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August 12, 1854.] THE LEA DEJL 757
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BRITISH PROGRESS IN INDIA. The amount of...
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AUSTRIA—FOB AM) AGAINST. "Whatever a few...
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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The President Of The Board Of Health. Si...
statistical society—even mischievous . Mr . Jerrold makes the sailor—who is examined as to the moral qualities of the husband of Black-eyed Susan—specify that his shipmate " plays the fiddle like an angel . " Similarly , if Sir Benjamin Hall were required to state why he is created a great official , -with a large salary and immense patronage , he would be bound to mention that he did not like bishops . The Coalition bad other views , perhaps : wearied of the croaking of the frogs , in the sewers , tliat Stork Chadwick was too energetic , Government pitches to them—a log . The appointment illustrates the aristocratic , as modified by the subservient Parliamentary , system . No reason whatever can be given why a Minister of Health , whose considerations cannot be political , should have a seat in Parliament . At all events , as it is obvious that . a Minister of Health should be a distinguished savant—the office being distinctly one which should be opened to our great men of science and social philosophythe necessity might "be met by appointing a savant , and afterwards finding a seat for himsuch , a seat as that which was so ingeniously discovered for Mr . Gordon at Beverley . Or if we could not have a scientific or medical man , because of reasons which would occur to the comprehensive mind of a Hayter , why shouldn't we have Lord Shaftesbury , who has learned the business of the Board of Health by live' years' bard work there ^ and who has been guilty of the excessively ridiculous practical Christianity of so working as unpaid president ? We fully believe the Grovernment has passed over Lord Shaftesbury merely because it really would not do to encourage such absurd precedents as iliat
August 12, 1854.] The Lea Dejl 757
August 12 , 1854 . ] THE LEA DEJL 757
British Progress In India. The Amount Of...
BRITISH PROGRESS IN INDIA . The amount of interest felt by Englishmen in the affairs of India is not to he estimated by the fact that only fifteen members were present on Tuesday night , when the Indian Minister made his first annual statement . It is scarcely credible that Sir Charles " Wood delivered to one of the thinnest Houses on record his account of the financial and social condition of India . But so it was ; and we can only hope that the public are more anxious than their so-called representatives to learn how the new system of Indian Government has worked . If we are to believe the few gentlemen who did stay to hear Sir Charles ' s statement , everything ia going on as smoothly as could bo desired . The lleform Bill , which cost so many weary hours of discussion , has achieved wonders . As regards finance , indeed , there was a deficit last year of 872 , 335 ^ ., and no expectation was held out of any increase in tho revenues . But iu other respects , the prospect was gratifying in tho extreme Ava and Nagporo had been added to the list of British possessions , the North-western tribes had been subdued , and the old despot Dost Mahomed wns on the ovo of paying homage to Queen Victoria ,. Then , as to internal improvements , Lord Dalhousie had been vigorous . A scheme has been laid before tho Bengal Government for increasing tho salaries of tho native judges and advancing them to a higher social position . Tho gigantic Ganges Canal , " an undertaking which surpasses all similar works in ancient or modern times , " has been opened ; tho Punjab , hitherto the perpetual scene of commotion and revolt , has been reduced to prder , and " nt thia moment life and property are more secure there than iu Bengal . " Then public worlsa are advancing in Madras and elsewhere , railways arc in progress , and already an electric telegraph hns been laid down from Calcutta to Bombay . It is pleasant , moreover , to learn that the Homo Directors performed tho bittor task oi i i i i i i 3 1 ; j - - i - I s v a i- i- s . ; > f o y il d cl id io oi
. " i it i t [ ¦ \ > > i i \ o !¦ ' o 5 v b s 3 3 t s b 3 - 3 3 - i f - d > f y y if y { t r , kI no 0- in is 1- d , ot at al lis o- ns is- ho " n id u £ uo self-decimation with the spirit of heroic mar- tyrs ; and the eighteen members of the New Court have worked together as cordially as if they had owed their appointment to the same authority . " With regard to public works in India , we are henceforth to know , by means of annual estimates , the exact amount of progress that has been made . AVorks are to be completed by means of advances from the "V Treasury , instead of waiting for a surplus sc revenue ; and means are to be taken for ce securing an adequate supply of superintend- a ing engineers . Last of all , attention has pi been paid to the qiiestiou of education : the tl Home Grovernment is engaged in preparing a h general scheme which will be applied as cir- tj cumstances may require , and gi'ants are to be a : furnished to every school irrespective of any IS religious instruction . We are to teach the t natives without attempting to make prose- i 1 lytes . a We should be very glad to think that this t picture was correct . We are not inclined 1 to exact too much from the Indian Govern- r m ent in th e very first year after the establish- r ment of the new system ; and if Sir Charles s Wood ' s exposition were not glaringly exag- t gerated , we should be more willing to echo a the eulogiums that were passed upon it . To t tell the truth , the portion of Sir Charles ' s a speech which seemed to please him least , was d precisely that which we read with the greatest 1 < satisfaction . Any one who knows the system t under which the Indian revenues are collected , will be glad to hear of a smaller rather than o of a larger surplus in the Treasury . There is b work enough to be done in India to absorb p more than a thousand times the surplus of o which the Indian minister boasted ; and it is b painful to believe that , in spite of all the r cool-blooded rhetoric of Sir James Weir v Hogg , the natives still groan under the most 3 shameful extortions . As for the prodigious i activity in public works , it is startling to be told that iu this same year , 1854 , Bombay is i once more in danger of drought , and only at i the last moment hav . e extraordinary exertions < been made by Lord Eiphinstone to carry out ] a plan proposed in . the da }' s of Sir George j Arthur . It is true that Sir Jamesetjee Jejeeb- s hoy has again come forward to meet the £ present need ; but it is infamous in the extreme £ that the Government has suffered another > year to elapse before adopting sufficient precautions . In the first year lifter the Indian Reform Bill , thousands are famishing by drought at Bombay . These two instancesone exhibiting false notions with respect to Indian economy , tho other a highly-coloured statement of facts—will cause our readers to look with , somo suspicion on the exposition of Sir Chaises AVood , acceptod though it was by a select body of Indian Reformers , The great hone for the future prosperity of India lies in the vigorous promotion of public works . The expense is wonderfully small when compared with the results that will surely be produced , and we hopo to hoar , next year , that tho Government has fulfilled its promise of providing means from tho Troasury . Then , again , as rogards tho elevation of natives to offices of importance in tho Government and Courts of Law , It is possible that the pictures of native intelligenco , with which wo are aomotiines favoured , ai ' e considerably exaggerated , but wo cannot forget the petition drawn up by natives at Bombay , and which excited an unusual amount of public attention , last y ear , in this country . The Indian Kofonnors should romember that ; thoir task ia by no means finished . It will never do for the administnition of the most splendid empiro in tho world to fall onco more into tho power of a clique . Wo have sent forth our fleets and armies with the avowed purpose of destroying " a despotism iu the cast of liurope . Is it true
th pc ar fo ni bhatother British troops are employed in supporting a despotism scarcely less oppressive and unjust ? This is a question which must form a portion of the programme of an organised Radical party .
Austria—Fob Am) Against. "Whatever A Few...
AUSTRIA—FOB AM ) AGAINST . Whatever a few blind or mendacious persons may pretend to the contrary , it is as tain as anything can be , that the chief cause of the great interest which the British people have taken , in the present war , and of the extraordinary enthusiasm , with which they have cheered it on , has been a vague expectation of £ ood likely to arise out of it to what are called " the distressed nationalities . " Mystify it as you like , that is the fact . Strike this element of interest out of the war—make plain that Hungary , Italy , and Poland , are not likely to derive any benefits" ) frona he war ; in other words , that the war is not likely to subserve the cause of continental revolution—and the enthusiasm , for the war , now felt from Cornwall to Caithness , will fall seventy per cent , to-morrow . Set down twenty per cent , to direct hatred of Bussia , and ten per cent , to independent affection for the Turks , and you make a very fair allowance for these elements . All the rest , we maintain , consists of pure , though vague , longing to see the Italians , the Hungarians , the Poles , and their brethren " up and doing . " We will not yet say that the main element f interest for the British people has . already been extracted out of the war—for it is impossible to calculate the spontaneous issues f so large and uncontrollable a business ; but we do fear that so far as the diplomatic management of the war by the Governments who conduct it is concerned , the " friends of European freedom" may now begin to give up hope . Translating the vague popular expectations from the war into what they precisely meant , they amounted to this—a wish for the partial dissolution or dismemberment of the Austrian Empire . This was not the j > hrase used ; but , just as six pennies uuited make sixpence , so the desire to see Italy free , the desire to see Hungary independent , and the desire to see the Poles restored to nationality , meant , when put together , the desire to see Austria made small by degrees and beautifully less in Europe . Accordingly , the universal wish at the beginning of the war—universal , at least , out of official circles—was that Austria would facilitate her own destruction by taking open part with Russia . Then , of course , almost by consent of the Grovernmeuts of Great Britain and France , the democracics would have been let loose upon her ; she would have been torn to pieces ; and the war -would have gone in the groove of the European Revolution . Austria , however , wise in her generation , did not go with Russia . A sense of solt-intorost , aided by the earnest entreaties of the Western Powers , anxious to their wit ' s ciul that the war should not go in tho groove of tho revolution , brought her to tho occidental side of the controversy , She gave in her adhesion , with necessary Germanic modifications and . by-troaties , to tho policy of Grout Britain and _ lYnnce . There was rejoicing over this event in Downing-street ;; Austria and " her magnanimous young emperor" wore union ised by Miniature in Parliament ; and now diplomatic conxing went on at a gront rate . Tho hope—lor it ronlly wna a hopo—of the lovers ot iMiropean freodom then was that ; Austria was insincere , aud would , nt ao . no turn of tho war or other , aliow the doven hoof . That hopo lailod nlso . Whether tho oiirneetneaB grew or not aa iortuno became inauspicious for her old protoctor , is no matter—Austria was earnest in tho part she took ; sho did find it her interest :
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Aug. 12, 1854, page 13, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_12081854/page/13/
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