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h ^§£0 THE LEADER. [Saturday,
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VINE CHOLERA AND HUMAN MILDEW. " The Chu...
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LORD DERBY'S "SCIENCE" A EEiiATrvE of Lo...
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SHEFFIELD—ITS TOWJT COUNCIL AND ITS POLI...
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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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Sunday Excursions And Sunday Licences. A...
^ Ow ^ B ^ " £ ** tS $ jf ^ 0 P $ $ i tfptofo proper application for open-¦^ ^ l ^ Sa ^ Si ^ SjB ^ q & rentertainment on the Sunday , -- » '' f- - ^! t ^^^ iLv ;^ a gial accommodation of excur-^ iv ^ 'bi ^ iS ^^^ u ^ as those who visit Hampstead , "'• ' L ^^ H apaptbii' OoiLirt , Epping Forest , Gravesend , ' ' ,- ' ( afcjSe ^ Wich / ' ^ r Richmond . The Sunday li-• £ © Sce wbulS ? rest upon its own grounds ; inighfe'be made quite a separate affair , and might fairly be bought for a separate fee . But at all events do not let us continue to debar the people of great towns from those rational excursions into the country which have been especially intended for them , by placing a parliamentary prohibition upon refreshments .
H ^§£0 The Leader. [Saturday,
h ^§ £ 0 THE LEADER . [ Saturday ,
Vine Cholera And Human Mildew. " The Chu...
VINE CHOLERA AND HUMAN MILDEW . " The Church in danger ! " most assuredly , for the jolly full bottle" has got the cholera . We are scarcely using a metaphor . The dear black bottle , which , gives its name as the designation of the soundest parts of the Church of England , is sick ; it has contracted an hereditary disease I The parent vine has been for a few years under the influence of a serious malad y * which , in the district of Alto Douro , has affected the plants , probably to the number of 80 , 000 , 000 , has put in peril of actual destruction property estimated to be worth 4 , 000 , 000 ? ., and has teazed proprietors and wine dealers with the harassing question of a " remedy . " The history of the disease is interesting : ¦—" The Alto-Douro , " says the Globe , following a paper by M > . J . J . Forrester , in the proceedings of the Royal Society , " comprises a tract 6 f very variable elevation ; at Baleira , the river runs at an elevation of not more than 250 feet ; while tlie Sierra do Marao attains an elevation of 4500 feet from the level of the sea ; the intermediate tract forming a long irregular basin , girt by granite chains , and thus protected from winds that might damage the vine . In 1851 the season was favourable ; the vines were vigorousi and produced perfect fruit , and the vintage of that year was excellent . The following year was wet and cold , and a blight appeared on the vines , which were attacked at the rate of about one in
every 1500 , and the vintage in that year was very inferior . Rain , sleet , hail , and bleak winds , extinguished the spring of 1853 , and floods impeded the navigation . In June , however , the sun burst forth with intense vigour , leaving the nights v « ry cold ; and again in March , 1854 , only lialf cargoes could be brought down the river Douro for want of water . In the meanwhile , the plants suffered severely ; in many places the fruit withered , in others less exposed the grapes grew no larger than peas ; while some plants , again , continued to show their accustomed vigour . But it is remarked that even these
healthy plants , in most instances , show traces of the disease , even after the fruit wais gathered in 1853 . The grapes which at first promised abundance of wine were filled with seeds , each berry containing from three to five instead of two or three stones . The quantity and quality were seriously afflicted ; ¦ w hereas 21 baskets of grapes uaually produce a pipe of wine , in 1853 that quantity could barely be obtained from thirty baskets ; and whereas seven to nine pipes of ordinary wine give a pipe of brandy 20 per cent , above British proof , in 1853 from ten to twelve pipes of ordinary wine were required . "
The land where the vine grows was formerly divided into two districts—one in which the best wines of distinct classes were produced , and the other where wines were grown only to a small extent for local conaumption and distillation . Now , the two districts have become one ; the plantations of pines on the heights , and the com-producing valleys , having alike been convertod into vineyards . In other words , human avarice
has forced tho vino to grow , not only , as it often , does , by tho side of tho more northern wheat , but by tho aide of the pino-troe , to whose soil and climato it is alien and repugnant . r Xhe vino has been forced against nature , not oncouragod according to nature j and after that fact , ivo aoo growing up within three short yoara a disease that threatens to destroy the plant . It seema to originate with the unhealthy planta , and thqnco to bo communicated to tho healthy elaas . It is a . sporadic disease .
It evidently resembles in its nature the disease of the potato plant ; and it is a question even . more important for some classes of the English people than the portwine question , whether the potato disease may not have been , produced in the same way ? "We bad potatoes , and they flourished in the land : we forced them to grow on unsuited soils , content to increase the quantity at the expense of quality ; and a disease springs up -which threatens to destroy strong as well as weakly . Is this a " judgment" on men for attempting- to overrrule the laws of nature ?
The disease which afflicts the vine , like that of the potato , appears , according to very probable conjecture , to resemble the great man disease of the present day—the cholera . According to " the Fungoid theory " of microscopical inquirers , man , like the potato he eats and the wine he drinks , is dying of a mildew . How far is this also to a judgment ? "We force numbers to live in crowded neighbourhoods , which even if they were uncrowded would be wrong abodes for men ; and have we thus engendered a disease which spreads even to the healthy quarters— which , engendered in St . Giles ' s , invades St . James's , and carries off a Jocelyn as well as the anonymous thousands ?
Lord Derby's "Science" A Eeiiatrve Of Lo...
LORD DERBY'S " SCIENCE " A EEiiATrvE of Lord Derby recently said , "• What ' a wonderful man nay would be if he were not so frightfully ignorant ! " Ijord Derby confirms that impression of him among his family , who should know him best , by remarking , at Liverpool , this week , that he was educated in the pre-scientific period , and is , therefore , totally ignorant of " science . " Lord Derby is not ashamed of his ignorance . The Tambov story would have ruined any other public man ; Lord Derby was the first to suggest " How the deuce should I know Tambov wasn't a port ? " He was educated in the pre-geographical period , too . His notion , evidently is , that men should not be expected to keep their knowledge abreast of their time . The English Peerage generally is the most ignorant class in Europe ; or Lord Derby would not have become premier peer . He is premier peer because he is so remarkably " smart" — making up for astounding ignorance . But Lord Derby should qualify his confession , aa an . ignoramus , by a reference to that notorious fact . He did not define " science ; " while it is well known that he is remarkably scientific — in his way —• as a sportsman and a politician . At Doncaster , last week , the course beheld the singular spectaclo of a great jockey getting mauled instead of caressed as ho walked his winning horso from the post to
the stable . Why ? He had sold , said the mob , one race to win this—he had sold the St . Loger cup to " bag" this third-rate handicap stakes . Ho was Lord Derby ' s jockey ; and the reporter who chronicles the scene observes with fine irony— "Tho public indignation was so intense that it was very fortunate Lord Derby had left the town . " Lord Derby bad started by train to meet tho men of science at Liverpool .
Wo disdain tho malignity which suggests that Lord Derby was particeps of the " sell " with his jockoy . Lord Derby is chivalrous on tho turf as on tho floor of the House of Lords . But wo may remark without oftbneo tho singular similarity of Derbyism on tho turf and Derby ism on politics . Scott , the jockey , or train or , is a Mnjor Borosford—a Stafforda l ^ orbca Mnckou / ao —~ in short , a Dorbyile . We do not for a moment imagine that Scott could " sell" a race : mobbed at Doncixator , he was just aa much tho victim of a Coalition aa
was Beresford when he was kicked out of the War-office , as -was Stafford when he trembled tefore a Committee of Inquiry , as was Maclienzie when ousted from his seat for Liverpool . These different gentlemen -were , like Mr . Scott , unfortunate : misunderstood , they "were suspected—but wrongly . Of this they have given tho most sacred private
assurances . Yet , unfortunate Lord Derby !—so chivalrous ! yet served by jockeys so suspected ! Ye shall know a man by his acquaintance , says the proverb of the pre-scientific period ; but if the proverb were good for anything , interpreted in a scientific period , it might be varied in this way : Ye shall know the acquaintance by the man . According to the proverb , Lord Derby would be a Derbyite ; but the reduction of the proverb is this—that all the Derbyites are chivalrous ; which is absurd .
When Mr . Disraeli , riding Protection , won Office , 'he escaped the fate of his colleague Scott—only Newdegate , and Butt , and one or two more , mobbed him ; it happened to "be the "interest" of the general crowd that he should sell the agricultural stakes . But as in all the se instances the Derby tactique is identical , we should be careful how we bet in Tory politics at present- Lord Derby has entered the horse " Protestant , " with Mr . Disraeli's colours—shot silk—for the next Parliamentary races jr ^ there can be no doubfc about that fact . We wonder what is the real aim ?
Sheffield—Its Towjt Council And Its Poli...
SHEFFIELD—ITS TOWJT COUNCIL AND ITS POLITICS . Accident ? gave me ten days' leisure in Sheffield , and curiosity induced me to devote it to the Towu Council . The Council Chamber , decorated somewhat in "the style of the Pompeian House at the Crystal Palace , possesses bountiful accommodation for visitors and auditors , and ia an agreeable interior . The Council , an animated and pungent body , occupy one end of the Chamber , and administer local affairs and animadvert on each other with an energy peculiar to Sheffield .
On this day a refractory Councilman had given notice of motion on the conduct of the magistrates , in having refused the lessee of the theatre her license because she had let it to a gentleman from Ohio , who had delivered certain lectures considered by the Bench not up to the magisterial standard of orthodoxy . Mr . Alderman Dunn , a rollicking , unctuous species of political pedagogue—one of those cacchinatory saints who , he roasted you at all would roast you with a guffaw—openly declared on the Bench that the license could not be granted because the theatre had been let to Mr . Joseph Barker , the heretical lecturer from Ohio . "Whereupon Mr , Isaac Ironside , tlie aforesaid refractory
Councillor , gives notice of motion of censure upon tho Bench . Between the period of giving notice and debating the said motion , tho Bench—as Aberdeen did lately by Layard—forestal the Councillor—the Bench redecido Mrs . Scott ' s caso ( that ia , the case of tho lady who ia lessee of tho theatre ) upon new grounds ; they find her son , the manager ' s , conduct defective in secular particulars—the rcliyious reason is thrown over—Mr . Alderman Dunn is instructed to cat the look in public , which ho does , and declares that ho merely apoko his own individual opinion—not that of tho Beach . This was some atonement to public opinion and right principle , but tho discussion in Council proceeded nevertheless .
Tho mover of tho motion indulged his colleagues with fuels of persecution beginning with tho Ep istle to tho Hebrews—taking WioklifF on the way—and then coming down to tho motion . Tho Mayor very naturally thought this unnecessary , but hia moilo of saying ao was a no less astonishing digression from tho record . of ofllciul dignity . With looks of contempt and woada of intense irritation , he charged the speaker with concealing tho lator decision of the Bench . Ho , tho Mayor , ruled , and very properly , thut tho Epistle to tho Hebrews and "Wickliff might bo diaponscd with , but added , " You know very well
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Sept. 23, 1854, page 12, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_23091854/page/12/
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