The Sun.
London, England, 1841-06-22 00:00:00

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LONDON:
TUESDAY, JUNE 22, 1841.

In the House of Lords much of the business of
the session was wound up by that last act of
legislation, the Royal assent, which was given
to a great number of public and private Bills.
We refer to our report for their names.
On the third reading of the Criminal Justice
Bill being moved, the Earl of WILTON moved
that Manchester be exempted from its opera-
tion. After some conversation on the pro-
priety of giving compensation to the Town Clerk
of Manchester, their Lordships divided, and the
amendment was carried by 70 to 36. The Bill
was then read a third time. _ _

Some conversation subsequently took place
about that inviting subject the Clonmel Union,
in conjunction with Poor-laws in Ireland, in
which the Marquis of WESTMEATII and the Earl
of MOUNTCASHEL had the greater part.

Their Lordships adjourned without transacting
any other business of importance, except receiv-
ing petitions.
In the Commons, after the presentation of a
great number of petitions,
Mr. WAKLEY brought the invention of Mr.
WARNER again under the notice of the House,
and moved for some correspondence between the
First Lord of the Treasury and Mr. WARNER ;
but after obtaining an expression of sympathy for
that gentleman and his ingenious invention, with-
drew his motion in the expectation that the subject
will be brought forward in the next Parliament.
The Lords' amendments to the Bribery at Elec-
tions, the Controverted Elections Trial, and the
Criminal Law Amendment Bills, were severally
agreed to.
Lord JOHN RUSSELL presented her MAJESTY'S
answer to the address on the Danish Claims. Her
MAJESTY said she would comply with the request
as soon as the House of Commons gave her the
means of doing so. The House rose before
seven o'clock. With the exception of the for-
mal act of prorogation, so ends the first Parlia-
liament of the reign of Queen VICTORIA.

We have, from time to time, both by extracts
from pamphlets and remarks of our own, endea-

voured to show that the farmers are injured by
the Corn-laws, and would be benefited by
abolishing them. We learn with pleasure, from
various quarters, that the fume's themselves
begin to entertain a similar opinion. Lord PAL-
MERSTON, for example. tells us that the farmers
about Tiverton do not believe that the Govern-
ment measures are an attack on the agricul-
turists. Mr. VILLIERS has published a letter
from a respectable Agriculturist in one of the
southern counties of England, who bears a
strong testimony to the injuriousness of these
laws to the farmers. The Agriculturist says :
I should have thought the summer of 1840 would have
convinced every landlord and farmer in the country of
the bad working of the law. Wheat, in June 1840,
averaged 70s. per quarter. The farmer had all his ex-
penses to pay during the summer after that high rate, but not
one farmer in ten had wheat to sell; but when he came
into market, Michaelmas 1840, to sl.l the growth of
that summer, he was obliged to take froln 525. to 58s.
per quarter in November, when he sells the greatest
quantity of that summer's growth (see the muTket quo-
tations for Aylesbury, Chichester, and Winchester); and
the mischief does not end there: it laid the foundajon
for future mischief. He is called on by his landlord to pay
a higher rent, and tenants are actually at this moment
consenting to pay an advance rent from ten to thirty per
cent. on account of the late high prices. It is in this
way that rents are got up, and men are forced into con-
tracts it is impossible to fulfil, and when a bountiful
\year comes, and prices fall, the country is filled with
accounts of agricultural distress, and you then see the
landlord going with the tenant in joetitioning Parliament
Ito do something for the land6d interest, alleging
that if something be not done the land will be thrown
out of cultivation, the tenant will be ruined, and the poor
labourer starved. They do not say' one word about the
amount of rent they are receiving, being out of all pro-
portion as to that part the landlord is fairly entitled to,
and it is that alone that causes all the tenant's misfor-
tunes and sorrows. The landlords, with 'all their cunning,
will soon find out they have had their day.

This gentleman writes from practical know-,
ledge of individual cases; but it is quite certain,
as a general rule, that prices will be high
in summer when,the farmer has got nothing to
sell, and low about Norember, when his crops
come to market. The modus operandi in all
cases, seems to us to be this. We speak of
tenants who hire land not of landowners.
The farmer is under an obligation to pay rent
at Michaelmas, and the higher the rent in pro-
portion to his capital the more stringent the
obligation. Besides his rent, he has a number
of tradesmen's bills to pay about the same period.
To meet these various obligations, he is obliged,
in the majority of cases, to send the principal
part of his crops to market, as soon as possible
after he has gathered them in. The Agricul-
turist says, that not one in ten of the farmers has
any wheat to sell about the month of June, which
is a tolerably fair representation of the whole
body of farmers. Nine out of ten of them are
obliged to send their crops to market to meet
their various obligations before Christmas.
The farmer's produce is not at once bought by

the consumers or millers, but by corn-dealers,
and other monied capitalists. By at once taking
the farmer's crop off his hands, they save
him the trouble of continually seeking for cus-
tomers for small portions, and supply him with
funds to carry on his farming operations for
the next year. He has the wages of plough-
men and sowers to pay, and the keep of his
horses to provide, though he must wait till the
following harvest before he reaps the fruit of
their labour. Undoubtedly it is advantageous to
him to find a wholesale dealer to buy his crops,
but the person who buys is a monied man,
connected with other monied men, and they un-
derstand how to work the markets so as to give the
farmer, who must sell, as small a price as possible
for his produce. In fact this is necessary for the
corn-dealers, in order that they may, on selling
again, realise a profit. Their business is to watch
the market, with their money in their hands, to
buy cheap and sell dear. That is the principle of
all mercantile transactions. Acting on this prin-
ciple, and having the means of command-
ing the market, it comes to pass in
bthyetheinAarrictuylturiosft, that the faasrmerm
corn at a low price in November,
andseenlltiliasosnhetidos
pay wages and buy all he needs
through the
summer at a high price. This is the nature of
things under the present right of property; and
it points out distinctly the disadvantage the far-
mer lies under, in relation to the monied capital-
ist, in consequence of the pecuniary engage-
ments which the former must fulfil about Mi-
chaelmas,

We do not complain of this compulsion on the
farmer to sell ; on the contrary, we regard it as
one of those conditions which arise in society,
without being planned or designed by human
wisdom, which are extremely beneficial. Unless
the agriculturist, in consequence of his pecuniary
obligations, and in consequence of the great ad-
vances he has made, and the debts he has in-
curred, were compelled to sell his produce, he
would be able to withhold fbod from the people,
and starve all other classes into submission to his
will. If the bulk of the agriculturists, instead of
having nothing at Midsummer, had then in their
own possession the whole of the crops, if they could
live for more than one year, without selling any
part of their produce, the lives of the rest of
the community would be at their mercy. The in-
debtedness, therefore, f the agriculturists, which
is their general condition as the harvest comes
on—the fact that the whole of the crops, as they
stand on the ground, and are gathered into their
barns, though in their possession do not belong
to them, keeps them dependent on others, and
puts an end to their monopoly of the food of the
community. We have now to apply the fact of