The Sun.
London, England, 1870-06-01 00:00:00

Women's Rights.

Lady Amberley explains that it is no part
of the programme of women's advocates to
secure by arbitrary means the same wages
as men. It would be absurd to attempt
to regulate wages by legislation. But Lady
Amberley is of opinion that other forces may secure
the same result. Women are at present forced
to accept lower wages for the same work, equally
well done, by the absence of free competition
with men, and by their restriction to the
lower and more servile occupations. Better
education and greater variety of employment,
with increased power, will, she thinks, enable them
to combine, and so to raise their wages by the same
means as men ; while the opening of the higher pro-
fessions will give women of the richer classes a sense
of common industrial interests with poor women, and
tend to make their work better paid.
Savings Banks.

Some interesting facts can be gleaned from a par-
liamentary return, relating to British and Irish
savings banks just published. There are (according
to the 1861 census) 18,949,930 people in England,
and this number of men, women, and children, and
of course an additional number of all three, supplied
to the world since the period named, had contributed
on the 20th of November, 1869, £30,574,472 18s. sd.
in deposits to English savings banks. The popula-
tion of Wales in 1861 was stated at 1,111,795. This
number of people, with the increase proportionate
to the nine years, had in November last a sum of
£1,014,018 Os. Bd. to their account in the banks.
The amount stored up on. behalf of the
Irish, who in 1861 numbered 5,764,543 perscms,
was, in November, £1,974,750 17s. 3d. Glancing
over the returns from Ireland, one is somewhat
strikingly reminded of the prosperity of the northern
counties as compared with those of the south, except
in the case of. Cork, where the thrifty have a larger
sum by £69,000 than in Dublin. In Londonderry
£179,209 has been lodged, while in Wexford the
peasantry have only succeeded in storing up £8,942.
The return for Tyrone shews that £86,939 has been
saved, while in Wicklow, the amount is stated at
£4,742 ; and similar wide differences occur in many
other cases. Of the Channel Islands the most
flourishing appears to be Jersey, the inhabitants of
which had £258,538 deposited in November last. The
sum lodged in the Government savings' banks by the
whole people of the United Kingdom is stated to be
upwards of 37 millions.
The Transit of' Cattle.

Acting upon the report of the commission ap-
pointed to inquire into the modes by which cattle
are conveyed into and from the British isles, and
to suggest provisions for their better treat-
ment on sea and land, the Privy Council have
Tst issued two special ordeis on the subject.
heir directions, strange to say, are not, so far as one
can judge from the parliamentary paper, meant to
apply to Ireland, from which country England exports
an immense quantity of live stock annually. Among
'other things the Council order that all pens
for COM and sheep in vessels must be of certain

JUNE 1, 1870.

width and breadth, and that all cattle trucks on rail-
way lines shall be provided with spring buffers, shall
be clean, well ventilated, and shall in no case be ever
allowed to become overcrowded. The enactments
or the comfort of sheep on journeys are equally to
the purpose. In all cases where sheep
are freshly shorn or unclothed, inclosed
and yet airy stalls in vessels or waggons on
railways must be supplied for their accommodation,
and freshly shorn sheep will in no instance be per-
mitted to be conveyed on the deck of a ship in the
period from the Ist of November to the Ist of April
in each year. The commands of the Privy Council
are very stringent as regards both the supply of
food and water at every place where cattle are
landed or shipped, and the arrangements for their
speedy and convenient disembarkation. Trucks and
pens must also be thoroughly disinfected and
cleansed after they have been used for the convey-
ance of animals. The second order of the Council
enumerates chiefly the railway-stations and ports in
England and Scotland at which the Council have
deemed it necessary that water-troughs for cattle
should be specially provided.
The Costs on Distress Warrants.

An abuse was noticed by the judge of the Liver-
pool County Court at the last sitting, which has
long been a serious injustice to the poor. During
the hearing of a case it transpired that nearly £3 had
been charged as costs in a distress which had only
realised £sl4s. Mr. I .ey Wheeler commented in strong
terms of indignation upon the poor people being
plundered in this way, and described it as " a regular
piece of cheating." According to the legal scale all
that could be charged was £1 55.. The judge
suggested that the matter should be investigated.
The Manufacturing City of Ireland.

Lord Chancellor O'Hagan, in distributing the prizes
to the successful workmen competitors at the Belfast
Exhibition a day or two since, congratulated the
citizens on the vast increase that had of late years
taken place in the linen industry. He thought
that they ought to be very proud of
the name they had obtained for themselves as
growers of flax and manufacturers of snowy cam-
brics, without having • had the support of Govern-
ment or of the public purse in the matter. By self-
reliance and self-exertion alone, they had advanced
with the first of industrial cities in the world, and, in
his opinion, the inventiveness, ingenuity, integrity, and
honest character of the Ulster men reflected an
honour of no questionable value on Ireland in
general, at a crisis in her history when appreciation
of the toil and labour her sons were willing to under-
take and to persevere in, was at a discount
in England. His lordship's encouraging
words, will, no doubt, aid in strengthening
the vast impulse, which, in all probability, will
be given in a few moLths to the trade of
Ulster. It has been found that an immense percen-
tage of the flax fibre when undergoing the scutching
process, passes into tow, owing to the imperfect
nature of the machinery used inreland. For years
defects in cranks and jennies have puzzled astute minds,
and although machinery for this extremely valuable
branch of husbandry has been improved wonderfully,
until a very short time ago flax dresse rs still continued to
lose considerably. After an expenditure of many thou-
sands of pounds, a new " breaker" has recently been
patented by a Liverpool gentleman, a Mr.
Hodgkin, and as it is found that this machine
produces a yield from average flax of about 281 b.
per cwt. (which is 25 per cent.) without loss, a
result heretofore looked upon as impossible, there is
no reason to fear but that the industry of Belfast
will now receive an impetus which will contribute
much happiness to the people of that city, and aid
largely in bettering the hopes and prospects of Irish-
men generally.