The Sun.
London, England, 1848-01-04 00:00:00

A vARY 4. 184..

of those who think that nothing goad can come out
of Lancashire. Let those who have been accustomed
to consider the factory girls as over-worked slaves,
immoral and debauched beyond the possibility of
reclaiming, read the following description of a factory
at work :

" But let us go down into the shed ' (shade), where
these threads are woven into cloth. What a magnific?nt
sight ! Wo enter a room, the end of which we can
hardly see—it is so far off. It is on a ground floor, and
has no building above it. The windows are placed in
the roof, that the hands' may have more light for their
work. A truly //tees a non lucendo derivation for the
term shade ! Within it there are three or four hundred
women, managing seven or eight hundred looms.
Women do you call them ? They seem to be young
girls. It is the circumstance of their having pinafores
tied round their throats that suggests the juvenile ap
pearance ; bat they vary in age front fifteen to forty, as
you will perceive, if you mark them closely. Each is
engaged on her work: there is no laughing, or giggling,
or child's play. Perhaps one here and there, recognis-
ing her minister,' may convey the intelligence to her
neighbour with a nod and a smile; but she becomes very
demure again when she fancies she is observed. She
probably begins to smooth her hair with the comb she
has always near her, or to tidy some portion of her
dress ; for most of them have a proper sense of their
becomings.' But why is she stopping her loom ?
Some thread has been broken, or some bad work made,
during her absence of mind, and it is to be svt right.
The thread is pieced, a rod is touched, and the shut:le
rattles on again, as if it w ere alternately shot from side
to side out of two fifty-pounders. Every thing is as
orderly and neat as it can be, where there must neces-
sarily be particles of dust and cotton flying about. The
ventilation is on the beat prirciple, and the temperature
not more than 65 deg. If there be a smell, it is the
healthy one of oil. Such an employment for ten hours
is not too fatiguing. The effort consists in mental
attention, and in remaining long upon the legs. See that
woman—a book is lying upon her stool—she can take
an occasional glance at some anecdote or narrative
while her looms are going. Another, you remark, has
her knitting by her side. These are very expert
wearers. And, as you are a disciple of Lavater, do you
not think that the intelligent eyes and interesting faces
around you will bear a favourable comparison with those
of your London Graces ? But how is this ? The din
of a thousand shuttles is yet ringing in our ears, but
every loom is still in an instant. It is now one o'clock;
the pinafores are thrown off ; the shawls and bonnets
hastily put on; and all the 'bands' are moving out in one
continuous stream. Come along with the crowd : there
is no rude remark to be heard ; a mercurial boy or two
may, perhaps, be talking louder than would beseem the
deportment. room of a fashionable academy—that is all.
The dense mass separates into its component parts as it
reaches the street, to collect again at the same place
about two o'clock."

Then, again, with regard to crime, the statistical
tables compiled by the Rev. John Clay show that
while in Worcestershire the proportion of criminals
to the population is 1 in 343, in Gloucestershire 1 in
364, in Shropshire 1 in 447, in Somersetshire 1 in
451, in Lancashire it is only 1 in 453; and this supe-
riority of the great manufacturing over the great
agricultural counties is thus satisfactorily accounted
for by the writer of this article :—" Where persons,"
says he, " are engaged in any well-regulated occupa-
tion from morning to night, there may be much ig-
norance, but there is little leisure for crime. On the
other hand, where men are employed, as they term it,
`at a loose end,' the temptations to evil are greatly
increased." We rise from the perusal of this article
quite ready to join in the writer's exclamation, " A
noble county is that of Lancaster ;" and we thank the
author of this admirable paper for having thus come
forward to rescue the inhabitants of this noble county
from the calumnies of puling sentimentalists, who
fancy that because an operative lives in a house in-
stead of a pigstye, sleeps in a bed instead of on
straw, works under shelter instead of being ex-
posed to all the inclemencies of the weather, and
earns from 18s. to 20s , instead of from 7s. to 10s. a
week, that therefore he must be discon-
tented, weakly, and vicious. This is followed
by an article, entitled " Modern Condottieri,"
being a spirit-stirring account of the exploits of the
foreign Algerine legion in Spain under the command
first of the jobbing Bernelle and his no less jcbbing
wife, then of the stupid Bedeau, and lastly of the gal-
lant and chivalrous Conrad who was killed at Bar-
bastro, near Saragossa, just as he got off his horse to
place on it a wounded man who had been badly hit
by his side. After his death the legion was disbanded,
having been reduced in two years from 7,000 soldiers
to 380 men, the greater number of whom were crip-
ples—a sad exemplification of the fact, that it is a
Spanish principle of action to pay their mercenary
troops as little as they can, and to make them fight as
much as possible, working them to death as hack
masters do cheap horses. In "The Literary Circles of
the Last Century" we find much amusing gossip about
Mrs. Montagu and her friends, and in the article
entitled "The King of Bavaria, Munich, and
Lola Montez," much that is new and much
that is true, about, perhaps, the most remark-
able monarch of his day, and his still more re-
markable female Prime Minister, for such is Lola
Montez to the King of Bavaria, rather than his mis
tress. An unfair course, says this writer, has been
pursued towards Lola Montez by her political
enemies. She would herself have no hesitation in
saying that the Jesuits were the prime movers
in all these cases, and certainly it is true,
no gentleman, no man accountable to society
would have resorted to such unmanly proceedings.
The object of the authors of the monstrous, ridicu-
lous, and absurd calumnies, of which Lola Montez
has been the object, has been to work upon the poeti-
cal temperament of the King, by exhibiting his fair
ally in a ridiculous and disgusting light ; for as the
writer justly observes, " the moral indignation, of
which there was so much displayed in these at-
tacks is unfortunately a sham. It was not that the
King of Bavaria had a mistress which offended these
calumniators, but that he had an ally in Lola Montez
who had the courage and the influence to open his
eyes to the monstrous iniquities perpetrated in his
name, and by which he incurred the odium." A
former mistress of the King was not only tolerated by
these persons, but patronised many years, because she
made her influence subservient to their party pur-
poses. The bull-dog, of which so much has been
said, is a quiet English animal, and not a bull-dog at
all; and if she has on some occasions exhibited the
natural resentment of a high spirited woman, it has
only been in cases where she has been grossly in-
sulted by men of position in a manner which
the lowest bully in England would consider
unworthy of bis sex. Her house, which is a
perfect bijou, was built under her own eye,
and is unique in its simplicity and lightness. She is
elegant in her manner, cultivated in her tastes, and
has a great respect for England and the English. She
has a strong mind, and has very clear ideas on foreign
politics,
and her novel and powerful mode of express-
ing them has a great influence on the King, who has
also a comprehensive mind, and snore than all, she is
incorruptible. She has refused the most tempting
offers which have been made to her, either to quit the
country or to abuse her influence over the Sang. She
is regarded by the members of the Royal Family
rather as a political character than as the King's
favourite ; and the Queen of Bavaria, to whom the King
has always paid the most scrupulous attention, has
voluntarily stated that should the King desire the
presentation of the newly-made Countess at Court,
she would offer no obstacle. We have, besides these
articles, a well-written paper urging the immediate
necessity of adopting measures for our national de-
fence, and another on the Hampden controversy, in
which the writer finds grievous fault with all parties.
It is difficult to say to whom he deals out the hardest
blows—to the Prime Minister, the Bishop elect, or
the remonstrant Bishops.

mutually explained themselves his encouraging
himself whenever he stopped at a hard word, while
reading, with " Now my lad ! With p. wifl !" or,
" Ed'arcl Cuttle, ste..dy !" and his delibilt
having made over his watch, spoons, and sugar-tongs
" jintly," are all in character, Captain Cu'tle is
, henceforth in the Buz Gallery. Florence and Walter
are affianced, and their betrothal is beautifully told.
No news is heard of Elith or of Carker ; and the con-
dolence of Mrs. Chick, of Cousin Phoenix, and of
Major Bagstock, is repelled in succession by the
merchant. Mr. Dombey is still too proud for sympathy.
" The tree is struck, but not down." Even Lucretia
Tox is obliged to evince a surreptitious interest in
his calamities by stolen visits to the horrible Pipchin.
There is throughout an evident tendency towards the
" wind up" or eclaircissernent.