NEWS OF THE WEEK A CCORDING to a telegram despatched from
Athens on Feb. 3, the Greek Government will assent to the protocol drawn up by Conference. King George has for some time been in favour of this course, but has been unable to form a Ministry which would consent to acknowledge that Greece had no right to assist Crete. At last, however, " M. Faimis," a person unknown in England, accepted the Premiership, and the King's success was telegraphed to the West. We note, however, that M. Delyanui is still Foreign Secretary, and suspect that the " adhesion " is clogged with conditions which will make it most unacceptable to Turkey. That power has already raised the blockade of Syra, and, it is said, withdrawn its ultimatum, and is altogether very much in the position of the sturdy beggar who, asking a young lady for a shilling, gets a tract.
Count Bismarck either is persuaded that Germany must fight before her new position in Europe can be a settled one, or he at least wishes to be thought to entertain this belief. His speeches in the Lower House of the Prussian Parliament on the ordinance for the confiscation of the private property of the ex-King of Hanover, and on that for confiscating the property of the Elector of Hesse Cassel,—to both of which the House has assented by large majorities,—were very threatening. He did not so much defend himself against the charge of espionage, with reference to the measures taken to prove the existence of the Hanovarian conspiracy and legion, as avow that, much as he disliked espionage, in the case of the internal enemies of Germany, it was a measure of simple self-defence.. As usual, he did not mince his language. " I was not born for a spy. That is not in my nature. But we must pursue these reptiles into their holes, and see what they are about." The Count intimates grimly that he would much prefer to have the reptiles strangled on Prussian soil ; but that as there is, unfortunately, in parts of Germany, not yet sufficient loyalty for that summary process, the disagreeable necessity of despatching spies to follow them when they run to earth cannot be avoided.
It is, however, Count Bismarck's expressions concerning the general threatenings of war which create most uneasiness. They are evidently carefully calculated to stir up the warlike pride and alarm the self-restrained spirit of Germany. Count Bismarck admits that the situation was still graver in the autumn before the change of government in the Principalities, but his language is still alarming enough. For instance, " Without being able to rely on peace, peace has not the value that it ought to have for a great nation. A peace which is exposed to the danger of being disturbed every day, every week, is not peace in the true acceptation of the term. A war is often less prejudicial to the general prosperity than a peace so ill-assured. (Cheers.)" Still more exciting in tone is the following, in reply to Herr Virchow :—" Yesterday Herr Virchow could not see the point of the sword which was directed against our heart. The same deputy has also happened not to see at all the hundreds of thousands of bayonets which were hovering in the air. I will remind him of the misfortune of that chamberlain of King Duncan, who was overtaken by sleep, and who was equally unable to see the poniard of Macbeth. It is the duty of the Government to keep its eyes open and to keep a sharp look-out." France, at least, might fairly retort that it was Macbeth who was so wide awake as to see the dagger hovering in the air, and that that dagger was, doubtless, his own. Interpret it as you will, such language from the most powerful minister in Europe is, at all events, not soothing.
The long-vacant Chief Commissionership of Police in London has been filled up by the appointment of Colonel Edmund Henderson, C.B., of the Royal Engineers. Colonel Henderson was for thirteen years head of the convict establishment in Western Australia, and in 1860 succeeded Sir Joshua Jebb. The appointment seems at first sight a good one. Colonel Henderson is a man in the prime of life, has succeeded as Director-General of Prisons, and has had special experience of the new police difficulty, the surveillance of criminals intended to be free while they behave well. From his Australian record, we may venture to predict that although he has the misfortune to be called Colonel, he will not be popular with burglars and garotters, or unpopular with workmen engaged in political meetings.
The Sun states, in its most prominent type, that Mr. Gladstone is ill, so ill that he could not on Friday leave his room to attend a Cabinet Council. We know nothing of Cabinets of course, and Mr. Gladstone may at two have had cholera or scarlet fever ; but at 10 p.m. he was in the Political Economy Club, iu the fullest possible health and spirits.
It was Print himself, was it not, who said the Gaulois had made itself the Moniteur of the Spanish Revolution ? This journal now publishes a telegram from Madrid stating that on the meeting of the Cortes, Marshal Serrano, Marshal Prim, and S. Rivero, said to be the ablest civilian in the Provisional Government, will be appointed a Directory, pending the election of a monarch, which will require time. This is declared to be an indirect proclamation of a Republic, or rather of a Dictatorship, rendered necessary by the danger of civil war. The selection named would in practice make Serrano President for Foreign Affairs, Prim for the Army, and Rivero for the Interior ; but accord among the three is very unlikely. These reports read very much like feelers put forward to accustom the people to the idea of a coup cr elat, either in behalf of Prim's nominee or of his own Dictatorship.
Baron Martin gave judgment on Tuesday in the Bradford case, declaring the Right Hon. W. E. Forster duly elected, speaking of the charge of bribery brought against him as absolutely ridiculous, and of the charge of treating as without foundation. The costa follow the judgment. The judge insisted strongly on the careful precautions taken by the candidate and his agent to prevent any illicit practices, and said that as far as Mr. Forster and his agent, Mr. Wade, were concerned, the election was "as honest an election as ever was carried on." He afterwards spoke of Mr. Forster as having employed " as respectable people as apparently could be found," and as " being most scrupulously desirous of doing nothing that was wrong." That, too, seems to be the impression of the whole people of Bradford. The cheering outside the Court-house began so instantaneously on the intimation of the judge's opinion, that Baron Martin was utterly puzzled as to the means of communication ;—many men half cried for joy, and the intensity of excitement when Mr. Forster returned to his hotel was of that kind which bespoke such a relation between the people and their representative as probably scarcely holds in any other constituency in England. Bradfordians not only like Mr. Forster's grim honesty and unaffected respect for his fellow men,—they love it.
Justice %Vines decided this day week that Colonel Dyott (Conservative) was duly elected for Lichfield, that no corrupt practice was proved to have been committed by the consent, or with the knowledge of any candidate, and that corrupt practices did not extensively prevail at the election. The judge's acquittal was of the fullest and amplest kind. Colonel Dyott was warmly cheered, and also chaired by the people on leaving the Court. Sir Arthur Guinness (Conservative) has been unseated for Dublin by Mr. Justice Keogh ; and Mr. J.L. Phipps (Conservative) has been unseated for Westbury, for intimidation, by Mr. Justice Willes.
Mr. !Viands (Liberal), the Member for Warrington, has been left in p(cession of his seat,—contrary to general expectation. The case turned chiefly on a number of Conservative votes which had been tendered at one of the polling-booths and not put on the polling-book. The main question was whether the poll-clerk ought to have received them, and whether, if he ought, there would have been enough to turn the election. Baron Martin decided that some of the votes were duly tendered and ought to have been received, but that others of them were not duly tendered, and that the fault in these cases lay with the electors themselves. " The real truth was that the persons doing wrong were those who went in a rush to vote, holding up their tickets or thrusting them upon the book instead of giving one by one, so as to enable a man to take their names down. A. ticket was uo means of voting at all ; it was given to a man to facilitate the voting, but bad nothing to do with the voting. The poll-clerk had nothing to do with the ticket, he ought to take down from the mouth of the voter his name and address, and the candidate for whom he voted." The judge therefore decided that the election was certainly not void by the fault of the poll-clerk, though, on a scrutiny, enough tenders of legal voters not recorded might finally be proved to turn the election. Mr. Price, however, gave up the idea of turning the minority into a majority by a scrutiny, as many of the votes on which he counted were decided by the judge not to have been legally tendered. Mr. Price, therefore, with the consent of the petitioners, withdrew the petition, and the judge decided that each party was to pay its own costa.
The Hon. Henry Cowper, Member for Hertfordshire, is to move the Address in the Commons, and Mr. Mundella, Member for Sheffield, is to second it. The choice of Mr. Mundella is a direct compliment to the working-class, whose representative he, more than any other new member, undoubtedly is. He was elected for his contribution to the problem of the best adjustment of the relations between capital and labour.
Dr. Tait was enthroned in Canterbury Cathedral in great state on Thursday, in the presence of six bishops of the Southern province, but in the absence of the Archbishop of York, between whom and the Primate,—we speak of the officials as such, and not of the individuals now holding these offices,—there is a traditional dispute of long standing as to equality of rank. The procession up the aisle of the cathedral was splendid, containing, besides the six bishops and two colonial bishops in full episcopal state, more than two hundred clergymen ; and the spectators, consisting of Trom two to three thousand persons, did something to fill and warm the great cathedral,—which was at first far colder than the outward air. The Archbishop was afterwards entertained at lunch in the new library of the cathedral, and made a speech on the faith held in common by the clergy of all parties in the Church. Dr. Tait did not believe in the theory of growing and threatening dissensions. He thought the clergy at large did their work with a zeal and harmony never exceeded." Perhaps so, according to Dr. Tait, for to him the points of difference are trivial ; but then, broad, genial, and able as he is, he is no theologian, and can hardly realize, from his semi-Presbyterian point of view, the significance of the controversies which seem to him so trivial.
The grand jury have returned a true bill against all the defendants in the case of Overend, Gurney, and Co., which will now be tried before the Queen's Bench. It will be necessary to appoint a special time for the hearing, as the case, if it came on in its turn, could not, it is said, be heard before January, 1.870—a disgrace to English procedure.
The news from Paraguay is bewildering, as usual, but the most intelligible account is that on December 21, Lopez, with from 4,000 to 7,000 Paraguayans, was posted on the hills of Lomas Valentinas, nine miles from Villeta. After six days of continual fighting and assaults, mainly on the lines connecting Lomas with Angostura, Marshal de Caxias made a grand attack, which ended— nobody exactly knows how, but it is assumed at Rio, possibly on sufficient evidence, possibly also on no evidence at all—in the total defeat of Lopez, who was "surrounded in a wood." The war is ended of course, for the tenth time, but according to the
Anglo-Brazilian Times Angostura has not fallen yet, and it is resolved in Rio that if Lopez is not taken, as he ought had he any regard to propriety to be, the war is to continue till he is, which is satisfactory news for those who see in this war the ruin of the last slaveholding empire in the world.
Mr. Chichester Fortescue has published a note stating that Lord Russell had not previously shown him " any one of the three letters with which he has done me the honour of associating my name." Does Mr. Fortescue, then, approve or disapprove the policy recommended in those letters ? Clearly he disapproves, or he would not have been at the trouble of this note.
The Kreuz Zeiteng, always supposed to be Count von Bismarck's organ, says that if the neutrality of Belgium is attacked, Allied Germany in arms will hasten to her defence. If that is official, —and good strategists say that with Belgium hostile Rhenish Prussia would be untenable—Belgium is safe enough. It will not suit Napoleon to force an alliance between Great Britain and Germany, which would make France feel as if her throat were in a steel collar.
It is stated that a ballot test is to be applied at Bradford, as recently in Manchester, to decide on the candidate of the Liberal party. Two are now named—Mr. Thompson, the former member, a local magnate of no particular claims, and Lord Hartington, English magnate and member of the Liberal Cabinet. If the latter consents to stand he will probably be elected unopposed, as both parties can unite on him, the Whigs not fearing the heir of Chatsworth or the Radicals a member of Mr. Gladstone's Ministry. All the Ministry will then be comfortably seated for counties, universities, or big boroughs, and there will in a week or two be plenty of seats to spare. The Judges have been brushing away returns, till there will be a sort of general election on a minute scale. Are none of the cultivated Radicals up to a second fight, or none of the corrupt boroughs willing to cleanse their names by electing men who will not pay a penny?
We print elsewhere a very simple, but we believe, very trustworthy account of recent events in New Zealand, and their causes. On account of its length we have omitted the writer's own plan for preserving peace, which is to import English military settlers, who will be stationed on the frontier in fortified farms of fifty acres each, given freehold on condition of service. If that suits the Colonial Government, and they will add, as the writer says they will, good wages for a year, and a free passage, they may pick and choose among ten thousand healthy youngsters in the Western Isles alone. The fighting would be only an attraction, and the Islanders are too gaunt to be nice to eat,---a mode of burial which the volunteers seem to dislike.
Our article of last week on the New Zealand War has been attacked by several contemporaries,—especially for its assertion that England owes any sort of pecuniary reparation to the colony for her blunders in governing it. Some of those who criticize us do not seem to know much of the history of England's recent management. The truth is, that during the whole term of Colonel Cameron's command there, the colony was permitted no power in the regulation of military affairs,—even its own volunteer levies were under the Commander-in-Chief,—yet nothing at all was effected, and a contribution of £50,000 a year taken from its resources to sustain the utterly helpless policy pursued. That policy issued in nothing but disaster and overwhelming debt, and for the disaster the colonial authorities are assuredly not responsible. It would be absurd to say that we ought always to pay our colonies compensation for our own blundering when we have intended to do our best. But when a dependency is in the anguish of such a struggle as now afflicts New Zealand, and people begin to talk of the need of military help, it is just as well to point out that it was military help, and the irresponsible military administration which was a consequence of that help, which led up to the present catastrophe, and that while we cannot do worse than meddle with the colony's military administration or responsibilities, we owe it at least far more in the way of reparation than we owe to other colonies to whom pecuniary guarantees have been accorded.
Sheward, the self-accused Norwich murderer, was committed for trial on Monday,—the only new evidence of the slightest importance being to the effect that he had formed a connection with some other woman within a very short time of his first wife's
disappearance in June, 1851,—and also the evidence of a nurse of one of his children by the present Mrs. Sheward, who spoke to having asked Sheward, from nine to thirteen years ago, why he did not mirry his present wife,—as he afterwards did,—his first wife having been long dead ; to which Sheward replied that "she might have been married before if she wished." This latter speech seems inconsistent with Sheward's language to the relatives of his first wife, to whom he never seems to have admitted any knowledge of her death. A letter written by Sheward, and dated 24th March, 1853, was also put in evidence, in which he stated that he should not take part in the arrangement of the affairs of a relative of his first wife's, on the ground that she (his wife) was not then in Norwich. The prisoner, by the advice of his counsel, reserved his defence for the trial itself.
It appears from the quarterly report of the Registrar-General that the natural increase of the people of the United Kingdom, the births in excess of deaths, was at the rate of 1,177 daily, or 410;000 a year. Emigration, however, carried off 391 daily, or 142,000 a year, leaving 268,000 as the final addition to the population. At this rate the kingdom increases by a Lancashire every ten years, or, say, a Savoy and Nice, and sends in the same time the population of a State like Massachusetts to America and the colonies. It is believed that other races are increasing as fast, but no other exerts the same centrifugal action upon its surplus, the Germans and the Chinese alone emigrating in large numbers. The total increase in America must be even greater, and together the speakers of English multiply by more than eighty millions per century ; and, be it remembered, that there does not in the world exist a community of 10,000 Englishmen not under their own laws.
Lord Hatherley has directed Mr. Edward Watkin Edwards, official assignee, to be called on for an explanation of his conduct in accepting money from Overend, Gurney, and Co. Mr. Commissioner Holroyd, therefore, called on him in open Court on Thursday, when Mr. Edwards read a statement, requesting time to consult such persons as could give him any information. His papers had been handed over to Overend, Gurney, and Co. when his connection with that firm ceased. He requested and obtained ten days. It would appear that Mr. Edwards had some sort of official leave to work for his employers outside the Court, for he sent in on 26th January, 1864, a letter, stating that he was engaged -"in arbitrations, references, and negotiations, which could not interfere with his official duties," and no prohibition seems to have been issued.
The Home Secretary on Saturday received a deputation of influential Londoners, who wished to present a memorial signed by 600 of the largest ratepayera in the metropolis, praying for its division into regular municipalities. Mr. Bruce quite agreed with the deputation that the time for inquiry had gone by, that municipalities were useful things, and that London was disorganized for want of them, so disorganized that he had to omit the metropolis from his education measure. He promised that their bills should be considered and referred to a select committee, and after full inquiry either accepted or withdrawn in favour of a Government measure to be introduced next session. The grand difficulty seems still to be the old one, the mode of federation. Suppose, as there seems a defect of originality among us, we let the London Corporation act as the Federal body? It would govern us pretty well, and seems to get its work done quickly, and is historical, and has estates to give big dinners with ?
The London correspondent of the Scotsman, who sometimes has very early information, states that Lord Clarendon consented to enter the Turko-Greek Conference with great reluctance, and only because England is one of the three protecting Powers. He demanded, moreover, to the great annoyance of France, that the decisions of the diplomatists should not be executive, stating frankly that English policy was a policy of peace, and that the Government world not stultify itself by signing decrees it did not intend to carry out. Lord Clarendon's objects, it is affirmed, were first to maintain peace, and secondly, to protect Greece from invasion, and he advised Turkey, if war did break out, to content itself with destroying the Greek marine. The papers ought to be before Parliament soon after the opening of the session.
The Lower Bons: of Congress has passed,—we suppose by the requisite majority,—a new amendment on the Constitution, rendering it illegal to refuse the suffrage to any man on the ground of colour. It has gone to the Senate for consideration. plaintiff, Miss Saurin, Irish Catholic, sues Mrs. Star, Superioress of the Catholic convent of Hull, on a charge of conspiring with other persons to secure her expulsion from the convent ; demands restoration of certain small articles belonging to her, and asks damages (claiming £5,000) for a libel, an accusation of theft contained in a letter from the Superioress to her Bishop, the Catholic Bishop of Beverley. The case, it will readily be perceived, is nearly unique, the lady's complaint being not that she was kept in a convent, the usual form of such complaints, but that she was driven out by a system of petty persecution. The persecution took the form of compelling her to do menial work, eat bad food, and generally submit to discomfort ; and the defence will probably be either that the facts are true, and the humiliations were inflicted for the soul's health, or that, having been canonically expelled, the complaining nun was really a pauper boarder. As yet (Friday night) no evidence has been heard upon the convent side.
We have received a considerable number of curious letters from correspondents who give us privately their names and addresses, some of which are well known and of great weight, concerning abnormal mental phenomena of the same class as thoseauthenticated by Mr. Tennyson, Mr. Browning, and Mr. Woolner, in " J. T.K.'s " letter of last week ; but none of these correspondents are willing to give their names to the public, and we still hold that no manner of good can be effected by the detail of remarkable cases unauthenticated by names of persons of weight and standing,— since unauthenticated marvels of this kind are never likely to be so far trusted as to be honestly studied by scientific men,—the only end we have in view. We must, therefore, keep strictly to the rale we laid down last week, to admit no narrative of the kind for which a living authority of some social or scientific weight is not openly given.
A deputation waited upon the Home Secretary on Wednesday to urge speedy measures for securing the safety of property and life in London. It was headed by Professor Marks, who represented the district of Marylebone. The Professor was a little behind the time in some of his notions ; he wished to do away in great measure with the ticket-of-leave system,—which really needs extension and elaboration,—aud to have some penal settlement bought for England where all the incurable and worst convicts should be sent. Mr. Bruce pointed out in reply the frightful horrors of a pure convict settlement, with no respectable external population to absorb the criminals when their time expires, and intimated his disapproval of the idea. He wished to extend the ticket-of-leave system, and render it much safer and more efficient than it is, by a complete system of registration. He denied the great increase of crime alleged. Going back forty years, he said, crime was then precisely as frequent as it is at present ; and as the population has greatly increased since then, the proportion is much diminished. But comparing more recent periods, 1867 showed a certain increase of crime on 1866 ; but 1866 showed a decrease on 1865, and the recent increase was due, no doubt, in great measure to the commercial distress and want of employment. Mr. Bruce repudiated heartily for the Government any feeling of false sentimentality towards crime.
The heavy withdrawals of bullion from the Bank have weakened the market for Home Securities ; but, on the other hand, the favourable news from the East has tended to promote an improved feeling. Consols at one time were as low as 93 to 9311 for the March account, but they closed yesterday at 93* to 93,1. Foreign bonds have been dealt in to a fair extent, and prices in many instances have risen. The announcement that the Duke of Richmond, as arbitrator between the London and Brighton and Surrey and Sussex Railways would give his decision in favour of the old directors, has caused the former stock to decline in value ; otherwise, the movements in the Railway Market have been favourable. Owing to the payment in connection with the 4th of the month, the demand for money has increased, and the rate for discounting choice three months' paper has been 2# to 2 per cent. The stock of bullion in the Bank of England is £18,511,205.
Yesterday and on Friday week the leading British Railway Shares left off at the annexed quotations :
