The Press.
London, England, 1853-11-05 00:00:00

THE PRESS.

we do not derpaire even yet of being able to avert any for-
midable war from arising out of these circumstances.
That some acts of hostility may occur is possibly to be ap-
prehended. lint the two armies are separated by a broad
river, which is difficult to pass; the winter season is ap-
proaching, and there are great hoiws that, even after the
declaration of war, actual hostilities may not be corn-
tnenced at present, and that the season which is appreach-
hag will give time for reflection, and for the interposition of
the efforts of those powers in Europe which, by their posi-
tion, are able to exercise an influence in the matter, and
which are interested in endeavouring, by some means eon-
'latent with the honour of both the opposing parties, to
reserve the 'ware of Europe. Cllear, hear,' and apidause.)
This, I hope, will be the case. The various nations of
Europe are large communities 1101111 d together by their
mutual interests, and no infraction of the peace can take
place without detriment to these interests. Of course it is
impossible to speak with any confidence on the subject as
it at present stands. The issues of peace and war are not
in our bands; and, however great our interest may be in
preserving peace, we may not be able to restrain those
fanatical spirits who arc bent on war. lint 1 believe that
the other powers of Europe are also 11111XIOUS to maintain
peace, as it is for the interest of all that the general peace
of Europe should be maintained; and I will conclude by
staying that, by the blessing of Providence, l hope we shall
yet be able to avert the greatest of all evils, war."

RIOTS IN THE MANUFACTURING
DISTRICTS. _

FEARFUL riots broke out in Wigan on Friday, the
2f4th ultimo, and were revived on subsequent days,
causing immense confusion in the town and neigh-
bourhood, and presenting the multitudes of eollit rs
and working men and boys of the district in the dis-
graceful character of a ruffianly mob. For many
hours together the town has been in absolute pos-
session of the lawless crowds, who have destroyed a
large amount of prop€rty and given a shock to public
confidence which the locality will not soon recover :
Friday is the market day in Wigan, mid the centre of
the town is then much thronged ; but on yesterday week
the Market-place and adjoining streets were mono crowded
than usual, owing to the autumn cattle fair being held, ac•
cording to charter, and a large number of colliers and fac-
tory operatives on strike loitering about. At four o'clock
in the afternoon the adj red meeting of the coal pro-
prietors of the district was held at the Royal Hotel, in the
Marketplace. fly the time it terminated several 1 keel
colliers had east-lidded in front of the loon I, and manifested
great anxiety to leant the result. When they learned tha
the masters had only derided to throw open their pits att
the old prices they scented much disappointed, and showed
an uneasy feeling. tirtiolually the excitement increased,
and WWII the crowd began to hoot gentlemen co • g out
of the hotel, or cheer them &naively. Four police officers,
who were on duty near, endeavoured to prevail upon the
crowd to disperse, but without avail. About half-past six
o'clock five or six gentlemen came out of the hotel together,
and were followed by the mob, who hooted, cheered, and
jostled theta. Two of them took refuge in a shop, when
the mob committed the first act of violence by breaking
the windows. The two gentlemen Nun-ceded in effecting a
retreat, when the crowd turned 1111101.1 the police, and began
to pelt them with oyster shells, stones, Se.
Information was sent to the Mayor and other authori-
ties, who arrived on the scene and endeavoured to overawe
the rioters; but the mob grew every moment moon- turbu-
lent ; stones were thrown and sticks used with great free-
dom, and many persons, including the Mayor himself,
severely injured. At length his worship got away to the
railway•station, whence he despatched a telegraphic
nres-
sage to Preston for mime soldiers. The votive force in
Wigan, it appears, is only composed of a constable, a
V rgt.llllt and nine men—eleven in all—and who of course
were altogether powerless against a crowd of some thousand
men and boys. By nine o'clock the town was completely
in their hands. They had extinguished all the gaslights,
broken an immense number of windows, and forced their
way into a multitude of shops and some of the hotels,
where they shattered the furniture, itc., to pieces. 'cry
little pilfering, however, is said to have taken place, no.
thing but wanton destruction of property appearing to be
their object. The few eases of plunder that came to light
appear to have been perpetrated by some young lads not
connected with the main Ludy of rioters. This scene
lasted for some hours. All this while the Mayor was at
the railwareutation, waiting for the military. Hy eleven
the soldiers arrived, and by twenty minutes to twelve were
in marching order, procceuting through the streets. Their
presence seemed for the moment effeetnal ; the riotous
crowd melted away and disappeared, leaving no one to
fight or even to apprehend, and nothing but the wreck to
testify to their pins-nee on the spot.
on Monday the proprietors, according to promise, threw
open their pits to the men, offering the former wages.
Main colliers and a number of new hands went to work
accordingly: but this seems to have enraged the mass of
turnouts, and the day was spent in anxious observation of
various detached masses of men, who marched to and fro,
and threatened to attack the houses or business premises
of sundry obnoxious employers. The display of the sof•
diers kept Wigan itself pretty free front outrage, but a
desperate onslaught was made ir. the evening upon some
sawmills near the town. The police force was mustered
within a line of boarding In defence of these mills, and a
desperate struggle took place between them and the crowd
outside. In the end the police were obliged to retreat,
and the mob haul obtained possession of the outworks of
the place. when a body of soldiers, previously sent for.
arrived and chased them all out. Firearms were used in
this operation, and nine or ten persons shot, though not
fatally, besides the extensive damage received from the
poliestuen's truudisens.

SATURDAY,

By Wednesday external quiet was tolerably iestored.
More soldiers had come in from Manchester and elsewhere,
and fresh help was placed within reach in case of need.
A number of special constables were also sworn in, and
the local authorities took the resolution of hereafter in•
creasing the number of policemen to whom it should be
entrusted to maintain order in a town numbering 7o,oist
inhabitants. About eighty of the country police have also
been brought into the villages round Wigan, where they
serve, as armed patrols, to cheek any sudden attack upon
houses or works in its outskirts. Orders were received at
Portsmouth garrison on Tuesday for two regiments to hold
themselves in readiness to proceed at a moment's notice,
if required, to the scene of the riots.
Some disorders of formidable character, but arising from
a different cause, occurred in Blackburn on Wednesday.
An election of common emmeilmen was in progress, and
much party spirit excited by the contest between different
candidates. From an early hour in the morning, men
armed with bludgeons were seen moving about, and even-
thing seemed to indicate that violence would be resorted
to before the day was over. At noon, when all the facto-
ries were " loosed," the street became tilled with operatives,
and a series of skirmishes ensued, in the course of which
several men were roughly handled, and one of them, a
butcher, was so severely injured that he is not expected to
recover. Some others were also struck, one so as to en-
danger life. Several windows were smashed, which led to
a general closing of the shops. The magistrates engaged
a large body of special constables, and also communicated
with the military at Burnley, but quiet was restored in the
evening without their interposition. The damage done
was very great. Alderman Hooks house was attacked,
and an immense frontage of glass destroyed.

AGRICULTURAL STATISTICS.
AN important letter on this subject has been aO-
- by Lord Ashburton to a select committee of
the board of guardians of a Hampshire union, of
which his lordship is a member. The misapprehen-
sions that have prevailed both "aa to the exact
nature of the return desired from us, and of the
motives of the Government in desiring it," are alleged
by Lord Ashburton as the reasons for his communi-
cation. The following are the principal paragraphs
of his letter

" With regard to the first point, the Government does
not require the a 1111 l unt of each Males stock, or the
extent of each man's cultivat• : such a return would he
too emobrous for use, too expensive fur publication. The
ilovennuent wants the sums total, nut the items of which
those sums total are composed. It seeks no more to mark
out and distinguish the return of each occupier, the n
we
seek to murk out and distinguish each brick of whit h our
house is built up. The house must be rut together brick
by brick, anti the return for the three kingdoms must be
gathered item by item ; but the items which compose the
sum total will be as much lost in the mass and aggregate
of the whole, as the bricks which compose the house are
lost in the mass and magnitude of the building.
"The next question is, Why does the Government de•
sire these statistics? What is its motive?
" It appears to me that the wonder is, not that the
lovernment should now endeavour to collect agricultural
statistics, but that it should never have sought to do so be-
fore. It has now for ninny consecutive years spent
large sums in order to collect, digest, and publish the
statistics of trade, shipping, and manufactures, for the use
of the merchants, shipowners, and manufacturers ; why
should not some little money have been spared to do as
much for us ?
Is it consistent with good sense that every month the
public should have paraded before their eyes, and canvassed
in every newspaper, the tons of shipping anti the pounds of
cotton which have entered anti quitted our ports, and that
no intimation should be given from year's end to yeses end
of the food prepared and preparing for a i t °pies sub.
stence ?
" Is our industry so unimportant, our capital so minute,
that no note should be taken of its condition ?
" The great corndealers have long frit the necessity of
collecting sonic such information for their own guidance.
Mr. Saunders, of Liverpool, told the House of Commons
committee, in 1S:13, that he employed agents to travel over
the corn districts, and report to him both the cultivation
said the yield.
" Now, what is the consequence of this partial know-
ledge enjoyed by some few men to the exclusion of the
mass? Mr. Saunders and his class can operate on the
market fur many days before we, the bulk of the selleis,
become aware of the true circumstances which regulate

the price of what we have to sell.
" Some ten years ago the same advantage was enjoyed
by the great money-jobbers on the Loudon Stock kx-
change. They kept their couriers travelling from city to
city, and obtained information five or six days in advance
of the ordinary poet ; they made rapid fortunes at the ex-
pense of the public ; but now the electric telegraph has
placed all upon a level. The publication of these statite
tics will produce the same good on the Corn Exchange.
" There is a further consideration which should influ-
ence our judgments. and I therefore mention it. though it
may touch upon politics. Not only does the farmer
suffer for want of statistics in his contest for price with
the great dealer on the Corn Exchange, but be suffers
also from the same want in his content fot consideration
and political power with other elasses on the meat stage
of life.
"1 have no doubt, in my own mind. but that the capital
we employ, and the Produce we raise. exceed in value all
the capitals and all the produce besides raised in this great
manufacturing country; but 1 have no figures to appeal
to: I can only speak from conjecture.
" When. therefore. next year, or when at any future time,
it shall be proposed to make a mow appointmoot of power

1.,"

NOVEMBER 5,1853.

according to the importance and magnitude of the several
industries, our claims will be most assuredly underrated.
These statistics would obtain for us justice in this respeet
—they would show that the contribution of the foreigner
to the subsistence of this country is as nothing when
compared to that furnished by us. They would prove that,
instead of being a backward unenterprising race, bigoted to
ancient practices, and incapable of improvement, we were
bringing every year more and inure acres into cultivation,
and that we were every year investing more capital, how•
ever small might be the profit we derived from it.
" They would place the small farmer wore upon an
equality with the great dealer on the Coen Exchange.
" They would further give to the trade such accurate
information as would diminish the danger of those fatal
speculations which ransack the world for corn under mil.e
taken anticipations of scarcity, and bring ruin upon all
engaged.
Actuated by these impressions, I have long desired
that we should be put upon an equality with the other
great industries of the country, and 1 have done Inv best
at all timer to induce the governments of the ably to
advance the money requisite for the experiment which is
now before you.
" I should athl that our Scotch neighbours, who are
shrewd enough to detect what is and what is not for their
advantage, have made their returns without hesitation.
" A still more searching return has been now made for two
”sars from Ireland, without complaint on the part of the
tenantry, who are am quick to perceive as they are Willful
to show up a grievance."

THE HEALTH AND MORALS OF THE
ARMY.
Sour curious and important information regarding
the condition of the British soldier has just appeared
in a blue book. The volume is intended to form a
continuation to some previous reports on the same
subject issued between Is3s anti 1841. It has been
compiled by Lieut.-C(4.1'1%110A, Military Superinten-
dent of Pensioners, and Br. Graham Balfour, M.D.
The return purports to convey a variety of statistical
returns Vouching "sickness and mortality among
the troops" since the period included in previous
reports on the subject, namely, IsB7 :
The present document commences by alluding to the
improvements which have been made during that time.
The god-conduct warrant was introduced in 1837, by
which a progressive increase of pay was made dependent
on the absence of any serirus crime or irregularity fur a
period of two years. Notwithstanding the strictness of
the regulations, the augmentation had been received by
14,090 soldieta out of 33,1NN1 who might have laid el • to
it ; and it was thus apparent that a powerful motive to
good conduct which did not previously exist had been held
out by this change. Barrack litanies, which in 1847 con-
tained 811,01klyoltunes, had been established ; and ball and
racket courts had been erected in most of the bamicks,
with a view to wean men from the habit of %pending their
time in the canteens. Greater attention had also been
paid to the ventilation and the general sanitary arrange-
inenta of their dwellings. lu 19.443 savings banks were
established, and by 1847 upwards of ropot. had been
deposited—au amount which had since been doubled. The
changes which had taken place with respect to free ills-
charges and limited enlistment are stated also to have a
very important bearing upon the monde of the army, and
would lead to the exclusion of all that class who from in-
temperance and misconduct were construit subjects of
pumahment and hospital treatment.
The average number of admissions to the hospital in
the Dragoons and Dragoon Guards throughout the king-
dom during ten years, from 1837 to 1837, had been SKI
per thousand per annum. During the preceding 'WWII
and a half years the proportion was 9.2.9 per thoumand ;
but the apparent increase was probably due to the greater
care which had been taken to obtain correct returns. At
all events, the ratio of death had bcen rather 114.1..
In
the former period the late was 14 per thousand, or deduct-
lug IA for the deaths from cholera, which slid not prevail
between 1837 and 1847, the corrected average would be
11.8. The rate tinting the ten years in question wow 11.4.
The deaths foam other causes than disease. were 1.2 per
thousand, being the exact proportion in the former period.
The total mortality had therefore been 13.6 per thousand
of the mean strength, or 1.7 per thousand more than is
mural amongst a town population at the same period of
life—"no very great difference certainly, but still sufficient
to show that, even in time of peace, the profession of a
soldier is not conducive to health." The rate of mortality
of the whole cavalry corps serving in Great Britain had
ht.en 13. ts per thonsand ; hut that in Ireland had lees only
11.6 ; being a difference in favour of the latter, but too
$lllllll in am 11111 l t to warrant ally conclusions as to the sills..
riur salubrity of that c try." There had been a consi-
derable increase in the diseases resulting from immorality.
During the six years previous to 1837 the average number
of admissions to the hospital had been 181 per year per
thousand; whereas during the ten years under notice the
proportion had risen to WO per thousand. In the foot
regiments the returns exhibited yet more ilisgrareful re-
sults—the number% lowing been 206 and 177. The num-
lwr in the Foot Guards had been 2:01; the number in the
nonsehold Cavalry not being reported.
The total mortality 44 the infantry regiments had been
17.9, ar 4.3 per thousand greater than the cavalry; a simi-
lar excess being invariably noticed not only at all our
home and colonial stations, but in the French and other
isreim armies. The mortality of the Foot Guards was
actually so high as 19.4. This was attributed in great
part to thc improper barrack aecommodation, inasmuch
as other regiments in London had suffi.red still mote.
The number of men admitted into hospital for all dis-
ea-ww, per thousand per year, had been :—at the
Towo, tC)::,; Portman Barracks, SO7 ; Wellington Bar-

THE PRESS.

racks, V 49; St. deorge's Barracks, 788 ; the detached
barracks, ;SA ; Windsor, 937 ; and Winchester, St.l3. 'the
ratio in the regiments of the line stationed at the 'Cower
was, however, as high as 1.093. Fevers anti pulmonary
disc asps h,ul liven peculiarly prevalent at the Tower--the
tinkportion of men who had died from the firmer cause
having been at the Tower as high as 1.1 : at the Portman
Itarraeks, 2.1; Wellington ditto, 1.6; St. tivorge'e, 1.1;
detached barracks, I.s; Windsor, 1.8 ; and Winchester,
1.9. Recent alteratiousk had been made iu the 'lower,
Hyde-park, Kensington. and Portman Biu-raeke which it
was hoped would produce a marked improvement in the
health of the troops. 'l' lie number of deaths in the House-
hold Cavalry had been only 11.1 ; but these moist taw
twssed many ativatitat.tes over every other in the service,
and there were greater facilities of discharging men who
were guilty of irregular conduct, or who developed tracer
of constitutional slimes-ow.
The total number of men who 11041 stable.' etirisiral
punisl lit during the tell yeant had been :—ltragoinis
and I b itgot Ilan's, I ; (Wards, 10; Infiniti". of
the line, ids ; showing the billowing ratios la" thousand
per year :—llragotitts and Dragoon I itiards, t. 4 ; root
tkuards, I : Infantry of the line, I.M. The gradual reduc-
tion had been very striking. The proportion per thou-
sand sentenced to coqiiiral pimisl .Ikt in IM E: was 10.1;
5.:1; Iµll, 7a; Is4l, 7.3 : 181.1, ; 1,444, ;
184:0; A.l ; 1810, 1.1. In IS:11. the Mali ttttttt lOf
lashes in•
dieted was 51N1; ill Is:13, ts 011; 18:1I, IWO; WI, 5110; 18311,
400; 1s:17, 1(10. After IS:10 no higher number could Ike
10111r41.41. (Will by a general court-martial. than 100 ; while
a tlistriet court-martial WON l• •rd to III), and a regimen•
tal one to MO. Sittee 1547 the maximum has been n..
stricted to MI lashes. In 1539 101.1 of every thousand men
Were tried by court-martial, and '1.:1 sentenced to trinispor-
kaiion :in 04.10 the ratio tried was 11. S, and the number
Wllll'llo4 to transportation only 0.9. Aecooling to an oni•
cis! n.turn it appeared that in IM:11 the number of men
tried lay court-martial in the French army was only
per tl sand. In that year the proport. in the English
army was 11.0. It appeared, however, that drunkenness,
whether habitual air oecitsi tttt al, was not liable to be triad in
France, sop that one-third must Ike deducted from the Eng-
lish trials before any etimparisialk 0111 be made. That
would leave the relative proportion of crime in the two
omits as IS to Ott; but in tin' h'rencli army It 'rampant-
tively small proptai• was tranintitted by the class of eon-
scripts whose service was compulsory, Knit who, being
sleeted by hut from the general mass of the people, mete
superior in respect of etnitlitet and MAC to those who
enlisted voluntarily. NIA who Well` Of less settled anti leas
prudent habits. Indeed. of the total ikunklwr of crimea, uo
fewer than MI Is'r tl sand were et ttttt nitted by the
tinily -enlisted meu, and 1.2 only by the conscripts. "
Thu
Withal Nrllly,“ continue tilt' 1111t1101TI of till' 101110•11 t
hOsik, being runlls,sed entirely of 111111 Vs 41110111'4 Cll•
listed, and who are usually l. thouglitlesa and impru-
dent than the general mass of the c • y, the comp'.
risen as regards crime must Ire le with the same class
in the French army, in which ease the results would ap-
proximate as nearly as 50 to 00; and the slight execite of
crime still apparent in the It army it no a than
may be readily ace tell for by the circumstance, that, us
the greater proportion of the otiose.% have their origin
in dflukkeistkess, they are likely to be most frequent
among a 1101111C111 Mei', who ILIC, ittifortituatEly, proms to
that vice."
Finally, the ratios of mortality in different ikrukivs, as far
as they could be Nrl.'l'l'Nlllyd, W4`l'l. us fOIIOWN :—Prussian
army, 1:1.I : United States (Northern division), 18.8;
Frenelk, 19 ; Intl' (exclusive of meta killed in action ),
M; Kingdom, 1:05.