The Sun.
London, England, 1838-03-19 00:00:00

T H

tent, the Tories already threaten to watch it narrowly and
defeat it.

That meddling priest the Bishop of EXETER, who is never
happy but when he is as busy as a certain friend of his is said
to be in a high wind, made one of his usual factious
exhibitions in the House of Lords the other night, on pre-
senting a petition about the New Poor Law. This is a,
theme well suited to the Bishop's peculiar talent for mis-
representation. It necessarily affords ample means to un-
principled declaimers, by the distortion of facts and frothy
appeals to a spurious humanity, to spit out their party
venom under the disguise of sympathy with the distresses
of the poor. The trick, however, is becoming too stale to
be practised much longer. The conduct of the Tories
with respect to this measure has been most infamous.
Joining heart and hand in the original enactment of the
law—from no other motive we are willing to allow than
the grossest selfishness—and deriving from it ever since
advantages infinitely greater than they could have imagined
it capable of producing, they are constantly shamming
dissatisfaction with it, and attempting to make it the
means of bringing unpopularity upon the Government.
At the last general election not a Tory candidate could
open his mouth upon the hustings, but out burst a torrent
of abuse against the Poor Law and every one connected
with it. The simpleton who could not muster an idea,
nor find a word to say on any other topic always contrived
to stammer out his hostility to this measure. Yet how did
these despicable creatures act when the question was brought
',before them as Members of the Honourable House ?
How many Tories—how many of those mob-courting pa-
triots who had publicly pledged themselves to their wretched
gulls to oppose the continuance of the new system, recorded
their votes against it ? The hypocrites ! not one—they
sliirked the question ,the whole kit of them, and thus rendered
themselves, if possible, more contemptible than they were be-
fore in the public estimation. One object of the Right Rev.
Prelate, and of his coadjutor the Earl of STANHOPE, that sa-
pient Nobleman, who may at least claim this merit, that he
can make his lack of sense singularly conspicuous even
among his peers, seems to have been to rouse the zeal of
the Times, which, it has been observed, has begun to flag
on this subject on which it was for a long period quite beside
itself. In this purpose, the par nobile have succeeded—to
a certain extent at least. The discussion in the House of
Lords has brought on a paroxysm, but not attended with
convulsions. The patient merely labours through a couple
of columns of twaddle as dull and spiritless as ever he in-
dicted in his sober senses.
The gist of the complaint made in this instance against
the administrators of the poor-law by the factious brawler
who brought it before the House of Lords, was that the
diet allowed in the workhouse of the Dudley Union to able-
bodied labourers was not equal to that which they are ac-
customed to when they are employed in their ordinary
labours. Only consider the absurdity of such a charge !
Men who are living in a state of idleness ought to receive
the same quantity of food as if they were occupied in the
most laborious work ! If they do not, how, asks the Bishop,
shall they be able to resume their work when they quit the
workhouse ? Ay, how indeed ?—there is the question. Per-
haps, worthy Bishop, if you ask a physician—not the
nameless one whom you consulted before, but one
who understands something of his business—he will tell
you that these Dudley men will be much fitter to resume
their work by being fed on not quite so full a diet when
they have nothing to do as when engaged in hard and ex-
hausting labour. Lord RADNOR'S able and excellent speech
seems to have posed the Times as much as it did the Bishop
of EXETER and Lord STANHOPE. The Noble Lord
silenced these cavillers by shewing that the dietary about
which they were clamouring had been adopted from a
neighbouring Union, with this difference, that an addition
had been made to it ; that the inmates of the Dudley work-
house—the parties, we should think, chiefly concerned—
were satisfied with it ; and that on comparing the quantity
of food consumed by families in and out of workhouses, he
had found in some cases a difference of upwards of thirty
pounds of solid food per week in favour of the workhouse I
This is a fact that speaks for itself. We are not surprised
that the anti-poor-law people do not relish it.

A case occurred at one of the Police-offices the other I
day, which we thought much too important to be merely
slipped over in the small typo and obscure corner to which
police cases are generally doomed. It appears that a poor
and miserable wretch sat down upon a step, and was told
to remove from it by a policeman. He said if he did it
must be to " another step—to die." He went to another
step, and died. He had been to the overseers of the parish,
and they had refused him relief, and had afterwards been
met with the usual answer at the Magistrates' office, " Oh,
go about your business—we have no power to inter-
fere. The New Poor Law has taken from us all
jurisdiction—we cannot help you—go !" Now, as cases
like this are of frequent occurrence, notwithstanding
the proud boast that by the law no man need die
of starvation in England, and 48 such cases are immediately
seized upon, and held up in all their horrors by the enemies
of the new Poor-law Bill as proofs of its " inhuman,"
" atrocious," " murderous" operation, it becomes important
to ascertain what the law really is as to all cases of urgent
necessity. No doubt some of the practical workings, and
perhaps one of the leading principles, of that much-abused
measure are susceptible of considerable amendments,
which amendments we shall hereafter state ; but at present
we shall confine ourselves to a short but sufficient answer
as to the operation of the New Poor-law Bill upon cases
of casual poor in a state of apprehended starvation,
sickness, or death. Be it known, therefore, to the
Thunderer" of Printing-house Square; " Grandmamma,"
with her " childish treble" of Shoe-lane ; " Publicola" with
his tomahawk ready to Dispatch whosoever and whatso-
ever comes in his way—be it known to all the large fry and
small fry of the press, emulating these their leaders, in
croaking, squeaking, roaring, or raving against the New
Poor-law Bill—be it more especially known to all Magis-
trates, Magistrates' Clerks, Jacks or Jackanapes in office,
who turn up their noses at miserable and destitute fellow-
creatures as worthy but more wretched than themselves—
be it known to all and sundry, that so far from the
New Poor-law Bill producing or promoting death by
hunger, or preventinglthe relief of all cases of urgency,
that it positively commands that all such eases shall
be relieved ; and so far from the Magistrates having no
jurisdiction in the matter, the Magistrate has all the juris-
diction in the matter ; and so far from the overseer not
having the power to extend such relief, the overseer is to
be fined " not exceeeing 51." for every instance in which he
shall disobey such order of such Magistrate. Will those
various persons and personages, justices and policemen,
clerks and contemporaries, Times and Standard, Herald
and Dispatch, be pleased to read and ponder, upon (we
cannot expect the latter to copy) the following extract
from the fifty-fourth clause of the Act of the fourth and
fifth of WILLIAM the FOURTH, chapter the seventy-ninth,
commonly called The Poor-law Amendment Act. The
fifty-fourth clause enacts that the ordering and directing
relief should be by Board of Guardians, and that the
Overseer shall not grant relief without such order—

" Except in cases of sudden and urgent necessity, in which
cases he is hereby required to give such temporary relief as
each case shall require, in articles of absolute necessity, but
not in money, and whether the applicant for relief be settled
in the parish where he shall apply for relief or not: Provided
always, that in case such overseer shall refuse or neglect to
give such necessary relief in any such case of necessity to poor
persons not settled nor usually residing in the parish to which
such overseer belongs, it shall and may be lawful for any Jus-
tice of the Peace to order the said overseer, by writing under
his hand and seal, to give such temporary relief in articles of
absolute necessity, as the case shall require, but not in money;
and in case such overseer shall disobey such order, he shall,
on conviction before two justices, forfeit any sum not exceed-
ing five pounds which such justices shall order : Provided al-
ways, that any justice of the peace shall be empowered to give
a similar order for medical relief (only) to any parishioner as
well as out-parishioner, where any case of sudden and dange-
rous illness may require it ; and any overseer shall be liable
to the same penalties as aforesaid for disobeying such order;
but it shall not be lawful for any justice or justices to order
relief to any person or persons from the poor-rates of any
such parish, except as hereinbefore provided."

RIDGWAY has just published, in the eonvenient form of
a pamphlet, Lord BRO Am's late admirable speech in the
House of Lords on the subject of the Eastern Slave Trade,
in which the Order in Couucil allowing the importation
into Guiana of Asiatic labourers is freely and fairly com-
mented on, as paving the way for great abuses, and, in fact,
reviving the slave system under another, and very little less
mitigated, form. This well digested document has made
its appearance at a most suitable crisis, when the question
is agaiu agitating the public mind, and available information
is eagerly sought after. Lord BROUGHAM tracks the mon-