The Sun.
London, England, 1845-03-20 00:00:00

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LONDON, THURSDAY, MARCH 20, 1845.

The House of Lords did not sit last night.
The House of Commons met at Twelve.
The Railway Clauses Consolidation Bill was read
a third time and passed.

The Lend Clauses Consolidation Bill was read a
third time and passed.
The report on the Railway Clauses Consolidation
(Scotland) Bill was brought up.
The third reading of the Land Clauses Consolidation
(Scotland) Bill was postponed.
In the course of the discussion on these Bills,
Mr. HAWES protested against these morning sittings
so early in the session.
Colonel Summar also expressed his objections to
them. Bills of the greatest importance were hurried
through at these sittings, when only 15 or 20 Mem-
bers were present.
Mr. LABOUCHERE admitting that, in the case of
these Bills, the Government had only a choice of
evils, thought that on the whole it was inexpedient
for the House to sit at that early hour. In the long
run, they would not get through more business than
if they sat at the usual hour in the evening.

Lord G. SOMERSET admitted the inconvenience of
morning sittings, and regretted the necessity that had
existed for having recourse to such a procedure.
The House adjourned at half-past One o'clock, and
re-assembled at Five.

Mr. PAKINGTON brought up the report of the Dart-
mouth Election Committee, declaring JOSEPH SO/lES,
Esq., duly elected.
After the transaction of private business,
Mr. C. BULLER moved that the petition of the mer-
chants of London, on the subject of New Zealand, be
printed, which was agreed to.
In answer to Sir R. Nam, it was stated by Sir R.
PEEL, that the intention of the Government was to
proceed by way of Bill in proposing the increased
grant to Maynooth and the grant for the establish-
ment of academical institutions in Ireland, as he
thought great advantage would be derived from doing
away with the annual discussion on this subject. The
Right Hon. Baronet further stated that he had no
objection to make the Regium Donum, and the grant
to the Presbyterian Church of Scotland also per-
manent.

Mr. ALDAsf, in reference to President TYLER'S re-
cent Message, put a question on the subject of the
state of the liberated negroes in the West Indies.
Sir R. PEEL said they were perfectly free there.
There was no apprenticeship—they were not com-
pelled to labour, and were in the state of free men—
and if the United States chose to appoint a Commis-
sion to investigate their state, every facility should
be afforded to that Commission for ascertaining the
facts of the case. With respect to the allegation that
both the subjects of the United States and those of
this country were concerned in carrying on the slave
trade, that was a subject for serious consideration.
He was not prepared to deny the fact. He hoped
that if the law did not reach this application of Bri-
tish capital, the Legislature would be prepared to
apply a remedy.
In answer to a question by Sir D. NORREYS,

Sir J. GRAHAM said it was not the intention of
the Government to propose any measure with regard
to Medical Charities in Ireland, nor to propose any
measure with regard to the railway system
in Ireland.

In answer to a series of questions from Mr. B.
DENNISON and Lord HowicK,
Sir G. CLERK denied that any negotiations had
taken place between the Board of Trade and the
promoters of the Direct Northern and the Cambridge
and Lincoln Railway Companies, or with the Newark
and Sleaford Railway Company, or that the Board
had given any intimation to to those companies to
form a coalition ; and that no facilities were given to
those companies to make communications to the
Board, which were not equally given to the London
and York Direct Railway Company.
In answer to Mr. SOMES, Lord INGESTRE stated
that he did not intend to bring the subject of Captain
WARNER'S invention again before the House; but
that Captain WARNER would abide by his offer to
destroy a line• of battle ship at five ruilus distance at
his own expense.

Sir C. NerLEE hoped that the Right Hon. Baronet
would permit Captain WARNER to try this experi-
ment, at his own expense, behind the Goodwin Sands.
Sir R. PEEL, had no doubt but that, if Captain
WARNER did intend to make the experiment at his
own expense, he would get permission to do so from
the Board of Ordnance.

Lord JOCELYN, in answer to Mr. HOESMAN, said
that a communication had been received from India
stating that the Governor-General in Council had
taken into consideration the recommendation of the
Home Government, to devise measures for placing
Penang sugar on the same footing as Indian sugar,
and had referred
.the subject to the Governor of
Penang.
The Home then went into Committee on the
Customs' Act.

The various articles in the tariff were gone
through, and, after some discussion, were agreed to.
The House then went into Committee of Supply ;
and, after voting the Ordnance Estimates, adjourned
at Five Minutes past One o'clock.

It ought to be a great consolation to very poor
men who cannot conjure a crown-piece into either
pocket, " charm they never so wisely," that there are
other mortals who are reduced to a fearful condition
of perplexity and distress by the very converse of
their own condition. A poet of antiquity has sung
" that a good man struggling with the storms of fate"
is a spectacle fit for the contemplation of the immortal
gods. He would have added, had he lived to our
times, that the study of a First Lord of the Treasury
" bother'd"—(there is no other phrase of force or
significancy equal to our meaning)—with a
surplus revenue of about 3,000,0001. is a luxury
to be enjoyed, in all its intensity, only
by a pauper. Pleasant to him ;who, having little
money enough, Heaven knows, to spare for his own
and his family's purposes, is compelled to part with a
portion of it to a grasping Government, which is
hampered in its movements by the fortunate dilemma
of having " money in both pockets." The Premier
is like a successful gamester, who, having broken the
other players and swept the board, is set upon, before
he can move off with his booty, by twenty different
claimants on his " kind consideration " and relief.
They become importunate in the proportion of his
success ; and the imperiousness and decision of their
demands in the ratio of their numbers and influence.
Sir R. PEEL had a task of no slight difficulty, either
on his original proposition of the income• tax or on
his recent application for its three years' renewal—
to win the consent of the.:House of Commons to his
plan. He played boldly, however, and, as we have
stated, he succeeded. In return, the House was to be
put in good humour with his scheme for appropriat-
ing the surplus of public income over expenditure
which he had realised on the financial year ending in
January last. Every man who voted for the Pre-
mier's property and income-tax must have assumed
that there was something to be obtained in return, by
way of fiscal concessions, in which his constituents
or himself would find themselves more or less inte-
rested. Not the least successful part of the character
which he so well sustained, pending the discussions
on the nature of the exigencies that were to
justify his demand and the vote of the
House, was, the ability with which he managed, up
to the very closing scene of his performance on this
occasion, to induce all classes of his supporters to
imagine that he was acting up to the wishes and hopes
of each, to the exclusion of those of all others. The

drama being over, the serious interlude ensues of the
" Surplus and its Disposal."
In this the new principal appeals to the favour of
the Legislature are sustained on behalf of the remis-
sion or modification of the tea duties, the total re-
moval of the window-tax, the extinction of the soap
duty, a large diminution of the duty on malt, or a
still larger reduction of the tobacco duties. When a
great nation can be persuaded, in a period of profound
peace, whilst in the enjoyment of a very high degree
of national prosperity, and of a still increasing com-
merce of unexampled extent and almost incalculable
value, to submit to the imposition of a war-tax, for
the sole purpose of bringing up the aggregate of the
public income to the sum of its expenditure—the
nation has a clear right to the 7greater:proportion of
whatever benefit, direct or indirect, may accrue on the
result of such an experiment. The constant tax-
payer has an equitable claim to this indulgence rather
than the larger tax-payer. This consideration is
strengthened by the fact that the new impost ,in virtue
of which the excess of revenue arises, is an extraor-
dinary one. Now, since it is the inevitable condition
of trade to fluctuate in extent and value, the product
of custom and excise duty must be liable to similar
variation. New tariffs, moreover, and the philosophy
of free-trade principles, occur now and then
to relieve trade from many and grievous burdens.
But there is no phenomenon in the history of Go-
vernment measures so rare; as a tariff of reduced
assessed taxes. The great bulk of assessed tax-
payers are a perpetualitarget:for Ministerial finance
practice. They stand to be shot at. There they
have stood so long, and have been fired at so success-
fully, that Ministers, without them, would retain
neither the eye nor: the aim needful to carry on the
operations of their Government. In short, the as-
sessed taxes, since the close of the war in 1814-15,
have had so little remission or indulgence that it
does seem high time to give them the honours of at
least a partial dismissal and retirement. They ought
to be superseded.

On the principles we have stated, it seems clear to
us that of all the proposed remission of taxes, this
class of imposts has the preferable claim on the
Premier. And of this class :we are strongly dis-
posed to concur with those who consider that the
window-tax ought to have stood foremost on the list
of the " boons," as they have been called, or re-
missions in favour of the tax-paying community.
Its principle was odious, vicious, and oppressive, from
the first day that it received the sanction of the
Legislature. Its operation, like that of almost
every other tax in this country, has been espe-
cially severe upon the poor. It has a ne-
cessary tendency, by rendering chargeable one
of the first common bounties of Providence, to
mar the beauty of nature; to sap the health of the
community; to discourage all those conditions of
the atmosphere within and without the dwellings of
man, which are most essential to the vigour, conve-
nience, and enjoyment of his existence. A tax upon
the light of heaven—that blessed element of all social
vitality and beauty—is a premium on disease, a de-
stroyer of industry, a scourge of the human consti-
tution, an incentive to crime, and a cloak for guilt;
and the mother of the most sordid progeny, that be-
speak their connexion:with idleness, squalor, misery,
and shame. Remove this tax, and give to the hum-
bler classes well-lighted, and therefore well-aired
tenements, and you surround them at once
with an ameliorated physical atmosphere, which
will have for its sure concomitants a moral
cheerfulness, an alacrity of spirit, a suscep-
tibility to the improving influences of natural
scenery, or civil associations, in the town and in the
country, which will work a reform and an improve-
ment in their condition far more practical and exten-
sive than any of which nine out of ten projectors of
utilitarian schemes and normal schools have, we sus-
pect, any notion.
On these grounds we are most anxious for the re-
mission of this window duty ; postponing only (but
far from undervaluing, even comparative3y) the re-
mission of the various other duties to which we have
alluded in the commencement of this article. We
have not forgotten with how much severity certain
Whig leaders, after accepting office, were visited by
their constituents for their violation of the pledges they
had given to procure the repeal of the window duties.
If anything connected with the ingrained " luck" of
the present Government could astonish us, we should
marvel at the facility with which the vast proportion
of their supporters, equally opposed to this obnoxious
tax, have permitted it hitherto to remain unchal-
lenged at the hands of her MAJESTY'S Ministers. The
division of Tuesday has settled the question for the
session, but hopes are held out by the Premier that he
will take the subject into serious consideration, and
remove the tax as soon as the state of the finances will
admit.

The proceedings of the meeting convened at Exeter-
hall, on Tuesday last, for the purpose of petitioning
against the anticipated endowment, and the enlarged
grant proposed to be made to the Roman Catholic Col-
lege at Maynooth, afforded a melancholy exemplification
of the pertinacious bigotry with which certain very
worthy persons will persist in treating all questions that
are connected with religious education. It is lament-
able to observe a gentleman of Mr. PLUMPTRE'S respect-
ability and goodness, lending himself to the sanction of
such a one-sided and pharisaical demonstration of at-
tachment to the principles—not of the Established
Church, but of Protestantism in general, and of hatred
and denunciation of the Roman Catholic Church. The
lion. Member for Kent felt the invidious character of
the position be had assumed, together with the chair of
the meeting, and therefore repeatedly disclaimed all
idea of harbouring any other sentiments but those of
brotherly lore, and hearty good-will for his Roman
Catholic brethren of Ireland ; but the liars h things ho
had to say of the religion professed by them, and
of the hopeless and eternally-doomed error of
their faith, he was compelled to utter, because,
forsooth, it was a question of "principle." In
this view of the subject consists the whole fallacy
of the impressions under which Mr. PLUMPTRE. and the
whole Anti-Maynooth Synod of Exeter-hall labour, in
treating the Maynooth grant. It is net a question of
principle—it is a question of domestic policy. What are
the facts ? A certain Church, or religious profession, is
recognised by law as " the Established" Church of the
United Kingdom. The United Kingdom is composed of
three elements, England and Wales—Scotland and Ire-
land. The Established Church, with its doctrines and
forms, is that of the great majority of the people in the
first of these integers ; the doctrine, without the forms
(Presbyterianism), is that of the second ; but the third
repudiates both the doctrines and the forms of the
other two, and stands inflexibly on its own more
ancient traditions, and its own succession and
stream of hierarchical ordination. Whatever be
the aggregate numbers of those who dissent from the
forms and ritual of the Established Church in England
and Wales, and Scotland, there can be no doubt that its
doctrine is that of the great majority of a population
mustering at least fifteen millions of souls. But in Ire-
land the doctrine, the forms, and the ritual of a perhaps
still greater majority of a population of between seven
and eight millions, are those of its ancient church, the
Church of Rome—not the Protestant Established Church
of England. If the amount or proportion of the majo-
rity determines the intensity of the attachment in the
one case, it must do so in the other. If the fact that in
all England and Wales and Scotland, six-sevenths of the
population are devoted to the cause of the Reformed or
Protestant Church, under whatever denominations—
if this be a proof of that genuine regard
for one species of doctrine, the same sort
of attachment on the part of somewhat more than six-
sevenths of the population of Ireland being with equal
sincerity attached to the doctrine and communion of the
Church of Rome, is to be as necessarily inferred. Now►
the highest and most sacred authority acknowledged by
either Church, has declared that the Sabbath was made
for men, not men for the Sabbath. Religion has been
thus devised for the benefit of man ; but man was not
made for the benefit of any particular form of religion.
Would Mr. PLUMPTRE and the Rev. Mr. BAPTIST NOEL
have six-sevenths of the Irish people surrender their
hereditary faith, their honest convictions, too, to the
authority and at the bidding of some proportion of their
brethren of Great Britain? Surely this is too preposterous.
Even the Honourable Member, and the Honourable
and Reverend Chaplain to her MAJESTY, do not
go the length of supporting any such preposterous pre-
tension. For what reason, then, are the Irish people
not to have the means granted by the Imperial Le-
gislature, for the careful and liberal education of
those among them destined for the priesthood of the
Church to which they belong, in the discipline and
the doctrine of that religious profession in whose ele-
ments it will be their especial function to instruct
the rising laity of Ireland ? What matters it, in this
view of the subject, whether the election of a church
or a creed which the Irish have made be right or

wrong ? That is an affair between the disciple of
a faith, and the GREAT SEARCHER of all hearts. Do
the brethren of Exeter Hall imagine that they can re
verse this election by a string of cut-and-dried resolu-
tions? Do they hope to roll back the mighty tide of usage,
prepossessions, associations, civil and religious, which
for fourteen centuries has poured on through the same
unaltered channels, without witnessing, as in other
countries, the downfal of its ancient land-marks—the
undermining of its bases throughout the length and
breadth of the land. On what plea the grant to May-
Booth, in respect of the Roman Catholic community of
Ireland, was to be opposed by those who support the
grants in aid of our Universities, in respect of the Pro-
testant community of Great Britain, we never could de-
vise. Wiser heads than that of Mr. PLUNPTRE—judg-
ments more dispassionate than that of the Hon. and
Rev. B. NOEL—have deeply considered, and solemnly
recognised, not only the moral justice and equity, but
the undoubted political epediency, of providing for
and protecting in Ireland, a foundation for the education
of her native priests in the doctrines of her national
church, in a native seminary. Mr. Pitt, and other en-
lightened statesmen, his contemporaries, readily per-
ceived the growing danger of leaving such a class of men
to find at once a refuge, a home, instruction, and na-
tional attachments in a foreign country, instead of at
home.

It seems unnecessary to push the argument further to
establish, in this instance, the powerful case of political
necessity. But we cannot take leave of the Exeter Hall
affair without acknowledging the amusement afforded to
us by the Rev. Mr. BAPTIST NOEL'S repeated declara-
tions of the extreme reluctance with which he would
have interfered at the meeting, or adopted any other
course that would have had a tendency "to embarrass
her Majesty's Ministers." Had there been any proba-
bility of such a result, he would, on no account,
have taken a step in anywise calculated to throw-
difficulties in their way, &c., &c. For gentlemen
who stand so
.stiffly on " principle," this is rather a
blinking of " essentials," as they call them, to " cere-
menials." But we find a key to the inconsistency in the
recollection—or in the matter that we recollect—the in-
sertion of this gentleman's name, the other day, in the
list of chaplains, ordinary or extraordinary, to her MA-
JESTY. Court chaplains may not fight First Lords of
the Treasury. Again—we remark two notable instances
of that " fair play and no favour" department in the
august Synod, which is always dear to Englishmen—
elsewhere. Only two individuals attempted to address
the meeting on the Liberal side. The first bold intruder
was removed—actually and bodily taken into custody,
and removed by the policemen in attendance, on the
motion of Sir C. EARDLEY SMITH, Bart., and
with " the unanimous consent of this very
fair and impartial meeting." Sir C. EARDLEY
SMITH, and the policemen who acted on his sugges-
tion, we would think it extremely likely will hear again
of this ebullition of enthusiasm. The other intruder,
whom we suspect to be the somewhat notorious Captain
ACXERLEY, Was also violently ejected, speech un-
spoken, and by the police. Exeter Hall fanaticism may
be incurable, but the Commissioners of Metropolitan
Police will do well to instruct their rather officious con-
stables better in the rights of English subjects at open
meetings—or meetings not professedly called by previous
advertisement announced to be intended only for
packed audiences.

We have received Madrid journals of the 11 th inst.,
which contain an outline of the Bill for reforming the
representative system in Spain, and perhaps in no
country where a national assembly exists is reform more
wanted. The return of Members hitherto has been made
not by the people, but by the men in power, corrupt
alcaldes, political chiefs, military officers, and smugglers.
ESPARTERO had too much honesty to bribe and inti-
midate, and on that account he failed. NARVAEZ was
less scrupulous—he left nothing untried, dared every
outrage, and succeeded in moulding a Cortes to his will.
The Bill was introduced on the 11th by the Minister
of the Interior. The country is to be divided
into 306 districts, each to return a Member
The qualification for electors is to be reduced to 400
reels of rent, and of Deputies to 12,000 reals of rent
(1201.). No changes are to be made in the electoral
lists, or in the districts. Precautions are to be taken
against frauds at elections. Captains-general of pro-
vinces, the Commanders-in-Chief of the navy, the
Procurours-general of the tribunals, political chiefs, and
intendents of the national debt, are to be excluded from
the Chamber. It is stated in one of the Madrid
papers, that the public prosecutor had demanded that
capital punishment should be inflicted on seven officers
implicated in the conspiracy at Vittoria. The provincial
deputation, the municipality, and the clergy, were pre.
paring a petition to the QUEEN to spare the lives of these
seven officers.

MADRID BOURSE, MARCH 11.—Three per Cents. 35i
at 60 days, 114 millions done ; Five per Cents. 26i- at 60
days, 80 millions done.; Passive Debt 8 at GO days ;
Vales Reales 10+ cash.

The Paris papers contain accounts of the grand ban-
quet given to Marshal BUCEAUD, on Sunday, in the
Salle de Bourse. About four hundred persons sat
down to dinner. M. GOUIN was in the chair, and
among those present were, the Duke of NEMOURS, the
Prince DE JOINVILLE, and their two younger brothers,
the Dukes of A UMALE and MONTPENSIER. The first

toast was " the KING," and the next the " Royal
Princes," who had honoured them with their company.
The Duke of NEMOURS returned thanks. The dinner
altogether was conducted in the English style—speeches
were
that toast
the Lord Mayor's feast on the 9th of followed toast, and the bill of fare
rivalled
November. One of the papers states that upwards of
400 waiters were employed. Marshal BUGEAUD, in
returning thanks fur the high honour conferred
on him by the commercial men of Paris, made
some remarks on the definitive system to be
adopted in carrying on the war, and in colonising the
country. Ile pointed out the immense advantages which
will be insured to the trade of France by the security of
her African possessions ; and, after reminding the com-
pany that the commercial movement between France
and Algeria last year amounted to eighty millions of
francs, he declared his conviction that in ten or twelve
years Algeria will be able to do without assistance from
the mother-country. At the conclusion, he an-
nounced that he would set out for Algiers in
two days. We regret to find that the report
respecting a dreadful explosion at that place is confirmed
in these papers. It is said that upwards of 200 per-
sons had lost their lives by the accident, the particulars
of which are given below. In the Chamber of Deputies
on Monday the Minister of Public Works presented a
up to public tender contracts for the
Paris to Lyons, and from Lyons to Avig-
rßaiilllrofoard
ruotmt i
non. The motion of M. DUVERGIER D'HAURANNE, for
abolishing vote by ballot in the Chamber, was
under discussion. The Journal des Debuts states
that a treaty of amity, commerce and navigation,
was signed on the 17th of November, at Zanzibar, be-
tween France and the Imaum of Muscat. Several of the
Opposition journals have been loud in their praises of
Sir ROBERT PEEL'S policy, not because they love PEEL,
but because they hate GulzoT more, and delighted to
draw the contrast between a Minister, with a majority
of 90, and one who rarely can muster nine. The
Journal des Debuts says the fault is not with the French
Minister but the French Conservatives in the Chamber,
who have not the patriotism, like the English Tories, to
sacrifice private differences to higher and more general
considerations. The following is an extract from the
artiele;:—
"There is really something amusing in the fit of admira-
tion with which the Opposition of every shade, from the left
to the dissentients of the centres, has been all at once seized
for the English Ministry, and particularly for Sir R. Peel. If
the illustrious Premier of England was not a prophet in his
own country, he would at least have the consolation of being
so in ours. We expect some of these days to see statues raised
to him by subscriptions opened in committees of the Opposi-
tion, or by the journals most affected by Anglo-phobia. In
truth, there is cause to render the English jealous or Sir IL
Peel suspected. The French tribune and press have no longer
eyes or ears but for this fortunate Minister. M. Billault, who
would like well enough to get a compliment in return, calls
hint a great man; Peers and Deputies offer him incense; the
journals join in this concert of praise; in fact, Sir Robert
Peel is the political lion of the moment. That does riot
shock us. Let the Opposition be at rest—we are not going to
accuse it of treason, or to reproach it with sacrificing to per-
fidious Albion the honour and interests of France! We shall
not call it the foreign party, or the Pritchard party, or even
the Peel party. We also have the highest esteem for the
Prime Minister of England ;
we believe, in fact, that the
Opposition has sometimes reproached us with expressing it
in fine, there is a measure in everything, and
etovoenoftthene.besßt
best
things ought not to be abused. As to us, if we
are ready on all occasions to admit how much boldness, as well
as spirit of government, there is in the important reforms ac-
complished in England by Sir R. Peel, we do not do so, it
may be believed, to lessen the men who govern us, and to
deprecate their acts. It would be perfectly absurd to turn
against the French Ministers the praises which every one
justly accords to those of England, seeing that the political
practices and habits of the two countries render all compa-
rison in this respect inapplicable. We shall even declare
that if a comparison of this kind could be made, and if it
could be disadvantageous to us, the fault would not be in
our government, but in our Chambers, and in the manner in
which the practice of Parliamentary institutions appears to
be comprehended in our country. Thus we behold every day
the English Ministry coming victoriously out of all debates
with majorities of ninety or 100, and thereupon the great
politicians of the Opposition fall into ecstasies, and exclaim
with an air of admiration and envy, ! there's a Ministry.
That's what can be called a GovCrnment.' It appears to us
that it would be quite as natural and much more just to cry
out, ' There's a House of Commons ! that's what may be
called a party F'
We subjoin, from the Akitbar, of Algiers, an abridged
account of the dreadful explosion which took place there
on the Bth instant:—
"About a quarter past ten at night, on the Bth, a loud
explosion was heard, in the direction of tho marine establish-