The Sun.
London, England, 1847-03-29 00:00:00

illeentinz

LONDON, MONDAY, MARCh 29, 1847.

"AV
We publish to-day, in another column, for the con-
venience of our readers who are interested in rail-
ways, an account of the Groups appointed by the
Select Committee for the classification of Railway
Bills, to sit after the Easter recess, together with the
names of the Bills contained in each Group, and the
week in which they will commence sitting.

Lord MOINTEAGLE has endeavoured to provoke the
indirect condemnation of the Government measure of
Poor-law Relief in the Upper House before the Bill is
formally brought under the consideration of their
Lordships. The intention of Lord MONTEAGLE has
been defeated. In the discussion which ensued on
Friday evening, upon the motion of the Noble Lord,
that the Ministerial scheme for affording assistance to
Irish destitution by a graduated rate levied upon Irish
property should be submitted to the deliberations of a
Select Committee, we perceive the first glimpses of
that aristocratic prejudice against en organized poor-
law which may considerably impede the passage of the
Government measure through the House of Peers.
Lord MONTRAGLI gots altogether upon false premises.
He insists that the distribution of out-door relief
to able-bodied labourers amounts in reality to a
territorials confiscation, because—because what ?
because, forsooth, the peasantry would be induced to
place their reliance not so much upon their own
corporeal industry as upon the subsistence derivable
from the workhouse ! Why, the argument is
about the most blundering paradox legislator
ever uttered. "The peasantry would rely more upon
ncs'a ensured them by the law than upon
FPO • - Why the subsistence
poreal Exertions:"
16 'IV by the law will only come in payment
ok,i lens:L.ocm for, their own corporeal exer-
Tis ric•-provisions handed to the Pble- od ied l.a:
I•• I, tae of to a 1 -
• ,
1:1s return :or the expenditure of so
rain
1"...161 rthriulaSnergy in so much local employment—the
"'" test upon which the legal alms of the parochial au-

thorities can be alone obtained will be the readiness
of the destitute to toil for his pittance. No money
whatever will be disbursed to the out-door paupers;
the assistance will be solely limited to food, and
that food they can alone obtain by proving their
willingness to work industriously. And yet Lord
MONTEAGLE stigmatises the proposition of Govern-
ment as a virtual confiscation of property, inasmuch
as he maintains it will promote indolence and
encourage pauperism among the Irish peasantry I
Disjointed as was the logic of Lord MONTEAGLE in
his observations upon the introduction of the poor-
law into Ireland, it was immeasurably exceeded, in
regard to its fallacy, by the reasoning of Archbishop
\VIIATELEY. With all reverence for the genius of
that illustrious prelate, with all admiration for the
keenness of his philosophic acumen, and with all re•
spect for him as a man whose mind has become
ripened by erudition and experience, we cannot but
acknowledge ourselves amazed at the shallowness of
the arguments upon which he bases his opposition to
the plans of the Government. He protests against
the distribution of relief to the able-bodied labourers
of Ireland, because—again, say we, because what ?
because (it is the Archbishop of DCBLIN who is
responding), with the Irish labourer, " inured to
Lerdehip, accustomed from his early days to privation,
your relief will be actual luxury to him. Ile will
be in the land of Cock .izne!" says the Archbishop.
So, then, an English labourer, ss ho is described as
living habitually in the midst of the comforts and
amenities of competence, is to he afforded the bread
and gruel of the workhouse more readily than the
miserable wretch who, as a type of the Irish
peasantry, is depicted by the Most Reverend Orator
as living perpetually on the brink of bankruptcy and
starvation ! Give the workhouse crusts to the
English peasant, says the Archbishop, give them to
him because they will taste unpalatable after his more
agreeable fare, and because they will smack to him
of wretchedness and degradation. Don't give the
workhouse crusts to the Irish peasant, he continues,
because they will seem to his palate like dainties, and
because they will impress upon his mind the notion
that his condition as a pauper is more elevated and
creditable than heretofore. The result of this reason-
ing is simply that those should be welcomed by the
parochial authorities with open and sheltering arms
who can best effort'. to tarry longer without relief,
and for whose destitution there is the least possible
excuse; while the unfortunate beings whose-debili-
tated bodies are utterly unfitted to withstand the en-
croachments of inanition, and whose ordinary condi-
tion is that of the extremest poverty, are, by reason of
their very feebleness and pauperism, to be spurned from
the precincts of 'the benignant board! " But he
will be in the land of Cockaigne I" insists the Arch-
bishop. Why what a sorry prevarication is this !
Because the able-bodied pauper will be "in the land
of Cockaigne," by merely devouring the meagre
rations of a workhouse, because the slice of bread, or
the basin of diluted porridge, will be to his fasting
lips as delicious as a dish of lampreys or ortolans to
those of an epicure—he must be sent back to his cabin
to sweep together the husks in his meal-bin, to sit
down and to die like a decent and uncomplaining
Christian ! What a land of Cockaigne to begrudge
the Irish pauper! What luxuries to deny him as de-
moralising! What exquisite inducements to idleness
and pauperism ! Archbishop WIIATELEY could not
have employed any language better calculated to en-
force the necessity of accepting the Government
measure of relief than the language used by that Most
Reverend Prelate to crush the plan of her MA-
JESTY'S Minister, and to annihilate the upholders of
an extended Poor-law. Thus far the motion of Lord
MONTEAGLE has proved more beneficial to the
Administration than by imparting to it the ephemeral
credit of having rejected that motion by a majority of
twenty-seven. it has demonstrated, even in the an-
tagonism of the supporters of Lord MONTEAGLE, the
fact that the Poor Relief (Ireland) Bi'l is abso-
lutely essential to the very existence of the destitute
peasantry.

The tide of emigration has set in with more than
usual rapidity. The widest calculations have fallen
short of the number of those about to bid a long fare-
well to their native shores, and to seek on a foreign
strand that maintenance and means of livelihood
which they despair of being enabled to obtain in their
fatherland. Those who have taken up the idea that
the extent of her population is the chief source of
Irish wretchedness, and that the social condition of
her people can be ameliorated only by an extraordi-
nary diminution in their numbers—that a wholesale
deportation must take place, and that hundreds of
thousands of industrious families must be expatriated
before prosperity and happiness can be hoped for, or
reasonably expected—may be gratified by this result;
but we confess that we are not of the number, and
that we regard the loss of the sturdy and intelligent
yeomen, who constitute the great bulk of the emi-
grants, as well as the amount of capital which they
will take with them to more propitious climes,
as a national misfortune of no ordinary magnitude.
It has never been asserted that Ireland possessed a
superabundance of capital, or that she could easily
bear a large drain in addition to that annually borne
from her shores in the shape of rents for absentee
landlords. On the contrary, she possesses a soil of
unexampled fertility and natural advantages of the
highest order ; but her fields have remained uncul-
tivated, her capabilities undeveloped ; and while there
is every facility for advancing her to a high position in
the scale of nations, and rendering her people happy
and contented, in the possession of everything necessary
for their simple wants and wishes, she, unfortunately,
is placed in the lowest rank, and her children are
suffering to a degree of misery and wretchedness un-
paralleled in the history of civilised communities.
The want of capital for the necessary improvements
is the chief cause of this lamentable state of things.
The 14,000,000 of acres nominally in tillage are not
half cultivated. It is admitted on all hands that the
produce might be quadrupled if adequate exertions
were made to effect that purpose ; the chief ingredient
necessary to attain that object is the employment of
sufficient labour on the lands. It is in abundance at
the very thresholds, and obtainable atone-half the price
that should in this country be paid for it, and yet it,
remains idle and unproductive, and the fields barren
and unimproved. It will not be asserted that the
natural capabilities of Ireland are inferior to those of
England, and yet the produce of the same extent of
land is sixty per cent. less than in this country, while
the proportion of labourers is nearly as five to two
ready to be employed in its cultivation, but unable to
get that employment so necessary for the comfort of
themselves and families, and the well. being of their
common country.
Why are these things suffered to remain in such a
state ? Why have not these improvements been
effected ? Simply because there is a deficiency of
capital in the country applicable to agricultural pur-
poses. And yet the very persons who admit the
accuracy of this statement contend that the country
is to be benefited by sending a considerable portion of
that deficient capital from the island, together with
men able and willing to work, who may well be
called the thews and sinews of the country. To
reduce the proportion of the smaller farmers and
labourers of Ireland to the same as that which now
exists in England, it would require the exportation of
no less than 700,000 families, averaging 3,500,000
human beings. The very lowest expense at which
this could be accomplished, calculating the cost of
passage and the sum necessary to settle them in their
new residences, and support them until the arrival of
the first harvest, would be from 1001. to 1201. per
family (it has never been calculated by the
advocates of emigration lower) ; this would at
once ccst the country from sixty to seventy-two
millions of money, and the outlay should be con-
tinued every year, in order to keep down the annual
increase which would of course be in the inverse ratio
of the population. What extraordinary benefits for
Ireland, what abundance and national prosperity
might be obtained by the judicious application of
even one-tenth part of that amount in the improve-
ment of the land, in giving employment to those able
and willing to work ! The money would produce an
ample return, and not be utterly cast away and de-
stroyed, as that expended in the banishment of the
extent desiredletlt
cannot appears, e
therefore,
adoptedo thatr nc. d
se
amigtri
oa
nt emigration
bt
ythe
o the
State.

We certaiuly were not LA" "
while Siace, from the corxplexion ' "'"•'.44 •

sion which took place in the Court of Aldermen
with respect to the reform of the corporation of the
city of London, that the violent dissensions, which
have for some time past prevailed between the Alder-
men and the Common Councilmen, would be speedily
and amicably terminated. In this hope, we confess,
we have been disappointed. The tenor of the discus-
sion which was held in the Court of Common
Council on Thursday last evinced very little
hope of reconciliation between the contending parties.
It is undoubted that certain reforms are required in
the Corporation; some contend that their present
powers are sufficient to effect them ; whilst others as-
sert that they cannot be accomplished without
the intervention of Parliament. The majority of
the Aldermen conceive they can dispense with the
services of Parliament; the Common Councilmen
that an appeal to the Senate is indispensable. We
are persuaded that the latter will be found, in the I
end, to be correct in their opinion. On Thursday
the Court of Common Council agreed to the report
of their Committee of Privileges, which recommended
that they should be empowered to prepare a Bill to
Parliament for reforming the Corporation. This step
was objected to as being premature, seeing that their
law officers had not yet given their opinions upon the
rights and powers of the Corporation. Still
we cannot wonder at the eagerness mani-
fested by the Common Councilmen to get
to Parliament. They are anxious to guard
themselves against unnecessary procrastina-
tion ; and their apprehension that needless delay will
not be disfavoured by the Court of Aldermen is not
without some show of reason. Their fears
in this respect are justified by a re-
view of the nature of the differences
between the Courts, and the fierceness with which
they have, from the first, been respectively main-
tained. The power claimed by the present Lord
Mayor, of not putting any question from the chair of
which he may individually disapprove, is of itself
quite sufficient to determine a body of men, who
conceived they constituted a deliberative assembly
to repair to Parliament without loss of time, and
demand that their chief officer shall be forthwith
divested of such an objectionab:e act of authority.
The reluctarce displayed by the Aldermen to appeal
to the Legislature does not place them in a very be-
coming light. They seem to be afraid of losing
some of their present powers, privileges, or-immu-
nities. But why should they, if these are really
subservient to the public good? If they are, they
can have no difficulty in establishing the fact; and if
they are not, ought they to desire to retain them ?
Were not the subject-matter too grave, as affecting
a Corporation which for antiquity, power, wealth, and
renown has never been equalled, one might be in-
clined to be amused at the spirit in which the dis-
putants support their wrangles. According to the
version of Mr. LAWRENCE, the Alderman thus ad-
dresses him :—" But look at what you will lose if
you go to Parliament !" In due Socratical fashion,
the Alderman is immediately replied to—" Wiil you
lose nothing? Will you not be clipped ? " We
submit that this style of disputation savours too much
of the Peachum and Lockit school; and it is clear
that when matters have reached such a crisis, the
sooner the parties resort to the mediatory influence of
the Legislature the better. We are, therefore, re-
joiced that the Court of Common Council have deter-
mined on adopting this course.

A letter from Copenhagen of the lith says that,
in consequence of the dearness of food, the KING has
issued an ordinance declaring that grain, vegetables, po-
tatoes, flour, and other alimentary productsoh all be free
from the duties levied at Lauembourg, whatever may
be their destination on the Elbe. The ordinance is
to be in force from the opening of the navigation
until the end of September.

A letter from Turin, of the 20th, says, that the
health of the King of SARDINIA has greatly improved,
and that his MAJEsTr has been able to transact
business with his Ministers.

The AugAburgh Gazette publishes a letter from
Poland, which says—" The misery now prevailing in
the western provinces of Austrian Gallicia is fright-
ful. An absolute famine prevails, and the starving
poor eagerly seize on the bodies of those who die of
want as food."

A letter from Warsaw gives a new explanation of
the movement of Russian troops towards the frontier
of Gallicia. " They are," it says, " part of the corps
of General KREUTZ, previously quartered in Lithu-
ania, and now occupying Poland. The corps of
General REDIGER is to quit Poland to return to
Russia. General KREUTZ has already arrived in this
city."
The Augsburgh Gazelle of the 19th states that
Prince JABLONOWITZ, a few days back, presented to
the Emperor of AUSTRIA a petition from the Nobles
of Gallicia, praying for some modifications in the
edicts relative to the forced labour of the peasantry.
The Emperor, to prevent the recurrence of die-
turbances, consented to receive a deputation of large
proprietors on this subject.

A Berlin letter of the 19th informs us that the
Prussian Government intends to reduce its army, and
that a great number of officers have already been
placed on the retired list.

The Hanover Gazette states that the Government
intends to declare Harburn and Gets free ports.

The Rhenish Observer announces that Senora
LOLL MONTEZ has at last been created Countess DE
STERNDEIM, and that the diploma conferring Bava-
rian naturalisation is to be given to her on the anni-
versary of her birthday.

The Madrid Mail of the 20th inst. had not arrived
in Paris.

The Fonzento of Barcelona announces that General
PAVIA has commuted the sentence passed by a
court-martial on five prisoners belonging to the Car-
list band of Jaime Montserrat from death to banish-
ment for ten years to a Presidio.

We have received the Paris papers of Thursday.
The debate on the proposition of 111. DUVERGIER
DE HAUILANNE, for electoral reform, still continue
in the Chamber of Deputies. During the discussion
on Wednesday the Minister of the Interior, M. Dan-
CHATEL, declared that the Ministry had determined
to make this a Cabinet question, and that if even the
prise en consideration of the proposition were carried
they would resign.
Count SALVANDY has published a letter in the
Moniteur Parisien denying that he has been made a
Duke.

The official returns of imports during the first two
months of the year have been published in the ilioni-
leur. They show a diminution of receipts of 4,903,000
francs, as compared with the two corresponding months
of 1846, but of only 326,000 francs, as compared with
1845. The falling off this year must be attributed to
the free admission of grain. But for this deficit,
which makes a difference of more than 3,500,000 f., the
general receipts of the Customs would have, not merely
equalled, but have actually exceeded those of last year.
The importations of raw materials has, however,
somewhat suffered, in consequence of the general re-
laxation of trade during the two months in question.
Thus there has been a decline in mahogany, cotton,
wool, silk, linen, threads, lead, zinc, &c. On the
other hand there is an increase in sugar, coffee, cast
iron, coal, lard, nitrates, and particularly in linseed,
and sesame, which in spite of the rigours of the tariff,
have risen to a considerable figure (49,000 metrical
quintals from 19,400).
The Moniteur also announces that the importation
of foreign grain in the harbours of France continued
with unabated activity during the first fortnight of
March. It amounted to 472,445 hectolitres, exceed-
ing by 80,000 hectolitres the quantity imported
during the second half of February.
Iu consequence of this large importation, the price
of corn and flour has fallen in most of the principal
markets of the kingdom.

The Siecle publishe3 the followin; letter from
Toulon :

" Six ships of war are at present being armed in this
port, viz., the ships of the line the Jetnappes and Her-
cui.e, the Pursuviaute and the Charte, tbelender Rhin,
and the corvette Astrolabe. The two ships of the line
are to form part of the squadron under the orders or
Vice-Admiral the Prince de Joinville. The frigate the
Pursuviante is to receive on board Rear-Admiral Lego-
arant de Tromolin, who is to replace Rear-Admiral
Ila+.io in the command- of the naval I.tation in the J.

16 La :ail fur N....,
Zealand, and the corvette the Astrolabe is, it is aid, to