The Sun.
London, England, 1827-10-09 00:00:00

direct violation of tenth ? Can any man with a
• shadoW of conscience or veracity affirm, at we
find it in the artic.le.now alluded to, that " Mr.
Canning represented the occupation of Portugal
as a counterpoise to the French occupation."
Mr. Canning never uttered such a word. Mr.
Canning was never fool enough to say or hint
what the 411oniteur here imputes to him. He
said, that England succoured Portugal in fulfil-
ment of the faith of treitties, and would limit
her interference to the. obligations which those
treaties imposed ; and she has done so strictly.
Will the principals of the Moniteur be better
satisfied if England follows, for the sake of the
cause of liberty, the example which the House
of Bourbon, in its warfare against liberty, has
shown her, by entering Portugal on one pretext,
and remaining there on another going to repel
a foreign invasion by Ferdinand, and staying to
defend the Charter of Don Pedro against its
domeetic enemies ? Times.
It is always with regret that we even appear to
find fault with any part of an establishment so
admirably conducted as the General Post-office ;
at the same time there is no doubt but that, ex-
cellent as most of its arrangements and details
are, there are others which 'would admit of con-
siderable improvement. Of these we long since
pointed out one, but which we are sorry to say
has never been attended to, by the adoption of
which the delivery of letters throughout the me-
tropolis would he expedited full an hour or more
--a matter of great moment to most persons ;
and which would be effected at a very small ex-
pellee, by merely carrying the postmen to their
stations, Instead of leaving them to walk as they
now do, and loiter on their road. The imme-
diate point we would now advert to, arises from
a letter which we inserted a short time since,
showing the want of post accommodation be-
tween towns at short distances from each other.
Innumerable instances .exist, as this part of the
Postsoffice. is at present regulated, in which let-
ters from towns and other places, only 10 or 20
miles apart, actually travel 100, and are three or
four days on the road. People who feel the in-
convenience of this, and apply to have it altered,
are told, it seems, that it may ,be _ done by way
of experiment, provided they willcnsme the ex-
pence for a'twelvemonth. This wt.& not think
is the way in which the matter should be treated ;
though it points out, we conceive, the funda-
mental error of the Post-offiCe—viz. that of
looking to it more ns a source of revenue than of
convenience. While this admirable establishment
upon its present great scale at least, was in its in-
fancy, and its whole revenues little more than
-paid•its charges, this kind of economy was very
excusable, and the accommodation alluded to
little sought for or expected; but now that commit-
- saiiations of other kinds are not confined to di-
rect roads,. but cross-roads, with stage coaches
• and other-kinds of conveyance, intersect the king-
dom in all directions, there ought not to be a
town, at least, between which and any other
prompt and constant intercourse were not kept
• up by means of the Post-office. Even the ex-
pence, if duly attended to, and regulated by con•
tracts, would be much less than may be imagined,
while the very establishment of cross posts more
'generally, would, as soon as they became known,
gradually furuish.the means of meeting, and, in
most cases, of very soon exceeding the charge.
At any rate,- to make it penal to' send a letter by
- any other conveyance than the post, when that
by the latter is not provided, is the height of
folly. and injustice ; and we confidently hope
that there is no one connected with the Post-
office, who is so wedded to routine and error, as.
not to be constantly alive to, and ready to adopt
any improvements which others may suggest, or
which common ,sense and common convenience
may point out, though it has not its origin at
head-quarters.—Morning,
Few trades, we believe, have been subject to
so much vexation as that of a maltstei; and
there is none, after all the real or apparent vigi-
lance of the Excise, in which greater frauds
upon the revenue have been and continue to be.
' committed. 'lndeed, we are inclined to think
from all that we have heard and seen, that most
of the various methods resorted to for the in-
crease and protection of the duty, have only
tended to increase the disease, and at the same
time lessen the goodness of the commodity, over
the manufacture of which such a state of teasing
inquisition is professed to be kept Up. During
the last Session, it seems, new and. intricate rules
were' established for shackling this illsfsted trade ;
the effect of which, as far as we have yet been
able to judge of them, can only' be to screw per-
' haps a little more duty from those who' cant be
found to conform to them, but to lessen the
whole of the duty considerably, by shutting up
many malt-houses, and driving the most re-
spectable persons in the trade out of it. This
latter result, re . understand, ha's already, to a
certain degree, been the case ; and when we find
it stated, and not contradicted, that in the greatest
barley market in the kingdom—that of Norwich,
the difference in the quantity of barley sold in a
• (riven period of this year, as compared with the
0
same period of last year, is as between 4,000 to
20,000 quarters ; it cannot fail, we should
imagine, to show the super-refiners upon these
. matters, 'to whose care the late alterations have
been confided, that, by a system of over-regula-
tion, the object they have in view—viz., that of
increasing the duty—seems on the eve of being
reversed. It is Said that no one should object to.
a .tax who is not prepared with a substitute for'
• it ; and it may, by parity of reasoning, be urged,
that no one should object to regulations, such as
those we are adverting to, unless .he has some
better method to propose for. attaining the same
object. Now this we .have ; and it is simply
this, that duty should attach' upon and`, bcpaid on
the barley in the first instance. Nothing would
be simpler than this ; nor can we imagine a
shadow of objection to it, except among those
Who would not like to see such a dirninution of
the army of Excise officers, as this mode of
fixing the duty would occasion. In fact it would
be nothing,more than takingy the, duty upon the
raw material, instead of, as now,
.following it
through all the stages of its manufacturing state.l
Of course the same rate of duty would not do
fora bushel of barleir, which now attaches to a
bushel of malt ; but would, of necessity, be
raised to what the average increase in the Malting
process is. We recommend this idea to the at-
tention of Government, as well as Of the landed
interest;—to the former, as enabling them to
raise this part of the revenue at the least charge,
and with less odium and trouble ; and to the
latter, as insuring them a more ready and exten-
sive sale fer" One of the main-products of the soil.

It would appear that the work of reformation
in Ireland, from Catholicism to Protestantism, is
going on almost altogether in the North of Ire-
land, which is the seat of the linen and cotton
manufactures. We have repeatedly asserted,
that in proportion as the Sco,tch and the English
Sectarian and Church of England people intro-