The Sun.
London, England, 1846-09-29 00:00:00

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LONDON, TUESDAY, SEPTEMBRR 29, 1846

Before Parliament can re-assemble, whether the
period of its meeting be the approaching 4th of
November, or whether the length of its prorogation
be extended, it is raost desirable that the present in.
terval should be occupied by a serious consideration
of the exigencies by the existence of which Ireland is
reduced to such woeful desolation, and by the satisfac-
tion of which that island would be endowed with a
plenitude of prosperity. Ireland is not an appendage, it
is an integral portion of the British Empire : it is not a
costly jewel in the diadem of VICTORIA, it is a
portion of her golden circlet. In endeavouring to
meliorate the condition of that country we are not
aiming at the aggrandisement of any profitable de-
pendency—we are struggling for the preservation
and perpetuation of our own dignity, we are attempt-
ing to allay our own agonies, we are striving to remove
a political leprosy from our own flesh and blood,
to satisfy our own thirst and hunger, and to
realise our own happiness. Never was a moral
blunder more calamitous or egregious than the one
which has tended to the estrangement of the popula-
tion of these islands ; it has originated many invi-
dious distinctions where no distinctions could really
exist. Sassenach, though an idle epithet coined by
circumstances, has proved itself a bugbear equally
potent and infelicitous with the buckler of Gorgon ;
it has jarred in upon the cordiality of the British
islanders, and ossified the hearts which had
previously pulsated with friendship. Such, at least,
were the misunderstandings engendered until very
recently. Now mitters are regarded as in a very
different position. Englishmen evince a sincere
anxiety for the improvement and happiness of Ire-
land, Irishmen are satisfied that their interests are
acquiring a deep importance in England; both have
betrayed an alacrity to coalesce for their own com-
mon advantage. Geographically, St. George's Channel
separates the lesser island from the greater, but vir-
tually it is no longer in existence.
For years the political and social advancement of
Ireland has formed the grand object of the internal
policy of Great Britain. Ministers have en-
rleavoured, one after the other, to discover
and enforce the measures most . suitable for
the attainment of that object. Administrations have
fallen, in succession, while striving to exorcise the
demon of misery by which Ireland has been pos-
sessed. One of the most eminent of modern states-
men declared, even when his ministerial influence
was at its perihelium, that his greatest difficulty was
Ireland. So many, indeed, have failed in the attempt to
legislate successfully for that country, so many astute
intellects hare acknowledged themselves incapable of
eradicating its numerous and enormous evils, that at
a superficial glance it would absolutely appear im-
practicable. But common sense tells us that the realisa-
tion of happiness to Ireland is not an impossibility.
Look at the broad and indubitable reality, and what are
the inferences to be drawn from that examination ?
Why, that every facility is afforded by nature, by
morality, end by education, for the elevation of that
island to the very pinnacle of national prosperity !
Here is Ireland, one of the most fertile regions of the
globe; its soil naturally strewed with verdure, its atmo-
sphere by turns sufficiently humid and sufficiently warm
to facilitate vegetation ; its people generous, tractable,
muscular, industrious, obedient, patient, and domestic.
And yet, notwithstanding all these advantages, pro-
visions are scarce even in times of abundance,
is incessantly fostered between the peasantry and
their employers, one vegetable is the principal pro-
duce of the land, and the principal article of con-
sumption amongst its people. Insubordination
is, in consequence, developing itself where tranquillity
might, by proper management, be the pervading and
permanent characteristic. Idleness is forced upon
thousands of an industrious race ; and so extreme are

the privations caused by a murrain in one single
species of tuber, that the population are
compelled to satisfy the rage of famine by
devouring seaweeds and hedge-nettles. So much
starvation in a spot naturally so fruitful ; so much
penury among men so capable of and anxious for
labour ; so much rancour and bad blood in
a peasantry so remarkable for their predis-
position to gentleness and domesticity, are facts
so glaringly anomalous as to demonstrate by their
♦ery existence the feasibility of their removal. The
antithesis formed by the actual degradation of Ire-
land, with the capacities possessed by Ireland for un-
bounded wealth and unstinted happiness, is at one
and the same time mournful and consolatory. It is
' mournful, inasmuch as it shows how much wretched-
ness might have been spared to her by merely cor-
responding with her natural endowments; and it is
consolitary, inasmuch as it testifies that by similar
means her future redemption from misery may be ac-
complished.
Impressed with these extraordinary considerations,
we turn with hope and with confidence to the de-
liberations of the present Government. Our Minis-
ters are, of course, availing themselves of the present
interval of the prorogation for the consideration of
the important questions bearing upon Ireland. In
their individual meditations, as well as in their col-
lective councils, that political problem will, without
doubt, take the precedency of all others. Many
schemes will naturally present themselves, many will
be, and have been, tendered by those who partake in
their anxiety, by private correspondents, and through
the columns of the press. We ourselves have offered
suggestions from time to time, and we shall continue
to do so with pertinacity and earnestness until the
great woes of our sister country shall be eradicated
by the Legislature.
Actuated by the same feelings, we publish the fol-
lowing proposition from an intelligent correspondent,
and we do so the more readily because it is based
upon justice and humanity, and because it accords
with all our preceding views upon the matter. The
writer, in addressing the Ministry to the subjoined
effect, is building up a scheme upon no specious
hypothesis of good—he is addressing himself in
homely phrase to the plain sense of our rulers :

" The Legislature," says he, " has successfully ar-
ranged the complicated and difficult question of tithes
in England, which affected the interests of the clergy,
and removed one of the greatest impediments
to the improved cultivation of the land. As
our population is increasing, and the surface of
the land is limited, it is very desirable,
both as the means of employment and increasing the
amount of subsistence, that all the land in Ireland
which can be brought into cultivation should be ac-
cessible to the people in a fair and equitable manner.
My suggestion is, for the Legislature to deal with
the uncultivated land in Ireland on a similar plan
and principle which they have adopted with respect to
the tithes in England. Perhaps the interests of the
landholders may be more complex and difficult than

the parties connected with tithes, but it may be pos-
sible to arrange a plan by which the Wad may be

liberated from its present bondage, without injury or
injustice to the landholder, by this means thrown
open in the market to those who are willing to un-
dertake its cultivation.

" I am not aware of any insuperable difficulties to
prevent the Legislature, by an Act of Parliament,
placing the uncultivated lands in the hands of
Commissioners (similar to the tithes), empowering
them to call to their aid competent persons to value
the land which is uncultivated, and pay the owners
its fair value ; the Commissioners to be empowered
to dispose of the land to the public as it comes into
their possession. The purchasers would have a simple
and good title, a number of capitalists would
be eager to become purchasers, the soil would be
cultivated, and the population find ample employment. ,
The landholders, in many cases, would be delivered '
from heavy burdens; the money received for unpro-
fitable land would be employed in improving land
uncultivated, and permanent benefit secured to the
nation without any loss to the Government."
Upon these simple suggestions we have not
leisure at this moment to enlarge, nor indeed
do they require any elaborate exposition. The re-
clamation of waste land—the vice desert& et intercluns
--so long as it can be accomplished without inter-
fering with the individual interests of land-
holders, is so manifestly calculated to benefit the
community and to extend the capacities of the coun-
try, that any explanation of the principle upon which
such a reclamation might be conducted would be
altogether superfluous. Beyond this the employ-
ment of the destitute peasantry upon the cul-
tivation of these reclaimed districts, and upon the
agricultural improvement of lands already culti-
vated, would prove more efficient in restoring peace
and plenty to Ireland than the formation of a dozen
Simplons. Let the Government transform Irish
peasants into farm labourers, rather than into
paviours ; let them give them the plough and
the hoe in preference to the mattock and
macadamized granite. Ireland wants additional food,
both farinaceous and animal, to convey along her
roads, rather than additional roads for conveying her
agricultural and manufacturing produce.

It is the nature and character of monopoly to
harden the hearts and warp the better feelings of
those exposed to its blighting influence. Men, in
other respects humane and charitable, upright and
honourable, will calmly countenance and support a
system by which millions of their fellow-creatures
are exposed to the greatest privations, and are (it is
hardly too strong a term to use) robbed of a large pro-
portion of their humble earnings. When once the mono-
polists have yielded themselves up to the desire of
gain they become insensible to the means by which it
is to be acquired. It is nothing that the victims from
whom that gain is to he extorted are the poor, the
needy, the hard-working, and the overtoiled, that a
change would improve their condition, promote their
comforts, and elevate them in the social scale ; nay,
the monopolist is so blinded by the considerations of
self-interest, that he will not understand that he may
derive as large an income by other and more justifiable
means; he will not be convinced that the consump-
tion of the article in which he is interested may be so
greatly increased by the diminution of its cost, as to
afford an equal, if not greater, profit. He even, after
a time, becomes insensible of the injustice of which
he has been guilty. He looks upon the sufferers as
born for his use, that it is most unreasonable of them
to complain of that to which they have long been
subjected, which has become
" An aged vice, a grey iniquity."

And he suspects the motives and impugns the honesty
of those who conscientiously labour for an improved
state of things, and believes that they can only be
actuated by sordid and selfish feelings.
It was owing to such a cause that we were so
long subjected to the operation of the iniquitous corn-
laws, that the food of the artizan was taxed, that pro-
duction was checked, commerce fettered and re-
stricted, and that our merchants were not permitted
to sell in the dearest and buy in the cheapest market.
Thanks be to GOD, we have succeeded at length in
shaking off the monster by which we were so long
oppressed. The weapons of truth and reason have
proved successful, the doctrines of free trade have
been approved and sanctioned by the Legislature, and
we can proudly boast that England has set an ex-
ample to the universe which will, which must speedily
be followed by other nations. The good seed has
been sown, and it will fructify and bring forth its
fruits in due season. One country may be more tardy
than another in giving in its adhesion to the doctriue,
but we doubt not that in a few short years the com-
mercial codes of every civilised people will he reformed
and improved.
It is doubly the duty of Britons, who have so
recently achieved so great a triumph for themselves,
to do nail- within their power to ameliorate the con-
ditions of those who are connected with, or dependent
on them—to banish monopoly as a plague-spot from
their colonies or dependencies, and to insist that a
grievous and heavy taxation, far exceeding the first
cost price of the article, shall no longer be levied on
one of the chief necessaries of the people.
The revelations which were made at the recent
meeting at Blackburn, respecting the salt monopoly
of the East India Company, are of so extraordinary
a character as to be scarcely credible, did we not
see men of respectability and station in society, men
who had full opportunity of being thoroughly ac-
quainted with the details, corning forward and vouch-
ing for their accuracy. We find the cost of salt,
almost the chief necessary of life, to more than one
hundred millions of our fellow-creatures, increased
tenfold by the weight of the taxation, and the ob-
jectionable manner in which it is levied. We can
easily understand the vast importance of salt to the
people of whom it is, if not the only, most certainly
the chief condiment ; and to obtain this necessary
the Hindoo peasant is obliged to devote nearly one-

fourth of his entire labour. The earnings of each
Hindoo, it is said, do not amount to more than 48s.
per annum; and, assuming each family to consist of
five persons, the consumption of salt will amount to

sixty pounds in the year, being 20 per cent less than
the, quantity allowed by the Government to the per-
sona in their service. Owing to the monopoly the
price of this sixty pounds is lls. Bd., representing
the labour of three months. This is, indeed, a fearful
grievance inflicted on so vast a body of our fellow-

subjects. The best Cheshire salt, we are told, can
be shipped at Liverpool at 20s. per ton ; the freight,
and all other minor expenses, would not be more than
245. in addition ; making a total of 445. per ton, the
cost price of the article at Calcutta. This would
not amount to more than a farthing per pound, and
yet we find that the poor Hindoo cannot obtain it at
less than 2 1-3 d. per pound—nearly ten times its
original price. Bad as this is, its atrocity is
fearfully magnified by the statement of Mr. AYLWIN
of the horrible cruelty practised in sustaining this
odious monopoly. He says—
" For instance the coast of Coromandel is encrusted
with salt. There the people are tied to the trees, and
flogged and tortured publicly in the gross, whole vil-
lages together, whenever they neglect to destroy the
salt as fast as it forms at their doors, in their fields, and
over their separate neighbourhoods, by the sun's evapo-
ration of the sea water, and similar processes of nature.
These same people are similarly punished if they neglect
to repair monthly to the Company's salt-pan at a dis-
tance, and there pay an infamously high price for an
arbitrary quantity of foul, black, muddy salt, unfit for
use until dissolved and reboiled, in order to purify it.
This is a moderate, unexaggerated, true account of the
Company's monopoly of salt in India."
What the bounty of PROVIDENCE brings to their
very doors, they are obliged to cast away, and to
expend time and money in procuring an inferior ar-
ticle. Such things cannot be permitted. Every
consideration of justice, of humanity, forbid it. We
shall not now speak of the impulse that would be
given to trade, the benefit that would be conferred
on the manufacturing or the shipping interests of
this country. Any person, however, possessed of the
slightest knowledge of commercial matters will easily
understand how great that benefit would be; but we
shall base our argument solely on the necessity of
acting fairly, of rendering simple justice towards the
millions and tens of millions who have been so im-
properly dealt with, who have been so grievously
harassed. It is an argument that will not be thrown
away on the nation that made such sacrifices for the
abolition of slavery and the removal of that disgrace
from our dominions.

Accounts from Leghorn of the 20th instant state
that at Ferrara, on a recent occasion, there had been
a collision between the Pontifical and the Austrian