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No. 452, Ne*EKMB-ad , 1858.1 THE "LEADER...
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THOUGHTS, FACTS, A1JD SUGGESTIONS ON PAR...
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BIOGRAPHIES OF GERMAN PRINCES. No. II. T...
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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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Jocular Politics. One Unmistakable 'Tend...
popular notions founded upon that picturesque sketch of the Chinese Empire to which we areso accustomed in the domestic willo \ v-pattarii- We may expect a good model of a " Yamun , " with cane tapestry , and crazy pottery , ad lib ., and perhaps a small-footed , line-eyebiwed young Chinawoman , eating perpetual fricasee of dog , and chewmg incessant tepid birds ' -nests-all . for the amusement of the ladies who are tired of Swiss landscapes and the St . Bernard quadruped , but who must go to . i _ _ tt \ a : _ , » . TToif oo tUpv must CTO tO tile milllthe tian Hall as they must go to the
milli-Egyp ner ' s anito church . And there is no doubt plenty to satirise and to sneer at among the British in China . The opiiun trade , and what that Christian trade leads to , will bear a sketch ; and so perhaps may Mr . Anstey . All this will be novel , treated by a clever man who can occasionally be in earnest . We can fancy statesmen and politicians , those who forced the war , and those who risked a general election in resisting it , will rush to reserved seats to n-ot tlic original conception likely to be offered of
this last acquisition to commerce and most recent proof of our national energy . It is yet strange that it should be left to a farceur to " open up" China in this method . Of course we could not get a complete notion of our new eccentric friends , _ and of our chances of succeeding witli them in trading and other respects , unless we saw them under every aspect , and Mr . Smith may give us information quite as important of its kind as that for which we arc to look to Consuls and Ministers Extraordinary . But if the " Entertainment" is to discharge these considerable functions in public affairs—if the jester is to be a teacher , and is . to do for us what the whole corps of consular and ambassadorial service fails in doing , from a defect in the appreciation of the partiality at home for the funny element in our imperial progress —the Albert Smiths must be considered from a
new and very different point of view ; and it will be well if they themselves arc not crushed out . of all capacity for the comic by an unexpected sense of responsibility . The facetious class have a good deal of work on hand . No one has yet undertaken to give us a ludicrous " evening" about Siam , though there is a treaty with the potentates of that State of two years' standing . Japan is virgin soil , even as yet . untrodden by the " Special Correspondent . " It will , perhaps , be Mr . Albert Smith's fate to take these in turn , and by degrees we shall make a jocose acquaintance with all the new
sections of mankind we are trying trade with and are expected to laugh at . The national foible , the despising and deriding all that we do not understand of these strange Easterns , may in one sense be quite safely indulged in , for our laughter is never likely to reach them , so as to hurt their possible sensitiveness . So far , then , we may at home get something out of the extension of the empire ,- ^—much more than the citizens of Home got—\ vc may get some fun . It is a question , however , which we cannot help treating seriously , whether this is the right spirit in which a Christum and commercial nation should make its imperial progress .
No. 452, Ne*Ekmb-Ad , 1858.1 The "Leader...
No . 452 , Ne * EKMB-ad , 1858 . 1 THE "LEADER . IMP
Thoughts, Facts, A1jd Suggestions On Par...
THOUGHTS , FACTS , A 1 JD SUGGESTIONS ON PARLIAMENTARY REFORM . No . II . Before entering on the details which must goto make up a comprehensive measure of Parliamentary Hefprni , there arc some things to be considered of great importance , if the mcasuro is to have any chance ot being regarded as . permanent , Tlio idea of finality has , indeed , been renounced on nil hands . The most cautious Conservatives huve for some time been busily engaged in fitting on , and learning how to wear , the uniform of progress . Nobody any longor affected to fear the principle of politionl amelioration : and nobody any longer professes to bolievo that tho concessions which are intended to be 3 fnnde next year will have the cilc ct of putting the nation politically to sloep for tho rest ot its life , or even ior tho life of the present generation . Nevertheless , it is felt very generally , that it ; was hardly worth while devoting so much trouble and time tb tho passing of an Amonded Roform Bill , if its framo bo so rigid , and its provisions so little in keeping with the growing wants of the ago , that ero long tho amendment will want to be itself amended . It is a . 11 very wall for humdrum , unreasoning , hand-to-mouth politicians , to com foil ; themselves with thq yocollootiontliat more than a quarter of a century has elapsed aiuoo tho passing of the Aot of 1832 , and to try to persuade one another
that as long an interval may probably elapse before the proposed readjustment of 1859 will have to be readjusted . But calmly considered this is a most absurd and delusive way of regarding the matter . The" best friends of the people cannot desire that an incessant hue-and-cry should be kept up about organic clmnge . They have buried finality long ago , but they have no mind to set up an Altar to the Winds over its grave . They know very weJl that beyond a certain point no Minister , however popular or powerful , can induce Parliament , as now constituted , to go ; they know very well that shape his bill as he may , the expanding wants and capacities of the nation will , before five years , render it to some extent a misfit ; and yet there are fe- \ y amongst tLeni who would seriously encourage the hope in others , or who sincerely cherish the hope ill themselves of seeing the work of general revision and reconstruction undertaken again after so brief
an interval . What then can be done to obviate the alternative evil thus palpably presenting itself—or how can we , on the one hand , sow the seeds of new anomalies , grievances , and discontent , and upon the other hand , the germs of incessant and interminable change ? It may not be possible completely to accomplish either ; hut assuredly every wise and impartial man ought diligently to seek the means of effecting the former , as he must thoroughly despair , should that fail , of securing the latter . Let us then look things clearly in'the face ,, and-see whether , very near the surface , there does not lie an element of salutary
Commons . It cannot be expected that any one of such calculations should be introduced here . It is enough if the principle be clearly indicated and the duty of its adoption shown . But this much may be said to prevent misapprehensiortj and to point out , rather by way of illustration than otherwise , how the rule would work Suppose , for example , that the number of towns returning two or more members to Parliament be taken at one hundred , and that the number of towns or groups of towns returning one member each be one hundred and fifty , nothing would be easier than to provide a Parliamentary tribunal
contain not only adequate provisions for a fair representation of all agricultural and urban communi ties as they now stand , but further , that suitable machinery may be devised to meet their representative wants hereafter in a just and appropriate manner . It is by no means necessary for this that the total number of members in the House oi Commons should be changed . A dozen arithmetical calculations might be offered , any one of which would show the feasibility of gradual readjustment and local re-distribution from time to time , without deviating from the magic numerals of 658 which now denote the present House of
before which any new town subsequently springing up might make its claim , to a preference over the least considerable of those named in the lastmentioned list , on the score of population , number of rated dwelling-houses , or value of ratable property . What would , perliaps , be still better , would be to enable a new town to claim before such tribunal to be included within the electoral confines of some contiguous borough . Upon the finding of the tribunal suggested , a short bill might be passed , authorising the legal enfranchisement thus the and
nature , which duly and dexterously applied , may impart to the contemplated measure of Reform the inestimable power of gradual self-adaptation . "We talk of America and Australia as growing countries , and we read without wonder a remark that their institutions contain within them carefully framed provisions for the rapid expansion of society that is constantly taking place with them . The Federal Constitution of the United States is now seventy years old . Nothing can be more unlike what the thirteen emancipated colonies were in 1789 than that prodigious aggregate of diverse and remote communities , twenty-eight m number , winch now
awarded ; and in this way recurrence regrowth of representative anomalies would be held in check . Towns now entitled to but one member ,, might , in like manner , be enabled to assert their preference to a place in the list of cities and boroughs-returning by reason of their increased property and population- In , all cases provision mights be made against the raising of questions too frequently in any particular instance , or upon narrowgrounds of comparison ; but once admit the principle , and minor difficulties ' of this kind could not long stand in the way .
make up the great Transatlantic commonwealth . Yet the organic laws which Jefferson and Hamilton and Adams framed remain unchanged in all their essential features . And why ? Because they had the wisdom and forethought not only to make them suitable to the immediate wants of their own political time , but to make them self-adaptable to the growing wants of the time to conic . Australia lias hardly been long enough in existence as a political state " to furnish forth similar illustrations , but the unfettered common-sense of our kinsfolk there has led them to adopt like causes , and there is no reason to doubt that , as they increase and multiply , the benefit will be found of having- done so .
Let no one say because England is an old historic country that its legislators may fitly treat its political conCiguratiou as fixed , or the aggregate of its political wants as a sum certain . Wot even in the United States of America have more signal changes of population and property taken place in the course of the last thirty years than within the confines of the United Kingdom . Not to speak of Highland glens depopulated and manufacturing hamlets stimulated into towns , it is enough to point to two gigantic facts \ inprcccdcnted in the history of civilised man , and unparalleled by anything in tho world Around us : London has added a million
and a half to its inhabitants within our own recollection , and two millions of human beings have disappeared from Ireland within tho same time . Is it possible for tho freakish fancy of satire or caricature to imagine anything more propostcrous than the rigidity of an clcotoral law which flatly refusos to recognise cither of fheso notorious facts P Talk of going into committee to determine whether country towns of throe thousand inhabitants , or of livo hundred 10 / . householders , should return members to Parliament , and , if not , whether towns of four thousand inhabitants and six hundred 10 / .
householders should bo allowed to do so ; why , it is like a man taking tho measure of tho buttons ho is to put on somo coat whilo he omits to measure you for tho coat itself . So far is it from boing true tliat ours is a stationary or fixed community , it might , with muohgrontor accurnoy , be said that wo are singularly tho reverse . It suite aristopratio habits of thought , indeed , to affect tho belief in popular stagnation ; but the nllbotatiou is a perilous one , ana fraught with tho worst follies of injustice ' Whon tlio forthcoming . Llofoi'tn Bill sees tho light , I is greatly to bo hoped that it will bo found to
Biographies Of German Princes. No. Ii. T...
BIOGRAPHIES OF GERMAN PRINCES . No . II . THE KING OF WURTEMBERG .
The founder of the Wurtemberg dynasty is alleged to have been a certain " Ulnch with the strongthumb "—so called from the extraordinary size of that particular finger of his hand . It would seein , that the descendants of this doughty baron have inherited something of that quality of their ancestor , for they have generally been noted for the vigour with which they sot to work to thump their subjects .. The present king has not degenerated in that respect . His obstinate propensities of arbitrary rule are most amply developed . Altogether , his notions of government would appear more appropriate to the latitude of Russia , whero he spent a
portion of his youth , than to that of the kingdom over which he holds sway . Wo should , here remark that in no country of Germany , if we except Baden , perhaps , and Schlcswig-Holstein , are the ideas of self-government so strongly rooted asamong tho peoplo of Wvrtemberg . 3 ? or centuriesthcy have waged war against their despotic dukes , maintaining ancient , liberties , not unfrequently with tho sword ; at other times by parliamentary struggles . The present king himself , evev since the year 1816 , when ho ascended the throne , has been , i ¦»• . i l hi 1 _ j _ j _ _* 1 involved in continual with his ostatesand
quarrels , at this vory moment tho Crown aud Diet again stand opposed to eaoh other in hostile array . It is a fortunate ciroumstance that the royal power should thus havo been kept in check , at leas ! ., to somo oxtont . Otherwise the Russian colonols of tho race of Ulrich would long ago havo dobasod tho country to tho level of Nijiu-Novgorod or Irkutsk . Some sycophant , in son roll of a ribbon for Jus * button-hole , has culled tlic King William of Wurtemberg a afoul dans tt / i entresol , a gmnt lor the display of whoso energies his small principality alfortls no scope . We know not what nro tho colossal qualities to which tho Court flatterer has alluded , unless thoy " aro tho superhuman onorgy tho King has always shown in resisting the progress , of Voedoni , or his enormous strength in performing :
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Nov. 20, 1858, page 19, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_20111858/page/19/
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