NEWS OF THE WEEK.

THE week began with an unusual stir—with reports of meetings among leading Anti-Ministerialists, and rumours that Sir Robert Peel would lie out of office by this present Saturday ; rumours to which a paper in the Times of Monday seemed to give counte- nance. Things have not gone on quite so fast; though, in truth, the plot thickens apace. One of the meetings held on Saturday was that of Protectionist Peers, to arrange plans for a struggle *rst the Corn Bill in Committee. The other was a meeting of ings at Lord John Russell's house in Chesham Place, to con- e* measures for ousting Sir Robert Peel—for such was in effect their object. They agreed, with one dissentient in each case, to *rst the Corn Bill in Committee. The other was a meeting of ings at Lord John Russell's house in Chesham Place, to con- e* measures for ousting Sir Robert Peel—for such was in effect their object. They agreed, with one dissentient in each case, to

. oppose the Coercion Bill, and to insist on a reduction of duties on

fbreign slave-grown sugar to the level of foreign free-labour sugar. -Both.propositions have the obvious purpose of upsetting the Go- yenunent. ovinopagy, the J=1945e. Commons presented a scene of Raercism41111ws the professed subject of debate, miaters were baited by Whig Iind Tory, in a House . that repeated attempts were made to count it out. Wand :possessed- no sufficient interest to assemble the loud- rezi-patribts ; but Ministers were present to further the pub- .., -.bnalness, and a few Liberals staid to badger Ministers. ltr...Bernal spoke in the midst of the attempts to count out. Then "followed his son, Mr. Bernal Osborne, with a speech in- ten* to draw out Lord Lincoln by exasperating him with re- polies of "ignorance" and "incapacity," in direct terms, which Seem to be Parliamentary, though they would not escape the re- sentment of bystanders in a party of gentlemen. Lord Lincoln Was called out, but not exasperated. Then came Lord George Bentinck, disgorging a farrago of stale vituperation, spiced with a few new expletives: to be answered by the more decorous Mr. Sidney Herbert ; who committed a blunder, less perhaps in the

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substance than n the manner of what he said. He quoted a 'Eamon ,r that the Protectionists had made some offer to Lord John Russell of coalescing against the Ministry, which Lord John was represented to have spurned. This story was indig- nantly denied by both parties ; and Mr. Herbert was obliged to retract. There needed no disclosure, no compact : every one remembers the understanding between Mr. Smith O'Brien and Lord George; Mr. O'Connell was at the Whig meeting on Sa- turday: without specific compact, it is clear that the parties in question are coalescing. And that the coalition is dictated solely li hostility to Ministers, is equally plain. The Protectionists are Tories, old abettors of coercion bills; and they do not even object to this one, but raise quibbles about hesitating to confer f.! unconstitutional " power on a Minister in whom they have "no confidence." The Whigs were continuators of coercion bills, authors of the last one ; and Lord John Russell had talked of im- proving this very one in Committee, thus contemplating its passing when he voted for the first reading. But it offers a ground on which Whigs and Tories may combine against Mi- meters for their several purposes ; and they do combine. What heed, then, of a compact ? That would gratuitously commit the

'al contracting parties to overt proof and recognition of a eful alliance ; while they can obtain all the advantages of Such alliance without recording their disgrace.

It does not lie in the mouths of these allies' at least of the Bngliah allies, to ascribe any peculiar badness to the measure; knd therefore they hunt about for excuses of their new-born hos- otility. They say, for instance, that the bill is no longer necessary, !because crime in Ireland is decreasing. That is, the amount of • . :crime varies, and at present the tide ebbs. But there is no real Change in Ireland: the true reproach to the bill is, that it does not touch that vicious social state which has existed in Ireland ever *teethe earliest dawn of history : if coercion bills were necessary in the ten years ending in 1841, they are necessary in the present decade ; if better measures are desirable now, they were desirable then : if Sir Robert Peel is at fault, what was Lord John in office ?

. On the other hand, Lord George Bentinck discovers that Sir Robert Peel is not in earnest, because he has suffered the bill to be delayed. Perhaps the reproach is not entirely unfounded.

As Sir Robert is a somewhat greater statesman than Lord George, it almost follows that he must have less faith in coercion bills. But, no doubt, there are officials who think that such a

measure may do some good; and Sir Robert himself may think that the want of it may do harm, as seeming to extend impunity to crime. He is not alone in that opinion ; for we see it influences

one of Lord John's followers so strongly as to overcome his Whig predilections, and extort a declaration in favour of the measure even at the Chesham Place meeting. But who was it that caused the delay ? The Protectionists themselves. The Corn Bill is Sir Robert Peel's special mission ; to carry that he returned to office;

to that he gave precedence in the work of the session ; that bill-

the Protectionists obstructed by every expedient ; and thus they delayed the Coercion Bill which stood behind. They would have had Sir Robert prove his "earnestness" by pushing forward the Irish measure, no tioubt, because that would have effected their object of stopping the Corn Bill. The Corn Bill, however, is urged forward; and so they take their revenge on the other bill—and on Peel.

The revenge only seems to succeed. Peel will not be beaten. Throughout this tryin,g. struggle, but most especially in the latter stages, his command of temper has been wonderful. It is a wise self-control. It not only saves those exasperations of which one of his best colleagues is so recklessly lavish, but is a severe teat of his capacity for commanding circumstances. It lays in a stock

of popularity proportionate to the intensity of the present annoy- ance; attests his personal sacrifices, and the sincerity with which he obeys the dictates of =science and patriotic policy ; and it proves his power to conquer obstacles--even the obstacles that he might suffer from his,own naturally imperious temper. The Coercion Bill cannot pass. Why- then should the Minister persevere ? There may be several reasons, but one is evident

enough : to give it up, would be to relinquish the government of Ireland, before the fulness of time for resigning the official seals. Other Ministers, who have not been recently placed in a state of antagonism with Irish agitators, may abstain from urging such a measure ; but Sir Robert Peel cannot abandon it now.

Nor do those who are to succeed him altogether relish the task before them of governibg Ireland. They begin to anticipate re-

proaches, by affecting that Peel hands over the country in a worse

state than he found it. Nonsense : he found sedition, and sedi- tion is quelled. The existing social disorder is the old perpetual disease. They say that he has "no policy" for Ireland. Who has one? what policy has yet been enunciated by any ? It is in- deed the first time that a bill for the coercion of Ireland will have been refused by the British Parliament ; which is an important fact, and may prove to be the first premonitory sign of some better policy to be yet evolved. We hope so. The bill is part of the old repertoire of Irish legislation, and means very little : had it been enacted, it would have made no substantial difference in the state of the country—it is but a shadow of the past ; but its omis- sion is an innovation, and means much as the sign of a new spirit. Those, however, who refuse coercion bills are bound to be pre- pared with something. better for good government—a matured policy-, practical and efficient measures. Pretences that Sir Ro- bert Peel leaves Ireland in some extraordinary condition will not serve as excuse for Whig inertion.

Some have accounted for Sir Robert Peel's pertinacity by the presumption that he "chooses the Coercion Bill as the measure

upon which to go out of office." We cannot see a shadow of pro- bability in such a conjecture—not a motive for such a " choice ". on the part of Peel, but many against it. It would be palpably impolitic for him to retire with even the appearance of attempting a measure hostile to Ireland. His Coercion Bill was only part, and we think the bad part, of a scheme for the improvement of that country ; and it is the part to which he would be the least de- sirous of giving disproportionate prominence. Others reproach him with imitating the Whigs in consenting to retain office on sufferance. All these persons forget his explicit declaration, that he would remain in office until the fate of the Corn Bill should be settled, and that being placed in a minority on another measure should not make him abandon his main enterprise. It is nearly achieved. Respecting his intentions we know nothing ; but our belief is, that when his peculiar mission is accomplished he will lay down the power which he retains solely for the accomplish-

anent of that mission; and will then leave the government of Ire- land, with the rest, to that better management which the Whigs seem to think they cairtmtimporias: The formal business transacted by P4irliament, thnugls‘not uai important, may be recorded. in brief space'. Theuoerd the grand subject of 'debate in the Commons, hangs over : some- thing was to be done about it last night, if time permitted ; and our Postscript will tell the result. It has been followed up by three other bills, which Lord Lin- coln introduced on Thursday, to improve the relation of landlord and tenant in Ireland. One of these bills is to secure the out- going tenant in compensation for his improvements ; the second m to facilitate the granting of leases ; and the third mitigates the law of ejectments,—securing to the tenant a more complete no- tice than he can as yet demand, and altering the law which re- quires all the under-tenants to be ousted because the middleman is ejected. The details, particularly of the first bill, look com- plicated; but it would be premature to judge of their merits by Lord Lincoln's very general though well-managed description. They were received by the House with marked and universal favour.

The Corn Bill has been under discussion by the Lords, on the demand to go into Committee ; resisted by Earl Stanhope and the Protectionists. Those Peers who missed the delivery of their speeches on the second reading, take this opportunity of duly publishing their essays. The debate has been heavy enough ; although enlivened at the outset by some of those droll sallies which Lord Stanhope means in sober sadness, though they have the air of jesting. Private Members have not been idle. Mr. Fox Maule has moved the second reading of his bill to extort Free Church sites from landlords in Scotland : but the debate is adjourned for a week. The bill belongs to the "stand and deliver" class of legislation, hitherto monopolized by the sovereign power in the State, but now gravely claimed by the new Scotch Dissenters. In April last Mr. Hawes obtained a vote of the Commons in favour of paying the outstanding Danish claims : this week Minis- ters have obtained a vote in favour of not paying. That kind of eating your own words is a familiar feat with the Commons' es- pecially in the matter of the Danish claims. Justice is with the claimants, we believe : but the affair has been so often explained to the intelligent British public—so often forgotten, reexplained, and reforgotten—that the public no- longer know or care to know what those tiresome words "Danish claims" mean : they only know that the talk is vastly tedious ; and that it is a habit inhe- rent in all Ministries, from time immemorial, to resist this de- mand : so the public always skip the debate, presume that what must be must be, and think it perhaps quite as well to save the 200,000/. which would be wanted to pay the sufferers. The inte- rest will never be revived, unless the claimants can induce Mr. Burford to turn their case into a panorama, or Mr. Lumley to produce it as a ballet.