The Sun.
London, England, 1828-08-04 00:00:00

Constitution, is what may be called " doing the
civil" towards Legitimacy as an old woman. The
only thing in the Speech which is unlike Mr. Peel,
is the decision and impudence of - one of the latter
passages, which ' commands' the Speaker to " con-
gratulate the House on the general prosperity of the
country!" We wonder that it did not wish the far-
mers joy on the late dry weather, so favourable for
tlfe gathering of the hay harvest, and the ripening of
the corn.—This passage seems to be stuck Into the
Speech, as with the end of a bayonet, at the military
word of "command," rather than in the grace of
Monarchy. It is a cruel insult upon the people, who
are more employed in remonstrating and petitioning
against the measures of Government, than in any
thing else. Though we have so far just touched on
Mr. Peel, as he may or may not be traces in the
King's Speech,—our object was to allude to him
more particularly in connection with other circum-
stances. In Mr. Peel's sort of Pedlar's Reform, he
undertook the " Bill for the Recovery of Small
Debts ;" but he broke down with it ; he could
not carry it through, on account of the numer-
ous difficulties that beset him, in time shape of
claims as " remunerations," &c. We much won-
der that no honourable member called for some
explanation on this point ; for had these remu-
nerations to a certain class and character of prac-
titioners been exposed,—it would be impossible
for the House to tolerate the existence of, such a
nest of infamy and corruption, for a single hour. We
would defy Mr. Peel to make out a case of remunera-
tion, except where the claim Made would prove to be
the strongest possible argument in favour of the Bill.
Mr. Peel knows this; but he had not the nerve.to be
just; when he found that he was disturbing an
hornet's nest. Whu and w'iat are the parties claim-
ing to be remunerated? Is there ao honest member
of the House, and friend of the middle classes that,
under some revisal of the subject, will put this ques-
tion to Mr. Peel ? We can ass are suck member, let
'aim be whom he may, that he will give the Home
Secretary one of the most unpleasant posers that he
has had since his return to office; for we arc certain
that he has felt himself to be a conscience-struck re-
creant, as a legislator, ever since he gave up the Bill
in question, before such an odious array of " every
creeping thing" that excites loathsomeness and dis-
gust; and which only became formidable from their
number when, on an inspection of the long range of
secret places which must be cleansed out, it was dis-
covered that they interlaced all the channels of Law ;
and clung by a thousand tendrils to the highest
offices of the profession. Hundreds had been
bred up to the corruption as a sort of step mother ;
and to break up the system would be throwing them
double orphans on the world—without kindred or
character. The late Lord A , though as
worthy a man as the Peerage could boast, once
charged a peasant with stealing a goose from the
common ; when time offender, turning round on the
Noble Lord, charged him with the greater offence of
stealing the common from the goose. (His Lord-
ship had recently enclosed a considerable extent of
waste land, without the authority of any act—and
planted it as a cover.) So it is with the advocates
of " things as they are." While all the clamour is
about the minor sacrifices of individual interests, the
real objection is in withdrawing the wide pasturage
of corruption from the future as well as from the
present. If Mr. Peel had been challenged to go into
an analysis of time obstructions of his Bill, it
would have been discovered that the great Le-
viathan of Law had a sort of parental affec-
tion for all the monsters that generated in its
train, down to the very vermin that propagated in
the filth of the Augean stable. The, main prin-
ciple of the remunerating of the highest Law Officer
of the State, is a per centage on the ruin of the
people ; being a profit on every writ that is issued
under the existing forms of the law. A sense of
shame at beginning on the 40s. Courts, and break-
ing up tile household of Borough and County Juris-
dictions, acted as a sort of cork jacket to the less
buoyant material of the ancient system. Here are a
set of men, only known, where they are known at
all, for living' on distraint: issued against the
poorest people in the kingdom who have any effects
that are tangible to the legal process; and without
doing any thing for others except turning the har-
pies of exaction on the principal, when they have
failed every where else. Should we ever dream of
remunerating a highwayman, because an Act of Par-
liament had converted his ride into a sheep co►n-
mon ? or ought we not to indemnilv the race of
Jack Ketches, to the third and fourth generations
after hanging men by the neck had gone out of
fashion—to avoid the moral injustice of breaking up
a lucrative profession, before the existing incumbents
could turn their hands with any advantage to ano-
her line of business.

(FROM THE SUNDAY HERALD.)

This has been a busy week with the wine-room
and hotel-keepers in every (quarter, and at every
principal office in the metropolis ; but loitherto their
efforts to procure licenses have been unavailing.—
The lesson, in fact, which the Lord Mayor and his
brother Magistrate received from the City Alder-
men, for having promised a license in a hole-and-
corner sort of way to Mr. Hillary, and the expla-
nations to which it gave rise, have not been without
their use; and in the case of the applications which
have been made to the Magistrates during the last
week, it affords us pleasure to remark that the most
praiseworthy caution has been observed. In the
course of this week, however, the meaning of the
Hotel-keepers' Act will be decided upon. On
Tuesday the case of the Strand Hotel will come
before Sir Richard Birnie, and on the Bth that
of Mr. Hillary's house, before the Lord Mayor
and Aldermen. We have no fear of the result.
Sir Richard is too well aware of the valuable inte-
rests on which he has to decide, to think, for a mo-
ment, of showing favour to any one—more especially
to those who have been violating the law for years, •
and now claim, on the ground of that very viola-
tion, an admission to all the rights and privileges of
the Licensed Victuallers ; while in the Lord Mayor's
Court, on the other hand, there are Aldermen Thomp
son and Wood—both fully aware of the intent of the
Legislature, and zealous 4( doing justice to the
Licensed Victuallers. In fact, however lawyers may
attempt to distort the Hotel-keepers' Act, which we
are far from considering to he either explicit in its
provisions, or wise in itsgeneral tenour, nothing is more
certain than that no wine-room can receive a licence
under it, provided the intentiots of the Legislature
are adhered to ; and, on the other hand, that no re-
spectable hotel—we mean a house of that nature
whore principal object is to accommodate residents,
and not to sell liquors—can, according to its provi-
sions, be refused. Several have, in fact, been
licensed in the course of the week in perfect accord-
ance with its spirit, and more in all probability Will
be so; but t) such licences the Victuallers of the
Metropolis make no objection. On the contrary,
they arc anxious to establish a union with them, and
wish for nothing more than to prevent the total ruin
of their property, and the introduction into their
trade of disreputable persons.

(FROM THE SPHYNX.)
It is wormwood to the Tories to find that Ire-
land never was more tranquil than at this moment;
the assizes have passed over almoq without a crane.
Judge after Judge has complimented the Grand
Juries ou the state of their counties. Mr. Baron
M'Cleland is satisfied. The Peelers cannot effec-
tively break the peace, nor Orange processions Pro-
voke a skirmish of any consequence. The grand
insurrection of the comity of Leitrim, the Vinegar
Hill of the new rebellion, turns out to have been
the arming of a few peasants, perhaps to attack, per-
haps only to defend themselves against one of these
illegal displays. The Magistrates, as usual, took
the wrong side : instead of prohibiting the illegal
procession, the substantial cause of offence, they
thought it better to call out the military and attack
the poor people in the bog; they allowed their own
friends to break the law with impunity, and turned
their wrath against those who had, informally no
doubt, assembled to oppose the original trans-
gressors. Had there been no Orangemen in Lei-
trim, there wouli have been no battle of Ballina-