The Sun.
London, England, 1842-10-14 00:00:00

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS.

FROM THE EVENING PAPES OF THIS DAY.

GLOBE.—That the article upon " The Last
Session" in the newly-published number of the
Edinburgh Review, should have sorely disquieted
the heads of the Tory party, will excite no sur-
prise in those who have carefully read and pon-
dered its facts and arguments. The policy of the
late Ministry is therein not merely vindicated
from the imputations so plentifully cast upon
it by the Tories—the opposition which it
encountered in Parliament, and the mis-
representation and calumnies with which
it was daily assailed by the Tory press, are
not merely shown to have originated in faction,
and to have been sustained and impelled by rest-
less selfishness hungering for office, but the con-
duct of the then Opposition is made to recoil
upon itself now that it constitutes the Govern-
ment. The triumph of the late Administration
.was not complete when it laid its free-trade
programme upon the table of Parliament, and
provoked the hostility of the monopolies, before
which it fell. That was the cause and the mo-
ment of its humiliation. Had nothinc, more
been done, there would at least, have been the.
embodied views of the Whig Cabinet on com-
mercial and fiscal policy to have been appealed
to, as a rallying-point, for the advocates
-of free-trade, which they might have advantage-
ously contrasted with the plans of a monopoly-
conserving Government. This would have been
worth something. It would have been an enduring
and honourable monument to the Melbourne Mi-
nistry; the presence of which would have inspired
apprehensions in the class-interests of an early
• resurrection to life and vigour of those princi-
tles which were embodied in its plans, and which
hey fondly hoped they had crushed by the de-
feat, and had buried in the tomb of the Govern-
ment with which they originated. The Trea-
sury-bench became, it is true, the seat of
a different set of men, who obtained posses-
sion of it by promises to govern upon prin-
ciples far different to those whom they dis-
placed. But the delusion was short lived.
The very first Budget of the new Government
proclaimed the dishonesty of its authors. By
adopting the leadiug features of the system of
the Ministers whom they had " pushed from
their stools," they convicted themselves of dis-
honesty—provoked the indignation of the classes
they had so egregiously deluded and deceived
—r rid pronounced the best imaginable eulogy
on the Government they had incessantly assailed
and opposed, on the ground of the very mea-
sures the principles of which they had adopted
as the bases of their own. To enable him to
carry out his grand scheme of fiscal revision and
modification, Sir Robert Peel was indebted to
the very men whom he had supplanted ; and but
for whose generous interposition, at the crisis of
his !lite, he would have been defeated and dis-
-placed, by means of a powerful section of mal -
contents in his own ranks. Then was the moral
triumph of the Whig Government complete.
Never in the history of party was there a more
gratifying spectacle than that which the House
of Commons exhibited on the occasion so well
remembered. The loss of office was, as it well
might be, forgotten by the Whim leaders.
STANDARD.—With pain, but without hesi-
tation, we lay before our readers the following
extract, from a hurried letter written on the 27th
of August at Bombay, by Major Messiter, of the
28th Regiment :

" Bombay, August 27, 1842.
* 'l:*

" The Colonel is going away in command of a bri-
gade. I therefore fall into the command of the regi-
ment. We take the field immediately. Most disas-
trous news [have] arrived [from] the interior. The
41st cut to pieces."
[A reference to some private affairs follows.]
" Yours, &c.,
" JOHN MESSITER."
There is no doubt of the authenticity of this
letter, and it is certain that the writer, well-
known as a gallant, experienced, and able Officer,
would not make such a communication without a
full conviction of its truth. As this is, however,
the only statement upon the subject that has
reached Europe, it is necessary to weigh carefully
the probabilities on both sides. And first, we
will take the considerations favourable to the
conclusions which we should least wish to find
verified. The character of Major Messiter, of
which we have already spoken, has great
weight ; and there is nothing of what is
known of the state of the compaign in Can-
dahar to raise any violent presumption
against the correctness of his melancholy.
statement. A letter from the scene of that cam-
' paign, which we have copied from this morning's
Times, and which 'we find perfectly accordant
with the accounts in the Indian journals, shows
how dreadfully the British force in Candahar is
over-matched, and what frightful difficulties it
has hitherto had to encounter. We see, too,
by a letter of July 29, in the Indian papers,
that the 41st was exposed to peculiar dan-
ger. This letter says that her Majesty's 41st,
the 25th Bombay Native Infantry, some com-
panies of light battalions, three or four of the
Shah's regiments, a troop of his Horse Artillery,
two companies of Bengal Foot Artillery, and
some Poonahs, were appointed to escort the bat-
tering train to Quettah—a service, the diffiulty
and hazard of which in such a country must
be extreme. To these considerations we must
add, that Major Messiter, being about to take an
important command; might naturally be entrusted
with a knowledge of facts which the authorities
would wish to withhold from the public as long as
possible. These are the probabilities on the one
side. Now let us with equal fairness state the
probabilities on the other. The Bombay journals
of the 27th of August, the date, of Major
Messiter's letter, are wholly silent, not only as
to the disaster spoken of, but as to any im-
mediate probability of such a disaster; and it
has not hitherto happened that the Indian
press has, with respect to information, been
in arrear of the Government. Again, no
information to confirm Major Messiter's state-
ment has reached the Horse Guards, the India
House, or any of the offices of Government.
Now, these facts, taken together, afford an im-
portant inference. If Major Messiter had
authentic information of an event of, which the
public of Bombay were ignorant—as the silence
of the journals proves they were—he must have
had it through an official channel ; but it is
incredible that what was officially known at
Bombay, before the departure of the mail,
should not be officially communicated to the de-
partments of the Home Government, especially
when the matter was of such momentous
interest—of such importance indeed to the
safety of the Indian empire. Major Messitcr's
position too, was such, as to expose him to be
easily misled : he had but just arrived, probably.
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the events of last wint: as to
the 41st with the 44th, Candahar with Cau-
bul, and to allude in his letter to the de-
struction of Elphinstone's army, still lie was
in circumstances to be very easily imposed
upon by any fabricated or exaggerated story ; he
had but just landed—he fbund his Colonel re-
moved suddenly for a service in the interior, and
himself summoned to • follow in the same rapid
manner. This looked like some extraordinary
emergency—ingenuity would be busy in surmis-
ing what the emergency was; and we all know
how soon, in such matters, loose surmise settles
into grave assertion. The seeming probability,
itself, that the escort of the battering train to
Quettah might be seriously attacked, would sug-
gest the defeat of that escort as the cause of
the hasty movement—it is a rule in weigh-
ing evidence to consider the probability of an
event as injurious to the credit of any unsup-
ported statement of its occurrence—and thus the
story might have easily obtained credit with
Major Messiter, to the extent of permitting him
to communicate it in a private letter. At the
'Horse Guards returns from the 41st have been
received to the Ist of July. The last advices
which represent the 41st as detached from the
main army on the way to Quettali, are of the
29th July.

SECONDARIES.—(THIS DAY.)
(Before Mr. Secondary JAMES.)
JEPPS V. MILBOURNE.
This was an action brought by the plaintiff, who
a house• agent, against the defendant, who is a house
proprietor, to recover 71. 103. commission, for having
disposed of certain houses for the defendant. It ap-
peared from evidence that the defendant had employed
plaintiff, who had advertised the houses in question
for sale, and had entered into negotiations with a gen-
tleman named Ford, for t;:e purpose of disposing of
them ; those negotiations were broken off, and about
1
a fortnight afterwards Mr. Ford saw an advertisement
for the disposal of the same houses from Messrs. Mills
and Co., house-agents. Ile accordingly applied to
them,_ and in consequence of the latter advertisement
purchased the houses. Mr. Jepps claimed the coin-
, mission on the ground of an undertaking which he
Milbourne had given to him to pay
IN'hen ever the houses in question should be dis-
posed Mr.of, whether through his instrumentality or not.
hsaimid
TTI
undertaking was produced. It was
book belonging to Mr. Jepps over a re-
ceipt given alleged
-aio him by Mr. Melboime for a sum of
24which was made one document, with-the
s. rent ,
by
making the latter conclude with the