The Express.
London, England, 1851-09-06 00:00:00

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TO CORRILSPON DENTS.
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LONDON, SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 6.

anxious to procure his " Company" to be registered
as a joint stock company, in order that it might
come under the Winding-up Acts, but the Registrar
of Joint Stock Companies refused to register it, and
the Court of Queen's Bench decided that such refu-
sal was correct. He then ;elicited a private act,
which he has at last obtainer to antinuise the Moo,
hition of this company, and the winding up of its
affairs under the general law for winding up abortive
and insolvent joint stock companies.
An order for that purpose has been made by the
Court of Chancery, and the report to which we re-
ferred was a meeting in the Musters' office, to appoint
an official manager. The legal difficulties having
been removed, there will be nothing peculiar in the
winding-up of the affairs of the " National Land
Company ;" the land will be sold, the debts and liabi-
lities discharged, and the surplus, if any, divided
amongst the subscribers of the 130,000 shares.
Practically, the effect of the proceeding will be to
protect Mr. O'CosNon personally from the demands
of individual subscribers for the return of their sub-
scriptions; and henceforth there will be little to dis-
tinguish the termination of this scheme from that of
hundreds of others, which have found their final
resting place in the Master's office, save the low estate
and poverty of the deluded subscribers.
But, as chroniclers of the events of the day, we can-
not let this scheme pass into oblivion without placing
on record some of its circumstances and details as
illustrative of that which was at one time an exten-
sively
The

prevalent popular delusion.
scheme originated at a timo when work wu
in the manufacturing districts, and Mr.
(Mosso% who had become the political leader of a
section of the operatives of those districts, seems to
have conceived the plan of relieving the distresses of
his adherents and increasing his own political im-
portance by converting the unemployed manufac-
turing operatives into peasant proprietors. To "go
upon the land" was the panacea held out in sundry
chartist publications and at most chartist meetings
for the evils of non-employment. Not a doubt was
entertained by the deluder or the deluded that the
end sought was desirable, and the only question was
how to attain it. To place men who were either
paupers or on the verge of pauperism upon their own
freehold farms, there to provide for their own happy,
maintenance, was worthy of the Hibernian genius of
the propounder of the land scheme. Indeed, the
idea was, from first to last, thoroughly Irish. No
Englishman would have thought of relieving poverty
by giving the poor man without capital a few acres
of land, subject to a rent twice as great as its market
value. Yet such was Mr. O'CoNNott's plan.
The company was to consist of 1,10,000 shares of
U. Gs. each, and no individual subscriber was to hold
less than two, or more than four shares. With the
money thus obtained, land was to be, and was, in
fact, purchased, and laid out in allotments of two,
three, and four acres each, corresponding with the
diff,Tent classes of two, three, and four share holders.
On every allotment a cottage and outbuildings were
to be erected, and a sum of money by way of farm-
ing capital of 71. 10s. per acre was to be allocated to
each lot of land.

IT would be rash to conclude that even the pm
sent insurrection in Cuba has been put down, al.
though the capture of fifty of Lorzz's followers
the act of re-embarking certainly creates struggler*•
babilities of such a result. Their execution excites
feelings of disgust, and reminds one too painfully of
those acts of wholesale slaughter so often perpetrated
by Spanish generals, in some instances upon English-
men. Who does not recollect the shooting of BOYIL/
and his companions, and the difficulty with which our
liberals swallowed their resentment ?
Our countrymen, however, who risked or lost their
lives in combating the hellish tyranny of FERDINAND
were embarked in a far more noble and disinterested
cause than the young Americans who invaded Cuba.
A wild and vague desire to increase the dominions
of their country, and hoist its Hag per fat ma arias
over all adjoining territories, together with a cer-
tain amount of gain and personal honour, seemed
the only aim of these adventurous spirits. It does
not even appear certain that a majority of the
Creoles, or native planters of the island, desire to fling
off the Spanish yoke. The feeling is not universal
even in that class, which, if it secured its political
ascendancy and independence of Spain, must neces-
sarily lean upon MOM other power for the force re-
quisite to keep down the slave population, and give
security to the island.
But however little we sympathise with the in-
*urgent' or approve of the conduct of these Ameri-
can adventurers, who bring war and invasion upon
a country upon such insufficient and unwarrantable
grounds, we must still maintain the opinion already
expressed by us, that Spain and its govern-
ment are chiefly to blame for this confusion, in-
security, and bloodshed. had Spain condescended
to conciliate the wishes and consult the interest of
any class in the island, it might have counted upon
their support; and the very fact would have deterred
thole buccaneers from their attempt. But when
Spain persist. in keeping up, in the midst of countries
and continents, all free, all emancipated, all admit-
ting the people to a largeshare of government—when
Spain persists in subjecting her own island to the old
tvinic of Mrs. Mother Country and her agents—
when absolute military rule is alone persevered in,
and the colony manifestly and avowedly adminis-
tered with the sole aim of enriching Spanish offi-
cials, beside the sending home a large tribute, it is
utterly impossible that the men of property and in-
telligence, born upon the island, can bear to be,
fear after year, treated like sheep, shorn, and
olded, and penned up, without more than a kind of
animal account being made of them.
As the quarrel stands, and as the Spaniards con-
duct themselves, it is evident that the Americans
will end by conquering the island, unless European
powers interfere. If beaten in fifties, they will come
to hundreds. Defeat will exasperate, and those
executions of prisoners which awe Spaniards, will but
exasperate and embolden Anglo-Americans: the
must efficient trumpet for Cubun annexation will
undoubtedly he Admiral IlesziLut's massacre.
The question is, ought we to interfere? It may
be desirable to retain Cuba fur Spain, in the hope
that Spain may govern it rationally. But, in that
very uncertain hope, are we to risk a war with men
of our own race and blood, for a nation from whom
we have reaped nothing hut contumely and ingrati-
tude ? Our view of the matter ought tote very much
that of the northern states of the Union, who dread
the annexation of Cuba as a slave state, thereby in-
creasing the powers of and perpetuating the slave-
holding. slave-cultivated region, and giving, it is to
be feared, the greatest encouragement to slave breed-
ing within the States themselves.
But. on the other hand, it is undeniable that we
would be great gainers by the Creoles acquiring
ascendancy. It would put an end, not to slavery in-
deed, but to the slave-trade. TURNBULL long since
assured us that the native planters would re-
joice in any law putting an end tothe negro im-
portation. And the wonder is, that the Americans
who have obtained lands iu Cuba should desire to
overturn the Spanish government, under which they
can import slaves and enjoy monopolies, which
even under annexation were hopeless. At all
events there ate ample reasons for us not
being over-zealous in the maintenance of
Spanish domination, and from our not being
Quixotic in interference. The French republicans,
at least their government, would no doubt think it
reason enough for interfering, that they are
supporting it monarchy and putting down a rePublic.
'fhev are quite fixdish and knavish enough to go to
the )lavannah on the same principle which brought
them to Rome. But such motives would not do fur
a British parliament or a British public.

The prospectus promised that the shareholders,
who ultimately numbered 70,000, should all be lo-
cated on their " freehold? within four years; how
that was to be accomplished is not very obvious. The
actual process was, when an estate had been bought,
laid out iu lots of two, three, or four acres, and built
upon, that a ballot, or more properly a lottery
drawing, should take place amongst all the
members of the respective classes who had paid
up their subscriptions in full, to determine
who should be the first fortunate holder of
his own freehold. The prizeholders were then
put into possession, under the liability to pay a per-
petual rent charge of i per cent. on the sum ex-
pended in locating them. This amounted, as it ap-
peared from the evidence before the committee, on
un average to 1001. per acre. The number of per-
sons located, out of the 70,000 seeking location, was ,
never more than 900, and of these very few were
ever able or willing to pay any rent at all. Mr.
O'Cose.sou, in whom the legal ownership of the
estates had been vested, has repeatedly distrained
fur rent, and, so far as the scheme had been reduced
into rmetice, it promised to exhibit in several of our
English counties a fee-simile picture, on a small
scale, of Irish pauperised occupiers of land.
The notion seems to have been, that when
one of these pauper colonies was established,
the rent charges which the colonists were liable to pay
could be mortgaged or sold, and the money so
obtained laid out in fresh purchases to be allotted,
built upon, balloted for, and mortgaged in the same
manner, and that in this aay an endless source of
means liar settling paupers on their own freeholds
had been discovered. Ibis golden dream, however,
vanished at its inception, for the first settlers could
p no rent-charges, and not a shilling could be
raised upon the lands first purchased.
That such a scheme, or any scheme, for creating a
chum of holders of small patches of land, from the
produce of which they are to derive, or attempt to
derive, a subsistence, should fail, is rather a subject
fur congratulation, for its success could only produce
misery and pauperism of the moat hopeless kind.

FRANCE.

Faun a report of proceedings in the office of the
Matter in Chancery, which appeared in our columns
the other day, it will be seen that "the National
Land Company"—that enormous bubble wherewith
Mr. FRAIMUS O'Coxxoa a few years ago deluded
himself and a great number of the working classes—
has arrived at that bourne from whence no " coin-
poly" returns—an order fur dissolution under the
Winding-up Acts. Some three years ago this scheme I
formed the subject of a purliamentar) inquiry, which
wigs undertaken with a strung notion, both in the
House of Commons and out of doors, that something
like a fraud for his own advantage had been coin-'
milted by Mr. O'Cosson on the subscribers to the
Lind Cotiquny. The investigations of the committee
and of the aertnuitants employed under its sanction,
however, proved that, though the utmost confusion sub-
sisted in the amount.' and the most surprising ignorance I
and incapacity prevailed amongst the managers,
there was no reason for imputing fraud or malvena- I
ties to any of the parties concerned. la fact, the '
accountants showed. very much to the astonishment, I
we believe, of Mr. O'Cosson himself, that there was
a couinderable balance doe to him from the "'Company."
The scheme was proved to be a delusion, and there
was nothing to show that the managers had not
honestly tried to carry an impossibility into exe-
cution. There were also on the committer a con-
siderable number of members personally friendly to
Mr. O'('osisoe. This committee reported that the
National Land Company did nut fall within the prin-
cipks of the Frieudly Sueieties, that it was an illegal
scheme (as being a land lottery), and that it would
not tultil the expectations held out by the directors
to the shareholders. The committee then stated the

result of their examination of the accounts. and re-
commended that powers should be granted to the
parties interested in the scheme, if they should so
desire. to wind up the undertaking and relieve them
from the penalties to which they had incautiously
subjeeted themselves.
After this report, the bubble, of course, was burst ;
and the subscribers and members. whose faith in
Mr. OTitxmott had before been a good deal shaken,
haie from time to time instituted proceedings against
him to recover back their subscriptions, and such
pnweedings were in general successful. To escape
the consequexces of such demands from all the

wilw.cribers—for the money subscribed had been
laid out in the purchase of land, building
outrages, and the like, and was as to three-fourths
d it irrecoverably lost—Mr. O'Cormon became

is believed—=stated that they, the committee, were''
sot a ildtherative body, and that it was no •
part of !heir duty to interfere in general polities.
Without approving the English policymthis respect,
he would remark that it was of very long standing. ,
It dated as far back es Queen Elisabeth, and the
.late of England did not permit a minister to inter- !
him with refugees so long as they did nothing to
Mono the public peace of the country which gave
lima an asylum. He was decidedly of opinion that
thresignittee ought not to interfere in so delicate a
ffer. ' The proposal was rejected. It is neverthe-
less rumoured this morning that M. Baroche has
addressed a diplomatic note to the English govern-
aWiit on tEI Subject.
Nothing farther took place of any importance.
General Le Flo, one of the qutestors of the Assem-
bly, has intimated to the self-styled Committee of
Surveillance that they cannot be permitted to hold
their meetings in the Palace of the National Assem-
bly.
The Moniteur contains a decree of the President of
the Republic promulgating the convention of April
12th, 18,51, between France and Portugal for the re-
ciprocal protection of copyright in literature and
works of art, and of property in distinctive trade
marks.
M. Brenier's mission to Berne is said to relate to
certain violations of the Swiss frontier by Austria.
Arrests are still going on in Paris, and it is said
that they are to be continued upon a large scale.
They have hitherto been effected in rather a whole-
sale manner. The police have gone to various sus-
pected cafe, and arrested everybody they found
there. In the garden of the Cafe de La Nouvelle
France, in the Faubourg Poissonniere, they arrested
60 persons, chiefly Germans; in the Café Mandard,
8 ; in the Café de Frankfort, Rue Coquilliire,
28; in the Cafe de la Haute Saone, Rue
de Grcnelle, 9; and in the Café Nogues,
Hue des Moulins, 21. In the latter caf the
Commissioner of Police was about to include the
waiter in his list, but, after some hesitation, he in-
quired whether the waiter was much wanted in the
house, and on being told that he was, he suffered
him to remain. Many of the prisoners, after being
interrogated and producing their passports, have been
already set at liberty, but about 200 are now in the
Maras prison.
A large number of police agents are spread about
in the different quarters inhabited by the working
classes, to watch their impressions with regard to the
arrests, and hourly reports are sent by these agents
to the prefecture.
M. Lacrosse's account of the " Paris Plot " is in-
teresting in two respects. In the first place, it clearly
appears not to be the horrible conspiracy for the
murder of all the officers of the French army which
the Adele denounced some days ago, and moreover
the germ of the Potrie's story seems evidently to be
what has taken place among the military in the
department of the brume, and to which M. Lacrosse
attaches no great importance.
The following incredible story is told by the As
sernbVe :
While the agents of justice were pursuing their search is
the offices of the nit du Troscrd. 111. Carri., member of
the Court of Appeal, and brother-in-law of M. d'Anthoine,
who had just been arrested, presented himself in the mom
where the commissary of police was sealing up the papists
which had been seised. One letter, which seriously com-
promised M. Lecke Rollin, had just been read and plated
on the mantel-piece, when suddenly the commissary of po-
lice mused it. That functionary immediately caused a
third person, who was present, to be searched,
but all endeavours to find the missing letter wets
fruitless. From the magisterial character of M.
Curd, on whom suspicions naturally fell, the com-
missary of police dared not order him to be searched,
sad he soon alter left the room. We may add, that an-
other circumstance is of a nature to give consistency to
the suspicions of the commissary ; the examining magistrate
having asked M. d'Anthoine where he resided, M. Cam
hastily replied that his brother in-law lived with him. At
a later period, on a search being male at the residence of
M. Cart+, it was found that M. d'Anthoine did not reside
with his brother-in-law, but occupied an apartment in
another part of the city, where the police agents discovered
some very important documents connected with the affair.
A declaration of all these circumstances has been drawn up,
and sent to the Minister of Justice, who will probably
charge the Court of Cessation to examine into the matter.
It must be understood that we only repeat the reports
which have reached us, but we may add that the sews was
generally regarded as certain during the evening.
It was M. Carre who conducted the prosecution
of the conspirators in the affair of Boulogne before
the House of leers in 1840.

The number of arrests of persons accused of being
implicated in the plot is now 178.
It is said that a personage of some importance has
been arrested at Strasbourg.
1 he oracular Debats speaks as follows of the Prince
de Joinville :

The important points which we maintain arc these: The
candidature of the I'rince de Joinville dues not at present
exist; for that it should exist, it would be n for the
prince to accept it, and this he has not done. WI lit some
day exist? We cannot tell. We do not desire it. But if
it were evidently required for the safety of France—if at
a given moment this candidature were to offer itself as the
only means of conciliating the votes of the party of order,
and of warding off the double danger of anarchy and of a
dictatorship, we do not think that in accepting it the Prince
de Joinville would be unfaithful to the policy of his family,
to the policy of the King, his father, to that policy of
devotedness and self-sacrifice which has ever placed the
interests and the wishes of France above everything else.
On another subject, of still more practical interest
and importance, the same article speaks with un-
PARIS, FRIDAY EVEXING. wonted clearness and energy :
Although there is no authentic report of what One last word. What disturbs theeoatillaionnel is,
otlr
tthiet aulretuaLlypseesi!inenttheoP n Joinvillet an opponent
sees it,e
passed yesterday in the Committee of Permanence,
the different accounts of their proceedings so nearly coming f rithece/teepublic.
election the votes of the party of order divided
correspond, that their substantial accuracy can between the Prince de Joinville and Prince Louis Napo-
scarcely be doubted. A short discussion took place Icon. It assumes that the latter will be a candidate. This
upon the question whether the members should un- is a completely gratuitous assumption, having no more
rjesailinvtywaetipurzntlteanretvhiseioenanudeidstaitounremult
tPrince ho so
l edde
dertake to observe strict secrecy with respect
to their debates • and, according to several and we are not the persons, whilst that question is pending,
reports, the affirmative was at one time to make way for questions of illegality and coups d'eta4.
voted by a show of hands. But it being proposed But in case the revision should be defiuitively rejected,
that a notice of their resolution to keep their debates would the President allow himself to be made a candidate ?
Would he accept an unconstitutional prorogation ? Would
secret should be inserted in the Moniteur, it was allg-
he think he had a right to accept it, in spite of his oath ?
gested that such a course might occasion groundless There is nothing to prove that he would. We can even
excitement, and lead the public to imagine that some aver that up to this time his acts and his Official
alarming intelligence had been revealed to the core- words tend to prove the contrary. M. Louis Napoleon
mittec. It was ultimately decided that in case is no longer the man of Strasbourg.and of Boulogne, we re-
any incorrect reports of their proceedings
itsie,eat,rito his
7has himself
thiritBl;aftleier
should be published, their president, in the hastened to Paris. On the request of the provisional
name of the committee, should insert a contradiction government, who thought his presence dangerous at
in the Munitear. M. Lacrosse, a vice-president of the that time, he once more quitted France. On tne occasion
Assemble, who presided, made a general statement of of his first election as a member of the Constituent
the political situation of the country, in the course of
Assembly,
4y,ht!electoedo in
torneakmnetrieienlVriaennl sees-
which, alluding to the late arrests, he said He
did nut return till tw'onnmonthsreannier the days of June,
that, being informed that the Central Committee of when all was tranquil. He returned to accept the conga-
London had established several committees, the tutional candidature for the presidency of the republic, and,
government had caused the utter to be since his nomination, whatever intentions may have been
watched, and finding that their object was to pro- imputed are
faithfulnl toto
tit': and to his before
ori:i `;
Wait'th, authorises
gate anarchical doctrines in France and in other the Cortstitutionsel to believe that, even if the revision
countries, principally in Germane, a descent had should be rejected, he would be, or allow himself to be,
been made by the police upon their places of re- brought forward as a candidate ? We will not add a word
sort. This descent had led to the arrest of a certain more.
number of individuals, among whom were several At a time when, foreseeing. and admitting the ine-
German refugees, at whose residences papers of vitable rejection of the revision, the daily efforts of 1
a very compromising nature had been seized. M. La- an influential party—backed, as it must be confessed, 1
crosse added that the government had reason to by no small amount of public opinion—are directed'
think that one of the principal agents of the London to prove the constitution a thing of little account, and
committee had been arrested at Strasbourg, while to inculcate the doctrine that both the constitution
on his way to Germany, and that proclamations and and the oath to observe it may be easily got rid of
documents sufficient to show the tendencies of these by a direct appeal to the appeal to the people, this, I
revointionary committees had been found upon him. coming from the Dusts, is very plain and significant
IHe also said' that the most perfect tranquillity pre- speaking. The golden rule in the conduct of that
railed both in Paris and the departments. In the journal ts ever to be upon the winning side, and it
Heinle some attempts had been made to corrupt the seldom indeed hazards an opinion unaccompanied by
soldiery, but with little success. The revolutionary a large escort of saving clauses and exceptional re-
, agentshad succeeded in some few instances, and serrations.
two private soldiers had deserted, and one had corn- I Several of the members of the Municipal Council
mined suicide in order to escape the chastisement ,of Montmartre have sent in their resignation to the
that awaited them. Prefect of the Seine. They assign as the motive for
With regard to the industrial state of the country, this proceeding their dissatisfaction at the conduct of
M. Lacrosse was happy to announce to the committee the mayor, who had proposed and carried, by a ma-
that two of the pnncipal classes of their manufac- jority of Bto 6, a motion in favour of the revision of
turn, the jewellers and cabinet-makers, who had the constitution, contrary to the law, which declares
feared that they should be at a stand-still in the municipal councils incompetent to discuss political
winter, would be able to find employment , questions.
for their numerous workmen, in consequence The mayor of the commune of Ouchamps has been
of large orders resulting from the London Exhibi- suspended by the prefect of Loir and Cher, upon the
tion. Owing to the prolongation of the Rue de Re alleged ground that he had openly professed prin-
vole the building trade was exceedingly active in all civics contrary to public order, and hai made him-
pacts of Paris. The harvest, NI. Lacrosse de- self an agent of anarchical propagandism.
scribed as an average one, which, he added,' Magne, minister of Public Works, arrived at
(broaching a questionable doctrine of political Prague on the 30th August, by railway, from
economy) was the most satisfactory state of things Dresden, on his way to Vienna.
for the producer and the buyer, and consequently , M. Thiers has arrived in Paris to-day, from the
for the consumer. Pyrenees.
A member proposed that the committee should The metallic reserve of the Bank of France has
request the minister for foreign affairs to re- increased i millions in Paris, and about of a mil-
monstrate with the English government on the 1 lion in the provinces. The discount accommodation
subject of the refugees in Loudon, who, he said, , has fallen off I f millions in Paris. and increased If
were treated with too much indulgence, and millions in the departments, the amount of the former
allowed to conspire against all established event- , being 33,303,983 fr., and of the latter 64,e17,021 fr.
meats. Another member—General Changarnter, it On the side of the liabilities the notes in circulation

have declined I millions in Paris, and increased 31
mlllbae in the branch banks. The account-current
rot the treasury has increased 4 millions, the present
amount being 125,334,000 fr. Private accounts cur-
rent have increased in I'aris 41 millions, and in the
departments 21 millions, the amount of the former
being 92,983,845 fr., and of the latter 32,925,650 fr.
The whole amount of the metallic reserve at present
is 6191 millions, to 5341 millions of notes in circu-
lation.
At the Bourse the Five per Cents. rose 30c., closing
at 94.30, and the Three per Cents. rose 35e., and
closed at 5645.