OUR LONDON LETTER.

Evening Star, Issue 3950, 22 October 1875, Page 2

OUR LONDON LETTER.

London, Septemb r 6. The session is over, and curing he past week or bo newspapers have been busy criticising its results In is hardly nec.ssary to say that .the general verdict is unfavorable. It is considered that the Government has manifested the e treme of weakness and vacillation. At the Lord Major’s banquet Mr Oisraeli made the usual speech, and passed in revi vr the events of the setsion, hut Respite all Ins adroitness the whole wore an apologetic air, and mtleed hardly justified the saying that a bad excuse is better than one at all. He alluded to Mr Hlim oil’s impassioned outbreak a« a " ura atic scene.” and m relation to the explosion of feeling whi hj ic elicited t roughout the country, he affirms ! that the Government welcomed ic as enabling them to carry the measure they most sincerely desired. Mr Disraeli said the Government acted by the aid of the public feeling, not under its pressure. It would be difficult 1 o convey an idea of the s 'orn with which these excuses have been received. 'V hat, it is assed, are we to think of a Go* vernment that, in a matter where the lives of thousands are concerned, could not, or dare a not, act until ...ee tings were everywhere held to denounce its ‘ wickedness and folly,” and the who’e en*ive Press concurred, holding it up to execration ? Much a plea is simply an invitation to contempt. It virtually says, “Pie se kick me.” Scarcely n ore happy has been the reception awarded to the Government policy respecting the Brighton Aquarium. Under a fossil Act of George the third’s this company, as well as railway companies acting in conjunction, rendered itself liab e to very heavy penalties for keeping open on| Sundays—the said penalties to go into the pocket of the informer. Wed, Mr Gr..88 expre sed his intention of remitting these penalties, but that proving ultra vires , a Bid had t. be brought into Parliament for euubi.ng him to do so, Againsi- this it is urged that, if the \ct was a bad one, the proper course was to repeal it—not for the i government to be introducing one law fir reuniting the penalties levied under another. Altogether the feeling regarding the past session is that it has been one £ talk ; that tune was found for deliberating on questions of privilege, Ac,, and for passing measures which were either not dosirabe or absolutely pernicious (as for insta. ce the Bill for partially reintroducing puichase into the army), whilst matters of vital moment were synicallv u glected. One curious result is, however, worth notice. Owing to delays in the House of Commons, a large mass of business was •■lent forward to the Lords just as the session Whs closing, and, in order to get through w.th it in time for the grouse shooting, the -ordshaa to pass the measures with unaocustom, d celerity, thus virtu illy abandoning thrir power of revision. At pr sent, with a i onservaiive Government, the Lords have adop.ed the course of tacit acquiescence, and it may be fund hereafter that they have thus created a preccd. Nt of which the next i.ibetal Government may peihaps avail themselves.

Ihere has be n a very smart passage of arms between Mr Piimsolland the Ibesideut of the Board of trade. Mr Phmsoll charged that department generally with neglect of duty, and asked Sir Charles Adderley how it was that whilst 515 ships had been detained a* unacawortby, an-i 28 of them were found to be bo bad that they hid to -,-e cond tuned and broken u , at 11 the - -o er ment had insututed no more than two pro eeutious. I he answer was that prosecutions could only be institu ed for actually sending oac an eaworthy ships, hoc for attempting to sand. I n ibis vi; w, of course, the more rotten shn-s were demined the smaller the number that actually got to seawhilst, as regards the latter, the worse they were, the Ic .s chance of ever bringing their owners to book. Dead men Ml no Men,” and rimavu ships can .ot be put in ev,deuce 1 hese tou-ideravinns ma , perhaps, exoner.uo the department, but (hey n fleet on the Gov rnmc t vi men could - qu esce in the law r in mug m sue , a sea Ma - u condition. I is somewhat sum,-fact ry, how-ver, to kno.v that by the tin.or.i, ct just passed the “ attemp: to send'’ uusc iwor: by ships uO . se v *‘l3 been iibule equal y punishable with the actual sending. A centenary celebration of the birth of Oanicl uVoimell has been held in Dublin, lied is d Ui-uy iul-t r -sti . a- • vid,- cn g a marked curtiige union i.as uncurled in Imn politics, For many years past, owing to the

penal laws and to the various disqualifications to which Roman Catholics were subjected in Ireland, the priesthood was compelled t» ally itself with the political party which advocated their abrogation—that is, the Liberal party. And thus the Catholic Church, whilst elsewhere suppressing the expression of hostile opinion or tenets to the utmost of its power, was obliged, in Ireland, to adopt the maxims of religious liberty, and accept the alliance of its advocates and defenders, it did not require much foresight to perceive that so unnatural an alliance could not be permanent, and would be dissolved as soon as its temporary eject was accomplished. The fulfilment of these progno tications we have just witnessed in a split between the secular and religious element in Ireland. The priest party wi bed to convert the O’Onnell celebration into a merely religious demo stration O’Connell was to be honored wholly or mainly as the emancipator of the Catholic Church ; but this interpretation of the life and aims of the great irishman was indignantly rejected by the secular party. At the banquet presided over by the Lord Mayor of Dublin, who is an Ultramontane, it was comp'ained that undue prominence was given to the supporters of the ecclesiastical policy. It bad be" arranged that sir Charles Gavan Duffy should respond to the toast of “The Legislative Independence of Ireland, •’ and Mr Butt to that of “ 'he People of Ireland ” Mr Butt’s friends, however, in ignorance of this arrangement, refused to hear Sir Charles, nnd when Mr Butt rose to explain, the Lord Mayor, not knowing his purport probably, declined to a low him to speak. Great confusion followed, during which the l.ord Mayor left the hall, and the gas was put out. Extreme indignation of course was expressed by the nationalists, and their papers maintain i hat their clerical schema for a purely ecclesi stical demonstration comp etely fail d, adding very significantly that Ireland has no sympathy with foreign clerical politics, and cares nothing for the quarrels ot German Bishops with the Ntats. It is not easy to overrate the importance of the movement indicated by th-« proceedings above referred to It makes the point of separation between the ecclesiastical and secular party in Ireland. which baa been directly led up to by the events ot the last twenty years. The constant flow of emigration to the United States brought the Irish into contact with American ideas, than which nothing can be more unfavorable to priestly power, and to this infl euce may be mainly ascribed i,he remarkable growth of an independent secular spirit, which all thinking Englishmen will welcome, notwithstanding that it addresses itself, in the present instance, to an unreasonable and hopeless etfo/t for legislative separation cf the sister island, (To be continued.)