The Sun.
London, England, 1853-01-25 00:00:00

He may be considered, without any exaggeration
of his merits, speaking in common phraseology, to
be the Father of the Sanitary Movement, Gradually, •
in consequence of the appearance of his very singular
and startling pamphlets the attention of the more
intelligent was enlisted in the cause, in the advo-
cacy of which he stood at • the outset altogether
alone. Eventually the Board of Health was
established. Gwyder House became numbered
amongst the recognised offices of the Government.
A Sanitary Commission was organised. The
Press, both metropolitan and provincial, became,
we believe, before long unanimous in insisting
upon the necessity of some Legislative interposi-
tion. A measure, as we have already intimated,
was laid upon the table of the House of Com-
mons, and that measure, after passing through
the required stages, grew at length into an
actual enactment. Yet, everything done, the
evil still exists—London is still cursed by the
horrid results of this abominable custom of intra-
mural interment. Since the passing of the Bill
intended to destroy that custom, we have been
compelled, time and again, to particularise spots
which are still infested by the old rats and the
old ghouls—in open and undisputed violation of
that miserably ineffectual Act of Parliament.
Among these ill-fated localities, we must not for-
get to specify, and that, too, in the strongest terms
of reprehension—Old St. Pancras burial-ground.
An exposure of the foul and hideously over-
crowded state of that churchyard has recently
been given, with very significant wood-cuts, in
the columns of our contemporary, the Builder. The
tevelation is such as imperatively demands, we
conceive, the instant interference of our Adminis-
trators. Unfortunately we can speak to the
accuracy of the account furnished by the Builder
in terms of deplorable corroboration. It is true
that the ground is there so rotten with the dead
that " the stones are falling all ways." It is
true that " the paved pathways are everywhere
disrupted, such is the loose and quaking state of
the whole mass." It is true that the soil, which
is " a stiff clay," and has long been in " a dis-
gusting state"—being, in fact, " a mere mud-pond
in that portion which is appropriated to the burial
of the poor." All this is true, without the
truth being in any way over-coloured. And can
we suppose that such a state of things can be
much longer tolerated ? Alas ! it must be con-
fessed that there is but too much reason for this
doubt when a document like the one we are about
to subjoin—dated, it will be seen, no less than
eighty-six years ago—is still in existence. It has
been furnished to our contemporary by no less an
authority than Mr. GEORGE ALFRED WALKER him-
self—that gentleman being, in truth, in posses-
sion of the original. The document is as fol-
lows :

" St. Clement Danes, Jan. 25, 1767.
"Notice is hereby given, that a vestry will be held on
Tuesday next, at six o'clock in the eveting, in the ves-
try-room of this parish, to take into consideration the
cleansing of the great vault under the church,"the same
still being in a very bad condition, and the smell of it so
offensive that divers of the parishioners are prevented
from attending divine service.
.(Signed) HENRY WALLIS,
Wm MAssEv, Churchwardens.
.

Eighty-six years ago, tlfat notice was posted up
at St. Clement Danes by the Churchwardens !
Yet between 1822 and 1847, being only a quar-
ter of a century, 2,759 bodies were deposited
in that same terrible old graveyard ! Assuredly,
then, with a knowledge of these fact's forced upon
our conviction, it is not without reason that we
regard with anxiety the indifference evinced upon
this Sanitary Question, both by the people and by
the Government.

Dr. WILLIA' FARR, to whose clear and con-
vincing argument, addressed to the members of
the Statistical Society, on the Property and In-
come Tax, we last week directed the public atten-
tion, has buckled on his armour in good earnest,
and entered the lists against the advocates of the
existing system, prepared to encounter them with
their own weapons. Although he allows every
" vantage" to his opponents, they must needs be
(" cunning of fence" if they can withstand the pow-
erful and convincing train of reasoning with
which the doughty champion sustains and fortifies
his position. The propositions advanced by Mr.
CHARLES BADEAGE and his less talented followers,
down to Sir CHARLES WooD, although revolting
to the common sense of the community, and pro-
ducing an almost instant dissent from every
hearer, cannot be easily disproved. It is
notorious to every mathematician that what are
commonly termed the "self-evident propositions,"
those which, without any very unreasonable as-
sumption might be demanded as " postulates"
are the most difficult to establish ; and it is an
equally arduous task to demonstrate the absurdity
of some of the most outrageous fallacies. It is on
these grounds that Mr. BARRAGE and the minor
fry, following " Longo intervallo" in his wake, have
been enabled so long to hold their ground. Had
not the principle been adopted and sanctioned by
the Legislature, and supported by some men of
known character, assailing it by serious arguments
would appear to be a mere fighting against
shadows, a Quixotic onslaught against windmills.
But theunfortunate precedent has been established,
and the abstruse terms (or, according to the vul-
gate, " jawbreakers ") adopted by the com-
batants have hitherto acted as dampers to
enterprise, and deterred champions from enter-
ing the list against those who did not
fight with ordinary weapons, but, like the wizards
of the old romances, induced their opponents to
combat on enchanted soil. In Dr. FARR, how-
ever, they meet a champion who apparently pos-
sesses a talisman which renders him proof against
all such devices, and enables him to meet the
enemy on their own ground. He can enter fully
into the technicalities and hard phrases in which
they are accustomed to seek refuge when worsted
in argument, and is thus able to drag them from
the inmost recesses of their lairs—another HER-
CULES bringing a modern Cocus to justice.
One of Mr. BARRAGE'S favourite points is to
throw individuals overboard, and to group so-
ciety into different classes or bodies of persons,
such, for instance, as " the legal," " the clerical,"
" the mercantile professions." He then en-
deavours to show that, however severely the rule
of equal taxation may press against individuals,
it is quite justifiable as to the class, because,
"although the incomes are only temporary as re-
gards the individuals who enjoy them, they a::e
not in fact temporary as regards the class ;"
adding, " the income of a class is as permanent
as the rents of lands or houses." If he consulted
Messrs. " BRIEFLESS" and " DITNUP," the stand-
ing counsel of our facetious contemporary Punch,
in place of Sir ALEXANDER COCKBURN or Sir
FREDERICK THESIGER, and inquired the effect of
the recent changes produced by the establishment
of local tribunals, and the numerous reforms since
introduced, up to the passing of the Common Law
Procedure Act, he might see cause to change his
opinion as to the " permanency and certainty"
of legal incomes, and to believe that the divi-
dends of the Three per Cent. Consols, or even the
rents of well-circumstanced real estate, would be
more desirable then to the recipient than the profits
even of the forensic magnates above referred to.
It was in vain to press him with cases of in-
dividual hardship. He treated all such in-
stances with as much contempt as Mr. FILER, the
political economist, immortalised by CHARLES
DICKENS in " The Chimes," could have evinced.
The saleable value of the property from which
each person derived his income, was as nothing to
the mighty thimblerigger. He could not per-
ceive that a matter, grossly and palpably unjust
to every single individual or unit of which the
class was made up, must also be unjust to the
class itself. What is wrong per se can never become
right by frequent use, nor can "an inequitable
tax he rendered equitable by constantly multi-
plying it." The only response, however, that could
be elicited to these home interrogatories was,
"Airy principles (principles, GOD save the mark !!!)
lead me very distinctly to this, that you ought to
assess upon the class !! !" Such were the princi-
ples (!) laid down by poor MAGINN in his very
amusing novel of Whitehall, where he makes the
presiding judge" sentence a Colonial Secretary to
death for the acts of his predecessor, on the sound
principle, " capit advantagios, surnit pope