The Sun.
London, England, 1844-02-21 00:00:00

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS.

GLOBE.—,Whatever may be the effect of. thepending
_debate upon the majority of the Houk of Commons—
though the Government .may affect to triumph on the
division—the facts adduced, and the arguments employed
by the speakers from the Opposition benches will not be
lost ?Ton the country. At every step in their Irish policy
the Ministers have, been lowered in the estimation of
the people of-England-rwhile in Ireland dislike has
heightened into. hatred. No former Ministry ever ap-
peared in so humiliating a position—so positively con-
victed of incapacity for dealing with an acknowledged
" difficulty," as. does that of Sir Robert Peel. A case
has been made out against them by the mal-administra-
tion of their power in Ireland, which has drawn down
upon than: the apprehensions of many and the wither-
ing scorn- of more, in this country ; while it has
obtained for the repeal of the Legislative Union, and
for:those against whoin the Government has obtained
a. conviction for the proceedings they have been en-
gaged in to attain it-4 .sympathy more general and
cordial than O'Connell could have • secured by his
best-devised projects, or his ceadjuters• by their 'most
strenuous exertions. Had Sir Robert Peel not. lent
his -powers to give impulse to
.the movement, it
would have expired ,of inanition. The Right lion.
Baronet no sooner appeared in the field, as the head
of a Clovernment, than, new life was infused into the
expiring scheme ; and i•very step he took in the path
of discouragement by threats and coereien, only stimu-
lated the Ropealera to renewed exertions; until the
larger portion of the country became united in one vast
confederacy—not so much for Repeal, as' of oppo-
sition to the policy of his administration: This feeling,
the emanation of long-eherished; because greatly,
provoked' dislike, has " grown with the growth,
and strengthened with the strength," of the Irish
people. It would have been diminished by con-
ciliation, but can never be destroyed by coer-
cion. Sir Robert Peel refused the - counsel which
advised and urged the employment-of a milder treat-
ment. He allowed his 'better nature, and his more
prudent and far-seeing. policy, to be 'counteracted by
the Lyndhurst-and-Stanley portion of his Cabinet:
Military occupation was substituted for, constitutional
government. Bayonets bristled in almost every village.
Every building capable of being fortified was placed in
.a state of military defence; The rivers which inter-
sected and divided the provinces became the stations
or ships of war. The whole country; in faet, wore
the aspect of a recent conquest, in which revolt would
follow the slightest relaxation of restriction, or indication
of confidence In the people. state prosecutions were
instituted ; these were conducted in the spirit and with
the violations of. constitutional forms and stretches 'of
the prerogative, mere in unison with the seventeenth
than the nineteenth century. The convictions thus ob-
tained have weakened, instead of strengthening, the hands
of Government ; for public opinion has been thereby
enlisted with the convicted parties. O'Connell has
regained a popularity which in this country was certainly
fast waning; while m Ireland it was rather dependent on
the course which the' Government would take, than on
any approval of Repeal by the more respectable portion
of the Catholic
.population of that country. If there be
any one man in the United Kingdom to whom 'Mr.
O'Connell has more reason to be grateful than another,
it is to that Cabinet Minister—be he who he may—who
goaded the reluctant Premier into a consent to adopt
coercion as the policy of his Irish administration, un-
accompanied by any of those remedial and conciliatory
measures by :which alone the nation could have been
reconciled to its adoption. _ _

STANDARD.—Every one in this country is weary
of the lumbering debate that has now for five- nights
occupied the House of Commons, and that for all that
appears may occupy it for five nights more, for there
is plainly no conceivable necessary termination to the
delivery of speeches by men vibe are not ashamed to
produce in cold blood, and to reproduce, and to pro-
duce again fallacies one thousand' times refuted—truth
is in both senses the end of all, legitimate discussion ;
but when teen deliberately leave truth on one side, it is
obvious, that in any sense discussion need not have any
end—a dreary prospect for us, and for all like es, com-
pelled to read Parliamentary debates. We are not
,by
any means disposed to provoke once more the question
which we hear at every Corner—" Is there to'be no end to
these Irish debates?'--but in order that the people may
see all the mischief, we would remind them that these de-
bates which are simply a nuisance in England, are a deadly
pestilence to the unhappy country which is 'the subject
of them, jest es the monotonous clatter of the copper-
smith, which merely annoys a healthy neighbour on one
side, will kill the patient on the other if he is recovering
from a fever, by depriving him of the rest upon which his
only hope of life depends. It is, in fact, impossible to.
overrate the evil of the present transfer of " the Con-
ciliation Hall" to Westminster, or the guilt of those by
whom it has been made. It is, indeed, to underrate
the evil, to speak of it merely as a mere transfer of the'
" Conciliation Hall," for incendiary speeches deli-
vered in the Houses of Parliament are ten-fold
more pernicious.. than the same speeches would be
delivered in Dublin, because the Irish peasant receives
such speeches (and they are all carried to him) as the
admissions of those whom he has been taught to con-
sider as adversaries, or as at least the testimonies of im-
Oartial witnesses. If there is in the proceedings of the
pposition any one circumstance more disgusting than
another, it is the new character with which, for their
purpose, they invest the Roman Catholic population
of Ireland—a character of universal treason—a
character not only different from, but exactly opposite
to, that in which they represented the same party
twenty or thirty years ago. We entreat those
who can remember—as unfortunately we can—
tles spe,eches of the Whigs twenty or thirty years
ago, to recollect with what zeal, with what
fury, -the disloyalty of Roman Catholics was re-
pelled as an impossible hypothesis in those speeches.
Few, now at an age of maturity, can forget that up to
1829 the Irish Roman Catholics were described by the
Whigs ae not merely universally loyal, but as being the
only truly loyal part of the Irish
.population. All will
remember that •an attempt to revive the falsehood was
made in 1835, when the Orange Committee was' ap-
pointed ; and again on the occasion of • her
Majesty's accession to the Crown, when Mr.
O'Connell 'spoiled the enterprise by. his fulsome
professions, accompanied by his seditious practice.
How happens it, then, that the Roman Catholics—
so zealously loyal under privations, which, however
light, were represented to them as intolerably' burthen-
some—have become universally the separatists and trai-
tors that their Whig-Radical friends now describe them,
within a few years of the removal of every vestige of '
privation ? This- would be indeed, as Mr. Grattan
said, " not merely unfounded, but monstrous." The
answer is, that it is not true that the great body of the '
'roman datholics are unquestionably now more loyal,
now more averse from separation than they were thirty
years ago. We can add the testimony of our own cor-
respondents to what is stated in the article which we
have borrowed from the Morning Herald, as to the
effect of the verdiete against Mr.' O'Connell—that
verdict, we are assured, has been received, not
with indifference, but with satisfaction by
nineteen-twentieths of the educated and intelligent
Roman Catholics, and even by the most ignorant of the
peasantry it has been received as a matter in which they
have little or na concern. Should evil result from it,
that evil will be the effect of the use which the Whigs
have sordidly- and corruptly made of the' topic in Par•
liament ; sot of anything that has- passed or is
passing in Ireland. It is quite as true now as it
was when Lord Plunket said it, in the passage quoted,
that " the separatists are neither numerous nor formi-
dable," though they -may ewer so to superficial ob-
servers, for a reason' given by the same Noble 'and
Learned Lord in the same speech:--e" It is. most unfair
to visit ,on [ascribed to] the Roman Catholics the
opinions and conduct of such public assemblies as pro-
fess to act for them. In all such places, we know that
unboundsd applause attends the- man who oc-
cupies the extreme positions of opinion ; and
that the extravagance- of his .expression of such
opinion will not be . calculated to diminish it.
/slow, what Lord. Plunket said to defend the Roman
Catholics against one set of accusers, it may be allowed
to us to say for their protection against a much more
foul and malignant charge than was ever before pre-
ferred against them. We say that they are not traitors,
and that the calmness and even complacency with which
they see the fall Of Mr. O'Connell, proves that that per-
son never possessed a tithe of the moral power ascribed
to him, and that he is no faithful expositor of Roman
Catholic feeling.

MARKET INTELLIGENCE.
(From the London New Price Current of Feb. 20 )
SUCIAR.-Theie has been a good business transacted in the
West India Sugar Market considering the very small and
indiffereut assortment; the rates previously established have
been well maintained for all.descriptions. To-day *he quan-
tity of India Sugar on show amounted to only 400 'Olds,
the chief part of indittbrent quality ; 250 Lhds of which were
actually disposed, o 4 and the rates given were fully as good
as On Friday last; grocers and refiners were desirous :to
purchase-
BEFMED.-To-day brown lumps were 7fis to 76s exi, and
standard lumps 77s 6d- to 78s 'per cwt. Bonded Crushed
small parcels at 2,5 s fid to 25s 9d per cwt.
.Turkey Loaves
double refined 211,1' to 4lbs; 35s to 38s ; Hambro 6lbs, 33s 6il to
345; 9'to 101bs, 30s to 31s; 13 to 141bs, 29s to 30s; Tittlers
20 to 301b5,,26s 6tl to 97s ; Prussian 40 40 451bs, 26s 6d per,
cwt. Titaele, 10s 9d to Ils ; Pieces 218-' to 225; Bastards
yellow 17s to 19s, Brown 15s to 16s. Dutch Crushed sugar at.
22s 64 to 23s 6d, and Belgian at 22s to 23s 6d per cwt.
• "Mactirrtus.-'llis afternoon fine yellow sOld at. 68s to
GBs 6d, good 64sto 665, mid 61s 64 to 63s 6d, low 59s to 61s,
fine brown 58a to 58s 6d, middling 564 and common -to fine
grey 59s to 65s per cwt.
EMT INDIA.-This afternoon four parcels •of Bengal,
amounting to 1,910 hagS were offered at public sale, and all
sold at an advance of 6sl per cwt; good white-fetched 69s 6d,
mid 66s 6d to 67s 6d, low mid 64s to 640 6d, grey 63s to 63s
6d, pod strong yellow 64s 6d to 665, and middling
62s per cwt.
.focEioN.-'l'o-day Ilavannah damaged
is
sold
6dat full price? ;
i
washed yellow fetched 178 to 20s, broWn'l t o 17s, white
21s 6d to 24s per cwt ; sound went at 18s 6d to for id
20s
dling to red yellow, being the full worth • whiteoluldat- •
26s to 26s 6d for fine, slid 25s to 25s 6d for gOod, being 13 to
2s
_par cwt cheaper.
MoLAssEs.-Demera*, 25s 6d to 275; Antigua 26s to 288,
Dominica 275, St. Vfncents 275, and Tortola at.23a per cwt.
For Honey better prices again kiven. To-day 21s was re-
fused for a large parcel of very low. St. Kitts molasseS.
Ru3t, BRA DT ANo .r..aspis.--Jamalca Rum, ordinary:
quality,. 27 to 29 per cent. ovenproof at 2a 8d to 2s 10d, fair
39 to 33 Over 39 1d toSs 4d, 'good 34 to 36 Over 3s 10d to 4s ;
2s'9d to 4976 d Per gallon for ordinary to fine 27 to 36 per.
per c'erit. oierproof. • Deinerara at 2s 10d to 2s 11d, and 33
for '35 to 38 per kent 'overproof. Leeward. Island,
at Is Id to 2s for proof to 5 per cent Over. Calcutta Rum
at Is proof, with certificate. Brandy , at' .the following
terms, viz. :-Cognac, best brands of the vintage of 1838 •
-Wads at 5s lid, puns 5s 9d; ditto, 1839, hhds
5s Bd, puns 5e .6d ;...ditto 1840, hb,ds 5s . 6d, nuns
55.4 d ; ditto, 1841, puns, 59 2d ; ditto, 1842, hhds
5s 3d, puns s id; middling, marks 3s Iod to 45,6 d, and.coni-
mon 3s to 3s 8d per gal loci. Geneva for 'shipping: IS 10d ; •
fine for duty 2s 4d to 3s per gallon. English Corn Spirits at
105 to 103 24.casir. . • I
To-clay for all descriptions- of \l'eet India Rum; the de- I