THREE:The career of Lord Ellenborough as Governor-General of India was one of the most remarkable in its annals. He went out for the purpose of inaugurating a policy of peace, conciliation, and non-intervention. His course from that day was one of constant aggression and war. The conquests of Scinde and Gwalior were planned and prepared for deliberately and in good time; and when the Governments to be subdued were goaded into hostilities, he was ready to pounce upon them with overwhelming force. His friends defended this policy on the ground that, though it was aggressive it was self-defensive; to guard against a possible, but very remote contingencyan invasion of the Sikhs to drive the British out of India. The Governor-General, however, had become entirely too warlike; and since he had smelt powder and tasted blood at Gwalior, the Board of Control, who had already formally censured his Scinde policy, became so alarmed at his martial propensities that they determined on his immediate recall, and sent out Sir Henry Hardinge to rule in his stead.It was proposed also to form, in certain districts, relief committees, which should be empowered to receive subscriptions, levy rates, and take charge of donations from the Government; and that out of the fund thus raised they should establish soup kitchens, and deliver rations to the famishing inhabitants. Sir John Burgoyne, Inspector-General of Fortifications, was appointed to superintend the works. Lord John Russell referred to measures for draining and reclaiming waste land in Ireland, and to advances of money for this purpose to the proprietors, to be repaid in instalments spread over a number of years. On a subsequent day, in answer to questions from Mr. Roebuck, the noble lord gave a statement of the sums that had already been advanced. 2,000,000 had been issued on account of the Poor Employment Act of the last Session. He expected that not less than 500,000 or 600,000 a month would be spent from the present time until August, and he calculated the whole expenditure would not be less than 7,000,000. There was great difference of opinion on the subject of the Government plans. A counter-scheme for the establishment of reproductive works deserves to be noticed for the interest it excited and the attention it occupied for years afterwardsnamely, the railway plan of Lord George Bentinck. Acts of Parliament, he said, had been passed for 1,582 miles of railway in Ireland, of which only 123 miles had then been completed, while 2,600 miles had been completed in England. In order to encourage the formation of Irish railways, therefore, he proposed that for every 100 expended by the companies 200 should be lent by the Government at the same interest at which they borrowed the money, Mr. Hudson, who was "chairman of 1,700 miles of railroad," pledging his credit that the Government would not lose a shilling by the transaction. By adopting this plan they could give reproductive employment to 109,000 men in different parts of the country, for earth-works, fences, drains, and watercourses connected with the lines. This would give support of 550,000 souls on useful work, tend to develop the resources of the country, and produce such improvement that the railways constructed would add 23,000,000 to the value of landed property in twenty-five years, and would pay 22,500 a year to the poor rates. The purchase of land for the railways would moreover place 1,250,000 in the hands of Irish proprietors, for the employment of fresh labour, and 240,000 in the hands of the occupying tenants for their own purposes. The Government also would reap from the expenditure of 24,000,000 on railways in Ireland, an enormous increase of revenue in the augmented consumption of articles of excise and customs. The noble lord's speech, which lasted two hours and a half, was received with cheers from both sides of the House. Leave was given to bring in the Bill, though it was strongly objected to by Lord John Russell, Mr. Labouchere, and other members of the Government. It was also opposed by Sir Robert Peel, who exposed the unsoundness of the economic principles involved in it. The Bill was rejected by a majority of 204, the numbers being 118 for the second reading, and 322 against it. Notwithstanding this decision, loans were subsequently advanced to certain Irish railways, amounting to 620,000, so that the objection of the Government was more to the extent than to the principle of Lord George Bentinck's measure.
FORE:Austria, the centre of despotic power on the Continent, the model of absolutism, in which the principle of Divine Right was most deeply rooted, enjoyed peace from 1815, when Europe was tranquillised by the Holy Alliance, down to 1848, when it felt in all its force the tremendous shock of revolution. During that time Prince Metternich ruled the Austrian Empire almost autocratically. This celebrated diplomatist was the greatest champion and most powerful protector in Europe of legitimacy and ultra-conservatism. The news of the French Revolution reached Vienna on the 1st of March; and no censorship of the press, no espionage, no sanitary cordon designed to exclude the plague of revolution, could avert its electric influence, or arrest its momentous effects. On the 13th the people rose, defeated the Imperial troops, forced Metternich to fly, and the emperor to promise constitutional reforms. The emperor and his family, however, soon felt that Vienna was too hot for them, and notwithstanding unlimited concessions, Ferdinand began to fear that his throne might share the fate of Louis Philippe's. Therefore, he secretly quitted the capital with the imperial family, on the evening of the 17th of May, 1848, alleging the state of his health as a reason for his flight, which took his Ministers quite by surprise. He proceeded to Innsbruck in Tyrol.
Aenean faucibus luctus enim. Duis quis sem risu suspend lacinia elementum nunc.
Aenean faucibus luctus enim. Duis quis sem risu suspend lacinia elementum nunc.
FORE:These occurrences in Ireland led to hostile demonstrations against the Government in Parliament. On the 7th of March Mr. Shaw, the Recorder of Dublin, as the representative of the Irish Protestants, commenced the campaign by moving for returns of the number of committals, convictions, inquests, rewards, and advertisements for the discovery of offenders in Ireland from 1835 to 1839, in order to enable the House to form a judgment with regard to the actual amount and increase of crime in that country. The debate was adjourned till the following Monday, when it was resumed by Mr. Lefroy, after which the House was counted out, and the question dropped; but it was taken up in the Lords on the 21st of March, when Lord Roden moved for a select Committee of inquiry on the state of Ireland since 1835, with respect to the commission of crime. His speech was a repetition of the usual charges, and the debate is chiefly worthy of notice on account of the elaborate defence by Lord Normanby of his Irish administration. "I am fully aware," said the noble marquis, "of the awful responsibility that would lie upon my head if these charges rested upon evidence at all commensurate with the vehemence of language and earnestness of manner with which they have been brought forward; but they rest upon no such foundation. I am ready, with natural indignation, to prove now, on the floor of this House, that I have grappled with crime wherever I have found it, firmly and unremittingly, and have yielded to none of my predecessors in the successful vindication of the laws." Among the mass of proofs adduced by Lord Normanby, he quoted a vast number of judges' charges, delivered from time to time between 1816 and 1835, which presented only one continuously gloomy picture of the prevailing practice of violence and atrocious outrage. Passing from this melancholy record, he proceeded to refer to numerous addresses of judges delivered on similar occasions since 1835. All of these contained one common topic of congratulationthe comparative lightness of the calendara circumstance, the noble marquis argued, which went far to establish his position, however it might fail to prove the extinction of exceptional cases of heinous crime. With regard to the wholesale liberation of prisoners, Lord Normanby distinctly denied that he had set free any persons detained for serious offences without due inquiry; or that any persons were liberated, merely because he happened to pass through the town, who would not have met with the same indulgence upon facts stated in memorials. "No; this measure," he insisted, "had been adopted upon the conviction that, in the peculiar case of Ireland, after severity had been so often tried, mercy was well worth the experiment. It was one which was not lightly to be repeated; but while he had received satisfactory evidence of the success of the measure, it was in his power to produce the testimony of judges with whom he had no political relations, to the pains taken in the examination of each case, and the deference shown to their reports."
Aenean faucibus luctus enim. Duis quis sem risu suspend lacinia elementum nunc.
Aenean faucibus luctus enim. Duis quis sem risu suspend lacinia elementum nunc.
FORE:
Aenean faucibus luctus enim. Duis quis sem risu suspend lacinia elementum nunc.
Aenean faucibus luctus enim. Duis quis sem risu suspend lacinia elementum nunc.
FORE:The direct consequence was that he was immediately nominated again by the freeholders of Middlesex. Mr. Dingley, a mercantile speculator of London, offered himself as the Government candidate, but withdrew in a fright, and Wilkes was returned, without opposition, on the 16th of February, only thirteen days after his expulsion. The next day Lord Strange moved in the Commons, that John Wilkes, after having been expelled, was incapable of serving again in the present Parliament, and the case of Sir Robert Walpole was quoted in justification. Wilkes was a second time declared incapable of sitting, the election was declared void, and the public indignation rose higher than ever. The freeholders of Middlesex instantly met at the "London" Tavern, and subscribed on the spot two thousand pounds towards defraying the expenses of Wilkes's election. They then formed themselves into a "Society for Supporting the Bill of Rights," and a third time proposed Wilkes as their candidate. He was immediately returned for Middlesex, Dingley not finding any one who dared to nominate him. The next day, the 17th of March, the Commons again voted the election void.
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