The Sun.
London, England, 1841-09-04 00:00:00

DISTRESSED CONDITION OF
THE ILk.ND-LOOM WEAVERS.
PUBLIC TEA PARTY IN MANCHESTER.
MINGHESTER, WEDNESDAY.—Last evening a public
tea party took place in the Corn Exchange, in this place,
in aid of the distressed hand-loom weavers. Upwards of
500 ladies and gentlemen sat down under the Presidency
of John Brooks, Esq., Alderman. There are up-
wards of 7,000 hand-loom wearers in this town and the
suburbs ; of these fully one-third are entirely without
employ. ; another third are only partially employed ;
and the utmost earnings of those in full employment do
not exceed 7s. per week. At the late Ministerial Confe-
rence in this town, it was fully demonstrated that the
distress' of this unfortunate class of men was immensely
aggravated, if not originated, by the operation of the
cruel restrictions on the importation of corn. This fact
being clearly established, great weight has been added
to the arguments of the advocates for a free trade in corn.
Amongst the company present were—Sir Thomas
Potter ; James Curtis, Esq., of Ohio, United States ; D.
Ainsworth, Esq., Boroughreeve of Manchester ; the
Reverends D. Nearne, W. Gadsby, J. W. Massie, &c.,
&c. After the cups " which cheer, but not inebriate,"
had circulated for about an hour, under the brilliant
auspices of a galaxy of Lancashire witches, the cloths
were drawn, and the following hymn was sung by the
whole of the company :
Great God, to thee, and thee a'one
Our country's woes are fully known:
The most severe, and widely spread,
Are want of work, and want of bread.
"Both might abound throughout the land,
If men obey'd Thy jnst command ;
But there are those, our island's shame,
Who by a law their mischief frame.

"Regardless of the poor they live ;
Their• pride and folly, Lord forgive ;
May they be wise, to know betimes,
The signs of these eventful times.

With pity view the sons of need ;
0 Lord, arise, their cause to plead ;
Break thou the proud oppressor's rod,
And show thyself the righteous God.
We meet this night that we may aid
Those who in deep distress are laid ;
We meet to pledge ourselves anew,
Our glorious object to pursue.

" Nor will we pause, nor will we rest,
Till these, our wrongs, have been redress'd ;
On thee, 0 God, the poor man's friend,
Our hopes rely—deliverance send."
The CHAIIIMAN, after alluding to the very great extent
of the distress which prevailed, observed that no good
could be done without going to the root of the evil. For
his own part he had thrown away party distinctions; he
was for free trade, which would go to the root of the evil,
and nothing else.—(Applause.)
The Rev. J. W. MAssiE announced that donations to
the amount of about 141. had been received for the cause
of the hand-loom weavers, and that many of the expenses
attending the tea party had been gratuitously defrayed.
He related an instance which he had heard from one of
the registrars in the town, of a weaver having died a few
days ago from literal want of food, and mentioned. se-
veral other cases of extreme distress. He stated that the
memorial from the Ministerial Conference had been pre-
sented to the Queen last Monday, and that her Majesty
had directed it to be stated that she had graciously re-
ceived it. Had its presentation not taken place till she
was surrounded by a band of monopolists, a very different
answer would have been returned.—(Cheers.)
The Rev. DANIEL. NEAItNE stated that in one street
alone in his neighbourhood last week, twenty-six fami-
lies out of thirty houses rose in the morning without
knowing where to get a morsel of food. Unless God
changed the hearts of our rulers, it was impossible to
conceive hoW the winter was to be got over. The
hand-loom weavers who, in 1835, with corn at 365. per
quarter received ss. 9d. a cut, now, when corn was at
G9s., only got 2s. 91 a cut.—(Bear, hear.) The increase
of sickness in the town was frightful to contemplate.
On his way down to that meeting he had visited three
persons who were suffering from English cholera in its
worst form.

JAMES CURTIS, Esq., of Ohio, United States, said he
was inclined to think that that pity and that charity
which the hand-loom weavers would most value, would
be that which would put men's hands into their pockets
in the first place, and in the next place that which would
devise some sort of means for bringing them out of their
difficulties ; for he could not bring himself to believe
that a class of Englishmen, so numerous asthe hand-loom
weavers, would wish to depend on charity.—(Applause.)
In the hymn that had been sung, they had stated
their greatest want to be " want of work and want
of bread ;" they wished, by the labour of their own
hands, to support themselves in that independence
which was one of the first characteristics of English-
men.—(Cheers.) It was capable of the most perfect de-
monstration that the hand of private charity never could
relieve the constant wants of a suffering communit in
vire- rand m wnren zney nvecr.--xxer wurau
any theory, but simply a practical plan. ng and had
been very fond of colonizing • why could she not be re-
lieved by it ? In Russia and near the shores of the
Black Sea there was a great corn-growing country, im-
mense plains spread out, where corn could be grown very
cheap. Why should not a large number of individuals,
who wanted work, go to those fertile, corn-growing
plains, and raise all the wheat we needed ? All they
wished for in return was simply to be paid for their
work, and he presumed we should do that. It was pro-
bable, too, the Emperor of Russia would be very
glad to have; Englishmen come as his subjects to
raise bread in his country, and would give them some
privileges. England had an abundance of capital
which might be laid out in the construction of canals
and other means of conveyance for the corn to be
thus raised. If Englishmen were so numerous, why
should they not go to the land where wheat might be
raised in abundance ? He did net know any exact an-
swer to this, except that the experiment had been tried
before. Something like two hundred years ago, Eng-
land had sent out a great number of her citizens to a far
distant land, a corn-growing land ; the population of that
colony now amounted to seventeen millions of souls ; and
one would suppose that that was enough of the Anglo-
Saxon race to supply food for those who remained be-
hind. What was the reason, in a land which could
raise more and better wheat than the plains of Moldavia
or Russia, that the great tide of emigration which had
already gone out could not supply the portion 'who re-
mained behind ? If there was any.power at all in colo-
nization to supply the home wants of this island, why
could not the immense colonization already effected by
England furnish that supply ?—(Hear, hear.) Not
only had they sent out seventeen millions of people
to North America, but those men had actually raised
the bread, and got it ready to send to us ; our
kindred across the water had done this.—(Hear, hear.)
In the colonization which had been carried on, we had
one of the strongest proofs history could furnish of the
over-ruling providence of God, for the very hour when
this island was filled with inhabitants who wanted bread,
those colonists, whom we had sent abroad, or who, in
the good providence of God, had been led abroad, had
the very supplies we needed.—(Hear, hear.) And if
they were kept away from us, the blame ought not to
be attributed to Providence • he had furnished a supply
for all the wants of all mankind ; it ought to be attri-
buted to the folly or ignorance of man.—(Cheers.) In
America there was, at the present moment, an abun-
dant supply of food for the whole of England. If the
amount which America could send abroad at this mo-
ment were brought to England, thctre would be enough
for every Englishman. And if there was an open trade,
the very articles which England had to sell and wished
to exchange for that food, were those which America
wished to receive in rettirn.—(Cheers.) But it should
be borne in mind that the supply at present
in hand in North America was not the
same that it would have been had there been a regular
trade between this country and America. It .was not to
be supposed that individuals descended from those intel-
ligent, enterprising men, who emigrated from foreign
climes, would pile up their wheat to rot in their own
granaries, when they had no market 'for it. If they
found there was no market abroad, they would produce
abundance for the home market, to be sure ; they would
turn their attention to other matters than raising wheat
to rot ; if they did not, Englishmen would disown them.
—(Applause.) In considering the ability of America to
supply this country with food, it should be remembered
that she had an immense territory, an abundance of land
of the greatest fertility ; it therefore became the interest
of America to abandon all things else in favour of the
cultivation of the soil, agriculture being the most profit-
able employment—the production of the raw material
and of food, to feed and clothe mankind.—(Applause.)
If she could derive from abroad the other supplies she
needed, the principal employment in America would be
agriculture ; it would be her natural and most profitable
employment. But the course of England—America's most
natural market—had been to refuse to suffer Americans to
carry forward their agricultural employment with any
profit ; she had forced them, in fact, into manufacturing
and supplying all those wants which an agricultural po-
pulation felt ; and, at the present time, this course being
continued, America was, to a very great extent, supply-
ing her own wants. The manufacturers there manufac-
tured at a profit ; because, by this course, agriculture
was reduced to a level with the profits of manufacturers,
and the two classes of employment were on a level, or
something like it. But let England once offer to take,
at a fair price, the agricultural produce of America, and
they should immediately restore their agriculture to that
natural advantage which it had in that country, from
the h h
n
the cheapness and abundance of land ; and the manufac-
turers would, at once, turn their attention m ore
profitable employment.—(Applause.) I
wished to compete with American
manufacturers,
a no'untia ue re sn,
in that land a more profitable em. p ,
the only way to do it was to render agriculture
their manufactures, or any thing but,
hear.) It was not by underrrtale,ilisleg. to shiuftEnogu-t
Eng-
land wished to break up the manufactures of America,
the very way was to take as much as she possibly could
of the agricultural produce of America.—(Applause.)
The commerce of America at present nearly equalled
that of Great Britain, and it was rapidly advancing upon
the latter. The American tonnage consisted of about
two millions—that of England was something larger—not
a /great deal. America, at the present time, manufao-