The Principality

TO CORRESPONDENTS. WE regret that, from want of space, we are compelled at the last moment, to postpone several articles of local intelligence.

THE CARDIFF M.P. LAST Thursday was a day long to be remembered, if not in the world's history, at any rate in that portion of it that with which a romantic disregard of truth, rarely permis- sible in these matter-of-fact days, we may describe as re- presented by JOIIN" NICHOLL, D.C.L. Last Friday's Sim contained the following astounding statement Mr. NICHOLL took the oaths and his seat for Cardiff! Tliis., certainly took us by surprise. To use an expression more expressive than classical, it struck us all of a heap. Down dropped our editorial pen, and up bristled our editorial hair. The idea we felt was too ridiculous to be seriously entertained. Had it been the first of April, we should at once have treated the matter as a hoax, and though we might have questioned its good taste, might have managed to have forced a smile, as we have seen a miserable henpecked hus- band smile, the lady of course being absent, when some heartless bachelor has held up to ricticule that mysterious power to which all married men, beginning with JOB and ending with CAUDLE, have succumbed. Had the statement appeared in Punch, we should have considered it as a "hit, a palpable hit," and quoted it accordingly; but the au- nouncement of it in the Sun, parliamentarily and officially, does, in spite of all the various injunctions we have received to be surprised at nothing, certainly surprise us very much. To a well-constituted and philosophical mind like our o,.N,ii, it, yields great pleasure to see that the great questions which men have vainly tried to solve, are gradually being answered by the advancing spread of science and the increas- ing intelligence of the age. The discovery of the mode by which the circle can be squared—of the philosopher's stone— of Hicks's Hall—of the Standard in Cornhill—and of the Member for Ciirdiff-wei-e questions we-had always con- sidered as removed, mysteriously and wisely no doubt, yet removed far from mortal ken. To comprehend them aright, we had imagined, was beyond our finite power. As regards ourselves, knowing how Fools rush in where angels fear to tread," we had purposely avoided endeavouring to pierce the mys- tery which had hidden them from the rude gaze of inquisi- tive mortals. The gods have been propitious, and what we had not dared to hope has been revealed. One of these questions has been solved. The mind is relieved by the solution of one of the great problems which have engaged its anxious thought. It is a clear, intelligible fact that j Cardiff's great unkown lias taken his seat and his oaths in St. Stephens. If he can take his seat there, we may supposc, notwithstanding the report about all old woman being in the House, that he is a man; no viewless shade, but a living flesh and blood reality; if he can take the oaths he is even more than this, he is a Christian—that is and a lover of all that is good, and true, and right .What a delightful prospect for England in general, and' Cardiff in, particular, that, as the Sun says, Mr. NICHOLL took the oaths aud his seat for Cardiff." And yet as the poet ) There's such a charm in melancholy, I would not, if I souid, be gay j" so we had found so much fascination in conjecture, that ;t 1 is with somewhat of a melancholy feeling that we exchange the plausible probability for the actual truth. Indeed our scepticism had much increased of late. As Betsy Prig said of Sairey Gamp's beloved associate Mrs, Harris, that she "didn't believe there Was no sieh person," so we had begun to look upon the existence of a member for Cardiff as a mere ponular delusion. Accordingly JOHN NICHOLL, D.C.L., had come to be placed by us in the same category with llengist, and Iiorsft—with Romulus and Rem us—with O.ssian and Homer, and the other illustrious worthies of.whose existence modern knowledge has, led ..us to more than: dt.u'it.. Nor i can it be said, that, our conjecture, was altogether "without foundation. Kven yet, -there- is a- pleasing degree of ob- scurity bv which curiosity is excited atiu our yvoj'ihy mem- bers concealment is continued. Sometimes we--haw .seen lii;a styled as Sir.JoHK Nicholi., Knt.; in an ahmuiac we fpuod him figuring the diploma by which his name is graced has given rise to a world of controversy in our mind, seeing that it has been claimed by law, and physic, and divinity alike. After all, we arc glad that these agitating questions have been decided by the authoritative announcement of the Sun, with which again we must refresh our readers' eyes- Mr. NICHOLL, D.C.L., took the oaths and his seat for Cardiff." Yet our gratification is not so intense as we could wish our joy is seasoned with trembling. The Sun may have made a mistake after all. The Times is silent about the matter, but it cannot be that the Sim would rudely grow facetious on a subject which a regard for the feelings of Cardiff would induce it to pass over with a respectful and compassionate silence. "Why," some of our readers will ask, why did Mr. NICHOLL take his seat at all?" Cardiff had uttered no voice of indignant remonstrance at the insult that had been done her in this virtual disfranchisement of nearly two years. Uncharitable men may say, "We have gone through times when every senator should have been at his post, or if that were impossible, have given it up, that an abler might have taken it in stead." Did we think that Mr. NICHOLL would have the impudence to offer himself for Cardiff again, or that the electors would be weak enough again to give him a chance of being returned, we might say, that his appear- ance at last has resulted from rumours that have been afloat respecting the dissolution of Parliament, or from some- thing like shame at the mode in which he has signally failed in the performance of the trust Cardiff had reposed in him. It may be, that he is afraid that the Bill to amend Oaths taken by Members of Parliament, will become law before lie has taken his seat, and antiquated formulas-formulas at va- riance with the spirit of the age-may give way to formulas more congenial with tolerance and common sense. Possibly he may have taken the oaths to show his steady adherence to the glorious constitution in Church and State as it now exists, before innovation has robbed it of its ab- surdities. Reformed, it may seem to him less dear. Hence his chivalrous zeal to be the last, possibly, to take an oath which all good and great statesmen have agreed utterly to condemn. Nevertheless, if Cardiff rejoices in her member let her do so. We are enabled to state on the best possible informa- tion, that everything is to be put to rights now, as the Sun tells us- Mr. NICHOLL took the oaths and his seat for Cardiff." Readers of the cheap edition of "Coningsby" are requested to erase the coming man," and read instead, Mr. JOHN NICHOLL, D.C.L. Young gentlemen who sing There's a good time coming, boys are respectfully informed that the good time is not coming, but now actually come—Ireland, we have it on the best authority, is to be regenerated—the cholera will cease, every- body will be well of it—young ladies will be provided with the most eligible husbands imaginable, as soon as ever their sparkling eyes have glanced on twenty summers' suns. We arc now enabled confidently to state, for the satisfaction of all the industrious youth of our boarding-schools, that the penny tart will hen. eforth be sold for precisely one-half of that ridiculously small sum—" there shall be in England seven halfpenny loaves sold for a penny; the three-hooped pots shall have ten hoops, and I will make it felony to drink small beer." Gentle reader, do you ask our authority for these heart-cheering statements—read again our quotation; from the Suit- Mr. NICHOLL D.C.L.,1; took the oaths and his seat for Cardiff'

PARLIAMENTARY REFORM. IN Mr. iNGLIs's pleasant little volume, entitled. Solitary Walks in Distant Lands," an anecdote is told that does in some degree illustrate the greatstanding-still party of which Lord John, the quondam reformer, now claims to be the head. Two gentlemen, it appears, had been dining with a 0 13 friend, and upon leaving, one observed that while his own gratuity to the servants was received with no more than the usual expressions of satisfaction, that of the other was productive, judging by appearances, of the utmost delight. Accordingly, as soon as ever they were seated comfortably in the carriage alone, the phenomenon was mentioned, and an explanation sought. The inquirer naturally concluded that his friend's generosity had been extreme, and hence the joy his presence had certainly diffused. Imagine, then, his surprise, when informed by his friend that, so far from having given a handsome sum, he had actually given no- thing, but had merely tickled the palm that had been held for the expected compliment. In some such manner has JOlIN BULL been served, after years of patient endurance and peaceful complaint. He has waited as humbly and respectfully as "JEAMES" himself. No man loves a lord more dearly than JOHN, and no man has been so humbugged by lords as he. And yet JOHN goes on waiting, trusting that those who have deceived him times without number may be found worthy at last; and when the annual farce at St. Stephens is closed, and Jonx's palms, instead of being blessed with a bit of real gold, are merely tickled by FINALITY RUSSELL JOHN goes away smiling content for a time, and, with an asinine simplicity, met with, we believe, in no other quarter of the globe, prides himself upon the great benefit he obtains by peaceful, Parliamentary and constitutional agitation. Unfortunately, this tickling—agreeable as the sensation may be for a time—cannot last for ever. The tickling done, J!L1.1_- 1 1 • T • T\ "I '1 FINALITY HUSSELL comiortatny scared in his Jjrougham, and rapidly hastening to Chcsham-placc, JOlIN looks at his baud and sees tile. i,e ii of Iiin c,iiot even a fourpenny bit, a bad shilling, or even one of those real" sovereings," which a seedy individual in Leicester-square informs you a gentleman has made a bet to sell a certain number of at the unremuncrating price of four a penny. For Jonx's attention—for the civility with which ho waited at table-for the readiness he evinced" for to go for to come for to carry"—for the zeal he dis- played in doing whatever dirty work hail to be done—no- thing-not even the window-tax—is returned, JOHN asks for bread, and lie gets a stone—he asks, at any rate, that he may have a vote, and be protected in the giving of that vote, oiitc and his humble prayer is contemptuously denied. Under the best of all possible constitutions—for such JOHN deems his own—he is denied those rights, the possession of which elevates in humanity the shoe-black in Paris, or even the wild, half-savage American hunter of the far West, We more than question the wisdom that has allowed suck a state of things to exist—which has degraded a human right into an accident, dependent neither upon intelligence nor character, but simply upon the possession of a cer- tain amount of wealth which has disfranchised the great working classes—the men most interested in the .Suite—the men most affected by good government, or the reverse—which has placed the representation in the hands of the people most interested in the preservation of misrepresentation and abuse. This has been strikingly il- lustrated in the debates of last week and the present 011 the estimates. In times of universal depression, private men are compelled to contract their expenditure, or, in vulgar language, to cut their government according to their oloth. If :1 eatmot afford it, he gives up building-if he cannot pay high wages, he pays low. Our Government, however, adopts precisely the reverse. Enormous salaries are still- paid to officials, and attempts to cut them down are studi- ously resisted. Tens of thousands are lavished upon palaces which will gratify royal whims for a few years, and will then be pulled down, as must be the gate at Buckingham Palace, which cost £ 80,000. Ambassadors and consuls arc salaried to an extent utterly disproportioned to the worth of the real services they perform (for these generally arc very small), under the pretence of keeping up the dignity of I the nation, as if France and America were not as well re- presented in foreign courts for a few hundreds as ourselves for thousands; and, what is still worse, the people are com- pelled to pay for a standing army, which exists to put them down, and to preserve abuses as they are. Last year, £ 100,000 was spent in building barracks at Preston. Altogether, we have now twenty barracks filled with the people's enemies, and existing for the people's hurt. The Government that must resort to bayonets—that skulks beneath a regiment of ] dragoons—that dare not trust itself without its system of terrorism and forts-had better not exist at all. Nothing can show how completely the people are misrepresented than the fact that the Rcgium Donum, against the unanimous wish of all but the few degraded men who receive it, is yearly voted by Parliament, so determined are they, in times of the utmost distress, to tax a people who have borne all amount of taxation unparalleled in the history of the world. Mr. liumir's motion does not come up to our standard. It will exclude many of the most intelligent in the empire, and will leave still a bone of controversy between the repre- i sented and those who are not; but something must be done. The pecuniary distress of which all complain will soon impel all to political agitation. We have been too long apathetic. While France has swept the last fragment of royalty from her soil-while the streets of Dresden, of Vienna, and Ber- lin, have been filled with armed men, maddened by the poli- tical degradation of years—whilst Hungary has nobly re- nounced the cherished class distinction which ages have pre- served-it is high time that in England a great effort bo. made for the political emancipation of those who at present have simply but to obey and pay. Had the people risen up in their majesty and might-lwd they done what they have done in Paris and in Rome—had they driven a luxurious and voluptuous court, and the whole tribe of placemen, and pensioners, and parasites from our land—had they seated citizen COBDEN in St. James's, and Quaker BRIGHT in Whitehall,—at any rate our political emancipation would have been secured. True, the thing would not have been done by peaceful, constitutional, and parliamentary agitation; but it was not peaceful, parliamentary, and constitutional agitation that won the Reform Bill for the Whigs; it was not peaceful, and constitutional, and parliamentary agitation < j that gave our nobles their broad domains. 11 With a sword," said a famed Norman earl, with a sword I won my estates, and with a sword I will preserve them." If our men in power—the rulers of our land—desiderate peaceful, and par- liamentary, and constitutional agitation, lot them show that that agitation would attain its end by the readiness with which they listen to the people's prayer, and seek the people's good.

THE LATTER DAY SAINTS. WfiEk after week we have had to record the proceedings of these extraordinary people, whose simplicity seems only equalled by their profound ignorance. They have, as our readers will perceive, in Cardiff, had a very narrow escape from being found guilty of manslaughter. At present, therefore, they have been kept out of the tender embrace of the law. However, if they continue their operations—if they anoint their victims with holy oil when they should administer black draughts and blue pills-if they send for a brother to pray, instead of sending for a medical man to blister and bleed-it will not be long before some of them will be afforded an intimate acquaintance with the interior arrangements of prisons, and thus be enabled still more f literally to follow the example of the Apostles, of whom they assert themselves to be the successors, and to whose power of working miracles they lay claim. Dir. JnTTNTKON naid. thD c.l;r —J «- .u n-ç-1 a argument against the existence of matter, was to knock the head of the man who asserted the doctrine, against the wall; j such logic is poor, yet we really can see no other way of answering a conscience in a state of such deplorable weak- ness and morbid susceptibility as that of a Latter Day Saint. t Conscience when it infringes on another's right "becomes a | nuisance, and must be treated as such. If I must respect my neighbour's conscience when it leads him to appropriate the contents of my pocket, lie must respect my conscience which leads me to take the liberty of introducing my conscientious brother to the conscientious care of the police. By all means respect liberty of conscience, but let not the extraordinary conscience of the Latter Day Saints be a burden and a stum- bling-block to the ordinary conscience of saiuts and sinners —not of the latter days. i The remedy for this s ate of things is education: fanati- cism and ignorance mutually aid each other. A criminal. f prosecution may make a Latter Day Saint feel himself a hero, and but nerve him up in his mischievous career; how- ever, it would signally dishearten all those who, after all, form the larger part of all fanatics, whose faith is not quite strong enough but education alone can show these deluded people, that whilst literally obeying Scripture, they are dis- obedient in spirit and in truth, and that they themselves, so far from showing more devotion to their Maker than other men, by their ignorant opposition to his laws, show actually less. Fanaticism has proved stronger before this, than the common instincts of our common humanity-it has set thE) son against the father, and the father against the son—it has condemned the young, the loving, and the beautiful to an ignominious and* painful death. It can be restrained by human law, but knowledge alone can blast it to its core.

TOWN LKrmtS-Xo, 5. I By a happy concatenation of circumstances the Bishop of London for once has got as good as he has given. For years Charles James has been a thorn in many a good man's side. With the insolence of a low-born Jack-in-offiee, he has played his fantastic tricks before high Heaven, and has succeeded too often in annoying at any rate men of nobler metal than himself. Ilis forbidding the annual sermon for the London Missionary Society has brought him into collision with that society, and the directors have certainly hit his lordship rather hard. It appears that for thirty-three years before the translation of the present bishop to the diocese of London, and for seven years afterwards, the London Missionary Society annually enjoyed (j) the uso of one of the parish churches of the metropolis that in May, 1835, the bislvop intimated that the use of Saint Bride'* for that purpose was contrary to his wish, but then. on a depu- tation from the Parent Society waiting on him, he waved his objections for that year. "From that period to the present, although with the return of every year an application has been made for the use of St. Bride's, or some other parish church, these applications, without a single exception, have proved un- successful; and, in every case, the refusal has been founded upon the well-known wishes of the bishop of the diocase, which he (the incumbent) did not feel at liberty to oppose. And yet the bishop pleads in his defence that he.interfered this year because he thought it was a new proceeding." In con- clusion, the directors, "although they have 110 intention to impeach the veracity of the Bishop of Lmtlon," sarcastically ol)SL,rve It is evident that in u)->king such a statement UU lordship must have laboured under that entire failure of memory, and unconsciousness of .the past, which, though not beyond the possibility of human infirmity, are happily, for the interest of the society, but of rare occurrence." Our bishop after all is but mortal. Homer sometimes nodded, and why not Charles James The principal business that has occupied the attention of Parliament this week, has been voting the supplies. The esti- mates, we are told, have been framed with a strict eye to economy. In some such a way, we suppose, as a policeman keeps a strict eye on a cook or as a fox may keep a strict eye on a hen-roost." Amongst other matters E500 a year is voted for services rendered to Charles ll. i a pension of more than £I,OO to the Duke of St. Anmns, because the first Duke was- the merrv monarch's bastard son; Lord Minto spends a few months pleasuring in Italy, and we are debited £ 2,000 the sable king of Musquito takes it into his head to be crowned in Jamaica, under Biitisli auspices, aiid we pay £ i!37 17s. for the distiii-

art object of the utmost moment, in which rdl classes, from the Ctown to the peas-ant, were interested, namely, good Government, lit imRoving its main instrument, the representation of the peo- ple in Parliament. He appealed, in spite of ironical cheers, to rpcent examples in other countries as evidence that those countries were in advance of u. and that a liberal system of represeniatioD strengthened a Government, whereas in this country coercion and resistance to constitutional rights were the expedients to which the Government resorted, instead of reposing on the love and affection t»f tho people. Mr, Hume expatiated upon the expenditure of the country, and upon the extravagance of the Coui t establishments, — descending to some amusing, particulars,—and contended that unless the nature of the House of Commons was essentially changed, the Ministers would not adopt a real financial reform, lie then laid down the propositions he was prepared to maintain— namely, that the House did not faitly represent the community and that it could not do so unless the suffrage were extended, the franchise exercised under the protection of the ballot, and the dura- tion of Parliament limited to what, he considered a proper period —that of three years. He showed the disproportion between the adult male3 and the registered electors-the former being 8,000,000, and the latter 82U,000, which disproportion was yearly increasing. He adduced glaring instances of the unequal distribu- rion of the franchise, and he professed to see the working of this system in the fact that the majority of that House represented only one-eighth of the people. After examining the different bases upon which the suffrage might be extended, whence it appeared that the result of population or of property would be the same, Mr. Hume pronoifnctd in favour of the former, as the easiest. Mr. H. BLRKE^EY, in seconding the motion, upbraided some of the occupants of the Treasury bench for their change of opinion on the subject of secret voting. Sir G. GRKY said, this identical motion had been brought before the House last session by Mr. Hume, and after two nights' discussion had been rejected by a large majority; and, after a year's experience, he was ready to put the question upon toe con- trast, which Mr. Hume had invited, between the internal condition of this country and that of the continent of Europe. Sir George ,r.owledged that he believed the Hou-e, since the Reform Act, fairly and adequately represented, under the Constitution of Par- liament, the feelings and wishes of the nation, and. he urged the Jiouse to shun the great danger that would be incurred by entering upon the course recommended by Mr. Hume. Mr. O'CONNOR, in a very declamatory harangue, supported the Miction as the beginning of the end but at the same tune declared that it would not satisfy the whole of the people. After a few words from Colonel THOMPSON, Mr. CAVA*BF.I.L showed how many questions of importance, connected-with the colonies and with Ireland, as well as with the social condition of England, ought to be adjusted topics consi- dered. emergencies nu t, and wants provided for—before it was v, ise or prudent to enter upon organic changes of the constitution. Mr. KIN G supported the motion, observing that if England desired to hold her position in the van of free states, it was essentia! that another measure of Parliamentary reform should pass, which in the present state of Europe would be as Conserva- tive as the last. The House should beware of delaying loo long correction of patent anomalies repugnant to common sense, whilst the wealth and population of the country continued to increase. Mr. NEWDEGATE exposed the system pursued by the associa- tion for organising the purchase and division of freeholds, and A>r attacking county constituencies, showing its injurious ancl illegal action, and he warned the House against a measure emanat- ing from a party connected with this association. iVIr.B RI&HT gave an explanation of the system of enfranchise- ment referred to by Mr. Newdegate, and observed that it was fortunate fur the country, after the avowals of Lord J. Russell and Sir G. Grey, that there was a mode by which industrious and i ntelligent members of the working-classes could place themselves wthin the pale of the constitution. In all civilised nations there wis a movement in the direction of a Government more under the Æ; ,¡¡no! of the people, and more in accordance with their interests. The measure proposed by Mr. Hume was consistent with the tif-'ory of the Constitution the existing mode of representation -was not consistent wifh that theory or with the interests of the nation it excluded masses of the community, qualified by know- ledge and moral culture for the franchise, from just privileges and rights. Lord John Russell's argument, that further change was oz)r-,ecessary, as Parliament had passed good measures since the Reform Act, would prove that that act itself was unnecessary.; hut Parliament turned a deaf ear to suggestions for the diminution, < f taxation, and the present system engendered discontent amongst large clas1 es of the country, which it would be better now, l>efore they were exasperated, to remove, by proving that the old 'system of compelling Parliament to do justice had gone by. Lord J. RUSSEM. paid a tribute to the moderation which had 'marked the speech of Mr. Hume. In considering the motion, Lord John thought it necessary briefly to explain the intention of those who framed the Reform Bill, which was to amend the delects in the representation in the spirit of the ancient Constitution. Lord John then showed that, in addition to measures of great public uiiliry passed by the reformed Parliament, a large amount (r taxation had been taken off, which pressed mainly upon the working classes. With regard to the gist of the motion to admit every male of full age to a vote, he frankly avowed that he objected to the proposition, because, although he gave credit to the great bulk of the working classes for virtue and integrity, and believed that the suffrage might from time to time be enlarged, he thought at present they would be liable to be misled by artful and designing demagogues, and a House so formed would not conduce to the welfare or good government of the country. Comparing this country with other countries under different forms of govern- ment, he observed that a constitutional monarchy was the form L'st suited to the genius of the people, and one which hz-d p-o- duced a great amount of happiness and a great development of talent. His belief was that if the House adopted the scheme of III r. Hume, as expounded by Mr. Bright, it would risk all those blessings he, therefore, prayed the House, in the name of that Constitution, not to adopt the scheme, but to give it a decided negative, as repugnant to the interests, and he believed to the .opinions and wishes, of the people. Mr. OSBOUNE attacked with great severity the speech of Lord J, Russell, which he pronounced a melancholy exhibition. Mr. WOOD, in supporting the motion, complained that no one had grappled with the arguments of Mr. Hume; the artifice of bis opponents had been' to assume that it was identical with Mr. -O'Connor's, whereas the very principle upon which he supported ■.the former would induce him to give his decided opposition to the latter. This was a favourable moment for such changes, and as Lord J. Russell had admicted that some extension of the suffrage ■■ was necessary, it was wise to make it now, and to admit all who were unjustly excluded from the pale of the Constitution. Mr. Wood defended the scheme of Mr. Hume, which he contended was not liable to the charge of vagueness. The House having divided, the motion was negatived by 268 against 82. The other orders were disposed of, and the House adjourned at half-past 12 o'clock, ■■■■■ ■■■II ■■in ■ YMNHIINNIPMBII PI