The Sun.
London, England, 1847-03-31 00:00:00

'T. toning Pititir*

LONDON, WEDNESDAY, MARCH 31, 1847.

The Royal Assent was given by Commission to
various Bills

The Lords re-assembled at Five o'clock.

The Waterworks' Clauses Bill, the Gasworks'
Clauses Bill, the Markets and Fairs' Clauses Bill, and
the Commissioners' Clauses Bill were respectively
read a third time and passed.
Lord BROUGHAM explained that he had not
changed his opinions with regard to arrest on
mesne process, and he thought that the manner in
which the late law, authorising imprisonment for
forty days for small debts, had been overstretched by
the Commissioners, would lead to the entire abolition
of imprisonment for debt. In reference to a petition
from Nottingham which claimed for the labourers a
right of support out of the produce of the land, the
Noble and Learned Lord declared emphatically that,
in his opinion, the only title which any able-bodied
poor man had to support was upon the produce of his
own work.

Lord COLVILLE then drew the attention of the
House to the vote which had been given in the late
election of a Scotch Representative Peer, by a person
calling himself Lord COLVILLE, of Ochiltree, and
moved for a return of the list of voters on that oc-
casion, which was agreed to.
Earl GREY, in moving the adjournment to the 15th
of April, announced that on their re-assembling, their
Lordships would meet in the New House.
Their Lordships then adjourned.
The Commons met at Four o'clock.
The
second reading of the Dublin Improvement
Bill was, on the motion of Ml'. GREGORY, postponed
until after Easter.
In answer to a question Captain BERKELEY said he
bad every reason to believe that a commission would
be issued to inquire into the administration of the
Merchant Seamen's Fund.
Mr. SPOONER then moved for leave to bring ir a
Bill to suppress trading in seduction and prostitution,
which was ultimately granted.
Mr. G. BERKELEY rose to order. The Hon.
Member to make good his case must go into details
unfit for publication, and he (Mr. G. Berkeley),
therefore, called the Speaker's attention to the fact
that there were strangers in both galleries. The gal-
leries were ordered to be cleared, and the debate pro-
ceeded with closed doors.

On the opening of the galleries we found Lord
MORPETH moving for leave to bring in a Bill to Im-
prove the Health of Towns, which was granted.
Various returns on the motion of several Hon.
Members were then ordered.
On the question being put for the House going into
Committee on the Army Service Bill,
Sir H. Dousv.s.s moved that it be committed that

day six months. After a short debate, the Hon.
Member withdrew the amendment.

The House then went into Committee pro forma,
and, on the motion of Mr. F. MAULE, it was agreed
that the Chairman should have leave to sit again
to-day.

The Irish Waste Lands Bill passed through Com-
mittee, the report to be received this day.
Lord MORPETH then brought in the Health of
Towns Improvement Bill, which was read a first
time, and ordered to be read a second time on the
23d of April.
The House adjourned at Half-past One.

It wanted only the introduction of an organized
scheme for effecting an improvement in the sanatory
condition of the people to crown the Parliamentary
labours of the Government before the Easter adjourn-
ment. Lord MORPETH, as Chief Commissioner of
her MAJESTY'S Woods and Forests, formally brought
this important matter under the consideration of the
representative legislators. It would be a mere affec-
tation to say that we are rejoiced at such a proceed-
ing on the part of Lord JOHN RussELL's Administra-
tion. We have so repeatedly and perpetually in-
veighed against the lassitude, or possibly the procras-
tination of the Executive. in dealing with this extra-
ordinary question and we have accompanied those
expressions of our impatience with such continual
and such earnest observations upon the economy and
humanity which are involved in it, that it would lite-
rally amount to affectation to offer our congratulations
to the Ministry upon the course they have at length
adopted. Considering that in the passage of some
such sanatory measures as those indicated by Lord
MORPETII yesterday evening, are implicated the hap-
piness or discomfort, the health or disease, the mora-
lity or depravity, the lives or deaths of many millions
of our fellow-creatures, we cannot but regard the
proposition of the Government with the most pecu-
liar and absorbing attention. Upon the activity of
the Legislature in removing the abuses pointed out
by the Noble Lord, the Chief Commissioner
of her MAJESTY'S Woods and Forests, de-
pends not merely the cleanliness, but the
bodily and mental health the mens sana
in corpore sano—of a populous and, so to speak, a
helpless and dependent multitude. The evils arising
from the insufficiency of drainage, from the indis
criminate interment within towns, from the squalor
and narrowness of the tenements occupied by the
industrial classes, from the lack of wholesome water,
and the general absence of proper ventilation, are
evils of a vast antiquity. They have grown and ex-
panded and propagated during the lapse of several
centuries. Upon the very cinders of the metropolitan
conflagration of 1666, upon the very cinders of that
conflagration which appeared to be intended not
merely for the purification of London from the
plague, but for the destruction of its rotten,
crowded, and pestilential thoroughfares, rose
up again the architectural testimonies of the
ignorance of the community and of the short-
sightedness of the municipal authorities. Since that

memorable epoch in the history of our capital its
mortality has marvellously outnumbered the average
mortality of the rural districts. The disproportion
of the mortality between the inhabitants of town and
country, making even allowance for the improvements
which have been effected in our medicinal know-

ledge, and taking into the calculation the different
facilities afforded for the receipt of medical assist-
ance, is of such an alarming and enormous character
as to render some interference on the part of the
Legislature absolutely requisite. Besides which,
the causes of that disproportion ed mortality
are of such antiquity and multiplicity as to be era-
dicable only through the gigantic interposition of
the Government.
Several of the statistical calculations of Lord
MORPETII in regard to the differenize observable be-
tween the mortality of our intennural and extra-
mural communities, were so apt and conclusive, as an
enforcement of the Ministerial proposition, and ae
a❑ argument for a comprehensive sanatory reform,
that we are induced, even at the ri2,l‘ of repeating
many of the facts previously enumerated by our-
selves, to interpolate the following, transcribed from

a statement forwarded to the Registrar-General by

the physician to King's College Hospital. The esti-
mate of that gentleman requires no enforcement :
"Population to the square mile, country, 199; town,
5,100. Annual deaths in 1,000,000, country, 19,300;

own, 27,073 ; annual excess in town' district, 7,773.
Rate of mortality, country, 1 in 52 ; 'town, 1 in 37."
Upon the average mortality of the British island
the physician in question regards •the subjoined
numbers as correct :—" England 1 iii i 45 ; Isle of
Wight, 1 in 58 ; Anglesea, 1 in 62; London, 1 in
39; Leeds and Birmingham, lin 37; Sheffield, lin
33 ; Bristol, 1 in 32 ; Manchester (CI I lion), 1 in 30;
Liverpool (parish), lin 29. Thus the. inhabitants of
London, compared with England at. large, lose 8
years of their lives ;of Liverpool, 19. The popula-
tion of large towns in England being 4,000,000, the
annual loss is between 31,000 and 32,000." Is
anything more essential to indicate the advisa-
bility of a legislative effort at a sanatory
reformation ? We should opin e not. The
pollutions of the atmosphere in haled in the
crowded habitations of the poor, the r ank exhalations
floating like a miasma in the vicinity of our metro-
politan grave-yards, the foulness and scarcity of the
water consumed in household oper at ions and as a
beverage, the odious accumulations 0 f filth in con-
sequence of neglected drainage, the very exclusion
of the daylight, with a view to the av oidance of the
window-tax,—all these things open ite independently
to the degradation and destruction clf the multitude.
For their permanent prevention it c 11.'y requires the
guidance and direction of an enligt'lb3ned Govern-
ment. Such practical philanthrt ists as Dr.
SOUTHWOOD SMITH have commer: ce .d the whole-
some crusade against these crying t ; they have
effectually smoothed the way for the ,E xecutive ; and
the ripeness of the popular mind for e nactments like
those now promised must act as a. generous in-
citement to Parliament and the A dminißtration.
The factory women and ebilt ire n are de
scribed (and accurately) as yearning for the
acceptance of the Bill introduced bj r Mr. FIEL-
DEN. A conviction that such is actual] y the case has
tended as much as anything to cat ry it so far
through the House of Commons. NU iy Lord MOR-
PETII'S proposition prosper in like ma m )er ! for it is
not merely a clique that is solicitoll:3 for sanatory
reform, it is an entire community—it is not the thou-
sand that yearn for these improvemet its, it is the
million—it is not a class, it is a nation.

Another discussion took place in the House of
Commons last night on the question Oa at the House
should go into Committee on the Arn2l • Service Bill.
Although the principle of the Bill was.f ally sanctioned
by the House on the occasion of the • second reading,
the Gallant General the Member for Liverpool again
forced a debate on that principle, ref et iting the argu-
ments he had previously made use of, and assuming
that the veteran Commander-in-Chi( tf was opposed to
the measure, because the advisers of the Crown had
refused to state the nature of communi-
cations of the most strictly confid( tial character.
We cannot, however, regret the occu r rence, as it had
the effect of eliciting from the Right sionourable the
Secretary at 'War a vindication botli of the justice
and expediency of the proposed altel .tions, that was
perfectly conclusive in their favour. To that speech
we confidently refer all those who h ai e feared to put
their own opinions in competition wit' h those of the
distinguished officers who have unfor inately been so
warped by their prejudices as to offer their strenuous
opposition to the limitation of the term of enlistment.
Every one of the grounds relied on b: its opponents
were answered in the most clear a nd satisfactory
manner, the fallacies detected, and the errors refuted.
The speech of the Gallant ;Member fc r Carlow was
also in the highest degree creditable t o his head and
heart, and the astounding fact which . he mentioned,
that no less than one death out of t wenty in cavalry
were cases of suicide, should alone 1 )e sufficient to in-
duce a Christian nation to incur any exp erase and to run
any risk to effect an alteration in 3tem a sy: that led to
such frightful results. Every consider Ition of justice
as well as of humanity calls fo
fitting that a great nation shouldr
eenct,
,Arn
ignet. It
into
contracts s not
or an age at which any engagements into
with lads who have not attaine y"i s of
whichd i sc re tit
hoeny,
entered with their fellow-subjects, would be held
binding—by which they would be. bound for their
entire lives,—contracts in which tl.ken is no recipro-
city, for, although thesollier eat, urai look forward

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