The Liverpool Standard, and General Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1854-12-26 00:00:00

it of episcopal and capitular

to bri

spirit in which

conceived and carried

br though there is, no doubt

he duty can (

)R of the

for much

tained leave to bring in a bill to alter the arrange

is to afford the depositors the immediate security

securitie

stock or publi,

through the Commissioners fo

Reduction of the National Debt

It will also have

the effect of simplifying the public accounts, by
making the interest allowed to depositors a charge

upon the Consolidated fund ; but it is not intended

paid. The measure was well received by the House

viii no doubt pass into a lay

ENLISTMENT OF FOREIGN SOLDIERS

IVE have no reason to congratulate the Oppo-
sition on their success at the opening of the

Parliamentary campaign, nor even to give theta
credit' for their steadiness of resolution. The
Session was opened on the 12th of this month,
and the assembled legislators were informed" by
the highest authority that they had been called
together- at that unusual period in order that the
Militia might be made available to relieve the
regular army doing garrison duty in our Mediter-
ranean oatports. Not a syllable about the hiring:
of foreign soldiers ; not even awindirect
to it, in any of those semi-official~ announcements •
in Ministerial papers which are usually received as
having the-sanction of authority. All was kept in
profound searesy ; the Militia Bilb was the only
pressing measure, leaving the financial part of the
question and everything else until after the Christ-
mas recess; and yet, within two or three hours after
HER MAJESTY had spoken that which was set down
for her, the-Ministers give notice of a Bill which
had been already prepared to legalise the employ-
ment of foreign mercenaries in the war carrying on
against Russia. No wonder that it was received
with astonishment and indignation-, not only for
the unconstitutional nature of the measure itself,
but for the manner in which it had been intro-
duced. There was a want, however, of zeal in the
opposition, a lurking apprehension that it was
unadvisable to throw any obstacle in the way of
the Ministry who were charged with the conduct
of the war.; and the smallness of the-number who
voted in the upper house showed how little their
lordships were prepared for or expected any busi-
ness requiring serious opposition. Fn the House

of Commons it was somewhat different : the mem-
bers mustered more numerously, and as the metro-
politan press had, with very slight exception,
pronounced against the measure, it was fully
anticipated that the Bill would be thrown out,
upon the confident conviction that,whatever might
be the opinions of Ministers, it was totally unneces-
sary and altogether uncalled for. The fact was
well known that recruiting had been going on to
an extent unprecedented in any era of our history ;
that since the great battles in the Crimea men
volunteered with an alacrity which proved that
danger was an inducement rather than a discou-
ragement, and that the ancient spirit which had

given the prestige of invincibility to British troops
still animated our population. It was a libel on
our native courage to convey by implication the
idea that we were unequal to the emergency,
however great that might prove, and therefore
required the assistance of foreign soldiers to rein-.
force our army ; and there was, moreover, the con-
viction that the gallant affair at Alma, and the
still more wonderful resistance to the fearful odds
arrayed against us at Inkerman, were solely owing
to the fact of the British army being composed of
British soldiers.

Here was sufficient cause to justify the most
strenuous opposition to the measure, even without
regarding the constitutional part of the question,
and the strong repugnance very naturally enter-
tained to any resort to the practice pursued in the
last war of subsidising foreign troops. It was no
wonder, therefore, that members declared their
determination to oppose the progress of the Bill
in all its stages—a course of policy not very diffi-
cult even for a smaller minority, when they
are fully resolved on their course. Indeed the
fate of the Bill seemed all but sealed, when the
Ministers resorted to one of those expedients which
nothing but the most pressing emergency could
justify,— a course which has never been pur-
sued except by Liberals, the Conservative
party always disdaining to resort to' it. A
Cabinet Council was held on Saturday week, and
on the Monday following it was announced, through
the usual channel, that, in the event of the Bill
being defeated, the Ministers would resign ; and
truly the emergency must have been great when
Liberals can seriously think even of the virtue of
resignation. The threat seemed to have had its
intended effect, for, notwithstanding the promised
opposition of members of all shades of politics, the
second reading was carried on Tuesday night, or
rather on Wednesday morning, by a majority of
thirty-nine in a house containing four hundred and
fifty members.

A resignation of Ministers at this particu-

with some of our timid representatives than
if aocArvpa Could it have been imagined for

under

In instant that a change of Ministry
would have had an injurious

such circumstanc

effect in stimulating

the Emperor of Rossi

sumption is, that it would have had a direct],

It would ha

world, not only our determination to persew

t confidence is

I strength

is the prestige of victors

that it

dent to