The Sun.
London, England, 1844-12-19 00:00:00

inarnin

LONDON, THURSDAY, DECEMBER 19, 1844.

We quote the following remarkable passsage from
the Post of yesterday :—" Will the landowners of
Xngland still refuse to learn wisdom:from experience ?
Will they still support that insane policy which is
undermining their social position, and sweeping away
their natural supporters into the abyss of ruin ?
Landowners are unwilling to break with the Minister
of their choice. The alternative, however, will not
long be left to them. The Minister will, at no distant
date, break with them ! Day by day the farmer-
chosen Minister draws nearer to the ranks of the free-
traders! Very soon will landowners be compelled,
openly, to adopt the principles of the League, or to
look out for new leaders." There is a world of truth
in this prediction of our Contemporary, which is wrung
from him, as it were, in very bitterness of spirit. The
day, indeed, is not distant when Sir ROBERT PEEL,
true to that system of expediency which has always
governed, and will always continue to govern, his
every action, will break fully and completely with
the Conservative landowners, and carry out into prac-
tice those principles of free trade which he has long
since declared to be the principles of common sense.
He sees the direction which the stream of public
opinion is taking, and though he may for a time make
head against it, he has quite sufficient sagacity to
foresee that it will in the entoverwhelm him, unless
he allow himself to be borne quletly onward with the
current. Ile is quite aware that the question of free
trade is one only of time; that it is a great
national necessity which, year by year, is be-
coming more and more apparent ; that the
Anti-Corn-law League is nothing more than the ex-
pression of this necessity, and is only popular be-
cause it expresses it with emphasis and particularity;
and our chief complaint against Sir ROBERT PEEL is,
that knowing all this—knowing that no party nor
combination of parties can protract much longer the
full and perfect triumph of the free-trade system, he
refuses to make the concession, while yet it is in his
power to concede with grace. Ile is evidently de-
sirous to play over again the old game of the Test
end Corporation Acts—that is to say, to make a show
of resistance to the last moment, long after conviction
has flashed upon his mind, and yield only to the irre

sistible pressure of necessity. And wherefore this ?
Simply in order that he may fur a brief while longer
secure the support of the Conservatives, whom
he cannot find it in his heart to break with, just at
present, notwithstanding that he has no sympathy
with many of their principles and prejudices, arid
knows that the liJur of his final separation from them
is at hand. There is, to our thinking, something ex-
ceedingly petty in this indecision and temporising.
It is very unworthy of the character of the first Mi-
nister of the first commercial kingdom in the world.
Far better would it be for the Premier's reputation
as a statesman, that he should do at once what must
eventually be done, and do it in a graceful, instead of
a churlish and reluctant, spirit. But Sir ROBERT
PEEL is not a Minister of an enlarged or generous
turn of mind. He has nothing of the CHATHAM or
CADMING in his nature. He adopts popular measures,
not from conviction, but on compulsion. He is inac-
cessible to 19fty and fervid impulses, and must be as-
stilled on the iide of his apprehensions. Above all things,
tie is the slave'of precedent, and shrinks aghast from the
idea of originating anything for which he has not

t

some sort of warrant from the past. It is this marked
trait in his political character that induces many
people to give him credit for being a safe Minister;
but such people should bear in mind that there are
times and seasons when the boldest and most decided
course of policy is also the safest that can be
pursued. Such a period is the present, for there
is no question that the Premier's constant habit
of shilly-shallying on the subject of free-
trade, at one moment giving it his direct counte-
nance, at another repudiating the system,
m uncalled for by existing circumstances, merely in
order to keep himself for a short time longer in fa-
vour with the Conservatives ;—there is no question,
we say, that this favourite habit, on the part of Sir
ROBERT PEEL, of playing fast-and-loose with free
trade, is daily tending more and more to unsettle
men's minds ; to engender in them a dis-
trust of Government and its policy; and
by so doing, to affect in no inconsider-
able or remote degree, all the great commercial
interests of the country. And are the Conservatives
grateful to the Premier for this temporising course of
policy ? Certainly not. They see clearly enough that
it must ere long have an end, and already they dislike
their leader quite as much as they would do, were he
at once to cut all connexion with them, throw himself
into the arms of the Liberals, and publicly proclaim
his adhesion to the principles of free trade.

We have seen in the Liverpool Mercury a very
sensible letter, conceived in terms of great moderation,
on the subject of Brazilian sugars. Our readers are
aware of the extraordinary interest which has been
imparted to this question by some of the more ex-
citable opponents—(and in this country it has no
fi iends)—of slavery. In their zeal to discourage,
and if possible to punish, the States which still permit
the- practice of this odious insult upon humanity,
these parties are for excluding from our ports all
sugar the produce of Brazil, inasmuch as it is to be
inferred that it must have been slave-grown. The
expiration of our seventeen years' treaty with that
Power, having left our hands free to deal with it as
we may see fit, we are urged to punish the sin it has
committed in the toleration of slavery, but which sin
we have, all that time, ourselves condoned and com-
promised by tolerating it, in virtue of that very
treaty. For sugar was not the less raised by slave
labour, in Brazil, in consequence of her consenting to
ab indon the trade or importation of slaves. Brazil,
herself, might honestly consent to, and even fulfil,
this latter stipulation (though that is not now the
question), and yet have not attempted to covenant
with, or coerce, her own subjects to employ only free
labour in the cultivation of sugar. Why, therefore,
the tardy suggestions of our slumbering morality, and
the period of the treaty's decease, should be coinci-
dent, it does seem difficult to account for, on any
broad and intelligible principles. The correspondent
of the Liverpool Mercury argues rightly, that if the
terms of that treaty had been capable of producing
any positive effect towards attaining its avowed
object (the repression or extinction of slavery in
Brazil), the lapse of seventeen years ought to have
sufficed to develop that effect. But since the commer-
cial policy of this country has been—as well before
as subsequently to the existence of that compact—to
discourage the consumption of Brazilian sugar, we
cannot perceive how that Brazilian question is di-
rectly affected by the New Sugar Bill of last session.
The much-complained-of admission of the sugars of
Venezuela, or even of the United States, leaves that
question, therefore, entirely untouched, without
adding to, or taking away, a single customer from
Brazil. The continued exclusion of Brazilian sugars
from our markets for consumption is no novelty, but
a mere perseverance in a system, long established,
ith a view to carry out that scheme of the universal
ab dition of slavery for which this country has already
paid so enormous a sum. But to what extent we
have achieved that vast object, beyond the shores and
limits of our own colonies, is, unhappily, a point of
by no means easy determination. Much less to be
d nibted is it, that, by attempting to enforce on other
States the more than literal adoption of our anti-
slavery views, and to enforce our enactments in
respect of those views, as if we were invoking a
" lex talionis"—is a course more calculated to defeat
than to advance the beneficial end, to the complete
accomplishment of which we have ungrudgingly
made such eosay
But what have we gained—what shall we acquire—
in the shape of advantage to our own sugar consumers
at home (who have some right to be considered in
such a matter), by straining the law of our own
country, touching slavery and the slave trade, against
the commerce of foreign States, willing to enter into
trading relations with us of mutual benefit, on con-
dition of our receiving sugars, the fact of which
having been raised by free labour, cannot be certified
in the manner prescribed by the New Sugar Duties
Bill, to qualify for admission the sugars of Manilla
and other foreign possessions ? Simply this—the
vindication and unity of a great principle; namely,
the principle of utterly discouraging the employment
of Slave labour. But, in truth, we have made ships
wreck of this principle already, by admitting Bra-
zilian sugars for the purposes of " refining." Will
all the boiling coppers and the pans of the White-
chapel houses—all the chemistry and manipulation
of the German refiners settled in London or at Liver-
pool—purify the product on which they work from
the guilt of the slave labour employed in raising that
raw commodity ? Will the atrocity of slavery (to
which no men can be more indignantly alive than
ourselves) be discharged with the scum and the im-
purities that are swept from its surface under tho
action of refining ? To give the " unity" which
some parties so hotly contend for to this principle of
slave labour discouragement, you should have pro-
hibited the importation of a single particle of Bra-
zilian-grown sugar, under whatever circumstanses—
ith whatever ostensible destination imported. Its
manufacture, here, for the dealers of Hamburgh and
St. Petershurgh, will not eradicate the slave-growth
taint it had acquired in the plantations of Aroibe or
Pernambuco.
But the theory of thus utterly excluding Brazilian,
as slave-grown sugars, from our own markets, in-
volves one enormous error, whilst its practical en-
forcement entails a commensurate evil. The theory
falsely assumes that, in faro conscientice, Govern.
ments (.4 d we will suppose the case of those which
are - - ~ore highly organised, efficient, and
pow• at of Brazil) are to be held as
repo . to individuals or communities are
in r conduct of their servants, for the
good fait with which their subjects shall discharge
the obligations contracted, on their behalf, by those
Governments. But there are prejudices of hab

- -
anti occupation, as well as of opinion, which the
,st wise and the best established Government can

.only eradicate or defeat with the aid of time, and by
the exercise of consummate prudence. The toleration

of negro slavery by a civilised Christian community
is one of these prejudices; and in respect of any
nation wherein it exists, no other nation has a right
to look too harshly or implacably at the offences of
individual citizens who have an immediate personal
interest in contravening the stipulations entered into
between their own SOVEREIGN and any other poten-
tate. If French smugglers succeed in largely running
contraband goods into this country, all we can expect
of a French Minister is his honourable assurance that

every possible means have been adopted, on his side,
to discourage and disavow such practices. No man
would dream of retaliating on the legitimate com-

merce of France with England, by encouraging Eng-
lish smugglers to run prohibited English goods into
France. We have done enough to vindicate our

sincere anxiety for the abolition of slavery. Our

anti-Brazilian policy is becoming, like Hamlet's
metaphysics, apt to "deal too curiously" with diffi-

cult and unsatisfactory premises. So much for the

thcoretieal error. The practical one is that which,
in the letter before us, is thus succinctly4sposed of;
and we have nothing to add to it, unless it be to

commend it to the reader's best attention :
" We see England making great sacrifices in life and
treasure, in her attempts—hitherto fruitless—to abolish

slavery and the slave trade in foreign countries. She

deprives her population of the advantages to be derived
from the admission of Brazil sugars, and from an ex-

tended and beneficial commerce with that country; and
whilst she is doing this, her rivals of the Zollverein and

elsewhere are preparing to profit by her anti-slavery
poli-y. She stands alone in her refusal of slave sugars,
and unless she can prevail upon other nations to join
her and to do likewise,' and thus succeed in closing up
all the European markets against them, can there be any
reasonable expectation of her ever being able, solo, to ,

accomplish the ' object' she has in view in keeping out
those sugars ?"

Accounts from Madrid of the 10th state that
Colonel REIIJIFO, GARCIA, and ARILLA had been
placed en capilla (in the chapel). Their friends
were making great efforts to procure a commutation
of the sentence, with apparently little hope of suc-
ceeding; for NARVAEZ, despite the representations of
Mr. BULWEN, and the Count DE BRESSON, seems de-
termined upon more slaughter, or examples, as he
terms his butcheries. We are inclined, however, to
believe the statement in the French Government
papers, that they had been pardoned. We find no
news of importance in the papers. The cold at
Madrid on the Bth was excessively severe. At
Bayonne the thermometer had stood as low as 24,
and vast quantities of snow had fallen along the
frontier.

MADRID BOURSE, Dzc. 10.—The Three per
Cents. are 1 per cent. higher to-day, and transac-
tions to the amount of 127,000,000 of reals took
place ; they closed at 321 at 60 days. Five per
Cents. 21+ at 60 days; Floating Debt 74 for 18th
instant ; Coupons 25i at 60 days

The sudden departure of Sir STRATFORD CANNING
from Constantinople gives rise to several conjectures
in the Paris papers. Some infer that it is a mere
jaunt of pleasure, and others that a serious misunder-
standing has taken place between the Porte and the
British Ambassador, and that he has demanded his.
passports. It appears, however, from the statements
in these papers that there is little foundation for such
rumours. The Smyrna Journal states that the short
absence of Sir STRATFORD CANNING IS no more than
an excursion of pleasure, which he has been in the
habit of making every year, and the Journal des De-
bats, which contains news from Constantinople to the
27th ult., says :—" It appears that the object of Sir
S. email/ices excursion was to visit the British Con-
sulates in the Troad, and a desire to ensure the sup-
ply of provisions which the English station of the
Levant required. Sir S. CANNING had passed over
to Tenedos on the 23d, and when the last intelligence
left was daily expected at Constantinople." M.THIERS'
journal, however, takes a different view of the affair, and
infers that owing to the little support which the Am-
bassador received from Lord ABERDEEN, the report
merits attention, " not that it is true, but as it proves
the truth of an observation we have often made during
the affairs of Servia, and which, indeed, has become a
general opinion, that the British Ambassador is not
sufficiently supported by his own Government, and,
therefore, not in a position to obtain any important
concession from the Porte." The National has an
article on jobbing in railway shares and on the nature
of the contracts entered into by the Government with
the different companies, which it considers too favour-
able to the latter. It states that the conditional pro-
mises of shares in the Northern line are sold at a pre-
mium of 40f. each, that the shares of the intended
line from Amiens to Boulogne are at 180 f. premium,
those of Orleans to Bordeaux 130 f , Vierzon 2301.,
Rouen to Havre 293 f., and Avignon to Marseilles
427 f. The National observes that, upon the shares
of the Paris and Rouen line, which is in action,
the shares are at a premium of .5301., and
those of the Paris and Orleans line, also
in action, 600 fr" The Journal des Debats
announces on the authority of a letter from Madrid
of the 10th, that the Queen of SPAIN has granted a
pardon to Colonel Rou.rfro, Captain GARCIA, and
Don MANUEL ARILLA, who had been condemned to
death by a court-martial, and then adds :—" This act
of clemency and royal generosity does honour to
the Spanish Government, and is, in the present state
of disturbance, both a proof of courage and of
strength. Such acts do more to insure the duration
of a government and the peace of a kingdom than
othose which we have been lately obliged to condemn,
and we hope that they are only the augury of a really.
humane and liberal policy." We can see no proof
either of courage or strength in such a course. These
men were unjustly condemned and NARVAEZ would
have carried the sentence into effect but for the fear
of universal execration. The following extract of a
Madrid letter in the National forms a strong contrast
to this proof of courage and strength :
" Each day brings us the news of some massacre. The
Government was not quite satisfied with having shot
Zurhano's brother-in-law and son ; it has also shot
ftnothri..*.a with the,...11
the vicins taken with arms
in their hands, or without them. this is (102115 wan-
out trial, and on the simple proof of their identity. They
have just shot twelve men in Arragon ; it is the begin-
ning of a butchery which will not stop there. General
Don Pedro Ramirez, 75 years of age, and who reckons
65 years' services, had the imprudence to make some
representations to the Government on all these acts of
barbarity, and at once he was arrested, and taken by
file of soldiers to the castello of Cadiz, where he is to be
embarked in the first vessel for the Canaries. Prison
first, exile next—such is the fate reserved for the oldest
and most faithful servants of the State."

The Constittdionnel makes these remarks on the
announcement of the Slade, that the King of
Pausal. is about to give a Representative Constitu-
tion to his people :
'•The Steele announces that the King of Prussia is
about to give a Constitution to his States, and has al-
ready officially communicated his intentions to the other
European Cabinets. According to all the information
we have received from time to time from Berlin, this
news is at least premature. The King of Prussia, it is
true, long ago thought of giving a Constitution to his
people, and he has bestowed great labour on the project;
but nothing has yet appeared to show that the work is
completed, and that the population of Prussia is on the
point of seeing its present government transformed into
a representative government. It is certain that between
the elaboration of a Constitution, in the leisure hours of
a Cabinet, and its public promulgation, there must be a
long interval. There is no doubt, however, that at a
period more or less remote, and under divers forms, the
representative system will be extended to nearly all
civ►lised States. Prussia, that enlightened, wise, and
inquiring nation, the lover of controversy, will certainly
be one of the first to adopt a mode of government founded
upon free discussion. But whether her King will take
the initiative, is very problematical."
THE BOURSE---bioNDAY, DEC. 16.

First Highest Lowest Last
Price. Price. Price. Price.
French Five per Cents. ••• • • 120 95 .. 121 • • 120 80 . • 120 80
Fours .
Three per Cents..... 85 .. 85 10 .. 85 .. 85 10
New Loan •• •• 86 50 .. 86 60 .. 86 50 .. 86 GO
Bank of France • .3275 —3275 • • 3275 .. 3275
Lafatte Bank, I,ooof Bhare/11110 ..1110 • • 1110 ..1110
5,000 f Bharesso92 50 —5091 50 —5091 50 "5092 50
Belgian Bank .. •• • ••• • • • 585 .• 595 • • 585 .. 595
1841•• •••••••1100 ••1100 ••1100 —llOO
Belgian Fives, 1840 •• • • • • 1031 . • 104 . • 1031 104
1842 .... •• • • 1061 .. 1061 • . 1061 • . 1061
Two-and-a-Half. ••• 62 70 62 70 .. 62 60 .. 62 60
Dutch Two and-a-Ha1f..... 631 • • 631 631 . 631
Portuguese Five per Cents— 57 .. 57 .. 57 .• 57
Spanisn Threes.. ••••• • • • • • 371 • • 371 .. 371 • • 371
Passive • •• . 6 • • 6 6 .. 6
Neapolitan •• • • •••• • • • • • 98 60 .. 98 60 .. 98 60 .. 98 60
Roman .• •• • • ..... •. •• 1044 • • 1041 .. 1041 • • 1041

RAILWAY SHARES.
St. Germain ..............1015 ..1020 ..101$ —lO2B
Versaales,R.B.•••••••• • 500 .. 580 .. 500 .. .500
L.B ••••• • • • 400 .. 400 .. 375 .. 375
Roman • .1045 . 1045 ..1015 ..1045
Rouen to Havre— .• •• 800 .. 805 .. &00 .. 802 50
Orleans .....•.....1110...
Stramherg to Bale• ••• •• •• 310 .. 318 75 . 310 .. 310
Avignon to Dfarseilles• • .. • • 917 50 .. 033 75 .. 911 50 .. 930

RAILWAY SIIARES FOR SETTLING, DE6. 16.
St. Germain: ...• •• •• ..1010 —lO2O ..1010 —lO2O
Versailles. L. 8.• •• •• •• 353 75 • 402 50 363 75 .. 368 75
Room •••• •• •• •••• •• •• ••1037 50 ..1045 ..1037 50 ..1040
Rouen to Ilavre•
Orleans ....... ...... .••• —llOO ..1172 50 ..1100 —lll5
Strashurg to Bale-- •••• 310 .. 317 50 •• 310 .. 310
Avignon to Marseilles 920 25 .. 935 .. 926 25 .. 931

RAILWAYS FOR THE ACCOUNT, JAN. 3.
St. Germain .• • • •••• • • ••1018 ..1030 —lOl2 50 ..1020
Versailles, It. 11.••
L.B. ... 395 403 75 370 .. 370
Rouen ..........•• •••• •• 1045 ..1050 ..1045 ..1045
Rouen to llayre••
Orleans .
Strasburg to Bale-- •••• 312 50 .. 320 .. 308 75 .. 306 75
Avignon to Itaxseilles....•• 927 80 .. 937 50 . 927 50 .. 930

wkI:BIETERL.A_TEThFe AinTqAuLisiAtioCnClDt:NbTe
hTeOld,
l‘tiolSisriveCstigAaßtike
the circumstances leading; to the death of this young and
pi omising arable, will held its sitting at ten: o'clock this
day.
I...7PIL4aEIt'S BACHELOR'S KETTLE.—We have had
submittedig our, inspehtion, by Mr. Edmond Spiller. of'
Holborn-hill, a' very ingenious contrivance for boiling
water, which he calls a " Bachelor's Kettle." It consist.,
of a flattened tea-kettle, which fits on a tin stand, the
stand being completely closed when the kettle is fitted
on, excepting for a small space at bottom, opposite to
which aperture is the chimney. In the centre of this
case a bundle of patent fire-wood is placed and lighted.
The kettle, filled with water, is fixed in. its place, and in
ten minutes the bachelor has three pints 'of boiling water,
at the cost, for fuel, of one farthing. In summer, or in
gipsy parties, the " Bachelor's Kettle" nec st be invaluable.
An inquest was held before C. H. Cooper, Esq., at
the New Inn, Parker's Piece, on view of the body of
Mr. Stephen Camp, late of Eden-strQift, aged 68. The
deceased had been in good health up :to the day of his
decease, and on Sunday he ate a heext.y dinner of roast
pork. In the evening of that day h e complained of a
pain in his chest. He took some p;in and water, and
then said he felt better. After walkii 3p.; up and down the
room, he sat down in a chair, and in s, few minutes after-
wards expired. A post-mortem exa urination was made
by Mr. Lostourgeon, who was of opi [Lion that death had
been caused by the quantity of pork d eceased had eaten
(of which there were pieces nearly: an inch square),
which had prevented the action of the heart, and so occa-
sioned death. The jury returned a -verdict of " Died by
the visitation of God.' *—Cantbridye Advertiser.