The Sun.
London, England, 1863-09-11 00:00:00

_LONDON, FRIDAY EVENING, SEPTEMBER 11, 1863.

UPS AND DOWNS OF AN ACTOR'S LIFE.

The Cotton Famine and the Health of the I °us time?. they pay litte attention to careful domes-
! tic economy, and now that it is needed they have no

Operatives.
—O--

lii the aultimn of la,t year opprehensions were
elltet'tuinkd lest the diftrcss in the manufacturing
dis.;.ricts should lead to the outbreak of some epide-
mic disease. In the month of October the attention
of the Me&cal Department of the Privy Council
was aroused, had Dr. Buchanan, one of the physi-
cians to the London F.;ver Hospital, was commis-
sioned to inquire into the sanitary condition of the
cotton districts. His investigations occupied about
two months, and at the end of December he made a
report which has been published as an appendix to
that of Mr. Simon, the Medical officer of the Privy
Council. That report is not confined to a mere
statement of the nature and extent of the disease
xnet with, but also contains much valuable informa
tion as to tha au'ficiency of relief afforded, and the
effect which prolonged distress has had upon the
habits of the operatives.

In spite of the vast efforts which were made to
assia the unemployed one of the most lamentable

consequences of extreme destitution appeared last
winter. Lancashire had been wholly exempt from
typhus fever, of what is called by Dr. Buchanan
the " true Irish type," since 1847-8 ; but last year
it again appeared, and in Preston and Manchester
assumed an epidemic form. At Preston 227 cases

knowledge how to turn their scanty inc er: a to the
beet advantage. If the money which they Tend in
food watt laid out to the best account, a they welt,
able to cook the materials so procu in the most
useful manner and without waste, their moneys
would go much further than they now do. An ex-
treme instance of ignorance in these respects was
exhibited by a poor girl at Preston who paid half
her earnings in rent and tried to keep herself aliee
upon the remaining lad. a week. This would have
been difficult with the best management, "but her
notions of economy were comprised in bread and
tea, and death by scurvy was the result of them."
The ordinary diet of the unemployed, as witnessed
by Dr. Bucuanan, was almost exclusively vegetable;
occasionally only they afforded a bit of bacon,
cheese, or butter, a herring, or, more rarely still, a
morsel of cheap meat.
" Bread constitutes the greatest part of their daily food.
OW meal or meal of Indian corn less commonly is the next
most usual food, made into porridge or into various sorts of
bread. To these a little butter or treacle is added generally
for the children when they can afford it. Potatoes stand
next, being happily good, cheap, and generally popular.
Partly from want of utensils, partly from inexpertness, their
cooking gives no variety to these materials. Tea with
sugar, but usually without milk, is now the common drink.
In very few families can a proper amount of milk, even it
any at all, be bought for the children ; they are put on the
same food as the adults at much too early an age."
After such a picture as this, it is satisfactory to
learn that, although animal food was so scantily
consumed in a solid form, the poorest usually buy•
ing none, yet, "in almost all towns there are soup
kitchens, where a quart of good meat soup is given
for a penny ;" that "in some few towns potato-hash"
(locally called "bob sconce") " may be had at a
penny a pint," and that "in Manchester and
Salford public dining kitchens Kane been lately
established, where not only soup, but meals of meat
and potatoes can be had for an extremely small pay-
ment." The advantage of such establishments is
strikingly illustrated by the fact that—" In these
ways a dinner containing about two ounces of ani-
mal food can be got for the same money that in the
homes of the poor would only procure a dish of po-
tatoes or a basin of porridge."
As far as the better class of cotton workers were
concerned, there was at the time of this report but
little alteration as regarded the houses which they
occupied. They were, as a rule, inhabiting the
same cottages of three or four rooms that they occu-
pied in more prosperous times. There was among
them but little disposition to crowd together,
though often a married son or daughter came
back to live with their parents, in order to save
rent. Among the poorer classes, however, things
were worse. Many who formerly rented a two or
three-roomed cottage were obliged to content them-
selves with a single room, while others took a
stranger to lodge with the family. In the very
poorest class two families frequently occupied a
single room, one bed sufficing for the whole of each
family. The amount paid for rent varied consider-
ably in different towns, and even in the same town
according to the means and disposition of landlords.
The owners of single cottages, often poor persons, to
whose support the rent was a material contribution,
were obliged to bear rather hardly upon the tenants,
but larger owners could afford to wait for their
rents, and as a rule they showed considerable libe-
rality. Distraint was rare, and not many cottages
were to be seen empty. The average of rent paid
was probably much less than half the usual amount.
Only in one town, Oldham, did the Relief Com-
mittees make a separate provision for the rent of
the people whom they were assisting, but as a rule
the committees regarded a portion of their grant as
applicable to this purpose, and arranged their allow-
ance with reference to that circumstance. Over-
crowding was distinctly on the increase, and had in
December reached a pitch fatal to cleanliness and
purity of air, and equally so to sexual delicacy.
In the very poorest cottages there was a further
reason for overcrowding, besides the desire to save
rent.
"In the bitter frosts of November the most destitute
began to huddle together as closely as possible for warmth,
and, being sadly deficient in bedding, their day clothes
often serving for their only covering by night, they care-
fully excluded from their crowded bedrooms every breath
of air. If they rented two bedrooms, they brought the beds
together into one. Six or eight people would come at night
into a room 12 feet square, with the window and door closed
and padded, and the fireplace (as is almost universal with
them) thoroughly papered up, and lie as closely as they
could for the heat of each others' bodies. They got their
warmth indeed, but in a fashion that was monstrously
hurtful to their health."
Even when Dr. Buchanan visited the manufac-
turing districts a check had been given to the over-
crowding which resulted from mere cold by the
distribution of bedding, and it is to be hoped that
' in the ensuing winter the poor will never be driven
to such unwholesome shifts to keep up the animal
heat.
In the article of dress the cotton operatives had
suffered as much as in those of food or lodging.
First their Sunday clothes, then their changes of
linen, were sold or pawned, and their single suit,
if not diminished in the same way, was worn to
shreds. The poorest people were constantly with-
out underclothing, and a single petticoat and
bodice often formed the entire wardrobe of a
woman or child. In such a state, and with deficient
bedding they were found by the early frosts of No-
vember. Had we hat! a very wet or cold winter, the
rate of mortality would have been frightful. As it
was, bronchitis was exceedingly prevalent, even
among the women and children, and the men who
were employed at out-door labour seem to have
suffered with especial severity from diseases pro-
duced by the cold. They would have suffered more
had not the Guardians in the worst weather dis-
pensed with the test of oat *door labour. Dr. Bu-
chanan found nothing to observe upon in the exter-
nal condition of the houses and streets all effected by
the distress, but as to the inside of the houses in-
habited by the poorer classes he states that there
' was a general want of cleanliness, in part connected
with their having more inhabitants, and in part due
to the cost of cleaning materials. Landlords,whose
weekly visit for rent was made in vain, appeared to
have become careless about the wholesomeness of
their houses, and few of the local authorities had
Acted on their powers of compelling attention to
these matters. Domestic cleanliness had been often
preserved under many incentives to its neglect, a
result aehich was probably greatly promoted by the
gratuitous distribution of soap by many of the relief
committees. _lf the old standard of personal tidi-
ness had not heed maintained, there hod been less
slovenliness and die't than might have been ex-
pected. In the Preston Union, when a dirty person
applied for relief, the Guarliarte, before considering
ticket
his case, sent him off with a
to the nearesi

bith.
One of the most interesting anti efteual means
which benevolenca created to contend wididistress
last winter was the sewing schools, raid it"
hem a
7t3 satis-
factory to learn from Dr. Buchanan that
medical point of view it would hardly be possible !0
give too much praise" to them. ccTaousands of
persons," he says," but especially of young wein2n,
are provided in them with shelter and warmth
throughout the day, are set to useful work, fur-
nished with clothes and money and kept from the
mental harm of idleness." Excellent as these insti-
tutions are, at the time of the doctor's visit one
serious fault pervaded them; they exhibited a la-
mentable deficiency of ventilation. Held, as they
„elle
ally wel e, in the large, low room of an empty
factory, or in a schoolroom intended for a less num-
ber of children, the original construction of neither
place
provided for a sufficient change of air," venti-
lation without
all
the
windows,
lindotwheir hot mills, insisted on shut-
, The
girls
_sec
to their
being scarcely possible."
• ting
stances we are not surifitaeod_
often intolerably close, and under such circum-
that the atmosphere was
to learn that the lady
superintendents often
faces trotsverk with the intense
girls themselves
flushed,her sewing,
that more than
headaches,,, that the
70YaLtenzibiarneltsut o n •
were seen unhealthily the
examined
one of them had fainted over
The only, schools which were specially
were those established by the guardi
It had lately seemed that the young
schools had been getting out of health, and at theo"
request of the managers Dr Buchanan undertook an
investigation into the nature, extent, and causes of
their sufferings. Of 35 girls examined eight had ail-

merits that had either existed before the cessation of
their factory work or appeared to be independent of
their altered circumstances; four had experienced
some loss of health, but not during their attendance
at the school, oue or two having indeed enjoy F d
better health since they attended the c!asses— ve
said that they were in better health than when they
were at mill work-12 stated that they were as
well as when so employed—and in the case of the
six others more or less deterioration of health had
occurred. Minute inquiries into the amo int of in-
come received by these girls, and the mode of its
appropriation, led to the conclusion that health was
being maintained on so much food as could he
bought with 2s. 11d. per week, but that where, from.
any cause, the amount of income available for loud
fell materially below that point loss of health was
very generally occurring_ The character of the food
appeared to be of less moment than sufficiency of
quantity, but still it seemed probtlble that depriva-
tion of fresh meat was assisting in the observed loss
of health, To meet this last evil it recommended
that the sewing girls should get their dinner at the
schools twice a week, by which means a meal, such
as potato-hash, containing fresh vegetables and
about two ounces of meat, might be supplied at the
same cost to the girls themselves as their innutri-
tious and monotonous dinner of bread and tea. The
ventilation of the room naturally attracted a good
deal of attention as exercising an important influence
upon the health of the scholars. The average at-
tendance of girls in the schools examined at Preston
was such that in those buildings each scholar had at
least 120 cubic feet of air, and the means of heating
and ventilation were such that the air could be
maintained sufficiently pure and warm. At times,
however, an unusual influx of scholars reduced the
breathing space to 70 or 80 cubic feet, or more fra-
quently the love of the girls for hot rooms led them
to close the windows and ventilators, and then the
atmosphere became oppressive and unwholesome.
So great an aversion have the girls accustomed to
the warm close rooms of the factories to anything
like a draught or a free current of air that even
where the breathing space available for each girl
does not exceed 60 cubic feet they take every oppor-
tunity of closing the windows or other apertures
intended for the admission of external air. Under
such circumstances it is not surprising that the at-
mosphere of many of these rooms is to a visitor
intolerably hot and close, and that, if the girls
themselves do not suffer, the injurious eft-cts of a
protracted attendance are frequently experienced
by the superintendents. Dr. Buchanan closes his
report with a recommendation that " 120 cubic feet
at least should be secured to each girl in the sew-
ing school, when necessary by a limitation of the
number of scholars in a room. In all cases due ven-

ables, books, Yankee notions. The voice was not sufficient
to solicit custom; the basket was thrust in your ribs for
your patronage. The hawkers of New York papers bawled
the titles of their ware in our ears till midnight.. Presently
came the turn for ~he Philadelphia, then for the Baltimore
early press. The evening trash was followed by the morn-
jug- rubbish, with first, second, and third editions, and the
" sensation" headings dinned at full length into our ears.
Anon there was the sharp twanging voice of the Yankee
guard squ,siling for tickets. He came past like a turnkey
making the round of his gaol birds. He dug his sharp-
nailed thumb between the shoulders and chest of the unlucky
sleepers. He spoke to us, handled us as no London police-
man would deal with a thief. Eight or ten times at letbt in
the night was that odious call for tickets renewed. The ne-
cestaies of the service may, for aught 1 know, render the
nuisance unavoidable; but nothing will convince me that
the surly official dog does not take a wanton pleasure in ag-
gravating the hardness of his functions ; that he does not
wish to impress you with the fact that all men are equal
before hire, and that till he sees your ticket ho has a right
to look upon you as a swindler, and has the right to treat
you as such both before and after seeing the ticket.
Mauled, pounded, and with all my poor blood boiling
with the sense of long-endured indignities, I at last reached
Washington, where, as a matter of course, I had to go
through the ordeal of porters, carmen, and hacki. ey coach-
men, and to bear the vacant, insolent stare of the office-
keeper, and the laziness and untidiness of the waiters at the
hotel. I have since been moving about, without ceasing,
by day no less than by night, by steamboats no less than on
railways. I found nowhere a change for the better. Every-
where the same crowds and mobs, the same filth, the same
utter disregard for other people's comfort, the same reck-
less irresponsible extortion, the same cool quiet insolence,
the same want of all order, punctuality, civility. I spoke to
well. to .do Americans, who agreed with me that travelling
in their country exposes them to all the harsh unmannerly
treatment I complained of, who confirmed my opinion that
matters on that score have become infinitely worse than
they used to be in my old experience of Yankeeland a quar-
ter of a century since, when they were in all conscience
already as bad as they ought to be. My friends shrug their
shoulders, and think the evil admits of no cure. Secession
you may have in America, and martial law, and the sus-
pension of the habeas corpus; but democracy must needs
hold its tyrannical sway on the high road; and a division
of railway carriages into classes, a separation of first and
second cabin passengers in steamboats, are no
more to be
thought of than the removal of the nasty quid from the
jaws of an independent citizen, or the abolition of the pri-
vilege every man has of turning the carpet even of a lady's
drawing-room into a pig-sty. How should, then, a poor
wight travel in this country ? The answer of my estimable
friends is simply "don't," and they illustrate precept by
practice by limiting their excursions in the States to jour-
neys of dire necessity, and hastening to Europe whenever
they can afford leisure and money for genial locomotion.
Travelling in America is like politics—a dirty work, from
which clean-minded men shrink, leaving it to those who
have no better way to get on in the world, and who know
how to turn it to the best account.

SPIRIT OP THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

- -

TlMES.—Marriage is an important as well as a
holy thing. Nothing can be sounder than the doe •
trine that a nation is in a had way when the mar-
riages among its population decline in number. The
fact is proof either of public distress or social dete-
rioration. Still,there must be fluctuations in such
statistics, but it is very desirable that their real
meaning should not be mistaken. Just now, the
returns on this head are rather remarkable, but we
doubt whether we have been correctly apprehended•
It is beyond question that the marriages in the
whole kingdom were below the average for the whole
year 186 t—the last annual reckoning published by
the Registrar-General. It is also certain that the
decline was distinctly marked in the manufacturing
districts, but we are by no means sure that the in-
fluence of the Cotton Famine in the matter has not
been materially overrated. When we read in the
report that in a certain quarter of the y
marriages in Manchester,ear, 1861 the
as compared with those of
a similar period in the year preceding, declined from
1,285 to 1,150 ; in Ashton, from 312 to 271 ; in
Blackburn, from 412 to 288; in Preston, from 355
to 254 ; and in Stockport,
from 332 to 218, it is
impossible to deny that the incipient paralysis of
the cotton industry might really have been then
affecting the returns of the year. Yet this influence
could not have been so powerful as was supposed.
The Quarter which we have quoted was the fourth
Quarter, and, indeed, we could hardly have looked
for much effect of the blockade before that time.
But the report shows that the whole year was more
or less unfavourable to Marriages, and especially
the first quarter of it, when the cotton supply had
experienced no interruption, and the Civil War in
America had not broken out. In point of fact, it
was the weather which at this period was the ob-
structive agent. Most readers will retain a lively
recollection of the Christmas of 1860, its intense
frosts and its snow. The extreme severity of the
season and the dearness of provisions rendered the
period " eminently unpropitious," and contributed
much to that decline which is visible upon the whole
year. The second and third quarters, again, succes-
sively failed to bring the marriage rate up to the
average, but still the prospective cotton famine could
not have been especially' in fauit, for the same pas_
home/lon was observable iu the majority Of the great
divisions of the kingdom. It is evident, in short,
upon an attentive inspection of these statistics, that
the decline in the number of whice. distin-
general and ordinary causes rather than to the in-
gushes the year 1861 was due to the operation of
fluence of any one extraordinary agency. We can
also
go one step further. We can show that this
decline, such as it then was, exhibited no alarming
or uncommon proportions.
Nobody examining the
tables of these statistics for the last 20 years would
be induced by the figures for 1851 to suspect that
any unprecedented misfortune had befallen the
country in that year. There is a very distinct fall-
ing off in the marriages, no doubt, since the total
numbers dropped from 170,156 to 163,706 for all
to rule, they should have risen a little as the popu-
lation increased. But such E r tg, ai nn d
tlairnurcet
i ylWe3a.
carat ale sslBatsoß3go,efh.oterhre marriages,
i, wst if
tat
trei
rreieeaa,g_s
thateco r
isd i
to
ng
in excess of the returns for 1861.
fluctuations are not
unusual.
though
among a smaller population, amounted to 164,500,
being seen-illy
two years later—that is to say, in 1855—they
had fallen to 152,113. Again, in 1858 the figure
dropped from 159,027, the number for 1857, to
156,070. The years 1840 and 1842 also fell off
from the returns of their predecessors, though not
materially ; but in 1847 the marriages, which had
been upwards of 143,000 in 1846, declined at a
sweet) to 135,845. There is nothing, therefore, in
the figures now before us to create any astonish-
ment. No doubt, 1861 was rather a bad year for
marriages, but the falling off in the numbers was
not so large as we have seen eu former occasions,
and it was not due in any great degree io the Cot-
ton Famine. But the last quarterly return of the
Registrar-General, just issued, announces an unex-
pected revival. The reader is probably aware that
in these Reports the marriage retm n is always three
months in arrear of the others, so that, whereas we
get the births and deaths up to June 30, we get the
marriages only up to March 31. Yet in that quar-
ter—the first of the current year—they were de-
cidedly increasing in some of the chief districts
affected by the Cotton Famine. In Manchester the
figures rose from 951 in 1861, and 830 in 1862, to
1,006 last spring. In Choitton, also, there was a
considerable increase, and in Salford too. In other
districts the tide was still setting the other way, and
possibly, as the Registrar-General observes, there
have been movements of population affecting these
results. Nevertheless, in spite of the destruction of
our greatest industry and the impoverishment of
our richest communities, the national marriage
rate for the first quarter of the present year is re-
ported above the average. So broad, in fact, is the
area of these surveys, and so numerous are the ele-
ments at work upon the results, that we may per-
haps find lighter traces of the Cotton Famine than
we expect even in the complete reports of 1862 and
sa,
s,y
1863. The cotton districts, after all, are but a frac-
tion of England, and if any causes should combine
to stimulate trade and encourage industry in other
great centres of population as they seem to have
done in the metropolis, the decline to be anticipated
in the marriages of Lancashire may be compensated
by increase elsewhere. We have already learnt that
cotton is not such a King as was supposed, and that
the destinies of England are not under his rule.
The cotton trade has been struck out from the in-
dustries of the country for a whole year with less
effect upon the business of the nation than anybody
co&d have imagined. Some analogous result we
may possibly discover in the Registrar-General's
future returns. We see, in fact, in the tables now
before us that the progress of the nation is but im-
perceptibly affected by any of the vicissitudes which
are successively chronicled. The great body moves
on like one of those migratory glaciers described
by geologists, with a slow but irresistible course,
grinding out for itself an onward passage through
every obstacle in its way. The Registrar-General
tells us that we may take the last quarter of a cen-
tury', and consider that the growth of our population
throughout the whole period proceeded as uninter-
ruptedly and as uniformly as the growth of a
gigantic pine. "Each quinquennial period added
a million or a little more tc the account. In 1836.40

tilation of the rooms should be resolutely insisted
on, and with such ventilation the temperature that
would be the best to adopt for a mean is probably
65 deg. Fahrenheit.

AMERICAN TRAVELLING.

(From a Correspondent of the Times.)
PHILADELPHIA, Aug. 13,

I left New York for Washington af w days ago. The
thermometer was at 96 deg. in the shade. I chose the even-
ing mail in the vain hope of shunning the killing heat of
the day. From my hotel to the ferry, and from this again
to the Jersey shore, I and my baggage were, of course, at
the mercy of hackney coachmen, carmen, and porters. Like
everything else, extortion is free in America ; it is sullen,
insolent, overbearing besides; it bows to no tariff, stoops to
no fixed charges ; it takes its own time, chooses its own way,
deaf to your remonstrances, unmoved by your hurry ; bully
or blackguard it does not, for it has a quiet consciousness
of its power, and does not condescend to Niggle or argue.
It bumps your " plunder" on the ground, shatters your
trunks wilfully, as if visiting on each luckless box that so-
cial sin that made some men owners, and some others mere
carriers of trunk.
The ticket-seller, the luggage master, all the railway offi-
cials, harbour towards you the same feelings as your cabman
or porter. They all aye you sorely, answer you curtly and
tartly. Nay, before they answer they stare at you leisurely
as if revolving in their mind what right you have to put a
a question, or what business it is of theirs to attend to it.
They have not the sharp, snappish, pedantic, dictatorial
tone of your French Jack-in-office, but neither have they
the rough-and-ready but good• humoured obliging English
way of going tow ork. The fare is not down on your ticket;
you pay as you are bidden ; your luggage is not weighed ;
the charge is made at discretion. It may be all right, no
doubt. I was bidden to pay twice as much far ray trunks
from Washington to Baltimore as I had paid between New
York and Washington—twice as much for the same weight
over hardly one third of the distance. I asked for explana-
tion, and was answered by a vacant supercilious look. Very
clearly inside the station the horse has the whip-hand of
his master. Your choice lies between travelling on such
conditions or travelling not at all.

Enter you have been kept en queue at the ticlret-
office ; you have been penned up at the waiting-room as in
France, or at Smithfield ; but the bell rings, and this is the
way to the "cars." The cars, or railway carriages, are
long vans on railway wheels, constructed to carry any
number of passengers from GO to 100, disposed iu seats, two
by two, with a gangway running the whole length between.
These cars are all for one and the same class. Americans
travel on the footing of perfect equality. The crowd was
immense, as it always is at every hour, on every road, by
every conveyance in this marvellously stirring community.
I read in the pages of a recent good-natured English
traveller that "this promiscuous coming together of persons
of every description gave rise to no inconvenience; for the
same thing happened here as on board the penny boats qn
the Thames, where the shabby passengers, altogether en-
titled to equal rights, instinctively shrink from contract
with the better dressed, and huddle together as if knowing
their places." I did not find my fellow-travellers so
modestly accommodating the other evening, nor have 1
since fouud many instances of this amiable disposition
among these people. There was a rush and a scrambling
and jolting ; the ears were taken by storm, the places were
secured, and with stranger "car-fellows" poverty could
scarcely have made me acquainted. It is true some of the
cars were not equally thrown open to the multitude. Before
them stood soldiers, grizzly guardians with muskets, bar-
ring the doors. These were reserved we know not for whom;
perhaps for the military. One or two wero set apart for
" ladies," for in America the sex is your true aristocracy.
Like the Emperor Nicholas, it confers distinctioa on those
its countenance shines upon, and so long only as it does so
shine upon. The sex enjoys privileges which it can easily ex-
tend to any man or set of men in its company. It is, however,
a distinction without a difference, for the " gents' " car (the
word gentleman is never written at full in these places) the
gents' cars are only open to the world. The " ladies "
cars are accessible to " the world and his wife." A very
fishwoman is as freely admitted into the privileged cora-
par ment as a duchess; and she can bring with her a whole
squad of fishmongers, as much entitled to rank among the
" ladies' men" as she among the ladies. Luckily or unluckily
I was owned by no lady, and had to put up with the gents'
limbo. I got in. The whole of Broadway was squeezed in
that close narrow space. There they all were, the loafer,
the rowdy, the coatless, the hatless, the teethed and th
unwashed, the sharp featured sour-visaged Yankee, the
wild shaggy. headed Irishman, the heavy-lipped beery Ger-
man; all the heads of the people, with the exception of the
negro head. All Broadway is on its travels, incessantly on
its travels. You would say that broadcloth shuns the high-
way, or that gentilidy dreps its trappings, and affects the
look, the ceeetunae, and the manners of rascality to propi-
tiate it on the highway. Toe air of the place choked me.
the sight sickened toe. lam an old stager, be it borne in
mind, broken into all manners of hardships, roughing it
with the hardiest of men. But I draw a line between the
washed and the unwashed when I can ; and I do not con-
ceive why, so long as one class lives apart from another in
houses, so long ais Amerieena shun contact with each other
as they do by pews in churches and bales in the theatres,
why, I say, they should not allow Money equal), to pur-
chase separation in public conveyances, why men of all

tapirs should be "made" to " pig together" on omnibuses,
boaLifi and railways. Talk of the tyranny that chains toge-
ther the patriot and the felon in the galleys I Why, here
is republican equality dooming the clean to spend a whole
night, or any number of nights, side by aide with the un•

the race itself.
I am an old stager, as I said, Auld it ,c9mpelled to travel
in a carriage seat as in the most luxurious of beds. I
smothered down my indignation, overcame my disgust,
ruelly banging as
crouched down in my narrow and by no means soft bench,
tho-
roughfare for vendor's of orange
and soon dozed. Dozing, indeed ! Behind me was the door
opening every two minutes, fiercely jarring as it opened,
clean in the cars.
I walked up and down the gangway twice and three times,
like a luckless dog fidgeting lound and round for a proper spct
to lay hiumelf down. Alas I no spot was Left. I took my seat
near one of the sovereign citizens, edging away from him,
without looking at him. Smoking is not allowed, I believe,
even ;T1 the gents' cars, bat the Yankee needs no dear to
make a ta.4st of himself with. The quid was in every two
mouths out of thive,, A.n incessant fire was kept up from the
double row on the right-hand seats to the double rowel). the
loft. The missiles flew out of the narrow open windows, re-
gardless of the wind which flung them back in minute
spray, mixed with the dust of the road and black aahes Lein
the engine. But why should I dwell on the loatheoow
scene ? I t was pandemoninfu ; and a night spent in an
American car, even if it brings a nun ‘1,A711. to a proper sense
of his own unworthiness as one of the race, is no:. ,certainly
calculated to awaken his kindest sympathies in behalf of
five or six nights in succession I can make inPoit. 4 ionic
it is
,closed. The gangway was a
Rop, iiatables and drink-

the population was risin; through its sixteenth
million; in 1811-45 through its. seventeenth; in
1846-50 through its eighteenth; in 1851-55 through
its nineteenth ; and in 184-60 through its twentieth
million." in the middle of 1861 our numbers are

computed to have been 2C,119,496 for England and
Wales only, and this, is spite of wars, mutinies,
commercial panics, deficient harvests, and inclement
seasons. Calamities which startle us at the moment,
and which ruay produce seep local distress, fail to

leave much mark in the great national account.
That accoant goes on with the steadiness and uni-
formity of mechanism, and happy it is for us that
its purport is prosperity. On another point, too,
connected with this subjcnt ;he same conditions of
the question may be remarked. Is has been asserted
that among the middle class of the population, or at
any rate among a particular section of that claf•s,
marriages have become of late less frequent than
they were and. than they ought to be. But this de-
cline, if it has anywhere cccurred, is lost in the
gross totals of the reckoning. Whatever may be
done by war or famine, we may be pretty certain
that a mere predilection for bachelorship has never
yet affected the marriage rate struck by the Regis-
trar-Gensral. We sincerely trust it never may
do so, for the symptom would be a bad one for the
country, but at present the whole assertion must
remai❑ without proof. We cannot test it. We can
only say that if it is founded on fact the result
is inappreciable in the statistics of the population,
and that it requires causes far more powerful than
social selfishness to influence the marriage rate of a
great nation.

DAILY NEWtJ.—The establishment of People's
Parks in our large manufacturing and commercial
towns is a felicity quite peculiar to our own day, a
striotly modern fact, and it is at the same time one
of the most gratifying signs of our social and poli-
tical progress as a nation. Until quite a recent
period, excepting in the single instance of the Me-
tropolis, Parks belonged only to the privileged
classes, being wholly identified with the royal or
noble owners for whose use and pleasure they were
in the main sacredly reserved. Close to many of
the large towns were magnificent parks and plea-
sure grounds, within whose dividing pale, from
year's end to year's end, only a single household or
a select circle ever entered, while the pent-up dwel-
lers in those towns had no means whatever of open-
air recreation except at too great a distance for any
but vagabonds habitually to enjoy. The rapid de-
velopment of our manufacturing, mining, and com-
mercial industry has no doubt tended, as Lord Rus-
set! points out, to increase these evils. The rapid
multiplication of mills and workshops will soon,
even in the west rural districts, absorb the village
green, turn the way-side stream into inky slush,
and cover the adjacent fields with a mass of densely-
populated, squalid tenements. In a few years al-
most the only available recreation for a working
man in such a district after his day's toil is a pipe
on the door-step, a wrangle with his wife, or a pot
with his companions at the beershop at the corner.
But this serious incidental evil, of our prosperous
industry is being rapidly corrected. In our day the
vanished village green is restored on a scale answer-
ing to the enlarged requirements of a manufacturing
town over those of a country town or a rural ham-
let, Within the last few years many of our large
towns, such as Salford and Halifax, have been sup-
plied with magnificent People's Parks, and the
boon has in most cases been the result of local muni-
ficence, the parks having been given in whole or
part by merchants and manufacturers. Those whose
capital has most largely profited by the modern
concentration of labour have thus been amongst the
first to recognise the claims of the industrial classes,
by making permanent provision on a general scale
for their comfort and recreation, and enjoyment.
Through the munificence of Sir 1). Baxter, Dundee
is now added to the number of towns thus favoured.
The beautiful park which this public-spirited mer-
chant has presented to his fellow-townsmen was
opened on Tuesday, Lord Russell gracing the occasion
with his presence, and appropriately summing up the
feeling which such an act naturally inspires :
" Happy is he who can give to those in populous
city pent' a rest from exhausting toil amid scenes
which invigorate the body, and turn the mind to
the contemplation of the wonderful works of God."
the political allusions of Lord Russell's address, if
deficient in the charm of novelty, were nevertheless
peculiarly fitted to such an occasion. We have no
doubt heard before of the noble lord's share in the
repeal of the Corporation and Test Acts, as well as
in the great Municipal and Parliamentary Reform.
But for this very reason, because a reference to
these measures is so familiar and commonplace, we
are too much disposed to overlook the great social
and political revolution they represent, and while
enjoying the beneficent results of this revolution it
is well that we should be reminded now and then
of the struggles through which it was achieved,
and learn to connect our superior advantages with
their true cause. There is a far closer connec-
tion between the Parliamentary Reform of thirty
years since and the People's Parks of to-day than
careless observers might be disposed perhaps to
imagine. It was substantially the battle of popular
rights and political justice against the combined
forces of class, privilege, and accumulated wrongs ;
and its success gained for the people the position
out of which People's Parks, popular education, and
numberless other schemes of industrial elevation and
social reform arose. That great instalment of public
justice, with the measures in favour of political and
religious libarty it produced, did much to remove
the bitter alienation that had grown up between
the governing classes and the people, established
an understanding between them, and laid for the
first time a solid basis of future action for the com-
mon good. It is enough to glance at the history of
this country during the years which preceded the
passing of the Reform Bill to be convinced of this.
We can hardly now even conceive of the terrible
social and political condition of England during the
fifteen years that intervened between the peace and
the era of successful reform. The Government of
the day was not only destitute of popular sympathy
and support, but waged an active and determined
warfare against the people. It was the era of the
Hampden Clubs, the march of the Blanketeers. the
so-called Derby insurrection, and the political trials
for alleged blasphemy and sedition. At the time
when Lord Russell first entered public life the govern-
ment of the day demanded and obtained from a
subservient Parliament a suspension of the Habeas
Corpus Act, on the plea that the existence of clubs
and societies in favour of Parliamentary Reform
was a public danger, demanding this extreme mea-
sure. Then, as now, Lord Russell was the cham-
pion of public justice and popular rights, against
the encroachment of arbitrary power and the selfish
violence of a privileged class. One of his first
speeches, it will be remembered, was against this
unconstitutional measure, and referring to the
much more serious dangers of the country when the
Act was passed, he said, "We talk much—l think
a great deal too much—of the wisdom of our an-
cestors. I wish we would imitate the courage of
our ancestors. They were not ready to lay down
their liberties at the foot of the Crown upon every
vain or imaginary alarm." In the same speech he
earnestly warned the House against losing the re-
spect of the people by refusing to listen to their
grievances. " Let not the Reformers say—When
we ask for redress you refuse all innovation ; when
the Crown asks for protection you sanction a new
code. For us you are not willing to go an inch—
for Ministers you go a mile. When we ask for our
rights, you ought not to touch the little finger of
the Constitution—but when those in authority de •
wand more power, you plunge your knife into its
heart." When Lord Russell used this bold and
Patriotic language, all the world of fashion, in
fluence,and power were against him, but he steadily
fought the battle of popular rights, giving the best
years of his life to the snuggle, and eventually he
triumphed. And amidst such welcome and striking
illustrations of the beneficent effects of the victory,
a reference to the cause is not only pardonable, but
in a high degree encouraging and instructive.

Another political murder has just been committed
at Warsaw on a man named Richter, the head of the pass-
port-office, who had recently been engaged in organizing a
new police. He was stabbed to the heart in the street close
to his own door.

SHOCKING GUN ACCIDENT AT WARRINGTON.--
An accident, attended with fatal consequences, oc-
curred on Monday. Two young men, named Peter Ken-
wright and Wm. Durkin, went to the house of John Mee,
in Haydock-street, and borrowed a gun, Mee was not at
home, but his wile, on being asked by Kenwright if the
gun was loaded, said sho did not know. The young men
then went together to the shop of Thomas Lowe, butcher,
Winwick-street. Kenwright went into Lowe's house for
the purpose of procuring a powder flask and shot bag, leav-
ing Durkin, who held the gun, at the shop door. Durkin
stood with the gun resting on his foot, but, by some means,
he let it fall, and, the hammer coming in contact with the
ground, an explosion was the result. The greater part of
the contents were lodged in the head of a boy of Lowe's,
four years of age, who was playing about in the shop.
The boy was killed instantly. Durkin, in a state of great
alarm, went to the police and gave himself into custody.
The chief constable, however, finding there was no blame
attached to him, did not detain him.

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On Monday, a case most painfully illustrative of
the vicissitudes of an actor's life came before the
bench at Hull. A middle-aged man, named James
Clifford, of wretched and half-starved appearance,
and whose only covering consisted of shirt, trousers,
and boots, was placed at the bar charged with
having attempted to commit suicide by jumping
into the Humber Dock on Saturday evening. A
young man, named Thomas Beantyman, a licensed
porter, stated that on that evening he was going
along the Humber Dock side, when he observed the
prisoner jump from the quay into the water. The
witness at once raised an alarm, and also got into
a boat with a view of saving the life of the unfor-
tunate man. After considerable difficulty and the
lapse of about five minutes he was successful in his
endeavours. The would-be suicide was hauled on
to the quay and handed over to the custody of the
police. The prisoner on being asked by the magi-
strate what he had to say for himself made the fol-
lowing statement : He said that for about 40 years
he had been a travelling performer with portable
theatres, and had performed at Winn's Theatre, at
Drypool Feast. He had once been in very com-
fortable circumstances, and had plenty of friends,
but latterly he had become very much reduced. He
had been compelled to part with all his clothes ex-
cept those few rags which now covered his body.
He soon found that when his clothes were gone his
friends had also flown, and those who had once ap-
peared to be the firmest of friends had now become
almost his greatest enemies. When he was left in
an almost naked state, he found it absolutely im-
possible to obtain an engagement, and having
nothing wherewith to procure food his existence
became miserable in the extreme. Daring the latter
part of last week he had wandered about houseless,
homeless, and friendless, and on Friday and Satur-
day had nothing to eat. On the evening of the
last named day the rain was falling very fast, and
on meeting a policeman he asked if he would be
allowed to go into the lock-up for the night. He
was informed by the officer that unless he had com-
mitted some crime he could not be locked up. Being
wet, cold, and hungry—in fact, just on the verge of
starvation—he sought refuge under the dock sheds,
and whilst he was so sheltering he began to con-
sider which would be the best way to pursue in his
then lone and desolate circumstances. He con-
sidered chat he had neither clothes, food, shelter, or
friends, and was at a loss how to proceed. If he
had had his clothes he would have known how to
proceed, but in his then state before any respecta-
ble manager he would have been naturally told that
he was " worse than a shoeblack." Therefore at the
time he thought there was only, one way for him,
and he determined to take it. He therefore got up
from the place where he was sheltering, walked to
the edge of the quay, and jumped into the water.
This was al'. that he (prisoner) had to say. Such a
thing had never before passed in the drama of his
life, and he hoped that it would be a caution for the
future, for if he lived he would long remember it.
During the time the prisoner was making the above
statement the most breathless silence prevailed in
the court. Mr. Winn, the proprietor of the portable
theatre which has been exhibiting near the Drypool
Church since the Dry pool Feast, was in the court.
He came forward and said that he had known the
prisoner for upwards of twenty years, during which
period the prisoner had been under his management
in several portable theatres. In the whole of this
time he had never known him commit an offence
similar to the one with which he was now charged.
He had always been a steady and inoffensive man.
The witness also further stated that about a fort-
night ago the prisoner and his wife quarreled. In
consequence of this he took to drinking. His
wife left him and took away with her his wardrobe,
thus depriving him of the means of going on the
stage. The witness had several times sent for the
prisoner to return to his theatre, directing the
messengers to tell him that he was quite agreeable
to take him on. The witness supposed that
through shame the prisoner declined an offer.
Whatever might be the cause, however, he did not
accept Mr. Winn's offer, and he (witness) was very
much astonished when on the previous night he
heard that the prisoner had attempted to commit
suicide. He could come to no other conclusion than
that he had been induced to commit the rash act
through want of food and through intoxicating
drink. Even at that moment he (witness) was
quite willing to take the prisoner back into his em-
ployment. His worship pointed out to the pri-
soner the folly of the course of conduct which he
had pursued. As the witness, however, had so
kindly come forward to speak for him, and had even
promised to take him into his service, he should
discharge him. A subscription was got up amongst
the attorneys and several gentlemen in court, his
worship also contributing, and upwards of 15s. were
placed in the hands of the prisoner, and he left the
court a happier and no doubt a wiser man. His
worship also presented ss. to Beautyman, for the
promptitude and presence of mind which he had
shown in rescuing the prisoner from a shocking and
untimely end.

WATERSPOUT IN THE MORAY FIRTH.

Monday's storm (says the Banffshire Journal)
was accompanied in this immediate neighbourhcod
by one of those splendid but no less terrific pheno.
mena rarely witnessed in these latitudes, namely,
a waterspout. This terrible phenomenon was seen
in the BA,. of Banff about 4 o'clock in the after •
noon, and presented a very magnificent and impos-
ing spectacle to those who had an opportunity of
witnessing it in all its furious grandeur. In noting
its progress, the phenomenon, as first it presented
itself to the eye of the beholders, would more pro-
perly be described as a whirlwind than a water •
spout. In the former shape it had its rise, in the
latter it had its fall. The wind was from the north
west, and strangely enoull, though it blew a
perfect hurricane inshore, the sea was calm as a
lake. In the offing away to the right, in the as
yet unruffled portion of the bay, was a little boat,
from Macduff, with three men on board, quietly, to
all appearance, fishing for mackerel. Away to the
left, or to the windward, fitful squalls were sweep-
ing round the little promontory at Blackpots towards
the breakwater at the harbour, eddying about in
the intermediate bay, throwing up a wave hero and
there, and lashing it into foam. In this way the
curious inshore hurricane continued with less or
more violence for nearly an hour, and the coast-
guardsmen were watching the squalls with 'consi-
derable anxiety, fearing lest at any moment they
should extend its playground a little further to
sea, and mayhap upset the mackerel boat. While
they were thus eagerly watching the peculiar
conduct of the warring elements, their atten-
tion was suddenly arrested by as object of a
still more peculiar nature away further to
windward. A violent whirlwind, scattering the
waves in its course, came sweeping along almost in
a direct line to the point of view, gathering up its
strength as it came. As the whirlwind approached,
it seemed to pause for a moment off the station, as
if to concentrate all its energies in a last effort. At
that moment the water, gathered up by the whirl-
wind somewhat in the form Of a cone, and lifFed
higher and higher in the air, was borne straight up-
wards to the height of more than 50 feet above the
surface. Pursuing its easterly course, the huge ap-
parition swept forward for a considerable distance,
till, just a little to the north-east of the breakwater,
it burst. As if caught on " the wings of the wind,"
the huge mass was borne aloft for some distance,
and then precipitated with great violence into the
"vasty deep," whence it came. The effect of the i
phenomenon is described by those who witnessed t
as something very grand and imposing, if not abso-
lutely terrible; for, had the fury of the whirlwind
expanded itself in a less convenient place, the con-
sequences might have been dire havoc indeed. Such
a sight has not been witnessed in these quarters tar
many a day.

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FALKIRK TRYST.

---a--

Tie Tryst o Tuesday Was favoured with a little better
weather in the early part of the day ; but tot, ards the after-
noon rt.in again came on, which quickly put an end to
business. The stock was all placed by eight o'clock, and
consisted of North and West Highland beasts of all ages,
and almost every quality—this class forming at least half
of the stock on the ground, although it was certainly de •
ficient in regard to Lumbers when compared with previous
September fairs. There were also short-horns and Irish
cattle, country beasts, and Ayrshire milch cows, and polled
cattle froraDurafrles and Galloway ; hut none of these stocks
showed anything like the numbers of previous years, except
perhaps the milch cows, which were a capital show. The
supply, however, in every department, was quite equal, in-
deed, superior to the demand, the fact being that there was
a considerable margin on each stock left at the conclusion
of the market unsold.
The Highland cattle in really good condition met a fair
sale; but those not so met a rather meagre demand. The
best conditioned lots of small beasts from the North High-
lands met a fair demand. It may be said that the Highland
cows were an excellent show, and attracted very considerable
notice, and many of them were sold at rather high prices.
It must also be added that there was a considerable number
of inferior looking Highland beasts on the ground, but this
may have arisen from the jaded state in which the beasts
were, after having been driven in many instances between
200 and 300 miles. The three-year .olds of the Highland
class were few comparatively, this kind of stock being ge-
nerally brought out in October ; but those which were in the
market met with a ready sale. The North Highland beasts,
from two to six years, also met similar good encouragement*
The kyloes, which were in anything like condition, were
very smartly looked after by the English jobbers, in conse-
quence of the turnips and other green crops having so much
improved from the recent rains. The best class of both
heifers and stots were in demand, but in some instances
prices were rather low, but the better kinds supported the
prices of last year. The £9 or £lO beasts were down Os. a-
head, but the condition being better than this time last
year, the reduction must be considered rather more. The
same may be said regarding the two and three-year-old
bullocks and kyloes ; in fact, the Highland cattle ;were
on the average from 10 to 15 per cent. below that of last year,
although there was no discernible difference between this
and last month's market. The polled cattle from Gallows/
and Dumfries were in a fair state, and met a ready sale. The
short-horned stock was a large supply, and was in famous
condition, especially the 3-yr-olds, which were readily picked
up, more particularly those fit for fleshing purposes. The 5-
yr-olds that were not in the same state also met a similar
sale. The milk cows were a shorter supply than usual, but
the market was stiff, and the sales effected were slightly
lower than last year, and ss, 103, to 20s less than the last
Rutherglen market. The Irish cattle were a large show,
comprising 3 and 2-yr-olds and six-quarter beasts. Those of
the first class that were in condition sold equally well as MA
year; the second class were ill to sell and £1 down, and the
inferior kinds were unsaleable. The Yorkshire calves were
a large show, for which there was a good demand.
The highest prices obtained for Highland cattle were :•"'
For 3-yr-old bullocks. £l6 108; 3-yr-old heifers, £lO 10e;
3-yr-old queys, £ll ; cows, £9 lOs; 2-yr-old stots,
15s ; 2-yr-old heifers, £7 7s ; yearling stots, lOs 6d;
6-quarter-old stots, £3 10s; 6-quarter-heifers, f 5 ss; and
stirks, £4lox.

The Ayrshire lunch cows fetched as much as £lB, and
the lowest price accepted was £lO.

The Irish cattle ran-3-yr-olds, £l4 to £l6 10s; 2-yr older
£lO to £l4 10s; and stirks, £6 lOs to £lO 10s.
The short-horns, 3-yr-olds, fetched as high as £l6; And
2-yr-olds, £ll to £l4; stirks, lOs to £lO lOs; and York'
shire calves, £5 to £7.

'1 he show of horses was rather large, more particularly
those of the draught stamp, which ran from £2O to £46'.
For this kind there was a fair demand for what Were,
really good, but the inferior kinds were ill to sell, and
it may be added the trade was very dull. The lighter
description of animals wore a tolerably fair show, but
did not meet that encouragement that might hal
been expected, in consequence of the broken state o'
the weather, which causes this class of beasts to be at a die"
count, the jaunting season being all but over.