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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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As regards the production of wealth in England , everybody knows that it is going on at a more rapid rate than in any old country in the world . " What we want to know , however , is the cause of the very imperfect distribution of all the enormous wealth annually produced in Great Britain , compared with the more healthy state of things in our colonies ; still more , the causes of the bad distribution of industry , which gives not enough to eat , and too much , a plethora , of things needless for life . In another passage he inadvertently supplies us with an explanation . " Otago and other
colonies , " says our contemporary , in a rather sneering style , " may be nice places for patronized deserving labourers ; but for ambitious wealthseeking men , the old country is the place . " In other words , England is the finest place in the world for the few to make wealth out of the wretchedness of the many . In Australia and those other colonies of which our Ministerial contemporary speaks so contemptuously , as " nice places for patronized deserving labourers , " we learn from the last accounts , that the wages of a married couple with a family , range from £ 30 to £ 35 per annum with rations , which means 12 lb . of flour , 12 lb . of
butcher s meat , 1 $ lb . of sugar , and 4 ounces of tea per week for each man , and a proportionate allowance for the other members of his family . Well may the Economist speak of such a colony as " a nice place for a labourer . " In this country , we have lately seen millions of human beings reduced to live , or rather starve , on a pound , or at most a pound and a half of Indian corn meal or oatmeal per day . By comparing such rations with
those of the Australian labourer , some notion may be formed of the difference between the old country and her colonies , as regards the condition of the mass of the people in the two countries . But , notwithstanding all this , let it never be forgotten that , " the old country is the place for ambitious , wealthseeking men" ! Did it never occur to the Economist to ask whether it might not be possible to manage matters so that England could become a much more comfortable residence , than Australia ?
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THE DEPOPULATION OF IRELAND . From a Government and a Legislature which can waste a whole session of Parliament in discussing such a measure as the Papal Aggression Bill , it would be monstrous folly to expect any serious consideration of the Condition-of-Ireland Question . Two months ago an attempt was made by Sir H . W . Barron to obtain the appointment of another
Irish Distress Committee—the sixty-fourth during the present century—and notwithstanding his own very indifferent advocacy of such a step , and the feeble support he received from the Irish members , the motion was all but carried against Government . Sir Henry Barron affirmed very truly that '" Irish distress has been caused by bad legislation , " hut when he descended to particulars , and endeavoured to show that " the disastrous Poor Law" was one
of the worst measures ever inflicted upon that unhappy country , he only made himself ridiculous . That the Poor Law has been a most disastrous measure for the landlords is beyond all doubt . Hundreds of that wretched class of gentry , who were three-fourths ruined before 1845 , are now left without a shilling . Twelve years ago Carlyle warned them that they could not carry on their oppression much longer with safety . In that chapter of his Chartism entitled "The Finest Peasantry in
the World , " he says : — " The time has come when the Irish population must either be improved a little , or else exterminated . Plausible management , adapted to this hollow outcry or to that , will no longer do ; it must be management grounded on sincerity and fact , to which the truth of things will respond , by an actual beginning of improvement to these wretched brother men . " The enactment of the Poor Law was one step in the right direction , and the Encumbered Estates Act another ; but
neither of tlieise measures will raise the peasantry of Ireland to that condition of comfort and security which they ought to occupy . Now , what with rack-rents , evictions , and oppressive poor-rates , the few who belong to the middle class are rapidly becoming fewer . Seeing no prospect of an early settlement of the landlordand-tcnant question , the small farmers who have a few pounds left are going oft' to America in thousands . The depopulation from pestilence and emigration iH described as frightful in some districts . The Galway Vindicator gives one parish in that county na an instance where the population is now little more than one-half of what it whs in 1841 . The number of emigrants , chiefly lriBli ,
who sailed from Liverpool during the first four months of the present year was 67 , 130 , against 49 , 463 , during the same period of last year ; an increase of 35 per cent . The Roscommon Journal says that county is nearly depopulated . " Every comfortable farmer and able-bodied labourer have either gone or are preparing to go to America . " This wholesale emigration , should it go on increasing for a few years , as it threatens to do , will bring about a settlement of the land question in a somewhat
forcible way . Instead of that desperate competition for land which has led to so much misery in Ireland , there will soon be a competition for tenants . If nothing else will bring the landlords to their senses , the emigration bids fair to do it , and we hail that movement as one that gives a promise of better days to the working men of both Great Britain and Ireland ; for without an improvement in the condition of the Irish peasantry no substantial improvement can take place in England .
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THE CRIME OF BEING GREEN . To be the victim of criminals is itself a crime , and subjects you to punishment . To be the utterer of forged coin is to incur transportation ; but to accept , false coin unwittingly is , by the help of magisterial discrimination , to incur severe castigation , irrespectively of the loss of the money . Nay , to tender money at all , if it be to a timid mistrustful person , is to brave no inconsiderable risk . Country people have felt this severely on their visit to London . At the Mansion-house , " two young men of very respectable appearance , " apparently from Liverpool , were charged with attempting to pass a bad £ 5 note : it proved to be a genuine note , and the prisoners were discharged . But meanwhile , they had passed a night at the station-house for the crime of a doubt existing in the mind of Mr . Blossom , of the Old Globe public-house , as to the
validity of a note which he had refused to change , and which , therefore , remained in the pocket of the gentleman that owned it . Mr . Blossom , it seems , is a punctilious as well as cautious man , and to have in j-our pocket a note respecting which he has doubts , though the Bank cashier has none , may subject you to pass a night of probationary imprisonment in the station-house .
The case of Mr . William Symington , of Bradford , is still worse . The young gentleman comes with a party to see the Exposition and other London sights , the Thames Tunnel being one : in the tunnel he buys a memorandum-book , and tenders a sovereign in payment : much delay in getting change ; much talk among stall-keepers , and bandying about of the sovereign : and at last Mr . Symington is given into custody on a charge of uttering forged coin—twice presented . He is taken before the magistrate at the Thames Police Office , who consents to admit bail , but declines
non-residents . Next day , it is discovered that there is " no case " : the sovereign produced in court unquestionably is not genuine ; but there is no proof that the sovereign originally offered by Mr . Symington was other than good , and he is " discharged . " But what is to compensate him for the night ' s imprisonment , or for the distress of mind consequent on being subjected to terrible formalities as t /* tnere had been " a case * ' ?
Much bad coin is afloat just now , also much foreign coin . It is a common thing for you to be suddenly called back , after you have paid for some article , or for a cab fare , with the cry , "This is not a shilling , sir , it is a franc , " or the like ; and undoubtedly the coin " returned" to you is not English , or is bad : but what proof have you that you gave the coin which is professedly returned to you with such an air of suddenness and spontaneity ? None . And yet , if you have unwittingly taken a
franc or a bad coin , as cabmen and waiters profess to have done , and if you pay it away again without having scrutinized it , you are liable to all the public formalities and the nightly lodging bestowed upon the real " smasher . " And while cabmen , waiters , and oLhcrs , ho politely forego the advantage and amusement of taking you before a magistrate , for having had base or illegal coin " returned" to you , you ought positively to feel obliged for the humanity which hj ) uich the castigation inflicted on the Liverpool and Bradford young Kcntlcinen .
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T U IS OONTllOU I . <) V 1- I It 13 . On k thought struck us as we surveyed the burning of the warehouBiH at London-bridge . The lire , which raged to so great an extent as to threaten every building in its neighbourhood , and which appeared more like the roar « g crater of a volcano than an ordinary conflagration ,
broke out in so singular a manner , and was so confhTd at first in its operations , that it might readily have b put out by any means which could have been brought bear on it on the instant . Those who have seen th ° Fire Annihilator at Vauxhall could not fail to think h * the presence of one of Phillips's machines at the outbr ll of the fire would have been the means of averting th vast destruction . In a few minutes those flames would have been called back and trampled down into darkneg The fine for neglecting that instrument of safety is ' esf " mated at £ 150 , 000 .
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REFKESHMENT BOOMS AT THE EXPOSITIO N POR THE "WOKKEBS . Respectability ia shocked at Labour , whose representatives carry baskets of victuals to the Exposition , and there devour it under the very eyes , and , w hat is worse beneath the nose , of Refinement . Now , people must eat ' and drink too , at the Exposition ; or why refreshments- ! ices , jellies , confections , and refreshing drinks , for—those who can pay for them ? If Refinement , justly outraged at the spectacle of bread and cheese and orange-peel will reflect , it will perceive that Labour can ' t afford Luxuries . Now , orange-peel and the vulgar necessaries of life we readily admit to be unsightly in the Fairy Palace . But we respectfully submit to the Royal Commission whether accommodation , no matter how rude , could not be provided at the Palace for those whom poverty and frugality compel ta carry their own refreshments ?
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A BUSSIAN PATRIOT DELIVERED UP BY AUSTRIA . Bakoonin ' s fate is decided . In our number of the 14 th instant we stated that he had been sentenced to death by an Austrian court-martial , for an " offence " committed in Saxony ; but that the sentence had been commuted to carcere duro , or solitary and harsh imprisonment for life . Bakoonin had taken part in the Dresden revolution , which was put down by Prussian bayonets ; he is tried by an Austrian court-martial , and now , it appears , the ¦ entencc is to be executed by Russia . From a trustworthy correspondent we learn that he has been delivered up to Russia , and it follows that he will end his days in Sibnia . " We are told that when Bakoonin was conveyed to Russia , he did not know whither he was going ; but supposed , of course , that he was on his way to an Austrian fortress . At Mikhalovitse he perceived the Russian gendarmes , and then he knew the fate that awaited him .
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SOCIAL REFORM . II . " THE DIFFICULTY . " TO JOHN GBAY , OF BAIUIOWFOBD . Hammersmith , June 23 , 1831 . My deab John Gbay , —The difficulty which I promised to discuss in this letter , is singular for beinp ; at once the one which ia the least pi evalent amonj ; the working-classes , and yet is the most fatal to them . I will not call it insincerity , nor falsehood , nor want of earnestness ; but it is that habit of" tlu ; day which , makes us content with an abatement < A the truth , not only in word , but in deed . I do not mean content to accept , with charity or resignation , the short-coming of others , but contentment in ourselves to fall short of that which we should think it right to say or do . This is a failing , I repeat , not peculiar to the working-classes ; on the contrary , they are less guilty of it than other classes . There are not many men of the People who entertain one set of opinions in private , and keep another Bet of opinions for public use ; though among classes "high" in the social sca ^ e , as men acquuinted with pructical politics are well aware , it is very common to hear from experienced politicians , that they quite agree in this or that opinion , but that they do not think it " safe , < t " prudent , " or " politic , " "to go so far , " or rather to say that they go so far . Perhaps , the most t angible effects of this weakness are , that the public action oi thcountry is really inferior to the public intelligt " tuii ti 10 luuuv iniciiv / i \\ / /
e ^ iijit ^ \; y . j i . in . < jm « - »«»« ----- * - « of the country , and that the timidity begets the usua want of self-reliance and confidence on the part o others . In history , the eonduct of our public men vnu seem as compared with what it might be , « nint ellig « » timid , and mistrustful . The middle class , I arnanxiou » to hope , in juBt awakening to a consciousness ot o things in lit aven and earth than thoae comprehencie in the philosophy of trade . 1 not only point to l ^ broad tacts before our eyes , of labour Bent awny » ° . ' ^ the land to the workhouse , and land lying idle , wn ^ vast numbers have not enough to live upon . « i » proof that the laws of mero trado are insufficient ^ secure a practically sound oeconomy , but I ul 8 ° P " ^ g to the immense auorecate of annual bankruptcy »
proof that tho system in unsound . The Ixll ( ., clnoflCH arc beginning , to understand how mucn ^ tricks of trade have been turned against that so" ^ nees and confidence which were the bouI and hui n - stance of English commerce ; and furthermore , i u mind trained up among tho tricks of trade " ! j ^ t narrowed and enfeebled , even until it is too smuU tho enjoyment and duties of life .
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608 . Cfte ft * after * [ Saturday ,
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), June 28, 1851, page 608, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1889/page/12/
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