POSTSCRIPT.
SATURDAY NIGHT.
The House of Commons was occupied for many hours last night with the subject of British intervention in Portugal; but the debate lost a por- tion of its interest from the fact that the speaker most looked for pertina- ciously abstained from rising, and the discussion was adjourned.
Mr. HUME began; moving a resolution, that the armed interference of the British Government between the political parties in Portugal was un- warrantable in principle and likely to lead to mischievous consequences. Mr. Hume did not question the technical right of our Government to interfere, but strenuously condemned its alliance with despotism to crush a popular move- ment,—a movement not against a sovereign but against a cabal of tyrannical ministers. He would not admit the argument that England was forced to inter- fere by the intervention of Spain and France: we do not yet know what France would have done. Louis Philippe cannot have forgotten the circumstances to which he owed his throne, and the principle by which he holds it. (A loud burst of cheering from all parts of the House.) Having interfered in Portugal, we have closed ourselves against opposin.g Russia or Austria should either send an army to Paris on the death of Louis Philippe to restore Legitimacy in France. What is done cannot be undone; but Mr. Hume called upon the House to reprobate a policy carried out against another people, which we should scornfully repudiate and indignantly resist if attempted against ourselves. The motion was seconded by Mr. BERNAL OSBORNE* and supported by Mr. WARBURTON, who observed that intervention has made us virtually responsible for good government in Portugal. Mr. BAILLIE asked what we had gained by former intervention, that we should once more plunge into the chaos of Peninsular politics. Lord WILLIAM PAELEr objected to interfering further than to protect the person of the Queen. Mr. Oemossim deplored the policy which, in sustaining a throne devoid of all title to re- spect, laid the seeds of a general war in Europe: it played the game of Costa Cabral, the author of all the mischief.
The Government was vindicated, on the score of necessity, by Lord HARRY VANE and Mr. MONCKTON MILNES. Mr. Milnes called to mind that without British intervention there would have been no constitutions in Spain, Portugal, and Greece. By interposing now, we have restricted the intervention to its narrowest limits: it is in fact an intervention in fa- vour of the British creditor and the Portuguese Junta.
Lord JOHN RUSSELL complained that the censors completely overlooked the facts of the case. Government is not engaged in an attempt to es- tablish " despotism" in Portugal, but quite the reverse. Lord John sketched the recent history of Portugal—its utter disorganization, and the inability of any party to enforce peace. Britain had persevered in a forbearing policy, until forced to counteract the advance of France and Spain. Had Spain interfered alone, she would have insisted on the banishment of the in- surgent leaders; and we must either have interfered to support the Junta against Donna Maria, or have endured a Spanish supremacy in Portugal, supported by France. What Lord Palmerston has done has been to strive for the restitution of Don Pedro's Charter, for the convocation of the Cortes, and the retractation of arbitrary policy. When Lord John Russell eat down about midnight, Mr. Bourn-mew moved the adjournment of the debate till Monday.
[After the second speaker, Lord Harry Vane, there was a dead pause, with loud cries for " Pahnerston "; and on his persisting to keep his seat, cries for a division. The gallery was actually cleared; but Mr. Monckton Milnes came to the rescue of the Foreign Secretary; whose speech is re- served for greater effect at a later stage.] Earlier in the evening, in reply to Dr. BovvRiNo, Viscount PALMER- STON stated that the British Government have offered to mediate between Mexico and the United States; but neither party has signified any desire to accept the proposal.
In the House of Peers, Lord STANLEY gave notice, for Tuesday, that he should move a resolution to the effect "that the papers laid before both Houses of Parliament by her Majesty's Government did not appear, in their opinion, to justify an interference in the internal affairs of Portugal."
The Bishop of EXETER moved his resolution, declaring that persons in orders ought to be employed as schoolmasters under the Government grant; a proposition which he supported mainly by the argument that the prospect of being ordained would attract a better and more intelligent class into the occupation of schoolmaster. As to the arrangement with the Wesleyans, he argued, with much bitter sarcasm, that they had no right to interfere; and the Government was bound by no recognized duty towards Dissenters.
Lord LANSDOWNE resisted the idea that a fund provided for one object can be rendered subservient to another.
Parliament is entitled to require that the grant should be confined to educa- tion purposes. The object was to create an order of schoolmasters; and the Bishop of Exeter wished to use the money for creating an order of clergy. The people of England are satisfied that an equitable, fair, and impartial distribution of the grant was intended; and therefore Ministers could submit to the mortifica- tion of not having satisfied the Bishop of Exeter. Strange to say, all the deputa- tions which had waited upon Ministers, when assured that the grant would not be diverted from its legitimate purpose, uniformly said, " This may be very tree; but the Bishop of Exeter will contrive to do so and so." Strange also, that when the aid was given to the schools, not one ordained person in a thousand became schoolmaster; but now that the stipend is given to the schoolmasters, the Bishop of Exeter wishes to make them Deacons! Whatever the result of the motion, it would not in the slightest degree impede her Majesty's Privy Council in admin- istering the grant according to the way originally proposed. The effect of this spirited bearing was shown in the sequel: Lord STAN- LEY made a speech in support of the motion, and finished by advising the Bishop to withdraw it. The motion was accordingly withdrawn; not, how- ever, before the Ministerial view had received support from the Bishop of NORWICH and the Earl of CHICHESTER.
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