The Welshman

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THE FOREIGN POLICY OF GREAT BRITAIN. I NO. VII. THE SIMPLIFICATION AND THE COMPLICATION OF OUR j INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS. I Two material changes have been brought over the I European world by the events and the progress of the I last half-century. One of these has tended greatly to simplify, and the other greatly to complicate, our inter- national relations. The first is the alteration which economic science has at length wrought in our system of commercial -policy the second is the spread of the de- mocratic spirit-as Tories would express themselves, or the awakening of peoples to a perception of their duties and their rights—as patriots would prefer to term it. Formerly half our quarrels with other nations had their origin in the grasping ambition and the narrow views of the commercial interest in England. Half our wars were undertaken to secure a monopoly of trade. We Jought for markets; and impressed our customers pretty much as we impressed our sailors. Our diplomatists were con- stantly engaged in treating for exclusive pritileges for our goods, or in placing our merchants on the footing of "the most favoured nation" and our admirals were nearly as perpetually engrossed with watching over and enforcing the ad vantages which our negotiators had extorted. We founded colonies of our own, and we conquered and re- tained the colonies of others, with a view of confining to ourselves the sale of all their produce and compelling them to supply their wants at our emporiums alone. Ships, Colonies, and Commerce," was our common battle-cry and we made war habitually in the name of the great arts and securities of peace. Now all this is changed. We have adopted a system at or.ce wiser, cheaper, and more Christian. We have em- braced unlimited freedom of trade and what we have de- cided on for ourselves we allow to our dependencies. We no longer seek to exclude the productions of other countries from any market. We sell wherever we can sell dearest and buy wherever we can buy cheapest, and we permit our colonies to do the same. We have opened our own arena to all competitors. We have repealed our stringent navi- gation laws, and we allow any goods to be imported in any bottoms. American ships can charter for Jamaica or discharge in Liverpool as freely as our own, sharing equal privileges, paying equal duties. Brazil and Cuba send us their sugar as freely as Trinidad or the Mauritius. Barba- does may purchase her flour and staves from New York instead of New Brunswick or Canada, if she prefers it. Colonies, too, we have come to consider in a new light. We are no longer very desirous either to extend our own or to possess those of other nations. We have resigned all the imaginary advantages arising out of their exclusive commerce, and we have discovered that they are costly to keep and troublesome to govern. Some among us, indeed —the politicians of the ledger—have begun to talk not only of emancipating them if they wish, but of cutting them adrift whether they wish or not. It is tisle that we still endeavour through our diplomatists to persuade other Governments to imitate our liberal commercial policy, but we do so as scientific professors, not as military bullies we exhort them in the name of their own interest; we no longer seck to compel them to a low tariff, or menace retaliation upon a high one. And, as far as our commerce is concerned, the occupation of our mighty navy is con- fined to protecting it from pirates in peace, from privateers in war, and from the occasional injustice or ill-treatment of capricious and half-civilised States. One most fertile source of hostile collision is thus cast off; and so far our position is far safer and our foreign policy far simpler than it used to be. But this new facility is more than counterbalanced by the new perplexity to which we have adverted. Previously to the great French Revolution our diplomacy knew nothing of peoples it dealt only with courts. Nations, in fact. as apart from their rulers, had no recognised ex- istence. They were the private estates, as it were, of the sovereigns who reigned over them. This appears in the diplomatic language and forms which have survived till now, though shorn of much of their genuineness. We do not treat with the Dutch, the Russians, the Turks, the Spaniards, the French but with the Court of Versailles," the "Cabinet of Madrid," the Porte," "the Hague," the Court of St. James," or of St. Petersburg," and so on. So long as in our negotiations and dealings we studied and penetrated the obvious interests, the traditional policy, the family alliances of these courts, we did all that was necessary. That the people might not back their rulers that the popular party might paralyze the action of the sovereign that the nation might be our enemy though the Government was our friend,—never entered or was required to enter into our calculations. States were indi- vidual potentates, having like ourselves personal ambi- tions, and sometimes personal hatreds and affections States whose objects and interests clashed, or were sup- posed to clash with ours, were out natural enemies"; States again, whose objects and interests came, or could be made to come, into collision with those of our national enemies," became thereby our natural allies." With the great convulsion of 17S9, however, a disturb- ing element was introduced into those simple international relations-an clement which has ever since been gaining strength, and which has manifested itself from time to time in a manner which enforces recognition. Internal struggles have to a great extent taken the place of foreign wars, and contest for civil rights and personal freedom have superseded in frequency and importance questions as to national independence and aggrandisement. Since the exciting examples set by America and France the people of every nation in Western Europe have been in a chronic state of fermentation on the question of free institutions and parliamentary government they have endeavoured to become citizens as well as subjects; some have succeeded partially some have succeeded temporarily some have abused their liberty, and brought it into disrepute some have abused their liberty, and lost it. But the conflict still goes on—sometimes silently—sometimes noisily the people are striving to extend their rights and liberalise their institutions the sovereigns are striving to recover their old authority or to maintain what they possess. In 1813 tl.e instincts of freedom were summoned to combat one mighty despot: in 1816 and subsequently the danger being past, smaller despots endeavoured once more to lull those instincts into torpor. In 1821 they broke out afresh; again in 1830 and 1831 again in 1818. In 1S32 England, the Great Constitutional Government of Europe, completed, extended, and consolidated the fabrics of her liberties. In 1850, Fiance, Spain, Portugal, Holland, Belgium, Sweden, Switzerland, and Piedmont, had parlia- mentary governments and popular liberties more or less extensive or established. Lombardy and Germany had tried for them and failed Hungary had lost by them a sad complication of treachery and violence. While sub- jects were thus striving with their rulers, and endeavour- ing to extort rights and institutions to which they deemed themselves entitled, but with which thse rulers deemed them unfit to be intrusted, it was natural that they should look to England for sympathy, if not for aid, and that England should look with favour, if not with ostensible encourage- ment upon their efforts. It was equally natural that the rulers in these cases should look for countenance and comfort from their fellow princes. Hence the people and the constitutional party in continental countries look to England, and sometimes to France, and the despots and the despotic party look to Austria and Russia as their "natural allies." Patriots, bent on conquering civil rights, found their own sovereigns to be their "natural enemies," and those countries once called such, to Ibe their real friends. In this way a new influence ran across the web of international policy, so simple and clearly defined pf old; and hostilities and alliances began to be modified or decided by sympathies of political opini- on more than by consideration of national interests Every country in which a parliamentary government pre- vailed we felt to be a sort of "natural ally"; every* country in which despotism had suppressed liberty could scarcely be otherwise than a suspected neutral or an un- derstood foe. Hence arose a strong interest in the inter. nal struggles of neighbouring States and an earnest de- sire for the victory of a party whose advent to power might convert an enemy into a friend. It is true that all these cross sympathies are constantly modified by a variety of circumstances, and are not yet systematised or fully avowed timidity or selfishness in our national councils oftencompel them to lie dormant; a Tory Ministry finds excuses for the tenacity of arbitrary power; a Liberal Ministry deprecates the excesses and dreads the too signal victory of freedom, when freedom assumes or menaces to assume the republican form;—but generally and as a whole, it is felt by our people and is beginning to be ac- knowledged by our rulers, that our natural enemies" are the Autocratic Sovereigns, and our natural allies" the free Governments of Europe. It is also felt and admitted, though less conclusively and universally, that in those countries where the popular and despotic elements are striving for the mastery, our real friendship belongs to the people, though our formal alliance may go with the sove- reign. Another element is still beginning to make itself heard and to add its might to the complexity around us. We have the spirit of nationality as well as the spirit of demo- cracy to deal with. To have sprung from the same race, to speak the same language, to belong to the same tribe, is daily more and more felt to be a yet stronger tie of political consanguity than even the idem velle et idem nolle de 2-epitblica. The desire for close union with bre. thien of the same people, is in many a mightier passion than even the love of liberty. The hatred of foreign do- mination is more vehement even than the detestation of tyrranical rule. It is, too, a feeling with which Britons can sympathise just as warmly. It is, we believe, yet more inextinguishable. And whatever we may think of Poland—however we may be disposed to accept the ex- tinction of that nationality as a fait ciecoinpli,-it is abundantly certain that so long as Lombards and Magyars groan under the wretched yoke of Austria, although the Court of St. James" may be in close and formal alliance with the Court of Vienna," the heart of the people of England will go with the people who are burning to re- lieve themselves from the abhorred Tedesco." And, sooner or later, now that foreign questions have been fairly taken up pj classes who a long wwle ago felt AQ interest regarding them, the feelings of the nation must find their expression and embodiment in the policy of the Government. As soon as Great Britain has arrived at a clear, strong, persistent opinion of international matters, the language and conduct of the Foreign Screlary Inust be in harmony with that opinion. We have thus discussed the question whether to a State like ours, isolation is possible or unseemly. We have seen that we are bound by every principle of interest and duty as well as by sheer necessity to concern ourselves with the movements of the outlying world. We hare glanced at the changes and complications which have come over the old scheme of international relations; and we have con- fes;rd that at present we have no well-defined or consis- tent foreign policy to deal with at all. We are now, therefore, in a position to consider what principles and maxims we should adopt as the guide and pole-star of our future course. It is for the nation deliberately to de- termine what port is to be steered for it is for the statesmen who from time to time are summoned to the helm, to decide in each varying contingency what tack to go on, and what sail to shift,—when to veer, when to furl canvass and when to set it.L,cotioniist. THE CONGRESS. I L'Empiere c'est la Paix"—the aphorism, embodied in a pamphlet, was thrown upon Europe from some mysteri- ous Imperial press of France, for the purpose of reconciling foreign states to the Elected of December in his full Napoleonic capacity. Some time after, was thrown out, in rather a different mode, a pamphlet, on the Recon- struction of the Map of Europe,"—parcelling out "the Orient" for the Western Powers, and giving Moldavia to Austria. The Czar had refused to acknowledge Sir, my brother" and my brother" appeared, by what we could see of his attitude in the side-mirror of this half-published half-suppressed pamphlet, to be contem- plating a redistribution of the inheritance of Europe. It was a kind of retort-tremendous upon the manoeuvre called the Sick Man." A third pamphlet falls from the clouds iOn the language of the Univers—videlicet French embodying, with advocacy, the proposal conveyed in its title, Oil the Necessity of a Congress to pacify Europe." It is not authenticated; rumour ascribes it, perhaps falsely, to the Imperial hand of Napoleon himself, who is said to have exercised some persuasion in order to draw Lord Palmerston into peace-negotiations. Who believes either the gossip about autograph pamphlets, or such a thing as difference of opinion between Napoleon and Palmerston ? There lies the pamphlet, however,—suffered, if not ordered; with its suggestion that since two out of the five Great Powers cannot reconcile the other three, we must have a Congress, which would restore Austria and Prussia to the position they have lost, Russia to the devolopment of her industry, France and England to peace. and the secondary states to tranquility. It is curious that all concurrent accounts represent Paris as the centre of what we may call the new Peace doctrine—some notion of erecting Austria and Prussia into arbitrators, and accepting such a peace as those powers would allow. There is a general supposition that the Emperor of the French has had enough of war, and would like to revert to the old announcement of the oracle, L'Empire c'.est la paix." The arguments of Saint-Mare Girardin, in the article in the Journal des Debats, go far to confirm this supposition. The Eastern war, he says. has been neither useless nor mischievous for France; it has given to her the alliance with England, the "favourable" neutrality of Germany, and the opportnnity of showing, in a war of conservative policy, that she is not irrevocably bound to revolutionary policy. This war has restored to France her independence of action in Europe, and with independence the ascendant. When we pray for peace, it is not to finish I as speedily as possible a war useless and gratuitous it is to finish be-fittingly a war that has given to us all that it can give; for peace has all the advantages which war could have for us at the present day, and it is peace alone which can consolidate the work of war." The pamphlet is probably afloat to test the direction of the current. It is the parallel of Mr. F. O. Ward's tur- nip to exhibit the flow of certain running streams. It asks Europe whether it will have a Congress ? The Govern- ments, we can imagine, might answer" Yes"; but they would find some difficulty in showing that the Western Powers are in a position which would render a Congress available for tlieii- professed objects. It might have been an efficacious mode of preventing war, if the Congress had been assembled before hostilities, and the Po.vers repre- sented had been perfectly impressed with' the necessity of constraining the encroachments of Absolutism as much as the spoliation of Anarchy. It might be a iftting mode of arranging peace when the Western Powers should have attained the objects of the war. But, pendente lite, the Western Powers are without a Incus standi which would enable them to insist upon their rights and they have no occasion to surrender those rights in order to accept the inferior concession which might be obtained through the verdict of a Congress. It may suit the purpose of Na- poleon III to merge France in an assemblage of constitu- ted royalties! it may suit him now, thus to neutralize the ultra-insular" influence of England but we cannot be blind to our own total submersion in such a conclave, under the overwhelming number of secondary states, re I luetant allies, and false neutrals, all eager to subserve the interests and designs of Russia. Whatever the Government in Paris may think, or in Downing Street,-tile public opinion of the people must go for something. At this precise moment a Congres would be regarded with great jealousy in France, and not with favour in England. It must assemble to effect a compromise of objects which, we have been assured, are not to be compromised, and which the English people, at least, would hold it mischievous and shameful to com- promise. Underlaying the question between the Western Powers luid'Russia is a question between the national communities of Europe and the governments,—the ques- tion, whether governments shall exist for the sake of a few families, or for the sake of the nations whose affairs are to be administered. The Congress, if assembled now, would come together on the basis of the family principle and what settlement could it make which would be satisfactory to the Continent ? In England we remember the last Congress. We remember how it was a concourse of courts-a great family party of the royal class-in which there was much jabber and much holiday-making business being left to the diplomatists, to the persevering Czar, and to acco- modating bureaucratists; with a dead weight of class inteiest to sustain such men against the teal statesmen of Germany and the representatives of England. It was an organized intrigue which resulted in a family compact and in the outwitting of English statesmen. Public opinion would not only refuse to telsrate any such result now, but, with that recalled. to it, the community here would watch its statesmen with jealousy, and would mistrust them even for the attempt, at such a time, to enter such a Congress at all.-Spectato),. THE RUSSIAN WAR IN ASIA. How shall the war be carried on ? Russia has been beaten in the Crimea, but she is triumphant in Turkish Armenia. She has lost Sebastopol, but she has gaiacd Kars and Bayazeed, and she occupies the road from Trc- bizond to Tehecall. h she to be permiltcd to retain or ex- tend her conquests at pleasure, or are we to retake them and retaliate in kind ? The latter course at present finds much favour, and it is undoubtedly one that demands grave consideration. But in speculating on the future conduct of the war, we must not confine ourselves to one point: we must survey the whole, and estimate not the absolute but the comparative merits of each proposed course. If the war were a purely military business, in which politics had no part, and if we were prepared to continue the war until Russia were rendered innocuous to surround- ing nations, few things would be more easy than to sketch the operations that would be necessary to that end. Thus, to block out Russia in the North, it is not enough to stipulate that Sweden shall not cede any portion of her territory to the enemy Finland should be conquered and restored to Sweden. To relieve Germany, Poland should be wrenched from the grasp of the Czar and set upon its iegs again. To preserve European Turkey and secure the free navigation of the Danube, the Crimean fortresses should be utterly destroyed Russian war-ships, should be excluded from the Black Sea Ismail should be dis- mantled, and a portion of the territory on the left bank of the Northernmost arm of the Danube ceded to Turkey. Then, we should cross the Black Sea, and thrust back the Itussians from the South to the north of the Caucasus, fixing their frontier on the Kouban and the Terek. But this would be a labour for giants, and the work of years A combination as extensive as that which overthrew Na- poleon would be required to overthrew the Czar, and wrcts from him the conquests of sixty years. lOur resources in men and money, however great, are not unlimited, and our objects must be limited to our means. The primary object of the war was not the se- curity of Germany and Scandinavia, but of Turkey its territoiial integrity and independence. There might be no objection, if Germany and Scandinavia would join us, to undertake the conquest of Finland and Poland but until they do so, we must be content to accomplish what we can without them, and in other directions more closely connected with the original object of the war. At the close of 1855 we stand in this position. We have taken and destroyed two-thirds of the" standing menace" to Constantinople-tile city of Sebastopol and the Russian Black Sea fleet; but the Russian army and the Northern forts remain. We have freed the Black Sea and its shores, and have ravaged the Sea of Azoff; but we have not fired a shot against Ismail, nor have we done anything to resist the Russians in Transcaucasia or Turkish Armenia. Putting the conquest of Poland aside as visionary, and that of Finland as problematical, and in any case as distinct from the operations in the East, there remain two courses before the Allies,-to continue their career in the Crimea, or to transfer the greater part of the army elsewhere. If the former were determined on, then the whole of the force now in the East would not be more than adequate to that object if the latter, then certainly, Balaklava, Kamiesch, Kertch, Eupatona, and Kinburn, could be held by garrisons, and more than half the army would be available for other operations. There are two points near the Black Sea that invite attack, -Ismaii, and Kherson and Nicholaief. But either operation would absorb the whole of the force that could be spared from the Crimea. Both, if successful, would iuflict great damage ppoa \Wfil1, wl¡í¡e theKdwtioa of Ismail would more directly conduce to the safety of Turkey and the freedom of the Danube. Neither would raise any political jealousy in the Cabinets of the Allied Powers, or that of Austria. But another expedition has been suggested to the Allies, and that we propose to consider. The general reader may have observed that the advo- cates of the Russian provinces in Transcaucasia as a field of conquest have again entered the arena of discussion, and are pressing their claims. Among others, Mr. Laurence Oliphant has republished his pamphlet on the subject, with a preface written in the Turkish camp at Sugdidi and dated the 13th November. Mr. Oliphant alleges that the Christian populations of Mingrelia, Im- meritia, and Georgia, hate the Russians, but abhor the Turks; and that their hostility to Omar Pacha's army perils the success of his enterprise. That hostility, he supposes, wonldgive way before a Christian army. Found- ing upon the advantages of the conquest of Trans- caucasia, he proposes that an army composed of the Christian allies of Turkey, or failing that an army composed of English alone, should be transferred to I ranscaucasia, there to undertake the conquest of those provinces. The Turkish army he would transport to Soudjak-Kaleh whence they might march to the plains of the Kouban, and, in conjunction with the Moslem mountaineers, who are devotedly attached to the Porte, move upon and intercept all communication between Russia and Transcaucasia, by the pass of Dariel a movement which, supported by a flotilla in the Sea of Azoff, would certainly facilitate, th;) operations of the Allies, to the South of the great mountain-chain. The question to be determined is, whether such a combined enterprise be practicable, or the best practicable, mode of continuing the war respecting its absolute advantages there can be no dispute. We have before explained the position of Russia South of the Caucasus, and pointed out how it is essential to the prosecution of Russian designs against our possessions in India how it effects the security of Asiatic Turkey, and the fo: tunes of Persia. The cessation of warfare in the Crimea, the fall of Kars, and the progress of Omar Pasha, have drawn all eyes to this quarter, and have revived the proposal for the conquest of Transcaucasia. Undoubtedly, if, as we stated above, the war were carried on by purely military men for ptireli, military aims, such an enterprise would be a matter of course, because it would complete the chain of conquests necessary for the curbing of Russia. But the war is carried on for mixed political and military purposes, the latter being subservient to and controlled by the former. In the enterprises undertaken, we may expect to find the political elements predominate. In waging war in the Crimea, in extending its field to the Danube or the Dnieper and Boug, the Allies would be on the common ground of their political interests. But would that be the case if the war, stationary in the Crimea and on the mainland of Southern Russia, were removed to Transcauca- sia ? There are already indications that such would not be the case. Such an extension of the war would be beyond doubt more conducive to the interests of England and Turkey then those of France and Austria The conquest of Transcaucasia would inflict a deadly blow on Russian projects in Asia; but it would recoil upon ourselves if it were doubtfully undertaken, or if it led to the weakening of our alliance with France, or the freezing of the chilly moral support we receive from Austria. The problem is tins—AVc could chase the Russian army from the Crimea, or compel it to surrender; we could attempt the capture of Kherson and Nicolaief; and we could take Ismail and free the Danube. In all these operations, it may be fairly assumed that the Allies would cheerfully bear a part, and that in the last Austria might be induced to co-operate. We could conquer Transcaucasia, with an English army alone, if a separation of the forces were determined on but in doing so we might endanger the alliance, and alienate Austria still further. The danger to us and to Europe from the Russian position is great, but remote and so long as the Black Sea is kept free from Russian ships, and the Russians are kept distant from its Eastern coasts, we may rely on it that Russia cannot undertake any material enterprise in Asia Minor. The question of her supremacy beyond the Caucasus mav therefore be safely adjourned, at least until we have ac- complished the work in the Black Sea and the Baltic, nearer to our hand and of more pressing importance. But then comes another question. Are we to submit to Russian encroachment, by force of arms, in Turkish Ar- menia, accomplished during a war undertaken to preserve the integrity of Turkey ? By undertaking and completing the conquest of Transcaucasia, we should undoubtedly expel the Russians from Turkish Armenia. But if we give up, from higher considerations, the conquest of Transcau- casia, it surely does not follow that we are bound to sub- mit to the Russian conquests, actual and probable, in Turkish Armenia ? On the contrary, the Western Powers are bound, by the terms of their alliance, to free Turkish territory from Russian foes it is for them, co-operating with Turkey, to devise means for that purpose: but they are not bound to conquer Transcaucasia. If it should be found that adequate terms of peace cannot be extorted from the enemy by operations in the Black Sea and the Baltic, at the same time that Turkish Armenia is secured, the Allies may be compelled to undertaka the conquest of Transcaucasia; and then it would be a legitimate opera- tion.—Spc-ctator. WHY, HOW, AND WHEN.-A CHRISTMAS CAROL. Society has a sin to expiate. It is now in the act of conveiting well-disposed boys into profligates, vagrants, and criminals. AViien we Eay "society,"wedonotmean only that vague indefinite thing the million, but those who legislate and administer for the million most especially, Lord Palmerston, Sir George Grey, Sir John Pakington, the Archbishop of Canterbury, and such as have the initiative and high consultative position near or in the Government, They convert well-disposed boys into pro- fligates, vagrants, and criminals and now, during this present Chiistmas, they are continuing that bad conver- sion. We do not say it metaphorically-it is sober fact. When Lord Sidmouth showed Robert Owen a prison-boy undergoing some kind of rough discipline, and asked the Socialist what he thought, Robert Owen replied, I think, my Lord, you and the boy ought to change places." And the enthusiast was very near the truth, as enthusiasts sometimes are. At the Sussex meeting, the other day, l\lr. Sydney Turner told the results of the statistics at ™ Rediiu-ili, discarding the last two years, as the sincerity of the reformed within that period has not been sufikiently tested ty time, lie finds that seven-tenths of the boys are effectually leforiued prove, in fact, to be good boys by nature, and well-conducted when they are taught how to be so. Thus in their previous condition, the boys have been artificially taught to be bad boys, and have been consigned to destruction. Qui facit per alium, facit per se": he who lets wrong be done which he might prevent, does it himself and in this case there is a direct responsi- bility. Lord Palmerston, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Lord Chief Justice Campbell, and Sir John Pakington— some of the principal heads of our goveming system-are directly responsible, because if they were to say that the thing shall be done, and were to put their shouldeis together to the wheel, it would be done. It is their duty, as administmtnrs and legislators, to protect the innocent against the guilty; but they leave the innocent children at the mercy of wicked parents and associates. Any one who attempts even honestly to seduce into lawful wedlock one of the Lord Chancellor's wealthy wards, shall be "in con- tempt," and shall sustain no end of punishment; but one who shall seduce no matter how many of Secretary Sir George Grey's penniless wards to courses of stealing, shall be let alone, and Secretary Sir Doberry Verges will only thank God that he is "quit of such vagrom men." This cannot be suffered to go on. We now know that of the total number of criminal boys, seven in ten at least arc so because they have been made so through causes which Lord Palmcrston, the Arcbishop of Canterbury, Sir George Grey, Chief Justice Campbell, and Sir John Pakington, could prevent. The working of the cause is easily traced. A. B. is a bey under ten or tiveli-c years of age. lie has seen his parents thieve, live in filth, go into ptison and out again. He thinks it is the doom of his class. He is hungry, and can satisfy his hunger at once by running off with that handker- chief and taking it to the marine store-dealer's. He has seen Charley Bates do it scores of times; and Charley is really a good fotiow-kind-hearted, cheerful, sharp, clever, and plucky—quite a respectable friend- So, little Oliver pligs what isn't his'n, and does not go to prison. If he doils, lie can't help it. He would probably get a situation, if he only knew how. Bnt who will take Charley Bates's fiiend ? lie could not even get a post as doctor's boy. There are no dinners handy. He has not the slightest acquaintance with statistics. He does not know that he could get half-a-crown a week as scavenger in a cotton-mill, or if he did, how to get there or if he could get there, how to economize half-a-crown to make it stretch over the week, paying for its due proportions of rent, food, clothing, &c. Nobody has told him the least iota of these things. Charley Bates is his real friend; his father only "teaches by ex,imple"-but he is not old enough yet to vie with that model. lie follows iu the steps of Bates. We, by and with the aid of Lord Palmerston, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Secretary Sir George Grey, Lord Chief Justice Campbell, and Sir John Pakington, could easily prevent the lad's fuHowiug that sad leader but we leave Charley Bates alone in his school, the good boy is made bad, and we are answer- able. That is why we are bound to interfere. But how to rescue the Oliver Twists from the Charley Batcses of life. They show us how at Redhill, at Ilard- wick Lodge, at Mettrav. Not only theoretically how, but practical. There is only one mode, though all modes have something in common. At Mettray, it is the complete military discipline and the principle of honour; at Redhill it is spade industry and the principle of duty; at Harwick Lodge, it is gradual training into the consciousness of being trusted, and useful employment. And they succeed. Not only the Oliver Twists but the confirmed Charley Batcses are rescued. Thoy are taught how they may live without following the habits and fashions of Saffron Hill how to get a dinner independently of the marine-store- dealer,—no mean lesson for them. Sydney Turner, Lloyd Baker, and Denietz. fasten the responsibility on Sir George Grey and his colleagues in the dobauohins? of boys by proxy. For Grey and his accomplices will not even leave the boys alone, to be, what they would then be,- wild boys, lawless, fierce, predacious, with redeeming qualities of bravery, pride and instinctive manly ri- valry. No; the boys must leave a civil life elabo- rately built up around them, and enclosed within a wall in the midst of which, the, poor boys, live the unwhole- some life of stewed Arabs, whence they know no rescue. There they arc taught to find their pride in prigging best, their manjiness in braving the beak taught by the proxies which Grey and his accomplices leave in possession, although Sydney Turner and bis coadjutators show how easily justice may be done by defending those innocent boys against their guilty and unguilty seducers And when ? Why, now. There is not this day the necessity to show that it costs less to train up Oliver Twist to be an intelligent, inuustrious, independent luiii, addinE to our wealth, than to be íUl ignorant, pled4gigW _aI, uestroying the wealth of those who really maintain him in prison and out of it. If Grey and his accomplices could only wake to a sense of their owu wicked ways by omission, if they could but see how u ichristian they have been, an d if lney should desire at this most fitting season to mend their ways and make some < xpiatory sacrifice,—they could not do better than resolve that forthwith they will do their duty, and begin at once-namely, in this session next en- siling-to rescue the lost boys without waiting to have the boys brought to them by the Criminal judge.-Stectator. THE ELOQUENCE OF INSANITY. Servility takes many shapes, but the spirit is the same in alt. l).c! English boast of being plain; our aristocracy is super-plain; your English gentleman, it is said, is distin- guished by having nothing remarkable" about him which is often true. Snobbishness catches tho spirit of its patron, and renders its language the mirror of the patron's wish. In the South, where quarterings accumulate upon quarter- ings, and a grandee canies about with him, as it were, the paraphernalia of the herald, the attendant courtier is ample in his language, as in the barbaric East he becomes turgid and hyperbolical. We copy this fashion of a special lan- guage for speaking about the great, and our Court news- man excels the herald in his verbal adulation. For the herald tried it once, but failed. Whereas to blazon the arms of common gentles he used the names of metals and colours, to blazon those of peers he used the names of precious stones. But the trick did not take. Dealing with things really noble, the herald found it difficult to keep up fantastical distinctions in the mere dialect of worship. Not so the Court newsman; but, to fit the spirit of his patrons, he has to employ a peculiar tongue fitted to their plainness -the lion-remarkable; and accordingly he selects his epithets for their baldness, pushing his insignificance so far that it becomes significant; adhering so closely to poverty that it becomes rich, his sterility pregnant, and through no-meaninff meaning is engendered. Our great people, like the little, have been enjoying the Chnstmas III their homes, and the public has to be told as much. The Iicrolu of the mom describes theni-btit in his special slang. They have friends and relatives with them, but it is unpolite to be so descriptive and suggestive. The word friend" implies feeling" relative" may suggest emotion,-which is impossible except at church, a wedding- breakfast, and a public speechmaking. The friends and relatives must be abstracted, and the great are painted during this present Christmas as being surrounded by a circle." The Duke and Duchess of Richmond are surrounded bv a circle; the Marchioness (Dowager) of Londonderry, Viscount and Viscountess Palmerston, Lord and Lady Ashburton, the Duke and Duchess of Bedford, are all encircled. But there are varieties the Richmond is a family" circle the Bed- ford a '• select," the Londonderry numerous fatuity," the I Asltburtoll "select," the Palmerston "numerous and dis- tinguished." These differences must mean something evi- dently the Richmond circle is not select, nor any of them but the Palmerston "distinguished." But selected from what ? distinguished from or by what ? Other nobles have, not a circle, but a "party;" only the treatment of or by the party differs. The Duke and Duchess of Northumberland are at their own house with" a party the Duke and Duchess of Sutherland have a family party, the Earl of Cardigan is "surrounded;" the Mar- quis of Lansdown is entertaining." The process with the circle also varies Richmond is surrounded" by the circle, 1 almerstonhas" it, Ashburton "entertains," Bedford is 'receiving it. How is a circle received? As in young lady's game of les graces ?" Those who have neither party nor circle have com- pany, and treat it difierently. Sidney Herbert is re- ceiving it" -hospitably; Stanley of Alderley is only seeing company"—from the window ? What is the practical difference between party, circle, and company '-between having, receiving, being surrounded, and catcrtnimng ? There must be a difference, as the terms are studiously chosen and the inquiry suggests many speculative probabilities as to the mysteries of the several processes. The account of the venerable Lansdowne is highly de- scriptive; but we ask whether in decorum it shou?d be publicly stuck in the papers ? — "The Marquis of Landowue is entertaining a distin- guished party at Dowood, Wilts. The noble Marquis will receive company until the middle of next month." How the eloquent insignificance, working itself up into J phrensy, contrives to suggest an exhaustless fund of droll- ness and receptivity \—lbid.

LIEUT. GOODKICKE, So'N OF SlIt F. L. II. GOODRICKE BART.-On Friday morning last, divine service was cele- brated in the parish church of Studley, when a large congregation of parishioners and neighbours assembled to unite with Sir F. L. II. Goodricke, Bart., and family, in returning public thanks to Almighty God for the preserva- tion of Lieut. Goodricke, under circumstances almost miraculous, at the attack on the Redan. Lieut. Goodricke, a very young officer, volunteered from his own regiment to one going to the Crimea. At the final attack his revolver was struck with three balls, either of which, from the position in which the pistol was held, must have proved mortal had it struck himself. His sword point was carried off by another ball, and a fourth passed through his coat. As the English were retiring another ball struck the gallant officer in the breast, and passed right through him, near an artery. This wound was pronounced mortal. Lieut. Goodricke has, however, returned home, and is now likely to recover. Among the congregation were several of the neighbouring clergy, including the Revds. B. Seymour, G. R. Gray, &c., &c. The thanksgiving sermon was preached by the Rev. J. C- Miller, M.A., from the words, "Forget not ail His benefits. After service a large party was entertained by Sir F. Goodricke and his lady, at Studley Castle. THE SUSPECTED POISONING CASE AT RUGELKY.—The astounding exposures which have been brought to light with respect to this fearful affair are prompting the still more zealous investigation of the case by the police authori- ties of the county. The accu&ed, whose death has been announced during the week in several of the London and provincial journals and subsequently contradicted, is still a prisoner in the gaol at Stafford and although he refused to take food for nearly a week previous to his arrest, and since then up to Thursday last, on that day he was induced to take nourishment, after being threatened that food would be forcibly administered to him if he still refrained from taking it. He is now in tolerably good health, and perfectly free from any disease calculated to cause death. Before the :apprehension of the prisoner William Palmer, he sent for the postboy who was engaged to convey the contents of the stomach and intestines of the late Mr. John Parsons Cook to the railway station, preparatory to their transmission to Professor Taylor for analysation in London, and offered him Elt) if he would upset the conveyance and break the jars, Since the prisoner's apprehension, it will be remembered that the whole of his fine stud of horses and other effects were seized under a bill of sale for EIO,500 by a solicitor from Birmingham and it is now rumoured that the prisoner will be declared a bankrupt. It is also stated thit three writs have been served on Mrs. Palmer, the prisoner's mother, a lady residing at Rugeley, for the recovery of bills amounting to between £10,000 and £ 20,000, said to have been accepted by her on behalf of the prisoner, and which are now alleged to be forgeries. The analyses of the stomachs and intestines of the prisoner's wife and brother, Walter Palmer (whose bodies were ex- humed at Rugeley last week), is still being prosecuted by Professor Taylor and although the analysis is at present incomplete, a small portion of arsenic has been found in the intestines of Mrs Palmer, on whose life there was an assurance of f,13,000 effected, and which the prisoner had shortly before wished to increase to more than double that amount. It is not improbable but that six or seven other bodies will be exhumed before the investigation of the case is completed-one of which is said to be that of a gentle- man of London, who, a year or two ago, visited the prisoner for the purpose of receiving payment of a large debt owing him, and who, although then in good health, after four or five days' illness, died at the prisoner's house. Every effort to find the betting book belonging to the deceas4 Mr. Cook has at present proved fruitless. THE YEw LorD AMPTHILL. The elevation of the Right Hon. Baron Parke to the House of Peers by the title of Baron Ampthill has been announced, and will probably be published officially in the new Gazette. His Lordship is the youngest son of the late Mr. Thomas Parke, of Ilighfield, near Liverpool, who, we believe, was a merchant of that place, by a daughter of Mr. William Preston. lie was born in 1782, and in 1817 married Cecilia, daughter of Mr. Samuel F. Barlow, of Middle- thorpe, Yorkshire. He was educated at Trinity College, Cambridge, of which he was elected a Scholar in 1800, and graduated B.A. in 1803 as oth Wrangler and Senior Chancellor's Medallist, in the same year with Professor Pryme, the late Mr. Justice Coltman, and Dr. Davys, the present Bishop of Peterborough. For some time after taking his degree he remained in residence in the Uni- versity, and was elected Fellow of Trinity in the follow- ing year. He was not called to the bar until some ten years later, his name appearing among those called at the Inner Temple in Easter Term, 1813. His steady and persevering industry here brought him early into notice, and business flowed in upon him with sufficient rapidity to warrant him in vacating his fellowship at Trinity by mar- riage, as we luive said above, within four years after he became a member of the bar. Henceforth his rise was rapid. In 1828 we find him promoted to the bench as one of the puisne judges of the King's Bench, on the death of Sir George S. Holroyd, from which he was tran- ferred to the Court of Exchequer in 1834, in the place of the late Baron Taunton. It does not appear that Lord Ampthill ever rose to the bench through the intermediate steps of King's Sergeant, or one of His Majesty's coun- sel, learned in the law." He never held the office of Attorney-General or Solicitor-General, and never occu- pied a seat in Parliament. His Lordship has long been the oldest judge upon the bench, from which he might have retired many years ago with the usual penm' j he been?ess actively and ?'?? ?"°?.-  '? he haa the cxperierce of 2,Q ■ '0/ 'I f?rrv?!-hh.? of 2 ears on the judicial bench to rry wlih. h;,7, to the assistance of the Law Lords in the pper House, who are now only five in number-viz., Lord Lyndhurst, Brougham, Campbell, Cramvorth, and «t. Leonard s—and to whom his assistance will be pecu- liarly valuable. The newly cleated peer has no male issuef his Lordship's only surviving child being a daughter, who is married and resides in Bedfordshire. The park of Ampthill belonged to the late Lord Carteret, and is still the property of the Tiyuiic- family and it is not a little singular that Baron Parke should have chosen his title from a plnee with which, though rich in historical ass" ciations as the residence of Queen Catherine, the fitll wife of Homy VIII., he has, we believe, no more perØ1AI | Mat comedo!) ft temporary lease of the molon.