CLIPPINGS.

Lyttelton Times, Volume XXXVII, Issue 3568, 25 June 1872, Page 3

CLIPPINGS.

M. Pouyer-Quertiors resignation or dismissal, mas been disoußsed in the French Assembly without much result. The real question seems to have been whether the Minister of Finance approved the system of transfers and fictitious entries of which M. Janvier de lh Motte? was accused. M!. PouyerQueftier sayahe did not, that he openly condemned” is certainly true as far as his abstract opinion goes —while M. ,Casimir Perier affirms that he did, which is also true, as far as his defence of the accused Prefect is concerned. The Assembly almost unanimously passed to the Order of the Day, that is, they affirmed the decision of the Government; and We suppose the truth is this—that the Cabinet, exasperated at the result of a trial which they intended to be a lesson to the Prefects, considered that if the Finance Minister remained, their efforts to secure economy and honesty in the Prefectures would be fruitless, and insisted on his retirement. No Successor to M. PouyerQuertier has yet been appointed, and he is conducting the superior duties of the department, though be does not attend Cabinet Councils. The French Government has evidently determined to take strong measures against the International. M. Dufaure asserts that the society is carrying on a propagandist war against property and society ; that it scatters its publications in thousands; and that all the dangerous Communists recently arrested were possessed of its cards of affiliation. He therefore proposes to make the fact of belonging to the International, or any similar society, ah offence against the public peace, punishable. with imprisonment for not less than three months or more than two years, and a fine not exceeding £4O, and a loss of civil rights for five years. All these penalties are doubled if the accused is a functionary of the society, or in any way propagates its doctrines. The principle of the Bill was voted by 501 to 104, and all its provisions have been passed. The law is a frightfully severe one, and will, as a first .result, change the society into a secret association, which will use terror in .self-defence, A short, clever pamphlet, proving to the peasantry : that if the International succeeded they Would lose their lands, would have' had ten times as much preventive effect.. Creeds are not suppressed by short sentences of im prisonment.

London has bden scandalised by the painful end of a more painful trial, One A. Chaffers, an attorney, in 1869 declared before a magistrate that the wife pf Sir Travers Twiss, the Queen’s Advocate-General, had in 1858 been a prostitute in Regent street under the name of Marie Gelas, and that he had himself lived with her, and forwarded this declaration to Sir Travers, adding that .Unless it were denied he would make.the declaration public. It was made public,, being sent to the Archbiahop of OanterbuiT and others, and Sir Travers. indicted; Chaffers, for 1 a malicioua libel with intent to extort money.; In Court tho accuser defended himself, and for days subjected Lady Twiss to the torture of filthy questions, which she met with a frank and bold denial. Witnesses came forward to prove her parentage, her history, her marriage to Sir Travers, her total want of identity with Marie Ge|as, and bribes offered by Chaffers to' procure evidence. It seemed certain that be must be committed for trial, but on .Wednesday Mr Poland, the counsel employed by Sir T. Twiss, announced that he could go no farther; that Lady Twiss had refused to appear in Court again and had left London, and that the prosecution had ended. No explanation was offered as to the ground for this decision, Which may have been caused by Lady Twiss’s inability to endure further torture. The Magistrate was therefore compelled, to his own expressed disgust and the indig-. nation of the whole country, to let Chaffers go. Another . prosecutor, whom he had accused of bigamy, also withdrew, and it is . still therefore doubtful whether be is a criminal in the eye of the law, or only “ an object of contempt,” as the magistrate said, “ to all honest men.”

It appears to be believed in Italy as well as in England that matters are going on very badly.in Spain. - Indeed, the departure, or rather expulsion, of King Amadeo is looked upon as certain, and intrigues are on foot for. filling up the throne, which would then be vacant. The cause of all this appears to be that the different factions of the Liberals have united against the King, whom they accuse of leaning towards the Conservatives, and are threatening the Conservatives, who have also united under Sagasta, with defeat at the polls or another insurrection. All the stories are probably exaggerated, but three facts may, we believe, be taken as nearly certain. The Italian Cabinet has begun to doubt of Amadeo’s final success ; the friends of the King in Madrid We seriously alarmed, and are threatening severe measures of repression ; and the Press of both parties has suddenly adopted that tone of ferocious hatred which in Spain indicates that debate is over, and an appeal to physical force immediately at hand. We should say that physical force would decide in favour of the monarch, but this is not the opinion of many who know Spanish politics well. The shareholders of the Brie Railway have regained control of their property. Deprived of his colleague Risk, Jay Gould could not keep bis control of tho concern, and on Mon-

(lay t.ho agents of the shareholders succeeded in’ coming to a compromise. Jay Gould and three other directors remain; but General Dix has been appointed president, and General M‘C!ellan superintendent, and honest men fill a majority of seats in the direction. The New York Legislature has also repealed the Classification Act, an Act passed to give the Eing a perpetual majority, but it has added a rider that no director

of the Atlantis and^Nerth-Western Railway shall be a director of the Erie. That may mean thatf the (Legislature dislikes monopolies, but may also mean that it is enraged at the defeat of its old friends, and determined that tb? .victors shall have as little benefit as possible. Of course the old plundering is condoned, Fisk, according to American papers, having died comparatively poor. Lord Salisbury made a good, but useless speech recently about Cape affairs. We are governing the South African colonies on a bad system, they being Crown colonies, yet ruled by elected Legislatures which cannot remove the Ministry, Lord Kimberley wants them to accept Responsible government, but the colonists do not like the expense ; and Lord Salisbury does not like the electors, who, he says, the majority of them being natives, are not fit for self-government. All that is true, but if we re-establish direct government we must pay, and run the risk of insurrection besides. We must go forward on the course fixed by the House of Commons, and trust to the capacity of the AngloSaxon for getting the better of any other people he may live with. The real difficulty is to prevent his getting the better too absolutely, and decreeing, as he is doing in G-riqualand, that a native found in possession of a diamond shall be held to have stolen it, and be flogged accordingly. The ideal system of the Cape would be a federation of elected Legislatures, under a Viceroy with a veto, and certain rights over natives, but Englishmen never adopt ideal systems. Mr Salt introduced his Public Worship Facilities Bill, and carried it through a second reading by a majority of 29. Its purpose is to give, in Mr Salt’s words, “ greater elasticity .td our ecclesiastical. system,” to enable the Bishop in certain parishes to introduce Supplementary clergymen who might act as missionary clergymen,— or a's Religious teachers o? those who dp not happen to belong to the ecclesiastical school of the incumbent, and this is the ■ great ground of opposition to the bill, which it is feared by Mr Beresford Hope may turn out a bill to promote ecclesiastical dissensions in the various parishes. But Mr Henley pointed out that the valuable principle of competition and the dread of it might improve clergymen as well as tradesmen. At present the very few idle clergymen have to dread only Nonconformist competition and many people shrink from attending a place of worship out of their own Church who would gladly embrace the opportunity, if they had it, of attepding another church. Then again, the divergencies ■of creed are now really so serious, that a strong Evangelical may have no escape from something very like mass except there be a Nonconformist chapel in the neighbourhood, while a strong Ritualist may have no escape from having his faith weekly denounced as pure and flagrant idolatry. All things considered, we regard the increased elasticity ’’ which the proposal would give to the ecclesiastical system as far more beneficial ■ than-the' opening for fresh bickerings Could be mischievous. An alternative phase of worship, afforded to Churchmen and Churchwomen, would bftener act as a safetyvalve than as a source of provocation. A meeting was held in the Mansion House under the presidency of the Lord Mayor, with the view of raising, as a thank-offering for the recovery of the Prince of Wales, a national fund for the completion and decoration of St. Paul’s in the gorgeous style originally contemplated by Sir Christopher Wren, a style essential to the character of the building. It seems that the Committee for the Completion have raised £40,000 with great difficulty, and that the Ecclesiastical Commission will contribute (for the more substantial part of the repairs) £25,000, but that these sums will not cover anthing Uke what is wanted to make St. Paul’s the richly-gilded and splendid building which Sir Christopher Wren designed it to be. A handsome subscription of over £BOOO was raised in the room, and a generous promise was read from Mr William Gibbs to give a thousand pounds on condition nine other people do the like towards the completion of the Cathedral; and if the first ten thousand pounds are raised; then Mr Gibbs will offer another thousand pounds on the same condition, so that he hopes to make his two thousand pounds a bait for £IB,OOO more, and it ought, we think, to be an adequate bait. Mr Baldwin Brown has in our columns made a generous appeal to the Noncomformists to come forward and aid in this national work, without waiting to see the fate of “ disestablishment and disendowment.” Certainly as a great work of Architecture only, the strictest of Dissenters might contribute to its completion, even if he abjured the imputation of ever worshipping himself beneath that ample dome—a fair symbol of the Catholic breadth and loftiness with which every State Church should endeavour to include the spiritual wants of all sects, as well as all classes, in its work. We have received a pamphlet, written, we are told, by an Austrian officer of experience and rank, strongly advocating the construction of the Euphrates railway. He believes that Russia has devised a plan for reaching the Mediterranean without taking Constantinople, through Asia Minor, and that she is immediately pressing towards the Persian Gulf, Persia being being now nearly prostrate. Considering that two ironclads could easily blockade tho only port on the Gulf, we doubt if Russia will spend much money or energy on that project, while the former one will occupy years. The Euphrates Valley Rail* way, however, scarcely needs high political arguments in its defence. It will accelerate the journey between two continents by ten days, give the world an alternative route to India, and wake up Asia Minor to new life ; and what can its advocates Whut more ? If we‘are to fight Russia, South Persia will do capitally for the purpose, much better than Candahar. General Simmons, said to be a man'

of unusualorgamsiogahility, has addressed a long letter to the Times, in which.he ipleads that the Militia and; Volunteers eh odd be abolished, and the money wasted on them be expended iia keeping up the Begnlar Reserves. , fie, calculates that we might in this way have 150,000 regularly trained troops besides the active army, say a quarter of a million good soldiers in all. Quite true, and very sensible from the military point ot view, provided statesmen could trust the House of Commons. But they cannot. The moment the new scheme had been fully arranged, the borough members would begin bidding against each other with reductions, till we should find

ourselves with 30,000 troops, 30,000 reserves, and no defensive army at all. General Simmons thinks that British electors understand armies as he does, —a very dangerous mistake. The average elector has an idea that ships are useful, and will pay for them; but he considers soldiers profligates in red, to be faired when he is frightened, and dismissed when he is making money. Lord Northbrook, the new Indian Viceroy, has done a curious thing. The Mayor of Winchester gave him a banquet, attended by the county and the representatives of India, and of course Lord Northbrook made a speech. Of course, also, he avoided any declaration of Indian policy, saying his knowledge was too imperfect; but he read out the Queen’s proclamation of 1859, a most important document, as is also Magna Charta, but for the same reason not often read aloud. We presume Lord Northbrook was speaking to India and not to England, and intended to tell the natives that he was coming opt no mission of vengeance for Lord Mayo, but to carry out the Proclamation which they regard as their charter, and which is certainly as deaf a pledge not to interfere with their religious ideas as it is well possible to frame. There is tact in that decidedly. The regular fight over the Ballot Bill was chiefly confined to payment of expenses, Mr M'Cullagh Torrens offering the extremely pleasant suggestion that the Eeturning Officers’ expenses should be paid out of the Consolidated fund. Why did he not move that hustings should be of ebony, inlaid with ivory, for they certainly in ten years’ time would be as costly ? The object is to keep down election expenses, not to enable every Eeturning Officer in England to dip bis band into the Treasury, sure that his member will fight for him, and that Government will not like to resist. There were actually 54- advocates for that mad piece of extravagance, but of course it was defeated by 362, and, to judge by the tone of the House, the expenses of elections will yet be put upon the rates. Till the final vote is passed, however, we distrust the rich, who plead in the most adroit manner for the poor ratepayers and their own monopoly at one and the same time. They are not afraid of the workmen, who would have to be supported even if they were elected, but of the men with brains.