ENGLISH NOTES,

Grey River Argus, Volume XII, Issue 1169, 27 April 1872, Page 2

ENGLISH NOTES.

[spectator.] , The Times appears to believe that we V shall get the tunnel under the chaimfij . after all. At least it announces that the British Government has granted all need* ful concessions, and that a company has been formed, with some great names on it, to run a driftway between Folkestone and Cape Grisnez, preparatory to making the tunnel. If the driftway can be 'cut safely- through the chalk, the., greatest difficulty, namely, a possible "fault" in / the chalk, will have been Bhown not to exist, and the engineers can go on in safety. As the driftway, however?* will cost from a million to a million and a half, and as there is no guarantee either of success or interest, it may be a little difficult to raise the money. The Times gives • the project four columns of its largest type, but adds that " there hangs over it . an element of extreme uncertainty." Mr Disraeli seems to have 'fixed the Easter week for stumping Lancashire in the Conservative interest. We hope he will find occasion to announce" in it the conclusion to which he came long ago, but which he has just formally reiterated in the new edition to his " Life of Lord George Bentinck," that " the principle of race is the key of history, and the surest clue in all ages to the conduct of man-' kind." An acute critic has recently, said of Mr Disraeli that the fundamental idea of his intellect is the theocratic idea. We fear his real view is that adherence to a v theocracy is a note of race, rather than, thau race is the instrument of a theocracy. But whichever way he puts it, if he would only confess in Lancashire his secret belief that he has a right to rule the coarse Saxon by virtue of his purer blood, Lancashire would not believe in him long. The Looshai Expedition seems to advance successfully. The two columns are threading the highest ranges occupied by the tribes, destroying their villages, burning their stores of rice 'by the 10,000 maunds at a time, and geuerally making war as hard for the women and children as they can. There is no help for it if other means are wanting, but we beg our readers to note three little facts, of which the two last are from writers on the spot. This war will cost L 250,000. The mea who plunge into the jungle after the sat ages whenever they show fight are Ghonrkas. The Lposhais who are captured arid agree to act as coolies, "do not desert." Does not that seem to show that about a tenth of this expenditjaftr*" would have turned the tribes into, faithful frontier policemen, useful for just the same work as the only men who can catch, them— the Ghoorkas. Colonel Tomline has not done sticking his little silver pins into the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Mr Lowe, he asserts, has at length woke up to the fact that' the silver currency is deficient, and the silver coinage very bad. Consequently he has directed the Bank to exchange old. silver coins for new, and ordered the Mint to coin silver night and day till the establishment is so fully employed that it cannot coin gold. "This morning," writes the member for Great Grimsby, "I saw. L 6,000,000 in gold ingots laid aside, that the men and machinery of the Mint might coin silver." ,He asks whether all this is not evidence that Tiis complaint of a scarcity of silver was well founded, and it will, if the facts are correctly stated, be difficult to answer "No:" If Mr Lowe desires to reduce the demand for silver swiftly and permanently, he should give the people their long sought boon—fiveshilling gold pieces. ...'•■' Mr Watson has been respited, and his sentence changed to penal servitude for life, on the recommendation of the Judge who tried him (Mr Justice Bykes) and of the Lord Chief Justice (Sir A. Cockburn). No one can help feeling a certain amount of pity for Mr Watson, or relief that he is not to be put to the ignominious death of the gallows ; * but we have a nervous feeling that a very different measure Has been dealt out to him and to certain criminals of a lower class whose reprieve has been steadfastly, we do not say unjustly, refused ; and we have the greatest possible fear of a suspicion of class- justice gaining ■' ground with the English people. We do not see any substantial ground for the mitigation of Mr Watson's sentence. The attempt to show insanity is admitted to have failed ; and the mere existence of provocation— of the extent of which in this case we have no real evidence—has | never been regarded as giving a title of mercy. We cannot regret the special result, but we do not fear its conse> quences. ; .

Mr Vernon LusbJngton. Permanent Secretary to the Admiralty, has given the Megaera Commissioners a noteworthy account of the way business is done in that department. It received more than 100,000 letters a year, but nobody was responsible for opening, registering, or, as we understand, for answering them. "In point of fact, though he was called Secretary to the Admiralty, the business was done here and there." Letters were passed on to departments, answered and Bent to him, and he signed them, "knowing nothing about them," as "Secretary of a phantom board." He could not tell who would make or receive a demand for a new troop-ship, and believed thero must soon be a revolutionary change, for things could not go on as they were. There were really twelve departments in the Admiralty, and "there was not any real control by the system pursued, for only patent defects could have a finger laid upon them, and the latent defects were to the patent defects as ten to one." That is the testimony, be it remembered, of an official not long enough in office, to have become blind to .the defects of the system. It is remarkable that Lord Shaf tesbury has promised to take the chair at a meeting to promote the Reform of the Church of England, to be held at St. James's Hall next Tursday week (15th February), at 8 p.m., of which it is to be one of the principles that the creed called the Athanasian is no longer to be publicly used in our church services. Dr Barry, the Principal .of King's College, Dr MiUer, of Greenwich, and, as it is hoped, even Mr Ryle, will support its programme, which is briefly this : — 1. Reform, not disestablishment. 2. The increased liberty in the use of the Prayer Book proposed by the Archbishop of Canterbury. 3. The disappearance of the Athanasian Creed, so far as regards the public church services. 4. Increased influence to the laity through representative Parochial Councils. 5. A reform of the system of patronage and of Convocation. The accession of such men as Lord Shaf tesbury, Dr Miller, and Dr Barry to the proposals of Mr Cowper Temple and his friends, is an event of considerable importance to the prospects of the liberal churchmen's movement.