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watchful sense of honour, and the most disinterested and generous loyalty, are characteristic of the cherished traditions of the great Catholic houses who for three centuries have remained stanch to the faith bequeathed them by Catholic England. The honour of every countryman is a precious possession, and we are moved by a strong spirit of indignation when we see a reckless and wanton hand scattering such wretched libels through the land. But we do not pause to give them the lie; it is enough for us that the law has declared them to be false. The law of England has explicitly asserted that a Roman Catholic is qualified to discharge public duties. A decent fiction preserves the Protestantism of the Chancellor ; but Roman Catholics are entitled to occupy every other office that the Sovereign can bestow. A series of wise and merciful measures has removed the disqualifications which a barbarous policy attached to religious belief; and when Lord Shaftesbury asks the Chief Minister of England to remove an able public servant from his post because he is a Roman Catholic, he asks him to revive a distinction which the law has ceased to recognise, and to impose a penalty which the Legislature has expressly abolished.

Here we may close. It is unnecessary for us to go further. It is enough for us to say that the sole disqualification seriously relied upon by the Alliance is one which the law disavows. But in this case at least law and common

sense agree. Every public office ought to be open to every citizen who is qualified to discharge its duties, and a Protestant, as such, is not better qualified than a Romanist, it being the truth that is wanted, and neither Protestantism Romanism. The special qualifications required in the present case, can only belong to a thorough antiquarian; and no one has ventured to deny that Mr. Turnbull is an eminent and accomplished mem

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ber of the craft. Great antiquaries are not as plentiful as blackberries: they are laborious students of the past, not because their work is lucrative or popular, but because they are attracted to it by natural taste and instinct; and it is a public loss when the insolence of the vulgar drives such men from our service. The first volume of The Calendar of Foreign State Papers, published since this article was commenced, proves that Mr. Turnbull in the Record Office was 'the right man in the right place; and adds to the regret we feel that he is not to be permitted to finish the task he had so ably and worthily and honestly entered upon.

But it is not yet too late. We are glad to learn that the subject is to be brought before the House of Commons; and in such a case—a case not only of personal wrong, but of public loss-the Commons are entitled and bound to interpose. To them we address the words with which we close. They were addressed to the Parliament of Cromwell; we regret that it should be needful to recal them to the Parliament of Queen Victoria.

I lastly proceed from the no good it can do, to the manifest hurt it causes, in being first the greatest discouragement and affront that can be offered to learning and learned men. If therefore ye be loth to dishearten utterly and discontent, not the mercenary crew of false pretenders to learning, but the free and ingenuous sort of such as evidently were born to study and love learning for itself, not for lucre, or any other end, but for the service of God and of truth, and perhaps that lasting fame and perpetuity of praise, which God and good men have consented shall be the reward of those whose published labours advance the good of mankind; then know, that so far to distrust the judgment and the honesty of one who hath but a common repute in learning, and never yet offended, as not to count him fit to print his mind without a tutor or examiner, lest he should drop a schism, or something of corruption, is the greatest displeasure and indignity to a free and knowing spirit that can be put upon him.

SHIRLEY.

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And yet thou deemest thy career
Of glory scarce begun;

Ah! if thy vision were but clear,
"Twould show thee it is done.
For though thy filibusters scan
The abject half-caste Mexican
Marked for an easy prey;
Yet, Carolina, it may be,

Those conquered serfs will conquer thee,
And thou be worse than they:
For hardy lands when freedom's gone,
Some glory may retain,

And Cæsar, or Napoleon,

May rise, and grandly reign.

But slavery beneath thy sun,
Will breed a baser Miramon

Than crucified New Spain.

Then shall thy weakness and thy sin
Affect thy gentler, nobler kin,
Till faith, and truth, and honour shun
The land which nurtured Washington.
No, thou hast said it, thou shalt be
Cut off, a cankered sore;
And the broad flag of liberty

Shall mock thy slaves no more.

Yet since thy fathers had a part
In the Great Patriot's mighty heart,
Thy wounds we fain would salve;
His glorious banner, fouled, and rent
For ever by thy discontent,

His banner thou shalt halve

So, while the Stars and Stripes must fly No more aloft, but folded lie

Upon the coffin lid,

Where the torn corpse of unity,
Destroyed by thee, is hid;

Two rival flags shall meet henceforth,

And both be blazoned types

'Stars' for the bright, the glorious North, For the black South the 'Stripes.'

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CHRONICLE OF CURRENT HISTORY.

THE Session has opened so peace

fully, every one is so glad to escape the discussion of great subjects, and a Government has so little to trouble it when the country asks from it nothing but a decently good Bankruptcy Bill, that political life seems almost suspended in England. It has appeared a matter of some importance at so very quiet a moment, that a committee has been appointed, in defiance of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, to inquire into the proper distribution of the Income Tax. If the decision of the House were to be taken as a direction for the framing of the Budget, Mr. Gladstone might naturally view with alarm a vote which imposed on him the necessity of burdening some portion of the community with new taxes. But if the question of the proper incidence of the tax is merely remitted to the investigation of an impartial tribunal, the sounder the opinion held by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the more likely it is to triumph. It is obvious that each side in the dispute has one good, plausible, intelligible argument in its favour. Those who think that all incomes should be taxed alike, say that the temporary income only pays so long as it lasts, and that the permanent income should not pay more in any one year than the temporary, since it always goes on paying. Those who claim a partial exemption for the professional and trading classes, point out that under indirect taxation it is only expenditure that is taxed, and that persons of permanent incomes can afford to expend all their income, while persons of temporary incomes must save a part. The part that escapes indirect taxation because it is saved, ought to escape direct. It would be highly satisfactory if once for all it could be demonstrated to the conviction of all sensible ordinary people which of these two popular arguments ought to prevail. Taxation in a country like England should never be a matter of sentiment; and the opportunity should

be taken away of appealing to the prejudices or the pockets of borough electors. If the nation could see that Mr. Gladstone was right when he says that to concede the exemption would be to rob other people, candidates would be ashamed to start as the plundering friend of the trader. We have to combat steadily the most fatal doctrine which can spread among the masses, that rich people ought to pay all the taxes. To combat this notion we must make it clear that economical science, and not class interests, regulate the incidence of the taxes we actually impose.

With the exception of the vote on the Income Tax, the path of. the Government has hitherto been smoothness itself. They propose to fill up the vacant seats in the House, and no one has a better proposal to suggest. The unsup

ported attempts of unattached Liberals to distinguish themselves by hopeless projects of partial reform, can scarcely be said even to excite contempt. Every one listened with respectful patience while Sir Charles Wood dispelled in a few words the cloud that had settled over Calcutta upon the news of the arrangement effected with the Mysore Princes; and it is only too pleasant to be told that next year the Indian revenue will balance the expenditure. The Opposition enjoyed the easy triumph of showing that Lord John Russell's quotations from Vattel were superfluous, pedantic, and unfair; but the unanimity with which the country has approved his foreign policy has given him an ample revenge. His enemies have indeed been the best friends of himself and his colleagues. In a moment of political stagnation it is almost as difficult to provoke strong antipathy as to win zealous support. There was probably only one way in which the Conservatives could have raised up a strong barrier between their party and the hopes of filling office in a creditable manner. Mr. Disraeli had discernment enough to see what this way was, and promptitude enough to

adopt it. He sneered at the Italians, paraded the merits of Austria, and treated Victor Emmanuel as an interloper and a brigand. Opinions may differ as to the merits of the existing Cabinet, but at any rate we are all agreed not to wish for the accession of a Ministry that would play into the hands of the reactionary Powers of the Conti

nent.

Parties, however, are very nearly balanced, and within the last few weeks the Opposition has gained several seats. There can be no doubt that although this is partly owing to the superior skill and greater zeal of the Conservative party in electioneering, it also arises in a large degree from a general hesitation and apathy in politics. At Leicester, the defeated Liberals openly proclaimed that they had thrown away a safe seat in order to gratify a fine spirit of local animosity. The truth is, that at this moment neither party has any object. The Liberals are in, and the country wishes them to be in, because their foreign policy is in harmony with the public sympathy for Italy, and because the greater number of distinguished parliamentary leaders are members of the Liberal Cabinet; but the Liberal party has no which it wishes to carry. Not one of the stock pledges given by the Liberal party on the hustings is redeemed by the united force of the party. Church-rates, the ballot, reduction of expenditure, are all open questions. A Liberal member may agree on one or all with his own party or with the Opposition. The only meaning of a Liberal member is that he wishes Lord Palmerston's Government should remain in office. But the Conservative party wishes this too. Lord Derby could gain nothing by accepting office, for his foreign policy would be a fatal obstacle. Even if he acted in the most liberal way, no one would give him credit for doing so. So long as Mr. Disraeli is his colleague, it will always be suspected that he is using his influence to thwart the Italians, at whom Mr. Disraeli laughs, and to

measure

back up Austria, whom Mr. Disraeli always praises to the skies.

There is, therefore, no real question at issue between the two parties, and while this is so, and while the nation is satisfied by a liberal foreign policy being pursued, elections very naturally befriend the party which does not profess to do more than wish to keep things as they are. The troubles through which America is passing also undoubtedly prompt the popular mind to steer a point or two clearer from democracy than it usually cares to do. Mi. Bright has so often quoted the United States as a model of cheap Government, where all is harmony, peace, and plenty, that the disruption and misfortunes of the States are held to show that all his doctrines are somehow wrong. He has decried the utility of a strong Government, of an efficient army and navy, of aristocratical officials. He now sees the Government he has set up as a model torn to pieces without being able to save itself, coherence rendered impossible by the absence of a central force, democratic officials crippling the resources of the State by the grossest bribery, and deserting their chief in his hour of need. He sees the cheap Government borrowing money at twelve per cent., and misery, famine, and strife ready to seize on his Paradise. He has invented a historical parallel, and he has seen that most brittle of reeds snap under him. Really the ques tion of reform in England is totally independent of anything in Ame rica. If we could but give a vote to intelligent, honest mechanics, without at the same time flooding the franchise with an ignorant, credulous, purchaseable multitude, we should be idiotic to refuse so beneficial a change because some one had said that this change would bring us nearer to a state of things which he wrongly described. But for the moment feeling is stronger than logic, and the distur bances in America make England Conservative. It would, however, be a great mistake to reckon on this as a durable influence. In

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