The Sun.
London, England, 1838-06-12 00:00:00

FE ASSURANCE-DEFERRED AN-
NUITIES.

(From the Scotsesan of Saturday, June 9.)
We have seen with satisfaction the advertisements of the
formation of a branch in Elnburgh, under a respectable Board
of Directors, of the National Loan Fund Life Assurance So-
ciety, which seems to offer great advantages, particularly to
the poorer clases.
Many of our readers may recollect two essays which ap-
peared in this journal. in November, 1830, entitled " The
Scotsman's Advice to the Labouring Classes." These, which
were penned during the prmdial outrages which preceded the
passing of the Reform Bill, were, at the request of several
eminent individuals, afterwards repeatedly published as a se-
parate pamphlet. On iequiry we find that they are out of
print_ As this Loan Fund Institution, however, connects
itself closely with the purpose for which they were written, we
embrace the opportunity thus presented to call attention anew
to the subject.
At the time that advice was written, the labouring popula-
tion seemed impressed with the belief that their misery and
poverty were chiefly the consequence of misgovernment.
Now, though far from denying that much evil arose from
this cause, and convinced that the reform in the representative
system has been of the greatest advantage to all classes, ex-
cepting only to those who lived upon the abuses which are in
the progress of abolition, still at that time we told our fellow-
co i-itrymen of the working-classes, that the misery they then
endured—misery which had fur generations been increasing,
and which is still but .very partially alleviated—was chiefly at-
tributable to the improvident and reckless habits of the suf-
ferers themselves, adding yearly to a population already too
great for the capital which found it employment, and thus re.
clueing the price of labour to a point verging on the extreme
limits of what is indispensable to preserve existence. When
the labourer puts the burden of a wife and family on the pro-
duce of his labour, before he has accumulated any savings, to
meet the increased demand, or provide against contingencies,
his sickness, if lengthened, produces great distress, and his
death inevitably reduces his family to starvation.
No efforts of legislation can adequately provide against
these mischiefs : the prosperity of the labouring class must
always depend on their own habits of prudence, forethought,
and :elf-contronl ; and, when the time arrives when every
working man shall consider that he had no right to marry
and bring human beings itito the world, until he is able, from
his previous savings, to meet the additional expense thus
thrown upon him, and to provide for their support and educa-
tion, in the event of his being carried off prematurely by death,
or rendered unable to labour by sickness, then, and not till
then, will the general condition of the labouring class be
permanently prosperous and happy. Their savings, which
are capital, will then go to augment the general capital of the
country, and labourers and the demand for labour will increase
in equitable progression.
In the long interval which has elapsed since this advice
was given, we have seen no reason to alter cur opinion.
The country is now governed according to the will of the
majority, but the price of ordinary labour is still kept by
competition at a minimum ; and the sickness or death of the
father still exposes the family of the labourer to destitution
and its fearful accompaniments. And why ? Because his
savings before marriage, or the small surplus he might reserve
after he has a family on his hands, are neither carefully hus-
banded, nor beneficially employed.
The Savings' Banks and Benefit S icieties have no doubt
proved of signal service to many ; but, unfortunately, the be-
nefits of the first are hardly attractive enough to be generally
popular, and the second are always of defective, and sum
times of most pernicious organization.
The Government plan of Deferred Annuities was also con
ceived in an admirable and most patriotic spirit, but it is too
much hampered with restrictions, and requires too much of
the co-operation of his superiors, to be much resorted to by the
operative of independent mind.
What the honest and industrious operative requires, is such
an investment of his savings as will ensure him the greatest
return, and in the mode best suited to his future contingent
necessities. He may, in advanced life, require an annuity for
himself, or a command of capital to advance his family in the
world—or, if fortune has placed him beyond the necessity of
having these, he may require a still larger provision for his
family at his death; and, besides all this, he must have security
that accidental sickness, or want of employment will not step
in to make him forfeit all these results. The Saving Bank
offers him, indeed, a sure, but small accumulation, continually
subject from the ease by which it may be withdrawn, to the
temptations of his own imprudence ; the Benefit Society too
often, by its convivialities, fosters this imprudence, and pro-
vides; only, and that in a niggardly way, for one or two of the
contingencies he dreads, viz., sickness and old age, leaving the
still more imminent one of being out of employment wholly
unprovided for ; while the Government Deferred Annuities
merely give him an annuity if he live to reach it, which is for-
feited entirely by any intermediate default in payment, though
his savings in such event ere returned into his hands.
Every thing depending, as we have shown above, on the 4
frugality and prudence of the operative himself, we hail witlsPl
pleasure the developement of every project which tends to
foster these virtues, and pive them a right direction : anco
therefore to the above r-Isurance Society (and to all others
having similar objects), we are disposed to afford our warm
support, as it apparently offers a great ammunt of benefits fore
the savings of the poor man's frugality.
Its leading principles appear to be twofold—first, it pr
vides by its loan fund to the assured or purchaser of a deferre
annuity, a resource from whence, during sickness or want o •
employment, he may support his family and continue his pre-
miums ; and, secondly, besides the larger provision its calcula-
tions allow, it makes the provision adapt its form to the even-
tual requirements of the individual, giving him the alternative
of an annuity, a large sum of money in cash, or a larger sum
at his death. Thus, a payment of Is. a-week, or 2/. 12s. per
annum, by a person at twenty, continued till he arrives, say at
sixty-five, will give him the option of an annuity of 471. 16s. 6d.,
or a sum in cash of 394/. Ils., or a policy, without any further
premium, payable at his death, of 466/. On the other hand,
should sickness or want of employment at any time interrupt
She payment of his Is. per week, he can at any time borrow
to ,!.he extent of two-thirds of his payments, and should he die
before reaching the stipulated age, two-thirds of his payments
will be returned to his' representatives.
The Society thus seems to combine the advantages of the
savings' banks, benefit societies, and Government securities,
with others of its own. It pretends to no exclusively mag-
.nanimous or philanthropic motives—it is established on purely
commercial principles, and therefore presents no restrictions
—requires no qualifications ; and when it gives the loan
which the poor man may need, it gives it as his right, in
terms of the bargain, and not as a favour which he might
blush to claim, or on an exposure he might shrink from sub-
jecting himself to.
Whenever the labouring and productive classes shall in
numbers resort to such modes of securing fair and honour-
able independence for themselves, trades' unions, and dan-
gerous combinations will Le unheard of—Government will
become an easy task, and the fear of convulsion be banished
from the land. We esteem it not the least among tile many-
benefits of Reform, that, by gradually elevating the tone and
feelings of the great mass of society, it renders the once-.
thought chimerical plans of self-iniprovenient by the working'
classes every day more obviously of practical and even easy
Attainment.

EXTRAORDINARY CHANGE OF FORTUNE.---
sir Jowl Leman, whose wcri'l'erful perseverance fer so many years has
at length ',oven to a certain extent crowned with success, arrived in this
town. with hi; lady, on Thursday I3st, and, we believe, will remain here
until his legal adviser leaves Feotland.—Leicester Chronicle.
A CAPSIZE AND LOSS OF LIVES.—The Alex-
a7,i,j is C.) Gazette says that on Thursday evening, the 10th inst., a
ris.rolir; smack was capsized in the Potomac, and seven or eight men
were deowned.
The :honour of executing the grand equestrian Wel-
lington testin:onlal, in the Western part of the Metropolis, was on Sa.
conferred upon Mr.
,M C. Wyatt. The Mar.
turday last unar:tmeeslY
proposed, and his Royal Highners the Duke of
quis of Londonde.-rY
Cambridge seconde:l, the proposition.
THE MAIDSTONE ELECTION'.—The day of no-
/kin:Alan is fixed fur Fr;fiay next. The friends of Mr. Fedor, the
Conservative candidate, win. was unseated by the. Committee, intend to
propose him again. It is not yet decidedly known whether the " Libe-
intend to propose any candidate on that interest. It is probable,
Illiwever, that Mr. Roberts win be put in nomination.
The Tories have got up a petition against the
ff;oretnment Municipal Bill, which lies for signature in the Royal Ex.
'change. The petition is chiefly directed against the application of the
Sill to Glasgow, and the reduction of the franchise to 54 in the smaller
bsstglis. The signatures come in but slowly.—Scuts Times.
The Brighton Gazette says, " Such was the effect
of the urbaoity of the Commodore at the late sailing match, that although
a most chilling, rainy, and uncongenial day, it was made deiightful by
this gentleman's extreme politeness!"
CROWS.—Williarri Evans of Trefargoed, in com-
pany with another farm,.", on Monday se'nnight, killed the immense
number of 1,915 crows in 21,r.tyderi Wood, Pembrokeshire, in the very
'short space of time of from threu to six o'clock in the evening.— Carnar.
von Herald.
Preparations are going forwed for a powerful anti-
tithe display in this city. A requisition, cai:in a meeting on the Hill
of Pallybricken is in active course of numerous and respectable
tore.— Waterford Chronicle.

The Prince of Canino (Lucien Bonai..larte) passed
through Liege on the fith instant, having come from Lo.id" by way of
Ostend, and going to Germaoy, travelling with a passport given him by
the Court of Rome.

NOVEL CIIALLENGE.--.--Alf. Stark, the la,idlord
of the Packet Inn, at Manninetree, offers that himself and dog shi: U play
any two gentlemen in England a game of cricket for any sum,.--G-.'Sex
Herald.

,
On Monday night some thieves broke into the,
Battle and Glass Inn, at Normanby, and succeeded in carrying off 7001.
in money from the room in which some of the family were sleeping:.
Suspicion fell upon two strangers who were drinking until a late hour
in the coffee-room, and they were traced to 'Nottingham, where all clue I
to the road taken by them was lost.—Lincoln Chronicle.
The most valuable of ail the possessions of this
.ccuntry is its good faith ; it is a possession which, above all others, we
sh.,uld watch with j,alous circumspection, and guard from the very
suspicion of infringement.— erforee.
On Sunday a boy named Walker dived into
Kennedy's dam, and never rose again to the surface. On the dam
Icing run out, he was found covered by about two feet of mud, in which
he had stuck fast.—Greenock Advertiser.
NEW WORKS PUBLISHED THIS DAY.—We are
are requested to state that Mr. Colburn, of Great Marlborough-street,
,4133 this day published the following New Works, which may now be had
of all Booksellers :—l. The Man About Town, by the Author of
"Glances at Life," &e. 2 vols. post Bvo. 18s. °. Mrs. Gore's Rose_
Fancier's Manual, comprising an Account of the Culture and Propaga.
;tier' of Roses, with a Descriptive Catalogue of 2,500 Varieties, I voL
-7boutid, I Os. Gd. And, 3. A New and Cheaper Edition, revised, of " The
Bend; and the Bar," by the Author of " Random Recollections of ,the
Mordg And Commons," &c., in 2 vols. post Svc.. price Ids.