The Sun.
London, England, 1849-09-03 00:00:00

ertAtieninit Vint

LONDON, MONDAY. SEPTEMBER 3,1849.

In the present depressed condition of Ireland
every tangible suggestion offered by intelligent and
experienced men for the regeneration of that unhappy
land, by the due development of its industrial re-
sources, is deserving of the most serious and attentive
consideration. As we have repeatedly pointed out,
her children, although primarily, are by no means '
solely interested in the prosperity of their country.
It is a matter of the deepest importance to the Eng-
lish taxpayer that the sister kingdom should not only
cease to be a burden on the Imperial resources, and
a drain on this more favoured land, but that she '
should be enabled to contribute her full proportion to
the revenues of the United Kingdoms, and to bear
her fair share of the national expenditure—to be-
come, in fact, an integral portion of the empire—the
right arm, the powerful auxiliary, and the glory
of England, in place of being her weakness
and reproach. This great desideratum, however, can
only be attained by the liberal and judicious applica-
tion of capital in the improvement of the soil, which,
although nominally under tillage, is still so negli-
gently cultivated that it scarcely produces one
quarter of what might be obtained under a better
system of agriculture, in the reclamation of the waste
lands that are now suffered to remain barren and
unproductive, and in stimulating the various branehes,
of industry, which have been shown to be capable of
making profitable returns for the amount expended
thereon. The railways, the mines, the fisheries, the
peat bogs of Ireland afford the most favourable
channels for investment ; and, perhaps, there is no
source that could be attended to with more beneficial
results than the proper cultivation of flax, and the due
development of the linen trade, the staple manufac.
titre of Ireland.

Mr. J. HILL DICKSON, of Hawkins•street, Dublin,
a clear headed and intelligent gentleman, who has
long and zealously exerted himself for the ameliora-
tion of Ireland and the improvement of the condition
of the working classes, by the introduction and use
of machinery and the development of arts and manu-
factures,
has addressed two letters to the Corporation
of the City of London in reference to the recent
proposition for the purchase of lands in Ireland, in
which he gives the results of his great experience as
to the vast resources of the country, and shows how
ample would be the profits to those expending
their capital therein. Mr. DICKSON declares his
opinion to be, that " the only way to regenerate
Ireland is to connect the agricultural and
the manufacturing interest." And he adds,
as the soil and climate of Ireland are peculiarly
adapted to the growth of flax, "let the manufacture
of linens—the natural trade of the country—be the
first." He paraphrases a maxim of the late DANIEL
O'CONNELL, who declared that "England's weakness
was Ireland's opportunity." Mr. DiciLsort truly
asserts that " Ireland's poverty is England's opportu-
nity ''—" not to destroy her trade or commerce by a
repeal of the Union, or separation ; not to confiscate
the property of the nobility and gentry of the south
and west ; but to encourage them with that liberality
of heart that dictated the gift of twenty millions
sterling, to emancipate slaves in distant climes,
whose fate was an Elysium compared with the sufferings
endured by millions of our labouring classes during
the last three years, who it is on all hands admitted are
able and willing to work if only half as well paid as
English labourers are."
This is indeed a glorious opportunity, and one
which we trust will not be neglected or lost sight of.
To relieve a warm-hearted and grateful people from
the almost unparalleled miseries they have under-
gone and are still sustaining, to elevate them in the
social scale, and to render them—what they ought to
be— a prosperous, contented, and happy race, in the
enjoyment of all the necessaries of life, and of those
humble comforts that should: be within the reach of
every labouring man, is a godlike undertaking, and
the merchant !princes of England, the British capi-
talists will not exhibit cold-blooded apathy or care-
lessness as to the welfare of their less fortunate Irish
brethren, more particularly as there is almost a cer-
tainty of receiving ample remuneration for any risk
and expenditure to which they may be subjected in
their speculations.
Mr. Dicxsorf also points out one 'of the chief
caw: es of
.the poverty and destitution of Munster
and COnnaught. He says, " The fact is, the majority
of the landowners in Munster and Connaught were
at all times too poor, and those who were compara-
tively rich were too proud, to connect themselves with
the mercantile or manufacturing classes, by which
alone the interests of all, and of the working classes
in particular, would be promoted ; and so long as
grants are made by Government to support idle
pauperism within or without the (miscalled) work-
houses in Ireland, so long will such men allow their
tenants in millions to remain as they now are, a
disgrace to Ireland, a burthen on
s the
lo industry.l of
Ulster, and a drain on England; will they
suffer them to remain incapable of appnrtgheceiatLing the
comforts enjoyed by the tenants of
Corporation in Derry, Antrim, &c., and si longd
must the millions of acres of waste land remain
unreclaimed." Mr. DICKSON also shows that we have
for the last six years been paying annually for flax,
oilcake, and flaxseed, an average of 7,783,883/.
sterling, the whole of which might be obtained from
Ireland, if proper care and attention was applied to
the cultivation thereof, exclusive of the incalculable
advantages to be derived from the employment
afforded by the weaving of that flax in the various
cottages throughout the country,' the best weavers
being girls of 17 or 18 years of age, who in the