The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1833-05-07 00:00:00

TUESDAY MORNING, MAY 7, 1833.

We received last night the following intelligence from
our private correspondent at Plymouth :--
" PLYMOUTH, Saturday, 4th May.—The Nimrod sloop of war
arrived here yesterday, having on board 150 men lately form-
ing a portion of the crews of. Sartorius' squadron. The Nimrod
proceeded on to Portsmouth the following tide, and I have been
assured, through a private channel, that. the Admiral's imme-
diate resignation is certain."
'We have every reliance on the accuracy and correct
information of our correspondent, as the insertion of the
above shows, yet we must frankly confess, that it is hardly
credible that one of his Majesty's ships should be em-
ployed in thus taking part in the contest, openly aiding
the adventurers, and violating all Lord Palmerston's and
Lord Althorp's pledges of strict neutrality. There is, to
be sure, one reason for believing it, apart from the re-
spectability of our correspondent, and that is, that not
the slightest faith can be placed in the promises of any
one member of the present cabinet. Carrying home the
disabled pirates may not be considered an act of inter.
ference, on the rule of the Foreign Secretary, that bom-
barding a citadel, and carrying away its garrison as pri-
soners, is not an act......0f war. We shall perhaps hear
more of this transaction in a few days.

WE have, it appears, given Mr. William Ewart more
credit for consistency than he is entitled to. He voted
against ministers on Sir John Key's motion, on Tuesday
last, and our mistake consists in setting him down as one
of their thick-and-thin supporters. It is a grievous mis-
take; we are heartily sorry for it, and promise never to
do him so kind a turn again. _ _

Reader, only bear in mind that on last Tuesday we'
published a letter, written by this same Mr. Ewart, in
which he defends his vote against the reduction of the
malt tax, on the previous Friday, on the ground that it
was calculated to embarrass ministers and drive them
from office. He thought it better to Prolong the burthens
of the people than lose the services of Lord Althorp and
•
his colleagues.
But, after making this defence, and giving these expla-
nations to his patrons, Messrs. Cropper, Benson, and Co.
what does our honourable and consistent representative.
do? He goes down to the house and votes against mi-
nisters, on a question which directly involved their reten-
tion of office ! He votes, on Tuesday, that his vote on
Friday ought not to have been given ! He votes against
the repeal of the malt tax on Friday, and in favour of it
on Triesday,; and not only in favour of it, but also in fa-
vour of the additional repeal of the house and window
duties! There is reason in roasting cockles, and perhaps
Ewart knows why ; but his reasons for supporting
ministers, by voting against them, are beyond all human
comprehension.

Sir John Cam Hobhouse's resignation of his seat and
place, previous to the debate on the assessed taxes turns
out to be just what we anticipated, as glaring a juggle as
ever was perpetrated by a petti-fogging attorney. Sir
John is still in office, his resignation not having been ac-
cepted ; and he only waits the honour of being returned
-by the electors of Westminster, to put aside the mask,
and exhibit himself as the secretary for Ireland.
That the electors of Westminster will allow themselves
to be duped in this manner remains to be seen. Their
representative had not the candour or the honesty to
resign his seat in sufficient time for them to express
their sentiments in Parliament, and yet he stood pledged
either to vote with them or retire. He retired, it is
true; but he might as well have absented himself; for
his vote was lost, and if he should be returned again,
what is to prevent him from serving his constituents a
similar trick on the very next opportunity ?
We observe that Mr. Escott, a conservative, is in the
field in opposition to Hobhouse, but we are afraid he is
too late; at any rate we wish hini success. The defeat
of the Secretary would be a great deliverance.

LORD GREY might now exclaim-with Macbeth :
"Hang out the banners on the outward walls,

The cry is still they come!" •
Yes, the Unions are up in tongue, if not in arms, and
the cry in Downing-street is they come ! Birmingham
has had-a preparatory meeting, and in a few days there
will be, as during the reform mania, threats of invasion,
vows to pay no taxes, exhortations to passive resistance,
if not the open menace of assembling five hundred thou-
sand men on Hampstead Heath: •
All this is precisely as we anticipated. The whigs
have created a giant which is standing over them, with
a bludgeon in one hand, and a brick-bat in the other, re-
solved either to extort an implicit compliance with his
demands, or knock out their brains. The doctrines
which the Political Unions now inculcate were -first
taught them by his Majesty's Ministers. When Lords
Grey, Althorp, and John Russell, became corresponding
members of the Birmingahm destructives they recognised
the constitutionality of the principles which they then
taught and still teach.. Lord Milton, now Lord leitzwil-
liam, declared he would pay no taxes unless the reform
bill *ere permitted to pass. Mr. William Brougham
made a similar declaration in Southwark. • Mr. Thomas
Duncombe sang the same song at a meeting of revolu-
tionary shoeblacks at St. John's Wood; and various
other persons, equally respectable, entered upon the
journals of tap-rooms and smoking clubs equally illegal
and seditious protestations.
But where is Lord Fitzwilliam now ? If a refusal to
pay taxes in the summer of 183'2 were justifiable, it
must be as defensible in the summer of 1833. The cry
then was to overawe the King, and keep the whigs in
office. The cry now is to compel the whigs to reduce the
public burthens, or drive them from office. 'The people,
even the members of these unions, have been shamefully'
used by ministers and by their representatives. Look
at the conduct of Burdett, Brougham, Horne, Lushing-
ton, Hobhouse, and Others. If they were not all pledged
against the assessed taxes, the most of them were, and
every one of them well knew, that their repeal was de-