The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1839-11-12 00:00:00

gence.

The gOvernment of New South Wales had determin-
ed upon sending between two and three thousand
bushels of good seed wheat to the settlers at Nepean,
for which they would only be obliged to give security
to return a:certain quantity after the next harvest.
A company was in contemplation, for the purpose
of running steam-boats to the flourishing township of
Wollongong. The capital was set down at £lO,OOO,
in shares of £5O, most of which had been taken up.
The Commercial Journal comments with great seve-
rity on the contemplated execution of several blacks,
for the murder of two white men. It maintains that
these blacks are not answerable to the laws of the in-
vaders of their soil—that they have never received any
payment for their land—that ,they have, on the con-
trary, strictly speaking, been robbed of it—that they
do not acknowledge the laws of the colonial govern-
ment as supreme—and that they will not submit to the
process of naturalization, to enable them 'to claim a
Briton's rights and privileges. How, then, it is de-
manded, when they slaughter both man and beast,
trespassing on their uncultivated wilds, can they be in-
dicted for murder ? The same journal then proceeds
to remark, that these blacks may be considered as at
perpetual war with the colonists, " and when, as with
the Caffers, they have an.opportunity of spearing man
or beast, they will do it, and generally with impunity.
If the government desire to protect the whites against
these treacherous and savage blacks, let all the known
tribes, both far and near, be told that war-is declared
against them, and that it will be right and lawful for
white men to shoot them if they disturb the peace of
the settled districts in any manner." If such language
may be taken as expressive of the sentiments enter-
tained by any large number of the colonists of New
South Wales, we need not feel surprised that the blacks
are reluctant to come to amicable terms with the set-

tiers. We have reason to suspect that the outrages
committed by the blacks are, in the great majority of
cases, mere acts of retaliatory vengeance, in the perpe-
tration of which they consider themselves fully justified
by the conduct of the whites.
Great complaints are made at Port Phillip of the pil-
fering and annoying habits of the natives, at many sta-
tions of the country. Two of the natives had been
killed on a recent occasion, while endeavouring to plun-
der a shoemaker in open day. The police regulations
of the district cannot be very efficient when such con-
sequences ensue. The inordinate cupidity of the na-
tives is well known, and some means should be forth-
with devised for preventing any thing like familiar in-
tercourse with thern.•

Seven bushrangers, who had been guilty of highway
robbery and murder, had been captured in the neigh-

bourhood of Berrima. These desperate marauders
had, it appears, long carried on their depredations with

.mpunity.

The supply of provisions at Sydney was plentiful,
and prices were declining. In South Australia flour
had risen from £3O to £4O per ton, and in some cases
to £45. Potatoes had also advanced from £l4 to £3O
per ton, and were even scarce at the last-mentioned
price. At Hobart Town the best flour was about £4O
per ton, and other articles proportionably dear.

The Whigs just now are a luckless set. Without
power or influence in the country, which they have so
long and so wretchedly misgoverned, they read in every
event which occurs evidence of their approaching
downfall. All the ingenious shifts and expedients by
which they have attempted to bolster up their party,
and infuse something like continued vitality into its
existence, have signally failed. The Reform Bill,
which was meant to exclude the Tories more than to
benefit the nation, and which was to be the sheet an-
chor by which the Liberals were to ride out all the
storms of the political world undamaged and triumph-
ant, has, at last, through the medium of the Registra-
tion Courts, turned against its authors, and aimed a
deathblow at their power. Ipswich, Cambridge, and
(we may add) Manchester led the way, and prophesied
their fall. The municipal elections, in which if any-
where one would have thought the Whig-Radicals
might have looked for consolation, have been a source
of nothing but despair. The notable attempt to con-
vert Convention demagogues and Chartist agitators
into peace-loving respectable magistrates, has proved
abortive,—and, not only abortive, it has been one of
the most fruitful causes of their humiliation and
shame.

The Whigs are a luckless set. Their Attorney-Ge-
neral, " plain Jolp," is sent on a political mission to
Edinburgh, to eat marmalade and oatcake at a public
breakfast—because a dinner was not just convenient—
and undertake the Quixotic office of defending his col-
leagues against the damning evidence of incapacity
and weakness brought forward by Lord Lyndhurst in
his Summary of the Session. Something he did say
of what the Whigs had done ; but more, far more, of
what they would have done in the way of jobbery and
misrule, if that nuisance the House of Lords had not
' interposed and prevented them. But the crowning
glory of the Whigs was the way they had treated Char-
tism. " I have put down. the Chartists," said the At-
torney-General, while a smile of self-satisfied suffici-
ency played upon his lips. " I have put down the
Chartists by the arm of the law. I have asked for no
gagging bills. I have demanded no suspensions of
the Habeas Corpus Act. I have indeed made no use
of suspensions of any kind, for I have hanged nobody;
but Chartism is extinct. How different would have
been the conduct of a Conservative Attorney-Geneial !
He would have attempted to prevent that which I was
solicitous only to punish." Such was the language of
Sir John Campbell ; but,
" Ah! luckless speech and bootless boast!
For which he paid full dear."

At the very moment when, over hot rolls and coffee,
this Whig functionary Nl.las felicitating himself on the
disappearance of Chartism, an armed and organised
rebellion was about to burst forth in South Wales, and
one of those magistrates whom Lord John Russell
chose to honour for his rampant Radicalism was at the
head of a band of ruffians, whose avowed object was
the plunder and murder, by wholesale, of their peace-
able fellow-subjects. It was Chartism in its most ma-
lignant and frightful form : and we take it the inhabi-
tants of Newport, Pontypool, and Monmouth will read
the account of the speech at the Edinburgh breakfast
with mingled feelings of wonder and disgust. What
a contrast betyeen Barry's snug parlour in Auld
Reekie—wherein was assembled the rump of the
Edinburgh Whigs, to hear the laudatory self-gratula-
tion of the Attorney-General, in which he took infinite
credit to himself for the fact that the law had achieved
over Chartism a bloodless triumph—and the wild and

gloomy hills in the neighbourhood of Newport, on
which, at that very moment, bodies of armed men
were being drilled and organised, some of them in
caverns underground, for the purpose of bursting, like
a destructive thunderbolt, upon the devoted town !
Verily, Sir John is no prophet :

" To- day he puts forth
The tender leaves of hope, to-morrow blossoms,
And bears his blushing honours thick upon him ;
The third day comes a Frost, a killing Frost,
And, when he thinks—good, easy man !—full surely
His greatness is a-ripening, nips his root,
And then he falls—."

But far graver considerations than any affecting the
vainglory of a conceited Whig force themselves upon
us in consequence of the late outbreak in South Wales.
How Was it that so widely-spread and dangerous a
conspiracy against property and life had extended its
ramifications on every side without attracting the notice
of Government ? It is next to impossible that a vigi-
lant Ministry could have been kept profoundly in the
dark as to the machinations of so large a body of men
as took part in the late insurrection. But perhaps
Government did receive a hint, and suspect that some-
thing of the kind was going on. We have been told
that such was the case, and that from some of the
neighbouring magistrates the Home-office was in-
formed that mischief was brewing amongst the hills.
What, then, shall we say of that functionary who
thought thirty soldiers sufficient protection for a town
menaced by a body of many thousand exasperated
colliers and miners. Providentially the cool courage
and admirable discipline of the handful of troops sta-
tioned in the Westgate Inn dismayed the rioters, and
an easy victory was gained : but who can calculate the
horrors which would have ensued, had the desperadoes
been more resolute, or the little party that garrisoned
the inn wavered at the sight of the overwhelming
numbers opposed to them ? The duty of a Home
Secretary is like that of the Roman Consul, to see
ne quid detrimenti respublica capiat—to provide before-
hand against such disastrous outbreaks as have dis-
graced Birmingham and South Wales.
If the Government believed that the efforts of the
Chartists were at an end, and when they commissioned
their Attorney-General to send round his begging-box
for applause on the ground that they were effectually
suppressed, it only proves how inefficient an Executive
we possess, which knows nothing whatever of the
movements of a vast, armed, insurrectionary body,
regu!arly disciplined and drilled, and ready at any
moment to convert one of the peaceful towns of Eng-
land into a heap of smoking ruins. Is it credible that
such a thing could have happened in the days of Mr.
Pitt, or under any Administration gifted with ordinary
energy, foresight, and vigilance ? If, on the contrary,
Lord Normanby was apprised, as we have every reason

to believe he was, of the approaching and meditated
attack, how culpable is the Minister who tempted the
poor deluded victims to rise en masse in insurrection,
because no precautionary measures had been taken to
prevent them, and no force provided to intimidate

them ! We doubt not that this matter will be made
the subject of grave inquiry in Parliament, and let the
late Irish Lord Lieutenant look to it, if he has been
playing the same tricks with the Chartists which it is
proved he has been doing with Ribandism in Ireland.
The word impeachment nowadays is a subject of mer-
riment with the Whigs, but they may yet find that the
lives and property of Englishmen are not to be sacri-
ficed to mob violence with impunity, while my Lord
111elbourne dances attendance at the Castle, and my
Lord Normanby superintends private theatricals at
Chatsworth.

By and bye the Melbourne Ministry will be like Sir
John Cutler's silk stockings, which were darned so
often with worsted, that at last it became impossible to
tell of what material they were composed. All the
changes which have taken place betoken an uneasy
restlessness—a conviction that " there 's something
rotten in the state of Denmark," which renders it
expedient to get clear of the concern as soon as pos-
sible, and feather the nest in some quarter where the
yearly income will no longer depend on the veering
weathercock of politics. Spring Rice has taken to
himself wings—aye ! the wings of an Eagle—and
flown away. Lord Howick has marched off like a
sulky schoolboy, and brought down upon the Ministry
the wrath of the multitudinous family of Greys. Sir
Robert Rolfe has transferred his person to the Bench
of the Common Pleas, or Exchequer, for which; having
been all his life an Equity lawyer, he must be so admi-
rably fitted. And last, not least—most ominous sign
of the fast-approaching overthrow of the Whigs !—Sir
John Campbell—cunning John, who never was known
yet to miscalculate his own interest—is said to be on
the eve of leaving Ministers in the lurch here, and
accepting the seals as Lord Chancellor of Ireland.
But mark the left-handed wisdom—plain men might
call it roguery—in this matter. The Whigs know that
they cannot stand as a Government more than a few
weeks, if so long, after the Session has commenced.
If they deny that they know this, they will at least
admit that this catastrophe is in a high degree probable.
Now Lord Plunket, the present Irish Chancellor, is
perfectly competent to discharge the duties of his situ-
ation for the short period before the meeting of Parlia-
ment : and then, if the Conservatives eject the present
Government, he will of course retire, and pocket his
pension. But it seems there is a better arrangement
than this. Why should not two retiring pensions be
sponged out of the public ? So it is said the present
Attorney-General is to go to Ireland as Chancellor—
Lord Plunket is to receive his pension—and in two or
three months, when the Whig-Radicals are out, Sir
John will also retire upon his allowance for life. Is
not this a delectable expedient on the part of men who
deafen us with their gabble about economy, retrench-
ment, and reform ? It is a gross job, and as such
will be looked upon and repudiated by the people of
England.

The municipal elections, in Scotland have proved
fully as adverse to the interests of 'Whig-Radicalism as
those which have taken place in England. Everything
that has recently taken place in the political world has
had a tendency to render more hopeless than ever the
prospects of the present patchwork administration.
They have been beaten—most signally and completely
beaten in the registration courts. The battle has been
fought and won before the Revising Barristers in a
manner which reflects the highest credit on the untiring
zeal, energy, and perseverance of the great Conservative
party now happily in the ascendant in every part of the
kingdom. At the recent elections under the Municipal
Corporation Act the faction have sustained a blow
from the stunning effects of which they have not yet
recovered. The insurrection in South Wales has also
proved to Lord Melbourne and his coadjutors a most
" untoward event." '[he specimen thus afforded of
the ultimate design and real nature of modern liberal-
ism has determined many a waverer, and caused many
who were halting between two opinions to enrol them-
selves among the ranks of Conservatives. Nor is there
wanting a voice from Scotland which bodes no good to
the Melbourne administration. The reaction in favour
of Conservative principles is not less manifest across
the borders than it is in England and 'Wales. Except-
ing in " Auld Reekie," and a few other strong holds of
"'philosophic" Whiggery, the liberals stand but a very
indifferent chance of success at any future election.
Our " cannie" friends in Scotland have discovered
that the " tree of liberty" planted by the 'Whigs is sap-
less and barren—that reform has proved an unproduc-
tive fallacy—that the splendid promises of a political
millenium held forth by the Whigs have proved as
baseless as the airy fabric of a vision.
It is not upon light or insufficient grounds that we
assert the fact of a wide-spread and permanent reaction
in Scotland. The last general election afforded strong
and unequivocal evidence of this fact. At the previous
election, the proportion of Conservatives to Radicals
was only as one to three. At the last election the num-
ber returned was equal with that of the liberal represen-
tatives. At the next election, we feel assured, there
will be two Conservatives returned to every Radical.
We ground this conviction, in the first place, upon
the result of the registrations for the last two years,
and, in the next place, upon the ascertained issue of
the recent municipalgelections.
We proceed to glance at a few of the more conspicu-
ous instances in which the municipal elections in Scot-
land have proved favourable to the Conservative cause,
and, in doing so, we rejoice to be able to add that there
has scarcely been an instance of an adverse character.
Eveu in Edinburgh itself the Conservatives have main-

tamed their position without any loss. Their strength
in the Town-council is the same as it was last year.
The radicals have been unable, notwithstanding the
most strenuous exertions, to advance a single step. At
Leith the contest was comparatively divested of a politi-
cal character—the several candidates ranging them-
selves as advocates of the "eastern or western harbour."
We are, therefore, unable to say what the precise issue
of the election has been in reference to the state of par-

.es. At Musselburgh two Conservatives and two
Radicals have been returned ; but the Conservatives
were at the head of the poll. At Glasgow the two par-
ties are equally balanced in the Council, precisely as
hey were two years ago, there being sixteen conserva-
yes and an equal number of Radicals among the rnem-
The decision of every important question must
rest with the casting vote of the Lord Provost. At
Portobello parties remain in the same relative position
as before. At Dunbar the Conversatives have put in

the whole of the new Councillors. At Greenock the
Conservatives have gained one, and the parties are now
equally divided. At Dumbarton five Conservatives
have been returned in opposition to four voluntaries
and one radical churchman. Here the triumph has
been complete. At Renfrew all the gentlemen elected
are Conservatives. At Falkirk the whole of the Coun-
cillors and Magistrates are Conservative. At Airdrie
the Conservatives have 'carried all their candidates
by considerable majorities. At Cupar-Fife none but
Conservatives were returned. At Perth, where, pre-
viously, there was not a single Conservative in the
Council, two sound Churchmen and constitutional-
ists were returned at the last election. At Aberdeen
four Conservatives and two Radicals have been
elected. We are unable to state the result of the
election at Kirkaldy, as we do not find the politics of
the respective candidates specified in any of the papers
before us. We have the same remark to make respect-
ing Montrose. At Brechin the Radicals have sustained
a mortifying defeat—all the Councillors chosen being
Conservatives. At Forfar the former Councillors were
all re-elected : their politics are not stated, but, from
the tone of the Montrose Standard, we suppose they
are " all right." At Paisley parties remain in statu
quo, the Conservatives having made no preparations
for a contest. At Kilmarnock the result of the elec-

tions has placed thirteen Conservatives and three Li-
berals in the Council. We shall not close our list
without giving our Liberal contemporaries the benefit
of the election at St. Andrews, where two Conserva-
tives and ten Whig-Radicals have been returned. As
we are not aware of the previous state of parties in
that burgh, we cannot say whether anything has been
gained or lost by the Conservatives.
Such is a summary of the municipal elections for
Scotland. The above results are highly gratifying to
every loyal Conservative. The counties of Scotland
have already returned an overwhelming majority of
Conservatives to Parliament : indeed, we cannot count
more than one or two Radicals as having been returned
by the county constituencies. The burghs bid fair to
rival the example set to them by the independent
county voters. Scotland will soon be found Conser-
vative to the very core, and will, we hesitate not to say,
contribute—most honourably to herself, and most
auspiciously for the interests of the kingdom at large—
to the speedy and irrecoverable downfall of the most
worthless and mischievous Administration that ever
disgraced the annals of the country.

The Albion of yesterday is unusually lugubrious in
its tone, which is a very remarkable circumstance in a
journal which is generally characterised by the mirth-
provoking jocularity of its leading articles. The editor
is evidently mortified at the result of the late municipal
election : but, even in the midst of the deep gloom
and despondency which has come over his mind, he
still finds some source of consolation in the soothing
reflection, that " the Reformers of Liverpool are not
alone in their mortification." Catching at this straw
which has fallen in his way, he proceeds to exclaim
that the Whig-Radicals of this town are " not the
worst off, when the trophies of the conflict are counted
up." Not the worst off, indeed ! They have escaped
being so by the narrowest chance in the world. But
for the casting votes of the Liberal returning officers
for Everton, Exchange, and South Toxteth Wards,
the Radicals would only have returned five, while the
Conservatives would have returned twelve members to
the Town Council. Again, in Pitt-street Ward the
Radicals barely escaped defeat, their " splendid" ma-
jority having dwindled down to three : whilst, in the
remaining wards, a little more exertion, and a better
system of organisation, would have resulted in the
return of the Conservative candidates.

When we read the exclamation that the " Reformers
of Liverpool were not the worst off" in the recent con-
flict, we imagined that the editor meant to contrast the
issue of the municipal election in this town with that
of the struggle at Leeds, at Wigan, at Bristol, and a
score of other places, where the Liberal faction have
had an extinguisher put upon their hopes of future
ascendancy. No such thing. The Albion is too cun-
ning to allude to these defeats. It would not suit its
purpose to commit itself by acknowledging the reac-

tion which is now so apparent throughout the king-
dom. Its consolatory reflections are not derived from
the circumstance that the Radicals of Liverpool have
been less soundly beaten than their brethren in other.
towns. Its " drops of comfort" are drawn from a
much nearer and a much more humble source. Our
readers will scarcely believe us when we tell them what
has administered the healing balm to the wounded
spirit of our contemporary. He has discovered that
only two of the " old Council ascendancy party" have
been returned at the recent election ! Wonderful dis-
covery ! Astonishing comfort to the " mortified"
Reformers of Liverpool ! Did it never recur to our
contemporary that "only two" of the members or im-
mediate connections of the " old Council" were pro-
posed as candidates, or else " the consolation" enjoyed
by him under the defeat might have happened to be
considerably less ? Does the Albion insinuate, that if

the candidates for the other wards in which the Con-
servatives were successful had been chosen from the
" old Council" party, the election of the latter would
not have been quite as secure as that of those who

have been returned ? The Conservatives returned the
whole of those candidates who had anything to do with
the "old regime," and that by very large majorities;
and the Albion is welcome to all the consolation which
such an " untoward event" is calculated to afford the
chopfallen Liberals.
The editor of the Albion need not be surprised that
" the Tories seem wonderfully elated with their suc-
cess"; nor need he express any astonishment that they
should predict that " in 1842 they would be the ruling
party in the Council of this borough." if he looks at
the numerical superiority of the Conservatives, taking
the aggregate amount of voters polled at the recent
election, he will see some reason for the exultation of
the Tories, and much cause for Radical .despondency.

The Council proceedings of Saturday last call for
very little remark. The most important transaction
was the election of our friend Joshua as Mayor of
Liverpool. He has, at length, attained the summit 'of
his wishes. The Reform Association have carried
their point against their more aristocratic brethren.
They must now look out for another chairman. We
recommend the rejected of Scotland Ward to their
choice. It may prove a stepping-stone to the Mayor-
alty. Why should not the " man of paint" succeed
as well as the " man of grain" ?
Several of our contemporaries have bestowed the
highest encomiums on the late Mayor. We see no
reason why we should dissent from them. His con-
duct has been, as far as it has fallen under our cogni-
zance, gentlemanly and dignified.
The sensitiveness of the Liberals in the Town Coun-
cil, on the question that the inquiry into the persona-
tion of voters should extend to all persons who had so
offended, is not to be wondered at. Such an inquiry
would prove exceedingly inconvenient to those gentle-
men among them who prate so loudly about " purity
of election." We hope soon to shew these superlative
purists that many of their party have not entered the
Council with " clean hands."

The shyness of certain of the Liberals of the Town
Council in reference to the acceptance of the liberal
offer of the Earl of Harrowby and Lord Sandon,
" trammelled as it would be with the condition" that
it should form the nucleus of a library accessible to the
public, is truly amusing. The very men who manifested
this shyness have always been loud in their advocacy
of the " education of the people." But who would
expect consistency from a Radical

CORRESPONDENCE.-

EXCHANGE WARD.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE LIVERPOOL STANDARD.

SlR,—The mention in my former letter of Mr. R. Rawson's
delinquency has called forth a reply not only from himself,
but from a correspondent of the Albion, " Radical" by name,
and probably the clerk of the Ocean Assurance Company will
not thank his friend for his rather officious interference.

Making all due allowance for the irritation displayed in
Mr. Rawson's letter, and which is natural enough in one
smarting under the consciousness of being found out, the
only point for me to notice is his denial of a promise not to
vote. Ido not wish to make use of the name of my inform-
ant without his authority, and his temporary absence from
town prevents me from obtaining this, but in a few days I
shall be able to satisfy Mr. Rawson himself on this point.
The principal charge Mr. Rawson wisely does not notice,
and his radical friend only recriminates that other persons
have given similar votes. _ .

He first asserts the baseness of the precedent, and then
admits that Mr. Rawson followed it. Kind friend, and ad-
mirable defender !

My charge is, that Mr. Rawson made a political engine of
the Ocean Assurance Company, and this he tacitly admits.
He does not pretend that he is the occupier of the office, or
that he pays the rent. It requires no great insight into fu-
turity to foresee that they will not be paid in his name again,
or if they should be, he knows very well that his name will
not stand upon another register.

CONSERVATIVE.

TO THOMAS SANDS, ESQ.,
COUNCILLOR FOR EXCHANGE WARD, &C.
Sir,—l take the liberty of addressing, through the public
press, in order that the. public, as well as yourself, may be-
come acquainted with the case. About three weeks ago, I
happened to go into the police-court, when, among a great
number of improper characters, three boys were brought up,
charged with playing marbles, and being disorderly in Han-
over-street, during the hours of divine service. The police-
officer, very modestly, stated that complaints had been made
by several respectable persons in that neighbourhood, he, the
officer, had stated that fact to Mr. Whitty, who directed him
the next time they offended to take them up. He accord-
ingly had done what he was ordered. The boys had every
appearance of being of the worst description; but, on the
officer making his statement to Mr. Rushton, he, the latter
gentleman, instead of giving the boys a reprimand for their
conduct, immediately ordered them to be discharged, and
gave a severe reprimand to the officer for what I considered
doing his duty, and told him it would have looked better if
he had given them a good dressing with his stick.
Now, as I understand that there was an order made by
your committee, that the police-officers were not to make use
of their sticks, I should like to know how the officers are to
act, inasmuch as your orders are in direct opposition to
those of the stipendiary magistrate.
As it has been frequently declared by the judges from the
bench and the criminals at the bar, that sabbath-breaking
has been the first step to the ruin of the latter, what are we
to think of such doctrine as that laid down by Mr. Rushton,
when it is a notorious fact, that pitch-and-toss, and all sorts of
gambling and sabbath-breaking prevails in this town with
greater impunity than any other in the kingdom ?
I trust that you will, in your official capacity, bring the
above case before the Town Council or the Watch Com-
mittee, so that the officers may know how to act under the
like circumstances.—l am, sir, your obedient servant,
AN ELECTOR OF EXCHANGE WARD.
11th November, 1839.

POLICE INTELLIGENCE.-FRIDAY.