The Sun.
London, England, 1869-04-16 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, FRIDAY EVENING, APRIL 16, 1869.

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have greatly exceeded the numher.at the disposal of
the committee. Gladly, we are told, have the poor
seized the opportunity, and joyfully have they,left
th eir overcrowded country for a land where there is,
at least, hope for all.

There is reason to be believe that these charitable
efforts will prove beneficial, because the committee
have carefully attended to the cardinal condition of
Much of the pauperism in England
is owing solely to want of work, and
for this portion of the poor emigration is
the best resource. But, as we have previously seen,
a great deal of poverty is to be attributed to other
causes. And as ail pauperism is not the effect of
scarcity of labour, so all pauperism is not to be got rid
of by emigration. There is no probability that a man
whose failure is owing to his own vices will thrive in a
colony. There is no reason why he should be trans-
ferred to a young country because he is an incum-
brance here. It is neither just nor practicable to
land our vagabonds, criminals, idlers, and drunkards
'on the other side of the Atlantic because we
find them a sore burden in England. Chari-
' table emigration, in order to do good,
must be confined to workmen, whether skilled or
unskilled, who have suffered from causes over
which they have no control. The emigrants
who left their old homes on Tuesday, and others
who have preceded them, have been judi-
ciously selected on this principle. Applications
from really unfortunate working-class families only
were considered ; and when a selection had to be
made, the best were chosen. Canada, in all proba-
bility, will receive a body of workmen who will
creditably fill some of the many places which are
now vacant. Conducted on this principle, charitable
emigration cannot fail to be useful, and may be advan-
tageously extended. When Rupert's Land is joined
to the Canadian Dominion the emigrant will find a
home of prosperity in the Fertile Belt. This region is
not much more distant than Canada, and surpasses
it in other respects; for whereas Canada is mostly
forest land, which must be cleared, the Fertile Belt
consists largely of soil which is now waiting for the
husbandman. Australia, too, may receive some
attention. The great distance of this colony is a
serious objection ; but labour is sadly needed there,
and the reward ought to be proportionate.

success.

A NEW SYSTEM OF SHORTIIAND. *
The increasing importance or shorthand as a practical
art is abundantly shewn by the multiplication of books
designed to teach it. Shorthand has for some time past
ceased to be a purely professional acquirement. As a
means of recording the words of a speaker, whether for
newspaper or other purposes, a vastly abbreviated
mode of writing has long been indispensable. But
the usefulness of the art is now being extended to the
ordinary purposes of life; it is becoming more and more an
aid to the student or the literary man. No one who is
much in the habit of writing can fail to observe the serious
inconvenience arising from the disparity between the
time required to invest thought with the form of language,
and the much longer period required to transform sounds
into written characters. To the professional reporter
some means of reducing this difference is absolutely
necessary, but to the general community the art
of shorthand cannot fail to prove of the highest
utility. The advantages to be derived from the
power of recording speech as fast as it is uttered are
palpable. But the art is difficult. Shorthand is nothing
snore than a means of expressing the complicated letters
of the alphabet in the simplest characters, such as strokes
and curves. These simple letters are joined together in
the same way as the ordinary manuscript characters.
Much practice is of course required before the hand
can be trained to trace these simple letters as
naturally as the familiar combinations of hooks and
curves. But the chief difficulty is to decipher the abbre-
viated writing after it has once been committed to paper.
The liability to error is great. If, in the hurry of writing,
a character which should be upright is sloped at an
angle, it represents something quite different. If a dot
be accidentally converted into a dash, the result is the
same. Everybody has read the amusing account of David
Copperfield's experience as a shorthand writer who could
not read his notes ; and instances of laughable blunders
would fill a volume. The great aim of a shorthand system
should be to ensure legibility without making the characters
so complex as to prevent rapid writing. This is the
object of Mr. Young's new system, and there can be no
doubt that so much yet remains to be done in this direc-
tion that no apology can be needed for the appearance of
another elementary work. Mr. Young does not aim
sr ecially at rapid writing ; indeed, his system may have
to yield the palm on this score to one or two others. Per-
fect legibility is Mr. Young's watchword, and it is one
which must sound grateful to all who have practically
realised the miseries of unreadable stenography. In one
or two systems of late years the principle of thick and
thin characters has been adopted, a stroke representing
one letter when thin and another when thick. But this
distinction is very difficult to keep up in practice ; a
stroke which should be thin very often becomes thick, and
vice versa. Mr. Young has rejected this principle, and
has devised his characters regardless of their thickness. This,
though it reduces the avilable number of strokes, and ren-
ders the sign for the less common letters more complicated,
is yet a decided gain on the score of legibility. Mr. Young's
system
possesses another great merit, one which we have
long thought indispensable to perfect shorthand writing,
but which has never, to our knowledge, been adopted
before. The inventor of "Readable Shorthand" has so
devised his vowel symbols that they can be written con-
tinuously with the consonants. The general principle
has been to express the vowels by means of dots,
which are placed side by side with the consonants.
Each vowel thus necessitated a lifting of the pen, and if,
as was generally the case, many were omitted, the legibility
of the writing became seriously impaired. By joining his
vowels to the consonants Mr. Young saves time, increases
legibility, and yet is able to omit the vowels at pleasure.
Dots are used only to express entire words, when the
brevity of the symbol compensates for the lifting of the
pen. By reserving his dots for complete words, Mr.
Young secures a very full assortment of phraseograms.
Besides the dot words, every letter represents
a word also, so that abundant facilities for
contraction are provided. Affixes and suffixes
receive ample attention. Mr. Young's is a stenographic
system ; that is, he follows the English alphabet exactly
as it stands, whilst phonographic shorthand is based on
the principle of giving every articulate sound a separate
symbol. It is a decided improvement on many previous
systems in respect of legibility ; and, though one or two
swifter modes of writing might be named, there is no
reason to apprehend that Mr. Young's system is lacking
in this particular. Greater legibility is well worth having
at the cost of a little speed.

" " Readable Shorthand. Self-taught." BY Murdo Young. London E. Stanford, Charing-cross.

THE LORD CHANCELLOR', RECEPTION.

Thursday being the first day of Easter Term, the Lord
Chancellor (Lord Hatherley), according to the usual
custom, gave a breakfast at his private residence to the
Judges, Queen's Counsel, and Serjeants, previous to the
opening of the different equity and common law courts.
Afterwards the judges Went in procession to Westmin-
ster Hall, the time occupied in the journey being much
shorter than usual, as the house of the Lord Chancellor
is in Great George-street, in the immediate neighbour.
hood of the courts. The hall was filled with people who
had assembled to witness the judges pass along in their
full robes, and accompanied by their different officers and
attendants.

Nearly all the judges, both in law and equity, were
present, and amongst the other gentlemen who assem-
bled, some of the earliest arrivals were Mr. Huddleston,
Q.C. ; the Attorney and Solicitor-Generals ; the Hon. G.
Denman, Q. CI 1%4
• ' • ; Sir J. Karslake, Q.C. ; Mr. Kars-
lake, Q.C. ; Arr. Jesse], Q. C., M.P. : Mr. H. Palmer, Q.C.,
M.P.; Serjeant Payne, Dr. Deane, Sir Travers Twiss, Mr.
Staveley Hill, n
M.P, ; Sir Richard Baggallay,
Q.C. ; Mr. O'Malley, Q.C, ; Dr. Stephens ; Mr. Montagu
Chambers, Q.C., M.P. ; Mr. T. Chambers, Q.C., M.P. ;
Sir Roundel' Palmer, Q.C., M.P. ; Mr. Digby Seymour,
Q.C.,

Dr. Petermann, of Gotha, has been informed that
two English expeditions will leave during the pres2ut year
for the Polar regions.

The Blackburn Standard states that the cost of the
recent Parliamentary elections to the ratepayers of Black-
burn will amount to £1,119. This amount is exclusive of
the cost to the candidates, anti of the election petition, and
the whole of the above amount will have to be chargeable
to the rates ! The Mayo• (Mr. John Smith) was put to an
expense of £2OO iu entertaining Mr. Justice Willes.
Many parts of the North of England were visited on
Wednesday with a thunderstorm of unusual severity. Early
in the day it broke over the neighbourhood of Manchester,
and in the afternoon and evening Huddersfield, Leeds, and
the intervening and surrounding districts were similarly
visited. At Burton Salmon, between Leeds and York, the
lightning struck and did great damage to two houses, the
property of a man named Sharp.

CORRESPQNDENCE FROM PARIS,

(FROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT.)

PARIS. THURSDAY, April 15,

The Corps Legislatif has had an Algerian day. N
Jules Favre proposed an amendment to promote the sub-
division of property amongst the natives as a means of
guarding against famine. This is considered by the best
authorities to be indispensible to the prosperity
of the colony. Amongst the Kabyles property
is subdivided to an indefinite extent, and the effect
is remarkable. Whilst the Arabs aro sluggish, indo.
lent, and indifferent, the Kabyles are manly, intelligent,
and active. Whilst the former suffer dreadfully from
famine after a deficient harvest, the energy of the
latter preserves them from the worst consequences
of scarcity. The tenure of land, and not native
peculiarities, are held to be the cause of this
difference. The Algerian Chamber of Commerce has
declared that the non-subdivision of property is the real
cause of the retrograde march of the Arabs and of the dis-
tress in the country. But Marshal Niel thinks differently.
He believes that the miserable failure of the Arabs and
the success of the Kabyles is entirely owing to differences
of race. The inhabitants of Kabylia differ entirely from
the Arabs in manners and physical constitution.
Amongst the latter woman is a slave ; with
the former she holds her place and authority in
the tribe. The Kabyles cultivate the soil and
live on their own resources; their habits more nearly
resemble those of Frenchmen, and this was the cause
why they did not suffer from the famine. This is all very
well ; but it seems to me that the best plan is not to
refuse the Arab a better land tenure because he is inferior
to the Kabyle, but to grant a better land tenure, and
thus leave him a fair chance to equal the Kabyle. So
thought a great many deputies. The division which
followed, like some others of late, was remarkable for a
large defection of Imperialists. The Government got 129
votes, but:the Opposition presented an unusually formidable
minority of 80. Truly the palmy days of Imperialism—
majorities of two or three hundred, and minorities of a
score—are passing away. Forty members of the Right voted
with the Left. It seems, therefore, that the 400,000 Arabs
who perished during the famine have caused forty sup-
porters of the Government to conclude that a change is ne-
cessary in Algeria. The Libertg puts the following problem :
If ten thousand Arabs killed by hunger convert one deputy,
how many must be killed before the Corps blgislatif
presents a majority in favour of a good system of colonial
government ?

M. Gassaud, a merchant of Nice, has become bankrupt
and fled. His liabilities would be nothing in England,
but they are deemed somewhat considerable in France.
The total is only £72,000.

THE VOLUNTEER CAPITATION GRANT.

Mr. Cardwell's answer to the memorial presented last
month by Lord Elcho in:the name of a number of peers and
members of Parliament who aro volunteers on the subject of
the capitation grant is pentad among the parliamentary
papers issued this morning. It is as follows:—"War
Office, March 17, 1869.—My Lord, —I am d'r,cted by the
Secretary of State for War to acknowledge the receipt of
your letter of the 3d inst., enclosing a memorial on the sub-
ject of the capitation grant of the volunteer force, agreed to
at a meeting of volunteer peers ani members of Parliament,
and 1 am to request that you will have the goodness to in-
form the memorialists that the question, whether any
increase of the present grant ought to be asked
for from Parliament, shall receive the careful con-
sideration of her Majesty's Government, in connection with
tie question, which is now also receiving their serious at-
tention, as to what measurs s it may bo expedient to take for
the better organisation of the reserve force as a support in
time of emergency to tho regular forces of her Majesty.—I
have, /cc. (signed) NORTHBROOK. —The Lord Elcho."

MANNERS OF TILE HOUSE OF COMMONS.

A correspondent who dates from the House of Corn-
MOW, and signs himself "A Bloated Aristocrat," sends
the following letter :—I read with groat interest yes_
terday your ingenious article on ":Manners in England
and America." It pleased me so much that I shall take care
to send a copy of it to a gentleman, a member of the House
of Commons, who was lately seen, in the reading-room
of that assembly, to take his boots off preliminary to the
enjoyment of his newspaper. Lounging in one chair,
with Lis feet reposing in their stockings upon another,
ho made in the sunshine a very striking if not quite an
agreeable figure. To bo sur,', Tuesday was a very
warm day; but that, I venture to t!,inlc, is no excuse
for this particular breach of good manners. Sir,
pray print my letter as a hirt to the gentle-
man in question; otherwise, when the dog days come in,
ho may be encouraged to strip himself still further—and
that would really be offensive. Besides, lad manners are
contagious, oven (though you might not think it) in so
august an atmosphere as ours.