1 JUNE 1839, Page 13

ARISTOCRATIC APPOINTMENTS.

THREE valuable appointments have within the last three or four weeks been conffirred on gentlemen, whose connexion with the aris- tocracy constitutes their sole claim to the very considerable incomes secured to them out of public funds for the remainder of their na- tural lives. Mr. Wiamast Russam,' as Accountant-General of the Court of Chancery, Mr. WILLIAM COWPER, RS Commissioner of Greenwich Hospital, and Mr. WILLIAM ASHLEY, as Master of' St. Katherine's hospital, will divide amongst themselves at least 8,000/. per annum. Mr. Russam.'s age is thirty-nine, Mr. Cow- PER'S twenty-eight, and Mr. ASHLEY s thirty-six. Who can state the public services of these gentlemen ? ffir what are they distin- guished Mr. llessma is son of Lord Wirla.tsm Ressam, ; Mr. Cowran, Lord Mammumsa's nephew and private secretary • and Mr. Asn Lay, Lord SHAFTESBURY'S son whose brother marriedLord iM aramunaa's niece. Such, and no other, are the claims and qua- lifications for 8,0001. a year.

If a veteran in the Navy, with a meagre income, a large family, and a long catalogue of brilliant actions, had applied to the Pre- mier for some employment, the reply would have been—"

there is nothing to bestow." A Commissionership of Greenwich Hospital becomes vacant : it is conferred, not on the veteran afore- said, but on the Premier's own nephew—a young statesman of twenty-eight.

There are distinguished lawyers who might fairly regard Mr. Russam.'s situation as one of the prizes of the profession : all are passed over—to nutke room for the Home Secretary's cousin. The Mastership of St. Katherine's Hospital is furnished.with an endowment sufficient handsomely to pension three accomplished men of literature and science : it is conferred upon a gentleman, qualified, no doubt, to be a Dowager Queen's Vice-Chamberlain, but of whose services to his country, or reputation in any other de- partment, the public never heard. All these appointments are jobs—time first and second, jobs of the " No Patronage" Whigs: but we make no special charge against time present Ministers for following an established prac- tice, having long ceased to expect adherence to the principle which they announced on taking office, ahhost nine years ago. The Tories in power would have done—will do—the same, in com- pliance with the system of government suffered in this country, under which claims of merit are postponed to those of tinnily. The appointments more immediately in question, confing so close upon earls other, and given to near connexions of titled men in office, all of them undistinguished and young, are rather remark- able illustrations of the system ; but Englishmen are so accus- tomed to regard places of emolument as portions of aristocratic plunder, that not a remark upon them, so far as we know, has ap- peared in any newspaper. It is not fit, however, that they should utterly escape notice and animadversion. Should a day of reckon- ing between the public and the privileged arrive, the latter ought not to have it in their power to say—" lf these things, which you now array against us, were so very offensive, why were they not protested against when they occurred?"