The Sun.
London, England, 1841-10-01 00:00:00

BRISTOL.

TUESDAY BYENING.---In. consequence of a requisition,
originating with the tradlsmen of the Ward, a public:
meeting of the inhabitant of Castle Precincts was held.
last evening in Castle-green.
The statements made by llEwitsr GEORGE FOWLER,
Esq., a highly respectable merchant, and the Consul of
France at this port, were received with marked attention..
Ono circumstance in particular, deserves to be pointed.
our, Mr. Fowler states that he had, in common with:
many others, taken early advantage of the facilities of-
fered by the operation of the sliding scale to operate
largely in the corn-trade, not only in this city but in Li-
verpool, London, Gloucester, and other places, with.
considerable success ; but so strongly was he impressed:
with the injustice of a system offering inducements to.
make money by the distresses of the people, that since
1837 he repudiated all dealing in the trade, and had.
never since had a single bushel of corn measured in his
name. This is a practical instance of what has been over
and over again urged by Mr. Cobden and other Anti-
Corn-law
advocates, namely, that no honest or conscen-
tious merchant could long continue in the corn-trade.
Mr. BOUCHER, in moving the first resolution, said op-
-eession at present was intolerable ; but it had always
Leen 'guild in all ages, that, when it arrived at that
erance was at hand.—(Hear, hear.) Pha-
point , den;
raoh took the a, raw from the children of Israel, and
insisted mpon their .making bricks of stubble ;it was
then the cry of insufts:ablnheopressilovnh
aatr
causedose'w the
brought their deliverance.--k 1-; rs.)
ion
American revolution ? Oppress ! What caused the
But he still hoped
French revolution ? Oppression
for this country.
there was something better in store -
They could produce abundance of menus:ctur
whole world, and all they asked was to be ,a 'lnt they
allowed fcodr tthhoe
means of exchanging them for food ; this was w.
asked for, and this they must and would have.—(C
,ers.)
L
Mr. Boucher concluded by moving the first resolution.
Mr. BULLMAN seconded the resolution, which Ifss)s
carried unanimously.
C. J. THOMAS, .Esq., proposed the next resolution,
which having been seconded by. Mr. DaseostnE,
H. G. FOWLER. Esq., Consul for France, rose, and
said that having been a free burgess of that City for
twenty-three years, and engaged during a great part of
that period in commercial affairs, he had paid a great
deal of attention to, and watched the operation ot; the
present Corn -law ; few merchants had more opportuni-
ties. His attention had been attracted to it from the
year 1827, because, being a pretty sharp calculator, lie
saw there were opportunities of making considerable
profits by the operation of that law, and he had, with
others, made a great deal of money by it ; but from the.
year 1837 he from principle repudiated all trading in
corn, from the conviction of the injustice of making a
profit by the sufferings of humanity.—(Cheers.) He
(Mr. Fowler) went still occasionally to see his friends' in
Devizes, Warminster, and other towns where he used
formerly to deal largely in corn, and in that fine county
he found amongst the labouring classes a gradual decay.
Honest and industrious women and young girls were
now to be seen on the road side breaking stones, with
nothing but dry bread in their wallet to sustain them.
He had been a traveller—he had visited many countries,
and he could therefore speak from observation, when
he said that bread was nowhere so dear as it was in
England, where it was now 2d. per lb., whilst in Paris
the working-man buys his bread at a ld. per lb. In
Nantes, in Bordeaux, in Marseilles, and throughout
France the price was the same, and in Leghorn bread was
sold at three farthings per pound, as good as Nelson's
sailors had at the battle of Trafalgar, or Admiral Stop-
ford's at the recent battle of Acre.—(Hear, hear.) He
(Mr. Fowler) thought the time had arrived when an al-
teration should take place in this law. It was that
which filled their Bridewell ; it was a want of bread that
brought to their police court every Monday morning
crowds of cases of destitute and suffering humanity.—
(Hear, hear.) During the last week a large number
of foreign ships had brought corn into this port
at high freights, and the corn-measurers and
labourers were grinning, absolutely grinning, at the folly
of the regulations which admitted foreign corn from
foreign vessels at one shilling per quarter duty, instead
i
of employing our own honest sailors and British vessels
to bring the cargoes at Bs. per quarter duty, as proposed
by the expelled Minister.—(Hear, hear.)
Afrt. c
et
othse
sEprsprosraolpottsnedd,seconding fßa iunoTteßrr
se
esb
eoo
01 resolution,
t ipd r
eoe
dn ,
Mr.
the adoption of as Address to her Majesty, to
seated by Earl Fitzhardinge.
On Monday,MEET MEETING AT
seen at this place we ever remember to have
t RolfNthGe Tl2gNes't meet-
ingson the proposed as-
sembledproro-
gation to address her Maj
lust., one
besides the Chairman, we
On the platform,
present.
ga;ion of Parliament. Not elisZ than 3,000 persons were
noticed Joseph Crosfield, Esq.,. G. W. Hardy, Esq.,
Thomas Wheeler, Esq., John Rylands, jun., Esq., John
Fq Peter Itylands, • Esq., Rev. F. Bishop,
Ashton, .s
George Crosfield, Esq., T. G. Rylands, Esq., John
Dakin, Esq., Mr. Hurst, Mr. Forrest, Mr. J.
B, Fdel-
ston, acid other Wive Reformers of the town.