The Express.
London, England, 1850-02-12 00:00:00

THE EXPRESS, TUESDAY EVENING, FEBRUARY 12, 1850.

Vie Erproo.

OUTGOING MAILS.

TM West Indisjare,e:eracriai Baia ads, Havannab,
Kaman, Honduras, New Orleans, an Meakes, aid including
&me far Madeira, Bt. Juan.de-Nisarevaa, New Granada,
W Panorill be nude up on Feb. 17.
The sails for Lisboa, Spain, and Gibraltar will be made
ap on Feb. 17.
The moils for Gibraltar, Malta, Orem, the lonian Islands,
Egypt, Ceylea, India, sad Chian, fill Southampton, wd.
be made up on the morning of Feb. 90.
The mails for British North Amities sad the United
States will be made up ea the 'mules of Feb. 22.
The malls nig Marseilles, to the Mediterranean, Egypt,
C•ylon, Hoag-Koog, dts., will be made up on the
evening of Feb. 25.
The mails for blades* the Brazils, and Buenos Ayres, will
be made lap on the meals( of March 4.

HIGH WAY= AT lantlil
Tam IM-16.abst, 27m..........AAAm0e5. Ik. 43a.
T —IMMO& IP, Ta. Aftinees. 3 17a.

there has never been a period when the poet ODA-
don were altogether in so eisfiishsewty a condition se
at the present time. The velum of the savings
banks show it; the returns of the provident societies
show it; the workhouse accounts illustrate it; nearly
every clergyman in every district in London will
bear his willing testimony to it.
Take the case of Bethnal Green. This district, as
every one knows, is the abode of the poorest of the
poor, and has suffered more then any other in England
from protection. For 130 years it bad the advantage (I)
as it was then thought, not only of a prohibitive
system, but of a regulated scale of wages.
Not only were foreign silks effectually prohibited to
favour this manufacture, but the wages of the filpital-
field weavers were regulated by act of parliament,
▪ the masters were prohibited under heavy penal-
ties from employing any work people at a rate of
wages below a certain fixed scale. What was the
n=,x, uen, , elistress of the BoitalffiWis weaver
into a proverb. He endured-under protection
more privations than any artisan in Europe. The
system, it is not too much to say, irretrievably con-
demned him to comparative penury, for it prevented
his keeping pace with the improvements introduced
in his manufacture elsewhere; ft obliged him to com-
pete by hand labour against the restless and untiring
machine. The Spitelfielde weaver must even
get less wages in proportion to his work
than any other workman in his trade. But
despite this circumstance what is the condition
of the Bpitalfields artisan at this time P Now mark
this : we state it upon indisputable authority. Tnere
is notin Bethnal-green or Spitalfields a single skilled
weever who may not at this time have full employ-
ment at good wages. There was one large silk hours
in Bpitalfields which stated a few weeks back that it
would willingly give LW. to be able to get 50 more
hands ; and although we have spoken solely of
skilled labour, we do not mean to confine ourselves to
that. Thenr.skilled artiflier of Bpitalfields must always
work at great disadvantage and consequently at com-
paratively low prices. But at this moment there is not
even • partially-skilled silk wormer that may not have
ample employment. the whom district, in fact, is at
work—a circumstance scarcely remembered even by

the '4 oldest inhabitant."
Tile dock labourers have been talked about. A
protectionist will tell you, with a sigh, that this must
be indeed a miserable claw. Mr. GEORGE FREON..
RICK YOUNG says "our shipping trade is ruined;"
and ttotieh he admits that more ships are building
in the Wear than ever were known to have been
building there before, he will make you believe that
there is nothing doing in London, and that every soul
connected with the shipping interest is in a state of
starvation, from the WIGRAMB down to the la-
bourer waiting at the dock-gate. Now, what
are the facts connected with dock labour ?
We have been favoured with the following interns
*towing the employment afforded to dock labourers
during the past month as contrasted with preceding
years:
- -------

Labourers employed during the last week of January in
emu year
1846
1847
1848
1849
1850
ST. KATHERINICS DOCKS _
.....
..

Lsbourara empioYeicusil;l;;.atieehinding 20th Janu-
ary in each year :
1847 6Bl
1848 1,(169
1849 1,326
1850 1,220

Lebouren employed daily in the week commencing sth of
January sash year:

1846
1,718
1847
1848 2,811
1849 1,387
1860 2,920

So that here we have an average of several thousand
more labourers employed in the docks this year than
during corresponding periods of any former year, and
it will be observed, this applies not to one day or one
week only, but to the whole qf the past month, as we
have purposely, taken the accounts at the different
docks for the early part, middle, and ecd of January
respectively.
Such is the satisfactory condition of the poorer
population at the oast of London: now let us take
the districts in the west We select purposely the
poorest parishes at our own end sr the town : we
take the parts of Westminster behind the Abbey.
Now, here is a comparative account of the expendi-
ture upon the poor of the parishes of St. Margaret
and St. John, Westminster, for the quarters ending
Christmas, 1849 and 1848:

Christmas Quarter.
1849. 1848.

la-door relief £2,411--15 7.. £3,210 17 2
Out-door relict

£3,41 5 7 £4,384 6 2
showing a saving of 9921. 17s. 7d. upon the quarter,
or of nearly 4,0001. upon the payments of the year !
The valuable return from which we quote these
figures gives an account of the contract prices for
provisions during the lut quarter of the year 1849
u contrasted with the same period of 1848. Here it
is; and it shows very satisfactorily the advantage
which the poor man is reaping from the reduction
in the present prices of the first necessaries of life:
' '

- -
Peas af the Senie Arti.
Contract Prices of the Principal Articles. des Oss the tarre-
d
1849. £a d. TV a. d.
Meat
Bread ll ii per cwt.
Flour l5 per sack. .......„ ...
Butter
Cheese
neer ......
(UMW ll per ewt. 1
Peas
Susar ......
Tea 3 per lb. ....... ....
Rice l5 per cwt. ...... ..... 1
Soap
Soft ditto
Milk
Potatoes lO 0 per ton. 1 0
So that it appears from this account that 1: re is •
saving of full 16 per cent. upon the price of the first
articles of human subsistence as compared only with
the corresponding period of last winter.
Bat is this satisfactory state of things confined to
Lancashire or London ? We trove not. It has been
remarked that the protectionist meetings are never
attended by agricultural labourers, or that if the
labourers do attend, it is rather to exclaim against
any continuance of protection. Now there is very
good cause for this in the fact that the agricultural la-
bourer is affected by the reduction in prices not as a la-
bourer but as a consumer. His 10s. or 12s. a week goes
much further than it did in 1848. He can give him-
self now en extra inch a night of farthing rushlight,
and an extra piece of cheese to his larger loaf of
bread. And wherever be is affected by manufactures,
he and his family can add pretty considerably to their
earning.. We had an account the other day from
Halstead, in North Essex, a district well known to
Sir JOHN TYRELL. We were informed, by an excel-
lent authority, wholly unconnected with politics is
that district, that the state of the poorer population
about Halstead was never better than at the present
time :

There is a considerable straw-plait trade in the neighbour-
hood, and the wives and families of agricultural labourers
and others are very extensively employed in it. At the
present time, and tar some time past, one straw-plait dealer
at Castle lledingham. a Mr. Clatwood, has been paying as
much as 1001. a week for plait, end other dealers have been
paying in proportion. Even the children of nine and tea
years old have been earning their weekly wages. The poor's
rates have diminished, and the number of paupers in the
house is considerably less than in preceding years. The
landlords of the district, however, with a single exception,
have maintained their rents to the full amount.
In the early part of last week we were favoured
with a letter on the state of the poor in the agricul-
tural districts of Bucks. The following was the report
made to us upon the state of Mr. Dleaanair own
locality—Chipping Wycombe :
The trade of this place, which is chiefly that of the cow
mon beech chair-making, has not been so brisk for years
as it is now. Scarcely a man can be found out of work. Two
years ago I should think ne-half of the ehalemakers were
unemployed. The lace trade of But kinghamshire has also
received an Impetus, prices having advanced about 25 per
cent. There is ..nother trade also carried on here, which
almost died a natural death a few years ago—via., the trade
in rabbit fur, which now sells for nearly double the price
it fetched some time back, and Is a trade greatly on the in-
crease. I have not alluded to the paper trade. There are,
as you are aware, several mills on this stream. They are
now, with one exception, in full employ, and that exoeption
is not owing to any want of trade.
What is the remelt of all this? It is that in
the Agricultural Union of Chipping Wyeombe, the
expenditure upon the poor has been very materially
reduced. We have before us an account of the re-
ceipts and expenditure of the Wycombe Union, com-
prising thirty sgrioultarallariabse, for the half year

ending Michaelmas, 1849. As compared with the
corresponding period of 1848 the decrease of expen-
diture was as !Wows :
Is =sine/nesse £344
Oat relief 1,178
Lunatics
Foes, dtr.
Common charges .

£3,067

The total expenditure et the half-year being
7,6821., it follows that there had been a saving
of nearly 60 per cent. upon the expenditure of
the corresponding period of 1848. And in
this swing Mr. DISRAELI'S two agricultu-
ral parishes of Bradenham and Hughendon had,
uwe find by the return, both participated. In
oonstquenos of the prosperity of the times, the hon.
(pro tem.) leader of the protectionists is in fact bene-
fiting remarkably in the saving in the shape of poor
rates payable tor his own estates I
Such facts as these speak trumpet-tongued to the
united empire. In the face of them we may leave
Lord Snimore and Mr. Yousro to rail against free
trade as they please. They proclaim, let what may
be said to the contrary, the triumph and the perma-
nence of the system of free trade.

FRANCE.

PARIS, MONDAY, 11 ♦.Y.

A letter from Marseille* of the 7th statestbat great
agitatioa had b•en telt in that city for the last twa or
three days. The troop. had been all confined to their
barracks, and ammunition had been distributed to the
national :guard% The accounts from other parts of
the department were also rather alarming. It was
said to be the intention of the reds to seize on the
arsenal and the prefecture. All the posts in Mar-
seilles had been doubled.

The shareholders of the Marseilles and Avignon
Railway Company met last week at Marseilles, and
decided on raising a loan of 30,000,000 fr. in bonds of
I,ooofr. escb, paying 5 per cent, interest, to be paid
off progressively.
The report of the committee on the bill relative to
the. Paris and Avignon Railway has been prevented
to the National Assembly. The report recommends
the ooncession to one or two companies, but in the
latter case it imposts a joint responsibility.
The final number of votes given at the election of
the Charente has now come to hand. Lieut.-Col.
Edgar Nev obtained 58,750 votes, and M. Babaud-
Laribiere 24,297.
M. Leoutre, ex-reeponsible editor of the IVforine,
was on Saturday condemned by the Court of Av:zes
to four months' imprisonment and 3,000 fr.:fine for an
article published in that journal on the 13th August
last, tending, to excite civil war, and excusing acts
declared crimes and misdemeanours by the law.
At the Passage def Opera, yesterday, a consider-
able number of speculators assembled, and the Five
per Cents, were in good request. Tee last price was
97 francs.

_
Letters from Rome, of the let inst., state that fresh
difficulties had arisen in the matter of the Pope's re-
turn to Rome. It seems that the ambassadors of
Austria and Russia have protested against the Pope's
intentions.

At the hour of going to press our Paris parcel of
yesterday evening bad not arrived.

TURKEY.

The Wanderer contains the following letter from
CONSTANTINOPLE, J. 23.
. _

Up to the present time no renewal of diplomatic
intercourse between Austria and the Porte has token
place ; and the Turkish commissioner, Achmet E:'-
fendi, appointed to repair to Shumla, is still here
waiting for the order set out on his jaurney. It is
in
cessant
fall possible that be may be detained by the
fall of snow during the last two days, which has been
so heavy that all the shops are shut, passage through
the streets impracticable, and the travelling of
couriers impeded. If Count Stunner should, however,
receive no instructions from Vienna in the course of
to-morrow, Achmet Effendi, will, weather permitting,
take his departure. Respecting the Italian retugees,
it seems that Baron Tecco expects by the next packet
authorisation from hie government to have them
transported to the island of Sardinia, where they will
form a colony. It wnu:d seem that the question of
the refugees is at least in so far settled that no war
is likely to arise out of it ; for the fleets are sailed
away, and 35,000 redife, collected in Constantinople,
have been dismissed. Oa the other hand, the qu,a-
lion is far from having attained a satisfactory conclu-
sion, from the want of distinctness in the demands,
which, were they unobjectionable in point of
justice, ought to have been clearly and precisely
expressed, if there was any real intention of settling
the point once for all. Meantime the procrastination
upon one pretext or the other of a definitive under•
standing leaves room to suppose that the object is to
diplomatise " against time. Hence continued alarm
in social,. stagnation in business, and paralysis in
the admimstration. The last is a calamity impossible
to contemplate without deep regret when it is
eansidered how many urgent reforms are suspended
in this vast empire by the present dispute. 'the fault
of the protection lies, however, not on the side of the
Turkish government, but of the Austrian and Russian
whose demands become daily higher. In fact, Count
Stunner's list has been by no means closed with the
48 names which he set down, but he has reserved to
himself the space of two months for the completion of
his proscriptive roll. M. Titoff has demanded the
expulsion of 14 persons, and to-day it is reported that
he will still further insist on the expu'sion of all who
are born Russians. Thus, when one list is finished
another is brought forward, and so the affair becomes
interminable.

Count Strirmer is about to send M. Jsamagyi as
commissioner to Shumla, in order to superintend the
strict execution of the wipulations in the question of
the refugees, a selection the more to be regretted, as
M. Jasmagyi enjoys in Constantinople a reputation
by no means spotless. Some time ago he was an
accountant in the Lloyd's Steam Company office at
Constantinople, and is said to have lost his post for
the omission of some important entries of receipts.
Count Stunner interested himself in order to snatch
this peculator from the jaws of justice, and procured
him a place in the Vienna police. M. Jasmagyi next
accompanied (loners! Hauslab on his mission to \Vid-
din, from which employment he was promoted to a
confidential poet near his benevolent patron, Count
Stunner, who employs him on the despatch servic
between Shumla and Constantinople.

Like muter, like man !

THE WESLETAN CONFERENCE EXPELLING A
NIWOP•PER EDITOIL—The IVeskyan Tomes, of Monday,
says: " Our columns to-day contain a fresh instance of
ecclesiastical despotism on the part of the dominant faction
of the Wesleyan conference. The editor of this journal has
been expelled, by one of the chief actors in the Manchester in-
quisition, for the erlme of editorship. Our professional
brethren, both in the metropolis and the provinces, will
doubtless be surprised to learn that editing a public journal
is a crime of such magnitude as to merit the extnmest
penalty a modern ecclesiastical conclave can inflict—that of
excommunication." The same paper gives a long account
of the proceedings of the court at which this decision was
arrived at.

TELE CASE OF SUSPECTED POISONING IN lIACb:NET.
—Yesterday morning the adjourned inquiry was resumed
for the fourth time and concluded before Mr. Bak, r, et the
Fountain Tavern, Upper Clayton, Hackney, as to the death
of James Merritt, aged 34 years, • tumor) k in the employ
of the Hut London Water Company, who i.ied from the
effects of a deadly poison, called arsenic," alleged to have
been administered by his wife Ann Merritt, who wet fur-
ther examined at the Worship-street Police Court on Satur-
day, charged on suspicion with having caused her husband's
death, and remanded by the magistrate until Friday next.
The particulate of the investiation before the coro-
ner and jury, and the examination at the polite
court, have appeared at different times in our
_journal.
The jury returned the following open verdict : " That the
deceased died Irons the deleterious effects of a mortal poison
called white arsenic, but how, or by whom, or in what man-
ner the same has been administered, there is no satisfactory
evidence to prove." The foreman then handed the coroner
the following recommendation "The jury, before they
separate, wish to record their opinion respecting burial clubs,
as they are at present constituted. They view them with
fear, in consequence of their holding out • premium for the
frightful crime of secret murder, and the facility with which
the burial money is obtained. Several cues have recently
come to light, the facts of which are startling, and on whim
their fears are founded ; besides the many we may presume
bare escaped discovery. We, the jury, in thus noticing the
evil tendency of the burial societies, from which money is ob-
tainable, upon the death of a :member, are desirou that they
should be differently constituted, either by the act of the
storeroom or through some legislative measure which should
be made either to control or guide them."—The proceedings
*ea teralastod.