The Sun.
London, England, 1855-09-10 00:00:00

spliaT ()? TH PI PUBLIC' JtIIUBS A

(From the Times of does day. )
In the address of Lord Stanley to the Matiehe•aer and
Liverpool Agricultural Society it is ea .y to recog:-ase
the honest and painstaking young noblemen who went
to the West Indies for the purpose of seeing with his
own eyes the condition of the emancipated blacks and
unprotected planters. He goes into the matter before
him in proper businesslike style, stating what had been
done, what is now in progress, and what, in his opinion,
aericulturists have to look forward to. All this he does
' with a rigorous exactness and a degree of simplicity and
candour very much contrasted with the more eloquent
and seductive addresses that used to be heard at these
meetings. There is evidently not the least desire to
pet the best leg foremost, to avoid disagreeable topics
and unpleasant allusions. This has been done so often
that even the soft and credulous nature of the British
farmer must be proof against it. But if there ever was
a time when the truth ought to be spoken to the sen-
siive agriculturist it is the present, when the war,
which is every day straitening most other classes more
' and more, sustains the price of food at a height far above
all ordinary calculations of profit. If there is anybody
in these days who ought to be laying by for bad times, it is
the British farmer ; and as he lays by his money, so also
ought he,l to store up good advice. So Lord Stanley's
address is a word in season. He advises the farmers of Lan-
cashire to omit no opportunity of improvement, not to
grudge the trifling expense of a guinea sub,cription to
the society, to 100 about for the very best implements,
to enter into any arrangements that may be made for
showing the use of them where the smallness of the
holding will not allow of the purchase, to prepare for
two or three farms being thrown into one for the sake
of better husbandry, to cultivate every acre that is not
wholly irreclaimable, to look for the guano nearer home
if it can be procured, and, in a word, to follow the ex-
ample of other arts and sciences, all of them evi:r on the
move. It is a specimen of Lord Stanley's other advice,
and of a plea with his own honesty, that he advises the
farmer to answer any questions that may be put to him
with a view to the collection of agricultural statistics.
It has been intimated to him that our farmers weuld not
like to let their landlords know exactly how much they
expect to get from their lands, while others think it a
piece of impertinence in the State to ask any questions
about a man's private affairs. The extreme seclusion in
which many farmers live, the importance they enjoy in
their own little domain, and their general ignorauce of
put eee .nay ,evesee this ohjsotion. But they ought to
be informed that all other classes euemit in more than
one way to the prying eyes of the St .:e, The manu-
facturers is inspected at every turn. Besides that tee
nation knows to a pound the quantity of cotton wool
imported every year ; it also knows to a yard, and a
pennywoith, the quantity of manufactured cotton goods
that lea., e the island. The inalufactute:r is boiled to
make returns of the ages of his younger ief,erativoe• I 3
emplo7 them only in such and such hours, to provi, n for
the youngest schools open to inspectors, and. to pass
over other minute inquiries to which he is subject, he
may be called on to lay all his books open to the Com-
missioners of ineeeree tax. S the farmers are under a
considerable mistiee if they think that they are the only
peerle _;chose aff,irs the State pry inte. But, after all,
it is the farmer who is especially ilituret is the coliec-
tees of trustworAy agricultural etatieties, as vela dy
suffers so !Ditch by the present want of them. He sells
his crop in the lark, and is generally taken in. Such ins
the tone of the advice Lord Stanley gives to the farmer,
and it derervee to be wt:l received.

Undoubtedly Berne of these suggestions are very dis-
agreeable, and Lord Stanley does not take much pains
to sweeten them. FOr example, the hint about the
small scale of the Lancashire holdings will be set down
by many people as not only unkind, but very unpoeti-
cal. We believe that many very excellent persons
think that the smaller the farm the greater the content,
the virtue, and even the pr sperity of the occupier,
till perhaps they would pnt their ideal of a per-
fect farm at four acres or thereabouts. Of course
it cannot be denied that small farms are more
tolerable io a da:ry district, such as that round the large
towns of Lancashire ; but, under all circumstances, they
are chiefly remarkable for slovenliness, irregularity, help-
lessness, and all that is usually comprised in the idea of
had condition. The small farmer has not enough time,
or money, or skill for any one pursuit. Everything,
therefore, goys wrong about him. He cannot afford to
pay labourers regularly or well ; he cannot afford good
s!rvants ; be cannot afford that cheerful, abundant, yet
economical home which is the best school of rural vir-
tues. The small farmer is generally a very poor crea-
tore, a very ignorant creature, and often a very dissolute
cr. ature, from the circumstance of his not having either
the hard teaching of extreme poverty, the chains of ser-
vice, or the responsibility and self-respect of a better con-
dition. There is no class of life in which domestic rela-
tions of an equivocal charactErso widely prevail as in that
of =ll faemers. There is none in which education is so
little valued. Tliere is none so inaccessible to the higher
influences of a civili'ed country. Some may be sorry to
see it altogether destroyed, but it produces little more
than picturesque ferny, tumile-down walls, dilapidated
cuthouses, gates that have coved to swing, fences that
have ceased to interfere with the movements of cattle,
bridges that are no Joager sale, and ditches that
no longer favour the flow of water. If you
want hedges that assume the luxuriance of
thickets and harbour every variety of British
bird—if you want fields favourable for botanising, cot-
tages that would adorn any album, and cattle that a
Mcrland would naturally step to sketch, and, finally,
boors that a Teniers or a Wilkie would make a memo-
rundum of, you will fiad them iu the small farms of the
dairy districts, which send out penniless adventurers, 'out
whose occupiers are still more wretched than those who
are sent out. We are quite sure that no landlord need
ever fret himself for the supposed wrongs of those who
have been to look out for th .mselves by the union of
small farms in larger ones: Toe process is the greatest
benefit; to the country, to the laboorer, and, we are
satisfied, to the small farmers thems?lves. Lord Stanley
deserves our thanks for recornmendin-e the process as a
public benefit in defiance of the prejudices of those who
take a picturesque view eef the question.
•On the other hand—and it is a very fair stet-off against
this suggestion— Lord Stanley contends for the liberty
of selling land on the part of the landowner. Settlements
and the technicalities of:conveyaece make it morally im-
possible in this country for a landowner to do what ho
likes with his own. There are many situations out of
the category of common farming in which a landowner
mil ht sell very ordinary land at 1001. an acre, if he
could do it at all or at the expense ,of 51. an acre
far the conveyance. No reason can be given why
this should net be permitted. We have heard
of a case where a town which had been intoler-
ably dissolute and ilkonditiened in all respects dated a
very startling improvement from the time when a new
landowner, who had nearly all the• property around it,
opened a market, so to speak, for the sale of his land.
But there'are many other occasions in which a landowner
wants to sell hie land, and cannot do it, even when there
is no contrary interest in question. As Lord Stanley
says, he does not want an Encumbered Estates Act, but
if property is to become more and more involved every
year, we shall be driven to some such 1., source before
many years. Already a great deal of land and other,
property of a high estimated value is quite as worthless
to its owners as if it were in another planet or had been
swallowed up in the sea. Without falling into any ex-
treme and fantastic theory about the soil, we must say
that it is the duty of the-State to promote, by all lawful
means, its conversion to the largest profit and the
greatest variety of uses. The whole population has an
interest in it, not only that it may be made to produce
the greatest quantity of food, and contribute most to the
national wealth, but also that it may be made the means
of the utmost enjoyment to all. There are very few
men who can ever attain to the occupation of land, still
fewer who can hope for the pride of possession ; but the
soil may be made the means of increased wealth, happi-
ness, and even security to all, and he is indeed a great
benefactor to his country who shows how this may be
done, and himself leads the way.

A VERY MYSTERIOUS CASE.-At the bench of magis-
trate-,, on Monday (present—the Mayor, A. Bigge, and
Montaeu Scott, E,cirs.), a female who gave her name
Sophia Baker, asked the advice of the Bench under the
following very extraordinary circumstances :—The appli-
cant stated that she went with a female friend into the
shop of Mr. Walley, East-street, called "Ye House of
Lud," for the purpose of purchasing a silk dress. Au
assistant met them at the door, and politely bowed them
in. After looking at certain articles, which did not suit
her, she was about to leave, when the assistant, being de-
termined that she should be a customer, politely handed
her to another part of the shop, and showed her other
g00d,,, and ultimatelpprevailed upon her to have a piece
of silk cut off for a dress, the price being 225. She took
out her purse, expecting to find in it two half-ove-
reigns' knowing that she had carefully placed theni
there before she went into the shop ; but, to her
utter astonishnunt, she found the purse, which she
had fastened with a clasp, open, one of the half-
sovereigns gone, and the other loose in her pocket.
Having expressed her great surprise at the circumstance,
she said that she could not pay for the dress ; but the
assistant said it was cut off, and she must have it. The
friend of the applicant threatened to send for a police::
man ; and a considerable sensation was produced in the
shop searching for the missing half-sovereign. At
length Mr. Walley offered to take what money she had
for the dress ; and if on her return she found the half-
sovereign, she was to return it to him, but if not, she
might keep the dress. Applicant took the dress ; and
then came to the Bench. The chief officer of police ob-
served that this was not the first time persons had com-
plained of having their pockets picked in that sire,
Mr. Walley was sent for ; and, on making his appear-
at,ce, the circumstances were repeated, and Mr
Walley said, rather than have any disturbance he al-
lowed the applicant, to take the dress away for the half-
sovereign. Mrs. Reed, applicant's friend, said it was
not till after that she had threatened to call in a police-
man, that applicant was allowed to take the dress
away for half a sovereign. Mr. Bigge said it did
not appear to be a case in which the magistrates
could grant a warrant ; but it was a very suspicious
affair. Mr. Scott said the worst part of the case
was that Mr. Walley should have reduced the price of
the dress 60 per cent. when a policeman was talked of.
This appeared to him to compromise the matter, and
create great suspicion. Not only did it seem to coin
promise the case, but it also compromised the character
of the establishment. If Mr. Walley liked, be might
bring forward his men to clear his shop from that suspi-
cion which the statements of applicant and her friend
were calculated to excite. Mr. Walley declined to do
so, preferring to let the matter rest where was.-- 1
Brighton gazgle. 4