Star.
London, England, 1830-10-13 00:00:00

SPIRIT. OF THE JOURNALS.

Cnioxtet. c. —The gentlemen—and farmers of Kent are in the
greatest consternation on account of the organised system of conflagra-
tion, from which so many of them have suffered. Every man who has
ever employed an Irishman is in constant dread of a visit. The insur-
gents go about in hands of one hundred and fifty, and coolly demand
the keys of the barns to destroy tbe thrashing machines, and all ides of
resistance is out of the question. Indeed, when gentlemen have applied
to their servants to assist them in repelling the attack, they have met
with a flat refusal. The signals are given by sky-rockets, and as many
se fourteen stack.yards have been in flames at the same time. There
has long been a sullen discontent among the peasantry of England. We
have often raised our voice in their behalf, but in vain. The genuy
hive not dons their duty towards them. The labourers feel that the
higher ranks are looking on with their arms folded, while they are sink-
ing to the level of wretchedness. It is deeply to be lamented that they
should have recourse to lawless outrage, but when did ever persons in
their situation reason correctly, with respect either to the cause of their
sufferings or the proper remedy The disturbances in Kent are a warn-
ing that ought not to be disregarded. What adds to the alarm of the
farmers, is the refusal of the Insurance Offices to ensure them, except on
the most ruinous terms.

Cm zoirretz.--A great dinner was given by the Birmingham rolideal
Union, in celebration of the French Kevoludon, on Meoday last. Our
t, says the Chroosiote, informs as that nearly 4,000 per-
sons dined this occasion, and that 6,000 must have been within the
walls after dinner. About one-third of the company wars master-men
of considerable respectability and intelligence; and the remaining two-
thirds, the superior description of mechanics, artisans, and workmen.
" Thank Goy (said lUr. Attwood) we have no occasion now to take up
murderous and destructive weapons. The progress of education and
knowledge has changed this state of things. Our weapons are union,truth,
justice, and reason. Our sword is • the sword of the spirit,' which is
the will of the people.' (Cheers.) Look round again upon this as-
sembly, and I will say, show me twenty such dinners as this, and
I will show you the governors of England—not the governors by
violence, anarchy, or brute furze, but by the moral agency of public
opinion, peacefully and legally influencing the opinions and the con-
duct of the Government." (Great cheers.) The greatest order pre-
vailed at this diaper. There is something it an exhibition like this
which leads to serious reflection —six thousand respectable and or-
derly citizens in one town, assembled under one roof. Verily, if the
Aristocracy do nut open their eyes now, they never will. A. for
the people, their eyes are open—never more to be closed.

Tuats.-Bome of our contemporaries have Dublin correspondents
who seem to be haunted by serious fears for the tranquillity of Ireland
on the approach of the November term, not from nightly outrages by
Ribandmen or Rockites, but from discussions by " men of all c cds
and parties, who have set their hearts" upon the repeal of the union,
and who are likely "to agitate that subject with much tangy and de.
termination not u a sectarian, but as a national and all-important
question." We can scarcely bring ourselves to believe all this. Mr.
O'Connell is indeed to arrive in Dublin, and is about to organize • new
confederacy for " the redress of legislative grievances;" meaning,
thereby, the redress or abolition of the union. Nothing is
more likely than the formation of such a project ; nor, judging
from rout circumstances, few things less likely than the sue.
ass of it, through any co-operatioo which can be looked for between
" men of all creeds and parties." The single party from which, as we
understand, much seal is to be anticipated in such a cause, is that of
Mr. O'Connell himself, together with the knot of professional agitators,
who themselves constitute a "grievance" requiring greatly " to be re-
dressed." The shopkeepers of Dublin may be considered the elective'
body of which Mr. O'Connell and Co. are lit representatives on the
Union question. Dublin, of course, has lost in one respect by the
Union, which drew to other quarters the Irish aristocracy and their pro-
fuse expenditure ; but we do not know that the country at large has suf.
tired from the same cause, at least in any thing like the same proportion.
That the late disturbances in Belgium, with their unhappy results,
would afford a rude material for the fancy of Irish demagogues to work
upon, and be converted into a topic of incitement, leading, if possible,
and in due season, to insurrection against the British Goversiment, few
persons who have watched the nianceuvrinp of faction in Ireland could
entertain a doubt. Before a separation of the Netherlands from Hol-
land was dreamed of—because long before the overthrow of the French
Bourbon Government—Mr. O'Connell bad "organised" his measures
for stirring up the people of Ireland is clamour for a repeal of the
Union. This was indeed very shortly after the repeal of the Catholic
disabilities had been accelerated (and he saying so we mean no reproach)
by the same instrument of clamour. The case of Belgium, therefore,
has not been the original moving power in this ill.omened enterprise.
It hes been a subsequent " God.send"—that is all.

Hearam.—A good deal of surprise has been expressed at Sir Gemge
11 urmy's removal from the Colonial Department,which, coupled with ffie
previous transfer of Sir Henry Hardinge from the War Office, looks as if'
the Prtmier had taken the hint, so often given him, that his Adnsinis•
tration had partaken rather too much of the character of a military Go-
vernment. Though we should be among the last to find fault with his
Grace for any deference, however tardy, lie may be inclined to pay to
public opinion, there does seem, we must be permitted to say, a little
impolicy, in parting with two of his best men at the moment when
the scene of operations is just opening on i new and more ',duals
contest. Besides, the Duke retails*, tor the present, his military
Privy Seal, who, without any disparagement to him, be it
spoken, Is of little value as compared with Sir George Murray. It is
peculiarly unfortunate, too, that another should be added to the many
changes which have so lately taken place in the Colonial Department,
lin which the old adage of " New Lords, new laws," seems especially
uncalled for. The situation of our colonies, both as regards them and
the mother country, calls fur a consistent, firm, and uniform Adosiois.
intim ; which cannot be, or, at least, is not the case, when the head
of the department scarcely remains in office to receive the answer to
his own despatch. Next to the slave question, which only in.
volves a part of them, the must material question as regards the
whole of our colonial establishments, is that they should be so go.
veined as to be made to bear the burden df their own de.
fence • which they would long since have done had they not
been lade the source of an official patronage, which has bowed in this,
as in too many other cases, to the all.pervading weight of hungry, ta.
hiltless boron_ghisrn. As far as Sir George Murray's management of
the Colonial Deportment has come within our observation, it has been
freer hens this besotting sin of his predecessors than could well have
been expected. There has been an open straOtforwardoess about it
ton, coupled with a business-lite attention to affialm, not always the ac-
companiments of office; and on all account's, we may say, that though
we shore ha the dislike which the country, naturally unnutietrifternig in-
wards too much appearance of military rule, it is due to Sir M sir.
ray to declare that the country wiU be fortunate indeed if in his case
there shall be change for the better.
Posy...—We sincerely wilds that— lives of the usfortunakt Minis-
ters of Charles X. may be spared, at whatever bawd to the eharacer or
stability of the Itevolutionary Government; and we entertain Chia wish
from the conviction that they have done nothing legally or morally

worthy of death. The members of the present French Choc; i.ment
entertain tbe wave wish with staselv hut they are far from lint!.
ing embraced the same conviction, 4.r at least, from the r.anlinesa
which would lead them to avow it. They would wires men to
escape punishment who are great criminals, if they them.
selves are not usurpers. Under monkish and sentimental pr...
tensions to liberality and philanthropy, they disguise the co
sciouaness of their own wrong. Ti vie mercy is the mercy t f
egotism. They wru!d defraud 11. e Levolution of its first clams
of victims, because they apprehend t'at the Revolution bas not yet
completed it career, and in its further niovcrrents they kuuw not what
further victims may be required. These is a r.anifest want of sine, ri•y
in the conduct of the Revolutionary Governnie•.t of France toward. ino
people, which will probably have tee effect of irritating and
provoking the latter more even than the Grit avowal of the
most unpopular intentions. If the liovervirent be of opiri 'lt that
humanity, justice, or expediency, t..tlrcis the a2plice.:t.ii of
extreme severity in the case of Prince Polignac and hi% col.
leagues, what but the consciousness that this opinion is not it, con.
formity with that of the sovereign people deters 'l:em from its oper and
distinct avowal ? And if the sense of the people be so abs•Phee in its
authority that the government may not sat: !y 4ilfer from it, with re.
serene to the merits and the fate or these anfortunate men, es••at coo.
tinuance can be conceived more futile and in suiting than that which
seeks to open a way for their escape under the poor subterfuge o: en cx
post facto and inapplicable law ?