ENGLISH NEWS.

Lyttelton Times, Volume I, Issue 11, 22 March 1851, Page 2

ENGLISH NEWS.

From the Spectator. Of public events, in this flattest of seasons, the most prominent has been the meeting of the Financial and Parliamentary Reform Association ; and quietists are delighted to cry that it also was flat to the last degree. Doubtless, it was not greatly redeemed from flatness, even by the somewhat boisterous intervention of Mr. Feargus 'Connor. The very principle and spirit of the Association involve that consequence. It is an attempt to effect a compromise between Liberal-Ministerialism and Chartism : too restless to stand still, it is discountenanced by all steady Whigs ; too slow to move with the people, it is suspected by all ardent Chartists; not gaining ground with either, it lacks the confidence even of middle class empirics. Its speakers touch upon topics some of which are rising in public interest, but it is only a touch and go. The leading men are bound by the social compact of its existence to abate their own tongues to the proper medium sense; their eloquence is self-converging in a gradual diminuendo, until at last they seem fairly to have established that which alarms nobody—an organized mediocrity.

Even more public stir lias been made—perhaps for want of other subjects exciting enough —about the new encroachment on the part of Rome, in creating an Archbishop of Westminster More importance is attached to the step than it deserves. It is true that the law forbids the Bishops of the Roman Church to assume the titles of sees, but in Ireland they have been allowed to suffer the public to nickname them with such titles, and even in England outlandish substitutes for the real territorial names have been endured. But a certain indecorum in encroaching upon the modern toleration of Great Britain, and in appointing an archbishop over a district eminently Protestant and not at all Romanist, is not to be denied. Perhaps the apparent extension is not without its danger to the very party which may take it for success. There is no doubt that the Papacy is thoroughly decayed at its centre ; that in Italy itself the Antipapal feeling is becoming a national one ; and that the iinal fall of the Pontificate is now manifestly a question of time alone. The more so, as the Roman Church may probably follow others, in not thoroughly breaking up, but in becoming imbued with a new spirit, which shall operate as a gradual conversion. That process is already at work, more actively than the very imperfect overt sign of Giobertism would suffice to indicate : and in the outskirts of the connexion where it comes in contact with the theological and spiritual discussion of the times, the progress of conversion is likely to take effect not only individually but still more collectively. The Anglo-romanists of Westminister are as little like the orthodox Romanists of the Vatican as they are to the strict Romanists of Smithfield. The portents of the Berlin wool trade and the titular sallies of the Sacred College are trifles compared to these graver and larger phenomena ; the progress of the world is not to be arrested by coloured worsted, or verbal audacities. But public affairs shrink into commonplaces compared to the startling manifestations of criminal violence. The journals of the week teem with every sort of murderous and burglarious excess; and the large towns do not enjoy a greater immunity than sequestered districts, The Police appear to act on a charm' ing determination to ignore the existence of crime, as if they meant to carry out the spirit of some orthodox dogmatists. In the Regent's Park, Mr. Holford's servants sustain a siege, and route the burglars by dint of valour and well-contrived defences. In Birmingham, while Mr. Marston, a gold-beater, is engaged in protracted conflict with thieves, his daughter cannot cannot convince an inspector and a constable of the Police force that her father is engaged in any more serious employment than " correcting " some disobedient member of his family ! Not only is Jael Denny strangled by a faithless lover at a lonely spot near Bventwood, but the Police examinations show how Mr. Miller has been strangled, though less fatally, in the open streets of London, and Mr. Cureton the medallist in his own house. While old Mrs. Anne Jones is supposed to have been poisoned in the interest of a son impatient for his inheritance, the Police have discovered a perfect merchant in the stolen goods line, whose transactions embraced Liverpool and

London, and must have given much encouragement to industry such as that which invaded the houses of Mr. Holford, Mr. Holiest, Mr. Vidal, and others. The news of the week presents our civilization in an extraordinary aspect. On a closer inspection, it turns out that in East Surrey the Magistrates have not only tried to do without a Bural Police, but have much neglected all the usual precautions of active vigilance. Still, the unprotected state of. East Surrey will not account for the invasions in London, Liverpool, and Birmingham. We (Globe) believe we are not premature in announcing that the vacant office of Vice-Chan-cellor has been conferred on Baron Kolfe. With respect to the two Vice-Chancellorships, it is to be observed that the statute 5 Victoria, cap. 5, sec. 10, under which the two last ViceChancellors were appointed, provides that upon a vacancy occurring in the office of the ViceChancellor first appointed it shall be filled up ; but that in the case of the one second appointed, it shall not be filled up independently, therefore, of the question of any further necessity for two Vice-Chancellors, as the law stands, one appointment only can now be made. The question of continuing three Vice-Chancellors is one altogether for the legislature ; but we believe no proposal to that effect will be made by the Government, the pressure of equity business, which called for an increase in the number of the judges of the Court of Chancery at the time of the passing of the act having very materially diminished. CHINA. The Sydney Morning Herald of February 18, says, — " Files of Hongkong papers to November 27th came to hand yesterday. The cholera and fever, which were so prevalent, had subsided. " A Board of Health and Cleanliness" had been appointed to enforce sanitary regulations- „...-"""' No satisfactory account of the destruction ol the frigate " Donna Maria" could be given ; how the accident occurred was a mystery. We observe that the English mail of September 24th was delivered at Hongkong on the forty-eighth day ; and it is stated that had the steamer from Singaporelbeen a fast one at least two days might have been saved. It is stated, but no authority is given, that the British Government had apologised to the Portuguese for the violation of their territory by the Meander's crew, had reprimanded Captain Keppel, and granted a pension to the widow of the man who was shot. This is so contrary to the position taken by Lord Palmebston at the time, that we believe the statement will be found to be incorrect."