COLONIAL TROUBLES.
WHILE our Indian empire is in the throes of civil war, our Colo- nies are undergoing gentler agitations. British North America is burnine with impatience for a grand act of annexation, and is threatened with a formidable invasion. Another company's tenure is in question besides the East Indian—that which rules the Hudson's Bay territory; and Canada is clamouring for " an- nexation " before Ministers have made up their minds to treat the lesser ecompaixy like the greater. According to the latest view of the subject, Brigham Young has reflected on the impolicy of making a stand against the arms that President Buchanan can send against him ; and should the Salt Lake be made by Yankee powers too hot to hold the Mormons, they will probably cross the Columbia on to British territory,. They will give up the theoretical immunity of "state rights, for the practical immunity of squatters on land of which a great landlord takes little heed. The scandal will then be brought home to Downing Street, and. Mr. Secretary Labouchere may feel him- self "obliged to act.' Now how-will he proceed—how-attempt to bind Mormonism with red tape ? Official etiquette will assert its inflexible rule : there will no doubt be " communications " • her Majesty's Secretary of State will find himself in correspondence with Brigham Young, Esq., &e., &e., &o. He will no doubt open it by saying that his attention has been called," and, close it by "having the honour to be" the arch Mormon's "most obe- dient servant.'
At the Australian anniversary dinner, Mr. Secretary Labou- chere declared, that he never opens a despatch from a Colonial Governor without finding the colony in the midst of a "
terial crisis." Public business is proportionately incommoded ; but the colony is so free that it is independent of the Government, and it "rubs through." Perhaps it's ablest men are too busy about their own affairs to be available for the public. At all events, the Crown, by its stinginess in giving or vecognizing Colonial honours' fails to impart that stamp.of distinction which is so often useful to settle the wavering choice even of the most democratic Anglo-Saxon community. Has Mr. Secretary La- bouehere consulted hiaGovesnors on that point?
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