The Express.
London, England, 1866-12-25 00:00:00

EXPRESS, TUESDAY EYED, DECEMB'

and absolutely diminish the amount of
soil available for production. nil has
the case, as evidence in excess exists to prove, in
the southern and south-eastern districts of France e
,
owing to the destruction of the foe
se
on th
Alps, the Cevennes, and the Pyrenees. Th ad-
jacent regions, of which these ranges form the
watershed, are leas productive and less densely
peopled now than they were half a centurj ago
and every census bears witness to a decline. What
was once pasture is now bare rock. The periodic
distress inflicted by the inundations, though the
most intensely felt, is the less serious part of the
calamity. Human industry and enterprise soon
repair the damages occasioned by these outbursts ;
and, by strengthening the banks and deepening
the channels of the rivers, and by the formation of
dykes, partial security may be taken against
their occurrence. The reduction to waste and
desert of what was once cultivated and in-
habited land, and the diminution of the amount
of human production and happiness, is a graver and
more permanent evil. This has its origin in the
short-sighted greed of the owners of moun-
tain forests. The colliers and miners to
le excessive demands for wages the trans-
ter of s part of our iron trade to Bel-
gium and other countries is attributed, are
sometimes reproached with making a selfish
sacrifice of the future to the present. Does not
the same charge lie as strongly against the owners
of the soil who are denuding the land for momen-
tary gain ? They expose agriculture to difficulties
whore it is still possible; they limit the area on which
it is practicable; they subject life and property to
periodical danger ; they make wood fuel scarcer,
while coal is becoming less accessible; they cut off
at the same time the chief material of, at least, our
merchant ships and our domestic architecture. The
November inundations show that the same causes
will produce the same effects in the Treut, the Med-
lock, the Ribble, and the Aire, as in the Loire and
the Cher, the Garonne, and the Tarn ; and it
would be vain to expect exemption from the per-
manent and constant, any more than from the oc-
casional and transitory evils of a wasteful and
thoughtless cupidity. In warning our artisans
against any shortsighted sacrifice of the present to
the future, let us not spare those who with even
less excuse have just as little patriotic forethought.

the local acts governing some metropolitan dia-
trieta the guardians are only elected from and by
the vestry. The accounts we gave recently of the
deliberations of Lambeth and St. George the
Martyr, the refusal to obey a magistrate and pro-
secute the scoundrels who were poisoning the poor,
and the turbulent disorder which culminated in
shaking fiats in a clergyman's face, are but average
examples of the tone and character of vestry and
guardian meetings. Within the last few weeks the
guardians of Bethnal-green indulged in a personal
brawl of too disgraceful a character for descrip-
tion, and levelled imputations at each other which
it would be libellous to repeat. Within the same
period the vestrymen of Clerkenwell varied their
proceedings by a stand-up fight, in which both
combatants " drew blood." This last incident was
subsequently glossed over, and a statement made
that as the vestry formally adjourned before the
fight began, it was only in their private capacity
that these gentlemen turned the Vestry-hall
into a prize-ring. But the fact remains
that a recent debate of this vestry culminated
in a wager by battle, after one orator had given
his brother the lie direct ; and its significance is
not lessened when we remember that the Clerken-
well guardians are elected by and from tie
Clerkenwell vestry, and hold their offices for life.
The conduct of these men, both at board meetings
and in their general administration, brands them
as unfit for the virtually irresponsible power they
wield ; and to bring forward any alterations which
may have been forced upon them as proofs that
the system under which they exist can by any
possibility be a right one, is like placing plucked
blossoms on a rotten tree and vaunting them
as evidences of its life. Nor is the conduct of
guardians at the other end of the social scale more
chcerirg. Those of Padilington have recently ex-
cluded from their workhouse the lady visi;ors who
presumed to act on behalf of the poor, and have
acted thus tyrannously in defiance of expo-
sure. The Poor-law Board is powir•less, or
unwilling to deal publicly with the serious
charges brought against Lambeth and Shoreditch,
and the present state of affairs may be summed up
in the single word--anticipatory. If a satisfactory
scheme is evolved out of recent inspections and
committee meetings the public will welcome the
string of minor improvements which have been
ettected. If these are designed as an excuse for
inaction, and a plea for maintaining things as they
are, Mr. HARI)Y will bu unpleasantly reminded of
his confident pledges, and asked how far he has
resisted or pandered to that morbid attachment to
local institutions which he has been forward to
denounce.

ate 'Qgi't•

OSBORNE, Me. 24.
The Queen walked and rode in the grounds this
morning, accompanied by Prince Arthur.
Prince and Princess Christian drove out. Princess
Louise walked in the grounds, attended by the Bon.
Caroline Cavendish; and Prince Leopold, Princess Beatrice,
and Prince Henry of Prussia, went out.

----
The Queen will hold a Council at Osborne on Friday
next, the 28th inst., at one o'clock.
Despatches were received yesterday at the Colonial-
office from the Governors of the Cape of Good Hope,
Natal, St. Helena, and Heligoland. Despatches were
sent to the Governors of the settlements on the West
Coast of Africa.
The Right Hon. Spencer Walpole left town yesterday
for Cambridge.

The Marquis of Bath has left Thomas's Hotel,
Berkeley-square, for his seat, Longleat.
The Earl and Countess of Leicester are enter-
taining a large party at Holkham Hall.
Mr. John M'Clintock, of Drnmcar, has been
appointed Lord-Lieutenant of Louth.
The Duke of Richmond, as Chancellor ofte in the
University of Aberdeen, has given his casting cote
favour of Mr. Grant Duff as Lord Rector.
Archbishop Maiming has been so unwell during
the past week that be has been compelled to delegate
some of the duties ois office to others. Ris illness, how-
ever, is not represenfthed to be very serious.
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CRYSTAL PALACE.