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    OUR BRAVE DEFENDERS.

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    being a bad bargain for the State , and as being tainted with corruption . At the end of a long night ' s discussion , one hunrdied and sixty-two members affirmed this view ; so the question was then resolved in the negative . To sum up the results of this most discreditable affair ; we have the two seats for Dover carried by corruption , while the members who filled them remain undisturbed ; and , we have the power and discretion of two great -departments of administration flagrantly abused for corrupt political purposes , without any censure , to say nothing of punishment , being inflicted on the evil-doers . Mr . Ciiurchwakd has failed indeed to secure his extra prize money ; but so little does he apprehend any disagreeable consequences to himself or his accomplices from public attention being fixed on the transaction , that he actually succeeds in persuading them to revive its discussion by a distinct motion in Pai-liament .

    Turn we now to the case of Norwich . That ancient city has long enjoyed ah unenviable notoriety in electoral malpractices . In April , 1859 , Lord Buby and Mr . Schneider obtained a majority over their opponents by means of direct and lavish bribery . So clear and incontestable was the evidence adduced beforethe Election Committee , that hardly a straggle was made to . retain - the seats . What is far more significant , there has been , within the last few mouths ; , a mutual confession by the managers on both sides at jSTorwich . that corruption has been the standing rule and practice almost invariably in their , parliamentary contests , and that it would be the greatest blessing to the CQinrauiiity generally if some means were found of breaking , the sordid and enslaving spell . AH this has been recorded circumstantially in the votes of the municipal council , and no audible voice has been raised to contravene it . Many of the

    most respectable inhabitants of Norwich have , moreover , memorialised the Government to institute proceedings , in the name of the ATTORNEYTGrENERAL , against , some of the most uo . torio . us offenders ; but this the Home Secretary , acting on the advice of Sir RiCMAitD UETHELL , has refused to do , upon the ground , as we . understand , that ex ~ 6 fficio prosecutions , being well nigh obsolete , it would be highly objectionable to commence a set of modern precedents for the resuscitation of that most questionable branch of the prerogative . Under these circumstances , what was the duty of the House of ConXmons ? Manifestly to interpose its judicial veto when a new writ was moved . But the House , like G . A . LLIO , cares for none , of these tilings . In spite of the remonstrances of some honourable members , who challenged contradiction when they averred that there- had been more

    bribery at Norwich , as far as the numbers of the bribed were concerned , than at Wakelield and Gloucester taken together , — ihe If ouse decided , the . writ should issue , in order that the carnival mip ; ht be kept at Norwich with all the usual cirqumstances of undisguised corruption . So kept it has been accordingly during the last week . Drunkenness and venality , jobbery and lying , have held high festival ; and the ignorant and unthinking partakers in the scandalous saturnalia ai-o of course more than ever confirmed in the not unreasonable conviction , that Parliament does not desire to put an end to bribery and treating at elections . That conviction , we confess regretfully , we are compelled to share . Virtuous protestations by Ministers of the Grown , and respectable elderly gentlemen on the Opposition benches , are mere fustian and fanfaronade in the teeth of the facts we have

    stated , If they were in earnest , why did they assent to issuing the writ for Norwich ? They wero not ignorant , they could not be unconscious ; in agreeing to this wanton act of legislative levity and recklessness , tlioy did what was manifestly and grievously wrong , and they know it .

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    fTHHEEE is a novelty of invention in the tragedy of the Great JL Tasmania which is quite appalling . l ? amino and pestilence raging in a transport ship is no uncommon spectacle . The British , public is so accustomed to hear of fifty or a hundred deaths occurring during the voyage of one of these floating pesthousos , that it receives the intelligence of such a calamity with the utmost coolness . The Aocnngton has been the subject of son ™ little interest , because the cook was supposed to have poisoiiod the captain ; but who will trouble about the Dudbrook ,

    which , carrying 290 souls , from Southampton , had only 3 G 3 to land at Bombay—or the Euxine , which , in her voyage to Madras , was the scene of some aovontyxsix deaths P The victims in these casos , as in nearly all those which have gone before , wero only womom and children ; and , hs they are deemed nuisances by the military authorities , a diminution of their number must bo rather matter for congratulation in official circles . Wo will not say that the public shares this opinion , but it allows itself to bo immediately satisfied with the excuse which the Government makes for such a mortality ,. that it is impossible to provide

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    better accommodation . Perhaps the soldier must not complain . He is sufficiently warned agaiast marriage by his superiors . 'He is practically told that he may spend his whole leisure time in the most disreputable dens of a garrison town , destroy his health , and make the Government expenditure upon his training- valueless . He . may deceive as many poor girls as he finds credulous enough to trust him , and abandon . them heartlessly when they moat need his aid ; but he must not give way to an honourable attachment , or . attempt to atone for the consequences of his passion . If he does so , his marriage will probably not be recognised , and lie will be separated from his wife ; or , if it is

    recognised , he must make up his mind to see her exposed to indignities and pr ivations without end ; and , if he goes on foreign service , he will probably hear that she and his children have died of cholera or starvation on board the transport which was bringing her to join him . So , as he marries well aware of the penalties which the generous-hearted British public patiently suffers the authorities to inflict upon him , he must not complain if the Government considers " killing no murder , " and quietly goes on packing the wives and children of its brave defenders upon a system " which justifies the expectation that the Government burdens will be lessened some twenty-five per cant , before the arrival of the good shir ) at her destination .

    The victims of the Great ¦ Tasmania werei stout stalwart soldiers , men who had stood that eiwftd siege of Lucknow , and with a heroism never surpassed- maintained the honour of their country in its utniost need . Bronzed and seasoned .. warriors , able to stand the heat of India , the fatigues of long inarches untired , and the privations ok-a . scanty commissariat . They were men of whorn , with all . their faults , any country might be proud , arid whose stalwart forms any general : \ yould have been delighted to see in his ranks . But they had offended the ( rovemiueut of India . by their assertion of a claim to a small sum of bounty ; They had been enlisted by the East India Company * , and they , asked that their transfer to the crown ' should be aecquvp . iuiied by the : . same

    consideration given them upon their original .. enlistment ,.. I heir claim , if not technically just , was fair enough . The omnipotence of an Act of Parliament may be pleaded against them , but . undoubtedly-Parliament had- no equitable right to tnuisfbr . these men from the Company to the Crown as somany head of cattle . The mryi supported- . their claim by the . opinion , of Lord ; , Palme R . STON-, who , referring to possible objections to the transfer of the European-army , said that the men would rto . doubt bo satisfied by a small bounty . Lord Cansinu and his advisers were , however , pedantic formalists , niid" preferred to endanger the safety of India rather than depart from the letter of the law . The iu ' tm -continued--to ur ^ e-their- demands , and a few

    mutinied ! The Governor-General , then alarmed , oll ' itrcd the men , not the bounty , bat a discharge , accompanying it by the menace that they would ; not be allowed to enlist again in India , the effect of which , ho anticipated , would be fo frighten them from accepting the discharge . The men , however , took his offer ; and 30 , just when England mosl needed men in the East , the best men for that service were b ^ iiifr sent mvjiy . in thousands . 3 Iauy of tin ? men huvo been in England some time , iuid are now serving in the regular army .. They belonged' to the Madras and Bombay presidencies , and were treated witli-as-mucli-oousidemtio . il us is usually given to the common soldier . The unfortunate thousand who came by thai Great

    Tasmania -belonged to Bengal ; and" they have boeu Hindu to feel tlie full weight of oHicla ' I , spite . They were niorclusd down from the interior at a season of the year whwi it was known tlvat the march would be severe and clangorous . They were then kept at the depot at Chinsurah , and left completely at tlio mercy of a sergeant-major , the proprietor of this canteen , who used every inducement ' tq make them drink , and uveti took thu , clothes off their batiks iu payment . Tlusy wero put on board the vessel in this-ill-clad , hall-drunken , stuto ' , predisposed to disease by the fatigue which the Government had wantonly exposed them to , uixil the- excesses which it had almost forced them to commit . Crowded together iu this vessel , they hud to food upon pro * food

    visions absolutely unfit for human food ; not only was-the had , but none of the ordinary precautions to prevent disease wore taken . There wero no ' disinfectants on board , and the lime-juice wns . so bad as to ho valueless . It was known that the ship would arrive at Liverpool in the winter , yut there was no supply of blankets , Too men wero put on bourd the vessel in a condition which the Calcutta authorities well knew rendered'thuja liable to disease . Th'ey were supplied , with provisions which were bud , and wluoh—it is no use blinking the fact—the officers who signed tho report stating that thoy were good must have known to be biul ' . They were destitute of the absolute necessaries , for their condition . Is it wonderful , then , that more than sixty of the poor fellowa have died , aud that many more have contracted diseases which must ere long carry

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    March 31 , I 860 ] The Leader and Saturday Analyst . 297

    Our Brave Defenders.

    OUR BRAVE DEFENDERS .

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), March 31, 1860, page 297, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2340/page/5/