The Sun.
London, England, 1849-12-10 00:00:00

Otrtniug 2'41111;5

LONDON, MONDAY DECEMBER 10, 1849.

The attention of the public, conscience-stricken by
the calamities of the cholera, is, for the time being,
occupied with the sufferings of the poor—of the
poor in general, and of the unhappy needle-
women in particular. This latter class, says Mr.
SIDNUI HERBEUT, who has deserved credit by his
earnest championship on their behalf, has " ari indis-
putable right to priority—theirs is the most helpless
sex, the most intense poverty, the most fearful de-
gradation." The miseries of this wretched class have
before now excited much public sympathy, and yet
those miseries are undiminished. At this day 33,500
women a-e engaged in the needle- work trade, and
the greater part of them only earn on an average
from 21d. to 40. a day. Even were purchasers
extravagant in their payments and employers generous
in their wages, it would be difficult, or rather impos-
sible, for so vast a number of hands to obtain ade-
quate remuneration in one branch of employment.
For ourselves we do not, generally speaking, believe
in the evils ascribed to over-population. A surplus popu-
lation, as it is called, is, or should be, an impossibility,
seeing that with every additional mouth to consume is,
or should be, an additional pair of hands to produce.
Thus, if society were rightly constituted, we could
never have a multitude of unemployed hands, Z. e.
a surplus population. It is idle, however, to dwell
upon what might be—let us rather contemplate
things as they are, in order that they may be ren-
dered as they should be. One thing is certain, we
have now in this country, practically, a surplus po-
pulation—the sad effects: of many misfortunes and
much injustice The only panacea for this evil
which the philanthropist can suggest is—emigration.

Beyond the seas there are lands where the labourers
are as scanty as here they are numerous—lands where
nature requires human aid to develope her abundant
riches—lands where the wages are plentiful and the
workmen rare. In former times, the children of
this country have gone forth, their veins filled with
the blood and their hearts fired with the energy of an
'independent retie. Poor men, most of them, humble
and unaided, they went forth " the world before
them where to choose." Like the first man, for them
the earth only brought forth, spontaneously, weeds
and thistles, but like the first man they earned their
oread by the sweat of their brow. They wrestled
with Nature, and she became their willing servant.
From those adventurers, those exiles from their
mother land, arose great nations which that mother
land now contemplates with admiring pride. In all
quarters of the world are the footsteps of our Colo-
nists—
" And the young and strong Republic was by these in
virtue bred—
The young and strong Republic that has filled the
world with fame,
.And with great praise and marvel of the Anglo-Saxon
name."

Shall not such things be again ? Notwithstanding
the "plethora" of which Mr. HERBERT speaks, the
heart of England is still beating with vigorous life;
her children, though crushed to the death, are not
degenerated. She may lament, and with justice, that
she cannot nourish them by her own hearth (which,
if all her duty had been rightly fulfilled, might have
been happily accomplished) ; hut the past, though
it be deplored, cannot be undone. LEA her now
perform the true mother's part, and send forth the suf-
ferers for their own good and her glory. Let her
send them forth from:death to life—from the death of
starvation to the life of labour, from the pestiferous
odour of the charnel-house to the healthful

_
breezes of the wilds. Let her snatch her
maidens from pollution to become happy wives

And honest mothers. Let her seize the friendless

youth who trembles on the verge of crime, and the
wretch who shudders between degradation and

despair, and send them out to learn the right use of
,-,,,f.,tropg hand and the holy happiness of an honest

~,

heart. The list defies enumeration. The noisome
cellar, where decrepit manhood and wasted infancy
languish in idleness and die of want—the naked
garret, where through the long day and by the fading
light—

" Women sit in unwomanly rags
Plying the needle and thread,"
she corners and crevices of the streets, where the
infant pickpockets lurk—the midnight thoroughfares,
where thousands of the women of England are driven
to sin, not from choice, but—
" Oh men with sisters dear,
Oh men with mothers and wives!"—
from the absolute fear of starvation !—these and a
hundred other spots are thronged with human crea-
tures, whose very presence here infects the social
atmosphere, but who, in other climes, might live like
men and die like Christians. Let us send them forth
for their salvation and our own. Let us send them
forth to sow and to reap in (for them) more productive
lands, and, realising the happy prophecy of Mr.
MACAULAY, to give birth to " those unborn millions
I who shall cover with cities and gardens the Caffra-
rian and Australasian deserts." At the same time we
are prepared to admit that the remedy is a:violent one,
and in the natural order of things emigration should
be the voluntary act of individuals. But if the remedy
be violent GOD knows the disease is violent also.
And therefore, while we are especially anxious that,
for the future, a more equitable system may preserve
us from a recurrence of the present distress, for the
time being we cordially concur in the proposition of
those who would give a helping hand to send forth
the destitute, the degraded, and the desperate, from
sin and suffering, "to Light, to Liberty, to Life.'
Who that has the power will refuse to aid in-such a
work ? Christiana! these are the missionaries you
should send forth—your sending them will be a
world-wide attestation of your faith. Legislators !
these are the convicts you should transport—before
and not after they are stained with crime, and have
laid a heavier burden on your purse and their own
souls. Men of property ! here is a true way to pre-
serve your wealth ; it is easier to convert an idle man
into a labourer than to keep him from being a poacher,
a rick-burner, or a thief. Mothers and maidens !
here are especial objects for your sympathy—women
rendered desperate by the cries of starving children,
and girls selling their honour to procure a crust of
bread. When we dwell upon these things it appears
indeed impossible that help can be withheld by any
human band whose owner possesses a human heart.

In a recent impression of this journal, as far as our
space and time permitted, we waded through the
mazy labyrinths of that stupendous absurdity, " The
Report of the Grand Orange Lodge of Ireland."
We went sufficiently far on that occasion to prove
the utter fallacy of the charges made against
Lord CLARENDON, and to demonstrate by their own
testimony that his Excellency neither recognized,
organized, nor armed the Irish Orangemen. And
we think we can convince all dispassionate and
rational persons that the evidence does not go even
far enough to prove that Captain KENNEDY armed
the Dublin Orangemen as an exclusive body, but as
part of an available force of loyal citizens to oppose
insurrection and maintain the laws.

The simple facts appear to be that the Government
expected a threatened outbreak of the disaffected,
and confided the defence of the city to Captain
KENNEDY in such an event. This responsible duty
constrained him to seek the co-operation of the
well affected of all political and religious
opinions, and it would be strange if he could pass
over a set of men who.have been eternally bleating
forth their exclusive loyalty, their devotions to the
house of Hanover and the British Constitution, &c.,
&c. The negotiations between Captain KENNEDY
and the Orangemen were conducted by a Colonel
PHA IRE, a gentleman we believe then much in the
confidence of the Orangeman, and holding a high
position in their society. But whether Colonel
PRAIRE was first requested to act :by the gallant Cap-
tain or by the Orangemen does not appear, but this
does appear clearly enough to us, that Colonel PRAIRE
had no mission from the Government, as we think will
appear manifest from a communication made to the
Colonel by Lord EXICISHILLEN, to the effect " that
Lord Cnlnimnom, in a conversation with him, Lord
ENNISKILLEN, had refused to supply the Orangemen
with arms, or give a satisfactory reply to their ad-
dress." If Colonel PRAIRE had a mission from the
Government, it is quite evident he did not require to
be enlightened on this point by the Grand Master of
the Orangemen.
As soon as the Orangemen fancied that
they were courted by the Government, as
soon as they thought Lord CLARENDON
was sufficiently embarrassed to yield to their selfish
demands, they at once manifested the true quality
of their lip•loyalty. Instead of standing, in the
hour of need, by the auiorities, and giving them

the generous and spontaneous support of free and
loyal citizens, they higgled and huxtered for their
own selfish ends ; they drew up insolent resolaCons,
and threatened to present an insolent address, if they
did not get arms and everything else they required.
But Lord CLAREIiDON remained firm, they swallowed
the address which they dared not to present, because
they were perfectly cognisant of the rebuff with
which it would be met. Had they had the manliness
and courage to present this address, we should never
have heard a word of the silly charges which have
been since made, as they would then have been enlight-
ened as to the true principles on which his Excellency
had resolved to administer the laws in Ireland.

The important position in which Captain KEN-
NEDY was placed, the serious duties which devolved
on him, naturally made him intensely anxious to
secure the services of every 'oval man, orange or
green, capable of bearing arms in the city, and, con-
sequently on his own responsibility, and knowing
that the Government had refused Lord ENNISKILLEN
to supply the Orangemen with arms, he got up a
subscription to purchase arms "for the well-affected
amongst the lower classes," and by this means was
enabled to supply 600 stand of arms to the brawling
Orangemen. Captain liumpy's letter, ons would
think, ought to have satisfied them on this point. We
extract it verbatim from the "Report :"

" Dublin, April 22, 184 g.
" Dear Colonel,—l have set on foot, with others, a
subscription for supplying arms to the well affected
amongst the lower classes, for the protection of lite and
property in the city of Dublin; and I take upon mysel/
the responsibility, as far asfive hundred stand, in case the
subscription should fall short of that, of furnishing that
number. I shall adopt any course you recommend to
expedite the supply of those five hundred stand of arms
in the shortest time.—Your's faithfully,"
" J. P. KENNEDY."
Surely the English language cannot more clearly
or intelligibly express the intention of the writer to
avoid all recognition of the Orangemen as a body;
yet they had the meanness to take arms from the man
who plainly told them these arms were to be pur-
chased from a fund to be raised ley subscription to
supply arms to the well-affected amongst the lower
classes; and not specially for the exclusively loyal
heroes of Whitefriars-hall.
We have very little sympathy for Captain KEN•
NEDTIS spooneyism in allowing himself to be dmt
out of 6001., which would have been much more
worthily bestowed on one or more of the many meri-
torious charities in the city. A little knowledge of
Irish political history ought to have induced the
Gallant Captain to hesitate before he foolishly ex-
pended so large a sum in supplying those heroes with
arms. It is not many years since an aggregate
meeting was called on some subject distasteful to the
Orangemen. Their organs sounded the tocsin,
and called on the brotherhood through the length
and breadth of the land to attend this
meeting, and manifest their strength and gallantry.
It was holden in the open air, at a place called the
Coburg Gardens. The Orangemen did muster, we
believe, from all parts of Ireland ; at all events, from
Dublin, Wicklow, and the neighbouring counties.

They marched in battle array to the scene, stormed
the gates, and made a rush to seize the platform ; it
was long before the hour of meeting, and but com-
paratively few were then" assembled; but the
patriotic coal porters happened to be present—they
attacked and repulsed the Orange heroes, who gal-
lantly took to their heels, after a few broken
heads, and were chased through the streets
and alleys by the " black diamonds," to the
great amusement of the military, and in a few
minutes there was not a valorous Orangeman to be
found outside the threshold of some friendly public-
house or other safe rendezvous. Had Captain
KENNEDY been aware of this heroic sped•
men of Orange chivalry, it might perhaps

THE SUN,