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IHBj blUAWLrl^H IN lAKLIAMLN
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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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of news for an hour after its reception in liondon . What was to prevent him from receiving it simultaneously with our Secretary to the Admiralty ? This is but one instance out of many , but ex uno disce—Sebastopol est pris .
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THE GIBRALTAB CENSOR . The Governor of Gibraltar has recently evinced the wildest ambition that we ever kne-w to seize a person in the capacity of Viceroy , wild as viceregalty often becomes . He has issued a proclamation , embodying an ordinance professedly to prohibit unlicensed printing within the State , the territory , and garrison of Gibraltar . The essential part of this order lies in the first paragraph : —
"Whereas it hath always been the custom of the garrison of Gibraltar that nothing should be printed therein without the permission of the Governor thereof ; and whereas it is necessary to the order , peace , and good government of the city and garrison of Gibraltar that the said custom should immediately be made , enacted , and advanced , to be the law thereof , and should be established by proper penalties for the violation of the said law ; be it , therefore , ordained
and enacted by his Excellency the Governor , that no person shall , within the said city , garrison , and territory , print , or cause to be printed , any matter or thing which shall not have been previously submitted to the Civil Secretary of the said garrison , and have received his confirmation in writing , signed by him , under a penalty not exceeding one hundred dollars , and not less than five dollars , to be recovered before any justice of the peace for the said city , garrison , and territory , at the discretion of such justice . "
Practically , therefore , the order requires that every article in any newspaper shall be revised before publication by the Civil Secretary , who stands , of course , only in the place of the Governor . What is this , but to enact that " his Excellency Sib Robebt William Gakdineb , Knight Commander of the Most Honourable Military Order of the Bath , Knight Commander of the Royal Hanoverian Guelphic Order , and of the Second Class of the Military Order of St . Anne of Russia , General of her Majesty ' Forces , Colonel Commandant of the 4 th battalion of the
Royal Artillery , Governor , Vice-Admiral and Commander-in-Chief of the city , garrison , and territory of Gibraltar , &c , Sec , &c , " claims to be the editor of every journal published in Gibraltar . We believe that Sir Robebt WiiiiiiAM Gabdineb is an extremely good officer , and a very worthy man ; the expiring of his term of service at Gibraltar has released him from a recal on account of this vagary , as well as others connected with the admission and departure of goods in the commercial port of Gibraltar ; but the ordinance is of a kind that , if it be not challenged , it could be continued by Sir Eobekt ' s successor .
Now , challenged it must be . It is a very arbitrary interference with the rights of any British community ; and it is needless as well as arbitrary . It has never been the custom in "the garrison of Gibraltar" that " nothing should be published without the permission of the Governor . " The averment in the preamble is false . There is a printing establishment in Malta which has been in operation since 18-11 ; and from that establishment
no proof sheet was ever sont for the sanction and approval of the censor of the press . Officials , however , very often assert that which is ludicrously and notoriously falso , simply that some new and arbitrary law may , in terms at least , have tho appearance of being a continuation . And hero was a case in point . While Sir Robert was about it , ho might liavo enlarged the time of the immemorial custom here pleaded . He might -have said that the custom had existed ever since I-Ieboulus established that " pillar" to prevent the progress of mankind beyond the impassable Strait of Gibraltar . There is no necessity for any such rulef It
is true that the Governor follows the custom of calling the place " the garrison of Gibraltar , " but Gibraltar is not only a garrison it is also a port of great commercial importance , though not of so great importance as it was before the commercial rise of Malta and the revival of Genoa . Being a commercial port , it is occupied by a resident English population , which has shown its intelligence in establishing those places of public worship and those schools , which ought to exist
wherever Englishmen are located . It seems impossible that our Government can sanction the Queen ' s representative in the colony in cancelling the right of Englishmen to the free publication of opinion . The less , we repeat , since there is no military necessity . It may be a question quite separate from that of civil rights , whether outside opinions ought to circulate with freedom amongst a soldiery . We think that they ought ; that if a soldiery be properly constituted and disciplined , —if the interests of the army be identified with those of the State , and the minds of the
individual soldiers be trained to have a proper trust in their commanders , any class of subject could be discussed in the ranks , and the results be nothing but a strengthening of the spirit of unity and discipline . Nevertheless , the question does stand separate from merely civil considerations ; but the lowest kind of discipline , the poorest species of influence , ought to enable any commanding officer to exclude unlicensed publications from admission to the soldier . The soldiery , therefore , might be kept in their state of infancy , without reducing the whole of the resident commercial population to the same
tutelage . There can be but one motive to compel hia Excellency Sir Robebt William Gardiner , &c , &c , &c , into such a course , and it must be the one that we started with . His Excellency is ambitious of being the Editor-in-chief , as well as Governor and Commander in and over , &c . The Governor might have his way , if it were not for two serious objections . First , official routine interposes endless delay ,
and we know no journal , even in our own metropolis , that would not be totally destroyed if its manuscript contributions and proofs had to go through one of the public departments before it came to the reader . The Times of to-day would be published a month hence . Secondly , we have no proof that Sir Robebt would be anything but a very bad editor . His own ordinance shows a total incapacity for grappling with facts .
Ihbj Bluawlrl^H In Lakliamln
«• THE STRANGER" IN PARLIAMENT . [ The responsibility of the Editor in regard to these contributions is limited to the act of giving them publicity . The opinions expressed are those of the ¦ writer : both the Leader and " The Stranger" benefit by tho freodom which is left to his pen and discretion . } The House of Commons is an assembly in which tho country has no confidence , and which lias no confidence in the Government—and that incoherency accounts for an adjourned debate extending over six nights , of seven hours per night , and of speeches which printed in full would produce a greater amount of letter-press than is engaged in the largest editions of the " Decline and Fall" or Hume ' s " History . " The IJouso of Commons has no purpose , is not adequately in contact with the people to know tho will of tho country , and without will of its own , without knowledge of affairs , and with a clubby tendency to Btave oiT agitation and crisis , it attempts to conceal its imbecility in adjourned debate—talk , chatter , cant . As well as one can at present make out the English , they are divided into two parties , Tory and Liberal , one in favour of going back , and by fur the largest , most respectable , and most religious party -, the other in favour of going forward : both profoundly disdainful and distrustful of tho present . Both are weary , sick , scornful of tho House of Commons , to that extent that even Conservative members of" tho administrative reform movoment are acknowledging that tho cry they must come to that they may get a hearing from the country , is « ' Election Reform . " As . well as one can make gut public ppinion , there is , what Mr , Henry
Drummond calls a fatal want of faith in public men and the six nights' debate does not promise to improve that singular state of things . A few people believe in the war , but no one believes in the Government . On the other hand , the Government points out with great effect that no one believes in anybody else . We acknowledge , even those who insisted that he was a Chatham , that Lord Palmerston is a delusion , deluding even himself , and that Lord John Russell is a man with a tendency to intrigue , but intelle ctually not up to so clever a business . But when , before we vote , we compare them with Derby a nd Disraeli , personages too smart to have character , we
come to regard even these conscienceless and callous old lords as statesmen and patriots . We have all made up our minds that the Peelites are Quakers well read in the Ethics of the Jesuits , and that the Manchester men are only fitted to be head clerks to the Peelites . As to the House of Commons' bench which is occupied by the gentlemen who answer every argument and fact by a reference to the " eventualities" of the war , who reply to the suggestion of the little bill , by dreamy talk of golden joys and Afric ' s sands , and , generally speaking , cosmogony—the gentlemen who
assume that they are public opinion , because when they denounce Russia the pot-houses applaud , —why even the pot-houses would be sorry to let them into power for a week . The House of Commons knows of this estimate of it by the nation : and if the Government will not lead—will not define the position , or sketch the prospect—what is the ludicrous club to do but wander in a woeful hog of -washy " able speeches ?" They have adjourned debates because they have nothing to discuss : they have so many amendments because they have no opinions to pronounce .
In this ( self-governed ) country it has been felt to be a degradation , formally levelling us to the condition of our cordial allies the French , that our representative institution set to work to discuss the conditions of peace after Government had been diplomatising in absolute independence of our opinions , wishes , or hopes : and in the House itself no one has anticipated the least benefit from the debate . Mr . Bright , indeed , has thanked Mr . Disraeli for having forced on the discussion ; but Mr . Bright cannot but
know that Mr . Disraeli ' s specific , though not ostensible , motive was to stop negotiations : so that Mr . Bright ' s congratulation is peculiar . Is it a benefit from the debate that the Peelites , most intellectual and honest of our governing class , have annihilated themselves as statesmen ? Our pleasure in hearing and reading Mr . Bright ' s exposure of the shallow natures and dishonourable statecraft of the Ministers , individually and collectively , is enormous : but when this conviction of them does not in the least lead to any
actual punishment , —does not advance us to any better form of government , any better set of men , or any better conduct from these men , —our enjoyment of Mr . Bright ' s magnificent oratory becomes a sensuous enjoyment which has little connexion wit li the practical business of our political life . Impossible to avoid the conclusion that the six nights' work of talk are not to be followed by any respectable seventh day rest , agreeable in a conscientious sense of results , —in short , to be brief about so lengthy an affair , all that hideous prolongation of chaotic palaver does not raise the House of Commons , and rather lowers England . hav
. When a debate like this spreads , when there e been several score speeches , the faculty of summarising , and the capacity for generalisation becomes valuable ; and in those cases the lawyers turn up in awful ascendancy - Last night— the conclusive night—when the division , or divisions , were inevitable —when therefore , there was appropriateness in 'istute retrospective arrangements , of the whole of the pros and cons—the lawyers came up as a matter ot course , and , from five to eleven had the banging ot the table and filling of the smoking-room almost entirely to themselves . Sir Frederick Thesigor , an advocate of tho foremost reputation , who having in his is
notorious ^ cxccllc ;! domestic affairs , supposed to be adequate to the management of the . Mate , sent every body to dinner ; and Mr . Fit / . roy ( worst at speaker , both in look and demeanour , since Onflow ; to sleep , with great emphasis , much ingenuity , ana attempt at great expenditure of physical energy —being observed and appreciated by Mr . Israeli , three ministers , and five iiiiscisllniK'O us persons . He was answering Sir Alexander Cockburn , tho Attorney-general , an indolent maili 01 prolcra
great power , who , for philosophic reasons , a fainc ' iint course of life , Imt who , when roiihCtt into energy , can display a grand energy- ~ w n > , on thirt occuaion , ma . Au the most use ot Iuh » I » lunl "" voice and his flexible intellect to show that his P "'™" ' tho old Lords , were painfully in tho right , and a « - surdly misunderstood , — tho which impartial » ir Alexander does not in tho least beliovo , but tho \ vinxu he argues because they are his clients , and b » L l " » J » happening to find tho House ( before dinner ) oroj" > " » ho liked " the excitement of fihowing them , v , wt * clever man might do with a bad case . Mr . Wn'PV , forcible feeble member for the Militin , was < - » " * " /" lawyer—more lawyer , and talked like a heavy O jw tian his amiably decorous commonplaces lor uu n «
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ft 44 THE I / E ADE It . [ Saturda y
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), June 9, 1855, page 544, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2094/page/16/
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