The Sun.
London, England, 1863-12-26 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS,

nereteen.—Notwithetantlirg all that has been
written in the recent controversy upon the law of
entail and primogeniture, we are not aware that
anything has been put forward on either side ex-
planatory of that law. It may be useful, therefore,
to inquire what its effects really are, and what would
be the consequence of repealing it. Now, the law
of entail does not, as a gnat many even educated
people and nearly all uneducated
people supp ose
enable any man to tie up his land in his fainilY for
,
ever; that law has been abolished for centnejes•
All that the law now permits is, that a man shall
tie up his property to a tenant for life, and after
his death to his sons successively, till the first
son entitled shall attain 21. That is the utmost
limit; for after the death of the tenantefor life the
son then entitled may, on attaining 21, cut off the
entail, sell the land. and do what he likes
with the money ; or keep the land if he
likes, and do what he likes with it. Nay
more; if the tenant for life is living when
his son attains 21, the two, if they agree about it,
can cut off the entail, and sell the land or divide it
into as many shares as they like. So much for the
terrible law of entail. As to the law of primoge-
niture, it is simply that, if a landowner dies intes-
tate, and under no other circumstances whatever,
the land goes exclusively to the heir-at-law, a con-
sequence which every man may prevent, and which
nine-tenths of all landowners, and ninety-nine
hundredths of all considerable landowners, do pre-
vent by making wills or settlements. How, then,
it would be asked by the anti-entail school, does it
happen that estates are perpetuated in the same
families for many generations ? Simply because
the owners of considerable estates almost always
like and choose to resettle their estates, when they
might sell them or subdivide them. Landowners
have a fancy for making what is called " an eldest
son"—or, in other words, they do not like their land
to be divided. Their taste may be very bad ; it
might be more patriotic—though we do not at ail
concur in the opinion that it would—to subdivide
their land among their children, and so on from
generation to generation till we should reach the
blessed millennium of every man owning, as lord in
fee simple, his acre or his half-acre of land. We
are not going to discuss this question of political
economy. M. Chevallier, no mean authority on
such questions, has discussed the effects on Agricul-
ture in reference to the law of France, which foeci-
bly subdivides land ; and we will leave that pee-
tion where he has left it. But be the choice and
taste of English landowners good or bad ; be their
consequences beneficial or the reverse, it is the
choice and taste of English landowners, as a body,
to keep their lands together as much as their
circumstances will permit. On what ground then
should that choice and that taste be forcibly in-
termeddled with by law ? It is said the result
of entail is frequently suffering any privation to
younger children. Equally so is extravagant
living on the part of any parent; yet scarcely
even Mr. Bright and Mr. Cobden would on
that ground ask for an act of Parliament to
"confine the expenditure of every man within a
fixed limit. Then it is said that during minorities
the result of entailing is to suspend the power of
improving land, and to cause inconvenience to
tenants ; but that is the result of ee ere, minority,
whether under an entail or otherwise; and yet Mr.
Bright would scarcely propose that a man should
not be allowed to leave his property to children be-
cause they are under age. The great objection, how-
ever, made to the law of entail—and that is its real
sting—is that it tends to accumulate too much
power in few hands. But the same might be said
of the absence of any restriction upon the accumu-
lation of money. A lord with £20,000 a year in
land is no doubt a very powerful person. But so is
a cotton spinner or a banker with half a million of
money, and yet though the Bright school appears to
think the law of entail should be abolished, in order
to prevent lords having £20,000 a year of landed
property, we never heard that they propose any
direct or indirect limitation of the fortune that a
cotton spinner may acquire, nor any compulsory
meddling with his right to settle or will it As he
pleases; and unless they can show some very geed
distinction between money and land, some good
reason why merchants should be at liberty to keep
their fortunes in brick and landowners should not,
their warfare against entailing seems unfounded.
But there is another thing to be considered. Sup•
pose the power of entailing and the right of primo-
geniture were abolished, while the taste of land-
owners continues the same, what would the aboli-
tion do ? Just nothing. Instead of entailing, a man
would by settlement or will give his eldest son his
land absolutely after his death; and the eldest son
would repeat the proceeding with his eldest son,
and so 'on, and the land would remain undivided
as much as ever. So that really one must go the
length of saying that, for the benefit of the com-
tnonwealth, we will abolish the right of every
matito give his property as he likes, either during
hi, or sfrcr his death ; we must make, es the
French low does, a compuleoey division of heed
on a man's death, if the object is to prevent the
supposed evils of lands been; kept together in
masses. Of course, if that were the law as to land,
it ought equally to be the law as to money, for
there can be no good reason why a man should do
as he likes with his money, and not do es he likes
with his land. Both money and land, in different
ways, confer power on their owner; the mischiefs
arising from that power are just as much mischief
with regard to money as with regard to land. We
do not apprehend, however, that either the prophets
or the alumni of the Bright school would like to be
told, " wnen you die you can only leave half your
mill and machinery and half your money as you
like—the other half must be divided equally be-
tween your children, whether you like it or not."
One word more, and we have done. It is quite a
mistake to suppose, as Messrs. Bright and Cobden
so often appear to do by their speeches, that the
desire of creating entails is a purely aristocratic
disease. Nothing is commoner than to find entails
of very small estates in the hands of quite humble
people. A man with a few freehold cottages almost
always gives them by will to his eldest son, or dies
intestate, so that he shall have them; ho has no
more notion of splitting up his humble landed estate
than a duke or a lord has, and as strict an entail as
ere ever saw was made by a small country tailor of
land worth about £6OO.
ADVERTISER.—The Duke of Cambridge, in dis-
tributing the prizes to the cadets at Weolwich,
addressed to these young gentlemen some observa-
tions which indicate on the part of his Royal High-
ness a due appreciation of the important duties he
had undertaken to discharge. He reminded the
young gentlemen who were about to receive com-
missions in her Majesty's service that they must
not consider their education completed—that when
they left those walls they would enter pn a career
which demanded of them to continue their education
and endeavour to keep pace with the spirit of the
age. It was essential if they desired to be reai;v
efficient officers to make themselves acquainted with
the improvements and discoveries that were con-
stantly arising. He knew many officers who had
made themselves truly scientific after obtaining
their commissions, and he hoped that the cadets
present would on a future occasion emulate their
example. We regard this utterance from the illus-
trious Commander-in-Chief as highly Appropriate
to the position of the officers in the British army in
the present day. There have been periods when this
address might have been regarded as a well-merited
censure on too many of our British officers rather
than as a word of encouragement to our cadets. Per-
sons whc were 'gentlemen by virtue of their rank were
singularly in need of learning, but remarkably in-
disposed to labour for its attainment. Very scant
were their libraries, but quite large enough for men
who never intended to read, whose days were spent
in the routine of the parade ground, and in lounging
idleness, while their nights were consumed is the
orgies of the mess, The Royal Corps of Engineers
being excepted, it would have been difficult to find
any class of gentlemen who were less acquainted
with the discoveries of science, or who knew the
value of a book, except as the means of whiling away
the hour in which they were waiting for dinner.
We have reached a much better era, and one in
which his Royal Highness is fully justified in
speaking of highly scientific officers who have be-
come so after obtaining their commissions. We
have in our army gentlemen, who, besides their
knowledge of the subjects essential to their profes-
sion, are distinguished for their scientific attain-
ments, and for their literary eminence. Many of
them holding high positions among the most dis-
tinguished authors of their day, and having con-
tributed lalgely to various departments of iitera.n-
byryeeie I hoped
observations
lure. It is not now as easy as it was for gentlemen
e
every where and in all cixeretthelaw examinations
al
ti
teneeesykeeo:
rcy-P of
to find their way into the British arms. air
favour
some circumstances persons have thherou
were Very
pushed themselves into positions t
appoint-
lad to find that
unworthy to fill, and we should
b:cges the standard
much above its r
that whilet e
the press
of attainment wash raised
low
is level.bebeing
t
ments, the military servic
Were tlie stan-
darddirection.provemen
of the Royal
whichelevatedrmay
ei amtyihet
ail
since the
aval strengt.'h, •
com-
menced. t
Thes
competitive m
Duke are the more deeerving of attention from the
fact which Nye noticed a fcw
owes sine©, that our
military, as well as n
measured by th© anion t is not now to be
cf our brute force, but by
the extent of our Weir
fare. The mind, attainments in the science of war•
the science, the inventive skill of
the great Europe
an Powers have the elements now
actively em
of amman employed in guiding them in the pursuit
m9'ne.Y; and there can be no doubt that in

any great struggle that may hereafter arise, the
superiority will be on the side of that nation whose
military and naval science has acquired the greatest
development. As we have said in reference to our
naval rivalry, the battle is fought in the dockyard
and in the gun-foundry. So we may say in reference
to armies, that the foundations of victory are laid
in the military school and in the studies of officers,
and those who aro assisting to give effect to their
ideas. We shall not be understood to deny the
necessity of personal courage and bravery in our
officers and men, as without these qualities the
most powerful implements of war would be forged
in vain. We know the value of the prudence and
scjrit which distinguisned every general bya
whom
victb:iy has been gained, and we know too that
bravery ho always proved Ps necessary as skill.
We suppose, top, that we may
be, in any future
engagements, somewhat on a par, in these respects,
with any nation with whom we may
again come
into collision, or anticipate defeat a 0 inevitable.
All these things we assume when we ara'
speaking
of the necessity of military skill in our ari."lY ; but
all these things being present, personal co.graget
good generalship, and numbers equal to the eng:ge-
ment, it still remains true that we must expect to
fail if our skill in the art of war and its materials
should prove, inferior to that of the enemy. If we'
allow their rifles and their cannon to be of a longer
range than our own ; if we should employ on the
sea Warriors less strongly clad; if on the field we
should be found relying on weapons which have
become in any degree antiquated; if we should be
engaged in our experiments when the enemy has
successfully concluded his, we may calculate Co
defeat and disaster as certain. We have therefore
to regard the address of the royal Duke not only as
a wise and excellent recommendation which we mei
heartily commend, but as a fair exposition of the
qualifications which the officers of our army ought
to poseess. We are as a people concerned deeply
on this subject. We know by recent and very bitter
experience what it is to suffer the loss of our brave
countrymen, to have the flower of the British army
mown down or left to perish from sickness and
disease, in consequence of the inefficiency of those
to whom the conduct of our war with Russia wee
entrusted ; and if we are to maintain an army for
the defence end honour of our nation in the future,
we must have for its officers gentlemen who enter
the profession not for ease, or honour, but from an
enthusiastic love of its duties, and who spend their
time in diligent studies, that in the day of conflict
they may discharge those duties with effect.