The Sun.
London, England, 1841-07-27 00:00:00

CONDITION. OF AGRICULTURAL

LABOURERS.

I visited their cottages, and obtained specific accounts
of their furniture, dietaries, wages, and other circum-
stances that affect their comfort. I will first describe
the cottage and mode of living of a Sussex labourer,
whose family is such as to make him one of the most
distressed of his class. He has a wife and seven chil-
dren, the eldest of whom is a girl aged twelve, and all
the rest happen to be girls, except one boy five
years old.
On entering, the cottage displays a room about 20
feet long by 15, paved with brick, and nearly divided
into two by a partition ; the fire-place is here, and it
forms the sitting-room of the family. The furniture
consists of one common-looking deal table, a rather
elegant round oak one, with moveable flaps, a maho-
gany cupboard, and six chairs ; there are curtains to
the windows. Adjoining is a pantry-, which seems
tilled with all sorts of cooking utensils, and a bake-
;l, else, where the family bake once a week, as it is the
custom in these parts, bakers being rarely employed.
Up stairs there are two bed-rooms, in one of :which the
man, his wife, and the baby sleep, and in the other, which
contains three beds, the rest of the children. They pur-
chase six gallons of flour weekly, which is made into
bread or cakes with potatoes. They drink tea made
with burnt crusts, China tea being too expensive now.
Since the price of sugar has risen, t 39 have been obliged to
give up its use ; but a qaarter of a pound is bought weekly
to sweeten the pap for the baby. They have no meat ex-
cept on a Sunday, when a meat pudding is made ; and
none of the family ever tastes beer, except, perhaps, the
man gets some now and then from his master. The man
is in constant work at 12s. a-week, but sometimes he
gets piece-work, and then earns 15s. weekly. The cot-
tage, which is rented at 2s. weekly, is clean and well
drained ; its literary furniture consists of two Bibles and
a New Testament : there is no Prayer-book, as the in-
mates are Dissenters. The distress of the family arises
from the unusual circumstance that the children are
nearly all girls, and hence can earn nothing. Were the
eldest or the second a boy, he would probably add 2s. to
3s. a-week to the general income by assisting his father.
The actual weekly expenditure is as follows :
s. d.

6 gallons of flour at 16d 8 0

1 lb. soap 0 3i
i lb. candles 0 44
1 lb. butter 1 0
1 lb. sugar 0 21
11 lb. meat 0 9
Yeast 0 3
Starch, pepper, and salt .......
1 lb. cheese 0 6
Worsted, cotton, tape, &c 0 3

Total

Here, and subsequently in the account; of the
weekly expenditure of labourers, I shall not insert the
rent or clothing, as I find that these are generally not
lipid for weekly, but are reserved to be paid off at har-
vest, or at odd times, when more than the usual wages
arc.. earned.

Here is another wooden cottage, in bad repair, con-
taining four rooms, which cost 301. to build, and is
rated at 2s. 6d. a week. It is tenanted by a man, his
vrif, and four children—two boys, a girl, and an infant.
They sleep in the two upper rooms ; the two boys in a
bed in one room, and the man, his wife, and the baby, in
one bed in the other, a contrivance being made upon the
floor for the girl to sleep. The sitting room is ten feet
square, and contains two plain deal tables. and a very
small stained one, a neat corner cupboard, three shelves
with earthenware ; a few small ornaments are on the
chimney-piece, and above it hang some small prints in
black frames. There is a calico window-curtain, two
small bits of carpet on the floor, a cradle, four chairs,
and an arm-chair. Some swinging-book-shelves, with
religious books. Altogether this cottage has a neat,
cleanly, and orderly appearance. The man's earnings
are 13s. a week, but he is occasionally out of work :
the wife, from ill-health, earns but little. The family
consume weekly 51 gallons of flour, 3 gallons of pota-
tos, 11b. of cheese, -A- oz. of tea, 2 oz. of coffee, 4 lb.
of suyar for the infant, 31d. worth of milk, lb. of soap,
1 lb. of candles, 1 cwt. of coals.
I have at former times frequently collected informa-
tion as to the precise method in which a labourer spends
his wages ; and, as the point seems to me very important
towards understanding the condition and economy of the
p or, I will give several of their dietaries.
In 183 i, an aged man and his wife expended their
wr•elcly earnings of 6s. in the following way :

a.
2 2

Bread, 2 gallons
Bacon, Ilb
Butter Ilb
Tea, 2 oz.
Sugar, Ilb
Coals, 1 cwt

Total

It would be quite impossible for the old couple to live
as well at at present, in consequence of the increased
price of provisions ; but the tea, the sugar, and the bacon,
now disappear from the board, and the money so saved
gofs to pay the additional cost of the bread. At the same
period, a man, his wife, and seven children, in Sussex,
spent their wages thus :

s. d.
6 gallons of bread
2* lbs. of bacon
2i lbs. of butter
1-. - oz. of tea. 0 6
1 lb. of sugar....
-?; lb. of candles....
lb. of soap

0 9
0 34

0 3

Total

12 9

The following is the expenditure of a labouring
man, with a with and six children, at present. The
contrast between these two cases is not so perfect as
it might be ; as, in the preceding case, the labourer
purchased bread ; in the following flour. The expense,
therefore, of making the bread and baking it should
be added to the account ;- and this will more than make
up the 6d. difference in the whole sum. Though there
is one less in family than in the last case, it will be
obviotis how much the increased price of provisions has
deteriorated the condition of the family :

" 6 gallons of flour
Yeast

_
s. d.
8 0
0 3

1 lb. of meat and I,of suet 0 8
1 lb. of butter
1 lb. of cheese 0 6
-.I; lb. of candles
lb. of soap o 31
Potatoes

Worsted, starch, cotton, and tape... 0 3
No sugar.
Total l2 3
I might insert numerous other examples of labour-
ers' dietaries ; but I trust the above will be sufficient
to show, in some degree, how their wages are expended.
They, however, are insufficient, as they do not show
the quality of the articles procured. For instance,
since the price of corn has risen, many of the labourers
have been compelled to resort to an inferior sort of flour,
termed " sharps," in order to obtain a sufficiency of
food. Tea, were it not an article so subject to adultera-
tion, ought to have materially risen in price, as the im-
portation in 1840, compared with that of 1836, shows a
diminution of 17,571,7621b5. I believe, however, the
reason it has not, is, that its place has been supplied by
a deleterious mixture, of which some of the medical
men make great complaints. It is now, too usually,
drunk without sugar, as the great rise in price in the
latter article has caused it nearly to disappear fro,'n the
labourer's house.—Mr. Tuffners Report on the Economy of
Lk Labouring Classes in Surrey and Kent.

PRESBYTERY OF ARBROATH.
During the two last weeks the Presbytery of Arbroath
have had two several meetings. In the first of these,
Mr. Lumsden, by way of reference, brought before the
Presbytery a case from
the Birk-Session of Barry, of
contumacy.
The Kirk-Session had summoned before
for the guilt of. Sabbath. parporfaivn:
them a farm-servant,
funeral o f his child on th -
tier., because he had the
before public worship. The individual. attended Zith'saYa.
friend, but would not follow the Session into.
house, and therefore was held by them. gtraty of con-
tumacy. The Presbytery enjoined the
which judgment
-Mr. Muir dissented, because the proceeding was unne-
cessarily harsh and irregular.
Mr. Dymoek came also with a -eerbal reference con-
cerning a similar charge. Some of the elders were
averse to give Church privileges to two persons—the
one for pumping water for the railway
engine on Sab-
bath, and the other for assorting letters on that
day. The Presbytery refused, to receive a verbal refer-
ence ; but some of the members hinted that he shoidd be
cautious of meddling with people of influence.
The Presbytery then proceeded to deal with Mr. Car-
ruthers, who gave in a wr.itten statement explaining some
.of the facts libelled. 'We understand that great com-
plaints were made by some members that he did not
make a full cor;ieSsion. After a long and senseless
aWei cat
on,
rwotions were made by Mr. Lumsden, Mr.
r, and *Mr. Crichton—some of which were very
inowilliosiy departed from, on account of one Mr. Muir :
—" That the case should be postponed to another day,
whea+ Mr. Carruthers should be again called in." At
tlle second meeting, Messrs. Laird and Lumsden com-
plained bitterly of the very unsatisfactory degree of con-
nlession made. Motions were then made by the Non-in-
trusionist, and carried ; from which the agent of the
venerable clergyman appealed.
it is not to be overlooked that in this case the more
experienced ministers and elders, and the whole parish,
without an exception, are on the side of the accused ;
and that all the youthful Non-intrusionists are on that
of severity. The grey hairs, the amiable, the honest, and
pleas character of the accused, render him an object of
regard to the whole country. He was never known to
d) a mean action, to frequent improper company, or seek
vitious indulgence. He was hospitable to the extent of
his means, even to these whose means are now employed
to molest hint. One of the severe members told him, in
del6nice of the unlimited period of suspension, that he
nen'i.l not consent to repone him till Mr. Carruthers'
tni:-(/ was changed. What did this mean ? The agent
ver, Properly told this member that he could judge only
of the mind by the actions. The parish to a man con,-
tinue to adhere to their minister, while some of his
quondam popular Non-intrusion neighbours are fast de-
cliuing, just because they intrude every where but where
they ought to be found.—Dundee Chronicle.

EWCASTLE.—POLITICAL PERSECUTION...—.
We are informed that a leading Tory i this an
ertensive hat manufacturer, is slily and gradually,town, but
nevertheless decidedly dismissing such of his workmen as
voted fur Mr. Harris at th late election. We hope this
may not prove true :fore, if it be true, we shall assuredly
devote ourselves to the unpleasant task of making several
awkard exposures concerning the Afasonic individual re-
ferred to.—Stafford9hire .Erarniner.

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS.
PROM THE DAILY PAPERS OF YESTERDAY.

CHRONICLE.—The Times has at length undertaken to
describe Toryism. It has done it con amore, and shown a per-
fect knowledge and feeling of the subject. In a leader of last
Saturday it described in graphic language the ruin of Toryism,
and states the causes of its " decline and fall." " Toryism
fell," it says, " partly because it became tainted with those
vices which inevitably accumulate during very long tenure of
power by one description of men; partly because it allowed
the principle of stability," now called Conservatism, "to swal-
low up all others in its esteem, degenerating sometimes into a
despicable viz inertia, at other ~times into an irrational
superstition !" " Toryism," it goes on to say, " be-
came a mere hollow crust, and collapsed under the first
thunderstorm which shook the political atmosphere."
In the stead of the system thus denounced as
" tainted with vices " as irrational " and " de-
spicable"—in the stead of this " hollow crust " of Toryism,
the Times recommends the solid ground of Conservatism—
that is, the same system under another name—nay, managed
and conducted by the same leader I " Sir Robert Peel (it
says), in watching over the formation and growth of this Par-
liamentary (Conservative) party, has performed his office
well, and so as to entitle him to public gratitude." But is he
not the same—the identical Sir Robert Peel who was the
head and (in the House of Commons) the leader of that very
party which the Times had just before denounced as "tainted
with vices," " hollow," superstitious," and "irrational? Can
the same fountain send forth sweet water and bitter ? Can we
trust the man now who formerly advocated and upheld
doctrines and principles which the Times itself admits
were so pernicious, and which it deseribes as so abomina-
ble? But it is not the principles alone to which the
censures of the Times are directed. It reprobates
the men as much as it denounces the measures. " The leaders
of the Tory party (it says) during the last ten years of its
sway, fell into a false position, paying at once too much and
too little regard to their own consistency" (that was, indeed, a
false position !), " dealing plainly neither with themselves nor
their supporters" (admirable moralists I). " Resisting upon
questions of expediency when it was impossible to resist with
prudence, and conceding upon questions of principle when it
was impossible to concede with honour." Yet these are the
leaders, men who could for ten years resist without prudence,
and concede without honour; these are the leaders to whom
the Times would now leave the direction of the State, and
whom it lauds as distinguished by wisdom and foresight, and as
fitted to be the savious of their country. What must Sir Ro-
bert Peel think and feel when his chief defenders describe the
past political conduct of himself and of his colleagues in the fol-
lowing language:—
"By their conduct with reference to Parliamentary Re-
form, they taught the country to think lightly of their ability
to fortify by legimate means their tenure of office - while by
their conduct on the Roman Catholic question they proved
themselves capable of committing a still more fatal mistake, and
consenting (what is as objectionable in politics as in morals)
• Propter vitam vivendi perdere causes.'
" After this," it is added, " all confidence in the Govern-
ment which had so acted was destroyed. The Tory, party
ceased to be identified with any principle whatever, either
religious, or moral, or political, in the eyes of the people at
lei ge."

Such, as described by the Times, is the " tainted garbage
of Toryism from which the Conservative party is to take its
flight. Such is the party from which the forthcoming Adminis •
tration is to be elected—a party identified, "in the eyes of
the people at large, with no principle, either religious, or
moral, or political." Such are the characters which,
according to the Times, the new servants of the Queen are to
bring with them from their last places! This, be it remem-
bered, is what their friends say of them ! It is what the
lawyers call " their case." So much for the past. The course
which Sir Robert Peel and his followers are to pursue in
future is marked out by the Times with equal distinctness.
They are called upon to avoid the errors of their predecessors
—" the wholesale machinery of espionage by Commissioners,
the establishment of a rural gendarmerie, and, above all, the
enactment and operation of the new Poor-law"—which means
if it mean anything, that Sir Robert Peel is to discharge the
Archbishop of Canterbury and the other distinguished indi-
viduals who are acting as Commissioners under the Queen, to
repeal Peel's Police Act, and not to continue in force the New
Poor-law, which (whether they be called Tories or Conserva-
tives) he and his party have almost warmly supported.
TIMES.—Sir Robert Peel is triumphantly borne into power
upon the shoulders of an admiring country. He takes the
reins with a clear majority of ninety at the least. Being thus
placed in a condition which must capacitate him for carrying
his measures irrespective of the demands of crochety indivi-
duals or sectional coteries, he can afford to resist whatever is
unreasonable and to repulse whatever is mercenery. Be the
private badgerings of individuals what they may (and we have
as little to suppose that they will be peculiarly, active, as to
anticipate that they will never be exercised at all), the power-
ful Conservative Minister, backed by an immense body of dis-
interested and independent supporters, who being immeasur-
ably above the condition of needy place-hunters, repose in him
an implicit and gratuitous confidence, is consequently enabled
to pursue a straight and inflexible course of political
rectitude, how much soever he may be importuned or threat-
ened, for any sinister purpose. We know well that the great
constitutional phalanx who will sit behind him will, almost to
a man, abstain from embarrassing him with any selfish suppli-
ancy. But should it even prove otherwise, to a partial extent,
the Right Hon. Baronet will allow himself to be dragooned in
nothing from the mere apprehension of losing a few of his sup-
porters. If any such persons should ever approach him in a
tone of miniatory, self-importance, we have at length a Govern-
ment who can dare to consult the public welfare in defiance of
individual caprice or personal selfishness. But, what is better
still, nothing of the kind, we can confidently predict, will ever
occur. The very existence of such a large Ministerial majority
as Sir Robert Peel's Cabinet will command, must be just as
effectual for repressing impertinent demands, as for empowering
the Government to resist them.
HERALD.—AIarm appears to have been taken in some
quarters at the negotiations which are said to be now going on
between France and Belgium for a Customs' Union between
the two kingdoms. This alarm is, to say the least of it, rather
premature and unnecessary. The Journal des Debats has,
it is true, lately opened its columns to the advocacy of some
such project ; but others of the French papers distinctly deny
that any proposition having such an object has been under the
consideration of the French Cabinet. The facts of the case
are, we believe, simply these :—The inhabitants of the French
provinces of Alsace and Lorraine have lately importuned
their Minister of Commerce to gain for them the aboli-
tion on the French frontiers bordering on Germany of
the present customs' system, and to establish free inter-
course between Fra nee and Germany, as has lately been done
between France and Holland; at the same time negotiations
have been entered into for the purpose of establishing freedom
of intercourse between France and Belgium, and thus to apply
the principles of the late treaty of commerce with Holland to
the entire northern frontier of France. But so far from these
negotiations having for their object the desiori of a politico.
commercial league between France and Belgium, it is a tact
that Belgium, while negotiating for this freedom of trade with
France, has proposed to Prussia either to join the German
Commercial Union, or to enter into engagements with that
league similar to those which she may form with France. The
common object of all these negotiations is to make the Rhine,
what it never yet has been, a free highway to all the countries
on its banks or those of its tributary rivers. In such negotia-
tions there is, we submit, nothing tending to disturb the
existing balance of European power, or to frighten Conserva-
tive statesmen. Whatever may once have been the wish of
many of the Belgians, with respect to a union of their
country with France, no such desire now exists. The
mercantile and manufacturing classes in Belgium deplore,
it is true, the present state of that kingdom ; but they
look forward to another junction with Holland, and not to
either a politico-commercial union with or an annexation to
France. As to what King Leopold may be anxious about, it
is of little matter ; le Roi des Postilions has about as much
real power in Belgium as the great beggarman will shortly
have in Ireland. En route to or in Paris, Wiesbaden, or Lon-
don, Leopold is an important personage ; at the Lacken, or in
Brussels, he is—a king without power—a monarch withou%
respect. While referring to this subject we may notice one
effect of the late treaty of commerce and navigation vvi-.;tch Lord
Palmerston signed with Prussia on behalf of the r.serman Zoll
Vorcin. Germany is already reaping the "dne-sided advan-
tages of that treaty, and German vessel, have lately, for the
first time, left the port of Hamburgh',aden with German manu-
factures, bound for the British,
colony of Barbadoes. Others
are taking in similar gcnus for British North America. So
that by this much vau:sted treaty Lord Palmerston has not only
given a political .
7:atres to the Zoll Vorein, and great encou-
ragement to Germany becoming a naval power, but he has ac-
tually introduced her manufactures in the British colonial
marktis,- without the intervention of British ships.
POST--Amongst the deliberate lies put forth by the parts;
of the beaten Administration this one ,s conspicuous, ,so
far as town constituencies are coneerned,the opinion in favour
of the stupidites lately launched by Ministers on the sabject of
sugar, core, and timber is an increasing opinion, The elec-
tions have plainly demonstrated that it is The opposite
views maintained by Conservative never received such support
in the towns since the Reform Bill was enacted as they have
just now received. Nothing aan possibly be more marked than
the decisive disapprobation of the Ministers by the towns since
their last absurdities were promulgated, compared with that
which appeared at former elections. The Conservatives have
been returned by town constituencies in a considerably greater
proportion than they were before, and where they did not suc-
ceed in being returned the number of votes in their favour was
very much greater than before. It is, therefore, perfectly clear
that, if the Whig-Radicals still have on their side a small ma-
jority of town Members, they represent a rapidly diminishing
opinion.
GLOBE.—The difficulty Sir Robert Peel will expe-
rien •
ce satisfying his howling pack of place-hunters,
every day
in the
mornin •ery day more obvious, and the Times of this
g is
the fatigue of pursuing,' its
employed in smacking the whip pretty smartly
that shears of the hungry crew, just to give them the hint
game is not for them, though they have had all
The article in the Times is
an amusing pounX of soft words and threatening at-
" I'm quite sureey
titudes--or hen
on the lip, and tomahawk in the hand.
such a distingui3.stdwill be very complacent. You are
men," says the Thun
aephalanx of constitutional gentle-
to brandish a bludgeonroer in morals, while his acts are
he is addressing the inz the heads of those to whom
Sir Robert Peel -really could complimentary epithets. If
luded to it would be all very Irwithout the persons al-
„ 11 but as they happen
to know how important wilt n • -
e their aid to the ex-
pectant Premier, it is not likely they will e content
to be flattered into forbearance or dragooned into dis-
interestedness. A crowd of schoolboy's that
have
been long hungering after a promised cake,
be more eager to get a slice than are the Tories cannott
a finger in the pie of office ; and it is absurd to sit get
that any but the very softest of the party will be pnt s'""er
by the old schoolboy trick of " Those who
as..
have any, And those who don't ask don't want shan'tany 7,
But what is Peel to do ?He cannot satlsfy izi;tl
yet all will insist on being satisfied. lie cannot emu-
late " the soldier who lived on his' r.-.ly, and spent half-a-
crown out of sixpence a-day,". Ile cannot come to a
composition, for he will not have a penny in the pound to
offer to his rapacious Conservative creditors. The T0r.17
list of Want Places is as formidable as that in the
lumns of the Times, and the applications are out of all
proportion beyond the vacancies. To mention one instance.
What is to be done with the three expectant Chancellors,
with only one Woolsack to offer them ? The Great Seal
makes too great an impression on an ambitious mind
to allow of an easy resignation of the prospect of posses-
sing it. The Tory Joint Stock Company turns out, like
many others, to have been designed only for the profit
of the immediate Directors, and the duty of answering
calls seems all that is to devolve on the main body of ad-
venturers. When the clamour for a dividend meets, as it
must, with no satisfactory reply, disappointment will lead
to disgust, the bubble will have burst, andthe backing out
will become general. The Post, which is by turns senti-
mental and severe—now sending forth paragraphs replete
with pathos, and now thundering out impotent anathemas
—has this morning gently and almoft affectingly reproved
us, for throwing in the teeth of the Tories the unwelcome
fact, that it,is not a " bed of roses" they are about to lie
upon.,
_With all our disposition to pity.the unfortunate,
we cannot carry our sympathy for Sir Robert Peel so far
:
as to in any way help him out of the mess which he

has voluntarily placed himself. We respect a dignified
and defeated foe ; but when we see an enemy doing all
he can to ca se the ground to give way beneath our feet,
and then marching deliberately into the mud he has him-
self thrown, we must be permitted to enjoy a little-merri-
ment at his sticking there, before we charitably come for-
ward to help him out of it.
COURIER.—The Chronicle has a long and lugubrious
article this morning in exaltation of the miraculous me-
rits of free trade principles, and their efficacity wherever
and whenever hitherto applied, with the inferential intent
of attributing the present depressed condition of various
important branches of trade and manufactures to the
sole prevalence of a too rigorously protective system.
Our Contemporary draws liberally of course in support
of his views upon the late Mr. Huskisson, for whose
'authority we ourselves profess to entertain no mean
consideration, and to the quotation of whose senti-
ments, as we find them cited to suit the particular
case, we are far from desiring to urge any objection. For
example an isolated passage is given from his speeches,
showing that, " there are occasions on which it is the
dity of a vigilant Government to watch the signs of the
times, and to accommodate their policy to those changes
in the world, under the continued operation of which a
blind adherence to our former system would no longer be
either safe or expedient." It may, with equal truth, be
said that it is the duty of a vigilant Government so to
time and adapt such changes as may be found advisable
in the fiscal and economical system, as that they shall
work the least possible detriment, or none at all, to inte-
rests existing, long established, and created even, by the
errors if you will, of former legislation. However
humble in extent and importance may be the interest
which contemplated changes may affect, it is entitled to
a fair hearing, and may not be rashly dealt with and sacri-
ficed upon some special assumption of general benefit. A
wise statesman will not be led astray with a false but flashy
theory about the " greatest happiness of the greatest
number," because the sacred obligation he contracts to-
wards the country at large, whose affairs he is called
upon to administer, is impartially to study the good of
every class and the prosperity of every interest alike,
that is, the greatest happiness, not of a majority alone,
but of the minority also—the good of all. Unquestion-
ably all such protections and prohibitions as are inopera-
tive to the end proposed should be mitigated or abolished.
If they are burdensome to the consumer without adequate
benefit to the home producer the case contemplated by
Mr. Huskisson would have arrived, when speaking of
" the removal of useless and inconvenient restrictions,
the doing away of prohibitions, and the lowering of
duties so excessive, as to be in fact, prohibitory on the
productions of other countries—restrictions, prohibi-
tions, and duties, which, without benefit, nay highly in-
jurious to ourselves, have produced all the evil effects,
and given rise in other parts of the world to the retalia-
tory efforts of foreign Governments to put down the
commerce of the country." It remains to prove the
special cases in point which the Chronicle, restricting it-
self within vague generalities, does not adventure upon,
although we shall not affect ignorance of the particular,
however indirect, bearingof its logic upon corn, sugar, and
timber-laws. Waiving for the present however the reference
to those importantsubjects, we shall content ourselves with
indicating the exaggerating spirit in which he is disposed to
regard the practical consequences of former modifica-
tions of our protective system. Without exactly de-
siring to impugn the motives of expediency, or of policy,
which dictated the relaxation of our navigation laws, and
the modification of the prohibitions against foreign silk
manufactures, we may observe that th beneficial results
of each have been grossly overrated. The immediate
effect of the changes in the silk trade was, as is well
known, the ruin of Macclesfield and Spitalfields—in the
case of the latter irretrievable ruin. Doubtless that
ruin might have been accomplished some years later by
the active concurrence in the silk manufacture on which
the, enterprising and intelligent capitalists and traders
of Manchester had entered, with all the appliances of
superior machinery, resources, and energy. But in
the meantime, the Spitalfields . and Macclesfield people
would have been " let down," to use a homely phrase, more
gently and by degrees, so as with the difference of time
to have gradually accommodated themselves to the revo-
lution in trade, so far as the change in its localities, which
was in course of operation. The Manchester traders
had been actively extending the silk manufacture in
that town for several years before Mr. Huskisson's fiscal
reforms were agitated or announced, and if their first
steps were naturally slow and cautious, their progress was
not the less sure. The railway locomotive does not start
" at score " at once, but is gradually accelerated in speed
after the steam power first painfully puts the train in
motion, and then carries it along at an increasing rate
until the maximum of velocity is attained for which
the power is calculated. We do not entertain the
least question ourselves but that the silk manufac-
ture would have been equally flourishing by this time
in Manchester and its neighbourhood without, as with,
Mr. Huskisson's measures, and there are few men who
have any knowledge of the subject who will gainsay the
opinion. The only real gain by any change yet operated
in respect of the silk trade consists in the removal of
those impediments, and that quasi prohibition, to the
export of raw silk conceded of late years by the French
Government.

STANDARD.—The emeute at Toulouse appears to
be at an end, and there is reason to think that the ac-
tual defiance of the law has been exaggerated, as hap-
pens universally in cases of this kind ; the cause of dis-
content—the deficiency of revenue, and the painful
pressure upon the people—scarcely admit of ex-
agxeration. Nevertheless, France continues the for-
tification of her capital and the augmentation of
her navy, no human being threatening to molest or in-
sult her—still prosecutes the wasteful and barren war in
Africa. This, which can scarcely be called by any more
respectful name than fatuity, is not to be laid to the
charge of the King. He, a man of strong sense and
benevolent dispositions, well knows that peace, con-
ducive to the happiness of all States, is indispensable to
the existence of order in France, and he will preserve
peace as long as he can. Neither are the mass of the
people to 133 bla:ned—they are kindly and well-disposed.
It is the eleventh plague—the swarm of empty and hungry
litterateurs, creatures as ravenous as the beasts of the de-
sert, and endued with just " as much reason as Heaven
gives an ape." It is this pestilent swarm of the ap-
propriation wants, the Roebucks, &c., of France, which
disorders the country as they would disorder this coun-
try, if we had not men of sense and learning (classes too
rare in France) to keep them in order. We cannot see
our way to the end of it, but we can now easily enough
forgive Napoleon's treatment of the ideologists as noxious
vermin.

MONEY MARKET and CITY N.l;:yirg.
FROM THE MORNING PAPERS OF - .ERDA Y.
,
; ESK
TIMES.—Some uneasiness was
week among the Directors of ' 'l.ansed in the middle of the
rni-London and Counti•y joint
Dighton, the rnana..:
Stock Bank by the abse....rn front business of Ms... ,Thntuts
Who disappeared under the Ilabst mys-
terious circums4,a,,
and of whom to tl'te present time no
trace see
r:4 to have been found either by the Directors or his
furfiy. When his absence was stAcovered, the Directors, it is
-said, examined the books east, and securities of the Bank, and
had the satisfaction to It.nd that nothing whatever had been
misappropriated. Thus the integrity of Mr. Dighton is by nu
means affected by his absence, and all anxiety of the Directors
is at an end, excepting that concerning the fate of the chief
officer of their establishment.
POST.—Something of a project for the capitalization of
the dividend of the AetiVe Debt of Spain for the half year end-
ing November 1, 1837, or the first lapsed dividend under the
Toreno arrangement of 1834, is said to have been submitted to
the Cortes, anti we are appealed to upon the subject, the holders
of the Trtr.Sury bonds given in lieu of the money for the said
divide del being desirous of knowing whether • the new Minister
of Finance has really such a scheme in contemplation or not.
Without having any special information upon the subject, we
should hope there must be some inaccuracy in the announce-
ment ; for, to suppose otherwise, would be to assume upon in-
adequate authority, that Seno. Surra y Bull is not only net the
honest man he has been represented to be, and one who is well
affected towards the people of this country, but further, it must be
assumed also that his financial legislation will, at the very outset,
be based upon the most unpardonable ignorance. According
to the new synopsis which has appeared in the papers, M.
Rull proposes to convert the Coupons in question, as repre-
sented by the Treasury Bonds, into a Three per Cent. Stock,
with five per cent. interest to December, 1840. No w, after
all the discussion that has taken place respecting this portion
of the Spanish debt, it seems incredible that any man who
enters upon the office of Finance Minister of Spain should be
so consummate a blockhead as not to know that the conversion
of the November dividend of 1836 has been literally effected
and in the moat complete, the most binding form already ;
that the bonds given for it are guaranteed by special decrees,
with an interest of five per cent. per annum, and that those
decrees have never been revoked. Don Carlos was at the
gates of Madrid with the Treasury bonds—the promissory
notes of the Queen, Cortes, and Mendizabel, and backed by
the Ambassador in London, were issued by Mr. I. L. Golds-
mid. The language of the Minister was to the effect-that what-
ever might be th demands upon his Exchequer, good faith should
be observed towards the holders of these temporary substitutes
for hard cash. The payment was advertised with all the for-
mality that the English Minister advertises the payment of
Exchequer Bills, first, on a given a day, when the price ad-
vanced to 65, while the ordinary debt was at no more than 20,
and next (for the word of the Embassy was braken), within a
short delay. The " The " short ditty" has been a delay of
nearly five years. In this disgraceful position the matter has
been left ; and it remains to be seen whether an engagement
of so pacific, so delicate a character—an engagement, moreover,
requiring no more than some 10,000/. sterling per annum in
interest is to be dissolved by a dash of the confiscatory pen of
Senor Rull or any other Minister—whether the five per cent.
obligation exigible in cash, surrounded by the most solemn
guarantees that three languages can express, is to be extracted
from the han'ts of the holder, and a worthless three, or two, or
one per cent., bond given in its stead.
Portugal has been base in many things. Ste, too,
1 1 inpma
oon,td, ;be in
out her Treasury paper, and failed, to this d.
"...y. to redeem it,
Hitherto, however, she has, at all eee:',3, ass given
the greet 1.0 ray
We abstain from purs:an,-stms*'l;Wri7:l3 'Ll'i.t
ei ioi..
tiit. Lc.i.
punctually the half-yearly stint'
._, ;-:,...ihad.
sent. Senor Ft.':. nu it;6'eigh.ett itidi., stv6iy. . thin grew&
have done
the ...gainst the finantibl tYA.paslteli ot is nation upon
;-;conerty of tortigoets,istAl It i 9 hard to believe he can have
eohotanitgeAdhis coat tO cluititly after taking office. But should it
turn tet 'AA the published project is anything more than a
Impudent fabrication, intended to injure his thariiitir
Atnigorlfanhl!a,naowcueLr,cyteoorntaasiGneeloyritdsaihnnialiwld,hna(tititle:phtarcifgahelh:„lntrrectitliltyftitih:litiiiiiiit6l32apes;kyt:,
tthheewmisehanowf
the
ee
former that
trhiattits;tier:kshi:sttill.:indif3the'en,4l: at
intor Court, and this will
..sury Bondholders if ettieertoaintk.lyatce.pe
‘ito.hdeki'C'etihrOi;i;
itpt4nertyY sailthe
to be meditated should be pe '5
l'ered in. The public are be-
ginning to awaken front their
lethargy, and to open their eyes
to the gross delusions •
practised upon them. Sir C. Williams's
address to the Wakefields the other day in the Court of Bank-
ruptcy was worthy of the
individual. . The bankrupts had evi-
dently, by the manner •
in which they spoke of their want of
" rectitude," no just con •
until it was
Placed
in
sheception of the magnitude of their guilt
The mass of fraud and strongeste light before them.
face of the foreign loan anr
fiunption concealed under the stirs
before long be exposed to a wonde •
ancial sys'em, will of 'necessity
___ .ring nation.
IT"

TENNA, JULY 16.—Prince Metternich
quite recovered, and will go to_ morrow to Bohemia, wis
here
part of his family and several persons employed in his office are
already gone. Count Fiquelinont went
shoit yesterday on a
leave of absence to Carlsbad, where the. otkiktess has been for
sqra eweeks.

it 't~.~