The Sun.
London, England, 1853-11-15 00:00:00

THE CORPORATION OF LONDON.

(From the Times.)
Though we have not yet gathered all the sweets
which the civic garden of roses presents to the
eager eye and greedy hand of the inquirer, we may
cull some samples which sufficiently betray the rich
and luxuriant nature of the soil in which they have
been reared. The case of Messrs. Combe and
Delafield, the great brewers, is as good an illustra-
tion as may be of the delights of municipal go-
vernment, and the truth of those annual compli-
ments which associate the name of the City Cor-
poration with the spread of industry and commerce.
This is the way the Corporation takes to encourage
the trades which, in spite of its baneful influence,
are still carried on within the limits of its jurisdic-
tion, or rather the following are the penalties which
we have to pay for the intolerable nuisance of a
Lord Mayor's Show, for the Aldermanic adminis-
tration of justice, for the ruin of our river, the
distortion of our thoroughfares, the enhancement
of the price of our coals, and the perversion of a
large mass of charitable property to any other pur-
pose rather than that for which it was intended.
Messrs. Combe and Delafield have the misfortune
tq.carry ou the trade of brewers within the pre-
cincts of St. Giles's. They had the additional mis-
fortune to be the proprietors of a wharf near Water-
loo-bridge, to which were sent large quantities of
malt for the purposes of their brewery. This
malt the city authorities claimed a right to unload
on behalf of the Corporation of Fellowship Porters,
which goodly fellowship claims the porterage and
cartage of all coals, corn, and grain, salt, apples,
pears, and plums, onions and roots, and all manner
of merchandise, measurable or to be measured,
arriving at the port of London. To enforce this
right of doing that for the brewers which they were
perfectly content to do for themselves a bill was filed

In October, 1835. In 1839 the city set up another
claim—that of metage—in addition to porterage
and cartage, which, as Messrs. Combeand Delafield
did not want their malt measured at all, they re-
garded with equal disfavour. The result of this
second instance of contumaciousness was the filing
another bill against them in 1839. So that here
was a respectable firm involved in two heavy law-
suits because they would rather pay threepence or
fourpence to their own porters than three shillings
and threepence to the civil guild for the porterage
of every ten quarters of malt, and because they
did not want the city to measure that which they
had already measured themselves. The matter
was of great importance to the brewers, the exac-
tion in question amounting to somewhere about
1,0001. a-year, and they naturally thought that they
would be better able to defend themselves if they
could get a sight of those documents upon which
these claims of metage and porterage rested. For
this purpose they filed two bills of discovery, to
which the city returned indirect and evasive an-
swers, and it was only after being twice excepted
to that anything like information could be ex-
tracted. This is the way in which a corporation,
whose existence can only be justified on the ground
that it contributes to the public good, treats those
against whom it is seeking to enforce the most op-
pressive claims in the most arbitrary manner, and
thus does it keep back the evidence on which
those claims are founded. But this was not all.
After they had got the third answer, Messrs.
Combe and Delafield asked Vice-Chancellor Knight
Bruce for leave to inspect the documents in ques-
tion in the cause, and the Vice-Chancellor granted
the application. The city appealed to Lord
Lyndhurst, then Chancellor, who dismissed the
appeal, and from this judgment they appealed to
the House of Lords, where the case remains un-
decided to this day. Thus, after a litigation of
18 years in the one case, and of 14 years in the
other, the question of metage and porterage re-
mains untried and undecided, and the case is, by
the act of the parties claiming the right, hung up
on a collateral point. It is very difficult to pe-
ruse these proceedings without feeling that the
city, which puts forward claims of this odious
and extravagant nature, which nothing but imme-
morial usage, presupposing an act of Parliament,
could sanction, has no confidence in its own case,
dare not expose to the world the evidence on which
its claim rests, and seeks to weary out and exhaust
others,
by prolonged and frivolous litigationsin an
resistancemay
which it despairs to overcome by the weapons of
reason and justice. In this case, as
we see the proof that the Corporation has entirely
lost sight of its public character ; that it regards
its franchises and its powers as private property,
to be used for the good of existing members, not
as trusts to be exercised for the public benefit ; and
that there is no artifice, no delay, no chicane at
which it will stop to extend its powers, or to beat
down and weary out opposition to its demands.
Such being the weapons that it wields, a poor man
—we had almost said a prudent one—must submit
to any extortion and bear any injustice rather than
risk his total ruin in the assertion of rights which
this great incorporation has raised up to trample
on and destroy.

But, while the Corporation is thus exhibited in .
most unfavourable colours in the inquiry before the SOCIETY AND SERVANTS IN SYDNEY.—PeopIe have not
Commission, we cannot say that those city magnates
servants to entertain with. I was surprised to see so
who have appeared to give evidence have done much
few smart equipages in Sydney, having heard a good
to raise the general opinion of their competence to deal of the wealth, and habits of display of the people.
deal with questions of this nature. No blame at- But I was told the reason of this was,f that you can get
taches to the Commission in this respect, for they
di not o like k do, the chances
have undoubtedly sought out for witnesses persons are he is such a ,
a place as
e to trust your
take 1 horses or your neck to.y The rate of
no one to drivelyno,unrle:rroluagwe,oourl, y
wages for the up-
of high standing in the city, and who usually 1
of servants do not seem to
class
in door servant, at 45/. a year ; and I thine
me so exorbitant)
high as I expected. A servant of mine 2 t y
mightwell
a lead in all its transactions. The problem is a per
very interesting one, and one which
t
The
awaken their utmost' care and. attention. The
in
;more than 501. A good cook, if such werneotr
heeghivdes
merchants of London are deeplyntecrests of trade could get very high wages ; a bad one gets 60/, ayeara
settling the question how far_themunicipal institu- Womeentslerrivsahnts.alre hired generally by the week. An
and commerce, the claims of
oaf city improvement,
aignwoeraek and hergirw, who
h waited in our lodging, got 10s.
tion, and the requirements
Yet, of these gentle- she only got 61. nays mg, and grumbled at it, though
can be conciliated together. Yet,
had little more to sa
Y labourers on the -ear
, she admitted, in Dublin. The
men, the first, Mr. Trav
Corporation, and desired its rally from 351, to 401. streets got 7s. a day. Shepherds gene-
than that he hated the a year, though I know particu-
(l'd not give the least reason ' lar instances where extinction, though he i
trouble to make 'are difficult they have gone for less. Mechanics
had taken any i very to
to suppose that he get.—Frazer's Magazine