The Press. — London, England, 1853-07-30 00:00:00

party during the winter and part of the ensuing year by hunting—was disappointed by the non-arrival of a boat with ammunition and stores—and thus found himself destitute of food, and deprived of the means of barter, towards the commencement of the winter. The Indians, receiving no payment in return, ceased to bring supplies ; while, in November, to crown his misfortunes, the fort took fire, leaving nothing unburnt except a few skins and some powder. He now quitted his post and went out into the forest, where for two mouths he lived on such game as could be picked up ; and, returning in March, found one of the two savages, whom he had left, dead, and the other feeding upon his carcase. Disgusted and horrified, he again took to the woods, and, returning a second time, discovered only the bones of the t:anniba I mingled with those of his victim. At the last extremity he was relieved by a friendly Indian, and thus survived to tell his tale. Cannibalism is not rare among these dwellers in the far north ; but it is the result of hard necessity, and not of choice. Sermons at Harrow School. Second Series. By C. J. Vaughan, D.D. London : John W. Parker and Son. WE have been disappointed by these tilt; courses. Their composer has often come before the public, and frequently with distinc tion, and we expected to find in his Harrow sermons a series of addresses calculated to arrest the attention of grown youths on the threshold of the world. While we recognise the merits of Dr. Vaughan as a preacher to a parochial audience, we do not see in these dis courses the special aptitude required for his present performance. His style is not sufficiently striking, and is destitute of fancy. He is also inexpert in those rhetorical arts which some preachers skilfully use as substitutes for the faculties that excite attention and prevent it from flagging. A cler gyman of the English Church can scarcely be called upon to address any congregation re quiring such peculiar qualifications in the preacher as when ho has to speak before the youths in one of our great public s chools. He before him a large body of huts, varying in their ages, taken from different classes of society. Some of them are youthful patricians, born to privileges, and heirs to no ble names. Others aro the sons of men who have fought an uphill contest in " the battle of life." All are alike, or nearly so, in being sub ject to the peculiar temptations incident to early years, and they all look upon the world through the illusions of a joyous imagination. In appealing to such minds, and describing the trials of the world, the preacher should re collect that he has to encounter competition with the novelist and the poet. He has to speak of old and familiar truths, and he has not the variety of a dramatix personw, or the ex emplication of a romantic plot, to give him aid. But what then? Surely, even in his particular subject, he is not without great resources. Be yond almost any other congregation the youths at a great public school are worked upon by the master passions of ambition, and thirsting eagerness to take part in the affairs of the great world. That world the preacher can repeatedly describe as it is; and if endowed with the faculty of personifying abstractions, and giving vivacity to sentiment, he can always get the audience of a public school to listen to him, for with such a peculiar congrega tion more dramatic vivacity of style is allow able than in other ministrations from the preacher's chair. The style of an essayist is not perhaps the worst for arresting the minds of young clever lads, themselves conversant with the mechanics of easy writing, and fami liar with the art of using commonplace books for their themes. But, while we indicate the fault running through these " Harrow Sermons" of being deficient in the special felicity required for a public school, we cordially recognise the merits of Dr. Vaughan as a preacher to the general world. Though without imagination, there is in his piety much that is emotional, without its degenerating into empty senti mentalism. He has strong sympathies , and his homily is often warmed by the genial glow THE PRESS. of Christian fervour. His religion is emphati cally manly and reflective ; and his appeals to the conscience, without the exaggerations of a " terrorist," are well calculated to arouse the apathetic. from the slumber of forgetfulness. The sermon on " The Office of Memory" pleased us most in the collection, though perhaps that on " Suicide" is the most power ful, and, along with "Suffering Universal," might, as tracts, be yopularly circulated with advantage. All who are interested in our great educational foundations will read with pleasure the defence of them in the discourse called " The Blessings of Permanence," from Nhich we will select the following passage can scarcely now be denied that the old routine of a public school education was adhered to with an unreason able rigidity, and that its progressive adaptation to the exigencies of modern society was indispensable to its re taining any hold upon the respect of an enlightened age. But this I maintain with the fullest conviction of its truth, that it is an unspeakable advantage to have a check im posed upon such reformations by the existence of a long established custom. It is not desirable that every new theory should be suffered to try its experiments upon the heads and the hearts of the youth of England. We cannot consent. to the sweeping condemnation of that mode of classical instruction which has developed (or certainly not prevented the development of) minds which have been from generation to generation our national glory and our national strength. It is impossible indeed to disprove the assertion that such results might have been witnessed equally under any other system. We are far from asserting that there is on such a subject an absolute right and wrong; one method alone beneficial, and every other mis chievous. We could conceive that some other languages besides Greek and Latin might have served the purpose of practising the memory, and forming the taste, and furnish ing the understanding, of the young : though we see pecu liar and incommunicable advantages (not admitting of enumeration here) which have attended this peculiar choice, and may justify it on a less superficial ground than that of mere experience. But at all events we are per suaded that it has been an incalculable benefit to have institutions, like these ancient public schools, interposed between the invention and the application of more recent schemes of education. They have attbrded ample oppor tunities for safe and cautious experiment. Studies which could not have been substituted for those of our classical schools without the utmost possible risk are gradually finding their place amongst the other with the moat bene ficial result. While we continue to protest against those utilitarian declamations which pronounce everything value less in education except that knowledge which qualifies directly for the business of life ; while we maintain, on the contrary, that the object of all youthful discipline is not no muen the storing as the exercising of the mind, and that, the less professional the early eduaition of a man has been, the better will he be qualified in the end even for professional as well as other pursuits: we are yet enabled, on the platform of our old and long-tried system, to extend in many directions the compass of our instructions, re moving by degrees the grounds of reasonable complaint, without sacrificing thane less obvious but (as we believe) most just principles on which the ancient fabric was originally founded. We may add that the turn of thought in all these discourses is essentially that of a Church of England divine, without reference to the controversies within the fold of the Establish ment. Thirteenth General Report of the Colonial Land and Emigration Commissioners. 1853. Lon don : Eyre and Spottiswoode. THE Thirteenth Report of the Emigration Commissioners, last week published, is a document of great interest as bearing on, perhaps, the most important of the social questions of the day. A simple summary of the facts contained in it will probably be more useful than any comment on their nature or tendency. It appears that in 1852 English and Irish emigration had reached the highest point vet known. In the thirty-eight years which have elapsed since the war, computed down to December 31, 1852, there have left this country altogether 3,463,292 emigrants; of whom more than one-half, or 1,791,446, have emigrated since the year 1847. In round numbers, we have emigrants from 1815 to 1852 inclusive, three and a half millions ; from 1847 to 1852, both inclusive, one million and four fifths : leaving, from 1815 to 1847 exclu sive, about one million and three-quarters. The above figures give nearly 300,000 as the yearly average since 1847. But last year's emigrants amounted to 368,764; being to this average in the ratio of six to five and upwards, and exceeding the emigration of 1851 by nearly ten per cent. Of these emigrants, say the commissioners, the great bulk are Irish—namely, " nine- SATURDAY, " tenths of those who have sailed from Liver " pool, and one-third of those who have sailed " from the Clyde to North America, in addi " don to all who have sailed from Irish " ports ;" besides many sent o ut at the cost of ciovermuent to Australia. The total of Irish emigration since 1847 exceeds 1,300,000 ; leav ing less than half a million for England, Mules, and Scotland. There is no inure striking feature of the Irish exodus than the vast sums sent back from relatives and friends iu America. These remittances from the savings of the poor, in aid of their yet poorer countrymen, are com puted as follows : In 184$ 4460,000 1849 1850 .. 957,000 1831 1,404,000 making in five years a total of 4,351,0001., nearly four and a half millions, or 900,0001. yearly on an average. Nor is this estimate complete ; for we know nothing of the amount sent through private hands, although from various sources that is ascertained to be large. It is quite within the limits of probability that the total thus remitted does not fall far short of seven millions in the above-named five years, or one pound per head for the whole popula tion of reland. On a point of far deeper interest to the nation at large we leave the commissioners to speak for themselves : The effect which the large emigration must have on the population of Ireland was IsAuted out in our report of last year, but, as the question is now attracting much in terest, we may be allowed to revert to it. It will be remembered that the census showed a total population in Ireland on March 31, 1851, of 1015,794, with a decrease during the preceding ten years of 1,659,330. Assuming the natural increase of the popula tion to be one per cent. per annum, or 65,157 a year, which we showed to have been the rate of increase between 1831 and 1841, the emigration of 1851 would have been nearly four times, and that of 1852 much more than three times, the whole increase. But, as emigration carries away more than a due proportion of the young and healthy, we think it probable that in point of fact the births of those who remain behind do no more than replace the deaths among them. Taking, however, Ireland alone, it seems probable that the movement has not only reached but passed its culminating point. The number of emigrants thence in 1851 exceeds that in 1852 by about one eighth, the numbers being in the two years respectively 254,000 and 224,000. Coincidently with this decrease pauperism has diminished ; thus proving that a sensible effect has been pro duced upon the labour market, of which those who remain behind are reaping the benefit. The able-bodied paupers in Irish workhouses were, in January, 1851, 80,000 ; in January, 1853, they are 50,000. Wages have not risen to any great extent; " but this fiwt," say the commissioners, "is not inconsistent with a " considerable improvement in the condition "of the labouring classes. We apprehend " that, although wages are still at a minimum, " the number receiving them, and the propor " tion they bear to the unemployed, is con " siderably larger than formerly." On the distribution of emigrants, a subject of moment, though one to which we do not ascribe all the importance which is some times attributed to it, the following statement is given:— The emigration from the whole United Kingdom during the years 1551 and 1559 was distributed is follows United North Statem ' America. 11 4 31 241.374 42,601 157.12 241,2111 31,5741 Australia. All tither place N. Total. 21,532 /47,r4s 4,4;1 3.7 3371,90 360,704 showing an actual decrease on the emigration to other places than Australia of :13,551 souls, and an actual in crease on the emigration to Australia of 116.3-19. Of this actual increase 11,4ti1 is adtitmtalde to the opera tions of this board. The numbers sent out by us in 1,411 having been 11,6 9 : 1 ; and in Ista, 33,354. The de crease in ist:sl in the emigration to the United States was, it will be observed, about nine per cent., while in the emigration to British North America it was nearly twenty-three per cent. We have no means of ascertaining the reasons for this disproportion, but we should be dis. posed to believe that of the En g lish who might otherwise ave gone to Canada, and who are not generally in b 0 destitute a state as the Irish, a portion have been diverted to Australia. y ~~ !f: