The Sun.
London, England, 1869-12-15 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, WEDNESDAY EVENING, DECEMBER 15, 1869

TH EA TRE - ROYAL DRURY- L ANE.
(foie Lessee and -Manager, Mr. F. B. Chatterton.
This EVENING, at 7, BELLES OF THE KITCHEN, At 8,
FORMOSA : Messrs. Barrett, II Irving, David Fisher, Britt:tin,
Wright, John Rouse; Mrs Billington, Misses M. Brannan, Mac-
donald. and Katharine Rodgers. Conclude with BORE )WED
PLUMES

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LONDON, TVEDNESDAY, DEC. 15, 1859.

Blackheath claims the credit of initiating a much-
needed practical reform. How to deal with our
vagrants is one of the most perplexing entanglements
of the gordian knot of metropolitan pauperism. Our
streets are crowded with beggars, shivering in the
cold, apparently starving in the midst of plenty,
beseeching our aid in tones of piteous wretchedness, or
silently reproaching our warmth and comfort with hol-
low eyes. Nl' e give liberally,and are rewarded by learn-
ing that the class of worthless idlers is steadily on the
increase, and that sturdy vagrants, who fail to
obtain the full amount they need, do not scruple
to exact it by force or by threats from the timid
or the helpless. Hardened by these revelations we
resolve, not without reason, to refuse eve! y chance
appeal, and the next news we hear is that a man
has been eight days without food, and finally
died in the workhouse that an emaciated
woman, unable to nurse her child, has
laid it on a doorstep to die. It has
often been said that it is better to give to a hundred
undeserving than to refuse relief to one case of real
distress, but the mischief is that the one by no me ma
prevents the other ; all the while these unfortunates
are fainting and dying by the wayside the profes-
sional beggar is reaping his harvest, the tramps are
busy in the suburbs, and the whole aystetn of living
at the expense of the charitable is in full opera-
tion. But the street- beggar's days are, we may hope,
numbered. Associations are being set on foot which
meet the difficulties of the case by a system of
ticket giving. The tickets are taken to some office
in the parish, where immediate relief, in the shape
of plain food, is given to the applicant, and a
rigid inquiry instituted into the case. Such an
organisation has been at work for the last twelve-
month in Blackheath, its first anniversary meet-
ing b2iug held yesterday evening, under the pre-
sidency of the Earl of LICHFIELD. In the year
the society has done good work, relieving
2,002 applicants in the first six months. We may
guess from this to what an extent the begging sys-
tem prevailed in the favoured locality of Blackheath,
since we must, of course, add to this number a large
amount of undeserving and therefore unrelieved
cases, besides those who received tickets, but did not
choose to have their claims upon pubic compassion
investigated too closely. How great was the
vigilance necessary to distinguish between the
applicants may be gathered from the fact
that in the month of October last the
number of applicants suddenly rose to 169. The
society were puzzled by this phenomenon, but a little
inquiry brought the cause of it to light. The tramps
were returning to their winter quarters from their
summer visits to the watering places ! The profes-
sion is sometimes hereditary, and the parish register
of a town in the north has the names of families who
had pursued the honourable calling of " solicitors"
since the days of ELIZABETH. Such is the testi-
mony of the Rev. Mr. 'TART of Blackheath,
who is, nevertheless, not without hope
that the tramp may be eradicated from England.
This desirable end will not, however, be accom-
plished until associations like the society of Black-
heath are extensively organized throughout the coun
try. However much our Poor-law may be reformed
or the administration of public relief improved upon,
we can never dispense with the volunteer element in
a task which is, after all, something more than a
mere matter of political economy—the relief of suf-
fering and distress.

SOME of our M.P's. have during the past summer
visited Ireland. They have done well. The Rhine,
the Alps, and the Isthmus of Suez, may be more
attractive, though Ireland possesses natural beauties
far beyond the conception of most persons. For
British legislators, about to deal with the most diffi-
cult political problem which has been presented to
this generation to solve, it was highly expedient that
they should endeavour to obtain a personal know-
ledge of the condition of the country in whose
behalf they will shortly have to legislate. It
is not often that personal knowledge is so
easily obtained. Most political questions are more
or less abstract. This one is intensely practical. For
that reason there ought to be little room for party
conflicts ; it is a question pre-eminently outside party,
and ought to be settled purely on its own merits by a
body bound before all things to do the best that is
just and possible for the country, whose condition
is a standing impeachment of legislative wisdom.
Two M.P.'s have just published the results of
their investigations. Mr. BERNHARD SAMUELSON,
M.P. for Banbury, has written some admirable
letters, which he has republished in the form of a little
bound pamphlet of forty-four pages. Mr. PETER
MCLAGAN, M.P. for Linlithgowshire, has written a
pamphlet of about double that size on Land Tenure
and Land Culture. Both gentlemen have especial
reasons for being interested in the matter, Mr.
MCLAGAN as a farmer, Mr. SAMUELSON as one of the
largest agricultural implement-makers in the world.
The one would notice more particularly the present
modes of farming, the other would estimate the
chances of agricultural development in its highest
form, which we take to be that of treating the land
as a manufactory for turning out the largest amount
of produce at the least cost. Of course both
gentlemen would see that the financial element is not
the only one, that the social element is very largely
present in the Irish land question. Yet it may be
taken as a sound principle of political economy that
' the best solution of the question from the social point
of view is that which will also yield the largest
financial results.

It is with very mingled feelings that we read Mr.
SAMUELSON'S description of land tenure. We confess
we had thought that the time of wholesale evictions
had been long past, and that the S c lILLY tragedy of last
year was an altogether exceptional case. It was by no
means exceptional. Within two miles of Tuam, Mr.
SA3IIIELSON saw the only remaining tenant of a group

of seventeen whose little dwellings erected by them-
selves were destroyed in 1867. The tenant's own was
saved at the intercession of a friend; but for that there
would have been another "agrarian outrage." In
Galway market Mr. SAMUELSON met one of twelve
tenants who were evicted near Oughterarde in 1864.
Nearly all were solvent and bad paid their rents, when
they received notice to quit. Those who had the
means offered to pay the arrears of the few insolvents
and to become bound for them in future. They
could not believe that they would be evicted until
their homes were destroyed, and they remained on
the roadside with their families for two months with-
out any shelter but that of a bit of canvas. When
asked why they did not go to the workhouse, the
man replied, " Because we were not paupers, and
would not be degraded to their level." Mr. SAMUEL-
SON adds that he will not repeat what was told him
by eye-witnesses of the proceedings this summer of a
nobleman on his estates in Donegal, for the state-
ment would not be believed ; and yet the evidence
is unimpeachable, and can lead to no other con-
clusion than that the nobleman in question is insane.
These evictions have possibly been checked by Rib-
bonism, and, if so, it is difficult to say which is worse,
the disease or the remedy. But there is no guarantee
that the malady will not break out again directly the
terror which Ribbonism inspires is removed. There
are estates where a notice to quit is printed on the
back of each half-year's receipt for rent, so that the
tenants are under perpetual notice. In the
agreements for yearly tenancies, which the tenants
on a certain property are forced to sign,
the landlord, besides reserving the imposition
of enormous fines, by way of liquidated damages, for
certain breaches of covenant, claims that "all the
top-dressing, compost, or manure of any kind remain-
ing on the land at the termination of the occupancy
shall belong to the landlord," a previous covenant
having forbidden their removal during the occupancy,
under a penalty of £5 per load. Arbitrary evictions,
ruinous covenants, often to be avoided only by bribing
the agent of the landlord—such are the two chief evils
under which the Irish tenant now groans. It is at
once disgraceful and encouraging that this should be
so. It is disgraceful because no man ought to be at
the mercy of another ; it is encouraging because
it explains the deep-seated discontent of the Irish
tenantry, and gives good reason for hoping that we
may shortly remove it.
Into other points of this land question Mr.
SAMUELSON has entered very fully. He shows that
it is a great mistake to suppose, as is generally
asserted, that Ireland is overpopulated, or that it is
not a corn-growing
country. lle goes so far as to
say that one thing which we have to do is to re-
people Ireland. At present there are not enough
hands to get through the farm work. The original
wages of agricultural labourers have increased 40 per
cent. in ten years. Sheavers in Kildare receive some-
times as much as 7s. a day ; women receive 3s. and
their food for tying
up the sheaves at harvest
time. Even at the highest rate, a Dublin farmer
finds it impossible to obtain men really competent
for harvesting. When it is remembered that there
are five millions of acres suitable for til-
lage which are now in grass, and that
this change would increase the demand for
labour as well as the value of agricultural produce in
Ireland by 10 or 12 millions sterling, it will be
admitted that, startling as Mr. SAMUELSON'S asser-
tion seems, it is not made without good reason.
Beyond this the mineral resources of the country have
to be developed. The geological survey, although it
has made very small progress, has clearly shown that
there is a considerable amount of mineral wealth in
the country. Altogether Mr. SAMUELSON believes
that the island has great capabilities, and that there
is a brilliant future in store for her if we will only
do our duty to her. That is a condition essential to
the fulfilment of this fair vision.

And what is our duty ? First and foremost to give
the tenant reasonable security. Let us, if we will,
afford small capitalists every facility for becoming
small landowners, but that is not the most pressing
need. This is to secure tenants from capricious
evictions and unreasonable covenants. Already
there prevails throughout the country a u.3age
which is generally admitted by the landlords.
But the evil is, that it is not compulsory
upon them, and that so long as it is not compulsory
no tenant feels himself safe, or is safe. The remedy
is, in Mr. SA3ItELSON'S opinion, and also, we imagine,
in Mr. McLAGAN'S—although he does not approve
of the arrangement on politico-economical grounds—
to give to the custom of tenant-right in Ulster the force
of law. If the tenant had notice to quit he would then be
able to demand the purchase of his tenant-right by
the landlord. That, says Mr. SAMUELSON, should be
based upon the existing rent. The valuation might
be made by local valuers, and there might be an
umpire appointed by public authority. In this way
any case of extremely low or extremely high rents
would be rectified at once. All permanent improvements
would be considered by the valuers to belong to the
tenant unless it were shown that he had been compen-
sated for them. The counter-demand of compulsory
purchase by the landlord, on the part of the tenant,
as a check upon the demand of an undue increase of
rent, would be a simple and effective remedy against
the confiscation of the tenant's interest. No tenant
farm, and would rather pay a
likes to give up his
moderate increase of rent than surrender possession. On
the other hand, a landlord will hesitate before he asks
an unreasonable rent or disturbs a solvent tenant, if
he knows that he will have to pay the full market
value of the farm, and, in the event of capricious or
tyrannical resumption, probably something more.
Altogether Mr. SAmuELSON'S proposal seems to us a
very near approach to a satisfactory settlement. We
are pleased to find that his personal investigations
have brought him to the same conclusion a.& we
reached several months ago, and that he now, as we
did then, considers that the existing Ulster tenant-
.right forms the basis of the settlement of this great
question.

LATEST INTELLIGENCE

(REUTER'S TELEGRAMS.) •

AMERICA.
(Per French Atlantic Cable.)
NEW Yonic, Dec. 14.
COMMERCIAL INTELLIGENCE.
CLOSING PBICES.

Gold closed at 121/ ;
,the highest quotation dur-
ing the day was 1221; the lowest, 121/.
Sterling Exchange on L0nd0n............ 1081.
5-20 U. S. Bonds, 1882 ................... 1141.

'4 .-
64
" 1885 ................... 113.
44
" 1867 ................... 1151.
10-40 " ......................... 110.

Illinois

Erie ...........

Cotton—Mid. upland ......................• 251 c.

Petroleum—Standard White .............. 31c.
Flour, extra state, $5.10c. to $5.70c. Corn, old
mixed, $1.12c.
According to Messrs. Moffatt, Davidig, and
Co.'s report the receipts of cotton for the last
four days, at all ports, have been 56,000 bales ;
shipments to England, 27,000 bales ; to France,
3,000 bales ; an 1 to the Continent, 8,000 bales,
Mid.lling, 11 3-la, cost anti freight per steamer.
11.0.1rAx, Dec. 14.
The Inman Royal Mail steamer arrived here at
3 p.m. to-day. All IV ell.
SOUTHAMPTON, Dec. 14.

Thl North German Lloyd's steamship Ohio,
from Baltimore on the Ist inst., en route for Bre-
men, has arrived here, with 23 passengers and a
full cargo.

BOMBAY MAIL.
MESSINA, Dec. 14.
The Peninstgar and Oriental Company's steamer

Massilia passed Messina at 4 p.m. to-day en route
for Marseilles.

SUEZ, Dec. 14.

The Bengal left at 11 a.m. and the Surat at 2
p.m. to-day for Bombay and Calcutta respectively.
BRINDISI, Dec. 14.

The Adriatic and Oriental Company's steamer
Cairo, 78 hours from Alexandria, has arrived here
with 72 passengers. Letters will be delivered in
London on Friday evening.

THE BRAZILS.

SOUTHAMPTON, Dec. 15.

The Royal Mail steamship Douro, from the
Brazils, arrived here this morning with 76 passen-
gers, £40,183 in specie, and 2,800 packages of

cargo.

The Argentine Minister had left Buenos Ayres
for Brazil, on a mission, it is sail, to take pre-
liminary steps for the withdrawal of his Govern-
ment from the Paraguayan struggle.
The Argentine Cabinet views with regret the
continuance of the campaign, now that the legi-
timate objects of the triple alliance have been
obtained.

The position of the belligerent forces was not
known. Lopez was supposed to be in the moun-
taing, with the Brazilians following him.
The rivers have fallen suddenly, and vessels laden
with army supplies were aground. The heat was
intense.

Some members of the Brazilian Cabinet have
urged the abandonment of the war, but the Em-
peror has resolved to continue operations until
Lopez has been captured or driven into exile.
Should the present Ministry decline to continue the
war, another will be called.
The Government of Monte Video have allowed
all exiled prisoners to return, except Gen. Flores.

'rite very extensive Distillery now being erected
at Belfast, with all recent improvements for the manufacture of
Irish whisky, by Messrs. DUNVILLE & Co., who have gained
a world-wide celebrity for their fine old Irish whisky, is to be
called "The Royal Irish Distillery."