The Sun.
London, England, 1860-04-19 00:00:00

1ft.....r.te•••••.••••..rm
Referring distinctly to the six-pound franchise
for boroughs—forming the chief, and, as we have
already ventured to call it, about the one only re-
deeming feature of Lord JOHN'S " Poor Little,"
weak-eyed, weak-voiced, and otherwise addle-
headed " Bill " for the Reform of Parliament—the
article in the Quarterly endeavours at once, as a
last resource, to excite a feeling actually of alarm
against this sufficiently moderate project of extend-
ing the elective franchise to the sixpounders !
Considering the extravagant character of the
epithets applied to this project by the

uarterly —this project of a six-pound
franchise for the boroughs—we are left in utter be-
wilderment as to what additional strength of

epithets could by any possibility be applied to a

really " Big Bill" instead of a " Little one"—a Reform

Bill, let us say, that should go the length among

other things of proposing the adoption of the
Chartist principle of Universal Suffrage. After
the adjectives here applied by the Quarterly to
the projected " six-pounders," the reviewer may be
literally said (in reference to the proposal of uni-
versal suffrage) to have " beggared description !" As
affording very readily proof positive that we are not,
in saying this, by any manner of means speaking at
random, we will just quote a few of the polite
allusions made by the Quarterly to this
Ministerial plan of extending tie privi-
lege of the franchise to the six poinders.
Quoth the Quarterly then, in sepulchral accents of
warning :—" The leap which the House of Com-
mons is taking with such philosophic calmness
is a leap absolutely in the dark. We are humbly
carrying our homage to some new king, but we
know neither his name nor character. When the
transfer is effected, when the new reign is opened,
when the old rulers are irrevocably dethroned,
then the veil shall be drawn aside, and we shall
see the form and lineaments of the now unknown
Power which will thenceforth dispose of the fortunes
of England. Until this interesting revelation is
made, it is scarcely worth while to speculate.
Some say that the publicans will be our masters ;
others declare that it will be the trades' unions.
it is a blessed choice between debauchery and
crime. On the whole, we pray for King Publican
and his merry rule. If the sceptre is to be
wielded for the benefit of one, and that the hun-
griest, class, the weaker the hands that it falls
into the better. Anyhow Elagabalue is more tole-
rable than Caligula. All the evils that we inveigh
against in the constituencies where freemen pre-
vail, the chronic corruption, the sickening de-
bauchery, the wide-spreading fraud and wholesale
perjury that adorn the working of our represen-
tative system in such places as Berwick and
Norwich would be ill exchanged for the strong,
steady, deadly gripe of the trades' unions. These
bodies have shown a tenacity of purpose, and a
pliability of organisation which would make them
redoubtable antagonists if they were actuated by
morality and guided by the most enlightened wisdom.
But the stupid barbarism of their economical creed,
the ferocity, with which their secret conclaves pro-
nounce the doom of a horrible death against all
who thwart their projects, the readiness with which
they find instruments to execute their murderous
decrees, warn us that, if ever England should really
pass under their power, WE SHOULD WELCOME THE
MILITARY DESPOTISM THAT SHOULD RELIEVE US."
The expressions we have here taken the liberty of
emphasing with italics, and especially the closing
sentence, which we could only fitly quote in small
capitals, will be accepted by our readers—cannot
fail to be so accepted by them—as ample justifica-
tion of every phrase above applied by us to this as-
tounding denunciation of Lord JOHN RUSSELL'S
" Poor Little Bill" by the Quarterly. Epithets so
applied, are, surely, something equivalent to the
discharge of a park of artillery at a cock sparrow ;
or to adopt the famous metaphor in POPE'S Satire,
he breaking upon the wheel of a butterfly.

Every now and then the subject of game preser-
vation is forced on public attention. Sometimes it
is by the terrible monition of a horrible murder, as

it is termed, and horrible enough it is, yet wanting
after all in the worst incidents of a murder—the
waylaying with intent to kill. Game murders,
which so awfully remind us of the existence of
game laws, are rather duels between persons whose
occupations make them bitter enemie's to each other.
Occasionally, also, a pamphlet, like the one now
before us,' serves to keep the subject before the
public. Mr. CORBET'S essay was originally read at
a meeting of the " Central Farmers' Club " this
spring, and is very properly printed in this form,
being too long to appear fully in the daily press.
It specially invites attention to the evils of the
" over preservation of game," and takes a view of
the fair use of game which ought to content any
reasonable man.

Amongst Mr. GLADSTONE'S money-squeezing
tricks, one is a modification of the game licenses, in
which he proposes to cancel one of the most practi-
cally useful of the gamo preservers' concessions, by
making rabbits game again ! Probably this ill-
advised proposal may have suggested to Mr.
CORDET taking up the subject just now. And,

though to townsmen the rabbit-killing license may
not seem much worse than a stamp on every letter
which is to make a bargain binding, it will prove,
in the country, a cause of the most wanton annoy-
ance. To the farmer all the furred game are the
most odious of ♦ermin. Hares do an incalculable
amount of damage. They cannot, like a flock of
sheep, be penned and required to consume an
assigned portion of food—they roam over a field of
turnips, bite far more than they eat, and thus

* Over Preservation of Game. By Henry Corbel
London : J, Ridgway,

expose to the rotting effects of frost, perhaps
twenty times the weight of,
mrooroetosr, eequait-
site to sustain them. Hares, Ter,
the young grain crops which sheep are, of
course, never allowed to do ; they also, being
rodentia, seem to take a pleasure in nibbling off the
blades for the pleasure of nibbling. Worse vermin
on his farm than hares the farmer cannot have.
But next to these come Mr. GLADSTONE'S rab-
bits. They too are great eaters of green crops, but
they do not ramble so far as hares. They keep in
the neighbourhood of their burrows. In their
vicinity they are as mischievous vermin as hares
themselves. But, as if to compensate for moving
in a smaller circle, they do far more damage within
it. They destroy banks and hedges by their bur-
rows, and have been known to cause endless trouble
by stopping up costly under-drains. To the farmer
both hares and rabbits are as great a Nuisance as rats
and mice. The charge against Mr.GLADSTONE i 3 that
one of these pests having been degraded from the
rank of game, Mr. GLADSTONE, for the sake of
thumb-screwing a trifle out of the farmer, proposes
to make them game again. We hope some inde-
pendent member will notice this shabby little trick.
Will not some of our county members do it ? They
retain, we suppose, as their motto—" Farmers'
Friends"—will they not look out for the farmers ?
If they consult their gamekeepers, the latter, who
always regard the rabbits as their perquisite, will
give
declared t he
in
twenty reasons why rabbits should be
game ; but if they ask their tenants they
will bid them declare rats game next, and Mr.