The Sun. — London, England, 1858-12-23 00:00:00

MR. B.R. IGHT IN GLASUOTV. [We published i yesterday a summary of Mr. Bright's speech, delivered by telegraph. We now publish a full rep ort :—] On Tuesday night Mr. Bright, the member for Birmingham, adrerised the citizens of Glasgow, in the City-hall, oil the subject of Parliamentary Reform. The h all contained 2,700 persons, for whom suitable ac cc nnmodation had been made, and on the whole the arrangements were excellent. The complexion of the meeting was that of the attendance at a middle-class concert or assembly, and there is no ea3ubt that the vast mass of those who filled the be aches was attracted, not from poli tical motives, bet from a natural desire to gratify the feelings of novelty and curiosity. The hall was completely filled long before the hour an nounced for the commencement of the proceedings. There was a small sprinkling of ladies in the throng. Mr. Lambeth play e d some a i rs on th e organ while the company was waiting for the opening of the proceedings. Mr. Buchanan, M.P., was called to the chair. This distinction had been previously offered to the Lord Provost, but it was declined by his lordship. The CHAIRMAN having introduced him in a few appropriate phrases, Mr. BRIGHT, on rising, was received with great cheering, the audience rising to their feet. He spoke as follows :—Gentlemen, when I look upon these great meetings, at several of which I have been permitted recently to be present, I cannot help asking myself--What is the question—what is the matter that appears to be stirring to its innermost depths the heart of my countrymen ? Is it some sudden frenzy, some fanaticism, which wise men might rather be sorry for than rejoice over? Is it some phantasm which you are pursuing, and which you never will overtake ? I judge, by the look of expectation and hope, and even of assur ance of success, which lights up the counte nances of so many before me, that you believe that yon have at least some great and worthy ob ject which has brought us together this evening. (Cheers.) I believe no more worthy object can assemble any portion of the citizens of a free nation, for we are here to discuss a great question of constitutional reform—to consider how far it may be possible to confirm and give greater per manence and security to whatsoever portion of liberty we have derived from our forefathers. And let me remind you that when you discuss questions connected with the House of Commons, you are discussing that branch of the Legislature which is by far the most important to liberty, and without Which liberty cannot exist. You may have liberty, and a large share of it, with a monarchy, as we have happily in this country, but you might have monarchy without libery, as yon see to be the case in many of the countries of Europe. You may have liberty, as we have, even with a portion of your legislative power in the hands of a house of here ditary legislators ; but you might have hereditary legislators and no liberty whatsoever. But the House of Commons, that branch of the Legislature which we are to-night particularly about to dis cuss, is not only consistent with the existence of liberty, but is inseparable in this country from the existence of liberty. (Hear, hear.) One of the greatest men, one of the brightest names on the muster-roll f English worthies, the illustrious founder of the colony and province of Pennsyl vania, gave this definition of freedom :—He said, " That is a free country where the laws rule, and where the people are a party to the making of the laws." (Cheers.) And we are assembled to-night, I hope, in the full understanding of the magnitude of the question before us, and with'none but this high resolve in our hearts, we will, if we can, by the extension and improvement of our representative system, confirm and secure perma nently, as far as lies in onr power, that which is the greatest guarantee for freedom which we in this country possess. (Loud applause.) Now, in the discussion of this question we are in a very different position from that in which we found ourselves when we were here before. It is now, I believe, generally, conceded that the figures are all on our side. Yon recollect twelve or fourteen years ago that there were orators almost innumerable about the country, some scores of them at least, who attacked us with figures without end in favour of the policy of Protection. Ido not intend to dig up those speeches from the oblivion which I am sure the orators who delivered them must wish they may perpetually' keep—(a laugh) —but I turn to them merely for the purpose of pointing out that nobody gets up to prove to us from the multiplication table that the people of England are fairly represented in the House of Commons. But there is one complaint made against us which it is very difficult to escape. We are told —I am told—that I use the same figures and the same facts. Well, now, what would be said were I to use different figures and different facts ? (Laughter and cheers.) It is the same case, the same cause, the same great grievance ; I speak to men of the same order, to be appealed to, reached and convinced and aroused by the same facts and arguments ; and, therefore, I cannot be expected to say something here wholly different from what I have said on other occasions. (Hear, hear.) For in stance, if I tell you that the whole body of the electors of the United Kingdom amount only to one-sixth portion of the whole number of adult men in the United Kingdom, and that one-sixth of the electors—that is, 1-36th of the adult men in the United Kingdom—return more than one-half of the:members of the House of Commons, I shall find it very difficult to convey an accurate idea of that fact, unless I make that statement ; and, therefore, though one may grieve our friendly critics who watch over everything we do and say, yet I am bound to explain this matter to my countrymen wherever I meet them, and wherever they are will ing to hear. Now, putting that statement into ano ther form, we have at least 6,000,000 grown men in the United Kingdom, and we have not more than 1,000,000 of them, or a little more, who have votes,, And we find by Parliamentary returns that 200,000 electors out of that 1,000,000 return some what more than one-half of the whole number of members who sit in the House of Commons. (Hear, hear.) The fact is it is very easy to show that the electoral body is so grouped and so managed, and the whole machine so ingeniously contrived, that almost all the objects for which a representative assembly should exist, and representation be ad mitted as part of the Constitution of a free country, are frustrated under the system which exists among us. There is another illustration of it that has often occurred to me. I have imagined that all the men in this kingdom, from 21 years of age, were assem bled on some Salisbury Plain, or, not to go so far, on some wild and desolat e pa r t o f your own coun try. I should be afraid to take you there, even though it be but in imagination, for fear we should be charged with disturbing those sacred animals, the grouse and the deer. (Great laughter and cheers.) But for the sake of this illustration we will imagine ourselves so assembled. The Consti tution—that is, the Parliamentary arrangement as we now find it—addresses the 6,000,000 men, and says to 5,000,000 of them—comprising almost the whole body of the working-classes of the kingdom, and not a few of those who may be said to belong to the middle-classes—we don't want you ; you may return to your homes, and those who are left will do your business for you. Well, then, there would remain a million which would compose the electoral body. Let us, then, make another separation. Take all the electors of the boroughs which comprise the greatinetropolis of the kingdom, seven great boroughs and seven great constituencies, and then add to them the constituencies of seven of the next largest cities in the kingdom— Liverpool. Glasgow, Manchester, Dublin, Birming ham, Leeds, and Edinburgh. It would require that you should take about 200,000 men from this million to form the constituencies for the great metropolis and for these great cities, and when youhad formed them you would find that they permitted to return 50 members to the Eng lish Parliament. In another part of this plain you find 200,000 more taken out of the great group, and put on one side, and the y are permitted to return 330 members t o the House of Commons.. Well, everybody se es a- e a glance that though Parliament, year, sitting half the r s , must do something, and must k„ ,, islate, pass laws, o met ed. un es good, sometimes bad —but, as we all k now , c gew b i utht be sensibl e difficulty —(laughter)—yet we cannotb ut the opinions of . this fact, that as a machine for representin and carryin g g views u prions of the people , out thei r v poli tical questions , or su s taining the character on country in it s legislation, it wo u ld perhaps be im possible to devise an instrument more utterly clumsy and untrustworthy for the purpose for which it exists. (Applause.) These boroughs that I have mentioned—the metropolis and those 7 great cities --tcontain•not less than four millions of inhabitants, being nearly one-seventh part of the whole popula tion of the United Kingdom, and yet they only re turn 30 members to the House of Commons. And of these 200,000 you have not heard the last. You = do not know so much of it in Scotland as we know of it England, but the 200,000 are not labelled together only in groups of 20,000 each, to carry on their political operations, and to return members freely; but they are scattered all up and down the country, many in Ireland, very many more in Eng, land, with constituencies varying: I think there is one as low as 86 electors, a .considerable number between 200 and 300, and the bulk of them have Only a very small body of electors, compared with the larger towns and constituencies. And when you have a very small number of persons to ether they can hardly, to use a common expression, keep them selves warm together. They can't preserve their independence. A neighbouring landowner, two or three lawyers, two or three anybodies who choose to combine and to act with a certain amount of unity and subtlety will affect the representation of one of those small boroughs ; and the members who go up to the House of Commons from them are often, and generally, not earnest men, anxious to carry . out any great popular principle, or any great principle at all ; but the House of Commons is a convenient club, a pleasant lounge, affords a nice way of filling up the time of a man who has passed through business, or being of the order that does not like business, and has never had any business — (laughter)—he wants something respectable, where he may pretend at least not to be absolutely idle. (Laughter and cheers.) Well, it follows from all this that the general result of what we call our Parliamentary representation is not found as yet a guard of our public interests ; it does not respond with any heartiness or any willingness to the aspirations of the people for a better Government. But it is found to be in sympathy, not with you, but with the ruling class and is infinitely more careful to preserve monopolies and privileges than the general interests of the great body of the na tion. (Cheers.) But to-morrow morning some body who is probably now sitting, or will be then, pen in hand, will say, and perhaps with a show of reason, that I am arguing entirely on a question of magnitude of population. It is not true ; but still he may say that, and say that in a country like this numbers simply should not decide these great ques tions, though there is a large space for improvement between the condition of things I have pointed out and the condition my critic dreads. But he will say property is to be taken into consideration at least as well as, and perhaps before, population. Let us take for a moment the test of wealth ; and, as I am in Scotland, take a comparison of your two foremost cities with some other portion of the coun try which enjoys, or possesses—l doubt if it does enjoy—an unfair share of representation. Your two cities of Edinburgh and Glasgow have a taxa ble property, taking Schedule A of the Income tax and Property-tax, which means land and buildings and property you can see, and Sche dule D, which means profits on trades and incomes from professions, and so forth—a taxable pro perty to the amount of £7,800,000—1 leave out all the odd sums. And there are 101 boroughs in Great Britain and Ireland, and by no means the smallest, whose taxable property is £7,434,000 — that is, some £350,000 less. Edinburgh and Glas gow, with the larger amount of that taxable pro perty, return together four members to the House of Commons ; and these other boroughs, with a smaller amount, return no less than 126 members. (Loud cries of Hear, hear.) Now, when I speak of these boroughs as adding 126 members, let me make this explanation. In the bill which Lord John Russell, acting in Lord Aberdeen's Govern ment, brought before the House of Commons in 1854, which, as you know, did not become law, he proposed to disfranchise all boroughs with a popu lation of less than 5,000, and whose number of electors was less than 300. Now, I have omitted all these ; I have drawn the line even higher. I believe if the line be drawn at 7,000 or 8,000, it will still leave this amazing . disparity, that £7,800,000 of taxable property in Edinburgh and Glasgow is represented by four members and a smaller amount of taxable property in other boroughs, leaving out these small boroughs of which I have spoken, is represented by 126 mem bers in that house. Take one other illustration on that point. The annual sum paid by the population of Edinburgh and Glasgow in taxes, including the' Income and Property-tax for the two schedules referred to, including house duty, assessed taxes, and land taxes—the whole of these taxes paid for Edinburgh and Glasgow is £556,000, represented by four members in Parliament ; and the whole sum which the 126 members represent, of annual direct taxes paid by their constituents is £562,000, being only £ll,OOO more than Edinburgh and Glasgow. Now, my investigation led me to this conclusion, whether you take numbers, or industry, or wealth, or what we comprehend as political indepen dence—l do not care by what test you choose to try it—but you will come to the same startling and, I would say, oppressive result, that these great populations and interests are most inadequately represented in the House of Commons under the present system of representation. (Applause.) Well, having got thus far, perhaps we shall all be agreed with everybody else out of doors, as .Mr. Buchanan says we are, that we must have a change. The question is, what change ? I have a great suspicion of those men who profess great anxiety for something to be done, but constantly assail those who are attempting to do something. (Great cheering.) You are aware that less than two months ago—some six or eight weeks ago—l had the privilege of addressing on two occasions very large meetings of my constituents in birmingham. You recollect the sort of howl of astonishment— (laughter)—with which—l do not complain of the Tory papers, because they are constantly labouring in their always unsuccessful vocation—(laughter) —but I mean that was set up by papers that cal themselves Liberal, but who, by some means or other, seem to be manacled to the triumph of 1832, and, after living 26 years longer, do not appear to be, if they are, even so far advanced as they were at the time of the Reform Bill. (Cheers.) Well, I am told that the sentiments that were so fright ful at Birmingham were very much moderated at Mane hester, :and that at Edinburgh they were almost, if not altogether, thrown away. (Laughter.) Well, now, I say to any of you who read leading articles, and who invariably believe them— (laughter)—and I have not the slightest doubt but this sort of notion may prevail in some minds here —I say that I believe it is impossible for any one to compare those speeches at Birmingham with the speech at Manchester, or the two or three with the speech at Edinburgh, and to discover the smallest possible abandonment of any one single sentiment that I uttered on the first occasions. (Cheers.) Do these men suppose that I . have the effrontery to stand before many thousands of my countrymen, after days and weeks of notice that I am so to ap pear before them, and that I conic there to speak simply the temporary passion and sentiment of the hour ? They - little know, if they dream of this, the sense of responsibility which I think every man shoed speak under who offers himself on any occasion as the expounder of the opinions or the guide of the deliberations of his countrymen. (Great cheering.) Nearly 30 years ago the senti ments that I have uttered upon this question of Parliamentary Reform were proclaimed to thou sands of our countrymen by the late Lord Durham. My opinions with regard to the franchise are not novel. I stated in Manchester that they were but the opinions which Fox uttered, and which Lord Grey proposed to the House of Commons to adopt in the year 1797. (Hear.) I am no conjuror, I have got not specific for national happiness. I offer you nothing made up of all sorts of conundrums and tricks, but I bring before you what I believe to be a rational and substantial project for the amendment of our representation, which I venture to say has had during the last 60 years the sanction and ap proval of the greatest minds and greatest patriots of our country. (Cheers.) Well, then, what is this change that is to swamp everybody, and that men stand aghast at ? (Laughter.) It is that the elective franchise, which now is confined, both in England and Scotland, in boroughs, with some exceptions, to the occupancy of a house of the yearly value of £lO, shall be lowered so as to take in in reality all the persons who are householders and occupiers of premises rated to the relief of thepoor. Your system of rating is much more- modern in Scotland than ours in England ; but I learn that, with two or, three most inconsiderable exceptions, it has now become uniform throughout the whole of your country. One reason why I propose this franchise is this. Unfortunately, in this country—l mean Great Britain and Ireland—there is a very large class constantly requiring assistance from their fel low men. There requires to be levied all through the kingdom a rate that does not amount to less—at least, in 1856 it amounted tomore—than the sum of seven millions sterling, chiefly devoted, and in fact, raised for the express purpose of giving relief to the indigent poor. Now, I think that one of your arti sans, let him be what he may in his particular walk of life, who works hard from morning till night six days in the week, finds heavy demands at home in his own family ; he is called upon to perfoam all the duties of citizenship, and to contribute from his own earnings to the support of some feeble, some sick—it may be, some dissolute and profligate man who is not able to support himself—l think that every man who is thus called upon to pay taxes from his weekly and annual earnings for such a purpose, has some claim to be considered a citi zen and to be admitted to the rights of citizenship. (Cheers.) I have been asked, lam told—for I have not had time to read half the attacks which, I understand, have been made upon me—but I am told that I have been attacked as having been Fuilty of misrepresentation in stating the custom in England with regard to the franchise.. I said that in E ng l and, in our parochial governments, in our Poor Law Unions and municipal governments, the system of rating and the scale of rating form the basis of the elective should not and I could see no reason why th ey s h od of the franchise in the election:flso na eforbm r the basis liame nt. Well, I am told th a t with nl regard es tof P oor Law unions, in the case of Someparishes, b u t not. universally, there is a mode of .voting by which men give,votes somewhat in proportion to their pro=- perty in the parish. One man may give one vote, and another man give, perhaps, six. It is a plan not very pleasant, wherever it is carried out, to those who have the smaller number of votes • but the defence and justification of it are this—that as the question is a question of expenditure in the im mediate locality—the making of roads in some cases, and a variety of objects requiring to be attended to by our various local governments— that it might possibly end in throwing an enor mous inequality of expenditure and taxation on a particular firm, or a few individuals, in a particular parish or district. But when you come to a ques tion of Parliamentary representation, where not taxes only are to be considered; but rights, and personal rights, and not taxes only and personal rights only, but all questions affecting the great policy of the country, both at home and abroad—l say that it would be to cast the most deadly and unchangeable, ineradicable insult upon the work ing classes oithis country if anybody for one single moment contended that I should go to give my six votes at the poll for a member of Parliament, and that one of the operatives in my employ should go at my side and give his one vote. (Cheers.) Till you are prepared to do full justice to a great propor tion of the unenfranchised class I would advise you to allow matters to remain as they are. lam sure that opinion is growing, intelligence is growing, power is growing, combination is growing, and before long it will be seen to be the interest of all those who value the tranquillity of the country and the contentment of the people that political rights should be widely and honestly extended among all classes of our countrymen. (Cheers.) There is one question about the suffrage which, I believe, I have never yet touched upon in any pre ceding speech I have delivered, and that is with regard to the possibility of conferring the franchise, in some shape or other, on those who are not rate payers, but what are called lodgers. (Hear, hear ) In England we have no such franchise ; in Scot land you have. I don't know whether it is by in difference in the Scotch Reform Bill—l rather think it must have been by a different interpreta tion being put upon it—that persons in lodgings for which they pay as rent £lO per annum—the rental required for a house 'which gives a vote— that such lodger can claim to have his name put on the register; and in Edinburgh I learn that there are a few—l believe not more than 30—on the list under such conditions. If that be so, there cannot be, I suppose, much difficulty in reducing the £lO to some smaller sum which shall become in some degree accordant with the principle on which the general franchise is based, in order that persons of this description who are ambitious to have a vote — and I do not want any one to have a vote who is not ambitious of it—that these persons should be placed on the electoral roll. I now come to the question of the counties, in which in England we have a considerable advantage over you in Scotland. I understand that in your counties you have no franchise whatever less than a £lO property fran chise and a £5O occupancy. In England we have a lower property franchise, coming down as low as 4s. a-year ; and, though many persons may exag• Berate the number that would be admitted, and I have made no calculation as to what the number would be, I think he must be a very fas tidious person indeed who thinks that the British constitution would be overthrown, and the safety of anybody worth preserving—(laughter)—be in the smallest degree put in jeopardy by extending the 40s. franchise to that part of the United King dom called Scotland. (Cheers.) One has to tread with remarkable particularity over the various steps of this great question, for if by any chance I say anything that is not fully explained, it is sure to be explained in a manner favourable to some supposed inconsistency. And if any point I have spoken on at a previous meeting is omitted, it is said that I have seen reason to change my opinion on that subject. (Laughter.) In Edinburgh my voice was very bad and the meeting crowded, and I was anxious not to make a long speech, and so said nothing of the question of the ballot. It was insinuated, therefore, that possibly I did not hold the same opinion on the ballot that I did in Man chester and Birmingham. So we won't altogether leave out the ballot to-night. (Laughter.) If the franchise in your boroughs be reduced so much as to double the whole number of your electors—if it be reduced so much in your counties as to increase by probably more than a half all the number of electors in these counties, I think, if there be any call now for the adoption of the ballot, that call would be imperative if such a change in the fran chise were made. lam quite certain that in the district from which I come, the county of Lancaster, there is but one opinion among the great body of those persons who are hoping by any Reform Bill to be admitted within the pale of the constitution of their country. And I think they would to a very large extent implore the House of Commons not to confer upon them the right of franchise, un less they conferred upon them also the power, which. I believe the ballot alone would give them, of ex ercising that franchise in accordance with their own convictions. (Hear, hear.) I cannot compre hend why any man should oppose the ballot. I can understand why men should think that we exaggerate its importance, but I cannot understand the man who supposes that it would be likely to inflict in jury upon the country. Every good and legitimate influence would still exist. The rich man would still be rich and powerful ; in the nature of things he must be so. The educated man, the intellectual giant, the benevolent man, the man of religious and saintly life, would exercise among all those who were of his circle, and knew of his excellent repu tation, an influence which is most beneficent, and which the ballot would not, I believe, in the smallest degree impair. But the influence of the landlord, of the creditor, of the customer, and the influence of the strong and unscrupulous mind over the feeble and the fearful, that influence would be as effectu ally checked' as, I believe, it can be by any human contrivance whatever. (Applause.) But there is another aspect of the question of the ballot, which, I think, is more important than its political one, and that is its moral aspect. How would canvass ing be conducted under the ballot ? Ido not know how you conduct canvassing in this large constitu ency. I suppose it is not very accurately done at all. But I can tell you how it is conducted in small and moderate boroughs in England. .The candidate goes round to see as many of the electors as possi ble ; the next thing is to try to find out about doubtful electors, who is his landlord or employer, or who did some particular kindness perhaps to one of his children, or has some kind of influence over him. Then half-a-dozen or a dozen get together and call upon him, and though there is somebody in that small number who has done him a benefit, and who expects to have a return; or somebody who has a power over him, and expects to be obeyed; anal while the professed purpose is that a canvass and soli citation are going on, it is in thousands of cases little better than a demonstration of force and tyranny. Every man who, for want of the ballot, votes contrary to his convictions, is a demoral ised and a degraded man, if he is not so be fore. (Applause.) He feels it necessary for the sustaining of his character that he should turn round and belie the principles that he has always, up to that moment, held, and declare that he holds contrary principles now, and therefore did not vote against the conviction of his conscience. There is no portion, I can assure this meeting, of the propo sitions for reform that have been submitted to the public in other parts of the country in England that has been received with such unanimity and such an enthusiasm of resolution as the proposition that the ballot shall form a portion of the coming Reform Bill. (Applause.) We come now to that question which, after all, is more difficult than the others to which I have referred—l mean more diffi cult of obtaining or carrying through Parliament— viz., the determination as to the mode in which members shall in future be allotted to electors and constituencies. I presume that any Reform Bill will draw some line, and below that line will dis franchise a number of boroughs ; assuming that their population is too small, their number of elec tors too limited, their interests too circumscribed to justify them in returning a member to Parliament. And the more of those boroughs that are thus cut off the larger 'will be the number of electors which Parliament. will have to distribute among our con stituencies. Now, what should be done with such a burgh as Glasgow ? Are you content to go on with your brethren in Edinburgh, with a popula tion of, I forget exactly how many, but approach ing half a million now—will you go on contentedly returning four members to the House of Commons to represent your vast and annually increasing in terests and population, and that a population no , greater than yours shall return, as the case may be, 50, or 80, or 100 members elsewhere. You are not the lovers of freedom that I take you to be—you do not understand this question as I am satisfied you do—you have not resolved .to brace yourselves up for this great contest as I hope you will to-night resolve, if you are content at all to go on in the same condition of things which you have been under in times past. (Applause.) I am not about to state what I think should be the limit that ought be taken. The limit that ought to be taken I am perfectly satisfied will not be taken. Lord J. Russell proposed that all boroughs whose population was under 6,000 should be dis franchised. Many persons proposed that all boroughs under 10,000 should not return members to Parlia ment, but should merge in the counties, electors for boroughs becoming in future electors for counties, to the vast improvement of the county representa tion. I will leave that point, for in my mind, if I had the drawing of a bill, it is not a settled ques andl know nothing whatsoever about the in-. tendons of either the Government or of anybody else who may be likely to take a prOlinent part in introducing any measure to the House of Commons and the country. Now, bear in mind that it is possi-- ble to make a great change in your representation without the smallest improvement. It is the same thiirg in daily life. At dinner you may go from one bad dish to another ; you may go from one unplea sant street to another ; you may go from unprofit able business to another. You make a very impor tant change —you may change the representation as you shuffle cards or move the pawns upon a chess board, but there may be no successful result ; and it is precisely this which we ought to warn each other about, especially because it is quite possible that the Government, hampered, perhaps, by their own pre judices and indispositions, hampered by their fol lowers—there may be some of their opponents who do not want much reform—may attempt a measure which, with the seeming of reform here and there, may leave the whole question of the representation in a state quite as unsatisfactory as it is at present. However, this I maintain, that there can be no re form whatsoever except upon the basis, or some thing like the basis,l have endeavoureatO lay down; and I state this with the more particularity, because I 'am anxious that all my countrymen should have so entirely investigated the question that, when any measure is really placed before Them, they may be in a condition of knowledge to form an intelligent opinion on it. (Applause.) At present the great body of the working classes of the country are excluded ; and I have shown you, I think, that, from the mode in which the electors are grouped and man aged, the great body of the middle classes, if not excluded, are so arranged and so worked upon that they may be said to be almost altogether de frauded. I want the working classes and the middle classes—l wish we had no such terms or that we had some better terms, but I mean all those persons who may be said to compose the vast population of the country, below the great privileged and titled classes of society—why should we not all unite fairly on behalf of this great measure of political freedom to which we are looking ? Depend upon it, a real measure of Reform is as,,much wanted for the security and the welfare of the middle classes of society as of the operative classes. (Applause.) There is a great attempt constantly made to frighten the middle classes. They are told that the working men will not be influenced in the least by those above them in condition, in circumstances, or in education. Some of you recollect 40 years ago, when such a thing as a public political meeting could not be held im Scotland. What did the ruling class say then ? That political meetings were dangerous, that they were absolutely treasonable, that public tran quillity and the security of Government were im possible, if Englishmen and Scotchmen were per mitted to meet and to discuss public affairs. Well, now we meet, and have met for many years, and we find that the public tranquillity and the security of the Government are infinitely , more established than they have been at any previous period proba bly in the history of this country. (Cheers.) Twenty seven years ago, before the Reform Bill passed, what did these great peers, some of whom I app ear t o have startled out o f their somnolent security, say ? They said the King's Government could not be car ried on, and that from the time when that mode rate but great measure of reform was passed, there would be an end of the greatness and glory of this great nation. Well, what has been the result? Every one of their predictions has been utterly fal sified. Twelve or 14 years ago, when I was here last, what did they tellus about that small measure of repealing the Corn Laws ? Why, one great peer told us that he would leave the country; but one of the labourers at the meeting said, " He'll not take his land with him." And we are told that not agriculture alone, but the manufactures and all the great commerce of the country would be crippled, if not destroyed, and your noble river, bearing the leviathans of naval architecture constructed upon its banks, would return into its former state of a small and pleasant stream, and I suppose men would catch trout and salmon from the bridges. (Laughter.) This kind of argumentation is what Jeremy Bentham has very happily described as a hobgoblin argument —the great trick now-a-days to frighten people lest they should do themselves some good. To the middle classes—to you who 27 years ago were pronounced utterly unworthy of the franchise, and to be filled with all manner of ignorance and all manner of evil tendencies—to you now they say, " You are the very bulwarks of our constitution." (Laughter.) You live in £lO houses ; but if you go below—to £9, £B, or £7—you go wrong, the case becomes more desperate at £5, and a rating franchise is positively revolutionary. (Renewed laughter.) I confess I do not believe this in the least. The num ber of electors under this rating franchise has been very much exaggerated by those who have not exa mined it. It was stated at a meeting at Edinburgh the other night, by a gentleman whose authority will not be disputed, that the franchise I propose would raise the number of electors in Edinburgh from about 8,000 to about 17,000. Well, I presume that in your city it would raise it in a rather greater proportion than that ; but, whatever it may be, I am satisfied myself that if we are to take any step—if we now must change our representation without going near to convulsing the country and. Parlia ment, destroying a Ministry or two, and perhaps having a couple of general elections Wore this question is settled—l say to every man of the middle class, to every man who wishes th e s t a bility of all our valuable institutions and the security of law—treat the great body of your people with magnanimous generosity, and I w h o lly mistake the character of my countrymen if 20 years hence there is not a unanimous acknowledgment that genero sity in 1859 was the path of absolute wisdom. (Loud and repeated cheers.) I observe in a num ber of some newspaper—l am not sure whether it was one in your city—but I will say of those in your city that I have seen, that when they have differed from the views that I have propounded, there has been a fairness in their criticisms which I appreciate and which I honour. am in favour of the most rigid criticism of political opinions and political acts, but this I do think, that we are en titled to demand of those who criticise that they shall not knowingly misrepresent, and that they shall not fill up any void which we may happen to leave with something that is obviously inconsistent with the general character of our observations. Now, one of those critics said that I had failed to show to the working classes that giving them a vote would be of the smallest advantage to them. I believe that it would be of advantage % them in the way of raising their self-respect. (Hear.) I have seen thousands of mea who had no votes at tending at the nomination of candidates, or stand ing about the polling booths with looks of great anxiety, and often with looks of great dejection. I believe that if the major part of these were enfran chised the effect upon their minds and morals and mental condition would be obvious and signal. The great secret of raising any man who happens to be in what may be called an inferior walk of life, and who seems as if he could make no effort to raise himself in it or from it, is to find out something that will increase his self-respe c t. If h e b ecomes possessed (that is not, to be sure, a very high ground for self-respect) of the sum of £5----ff he thinks he can make it .ElO by frugality and labour—if he sees there is anything among his fellow-workmen, or any of your numerous societies, benevolent and educational, in which he can be of the least use, don't you see at once a change in the look of the man ? 'What there was that was stupid, or low, or degrading to some extent, or hopeless, seems as if it gradually sank and diminished, and in time retires altogether, a n d i n its place it is succeeded by something greater, andhappier, and ennobling. I believe when you invite the great body of your artisans within the list of the roll of electors—when they can not only attend your nominations and hold up their hands and cheer for the successful or ap plauded candidate, but when they can also go one by one into the polling booth and register their fiat a, to the man who shall represent the great interests of the community —my honest, my conscientious con viction is, that you will do as much to raise their self-respect, to give them at least the rudiments and elements of a higher class of citizenship, as you do by all the other means that you now have in opera tion, with the view of improving the temper and the condition of the working classes. (Applause : ) And there are other results that will come to this country, in case you ever obtain a fair representa tion of the people. I have been in Scotland a good deal for the last three or four years, and often before then. I have found, in travelling over your coun try, that your land is not the land of the people of Scotland, but that it is in possession in a manner exclusively, which is not found to be the case with regard to any other property, compared with the whole number of the people, of a small handful of proprietors. • Now, let no man say that I am about to assail any landed proprietor in Scotland. I have received many courtesies from them, and not a few courtesies from the most eminent and most dis tinguished among them. I speak only of a system which arises from legislation, which is diametrically opposed to all those great principles of political economy which we and you struggled for many years to place on our statute book in the shape of legislation in matters of trade. Land is the basis of your industry. Is there any reason why land should not be as free as machinery, or ships, or household furniture, or cattle, or the goods and manufactures in your warehouses? If freedom be the law of right, of wisdom, and of benevolence with re gard to all other kinds of property, how shall the reverse of freedom be any other than the law of mis chief and injury when applied to land ? (Applause.) You travel, I was i•oing to say, from the rising of the sun to the going down thereof, on one single estate in Scotland ; north -or south, east or west, 'wherever you go, you ask whose land you are on, and: it belongs to . Lerd This= or Lord qie:Other, or Mr Sothebody-else. - These - are happy mortals ER 23, 1858, it may be said, who possess these great territories, and so - , - - perhaps, they would be if it were possible for any man, however well disposed, ade quately to answer the responsibilities which such possessions lay upon him. You find on these vast estates very few tenants, and generally few of an agricultural population at all. There is little social freedom—there is little industrial freedom—there is still less political freedom in districts such as these lam describing. I don't know myself very well how men can breathe freely when they find themselves continually—but I suppose habit helps them to it—on a soil not a morsel of which can they call their own, nor can they ever hope to call any of it their own, until they take their last long sleep in that which society shall allot them. lam no advocate for laws to force a division of land. I do not want any landlord to be compelled to have a greater or smaller number of tenants ; but I say that a system of legislation in laws of .primogeni ture and in laws of entail, which is intended to keep vast estates in one hand through successive generations, to prevent that occasional dispersion and change of property which is found so advan tageous in every other kind of property—l say that state of things is full of the most pernicious consequences not only to the agricultural classes, but to all other classes of our countrymen, for all are affected by it. (Applause.) I recollect seeing a farmer one evening riding away from an inn that I was staying at in the Highlands, and I asked his name. They said he was a farmer in some neigh bouring glen, and that he had a prodigious farm. At one time my informant said he recollected there were 14 good farms on that farm, and that these 14 families always managed to send at least one of their sons to get a first-class university education. I don't want any law to strip that one farmer of his -farm and restore the 14, but laws that interfere with the free course of transactions in land, which aid and keep, up such transactions in an estate, giving to one man the power over, a whole terri tory, whereby he has at his disposal tenants and labourers alike, is a state of things not consistent with that freedom which the people of England and Scotland, in my opinion, are alike entitled to. (Applause.) Your agricultural population have no chance of rising in the world. They can come to Glasgow, as scores of thousands of them have come here from the Highlands and from Ireland, and, forced by the unfavourable cir cumstances in which they find themselves, that they may become exiles from their native country, and may form colonies in the far Pacific or beyond the Atlantic. But I think we are bound as free men—and we in this town are especially bound, for we only have the power, to take the initiative in this great question, so far as we are able by our re presentatives in Parliament, and I have no doubt it would be one of the consequences of a real Reform Bill, to apply those great principles of political economy which are the gospel and charter of indus try as fully to the great property in land as we have already applied them to property enjoyed in trade. (Applause.) There is one other point to which I must ask your attention, in answer to the question, What is the good which the working classes, or any class will get from a wider extension of the franchise ? Now, there is one great qnestion which the public have no sort of hold over. The present Chancellor of the Exchequer, Mr. Disraeli, an eminent member of the' House of Commons, a leading member of the Government, and a man of genius, whose position, I may say, is a proclama tion to the world of the incompetency of the Con servative aristocracy and of the country gentlemen of the United Kingdom—(applause)—and, what is still more to be remarked, is the evidence which this shows of the humility which adorns their character—(laughter)—in thus permitting it—Mr. Disraeli said. on more than one recent occasion, that expenditure depends upon policy, and he meant by that that our public expenditure depends upon our foreign policy. Now, our past foreign policy has been of a very questionable character. It has landed us in a permanent payment, from which there is no honourable escape, of the sum of £28,000,000 sterling per annum—(hear, hear)—and our present foreign policy, and matters connected with it, involve us in a present payment of £22,000,000 per annum in our great military and naval preparations and expenses. Now, lam not about for a moment to discuss the question of whe ther our foreign policy has been, or is now, good, bad, or indifferent, because that does not very much affect the question to which I want to call your atten tion. • Now, in our home affairs we have a very open system of Government. If the Home-office is going to do anything somebody hears of it, and somebody approves or somebody objects. On all matters connected with our freedom, with the ad ministration of justice, on things which may be called internal, we have the freest opportunities of obtaining information and expressing our opinions and enforcing our views upon the Government, — that is, the freest that is possible so long as our re presentation is as imperfect as it now is ; but when you come to our foreign policy you are no longer Englishmen, you are no loner free. You are re commended not to inquire ; if you do you are told that you cannot understand it, =you are snubbed, hustled on one side, told that it is a matter too deep for common understandings like yours; there is a great mystery about it. We ha ve what is called diplomacy,—we have a great many Lords engaged in what they call diplomacy. (Loud applause.) We have a Lori in Paris, we have another in Ma drid, another in Berlin, .another (at least we have had up till lately) at Vienna, another until lately at Constantinople, another at Washington—all over the Continent particularly, and where the society is the most pleasing and the climate the most agree able, there is always an English nobleman to repre sent the Foreign-office. (Laughter and applause.) But you never know what he is doing. You have three or four columns in the Times newspaper nearly every day, and in almost all the rest of the London papers, and not a little of this is copied into the provincial papers, all about foreign affairs; but, notwithstanding that, you are seldom a bit more acquainted with them when you read these things—if anybody ever does—than you were be fore., But yet out of all this has come this great fact of the £28,000,000 which you have paid since 1815, for more than 40 years—a thousand millions of money paid out of the industry of your people. And out of this comes now the supposed necessity for armaments twice as large as were considered necessary 25 years ago ; and yet you have no control over this, and you positively know nothing whatsoever about it. There is no population equal to this in Russia, Austria, or France, that knows less about the foreign policy or foreign affairs of Russia, Austria, and France, probably than this nation knows of the foreign affairs of England. Lately, your Minister of Foreign Affairs was. candid enough to tell you that the Government drifted—you know what they mean when a ship drifts—into war ; and these Foreign Ministers have drifted us into a great many wars; and I suspect if some change is not made with regard to this matter, they will find it very convenient, or find that they cannot avoid it, from some cause or another, to allow us to drift into war in future. I won't talk about what 'war is ;we have had a specimen. Be it necessary, be it unne cessary, be the quarrel just or be it unjust, be it for the rights of a nation, or be it to gratify the stupidity of a Monarch or the intrigues of a Minis ter —war, nevertheless, is one of the greatest cala mities which can ever afflict any kingdom of the human race. (Loud applause.) But your people are ignorant of the steps by which you are dragged into war. A Scotch duke—rather a sprightly duke too—lately took me to task for something which T said in a public speech. I called in question the wisdOm of these enterprises abroad while the people of Ireland had a shilling a-day of wages, and great numbers of families in the Highlands of Scotland had two or three meals a-day consisting only of oatmeal. Why, what is the answer, the triumphant refutation—that oatmeal was a wholesome diet. (Laughter.) If I had said that the duke's dogs, at Inverary Castle were fed with oatmeal the answer would have been perfectly satisfactory. (Loud and repeated cheers.) But I am told further by these great authorities that though the country does occasionally become involved in the calamities of war, the people are as fond of war as their rulers, and that even the House of Lords was less disposed to the last war than the people. 'Well, if they sorrowed for the wars, all I can say is they "never told their grief." So far as I can recollect there was but one member of the House of Lords —and I hold him in the highest honour for his courage, and, as I believe for his wisdom—that boldly declared the non-necessity of the contest into which we were drifting. But is the people, are we, the nation, who know nothing about these foreign affairs, to . have the blame of these calamities thrown on us when they do occur ? Who form your Cabinets ? Glas gow merchants, or shopkeepers, or artisans, or the farmers of your counties ? No ; but members of the peerage of the United Kingdom. The half of your Cabinet is alwaTs in your House of Lords, and the half that is in the House of Commons is more than half always connected with the peerage. Don't let us have the same men for generations— men of one class, of a few families holding these high positions, enjoying their , vast emoluments, standing before their country honoured with all its dignities, and when some one such as I am steps forward to point out the grievous blnnders they have made, and the crimes that some-of them have committed, and the fearful and incalculable suffer ings which their countrymen have endured—suffer ings which never will be . revealed to us here, but are known only, and will 'be recorded only, on the everlasting tablets of the Eternal : I say, when we point at these, don't let them turn round and say that we' were in the Cabinets; we received the emo- luments, we had the dignities, we were the rulers' of the country, but the people were in favour of war, and we had little to do with it. (Applause.) It is a striking thing to observe the wonderful de lusions which nations live under in almost all ages of the world, and the submissive spirit with which they yield to them. I have often compared in my mind the people of England with the people of Egypt, and the Foreign-office of this country with the temples of the Egyptians. lam told that those who pass up and down the Nile—and we know something of it from the beautiful artistic repre sentations that have been laid before us—that you have, as you approach these temples, massive and lofty columns, towering obelisks, and gigantic statues, each one of which would appear almost to have exhausted a quarry. You have those vast chambers and gloomy passages, and some enormous recess, some holy of holies, in which when you ar rive you find, perhaps, some crawling reptile, almost loathsome to the unaccustomed eye, to which a nation had knelt in adoration, and to which it had offered the countless treasures of its wealth. In our Foreign-office we have none of these columns, no obelisks, none of these statues, nor have we these vast chambers, but we have mystery as profound, we have a deception as com plete, we have a superstition as contemptible; for in the enormous recess we find some miserable in trigue, in the pretended defence of which your fleets are traversing every ocean, your armies are marching and perishing in every clime, your toil-worn artisans and labourers are sweating at every pore, and the blood of our countrymen's children is squandered as though it was water, and had no price at all. (Loud applause.) I hope that an improved repre sentation will change all this, that that great por tion of our public expenditure which is connected with the doings, the secret and irresponsible doings, of our Foreign-office, will be placed directly under the firm control of a Parliament elected by the good sense and virtue of the great body of the people of the United Kingdom, and then, and not till then, will your industry be secure from that gigantic confiscation to which it has been subjected during the last 150 years. (Applause.) There is much in this country, notwithstanding all this, that we might be proud of. We can write freely, we can meet in public as we are met to-night, we can speak freely all our political wishes and our politi cal grievances. The ruling class, with a wise sagacity, have yielded this of late years without further struggle. But we are so delighted with our personal freedom—that we have no passports, that we have practically no censorship of the press, that we can move, speak, write, and act as freely as men require to do in a free country—we are so de lighted with all these that we appear to be almost altogether unconscious of the fact that our rulers extract from the industry of the people, and have dene it for half a century past, a far larger amount than any Government on the face of the earth in any age of the world, has ever extracted for pur poses of government, or for pretences of government, from an equal number of people. Dr. Livingstone, the African traveller, if I am not mistaken, is a na tive of this city, or, at least, of the neighbourhood of this city, and you identify his reputation in some degree with yours. (Cheers.) He gives in his most charming work many anecdotes of the various crea tures, not human creatures, which he saw and heard of during his troubles. His describes in one place I recollect, a bird which he calls a dull, stupid bird, a kind of pelican, I believe, which occupies itself with its own affairs by a river side in catching the unsuspecting fish which are gliding by. The peli can seizes a fish and puts it into a purse or pouch which he has, instead of the ordinary accommoda tion which anglers in Scotland have, a fish basket. Dr. Livingstone says there is anotherbird in that country which is neither dull nor stupid, and it is called a fish-hawk. He says that this fish-hawk hovers over the fishing pelican, and by and by comes down, not quickly but with a gentle poise of wing, the pelican looks up, becomes a little alarmed, opens its mouth. The hawk comes down, takes the fish, and away he goes. (Laughter.) The pelican, delighted that the hawk did not take himself away, immediately sets to work with the greatest possible diligence and endeavours to catch another fish. Now, I ask whether you can apply this anecdote. (Laughter and applause.) You are delighted that your Government is a Government that allows you to meet in vast assemblies like this—that it allows every man, at least in times of ordinary tranquillity, to say anything short of absolute treason, that your leading article writers can denounce every mem ber of the Government, and still walk the streets in perfect security; you are delighted that your ruling class makes no objection to the possession of all this freedom ; and, like that pelican, you are so delighted that you are not absolutely eaten up, that you allow them to extract from your pockets every week of your lives, every year of your lives, an incredible portion of your industry, and you go to work again just as the pelican did—producing, labouring, making wealth, and this great Govern ment sponge comes down again upon you. (Cheers.) Now, what I want is that all the people should examine this question thoroughly, for rely upon it their present and future welfare as a nation is greatly wound up with it. Many persons suppose that if a working man himself pays very little taxes—though we know that he pays a great deal, if he consumes coffee, tea, tobacco, spirits, or ale—it matters nothing to him what taxes the Government collects and expends. But there is no greater delusion than that. Everything which the Government expends, suppose it were all collected from the employers of the people, and none from the operative class, would be by so much a diminution of that great fund and capital out of which employment is found, and out of which alone wages can be paid. And any man, whether he pay taxes or not, who is not content to be a mere liver upon the taxes, has the strongest and most direct interest in establishing that, kind of representation of the people which shall give us a firm control over the expenditure of the public money. (Ap plause.) I have spent some years of my life in labouring for freed.oM of industry, and I hope to live to see in this country a complete freedom of the soil. I believe that to the landed proprietors, to those great nobles who are the possessors of so much of the soil, it would work a change to the full as beneficent as that which has been produced by the abolition of the corn laws. I think that freedom to the land, and greater economy in the expenditure of the public money, with the growing intelligence which we all see around us, and which has made a revolution in the people of this country within the last twenty years, with the increase of habits of temperance among the people—l say all these things together fill me often with the hope that whatsoever we may have in our annals in the past of which we may boast, there is yet even a brighter future for this country, and a more pros perous and happy time for its people. (Applause.) I come among you not to stir up animosities be tween class and class. That is the charge of men who wish that one class should permanently rule the other classes of the country. I come among you rather that we may all deliberate in a friendly and open council on this great question, on which our individual success and our natural prosperity so much depend. You know it, at least if you do not know, I can tell you, that I am no frequenter of Courts • I have never been a seeker fo r office, or for the emoluments of office ; I have no craving for popularity, I think I have but little of that which may be called a lust of fame ; I am a citizen of a free country, as you also are citizens. I love my country ; I love its freedom, but I believe that that freedom can only be ex teoded on a fair and honest representation of the people, and it is because I believe that I am here to-night to ask you, in the power of your numbers and of your intelligence, to step into the harvest that is before you, and obtain possession of that harvest. Mr. Bright concluded amid a burst of tremen dous, cheering, having spoken an hour and fifty minutes. The following resolutions were then carried " That this meeting of the citizens of Glasgow presents to John Bright, Esq., M.P its warm congratulations on his happy restoration to health, and most respectfully assures him of its cordial and energetic support in promot ing the great cause of Parliamentary Reform which he so ably advocates. " That the committee promoting this meeting be re quested to adopt measures to advance its object, and that they have power to add to their number, and to take steps to secure extended co-operation." The proceedings of the meeting terminated with three loud cheers for Mr. Bright. [AnvEnzisEmENT.l—Rarey's Horse and Cattle Improv ing Food is equally adapted to improve the stamina of ill conditioned Horses, Cows, Bullocks, Calves, Sheep, and Pigs. It causes no extra expense, as it contains far more and better nourishment than its cost of lid. per feed sup plies in corn and hay; hence ensures an actual saving in the keep. But its principal advantages are a great im provement in the digestive functions, the stamina and general condition of horses enabling them to perform far more labour without getting distressed. It imparts new vigour to sick, debilitated, or old apparently worn-out horses, and it puts rapidly the finest flesh on cattle gene rally, and improves the milk in cows, as it enables them to extract the entire nourishment out of everything they feed on. garey and Co., 77, Regent's Quadrant, Piccadilly, London. Packed in tins of about 99 feeds, 11s. ; in casks of about 450 feeds, 50s. ; of about 1,000 feeds, £5, being lid. nor feed. [ A D VERTI SEMENT.]-11olloway's Ointment.—Measles, Cough, Wheezing.—The symptoms of coming measles are generally recognised by every parent; but the safe mode of treatment is not StiumversaLly kiiown or Happily followed. The:grand object is to keep the rashwell out ; to prevent in - flammation ; to check cough. Holloway's Ointment as sisted by a regulated temperature answers these desirable results, when well rubbed upon the back and c h es t it i s at sorbed, and acts so wholesomely on the entire system, that the morbid matter is naturally expelled, and with moderate care afterwards all danger of . pulmonary or head disease passes away. It is prudent in every case to use this re medy, nor should the mildest attack lull us into delusive or censurable security, - , REVOLT AT TONKIN. The Moniteur de la Plate says:— " The news of a revolt at Tonkin seems likely to be confirmed. If credit is to be attached to a Manilla letter of the 23c1 Oct. which has been communicated to us, the chief of the insurrection is a Prince of the Trinh dynasty, whose father died in 1851 only, after having enjoyed great popularity at Tonkin. This family:reigned contemporaneously with t he Le dynasty until the end of the 18th century, and was dethroned by the usurpers called Tay-Son, wh o only held power for a few years, and were in turn vanquished, after a severe struggle, by Hoang-Pe, of the Nguyen dynasty, who owed his success to the Bishop of Adran, so justly celebrated ; to the French officers commanding his armies, and to the Roman Catholics, his noble auxiliaries. Hoang-De; once victorious, joined Tonkin to Cochin-China , and assumed in 1802 the name of Gia Long, under which he immortalised himself. That Prince pro tected the French and the Catholics, to whom he owed everything. But at his death, in 1820, his son and successor, Minh-Menh, changed the system entirely, and broke off rel a ti ons with t h e old friends and the brave lieutenants. of his fath er c i Thieu-Tri, the son of Mi n h-M en h, h av ing attain(' to power in 1841, commenced persecuting the benefactors of his family ; and his successor Tu Duc, the present Emperor being animated b y a worse spirit than even his predecessor, con tinued to exercise against the Christians, to who ' he owed his crown, a system of persecutions an tortures which reed to mind the sanguinary aid of the reign of Diocletian. Seldom has more stop ' ferocity been seen united to• blacker ingratitud.; His sanguinary reign commenced in 1847, and tyranny has not only been exercised against t Christians, but has weighed heavily on the other populations of his States, and especially on the a " habitants of Tonkin, who entertain a profetr s aversion for his government. This hatred exPla,i n e the sympathy which the last descendant of tu Trinh dynasty has met with. It was stated at Manilla that the new pretender exhibited the m es a favourable dispositions towards the Christians, an it is already known that, about 1837, his fat her having wished to consolidate his position, for that end had sought to secure the support of the Chris tians. We shall not be long in finding out whet her these reports are correct, and what is the extent 0 f the revolt, for Father Rivas, sent to Tonkin to as certain the real state of matters, left on the 14th October. What appears certain both as regard s Tonkin and Cambodia, is, that the country gen' rally is in a state of agitation. It is easily liV . „'"‘ stood that Admiral Rigault de Genouilly, mander in Chief of the expedition, whose merit au lt devotedness are known finding himself amortgbe population of several millions of souls, wishes to well acquainted with the position of affairs before undertaking his great operations towards the centre of the country, which will comm e nce as seoll as circumstances allow." COUNTRY MARKETS. NEWCASTLE-UPON-TYNE—DEc. 21. At this morning's market the trade in wheat was ifro active, and the few parcels disposed of were at last Weal' rates. The trade in barley was confined to a few fine in, ing samples, at previous rates. A fair demand foes7 o '; and Saturday's prices realised. Very few inquir e flour, but it was not offered on any lower terms. In 01 • articles nothing doing. NEWARK—DEC. 22. and, th e To-day the show of wheat was very limited, sales made were at is to 2s advance on last week's Ter, A moderate show of barley, fine malting parcels is dea_ r ti e ll ; in inferior sorts little doing. In oats no change. 13 ' scarce and dear. White wheat, new, 46s to 49s Barley, grinding.. 28s to .... 321 0 Red do. 4os to 42s Oats, old, .. _—s to Old white 39s to 40s New do 25s to :",,au Red do. 36s to 39s I 8ean5...... 44s to 401 Barley, malting.... 36s to 39s I Ma1t ...... 66s to VI HULL—DEC. 21. n , At the market this morning there was a moderate * r e ply of English wheat, for which the demand was raL general than of late, and sales free at fully the late ra_n i l Foreign held too high for buye r s. B ar l e y dull. 13 :7; and peas a slow sale, but not c h ea p er . O a t s a slow In, in favour of the buyer. More inquiry for clover and g- seeds. Linseed in good supply. Wheat.... Old white.... per qr Old red ,, New white .. „ New red .... , Dant z i c , Kon b . , &c . old white Dutch, Belgian, and French 4ss Od to 460 081 Baltic and Hamburg, red . . 43s Od to 45s 0 3 St. Petersburg and Riga, old. 38s Od to 39 0 Barley.... English malting 32s Od to 36s o vi Grinding 2Bs Od to 308 Od Saal and Oderbruck Holstein and Danish 29s Od to 318 Od e Grinding Oats English, old Archangel and Riga, per st Os lid to l i g Friesland and Dutch Osllld to 13 Swedish and Danish oBlla to Osti ,ld , o d Beans ....English, old, per qr 4ls Od to 45 6 o a New pigeon 4os Od to 42 5 0 New tick. 398 Od to 400 . Od Egyptian sss Od to 3 68 t oj Peas .. Foreign breakers o Grinding Tares ....Winter B ss Od- to .90 8 oj Indian Corn Linseed, feeding sos Od to 56 9 ni crushing Linseed cakes (Hull) £9 7 6to £9 10 a Foreign BlO oto 6 15 0 Rape cakes 6 5 oto 6 , 10 g 0 Bones CORK—DEC. 20. g e l The following were the quotations this morning 9 4 wheat, 17s Od to 235; white, 18s 6d to 22s Od; barley 1 06 to 15s 3d; oats, 9s Od to 12s 6d. DUBLIN• f—DEc. 21. 5 6 0 clues much the same as The market to-day conti Friday, with a small supply, d. s. d. Wheat, white.. 22 6 to 24 6 Do., red 2l 6 to 22 6 Do., new .... 21 6 to 24 6 Barley, • l2 0 to 17 3 Oats Do., black ll 0 to 12 0 at the following prices 41 , s. d. 1., 0 Do., new ll 6 to I .' 6 Bere Rapeseed Oatmeal l2 6 to 1 4 i Bakers' flour Indian corn COAL MART (Prices of Coal per Ton at :ET—DEc. 22. the close of the market.) - • es, d. Wylam l5 6 Hartlepool West Hart ley 14 9 Walls End. d. s Bell 1 9 Bradyll's Hetton....• •:,` 0 Harvey ....... , . • ••• . ` 1 0 Kelloe Hilda 16 Belmont 0 Nixon's Duffryn ...... 24—Sold, 24. Walls End. Cassop . 18 9 Hartlepool. l9 3 South Hartlepool 18 3 Ships at market _LOCAL SHARE MARKETS. LIVERPOOL—DEC. 22. Ilat The market was stea throughout the day, closing -, North British, 5819—York and North Midland, 761 7 !r • e r Eastern Counties, 12 1-16 Midland, 1021 and Holyheads, 45 I —Caledonians, 871 71, —Lanear T .! and Yorkshire, 981—London and North-Westerns,_ East Lancashire, 96 7—Dutch Rhenish, 31 9-16 dl j. Grand Trunk of Canada, 91 3-16—Great Western, 5 ° 4 Leeds Northern, 48—Dovers, 221 9-16—Berwicks, „„ Great Western of Canada, 161 161—Blackburns, 11 g • Birkenheads, 67 671. MANCHESTER—DEC. 22. The market was rather quieter to-day but firm. Pf„ era d: 221—Sheffie1ds, 39A—Ditto 3i per Cents., 691 t. 102 I—North Stafford, 4 d.—East Lancashire, 6 per Pref., 141 I—Blackburn stock, 44—Grand Trunks, 9 ; Londons, 96 }—Leeds, 984 b. BIRMINGHAM—DEC. 22. _ The transactions in shares to-day wore as follow,„ South Staffords, from 101 to 108- 7 -Shropshire Unions, 4 °ll Great Westerns, 55-4--Ditto 13irmingham Guarantev stock, 74—Midland, 41—Pref. stock, 105. BIRTHS. BILAMALL.—On the 19th inst., the wife of W. F. Brauvi lL Esq., of a son. CROPPEn.—On the 19th inst., at Dingle Bank, LiverP °Olf the Hon. Mrs. Edward Cropper, of a daughter. HAINES.—On the 20th inst., at Viewlield-place,Stir l % the lady of Brevet-Major Haines, 92d Hi g hlanders, a' daughter. NIND.—On the 22d inst., at B eec h-h ouse , M rs . a Ann. of a son and heir. MARRIAGES. Ma o f COLLINSON — BARBER.—On the 21st inst. at St. lif„, of in-the-Fields, John Wm. Sowden Co il inson, Esq'' t Doncaster, Yorkshire, to Jane Elizabeth, the y o n daughter of Robert H. Barber, Esq., of Hayton. Ca° county of Notts. ris t SPOFFORTH LOUDON. —On the 21st inst., at C hi , , Church, Craven hill, Paddington, Markham Spen° o o Esq., of 61, Jermyn-street, St. James's, to Asses , child of the late J. C. Loudon, Esq. DEATHS. p oY CowsLADE.--On the 22d inst., at Bayswater, Fr' -11 CoWslade, Esq., late of Reading. DANSEY.—At Stoke Devonport, Frederick DanseY , 611.1 of Canterbury Villas, Maida-vale, London, aged 5 3 ., 0 , DALTON.—On the 20th inst., at the Vicarage, Kelevelat Essex, the Rev. C. Dalton, 54 years resident v icar of t parish, aged 83. 13., ELLICE.—On the 19th inst., at Balbirnie, Fifeshire, Robert Ellice, Esq., aged 43. % W e l GRIBELE.—On the 21st inst., suddenly, at his reel o Warner-road, Camberwell, Mr. Edward Gribble, l ate the East India House, aged 71.. ROBINSON.—On the 21st inst., at Frenchay, near 13.1.- Colonel W. H. Robinson, aged 58. the StiaiNEß.—On the 20th inst., at Brightwell Rector'', o f Rev. R. Sumner, rector of Brightwell, and third se ll the Lord Bishop of Winchester, aged 35. LONDON : Printed and Published by MURDO Y— n 1-/ 11 2, of No. 112, Strand, P r i n t er, a t Th e S un Office,No . ,.: o i Strand, in the P rec i nc t o f th e S avo y, i n the coun ty Middlose; Thursday , December 23 , 1858 TI E 01 ...._;4l,les-s ee tre t e . t, t, t4l, t2l Are ' 14 kit f a ; PI c 4 the l it:°).o/ otcl v kty lot t i ; trade, tc theql n spil l ;44 tun-field * °ll 4r 3 ) C o ) °races FAS T t i [NDC - The e n [i A bete = tat ßOAn ti r - q will 1111,4'12d W.ll ,!Iter.,„ Btoo of lig 148t, nt. the c N.n le • ' the c 1 1 13 U SE 14 01 llow 1 . Th e 4,0.1T0 marl kid e , , ra, b et Ci k t tin let . i t „ v took 'and b , is aairs, 1 lteee l'e!Yar , also. • • 4 Quilts; T I E Ltv -- , Aro • i, 181, 11,717 0, P!re 17,338. if i`•!fOop li`un( vt :th eiti ! . _ t 4"ll ll.T in Paid PINSU , i ',„ (l to ni e q tlir n a ' 6 ,:nd att kt„,,, 0 4, e 0,43, ct E tih„,Polaibl • 1 0 7eilt on n t ' i . n el tef o t ' e P oliciCt re t he 9th (1 -11 AAT c 44 1 tio 14; eA.L Per 1 V4l: t o b e ' d aY, 1 ho• are holde tit l , th e ttl4 l l l , or an, ttloe tat five pc T `'= five O ti re a , tp t 1 117 sn rl phoki, dreArin Cet t31 13 , e °, and ko t lion or to t h o ' clock A e nanke lith o b ( the " e given t tett ) ti th , ,for T4011,] a rum It Is o f ha LI Of ani Ina Vebrity 4 1;11t abo kL le llincr tir r tett g t tt n f of Tlnimat 41.8 torley's Ret tl 4 ,l -gdl tli a lt4 ral Rh lc It v r tied off lif e ', r ood fo trq i ,;?reed. Aro te 's onri qave tr Pak h jt ;well TAE s J ust publ SELF-1 to , on the on the hath Ri m to 31 11, 4 4 ZY 01 4 4 . tir e TeoPe to the *it , ca mane, I I