Marylebone Workhouse has been assessed. Is it an assessment on
ever, there must be in this case an egregious blunder somewhere. view as to the probable necessity of severe measures, on the ordi-. Last week a notion went abroad that Government had given nary principles of warfare. Had Barcelona been allowed to pun- sweeping instructions in the Tower Ward to raise all the assess- chase escape for itself and its adherents by submission merely when meat,: Mr. Wea.se, the Surveyor of Taxes, declares that no the troops around it became too numerous forreeistance, the lesson. "such order has -been issued ; but meanwhile there has been a would have been held out to the other disorderly provincial eapi- sweeping enhancement of the assessments, not only in the Tower, tals of the country, that they tnight raise rebellion with impunity: but in Langbourne Ward. All this has an unfortunate appear- provided they submitted when an army had been concentrate& ance, and is sure to be unpopular: and though it is likely enough against them; and the Spanish Government Might, have been kept that some surcharges may have been necessary in consequence of perpetually on the move to quell an enemy irrepressible because, attempts to evade the tax by false returns of income, it is also pos- not resisting on extremity. The ease of the troops was peculiarly. 'Able that some are the reiults of eagerness to increase the receipts bad. When they could no longer plead.compulsion by the insur- of the district,; whilst some may be really cruel--grounded on the gents, they still held back from returning to ,their duty : in them. struggle which the "poor gentleman" is making to keep up an the crime of rebellion was aggravated by that of desertion. It will the mode of levying the tax, rather than to its principle. People The conduct of the French Consul derives importance from the object to other taxes-td a Corn-tax, or a Sugar-tax—as bad in pother of discussion raised about it, and from the statement that principle; but, to the Income-tax as bad because its enforcement the Kim of the French was a direct instigator of M. LESSRPS in. is involved in endless trouble—doubts even as to what the law abetting rebellion. The subject is more obscured than it Was really is or how it is to be obeyed, a.ed which doubts there is no at firlit by contradictory assertions, which are yet not altogether ready means of getting resolved. There was an equal outcry incompatible. These things appear: the French Consul has re- against the former income-tax; yet that very law was taken by Sir ceived promotion in the Legion of Honour since his conduct was' Reimer Peea for a model, and without simplification or essential made known in France ; it is roundly asserted that Louis Futures- improvement. Instead of taking that particular enactment, so gave him directions without the privity of the French Foreign generally execrated, as an example ad evitandum, it was appro. Minister ; some of the most odious charges against him, such as' priated with some modifications of detail. How much better would his having held prisoners VAN Ilamtiv's wife, and daughters, are it have been to make a new one altogether : not to consider what partly explained away ; some of the French papers afflict to dig- Lord LIVERPOOL Or Lord HENRY PETTY, Or any other statesman, credit, and conditionally to disavow, the political conduct imputed did or approved in the last generation, failing of success ; but what to him; and it is explained that the reward given to hincis..but a- wes the object to be attained, what the best means, and what the tribute to public *pinion in France before the Aneetieg of the best method of avoiding the former unpopularity. The Premier Chambers. The last clause is likely enotigh, and it'wonld account failed thichigh the weakness which too often goes with discretion for much that seems extravagant or inconsistent in, all the rest. It in statesmen, a reliance above all things on precedent. But at it is true, the implication of die French Government in the affair, •
least, as the old law was adopted, it was incumbent on the states- though it enhances the newspaper importance of the citication" man to recast its ambiguous language, to illustrate it by simple ex- between France and England, need not give, us much coikern.
planations, and to select the best possible agents to work it ; having The hubbub will die away where it arose, in France itself. That over them a man honest and zealous in his duty towards Govern- it might indeed have been otherwise with a PALMERSTON at the nient and the people, to see that the law was intelligibly explained Foreign Office to worry the French into a. real quarrel, we are and tenderly carried out. The result either proves that none of not allowed to forget, by the daily endeavours of the Mdrning these things have been attended to, or that the old law was so Chronicle to make the most of' it.
radically bad that it 'ought never to have been revived. The new-
,ness of the vocation, though it may be the source of considerable A "question" has arisen • in Polynesia—not.one,43owever, with
difficulty, can hardly have caused it all; and even what it did which we have any concern except as spectators. Rear-Admiral cause might have been in some degree obviated by the precautions Dorerzi-Tuouaas has taken possession of the Maiquesas for
!Inch'we have mentioned. But the means of smoothing the opera- France, with ceremonies the mint imposing 'and 'under circUm- bon have been so utterly neglected, that some honest persons.even stances Of the most complicated foreign relations. It is quite a suspectahat the treuble has been made as great as possible, to in- military and diplotnatie puzzle; with a little 'sluiti...of `conquest, of duce people to submit to illegal loss rather than undergo the an- arrogante, and of constructive war,' just calciirated to divert a noyanee of resisting—that sheer plague has been employed by , a portion of Parisian attention frotireThitich meditating on the great statesman as a means of extortion I This is incredible; approao/aing session. Admiral DUPETIT landed, and took possesioa but it shows that the plague really is felt to operate in that way. haid all the pomp and clicumstatier supblied by the n'sources of . Even now, probably, there is a world of trouble behind, which k
