The Express.
London, England, 1847-11-19 00:00:00

THE EXPRESS, FRIDAY EVENING, NOVEMBER 19, 1847.

Fairer upon the list, stands a small, and we have
every reason to think by no mesas an united, group
of persons, who cherish a lingering faith in the virtues
and destiny of the experiment of 1844 ; as far as we
can gather, there appears to be a somewhat
dangerous schism among this little band of
discomfited disciples. And it is another cart-'1
one illustration of that extreme perversity
of human nature which so often creates disruption
among men who apparently have the strongest
motives for unanimity, that the source of disagree-
ment in this instance takes the most ultra form. The
more numerous section are in favour of a latitudina-
rian prescription, which shall attempt to resuscitate
the patient by giving him the power of a voluntary
suspension of existence whenever it may be conve-
nient. The more consistent minority maintain that
the entire mischief has been brought about because
the regimen has hitherto sinned, not on the side of
rigidity, but of relaxation. Between this domestic
disagreement on the one side, and a very prevalent con-
viction on the other, that neither with the complement
of a more complying disposition, nor with the aggrava-
tion of further stringency, can the scheme be any
longer tolerated, we think we may safely assure our-
selves that to whomsoever the victory may fall, it will
not again become the trophy of the currency theorists.
Finally, there is a fifth party which, in many re-
'poets, may be described as the Eclecticism of the
preceding four. They feel the importance and the
paramount nature of credit as fully as the followers
of Mr. Arrwoon, but they utterly repudiate the
Birmingham opinions respecting the great settlement
of 1819. They admit, with the government paper,
party, the desirableness of some great and central
body, but they deny that it is either safe or prudent
that the state should be invested with so novel
and so momentous a responsibility. They con-
cede to the banking free traders the wisdom
of a full and free competition, but they question the
sagacity of a plan which appears much more likely
to introduce license than liberty. They fully concur
with the school of Mr. JONES LOYD, in seeking to
preserve inviolate the credit and convertibility of the
bank-note, bat they hesitate to admit the paradox
that this end will be best attained by crippling the
central authority with an absurd formality of division.
They seek to temper theory with experience, to
_join
a foresight for emergencies with an elastic principle
of safety, and to give lege heed to the glittering con-
trivaeces which boast that they are "the most recent
improvements," than to a calm and patient disposition
to disturb little, where to disturb is often the same
thing as to destroy.

Avrootrcit we have not yet specially noticed the
concluding reports of the select committee of last ses-
sion on settlement and poor removal, our notices of
the former reports, and our remarks on the law itself,
will have put our readers in possession of the greater
part of the information which they contain. The'
committee has decided, after much division of opi-
nion, to recommend to the house the entire abolition
of the power of removal, and consequently of settle-
ment. They further recommend the adoption of the
anion as the area of chargeability; and that addi-
tional facilities should be given for the alteration of
the limits of unions.
It will at once be seen that the resolutions of the
committee fall far short of supplying the mate-
rials for a substantial measure such as will be
necessary for the government to frame. The principle
on which the new adjustment of liability is to be
brought into practical operation will probably be
found in parliament, as was the case in the committee
itself, more difficult to determine than the general
question either of settlement or chargeability. The
committee themselves acknowledge the incomplete-
ness of the result at which they have arrived, in a
paragraph of the report, in which they take deserved
credit for the amount of information which they have
collected :—" Although your committee do not submit
for the consideration of the house any specific plan
for the amendment of the law, they feel confident
that their labours will not prove useless, inasmuch as
they have brought together a large mass of valuable
information, and fixed public attention on thc,ie points
which require especial consideration in any attempt
to legislate on a subject of such great importance to
the interests of the poor, and the general well-being
of the country."
The difficulty which the committee has declined to
solve consists in determining how the existing bodies
of rate-payers are to be affected by the prepoeed aboli-
tion of the power of removal. As the resolutions of
the committee stand, it would seem that the burden
of taxation is at once to be shifted from the parishes
to the unions, or, in other words, from the populous
parishes which are now moat heavily burdened, to the
wealthy or close perishes which are, compara-
tively, lightly rated. The hardships upon those
who in their rents and other contracts have taken
the comparative exemption from parochial taxa-
tion into account, if they were at once pat
on a level with their neighbours, who at present
are compelled to support the bulk of the poor, is too
obvious to require explanatian. The sudden shifting
of taxation always produces injustice; but never so
much as when the tax to be re-adjusted is one levied,
like parish rates, on property locally fixed. Houses,
and other tenements, vary in value more directly than
any other possessions, in proportion to the lighter or
heavier burdens to which they are subject. The ne-
cessity of keeping in view the relative amounts of
taxation to which parishes have hitherto been subject
led Sir JAMES GRAHAM, in a bill which he brought
forward two or three years ago, into the opposite error,
of proposing to fix the proportions of taxation for
ever, according to an average of a certain number of
years before the passing of an set for abolishing or
extending settlement.
The committee, as might be supposed, did not fail
to attend to this important question. It being
that henceforth the union should maintain all agreed
tliti
paupers within its bounds, the burden must be di-
vided among the parishes either in proportion to their
past expenditure, or by equal taxation, or by some
intermediate arrangement, either temporary or per-
manent. Several plans of more or less complication
were submitted to their notice ; but none of them ap-
pear to have been able to command a majority. The
division lists, however, are not uainstructive, by the
means which they afford for conjecturing the future
course to be adopted by parliament. It is most
probable that a minority of the committee
will command the support of the house. Mr.
ALDAM was defeated b a large majority on •
proposal that parishes should be taxed according
to their former proportions, as long as the amount
levied in the union did not exceed the present aver-
age, and that all sums above that amount should be
raised by an equal anion rate. The rejection of this
scheme may be considered equivalent to a decision by
the committee that the rating throughout the union
should at some period be equalised. A somewhat
similar resolution drawn up by the chairman, Mr. C.
BULLER, had previously been rejected, Sir G. GREY,
however, and Sir J. GRAHAM, votinE in the minority.
A resolution proposed by Mr. P. SCROPE, that
the contribution of each parish should be based on
past averages, and brought by a gradual approxima-
tion to an equal rate, shared a similar fate. The late
and present Home Secretaries, however, and Mr. C.
VILLIERS, were again in the minority.
Without denying the difficulties of the question,
we have no doubt that Mr. SCROPE'S plan is that
which must be adopted. It is evidently just that
poor-law taxation ought hereafter to be spread over
wider areas than at present; and it is equally plain
that the immediate relief of large. parishes at the
expense of small ones will produce similar hardships
to those which have been so universally complained of
as arising from the act of 1846. Mr. BULLER'S plan
would perpetuate a part of the present admitted irre-
gularity of taxation; but the majority of the commit-
tee, if it wished to introduce immediate equality,
would cause mach more immediate and severer hard-

shi p.
Putting out of the question the unfairness of suddenly
shifting the burden of taxation, the attempt to carry
such a measure would expose the government to
formidable—perhaps insuperable—opposition. The
case of the more lightly taxed, and even of the close
parishes, is not without its claims on the considera-
tion of parliament. In many instances, the com-
parative exemption from taxation is the result of •
wise economy, which is entitled to ite legitimate re-
ward. There is no county in which a spendthrift
pariah might not be pointed oat by the side
of one which his prevented by proper precautions
the undue increase of pauperism. Close parishes,
though they may act harshly in preventing the poor
from obtaining a settlement, are the best of all settle-
ments for the few poor whom they contain. Ac-
cording to the evidence of Mr. Fitentuars, an exten-
sive occupier and land-agent in Oxfordshire, the poor

In the wilco workhouse come almost entirely from the'
large parishes. The this* or fear farmers who pay
the rates of a small parish, can easily calculate the
burden to themselves of maintaining an unproductive
pauper in the workhouse. They find it better to
give him work, even where, as on grass lands in',
winter, they have little real occasion for his services.
Whatever may be the reasonable claims of those
parishes which would be aggrieved by the immediate
introduction of a system of union rating, there can be
no doubt that their advocates would have it in their ,
power greatly to embarrass, if not entirely to prevent,
the passing of any measure which contained no pro-
vision to satisfy them. Parliament may be well assured
that, popular as the proposed abolition of settlement
may be among members of the house and the
constituents who have most frequent access to them,
it will require all its courage to meet, and all its ilia-
tiee to disarm, the opposition which will be raised
to the measure when it is actually brought
forward. The recital of benefit to the peer
to be derived from the free circulation of the poor,
sincere as it is, and in a great degree well founded,
is too abstract and scientific in its terms to secure ge-
neral popularity for the measure which it introduces.
The separation of the pauper from those on whom he
had a legal local claim, the taking away of hie only
property, even though a substitute is given for it,'
will be urged with vehemence against the change.
The measure is, as we have formerly shown, a carry-
ing out and extension of the poor-law bill. One of
the witnesses recommends it on the ground that it
will cause the workhouse test to 132 more generally
adopted. from the breaking off of the local sympathies
which have hitherto made rate-payers unwilling to
apply it. The union regulations also for relief, if not
severer, must be made more uniform, to prevent the
i concourse of unsettled poor in districts which would
be preferred for their lax discipline. To secure uni-
formity it will probably be necessary to extend the
powers, or at least to multiply the interference, of the
poor-law board and its inspectors. As supporters of
the principle of the poor-law, we do not bring forward
these suggestions as arguments against a change, but
RS cautions to government not to add unnecessarily
to the opposition which it will inevitably experience.
We have, however, little doubt that Sir G. GRF.Y
will decide on the course which he has already sup-
ported
in committee. A limited period of taxation,
according to previous averages, will prepare the way
for the equitable introduction of a more equally dis-
tributed assessment. If, as is far from impossible,
the area of taxation is, after some experience of the
union rate, further enlarged, the change may be car-
ried out on the same principle, but with greater ease,
as unions, on the average, are more equal in their cir-
cumstances and burdens than parishes.

IIIERE 111 no nuisance so great but usage will
harden the senses against it, or awaken an artificial
enjoyment of what to others is intolerable. The
candle milker positively delights in the savour of his
own melting•pots, while he is acutely sensible of the
annoyance of the neighbouring nightman's yard. The
nightman, for his part, is indignant that tallow-
melters should be tolerated.

This one-sided insensibility is very common
among the witnesses before the committee ap-
pointed to inquire into the suggested removal
of Smithfield market. There is one, for ex-
ample, who has lived forty-six years in Smith-
field. He quite revels in its sights, sounds, and
smells. He is is the habit of walking every evening
in the market after his warehouse is shut, and con-
siders the effluvia from the cattle as likely to be very
beneficial to his health. He uses the air thus im-
pregnated as a restorative. Being taken unwell
during the spring, he "took his stick, got into Smith-
field, and was completely restored'.' He has not
had a doctor for the whole forty-five years he
has lived in the locality, and considers it the healthi-
est spot he can choose. He has not seen an instance
of cruelty for fourteen or fifteen years. He has heard
a mere trifle of cursing and swearing. The noise of
Sundaynightnever kept him an hoar awake in his life.
In the whole forty-fiveyears of his experience he never
knew any more serious accident from the cattle than
one lady's petticoats torn and a leg slightly lacerated.
No doubt this witness is perfectly honest. He
speaks his impression. He has become indurated to
Smithfield experiences. In like manner Mr. GIBLETT,
one of the great salesmen, who has attended the mar-
ket twice a week for twenty years, " has been better
after attending the market than when he went." He
thinks it has improved his health. Very much, no
doubt, as temperance increased the durability of the
reformed Chelsea pensioner's wooden legs.
Of course we have the counter statements of those
who do suffer, both in eye, ear, and nose, to set
against these ; and very formidable grievances they
parade before the committee. Something most be
bated on both sides, in order to strike a fair balance
of the evidence as to Smithfield nuisances, which the
committee have not yet done. Our own impression
is, that the objections to the market have been ex-
aggerated. It is in itself neither so pernicious to
health, nor a source of such annoyance to the public,
as to call for its removal. The accidents caused by
the cattle on their road to it have been exaggerated.
No doubt, the unfortunate witness is to be pitied
whose nurse, walking upstairs from the kitchen, met
a bullock walking down, which stepped into the
kitchen, and with a perverse and wanton taste de-
stroyed all the china in the place, sparing, appa-
rently, the meaner crockery. Ivor can we refuse our
commiseration to the respectable oilman who has
had bullocks in his shop several times, and who is so
accustomed to see sheep there, that he considers
them hardly worth complaining of, it being "the
bullocks we dread." These visitations are naturally
an annoyance to shopkeepers whose customers are '
not connected with the market. A stationer who
supplies account books to the market people can
afford to talk lightly, and by the way, of a calf
putting his head through the shop window. He sets
off his Mondays' and Fridays' extra profits against
such contingencies. No doubt, timid ladies are occa-
sionally frightened into fits by very harmless oxen,
and timid old gentlemen driven by sudden onsets from
the same on perilous leaps into shops and door-
ways. Bat these and similar accidents, make the
most you can of them, furnish no sufficient grounds
for disturbing the capital invested in and about
Smithfield. Nor, on the score of health, can a
good case be made out against the mere mar-
ket. Its uses as an open space more than
counterbalance any ill effects arising from the
cattle, or what they leave behind them. It is
admitted, moreover, that the greatest possible cleanli-
ness is enforced. _ _ .

We are thus careful in giving the fullest weight
to all that can be said for Smithfield, because
it is most desirable that, in connexion with the
sanitary question, all exaggeration should be avoided.
The case wants no aid from statements that can-
not be borne out, and grievances that will not bear
investigation. If the preservation of Smithfield
market meant no more than the keeping open an
area in London for the sale of cattle, there is much
that sanitary law may busy itself with before it lays
hands on this. Those who oppose all change will
take hold of our admission as an argument on their
side, in the same way as they will wrest to their own
favour the exaggerations of those who refuse
to make such an admission. But the public
must be warned that the matter in dispute is not
Smithfield market, simply; but what grows out of
and goes along with it. The charges we would
allege against Smithfield divide themselves into two
heads : under the first we place the insufficient size of
its area, the consequent cruelty to the animals assem-
bled in it for sale, and the injury to the meat resulting
from the violence rendered necessary by want of room.
Under the second, we include the manifold abomina-
tions of the slaughter-houses round about the area of
Smithfield, which cannot be got rid of while the
market remains where it is.

The existence and importance of these two distinct
classes of evils are both, as it appears to us, proved
fully by the evidence of the committee already printed.
The more ample exhibition of them from the Blue
Book we defer for the present. It is a curious fact
that the 14th century was intolerant of some evils to
which the 19th patiently submits. This practice of
slaughtering, skinning, and disembowelling cattle
and sheep, which is now carried on in its most revolt-
ing
form about Warwick-lane, Cow-cross, and White-
chapel, was prohibited, A.D., 1361, by EDWARD lIL,
in a letter addressed to the mayor and sheriffs of
London, which we give, in MAITLAND'e translation
of it from the original roll in the Tower :
Beaton by killing of great besets, &c., from whose putre-
fied blood runnnut down the streets, and the bowels cast
into the Thames, the air in the city is very much corrupted
and infected, whence abominable and moat filthy stinks pro-
ceed, sicknesses and many other evils have happened to such
u have abode in the said city, or have resorted is it ; and

gent dangers are hared to fall out for the time to come, an-
lees remedy be presently made against it. We, willing to
prevent such danger, and to provide as much as in us lies fur
the honesty of the raid city and the safety of our people,
by the consent of our council in our present parliament,
have ordained that all bulls, ozen, hogs, and other
gross creatures, to be slain for the sustenance of the said
city, be led an far as the town of Stratford on one part of
London, and the town of Knightsbridge on the other, and
there, and not on this side, be slain ; and that their bowels
be there cleansed, to be brought, together with the flesh, to
the said city to be sold. And if any butcher shall presume
anything rashly against this ordinance, let him incur forfeit-
ure of the flesh of the creatures which he bath caused to be
slain on this side of the said towns, and the punishment of
Imprisonment for one year. Thikordinance to be published,
proclaimed, and held, and all butchers doing otherwise to be
chastised and punished according to the form of the ordi-
nance aforesaid. Witness the King, at Westminster, the
twenty-fifth day of February."—A.L. 1361.
Nor was this a solitary instance of such interfer-
ence. A statute of Rich. IL, c. 13, A.D. 1388, pro-
vides for the punishment of those " which cause cor-
ruption near a city or great town to corrupt the air,
by casting the dung and filth of the garbage and en-
trails, as well of beasts killed as of other corruptions,
in ditches, rivers, waters, and elsewhere, within and
nigh unto divers cities, boroughs, and towns of the
realm, and the suburbs of them, so that the air is
thereby greatly infect, whereby many maladies and
other intolerable diseases do happen." The penalty
imposed for not removing such nuisances or creating
new ones was the enormous fine, for those times, of
201. It is well that we should now and then look
back as well as forward in legislation. The "wisdom
of our ancestors," even in their social police, is not all
foolishness.

Titz remonstrance we offered, on the eighth of this
month, against the proposal to increase the delays
of Chancery by allowing the number of taxing-
masters to be reduced to five, has not been unavailing.
A successor has been appointed to Mr. GArry, and,
what is more, that successor is a gentleman whose
previous public career affords an ample guarantee
that he will efficiently discharge his duties. Mr.
JOSEPH PARKES has, in various capacities, proved that
he possesses in a rare degree the perspicacity, indus-
try, and firmness of character which his new office
demands.

It would be gratifying were we able to add that
the terms upon which the demission of his prede-
cessor has been accepted were equally entitled to
praise. But this is impossible. Mr. Gums' is one of
those " sworn clerks" whose functions were put an
end to by the act of 1842. The compensation
awarded to him under that act for his loss of office,
was 6,000/. a year; one half of which is to be conti-
nued to his representatives for seven years after hie
death. Yet he accepted the office of taxing-master, to
add a couple of thousands more to his annual income.
And now, though yet in the prime of life—at the best
possible working age—he is allowed an additional
retiring pension of something approaching to 1,0001.
per annum for life, on resigning his late office.
There was no necessity for accepting Mr. GArry'a
resignation upon such terms. Ile was every way
competent to the discharge of his duties, and might
have been held to perform them, had he refused to
cultivate " retired leisure " on the pittance of 6,000/.
per annum. It is too late to indulge in the hope that
this bargain can be rescinded, for it will not be easy
to shame a gentleman who could ask and accept so
much of the public money, into giving it up. But
really it is time that some effort should be made to
obtain re-organisation of oar judicial establishments,
or changes in the personnel of legal functionaries at a
less extravagant cost than the nation has of late been
paying for them.

Oar Paris despatches of Wednesday contain no
news of importance.
The Courrier Francais says: alt is reported as a
certainty that the office of grand-admiral is to be cre-
ated in favour of the Prince de Joinville ; but it ap-
pears that the ministry has not dared to carry out this
measure by a simple royal ordonnance, and that a bill
is to be presented on the subject to the Chambers,
which it is hoped to find docile."
Pails Baran., Nov. 17.—For kloney.—Three per Conth... 76 90,
Fives, 116 20; Four*, 100. Treasury Bonds, 5. Bank Shares,
3,297 50. Exchange oo London (siutt), 25 70.

The Madrid mails of the 12th have arrived. The
moat important news they bring is that of the
appointment of General Concha to the Paris
embassy, vacant since the departure of Narvaez.
M. Bravo Murillo is appointed to the Ministry
of Public Instruction. The deputies were ar-
riving, and the moderados were to have had
a preliminary meeting on Saturday. It was ex-
pected that M. Mon would be elected president of
the representative chamber. There was a report that
the moderados intended to impeach M. Salamanca.
General Ortega, a friend of Salamanca, has been
exiled to Corunna. We learn from our own cor-
respondent that the Queen has refused to
open in person the session of the Cortes.
Her Majesty says that she will never go
to a place where her authority has been ques-
tioned, and where a ministry which imprisoned and
oppressed her has obtained votes of confidence. It
was expected that some strong manifestation of her
distaste for the present cabinet would suddenly take
place.
The Espeetador announces that an English diplo-
matist had arrived at Madrid on what it calls " a
delicate mission ;" and it says that, in order not to
create obstacles, it will for the present not state what
the mission is, though it will do so hereafter. The
Heralds professes to know nothing, either of the
diplomatist or his mysterious mission. The Espanol
states that it was positively asserted that the Bank
de Foment* had offered to transfer the quicksilver
contract to the representative of the house of Roths-
child. A French general named Corbin has left Mad-
rid after several days' stay. His visit excited some
attention from its having been supposed by some per-
sons to have had a secret political object. He was
treated with great distinction. The government has,
it is maid, determined to take measures to prevent a
scarcity of food in Madrid. The journals state that a
day or two previously the horses of Queen Christina's
carriage ran away, whereby the Queen was placed
in great danger.
Itenaro:Bous, Nov. 13.—Throe per Cents., 261 at 50 days, 263.16 1
eaah ; Five per Cents., 141 yeper, 141 sash ; Pasives, 41 paper
Coupon paper of Bt. Ferdwand, 130 nab ; Bank or St.;
Labelle 124 paper. Bpiettanne on London, 46 70-100.

We mentioned yesterday, in general terms, a colli-
sion which bad taken piece at Fivizzano between
the Modenese soldiers and the inhabitants. The
straggle was at its height when the mail left, and its
issue is still unknown. But we have received the
despatches and journals from Tuscany and Modena,
which are tilled with detailed reports of great length
of the events which preceded the sudden and unex-
pected seizure of Fivizzano by the Modenese troops.
On the sth instant, at half-past one in the morning,
the outposts of Fivizzano discovered the approach of a
division of Modenese troops. The chief city authority
received a letter from the commander of the troops,
requesting to be allowed to pass his troops through
the town. The alarm which the appearance of these
troops first produced was thus allayed, and the latter
were thrown off their guard. The troops marched in,
but, to the great surprise of the inhabitants and the
authorities, instead of marching out again, coolly
took up their quarters, seized the posts and gate, and
declared that they were come in the name of the
Duke of Modena to take possession of the town.
Nothing could exceed the astonishment and
indignation produced by this trick. The Goa.
falonieri refused to acknowledge the act, and
protested against it in the name of the Tus-
can government. The protest was duly drawn and
executed before a notary. All this took place in the
morning and forenoon of the sth. On the night of
the 4th, at 9 o'clock, the Tuscan government received
at Florence a despatch from the Modenese govern-
ment, dated the 3rd, in which the latter announced
that on the sth a Modenese commissioner would pre-
tent himself at Fivizzano, to take possession of
she place, and that it would be necessary that the
Grand Duke of Tuscany should take the measures
necessary for its surrender. Since, however, only
twelve hours intervened between the delivery of this
despatch and the seizure of Fivizzano, it was evi-
dently impossible for the Tuscan government,whatever
might be its disposition to take the required measures.
The publication of these circumstances raised a
most formidable commotion in the chief cities
of Tuscany, and the whole population seemed about
to fly to arms and march to the rescue of their
fellow-subjects at Fivizzano. This excitement
was partially tranquillised by the publication of
a manifesto in the .Florence Gaulle on the 9th, in
which the government details with circumstantial
minuteness of time and place all the circumstances of
which we have given the outline, and leaves it to be

understood that it had no intention of submi----""ing
passively to such an outrage.
We announced yesterday that a collision had
already taken place between the inhabitants of Firiz,
nun and the troops, that those of Pict,* Soot;
another populous town of Tuscany in the neighbour.
hood, had risen. We have now to add that en the 9th
inst. large bodies of the citizens of l'isa, and of Lee.
horn had taken arms and marched for Fivizzano, that
a number of Florentine youths were about to adopt!'
like course, and that placards were posted throughout
Florence calling en the Tuscans to avenge the outrage
committed against their well-beloved sovervigo, sod
to assist their fellow-subjects of Fivizzano. The
general place of rendezvous for those who were togo
on this expedition was Pisa.

PRUSSIA.—BERLIN.—M. Dieffenbach, one or the
most.listioguished member of the German medical faeat,
died at Berlin, on the 11th instant, of apoplexy, at the yt
of 53.

TUE CABIBRIA.—It is intended that the C,atateit
steamer shall sail for New York on the lan of January. Tiki,
will be the precedent for the new arrangements teat
been for some time in contemplation of despatching the 6,04
every week during the summer months alternately to gqt„
and New York. Meanwhile they will continue to be di.
'patched fortnightly.