The Sun.
London, England, 1865-04-11 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS

TIMES.—The first upland out 'of London where
he western breeze comes fresh upon the cheek is
Wimbledon-common. Centuries ago you might have
filled your lungs with oxygen at the " village of
Charing," or, if you had lived in the years of Henry
VIII., you would have found an hostelry with 18
acres of pasture land at the top of Drury-lane ; but
now Wimbledon-common is the first open space
where the western wind gets a chance of a steady
blow. It is almost country. It is high and dry,
with deep gravel, and a wide expanse of view over
to the Epsom-downs. Richmond-park joins on to
the right. Kingston-hill and the wooded coverts of
Combe-warren are before you. Putney and Roe-
hampton and the Thames are away down in the
valley, and the great smoky London is only a brisk
hour's walk behind you. There is nothing near the
metropolis to compare with it. Pity it cannot last
so for ever ! Pity that when millions of human
creatures multiply they must expand over more
space ! Yet Wimbledon-common is doomed, what-
ever the Open Spaces Committee may say to the
contrary. Already the Clapham-junction is put-
ting forth its long antennae of streets and cottages ;
already the builders are walking up Wandsworth-
hill ; already the few meadows between the Heath
and Putney-town are seized upon by land jobbers,
and are; being parcelled out into terraces and cir-
cuses of narrow, lofty, squeezed-up houses. Wim-
bledon-park, which a few years ago could have been
bought for £l5O an acre, is now worth £l,OOO an
acre, and is covered with stately villas ; Wimble-
don village is crowded with houses ; and even low
lying Morden has been changed from a swamp into
a little town. Some day the Duke of Cambridge
or his successor will succumb to the temptation, and
kill his pheasants down and accept an enormous in-
c nie for changing Combe-warren into a region of
pleasant villas. All the frontiers of our old favourite
common are mapped out for occupation, and what-
ever may happen to the common itself, it will within
a few years be hemmed in by habitations more or less
ugly and more or less crowded. The sacred fron-
tiers of the common itself, however, are at present
intact. It is near a thousand acres. If they could
sell it for building sites it would be worth £5OO an
acre. Fortunately, however, they cannot sell it—
at least, there is great doubt upon the point. There
is a hope, therefore, that this great space, although
it must necessarily lose its present rural character,
may yet be kept to some extent open, and be left,
as a speaker in the late debate rather happily ex-
pressed it, as a Village Green for the Village of Lon-
don. There are legal difficulties in the enclosure
and division of this and other open Commons, but
those difficulties are certainly not such as are sup-
posed to exist bysome of ourParliamentaryspeakers.
As to public rights upon the Wimbledon Common,
the public have no more legal right there than they
have over Mr. Cox's mignonette boxes. If any class
have acquired rights by trespass on Wimbledon Com-
mon, it must be the gipsies; for they have used it con-
tinuously and from time immemorial. The chief object
of the present movement is, however, to drive them
away. But although it is ridiculous to imagine that
the public could for a moment maintain legal rights
to any user of this property of the Lord and Com-
moners of the Manors of Wimbledon and Wands-
worth, yet the public have a very strong equitable
claim to be considered if the aid ofthe Legislature
is asked for in order to change the character of a
district like this, We have no sympathy whatever
with people who buy bits of land upon the borders
of an open space, and cover their own land with
bricks and mortar, and then clamour to have a park
made or kept open for them at their neighbours'
expense. If Lord Spencer did with Wimbledon
Common what these gentlemen have done with
Wimbledon Park, we should have nothing to say
to him so far as they are concerned. But for the
inhabitants of this great crowded metropolis there
is an equity. It is the pressure of the population
of this ever-swelling Babylon that alone gives
the enormous value to this land which it would

now bear if brought into the_ land market. That
population, therefore, which confers the value has
some right to have its necessities considered when
special legislation is asked for in order to dis-
pose of the land to which its necessities have given
an enormous price. If the Lord and Commoners
who own this tract can divide it between them
without the aid of the Legislature, we have nothing
to say, unless we are prepared to buy the land. But
if they come for special powers, then we hold we
are fully justified in driving a bargain for the popu-
lation of London, that their accustomed although
unauthorised enjoyment shall be reasonably con-
sidered and to a fair extent perpetuated. Such is,
we apprehend, the only ground upon which sober
people could advocate any interference short of pur-
chase with the open spaces round London. To be
honest in such a matter you must either buy with
money, or make a bargain while you have some
quid pro quo to offer. Lord Spencer, the Lord of
these Wimbledon and Wandsworth manors, comes
to us voluntarily and offers to bargain with us.
What his rights as Lord are we do not pretend to
know, but as he sells the gravel, grants leave to
make temporary enclosures on the Common, and
disputes all claims of the copyholders, we apprehend

that his chances are such that many a sic-culative
attorney in London would give him £lOO,OOO for
them. He is not, therefore, seeking any pecuniary
gain when he comes forward and offers to secure to
the public 700 acres of this Common, and to enclose
it, level it, and preserve it for the popular use.
Whatever we may think of his proposition, Lord
Spencer deserves the public gratitude for the gene-
rosity of his intentions. The tone in which he has
been treated by some persons is obviously unde-
served, and very unworthy both of him and of the
real public sentiment in this matter. He proposes,
no doubt, to sell off some strips for building, and
this would probably, by competition, bring down
the unnatural prices of building sites in that locality,
which may be a disadvantage to individuals, but
would certainly be a public benefit. But for any one
to pretend that to cut off a portion of this great area
—which must infallibly be built all round—can be
any loss to the public is a transparent false pretence.
Seven hundred acres of wild pleasure ground is
ample Village Green even for the Village for London.

Still, however; although the persons who pretend to
do with Lord Spencer's property precisely as they
please, and claiming to represent the public would
also appear desirous of warning other landowners
againstdealing generously with the public—although
those persons have acted in the worst possible taste,
yet there is something in the matter of the objec-
tions they make to Lord Spencer's scheme. What-
ever the public are to have they should have as their
own. A gift is no gift if clogged with stipulations,
and if even nominal property is reserved to the
donor. The proposition to enclose was a mistake
altogether, the reservation of the right to dig pits
and cart away the soil was a mistake, and the level-
ling and planting and cultivating were great mis-
takes; bnt the greatest mistake of all was the insist-
ing upon a power to make bylaws as to how the
public should enjoy their new acquisition. It was
well intended, but there was too much complexity
about the scheme. Wimbledon Common would
have lost all its freedom and all its value.
Lord Spencer, however, has shown that he is
not obstinately wedded to his own scheme.
" If you do not like my scheme, gentlemen, tell me
what you would like," he says, and his bill has gone
up to a select committee to be remodelled. In the
interest of the public we should think there can be
no question what the scheme ought to be. It should
be as simple as possible. There should be no en-
closure, no flower-gardens, and no more gravel-pits
or turf-burning. The common should be placed
under the control of the Home Secretary and the
police ; and all we want them to do is to prevent
squatting and stealing and to keep the peace. The
value of the rights upon the Common should be
ascertained upon a calculation based upon the re-
ceipts during an average of past years. Let these
rights be compensated by an annual rentcharge, to
be divided among those entitled to it. Then let' an
estimate be made of the annual amount requisite to
keep up necessary drainage and roads and a good
staff of police. When you thus know what money
you want, let off as much land upon 99 years' build-
ing leases as will bring in the required sum. You
can hardly want 300 acres for this purpose. Your
fund will thus be secured ; and a hundred years
hence, when the leases fall in, the " Common Fund"
will be rich enough to meet any extraordinary ex-
penditure that may then be necessary. This ap-
pears to us to be the natural and simple way of
effecting all that is really required either by Lord
Spencer or by the public.
HERALD.—WhiIe eager to recognise as authentic
the statements we receive to the effect that the de-
structive epidemic in Russia is abating, and while
anxious to believe that the terror of the pestilence
has been highly exaggerated, we would, at the ap-
proach of hot weather, counsel the public to keep
upon their guard. Three English physicians have
gone out, by official appointment, to investigate the
nature of the disease concerning which so many
opinions prevail; clean bills of health are required
from all ships arriving in our ports with Baltic car-
goes; the French Government, together with the
British, has taken action to ascertain in what direc-
tion, if at all, the pestilence is travelling ; and whe-
ther it be a fever or malady vaguely known as the
plague, the time for precaution has not yet gone
by. We should stand in just as much dread of the
typhus as the cholera, and it is certain that typhus
and two other contagions exist at St. Petersburg,
whither they have arrived from distant parts of
Europe,rand even from beyond the mountain boun-
daries of Asia. For six months the children, in many
districts of Russia, have been peculiarly, and often
fatally, affected by some mysteriously morbid action
of the brain. The febrile storm next passed, and
an immense mortality ensued ; that which now rages
is vulgarly denominated the Siberian plague ; and
the questions are, what is the real nature of the
attack, and is it approaching our shores ? We can-
not rely implicitly upon the dogmatism of profes-
sional gentlemen and others who volunteer their
diagnosis from a distance, and pretend to be per-
fectly familiar with the causes, symptoms, and reme-
dies of the malady. They were equally flippant when
diphtheria, with its deadly strangeness of malignity,
first appeared among us, and to this hour the doctors
differ on the subject of Asiatic cholera. Without,
therefore, justifying the attempt which has been
wantonly made to produce a panic, without forebod-
ing the approach of a ghastly visitor, and without
even assuming as probable the arrival of the
Russian plague in this country, we are bound to
hold the matter in view as one of serious interest.
The disease, in the Russian dominions, is generally
regarded as having, at a period more or less remote,
had its origin in Siberia. Its chief ravages are
always among the poor—a fact which we should be
sorry to accept as a consolation. There is no neces-
sity for quoting medical jargon to invent an expla-
nation of its special character ; but there exists a
very strong necessity for bidding the public not as
yet to put faith in theories which have been confi-
dently broached about horned rye, black bread, and
ergot, or the efficacy of stimulants and quinine. If
the truth must be told, we are practically in the
dark concerning the history, nature, and cause of
this remarkable disorder, which has desolated the
circle of Waldai, spread death through Dantzic,
Konigsberg, and Gumbinnen, and actually depopu-
lated entire villages to the south-west of St. Peters-
burgh. In fact, we are awaiting information, and,
in the meantime, without yielding to panic, shall be
wise if we adopt reasonable measures for the com-
mon safety. There can be no doubt, that, for many
days, a sense of consternation overwhelmed the
modern capital of Russia. In the hospital of Oka-
bow, not merely did the whole of the patients die,
but, in addition, all the official staff ; and the Czar's
Government has thoLghtfully sent for eminent
medical men from England, France, and Germany,
in order to consult them. Thus the subject rests,at
present, in obscurity, and our only course is to re-
gard the statements which have been made upon it,
no matter in what quarter, as signally incomplete,
contradictory, and deserving the slightest possible
credence. There may have been exaggeration—
there may be mystification—there certainly need
not be panic ; but the topic must not yet be dis-
missed from the view of Western Europe.
It is not to be denied that epidemics of various
kinds have many times, emerging from Asia,
traversed enormous spaces of Europe, although
the. plague itself, when it broke forth once in
Russia with great virulence, died out within the
frontiers of that empire. But dysentery, and even
influenza, have been known, like the cholera, to
make prodigious circuits and cross large breadths
of sea—a truth which we do not cite upon the
authority of that credulous Dr. Foster, who
affirmed that the comet of 1668 "made all the cats
in Westphalia sick." However, assuming the pos-
sibility of a dangerous contagion reaching us, what
would Ministers do ? Their existing code of regu-
lations must be designated as a mass of unmeaning
absurdities, totally ineffectual and inapplicable. This
is a question principally of police—that is of admini-
strative vigilance. There is no demand for pest or
lazar-houses, floating hospitals anchored out at sea,
or a system of quarantine such as was advocated
in 1831; but when the character of the epidemic has
been, so far as may be practicable, ascertained, and
when we have learned whether or not its scourge is
being carried towards the West, there are certain
obvious precautions to be taken. Many years ago,
in a work upon the " History of Plagues," a phrase
occurred which curiously bears bn the reports we
have received from St. Petersburgh-44 in all pesti-
lences the mortality is fiercest among bakers and
mildest among fishermen." Of course, we are not
now, as we were then, in imminent and visibleperil,
crying out for new rules to govern markets, inns,
hotels, public conveyances, hospitals, burial-grounds,
and warehouses of medicine ; but we cannot, at all
events, be too safe, and in a matter like this we must
look for protection to the central authority. There
can be no doubt that in Prussia, along the Russian
borders, notwithstanding the reassuring intelligence
telegraphed to London, considerable apprehension
exists. In the frontier towns the streets are patrolled
by medical inspectors, the houses of the poor are
ordered to be whitewashed, decayed fruit, vegetables,
and filth of every kind are sedulously removed, and,
at the same time, every effort is made to repress the
popular excitement. This is a useful and judicious
policy. We are, as yet, under no obligation what-
ever to imitate it ; our necessity is that of watching
and endeavouring to understand the epidemic, which,
unquestionably, has been filling thousands of graves
in many districts of Russia. There, moreover, an-
other singular fact is to be noted. The Russians,
through the very circumstance of their inhabiting a
generally cold climate, are particularly exposed to
contagion. Among all articles of clothing fur is the
most likely to catch and retain morbific exhalations ;
woollen stuffs are more dangerous than cottons, and
cottons than silks. The furs and flannel bands of
the Russians and Poles are strongly condemned by
their own physicians, and yet they are told to keep
themselves constantly warm. Their doctorsin nume-
rous cases approach the patient in garments pitched
all over, or of oil-skin, carrying phials of chloride,