The Sun.
London, England, 1856-09-05 00:00:00

PROSPECTS OP THE _HARVEST.

There seldom was a year when the prospects of
the harvest were either more varying or more im-
portant than we now find them. About ten weeks
ago the indifferent yield of last year, the extra-
ordinary consumption of the war, the fact of large
corn-growing districts in the East having been left
untilled and the backwardness of the spring, raised
the prices of grain to a pitch at least very dis-
couraging to commercial enterprise. Then came
several weeks of unusual heat, during which the
crops ripened so fast that there arose a new panic ;
bands could not be found, railway works were sus-
pended to release labour for the fields, but the
farmers would not bid high enough; they trusted
to a continuance of the fine weather ; and much
grain that might have been got in was allowed to
remain on the field. There was then a sudden
change of weather, which told severely on
the crops, whether standing or cut. The market
rose, and we were threatened with scarcity. We
have now bad a week of fine drying weather ; and
each day we read that the corn market is " dull,"
or " drooping," or " heavy," as the gratifying
prospect of plenty is usually announced. The clear
sky now above our heads certainly seems to pro-
mise ample opportunity for saving all that is still
ungarnered, and it will be the fault of the farmer
if his rickyard is not at least as well filled as in most
former years. Thus far there is no prospect of
prices receding to a point injurious to agricultural
interests, but there is little doubt of that plenty
which is necessary for the interests of trade and the
comfort of the people at large. Such are
the fluctu-
ations to which we have been exposed in the brief
space of ten weeks. The importance of the question
consists in the obvious advantage of what may be
called a commercial revival just now. It would on
all accounts be a great thing for Europe if the
minds of men could be diverted from painful
topics, from sores ever ready to break out anew,
and feeling ever threatened with collision, to the
vulgar but more useful rivalry of material enter-
prise. Railways, steampackets, mines, manufac-
tures, the conflux of traders, the currents of traffic,
and even the streams of summer tourists, un-
doubtedly tend to unity and peace, and slowly but
surely conduce to the improvement of mankind.
One of their first conditions is plenty, and that we
may now reasonably expect for one more year.
From the Continent the accounts of the harvest
are still more favourable. As it was earlier than
in this country, it has not suffered to the same
extent by the general change of weather
three weeks ago. A well-known correspondent,
writing from Magdeburg on the 30th ultimo,
and recording his observations on a journey
from England, describes the harvest as every-
where much above the average, and, for some
hundreds of miles, more abundant than in this
country. As this occurs where the proportion of
tillage is much larger than with us, the result is
all the more important. There is probably an im-
mense increase upon former years, and of that in-
crease England will have the full advantage. The
great fretwork of railways is rapidly pervading and
penetrating the whole continent of Europe, and not
only the vast plains of Germany and France, but
even the valleys of Switzerland, are now traversed
by the locomotive. The effect upon prices is the
same as we have already experienced in this coun-
try. But a few years ago the most saleable and
movable things—wheat, fat beasts, horses, butter,
cheese, and eggs—varied considerably in price in
districts not very wide apart ; and it was usual for
families to fix their residence in this neighbour-
hood or that, because, it being thirty or forty
miles from a market, the necessaries of life were
ridiculously cheap. Meat was cheaper by
two pence a pound ; butter was only half the
price ; eggs were to be had in incredible abun-
dance, and poultry at fabulous prices, because the
only means of conveying these articles to the dis-
tant market were slow, costly, and precarious.
All that is now past. In England, at least, leav-
ing Wales and the Highlands out of the question,
the market is becoming almost uniform, and no one
district is at much disadvantage compared with the
rest. Railways are doing the same for the Contin-
ent, and prices are consequently often twice what
they were a few years ago. It is so, at least, in all
articles of the better quality, for the English will
have the best of everything, and appear every-
where as the rivals of the native consumer. Thus
year by year Europe becomes one vast market, and
we recover from those great fluctuations that but
the other day were of frequent occurrence.
There are many things to be considered in com-
paring the cost of production in countries and
populations so different as those enumerated in the
letter of our correspondent ; and perhaps some
of these may escape the notice of the most
vigilant railway traveller. Where labour is cheap
it is commonly thought to be so much the less
valuable ; if agricultural implements are simple,
they may be so much the less capable of heavy
work, and light carts are often a necessity of bad
roads. If there are no trees or hedgerows to ob-
struct the rays of the sun and harbour birds and
insects, on the other hand the subdivision of pro-
perty, and the minuteness of the patches devoted
to the different crops, present a more effectual
check to profitable cultivation. Throughout great
part of Germany, indeed, there are large domains,
and farms of corresponding proportions. But we
are slow to believe that even in the vast plains of
central Europe, or the fertile banks of the Etbe,
agriculture is under any considerable advantage
compared with this country. At all events, we
should like to see the comparison instituted by those
who have had the advantage of a residence, with
ample means of information. Undoubtedly, a large
proportion of the Continent is cultivated in a way
that would not answer in this country, and that
would rain both peasant and proprietor in the end.
Nevertheless, in such a year as this the result is an
abundant harvest, not only of grain, but of pota-
toes, beetroot, and many crops little known here ;
and by all accounts we are promised an abundance
which will tell even on future years. This, too, is
plenty after peace. It comes at a time when labour,
money, and enterprise are happily released from
the unproductive employments of war. It is not
unreasonable to hope that such a prospect, and the
undertakings which will invite the co-operation of
different States, will serve to heal sores, to efface
painful memories, and even soften and humanise
the despotisms now so formidable to the tranquil-
lity of Europe. The arts of peace may not always
be successful for this purpose, but there is at least
less risk in them than in the cast of war.—Times.

The Scinde Railway Company yesterday despatched
Mr. William Brunton, and a staff of six engineers, by
the steamer Indus, for Bombay and Kurrachee, en route
for the Punjaub, to prosecute the survey of the country
between Mooltar, Lahore, and Umritsir. Mr. Brunton
was appointed by the railway company under the sanc-
tion of the India House, and it is expected from the
facilities which the Purjaub Government are said to be
prepared to afford that the preliminary survey of the
line will be completed by the end of the ensuing cold
season.

THE LATE Six RICHARD WESTRACOTT, R.N.—There
was a time when the death of Sir R. Westmacott would
have created more sensation in the world of art, both in
England and on the continent, than is likely now to be
the case when a younger race of sculptors have arisen,
with a new school more or less of their own creation. Sir
Richard died at his Gown residence in South A wllcy.
street on the Ist inst., in his 82d year, after an illness of
about three weeks' duration. Richard Westmacott was
born in London in 1775, and, showing early signs of
his future vecat'on, adopted the profession of a sculptor
when he was quite a child. Having received the firstrudi-
ments of instruction in the studio of his father, who was a
sculptor of some eminence in Mount-street;Grosvenor-
'square, he visited Rome in 1793, where he is said to have
studied for a time under Canova. Be this as it may, in
the following year he received from the Academy of
Florence their first premium for sculpture, and the medal
of his Holine-s in 1795, in which year he was also elected
a member of the Academy of Florence. Having passed
some years in the classic regions of Italy, and made him-
Eel familiar with the best remains of ancient art, he re-
turned to England, and established himself in the west-
end of Londore where he soon gained an extensive repu-
tation. In 1805 the Royal Academy of London elected
him an associate of their body, and he became in 1816 a
Royal Academician. Toe works of art by which be
was best known ars his statues of Addison, Pitt, and
Erskine, his statues of the late Duke •f Bedford and of
Charles James Fox, in Bedford and Russell-squares, and
his monuments to Sir Ralph Abercromby, Lord Coiling.
wood, and others in Westminster Abbey and St. Paul's
Cathedral, together wi(h the elegant and classical figure of
Psyche, so much admired by every lover of art for its ele-
gance of form and chastity of expressica. Besides these
he designed the colossal statue of Achilles in Hyde-park
and the statue of Ne'son at the Liverpool Exchange, and
together with Flaxman and Bally, a p irtion of the
figures on the frieze of the marble arch originally erected
at Buckingham Palace, but now standingat Cumberland
gate. His latest work, we believe, was the sculptured
iment at the British Museum. In 1827 he succeeded
Flaxman as Professor of Sculpture in the Royal Acade-
my, and held that appointment until his decease ; he
had not, however, exhibited since 1339. His artistic
works are all strictly classical in their style, but partake
far more of the Roman than of the Greek character. They
are not abstract and ideal, or of the highest order of
conception, but living and breehing realities, executed to '
the life in a bold and severe style. Among the best known
of his productions are "The Distressed Mother," which
be executed in 1822 for the Marquis of Lansdowne; "The
liouseless Traveller, a copy of which is in Westminster
Abbey; his
rtEupbrosyne," for the late Duke of New-
castle in 1837; his two statues "Cupid" and "Psyche,"
in possession of the Duke of Bedford ; together with a
large alto relievo, " The death of Horace," which be
executed for the late Earl of Egremont, and which we
believe is still in the gallery at Petwerth. He received
the honour of knighthood as an acknowledgment of his
artistic merits in 1837. Sir R. Westmacott married, in
1798, Dorothy Margaret, the daughterof Dr. Wilkinson.
His son, Mr. R. Westmacott, is a Royal Academician,
and has inherited a large share of his father's genius.