The Sun.
London, England, 1844-06-21 00:00:00

e toxins Oint

LONDON, FRIDAY, JUNE 21, 1844.

In the Commons forty-nine petitions were presented
in favour of the Repeal of the Union.
In answer to a question from Mr. MasrEilmAN re-
lative to the operation of the Bank Charter Bill and
Joint-Stock Banks, Mr. GLADSTONE said it was not
the intention of the Government to apply the pro-
visions of the Bill to these banks at present, except
with regard to registration. The Government recog-
nised all the privileges of these banks up to the pass-
ing of the Bill.
Captain LAYARD asked the Government whether
there
was any truth in the report that Earl DE GREY
had resigned his office as Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland.
Lord ELIOT could give no answer, and referred the
Eon. Member to Sir ROBERT PEEL.
At a later period of the evening Sir R. PEEL ob-
served that he had mistaken Captain LAYARD'S clues_
tiOrl respecting Lord DE GREY'S resignation—he had
_resigned, but solely through ill health.
Mr. SIHEL gave notice that he would this evening
put a question to Sir ROBERT PEEL, to ascertain
whether he had issued any orders to the Education
Committee, relative to Church patronage in Ireland.
The House went into Committee on the Sugar
Duties Bill, when a very amusing discussion took
place, about slave-labour sugar and free-labour sugar.
The only answer relative to their distinction was
given by Mr. GLADSTONE, who said the slavery of
Java was different from the slavery of Brazil. This
was no answer at all, and notwithstanding some able
remarks made by Lord PALMERSTON, Ministers
could not adduce another argument in favour
of their differential duty. Mr. Hum: stated,
evidently with the approbation of the House,
that the Government itself did not know what the
distinction meant. A lengthened conversation fol-
lowed, when Mr. GLADSTONE, being driven into a
corner, declared that he did not know whether the
sugar raised in Cochin-China was the produce of free-
labour. Nearly the whole of the evening was occu-
pied in the discussion of the different clauses of this
Bill, and no Government certainly ever made such a
lame defence for a measure of such vast imp o;tance
Mr. GLADSTONE, who had to bear the brunt of the

battle, had recourse to mere shuffling—to the logic
practised in debating clubs, and Sir ROBERT PEEL
now and then came to his relief, but, unfortunately,
he lent him,no aid. Taking it altogether, this Sugar
Bill is the most bungling measure ever introduced
into Parliament. Government pretend a horror of
sugar raised by slaves; they insult the Brazilians,
among the best of our customers ; and they give a
preference to some miserable islands in the East,
where, according to all accounts, slavery is more ram-
pant than in South America.
On the fourth clause being read, which referred to
certificates respecting the countries from which sugar
was to be imported, a division took place, on the
motion of Lord PALMERSTON, when there were, for
the clause, 114; and against it, 60.
Several other clauses were agreed to, and the
House resumed. The report was ordered to be re-
ceived this day.

The Parishes (Scotland) Bill was read a third time
and passed.
The other orders of the day were then disposed
of, and the House adjourned at Half-past One.

In reply to a question put by Captain LAYARD last
night in the House of Commons, with regard to the
rumoured resignation of Earl DE GREY, the present
Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, Sir ROBERT PEEL said,
that there was no truth whatever in the report, but
added that at the same time he did not mean to say
that his Lordship's state of health had not for some
months past made him anxious to be relieved from his
present office. "At a later period of the evening,"
observes a morning Contemporary, " the Premier
further qualified his first unqualified statement by an-
nouncing that an immediate change in the Irish Go-
vernment was in contemplation, but that it was solely
in consequence of Earl DE Grunt's health." His
Lordship's indisposition has occurred at amost fortunate
season—just in time, in fact, to save his political cha-
racter, and rescue him from the annoyance and humi-
liation of an abrupt recal. He will now, we presume,
be speedily disembarassed of the toils and resposibi-
litiea attending his Viceroyalty—far luckier in this
respect than Lord ELLENBOROUGH, who has no con-
venient illness to plead in explanation of his hasty
recal from India. Ministers seem to be peculiarly
unfortunate in some of their most important appoint-
ments, for their Viceroy in the West appears to have
given them as much trouble as their Governor-
General in the East ; and as the former has added
to the weight and multitude of their perplexities in
Ireland, so the latter has very nearly got them into
a squabble with the East India Company. As re-
gards the particular case of Earl DE GREY, we look
upon his resignation as a matter imperatively called for
under the existing circumstances of the sister country,
and we are only surprised that it has been so long
delayed. Had his Lordship retired some months
earlier, he would have better consulted his own
dignity ; for, from the first moment of his entering
upon the Viceroyalty, his administration has been one
long blunder—or rather a series of petty, provoking
blunders, which have occasioned quite as much
ridicule as indignation. Professing the strictest im-
partiality in his conduct, his legal and other appoint-
ments were all, with but one or two unimportant ex-
ceptions, of a one-sided character. Then, the mode
in which he arrayed himself in hostility to the Re-
pealers, and the nature of the military precautions
he adopted against their apprehended insurrection—
could anything be more absurd—more calculated to
increase the general discontent of all parties, Orange-
men as well as Catholics ? We say nothing of his
fortification of the Dublin Pigeon-house of his
placing a couple of extra sentinels at the gates of
the Castle, in order to drive away the invading army
of the Corn Exchange—of the hurried voyage of
troops, per steam-boat, without their dinners, to
Waterford, and of their still more hurried voyage
back again, after finding, to their infinite disappoint-
ment, not a single insurgent in the city, but only a
deaf old woman selling matches on the quay—
of the rebuilding of the crazy old forts on
the Shannon, and the late miserable and
truly dignified crusade against the Repeal
buttons ;—we say nothing of all these multiplied fool-
eries ; but think of the summary dismissal of many
of the most respectable and efficient Magistrates in
Ireland, a proceeding whose only effect, as might
have been anticipated, was to increase the Repeal
ferment; think of the forbearance shown for months,
(luring the hottest periods of the agitation, towards
Mr. O'CONNELL and the monster- meetings ; and then,
when these meetings were just about to terminate for
the season, and the Liberator had announced his in-
tention of retiring for a time into the privacy
of Derrinane—of the sudden exhibition made of
official vigour in the putting down of the Clontarf
meeting, under circumstances which—had it not been
for the exertions of O'CONNELL and his indefatigable
colleague Tom STEELE—might have caused the blood
of the people to flow in torrents, and made quite an
Aceldama of the field of Clontarf ;—think, we say, of
these things, and then, reader, whether you be Whig,
Tory, or Radical, you will scarcely fail to agree with
us in opinion, that Earl DE GREY'S Administration
was throughout one long blunder, and that a more in-
competent Viceroy could scarcely have been selected
for Ireland at such a feverish crisis. When his Lord-
ship first entered on his high post, he found—thanks
to the enlightened sway of the Marquis of NORMANDY
and Earl FORTESCUE—the country in a comparatively
tranquil state ; but, before he had been six months in
office, it was in a state of agitation from one end to
the other; and when he leaves it, he will leave it
overrun with troops, horse, foot, and artillery; vigi-
lantly watched by steam war-ships; and treated with
little less ceremony than if it were a conquered pro-
vince, instead of an integral part of the British
Empire ! Such is the legacy which a Tory Lord-
Lieutenant will leave, on his resignation, to insulted
and oppressed Ireland ! We shall be exceedingly
curious to know whom Sir ROBERT,PEEL will appoint
as the successor of Earl DE GREY.

Lord MONTEAGLE, on Thursday se'nnight, moved,
in the House of Lords, for the appointment of a
" Select Committee on the Import Duties, with the
view of considering the effect produced by protecting
duties on the foreign commerce, the home industry,
the revenue, and the general prosperity of the British
Empire." The speech of the Noble Lord, which
occupied more than three hours in its delivery, had
obviously been prepared with extraordinary care and
reflection. It is long since we have perused any
effort of this kind, which was more remarkable for its
indication of these qualities—so essential to the impres-
sive effect of an address to the House of Peers,
replete with fiscal and commercial statistics, and
devoted, in the main, to the distasteful object of
establishing, against the legislation of the present and
of former Governments, a case of signal misconcep-
tion as to the true interests of trade, and of deplor-
able failure in the policy adopted in dealing with them
by British Administrations. The speech was not less
truly than emphatically characterised by the Earl ofl
DALHOUSIE, on whom devolved the task of replying
to it, as " a very able and admirable" one.
Those of our readers who would desire to avail
themselves of the rapid, but well-arranged and com-
prehensive summary of the follies involved in our
long fostered policy of protecting duties—their effects
upon foreign commerce and their reaction upon our-
selves—we earnestly refer to the report of Lord
MONTEAGLE'S speech. If we were to attempt any-
thing like an abstract of its various and important
details, we should only do great injustice to a state-
ment which had been already carefully considered by
its noble author. We should be most sorry to dete-
riorate the value and effect of so well digested, so
perspicuous, and so excellently reasoned an exposi-
tion of the grounds on which his Lordship called for
the Committee in question. That in a House of 259

Peers (of whom 128 were present and 131 proxies)
there should have been declared a majority of 109
against the motion, will surprise no one who knows
how " they manage these things" in that branch of
the Legislature. It is instructive to note, however,
that of the 184 Peers whose votes rejected the propo-
sition, 94 were proxies, i. e., not present at the de-
bate.
Lord MONTLAGLE, after adducing precedents for
similar and more extensive returns from the year
1820 downwards, imprtssed upon their Lordships the
fact that this was "neither a political nor a party
not even a political question." But it is one at
all times of paramount and urgent importance; and
from particular circumstances connected •with the
results of the large financial measures wherewith the
present Government had commenced their adminis-
tration, at no period could it have been more conve-
niently entertained or with less danger of occasioning ,

any disturbance to the operations of commerce, or of
unsettling the minds and the speculations of commer-
cial men. Should the result of such an inquiry as he
solicited be, as undoubtedly it would be, a present
ostensible reduction of revenue, the increasing product
of the property-tax would enable the Government to
begin the experiment of reduction, without that danger
which a more unfavourable condition of the public
finances might seem to threaten. On the other hand,
to put these duties on a better and correcter footing
would undoubtedly expand, to a point beyond belief,
the energies and the beneficial returns of the com-
merce of the country. He wished to consider the
import duties as bearing particularly on the question
of protection. Now, so far from protecting our trade,
he would take the liberty of showing that they held
out the most delusive hopes, which were injurious to
the interests, in particular, supposed to be protected ;
and, in general, to the interests of the whole commu-
nity. Then he explained what were the views on
which a State ought to proceed in the management of
its commercial and financial administration, namely,
to obtain the largest amount of revenue for the public
service which it required, and which should be taken
in a manner the least burdensome to the public at
large. National should be dealt with, as nearly as
possible, in the same manner as private interests ; and,
as to the latter, all individual action should be left
free. With these notions, the well-known definition
by Mr. RICARDO of the true principles of free trade,
perfectly harmonised. Lord MONTEAGLE, with great
clearness expounded the three classes of duties with
which commercial legislation had to deal. The first,
—a duty for the purposes of revenue—if rightly admi-
nistered, was one which every class ought to derive a
a direct benefit from ; for it was meant to maintain
the honour and establishments of the empire. The
second one was called a countervailing duty :—" If it
could be shown that any class in the community had
burdens peculiar to themselves, it would be the
greatest of all acts of injustice if the State were to
allow articles similar to those produced by this over-
burdened class to be introduced into this country
without payment of duty." He instanced the case of
hops. A fair protection to the British grower, who
paid it, demanded that French or Belgian hops should
not be admitted, except at a higher duty. But the
third and most indefensible duty of all, was a "pro-
tecting duty," as it was, by a sort of solecism, called ;
for, granted to one interest or class of our agricul-
tural or productive industry in particular, it was ne-
cessarily an oppressive or fraudulent duty, charged on.
other classes or interests to the same extent. But not
unfrequently it operated to the serious prejudice of the
very party in whose favour it had been created. The
Noble Lord quoted very cogent and apposite extracts
from two eminent fiscal authorities, the one a public
servant of the United States—the other of this Go-
vernment : Mr. CALHOUN, of the United States, and
Mr. DEACON HUME, who for thirty-eight years sate
at the Board of Customs, and for eleven years at the
Board of Trade, equally denounced them in two re-
markable passages, which the Noble Lord read at
length. Having laid these large and solid foundations
for his motion, the Noble Lord incidentally noticed the
" sliding scale" of Sir ROBERT PEEL'S law as being
obnoxious to all the reproaches of inefficiency and ab•
surdity to which other protecting duties are so largely
open. He also contended that, with the exception of
some seven or eight articles out of the 11,000 or
12,000 comprehended in the new tariff, Ministers had
not adhered, in settling that document, to their own
principles of commercial policy, as avowed by them-
selves. Thu;, the duty on cotton imported (raw ma-
terial), which was not to have been quite six per
cwt., is kept up at eight, to say nothing of the larger
indirect taxation on yarns and manufactured goods
for export, into which this new material enters. He
gave abundant credit, however, to the Government
fer the large advances they had made in the right
course in reducing the duties on woollens and coffee.
The examples of Spain and of France supplied him
with powerful illustrations of the hand-in-hand
march of smuggling with protective duties ; and he
forcibly illustrated the hypocrisy and imbecility of
the grounds assigned by us for prohibiting all slave-
grown sugar by duties which seemed to have been
calculated on a forgetfulness of the fact, that if we
did not permit the importation of such sugars direct,
we indirectly, but most efficiently encouraged the
further production of slave-grown sugar ; as by
admitting, for example, the sugar of Brazil or Cuba,
for re-exportation, and employing it in our consign-
ments to St. Petersburgh. From the case of timber,
he argued that the operation of protective duties was
to substitute an inferior article for a better; and he
condemned the Ministerial policy of remitting, to so
large an extent, the duties on colonial timber, as a
vast but ineffective sacrifice of revenue—not beneficial
to any extent to the colonists themselves, and involv-
ing the gradual but fatal decay of our trade with
Norway, Sweden, and the Baltic ports.
We have no room to pursue the subject further;
but we must again remark that this speech was one
of the ablest which the session has produced ; and we
are disposed to think that it will not be without its
effect on the future commercial and colonial policy of
Ministers.

Madrid journals of the 13th have been received.
According to some of them, reports prevailed that the
Cortes would be dissolved on the 10th of July, and the
new Cortes summoned for the 10th of October, when
the QUEEN would attain her real majority. A re-
view of troops, on a grand scale, was to take place at
Madrid in a few days. Deputations from many of
the surrounding provinces had arrived at Barcelona
to have audiences of their MAJESTIES to present ad-
dresses of congratulation. During the procession of
the Fête Dieu at Barcelona, their MAJESTIES, who
had been visiting some of the churches, met the pro-
cession in the street. They immediately alighted
from their carriage, and prostrated themselves before
the Host in the midst of a large crowd, who were
much moved by this display of religious zeal.
The Three per Cents. were done at 27* for cash,
and 271 at 60 days ; and the Five per Cents. at 19i
for cash.

The French Chamber of Deputies, after tedious
discussions, continued for eight days, passed the
Orleans and Bordeaux Railway Bill, on Tuesday, by
a majority of 218 to 56. This Bill authorises the
Government to construct the line only when it shall
be let by public auction to a company, who are to
lay down the rails, build the carriages, &c., according
to certain conditions. The lease is to continue for 45
years, and the party contracting are to give security
for the due performance of the work, to the amount
of 2,000,000 f. (80,0001.) Towards the conclusion of
the debate M. CREMIEUX, a lawyer, moved the follow-
ing singular resolution, "that no Member of either
Chamber can be an administrator or contractor on
any line for which a concession is granted."
The resolution, strange to say, met with little oppo-
sition. Two of the Government papers, the Journal
des Debats and the Globe, are decidedly opposed to
the resolution, and little doubt, therefore, remains
that an attempt will be made to rescind the vote. The
former journal thus points cut its absurdity :—" If
the members of both Chambers are not to have the
right of taking part in the administration of a rail-
road, what are the employments or occupations with
which Deputies or Peers may be invested ? Why is
this work to be prohibited more than any other ?
What is there particularly suspicious in the carrying
on of one of those undertakings, which everybody
allows are most highly important for the prosperity
and strength of the country? And if incompatibi-
lity results from their personal participation, why
should it not be also applicable to that of a bro-
ther or friend ? In a word, to be a legislator,
according to this amendment, the first condition
shall be to possess neither moveable property,
nor landed property, nor manufactory, nor any
business whatever. Nor will this be enough—
a member must also be without family and without
friends. Such is the upshot of this system—it leads
direct to absurdity. The Opposition had, it must be
allowed, without disclosing their design, cleverly
prepared men's minds in favour of this vote, by a
proceeding of which several of the majority, not
perceiving the snare, had become the accomplices and
supporters. A paper had been hawked about, in
which the signers declared themselves to have nothing
to do with any railroad undertaking, and several
Conservatives thought it right to sign. They must
now comprehend what was the object of the paper
thus presented to them. They have had placed be-
fore them to day the measure of that independence
and patriotism which seize on all pretexts, and avail
themselves of all kinds of passions, to bring about the
failure of those enterprises from which the country