The Express. — 1848-02-18 (London, England)

THE EXPRESS, FRIDAY EVENING, FEBRUARY 18, 1848.  the law which re*Wed Itia leak to so small a merry% and yet the Qum:mum or THE EXCHEQUER ifs quite certain that this suspended law had nothing whatever to tie w iin exciting the panic ! We exclaim with Alderman Titottrsott,—then what, in the name of goodness, did excite the panic? Where does the CHANCELLOR OP THE EXCHEQUER mean to find the exciting agency ? In the earth or the air, or the direction of the wind, or in the prevalence of some miraculous hallucination ? lle repeated last night with great complacency the statement he made in November. Parties went to him, and they said they did not want money ; they simply wanted the assurance that people with abundance of unimpeachable security in their hands should not be denied all reasonable accommodation. lie suspended the law, and gave them that assurance, and the panic was instantly at an end. It is a most extraordinary circumstance that • man of an accurate and reasoning mind can permit himself to repeat these facts without deducing from them their palpable infereace—that the panic was calmed by the want of an assurance which the repeal of the Bank Act gave ; and yet the panic was not caused by the Bank Act. We again my, then by what was it caused ? It seems to us that no allegations can be more unsatisfactory than those which affirm the impolicy of Mr. Humus' motion, because parliament is sitting and a committee has been appointed. Why is the House of Commons to be converted into an executive department, and the pmress of the public business placed in jeopardy by the transference to the houses of legislature of discussions and responsibilities, which can only be conducted with advantage and resolved with safety by the members of the cabinet? Why is one of the most momentous public concerns of the time to be made an exception to the maxim, as forcible as it is old, which teaches that the best treatment of an admitted evil is the precaution which prevents its occurrence ? It is sat • small matter to place the stability of the cominerefig institutions of the country upon the problematical temper of a heterogeneous assembly, and still lam upon the problematical nerve or the doubtful car panty of a minister of the crown. There is one word to be said in conclusion. The debate of last night did not pass off without owns allusion to the favourite doctrine of the currency school, that when the Bank has got to the bottom of its reserve, and wants money, it may sell securities. By all means, say they, go into the market. Into what market ? Where was the market in the panic of 1825, or in October last ? These good people have not the remotest idea of the difficulty of selling that which nobody will buy; and with all deference we beg to suggest, when they exhort the Bank ruthlessly to sacrifice its securities in the teeth of a panic, they ought by the same rule to accuse of suicide a parched caravan in the desert, because it c:id not buy water which did not exist ; or a beleaguered and perishing city of folly, because it did not buy provisions which nobody could  on Saturday evening last interred, mantes, and shrouding, his child, then live days disa. In Roscommon thbles are quite as bad, and in Mayo the local paper states—" Deaths from ttarvation scour by dosens."