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says the author of the " Night Thoughts ; " but the wheel , when it is doing- its duty as a wheel , makes , at the same time , its revolutions and its prosrress—^ a union of movemen ts which , in the case of our social and political wheel ,, we are often sadly disposed to doubt . It is difficult to forbear a smile when Goldsmith or Johnson—we Will vouch that it is one of them , though just now we forget whichcompares the stationary bird ' s nest with the ship , which is eternally improving ; " —yes , perhaps the same ship , dubiously , and at very great expense , at Chatham , cut , and sliced , and extended , and abbreviated . The latter is what we prefer to do with quotations , but one we shall yive in extenso , for it has dictated the present article , of which it will form a considerable part . It may make us despair , or ply the : rxe more manfully than ever at the root of the tree of corruption . Sheridan loquitur ; date March 15 th , 3 SOL
"It is known that out of the 120 gun-boats which the right honourable gentleman had in commission at the close of the last war , there were scarcely any retained as at all useful , and that sixty-two of them , which wei ' e purchased from contractors , were much the worst . Enough has been said by the honourable baronet of the kind of vessels which contractors generally built ; and without referring' to the ships of the line , of which the honourable baronet takes notice in proof of the badness of their materials and the inferiority of their workmanship , I shall only remark on these gunboats . I do not , indeed , like to dwell on the misconduct of inferior officers in any department . I do not wish to hear of such persons in this house " We should always look to the heads of those departments as the persons answerable to us . The navy board may be
suspected of haying played into the hands of the contractors during the last war , and p ' erhaps to that was owing the great inferiority of the right honourable gentleman ' s gun-boats—an inferiority which was certainly very glaring , for out of the 120 , 87 were sold after advertisement for almost nothing ; some which could not be disposed of were retained , and six were sent to Jersey , winch were found so utterly useless , that Captain D'Auvergne knew not what to do with them . . . . . Has the honourable gentleman observed the frauds exposed in the second report—the block and coopers ' contracts , where £ 2 , 000 have been paid for work proved not to be worth £ 200 ? . . . . What a melancholy expression that in those Yards , where there were 3 , 200 men employed , nothing more
Fox , in 1801 ( we cannot refer to the day ) , in his speech on the State of the Nation : — " Ten thousand Irish militia were to come to England , and ten thousand English to goto Ireland . Some of the troops wanted their new coats , some their arms . " No one can say that , in these points , we have degenerated from ouy ancestors . It is the same in the matter of general preparation . Enormous sums of money are paid for the defence of the country , yet , were it not for the patriotism and private expenditure of the volunteers , all parties are obliged to admit , that we should be but poorly provided in case of foreign invasion;—in other words , in spite of an income-tax , we are obliged for our safety and honour sake to tax ourselves doubly . We are on the very edge of danger before Government bestirs itself : such has always been our wont .
A member of the administration , and a man of no desponding temper , HekeY Fox , in his confidential letters at this period ( 174 . 5 ) , admits and deplores the state of public feeling . " England , " Wade says , "I believe , is for the first coiner ; and if you can . tell whether the 6 , 000 Dutch and the ten battalions of English , or 5 , 000 French or Spaniards will be here first , you know our fate . The French are not come , God be thanked ! but had 5 , 000 landed on any part of the island a week ago , I verily believe the entire conquest would not have cost them si battle . " Again , take the first Pitt , in 1777 , in his speech on the Address ( Majion ' s History , chap , xxviii . ) : — " My lords , what is the condition of your formidable and inveterate enemies ? . . They have a formidable navy . I say , my lords , their intentions are hostile . What have you to oppose " to them ? Not 5 , 000 men in this island , not more in Ireland . Without an immediate restoration of tranquillity , this nation is ruined , " &c .
We are certainly better off , rather , than when Chatham made this appeal ; but still the habit of the nation , or rather of its Governments , remains pretty much the same . If England has been saved ^ it has been owing to Providence , to the energy of the people when called out by necessity , and to , here and there , an honest and business-like man in our " administration . Time and taxation cannot be said to have taught us many lessons of providence or economy . A more democratic Government than those which have hitherto managed our business for us , might possibly be as careless , as corrupt , and more ignorant ; but in the articles of thrift , vigilance , and purity , the majority of those who have hitherto held the reins certainly " have had but little to boast of . - - ~
than-the-repair' of ships conld 'be done . They could only finish in these vards twenty-four sail of tlTe line , fifteen frigates , aiid-some few sloops , in the course oftwenty years , although it is known that forty-five shipwrights can build a ' seventyrfour' in one year . As there are-3 , 200 . shipwrights hi . those yards , and the expense conld not be less , in twenty yearsH than £ 1 . 100 , 000 , a sum equal to the Iniii'ding of the whole navy of England , it follows , " of course , that it is bail policy to continue theTnaintenance-of those dockyards . . . I assert , and am prepared to _ maintain the assertion , that abuse pervades every department of the system . Does the right honourable gentleman know . of . the frauds which the eommissioijerss have found to have been committed in every article with which these yards are furnished ?'' &c .
These places are Gibraltar-forts of immovable and corrupt routine . Energetic and patriotic officers have since nearly broken their hearts , and expended all their energies in trying to overcome the surd dead resistance of their interested and vicious S 3 -stem ; and so we are tared ^' roiii-gcneratioTTiw-generationnvnmercil' uHy-with ^ - I ^ gidature which cannot or will not defend us . " OIi , foolish Israel , never warned of Ml [ effectively ] , Still the same baits , and circumvented still . " Many of the calamitous blunders in connection with the Crimean campaign were mere echoes , " confirmatory ' of a striking expression of Makt . boroxtch ' s in one of his letters to Godoi / phin , Sept . 2 nd , 1702 , alluding to our commissariat— " England , that is famous for negligence . "
Our returning soldiers have been recently poisoned with bad provisions . An historian of the reign of Queen Annk says : — "We lost many of our seamen , who , as was said , wero poisoned by ill food ; and though great complaints were made of the victuallers "—precisely as at present , " yet there was not such care iahen to loo ] , ! into it as a waiter of sucJicovscquence deserved . " ( 170 : } . ) Of course not ; but wo are forgetting our Crimean echoes . Wo find in a speech of Fox ' s , in 177 l > : — " Had not all intelligence been deah'oyed by an invisible cabinet influence , could it ever have happened that there should ever have been , in ono of our latelycaptured islands , ono hundred and fifty pieces of ordnance and only forty men to work them ? Could there have been in one place cannon without balls : and , in another , balls without cannon ?" (
Let us take S'hkkidan again : April 21 st , 17 . ><> , when ho remonstrates on the " deplorable condition of the troops in consequence of excessive fatigue . . their want of proper clothing , and particularly thflir want of shoos . " Then , as now , wo suppose contractors hnd been pocketing the money which ought to have contributed to the comfort and efficiency of tho troops . Again , in tho same speech : " The hospitals in Mnrtinioo were crowded with British ofiicers and soldiere , who wore riot < mty ^ wounds . " . 1
HearSj rum pan ngnin , Feb . 10 th , 1800 ; - — " It lins been positively asserted , that tho army wan loft without baggngo-waggpns j thnt they were first cheered with tho hope thnt certain nhipH in Bight contained tbeso waggons , anil that afterwards their hopes wore damped on , being-told thnt tho waggons wero in sorno ships , but tho wheels we > -o in others . Wns it truo that aucih ignornnco prevailed of tho ronds in Holland , that the wngrgons which wore nfterwnrda employed proved useless ?"
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It was Horace , we believe , who ' no man u pe completely h . appy who was liable to a cold in the-head . So it lr . ay be flffirined that the possessor of property , or wealth , cannot account himself supremely blest ,-while he is subject to the dispensation of the Court of Chancery . It seems to be as easy for the man or woman of property to escape Chancery process , as for humanity in general to avoid the dfjluxusiiasa-. Erring man wij . l draw up * reckless conveyances , and go out in the rain without his umbrella . But who would have thought that the Abode of Love would ever get into Chancery ? Who would have thought that the Lobi > IliGir CiiAXCKr . Lon would ever get the head of Mr . Pkixck under his arm—Pjiince , tho perfect man , the Apostle of —urrrveTstrl—lm'er-brothei-lrootlr * aiid-ft-eonmJO ) i ~ p » H 9 er-kept-ttnd-di
6--pensed by Apostle Prince himself ! Yet so it is . H the course of love has run smoothly in the Agapemone , its peace at least has been rudely broken ; and here are the relatives of Miss Louisa Jv ^ e Notti dge disputing the right of Apostle Puince to a legacy left to him by the said Miss Louisa Jane Nottioge , on the ground that the said Miss Louisa Jank Nottidok was not in possession of her sound senses sit the time she made the will . It is possible that in this case Mr . Pimnce will have the law on his side . Tho deceased lady had been placed in a lunatic asylum by her relatives , but got out again on . establishing her sanity . So far it can be proved that Miss Nottibgk has been pronounced a sane person by competent authority . Ordinary judges , however , who arc not another view of
trammelled with professional competency , may take the matter , when they have boon favoured with a glimpse of tho internal economy of the Abode of Love , where Miss Nottijxjk resided under the spiritual and temporal care of . Apostle Prince * Prince , it appears , was originally a clergyman of the Church of England , but liml the misfortune twice to bu deprived of his license- — on the first ouension by the Bi » hop of Bath and Wucr . s , on tho second by the Bishop of Ely . Whether it was that Mr . Prince was too good or too bad for the Establishment wo are not aware ; but ho irrevocably lost his flock . A short time nfior this , he set up a chapel of his own in tho congenial soil of Brighton , and culled it tho Chapel of A oujxam . Here ho first began to discover thnt ho had a mission to perform , and beset himself to perform it accordingly . Ho ma-Indies of certain and his
nured to attnict a select audii-nee oJ a uge , new doetrineof'lovo and community oftemporal interests . became very popular with tho lender sox ; so popular , indued , thnt four sisters of the name of Norn doe , all posses-Vin tf considerable property , were found 'Willing to Ihrow their wealth , ovn portion or * their wealth y into a common stock , to enable Mr . Pkkmio to found au Abode ot Lf > vo , where they could all reside together in undisturbed harmony . Mr Prince iito ' noe selected Komcrsel » hire for tho locality of this now touiple , imd striiitfhtwny laid out tho money of the Minnes Nottidoh in purchasing u property of lour hundred neres . TotJiiH pliwo , when the Abode wasready , Mr . Prince , inning from hiscuvo oI Ai > ui . wm at Brighton , inmlu his way with tho four Histor * undor IiIh protectinir winirs . And quite a nniHuifioent place the Abodo Hoema to be . Thoro in a handsomo house , htmdaomely furniahed ; thero are gardens ,
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June 16 , I 860 . ] The Leader and Satiirday Analyst * 565
~ Tiie-Abo33e Of Loye:
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Leader (1850-1860), June 16, 1860, page 565, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2352/page/9/
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