_April 4th._--The Government would have been beaten on the Irish question if the division had taken place earlier than it did. John O'Connell would speak, and the time he gave saved a defeat. We are now involved in a maze of endless delays, but the news of the great victory at Sobraon and termination of the Sikh war has put the world in such good spirits, and filled everybody with such joy, that for the time everything else has been almost forgotten. There certainly never was anything more complete than this piece of Indian history, so grand and so dramatic, such a glorious mixture of bravery and moderation, and such a display of national dignity and power. Auckland said to me last night that it was impossible to pick a fault if you wished to do so. He approves of everything that Hardinge has done. The Duke was very energetic in the House of Lords on the thanks; and it is a fine thing for him to have lived to see his military children covering themselves with glory on the scene of his own first achievements half a century ago, and himself still hale, fresh, and his intellect vigorous and unclouded. [Sidenote: TRIUMPH OF FREE TRADE.] The delay that the Protectionists have contrived to make in the Free Trade measures is proving fatal to their cause, for it is now past a doubt that a great change has been produced over all the country _among the farmers_. They do not care for, do not dread, the repeal of the Corn Laws, but they do most particularly wish to have the question settled. The evidences of this change are not to be mistaken, and many of the Protectionists admit it. They find to their astonishment that there is no depreciation in landed property, that there is no difficulty in letting farms, and that rents are generally rising rather than falling.