The Sun.
London, England, 1867-12-26 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

The loss of 178 lives in the Ferndale Colliery has been
made the subject of an inquiry which will, the Times
trusts, conduce in some degree to the more effectual pro-
tection of miners in their perilous trade. Complicated and
technical as the report of this inquest may appear, it is
nevertheless reducible to a few plain statements and an
equally plain moral. The danger of coal-mining consists
in the presence of inflammable air discharged from coal.
This gas, or firedamp, will explode if brougiat into contact
with flame, and yet flame, in the shape of light, is indis-
pensable to the business of the mine. The first source of
this danger cannot be removed. Coal will always dis-
charge gas, more or less. Some seams are far mere " fiery"
than others, and certain states of the atmosphere or
other natural causes may lead to the unusual ace-amnia-
Con or escape of gas at particular times. In general,
however, it must be assumed that in every coal-mine
there is a liability to this danger. The coal will give
out the gas, the gas will be liable to explosion, and
a catastrophe like that at Ferndale may at any
time follow. This is the peril against which it is
necessary to provide, and the provision, if proper pains
art taken, can be made with almost complete effect.
Of course, the first and most obvious duty is to carry off
the gas before it accumulates in sufficient quantities to
become dangerous ; in other words, to ventilate the mine.
Collieries should be subjected more effectually to indepen-
dent inspection ; and this should be combined with some
measures for ascertaining freely the views and opinions
of the miners employed. It is shewn but too clearly in
the very narrative before us that colliers are often reckless
of danger ; but, on the other hand, we have been re-
peatedly assured that some of them, at least, are more
careful of their lives, and that they would often be willing
to indicate the unsafe points in the working of the pits if
they were allowed proper opportunities of speaking their
minds. It concurs with the regret expressed by the jury
that a deputation from the Miners' National Association
was not permitted to go down into the Ferndale pit, for it
would have been, at least, satisfactory, and might possibly
have been serviceable, to hear the opinions of such witnesses
uponthe catastrophe itself, and the general dangers which it
represented. The fault of the present system appears to
lie in a variety of slight defects at its several points. In
theory it is complete ; at least, no addition is suggested to
it ; but in practice it fails. The men have their safety
lamps, but they find the means of neutralising the safe-
guard ; the owners ventilate the mine, but not always
effectually, and there is no register of the air draught from
day to day, as there might be ; the firemen are on the look-
out for firedamp, but there is no record of their reports ;
and the outside, or independent inspection, which should
keep all this machinery in order, is not sufficient for the
purpose. The sources of danger are well known, and the
requisite preventives are all presumed to be in action, but
there is no security for the constant efficiency of the whole
organisation. So the result is seen in catastrophes like
that at Ferndale, and the remedy ought not to be long
withheld after so terrible a warning.

In the opinion of the Daily News, the attitude of the
English people towards the misdeeds of the Fenian conspi-
rators exhibits the national character in a very fair and
honourable light. The crimes which have shocked the
world are not outrages merely upon law and authority,
but upon society and human nature itself. They exhibit
a depravity to which it would be hard to find a parallel.
The cry of execration which they have raised has been
universal. But the public mind has preserved its self-
possession in the midst of its just anger. It has refused
to be urge by lawlessness into lawlessness, or to suffer the
contagion of the Fenian frenzy to infect itself. In order
that justice may he done upon the offenders, and that the
stern retribution which public sentiment and the public
interests alike require may be exacted, the limits and safe-
guards of law must be strictly observed. Its rules and
processes afford the surest means of tracking out the guilty
and of shielding the innocent—ends which are inseparable.
To let the blow fall swift and strong, no matter upon
whom, is a course to which, notwithstanding some dis-
creditable incentives, neither the Government nor the
public has displayed any proneness. The disturbers of
society have nothing to hope from this temper. An out-
burst of wild and fierce passion is likely, when it has
spent itself, to be followed by feeble laxity. The steady
sense of justice will not know the weakness of either
extreme.

The Standard nrges on Irish fellow-citizens, both rich
and poor, to lose no time in shaking off from themselves
every suspicion of disloyalty, by joining in the common
measures of self-protection against the Fenians. Of all
the calamities which are in the catalogue of Irish
grievances, certainly the worst would be the belief in the
English mind that every Irishman of the Roman Catholic
faith is a Fenian. Our contemporary continues : That any
considerable number of them, even in Irettml, are of the
same mind as that illustrious but mysterious chieftain who
styles himself "'the O'Donoghue," we cannot bring our-
selves to believe. They may have been led away by an
ill-regulated sentiment of romantic generosity to talk of
the' murderers of an English policeman as " glorious
martyrs ;" but we are willing to excuse this as a fit of
hysterics. Having had their cry out, and finished the
" berrin'," we may hope that they will speedily return to
their senses. The Clerkenwell outrage not have been
altogether useless if it helps all honest Irishmen to reject
this loathsome image whith comes in the shape of Irish
patriotism—whose favourite weapons are gunpowder and
Greek fire—whose battle-field is the poor man's home—
whose victims are women and children, and whose highest
achievement is the slaughter of an unarmed policeman.

The Telegraph writes : Let the spirit of the season pleat
with all who have abundance for the good societies which
grapple with the miseries and errors of our time. Let the
hand open largely and liberally towards the coffers which
are emptied for the real poor. Charity covers a multitude
of sins ; and none of us can look back from Christmas
time along the vista of the dying year without accusing
thoughts. Send a thumping Christmas-box towards some
one or other of the thousand efforts made by worthy
and energetic people for the good of the struggling and
the suffering. Help the infirmary, the reformatory, the
refuge, the ragged school, to close the year with a pleasant
balance. It is astonishing how much easier the conscience
will then feel respecting that dubious profit, that doubtful
acquaintance, that questionable piece of conduct in the
bygone twelvemonths which the moral sense has not yet
digested. Pay what you must pay, but pay something to
that which has no " must" at all in its silent and
eloquent pleading ; and you will find that you take out
of a " Christmas-box " something which you never put
into it.

We have not, says the Herald, as yet heard of deaths
from absolute starvation in the Poplar and Stepney
unions ; but where the extent of weekly relief is limited
in the one to one shilling, and in the other to one shilling
and sixpence for each person, it is easy to anticipate,
should the scale not be altered, the consequences which
must ensue. The benefit of the poor law to those who
apply for relief under it mainly depends upon the disposi-
tion and conduct of the relieving officer, for his recom-
mendation cannot with safety be disregarded ; while the
master can make the house a hell or a home to those
placed under his control. IV,' have endeavoured for year 3
past to impress upon the Poor-law Board the necessity of
themselves directly nominating these two classes of offi-
cials, many of whom under the existing system seem to
defy censure, and are insensible to the disgrace of
exposure or the dread of punishment for their reisded3.
One thing we are convinced of—that, no matter wLat
amendments may be effected in the law, its humane exe-
cution will never be ensured until the duty of searchin-
out poverty, instead of waiting fur its appeal, be entrusted,
as it is in France, to meek and Christian women, instead
of being confided, as it is here, to brutal mannered and