English Intelligence.

Hawke's Bay Times, Volume 7, Issue 354, 1 March 1866, Page 1

English Intelligence.

HOME TALK. (From Home News, 36th December.) The Temple, 26th Dee. This day last year the present writer was lamenting a paucity .of subjects of domestic interest. He had little to send to Australia beyond the usual Christmas topics, and even these were rather colourless. I. think that we are rather better off this year, though the season is proverbially fiat, except for those who have their own special holiday enjoyments. Christmas in London is what most people who have choice endeavour to eschew. “ Nobody now spends bis Christmas in town,” said a poet some years back, and the habit of escape has grown with the opportunities. The Queen sets us an example, and is at quiet Osborne for the festive season. Special correspondents, of course, must be where they date their letters from, and accept their fate without murmuring. Haring named our Sovereign, I should state that the announcement that if her Majesty’s health permits, she will open Parliament in person, has given much satisfaction, because the intimation indicates a complete restoration of the Queen’s strength of mind and body. There has been, however, no duty of state which the monarch has not performed during her seclusion, and the people have waited respectfully, without impatience, for the time when it might please her to take part once more in mere ceremonials. The Court receptions have been held, with much grace, by the Heir Apparent and his admired bride, aud it has been felt that there was no case for those whose superfluous exhortations to the Queen to come forth from her retirement have been by no means considerate or courteous. There is one part of the intimation to which 1 refer which has excited curious comment. It is said that the the Sovereign will not wear her State robes on the occasion spoken of, but that these will be deposited on the throne, aud her Majesty is supposed to be disinclined to conceal the ensigns of widowhood. There is time, however, to reconsider this novel arrangement. The Speech is, we are told, to be delivered by the Chancellor, which is to be regretted, as the Queen’s enunciation of such addresses is very admirablle. Among the topics of the Speech will be the announcement of the betrothal of Princess Helena to the brother of the Duke of Augusteuburg, and a request for the provision of the young couple. The match can in no worldly way be called a good one, for the Prince has neither position nor money, but a daughter of England need not be solicitous about either. It is said that the Queeu is desirous that one of her children should, when married, remain with her; and this object can certainly be accomplished, in this case, without the slightest inconvenience to any portion of the continent. I have also heard a rumour that Parliament will be asked for some further aid to the immense memorial to the late Prince Consort, which is now slowly rising at South Kensington; but 1 will venture to hope that this report is baseless, as I do not think that such an application, alter £50,000 has been added by the Commons to the large subscription, will be. very favorably received, and we have no Lord Palmerston now to make the vote seem like a personal gift to himself, whom every one liked to oblige. Earl Russell’s Cabinet has not even yet received the final touches. One appointment, however, has been made, which is held to have a certain significance. Mr W. E. Forster, member for Bradford, succeeds Mr Chichester Fortescue as Under-Secretary for your own and the other Colonies. This gentleman’s opinions are of an “ advanced kind, that is to say, he is what used to be called a Radical. It is supposed that Earl Russell would not have offered—or at least that Mr Forster would not have accepted office, if a decidedly Liberal policy, as it is termed, had not been resolved on by the Government. In other words, a Reform Bill is to be introduced, and the franchise is to be lowered. Mr Bright has been making speeches, in which, after the wildest abuse of the Tories, whom ho believes to exist, in enormous force, in the same beliefs as those of Lord Eldon, he has spoken warmly of Earl Russell, promised him support, and declared that it is intended to add a million of persons to the present electoral body, that is to double it. Moreover, the Home Secretary is demanding various returns from olficials, aud the information is understood to bo wanted in aid of arrangements for a Reform scheme. Whether any committee or commission is to precide the bringing in a bill is doubtful, but there is a prevalent idea that something of the kind will be proposed. I need not anticipate the conflict of oratory which is certain to take place. A large number of persons believe that ho change in the representation is yet required, atid that the present Parliamentary system not only brings oat all opinions which deserve attention, but also works practically and well for national prosperity. Another large body make it a question of principle, and consider that taxpayers are aggrieved by being deprived of a direct vote. Some go further, and advocate manhood sufferage, but these are felt, by the moderate and thoughtful on both sides, to be madmen, and are advised to mix in any mob, or pass an hour at street corners, after dusk, and study the fitness of those around them for political power. 1 hazard no predictions, but I have an impression that the Reform Bill will be a moderate one, will extend laterally as well as as well ns downwards, and propose few changes in excess of those contained in the bill which Lord John Russell, in natural agitation, had to withdraw on tht ev» of tha Crimean w«tr.

In my last lettter I mentioned the news from Jamaica, the rising of the negroes, the hideous murders aud other atrocities which they had committed, and the chastisement which had been inflicted by Governor Eyre and the military. The next mails showed how far short the first tidings had come as to the gravity of the crisis. We learned that the colonial authorities had discovered that there was a foul and widely-spread plot to massacre the white population, and that the most tremendous measures of repression had been resorted to. Some two thousand blacks had been killed, and other punishments, especially flogging, had been administered on a large scale. The result has been that while society here has heard the nows with sorrow, it has felt that Governor Eyre and the colonial authorities (including both Houses of Parliament in Jamaica, which have formally thanked him for saving the colony,) must have acted on good grounds, and that the half-reclaimed savage, called a negro, had terribly demonstrated the incompleteness of his civilisation. Those who were least assured of this resolved to wait for full information, which was at once promised by our Government. But not so the extreme Radicals here, and their allies, the Baptists, whose missionaries are numerous among the blacks, and are thought by no tneans to have confined themselves to their legitimate business of substituting Calvinism for Fetish-worship. These parties have blazed up into Unexampled fury. Meetings have been held, at which not a word was said about the massacres by the blacks, but the most violent denunciations have been uttered agaiust the whites who defended themselves. Eyre has been called, in the plainest language, a murderer, who ought to share the fate of Gov. Wall; the poor dear blacks have been described as helpiess martyrs, and the brown person, Gordon, who was hanged by a court-martial, has been compared to Lord William Russell, and to a personage whose name is too saered to be lightly written down. As for the venom and malice oi the articles which have appeared, day after day, in the organs of these parties, I can give you no adequate idea of them, unless you can imagine the raving of a fanatic preacher who had been educated in Billingsgate, Such demonstrations have beeen a disgrace to the country. They have, of course, produced no result, except disgust. Earl Russell sends out Sir Henry Storks to take Governor Eyre’s place while an investigation proceeds, and ail those whose opinion alone a gentleman can possibly care about, hope and believe that the examination will prove that the colonial authorities did only what was just and necessary, in the presence of a strange and terrible crisis. Wo remember Bristol, ravaged and burned because the military were afraid to act; we remember the Indian mutiny, which might have been checked by early and stem examples, and we know what would have been said of Eyre, had the black Baptists and others been alowed to get the upper hand, and the rebellion had spread. Colonists will appreciate the situation of a body of Englishmen, eight times outnumbered by angry savages, and the advantage of having as governor an officer aware of his responsibilities to the colony and to the Crown. (To be continued.)