The Sun.
London, England, 1863-12-11 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS

TlMEs.—Birmingham has long enjoyed a repu-
tation for successful counterfeits, but all former
specimens of its craft are totally eclipsed by the
magnificence of that now revealed to the public.
Few people will have forgotten a certain memorable
event of the year 1858. A Royal visit was paid,
on a most interesting occasion, to the town of Bir-
mingham. The authorities or the leading inhabi,
tants of that opulent and populous borough had re-
solved on providing its working classes with the
invaluable advantage of an open park for their re-
creation and exercise. This judicious design was
carried into execution ; a suitable site was selected,
" the People's Park" was duly formed, and when
the Queen acceded to the invitation of the Mayor
and other officials to proceed to Birmingham and
open the park for use, it was universally felt that
her Majesty's gracious compliance was not unde-
served. The scheme was beneficent enough to merit
Royal countenance, and that countenance was ac-
corded. Aston Hall and Park were delivered by
the Queen and Prince Consort to the people of Bir-
mingham for their advantage and enjoyment, and
the promoters of the undertaking gained signal
credit for their liberal and patriotic policy. A
strange story, however, has now come to light.
This park, which was thus offered to the people,
and which the Queen was thus asked to bestow,
had never been really acquired by the reputed
authors of the gift. The property had not been
purchased, nor had the money for buying it been
raised. Tne real owners were a certain banking
firm, who retained a natural right of resuming the
estate in default of the requisite satisfaction in law-
ful money. - What sum was demanded for the
park, what amount was actually contributed, or
what designs were entertained for procuring the
remainder, we need not inquire, but a correspon-
dence which we yesterday published contained
evidence enough to prove that when Birmingham
acquired such a distinction five years ago the
price of her honour had not nearly been paid. In
short, it comes to this—that if what ought to have
been done in 1858 is not done now and that quickly
the People's Park at Birmingham will be the
People's Park no longer, but will relapse to the
owners, who have been willing to sell it, but who
have never been able to get their money. With the
correspondence itself the public must have been
greatly edified. In October last the late Mayor of
Birmingham, discerning the impending " catas-
erophe," and feeling that the ejection of the people
from the Park which they bad received at the
hands of their Queen would " be stigmatised as a
disgrace to all parties concerned," addresses himself
in his difficulty to the Lord-Lieutenant of the
county. In this communication the facts of the case
are admitted without disguise. To save the Park,
or, as we should rather say, to acquire it, a sum of
no less than £28,000—representing we believe fully
two-thirds of the whole purchase-money—is imme-
diately needed. The Mayor thinks the Town
Council could be successfully moved to provide
120,000, and it strikes him that if the Lord-Lieu-
tenant would move the County to provide £B,OOO
the thing could be done. To this suggestion Lord
Leigh replies by a very natural remark that if the
Corporation of Birmingham requires £28,000 for
purposes essentially proper to the town, and is
ready to vote £20,000 of this amount, it would
surely be better for so wealthy and important a
body to go one short step further and raise the whole
at once, instead of soliciting contributions from gen-
tlemen at a distance who had already subscribed
enough to indicate the interest they had in the pro-
ceeding. However, not to be abrupt in the matter,
his Lordship undertakes to consult the County
magistrates at the next Quarter Sessions, and then
to send the Mayor an official reply. But for this
reply the Mayor does not wait. He interposes a
brief but emphatic epistle to the effect that, even if
the Council had the means of raising so large a sum
as £20,000, " they never could be induced to apply
that amount, or, indeed, any larger amount than
he had mentioned, in the purchase of Aston
Park ;" so that, he adds, " unless we have help,
the catastrophe which every right-minded person
must deplore will inevitably and immediately ensue."
The help did not come. Lord Leigh had intimated
to the Mayor in a friendly tone that, as the object
of the Park was to benefit the Birmingham people,
as the design was conceived by the Birmingham
authorities, and as the Queen had patronised the
scheme on the invitation of Birmingham, Birming-
ham ought to be at the charges of the undertaking ;
and in this reasonable view of the case the gentle-
men of the county appear to have concurred. The
magistrates expressed an opinion that the Lord
Lieutenant should not move in the matter, and so the
Mayor and Council were left to their own resources.
In this predicament they took another and a still
more objectionable step. With a strange blindness
to the character of the case, the Mayor ventured on
placing it before her Majesty, from whom, if from
anybody, such a revelation should have been care-
fully concealed. Availing himself, with strange
infelicity, of the communication made by the Queen
in July last on the subject of the accident in Aston
Park, the Mayor enclosed to Sir Charles Phipps the
correspondence which we have described above. If
this measure was adopted in the expectation of
obtaining from her Majesty what had been vainly
besought from the gentlemen of the county, it failed
in its purpose ; but it produced a reply from wle!ce
the Birmingham authorities may derive iastructusbn
and profit. Her Majesty much regrets to hear of
having
e
contingency which the Mayor describes, hmaveia4
hoped, as of course everybody else did, tha trhke
which
required for securing to the
y parovided."
don laeenndn estimatedee undesirable rable nowe
shortcomingsr
yt to
persondeprive
in
was given to them " hadbeen
e*
anetno believe that,
But her Majesty " is still nnw
illeivaegalth is found in
pst
bo
rpatr
rhoye-
rmpeople the P
in a locality in which so much b
proximity to the hard labour by
doted, funds can be
wantingt the value yb tyweht ohei feee heetwhich
temporary
they
which it would be
population an
words. the authorities of l3iming-
hamhave been tauegatejta
uveseryofi n
jAulsdnt
joctniho
euPssea rakny,t
is known.
read what will be f.geoltodbytheee
the "
may
now do
since, and it would have
dheo.nistbtoe
makestory The least
onreyoehave done so with as little publicity as
It was, of course, assumed_
by t beenbe. . more. Queen
ttodpbtifioseescyfiscriveobceoulaetnn.tyt
and by the public, when this' Park was opened with
Royal pomp, that the estate had really been
enjoyedac-
quired by those who
it to others. Even
if the purchase-money had not
been actually or
wholly
rae toerp
leaveait dhe d oc
nowomn
doubt, .
et t
eshould
about
haveft tt
the
the
been so provided fo
finality of the bargain
gift. We all know that public works are occasion-
ally saddled with debts, and that if no new building
were opened
till it had been absolutely paid for very

few would ever be opened at all. But there is a
limit to the margin allowable in such case, and that
limit the Birmingham authorities have very largely
exceeded. We are told, indeed, that of the £40,000
which the Park was to cost, not £lO,OOO had ever
beau raised, so that Birmingham got the credit of a
liberality which had never been exercised, while the
presence of Royalty itself was invoked to lend
at
a
splendour to the counterfeit. This is going a were
re
deal too far. The promoters of Aston Park
under no obligations to do as they did; but if they
chose to express this solicitude for the welfare of
their poorer fellow-townsmen, and to present the
people of Birmingham with a public Park for their
pro-
recreation and enjoyment, they were bound toated
vide the price of the gift before they appropri the
its credit, and, above all, before they solicited
Queen to become the donor of the prize.
POST..—There is no class in the country that hae
held its own against a crowd of adverse circutu.°
stances so bravely and successfully as that whiell
has this week been exhibiting some of the resits o!
its industry and perseverance in the Agricultural
Hall at Islington. The British farmer has had to
meet difficulties that he of all men was the least
prepared to encounter, and he has not only over'
come them, but has renewed his strength in the
struggle. For a while his heart failed him, and he
ne
felt as if he was too old to begin life again on a ,sc_
system. But better and more hopeful though"
revailed, and, in bracing himself to the needful
exertion, he awoke for the first time to a full OPT
hension of his natural ability and his proper pow
tion. Like Sydney Smith, who said he 11°11111c
knew a turnip from a carrot when he set so"'
tilling his own glebe, the farmer brought himselflf
study the whole art and science of cultivation, an'
laying aside old ideas and old implements, aduPte-
every mechanical invention for economising labour
s.
and improving the land. He saw that be n'us'
keep abreast of the age in which his lot wag en
and he mended his pace and conformed to the conr
moo requirements of progress. He called upon hth
energy, and, as a good steed answers to the tighte;
-ng rein, it came in time to carry him over t
difficulty ; and now competition has long ceased t:
be a terror in his way, and he even rejoices gnarl
rivalry which has established his superiority es
agriculturist and elevated his character as a r11;13,-;
Still there are some who, more witty than W 1
persist in amusing themselves at the ex -
the British farmer, and the cattle show w -ee. t,e
is made a target for their spent ridicule. For
most part it is evident that these humorous eritlie
are laughing in the dark. They talk about call
as they talk about Rosa Bonheur's paintingli
and though they can relish a prize sirloin when„o.
is cooked and served up to them, as to its prOd", l 0
tion they admit frankly enough that they ari,t,
the hands of the graziers and the butchers•
underlying all this affected indifference, there rt.,
mains the solid fact that we are as a nation
cuter about our food. Even those who eat lias,t;ii
in moments snatched from business, appreeitna
juicy steak or a tender chop. The procuring of go al
and wholesome meat is, indeed, a matter of gerletto
concern, and if but few of us look minutely int° the
by which it is obtained, we are all laic°
rested in the result. Wo have to pay a high P,r er
for prime joints, and we expect them to aas:.ict
their description. Besides, so much has been 10r
of late about diseased cattle, and the necessity 4
veterinary inspection, that what was used to be a'of
a question of taste and luxury had become (113%a
health and safety. The importation of fereo.
cattle has been attended with very disastrous beets."
sequences. The free trade in live stock has
worse than a failure, for it has cost tie so
through the disease it has introduced, than 00.01
reckoned in the present market price of meat, Wiltilre
is also to be charged to its account—and a 1061 %ot
which was recommended for the benefit of the Prod
has actually been the means of placing animal this
out of their reach. There is now, therefore,
special reason for encouraging home prodnelintlby
and if art and science are fostered and promotedseg
exhibitions, and if the blood and breed of tor of
are maintained by race meetings, it seems ,t,(ll,,,ti4st-
the least of it, unreasonable to undervalue a' t''',,lol
mas cattle show, including as it does an ani,'or
gathering of persons from every part of the 'llB
dom who are engaged in what is, after allt.or
1 primary and fundamental occupation of the .L't to
ash people. As regards this year's show, ,0,
considered to have been quite up to the avernrqu
There has been no falling off either in quality al.vg
form—and if there has been no new feature, not
claiming prominent and marked recognition, Da .4
traordinary instance of merit, it has not been 040
to any want of interest in the competition. 4,
Smithfield Ciub, too, is in a flourishing con dit3-a
having a handsome cash surplus in reserve, f'l,o
with the means of increasing the premiums it O' n,
—and, with a new and popularised constitution,
there is every reason to expect that its future P,r'
ceedings will sustain the confidence the agricail-
rists as a body place in the justice of its decisiolt;
and warrant the public support which has bekio
largely extended to it. There are interests t.tlch
country cannot afford to neglect, and that vv.btito
has been represented at Islington is one, anare, or
chief of them. Every other interest is
less subject to external influences—but thimsode, like
cadent
of
the nation of which it is the staff, is indePen
all foreign control.