The Sun.
London, England, 1844-07-01 00:00:00

MAGAZINE DAY.

under the skirts of his blue frock-coat, walking briskly
up the floor of the House, without stop or stay. Now
he bows gracefully to the Sp aker, and lakes his seat in
the centre of the Treasury B. itch, next to the Hcme
Secretary. He looks round, and seems care-worn and
exhausted, as if the official duties of the day were suffi-
cient for him, without being in addition harnessed to
those of the senatorial night. He is what most women
and some men would call a handsome man ; his features
regular, his complexion clear, his hair fair ; dressed
neither above nor under the good taste of a gentleman.
If you did not know him, you might imagine him a
wealthy merchant, a prosperous manufacturer, or banker ;
his expression and manner approach more nearly that
of one of the highest commercial class than any other ;
that man is the Prime Minister of England.
"Yes, there he sits, the Premier, and we cannot help
having a good stare at him. Not that he is more or less
remarkable in point of physical stature than the gene-
rality of men :—he is evidently neither an Irish giant
nor Tom Thumb the Great ; nor is there anything
particularly statesmanlike in his air, manner, or expres-
sion. He is a prepossessing-looking man, with a letter-
of-recommendation-face, and there's an end on't. He
looks one of those men you would select in a stage-
coach, or on the deck of a steamer, for advances to-
wards a travelling-acquaintanceship, satisfied beforehand
that you would meet with a favourable reception. But
when one contemplates the man's position,—when you
come to consider how much is in his power for good or
evil,—how much depends upon him—what a large
small human family look up to him, as to some pre-
siding genius, upon whose will depend the alternations
of public prosperity or distress—when you think of the
weighty interests intrusted to his vigilance and care,—
when you recollect that, placed as he is, war may be
proclaimed from those lips, and that arm, no longer
than another man's, can reach the Antipodes in mercy,
vengeance, or justice—when you remember that to him,
simple as he sits there, is delegated the patronage of the
Crown of Great Britain and Ireland, and that the fates
and fortunes of the aspiring intellect of England, in
every way in which it can be exhibited as connected
with public life, are more or less in his hands—that a
smile from that man is fortune, and his frown exclusion
from expected honours and coveted rewards—l say,
whether you regard the weight of his responsibility, the
depth of hie care, or the height of his power, you cannot
behold the Chief Minister of England without some
emotion, with which you are unaffected in contemplating
any private man, of a station soever exalted.
" The Prime Minister swells beyond the circumference
of ordinary mortals. He is not a man ; he is a body
politic. We do not behold a Right Honourable Baronet;
he is before our eyes a great gubernating abstraction. In
royalty we regard the pride and pomp ; but in him we
see the circumstance of executive authority. Yet, great
as he is, high as is, above us as he is placed, he is, after
all, the creature of the Crown, the humble servant of
the law ; the power that gave him power is yet more
powerful than he ; he is but as one of the genii, who in
his turn is obliged to obey the spirits that obey him ;
he is tenant of power only at will ; he holds all that his
magnificent position bestows upon him, and enables him
to bestow upon others, of the people of this conntry.
Recollecting that the power of a Premier is but the
power of the public will, devolved upon one man, ex-
ercised by one man for the time being, we have a
greater interest in him ; he is nearer us, and all that
concerns him is our concern."

I; f.. 4CK 11 10D' S MAGAZINE.

In a closely re,is9ned essay o❑ the " Causes of the
eeyease of Crime," which leads off the present Num-
ber, the anther states that the habit of strikes, which
of lat,. years has been so frequent among operatives,
has teen one of the principal causes of the alarming
.' spread of vice, observing that the effects of these
strikes invariably appear for a course of years after-
wards in the increased roll of criminal commitments,
and the number of young persons of both sexes, who,
loosened by these protracted periods of idleness, never
after o anis regain habits of regularity and industry.
Another cause, he tells us, may be sound in the cus-
tom, so prevalent in the manufacturing districts, of
parents sending out their children at the earliest pos-
sible period into the factories, who " thus come to be
looked on not as objects of affection but as instruments
of gain ; in fact, the children are, practically speak-
ing, sold for slaves, and the sellers are their own
prirents ! Unbounded is the demoralization produced
by this monstrus perversion of the first principles of
nature." This is a sad state of things, but it will
baffle, we fear, the ingenuity and wisdom of our most
enlightened statesmen to find a remedy for it. We
must take the evil with the good; if we will insist on
being the first manufacturing country in the world,
we must put up with the vices ,that the manufactur-
ing system engenders. The " Heart of the Bruce "
is a spirited ballad, penned in imitation of one of the
Percy Relics. " Memorandums of a Month's Tour
in Sicily," skims the surface of things in a very light,
readable manner. The tourist is an inveterate John
Buil in his predilections, for he actually prefers our
English fruits to those mellow and delicious ones which
ripen beneath Sicilian skies, and along the shores of
the fuediterannean ! His passing description of a
visit which he paid to the ruins of the Temple
of Segeste, breathes a glowing spirit of classical
enthusiasm such as would have warmed the
heart of Eustace. Of the general character of the
Sicilian inns he speaks with marked contempt, and is by
no means enamoured of the great, healthy, hungry
fleas and bugs—which, it appears, are in season all
the year round.—that bivouac in the beds of these
establishments. " Poems and Ballads of Goethe"
contain translations, executed with evident pains-
taking, of some of the minor lyrics of this great Ger-
man poet. In the present chapters of " Marston, or
the Memoirs of a Statesman" we find the hero once
again landed in England, after his perilous adventures
among the French Republicans, and seated as a visitor
in the House of Commons in the hope of hearing Pitt

rise and defend the warlike, anti-Gallic policy of the
Cabinet. The description of the mannerandappearance
of this minister's great rival Fox, as he walked up the
house and took his usual ieat on the front bench of
the Opposition, is very adroitly introduced, and reads
just like an extract from IVrax6ll's Memoirs. The

THE SUN, LONDON, MONDAY EVENING, JULY 1, 1644.

Is there no method to tell her in Spaniel
June's twice June since she breathed it with me ?
Come, bud, show me the least of her traces,
Tread in my lady's lightest foot-fan—
Ah,,you may flout and turn up your faces !
Roses, are you so fair after all ?