The Sun.
London, England, 1849-03-26 00:00:00

eilentilkt

LONDON, MONDAY, MARCH 26. 1849.

It will be observed from the report from the Com-
mittee of her Majesty's Privy Council for Trade and
Plantations, published by ourselves in another part of
this evening's impression, that the Government have
considered themselves bound to recommend to her
MAJESTY, and that her MAJESTY has been graciously
pleased to approve of certain modifications of the
conditions in the draft of the grant of Vancouver's
Island to the Hudson's Bay Company. The nature
of these amendments may be perceived in three mi-
nutes by a glance through the document to which we
have referred. We are induced to direct public atten-
tion to this supplementary proceeding of the Ad-
ministration, not because we recognise any very
remarkable improvement in these corrections of a
blunder that must be ever viewed as altogether
deplorable, but because we consider the very fact of
this additional report being regarded as necessary as
perhaps the most striking testimony that could have
been afforded of the shameful precipitation of the
Government. So hastily was this splendid island
juggled into the possession of the fur-traders that the
members .of the Cabinet find it already incumbent
upon them, in order to stop the clamour
of the
people, and to evade the investi-
gations of Parliamentot, to patch and cobble
in
the draft grant a shape such as may
not be a
flagrant indication of its having been
an emanation from jobbery. Added to the monster
blunder of the grant itself, there appear to have
sprouted forth smaller blunders like fungi—offshoots
from the main stock of corruption. In the hurry to
gratify the greed of the Company, the Government
made no adequate provision for the mode of adminis-
tering justice in the future management of that in-
sular possession. Nor were there any sufficient gua-
rantees for the retention of land to the Crown for
the construction of such docks or harbours as might
be found to be necessary. Neither was there any solid
ecurity for the prevention of such wholesale and

extravagant bartering away of the soil, of the timber, I
and of the coal, on the part of the Hudson's Bay '
Company as would, by the time their reign in Van-
couver's Island had expired, have frittered away the
best portions and products of the colony to the ad-
vantage of adventurers, to the detriment of the inte-
rests of the nation, and to the cramming of the exchequer
of this vast fur-trading, barbarous, desolating, depo-
pulating, and dominion-absorbing association of in-
triguers and speculators.

By a preposterous expression used in the report
from the Committee of her Majesty's Privy Council
for Trade and Plantations, it is pretended to convey
to the imagination of the more sanguine members of
the community that the Fur Company have serious
intentions of colonizing Vancouver's Island, now that
that island has passed into their possession. As if the
terrible experience derived from their long and
despotic sway over their continental territories in
North America had not been enough to show that the
sole aim of the association is to preserve the savage
condition of the forests and jungles, to prevent the
possibility of clearings, to wither every nascent set-
tlement into a miserable group of log huts, and by
that means to stimulate the growth and propagation
of the wild animals who thrive into furry maturity in
the thickets inaccessible to civilized man, and imper-
vious to all save the practised hunter.

" Doubt that the stars are fire,
Doubt that the sun doth move,

Doubt truth to be a liar,"
but certainly never doubt that the Hudson's Bay
Company will retard the progress of civilization.
They are pledged to it. Civilization—and coloniza-
tion is the medium necessary for the diffusion of
civilization—must, in their estimation, be " put
down," as inexorably as Alderman 'CUTE would have
" put down" suicide—if he could ! Unfortunately,
the Company has a larger capacity for carry-
ing out its crotchets than that possessed by
the Alderman. It holds supreme sway
over dominions which in Europe would constitute
the extent of a magnificent empire. They are almost
irresponsible, too, if we may judge from the impunity
with which they have gone on in their evil cGurse,
cherishing the savage animals and exterminating the
colonists. They look westwards across the waves of
Juan de Fuca, and they see there on the
verge of the Pacific an island almost equal in its
dimensions to England. They gain audacity from
their previous immunity from retribution, and
seize the whole Quadra with the connivance of the
Government. Thereupon this Government, when
called upon to render an account of this melancholy
example of family legislation, pretend, forsooth, that
it is the intention of the Hudson's Bay Company to
promote emigration :to Vancouver's Island. The in-
tention I—as if it were even the policy of the fur-
traders to act thus !

Every additional consideration only proves more
and more the folly, and more than the folly, the
culpability, of the recent grant of so large and
singularly situated a colony into the hands of so self-
interested and barbarising an association. Every
day, as it reveals more clearly the importance of
holding an outlet to our colonial riches on the western
shores of North America, increases our regret for
the loss of the only part of our transatlantic posses-
sions that could be said to command the billows of
the Pacific. We say the loss—for the transference of
the island to the Hudson's Bay Company for so pro.
tracted an interval is tantamount to its actual loss—
seeing that by the time their period of do-
mination shall have expired, the Americans
will have so far progressed in California, through the
medium of the noble harbour of San Francisco,
that any competition on our part, in that direction,
would seem by that time little short of insanity. And
all this, be it remembered—thanks to the avarice of
the Company and the complicity of the Government !
Much might be said in exposure of the blunder of
this deplorable proceeding, but nothing that could by
any possibility be remarked would equal in force the
self-condemnation of the Government. The report
to which we have here directed the attention of the
country is the most severe exposure of the whole
transaction that has yet occurred. It discloses in a
glaring light the dangers and losses which, the
Ministry have rendered the nation liable to by their
precipitation.

There is a strong and widely-diffused feeling
throughout the entire country for the speedy removal
of the technical difficulties that attend the transfer of
real property, and for the establishment of what Mr.
JAMES STEWART, the eminent conveyancer, happily
termed a " free trade in land." The Hon. and
witty Member for Buckinghamshire, in enumerating
the various burdens that fall exclusively on the owners
of real property, omitted to notice one of the most
onerous, which operates perhaps more injuriously
than any of those to which he directed the attention of
Parliament. He made no allusion to the present
state of the law or to the existing practice with re-
spect thereto—by which persons are prevented from
dealing freely with their estates—by disposing of, or
charging the same freely and without restriction.
The local rates of which he complained so loudly,
must be levied in some form. If not defrayed by
the different districts, they must fall upon the
Consolidated Fund. These are necessary evils that
must be submitted to in some shape or other. If the
ratepayers are prejudiced to a certain extent, the
community in general at least derive some benefit
If the local taxation is unduly increased, the general
revenue is improved pro tanto. But it is altogether
different with respect to the grievance to which we
refer. There is no possible advantage to be derived
by any class whatever—not even by the lawyers, who
are supposed, as a body, to be the opponents of any
change or simplification of the existing system. We
say as a body,lfor there are, indeed, many, very
many honourable exceptions ; many of the most pro-
found and skilful jurists who have assumed the most
prominent position among legal reformers—who feel
that they can materially serve the general public
without, in any degree, injuring the professions of
which they are themselves some of the brightest or-
naments. It is a most mistaken and fallacious opinion
that the adoption of an improved system, the aboli-
tion of the retrospective deductions of title,
would really injure the profession. There would un-
doubtedly be "smaller profits " on each transaction ;
but there would be " quicker returns." The number
of sales on mortgages would be increased to such an
extent as to far more than compensate for the
diminished bills of costs in each particular case.
Eighteen or twenty per cent. on the purchase money
would no longer be swallowed up in preparing the
abstract of title, and making a valid and effectual
conveyance to the purchaser, who would still, not-
withstanding the searching and enormously expen-
sive investigation that had taken place, be exposed
to at least the possibility of being at any moment de-
prived of the property which he had acquired at the
cost, perhaps, of the savings of his entire life—and
who to a certainty would have again to encounter the
same tedious and vexatious delays, the same inordi-
nate costs that partially prohibit almost every dealing
with real property. If full and perfect
security, and, if we may use the expression,
" marketability" of title could be attained,
the demand for real estates would increase to such an
extent as to materially improve their value—to lead
to a great increase in the number of sales, and, as a
necessary consequence, to the amount of professional
business in connexion therewith. It might fairly be
estimated that lands would sell for, at least, five years'
purchase more than ,at present; while, if the con-
veyancer made but the fifth part of the profits on
each transfer, he would have at least ten times the
quantity of business, and his professional income
would be at least doubled by the introduction of an
improved system.
The Hon. Member for West Surrey deserves the
highest credit for having grappled with this monster
nuisance. If he can succeed in cleansing the Augean
stable—in removing the cumbrous technicalities that
have arisen during a long succession of ages—in sim•
plifying the law of real property, he will, indeed,
have earned for himself the cordial thanks of every
well-wisher of his country. He has already
succeeded in obtaining the sanction of the
House of Commons to the principle of his
measure. He has carried the second reading despite
the Government opposition, and we trust that he will
meetwitrheeeliqnisual success in preventing his Bill from
being frittered away and diluted in Committee.. The
general
of the nation is in his favour, and if
he persevere boldly and resolutely, and refuse every
compromise that may be offered, hie exertions must