The Sun.
London, England, 1845-04-08 00:00:00

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS.
FROM THE EVENING PAPERS OF YESTERDAY.
GLOBE.—When President Polk made his recent assertion
of the " unquestionable" right of the United States to the
9regon Territory, and so broadly intimated their intention
So have it by fair means or by foul, it is pretty evident that
he did a very foolish thing. That the first speech of a new
President, like the first work of a " prentice hand," must be
taken cum grano salis, we are perfectly aware. We offer no ob-
jsetion to the national taste which extorts from every Presi.
dent, at every opportunity, these fulsome eulogies of his coun-
try and its institutions ; nor do we forget that our transat-
lantic brethren, like their aboriginal predecessors, have a
constitutional tendency to soar into " palaver" of a random
kind; or that the favourite weapon of the red warrior is still
hurled by the white orator in high-flown prose. But there
are limits to the allowance to be made even to American
Presidents. The British Government has shown itself,
throughout the conduct of this affair. extremely slow to
take offence. No. claim has been put forward on our part
which does not admit of ample support by appeal to
every authority which can rationally be appealed to on
such a subject. The value to the British colonies in North
America of the country west of the Rocky Mountains, and
north of the Columbia, is quite equal to that attached by the
United States to a similar outlet to the Pacific. Our Borth
American trade westward is chiefly in peltries, and
China is our principal market. To give up the dis-
puted territory to the United States, would, there-
fore, be to give up not only what we have a valid claim
to, but what it is of considerable importance we should re-
tain. Were the elements of the case so altered that the
subject of the dispute should be of small value to us, but of
great importance to the United States, the point of right
might be of little moment. If against us, we should have
no interest in pushing the dispute to extremities; and if
in our favour the conditions of its cession might be readily
and amicably settled by negotiation. But it is not so.
The labours of several very able men on both sides
have been devoted to the investigation of the respective
claims of the two countries. The result is a very
general admission of the justice of that of Great
Britain, to an extent even greater than that to which it is
now urged. And again, every year increases the number of
settlers in the northern district of the country, who have
placed their dependence for Security of person and property
upon the undisputed recognition of British authority from
Canada to the mouth of the Columbia. Since Oc-
tober, 1818, the dispute has been avoided by a tem-
porary compromise, under which the territory is left
open to the subjects of both Powers, without preju-
dice to their respective claims. But this is an arrangement
which, however satisfactory while the country remained un-
settled and uninhabited except by a few wandering natives
and the trappers and collectors of peltry, is obviously incon-
sistent with the establishment of the forms of government
which become requisite as soon as the regular settler makes
his appearance. Either party is at liberty to terminate
the arrangement on giving a year's notice. But in the
mean time, of course, the rights of both are in • abeyance.
The negotiations now going on between Mr. Pakenham
and the United States Government have for their object the
amicable termination of what all admit cannot long endure.
By entering upon them, the American Government has
tacitly admitted that there is something in the case fairly
liable to doubt or dispute. It is not usual either for men or for
nations to engage in conference upon matters which either
party deems indisputable ; but while such a conference conti-
nues, it is usual with both to preserve a decent abstinence from
any direct allusion or appeal to popular persuasions or pas-
sions. In meeting our Plenipotentiary, the American Go-
vernment addresses itself to our judgment and our sense
of justice. Does it find in us so great a lack of these
as to necessitate an appeal to our feelings—and is the
American estimate of our courage and our power so
very low as to justify, even to themselves, the special
direction of that appeal to our fears ? If this be Mr.
Polk's view of the matter, we can confidently assure him he
is wrong ; and that an adherence to it will not only fail to
facilitate the adjustment ef the present difference of opinion
between the two countries, but will probablyopen up one still
more difficult to settle. No doubt a large portion of the Ame-
rican people believe the claim of their Government upon the
disputed territory to be a just one. The national imagination
is agreeably filled by the idea of extending the Union to
the western shores of the Continent; and it needs but the
suppression of a few facts, and the sturdy assertion of one or
two doubtful doctrines, to make a popular case in favour of
the claim. But we can hardly believe that even the American
populace can be so besotted as to imagine that we are likely
to yield to bullying what we refuse to a fair demand., " The
old country," groan though it may under the horrors of
despotism and heavy taxes, has yet a fair reputation
for courage—has not commonly been found wanting
either in the ability or the will to fight when fair occasion
offered. We are yet unacquainted, except through the
flowery medium of a President's message, with "the' inesti-
mable blessings" of a purely democratic Government—we
do not know what it is to have the highest offices of our Go-
vernment filled by gentlemen caught hastily in the back-
woods, with much party-patriotism and little prudence, and
quite uncontaminated by official experience ; but we like to
keep our own—we do not like to be threatened—and we can
fight if we are forced to it.
STANDARD.—The Dublin Freeman's Journal offers the
following notice of some observations that lately appeared in
the Standard:—" The Standard pipes on a new key. That
rabid bigot finds himself lashed into submission, and strives
to restrain the effervescence of its bile by persuading
itself that the increased grant to Maynooth is not a
concession,' nor yet a measure of conciliation,' but
a measure of compulsion towards the clergy—' a mea-
sure of Government—a measure (says the Standard) of a
sound, and not unjust or harsh policy, compelling the religious
teachers' to qualify themselves for their functions. But we
must reprint the passage here though we have transferred
the whole article to another column :—" The proposed grant
to Maynooth is not a measure of concession or of concilia •
tion,' to use a phrase which abuse and failure have rendered
odious and absurd—it is a measure of Government, a mea-
sure of a sound, and not unjust or harsh, policy, com-
pelling the religious teachers of a large proportion of
the Queen's subjects to qualify themselves for the
office they asssume by a far better education than they now
receive. As such a compulsorymeasure the Roman Catholic
priests in Ireland treat it, although they cannot honestly con-
fess the truth, because they cannot charge the proposition
with injustice or harshness.' If this sort of coercion
satisfies the Standard, we have no reason to complain.
It is—yes, it positively is—a measure of coercion, says
the Standard. Peel may call it coercion ; the Queen
may call it conciliation ; but we know it is neither. Were
it either, we would oppose it ; but it is not—it is down-
right, though neither unjust' nor 'harsh,' compulsion to
force those 20,000/. upon the priests, and we will call it such.
Why, then, oppose this proposition?" The compulsion of
which we spoke is not coercion. It is a compulsion by the
public opinion of a man's class, which though the very re-
verse of coercion, is, in the long run, the most powerful of all
influences in directing the conduct of men ; we say in the
long run, because we think that we have been misun-
derstood upon this point by some critics less unfriendly than
the Dublin Freeman's Journal. We do not anticipate an
early manifestation of improvement in the character of the
nriests—the education of an individual is not the work of a day,
still less is the education of a class ; but we do anticipate
that the Roman Catholic laity knowing that their clergy
have the means of respectable education ; and being, as we
trust they will be, better educated themselves, will compel
the aspirants to the priesthood to avail themselves of the
bounty of the State, and will even add something of their
own, should the bounty of the State be insufficient. This we
count the first stage towards the reformation of Ireland, and it
will occupy some years ; but the second stage is morally
certain to succeed. This, it may be said, is drawing hope
from a distant future. It is—and who knows anything of
political science who does not know that the distant future
ought to be a principal consideration with statesmen ? All
great operations in moral, as in physical nature, are the effect
of a long train of causes, acting through a long period of
time ; but if such operations are not undertaken, ex-
cept with the prospect of immediate results, they will
not be undertaken at all. Now to another point. In the
seeming support which Lord John Russell gave to Ministers
on Thursday, his Lordship, in the exercise of the accus-
tomed craft of his party, did his utmost to damage
the measure which he affected to aid, advancing false
and offensive arguments in its support, and Lord John, we
are sorry to say, was countenanced in the same line by some
who ought to have knoWn better.

LAW INTELLIGENCE.
HOUSE OF LORDS, April 7.
The House sat to-day for the first time to hear appeals
since the termination of the Easter recess. The Peers pre-
sent were the Lord Chancellor, Lord Brougham, Lord Cot-
tenham, Lord Langdale, and Lord Campbell.
"ROBERT ALLEN (A PAUPER) 2.. M`PHERSON, TOMEINS, Ai
THOMAS ALLEN.
The arguments of this appeal from the decision of the Lord
Chancellor, reversing a judgment of the Master of the Rolls,
which were only partly heard before the Easter recess, were
resumed this morning at eleven o'clock. The case is one
of a rather singular nature, and the facts may be thus
stated :—John Allen, of HighbUry-place, Islington, by his
will, Mated 11th December, 1834, gave and bequeathed differ-
ent sums of money to various relatives, of whom the plaintiff
was one. By the will he appointed M'Pherson and Tomkins
his executors. He afterwards made nine codicils to his will.
The fourth codicil was in the following words :—" Whereas I
am desirous in the event of my daughter Susannah Evans
dying in the lifetime of her husband, George Evans, to in-
crease the provisions hereinafter made for the undermentioned
persons : I hereby give and bequeath to Susannah Allen,
daughter of my late nephew, Thomas Allen, 3,000/. ; Thomas
Allen and Robert (the plaintiff), sons of the said Thomas
Allen, 2,0001. each ; and to John Allen, son of my nephew,
Charles Allen, the sum of 2,000/. ; the same moneys to
be paid as soon as conveniently ater my decease, in ad-
dition to the legacies hereinbefore mentioned." The
testator, by his sixth codicil, dated the 22d of
March, 1837, gave and bequeathed to the plaintiff
one-fourth of the clear residue of his estate and effects, to and
for his own use and benefit. By his seventh codicil the tes-
tator appointed William Allen (one of the defendants) to be
a trustee and executor with his former trustees and execu-
tors. The testator, by his ninth and last codicil, dated the
3d of October, 1837, after revoking the legacies given by his
will and codicils to and in trust for his nephew, Charles Allen,
and his children, and the child or children of his deceased
nephew, Thomas Allen, declared .that they should take no
further or other benefit under his will, or any codicil or
codicils thereto, save and except as therein mentioned ;
and he thereby gave unto trustees, therein named, the
sum of 1,000/. sterling, upon trust to invest the same:
and to receive the dividends, and pay the sane unto
his nephew( Charles Allen, and his wife, during their
lives, and the life of the survivor of them, and after-
wards to fall into and form part of his residue. And the
testator thereby gave' and bequeathed unto Nathaniel Bart..
lett, Susannah Evans, and William Allen (one of flip
fendants), the sum of 400/. sterling, u on trust, to invest the
Game In their names, or in the name of the survivor of them,
and to pay the same unto Susannah Allen, at such time as
she might marry with consent of the said trustees, or the sur-
vivor of them, or at such time as tile said trwitee4 mlght think
proper. 4q4 after hequeathing the Gm of apeg.
to Thomas
Allen for his own use And benefit, he thereby directed his ex-
ecutors, as soon as convenient after his decease, to purchase and
invest In the names ofNathaniel Bartlett, Susannah Evans, and
the defendant, William Allen, the cum of 800/, Three per Cent.