Glasgow Courier. — 1866-01-18 (Glasgow, Strathclyde, Scotland)

JAMAICA.  The Times says there is good reason to believe that the political collapse of the island has been chiefly duo to the reckless manner in which political warfare has been carried on. The aboriginal Caribs of the island could not have tomahawked or scalped their enemies with greater ferocity than the Radicals of the present day have vituperated their opponents. Long before Mr. Eyre came to the island—which, indeed, was only three years ago--the evil was at its height ; but it is his misfortune to be in office when it has produced the final catastrophe. Every man who came forward in a public position in Jamaica had to prepare for a flood of abuse and misrepresentation, for taunts, for insinuations, for gross personalities, not always confined to himself, but sometimes extending to his family and household. We have already seen how Governor Eyre was charged by Gordon with defrauding the island out of the price of a piano, and Baron von Ketelholdt of appropriating to his own use a charitable fund; and numbers of similar accusations by the Radical speakers will be forthcoming if any one chooses to inquire for them. The Standard observes that the position in which Ministers have placed themselves with reference to the Jamaica inquiry is one so singular that we are at a loss to find a precodeut for it in the whole of our colonial history. They begin by writing a dispatch in the name of the Queen congratulating Governor Eyre upon the promptitude with which he and all the loyal subjects had averted a great danger from the island. He is told expressly that his conduct has given the highest satisfaction ; he is thanked on behalf of his country for having mainly effected by his own energetic measures the restoration of order; and immediately afterwards, at the cry of a noisy faction, he is put to trial upon the question whether those measures were murders or not. Incapable and weak as many Whig administrations have been, we have never yet known anything like this. It is a direct abandonment by the Cabinet of its responsibility. It is a cowardly flight from official duty. This is, of course, the only one explanation possible. Mr. Cardwell probably understood the significance of the feats that had been brought to him, and he wrote on the knowledge of those facts in a spirit becoming a British Minister, to the man, who by triumphantly encountering this great peril, rendered his country this great service: , Biat.Lord Russell is not proof aginst the influence of deputations, especially when they come from Exeter Hall, or from beneath the resounding roofs of Birmingham. It was the power of these patched-up imitations of public opinion that induced him to snub his colleague and practically sacrifice Governor Eyre. We cannot yet feel perfectly sure that at the same time he has not practically sacrificed the British possession of Jamaica. For if ever there was a policy calculated to lose a colony and discredit a government, it is that which Lord Russell, in his contemptible anxiety for office, has pursued in this matter, is flagrant discourtesy towards his own colleague, and at the dictation of an uncharitable cabal. The Daily News says that the extracts from Mr. Cardwell's dispatch to Governor Eyre, which have been communicated by the latter to the Jamaica Assembly, and reach us by the last mail, do not bear the character of a full and absolute approvel of Governor Eyre's conduct, as the first intimation of the telegraph led many to suppose. The first paragraph acknowledges receipt, the day before, of Governor Eyre's dispatch and narrative ; the second expresses that feeling which was and still is universal in this country, of profound regret at the massacre of white and coloured men in the outbreak at Morant Bay, and of deep sympathy with the relatives ef Those who had thus fallen ; the third states that Governor Eyre's approval of the officers of the army and navy will be brought under the notice of their respective chiefs, and expresses the Colonial Secretary's own satisfaetion in learning that the civil authorities had faith-fully done their duty; and the ninth recognisea with 'pleasure the alacrity with which the well affected inhabitants of the island had placed their services at the governor's disposal. In all there is nothing more than the expression of sentiment which everyone must share, of the dry formalities of official intercourse. So much, it appears to us, should be admitted in mere justice to Mr. Cardwell, who, however, is doing small justice to himself by withholding the official intelligence which has reached him since he received Governor Eyre's published dispatch.