The Sun.
London, England, 1849-01-22 00:00:00

A SONG FOP. THE WORKERS.

(WRITTEN FOR THE EARLY CLOSING MOTEMENT.)
Let Man toil to win his living,
Work is not a task to spurn ;
Poor is gold of others' giving,
To the silver that we earn.
Let Man proudly take his station
At the smithy, loom, or plough ;
The richest crown-pearls in a nation
Hang from Labour's reeking brow.
Though her hand grows hard with duty,
Filling up the common Fate,
Let fair Woman's cheek of beauty
Never blush to own its state.
Let fond Woman's heart of feeling
Never be ashamed to spread
Industry and honest dealing,
As a barter for her bread.
Work on bravely, God's own daughters!
Work on staunchly, God's own sons!
But when Life has too rough waters,
Truth must fire her minute guns.
Shall ye be unceasing drudges?
Shall the cry upon your lips
Never make your selfish judges
Less severe with golden whips?
Shall the mercy that we cherish,
As old England's primest boast,
See no slaves but those who perish
On a far anu foreign coast?
When we reckon hives of money,
Owned by Luxury and Ease,
Is it just to grasp the honey
While Oppression chokes the bees?
Is it just the poor and lowly
Should be held as soulless things?
Have they not a claim as holy,
As rich men, to angels' wings?
Shall we burthen Boyhood's muscle?
Shall the young girl mope and lean
Till we hear the dead leaves rustle
On a tree that should be green?
Shall we bar the brain from thinking
Of aught else than work or woe?
Shall we keep parched lips from drinking
Where refreshing waters flow?
Shall we strive to shut out Reason,
Knowledge, Liberty and Health?
Shall all Spirit-light be treason
To the de,pot King of Wealth?
Shall we stint with niggard measure
Human joy and human rest?
Leave no profit—give no pleasure,
To the toiler's human breast?
Shall our Men, fatigued to loathing,
Plod on sickly, worn, and bowed?
Shall our Maidens sew fine clothing,
Dreaming of their own white shroud?
No! for Right is up and asking
Loudly for a fairer lot,
And Commerce must not let her tasking
Form a nation's canker spot.
Work on bravely, God's own daughters!
Work on staunchly, God's own sons!
But till ye have smoother waters,
Let Truth fire her minute guns!
-Weekly Dispatch. ELIZA COOK.

ADMISSION OF SOLICITORS IN CHANCERY.—The
Master of the Rolls has appointed Tuesday, January 30,
at the Rolls' Court, Chancery-lane, at three o'clock in
the afternoon, for swearing solicitors. Every person
desirous of being sworn on the above day must leave his
common law admission, or his certificate of practice fur
the current year, at the Secretary's-office, Rolls'-yard,
Chanaery-lane, eu ur Wowlo4dpy, 29th January.

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS

FROM THE MORNING PAPERS OF THIS DIY.
TIMES.—The Financial Reform Association have at
length hit upon a topic on which they will carry with
them public sympathy. With whatever hesitation we
may admit the policy of adopting speculative reforms
which must have as their first and necessary Effect to
denude the country of those means of safety on which
we have hitherto relied, when no such considerations are
involved the Financial Reformer has an easy task before
him. Man is not a tax-paying animal by nature, but by
necessity. We receive no abstract pleasure from con-
tributing even to the maintenance of army, navy, and
ordnance. Our wish to guard the country from the
danger of foreign attack, and to keep the sea inviolate
for the traffic of our mercantile marine, is the result of
reflection, not of impulse. " There be land rats and
water rats." It is no use carrying their non-existence
by acclamation. There they are, and we are not yet
convinced that it would be prudent to drop the in-
surance, although no doubt the annual payments may be
lessened in amount. To-day we publish a return upon a
different branch of the Administration—the Woods and
Forests. The royal revenues arising from forests,
chases, waters, parks, manors, lands, estates, houses,
&c., have, as is well known, been long commuted
for the grant of a fixed civil list on the accession
of the Sovereign. The nation has taken
these possessions into its own hands, and may
fairly look to them as a source of profit. They
now make up a part of the nation's estates. We are
entitled to expect that the same care shall be displayed
in their management as a private individual would be-
stow upon his own possessions. So far from this being
the case, it would be, we verily believe, impossible to
conceive a more utter or wanton waste of property than
takes place under the administration of the board which
is known as the Woods and Forests. The history of
this board we find in brief to be this:—The land reve-
nues of the Crown were originally collected by the
sheriffs of counties, who paid their rents into the Ex-
chequer. In 1535'a court was erected, called the Court
of Augmentations, for the management of the lands of
the suppressed monasteries not having more than 2001.
tanyeeKari,nga.ll ofu hierc
thish had been
court,and
h
given t
e Court o
by
Parliament
General
to
Surveyors of Crown Lands, and a Board of Works,
Under
the royal property continued for centuries. In 1781
the Board of Works was abolished, and the Royal build-
ings, which had until then been under its management,
were placed under the direction of a surveyor or
comptroller. This office was united with that of the
Commissioners of Woods and Forests in 1832, saving
so far as the royal gardens are concerned. In 1828 the
management of the Irish land revenue was given to the
Commissioners. These, together with some minor
changes, scarcely affecting the subject matter on which
it had to operate, have brought the Commission to its
present form. The report, of which we publish an ex-
tract to-day, deals mainly with one of the many classes
of property which are under the control of the Board.
There are, it appears, four forests, each with its Lord
Warden—the New Forest, warden the Duke of Cam-
bridge; Waltham, Lord Mornington; Whittlewood, Duke
of Grafton; Whychwood, Lord Churchill. It appears
that the salaries attached to these merely honorary posts
are of no account, and would, in fact, scarcely suffice to
pay the salary of any one of the footmen of any one of
the noblemen in question. But the perquisites are valu-
able. Lord Churchill, for example, is entitled to deer
and game to his own use out of Whychwood Forest to an
unlimited extent, to make no mention of heath, furze,
fern, bushes, and shrubs. The Duke of Grafton has
all the underwood in Whistlewood Forest, which is cut
every twenty-one years. He enjoys besides "the use of
Wakefield Lodge"—so it is stated in the report—"and
the pasturage of Wakefield Lawn, consisting of 200 or
300 acres, besides venison and game ad libitum' and
claims all the deer as his own." We would refer, how-
ever, to the report itself for fuller particulars, in order
to arrive at a point in comparison with which the pecu-
lations of Lords Wardens are but of trifling concern.
In these days of railroads, most persons, either called by
business or attracted by pleasure, have visited the neigh-
bourhood of Southampton, Few would have so little
curiosity as not to devote any hours they could spare to
a ride through the New Forest. Take it all in all,
there is no timber district in England, not even Wind-
sor Forest, which can compare for picturesque beauty
with this. In the neighbourhood of Lyndhurst the
long savannahs and groups of old trees are so beautiful,
that a lover of sylvan scenery would weep over their
destruction. The Liverpool ;men are not open to con-
siderations of this sort. Their view is bald, prosaic, and
disagreeable, but it has its element of truth. " Here
we are," say they, " with a good landed property,
it is true, but heavily encumbered. Embarrassed
men must rather seek to satisfy their creditors than
gratify their taste. We must clear. We must cut
down our timber, and break up the soil into arable and
pasture land. We are not entitled to waste a shilling
upon our love for the picturesque until all our obliga-
tions shall have been honestly discharged." Now the
income derived from the New Forest in six years-1835-6
to 1840-1—was 59,5431., and the expenditure during the
same period 54,824/. ; something, in fact, very con-
siderably under 1,0001. per annum was derived from this
enormous property. During the next six years-1841-2
to 1846-7—the case was infinitely worse. The income
had fallen to 53,2961, and the expenditure had risen to
66,472/, showing an actual loss by the propertyof 2,2001.
yearly. In 1847 matters had got from worse to still
worse. The New Forest cost the country in that year
3,266/. We take these figures as we find them from the
report, and if faith can be placed in the statement of Mr.
Downes, the property is in reality of the most valuable
nature. The timber and plantations alone ho values at
942,0001.. equal, at three and a half per cent.,
to 32,9701. per annum. Fur further particulars
with regard to Whittlewood, which paid last
year 1/. 3s. old., and to Whychwood, which produced
1231. Is. 7d., and Waltham, which contributed 352/. 75.6 d.
to the national Exchequer, we must refer to the report.
Now, it is evident that here is a source from which a
large revenue may be derived which has been wholly
neglected. When we find individuals coming forward
and offering to pay a large sum in the shape of rent for
a district which at present returns nothing, no reason-
able man can entertain a doubt that there is gross mis-
management. Either the bid should be accepted,, or the
property should be made to return more in its present
hands. Without adopting wholly the views of the
Financial Reformers, we are satisfied that no one can
have passed through such a tract of woodland country
as that which is called the New Forest without perceiv-
ing that a great portion of it might with great advantage
be cleared and devoted to agricultural purposes. More
thau eight centuries ago, when the surface of England
was but thinly populated, this district was covered with
smiling hamlets and homesteads. The second William
and his successors ruthlessly swept these habitations
away in order to make room for a vast forest in which
they might take their pastime. What the tyranny of
one race accomplished the cupidity and mismanagement
of others have continued. It is time that much of the
land should return to the plough and to the harrow.
Where corn has grown corn will grow again, and the
nation would thus possess a thriving district instead of
an unproductive waste,
CHRONICLE.—" It has pleased Almighty God to
vouchsafe to the British arms the most successful issue
to the extensive combinations rendered necessary for the
purpose of effecting the passage of the Chenaub "—such
is the pious and politic exordium of a dispatch intended
to apprise the people of India, that the Seikhs had
effected a safe retreat on their hill country, in the face of
an overpowering British force. In England, we may
venture, without indiscretion, to doubt whether that
" issue" was commensurate, in point of real value,
either with the magnitude of the 'preliminary prepara-
tions, or with the elevation of language observable in the
official announcement. Possibly, we may be apt to
undervalue a military success which has been purchased
at so severe a cost ; and the lamented names of Cureton,
Havelock, and Fitzgerald, almost unavoidably compel a
sober and measured estimate of the fruits of
a victory so bought. Yet, even irrespectively
of this melancholy list of casualties, there
appears too much reason for thinking that the
extensive preparations, and the well-laid plans, of
the Commander-in-Chief, have, to some extent, been
frustrated—partly, by the irrepressible ardour and
eagerness of our troops, when in sight of the enemy,
and partly by incidental errors of detail in the execution
of the operations. Amidst a crowd of confused state-
ments, the following facts stand prominent : For twelve
days, 18,000 regular Seikh troops, with a mob of about
as many more irregulars, and 28 guns, were encamped
opposite the " Army of the Punjaub," which mustered
23,000 strong, and was supported by a magnificent park
of artillery. During that interval, on the only two oc-
casions on which our men were engaged with the enemy
they were compelled to retire—in the one case, with
the loss of a gun, in the other, after a severe conilict.
When, at length, a general plan of attack was resolved
on, it was marred by a blunder at the fords. The de-
tachment destined to take the enemy in Rank made a
needless detour, by which they were so greatly fatigued,
that, after bravely repelling an assault, they stood in ab-
solute need of rest. An invaluable day was thus lost. On
the next, the rebel forces were out of reach having
" concealed," writes his Lordship, "or carried with
them, their artillery." A safe alternative, by which we
fear his Excellency merely means us to understand,
that he had neither got their guns himself, nor knew
anything about them. It is not improbable that, by
this time, they aro crowning some ravine to the west of
the Hydaspes, where a harassing guerilla warfare may,
for a while, postpone the final triumph of our arms. Of
some other portions of our present Indian intelligence,
we are, happily, able to speak with fewer qualifications
and reserves. It is our pleasing duty to notice that
Attock still holds out, that Moolraj is less defiant, and
that Cashmere continues faithful. In all probability,
therefore, Shere Singh has but deferred his defeat. He
leads a tribe—a dominant tribe, it is true, and diame-
trically opposed, in all its interests, to ourselves—still, it
is only a tribe ; and in that fact lies the moral certainty of
his final failure. The population around him, to say the
least, stand neuter in the struggle. They can feel no
reluctance to be brought back from under the novel and
galling yoke of a sect of persecuting fanatics, to an an-
cient empire, which, under all its dynasties—Persian,
Affghan, Mogul, and British—has extended an equal
tolerance to the voteries of its multiform creeds. With
the passive assistance of the Punjaub peasantry, it can
hardly be long before Lord Dalhousie is called upon to
decide whether the Seikhs are to be treated with, or go-
verned—whether he will put up with dangerous neigh-
bours, or with unruly subjects. This is an old dilemma
—as old as British India itself ; yet, for that very rea-
son, the difficulty of making a choice is comparatively
inconsiderable. Encouraged by the results of past ex-
perience, we confess that it does not appear to us that any
grievous risk will be incurred by choosing what has been
repeatedly found to be the least of two evils. There are,
however, a large class ofpersons in this country, who, inno-
cent of the slightest curiosity respecting Indian affairs in
general, will yet pronounce very positively upon this
question, without any such retrospective glance. It is
enough for them, that the area of our Eastern dominions