The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1839-04-02 00:00:00

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TUESDAY MORNING, APRIL 2, 1339.

The following is an extract from a letter received in
this town yesterday, by the Mexican packet, dated Ha-
vana, 28th of February :

" The brig of war Serpent has this. moment arrived
with despatches from the admiralty, from Vera Cruz,
(date, 15th inst.) it is said everything was settled. Mr.
Pakenham was expected back at Vera. Ctuz on the

and we hope soon to receive news which will enable
to despatch the Laurina for her destination."

The decks at last are cleared for action. 'Whether
the destinies of Great Britain shall any longer be traf-

ficked with, by the weakest and wickedest ministry
that has borne rule since the days of Walpole, must be
decided on the re-assembling of Parliament. We have
reached the "beginning of the end." Every man in
this broad realm has his hopes and fears suspended, as
though nations were on the eve of a decisive contest,
and anxiously with his neighbour speculates on the
probable result. Let the good cause triumph, and not
only will certain partisans rejoice, but there will be joy
from the Land's. End to Cape Wrath for many a quiet,
unobtrusive, patient lover of his church and country.
The waves shall close over the whigs for ever, and none
shall say " God bless them !"

We promised that we would this day consider, as
fully and fairly as we could, the present position of
parties, and the probable issue of the ensuing struggle.
We believe that the threads of Fate are held in a single
hand. If Sir Robert Peel choose to meet Lord John
Russell with a direct vote of censure, we suppose he
will certainly carry it this reformed, this Melbourne-
summoned House of Commons. But if he confine'
himself to their Irish policy, they will probably be
dragged through by a base majority, ranging perhaps
from ten to twenty; for they have already pledged their
motley myrmidons to the compact of Lichfield House,
and no party to that shameful alliance can refuse to
vote black white in. support of its disgraceful condi-
tions. And there is another and more cogent reason
behind. The faction want Lord Normanby. Lords
Melbourne and John Russell are to be thrown away
(as Lord, Grey was before them) like sucked oranges;
but Lord Normanby is the chosen instrument of those
ulterior designs, which every day is more and more
plainly disclosing. It would not pay to make by their
votes his past policy appear to have been "worse than
a crime—an error."

Since party feeling, . mere sordid, self-seeking inte-
rests are at work,—and public principle never embar-
rasses the liberal discussions,—Lord Normanby is out
and out the most desirable leader for the Whig, and
Radical, and Papist factions. There is not in the em-
pire so apt a tool—a man so well connected, and so
base : so aristocratic by blood and birth—so identified
with the dregs of the community in nature and by cha-
racter. It would be idle affectation for us to say that
any whiggish act could be too base for the Whigs of
the present cabinet. But Lords Melbourne and John
Russell are understood to have rules of their own,
which we know not, and cannot appreciate ; and, what-
ever be the reason, it is believed they shrink from mea-
sures which their soi-disant friends require, and into
which Lord Normanby will plunge without remorse.
Lord John will have no fellowship with Frost, and
scorns to be a conspirator with Feargus. Lord Nor-
manby knows that " misery acquaints a man with
strange bed-fellows," and, in the fallen fortunes of his
faction, he will cordially hug them both. And he is
right. They showed O'Connell the inside of Dublin
gaol; and, when the tables were turned, they met that
same O'Connell at Lichfield-house. They have put
Stephens in Kirkdale—they have denounced him from
the throne ; but there are no reasons why they should
not swear an everlasting friendship with the same Ste-
phens in Buckingham Palace. For what is there that
can be laid at Stephens' door, that it lies in a whig
mouth to call a crime ? We know he is a rebel. We
never heard that he was a liar, or a Fwindler, or a pro-
fligate,—or a profaner of God's sacred name, or a su-
borner of assassins. And if he had been all these, we
ask any man who knows the history of his country for
the last four years, would they have been reasons why
he should not be confederate with, and chieftain of,
the whigs ? Let the Chartists then take courage ; let
every cut-throat in the northern counties rally round
the man, who " opened the gaols and let loose the pri-

soners."

But if this be the game=if Lord Normanby, and
household suffrage, and a dissolution of parliament,
are to be the liberal trumps—we shall beat them off
the board. Do they think that no one has thought
twice about the Court ?—that no whispers of the deli-
cate investigations at Windsor have been blown about
the country ?—that no freeholders, or householders,
fathers of families, husbands, sons, and brothers, have
heard or read of the amiable correspondence that has
passed between two ladies, nearest in blood and .most
exalted in condition ? Do they think that principles
which Englishmen have ever held most dear can thus
be outraged, that the sanctity of female character can
be wantonly invaded, and no note be taken—no com-
ment made ? Lords Melbourne, and Palmerston, and
Holland, and Normanby, and Headfort, (fitting guar-
dians for our youthful Queen !) may fancy these are
trivial things, and such as will be in high circles. We
can tell them people are more prudish in less fashion-
able quarters, and they will discover this when they
appeal to the constituencies at a new election.

Again : do they flatter themselves that so many "li-
beral souls have been made fat" for nothing ?—that
there is no odour of whig and radical places, and corn-
missionerships, and jobs, in the public nostrils—that
radical town-councils have worked all this while in
vain ?—that Lord Durham has never been heard of in
the provinces ?—that no statistics of colonial, or Irish,
or foreign expenditure have been made, or can be
shrewdly guessed at ?—that the increase of debt, the
failure of revenue, and the flowing of public money
into private pockets, are clean gone out of mind and
forgotten ? Let them dissolve, and they will find that
the people of England are not quite such fools as they
take them for.

But do they build upon an united, a well-compacted
faction ? What character have they assigned to the
only man of wit among them ? Does Lord Normanby
dream of governing, and think this a convenient sea-
son for dissolving his twenty years' friendship with
Lord Brougham ? This is a cat he cannot bell. He
may play fast and loose—he may say one thing and
mean another—he may try the furthest corners—the
shabbiest shifts of liberalism. Brougham is an ex-
ploded humbug ; but he is not the worse liberal for
that : he is the older and abler brother of the craft.
Let Lord Normanby think on that ancient proverb
which tells who should be set to catch what sort of
man.

So much then for the liberals and the new agitation.
We fancy we have seen to the bottom of this same
shallow. If there should be war, or apprehension of
war, which the whits have contrived to render far from
improbable in the north and in the south, in the east
and in the west, from America, and India, and Spain,
and Russia,—then indeed the united voice of all this
empire will call aloud for the one man, whose name is
a tower of strength ; and then, in shame and fear, the
wretched whips—
«
the dull Tribunes,
That, with the fusty Plebeians, hate his honours—
Shall say, against their hearts, ' We thank the gods
Our Rome bath ruck a soldier.' "

Should peace and prosperity prevail, very sanguine
anticipations are entertained that the conservative party
would meet with national support sufficient to counter-
balance the Whig influences at court and the packed
constituencies of Ireland. England is true to the back-
bone. The energies of returning life are longer in
reaching the palsied extremities of the empire, where
corruption has obtained a firmer grasp, and political
intelligence does not circulate so briskly. But it is
confidently believed that a dissolution in the autumn of
the present year, under the coming registry, would re-
turn a good working majority to the House of Com-
mons.

We anticipate that Sir Robert will " bide his time."
We do not believe he will accelerate that fall, which
cannot now be long delayed, and will, in its due time,
be the fall of Lucifer.

It is quite clear to us that unless the boundary line
between the United States and Canada be clearly and
distinctly defined, both countries ,will be involved in
war. When America agreed to the arbitrament of the
King of the Netherlands she was bound in honour to
submit to his decision, or she ought never to have
consented to the arbitration ; and it says little for the
honour of her people, and less for the strength of her
executive, that the one refuses concurrence in the de-
cision of the referee, and the other is too weak to with-
stand the demands of the former party. The truth is,
the American Congress is secretly aiding and abetting
the insane governor of Maine, who has, however,
meaning in his madness, and as the States are resolved
upon annexing the neutral territory, " honestly, if they