The Express.
London, England, 1847-07-16 00:00:00

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HIGH WAITS AT LONDONAIRIDGE.
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LONDOV FRIDAY, JULY 16.
IN the House of Lords yesterday, the Poor Relief
Supervision (Ireland) Bill was read a third time and
passed.—The Marquis of Lem:roots is having moved
the third reading of the Poor-law Administration Bill,
Lord BROUGHAM moved that it be read a third time
that day six months ; stating as his grounds for so
doing the objection he entertained to the manner in
which it was proposed to pay the chief officer, and in
consequence of no provision being made for Mr. Chad-
wick or Mr. Nicholls, both of whom were to be left
entirely without employment and without compensa-
tion, after a period of sixteen years' service. Mr.
Chadwick's Moors had not been limited to the duties
of his office as secretary to the poor-law commis-
sion, his exertions on the subject of sanitary reform
having led to the production of the Health of Towns
Bill, which measure, if it had passed, and for which
the noble and learned lord said he should have voted
even though the City of London was excluded from
its operation, would have furnished the means
for continuing Mr. Chadwick in the public
service. The Bishop of LONDON and the Earl
of ELLENBOROUGH expressed. in strong terms
the high sense they entertained of Mr. Chad-
wick's services, considering that it would be
en act of great injustice if he were not again em-
ployed in the public service.—The Marquis of LANS-
DOWNE said the Poor-law Act was so framed, that the

commissioners and secretary had no claim whatever
to retiring pensions, and they had accepted their
Aces on the unthrstanding that the measure was of
a temporary character, which parliament might or
night not continue. He admitted, however, tt the
abilities of the gentlemen referred to, and their
general conduct, gave each of them a claim which
aught tobe acknowledged for other employment—After
some further discussion their lordships divided, when
the third reading of the bill was carried by a majority
of 32 to 10. _ _ _ _

In the House of Commons, Lord J. Rusanu., in
answer to Mr. HORSMAN, stated, that the Rev. Mr.
Bowers, who had been appointed Dean of Manchester,
would relinquish the living of St. Pad's, Covent-
garden, as soon as the Duke of Bedford had nomi-
nated his successor, if not before.—Mr. T. DUN-
CONDE complained that letters addressed to the
fishing-stations on the coast of the counties of Ross,
Sutherland, and Caithness, were detained at Inverness
for seventeen hours daily. The CHANCELLOR of the
LICHEGITER relied that, undoubtedly, the parties in
question had just ground of complaint, the evil
arising from the acceleration of the north and south
mails by railways, these letters having to go by a
aces mail ; bat as soon as the necessary arrangements
could be made, the delay to which they were now
subject would be obviated.—Lord GEORGE BENTINCK
drew the attention of the house to an alleged infrac-
tion by the Dutch government of the treaty of com-
merce of 1824, wishing to know whether any re-
monstrance bad been made to the government of the
Netherlands, and whether there was any pro-
spect of redress being afforded. Lord PALMERSTON
entered into an explanation of the circumstances re-
ferred to, which :were under investigation, and the sub-
ject of communication between the two countries, ex-
Teeming hisbelief that the result would be an arrange-
ment equally satisfactory to both.—ln answer to Sir
Iscus the noble lord also entered into a statement
relative to the treatment of British protestants in
Madeira, particularly as regarded the case of
BALLET.—The question of the committal of the
Bjeh?pric of Manchester Bill having been proposed,
Dlr. HUME moved that the committee be. postponed
until that day week. A protracted diocusamon ensued,
at the termination of which the house divided, when
the Original question was carried by a majority of 138
1°,2°.---011 the question that the Speaker do leave the
fir, Mr. T. DUNCOMBE moved the adjournment of
lie debate until this day, in terms which called for the
intervention of the Speaker, the motion, after some
explanatory observations from Lord J. RUSSELL,
Ong agreed to.

IT is now generally understood that the Committee
of the House of Commons en the Navigation Laws
IQ merely report the minutes of evidence taken,

without offering any opinion of their own. Perhaps,
at the close of a session and parliament, this is the
best course they could adopt. In their minutes will
be found statements of the views entertained by prac-
tical men of the working of these laws by the parties
themselves—by friends as well as by opponents of the
laws, by British merchants and foreigners, by repre-
sentatives of our foreign and of our colonial traders,
and by diplomatists and officers in the executive de-
partments of government.
The terms of the intimation given by the Chevalier
BONSEN, in behalf of Prussia and the Zollverein,
that the treaty of 1811 is to cease from the lst of
January, 1848, to which we drew attention on Wed-
nesday, will ensure to this important compendium of
practical opinions, a more impartial and careful study
on the part of our merchants and shipowners, than in
other circumstances it might have received at their
hands We again repeat the import of these words,
so full of meaning.
" The nomination of a parliamentary committee,"
says M. BUNSEN, " to examine the English naviga-
tion laws, and to report daring the present session of
parliament thereupon, has held out to the Prussian
government a hope that Great Britain will, at no
remote period, by means of a general legislative
measure, cause the restrictions to disappear which
at present weigh upon German navigation and com-
merce, and which so notoriously impede the develop.
ment of the commercial relations of the two coun-
tries." Upon this ground, and upon this ground
alone, the Prussian minister proposes an arrange-
ment by which " everything which could even for a
brief space of time retard a development so much to
be wished for by both countries" may be avoided.
As the basis of this arrangement, it is suggested that
the treaty of 1821, as a general treaty of reciprocity,
remain the recognised basis of relations, and that "the
existing status quo by means of diplomatic declaration,
be de facto maintained, and departmeutal orders
issued for that purpose to the respective authorities
in order to afford the high contracting parties the
opportunity of coming to an understanding with
respect to an application of the principle of recipro-
city as perfect and extended as possible." Lord PAL-
MERSTON has declared that her Majesty's government
are ready to assent to this proposal.
Upon such a revision, therefore, of our navigation
laws as shall at the least bring them into a form and
pressure less liable than at present to give umbrage
to Prussia and the Zollverein, depends the permanence
and extension of our liberal and mutually amicable
commercial relations with Prussia—we may say with
the Baltic. Our merchant*, manufacturers, and
shipowners, must make their choice now between
concession in regard to the strictness of our navigation
laws or a war of restrictive reprisals alike injurious to
both parties. This is no reason for panic or precipi-
tate surrender ; but it is a validreason for deliberately
examining what we gain, or whether we gain anything,
by these laws.
An elaborate table, published as an addendum to the
Sound List, and presenting a classified list of the
vessels passing Elsinore to and from British and Baltic
ports during the half-year ended 30th June, 1846, es-
tablishes an instructive fact illustrative of the working
of the navigation laws and the corresponding restric-
tive legislation of other countries. The number of
ships that passed Elsinore between British and
Baltic ports daring the half-year was 3,869. Of these
2,159 were British and 1,710 foreign vessels. Of the
2,159 British, no less than 664 cleared out in ballast
from British ports alone; the number of foreign
vessels in ballast between British and Baltic ports is
not stated, but it could scarcely be less considerable,
for no less than 4,010 of them are noted to have named
Elsinore in ballast between Baltic ports and all parts
of the world in the course of the half year. On looking
narrowly into the characters of the cargoes, we find
that the proportional number of British or foreign
vessels employed depends upon the national er har-
bour regulations affecting the vessels employed
in carrying them. The favour given to British
vessels in British ports renders them more eli-
gible for certain classes of cargo in certain
directions, and the counteracting favours shown to the
vessels of other countries in their respective harbours
has a similar effect. To this is owing the great num-
ber that sail in ballast: discriminating duties make it
sometimes more economical to pay a higher freight to
a vessel carrying cargo only in one direction, than the
more moderate freight that would remunerate the
owners of a vessel carrying both out and home cargoes.
If foreign and home vessels were placed on an equal
footing in respect of customs and harbour dues in all
ports, the Baltic trade would not be in the anomalous
condition that nearly half the vessels engaged in it
carry cargo only one way. Ship owners and char-
terers but for the disturbing influence of dieeriminat-
ing duties would find it more remunerative by lower-
ing their rates to ensure both out and return cargoes.
At present nearly one-third more vessels are used than
would be necessary if they carried cargoes both
ways ; and the rates of freight are raised to make the
voyage with cargo pay both its expenses and those
of the voyage in ballast.
The loss occasioned by such arrangements to the
merchants of all countries concerned is obvious; nor
are even the shipowners gainers by this prepos-
terous policy. The increased cost of goods consequent
upon the increased expense of carriage checks trade.
There are fewer cargoes to carry. Reduced prices of
goods would soon multiply the number of cargoes
to be transported ; the vessels which now obtain
cargoes only in one direction would have them
both and home; and their owners would gain
more by moderate freights for both voyages than'
from higher for one oaly. There would be ample
employment not only for all the British and foreign
ships already existing, but for increased numbers.
The greater capital and skill of Great Britain would
render the multiplication of its ships more easy than
that of the vessels of less wealthy nations would prove.
And the alleged greater expense of navigating British
ships will be found to be owing entirely to our own
local and general legislation. The Navigation ,1
Act compels owners to employ a greater number
of sailors than is neceerry. The regulations of the
port of London compel them to employ the aid of
Londoners in loading and unloading, while their own
seamen are getting into all sorts of scrapes to escape
the ennui of idleness. The Trinity Board taxes
British vessels enormously for lighting and buoyage,
very inadequately performed. The extra expenses of
British navigation are to be diminished by removing
unjust imposts and arbitrary restrictions, not compen-
sated by navigation laws which cramp our trade and
manufactures by increasing the cost of carriage.

Tea great questions connected with our law of
bankruptcy and insolvency are not even touched in'
the measure on which the house went into committee
on Tuesday. The act in question is a purely
admi-
• •
motility's one. It does little more than formally
abolish certain offices which have already in practice
abolished themselves. Moreover, it undoes certain
useless doings of recent legislation. It does away
with a court which a very few years' working has
proved utterly unnecessary, and merges the circuit
business of the insolvency commissioners in the local
courts established by the late act.
It is one of the measures which may be allowed to
paw at the farend of the session. There is nothing
in it that twilight can hide. Its objects are purely
distinctive and transferential. It creates nothing.
The suspicion that it is a job is the most baseless that
can be imagined.
One of the Vice-Chancellors now does the duties
of a court of review. The bill proposes to abolish
this mere name of a court, and confer on the
Vice-Chancellor de jure the jurisdiction he now
exercises deforto. tesides a court of review, with
• staff of judges, which has been found useless,
recent insolvency legislation has given us tra-
velling oommismoners who make their circuit/
without finding any insolvents to deal upon.
Mr. Law is represented as wandering about for six
weeks without bagging a single insolvent. Mr.
PHILIPPS takes a circuit of 280 miles with the same
miserable result. The no-business of these gentlemen
is to be transferred to the new county courts. This is
the feature of the bill which deserves most notice. It
is the beginning of the end, the first step in a pro-
gress which is destined to carry us farther than most
people have yet Sentured to anticipate. It is the first
I grasp of the cheap courts on a new jurisdiction. Who
Shall say how much they may &bomb, before their
full powers are developed, or their latent advantages
fairly called into play ?
Already the operation of these courts is felt on the
circuits, and among the profession. Among members
of the bar there is a prevalent and growing im-
pression that much of the contract business of the
country is destined to flow into these courts. To their
credit be it spoken, this anticipation is not accom-
panied withlaments over curtailed cause lists and fad-

m ExpßEsB, FRIDAY EVENING, JULY 16, 1847.

ing fees. The sense of aiding to carry en an
exorbitantly expensive legal system is not a plea-
sant one for cultivated and conscientious men. Not
only the bar, but the respectable portion of the other
branch of the profession, are, we sincerely be-
lieve, rejoiced at the greet step which has
been taken in the foundation of the county courts.
That their jurisdiction must gradually extend is a
truth apparent to all lawyers. But it is important
that this extension should take place gradually. As
it is, in the larger towns of England, it is found that
the judge of the county court, instead of a pleasant
day's work once a month, from ten till four, he. his
two or four days' sittings weekly, often extending late
into the night. It would almost appear that with the
present limited jurisdiction there is full employment
for the courts which already exist.
The subject of fees is one which must never be lost
sight of, when conntyoourts are discussed. The fee eye-
tem has been the monster grievance of the superior courts
both of law and equity. The world knows little of the
extent of this mischief. The committee now sittingon
the subject will probably bring to light some startling
revelations of mighty evils growing up in the higher
courts, in this particular, from the slenderest and
slightest roots. It behoves the government to guard
against such a seed being sown in the county courts.
There are premonitory symptoms of the disorder
already. While the officials of these courts continue
to be paid by fees, these symptoms will go on to more
aggravated forms. A few years' delay may serve to
root the malady so firmly, that nothing short of the
knife of a thorough reform can relieve the suffering
system.
All who have interest in the new cowls as suitors,
as well as all in authority, should carefully watch the
workiegs of the fee system. Every instance of ex-
tortion, or multiplication of these tolls on the road to
justice, should be brought to light,_ commented
on, and punished. But, above all, the experiment of
payment by fees should be continued no longer than
is sufficient to approximate to a determination of
salaries. When it is once ascertained with tolerable
certainty what are the labours of a court and the
average amount of the fees received, the remunera-
tion of the officers should come directly from the
treasury, into which the proper functionary should
be bound to pay over all court receipts.
The value of these courts depends mainly on their
cheapness, and on that despatch which alone renders
cheapness possible. Payment by fees is a tonne on
delay, and leads surely to the interposition of use-
less forms between plaint entered and judgment
given. It is the indirect effect of these delays, far
more than the actual expense of them, which makes
it so important a duty for all in authority to exclude
them as much as possible from the new courts. It
is the prospect of extended jurisdiction for these
courts which makes it peculiarly necessary to
them against the invasion of that very evil which
guardae
done its best to render justice inaccessible through
Westminster Hall or Lincoln's Inn.

Or all the absurdities which grow out of tho pro-
tection system, one of the most transparent is that
which is called a " wool fair." This is the sort of
thing. The farmers assemble on a certain day with
a small sample of their wool and a few of the
wool dealers of the district meet them at •
dinner, over which some squire—usually a flaming
"farmers' friend" presides, and the president
is supported by other landowners. After drinking
"success to agriculture," "the county members"—
sly fellows who are commonly at the bottom of these
meetings—" the wool buyers," and so forth, the chair-
man proceeds to what he facetiously calls " business."
He calls upon some one to offer his wool for sale, and
perhaps says that he has so many "down hogget
wools," a certain number of " Norfolk ewe fleeces," so
much " half-bred tegs," or " pure Leicester hoggeta,"
and so on, which for the good of the agricultural in-
terest, and to uphold the wool fair, he is ready there
and then to sell at 2d. per pound above the market
price of the day. Of course the wool dealers, who
are men of business, shake their heads and say nay. I
Then right and left the farmers enumerate their
fleeces, and ask for biddings from the dealers, who
naturally take care to make their offers on the safe aide
for an article they have not seen. Most of them, however,
know their men, having perhaps bought the wool of
particular farmers yearafter year,and thus occasionally
a bargain is announced to have been made at just the
same price the farmer might and would have had
upon hie own farm from the same customer. Great,
then, is the exultation of the squire chairman and his
acred supporters ; many are the speeches made in
glorification of the squires, and for the magnification
of their influence, whereby it is proved, by most
equirearchal logic, that the sale of 250 fleeces of "down
hogget wool," jest then effected by Farmer JOBSON,
at the market price, has been happily brought about
by the special interposition of the "farmers' friend."
We know nothing like this in the real business of life,
except the manner in which the wild Welsh ponies
brought to the fairs near London by drovers and
dealers far more wild than the ponies are sold.
When a pony has been selected from the drove, and
sold at two-thirds of the price fast asked, and less
than the wild Welshman protests it cost him in
Wales, the drovers throw up their hats and their
hands with exultant shouts of "Sold ! sold again
sold again, and got the money!" We hive never
been able to get over the feeling that we have been
taken in by these gentry in what, bat for such ex-
ultations, would appear to have been a very harmless
bargain. And, from all we hear, the dealers at these
wool-fain cannot at times resist a similar impression,
when they hear the self-laudations of the squire.
This method of selling wool is simply that of a
Hatch auction, where the commodity is offered at a
high price, which the seller gradually reduces till he
gets low enough to induce some one to buy. Had
such a mode of effecting the sale of wool been found
advantageous to the growers and dealers, they would
have adopted it, just as sheep, horse, and cattle fairs
are held, not after dinner, and under the presidency
of a rent-loving landlord, but as an ordinary business
arrangement
But
in fact the sales effected at these wool fairs are
merely nominal, and are just such as would have been
made in the farmer's own yard, or at the ordinary
market table. Wool is a bulky article, which cannot
be conveniently brought to a fair, and consequently
will never naturally be disposed of in that way. So
far from the grower being benefited by a wool fair,
he is more likely to suffer, for the commodity not
being under the inspection of the purchaser at the
time of sale, he will take are no is regulate his offer
as to protect himself against the bulk proving worse
than the sample. This is illustrated by what occurs
in the sale of wheat, for which a better price is always
obtained in a pitched market, where the buyer can
see a whole sack, than in a sample market, where
the seller pulls his little bag out of his breeches pocket.
The theory of a wool fair is precisely that of pro-
tection—namely, that an English farmer cannot con-
duct his own burliness, in his own way, so well as
when he is patronised, dandled, and protected by the
land-owning class. Now the very reverse of this is
the truth. Wherever landlords, individually or col-
, lectively, interfere with the business of the farmer,
they do him disservice.
So its in the wool fair scheme; farmers are in-
duoed to suppose that, by a kind of combination with
their landlords, they can put a pressure upon the wool
dealers, and compel them to give higher prices at •
public table than the?' would give elsewhere, and they
neglect that self-reliance and individual action by
I which those who have anything to dispose of will
beet promote their own interests. At all events, wool
fairs, as matters of business, are simply useless, and,
like protection societies, local agricultural meetings
and the like, will soon be numbered amongst the
obsolete contrivances of the protective system.
It is, however, of essential service to English hus-
bandry, to set these nonsensical affairs in their true
light, for one of the greatest evils under which our
farmers have laboured has been the misdirection of
their attention. They have too often followed
shadows instead of boldly facing the difficulties of
their position.
.With this object, a few incidental notion of the
proceedings at recent wool fairs will not be useless.
Eases has lately been often the some of this kind of
tomfoolery; and one occurred the other day at Col-
cheater. Mr. Rearm said that himself and some
other gentlemen had put down their names as
willing to bring their wool, and had brought it. The
farmers, however, seem to have been but little in-
fluenced by the example of the squires : for a wool
buyer from London said, "the growers could not ex-
pect to sell, as they had not given any strong= a
fair chance of purchasing. It was impossible kr a
strange buyer to tell to whom the wools belonged, at
the real value of them, as the bulks were not invoke
into the fair." Does not this plainly show ths otter