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Leader (1850-1860), 10th September 1853, Edition Country of 2, Page 12, 876 THE LEADER. - [Saturday,

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      Turkey Deserted By Her Allies. With The ...

      but a passing appearance , and that a revived vigour in the English Government might falsify our fears !

      876 The Leader. - [Saturday,

      876 THE LEADER . - [ Saturday

      Spain The Defaulter. Spain Has A Strong ...

      SPAIN THE DEFAULTER . Spain has a strong sense of her own dignity When her good ally , Great Britain , asked her through , the ambassador at Madrid , to grant a jProtestant burial ground for subjects who happened to die in the Spanish capita ] , the request was granted . It was granted after it had been asked , for fifty years , and upon condition that the English attending the funeral should make no sign either that they had a chapel , or that they performed public worship , or evert that they had a dead body ; for the corpse is to be conveyed to the grave without publicity . In Spain , the English are said to be heretic , without a faith ; and perhaps to make good their words , the Spanish authorities forbid the English to appear with any signs of faith at the close of life . Such are the conditions when England has a favour to ask of Spain .

      Spain has asked a favour of England , or of private Englishmen : it is to advance capital for Spanish railways . The request has been thought sufficiently important for a special agent to come to this country ; he was anticipated by rumour , not at all surprising in the case of a Government like that of Spain . It was said that , as usual , official or royal people would profit by these projects ; and the traditions of Capel Court and its titled clients were for a time transferred to

      Madrid and certain distinguished persons , who are understood to have made capital out of the political vicissitudes of . that country . This , coupled with that bad faith which has excluded Spanish Stock from quotation on our Exchange , had cast discredit upon the projects . Some , however , were inclined to give money , and a natural anxiety existed to know who would guarantee the good faith of Spain . Allusion was made on the part of the possible lenders to their own Government , as their protector ; and on this hint , the JEspana , a Madrid journal , which is

      understood to be the organ of the Minister , Senor Egana , launches out indignantly at the insult . " Base is the slave that pays , " and baser still he that gives guarantees or admits the appeal to a foreign Government . If Englishmen are permitted to advance their capital for Spanish railways , it must be without these humiliating conditions for Spain . If we accept the scrap of ground for burial , the conditions may bow us down with our foreheads to the earth ; but if Spain accepts our millions , she must pay ua when she pleases , and we must not talk about appeals , or doubt her faith .

      Yet Spain has owed us before , and we have had some reason to question her dignity . There was , for example , the capital of the Spanish Five-per-cent . " Active" bonds of 1834 , about 30 , 000 , 000 / . ; then there was the Spanish " Deferred" Pive-per-cents . of 1834 , capital about 13 , 000 , 000- ? . ; Spanish " Passive" bonds of 1834 , capital 12 , 700 , 000 / . ; and Spanish Threeper-cents , of 1840 , capital 7 , 000 , 000 / . ; created by the capitalization of interests at par . We say nothing of the arrears of interest , sometimes capitalized , sometimes simply over-due for years together ; but those are good round sums , by which English trust and Spanish integrity havo been tested .

      Nor is money all that Spain owes to England . Spain possesses a Constitution given to her by England ; for Spain had groaned under the moat tyrannical of Governments . The memory of Jiiego is still a sorrow to the nation ; Ferdinand tho Seventh is still remembered as the creature of the Inquisition ; Don Carlos is still living , by his boh , ready to restore an Austrian rule in Spain . But from all these things Spain wa « rescued mainly by tho support of England . Having accomplished lior rescue from usurpation , Spain conceives a contemp t , even for her own liberal opinions , casts thorn aside , exiles them with KHpartoro , and . begins to spurn the English

      allinnco . Beyond money orfreo institutions , Spainowes to us something fltill higher—her independence . She waa a province under France ; it wan mainly by tho help of English anna that sho wan restored to bo a nation . More than onco English blood lias been poured upon the Held of Spain ; hut if tho debt is romembored , it ifl , wo fear , by . England only . It would become our dignity to forgot it ; but if bo , wo ought to forget also that

      there ever has been any alliance between England and that estranged country . The honour and dignity of Spain were once real things . They now exist in the language of Senor Egana ; but the words must mean something very different from what we understand in England , when they are applied to a country whose conduct , we have described ; and yet , in the incidents we have enumerated , we have not reckoned that most peculiar specimen of Spanish honour and dignity , which we mentioned lately while speaking of a different subject . When Spain had great cause to fear for the retention

      of Cuba , England and France proposed a tripartite treaty with the United States , to guarantee for ever the Spanish possession of . the island . America refused to forego her right of acquiring the island ; we might have declined to interfere , not only on the ground that America is our ally as well as Spain ; but also on the ground that Cuba , of all p laces , is the spot on which England has a right to reproach Spain with breach of faith . Spain , for whom we have done so much , promised to assist us in putting down

      the slave trade . But how has she done it P By appointing governors who share with her the profits of the trade ; by giving commissions to officers who rescued captured slavers from their English captors , with insults for the English officers ; and , in short , by obstructing where she should aid , by insulting where she professes sympathy . Interfere , however , we did ; and then it was that the Marquis of Miraflores , calculating on the easy disposition of England , actually went so far as to petition , that even if

      America refused , England and . France would guarantee the Spanish possession of Cuba against annexation , or against the insurrection of its own inhabitants . The Government that for fifty years refuses a burial ground for the dead English , and then grants it on terms of shameful humiliation—the Government that has accepted English . money , and paid debts as we have seen —the Government that asks us for more money , and is indignant at a talk of pledges or guarantees —the Government that promises to suppress the slave trade iu Cuba , and connives at the traffic , while its officers insult our own—that

      Government petitions ours to retain for it its island colony against a foreign conqueror , or against the disaffection provoked by its own bad rule . It appears to us that national meanness could not be carried to a more contemptible point of degradation than it has been by the high and honourable , the most Catholic and most religious , Government of Spain .

      The Truth About The Roman Disclosures. W...

      THE TRUTH ABOUT THE ROMAN DISCLOSURES . When a people , intelligent , and not dead in its moral feeling , is oppressed for a length of time , it resorts to secret machinery for restoring something like that government of itself which is prevented by the constituted anarchy at the head . Such is tho state of the Italian people . The self-government of the Italians is conducted entirely in secret by Italians . The ostensible government of Italy is carried on by Austria , and its proteges , with military instruments , priestly accomplices , and an army of spies . It follows that occasionally the self-government of the Italians , is , as it is called , " detected ; " and one of these detections has just occurred at Kome . The character of tho persons who havo been seized ia not to bo denied ; they aro genuine patriots , in the fullest sense of tho term , as it will bo understood by our readers . Tho principal is a man of excellent abilities , and of singular good faith . By the pertinacity and zeal of his character , ho has exercised a decided influence over his countrymen , and has been detected by tho police only through tho treachery of some who diagraco tho namo of patriots . There havo been divisions amongst the Italians

      •—oven amongst tho Liberal party of tho Italians . There aro some who aro . for Italy . a Republic , or at all events for Italy entirely to herself ; and "there havo been various sections of the liberal party in favour of this or that compromise , between tho Italian aspirations , and what aro regarded to bo practicabilities . Soino of these purtioH havo boon discontented with the lirinnenn , or , as they call it , the obstinacy of the Italian party ; and it is to bo feared that occasional patriots , disaffected , towards patrioliHiii , havo suffered their tomper , their weakness , or a worse vice , to load , thorn into treason . Few of tho

      imprisoned patriots would exchange places •»'« , them . Wlt & One version of the report from Rome is tb these arrests prevented an immediate movem ^?• the Eternal City , under the direction of MaS ' * This is an entire mistake , and , if Mazzini w ? * to come forward with the proofs , he would h able to show ,, to the satisfaction of the most A trian mind , that there was no movement direct !} by him in present contemplation . But Mazzin has before permitted misconstruction of his i tentions , when he has thought that to exoxierat himself might entail difficulty upon friends at ° distance , or undue punishment , even , upon those who are indiscreet .

      There was some kind of movement in content , plation—a movement of a very partial and imi pulsive character , implicating very few , and en . tirely , if we may use the expression , of an unau ^ thorized character . The exact seat of this move ^ ment we do not know , and do not care to know with the date of its probable execution we havo no concern . The suspicions on that subject , and the detection of Petroni and his friends , have no relation , excepting that of a coincidence in point of time . Our readers will be interested to know who were the patriots newly added to the thou .

      sands in trouble , in that devoted country , but they will also be interested to understand that the movement which has been prevented was not a national , nor an authorized movement .

      A Monument To Napier. Napiee Has Gone Be...

      A MONUMENT TO NAPIER . Napiee has gone before the nation was able to express the sense which it really entertained of his value , as a soldier , a general , and a patriot . The nation entertained that sense , and desired to express it ; but , unhappily , the nation is obliged to act by a machine ludicrously named , as if for its non-execution , the executive ; and therefore

      towards papier the nation was expressly noncognizant . How m any an inferior man performing inferior services , attained , and promptly too , a superior reward . We have Lord Keane , and Lord Seaton , or a Lord Gough , —gallant men all ; but if a peerage is to be given for such services , how was it that Napier did not pass from Meaneo into theHouse of Lords ? Was it precisely because his achievements were not limited to dashing exploits , but were to be found in service extraordinary for the combination of its long continuance and its surprising energy ? Was it

      because , to the vigour with which ho wielded the sword , the daring with which he faced the enemy , he added the moral courage of facing abuses'in the army , and vigour of tongue or pen to expose those abuses ? Was it because , to great achievements in vanquishing the foe on foreign ground , he added the patriotic service of showing how the English people can bo associated with its own army in repelling the invader from our own soil ? In short , was it becauBe ho

      was a patriot as well as a soldier , a statesman , and not only a Rubserviont officer . Tho unenlightened " English people , not versed m tho mysteries of tho Horse-Guards , will be very apt to reason upon the propter hoc princip le , ana finding that Napier was patriot as well as soldier , was an outspoken Englishman as well as an acting warrior , to surmise that that was the reason wliy he was disparaged in high quarters , and why W ° sank to the nobler immortality of tho tomb wwj a titlo beneath that of his inferiors , equal to tuaj of a Sir tfrcdorick Smith or a Sir JiicUaru England .

      Ho has gono without his duo acknowledgement , but something remains to bo done yt There is in England a custom of dealing with mien cases . Unless a fashion sets in during Uio u < _ timo of a hero , in which case wo heap upon ni ^ moro than almost any single man can acccp although instances of elasticity can bo 8 nm !" fl that respect , — wo rescrvo our rewards ^ post mortem examination . of tho groat man . j / usi , ywricm examination . cm miv ^» . <¦ - - , j ,

      such cases sometimes we give tho . rewaruH , a Chinese do , to tho offspring in th ° iov r . ^ honours ami pensions . But our common ciwio ¦ peculiar : where tho patriot has l )() oa . 1 c | ry / | t ] , ( , fio very devoted in his ' service , wo ¦ w ithhold __ more personal rewards as if thoro were a 1 , tilious delicacy lent wo wliould oflend J »» j « ^ with tho appearance of corrup t ofioru . - ^ kept Nelson ' s daughter in penury , an < l wl Jnifl 0 ft aro at a loss on mieh occasions to roc fe _ >»_ - horo wo ran always fall back upon " a < j ° ^ ^\ we givo him a monument . Of course

  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), Sept. 10, 1853, page 12, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_10091853/page/12/