The Express.
London, England, 1847-05-25 00:00:00

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ot the 7th AMC.

TO CORRESPONDENTS.
wee Advertiaemeats Weeded for Me //spren, London moles paper,
sing be at the glike by Two o'clock o the day of publication.

HIGH WATER AT LONDON.BRIDGE.
DAT —lllOllll2ll. 33 nilm pet o , Afternoon. 5 min. re 11.
Te-Iteakor —Montag, 34 rain. p.m 11; Afternoon, 0 min. mon 0.

LONDON, TUESDAY, MAY 25.
OUR columns of Saturday contained the text of a
bill, which, if not of the very highest importance,
combines several merits not often to be found in
attempts at modern legislation. In the first place the
enacting part of the bill is contained in one sentence ;
in a sentence which is tolerably grammatical, quite
intelligible, and swelled by verbiage and common
forms to an amount not exceeding by above two or
three times its natural bulk. Nor is the matter of the
bill unworthy of the excellence of its construction. It
injures no party or section of the community; it ap-
plies an easy remedy to an undeniable evil, and, as it
refers to county elections, the introduction
of it at the present moment is judiciously
timed. We hope that, even though it has
been brought in by a private member, it
will be allowed to pass during the present
session. There are some innovations to which even
the timidity of an expiring parliament may string its
serves; and if Mr. FsewaN's reform should be
adopted before the prorogation, several of its sup-
porters will be rewarded for their boldness by a saving
at the election, which, collectively, may amount to
some thousands of pounds.
The bill of which we speak proposes to limit the
duration of the poll in county elections to a single day
—a measure which will greatly reduce the expense
of contests, and materiall7 diminish the abuses of
bribery, treating, and intimidation. There was no
single enactment of the Reform Bill which was so
universally approved, or which offered such un-
mixed advantages as the reduction of the time
allowed for contested elections. Since the substitution
of two days far fifteen an the time for keeping the
poll open, there has been no example of the insane
expenditure of twenty, fifty, or eighty thousand
pounds, by which in former years candidates so often
ruined their families, at the sometime that they demo.
ralised constituencies. There has been, and there is,
much bribery, direct and indirect; but the most die-
graceful and profligate part of the election system has
Feen partly amended and partly removed from sight.
It is not merely that the duration of the period
appointed for drinking and bribing has been short-
ened ; but that neither electors nor electioneerers
arrive in two days at the same pitch of desperation as
in a fortnight. Nemo repente fuit turpissimut.
The experience of the two or three years which fol-
lowed the Reform Bill led to the further improvement
of confining the polling time in boroughs to a single
day. We have never heard of any inconvenience which
has resulted from the change; and we see no valid
reason against extending the benefit of the same limi-
tation to counties. The only distinction in the cases
consists in the right of non-residents to vote in coun-
ties, and in the comparative frequency of a plurality
of county votes in the possession of the same indivi-
dual. It is evident, however, that both cases, even in
county constituencies, form exceptions to the general
rule. By far the greater number of county voters are
resident, and of those who live at a distance, many are
mere faggot voters, whose presence it is desirable to
discourage. The eases in which one person votes in se-
veral places are too few to make it necessary to provide
for them. Such voters generally possess influence which
is more effectual than their individual voices. The
persons who determine the result of a county election
seldom form more than a small numerical fraction of
the constituency. In all cases, moreover, it must be
remembered that where railroads exist, non-resident
voters enjoy far greater facilities for exercising their
franchise than those which existed at the time of the
Reform Bill.
If the objections to a limitation of the time allowed
for county contests are immaterial, the arguments in
favour of the change are grave and numerous. In
the first place, the redaction of expense is not
inconsiderable. Poll clerks, booths, and constables,
agents and messengers, not to speak of tap-reoms
and other contraband sources of expenditure,
will only be required for half the time. One of
the present election days will be restored to honest
and lawful occupation, and the successful or defeated
candidate may begin twenty-four hours earlier to
count his cost and find it smaller. It is not necessary
to argue how greatly the public is interested in re-
ducing the cost of election contests. It constantly
• happens that an unpopular and unqualified candidate
is selected by a party to fight its battle, for no as-
signed or assignable reason but because he can afford
to pay the estimated sum. The difference between
two thousand pounds and one thousand in the coat of
an election often involves the exclusion of every suit-
able candidate in the county. There may be a dozen
persons of the requisite local position, some of them
honest and intelligent, who would be responsible for
the smaller sum, where only one—perhaps a clown or a
blockhead—can venture to double the risk.
Unfortunately the expense of elections is only one
of the many evils which are connected with them,
and which ought to have as short a time as possible
to display themselves in, consistently with the main
object of ascertaining the choice of the constituency.
We know no more painful or depressing spectacle
than an election. Brawling and faction in public,
private sycophancy and private slander, the diplomacy
of the corrupters and the corrupted, the propagation
and wilful reception of falsehood are too universally
mixed up with the conflict to make it other than a
necessary evil. A timid politician would consider it
a miracle that a constitutian which rests upon such a
basis could panels the conditions of good govern-
ment—

It forte and falsehood break not Heaven's &atm
Wby then a Borgia or a Paine/
The fact seems to be that the evil influences on oppo-
site sides to some extent neutralise one another, and
leave the field open for the honest convictions of the
electors. It is satisfactory to know that the evils of
elections are on the whole diminishing, as the country
becomes more civilised.
It is not, however, simply by shortening the dura-
tion of the expenditure and other evils of elections,
that the limitation of the poll to a single day would
diminish their magnitude. It is well known that the
most demoralising, and frequently the moat expensive,
part of an election is the interval between the first
and second day. The bulk of the coaseAteestey almost
always vote on the first day ; and if 001111 skis is dui-
dedly the stronger, the election is then virtsally
decided, and the form of keeping the poll open for
tie second day involves no evil beyond a useless ex-
pense. But when parties are more equally matched,
and the result depends on the votes of the unpolled
minority, the night between the polling days is the
principal period of corruption. Every residuary vote
in of importance, and the price of every dishonest
v -ter is at its maximum. Those who have firmness
t "held on" to the last may, it is true, be disap-
pointed by being dispensed with; but they often
make a profitable speculation. In boroughs it often
happened that a body of voters reserved themselves,
on principle, for the end of the second day's poll ;
and we have known cases where they outataid their
market, by allowing one side to obtain a majority
which their collective number was insufficient to
outweigh. In a smaller degree we know that the same
speculation is practised in counties, and that votes for
which at first a little flattery would be thought a suffi-
cient price, have commanded round sums in money
after the first day's returns have shown a nicely ba-
lanced constituency. Nor are the opportunities for
bribery alone increased by a prolongation of the elec-
tion. All the influences of cajolery, of promisee, and
of threats, are for the same reason applied with in-
creased vigour to thews who remain unpolled. The
only motives which derive no new tome from delay
are those of reason and principle and public spirit.
The honest and independent elector is not likely to
re:eive new light between the first day and the

mooed, or to determine hie vote by considering the I
numbers of those who hays already voted.
If the House of Commons will not attend to thaws
considerations, or °epeeist to remove even so unde-
sirable and unattractive a grievaaoe u that which the
r bills intended to remedy, it is satisfactory
to=edk that many of its members will in a few
months be taxed heavily for their timidity or in-
difference.

WE have received a paper of objections from
Leeds against the Highway and Health of Towns
Bilis, with the signatures of four persons on behalf
of the road surveyors of that town.
The sum and substance of the main objections to
both bills is that they take certain powers from the
ratepayers and traisfer them to the commissioners
appointed by government. The opposition to both
proceeds from the same indistinct and exaggerated
notions on the subject of self-government which are
at the bottom of previous remonstrances from other
places against the Health of Towns Bill singly.
That surveyors should feel some prejudice against a
measure which supersedes them is naturaL But the
same fact should make us cautious in giving too
ready a belief to their representations of the ill
effects likely to follow on a change.
They are averse to any control of commissioners being
introduced into a department where everything has
hitherto been done by local authorities. All has been
well done in Leeds under the old system, they assert,
and therefore Leeds should be exempt from the bill.
But the very principle of the bill supplies an
answer to this objection.
The roads throughout the country have, ander the
regulation of numberless local bodies, been managed
at once badly and expensively. The bill aims at
introducing greater economy and regularity, as well
as frreater efficiency, into road management, by
uniting to these local administrations, which the bill
preserves, a central iwectaial control, interfering in
some points with local authority, but in no respect
superseding it. If the roads of Leeds be perfectly
managed the commissioners will have nothing to do.
The surveyors, who have resisted the tendencies to
lavish expenditure and jobbing which have proved so
irresistible in other places, will continue to do so
under their new title of waywardens. It is only
when the local agents are incompetent or profligate
that the power of the commissioners to inspect and
check will be put in motion for the benefit of the rate-
payers, who will elect their waywardens just as
much as they now elect their surveyors.
Mere local knowledge, we must repeat, in no way
implies peculiar fitness to judge of and decide upon
local improvements. In roads, as well as in sewers,
the country often wants more knowledge and a freer
expenditure than the wisdom of the neighbourhood
will either supply or sanction. It is here that the
commissioners will step in—not, as is generally re-
presented, to speak, like the ancient oracles, from a
distance, with a supernatural knowledge in London
of what is wanted in Leeds or Birmingham ; but on
the information of thoroughly skilled inspectors, who
will know all the Leeds or Birmingham surveyor
knows, at least, and judge on the data on which the
Leeds or Birmingham surveyor
.jud without the
disturbing influences of local 'pi or diquery,
and with a far more potent sense of responsibility, as
being subject first to the jealous scrutiny of the local
functionaries, and next to the approval of a board
directly amenable to parliament, through the head of
its department. As a general rule, a popular govern-
ment like that of this country may be said to repro-
tent the average intelligence of the nation on a par-
ticular point, and to carry its will on this point into
execution. But a very different view of this relation
of the government and the country will follow accord-
ing to the mode in which we gauge the national in-
telligence, and determine what is the national will.
When we use these terms we do not mean the in-

telligence or will, merely, of the numerical majority.
It is clear that they have no adequately formed intel-
lieence, and no definitely expressed wilL Sound:go-
vernment measures are directed, not in obedience to
the knowledge or will of the mass, but strive to en-
lighten the former and create the latter.
Neither is the national intelligence and will, as ap-
plied, for example, to sanitary regulations, the intelli-
gence or will of those who have hitherto had to do
with matters on which sanitary regulation touches
and trenches. The minister does not take the suffrages
of surveyors, or commissioners of paving boards, or
sewers, or of water companies or vestries, or beadles,
or nightmen, before he ventures to interfere with
roads, sewers, water, or filth. He is guided
iby very
different exponents of the national intelligence in such
matters. That intelligence is to be found in the men
who have devoted the most cultivated understandings,
the moat benevolent hearts, and the clearest
beads to the subject of public health and national
msonomy. The national intelligence on the subject of
fever, for example, is the intelligence of Dr. SOUTH-
WOOD SMITH, and not that of Sir PETER LAURIE or
Mr. DANIELL. The government which at this day
ventures upon a health of towns bill, does not under-
stand the step it is taking, if it is not prepared to en-
counter and resist much parochial opposition. Much
depends, in determining the national will, upon the
question at issue. The demand for reform was a
popular demand. It had reached that point of uni-
versality and determination at which governments
have no choice but to submit. So with the cry for
catholic emancipation and free trade. It was agita-
tion which turned these demands from the concep-
tions of a few to the will of many. In matters which
touch political change, or commercial policy, among a
people essentially self-governing and commercial, it is
possible that this conversion of theories of the closet
into demands of the crowd, may be brought about
rapidly ; though, till a systematic agitation com-
mences, they may lie dormant, or awake only here
and there, for centuries before they are abroad among
the nation.
Sanitary legislation is in a different position. The
mischiefs which result from the neglect of it are felt
by all, but traceable only by few. Impatient under
the misery which this neglect has a great share in ,1
producing, ignorant men refer their sufferings to
every cause but the right one, to political exclusion or
social injustice. In one sense they are right. That
the poor man is unhappy, is filthy, unhealthy, without
a comfortable home, without education, is the result
of political and social ceases. But they are not M.
political and social causes which he thinks they are.
A wider representation would not relieve him unless
it was one of better-instructed representatives. A
division of property and profits would not help
him unless the duties of, property were better
understood and more largely practised. But he is
virtually better represented when his representative
has a better knowledge of the evils which the repre-
sented suffer from, and the remedies of them, and
helps to legislate with the view of removing the
former by introducing the latter. This is just what
a government does in introducing, and a parliament
in passing, a Health of Towns Bill. It strikes at
the root of a palpable, prominent, and meet active
mischief, to which the very sufferers from it are in-
sufficiently alive from want of special Maisie, to
detect the connexion of cause and effect between filth
and disease, and again between disease and poverty,
pauperism and crime.
The common class of pariah officials are as mach in
the dark upon the subject as those they
.are placed to
relieve and benefit. Government acts wisely in avail-
ing itself of wider knowledge and a keener foresight
than they can be expected to have.
The objections to the Health of. Towns Bill from
the Leeds surveyors illustrate what we have written
above. But we must remark, before adverting to
them, that we do not mean to say that Leeds does not
furnish men perfectly instructed upon sanitary points
and able to co-operate in carrying out sanitary laws.
Only we apprehend, they will he found not amongst
the opponents, but the most zealous advocates, of Lord
Moneern's bill. Bat let na take Leeds as a specimen
of the places which object to the measure. Inat
the condition of the poor and helpless in the place, the
population which does not possess and, there ore, has
no representation in virtue of propprty ? We refer to
the report of a practical man, Mr. Sierra, of Dean-
don, for a humiliating answer:
The general arrangement of the streets and alleys of Leeds
is in the older parts very much, as in all old towns, some-
what irregular and narrow ; but, fortunately for Leeds, the
main street is of ample width, ahem, as I was told, from
• practice of the olden time, of haAng gardens in front of
the houses, the errs of which US in later times been added
to the street. The row of streets running parallel to the
river is, however, narrow, crooked, and Irregular Streets
more recently formed are more ample In wails and there
are many viry cheerful open streets where the better classes
reside. The lower dames here, as elearbere, inhabit the
hoe oomfortable and lees healthy localities along both sides
of the Addle Beck, a stream which Intersects the einem
division of the town, and which is obstructed by essay
wars and bridges of limited openings, and by the encroach-

THE EXPRESS, TUESDAY EVENING, MAY 25, 1847.

meat of buildings ea Its bed. A gnat number al dye-
*wog Massa and mantidastories are mooted on the margin,
and. with ,a n InZadprellings, which
has with
• snag 6Mrt the
= at thia *Maillinid walk
the front dui Make, of
man g. Batiby most unh g localities of
Leeds are elLose equate of laresee, or yards, meths" are milled
which have bees amend fee the accommodatial of working
people. . leer eof thee% &suit situated in companuively
high ground, are airless from the enclosed ateacture, and
being wholly unprovided with any form of under drainage,
or convenience, or arrangements for eloaasine, are one ma $
of damp and filth. In some instances I Sound cellos, or
under-rooms, with from two to six inches of water standing
over the floors, and putrid from its stagnation in one case, from
receiving the soakage of the slop water standing in pools in
the street adjoining. The ashes, garbage, and filth of all
kinds are thrown from the doors and windows of the houses
upon the surface of the streets and courts; end in some cases
where a gallery of entrance hes been erected for the ioh ,-
Wants of the second flair, the wh de of the slops and filth
era thrown over the gallery in front of the hours beneath,
end as the ground is often sloping towards the deers of the
lawn dwellings, they are inundated with water and filth,
sad the poor inhabitants placed in a miserable nod uuhralthy
condition. The privies, as usual in such situations, are few
Is properaloa to the number of inhabitants. Thee are open to
elawlliala to front andreer, are invariably in '91114 condition,
sod oft= swab without the removal of any portion of the
filth, for stet mmMhe. The feelings of the people ace blunted
to all savadog essasfy, and, from the constantly contami-
nated state ef the stmappbere, a vast amount of illlitalth
prevails, leading 00 Balessness, and inducing a desire for
spirits and opiates ; the combined influence of the whole
condition causing much It, of time, increasing poverty, and
terminating the existenee of many in premature death. Mr.
Baker, a medical practitioner of Leeds, end for many year.
one of the council, published, a few years ago, • treatitc on
the vital statistics of Leeds, going very fully into this sub-
ject ; and he has demonstrated very clearly and undeniably,
from facts observed during • long residents, the evil effects
of bad ventilation, bad drainage, and deficient supplies of
water.
Many of the streets, alleys, and courts are unpaved, and
some paved in a very imperfect manner. They are full of
ruts and hollows holang water and filth. All vacant spans
ef buildinreground are left undrained and uoenclosed, and
with uneven Gurnee+, and in many cases the slop water from
the neighbouring dwellings drains into them, creatiug ex-'
tensive ponds of filthy water. All ants of rubbish and
filth are thrown upon throe vacant spates, and they become I
a wide field of effluvia end deleterious emanations. Pigsties
are frequently erected upon them, and they ere used as
depots for dung by the muck-gatherers. No cognisance is
taken of their condition by the polies.
The main sewerage of the town is imperfect. There are
sewers in a few of the principal seems, but in the greater
number of streets and alleys there is no provision whatever
for drainage or sewerage. The main sewers are defective in
position and defective in structure • they discharge. either
tato the river or into the Addle Beck. The water as often
set back into the sewers by 11:nds, and the gross matter in
the water, sinking and aludmog by the sides of the river,
forms sources of much annoyance, and contaminates the
atmosphere. Immediately after the passing of the late
improvement act for Leeds, steps were taken by the mayor
and council for having a general survey made relative to the
sewerage, which was ably executed by Capt. Vetch, of the
Royal Engineers ; and a plan was furnished by him or a
superior character, providing for the complete sewerage of
all the streets, alleys, and courts, and carrying the main sewer
clear of the river. Provision was made for carrying the
accumulated water into a main covered sewer to a distance
from the town, where it was proposed to use it for agricul-
tural purposes. An attempt was made to execute a part of
this plan under Me resident surveyor, who, at the start,
committed a blunder amounting to two feet in the level of
the first sewer he attempted, which caused an extensive stay
nation of the water. The council of the burnish, under
wham he acted, became alarmed at the want of suave, and
stopped further procedure. Some time after, with a new
council, a proposal was made to follow out Captain Vetch's
plan. I was present for nearly six hours listening to the
debate on this important subject, and much was said to
satisfy me that such court acting alone was most incompe-
tent for judging and determining on such matters. The
chief theme of the speakers, in opposition to the adoption of
the plan of Captain Vetch, related to what they vary erro-
neously supposed to be the means of saving the pockets of
the ratepayers, with very little regard to sanitary rniults.
The mover and secoader were the only parties who sup-
ported the motion. A counter motion was made and car-
ried to consider a plan by their own surveyor, which plan
wee more calculated to save outlay than to insure efficiency.
Until, however, the localities of the abodes of the working
slimes are rendered more approachable to the higher classes ,
of their fellow-citisens by the removal of the many disgust-
ing objects of sight and smell which abound in every quar-
ter, it is in vain to expect that any useful intercourse can be
maintained. I learned that a few clergymen and rids.
aionaries, and occasionally some benevolent females of the
middle classes, made transient visits to the abodes of the sick
and the wretched; but I could not find that any general in-
tercourse was any where maintained, or that any heed was
given by those benevolent visitors to any attempt at the
amendment of the deplorable association of filth and malaria
in which the poor people were left, It seems that they im
variably rushed from the disagreeable and disgusting lo-
cality as soon as their labours of charity were completed.
The renewal of the surrounding disorder they deemed as
not in their province ; though in reality even the evils they
ease to mitigate might, in a great measure, have been pre-
vented by a timely attention to the removal of the primary
causes.
After reading these passages, will our readers be
astonished that we persist in refusing to allow to the
advocates of the present system, under which such
results have been produced, any great weight in the
objections urged by them against a change, chiefly
because it will impair such self-government as this ?

Oar correspondence and the Paris journals of
Sunday have reached us. Various petitions directed
to social reforms engaged the attention of the Cham-
ber of Deputies on Saturday. Among these were
reform in the public charities, the care and treatment
of foundlings, the mendicity laws, the Mont de Piste,
and the labour of children in factories.
The discussion in which the scandalous abuses of
colonial slavery were lately brought under public
attention has compelled the government to break
through its standing rule of inaction, and M. Ouizot
has accordingly laid before the chamber a project
of law for the reform of criminal courts in the colonies.
A committee of the chamber has been appointed to
report on the project of law introduced by M.
Cremieux, to exclude railway directors from seats in
the chamber. There is, however, no probability of
any measure of this kind being adopted by the
chamber.

Advice@ from Madrid of the 18th inst. bring intel-
ligence which indicates au approaching crisis to the
domestic dimensions which have so long prevailed in
the palace. The ministers had come from Aranjuez
and assembled in council, the subject of their deli-
beration being the present unfortunate situation of
the Queen in relation to the King Consort. His
Majesty was still at the royal residence of the Pardo,
and no persuasion could move him to join the Queen
at Aranjuez. M. Salamanca had waited os the King,
and intimated the opinion of the council of ministers
on the propriety of his residing under the same roof
with the Queen, but without effect. El E4warmol
affirms that at e cabinet council held on the 16th
several venerable prelates were called on to give their
opinion upon an important canonical question, the
exact nature of which it cannot with propriety state.
El Tiempo says that the subject discussed by the
council was a question connected with the interior of
the palace, of the highest importance to the public
interests and to the interests of the crown.
_ _ _

___..............„...
Another cabinet council was held on the 18th, at
which all the ministers attended. A special m-ssen-
ger was sent is the morning to the Pardo, to ask the
king to name a time at which he could receive the
ministers. At 10 o'clock all the ministers left for the
Pardo, and were with the King at the moment of the
departure of the maiL It was reported to be the
object of the cabinet to induce the King to return to
Madrid, where the Queen intended also to come, in
order that they may cease to present to the public the
diecreditable spectacle of a personal separation. Her
Majesty was expected in. Madrid on the 19th.
At a splendid banquet given at Aranjuez by the
Queen, the Minister of War gave the health of her
Majesty, to which the Queen replied by giving
" The Spanish army." On this occasion the Queen
announced her intention of holding a grand review of
the troops of the
.garrison at Madrid, on her return to
that capital. Private letters say that her Majesty
will, on this occasion, appear on horseback, in a gene-
ral's uniform, a PAnkszone. The announcement was
received with acclamation by the military officers
prese M. nt.
Olozaga had left for Aranjnez, to take leave of
Ithe Queen, on his departure to visit his family at
Lagrone.

ITALY. —NAPLES, MAT 7. DISCOVERY or A
COAL MINE IX THE ADRUZZL-11. coal mine has been dis-
covered near Teremo, the capital of the Abruzzi. The
quality is said to be equal to that of Newcastle. The mine
is 240 :eat below the surface of the earth, and promises to be
a rich one. It to to be worked by the government.
HOLLAND. THE HAGUE, MAY 21. THE
Caors.—The accounts from Holland are of the most favour-
able description, not only with reference to the preoperous
appearance of the growing grain crepe, but also of the fruits
and vegetables. The season not being so precocious, it is ob-
served, ea in former years, there was no longer cause to fear
that the flowering and vegetation would be followed by that
cold and rainy weather which so often deceived the hope
of the cultivators. The early potatoes were showing well, sad
already selling in the markets. The grass lands presenter) a
splendid aspect