The Sun.
London, England, 1869-01-30 00:00:00

fastened against the paneleis windows, a piece of
salt, a tract entitled " The Goodness of God," and a
bundle of rags, whereon lay two corpses. Some
kind missionary had giver. the tract, no doubt,
with a " Be ye warmed and be ye filled." A hundred-
weight of coals would have given more warmth ;
and as for filling, there was nothing but the piece of
salt aforesaid, and a portion of this was the last food
that had entered the mouth of one of the two
corpses before famine had completed its work. The
husband had applied for relief, and received a pound
of meat, two ounces of tea, and a pound of sugar,
and an order to the sfoni- yard. Ire did not go
there, for by the wisdom of the guardians it is
ordained that a man shall .never receive more than
Bd. a day, even though he may earn twice that
amount. But, it will be said, better half a loaf
than no bread. Undoubtedly a sane man will
think so. But SPENCE was insane ; his
misery had driven him mad, raging mad.
He was taken to the asylum, but it was
full, for between one circle and another in this
East-end Inferno, between poverty and 'insanity
there is but a step, and asylums are apt to be full in
such localities. So they took him to the workhouse,
where he had to be " looked after," and what that
means in the case of a pauper maniac we shudder to
think.

Meanwhile how is it going on at "home "? The
wife has long ago sold all her clothes for food;
she has nothing wherewith to buy ; she cannot go
out to beg. First of all the baby dies, the feeble spark
of life goes out for want of oil. Then the mother,
vainly endeavouring to assuage the horrible pangs of
hunger by eating salt, gives up the weary struggle,
and finds that she must seek in another world for
"the goodness of GoD," whereof the missionary's
tract spoke so pleasantly. There had been no inquest
on the child, for babies are born to die in the Isle of
Dogs and parts adjacent. But when a dead woman
is found Maine n an empty. room upon a bundle of
rags th'ejic.e, need of inquiry. The surgeon makes a
post-moFtem examination, and finds a stomach perfectly
empty. No need to hide the cause of death under
learned talk about extravasation and syncope. Nay,
rather there is great need. One juror began to
denounce the stone-yard system, and said that men
had told him they could not keep their families on
Bd. a day; had said, " I will not go there ; it is no use.
The parish must bury me." Up rose another juror, " a
large employer of labour in the island," and protested
against a verdict of death from starvation. It
would get into the papers and cause the island to be
talked about. Clearly SPENCE had, in this juror's
idea, gone mad out of spite to the guardians, and his
wife had died only that she might make the parish
bury her. lle would be one with them, however.
" What use," he said, "were people when they are
dead ? Why not bury them in an egg-box, or,
better still, without any coffin at all ?" Really, view-
ing the matter from this large employer of labour's
standpoint, we do not see our way to an answer.
Here is " only a pauper whom nobody owns," whom
even the good GOD seems to have disowned. Of
what use are such to large employers of labour ?
Why should large employers of labour have to pay
for burying them ? There is the Thames or the
dust-heap for the dead body of pauper LAZARUS in
this world, and for large-employer-of-labour DIVES
there is in the next the parched tongue and the great
gulf.

Mr. DAVID WARD CHAPMAN has contributed a
fresh chapter to the history of " Overend, Gurney,
and Co." The substance of his letter appears in
another column. If it serves to exculpate him so
far as his transactions are concerned, it certainly
does not improve the position of his former
colleagues. Mr. CHAPMAN states that the
connection between Mr. EDWARDS and the
old firm began by Mr. EDMUND GURNEY'S
asking the advice of Mr. EDWARDS with reference to
some bankrupt estate in which the firm were inte-
rested. Remembering that Mr. EDWARDS was the
official assignee of the court through which this
estate had to pass, we need not dwell on the
extreme impropriety of retorting to him for counsel.
The counsel was not only asked, but given, and was
found to be so valuable, or, to use Mr. CHAPMAN'S
words, Mr. EDMUND GURNEY was "so pleased
with the sagacity which he thought was shewn by
EDWARDS " that " he consulted him during the whole
year upon many of what I may call the illegiti-
mate advances which the firm had then made."
The " illegitimate advances" gave rise to illegitimate
consultations, which became more and more frequent.
At length Mr. EDWARDS was found so necessary to
the firm that, as Mr. EDMUND GURNEY said in paying
him £5,000, " Friend EDWARDS, I do not see how we
are to get on without thee." So this public official in the
receipt of a handsome salary was put in charge of the
firm's accounts. Ile does not seem to have examined
them very strictly, for it was left to Mr. JOHN HENRY
GURNEY, of Norwich, to find out that " the house
was in a mess," and to inform this confidential adviser
and accountant thereof. Mr. CHAPMAN would have us
believe that Mr. EDWARDS was so pleased with this
state of thing. that he tried to force himself upon
PotuerYed of the prospect that he
the firm as a partner; that is, finding a business on
and making' enormous
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sb ihnek
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ennkar
wished to take a share of the impending ruin. What
was to be done ? Mr. CHAPMAN and his partners
could not afford to part with any portion of their
splendid property. They had no alternative but to
place £OO,OOO to Mr. EDWARDS'S credit as hush-
money, in order to prevent him from forcing them
to put up their shutters by revealing the secrets with
ehrisi
inosne f acquainted. Taking
of the story as correct,
ANNihri.cohnlriermhAaNgsd
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he was in no way responsible for the " wild " advances
to the Millwall Company, Mr. LEVER, and
STEPANOS XENOS. Still,he thought that the
firm could pull through the enormous losses in which
it had involved itself. He was, however, not
sufficiently sanguine, or was too cautious, to
put his name t the prospectus which announced
the formation of the limited liability company.
It is thus he has escaped the unpleasant position
in which his colleagues now find themselves. They,
according to Mr. CHAPMAN'S letter, sold for
millions a business which was so thoroughly rotten
that if they had not paid their confidential adviser
£20,000 hush-money, he would have " forced them
to put up their shutters within twenty-four hours."
Bad as was the case for the defendants in the
recent investigation,. it is fortunate for them that
their quondam colleague had changed his residence
from London to Tours. But for that change they
would have fared even worse.