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280 THE LEADflB. , [Saturday,
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IN THIS DEPARTMENT, AS ALL OPINIONS, HOW...
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HTNTS_TO THE ADMIRALTY. (To the Editor o...
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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« The Stranger" In Parliament. [The Resp...
little church which is chapel to the House . And how still more severe must have been the energy evidenced by Mr . Disraeli in his dutiful attendance on Wednesday—when you could see that he was doing his best , as the leader of his side , to catch Providence ' s eye . It was a picture , a touching picture , to see the pains he took to pray as English Tory gentlemen pray to the God of the Jews . Here and there were consolations for him in the service ; you could see that the eyelashes , carefully drooping over the livid cheek , were now and then raised in pleasant surprise when he found the ceremonial required that an English Tory Protestant gentleman should turn—to the East .
The discussion on the Tuesday evening was whether the interests of true religion would suffer if the populace were admitted to the national exhibitions on Sunday afternoons ; and the Prayerful Wednesday turned up with appropriateness to illustrate the debate . The East that honourable gentlemen turned to—from the City-road to Rotherhitheraged for beer , and from two to six blasphemed with a persistency that proved the blessing which we possess in half a dozen Reformed religions . Nevertheless , the desecration of the Sabbath is a capital cant : and , on Tuesday , nearly 300 gentlemen , every
' one of whom will be at parties—Lord Palnaerston ' s and others '—when next Sunday morning opens ^—decided , against forty-eight desecrators—gentlemen who never wait for the ballet on Saturday night operas—that it would be to cultivate national damnation if we let Mr . and Mrs . Brown and the children stroll about among pictures and -statues , on Sundays , instead of staying in the domestic dark backparlour to drink gin-and-water and get cross with one another . People are abusing Lord Palmerston for his " canting" speech on the subject . But that ia ridiculous ; the majority is Lord Palmerston ' s
justification . It is a consciously religious country , and great statesmen' — whose function it is , not to form , but to make use of public opinionmust not _ overlook cants — must obey the " religious public . " In Persia the religious public UkeB periodical bonfires : and the Persian Prime Minister ordains an unlimited supply of fagots . In England our religious public likes certain corner houses , in its streets , to be closed , its theatres to be shut up , and its pictures and statues concealed from the general gaze ;—and the clever Prime Minister , who will have his joke about it at a dinnerparty ,
insists on the sanctity , expediency , and beauty of the superstition—and the 300 representatives of the mysterious class of gentlemen who-wear , whiteneckcloths night and day , cheered . How hypocritical , says Jones of the Daily Democrat : Jones can tell you that the majority is made up of gentlemen who are not painfully ascetic , in the religious point of view—who keep petites maisons , are gamblers on the Stock Exchange , nobblers on the Turf , and loose everywhere . But the 300 are very sensible fellows to give in to the cant : it is not their business to enlighten the country—they are in
Parliament , for certain purposes of their own , on condition of representing the average folly of English mankind . The folly is all on the side of tlie minority , who presumptuously affect to be wiser than their neighbours , and who pretend to sympathise with Mr . and Mrs . Brown , reduced to the alleviation of Sabbatical and compulsory gin-punch . The Liberals are all delighted with Lord Stanley ' s speech : so well delivered , so wide in its sympathies , so strong , so eloquent . Yet if we are to consider Lord Stanley as among our statesmen—the class who select the profession of managing the nation , —it was a very ridiculous speech : it will induce extra ounces
of starch into the white neckcloth interest of the empire—It offends a party , —it risks power . The old Tories , who are frightfully suspicious of the young Tories— " their minds are rilled with the trash of Disraeli ' s novels , Sir , "—go about sulkily talking of Lord Stanley— " a dangerous young man , Sir . " And bo he is : for if he goes on voting according to hia logical conclusions , and , not according to his party ' s interests , what the deuce is to become of the constitution ? You can ' t govern a country , —complicated society , and so on , —on first principles ; and Lord Stanley is taking comprehensively to first principles—the paternal dismay being doubtless that ' of an elderly hen who sees the goslings eho has
hatched ( under a misapprehension ) taking to the water . Biggs quoting a few pages of Barry Cornwall to a hilarious House of Commons , was comic , on Tuesday : but not more ludicrous than sensible Lord Stanley was , in rising from the Tory opposition bench and delivering a speech which W . J . Fox had to compliment . Even a cant ought not to be taken up but at particular times . Sir Robert Peel is quite right , in his position as a generous and amusing individuality , to ll go in" for Poland and Hungary : but he was quite wrong to obtrude these intensely liberal sympathies of his on the town which he owns , and which he could and would empty if they didn't do what he told them , when he stood on the Tamworth
hustings as a member of a Government . See the consequences . Lord Palmerston , compromised , has had to annihilate his egregious character as a Liberal , and , to the perplexity of whilom deputations , and of that large class of credulous Liberalisms whom poor Lord Dudley Stuart so nobly and so innocently represented , to announce that he does not contemplate disturbing the map market by wrenching Hungary and Poland into " Independence "—and " Independence" is what English Liberals who have no votes and no influence insist on for races of which they know nothing , and which , if they did , they would despise , upon the general ground usually taken by the Briton in his complacent survey of foreigners . Lord Palmerston un-liberalised himself with great vigour and boldness : there was no mistake about his emphatic
repudiation of those " sympathies" which once recommended the bottle-holder to the favour of impulsive English Radicals : and , after this , let us hope we shall hear no more of his lordship ' s connexion with the Liberal party . Lord Lyndhurst had one of his strange parliamentary successes on Tuesday . His speech does not read as very original matter : his facts were the newspaper facts of the day : ~ his illustrations rather common-place : and his little bits of wit and small well-known Latin quotation from Virgilj impress one with the notion that this was the old business . But it is the
physical triumph—of a man past eighty , blind and deaf , and yet able to speak out his sensible mediocrity with tolerable clearness , distinctness , and grace of manner and gesture , so as to command the attention of the Peers for a full hour—which must be admired . Then , Lord Lyndhurst indicates undecayed acuteness in seizing on so excellent a cant , for momentary purposes , as that which creates the British indignation with Prussia because she attends to her own rather than to English or Turkish interests . The morning papers say , it was an overwhelming exposure of the perfidy of the . Berlin . Gourtandpublic . Lord Lyndhurst , in that
act , proved against Prussia precisely case which German politicians have so often urged against England : —so ready is one nation to detect political unworthiness in another nation . When Lord Chatham sent Mr . Hans Stanley to Berlin , to ask for the alliance of the new monarchy against France , the great Frederick said—" Your Ministers are too dishonest , and your people too changeable , to allow me to trust to such an alliance—I dare not depend on you . " Any well-read Frenchman will show any Englishman that the history of England is her is the
the conquest of selfishness—that success success of falsity , and plunder , and relentless commercial despotism . The English Liberal , who assumes too much for his own country , and who i 3 sympathetic with Sclavonians even at times when Great Britain has Irish , Ionian , Kaffir , and Indian insurrections and wars on hand , is frequently inclined to be an illogical animal : and it does not become so wise an assembly of statesmen as the House of Peers unquestionably is to be encouraging the old lawyers of its body in vindication of " eternal justice" in practical European politics .
The Newspaper Stamp Bill debate on Monday was only remarkable for a further development of the absolute incapacity of the accomplished Sir Cornewall Lewis to carry on a greut department in the House of Commons . He cannot speak—that is the whole truth—and it is of no use having a mere man of genius to think—a Chancellor of the Exchequer must be able to talk . Various circumstances render it doubtful if the measure can become law : but the great danger is in the fact that the Minister in oharge
of the bill has no resolution of character , and cannot fight the bill through its dangerous stage—committee . That it is a good bill is of no account : there arc triumphant cants in its way . The cant that the existing press is of the " highest character" in Europe is , perhaps , the most awful . This is an objection against change put forward by the provincial newspaper proprietors—proprietors of potty little concerns which , intellectually , are below contempt , and which , commercially , exist cither by
" consulting" " requests" of advertisers , or b pandering to the prevailing twaddle of some paro chial potentate , either a magistrate or a clergyma of the neighbourhood . Even in . London the prt tension is ludicrous . Compared with the chea press of Paris the dear press of London is intellects ally inferior : this a Manager of the Times adrnittec as his opinion , to the committee'of 52 : and wha " character" can you assert for the versatile 7 ' imei if it be not a character for cleverness ? Where is th character of the serenely stupid and vulgar mornin paper which bids for the knowledgeless approvs of the metropolitan tap-room , —or of the antithe
tical " fashionable" organ , which " lives" upon th paid paragraphs scattered by house - steward chronicling the dismal epic of a dull great party What character have the other morning paper but that of abundant obedience to " party" die tation—party organs being necessarily un-nationa and anti-chivalric . As to the weekly papers which are making themselves conspicuous fo conduct so copiously abused in Protectionists - where is their character ? What is now the Examine —still so . well able to be witty , vigorous , and origina —but a contented parasite of the Times ?—all it
political and literary ambition apparently gratifiei in being noticed by its great contemporary—alerl in adulation of the " high character" of a journa which , because it is conducted by men who compre Lend their country , has but one morale—never to bi in a minority . A cheap press may not be astound ingly intellectual , or recklessly honest : but forser vility of imitation—not so bad as " piracy , " of cour ® —and fulsomeness of flunkeyism—commend us t < weekly journals which are in dread that an un stamped press would vulgarise London journalism . "A Stranger . "
280 The Leadflb. , [Saturday,
280 THE LEADflB . , [ Saturday ,
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In This Department, As All Opinions, How...
IN THIS DEPARTMENT , AS ALL OPINIONS , HOWEVER EXTREME , AB ALLOWED AN EXPRESSION , THE EDITOB NECESSARILY HOLDS HIM SELF RESPONSIBLE FOR SOHE . l
Htnts_To The Admiralty. (To The Editor O...
HTNTS _ TO THE ADMIRALTY . ( To the Editor of the Leader . ' ) Portsmouth , March 19 . Sir , —The sanitary condition of the British flee must always be an object of primary importance t < the British nation . Allow me to bring before you notice the following instance of misplaced economy On the other side of this harbour stands a mos noble edifice , a monument of the interest this natioi takes in the welfare of our sick and wounded sea men , Haslar Hospital . It is approached by a si nuous inlet about half a mile in length , the navigatioi of which ( even for boats ) is difficult , the mud oi either side of the channel ( about twenty yard broad ) being left dry at low-water . The entir distance from the hospital to the Victory must b about a mile , from the hospital to the fleet at Spit head about two and a-half miles . Will you believ that to traverse this distance i ; here is no hospita boat—that is , no boat covered in ? I am told tha this is not the fault of the local authorities , that i boat of this description has been frequently npplie < for , but refused on account of the expense ; that is because the Lords of the Admiralty feared tin Brighto-Cobden spirit of the House of Commons plight be irritated through their proposing such an innovation . I have not heard that this wholesome
dread ever induced them to propose a diminution their own salaries . It is only due to Messrs . Cobden and Bright to state , that in my recollection no objection has ever been made to any reasonable improvement of the sort I allude to ; their objections have been muinly to useless works , mid to the increase of our naval effective force . In the first the majority of your readers will concur . As to the second , you , at least , have always opposed them . You will oblige me by lending your powerful aid to rectify this anomaly , and as , of course , somo expense must bo incurred by the country in doing so , allow me to point out a way by which fifty times the amount expended can be saved . It is probable that our Baltic fleet will this year ( as they did in 54 ; of
pass a considerable time off the island Nnrgen , situated between Revel and Helsingfors . This island is covered with wood the property of the Lnipcror oi Russia . A hundred men landed from a linc-ot-battle ship will cut and stack at least fifty tons ot wooa per diem ; the seamen will bo amply recompensed ! for their extra work by a shilling a day , and great will be the competition for such cinp'oy » icut / . Al " . lowing a ton of coal to do as much as five tons oi wood , the expense of fuel equal to a ton of the former will only bo ton shillings , whereas last year we pniu from thirty to forty shillings for coal , and sometimes a good bit more . The steamers can embark tlio wood as easily as they can tho coal , and wo bIjoii have fewer instances of demurrage of colliers . J . ru « - f its you will persuade the Admiralty to allow those two suggestions to take effect , I have tho honour to remain , Sir , Yours , & c , *¦
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), March 24, 1855, page 16, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_24031855/page/16/
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