The Sun.
London, England, 1841-01-05 00:00:00

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS.

(nog THE MORNING PAPERS OF THIS DAY.)
(From the Times.)
A dispute has arisen between the Colonial-office
and some of the emigration-mongers upon the means of
regulating the exportation of emigrants to the British
colonies- It hall been observed that in those new
countries where land is to be bad for little more than
the trouble of taking possession, no settler is content
to labour for a master ; that each longs to be an owner
of much more than he can cultivate—that, conse-
quently, much of the land is wholly neglected—and
that even the portion wrought is rather scratched than
tilled. It was found that this lack of labourers was a
difficulty not easily to be remedied ; since no colonial
proprietor was willing to incur the expense of importing
husbandmen, whose whole object would be at the ear-
liest
possible moment to throw up their contracts, and
quit the working for the pyoprietary class, thereby in-
creasing instead of diminishing the disproportion be-
tween the appropriated land and the labour. It was
then inferred, that if the Ceown, the universal owner
of the soil, were to raise the sale price of the
lands, and employ the proceeds in the impor-
tation of labourers, the requisite proportion be-
tween the land and the labour would be restored ;
inasmuch as capitalists would not pay great prices for
allotments which they could not work, and labourers
would be obliged to continue for some time in the
earning of wages before their savings would enable
them to become cultivators on their own account.
This principle was adopted by the Government, and
the " Emigration" or " Colonial Land Board," ap-
pointed by and under the Colonial-office, has already
obtained, from the sale of Crown lands, considerable
sums, the balance whereof remaining in each respec-
tive colony (after meeting such exigencies of its local
government as must have been otherwise unpro-
vided for) has been expended in the exportation of
labourers thither. It is on the propriety of that
deduction for local government that the main schism
has occurred between the emigrationists and the
colonial administration ; and the money question,
the financial pressure, has here had a strong opera-
tion in keeping Ministers right. The demand for
the application of the whole fund to the exportation of
labour being strongly pressed upon them by some of
their Radical supporters, they would have been but
too much reason to expect the compliance of Govern-
ment, had not this been happily made impossible
by the pecuniary circumstances of the case. The ex-
penses of the local governments were increasing, and
with them was increasing also the indisposition of Per-
liament to vote the money of the mother country for
defraying. them. Ministers, therefore, in this one
lucky instance, had no choice but to do what was
right in despite of their supporters. The emigra:ion-
ists, opposing the Government on this subject, are of
that very common, not to say vulgar, class of modern
philosophers, who, when they have got hold of a princi-
ple, insist upon working it to the last extremity. Because
the colonization of our transmarine possessions can
in no way be so safely and speedily advanced as by
making the land defray the means of its own eulti.
variation, therefore it is concluded that every shidieg of
prico diverted from the freight of labourers is lost to
the interesms of colonization. Ia this plCnosophy man
is regarded not as a creature .having passions, affec-
tions, moral faculties, and powers—formed for society
and destined for heaven—but as a inure implement
of husbandry, a self-impelling steam-plough, and the
number of hands makes the sum of the colony. Go-
vernment, law, police, reads, bi-i,lges, wharfs, emltack-
ma-nts, public bulldogs, the practical sciences, the arts
of. life, the schools of human and avine int,truction—
ail these main necessaries of out earthly cxistence are
omitted in the provision of the philosopiiieal enii,tr a-
tionist. ihu dou:,t all these things cost mom-y,
make at first a lerce deduction front the fend which
; you desire to erupl.,y so (xclosinly ulion the freight of
I hunt In cargoes, but without th-ot the c...r,:;oes are ge.,A
for nothing d lirered. You might just as well
refuse to hesto N any part of the fund upon the
v:ctnaiiing of the tolags, or upon the pro% iulna f
dwellings or tools for your labourers at the 1:l: cc el
their destioatina. The priocipie Lich s::ouhl be im-
pressed on tie! minds of ail who tithe an interest in
eel)e:z.Con is, that Ilic mere lo(cii.-:n 0/ a ct•riaiii pro-
! p0..'2,n uj lalirniciv upon a cci.tato allotment of laid
will ,T,l make a co.' ny. Sucli a pLmtatio3, without
rot t! C 'IIIIIIM I:lSti:u!:ens and some m tral and
religious connexion, to bind, and at tarm.:s to briog togc-
tact-, the s..lattcred ittliah.tants cf the wild courttry, is but
one dcgret•, if at all, aboze the state of the huotor-tribes
of North America. The emigrants mty have hater
tools twit those aborigines, and follow tame flecks of
shsop instead cf w 11l herds of huff.does ; but for any thing
Ott raises min above his animal condition, the friend
of human nature will search in vain among the English
colonithts, if' the Government shall ever fall into the
views of those who think that the only legitimate r.p-
pliztation of Inc land-rund is to export the maximum
of hands. The State has no right, end._ r the pretence
of relieving n crowded populwien, to send a portion of
it beyond the reach of moral improvement and reli-
. ;lints iteetrucci in. With the wca4ll which our M.ilU-
fictures have brought to on, we have contracted corre-
lative duties to the pepulat:oe which they have bred ;
and we ere not entitled, for the sake of relieving our-
selves from co much more of our incumbent pauper:sm,
to huddle out a mass of people without those provisions
which constitute the necessaries and very el,meots of a
civilized community. In older countries, the amount
expended on public objects is defrayed limn taxation
upon private property ; it is the good fortune of new
colonies that theme is unappropriated land, the land of
the public, available for this purpose, without the levy
of taxes. But if the State is content to waive all pre-
sent benefit to its exchequer in the sale of the public
land, the least which that land can be expected to yield
is the sufficient and complete maintenance, social as
well as physical, religious as well as civil, of the f.sing
na,iens that are planted on it.
(From the Morning Chronicle.)
We must once more entreat all the Liberal electors
of Walsall to think only now of returning Mr. Smnith.
Those who may feel off.nded at the proceedings
adopted-with regard to Mr. Lyttelton, would do well
to reflect, that if a mistake has been committed, no
good can result from committing another. It would be
a grievous mistake to leave any means untried by which
the return of Mr. Gladstone can be prevented. We
would entreat those supporters of Mr. Lyttclton, who
may be offended at what has taken place, to consider
that Mr. S:nith would in every respect be suitable re-
presentative for Walsall. If, then, they withhold their
support from Mr. Smith, they are responsible for the re-
' turn of Mr. Gladstone, It will not do to say that if the
Radicals and advocates of tree trade had stood by r.
L) ttclton, Mr. Gladstone would have been defeated.
Mr. Lyttelton is no longer in the field, and the
I fault of others canuot justify any portion of the elec-
tors entertaining Liberal opinion', in disrrgarding the
positive duty of supporting a Liberal. They would
not be more culpably were they to vote for Gladstone,
than in refusing to vote for Mr. Smith , if they thereby
1 secure the return of the former. If faults have been
committed, the fitting time for going iota them is not
when the enemy is in field. Were we in the situa:ion
of those supporters of Mr. Lyttelton, who conceive
that gentlemen to have been ill used, the reproof we
should administer would be to exert our utmost eller-
'
gme.s on behalf of Mr. Smith. It gives us much satis•
faction to learn that the enthusiasm of the men of
Walsall has been roused, and the best hopes are enter-
tained that that place will have the distinction of re-
turning a stanch advocate of free trade to the House
of Commons. Much will it rejoice us to find that the
estimate we had been taught to form of the spirit and
independence of the men of Walsall is below their me-
rits, Their return of Mr. Smith at this time will have a
most salutary influence. We need not add, that
every manufacturing town in England is now looking
anxiously towards Walsall, and they would derive fresh
courage from the return of an advocate of free trade,
after a Tory had been fifteen days in the field, and made
himself sure of victory from the faults committed by the
Liberals. The Radicals and advocates of free trade
will, unquestionably, support Mr. Smith. If be fail to
be returned, the circumstance still serve to widen the
breach elsewhere between the different divisions of
Liberals. We entreat the Whigs of 'Walsall and its
vicinity, who possessinfluence in that place, to reflect
on the possible consequences elsewhere of any haek•
wardness on their part at this time. Let the past be
forgotten—it cannot be recalled. The effect of such a
geacnous course of conduct cannot fail to operate most
beneficially. Once more, then, we call on all the Li-
berals to unite, and act cordially. The return of a
Tory, through the blunders of any portion of the Li-
berals, will reflect disgrace on all.
(From the Morning Herald.)
The following paragraph is copied front the Lincoln
Mercury :
" The picture \S". Uilathorne, D.D., Vicar-General of
New Holland and Van aernen'a Land, gives of time suffer-
jetre of the convicts at the penal settlements of Norfolk
Moreten Bay, atrl Part Arthur, is truly horrifying.
and are subjeet to trio.
'ai;',hpliceaTtrit:tos of the lainshehaat;l-hgea‘nvgil'i'of the overseer, and at
night and on Sendays are locked up in square portable
boxes, 1(3 being crJwdcd together in a space considerably
less than two feet square for each person : time food on
Norfolk Island is salt meat and maize bread; and, mark
the recklesseess of life induced by the dreadful sufferings,
'so indiErent had even life become, that murders were
committed in cold blood; the rnurde,,relr,istf;:irevrtinari. dsbdt:tctllamri
i,"4 that be had no ill-fecling
Bgain t
Lis sele objr.et real to obhiii his own relea,v. Lets were
altarcstn cast; tic man on wi:pm t
irnsrorite.; itsteiedwtch d
,fe
12eciend,
g
for a time trod talc sceacs of daily miseries to
appear n the
to ttion
r ere:tit:it: they kmmcw they shoal be
Mr. NlEverel deelarsr of wretchedness.' An, t,t,-,1 itLiu
four yearg, 'many 0,c;14
t Sidn~ altlhour•lt after
ferr:-d stffrivg death that of 74 be saw exec,. `,
rtilelerencaxinczce!ceu:
u(:
sOlt
ent
steoa fiNoolrlicitkbalt Jana
like t
A system of
aho,e deserihcd, and wl,;:-'21:ItY
dornini,tns the notion of ttithit the 13; iii 1h
and tort 2rc,
calcu-
lated convert criminals into c upon car
,+, defeatc'lC-
-14-hzit should be the great olajeie of all lecal punish-

ment, the reformation of the offender. Examples of
cruelty committed even upon criminals have a tend. I
ency to propagate themselves, and to induce the com-
mission of greater crimes than they punish. The un-
doubted right of society to correct and coerce the vio-
lators of the laws, does not extend to the infliction of
wanton cruelty, or, indeed, of any cruelty at all. It is
possible that not one of the malefactors subjected to
the system of truly barbarous infliction, prac-
tised as shove described at .the penal settle-
ments of Norfolk Island, Moreton Bay, and
Port Arthur, ever committed an offence so
atrocious as the mode of punishment thus enforced.
That such a mode of punishment should drive men
from' less to greater crimes, is not at all to be wondered
at. When a Government takes pains to make demons
of human beings,- they will not fail to act up to the
character thus artificially created. When hope is ex-
cluded from the human mind, what is there to check
the most terrible and guilty suggestions of despair ?
Of the criminals in the penal settlements which we have
mentioned it may be truly said-
-- Hope never comes
That comes to all, but torture without end
Still urges, and a penal system fed
By ever-burning vengeance unconsumed.

This is not the system of enlightened justice. It is a
mode of punishment, brutal and ferocious, savouring
more of the wild rage of insatiable vengeance than the
usual severity of judicious coercion. Who that hears
of such foul cruelties committed, in the desecrated
name of public justice, can wonder that to the help-
less, hopeless, agonised victims of such infernal tor.
ment, "so indifferent had even life become, that mut,
ders were committed in cold blood—the murderer
afterwards declaring that he bad no ill-feeling against
his victim, but that his sole object was to obtain his own
release." Thus the offender who had stolen a sheep,
or committed a robbery on the highway without per-
sonal violence, is stimulate:l to dip his hands in the blood
of his fellow-creature, for the purpose of getting rid of
the earthly torments inflicted in the name of justice, and
thus—still more horrible—are immortal souls qualifiedfor
perdition! If such a picture of a miscalled system of pe-
nal justice had not been given on the high authority of
the Vicar-General of New Holland and Van Diemen's
Land, we could ; not have credited its horrible accuracy.
We are aware, indeed, that of late years the Judges in
England have been accustomed to tell persons sentenced
to transportation for various offences, more especially it
the term of banishment was for life, that they were
about to go to a land of slavery, where their time would
be passed in the terrible servitude and degradation of
ironed gangs, &c. ; but we did not know, we could not
imagine, that a system of cruelty prevailed at those
penal settlements so dreadful and savage in its nature.
as to be truly diabolical, and only productive of diabo-
lical deeds. Let the civilised and Christian people of
England only thick what the system of punishmen!
must be which, causes the convicts to determine upon
committing murder upon some person (perhaps a fellow
convict), against whom they have no malice whatever,
and having conspired,to commit murder, then to cast
lots to ascertain who is to perpetrate it, that they on
whom the lot does not fall may have a temporary res-
pite from their torments, by their being taken to the
court at Sydney to appear as %vitneses against the
gu'ty wretch who has been their instrument in commit-
ting the deed of blood ! We have then the testimony
of the Rev. Mr. M'Everal, that of seventy-four con-
victs whom he saw executed within four years, many
declared on the scaffold that they preferred suffering
death to bk ing sent to Norfolk Island. Here we
find such is the system of wholesale butchery of human
beings in New S4uth Wales, that one clergyman has
had to attend seventy-four ccnvicts to the gallows in
the course of four years ! With such examples of
barbarity in the system which tlgraces the name of
pubic justice, who can Wender if the result be to
multiply crime t.y f:lniiliarising the population with such
Lrutal and ftroriens practices? What a specimen of
the enlightened pole of our ColonVt Government.
(From the !t riling Pcst.)

The Walesa!) election is a source of great pain to
our Ministerial Centiouporeries, and threatens to in-
fl ct a mortify ieg (ally we not, in their present state
of weakness in the House of Cemroons, call it a
reinous ?) discomfiture upon their efficial patrons.
What makes thie, the unkindest cut of all is that the
the fete! wound is ascribed to the Anti-Corn-he
League, a confederecy which the MMisterial party and
its cunning emissaries and agents called into being in
tho espectation and for the purpose of drawing rain-
fdrcienent from its strength at or cry election contest.
Mr'. Spencer Lyttelton was the Ministerial candidate,
aid the Anti•Cormlaw Lents:riming sent a deputation
from Alenchester to ascertain how be intended, in the
ei.ent of his election, to act in P irliement upon the snb-
ject of the Corn-lice, lie, not being able to pledge him-
self, to- the extent of their views, withdrew from the coo-
teat. This is all that can fairly be called narrative up to
the time of Mr. Lyttleton's retirement. When, how-
ever, the Chronicle tend Globe add to this that
the return of the Whig candidate would have been se-
cu .a but for this interfery nee of the Anti-Corn-law
League, they plainly cease to nate :te, and begin to sur-
mise or invent. •Mr. Bolton, who, in a letter to the
Ch;-o;:icic, describes himself as the professional agent ol
Mr. Lyttelton, tells a very different tale ; to wit, that
from the first Mr. Lyttelton had but an indifferent
chance of success, ia consequence of the inherent weak-
ness of the Ministerial cause. "It is well known," says
this gentleman, " that Mr. Finch was returned by a
small majority. The borough registration on the part
of the Liberals has since been almost totally neglected ;
while on-the part cf the Tories active preparations
hare been made to increase their numbers." And again—
" It became obvious to Mr. Lytteltou's friends that
a candidate of Radical opinions stood not even a chance
of sucees', while nothing but the most perfect unity
of all classes of Reformers, and their indefati-
gatle exertions, could effect- the return of a Whig
candidate." And this union having been ef-
fected, and these exertions made—what then? The
certainty of success to the Whig candidate ? By no
means. M. Bolton, though the professional agent of
the discomfited candidate, and naturally, therefore.
more annoyed and disappointed than any body else by
the sudden termination of a contest which was at least
good for him, has too much regard to truth to say any-
thing like this. If such was the state of the Ministe-
rial cause at Walsall in the hands of Mr. Lyttelton,
what must it be now ? The retirement of this gentle-
man was the signal for a search after a candidate more
active, anxious, and indiscriminate than party zeal or
party despair ever before occasioned. 'The very lanes
and hedges of political life were eagerly visited to see
whether some guest to the electioneering feast of the
men of all grades of political opinion" at Walsall
might not be found and trepanned. Even Dr. Bow-
ring was sent for, and, if our Ministerial Contem-
poraries spoke truth, was silly enough to go down
to see the state of preparation for the Liberal banquet.
The view seems to have effected the free-trade and
polyglot Doctor with a considerable degree of nausea,
for be suddenly vanished out of sight, and has been
heard of no more. The affair at Waleell stands as well as
the Conservatives could desire, for, in addition to a certain
triumph, it promises them a good deal of fun, a fore-
taste of which it already yields. Our Ministerial
Contemporaries the Globe and Chronicle are labour-
ing to persuade the Liberals of Walsall that, as those
among them who are for the repeal of the Corn-
laws would :not co-operate in the election of a re-
presentative, with those who are not for a repeal,
it is the duty of the latter to co-operate with the
former ; that it is for the interest and honour of all
to be unanimous to-day in support of a can-
didate who is a repealer, though it was for
the interest and honour of all yesterday to be
unanimous in support of a candidate who is an anti-
repealer ; that, in a word, the Corn-law question, upon
which for two years they have been labouring to agitate
the country, which they always describe as the question
• upon the decision of which the prosperity of the country
and the material welfare of the great masses of its
people wholly depend, is so utterly worthless and in-
significant a. question that it ought not of itself; and in-
dependently of the party object of keeping the Whigs
in place, to determine so much -as a single vote at
a popular election. This is very droll ;but, at the same
time, very contemptible drollery. It is a remarkable illus-
tration of the party character and motive of the Anti-Corn-
law agitation that not one of the Ministerial grumblers at
the conduct of the Manchester delegates who interfered
in the matter of the Walsall election ever ventured so
much as to hint at the true, rational, and constitutional
objection to that interference. There would have been
sense and spirit in telling the Manchester deputation of
Anti-Corn-law Leaguers that their interference with
the Walsall election was an impertinent and unwarrant-
able intrusion into as affair which which they had no-
thing to do. This is what the Conservative candidate,
when they proposed their test to him, did tell them.
Bat whosoever expected the same straightforwardness
from a Whig candidate, or a Whig journal, was fore-
doomed to a necessary disappointmen'.
(From the Morning Advertiser.)
To repeal the Corn-laws ? or repeal the Poor-laws ?
This is the questions—so saith the Times, which as-
cribes the delay in the solution of the query " to the
apathy induced on the public mind by the want of
indices propounded by the political leaders for the
putting forth any exertion in behalf of either of the two
great parties.' The Times charges the Ministerial
papers with taunting the Tory opponents of the Poor-
law with the query, " Which of all your Conservative
leaders can you ieluce to propose a repeal of that
law ?" and retorts the accusation with the rejoinder,
" Which of all your vaunted Reform Ministers will you
get to propose the abolition of the Corn-laws ?" From
the position implied by these queries, the l'inzcs comes
to the conclusion that " the wishes, then, of the respec-
tive
parties out of doors are not responded to with frank-
ness and warmth by the leaders of either side in Parlia-
ment. So much may be admitted ; and it is quite as
true and as incontrovertible on the one side as on the
other."- We grapple the Times on this position, and claim,
by its regard far consistency, its support in procuring a
reform of that Pailiament, the leaders of which repro-
setit fairly neither of the parties out of doors. Will the
Tines support us in this object ? We do not expect it.