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    perverse-agility to the Vienna Conferences , and finds a new explanation of Austrian . policy . And his explanation is this ^ —that Austria ' s policy is—expectant- The Earl believes that , " if- while these negotiations "were pending , Sevastopol , had fallen , we should eitneu have secured peace with Russia , or- obtained the active co-operation of Austria . " From the conftision of this logic we infer , that the

    Emperor Francis-Joseph at first sympathised with Turkey and the Western Powers ; next , that he was estranged from tliein—that " his- feelings greatly changed , " —through manifestations of opinions over which the Cabinet of England had no control , and which were not permitted in Prance . Thirdly , he affected to expel the Russians from the territory they had seized , and only waited for their discomfiture in the Crimea to coerce

    them , if neeessary , by arms . One of these contradictory phrases confutes the other . To us it appears that Austria adheres to a distinct line of action . She raised her military forces at an enormous cost to a formidable efficiency . She stationed herself upon the Danube—the long-sought object of her ambition—she maintained her armies in a threatening attitude while she demanded concessions from

    Russia at Vienna—concessions for herself , not for Turkey , which she abandoned . Russia acquiesced , and . after a last pretence at negotiations , which Lord Ciaeendoit admits to have been a sham , the imposing panoply of Austria dissolves , and the flower of the Czar ' s troops , which had been detained upon the Gallician frontier , march southwards to press upon the AV ^ estern Allies .

    If there be a logic in human , policy , this proves , not that Austria has been irritated by England , but that she has been drugged by Russia . Count BtroL has declared so much . ILet Turkey be guarded , he suggests , by a tripartite treaty . Let the Sultak open the Straits when he is in danger . Austria , meanwhile , will continue to occupy the Principalities , and Russia agrees to ratify the privileges of her neutral ally on the Danube . Is there more than this in the speech of the Earl of Clarendon ? The infatuation of the

    British Government consists in its regarding as an advantage the maintenance in the Principalities of an Austrian army large enough to enforce martial law , but too small to menace Russia . Lord LrNDmiRST put this with perfect clearness to tho House of Peers . He demonstrated that the diminution of the Austrian forces in Oallicia afforded a corresponding opportunity to the Russian generals ; and ho hinted at tho secret and sinister understanding on this subject which may bo supposed to exist between the Cabinets of Vienna and St . Petersburg .

    Lord Clarendon , on tho part of the Government , gave no explanation on this point . His nerveless speech was tho sliy and sickly plea of a helpless applicant affecting to prize even tho negative duplicity of an equivocal ally . Incapable of dealing witli the question , he glided over its surface , il uttering about tho wx'itings and speeches that huvo wounded tho susceptibilities of Germany , forsooth!—as if the Germany " of Courts and Camarillas were tho German nation—excusing tho retreat of Austria from her engagement * ,

    alluding vaguely to future terms ot peace , and trying to show that tho presence of an Austrian , division on the Danube wna of importance to tho Allies . Ho did not utter a "word to satisfy tho nation i \ b to the tenure by which the Austrian Emperor holda his ground , or as to tho condition of tho provinces which his barbariaiiH sconrgo . Ho confounded a gratuity winch that potentate has received with a Bei-vice rendered . It ia necessary to in wist on this distinction . It may bo well that Auatria should

    arm her legions , as it . has .. been pretended , ; to , extort . concessions * from . Russia ^ and di&- < arm as'iaoon . as these concessions have been ' obtained . She . thus fulfils her own- ; policy , , and leaves Russia , free to fulfil hers-. But it is as silLy as . it is false to represent this , conduct as serviceable to tb . e Ottoman Empire or to the Western Powers . Lord C : larendon did not even attemp t , to meet the powerful and comprehensive statement of Lord Lisdhdrst with a reply . He simply exhibited himself and his colleagues as the voluntary dupes of a Power whose ambiguous neutrality in London is lawless domination at Bucharest .

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    THE SUICIDE OP COMMERCE . Commeece has come to the criminal court ; the banker takes his stand in the place of the felon . It is no young house of commission agents , "but one of the oldest and most respected houses in the metropolis that thus represents commerce in that tribunal . We have never been among the adulators of trade ; the old boasted soundness of the English commercial world was not quite sound—the plain , downright , pay-your-way , solid man of business had his virtues ,, but

    also his narrownesses ; and he it was who paved the way for the vices which have sapped the very life of commerce ; have poisoned * it with depravity U 7 itil it becomes criminal . If there is anything real in the world , it ought to be trade , commerce , " business . " It deals with solid , tangible things ; its laws are simple , its results are palpable , personally appreciated ; yet commerce , as we have said before , partakes the same unreality , the same hypocritical smoothness of surface over a disordered interior which it has been our

    business to expose in reference to many other sections of society . With what object have we insisted upon the uniform characteristic of these exposures ? Has it been in tlie love of decrying our fellow-creatures ; in the pleasure of ex > posing sore places , and of making human fallibility feel its shame more bitterly ? Quite the reverse . We know that our purpose in persevering with that gi * eat task has been by some misinterpreted , but by many

    more it has been clearly understood . We know that the body oft the English people , high and low , is more " genuine" than the artificial product into which it converts itself , called " society ; " that its real motives , its flesh-and-blood sympathies , are more healthy , and in the long run are stronger than its factitious requirements and convenances . But it is precisely because we know man to be better than the best disguise which he puts on , for the purposes of the " world , "

    as it ia called , that we urge him to throw off the disguise ; that wo point out its shocking effects on himself and on all that he holds dear . The man , we say , is better than the tradesman , the clergyman , the aristocrat , the representative of any class ; and if he will but look boldly into his own experience , he will find that the basest practices which ho thinks necessary to get on in tlie world , bring with them their own penalty , and are indeed useleaa and profitless .

    There is no part ; of society in which the reality is not disguised by the unreality . In this ii-oo country wo have a majority of men who arc bound by laws , in the formation of which they havo " no voice . Tho Church , m » wo havo " shown over and over again , ia thronged with dissenters and unbelievers , who conceal their non-conformity for the

    sake of the pay and position . I he nnatocraoy , which professes to bo so elevated by hi ^ h birth , wealth , and refined training ) iu detoctod in cheating at card a ; a VU'i'iKKS runs away from fraudulent turf liabilities ;

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    a , Gsosmosr . is ,: before the . n . olieer-courfcs fox makuag away with securities ; a > Baronet stands in the same place on the same charge ; . ' and now commerce- seems to convict , itself as the most unreal among alj .. these disguises and artificial creations . It will be almost a safe rule for the Englishman not to believe anything that he sees . What was once genuine , may now be spurious . If he sees a man . preaching in the pulpit , let him not be sure that that man is not a Papist , a Unitarian , or an Atheist ; for such thiugs are , and we can point to individual instances , '—which are not solitary . If he sees an " Honourable" welcomed in the highest society , let him not be sure that the man-is not a swindler or a blackleg . If he sees a peculiarly well-ordered domestic circle , let him watch the proceedings in the courts matrimonial or testamentary .. If lie sees a British merchant , let him not be sure that he has not before him a dealer in flash goods ; if a banker , that he is not an embezzler . We have from time to time made out the ease against the peculiar sustaiaers of " our civilisation" in other circles of society ; our business now is with the banker and with the trader . There is no country in the world that should serve the purpose of the commercial enterprise better than England . It is tlie spoilt child of fortune ; and this season of all others is nearly the brightest that commerce could desire . The war is kept aloof by tlie power of our marine ; we have opened up communication with every centre of population in the world ; commerce has procured its great measure of free-trade , —the monopoly of the landowner has been destroyed ; and

    while this country , at the present season , smiles -with a growing harvest everywhere of the finest promise , we have the same cheering reports from abroad , and especially from America . We are suffering from the failure of a past season , but there is every prospect of plenty . By relieving the labour-market , emigration has caused an actual rising of wages ; yet the rise is not more than sufficient to relieve the poor-rate , leaving to commerce still an abundant supply of handlabour . Markets more widened , therefore ,

    either at home or abroad , machinery more perfect , roads of transit more open , commerce could not have . Yet in the very midst of this prosperity , while constructive enterprise of various kinds is still opening new investments , and laying the foundation for future successes , commerce brings bankruptcy upon itself . It is not that it is unprotected . It has laws to restrain the swindler ; and policemen aid to px-otect the quiet entrance to the bank . But it is the banker himself who enters into the stronghold of the establishment , and carries away the property . It is the merchant himself who tampers with securitiesand competes with tlie ordinary

    , swindler in unlawful acts . Go wherever you will into trading society , you find some element introduced foreign to the very nature of the trade . Manufacturers become petty dealers in provisions , competing with tlie villaff o " shop , " by forcing their workpeople into the truck system . The same manufacturers compete with another branch ot trade , and becoming their own agents , assist to heap ill ) that glut in Australian , America * , the last groat

    and Indian inurkota , which put : "cnoral check to our commercial prosperity - Tho retail tradesman hardly sells uu article whicli in not adulterated , and the conduct ot traders has entirely destroyed faith in 1 ihe wares they soil . 'Merchants profess to be very oxact in their dealings , but fr om the ciiHOB of Danucu Mitchj . ji . 1 . Davidson , and Cosmo Wimviam Gohdon , wo find an gjubU ing p ractice of strangely dealing ux » kh-

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    No . 275 , June 30 , 1855 . ] THE * LEABE-HV . 6 $ 3

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), June 30, 1855, page 623, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2097/page/11/