The Sun.
London, England, 1827-11-21 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

The blustering and malignant blunderer who
volunteered an article in a morning paper of yes-.
terday on the feelings of Ministers with regard
to the late battle, has uttered as many misstate-
ments as he has risked assertions. It is not true
that public opinion has declared itself against
the battle of Navarin, as an act of violence and
aggression ; but, on the contrary, it is univer-
sally regarded as an event as unavoidable as it
was professionally glorious. It is not true that
a shadow of difference has arisen among the
Bing's Ministers as to the causes, the conduct,
or the consequences of that battle, or on the
-propriety of honouring and rewarding the officers
who achieved the victory. It is not true, but a
most iniquitOtts and disgraceful calumny, to al-
lege that the despatches of Sir Edward Codring-
ton were garbled, or in contradiction'to the log-
books of his fleet,—that any part of them was
" erased, lopped, or altered, with the concuir-
rence of Ministers." These are positive denials
of peremptory allegations, let the writer of the
article in the morning paper substantiate any one
of his " facts," if he can ! The question is
now fairly at issue, and with it the character of
the individual who raised it. We may add to
the list Of mis-statements, the rumour which is
reported to have prevailed in the city yesterday,
that Sir Edward Codringtoit is to be super-
seded. So far from it, that his Royal High-
ness the Lord High Admiral has added
to the distinctions already bestowed upon
that gallant Admiral, in recompense for his
noble intrepidity and skill, by surrendering
his own patronage to Sir Edward, and leaving it
to the gallant officer to fill the vacancies .occa-
sioned by the action, from the successor to Capt,
Bathurst downwards ; that is, Sir Edward has at
his disposal the appointments of a Post Captain,
of a Commander, and of a Lieutenant, to be
distributed as he shall determine, according to
his own knowledge of the merits of the indivi,
duals who served under him. This proceeding
is no less liberal iii itself than decisive of the
feeling of every part of the Government as. to
the conduct of this excellent officer.—Times..

We have fulfilled our promise to a Corre-
spondent signing himself" Africanus," by pub-
lishing his letter on the two subjects of Sir Neil
Canipbell, and of Sierra Leone. In noticing
the death of the late Governor of that pestilen-
tial colony, we felt it a duty to truth and to the
own
knowledge to state what we knew of our
knowledge respecting him—lst. That he was a
most intrepid and zealous officer. 2d. That he
was a gentleman of a kind and excellent heart.
That the anger of this correspondent " Afri-
canus" has been moved in no small degree, by
the article wherein we declared our sentiments of
Sir Neil Campbell as a soldier and a gentleman,
is sufficiently obvious without our taking the
trouble to point it out. He begins his address
to us by observing, that our " panegyric upon
the character of Sir Neil Campbell affords a
striking proof of the little dependence that can be
placed on newspaper authority in such cases."
And how does this writer bring put his proof of
the fallacy with which he charges us ? He talks
of Sir Neil Campbell—whether truly or falsely
we are indeed quite ignorant—as " being vio-
lent and arbitrary in his conduct ever since he
entered on his official duties " at Sierra Leone.
Now, as we had not said or hinted a single word
about the public conduct of the late Governor,
but merely praised his private and professional
qualities,—how, we should like to ask, does the
writer justify the unmannerly sentence with which
he has commenced his letter ? Has he ventured
to say that Sir Neil Campbell was not brave, or
not warm-hearted and holiest ?—that he was not
formidable to his enemies, or dear to his friends ?
for these were the only points of his character
which we had touched upon. By no means. He
gives us an extract from a communication written
by a mercantile correspondent' of his ewn, where
the Governor's qfficial conduct towards military
and civil officers, and towards the merchants
also, is abused by the lump as harassing and •
ruinous to the colony ; and this is to be the
ground of an attack on our veracity for uphold-
ing his personal good name. If the writer had
ever received a lesson in the Court of Chancery,
he must have known that such an " answer" to
our bill would have been dismissed at once as
" impertinent." But we have reason to believe
that the true gravamen of the case in the eyes
of this gentleman is, our strenuous remonstrance
with the Government on the cruelty of retaining
at all these murderous colonies on the Western
Coast of Africa. We lamented the extravagant
cost of these charnel-houses—the enormous loss
of brave men's lives which they entail every pass-
ing year upon Great Britain—their absolute inef-
ficacy as schools of civilization for the Negroes
—and their utter worthlessness in every point of
view, as -ompared with the blood and treasure of
which they require the sacrifice ; and how does
" Africanus" meet these arguments ? " Afri-
canus," who, notwithstanding his assumed name,

takes care to keep himself in a temperate atmos-
phere and a sound skin at home, while he insists
on exposing the unfortunate army and navy of
the empire to almost inevitable destruction for
the sake 'of his lucrative traffic. Does he deny
any one of our assertions on the subject of Sierra
Leonel—that the officers and soldiers, the regi-
ment Sand ship's companies, die offlike rotten sheep
under the wild -fire pestilence of that intolerable cli-
mate ? Does he deny that the odious slave-
trade flourishes along the coast, in spite and in
derision of the British Government ?—or that
the Negroes of this surrounding country are as
barbarous as an?'iAlier Negroes ?—or that the
expense which the trldon submits to annually,
and for which it i jceiv es no shadow of advan-
tage, is so much positive waste of treasure, as
the shocking mortality of our poor countrymen
is so much gratuitous expenditure of life ? Not
one of these facts has ,the Sierra Leone merchant
or agent attempted hn invalidate ; but, in the
same spirit which led him to accuse us indirectly
of falsehood, when we did bare . justice to one of
the many victims who had perished there, he in-
sinuates that we have been the dupes of a cor-
ruption by which other journalists have been
enriched and disgraced, because our opinion has
been given broadly upon the true nature and
value of the settlements in the West of Africa.

----
" As to your remarks," says his letter, " on the
settlement of Sierra Leone, I am not surprised
at them, considering the pains that have been
taken by the partisans of the West India slave-
owners to raise aprejudice against the place," (!)
" in which they have at length succeeded to an
extent that must be highly gratifying to their
patrons, and which must entitle them to addi-
tional reward and favour at their hands."—
" Africanus" may fancy that there is force or
severity in 'such insinuations as these; but we
can assure him that they are nothing better than
contemptible. Ministers have acted wisely in
withdrawing from
Cape Coast Castle : they will
act more wisely in abandoning the whole African
coast, inasmuch as the lives of thousands of

Englishmen are worthier the paternal care of
Government than the profits of a few merchants
and the salaries of their clerks.—lbid.
• •
A contemporary (the Globe) observed very
happily the other day, with reference to the Re-
pbrt of some Irish Meeting, that hi geni4ne
oratory it was impossible to know whether any
matter was trifling or important. Mr. Fox gave
.an equally happy account of oratory, when, on
hearing a speech extolled which had been de-
livered on the previous evening, lie asked if the
report of it read well; because, he subjoined, if
it read well, it must infallibly have been a bad
speech. Eloquence addresses itself to the feel-
ings, and the imagination—its business is to ex-
aggerate and distort ; and it tails where it does
not produce a sort of mental intoxication, under
which the, exercise of the reasoning powers be-
comes impossible. The prejudiced and the ig-
norant—those' who love the marvellous, are the
fittest subjects for eloquence to operate' on ; and
hence, the lower the audience the finer the field
lot the orator. We would not, like Plato, banish
orators from our commonwealth ; but we would
make their trade not worth the following, by dif-
fusing education, and accustoming the people,
as much as possible, to those processes which
break the orator's spell. We will venture to say,
that an old Judge, whose feelings arc worn out,
but whose intellect is still vigorous, looking
knowingly in an orator's face, would soon dry Up •
the source of his eloquence. We have been led
to make these observations, from the annoyance
we feel at the flourishing state of oratory in Ire-
land, and a consideration of the mischievous ef-
fects produced in that country by the constant
appeals to the passions, prejudice, and ignorance
of a susceptible people, by its public speakers.
If there be one point in politics better established
than another, it is the tendency of the popula-
tion of a country to increase till 'it reach the ex-
treme limit bof the means of subsistence. To this
tendency we owe the rapidity with which new
countries are peopled. Ezra Stiles, in a sermon
preached before a Convention of the Clergy, at
Bristol, in Rhode Island, in 1760, tells us :

" Four thousand British Planters settled in New Eng-
land, and in 120 years their posterity are increased to
500,000 souls. . . .

" There are at this present year in New England—
Episcopalians 11:600
. Quakers 16,000
Baptists 22,000
Congregationalists 440,000
This is one of many instances which we have
of the rapidity with which our species multiply
when the means of subsistence are abundant. It
is clear that this power cannot be exercised, in
all its extent, for any length of time in any given
territory ; otherwise, as is very happily observed
by an Italian writer, the world could not oontain
the inhabitants propagated since the flood, even
if they were packed as close as herrings in a bar 7
rel. How absurd is it then to hold out to the
Irish people that a country can never have too many
inhabitants, and that all attempts to inculcate pru-
dence in entering on marriage are .impious !
Yet thiswild and mischievous doctrine is address 7
ed every day to the people, to whom of all others
it ought not to be addressed, by the Irish orators !
We confess we were surprised that the acute and
well informed Editor of the. Dublin Evening
Post, whose disposition to analyse ought to have
secured him against lapses of such a nature,
should have questioned the reality of the ten-
dency of population to increase beyond the limits
of subsistence, and referred us to the Netherlandu
and Tuscany for a refutation. With respect to
the Netherlands, we can °lily say, that We possess.
Mendicity Reports which exhibit a number of
poor greater than is to be found in the worst
parts of England. In East Flanders, of which
the population is a little above 600,000, the poor
receiving aid amounted to nearly 70,000 ; and
as the causes of this poverty are assigned, as for
instance, orphanage, misconduct, accidents, old
age, excessive families, &c., we find that the
cause of poverty, in 60 out of every 100, is
excessive families—that is, a number df children
greater than can Ile supported by the wages of
the , labourer. With respect to Tuscany, we
showed the other day, by comparing a return.
two hundred years ago with one in the present.
day, that the population was stationary. On
looking into a very instructive volume, published
in 1801 i by M. Sismondi, who there calls him- .
self Simonde, on the agriculture of Tuscany,
where he was himself an agriculturist for many
years, we find an explanation of the cause of the
stationary state of the population. ," We
may almost count (he says), among the
domestics of the house, not merely the sons
and daughters, but also the brothers and sisters
of him who is the head.of it. Nothing is more
natural than to see the former subject to the pa-
ternal authority, coMpensating by their labour for
the fatigues and expence which their edtteation
haS caused to their parents ; but on the death of
the father, it is impossible not to be astonished
at seeing the oldest of the family become the
master, keep the purse, without rendering any
account to his brothers, dispose of their labour
and of its fruits without consulting them, feed
them and clothe them without ever giving them
any money ; and yet all these brothers live oil
the best terms, without complaining of a distri-
bution which appears so singular, and without
even envying the lot of their elder brother. I
shall.long bear in remembrance a family of pea-
sants in the environs of Pescia, composed of four
brothers and their children, in all twenty-two
Men and eight women, all married, or of an age
to Be married, who lived in perfect harmony on
their common purse, and whom their very great
fortune bad never been able to disunite. It is
rare, however, to see so many women under the
same roof; because, unless the possessor requires
a great number Cif hands, the eldest alone of the
family marries, and the father and mother would
be very much displeased if another of their sons,
by taking a wife, were to deprive the heir of
the house of the hopes which he might
found on his uncles. A lady of my ae-
.quaintance, speaking in praise of a female
peasant of the neighbourhood, said never was
there a wife more generous, or a mother more
kind, more tender and devoted td the interests
of her family ; undoubtedly, she added, if her
second son were to many, she would die of
chagrin. Why ? I asked with astonishment.
What ! do not you know, she replied, that he
is born the heritage of the elder ?" So much
for confident appeals to countries, without know-
ing anything of their domestic economy. But
these peasants have not the misfortune of living
under a heartless Aristocracy. The same family
has lived on the same little famfor a series of
generations. No brute in human shape in that
country coolly talks of his right to drive the
people from his estate, and the hardship of being
obliged to give anything to the. assistance of
those whom he has detruded, and thrown with-
, out resources on the world, as the law enables
him to sentence them to annihilation. The con-
duct of the landlords of those parts of this Em-
pire, where the poor laws do not compel the
higher orders to look, into the condition of the

lower, has always- excited horror in the rest of
Europe. Niebuhr, in the second volume of the
first edition of his Roman History, observes in
a note—" In the Highlands of Scotland, the in-
! habitants of many villages have, been forced to
emigrate, because the landlords_ found sheep cul-
tivation more profitable : eleven hundred went
from one estate to Canada. Woe to a nation,
when the old feudal pride having become extinct,
and yielded to the love of gain, all is.considered
only as a speculation ; love and the attachment
inherited from generation to generation have no
longer any attraction, and estates become the
property of every Jew—if in such a case the re- .
lations between the peasant and the laridlord, and
his possession, are not firmly .secured to him.
A beggarly liberty will not be of much avail to
him." But what would this celebrated historian
say, were he to hear the landlords of a country
coolly calculating on the destruction of two mil-
lions of human beings, to make it comfortable to
themselves, and proposing the abandonment of it
to military execution, if plague and famine did
not anticipate the sword ? Poor Laws, with
Laws of Settlement, will alone secure the lower
orders from the caprice of cold-blooded aristo-
cratical tyrants. This was the opinion of Lord'
Liverpool, and every page of the domestic his-
tory of England proves the'wisdom of giving the
people a local habitation, and of throwing the
responsibility, of regulating their numbers on
those who are legally bound to support them.
Half savages, like the lower Irish or Scotch
Highlanders, cannot be expected to act with the
prudence'of the highly civilized Tuscan peasant ;
but were the higher orders responsible for their
support, it would be their' interest to attend to
their improvement. The misery of the labourers !
of England began with. the violation of the Laws
of Settlement, and the introduction of the paying
wages out of Poor Rates, one of the many evils
which we owe to Pitt, who caught the alarm of
Dr. Price, that the population was diminishing.
If the land of Ireland be made liable for the poor
of that country, as justice and humanity demand,
and the Law of Settlement be restored to what
it was, we shall soon cease to hear of a surplus
population. We will trust the Landholders
with the inculcation of sound views, when their
own subsistence depends on it.--Morning
Chronicle.

The opinion.is fast gaining ground in the City
that his Majesty's Ministers are far from approv-
ing the conduct of Sir Edward Codrington, re-
lathe to the attack upon, and the destruction of,
the Egyptian fleet.. A correspondent in the
Morning Herald has stated this to be the fact,
and he is borne out in his assertion by an Even-
ing Paper of yesterday, which is known to be in
the confidence of Ministers. The paper alluded
to says—" We have reason to believe, that,
with every admiration of the gallantry and
skill exhibited by Sir Edward Codrington in
the -destruction of the Turkish fleet, his Ma-
jesty's Ministers, on the scanty ilformation
they possess of the circumstances which led
to actual hostilities, will not entirely approve of
the gallant Admiral's proceedings until they re-
ceive from him some further information and
explanation, to obtain which a distinguished
Officer, of high naval rank, will proceed forth-
with to his flag-ship." This statement, which
comes from a paper of much greater character
than the old Evening Ministerial hack, is re-
markably corroborated by the conduct of the
French Government, who, it will be recollected,
have not approved, in any way, of the conduct
of their Admiral. Indeed the French Papers
openly declare that De Rigny has acted contrary
to the wishes of the Ministers. The greater part
of the English would-be-ministerial papers ap-
pear to us to have made sad work in their defence
of the battle of Navarin. A Moining contem-
porary, writing upon this subject, observes, that
" men give starting room to deer, but not to
wolves;" of course meaning thereby, that Admi-
ral Codrington has done right in . considering
and treating the Turks as beasts of prey. With-,
out stopping to inquire whether these people
ought to be so considered or so treated,, it will
be sufficient for our purpose to observe, that
our Government has never (unless we consider
the late battle an exception) so considered or
so treated them. Nay, so far from this be-
ing the case, it is quite clear that in the docu-
ment called the Greek treaty, and throughout
the whole of the subsequent negotiations,
the Allied Powers have expressed the greatest
concern for their interests, and have over and
over again declared that they feel an " in-
violable friendship" for them. In the second
note presented by the three Ambassadors, on
the positive refusal of the Sultan to accept the
intervention, we find these Ministers thus ex-
pressing the sentiments of their respective Go-
vernments. They declare that whatever mea-
sures they may.find it necessary to take to, en-
force the armistice, their Governments are de-
termined, that they shall not be of such a nature
as in any manner to interrupt the friendly rela-
tions which subsist between the high Allied
Powers and the Sublime Porte, and that, the
Sublime Porte will find in those measures a
fresh proof of the inviolable friendship and re-
gard which they feel for his Highness. Such
is the substance of the note which, according to
the Austrian Observer, was presented to the
Reis Effendi on the Ist of September ; and yet,
in little more than a month, these same high
Allied Powers attack and destroy the fleet of
their dear friend, consisting of more than one
hundred and fifty ships, and containing more
than five thousand souls, the greater part of
whom fell in the battle. Now, though it may
be sometimes expedient to treat men, according
to our contemporary, as beasts of prey, yet we
apprehend it never can be just to lead such men
to believe, when we intend thus to treat them,
'that we have the highest regard and respect for
'them. For our parts, we have no doubt that
'the Government, notwithstanding what some of
their scribes may say to the contrary, are heartily
sorry for what has occurred, and that they will
use their best endeavour to repair the mischief.
Indeed it is confidently reported that Admiral
Sir John Gore, who left town for Malta yester-
day, accompanied by Lord Ingestrie and a [Vb.
Codrington, is gone out to supersede Sir Ed-
ard Codrington, and not, as the Ministerial Paper before alluded to asserts, to obtain further
information relative to the battle of Navarin.—
r6rning Herald.
The Ministerial Papers take upon them, una
ce, to contradict the statement which, from the
4ery best authority, we were yesterday enabled to
lay before the public. To these contradictions
+e reply, in the first place, by re-affirming all
t e important particulars of our statement:
;t is true that Ministers have been thrown into
sprious agitation and alarm by the manner in
vthich the good sense of the people of England
has led them to receive the accounts of the battle
of Navarin. It is true that the consequences of
this victory have been dissentions among our
Wading rulers, which the examination of Lord
• ,

Ingcstrie has not teided to moderate. It is true
that a difference of epiuion prevailed, and pre-
vails still, in the Calinet, as to the expediency of
conferring, withoih' further information, any
mark of Royal fa/our upon Sir E. Codringt6,
It is true that the despatch, as published in the
Gazette, contains s, representation of the circum-
stances immediately leading to the battle, which
is not in accordance with the log-books of the
different vessels of the squadron. And lastly; it
is true that the Gazette does not contain the
despatch as it actually arrived in England, with-
out erasure or ►mutilation. These are:. the facts
which we stated yesterday ; and from the au-
thentic source whence they were derived, we can
now have no hesitation in repeating, with tl►e
utmost confidence, that the seve►al statements
Are substantially correct. Our assertions are
strongly corroborated indeed by the confessions
we have extorted from the most respectable and
best informed of the Evening Ministerial Jou-
nals. The SUN would willingly be thought to
contradict us. The value of its contradiction
may be estimated, however, by the following
article, to which it assigns a leadi►ig place in its
columns, and which it professes to have written
before our statement had attracted its notice :

" Our rea7lers may have observed that we have cau-
tiously abstained from entering into the discussions which
our cotemporaries have indulged in on the propriety of the
measures pursued by the Admirals of the Allied squadrons,
which brought on the action terminating in the destruc-
tion of the Turkish and Egyptian fleets. We considered
that it would be indelicate to snake any allusions on this
subject, at the moment when the skill and gallantry of the
.Commander-in-Chief of our squadron, and that of -the
Officers under his orders, had received honourable marks
of their Sovereign's approbation, and when his Majesty's
Ministers were weighing and considering all the circum-
stances under which Sir Edward Codrington had adopted
a course which could hardly fail to lead to the result which
actually ensued. The time, however, is now arrived when,
without impropriety, we may say, we have reason to be-
lieve that, with every admiration of the gallantry and skill
exhibited by Sir E. Codrington in the destruction of the
Turkish fleet, his Majesty's Ministers, on the scanty infor-
mation they possess of the circumstances which led to ac-
tual hostilities, will not entirely approve of the Gallant
Admiral's proceedings, until they receive from him some
further information and explanation, to obtain which, a
distinguished Officer of high naval rank will proceed forth-
with to his flag ship."
So that, according to our contemporary, who
expressly contradicts our assertion of there having
existed a difference of opinion upon the subject
of the honour bestowed upon Sir E. Codring-
ton, among the Members of Administration, this
extraordinary body is perfectly unanimous—first,
in conferring these honours upon Sir Edward—
and secondly, in sending a distinguished Officer,
of high naval rank to his flag-ship, in order to
ascertain whether he had really merited reward
or punishment. The Officer of high rank here
alluded to (Sir John Gore, K. C. B.), it will be
seen by a paragraph in another part of our Paper,
departed yesterday on his important mission, ac-
companied by the son of Admiral Codrington.
—Another Evening Ministerial Journal, dis-;
anguished only for its ignorance and its
vulgarity, and which has of late lost all
the respectability it formerly possessed, pre-'
sumes to contradict our statement upon
pretended information, that " Admiral Codring-
ton's despatch was printed in the Gazette, ver-
batim et literati;n, as it was received in Eng-
land !" Of the . value and importance of
this ilformatipn, we were enabled to judge,
when, in referring. to the Gazette itself,
we found that what .it professed to publish
were not merely copies, but extracts also
from the dispatches of the gallant Admiral.
We cannot, of course, attempt after this to esta-
blish the accuracy of our own intelligence, in
opposition to that of so well-informed an assailant.
The facts are as we have stated them. And in
what a disgraceful and
Government
deplorablend
of condition
England d
they place the actual
The flagrant. injustice and gross impolicy of the
Treaty of Intervention • are unquestionably the'
chief cause of all the. embarrassment, and con-
fusion, and calamity., which have ensued'. Clear
instructions to avoid injustice would have mili-
tated against the spirit and objects of the Treaty.
land would in effect have placed England in op-
position to Russia. Clear instructions to com-
mit injustice Government had not the courage
to give. 'Thus Admiral Codrington has been
left, without any precise instructions, to govern
himself according to his own view and that of
the Admirals acting in 'conjunction with him, of
what the Treaty permitted and required in any
circumstances which might arise ; and Govern-
ment is left in the deplorable and humiliating
predicament of not knowing whether to avow or
disavow, to censure or to praise him, for the ex-
ploit he has atehieyed.—Morning Post.

Our readers will find, in another part of our
Paper of to-day, an account of a highly interest-
ing Meeting of the Shareholders of the far-
famed Thames Tunnel. We are exceedingly
highly gratified to find, in the first place, that so
small a sum, comparatively speaking, is necessary
to complete that stupendous undertaking; and,
in the second place, that the Shareholders are so
unanimous in wishing for its completion. The
whole sum that will be required to carry the
Tunnel to Wapping is, estimated at seventy-
eight thousand pounds ; and from this there is a
well-grounded expectation that considerable de-
ductions will be made. The approaches on
each side will require about sixty thousand
pounds more ; so that the whole work will only
cost about three hundred thousand pounds, not
more than a fourth part of the cost of Waterloo-
bridge, which is the only thing in England,
we might say in the world, that can look to
rival it as a monument of genius and
art. The damage sustained by the bursting in of
the water has cost less to repair it than we
could have possibly expected. Twelve thousand
pounds were found sufficient ; a large sum no
doubt, but trifling when compared to the magni-
tude of the evil and its anticipated consequences.
From this it will appear, that had no such unto-
ward accident happened, the call for a sum very
little less than what is now asked must have been
made in a very short time. We most ardently
hope that no second mishap will occur to damp
the hopes of its most ingenious and able projec-
tor, but that he will see the labour of his hands
prosper until he lay the top stone of it with joy.
We look on it with the same intensity of interest
with which we survey every plan and project
which is calculated to raise the character and
enhance the reputation of Englishmen. Whether
it pay the shareholders may be questionable,
though even on that head there seems no room
for despundency ; but that it will do honour to
the country of which they are children is indu-
bitable.—New Times.

We hear that it is intended to establish a Lite-
rary and Philosophical Society in this city.—Carlisle
Patriot.

PENIBROKESIIIRE HUNT MEETING.—This
annual scene of gaiety and festivity commenced on Monday,
the sth of November, under the most favourable auspices ;
the weather continued during the whole week to be every
thing which could be wished fur, and the sports of the field
Were great beyond any former example.--Cambrian.

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