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Colonist, Volume III, Issue 227, 23 December 1859, Page 4

The Press and Public Men.— Of all our public men there is not one who does not make the fullest, confession of the allegiance to the great doctrine of the Freedom ofthe Press,—"the palladium of our liberties," "the safe guard of our Constitution," «' the means of diffusing among the people that knowledge, that enlightment, which enables them to of all judge with candour, impartiality, and moderation, and thus makes democratic influences permanent by protecting them from violence and excess." Who does not hold this language? Yet who, we may venture to ask, really and honestly subscribes to its truth? There are few Englishmen, we believe, who see a newspaper in their own language among the periodical literature of the Continent, on the table of a reading-room in a French or German watering-place, without experiencing a certain emotion of national pride; and yet few of these same persons have probably ever considered, or frankly admitted to themselves, the real condition on which the incontestible- superiority of the English Press depends. The English Press is superior to its foreign contemporaries for the simple reason that it is free—free in the widest and fullest sense of the word; not only free to write that which is agreeable to men in power, that which suits the popular impulse ofthe moment, or that which may most facilitate the operations of this Government, but free to utter that which men in power often will not tell or look in the face, which the people at large do not always see, and which tbe masters of mankind do not often wish to see—the bare and naked truth. There is hardly a statesman of our day who has been able to form for himself the real and grand idea of a free press. Freedom from vexatious prosecutions they are willing to concede, but there is scarcely one of them who has elevated his mind above the idea that the Press should be the representative of particular men or particular parties, so as to admit that it may safely and wisely be left to draw its own conclusions and announce its own opinions. It is in vain that one after another of the sickly scions of periodical literature—kept in existence to not meet the public want, but to serve the purpose of a man or a party —successfully droop and die. Experience, is thrown away, and the same folly recommences. We cannot wonder that men who seem just as unable to comprehend the perfectly free and self-regulating action of the Press as a blind man is to appreciate the shades of color, should think it necessary from time to time to lecture those whom they would willingly coerce, and to take credit to themselves for superior wisdom by denouncing any truth which it is inconvenient tp them to hear. 'This distrust and hatred' of the Press is peculiar to no party—nay, it probably prevails with more violence among those whose professions are most liberal. Mysterious- Affair.— As two parties were proceeding through the bush, near. Tyler's Half-Way House, Kingower, on the 24th ult., they came across a tent in a very lonely part, and perceiving a very strong smell issuing therefrom, they looked in, when they discovered the body of a man in an advanced stage of decomposition. The body was lying on an opossum rug, and a bed of bushes. There were two billies in the tent—one containing water and the other tea, but no tools, and: the tent was fastened from the outside, and had been apparently shut up with great care. The body was only covered with a shirt, and no other chothes were found except the trousers, which were under the head. The body was removed to Tylers publichouse, where an inquest was held, and the above facts being elicited, the jury returned a verdict " That deceased died from some causes unknown," and added a rider that they considered the case ought to be further looked into, as they were fully of opinion that other persons were present with the deceased at the time of his death. The potatoe disease is again appearing in Ireland. - ' . .ny *,