The Sun.
London, England, 1842-03-01 00:00:00

emit _Suitt

LONDON!
TUESDAY MORNING, MARCH 1, 1842.

The Tory Journals and the landlords seem much
disposed to encourage the boisterous attacks of Mr,
FERRAND on the manufacturers. They may not act
in alliance with the anti-capitalists, but they will
effectually serve their purpose. In 1837, and subse-
quently, the mill-owners:and the demagogues were at
open enmity—they have never yet been reconciled.
Mr. FERRAND is said to receive instructions from Mr.
OASTLER ; thus the encouragement he receives from
the landowners and the Tories may be considered a
branch of the general alliance between them and the
mob. It Will tend to the same end. Should the mills
of the capitalists be injured or destroyed by such an
agency, will the roof tree of the landlord's mansion be
more secure ?

A more vulnerable race of men does not exist, and
though bullying in Parliament may not be retorted
on them, it ill becomes those who live in glass houses
to make it a pastime to throw stones. A brazen-
faced, large-lunged, impudent young man may yet
be found on the side of the manufacturers who will
rise in the House of Commons and read anonymous
letters, charging some landlords with turning the
poor out of their homes, and pulling their cot-
tages down about their ears. lie may pourtray aged
men and helpless infancy, perishing on the wide moor
or in the deep ditch, and ring it into the landlords'
ears, " Behold your work." He may astound the
country by tracing an agricultural labourer from his
first rising at dawn to his retirement at dark, toiling
the whole of the intervening period amidst the morn-
ing frosts and the mid-day heat, and creeping home
exhausted as the night-dew begins to fall. He
may easily draw a picture of such a man, bent and
decrepid, and the prey of chronic rheumatism, before
he has reached what is the prime of life for
a well-fed artisan. He may show that for all this
sacrifice the wretched peasant gets from 7s. to 10s.
a week, that he has neither a sufficiency food nor
half enough clothing, and at the premature close of
his painful and degraded career he fancies himself
tolerably well off to find an abode for the wretched
remnant of his days in a new Poor-lag Bastile. He

The news from the East is too limited to call for
an expression of either congratulation or regret.
From China the accounts are but to the Ist of De-
cember—five days later than the intelligence
brought by the last Overland Mail. Of course the
opportunities which occurred in so short a period
of judging of the impression which the cap-
ture of Ningpo and Amoy, and the re-occu-
pation of Chusan, would make upon the Celestial
Government, were too few to furnish matter for de-
cided political inferences. All that was observed
was, that the great Mandarins along the coast
manifested no disposition to treat with the
officers of the expedition, nor were the common
people so friendly and communicative to the
northward, as in the vicinity of Hong Kong. Cap-
tain SMITH of the Druid, who had been left with two
vessels and 600 men at Amoy, was apprehensive of
being attacked by a powerful and overwhelming
Chinese army, and had written to Sir H. POTTINGER
for reinforcements. There was a report, but nothing
more, that despatches from the Emperor of a pacific
character were addressed to the British Plenipo-
teniary. According to the current rumour they con-
tained an offer of indemnity for the opium, and a
considerable extension of the privileges of trading
with China.

The Indian Government seems determined to carry
on the Chinese war with vigour. Sixteen transports
of 11,000 tons burden, were ready to sail from Cal-
cutta on the 11th January, having on board 10,000
additional troops. It is gratifying to state that 800 of
the native troops volunteered for this service.

We have received a number of letters from Liberal
electors of Bridport, denouncing in very strong terms,
the conduct of the Honourable Member for that
borough, Mr. MITCHELL, upon the Corn-laws.
This gentleman, who now accepts PEEL'S measure
with such gratitude, was at the time of his election,
a declared enemy of the sliding scale, and pledged
himself to support the plan brought forliard by the
late Government. Some of our correspondents, who
have given their names, but for whose letters we are
sorry that we cannot find room, assure us that the
votes of Mr. MITCHELL have greatly dissatisfied his
constituents, and that nothing could be more contrary
to fact, than his statement in the House of Commons,
that the people of Bridport were favourable to the
giving Sir ROBERT PEEL'S Corn-law project a fair
trial. On the contrary, the great majority of the
electors of the borough have declared that they will
have nothing to do with the Tory remedy, which they
pronounce worse than the disease. If they cannot
have corn free, they are for a fixed duty, which will
prevent gambling, and specify the exact sum of which
Parliament authorises the landlords to rob the public.
When the clay of reckoning comes, we trust that the
electors of Bridport will convince Mr. MITCHELL, that
a sliding scale is closely associated with a slide out of
Parliament, and public confidence.

The usual results of a Tory. Administration are be-
ginning to develope themselves in Ireland. Secret

societies are on the increase, and Ribandmetn once
, again on the alert. At the Longford Assizes Mr.
Justice BURTON, alluding to these unwelcome truths,
observed that " the re-appearance of secret societies
in Longford showed but too plainly that there was a
want of subordination to the laws of the country, and
that there was not that security for life and property
which should exist in a well-ordered state of society."
Such was not the language held by the Judges of
Assizes during the period when Lords EBRINQTON
and MORPETH were at the head of the Irish Govern-
ment. There were then no judicial lamentations over
the spread of Ribandism—no strong allusions to the
increase of dissatisfaction throughout the country.
Ireland, if not wholly tranquil, was in a fair way to
become so, for the people had confidence in the
good intentions of their rulers. But not all is
changed. Distrust has usurped the place of confi-
dence—discontent has succeeded to peace and subordi-
nation. The old enemies of Ireland are once again in
power, and strange indeed would it be, if with them,
did not return also the old feelings of distrust and
indignation. The shadow is not closer connected
with the substance, than is Irish Orangeism with
Irish Ribandism. Like cause and effect, they are in-
separable. Let Toryism continue in the ascendant
but one year longer, and not one Judge only, but a
dozen Judges, will be deploring from the Bench the
rapid spread of discontent and misrule throughout the
sister-country. Of a verity, Sir ROBERT PEEL is in
a peculiarly agreeable position ! As if he had not
difficulties enough to contend with in England, he is
blest with an Irish Viceroy who is doing all he pos-
sibly can, to increase his difficulties in Ireland, by
bestowing his patronage almost exclusively on the
Orange faction.

The legislation of lawyers is proverbially bad.
With a few illustrious exceptions, in the list of which
the names of ROMILLY and BROUGHAM occupy a
distinguished position, we owe little of the improve-
ments which have taken place within the last half
century, in the civil and criminal code of England,
to the gentlemen of the long robe; they have an
interest in litigation, and no class of men have ha-
bitually a more watchful eye to their own interest.
But without impeaching their integrity as legislators,
we may observe, that their habits and pursuits as

advocates, disqualify them for framing the laws by
which a great country ought to be governed. In
describing the simplest remedy for any evil which
afflicts society, they lose themselves in a wilder-
ness of words, as if the object of laws were to
puzzle and perplex men, instead of serving them as
moral finger-posts, set up by Government at every cross
road in the great highway of life. No law is good
or beneficial of which the meaning is not clear and

certain ; the command or observance which it imposes

just; the execution cheap, easy, and expeditious; the
form in accordance with public opinion ; and of
which the object is not: thei increase of virtue in, or

the removal of evil from, the portion of society
affected by it. Now clearness and certainty of mean-
ing would seem to be carefully excluded from almost
every Bill with which lawyers load the table of the
House of Commons. But one of the greatest evils in
the legislation of lawyers is the want of comprehen-

siveness in every measure supported by them. Instead
of legislating for the removal of the cause of any
evil, they seem satisfied if they can only correct the
most immediate of its effects. This is strikingly ex-
emplified in the short Bill prepared by the Solicitor-
General for Ireland for amending the law respecting
Presbyterian marriages in that kingdom. When, by
a sentence of the Irish Court of Queen's Bench, mar-
riages celebrated by Presbyterian clergymen between
Protestants'and Presbyterians were declared invalid
and illegal, it was expected that a thorough revision
of the law of marriage in Ireland would be one of
the first undertakings of the law officers of the Crown.
Accordingly the Noble Secretary for Ireland lost no
time in preparing the public for a forthcoming Bill
of which his Lordship and the Learned Irish Soli-
citor-General were to be the joint concocters. That

Bill is now before us, but instead of amending the
law of marriage in Ireland, it leaves the whole ques-
tion exactly where the framers of the Bill found it !
Such Presbyterian marriages as have been celebrated
in Ireland before the passing of this Act are declared
to be valid, unless they have been pronounced other-
wise in a Court of Law ; but not a syllable is en-
acted to legalize such marriages in future. As the
question to be settled by this I3ill has excited e, very
deep and painful interest in the North of Ireland,
and as it is one to which the Church of Scotland can-
not be indifferent, we shall here qaote the text of the
proposed enactment :
Whereas marriages have in divers instances been had
and solemnised in Ireland by Protestant Dissenting
ministers or teachers, between persons being, one a
member of the United Church of England and Ireland,
and the other a Protestant Dissenter, and it is expedient
to confirm such marriages ; be it therefore enacted, by
the Queen's most excellent Majesty, by and with the
advice and consent of the Lords spiritual and temporal,
and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and
by the authority of the same that all marriages hereto-
fore had and solemnised in Ireland by Protestant Dis-
senting ministers or teachers, between persons being, one
a member of the United Church of England and Ireland,
and the other a Protestant Dissenter, shall be and shall
be adjudged and taken to have been and to be of the
same and no other force and effect, as if such marriages
had been had and solemnised by clergymen of the said
United Church of England and Ireland.
Provided always, and be it enacted, that nothing in
this Act contained shall extend, or be construed to ex-
tend, to or affect any marriage declared invalid by any
court or 'competent jurisdiction before the passing of this
Act, nor any marriage where either of the parties shall,
at any time afterwards, during the life of the other party,
have lawfully intermarried with any other person.
Provided further, and be it enacted, that nothing in
this Act contained shall extend, or be construed to ex-
tend, to or affect any act done before the passing of ih's
Act, under the authority of any Court, or in the admi-
nistration of any personal estate or effects, or the exe-
cution of any will or testament, or the performance of
any trust.
Provided further, and be it enacted, that nothing in
this Act contained halt in anywise affect any marriage
had or solemnised In Ireland, except such as had been
had or solemnised by and between such persons, and in
such manner as is hereiabefore specified.
And be it enacted, that this Act may be amended,
altered, or repealed by any Act to be passed in this pre-
sent session of Parliament.

Why this is but
,a Presbyterian Bill of Indemnity
The Irish Protestant Dissenters are called upon,
with true Hibernian politeness, to thank the Go-
vernment for nothing. But the Bill is worse
than nothing ; it is an insult, if it be not in-
tended as the precursor of a general measure which
will settle the question of marriages altogether.
Before the decision of the Court of Queen's Bench,
the validity of marriages celebrated by Presbyterian
clergymen in Ireland was never doubted ; now, how-
ever, the Bill before Parliament establishes the insult-
ing judgment of the Court, that such clergymen had
no authority lawfully to celebrate such mixed mar-
riages. Instead of legalising a sacerdotal right, which
it is time the Legislature should recognise as belong-
ing alike to every Christian priesthood, the Govern-
ment comes forward and graciously shields the blind
believers in it from the perils with which a dominant
hierarchy may visit its exercise !

The Bill is a short Bill, and yet it bears marks of
its legal paternity. The second clause consists of but
a single sentence, and yet we have put it into the hands
of more than a dozen persons, not one of whom could
discover what was meant by the second member of
it. The Irish Solicitor-General wished to enact that
parties whose marriages had been dissolved by the
sentence of a Court of Law previous to the.passing of
this Bill, and who were married to, or might marry
again with, other persons, had done so, and might
hereafter do so with 'impunity ; but instead pf ex-
pressing this in clear, intelligible language, he has
employed phrases which would admit of another
action, and the presence of the twelve Judges to deter-
mine their meaning.

There is no political news in the French Journals,
now that they have exhausted the right of search
question. The following are extracts from them :
The Journal du Havre of the 25th has the following
article :—" It will be recollected that when M. Lovas •
seur, the Consul-General of France at St. Domingo, re-
solted to strike his flag, and retire on board the corvette
Berceau, he sent a statement of this rupture to Mar-
tinique for instructions and a sufficient force to support
his negotiations. By a letter from St. Thomas, via
England, we learn that on the 23d ult. a division of four
ships, part of the Antilles station, and among them the
Arimdei frigate, Vice-Admiral Anions, Commandant of
the station, passed in sight of St. Thomas, on its way to
Port-au-Prince. Thi, letter adds that the arrival of this
detachment will make the number of French ships off
this port to amount to eight."—Ccmstitutionnel.
Rodel's troops The Phare
sPayrreendereaswsinay :—" It se
drawing nearer
neare rtotehmesthat
frontier.Gene-
rallt
tis reported along the frontier that fresh troops will
shortly arrive. We do not know what confidence may
gb
iemplaced f inin
ftahnetsrey r man f
tosurt r
as,
o 1
14aeducraan, thatownhlyiehsaywas oatnhtoe
nreed-
at Alfare, has come to Estella, and that that of B our-