The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1853-06-07 00:00:00

FROM OUR LONDON CORRESPONDENT.

MONDAY MORNING.
THE great and important event of the week has been,
as you can readily surmise, the breeze in the Ministry
occasioned by Lord JOHN RUSSELL'S Anti-Popery speech
on Wednesday morning, and the tendered resignation of
their offices in the Administration of Mr. KEOGH, Soli-
citor-General for Ireland, Mr. SADLEIR, junior Lord of
the Treasury, and Mr. MoNsELL, Clerk of the Ordnance,
three as choice spirits as the Romish Church ever fur-
nished to the British House of Commons. Lord Joirs,
naturally incensed at some violent declamation in the
course of the debate on Mr. MOORE'S modest motion for
the utter annihilation of the Irish Church establishment,
and the appropriation of the revenues of that institution
to the purposes of the POPE and his clergy, took occasion
to declare his conviction that if the priesthood of the sons
of Rome were armed with more power and privileges than
they now possessed, both the one and the other would be
used to check the spread of those principles which it was
the proud boast of the British Constitution to propagate,
and that their best energies would be devoted to check the
progress of civil and religious liberty. Consequent on
this declaration, the Irish triumvirate sent in their re-
eignation, embodied in a letter to Lord ABERDEEN, but I
am in a position to state, that not only have those re-
signations not been received, but that Lord ABER-
DEEN, in his capacity of Prime Minister, has repudiated,
disavowed, and condemned, on the part of the Cabinet,
Lord JOHN'S " offensive" language, expressed regret that
it should have been used, and requests that it has not
been considered as in any manner receiving the sanction
or support of the Government. Lord JOHN, too, has
been brought on his marrow bones. He declares that he
went further in the heat of debate than he intended ;
moreover, that his language has been misunderstood, and
. that he withdraws all that the least Papistical member of
the House could object to in his speech. That a humilia-
ting position for the ex-Premier of England ! Forced to
eat his own words by three subordinate officers who, not
twelve months ago, kicked him from the high position of
Prime Minister. But even here the determination of the
triad does not stop. They must have a public apology for
the insult offered to the Church of Rome, and they
suggest this should be made either in Parliament or by the
publication of the correspondence with Lord ABERDEEN.
THE list of distinguished individuals selected by the Earl
of DRRBY, Chancellor of the University of Oxford, to
have the honour of scarlet gowns conferred to grace the
installation, was much canvassed at the Atheneum Club
when it—the list— came to town from Oxford the other
day. It is a wise and unwise selection—questionable here,
sensible there, but all through is predominant " Caw me
and I'll caw thee." They stuck by him in his Govern-
ment, and he acknowledges it. Mostly all of them are
scholars—some not severely so,—and hence I think not
entitled to the " Red." In the heap we find J. T. F.
MITFORD, Lord REDESDALE ; he is, certainly, one of the
most unaccountable beings I have known during the last
twenty years and more. We call him " the waiter." He is
the son of the first baron, who was Lord High Chancellor
of Ireland some thirty years ago, of whom more anon.
The epithet " waiter," above bestowed on the late Lord
Chancellor's son, is entirely due to Lord REDESDALE'S
manners and mode of dress. No offence—far from it—to
onr thousand and one friends who minister graciously in
hostelries. Winter and summer Lord REDESDALE'S
daily costume comprises an indifferent hat, ditto pair of
shoes, white cotton stockings, black trowsers (apparently
slops), yellow waistcoat,—these vulgarities having over
them a blue coat and brass buttons. No gloves—red
hands. This is Lord REDESDALE, Chairman of Com-
mittees in their Lordships' House, with a salary of £5,000
a-year. He is a fine, fresh-looking lad ; though close
upon fifty, the greatest physiologist that ever traced exis-
tence animal, from Zoophyte to Man, would say that
REDESDALE is not more than half the fifty aforesaid.
There he is in the House of Lords, from day to day, the
same verdant youth. He belongs to a family of some
literary position—l may not hesitate to say distinction.
His uncle was the historian of Greece ; his sister, the Miss
MITFORD, made village life popular wherever circulating
libraries are to be found. The present lord's father was a
good old Conservative before that honoured appellation
was found necessary by the degenerate character of later
times. He loved the Crown of England and the Irish
people—the latter to a fault. He was, however, a great
dawdle sometimes in the House. During the last stage
of the proceedings on the Roman Catholic Emancipation
Bill, old Lord REDESDALE came forward to the table of

their Lordships' House—he was then about 80 years of
age,—and, as T have hinted, very loyal. "My lords," he
said, " T like the Trish people—l have lived a long time
among them (he weeps—boo-hoo !)—I say I have lived a
long time among them—they are good-hearted people
(boo-hoo again); but I cannot (boo-hoo) vote for this
bill." Such was the first baron when I knew and res-
vected him ; his son, the present baron, about to receive
the scarlet gown of the doctor from Lord DERBY, is in-
comprehensible.
I referred to Mrs. HARRIET BEECHER STOWE in a
recent communication, not, I beg to assure your readers,
in terms of disrespect, far from it; although I considered
it by no means complimentary to the cause of slave eman-
cipation that she should appear evidently the "observed
of all observers," doing a little paltry knitting, the value
of which could not all the evening amount to a groat.
Well, she has had plenty of " lionising" since at concerts
and confabs, city meetings and meetings of the legislature
—take, par example, the first working day of the week,
Monday. In the morning she was to be found at that
noisy scene in the Guildhall, where Sir JOHN KEY, who
has worked for the corporation for thirty years without
receiving a halfpenny of wages. was trying to get in his
old age—time out of mind the boon to aldermen—the
city chamberlainship, was opposed by one of the Guildhall
clerks, Mr. B. SCOTT, who all through, as well as his father
before him, had received and still receives a thumping
salary for his clerkship work ;—however the alderman has
got in, and Mrs. H. B. STOWE was there to see. After
that she had a bit of luncheon ,• and, at five o'clock, we
have her again in public in the House of Peers, under the
shadow of the Duchess of SUTHERLAND'S wing,—that
noble lady's brother, the Earl of CARLISLE, having a
bootless petition to present from the women of Kingston,
Jamaica, against Cuban slavery. Petitions on this nefa-
rious subject to our houses of legislature are so many bits
of useless parchment. The question of slavery at Cuba
is blinked ; the treaty—that word of promise—is affected
by the court of Spain to be kept to the ear, but it is
broken to the hope, and will continue to be, so
long as Cuba appears to flourish like the wicked. The
ladies of Kingston and their lords are now impoverished
by the legislation of the last twenty years ; the Cubans
are wallowing in ill-gotten wealth. We all know it,—
deplore their practices, yet can't prevent them. The Earl
of CARLISLE made a good speech on the occasion ; he
could not do otherwise, considering the question and the
man ; he got very little from CLARENDON, the minister,
in answer ;—the cruisers were at work,—they had taken
certain slave ships lately,—the present Captain-General
of Cuba was a good sort of man enough, and was deeply
alive to the iniquity of the trade. Of course he is ; but, if
there were twenty such Captains-General at Cuba, so
long as the riff-raff of the world, from the crimp to the
murderer, is allowed to reside and trade in Cuba, the slave
will find he is purchased. The average price is about
£lOO a head ; when such a bonus is held out, good-bye to
your treaty and protocol ! There will he a row in that
part of the globe before long. Lord BROUGHAM, who
looked remarkably well, had a word or two to say, and
the petition was laid on the table.
Shortly afterwards the head of the Government, the
Earl of ABERDEEN, entirely lost his temper. They were
talking about that almost worthless borough, Maldon ; '
and the Earl of DERBY, who never loses an opportunity
of twitting the coalition Cabinet, charged ABERDEEN
with allowing his subs. to laugh and sneer, when they
ought to be quiet. " What do you mean ?" said ABER-
DEEN, very wroth; "I have no subordinates that I know
in this house, who have not a right to laugh or cry if they
like." The scene was capital, and Mrs. STOWE appeared
to enjoy the brawl. In the House of Lords the Earl of
DERBY ought to have remembered that there are no
subordinates—they are all peers—not even recognising
the LORD CHANCE LLOR as more—the lowest baron sitting
on the woolsack, if he so like, alongside the CHANCELLOR.
The same question about the aspect of affairs between
Russia and Turkey was in both houses on the same even-
ing. The Earl of HARDWIC KE had made a long speech
when CLARENDON came in and gave an answer containing
nothing. In the House of Commons, Mr n
made a long speech on the same subject, his question
being contained in one line at the end. Lird-7 JOHN
RUSSELL'S answer was the Earl of CLARENDO:. S. Nix!
Concert and confab ! Of the former let me give you a
specimen from the " true avouch," Szc. No one surely
can find fault for shooting folly as it flies ; if any there are
so thin-skinned, so mercifully sentimental, let him or her
coins forward and condemn me. I hate what we English
know well by the term humbug ; I hate the semblance of
it in man or woman,—seldom we find it in the latter; but
hen it occurs among the fair sex, there's no standing it.
somebody ought to tell •Irs. SrowE the meaning of
ie word humbug ; whether she is a clever woman or not,
I cannot tell ; and, indeed, care not. Of this lam cer-
tain, she shows herself to he a most sensible woman, by
holding her tongue in public. We have it on the highest
authorities, Scripture and SHAKESPEARE, that a fool is
accounted wise ellen he holds his peace. Mrs STOWE
says little or nothing in public, and up to a certain point
max have maintained the glorious truth referred to, of
which COLERIDGE (wasn't it) gives the converse at a

market dinner, when a lusty specimen of the English 7
farmer sat down to the roast beef and pudding—ate—said
nothing, till the Norfolk dumplings came on—confound
them, they nearly choked me one day after snipe-shooting
—the farmer rent the veil of his respectability ; for,
eyeing the aforesaid indigestible balls, he exclaimed, in
extacy, " them's the jockies for me." The illusion
went instanter. Now, Mrs. STowE holds her tongue
entirely. That's right. On Tuesday morning she came out
strong. No mistake. A black female, named in the bills
Miss GREENFIELD—how English !—had got herself ad-
vertised for a concert. To everyone acquainted with the