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June 8, 1850.] ffl&t &$&&*?* 259
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A Sunday in London. ByJ. M. Capes, M.A. ...
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NOTES AND EXTRACTS. Emigration. —Let no ...
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THE LYRIC DRAMA. The "awful excitement" ...
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WATER, SOIL, AND CLIMATE. There are no d...
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Transcript
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Newman's Phases Of Faith. Phases Of Fait...
its reading-room and library , easily formed and replenished , should be open freely and gladly to all . Such an edifice , rightly planned and constructed , might become , and I confidently hope would become , a most important instrumentality in the great work of advancing the labouring class in comfort , intelligence , and independence . I trust we need not long await its erection , " Mr . Melson , who reprints this address , also adds , " A few Thoughts for a Young Man , " both things making a serviceable little pamphlet . The Bury Observer , and Herald of the Good Time Coming . A Monthly Journal of Social and Political Reform . Ho . 3 . Bury : Benjamin Glover ; Manchester : Joseph Johnson . In this cheap and well-conducted Periodical the true interests of the people are advocated in a manner which at once does credit to its conductors , and shows the state of public opinion in the district wherein it circulates . The temperance cause , the franchise extension , sanitary reform , the abolition of the taxes on knowledge , all are discussed with zeal , temper , and ability , while some " simple annals of the poor , " e . g ., " My Temptations , " by a Poor Man , indicate heart-feeling and power of description , which would do honour to any class of writers . We are not unconscious of the difficulties which beset a provincial periodical , but we trust that in the case of the Bury Observer they will be overcome by the local as well as general support which it indisputably deserves .
June 8, 1850.] Ffl&T &$&&*?* 259
June 8 , 1850 . ] ffl & t & $ &&*?* 259
A Sunday In London. Byj. M. Capes, M.A. ...
A Sunday in London . ByJ . M . Capes , M . A . Longman and Co . ElUe Forestierre , A Novel . By John Brent , Esq . Author of " The Battle Cross , " "The Sea Wolf , " & c . 3 vols . T . C . Newby . Penelope Wedgebone : the Supposed Heiress . By Lieut .-Colonel Hort , Author of" The Horse Guards , " The White Charger , " & c . Embellished with Eight coloured Etchings on Steel , by Alfred Ashley . J . and D . A . Darling . Washington Irving's Tales of a Traveller . ( Bohn ' s Shilling Stries ) . Washington Irving ' s Sketch Book . ( Bohn ' s Shilling Series ) . Washington Irving ' s Tour on the Prairies . ( Bohn ' s Shilling . Series ) . Washington Irving's Legends of the Conquest of Spain and Granada . 2 vols . ( Bohn ' s Shilling Series ) . Pictorial Half-Hours . Edited by Charles Knight . Tart I . C . Knight . The Imperial Cycloptedia—( Cyclopepdia of Geography ) . Part II . C . Knight .
Notes And Extracts. Emigration. —Let No ...
NOTES AND EXTRACTS . Emigration . —Let no poor man emigrate in search of employment . The labour market in such a state of society as that of an agricultural colony , in which every settler is himself a labourer , working for his own subsistence , on his own lot of land , and with " no capital , in general , to t > ay wages with but his growing crops , is necessarily very limited , and easily overstocked . The high wages , the three , four , and five shillings a-day for common labour or ordinary handicraft-work , which the crimps of the land companies talk of , and advertise , and write home about , are barefaced deceptions . What are the products of any of our colonies that can afford such wages ? Is it wheat , or timber , or wool , that can afford five shillings a-day for common labour in producing them , or working about them , or that can enable the owner of them to pay high wages continually , for any kind of work , however much he may require it ? A rate of wages , higher than the value of the products of a colony to the producers can afford , is no safe ground for a working-man to emigrate upon , Such rates soon find their true level ; and that is a bare subsistence for part of the year , and in the winter half-year , or when a job of work is finished , no wages , and no out-door work to be found within a hundred miles . It is only in a dense population , with classes too opulent to work themselves , that a working-man can find steady employment . He can find none in a population of small proprietors , working themselves with their families on their own land , and requiring no hired labourers for its cultivation , and with no means to pay them if they did require them . —Laing ' s Observations on Europe . "The Present and the Future . —We will write no diatribe against our age ; the more so as we see in it the issue to a brighter . Deep in the centre of the aristocratic era one may detect the germs of that which was to follow ; and so , amidst the multitudinous forms of our present life , it is not difficult to discern the openings of a new state . If nothing else pointed to it , we should be content to rest upon the before-mentioned characteristic of our age—solicitude for the people . It is a new feature ; it has new motives , and will produce new results . The people have been " cared for " ere now ; but never have their wants , their wishes , and their rights been scrutinized as they are now . It is becoming a generally accepted truth that society is to be the expression of our national life , and that the nation is not one class , but all classes ; that a glorious constitution which permits such accumulated misery to decimate and madden the vast majority , however " glorious " it may be to the more fortunate classes , cannot , on the whole , be pronounced a " 1 st and wise system ; that such inequalities at present exist between the wealthy capitalists and their operatives cannot long continue strictly as they are . The his * tory of the thirty years' peace painfully obtrudes this fact upon our notice , for it shows us the most striking and universal advance in political knowledge and popular tendencies ; and we are forced to reflect that this advance has not been accompanied by any adequate increase of comfort to the operatives , but rather by a gradual depreciation of labour . Now , we ask any serious man whether he can believe that knowledge will continue expanding the minds of the many , and wealth and privilege continue to be the lot of the few ? Can the nation bo taught its strength and its rights , yet suffer itstlf to be governed in the interests of a few circJes ? There can pe but one answer . —British Quarterly Revie \ o May *
The Lyric Drama. The "Awful Excitement" ...
THE LYRIC DRAMA . The " awful excitement" which the lessee of her Majesty ' s Theatre is manufacturing for La Tempesta , has been this week somewhat injudiciously worked . Bills announcing the opera for Thursday were issued at the beginning of the week , and kept all over the town until Thursday morning , when the opera was suddenly changed to Lucia , the " preparations " for La Tempesta being so gigantic , that it was necessary to postpone its production until Saturday , No
reason can justify such a proceeding . If the opera could not be brought out on Thursday , it should not have been advertised ; and if it could , it should have been , whatever was the consequence . Tickets and boxes had been largely disposed of on the faith of the production of a new opera , and the public had a right to be earlier informed of the change . The lessee of this establishment must take timely warning , or he may find that there is a limit to the gullibility even of the subscribers to her Majesty ' s Theatre .
At the Royal Italian Opera , we must pass over the Barbiere di Siviglia with a word of commendation on Ronconi ' s * ' Figaro" and Madame Castellan ' s ** Rosina , " to dwell on the " Leporello" of Herr Formes , a performance which gave to the Don Giovanni , on Thursday evening , an interest entirely new . The traditional buffoonery of this part , up to the present time , has become an integral portion of the opera . It is an easy thing for a vocalist to find favour with an audience by being funny , and , therefore , has " Leporello" hitherto appeared to us as the mere conventional ' * comic servant . " But Herr
Formes is a true artist , and barters not his reputation for laughter . To attempt to reach sublimity in any portion of the part of * ' Leporello" requires courage—to succeed in it requires genius—and the effect produced upon the audience by the truthful reading of Formes will fully prove that buffoonery is not the only method of gaining applause . We do not mean that parts of ** Leporello" are not intended to be comic . Formes makes them so , reserving the
oiher phases of his character to be developed by circumstances . Hence in the churchyard and the last scene nothing could be more natural than , the intensity of his iear—prostrated with excess of terror , his cowering before the ghost was positively appalling-, and a breathless silence replaced the roars of laughter with which this scene is usually enlivened . In a word , Formes has for the first time given an intellectual view of " Leporello , " and it is no longer a part for ** funny men . "
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Water, Soil, And Climate. There Are No D...
WATER , SOIL , AND CLIMATE . There are no doubt many people who ask what all this trouble means about water , drainage , and sewage . When we consider that in these are involved all , or nearly all , that is comprehended in the word climate , there will be no difficulty in seeing their great importance . We all believe in differences of climate ; we find that in towns there is a great difference in the amount of deaths , and in countries there is a great difference in the vigour of health during life . It has never yet been clearly made out to what the difference is owing , although many facts are well known about it . To some , all the evils of a town life are summed up in the word smoke ; and we have a better chance of life in Rutland than we have in Manchester , because there is less soot : we have cleaner hands , cleaner linen , and cleaner lungs . This may be , and is , no doubt , to some extent true ; but this will not explain one thing . Every one has felt the power of a fine mountain breeze ; it seems to bear life in it , and not merely to allow us to live more freely , and with fewer obstructions to our breathing , but it seems to breathe life into us ; and the word intoxicate , which has been used on such occasions , is really not too strong to express the glow of renewed health which we feel . Some have attributed all the evils of a bad climate to moisture ; but we who are Englishmen must not yield to such an opinion . We live in a moist climate which the Levantine despises ; the Egyptian pities us enveloped in constant fogs . But we know that the vigour of Englishmen is surpassed by none , and the cattle also partake of the fine qualities of the climate . It is not for us to run down a climate which makes us what we are . The glow of health is no where given on any cheeks , and the men neither grow into unwieldly hulks , nor are they wasted by a feverish haste in thought or in action . But it is a climate pleasant only to those whose habits are in accordance with it , not to those who have learned to live
out of doors in Italy , or to lie languid in artificially cooled rooms in India . That Italy is better even for consumptive patients is now by many strenuously denied ; but , however that may be , ours is a climate unusually temperate , with a vegetation unusually constant in its growth , with perpetual green fields well fitted for supplying food to animals , and rendering our island famous for its live stock , and , as it is generally expressed , for its beef .
It cannot , then , be said that here moisture makes an unhealthy climate ; the whole country is an example to the contrary , and our sailors living in moisture constantly are surely not sickened by the life they lead . But we know that there are evils attending an excess of moisture , especially in connection with vegetable matter , where decomposition is going on . We shall not try to prove that the products of such a decomposition are unwholesome ; it is now known by all to be true . As a matter affecting natural climate and health , it is , then , exceedingly important to know how to get
rid of the excess of moisture in such cases ; and this we have been taught by the agriculturists , who have shown us that the land for growing crops improves it also in climate . This respects drainage generally ; as to the drainage of towns , where there is a constant mass of refuse matter along with the water , agriculture may also give us a lesson . It has been the practice in all ages to get rid of all impurities by putting upon them upon the land , and no amount seems to render it impure . It has a purifying agency without limits . It is true that it has not been done with a sanitary purpose , but it has been done with a sanitary effect .
The theory of this effect has been illustrated to a great extent by Professor May . He has found that clay absorbs many salts , and organic matter to a great extent ; that the most offensive liquids passing through it become inodorous , and are , in fact , pure , or nearly pure , water . The same property is possessed by soils in proportion , as he thinks , to the amount of clay . This explains the agricultural value of clay in land . The soil , then , has the power of absorbing from liquids all that plants can use , and of retaining it with great power . It is not the plants merely , or it
would then happen that manure laid out on a field would make the atmosphere unwholesome until the plants grew up and consumed all their food . It is a provision of nature that the soil should be a receptacle for all matter which can conduce to growth , and that the water coming from it should not be a solution of the richness of the soil , but , on the contrary , pure water . If this were not the case , the water would have long ago removed all the mater capable of being converted into plants and animals , and the sea would have become the only wellinhabited district .
It is interesting to find , as Professor May seems to have done , the working agents in accomplishing this purpose . Soil , viewed in this light , becomes the great purifying agent of the climate . First , the air , by being washed by the rain , becomes pure , and the water , by passing through the soil , becomes also pure . It is also remarkable that with all our reasoning we seem here to be brought back to the original practice , to put the impurities upon the land , which is the only thing known that can purify large bodies of impure matter . The great sources of such water are the towns : when this sewage flows down a river it does not for a long time become decomposed ; if it were put upon land it
would be rapidly punned or deodorised , and the resulting water would flow again into the river perfectly clear . That is , as clear as river water j for that , after all , is water which has passed through manured fields . Chemistry has devised no method for doing this effectively ; but it seems that the natural is the cheapest method . The result appearsi simply to be this ; all the country is kept clean by the impurities being removed on the land . The water does not carry away these impurities , but leaves them in the soil . The towns may use the same method , and in purifying themselves , purify the rivers also .
All these questions , then , become one question , and one in which the whole nation is concerned . It is a simple routine of action ; there is no innovation in the ordinary established working of water courses and soil . As this becomes more generally known , there will be less difference of opinion about the mode of treating sewage water—and a more general desire on the side of the public to see these matters well settled every where . This is tha Physical Science which , after all , most concerns us as a society .
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), June 8, 1850, page 19, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_08061850/page/19/
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