The Press.
London, England, 1854-12-09 00:00:00

SATURDAY,

dity of this assertion were necessary, it is to be found in
the fact that a committee of the House of Representatives
for the United States had recently described England as the
centre of the arms trade of the world; and in the fact that
no failure in the supplies of arms to the East India Company
has occurred, although their army is much larger than that
of the Imperial Government, and their demand has been of
late years much more irregular. Nor has there been any
failure proved in the supply of the numerous, and, of
course, uncertain demands of foreign Governments. But
there was a very cogent reason why the army of England
should not be supplied by the arms trade of England.
That reason was, that the permanent staff—the subordi-
nates of the Ordnance—did not choose that they should.
They meant, and I fear they still mean, to have an enor-
mous Government arms factory, with all its patronage,
pay, and appliances • and that if they are not to have this,
they seem determined the army of England shall not have
English arms, though they are the best in the world. We
are accused of having perpetrated a Birmingham job
because we opposed a vote of 100,0001. to establish a
Government factory for manufacturing small arms. If I,
for one, had been guilty of a Birmingham job, I should
not have come to Rugby to parade it; 1 know you too well.
When that proposal was first announced, Mr. Muntz, the
late Mr. Geach, my honourable colleague, and myself,
consulted whether it was not our duty to vote for that pro-
posal, well knowing the lamentable deficiency of improved
muskets which existed for the use of the army. Had we
thought that the establishing of that factory would have ac•
celerated the supply of these arms, we would willingly have
sacrificed any interest our constituents might have in the
supply of arms, in order to assist the Government in the
emergency created by the wilful delay and misconduct of
their own officers in not having a sufficient supply of arms;
but we were convinced, and we proved to the satisfaction
of a committee of the House of Commons nominated by
the Government, and to the satisfaction of the House of
Commons itself, that if the vote for the enormous Govern-
ment factory which was proposed had been granted on the
very night it first stood upon the votes, and if the bu lding
had been commenced the next morning, it was impossible
that any number of muskets could be turned out of that
then unfounded factory for a year or eighteen months;
whilst the fact of the Government having undertaken to
supersede the trade would at once paralyse the immediate
production of arms by the trade, because no prudent man
would venture his capital largely in an undertaking with a
prospect of being entirely superseded by the Government
in a year or eighteen months. Now, I do not wish to be un-
just on these subordinates. The chief criminal among them
(the late inspector of small arms) is dead ; but I fear that
the spirit which actuated him survives, and if it does it
would be prudent in those who have been its tools to be-
ware how they subject themselves to the heavy charges for
which the foundation has been laid in the evidence taken
before the Small Arms Committee of last session. It was
proved that the late inspector of small arms rejected in
some cases eighty per cent. of the musket barrels sent in
by the trade ; and when the same barrels were sent in a
second time, without his knowledge that they were the
same, he passed many of them. It was proved before that
committee that he rejected locks which were afterwards
sent to the Great Exhibition, where, as one of the judges,
he awarded a prize for those very locks. It was proved
that Mr. Lovel, the late inspector, marked the barrels of
the 20,000 Minis rifles now in use in the Crimea, and
marked them so that the sights should be put on crooked,
and when warned of the fact by the workmen, refused to
correct the sights, and when warned by Mr. WestleY
Richards, said, " Well, if the sights are crooked, they (the
soldiers) may hold them on one side." There could he
no greater crime than that man attempted, for he attempted
to send our soldiers into action with unserviceable arms.
(Cries of " Shame.") Those whose duty it was to pro-
cure arms prevented the supply, and even where the ob-
stacles to the supply, which they interposed, were pertly
overcome, they wilfully mutilated and rendered useless the e
arms which they placed in the hands of our troops. Iht
seen a paragraph in the papers intimating that the ism.
muskets are not manufactured fast enough in Birmingham.
The answer is, that by no human agency can either 60,000
or 100,0(X) stand of arms be manufactured in a day; and
that the orders for them, or the patterns for them, which
are as necessary as the orders,though now given, have been
withheld until it surpasses the powers of the centre of the
arms trade of the world to have all that are required
finished now, as they might have been had the Ordnance
chosen to issue the orders and patterns as they ought to
have done, not last May or June, but in the autumn of last
year. Gentlemen, I have dwelt upon this subject, for it
concerns the safety of the country, which depends upon
the prestige which was so dearly purchased during he
thirty years' war, and has manifested its power by securting
us forty years of peace. These are questions which n
do,ow
concern every Englishman, whether he dwells, as we
here close upon the centre atone of England or in our mot
distant colonies.

A MAN named Flanchin has been tried in Paris for
robbery. it appeared that he was accustomed to wear one
of those cloaks to which hoods are attached, when visiting
jewellers' anti other shops, and whilst examining different
articles to raise his hand repeatedly to his neck, as if to
scratch it. It subsequently turned out that each time be
did this he slipped into his hood some article which ho
had contrived to take unobserved. He carried on his
ingenious system of robbery for some time with conside
eight
er-
able success. When at last he was detected, there
w.te
found in his hood, which was of vast dimensions,
watches, three chains, fourteen rings, two parcels of lace, ten
tooth-brushes, several pots of pomatum, some
several books, a quantity of fruit, and other " unconsidered
trifles." All that the man could say in his defence was
that the things had been put into his hood by way of
but when asked by whom, he was silent. Ha was sentenced
to two years imprisonment,