The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1868-01-04 00:00:00

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riar deem eilzht to state ffixt wo et not at all ttraes
Oar tuln-potOovng 03101545.
. _
Re mast be II very deep-thinking and clear-sighted
man who at these presents can discover any-
thing like political activity, or any current event
indeed of political interest. Nor is this to be
wondered at. The people who make political
history are otherwise engaged, and it is to be hoped
more agreeably. They are at their country houses, or
the houses of friends, enjoying the relaxation and the
pleasures of the season, and perhaps voting politics a
bore. But ere long not only will a season of political,
but of commercial activity set in. In six weeks
Parliament will have met, but before that time the
political world will be stirred and roused by the notes
of preparation for the coming contest. The year 1867
was remarkable for its Reform session; the year 1868
will probably be remarkable for its educational session.
We shall have plenty of ealk about Reform too, next
session, for the Scotch and Irish bills u ill not be
settled without many desperate battles; but the signs
of the times indicate that education wine the subject of
overpowering interest There is reason to believe that
Mr. Disraeli will bring in shill to increase the educat'onal
facilities now existing, or in other words to establish a
eystem of national education which shall be worthy of
the name. The very fact of his bringing in the bill
will make this, to a great extent, a party question ;
but it is to be hoped that, after a few party ekirmishes,
our legislators may agree to differ, and combine to give
the country what it so sorely needs—a grand national
scheme of education. How long, it may be asked, are
we to remain under the stigma of being the worst
educated nation in the world ? Our aristocracy, it is'
true, are highly educated (though, to a great extent,
abroad), and our middle classes are very fairly, though
very expensively educated; but, alas! what is the
state of the education of the poor? Disgracefully in-
efficient ; and that phrase is one which all the debating
societies of the 'United Kingdom may be challenged to.
disprove. Whatever may be the opinion of the public
on this point—and the majority of the public are not
in a position to form a correct estimate of the state of
education here,—it is pretty certain that the legisla-
ture, on the whole, incline to the opinion that a reform
is decidedly needed, and we may therefore look hope-
fully to the coming session.

It is difficult to ignore the one pervading and
absorbing topic of the day, Fenianism ; but so shifting
-are its Aswan, so startlingly rapid are its facts,
and so doubtful the many rumours that emceed each
other with still greater rapidity, that I cannot hope to
say anything of special interest. I begin to be con-
vinced that we are making too much fuss about
Fenianism, and that in so doing we are giving eneon-
. . . .

ragement to those excitable and.malicions people, seho
maybe called lonians of the Fenians, physical fotm
Anglo-maniacs, or wild Irish, as distinguished from
the &eat mass of Ildehmen in this country or else-
where. , 4ut I dare not insist too strongly on what after
all I'S only an idea, a hope, a dawning conviction. It
will not do to shut one's eyes to the facts which would
now startle us whenever we take up a paper, tut that
similar facts are so common; but can there be any
necessity, I would ask, for the extensive arrangements
that are now made for guarding public and private
buildings? A threatened attack upon this or that
building, which may or may not have been intended,
is no sooner made tallith: than forthwith merchants and
bankers, manufacturers, and even tradesmen, com-
mence guarding their establishments by the means of
hired watchmen. Fenianism has at least done an
immense amount of good in this way. It has provided
employn_ent for a large number of special watchmen
and guards. In the City of London there is positively I
• panic manifesting itself in this way. Private
watchmen exist by hundreds where they were never
thought of before, but so secretly has this been done
that it is only from private sources of information
that the fact becomes known. And if Fenianism dies
out—and there are some signs that it is dying out—
many of these private watchmen will still be retained.
Two or three instances have come to my knowledge
in which this fever for private watchmen has had a
curious result. There were hundreds of Irishmen die.
charged at the end of the year—not ostensibly, of
course, because they were Irishmen, but on the ground ,
of scarcity of work; and in two or three cages these I
very men have been employed as private watchmen.
Set a thief to catch a thief is the motto that will im-
mediately occur ti the reader, but in the instances re-
fat red to the men are honest, peaceable, and loyal
Irishmen, and no more Fenians than you or I, dear
reader. And here the thought obtrudes itself, how
foolish and how wrong it is for employers to act as
some have done, to discharge men really for no other
reason than because they are Irish. The Fenians,
who are only a section of the Irish, have done their
hest to make us dislike their countrymen, but we
ought to return good for evil, and, at the very least,
should aim at lessening that anti-Irish feeling whiali
is now becoming so painful a feature of the times. i
Even those who Oiii wit nisi& in London must have
taken some interest in the imm, nee works that have
been going on here for the last few years ; the Thames
embankment anil the Main Drainage acheme to w 4.
We Londoners, fusee watched these great undertakingi,
however, with far more interest than "friends at a
distance." cane supposed to take inthem ; and for
very goal reasonpeineing others ; Ilky touch ue in odr
tenderest parld—.int our pockets. .It will be a grand
thing, no &Alibi, to 4isse the banks if, the Theme),
lined and barricaded'hy a noble roadway of stone ; it
will be a splendid thinglo have the Thames purified,
and the drainage of the vast metropolis' carried some
miles below the mass of houses (though not low enough);
but all this v•ill cost millions of money, and the Metro-
politan Board of Works has now succeeded in getting
taxation to such a pitch that we are grumbling in good
earnest, and when Parliament meets we mean to
make our wants known. As soon as the Legislature gets
into working, Mr. Goschen intends to call attention
to the continuoua increase of taxation laid upon the
metropolis. It would not he surprising if, in the
coarse of the discussion, some members were to main-
tain that part of this taxation ought to be imperial,
the whole country being more or leafs interested in the
great improvements to be effected. But it would
require a marvellously clever 'meeker to persuade the
people of Cornwall or Northumberland, for instance,
that such a theory is pound.
I find that during the year that has just closed, no
lees than 740 tradesmen in South London alone were
fined for short weights and measures. During 1860
there were SOK Th tis Rome slight improvement, but
it would be well if we had such a stringent law on this
subject as to prevent short weights and measures pay-
ing. " Honesty is the hi at policy," it is said, but
thousands of tradesmen do not believe this, or do not
act as if they did. The fines impopeil for this offence
are in ridiculously small, that they are practically in-
operative, and the only thing that seems to act as a
deterrent power, is the fear of publicity. Would that
some legislator, acting on this fact, would turn hie
attention to this matter anil the kindred evil of adul-
teration. The two eel's would be too much for the
hardest-working and largest-souleel nit-tuber of Puha.
ment, but surely these great public grievances are
not to be allowed to continue just because they dre
great.
,
Perhaps the ugliest, most sombre, and most re-
puleive-looking building in London, after Milbank
(which Wag built after the fashion of the Bastille). is
Newgate, or the Old Bailey. No feet with regard to
this building is likely to lie of a pleasing character,
and the last is no exception. It is stated that it is
now found to be too small for its wants, and there Is
a proposition to enlarge it. Why not pull it ilov4n
altogether, and bnilil another prison a few miles fro'
the outskirts of London? Such a proposal would p
bably be laughed at, but what a boon would be t
ground on which it stands—eay for workmen's dwe -
ings—bouses for the poor, not Peabody buildin)., ,
which are adapted only for a very different class froan
those whom the betievolent.M.r..Pealiedy wished lie
benefit. We could very well spare one prison from the
many we have in the metropolis, and thus iv-Should
get rid of an ugly and repulsive block of buildings
which makes one shudder at a mere glance at it. i •
Our theatres and places of entertainment, are being
crowded nightly, and the pantomimes are largely
patronized by juvenile holiday-makers. Considering
the late hour at which these young pleasure-seekers
are turned out, and the wretched weather, it may well
be disibted whether, as a rile, the game is worth the
candle, am the French say.
We have now almost got over the Christmas fes-
tivities. Take it for all in all it haa been a Merry
Christmas, but the most acreitiab!e feature of it is that
there has been so much charity and benevolence froai
the rich towards the poor. Never ha there been a

time when this benevolence was more needed than
during that dull and doleful winter time, which by
complaisance we call Merry Christmas. London
doubtlees, the wealthiest city in tho world, lett
nowhere in the world is there in much poverty anti
misery as in this vast metropolis. Th011Sa41(114 of the
poorest classes may now look back an Christmas Dai
as "a day to be marked with a white stone," and this
is the plessantest point of view after all from which
to look back upon Christmas. But hold, enough ! 137
this thue your readers must have had enough of thi
literature of Christmastide.

Afl a precaution against I :reek fire, the authorities
In London have canned large I illeittitle• of sand to be corb-
veyed to all the ktovernment ,Itteee, and placed in heaps in-
side the window. of every floor that tent all accessible from
the outside.