The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1838-06-01 00:00:00

countrymen have returned to England in abject poverty
and wretchedness. They have claims upon the Spanish
government for arrears of pay which that government
will not discharge Our ministers have been repeatedly
besought to interfere, but in vain. On Tuesday evening
the Marquis of Londonderry presented a petition to the.
House of Lords from the officers and men of the late
Legion, praying ministers to do something for them ; but
Lord Melbourne would only promise the " good offices"
of himself and colleagues, and denied that the petitioners
had any right to more.
His lordship does the misguided and hapless men much
injustice. Had he and his colleagues not, to say the
least, allowed false hopes to be held outolle Legion
would-never have been formed. He is, therefore, bound
in good faith to see them righted. Every Englishman
has'an indefeasible claim upon him, as the chief minister
of the crown, for protection from robbery by any foreign
power ; and this claim is a thousand-fold stronger on the
part of the men of the Legion, because of Lord Mel-
bourne's part in getting it up. He should, as he could
without much trouble, compel the Spanish government
to pay the arrears forthwith. He would do so if he were
desirous to vindicate bis own honour. The Legion was
fraudulently originated; and all those who were of it,
save the inglorious knight, have been fraudulently dealt
with from first to last. Their fate is a warning to Eng-
lishmen, which we hope will never be forgotten, to leave
dishonourable and unjustifiable warfare to our enemies.

IRISH MUNICIPAL REFORM.

(From the Dublin Evening Mail.)

We have feceived from our London Correspondent the fol-
lowing important communication on this all absorbing subject.
It will be read in Ireland with deep anxiety—and if we be not
much mistaken, the proposed arrangements will by all parties
be deemed far from satisfactory :
" LONDON, SATURDAY, 1M A Y-26.—The discussion on the Irish
corporation bill has been postponed until Tuesday next. I be-
lieve I can inform you pretty accurately of the concessions
which the Conservatives mean to make in return for the conces-
sions made to them on the Irish tithe question by the govern-
ment. I apprehend Sir Robert Peel will on Tuesday night in.
form the house that be is prepared to grant corporations to all
the towns in Ireland having a population exceeding 15,000
souls. This will consequently include the following towns, viz.:
—Dublin, Cork, Limerick, Waterford, Belfast and Galway.
The franchise is to be a ten-pound one, and the rate under the
new poor-law bill to be the basis. Sir Robert Peel will also
insist on the appointment of sheriffs, recorders, &c. being in the
bands of the government, and not, as in the English bill, in the
gift of the council. It will also be intimated to the government that
unless the tithe bill be framed in every particular so as to meet
the views of the Conservative party, no corporate reform bill
will obtain their sanction. Whether or no the plan T have
sketched will receive the approval of Mr. O'Connell or his
servants, the ministers, I have no Means of ascertaining, but all
must allow that the proposed concessions on the part of the
Conservatives are large enough to satisfy the rapacity of any
one save Mr. O'Coanell."

'This is the first intimation in the press of either country as to
the course intended to be adopted. The reservation which sus-
pends the passing of the Corporate Refoirn Bill, to the extent
and validity of the securities to be provided for the Church in
the Tithe Bill, is intended apparently to disarm the fears of
those who dread the operations of expediency and the facilities
of compromise—and doubtless it will reconcile many to with
hold their judgments until the experiment shall have been tested
by the actual plifivisions of both measures. Neither can we deny
that the restriction of municipal rights to a high rate of popula-
tion—and of corporate franchise to a high rate of taxation, will
remove some of the apprehensions with which this measure is
viewed by the Protestants of Ireland. We shall also admit that
the retention of the power of appointing Sheriffs, Recorders,
&c. from the hands of the corporate democracy to be thus
created, is a vast improvement upon the English system ; and
consequently that if the bill, as contemplated, be carried by both
Houses of Parliament, it will constitute a measure much less
dangerous and objectionable than the formidable transfers here-
tofore insisted upon by the members of the Lichfield House
conspiracy. Notwithstanding these improvements, we must en-
ter, in the name of the Protestants of Ireland, a caveat against
the measure. After all, it is but a greater or less degree, a
transfer of municipal privileges from one party to another;
and as long as that is the case in any respect, so long and so far
the original objections continue to be valid. Corporations, mu-
nicipal or otherwise, are the creatures of the law, created for
specific purposes. When these purposes cease to be exigent—
or when the pursuit of them becomes inexpedient, it is obviously
competent to the creating power to annihilate its own creatures;
and the policy may be wise and beneficial which dictates their
extinction ; but it can be neither wise nor beneficial to re-
create those institutions in favour of an adverse principle—or
even a different body of constituents—still subject to those ob-
jections and inconveniences'which render their suppression, as
far as regarded their original possessors, salutary or expedient.
And such is the case of the Irish Municipal Corporations. They
were created for the encouragement of the ,Protestant religion,
and for strengthening the bonds of connexion between Great
Britain. and Ireland, by fostering in this country a British in-
terest. If they have become needless in these respects—if their
working be prejudicial to both or either of their original objects
—let them be suppressed—let them be extinguished. The Pro-
testants of Ireland make no objection; for peace-sake they are
content to part with privileges, which, for centuries have been
their birth-right. But in the name of common sense—cf true
religion—of sound policy, and of national faith, do not trans-
fer them, in whole or in part, to those against whose power and
machinations they were first set up as a bulwark ; do not baud
them over to the enemy as instruments to lee used, and effec-
tually used, to the pie motion of purposes the very reverse of
those contemplated in their first institution. A measure short
of the latter we feel confident will never content the enemies of
the Protestant faith and British connection in Ireland :—any
thing approaching to it cannot but dissatisfy and discourage
that powerful, intelligent, loyal, and wealthy portion of the
Irish people, on whose affections and religious sympathy the
permaneuce of the British connection, so far as this country is
concerned, altogether depends. Security for the church is,
doubtless, a desirable object; but, under peculiar circum-
stances, it might be purchased at a rate wantonly extravagant ;
and, in the present circumstances, we can ourselves command
the market. We can reduce the enemy to concession, without
sacrificing one principle, or abandoning one just and reasona-
ble advantage of our own. We can afford to hold out, for the
adversary but exhausts his vigour in those attacks which daily
add to our triumph, by proving our position to he' impregnable.
We therefore recommend the protestants of Ireland to pause
and ponder ere they finally approve. The measure we confess
to be divested of several of its most adverse chafacters:—cor-
porations, as now proposed, will become a name millet than a
reality; in the reform proposed, the remedy dwindles into a
placebo. But in proportion as it is so, it is less likely to be ac-
ceptable to that party to whose pretensions it professes to be a
sacrifice; and we are, therefore, convinced that the safest and
the best method for all would be the total abolition of the insti-
tutions themselves.

For supposing, for a moment, the Protestants to be content
—is there no other party to be satisfied? Will the Irish agita-
tion, joyfully accept this proffered bauble of corporate equality
in lieu of the substantial machine of municipal power? Will
they accept dress parts in the six raree shows of municipal dig-
nity reserved for their amusement, and play mayors and com-
mon-council men on the stage of public life, will) all the strut 2
and as little of the reality, as the members of the histrionic body
enact kings and cobblers—tyrants and huffoons—" lords and
others," on the stage theatrical ? To ride in the gilt coach of
Dublin—to walk behind a mace in Cork—to sport a three-cocked
hat on week days, in' Limerick—to he ushered into chapel after
the cap of maintenance in Waterford—to sit in Walker's chair
in Derry—or even to tlstonish Belfast with the unwished-for
glories of a civic procession, may be an object to some—" for
"little things are great to little men"—but what is this but the

childishness of ambition, "pleased with the rattle, tickled with
a straw;" whilst all the greatness and solid power whicirmanly
ambition wishes to grasp, have already vanished from the empty
pageant? It is true these may be Caivthialic mayors, and com-
mon-councilmen, and burgesses and so forth—hut "the mace"
will be, as in Cromwell's eves, "au empty bauble," and their
councils so many schools of idle oratory, or noisome agitation.
The substantial powers of a corporation, viz., the election of
sheriffs, &c., will, by the present measure, be withdrawn ; and
the local authority over the lighting, paving, furnishing of wa-
ter, and other municipal improvements, will he, in every in-
stance, vested in commissioners appointed for these purposes.
Unlike the municipal institutions of England, in which the
powers just mentioned are legally vested, the new corporations
to be established in Ireland will he but the shadow of a shade—
the unreal mockery—the unsubstantial pageant of our ancient
corporate solidity. There still be the rotundity of the alderman,
per chance, but nothing,, as we may say, of the calapash and
calapee which ministered to his greatness.
'Surely it is not for the sake of conferring on the one hand, or
acquiring, on the other, such trumpery honours, that the great
and powerful Protestant interest is to be offended, and its reli-
gion, liberties, rights, and independence, to be endangered
We beg of her Majesty's opposition to consider this, without
reference to the motives which actuate the concession—for it
must be apparent, to the most short-sighted observer, that the
Duke of Wellington and Sir Robert Peel are conscious that the
time is come when the voice of the nation will make the accept-
ance of office imperative—and it is equally obvious, that the
settleinent of These qtfestions is solely with a view of removing
all obstacles to the permanent continuance of their adininistra-
tiun.