The Sun.
London, England, 1842-07-11 00:00:00

THE ‘VEA THER.-NOON, JULY 9.

ROYAL GALLERY OF SCIENCE, ADELAIDE-STREET.
Thermometer.— 63 I Highest 64 I Lowest 47
Barometer 29.80.—Wind S.W.

HIGH W ATER AT LONDON BRIDGE THIS DAY.
Morning...—. 51 minutes after 3 i Evening 14 minutes after 4,

All Advertisements of a Disgusting Character,
or Immoral Tendency, are excluded from
the Columns of " The Sun."

legislation is their appropriate cure. The law may re-
medy the evils it causes, but evils not caused 'by enact-
ments are not always to be put down by them.
Our Contemporary was eloquent about the improve-
ment of the criminal code; but the old system of hanging
men fur every kind of offence was the offspring of law,
and it was only necessary to abolish the sanguinary de-
cree to put an end to the infliction of death. So with
the slave-trade and slavery ; both existed under the po-
sitive sanction of the law, and the latter was expressly
supported by the power of the State. The planters
could not have maintained the slaves in obedience with-
out the assistance of the fleets and armies of the mother
country. While it was, therefore, an imperative duty
on the people of England not to countenance
those enormities, it also followed, as a matter
of course, that when they withdrew their sanction and
support, the evils of the slave- trade and of slavery, so far
as British subjects are concerned, whatever else might
come in their place, would also cease. But evils not
caused by the laws may not cease when laws are passed
to put an end to them ; and the best meant law may in-
flict, like the Climbing-boy Act, starvation on those it
was meant to serve.

Admitting that gross evils are connected with the
management of collieries, we cannot believe that the
gentlemen who meet at Westminster, the spawn of gross
corruption, the representatives of class interests, the
advocates of monopoly, the persons who wantonly and
wickedly keep bread from the suffering and starving
people are ever likely, by any measures, to remedy the
evils which the colliers suffer. The condemnation
of women to the drudgery of the coal mines, the
employment of children at most unsuitable ages,
and during a far greater number of hours than
children ought to be employed, are only a part
and symptom of the general degradation to which
the working classes have been doomed by a poli-
tical system, calculated and intended to keep them in a
law and degraded condition. _ _ _

There is— abundant evidence that the colliers do not
wish their wives and children to work in the pits. Their
poverty, and not their will, consents. They submit, like
the feeders on nettles and carrion, to the hard necessity
which the law imposes on them. The true way, there-
fore, to put an end to the system which Lord ASHLEY
deplores, is to abolish the laws which diminish the wages
of labour, and tend to deprive the labourer of the senti-
ments of independence and self-respect. Let gentlemen
who are, in truth, very ignorant of his thoughts, pursuits,
and habits, cease to meddle with him, cease to infringe
on his liberty, cease to plunder him by various legislative
devices, and he will soon learn to respect himself, and
learn, still more than at present, to love and respect his
wife and children. Lord ASHLEY'S Bill will only
add other links to the thrall's chains, and reduce hun-
dreds of persons to the sad condition of claiming relief,
like the climbing boys. We assert for ourselves as
strong a wish to benefit the colliers, whether men,
women, or boys, and to benefit the bulk of our toiling
fellow .countrymen, as any journal in the emiire, and
yet we have opposed and still oppose Lord ASHLEY'S
meddling legislation. It is the offspring of spurious
humanity, seeking public applause, rather than of an
intelligent desire to confer benefit on the people. Let
the Legislature first be just, and then humane.

The Duke of RICHMOND informed the House of Lords
on Friday that a witness called before the Oaths Com-
mittee had refused to give evidence on oath, and he
moved that the witness's reasons for not swearing, and
the questions put to him, should be printed. This wit-
ness was not a member of the Society of Friends, or he
would hare had no difficulty in evading the taking of an
oath. We gather from this, as well as from numerous
difficulties which have lately been thrown in
the way of the administration of justice by the dis-
inclination of witnesses to take oaths, that there is a
growing conviction throughout the religious world, that
the whole system of book-swearing is exceedingly ini-
quitous, and directly contrary to the express command
of the Founder of our holy religion. We rejoica at this.
There is by far too much swearing, and it leads to
the impression that a man cannot open his mouth
without giving utterance to a lie without a book
in his hand. Is any Member of the House of
Commons a jot the more loyal for having taken
the oath of allegiance at its bar ? Is he one iota the
better Protestant for having insulted his Catholic fel-
low-subjects, by swearing not Only that he believes the
Thirity-nine Articles, but that he believes the Mass to
be " idolatrous and damnable ?" Let oaths be retained
for the especial benefit of such persons as feel that they
cannot speak truth without them ; but compel no
man to swear who religiously objects to take an oath.
As to swearing tide-waiters, guagers, and other revenue
officers, it would be quite a farce, but for the awful and
daily mass of perjury to which it gives rise. Oaths
rarely, if ever, bind the consciences of these men. They
are honest in many cases from principle, but we appre-
hend in most by dread of detection, loss of situation, and
certainty of panishment.

The vote of the House of Commons upon Mr. WM,
LACE'S mction vyill fill the working classes of this coun-
try with feelings of dismay and despair. That only
forty-nine Members of that House should be found to
vote for an inquiry into the extent of their sufferings,
proves the little sympathy which is felt in that assembly
for their overwhelming distresses. The Whig and
Tory speakers who voted against the inquiry objected to
the way in which the resolutions were drawn up ; but
they had not the honesty to propose amending them.
Mr. WALLACE, in the most conciliatory spirit, offered to
adopt any amendments proposed upon his resolutions,
but Ministers preferred getting rid of the subject alto-
together, by rejecting them in the lump. A cry of hun-
ger is heard throughout the land—every breeze from
the manufacturing districts wafts upon it the wail of
famine; and yet the Government will neither pledge
itself to relieve it, nor allow corn to be brought in, free
of duty, to feed the starving people. What inheritance
have the starving millions in such a Government ?
Why should they be toiled, and taxed, and coerced, and
manacled for its support ? These are questions which
the people wi ask themselves, and to which their hearts
will give responses but little in accordance with the
sentiments of Sir ROBERT PEEL. The Government is
treading upon dangerous ground. Millions of our fellow-
oountrymen approach the House of Commons and the
Ministers, in the attitude of suppliants—suppliants for
the coarse means of physical existence ; they tell that
House and those Ministers, that they are absolutely
and literally dying of hunger; they implore relief and
permission to exchange their labour for untaxed foreign
wheat, and their prayer is rejected ; in an assembly
of upwards of six hundred legislators, only forty-nine are
fbund to vote for an 'inquiry into the extent of their
wretchedness ! Is it to be supposed that this treatment
will
.not sink deep into their hearts ? They were less
than men if it did not. It will engender sad, bitter,
and terrible feelings, which they will bequeath as an
inheritance to their children. The names of the forty-
nine Members who voted for Mr. WALLACE'S motion
will become household words throughout the land—the
list of them will be found in many a cottage when Sir
ROBERT PEEL'S Government is forgotten, or remem,
bered only for its rejection of the inlayer of millions o:
starving Englishmen.

Two important notices were given on Friday ; the
first by Mr. VILLIERS, to move on Monday next, on
t motion for a Committee of Supply, for a repeal of
the Corn-laws. That is bold and useful policy. On
the 14th July, Lord Howicx is to move for a Com-
mittee of the whole House, with a view to propose
" That it is expedient that wheat imported from
foreign countries shall, until the Ist of March,
1843, be admissible for home consumption, on payment of
a duty not exceeding fourteen shillings a quarter."
These are two excellent notices, the first especially ; and
we trust that Mr. VILLIERS will give way to no per-
suasions, and will as boldly carry his notice into effect
as he has honestly given it. We are sorry to see
indications on the part of the Whigs of a
wish to give a preference to the motion of Lord
HOWICK, and throw overboard that of Mr. VILLIERS.
We must at once tell them that the country will regard
this as a shabby proceeding. The vast distre demands
a great and a bold remedy, and the total repeal of the
Corn-laws will place our trade on a permanent basis ;
while Lord Howicies motion; were it successful, would
continue all the uncertainty which now prevails. The
total repealers must earnestly prefer Mr. VILLIER'S mo-
tion to that of Lord bowies.

We beg to call attention to the petition (a copy of
which will be found in this day's Sun) presented to the
House of Commons en behalf of the claimants for losses
'sustained through the reprisals made by the Danes for
our unjust and unprovoked attack on that State in 1807.
Be it understood that the property of which these un-
offending claimants were despoiled, was not lost in a ease
of war, but in retaliation for the Danish ships, and other
property, seized from Denmark whilst we were profes-
sing to be in a state of friendship with that power, and
by the sale of which Danish property, upwards of a
was paid into the British treasury.
to us to be one of the greatest cases of
Now it sterling
appears
arbitrary power which can be exercised by a Minister,
to deny redress to these claimants, after the repeated
decisions of the House of Commons, and her MAJESTY'S
graciqus answer in their favour. This injustice
seems to be increased when we consider the
ridiculous distinction which has been made in grant-
ing compensation to the owners of such a portion of a
a ship lying

-*%
on the wharf at the time of seizure, and refusing it to
the owners of the other portion which happened to be on
board the ship which was discharging that cargo at the
same wharf, the whole of which, landed and unlanded, was
taken possession of at the same time. It is one thing,
however. to do a pure act of justice to suffering indivi-
duals without power, and to propose the grossest job
where the Minister's influence is concerned.

The French Journals contain nothing but else
tion news. Among the abKurd rumours set afloat
by the Opposition Journal's is one to the effect that
British gold is extensively employed in procuring
the return of Deputies favourable to M. GuiroT I We
have too much to do at home with our gold. There are
sinks of corruption enough in England to swallow up all
the surplus cash of the Tories.

The Madrid and Barcelona Journals come down to the lsi
of this month.

'she accounts from the provinces to the north and south of
Spain► are favourable ; the greatest tranquillity prevails in
those countries.

The 7th Regiment of Infantry, which was to come from
Aragon, and the provincial battalion of Salamanca, being part
of the corps of General Zurbano, were expected from Barcelona.
A letter from Amsterdam, of the, 28th of June, says—
" Great sensation has been excited on 'Change to-day, by a no-
tice given by the house of Hope and Co., which announces
that the coupon of the American stack, which becomes due on
the Ist of July, will not be paid, because the house has re-
ceived nothing to make the payment. On this point there is not
much to soy, because it was foreseen that the funds for the pay-
ment of this coupon would not arrive. But what is
openly blamed, and will probably be the foundation of an action
against Hope and Co. is, that their bankers, having been fur-
nished by the Bank of the United States with a quantity of
effects ( Valeurs) as security for the tenders, have thought
themselves authorised to part with a portion of those securities
in exchange for others. As chance would have it, though the
nominal value has remained the same, it turns out that Messrs.
Hope and Co. have parted with ate most valuable, in exchange
for such as have hardly any value at all. We need not sly that
the holders are furious."— Commerce.
BOURSE—PARIS, THURSDAY, JULY 7.
- -

first Highest Lowest last
Price Price. Prig,. Prier.
French :. per Ccute......« 119 85 ... 120 .., 119 8i ... 119 85
434 per Cents IOS 50 ... 1.8 50 ... 108 50 ... 108 50
4 per Cants. ......
3 per Cents 79 95 IV 95 ... 79 75 ... 79 75
8 ink of klance . 3286 25 ~729.90 ...5256 25 ...5290
Laffitte Bank I,ooof. Shares 1015 —lOl5 ...1015 ...1015
Belgian 5 per Cents.
1840 104% ... 1(5 ... 104% „. 105
Spanish Active 22 22% .•• 23 ..• 22% ... 23
Pa55ive................. 4% ... 4% ••• 4% ... 4%
Neapolitan l(6 ... 1. 5 ... 103 ... .06
R0man...—......-- ...... .. . lO4 ... 104 ... 104 ... 104
RAILWAY SHARES.
st. Germain ......, ..........
Versailles, &IT ~, ~,,
L.B
Rouen
Orleans..... .... ~" 562 50 ... 162 50 ... 562 50 ... 562 50
Strasburg to Bile — 2Ol 25 .., 202 50 ... 201 25 ~. 201 25
BELGIAN kUNDS—BetisarLs, JULY 8.
Actual Debt, 234 per Cent.
Rothschild's Loan 5 per Cent lO2
Loan of Thirty Millions, 4 per Cent. 93
3per Cent.
--- 7114
(1E140) l(3 •
Loan of City, 1932, 4 per Cent RIX
Society of Commerce, 43.iper Cent 8(1
Bank of Belgium, 5 per Cent
76

Thirty.seven.

Natioaal Society -
Exchange on London (short)
—Brussels PaFere, July 8.
AUSTRIAN FUNDS.—VIENNA, JUNE 28
fiveper Ccats.Metalliques
Four percents. len%
Three pn Cents.
Bank Shares
ItIAMBURUH BORSEN HALLE, JULY 5.
Bills. Money.
116

Austrian 5 per Cents.
Bank Shares 1678
Anglo-Russian Loan 10934 109
Russian 5 Der Cent., Ist series, Certificate 1034 103
Inscription, lit series lO3
Russian 5 per Cent. Hope and Co., 3d and 4th
Series 96%
Ditto in Certificates
New 4 per Cent. (18.10) BB3l 88%
Dutch Actual Debt, tt% per Cent
Ditto S per Cent. -
Polish Bonds —
New Tickets l6B
Anglo-Danish Loan, 3 per Cent. 78% . 783 i
Spanish, New 5 per Cents. lB

EXCHANGES ON LONDOF.
HAMBURGH, JULY 5.-13 73i, Two monthsll.3 6.
PETERSBURG, JUNE 24.—Three months, 37% pence.
STOCKHOLM, JUNE 28.—Seventy-five days, 12 6.

PRUSSIAN FUNDS.—BERLIN, JULY 2,
Bills. Money
St. Schuld Sch., 4 per cent. .......... 104% 1041,,,
Prussian English Bond,, 1630, 4 per cent. 1(13% 102%
Exchange on London
Prussian State Gazette, July 3.

ABUSES AT THE CUSTOM HOUSE.—In the month of
March we stated from authority that regulations had
been issued by the Board of Customs for increased
facility and despatch in the passing of passengers' lug-
gage at the London Custom-House ; and that a second
landing waiter was to be appointed to assist in the exa-
mination of the luggage, whose duty was to be confined
to the examination of such of the passengers' luggage
as did not exceed one packet. Now, this announcement
by the Board of Customs was either a direct false-
hood, or their order has been wantonly and shamefully
disobeyed. Yesterday one of the steamers of the Gene-
ral Steam Navigation Company reached London-bridge-
wharf from Boulogne at eleven o'clock, with 102 pas-
sengers, and a vast amount of luggage. A Custom-
house officer was present to see the passengers leave the
vessel, and in several instances he refused to obey the
order just referred to. We make the statement
from personal experience. A passenger, with only
one small packet, containing the necessary arti-
cles of dress for a few days' stay, exhibited it open
for inspection, but though informed that it was the only
luggage the passenger had, the Custom-house officer re-
jectedit, and handed thepacket to one of his colleagues to
be placed among the vast heap of luggage. Remon-
strance was vain—the passenger was obliged to quit the
vessel, and, after waiting for more than hour, and finding
that he would probablylbe compelled to wait four hours
more, he returned on board the vessel, and, at last, suc-
ceeded in obtaining the small packet. The poor travel-
lers, to the number of some sixty or seventy, worn out
with sea-sickness, and want of sleep, were collected to-
gether in a waiting-room, several of them only with
one packet each, and could neither get their luggage
nor the slightest information when they had any chance
for it. Indeed no person connected with the Custom-
house could be seen, except a door-keeper, who
referred them to an insolent lad about sixteen
years of age, and this functionary seemed to take
delight only in displaying his authority. AN
the small luggage could have been cleared in twenty
minutes, and as it was announced by this juvenile
hanger-on at the office that every one must take his
turn, whether the packages were small or great, or
numerous; some of these unfortunate victims must
have been detained at least four hours. Such
conduct is a disgrace to the country. Foreigners
have heard much of the despatch and skill of the
English in almost every department of trade, when
they are left to manage their own concerns ; and here
they find not only insolence, but the most sluggish
and arbitrary system of proceeding, when public
officers are paid, whether they work or not. The
system of bribery under despotic Governments is
infinitely preferable to this: Perhaps one-half of the
passengers would willingly have given money to these
officers only to induce them to do their duty. In France
an officer is specially appointed for the purpose of pass-
ing small packets, whether there are five or fifty, or
whether a passenger has one, two, or three, and
every proceeding is conducted with the utmost
good order and politeness. It may be proper
to add, that the English Custom-house officers,
when remonstrated with, behaved with civility, and
said they were not to blame, but the system, for
there were too few hands. The Board of Cus-
toms, in fact, should be abolished, for whether it is
their fault originally, or the fault of those under them,
it is clear that the whole mode of conducting that de-
partment is radically bad. To crown the scene, passen-
gers, after being thus tormented for hours, had to pay
sixpence for each package, but into whose pocket this
money goes we cannot tell. Why not take a bribe at
once ?

MR. GLADSTONE'S SKILL AT CONVERSION.--The
Right
.Hon. Vice-President of the Board of Trade is a
great master of words. No juggler ever handled his
instruments more dexterously. He has been conspicuous
both as a religious writer and as a political orator, and dis-
covered a conscience for the State after he had lost his
own. In Parliament we have heard him deal with prin-
ciples as if they were his own coin, which he ought to
put out to the most profitable usance. He has no
notion, however, of following them out, except as they
serve his purposes, but others profit by his lessons, who
think it discreditable to follow his example. There ale
thousands who will apply his political principles to,the
trade in corn as well as cattle, and insist that if it is good
to have the latter cheap, it is still better to have
the former both free and cheap. There are hun-
dreds, too, who will follow out his religious prin-
ciples, and, us they must rely on authority and tra-
dition, and on'reason—must, above all things, obey
the Church, they will, as a natural consequence obey the
Church of Rome, in preference to the mongrel Church
which has no higher authority than the base passions of
Henry the Eighth. We are not surprised, knowing Mr.
Gladstone's eloquence, to find some of his first converts
in his own family. The Birmingham Advertiser informs
US Mit the SISTER TO THE VICE-PRESIDENT OF THE
BOARD OF TRADE WAS, ON TUESDAY-WEEK, confirmed
a member of the CATHOLIC CHURCH, in the chapel of
the Nunnery near Birmingham. When will the Right
Honourable Gentleman make his own peace with that
Church? When he has, like his sister, no purpose of
worldly ambition to answer, by professing a nominal
Protestantism.

. THE MARQUIS OF LONDONDERRY.—A new work
is about to make its appearance, which will excite no
less attention in the political and fashionable, than in the
literary circles. It is a narrative of recent travels and
voyages through Germany, Austria, on the Danube,
into Turkey, Greece, the lonian Islands, Italy, Spain,
and Portugal, by the Marquis of Londonderry, G.C.B.
The reputation-the Noble Writer enjoys in the different
Courts of Europe, as "a distinguished diplomatist and
general officer, could not fail to produce for him a very
flattering reception wherever he appeared. We have
beard that the volumes will contain the substance of va-
rious conversations the writer held at Vienna with
Prince Metternich ; also many curious anecdotes of this
and other illustrious characters with whom his Lordship
associated. The Emperor of Austria, Prince Esterhazy,
and the brilliant circle of the Austrian capital, the young
Sultan of Turkey and his principal Ministers, the King
of Greece, and the chief officers of his Government,
&c. &c.

LATHE MACHINERY QlllBBLE.—Compelled reluctantly
to admit that the distress under which the country at
present labours is almost unexampled, the Tories, who
are never at a loss for a sophistry, have discovered that
this alarming state of things, has been brought about by
machinery. " Machinery,: say they—and Sir Robert
Peel, who is the very genius of equivocation, of course
endorses the felkoy—,6 machinery has done it all I" Are

• •
...4 . •,-„;?; . oNV a ?Le.4,
• I t
-:`, ',..,..e....,4,- 2,,,,,,,r. ~..,....-z,,44,;-.04 --, . --,.,,,,,t11,0). • , •,c,.:.,,,,,,,, -
4
---1-,40-,,,,,j:5..' -,,,,:....*,114111 .4ZI, re, •-t- - %.• , --r-, '
-A-, -
c-....--i., -',
.4.,,A....-,:r,.. : , m . ~--L•t!I -
- - -...,:k..: :,,---.7,--•.-% • '