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MOLDO-WALLACHIA-N AGENCIES . Tilth French Government has declared itself favourable to the Union of the Damibian Pxincipalities . The discussion , therefore , has advanced a step since we last adverted to it ; but no new points have been raised for investigation . However , considering the position held by England with reference to Moldavia and . "Wauacliia , there are some circumstances indirectly bearing on the subject , to which we invite the attention of the reader .
It would be well if , while endeavouring to reform the Turkish Empire , we undertook to reform our own agents in Turkey . The East , which we propose to fashion after our own image , must have a strange power of transforming the strangers who inhabit it , since it has so powerful an action on Englishmen , who boast that wherever they go they always remain emphatically and positively English . If we cannot say what Ave gained by the last ¦ war , if our taxes have been , augmented in
order that thousands of souls might perish from cold or hunger in the East , those who had the good fortune to return are able to tell us that they saw with their own eyes the misery of the Turks > and found the representatives of England more Turkish than , the Ottomans themselves . It . appears that many of these gentlemen , instead of endeavouring to introduce into Turkey our customs and civilization , have thought it more agreeable to become Turks themselves , and have been
so accustomed to Eastern life that they have actually succeeded in getting themselves called Pachas . Our agents , of all classes , in Turkey , would seem to have formed , by means of reciprocal services and protection , a species of Mutual Annuity ; Society , with the assistance of Avhich they slip from under the control of the central Government ; and once installed in office , they remain there for life , no matter what their conduct may be . Doubtless it would bo a pernicious policy to
make frequent changes in our consular establishments , but our present system of' perpetual service in such situations is often seriously inconvenient , when we consider that these agents aro virtually free from controlespecially in Turkey , where so many temptations abound and so many facilities aro afforded for intrigue . After too long a residence they lose sight of their mission , and become accustomed to feel arid see tilings in the- same light as tho natives , while
frequently they crcato for themsolves interests us contrary to those of tho country they reside in as to thoso of the country they represent . Tho vices of tho system are nowhere more apparent than in tho Dimubian Principalities , whero life annuities aro secured to the representatives oi British interests , who , oven if wo suppose
them to havo once possessed tho necessary qualifications , havo , in twenty or thirty years , become necessarily disqualified for the posts in which they havo been forgotten , lu the Principalities our representatives are not more commercial agon be ; they havo also a diplomatic mission , and aro pitted in that capacity against other consula generally the most eminent of Europoan diplomatists .
At tho conclusion of tho Avar , . bVance , Austria , Russia , Prussia , and even Belgium , sent spcciul agents to deal with tho exceptional wtiitc of things which had arisen in Moldo-Wallachia—England alone employed on thid special Hcrvico her consuls of twenty yen ' Hiaudin ^ . These gentlemen thus fancied themselves in tho palmy days of their iirsi ; appointment , and limited their action , to tho
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ism- ^ which is agreed upon by elderly baronets ill amber drawing-rooms , "but which is not calculated to attract to itself the enthusiastic support of any party in or out of the Legislature . Sir Easdle y "Wilmjot is a Reformer •—sincere and vigorous : —but a Reformer of that class which Avould trim a ' measure ' into an elegant pattern , and send ifc up to the House of Lords etherealised and perfumed , with no rough sufaces or sharp edges . Precisely similar in spirit is Mr . GeorgeI-Luihis , *
who adds another to the long category of theoretical-He-form Bills , and desires that every learned order and every profession shall depute its delegates to the House of Commons , treating the nation , the body of the commonwealth , as a mere numerical majority not comparable in importance with a Eaeulty or an Academy . Mi * . Harms is not so practical as Sir EardIjET Wilmot , who solicits the support of Lord Brougham for a programme Avhich
is infinitely too liberal for the present Cabinet . He is infected , however , with the fallacy that Party-GrOA ernrneiit has ceased to exist , forgetful of the truth" that Toryism and " Whiggery divide the Legislature as completely as ever , and that wliat seenis a fusion is only a floating fragment which , occasionally unites the political continents on the right and left of tine Speaker ' s chair . However , he strikes off , after some preliminary pages , into the question of Parliamentary
Reform ; proposing to disenfranchise totally or partially , a'number of small and decaying boroughs—leaving , fifty seats for distribution among those counties and boroughs which are now imperfectly represented , or not directly represented at all . Enlarge the basis of the suffrage by reducing the electoral qualification ; but do this in a nibbling , hesitating way , is the counsel of Sir Eardi , ey Wilmot . Sit Earbie y now turns a corner and reaches the Ballot . 3 ie hates it , does not understand it , insults it , and passes on , without adducing the ghost of an
argument in disparagement of the principle . The Ballot , Sir Eabdley " , has been adopted as a liberal test ; and , at the next election , it will go hard Avith many candidates , unless they advance a few steps on this point , and meet the popular desires . The ideal session , supposed by tho Recorder of Warwick , Avould restore the system of transportation , abolish tickets of leave , put a check on the royal prerogative in cases of murder , reform the law of divorce , purge the ecclesiastical courts , enlarge the jurisdiction of county courts , cheapen Chancery , establish
a department of public justice . These are the views , this is tho ideal , of an irresponsible Whig ; what should we expect from the same Whig in official letters ? It is to be feared that , Avithout an agitation sproading far and wide , and resounding like that of 1830 , the policy of the Whigs Avill continue tamo , slow , and unsatisfactory .
As a rider to this statement , avo wish to notice the taunt so frequently flung at the Liberal party . Jt has no recognised or palpable organization ,. We know , and havo acknowledged that fact . But Avhy is it a fact ? Because tho Liberal party has never been in power ; the ' Whigs and ' Tories havo held office alternately lor centuries ; tho Liberals have been invariably excluded . On tin ' s account , unless rallied round the standard of some exciting question , they are nceos-wurily scattered , and their course ' of action i « us necessarily indelinile .
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annual three bills on the subjects of Church discipline , testamentary jurisdiction , and marriage and divorce . He proposes to place the procedure against clergymen , guilty of immoral conduct or of bad doctrine , under some kind of rule . Priests in the pulpit would no longer be persecuted by dissenting churchwardens , but a clergyman must take the initiative before the bishop : and
prosecuhopes of relief , and stopping the vray of those who would really give us the reform . If priests are his favourites , he is less considerate to wills , but cruellest of all to Avives .
tions for immorality Avould . cease to be the A ent for private spite . But perhaps the greatest favour which the Lobd ChawceIiIiOii has conferred upon the clergy is , that he has not yet got his bill ready . It is most desirable that there should be a reform of the law bearing upon the gentlemen in black , but a * bill by the Loud Chancellor , is as certain a preventive of any improvement as any finality ever yet invented .
The abuses that have made wills the food of rats ; the legacies and means of legatees ; , the food of proctors ; the expenses the food of courts , with unsettled , and barbarous , and dilatory jurisdiction , are perfectly well known to every reader of JBleale House and David . Oopperjielcl ; that is , to all the world , ! The 'Lord Chancellor has to amend this ; but what does he do ? He retains the diocesan
districts , lie retains the proctors , and , by Avay of improving the confusion , he creates a new court Avh ere no new court is wanted , puts at its head a com-inon-law- judge , and places it under the Court of Chancery .- . But the best of the joke is the legislation on the subject of marriage and / divorce . It would be quite waste of time to examine the drafts of legislation , ¦ wh ich- are nothing more than dreams . Tliey would have been greeted in . the House of XordS with a shout of
laughter—Avere it not that all the laAv lords , yes , even the reactionary Lord St . Leonards , really wish to get oil with reforms- —and amusement at the Chancellor ' s vagaries * is crushed in indignation at the . waste of time . The man means well , lie had in his Bill a provision by which any married couple , oil agreement , might obtain a divorce for all practical purposes—except marrying again . ] Nfo doubt this proposal creates a great deal of alarm . People are content to
see the hideous amount of vice which goes on at present ; the domestic discord ; the collusion . Tlie man who sells his wife , and , disappointed of payment , brings an ^ ction for criminal conversation , 'is condemned to maintain the same happy home which ho has exposed to the public ; and that is said to be in the interest of " morality ! " The poorer husband ; , avIio , like poor Mr . Tjdnnaut
appeals to tho Marlborough-street police court against tho Avifo that pursues him Avith drunken vileiiesaes and wastes hia substance , must continue to exemplify conjugal fidelity . A direct and orderly separation i 3 what tho public mind is not at present prepared to tolerate . The proposal ¦ horrified . Lord Gamimjklii , and tho CjiANOioiiLOit himsoll mentioned the provision Avith that modest voico which invites condemnation . " But there
is another provision Avhich ho did not include in hia hill . Jn tho case of Ling versus Ohokiok , Sir I'ltinvKmc . K Tiihstqick , the high Conservative , expressed tho embarrassment and dilllculty wl lich he felt in bringing before a court of law a caso of criminal conversation , lie described tlio exposure , ao disgraceful to every person concerned , even to tho plaint / ill
WILLS , W . LVKS , AND IMtl . KSTS . Tina Loud CiUKCui . Lort , deserves to bo a fa-YP ^^ t e with tho clergy ; ho ban produced his
who is appealing I " or justieo . " j always fool oppressed Avith these considerations Avhonevor I . lmvo to open a cn . se of this kind . " It ia the one iihiifio which most challenges instant removal . The IjOIII ) Oil A . NOE 1 jliOlt'S hill ( loOB nothing for it . , I ! o persecutes wives and husbands with another of his tentative- clauses ., leaving them to every misery created by tlui past or the present law , tantalizing them Avitli
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rite True , Theory of Itejtrisc . ntutioit . \\ y ( leorjjo Harris . Longman and Co .
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February 14 * 1857 . ] THE LEADS Ik 159
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Feb. 14, 1857, page 159, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2180/page/15/
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