The Express.
London, England, 1853-11-10 00:00:00

GREECE.

The Greek government has just presented to the
Senate a bill for contracting a loan of five millions of
drachmas (4,300,000 f.)

Ot Court.

WINDSOR, Nov. 9.
The dinner party yesterday included the Duchess
of Brabnt, the Duke of Brabant, Colonel ehe lion. .
Phipps sand Count and Countess Gustave de Lannoy.V B.
The band of the Scot+ Fusilcer Guards attended in the
Castle and performed during dinner; and in the evening
her Majesty's private band played the following selection
overtime—. Prometheus "
Faintish on Airs composed by Prince Albert.
Selection—. Marco hpaila
Thumphal March
Andante —Minima°, Trio, and Finale, "Sisfooia"
To-day being the birthday of the Prince a Wales, the
the of

treopa forming ...e gurison of Windsor, consisting .... the
lit Life Guards, commanded by Lieut..Coloncl Parker;
and the 2nd Battallion Scots lusileer Guards, by Lieut.-
Colonel Onslow; the whoie under Colonel Dixon, paraded
at a quarter before 10 o'clock in the Home Park. Her
Majesty, accompanied by Prince Albert, the Duke and
Duchess of Brabant, the Prince of Wales, Prince Alfred,
the Princess Royal, and the younger branch of the Royal
Family, and attended by the Ladies and Gentlemen in
Waiting took her position immediately under the cut
terrace, when the line presented arms, fired a feu-de joie,
and gave three cheers for the Prince of Wales. The
troops thensarehed past in slow and quick time, wheeled
into line, and again presented arms, niter which they re•
turned to their barracks.

The Duchess of Kent breakfasted with the Queen this
morning.
Lord Weterpark has succeeded Lord Camay* as Lord in
Waiting to her Majesty.
Captain Dig Wield, R.N., had the honour of baring an
audience of her Majesty, and submitted for the inspection
of the Queen and Prince his drawings connected with the
Arctic Expedition.
Mr. R. Thorneycroft had the honour of submitting yes-
terday for the inspection of the Queen and Prince a plaster
east of an equestrian statuette of her Majesty.

Mr. J. Ne'inn Wood (chairman, Mr. William Mann, and
Mr. Joseph Mondell (Commissioners of Pilotage for Liver-
pool), together with Mr. David Rowland (secretary), had an
interview yesterday with the Right llon. E. Cardwell, at
the Board of Trade.

A deputation from the burial committee of the parish of
St. Giles, Camberwell, had an interview with Viscount
Palmerston OR Tuesday, at the Rome Office. The deputa-
tion consisted of Messrs. William Etherington, Thomas
Potts, John Cooper, James Thornhill, Thomas Billing,
George W. Marsden (vestry clerk), and William Searle.
The Chancellor of the Exchequer left town yesterday
afternoon, (or Windsor Castle, on a virit to the Queen.
Mr. S. R. G and Mr. Feral., of Liverpool, on behalf
of the Shipowners Association, had an interview yesterday
with the Right lionottraWe E. Cardwell, at the Board of
Trade.

Despatches were received yesterday at the Colonial Office,
from the Governor of Malta.

THE DISMISSAL OF THE REV. PROFESSOR

THE STRIKES.

(ritual OLY LOCAL CoUIiIiSPUNDINT.)
WP.FNF iDAy

--- • .
It may seem a remarkable circumstance that
Blackburn, situated midway between Preston and Burnley,
the headquarters of the lock out., should be in Mil work,
whilst the chimneys on either side of them should be smoke.
less. Those who proiosa to be, and nu doubt arc, well in-
formed on this matter contend that this is not because the
employers at Blackburn have found their hands more
tractable, or because the operatives have been lees tyran-
nical in this their day of power than those of other plum.
There is an impression that political rather thou any other
m nivel interfere at the preseat monseut with the free
action of the employers at this place. Certain it is that
they have great power at this moment in the disputes at
Preston and Burnley if they were to throw their weight
into the balance. Blackburn contributes from the wages
of its operatives something like a fourth of the
whole funds that go to Preston. The people at this place,
it has been remarked, ars placing theist... Mom en a
critical position ; for whilst they are contributing so much
to sustain the strikes elsewhere, they are diminishing their
own resources, and laying themselves more and more at
the mercy of their own employers. There is a marked dif-
ferent.; between the position of employers and employed in
great strike like the preseat; inasmuch as the former,
after keeping their machinery idle, may probably re-eater
the market with their goods when prices have beeu unna.
turally forced up by the strike, and may reimburse them-
selves, to some extent, for their loss daring the period of
inactivity ; but the operatives are always losers in a strike,
and it would take many 10 p r cents., even it they achieved
the victory, to repay themselves the sacrifices incurred by
wives mid children halfstarved, savings spent, and debts
incurred which can never be wiped off, but
wi.l hang about them a sense of i•egradation
during the remainder of their lives. At a dis-
tance, it is said, the question is too much regarded as
one of mere wages. At the commencement it was properly
enough so regarded, but it has assumed a new phase. in
many places the 10 per cent. had been conceded before the
lock-out, as it is termed, was resolved upon, cud the mill-
owners felt themselves compelled to take that step, not
because they were determined to refuse the demands of
their wurkpeople, but in order to resist the dietutorial
assumptions of persous who were continually urging the
operatives to take higher greuud in proportion as the em-
ployers yielded to their importunities. lac many cases, the
10 per tent. having been given, the workpeople asked fur a
further advance, which the masters refnael; this operatives
said they would strike unless their new demands were
complied with, and the employers replied, "Then, if
we are forced to stop work.ug after all, we will
take back the 10 per cent. which we have already
granted." At Illackburn the employers, instead of
assuming an attitude so decided, appear to be patiently
awaiting the result of the contest in other places. 'Ws
disposition cannot be accounted fur by the superior piacti-
<ability of their workpeople, for we shall presently show
that the operatives have not been more easy to deal with at
I Blackburn than elsewhere, and people must be left to form
their own opinion whether the political fecliu,r which
causes such a marked division in that sombre locality has
the effect of deterring either party from imitating the ex-
ample set by employers in other places, lest such a
I step should in anywise advantage their political
opponents. But the point to be kept in mind is that the
masters find themselves under the necessity of adoptirg
their present course owing to a disposition to insolence and
abuse of power, which is manifested on the part of the
operatives, and which would become (mite us icisulferable
as the conduct of employers would be if they were
really the grinding oppressors which it has sometimes been
the policy of demagogues to paint them. It is easy to give
examples, to show that we are not hazarding aseertions that
are unsustainable by facts. We may mention one instance
where the operatives iu a mill at Blackburn, atter obtaining
the ten per cent. advance, wrist to their emploaers and
asked them for some money to celebrate the victory which
had been gained over themselves. No notice was taken of
the appearance of insult contained in this request, and 10..
was given to the h. nds to make merry with ; but after-
' wards one of their employers was informed that they had
struck. On going to ask them the reason, they told him
they would nut work for him, because a certain other estab-
lishment in the same town had refused to give is ,bands
a similar " treat." The workpeople at another
mill in the same neighbourhood turned out,
because their employer had purchased sonic yarn,
of undeniable quality, from a firm whose weavers were on
strike. At Harwood, the hands in one establishment
struck bemuse the master would not discharge the over-
looker, who had made himself obnoxious by refusing to
contribute to the support of the turnouts. In another
instance the hands refused to make a particular sort of
cloth, and their employer had in consequence to sacrifice
a considerable sum to release himself from a contract which
his workpeople had thus rendered him unable to fulfil.
The canto of one strike in Blackburn would be sufficiently
amusing if it were not painful to see a body of workpeople
rush precipitately in the way of a wrestle with starvation
from so slight a motive. In this instance the mei,
looker was censuring a man for not keeping his
looms clean, when the weaver pleaded that he had
no brush. This man was particularly proud of a
luxuriant growth of whiskers which adorned his phi-
siognomy, and the overlooker, unable to forbear
a sarcasm at the expense of a man whom he perhaps thought
more attentive to the culture of this hirsute crop than to the
discharge of his duty, replied, "Then, it I were thee, I'd
cut my whiskers oft to clean the looms with." To revenge
this affront, offered to one of their number, the whole of
the operatives turned out, and remained on strike for a con-
siderable time, although they had already obtained the
advance. Alter the strike at Stockport, the hands of one of
the mills which were the first to resume work, conducted
themselves in a most overbearing way. Their employers
were going to send away some yarn, when the men inter-
fered, and demanded, " Where is that yarn going to
"To Manchester," was the reply. " No," said the men,
we are not going to send yarn to Manchester when there
are weavers in Stockport waiting for it." And the em-
ployers were obliged to yield the point. It is needless to
multiply instances: the above are sufficient to demonstrate
the existence of the usurping and exacting spirit which the
employers are now endeavouring to check.
If these who are leading the operatives in this dispute
had been in the pay of an association of masters, they could
not have played into their hands more effectually than they
have been doing ; for the masters were never more agree-
able to a suspension of op 'rations than they are at the pre-
sent time. The operatives have based their demands on
the fact that trade has been good during the last four years,
but for some time back all the profits have been made on
spinning, whilst there has been scarcely any description of
cloth which could be made at a profit, and the great bulk
of the trade in Blackburn and the neighbourhood is com-
posed of men who are manufacturers only. It is tolerably
certain that an accommodation would have been entered

into long since between the employers and their hands, in
many instances, if the operatives bad been left
free agents in the matter ; but they are obliged to refer all

offers of employment to the consideration of their central
committee, an irresponsible body, whose members are very
little known, and who always interfere to prevent any com-
promise. This committee, moreover, constitutes itself a
sort of inquisition, and instances are related in which,
when there has been any dispute between the hands and
their employers, the members hive gone to examine the
machinery, to satisfy themselves whether the masters were
working properly. Hands who may be disposed to offer to
return to work are deterred from doing so by the fear of
this committee, which would at once stop their allowance,
and deprive them of the onlyscsourcc they have left against
starvation. We are in a position to correct some state-
ments on this subject which have appeared in the morning
papers. It has been said that the operatives in this dis-
trict must be doing very well if they can afford to con-
tribute Gs. per loom towards the support of the
turnouts; and that provisions must be very cheap if people
are able to live upon Gs. per week. The fact is that the
men contribute only 3d. par loom (although a much higher
levy has been talked of), and, as each man works at four
looms, that would make Is. per week ; and the average
earnings are somewhere about ISs. per week, so that Gt.
per weak cannot support them, and they are constantly iu
debt to the small shopkeepers. It is probable that if those
who have been urging on the operatives to the struggle
were reduced to the same allowance per week which the
hands have now to subsist upon, there would soon I e an
end of the strike.

ELEcTons.—Yesterday, an abstract return to the
How,: of Commons was printat of the number of electors
on the register of 18.52-5:3, in each county, city, and borough
in Ireland, distinguishing their .itislitieation In counties
the electors nurnberr.l 119,854, and in cities and borooghs
29,631, making the total number of electors 179,489.