The Sun.
London, England, 1851-11-21 00:00:00

LoNn ON,

Bible. As NAPOLEON was wont to do so frequently—
we appeal to history for corroboration ; and we rest
unfortunately but too well satisfied that the records
which have there been preserved, in reference to the
North American Continent, will testify in a manner
altogether unanswerable the accuracy of our re-
luctant accusations. While the United States
have risen from a thinly populated colony into one
of the most densely inhabited among the powers of
Christendom ; while the Canadas have flourished under
the effects of a perpetually multiplying industry ;
while even Texas has displayed evidences of advance-
ment, and Oregon has opened up numerous fields for
enterprise, and California has collected together mul•
titudes of adventurers from all parts of the globe,
to ransack its mineral treasures—what has been
the condition of the vast and fruitful country
subjected to the Hudson's Bay Company for
its government ? Has it not remained as
impervious to all colonization as the fabulous land of
Utopia ? Has it not defied entrance more rigidly
than the magic garden of the Hesperides ? Have not
its fruits remained more entirely beyond human
reach than the vegetable jewels in the subterranean
paradise of ALADDIN ? Why the stagnation visible in
that part of the western hemisphere has been long
notorious. Remember, moreover, that the enormous
extent of the possessions thus closed against improve-
ment renders the fact of their past and present condi-
tion peculiarly lamentable. They spread over a surface
equivalent to the whole of Europe, and comprise
within their boundaries a portion of the earth
abounding in sources of wealth and materials for the
extension of commerce. Melancholy enough the
spectacle referred to must surely be allowed to be,
when it is considered that the indolence complained
of has been exclusively for the advantage of about
half-a-dozen individuals.

Under the jurisdiction of the Hudson's Bay Com-
pany we do not, of course, mean to aver that
there are lands capable of being transformed
into rich pastures, or square miles of coun-
try presenting very remarkable temptations
to the agriculturist, but we do unquestionably mean
to assert that the territories entrusted to them—ter-
ritories embracing among other places
.the whole of
Labrador—are rich in other things besides the furs of
savage animals, the skins of the bear, the beaver, the
fox, the
.wild cat, the musk rat, , the martin, and
the racoon. Besides these means for obtaining wealth,
the country in question abounds in an extraordinary
variety of minerals—such, for example, as copper,
lead, iron, and marble. Yet not one of them is
worked—thanks to the ingenious obduracy of the
Hudson's Bay Company. Then, again, on
the coast of Hudson's Bay itself are vast numbers
of the walrus, while along the shores of Labrador
are many very ♦aluable fisheries. These latter are
happily attended to with considerable assiduity, but
inland the soil is delivered up wholly to the enjoy-
ment of the wild beasts, abounding there in pro-
fusion.

What says the late naval commander-in-chief on
the North American station in reference to the capa-
bilities of these regions, and upon their present
situation ? We ask this, because i❑ the illustrious
Earl of DUNDONALD we recognise not merely one of
the greatest heroes of England, but one of
those men most remarkable for sagacity and vigilance
of observation. Among other things, speaking of
Labrador, the Earl says'—" The absence of vegetable
productions of spontaneous growth is by no means a
proof of sterility in this region as to horticultural
produce ;" this he remarks after having observed that
" the valleys here, as well as the hills, as far as we
could see inland, are destitute of trees of any kind
higher than gooseberry bushes." Yet, as we have
shown, he does not by any means regard that as a
testimony of sterility. On the contrary, he says im-
mediately afterwards "in a garden here we saw
potatoes of excellent quality growing from others of
last year's crop, produced on the spot"—adding, the
owner of the garden showed as lettuces and radishes
as forward as those we left three weeks ago in the
Admiralty Gardens at Halifax." A little further on
he continues, " perhaps a botanist might discover
useful plants in this region adapted to English agri-
culture." It is not, however, to those portions of the
remarks made by the Earl of DUNDONALD upon the
condition of Labrador that we wish espe-
cially to refer, it is particularly and beyond
all to the sentence which follows his observa-
tion that, " the British possessions in Labra-
dor extend over a tract of country as great
as the northern regions of Russia from St. Peters-
burgh to the Pole," and, bear in mind that Labrador
is only a section of the Hudson's Bay territory.
Having penned thus much, the Earl of DUNDONALD
writes—" I have often felt surprised at the indiffe-
rence evinced by the 'Spanish Government as respects
the development of the resources of their possessions ;
but it is with still greater astonishment that I view
the supineness of our own Government in leaving this
vast tract unexplored, and its probable treasures un-
discovered." The reason is obvious enough—namely,
that Labrador, as well as the adjacent portion of the
North American Continent, has been shamefully
abandoned to the Hudson's Bay Company's Govern-
ment. The consequences we have demonstrated to
be in the very last degree lamentable ; and yet it is to
this same company that Ministers have yielded up
also Vancouver's Island, an island which, if only for
its coal mines, would be one of extraordinary im-
portance. How far our predictions as to
the results of this latter proceeding have
already been verified may be seen by reference
to the latest intelligence brought to England by way
of California, and dated October the Ist, San Fran-
cisco. It mentions that her MAJESTY'S ship Daphne,
Captain FANSUAWE, had recently arrived in that port
from Vancouver's Island, bringing thence accounts to
the effect that no progress whatever had been made
in settling the colony, and that, sooth to say, there
did not appear the slightest prospect of its settlement
so long as it continued in the hands of the Hudson's
Bay Company the policy of that company
being rather to discourage emigration, and to prevent
the cultivation of their territories. Of course. We
ourselves asserted this long ago—and the intelligence
just received from Vancouver's Island comes only as
a too lamentable verification.

"` " Notes on the Mineralogy, Government, and Con-
dition of the British West India Islands and North
American Maritime Colonies, &c." By Admiral the
Earl of Dundanald. G.C.8., &c. Bvo., pp. 128. Loa-
don: Ridgway. 1851.

The announcement on the part of the Earl of
SHAFTESSBURY of his intention to propose some
change in the law relating to criminal lunatics, has
had the effect of inducing the members both of the
medical and of the legal profession to direct their
attention, not only to the manner in which criminal
lunatics are treated in our asylums, but also to that
preliminary proceeding which renders the confine-
ment in an asylum necessary, viz., the plea of insanity
in criminal cases. Among the many valuable pub-
lications on these subjects which have of late ap-
peared, by far the most valuable is a recently published
pamphlet by Dr. WooD,* the learned, talented, and
indefatigable medical officer of Bethlem Hospital,
who is acknowledged on all hands to be the most ac.
complished psychological pathologist of the day, and
whose position, bringing him into not merely daily
but hourly contact with a large majority of the cri
urinal lunatics at present confined in the United
Kingdom (for we imagine that the number of cri-
minals confined in Bethtern Hospital must equal, if not
exceed, the criminal lunatics confined in all the other
asylums of the kingdom), peculiarly fits him for form-
ing a sound opinion on this subject, and cannot but
secure for such opinion a deliberate and attentive
consideration. Dr. WOOD commences his pamphlet
by declaring it as his opinion that much mischief has
resulted to society from the too frequent admission of
the plea of insanity, an opinion in which every lawyer
who has had any experience of the mode
of proceeding in our criminal courts, and every phy-
sician who has even occasionally visited the so-called
criminal lunatics who are confined in our asylums,
will at once cordially concur. He adds—" I totally
repudiate the doctrine that an insane person is ne-
cessarily irresponsible ;" and in this opinion we be-
lieve the majority of medical men who are competent
to form an opinion on the subject agree with Dr.
WOOD. And here it strikes us that Dr. Woo]) has
furnished a means of reconciling those differences ex-
isting' between the lawyers and the doctors on the sub-

*
Remarks the Pita Insanity, and on the Ma-
nagement of Criminal Lunatics." By W. Wood, M.D.,
Licentiate of the College of Physicians, and Medical
Qfficer of Betblero Llospital