The Sun.
London, England, 1851-08-02 00:00:00

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LONDON,

considered, they will be found well worthy of the
notice of all Parliamentary reformers.

HENRY MAYHEW has not lived in vain. As the
historian of the poor he will be long and honourably
remembered. There is, to our thinking, something
very noble and touching indeed in the assiduity with
which he has conducted his researches into the con-
dition of the labouring classes of the metropolis, and,
undeterred by the squalor and wretchedness encoun-
tered in those inquiries, proceeded resolutely in col-
lecting together the materials of his strange and
melancholy revelations. During the past twelve
months there have appeared in regular in-
stalments the result of his very remarkable
experiences. Published unostentatiously among
the cheapest class of periodicals, the importance of this
extraordinary serial may possibly have been over-
looked by the undiscerning, its value as a contribu-
tion to the general stock of knowledge not being duly
recognised and appreciated. With the future anna-
list of the reign of VICTORIA the great work here
undertaken by Mr. MAYHEW will be held in very
different estimation. It will be regarded in its true
character as one of the most generous enterprises
ever entered upon by one who was anxious to
aid in ameliorating the condition of his fellow-crea-
tures, and to evidence while so doing a visible bene-
volence and a practical philanthropy. As the
originator and conductor of this novel, we might even
say unprecedented scheme, he himself remarks in the
Preface to his first volume, now just issued from the
press,* that the attempt may assuredly be considered
curious, inasmuch as it '3 in truth an endeavour to
" publish the history of a people from the lips
of the people themselves," the entire com-
pilation being intended to form, when com-
pleted, a " cyclopmdia of the industry, the want,
and the vice of the great Metropolis." Such
au enterprise as this must indeed be acknowledged to
possess a peculiar claim upon public curiosity, and
a claim also, of no feeble kind, upon national
admiration. Its mere suggestion would have be-
tokened a singular degree of beneficence. What,
therefore, shall be said of its successful commence-
ment and gradually developing realization ? What ?
But that its author has entitled himself to the good
wishes of the community he has thus striven to relieve
by the exposure of a multiplicity of evils—evils of a
kind so terrible and of a magnitude so enormous that they
must inevitably have induced any ordinary investigator
to recoil from the horror of their mere enumeration.

Estimating at this high value the fruits of these toils
on the part of HENRY MAYHEW, it would, perhaps,
be unfair to that gentleman, as well as to ourselves, if
we were not to premise, while expressing these opi-

nions, that personally we are altogether strangers to
each other. It is consequently from no feelings less
deserving of regard than those of conscientious and
deliberate conviction, that we pronounce these simple
but emphatic words of eulogium over the head of this
true-hearted Englishman.
That we are not exaggerating in any particular
whatever the it of the volume just com-
pleted, we conceive that its homely but arresting nar-
rative affords a sufficient demonstration. In it are
comprised accounts of the Street Sellers from the lips
of the Street Sellers themselves, having especial re-
ference to the Patterers and Costermongers of the
metropolis. Recollecting that the facts accumulated
together in these pages have in every instance been
owing to the personal inquiries of Mr. MAYHEW, and
that very frequently indeed they have been recounted
to him with a storm of tears and lamentations, evi•
dencing in this manner their most lamentable authen-
ticity—the work it must be confessed assumes to itself
a value beyond all price, the value of a truth alto-
gether unimpeachable. We might almost characterise
it as a collection of autobiographies interspersed with
illustrative remarks, and embellished with suggestive
engravings from daguerreotypes. When it is remem-
bered that these histories of wretchedness and degra•
dation have been obtained by HENRY MAYHEW solely
through the industrious pertinacity of his researches ;
when it is remembered, moreover, that those re-
searches have necessitated his entrance into the most
abominable dens of London, the foulest rookeries, the
most pestilential and squalid localities within the
boundaries of the capital, it must be allowed that to
him the public are indebted for a noble dis-
regard of personal inconvenience. The villanous
and obscure haunts frequented by the lowest
dregs of the community, the most loathsome
dwellings of a class almost brutalised in their igno-
rance and licentiousness, scenes of unutterable pollu-
tion, and neighbourhoods notorious for the ferocity
of their depraved inhabitants,—all,these places have
bad to be scrutinized, all their horrid disclosures have
had to be ransacked and detailed from the lips of beings
whose ignominious debasement would have induced
must men to recoil from their approach—before the
work could be adventured upon which is here
progressively advancing in its developement.
HENRY MAYHEW has consequently had to set
at nought all considerations of self in
realizing his heroic ambition of assuaging the pangs
of the poor by constituting himself their historian.
Such he must henceforth be regarded, and as such he
has secured to himself the respect and admiration
of all right-thinking observers. His exertions
in behalf of the general community have been and
are still of no ordinary magnitude. In referring to
them thus explicitly, we must, as one of the organs
of journalism, do so in language of earnest and
grateful panegyric, bidding him, moreover, a fervent
God speed in the completion of his beneficent enterprise.
" London Labour and the London Poor; a Cyclo-
ptalia of the Condition and Earnings of these that will
Work, tikse that cannot Work, and those that will not
Work. lrol. I. By Henry Mayhew, 16, Upper Wel-
ngton-street, Strand, London."

LIVERPOOL, FRIDAY, AUG. I.—The screw steam-
ship C ty of Glasgow, Captain Latch, arrived this morning
from Philadelphia, whence she sailed on the 17th ult. bhe
brings 15,000 dolls. in specie on freight. The Pacific Steam
Navigation Company's steam-ship Santiago arrived in the
Mersey yesterday from Glasgow. She is of 1,100 tons bur-
den, with engines of 400 horse-power, and is intended to
carry the mails between Panama, Callao, and Valparaiso.
The Santiago will sail fur her destination on the 7th inst.,
touching on the passage at Rio Janeiro.
HONESTY REWARDED —A few nights since, a re-
markable instance, showing the manner in which honest men
a,e sometimes rewarded, occurred to a waterman, named
Daniel Bowlas, of Rotherhithe. It appears a person of gen-
tlemanly appearance engaged Bowlas to ferry him across
from Wapping Dock-stairs to Mr. Smith's, Church-stairs,
Rotherhithe, about eleven o'clock at night. The fare was
completed, and Bowlas went ashore. In about two hours
afterwards the gentleman returned in great haste and much
excited, making anxious inquiry for the waterman who had
rowed him across the river. Bowlas was subsequently found,
when the gentleman informed him that he had left a bag in
his boat containing fifty sovereigns in gold. A light was im-
mediately procured, Ind, upon searching the boat, the mis-
sing money was discovered by Bowles lying under the seat.
The gentleman (whose name is unknown) came ashore,
greatly astonished at his fortunate recovery of the cash, and
after thanking the waterman for his honesty, kindly gave him
a pint of porter and then walked away.
THE ASTRONOMER PUZZLED.—LittIe Boy—What's
the use of an eclipse? Astronom,3r—Oh, I don't know! It
gives the sun time for reflection.—Punch.
Lord John Russell paid a visit to Osborne on
Thursday. On arriving at Southampton at one P.M., his
Lordship was informed that her Majesty's yacht Fairy would
not arrive to take him to Cowes before nearly three P.M.
Lord John, therefore, snugly ensconsed himself during the
interval in one of the dock offices, and quietly read a book
which he had with him. The Prime Minister returned to
town yesterday by one of the early morning trains, accom-
panied by the Earl of Shelburne.
ANOTHER POISONING CASE IN NORFOLS.—A
young woman named Hannah Neale, residing in the village
of Outwell, near Downham, has been committed for trial on
a charge of having poisoned her husband. From the evidence
adduced at the inquest it appeared that the accused had
formed an intimacy with another man, and had, not long
since, deserted her husband and family for a brief period,
which she spent with her paramour. Soon after her return
home her husband was seized with an illness of which he
died, and the symptoms were of such a suspicious character
that the surgeon in attendance determined on making an
examination of the body. This proceeding was opposed by
the widow, and the result was an inquest on Thursday last,
when, after the examination of several witnesses, Hannah
Neale was fully committed for trial at the next Norwich
assizes for the wilful murder of her husband.
SOYEi S SYMPOSIUM.—The usual Friday fete at
Gore House, Kensington, passed off with great eclat. The
public are greatly indebted to M. Soyer for the munificent
manner in which these weekly fetes are provided for them.
The grounds are beautiful, and when lit up surpass even
Cremorne in point of display. The attendance was very nu-
merous. In addition to the other attractions, the visitors
seemed to pay a marked attention to M. Soyer's cuisine, the
cheapness and comfort of which is so efficiently displayed at.
this establishment. The fireworks were of the usual magni-
ficent description.
Nsw MONET ORDER OFFICES.--The undermen-
tioned offices will be opened as Minor Money Order Offices
on the following days, viz., on the Ist of August—Ensham,
Oxfordshire; Kingscliffe, Northamptonshire; Ripley, York-
shire; SlaithwaAe, Yorkshire. On the 4th of August
Ombersley, Worcestershire. On the 6th of August—Rag-
land, Monmouthshire. On the Bth of August—Blaenavon,
Monmouthshire. On the 11th of August—Talgarth, Bre-
conshire. On the 13th of August —Llandrindod, Radnor-
shire. On the 15th of August— Trecastle, Brecondhire. On
the 18th of August—Tregaron, Cardiganshire.