The Sun.
London, England, 1828-10-31 00:00:00

SUFFOLK.

On Monday a meeting was held at the Angel Inn,
in Halesworth, for the purpose of forming an Acso-
eiation for the protection of property and the prose-
cution of thieves.

Lord HUNTINGFIELD (in the absence of Sir T.
S. Gooch, M.P., who bed been expected to attend
for such purpose) took the chair. His Lordship,
in explaining the objects of the meeting, observed
that it was with regret he had to say that such an
Asgocilition was mach called for; that the robberies
committed on agriculturists of all stations were
ruinously numerous ; and that, iFt fact, there was no
county in England (so help him God!) like Suffolk for
the frequency of these thefts, especially petty thefts.
Mr. ALCOCK (an attorney of Halesworth) then
read a se:•ies of mks for the fo; mation of an associa-
tion, embodying a scale of rewards, &c.; but none
of the money to be expended in supporting prosecu-
dons founded on the game laws.
Lord HU/WINGFIELD asked whether the surround-
ing parishes had formed any associations or regula-
tions regarding the poor, and what allowances were
made for children ?

Different farmers answered that no associations
were formed ; but that there were allowances in
some cases, where there were more than three
children.

Lord HUNTINGFIELD—In ray neighbourhood we
allow for all above two, if the labourer have only
common wages.

Mr. GAURAULD— What does your Lordship call
fair wages ?
Lord HUNTINGFIELD—Why, 20d. a-day.
Mr. GAURAULD--Well, We only allow for all
children above three, and the wages are generally
about 10s. a week.

Lord Hu NTINGFIELD-4 do not sce how a labourer,
his wife, and three children, car. live on 10s. a week,
especially considering the prices of provisions; to
sure wheat is filling ; there were great supplies
last week.

The rewards for the apprehension of petty offen-
det s, those who might not get, if convicted, above
one or two months' imprisonment, were then dis-
cussed; and those of 51. and 10/. for the conviction
of such offenders were generally resisted, as being
calculated to encourage offences rather than to check
them ; as some of the farmers said, tkey feared, such
was the state of the labourers, that many of them
might not shrink from committing petty robberies
for the sake of the rewards beiniegained : so long as
their families got part of the money, they might not
much care about a month's imprisonment and good
gaol allowances. The rewards were therefore ge-
nerally reduced to bout 2/.

Lord HUNTINGFIELD repeated, that the state of
parts of the agricultural population was deplorable;
and instanced that, during the recent harvest, such
crowds had attacked his fields to glean in them, that
he was obliged to hire constables at half-a-crown a
day to keep them in order. He would not have
aired had those only of the parish in which the fields
were situated gleaned ; but they were crowded from
other parishes. The gleaning was carrried to such
an outrageous extent, that the parties would not be
quiet till their destructive practices forced the com-
plete suppression of the custom.
Several farmers concurred in this opinion.
The Resolutions were ordered to be further con-
sidered on Tuesday next, Lord Huntingfield again
in the chair.

(From the remarks of many farmers arid others,
it appeared that pig-stealing in particular is carried to
an amazing extent. The thieves have a style of
muzzling the pigs, and thus preventing their squeak-
ing, which might give an alarm, and thus safely carry.
ing them off.)

Two men of fashion meeting a beautiful lady
in a narrow thoroughfare in Glasgow, her ci:r caught the
following observations :—" I protect, Bomar, this place is
ay narrow as Balsam's-passage" (a lane in Glasgow.)_
‘, To," said his companion, "and, like BALAAM, lam
,topped by an angel."—" And I," returned the lady, "by
the ass."—Edintatrgh Paper,
CURIOUS TIME PIECE.--,Mr. PACE, of
Bury, has manufactured a skeleton spring time piece, made
to go three years without winding up, by a maintaining
power, consisting- of six springs, whose uni.-ed force is 240
pounds; the escapement is a dead beat, with a half second
pendulum; the dials are five in number, shewing the
seconds, hours, and minutes, day of mouth, and registering
the number Of weeks and years sines it was wound up.
The whole is enclosed under a glass shade, £7 inches by
21.—Hull Pocket.

Major Alexander Gordon Laing, eldest son
of Mr. William Laing, A.M., was born at Edin-
burgh the 27th December 1791. His father,
one of the most popular classical teachers of his
day, having for many years had an academy in
the New town of Edinburgh, young Laing re-
ceived nearly the whole of his education under
the paternal roof, and, indeed, all that valuable
portion of his learning which went to prepare
him for the University he received directly at the
hands, or rather we should say, from the 'kips of
his father. Under such guardianship, and pos-
sessing, as lie did, a quick intuitive perception,
together with an ardent desire for the acquire-
ment of classical knowledge, it might naturally
be expected that lie would make rapid progress
in his academical studies, and accordingly, at the
early age of thirteen, lie entered the Alma Mater
of his native city. Here those rays of learning,
which had been concentrating in the Tyro, be-
gan to beam forth from the youthful Alumnus,
and that in so marked a manner, that the late,
respected Professor of Humanity, Mr. Christi-
son, perceiving his taste for literature, frequently
took occasion to point to this youth, in the pub-
lic class, as one whose example it would be for
the benefit of all his fellow students to imitate,
though few might aspire to rival him. With the
view to habituate him in communicating that
knowledge to others which he so eagerly ac-
quired hirriself, Master Laing went, in his fif-
teenth year, to fill, for a time, the situation of
Assistant to Mr. Bruce, an eminent teacher in
Newcastle-upon-Tyne, whence he returned to
Edinburgh, six months thereafter, and entered
upon a similar duty under his father, for which
it will he seen he was in no small degree quali-
fied, having been trained to tuition in a manner
from his infancy.
At this period the habits and prospects of
the embryo traveller had apparently assumed a
settled and determined form. Not that he had
as yet taken any decisive or irretrievable step from
which he mitiht not recede without incurring
the charge of.fickleneas---not that he was bound
to pursue that precise path to which he had
hitherto looked forward; but nothing appeared
to be farther from his intention than the active,
bustling, and adventurous life of a soldier, or
the still more hazardous and arduous employment
of a professional traveller in the unexplored re-
gions of inhospitable Africa, and the hordes of
its selfish, treacherous, and uncivilized Africans.
Placed as he then was, with a prospect, upon his
father's retirement, an event which occurred a
few years afterwards, of succeeding to his esta-
blishment and profession, which, though no doubt
abundantly laborious, was calculated t 9 yield a
comfortable and respectable maintenance, he had
thus every inducement to follow it out, or with
his predilection for study, if he did relinquish
that pursuit, he was more likely to become a
candidate for fame in the peaceful paths of science
than in the field where glory grows—the forlorn
hope of African discovery was not then perhaps
ever dreamed of, much less contemplated I
Circumstances, however, occurred which un-
settled all his preconceived plans, and aroused
him to that spirit of enterprise and adventure
which characterised his after life. It was his
fate to emerge into the world at a time when
the profession of arms was every where blended
with that of the civilian ; at a time when it was
considered that every man in Britain was in duty
bound to bear a sword or a &clock, and to
know how to use them ; and it may be safely
said, that nowhere was that feeling more generally
acted upon, or that duty better understood, than
in Edinburgh, the birth place of Alexander
Gordon Laing. During that rage of martial
fever—no one at the time ever imagined it to
be a plague—which few men and fewer youths
escaped. Master Laing having attained his
seventeenth year, was, like most of his acquaint-
ance, not invulnerable to its attack ; he was in
1810 appointed an Ensign in the Prince of
Wales' Edinburgh Volunteers, a corps which
certainly had nothing fascinating about it,
though it afforded the occasional opportunity
of sporting a military uniform, and of display-
ing a stand of colours. This regiment was
originally armed with pikes, and although it was
afterwards provided with muskets, the men con-
tinued to be vulgarly, and rather ironically, de-
nominated the
the was
ranks
t.
nominated the pikemen. It is well known that
this introduction of Major Laing to martial life
dl uen
iitied withei
ir ;
kse
manner supplied from the
is not an isolated or solitary case. Thousands
who have since fought and bled in their country's
British
ohfa tti e
fruitful source.
oefoaffirucsleleor,st,
Duly
butcommenced their careerraergmy provided o
were v
uia a
service which
with the slight foretaste of military
which the volunteer system afforded him,
the object of this memoir " wou'd be a soldier,"
and would be nothing else; he could no longer
submit to the restraints or go through the mo-
notonous routine of school discipline ; he, in
fact, now regarded teaching with the most sove-
reign contempt, and finally gave it up at the ter-
mination of the second year, the latter of which
was doubtless spent in a struggle between duty
and inclination, as it was anxiously &eked by

vices, -inimeaiately appointed Lieutenant and
Adjutant, and proceeded to Sierra Leone.
Early in January 1822, Lieutenant Laing
was sent by the late Governor, Sir Charles
iii‘Cartliy, on au embassy to Kambia and the
i\landingo country, to ascertain the political
state of those districts, the disposition of the in-
habitants to trade, and their sentiments in regard
to the abolition of the Slave Trade. Having
executed that mission to the complete satisfac-
tion of the Governor, and some alarm having
arisen as to the fate of Sannassee, a chief in
amity with our Government, who had been taken
prisoner by Yarradee, a war nian of the King df
Soolima, Lieut. and Adjutant Laing, though his
health, which had suffered from the effects of hi:
for.ner journey, was yet only in a state of conva-
lescence, was appointed to undertake a second
embassy for the purpose of procuring Sannasseere
release from captivity. On arriving at the camp
of the Soolima army he was informed that the
unfortunate Sanaesee hae been set at liberty after
his town had been burnt, and that his life had
been spared only from the fear of offending the
British Governor. While upon the second mis-
sion he had observed that many men who accom-
panied the Soolirna Army possessed considerable
quantities of gold, and hating learned ti-,at ivory
abounded in Soolirna, he suggested to the Go-
vernor the advantages to the colony of opekiing
up an intercourse with these pzople; that such
an attempt would not be attended with much
oaaard or expenee, and that a great object would
be attained by the knowledge of many countries
to the eastward of the colony, which, like that of
the Soolimas, was known only by name. This
suggestion was submitted to the Council, who
approved the undertaking, and left it to the jud.g-
ment of the traveller to pursue his ova route. He
was now as ranch a volunteer traveller as bef"urt.
ha had been a volunteer officer, nay more so,
being in fact allowed to prosecute his own enter..
prise in his own way. This third mission, upon
which he set out from Sierra Leone on the 16th
April 1822, led him to penetrate through a far
more extensive tract of country than before, much
of it previously unexplored, but which is particu-
larly described, together with the inhahi:auts,
their manners, customs, &c. in his highly
resting journal, published only three eince,
its publication having been retarded, by his
being called into active service during the unfor-
tunate Ashantee war, and subsequently by his
being hurried off on his last great enterprise,
when he was compelled to leave the superinten-
dence of its publication to hisfriend Capt. Sabine.
While at Falaba, upon his third embassy, he
received intelligence of his promotion to the rank
of Captain, and immediately on his return to
Sierra Leone, in the Autumn of 1822, he was
twc,ol,ol,rihetdnheesr
eirdddeeeedatrhtaatheocbhlj,aoemo:ii
detachments
sr‘ir.sei
employed
oogthlryilacmeeredleAenosiintsihoi‘atntirihl,teecet leiceorAtiGini ymo frontierladn
command
foomtfhtez:
Ashantee country, and was frequently engaged
in). po
Captain Laing was vziat to England to:aneqlLuBa2i4nit:
the Government with the state of the command
in Africa. At this period he obtained a short
leave of absence to revisit Scotland, and again
returned to London in October 1824.

An opportunity now presented itself; which
our traveller had long anxiously desired, of pro-
ceeding, under the auspices of Government, on
an expedition to discover the course and termi-
nation of the Niger. He was now promoted to
the rank of Major, and departed from London
on that enterprise early in February 1825, with
leavinglsi Tripoli for Timbuctoo
summer of that year. The
in the
the
courseintention tion ooff
the. u
kind treatment which he experienced from the
late Marquis of Hastings, then at Malta, where
the Niajor went on his way to Tripoli, will be in
the recollection of most newspaper readers, as
the fact of his being repeatedly entertained at the-
table of the Noble Marquis was noticed in all the
public journals at the time.
At Tripoli a highly interesting scene awaited
him, while, at the same time, think
vie it must
have been to himself, `
and at least one other in-
dividual, a peculiarly painful one,
both
in pro-
spect and in retrospect. The period of mar-
riage is one to which most persons look forward
as a season of joy and of congratulation, and it.
is to be hoped that such a season is not unfre-
fluently regarded, retrospectively, as one of un-
mingled pleasure to the ~ contracting parties"
and their friends. But the rule has its cxcep-
tions,---a notable instance of which is to be found
in the history of Major Laing, and in allusion
to which, it is here necessary to premise, that in
the progress of the intercourse which the Major
necessarily had officially with Mr. Warrington,
the British Consul at Tripoli, that
gentleman
was not likely, under the actual circumstances in
which the Major was presented to hint, to re-
strict himself to the dry routine of official duty,
and we believe that it is an acknowledged maxim
that mutual conrtesy le;.:ds to mutual friendship.
If, therefore, the existence of friendship be-
tween Mr. Warrington and Major Laing, con-
tracted in the course of the perforrnaucv a

official duties, was not merely permissible but
landible, the existence of a more tender feeling
betw-ven the Major and the acs omr!lished
daughter cf his friend, was equally permissible,
and perhaps not less laudable. The parties, it
will he recollected, were utter strangers to each
other but a few weeks before. There was no time
to waste in protracted courtship, and on the 14th
July, 1825, Major Laing was married to Miss
Emma Mlria Warrington. But the eve of their
was al:.0 the ere of his departure upon
marriage
that mission from which he was doomed, alas !
,
never to return. Ihe second day after the nup-
tials he set out for those vallies of death wherein
all preceding adventurers had found a grave—for
the mazes of African mystery have ever proved
to be, in one form or other, a bourne from
which no traveller returns The bitterness of
parting the objects of recent and romantic pas-
sion, under such circumstances. is to us alto-
gether inconceivable ; to the parties it must have
been indescribably distressing.
We have thus briefi:- lnd imperfectly, because
of its brevity, traced the steps of the heroic
Major Laing from infancy to boyhood, from
boyhood to youth, and from youth unto man's
estate ; we have ventured to follow him to the
altar, not of sacrifice, Heaven for fend ! (for
although he was sacrificed it was not upon the
altar), but we have ventured to follow him to
the altar of Love; we have even teen him wrung
from the object of his vows by the urgent ha-
'pulses of honour and of duty; and, on review-
ing the sketch so strongly engraven on the mind's
eye—for the mind is a limner far superior to the
pen—we are involuntarily induced to imagine it
a fabled picture or a fairy tale. Reader, this is
no fiction ; it is no web of fancy's weaving ;
neither is it a fictitious superstructure reared
upon a foundation of facts—call it romance if
you will—but it is the romance of reality. We
have but a few steps further to trace, and these
lead to the commencement of the traveller's
thirty-second year ; beyond this is a chasm which
cuts us off from his tomb, if, peradventure the
barbarians admit that last of luxuries.

Had Major Laing been permitted to return,
after having accomplished the great object of his
heartethat of ascertaining the course of the
mysterious Niger—how gladly would his ad-
miring country have hailed him I With what
transport would he have been received by his
friends—by his three brothers, two of whom are,
as he himself was, soldiers of fortune in a distant
land, and by his five sisters—by his father and
his mother, now sinking into the vale of years,—
arid, lastly, by his still nearer, thought more re
cently acquired relative, his now widewed bride,
for. the endearing appellation of wife appears, in
her case, to be all but inapplicable. But it was
otherwise decreed. From the time, of his leaving-
Tripoli until he reached Tuat, which he was
forced to do by a circuitous route, letters were
frequently received from him ; the last that
reached this country was from that place under
date of the 27th December 1825, the thirty-first
anniversary of his birth. From that time no ac-
curate accouts were received of his father progress;
and indeed little else was heard of hire but vague
and cruelly tantalising reports of his death, with,
alternately, equally vague contradictions of those
reports. Within the last few weeks however
the reports of his death have been confirmed in
a manner which has removed all doubts of the
melancholy fact from the minds of his friends ;
and these but too well authenticated accounts
state him to have fallen by the hands of the bar-
barians, under the murderous fiat of the King
of the Foulahs, long the inveterate enemies of
the Soolimas, with the King of which latter
nafion Major Laing had been on the most
friendly footing on E e; previous mission,. having
resided in his capital of Fa4ba, tbr upwards of
aree months. He is stated to have suffered
soon after the 214 of September, 1826.
Having now arrived at the termination of
!,lajor Laing's short and evanescent existence,
what, it may be asked, has he achieved to call
forth tut admiration and those praises which
have been heaped upon him while he was, yet
I:c LI life, and that stron', sympaa.hy
for his suEarings, and those heartfelt regrets
which have been expressed at the untimely close
of his mortal career ? In answer to such a ques-
tion, we would found no claim in his favour on
the ground of his precocious talent for the ac-
quirement of knowledge, though that had its in-
fluence in qualifYing him, at so early a period, for
entering upon those scenes in which he was des-
tined to become so prominent an actor ; nor
would we found any extraordinary claim in his
behalf on account of his highly meritorious
and duly appreciated and acknowledged ser-
vices as a British officer ; for, although it
must be admitted that he possesses a just
claim to his country's gratitude on that ground.
yet, that is a field 'in which he has a host of
competitors, and not a few glorious rivals, whose
superiority to himself he would hare been the
first to acknowledge. But it is in his capacity
of a traveller for the benefit of all nations that
Major Laing has earned the applause and ad-
miration of his own. Not because his country,
or any other country, put the least value on those
labours in so far as they tend merely to gratify
am idle and prurient curiosity, but inasmuch as
they tend to the universal benefit of the human
race. By those who have read Major Laing's
work, before alluded to, no such question as
that we have 'propounded will be put. They
need not again to be told of the productive
countries which he has been the means of laying
open to the reciprocities of commerce and to
civilization. They will have seen his exposure
of a vital error in the well meant efforts of the
private missionary system, arising from the
of a ex-
tension of their missions beyond the reach
salutary superintendence, and the consequent
difficulty of removing even those, who, in the
absence of that superintendence, relax into the
biuu contemptible unworthiness, dishonourable
to the characters of men, and altogether infam-
ous in such as pretend to be instructors of men ;
and they will have perceived by what palpable
and obvious means he had proposed to disse-
minate, simultaneously, the lights of literature
and Christianity, the superior purity of which
might, in flue time, dispel the darkness of pa,
„iusm, and extinguish the. glimmerings of the
orai) ; and they will also Lave seen, though
the fact is mentioned only incidentally, how he
private generously contributed from his own
re-
sources, while these could not be greatly more
,vo exigencies, to the flu.-
than adequate for his o
therance of one branch of his philanthropic plan.
Whilst, then, we view him in the exercise of those
beneficent labours, so well calculated to extricate
the name of African from that obloquy with
which we are too apt, unthinkingly, to brand it,
for after all that has happened, the crimes of the
African are more to be pitied than punished, we
can -not refuse to him all the merit that is due to
one of the greatest benefactors of a benighted and
kindred race ; nor can we divest the memory of
him, who has sacrificed his life in its prime
•to the prosecution of those labours, of all the

reverence that Is he to the memory ot an
early martyr in the kindred causes of humanity
and Christianity.

THE MIDDLESEX MAGISTRATES.

Yesterday a Meeting of the Magistrates of Mid-
dlesex was held at Hicks's Hall, to receive Reports
(n he County Expenditure, and other business.
It was announced that Mr. Stirling had not yet
made up his accounts, but that they were in progress.
The Report from the Committee for the Manage-
ment of the County Prisons recommended the ap-
pointment of four additional officers to act in the
House of Correction, as cooks and as schoolmasters,
over the juvenile offenders confined there.
A MAGISTRATE said, the necessity for the pro-
posed additional officers had not been clearly made
out.

Mr. FLoWER said, the Committee had found that
it was the s!.tctice to appoint prisoners as school-
masters, and one man had been appointed to act in
that capacity by the Chaplain, which man had been
twice committed as a reputed thief, and who was
committed to hard labour the last time fer having
attempted to break open a house. The Gaol Com-
mittee did Hot ~.:trisider this m^ll a very fit instruc-
tor, or very likely to lead the young offenders back
to the paths of virtue (Hear, hear) ; neither did
they conceive that it was good economy to select
preceptors for offenders from amongst the prisoners.
Many had been sentenced to hard labour, who had
avoided '; by getting into situations. It was
also the practice to employ prisoners as cooks. The
consequence was, that the dripping, pieces of meat,
and other materials, were constantly stolen, and it
was found impossible to prevent such practices.—
(Hear.)
The Magistrate inquiring, and others also, ex-
pressed themselves satisfied of the expediency of the
proposed appointments.
Mr. Sergeant PELL observed, that it had been
stated by Mr. FLOWER, and he believed with strict
truth, that in their prison nothing was to be done
without money—in fact, that a system of bribery
and corruption prevailed there. This was a subject
which certainly demanded immediate inquiry.
The CHAIRMAN stated, that the subject was un•
der inquiry.
In a Report from the Governor-of the House of
Correction, it was stated that the House of Cor-
rection ;vas capable of holding between 800 and 908
prisoners. This was a statement which was to go
before the Secretary of State.
Mr. Sergeant PELL did not think that the prison
would well contain more than 650 prisoners.
The Report was referred back for alteration.
On the Chaplain's Report,
Mr. BRISCOE expressed regret that the sentences
of transportation were not • in - every instance carried
into effect.

Mr. Flowurt. moved, " that Plans and Estimates
should he prepared for the erection of an additional
building before the County Prisons, to contain 260
prisoners.

Sir HENRY WILSON and another Magistrate pro-
posed as an amendment, that " the previous report
should be printed and circulated amongst the Mem-
bers, and that the consideration of the subject should
be adjourned."
The amendment was negatived by an-overwhelm-
ing majority.
After some business of a local .nature the Court
adjourned.

FOREIGN INTELLIGENCE.

FRENCH PAPERS.
(From the Gazette de France; Oct.. 12.)

ODESSA, OCT. I2.—We expect every day the
• news of the fall of Varna. The Turkish corps which
came to the relief of that place is said not only to
have been several dines beaten by our troops, but to
he almost surrounded. Sili-”.r:a is likewise closely
invested, and an attack of the enemy on our redoubts
• has been repulsed, with loss, by General • Kreutz.
The heavy artillery from Brailow arrived before
Silistria ou the 22d of September. Affairs are still
in the same Situation before Shumla. General
Roth's p-, has supplied the place- of the troops
sent to .co,Vaunt under Prince Eugene of Wurtem! mg.
SLILIN, OCT. 13.—Sim e yesterday, the Turks
here tiara been intoxicated with joy, and talk of
nothing but victories gained over the Russians be-
fore Yuma by their countrymen, whoithey say, have
caused the s•ieLe of that place to be raised. The
P.teha of Widdin, who sends this news to the Pacha
of Belgrade, estimates the loss of the Russians at
many ihousand men, besides a great quantity of bag-
gage, &c. It was affirmed at Belgrade, that they
had been ob:i,d to quit tb,‘H positions before
Shumla, whir;s will be a natural consequence of the
giving up of the siege of Varna, if that news should
be confirmed*.

At Semlin, however, all these reports are consi-
dered as deserving of little credit, especially as the
Yaks pretend that Silistria has been relieved; and
we know, on the contrary, from good authority, that
fresh Russian troops have arrived before that place,
as well as the heavy artillery employed in
.the siege
of Brailow.

Lastly,it is affirmed that the Porte is sending above
50,000 men from Albania and Greece towards the
Danube. This last news has caused a great sensa-
tion in Servia.—Augsburgh Gazette.
(From the Iffessager des Chambres of Oct. 29.)

PARIS, OCT. 27.—The Semaphore of Marseilles,
of 26th Sept. mber, has the following article
" A letter, written by the first Deputy of the
French merchants at Constantinople, announces, that
on the 13th of that month the Porte declared all
commerce with Russia prohibited, and the Bospho-
rus was immediately closed.
" The ships which were laden were obliged to re-
nounce their voyage, and those which had already
received their firman have been obliged to give it bark.
" The landing of the French in the Morea has
made no change in our situation. The French mer-
chants continue to enjoy the same protection as
before from the Porte ; and what makes us quite
easy is, that the Russian merchants who have re-
mained at Constantinople are equally protected."
From the 13th to the 20th October seven ships
from the Baltic, laden with corn, for account of the
Government, arrived at Calais. The corn lately ar-
rived at Havre is only in entrepot, and may therefore
be
sold, if needful, for exportation. In fact, a letter
from Havre, of the 2-Ith instant, informs us, that
.5,000 or 6,000 hectolitres of wheat have been sold
for England at the price of 27 and 28 francs per
hectolitre.

(From
2tisie._CoNuoritehri Francais.)
PARIS,
the
meeting of then - Council i5t.)8153
whichp transpired d
took re-
plaltailiAeß:titerday. It seems, however, that no deci-
:itolailof .wasg ccoomnefetroe,nactied
tthheayt INhI iaidii staetr st
hceo
Ecclesiastical
Minister's on Saturday. The architect of the Cham-
ber has supplied them with a pretext foril)tohstopfonDing
the opening of Parliament fromso
thattbe there is ne-
13y regulating theo
some labours '
pbryolonged
De-
cember etro tob the,e in
hearisdt eotf o. jadecZl decide.
proceedings of
3,thiienisCtTeor%syerbnatile.ent
masonry, the .6 in
ex-
istence for a short time of the quiet hours they have
passed since the close of the
.Session. When they are
told that the Villele Administration still presses on
France, they will
be indignant at that inconceivable
impatience .Ivhich supposes that in ten months some
meliorations might have been effected. They think
they arc not to cause a re-action, and that the only
means of avoiding it is, to allow all that mischief to
remain of which France demands the removal. Till
the Parliament meets, they will try to come to an
understanding with the right side, to which two of
the Ministers have already declared their intention
to approximate ; they will promise and intrigue ;
and if they
can open the Session with a majority,
we shall have much boasting of legal order, consoli-
dated by the two Ordinances of the acclamations of
Alsace and Lorraine; and they will so order things

° The incorrectness of these statements is proved by
the Russian Bulletin to let October.

that the nest Session shall answer lest to the wishes
of France than the last. The public may have been
deceived for a short time, but things must now be
seen in their true light. Hitherto the Ministry
have lived on the two Ordinances, and they
are not executed. Some Bishops have submitted,
and nothing is said of those who, like M. Clermont
Tonnere, mock at the Ministry. It is probable that
they have seceded, and are consenting to secret mo-
difications. Ami de la Religion says, that the pre-
cious Colleges, the existence of vhich was threaten-
ed, are to he preserved, and the Messager has not
denied the assertion. The two Ordinances will
serve the double purpose of hoodwinking the people,
and, not being executed, of supplying the Ministers
with a means of becoming reconciled to the Priest
party. The Villele Prefects begin to be reconciled
to a legal order which so much resembles the de-
plorable regime. They execute as badly as possible
the law on the Electoral Lists, taking care, under
the directions of M. Martignac, not to consult
the wishes of the consulting Committees. The
Council of State numbers among its most assiduous
members MM. Franchet, Delavau, Syrieys de Mayrin-
hac,&c. Never were they so constantly in attendance.
They decide all the affairs of parishes, and decide
if a parish may accept the legacies bequeathed to it
by a dying man. Happy iin the disgrace which
leaves them such important functions, they make the
most of necessity. Into what hands are the' inte-
rests of the country committed ? In the face of
these things, we are told that the least change would
lead to a re-action, and that France would be terri-
fied at its aspect. The ministers rely for popularity
on those acclamations which were excited by a hope
of improvement. The French have certainly not
shewn themselves impatient. They have confided
in the good intentions of the Ministers, but a time
is coining when good intentions must bear their proper
fruit ; protests must be followed by measures, or the
embarrassments, out of which no effort is made to
extricate us, is only a pretext for weakness, which is
equivalent to a Nvant of will.