The Sun.
London, England, 1858-10-16 00:00:00

'IIIE SUN, LONDON, SATURDAY EVENING, OCTOBER 16, 1858.

miles in quest of this charmed ore. On, on, on they rush,
year after year, in nearly equal numbers, but yet with in-
stinctive discipline, marking their track by the establish-
ment of law and order. Melbourne, like Jonah's gourd, but
happily only in its growth, rises in a night from a village
to a city. All the other settlements contribute their in-
dustry to the maintenance of the vast ingress of the popula-
tion. Ship after ship pours in the riches of India, America,
and England, and within three yearsthe imports amountsd
in 12 months to upwards of 20 millions sterling. Such an
array. of figures made the wildest speculator hold his breath.
A crisis of no ordinary magnitude seemed impending, but
all sagacity was baffled by the rich treasures of Ballarat,
Bendigo, and Mount Alexander, and ere six months had
passed the market was relieved, and the marvel remains to
this day how and where the immense stores of every con-
ceivable produce were consumed. Nor is the wonder over.
Nor do we see its limits as long as the auriferous deposits
yield their accustomed riches, added to the wealth of their
fleeces and copper ore. The population of Australia now ex-
ceeds 800,000, and is daily increasd with our best blood,
while its Government is almost a reflex of the British Con-
stitution. The divisible labour fund is the greatest by far in
the history of mankind. Its trade is third in importance in the
list of our vast commerce. Our tonnage to its ports counts

by hundreds of thousands of tons. Its public revenues are
upwards of £5,000,000 per annum, while railways of great
extent, among others connecting Port Philip with the Mur-
ray, a river navigable for 1,500 miles from its source, are
now in progress at a cost of £8,000,000, and hydraulic
works worthy of ancient Rome provide the city of Mel-
bourne with abundance of pure water. Such is but an im-
perfect outline of " emigration" within a recent period, and
its reproductive influence on the mother country is a cal-
culation I would hardly dare to venture on. Our own
colonies are the homes of tens of thousands of our fellow-
countrymen, and the goal of countless thousands more.
Those who have left us love to linger over the history of
their fatherland with all its glorious associations of civiliza-
tion and freedom. Those who seek to follow will leave us,
I trust, schooled in those solid virtues which have built up
England's greatness, and in both there is an undying wish
to link themselves in thought and interest with the land of
their birth. Such feelings have something far, far beyond
a mere sentimental value ; they impart a reciprocal attach-
ment which distance can neither enfeeble nor sever, and
are leading to social and commercial results, the culminat-
ingi point of which will, I hope, be in a futurity much too
distant for any human calculation.
A paper having been read upon the subject of the Slave
Trade by the secretary of the Anti-Slavery Society.
Lord BROUGHAM said that the question was not entirely
settled at the present day, for what the paper had alluded
to as a " call for emigration," raised, naturally enough, the
question of immigration, as it had been called, by which it
was thought—not in our own colonies, but in some foreign
colonies—to supply the want oflabour by what was called emi-
gration from the cum!, ut• Abler& , but It turned out mat
the emigration consisted of men who were kidnapped
and taken on board ship in manacles, or who were put in
manacles before they had been 24 hours on board the vessel.
This was called free emigration. The paper, he regretted,
did not dwell upon the substitute in the encouragement to
the not only innecent, but praiseworthy trade on the coast
of Africa which had been constantly increasing for years
past, since the abolition of the greater portion of the traffic.
He had every reason to hope that the good sense of the
Government—the French Government, as well as other
Governments of the present day—would put an end to that
speculation in men, for he could call it nothing else, which
had been lately attempted, but which he trusted had very
generally failed. His lordship contended that the planter
with free labour was a great sufferer by the admission of
the Spanish slave-grown sugar upon the same terms as re-
garded duty as our free-grown sugar. It was not the
natural increase of Cuba, but the constant importation of
slaves from the African coast, which caused the free-grower
to be undersold in the market. It gave him very great
satisfaction to state that from a late communication that
had been received from Dr. Livingstone, on the east coast
of Africa, there was every reason to suppose with regard to
the demand for cotton—the article now so very much in
demand, and respecting which so considerable alarm lately
prevailed, particularly at Manchester—that that demand
would be supplied. His right rev. friend the Bishop of
Oxford had been kind enough to communicate to him (Lord
Brougham) a letter whichhe had just received from Dr. Li-
vingstone, from which two things appeared. One was that
great indignation was expressed by the natives of that coast
against the Portuguese Government for allowing the native
princes to traffic in slaves. Those princes did not join, of
course, in the indignation; but the poor negroes, the peo-
ple, generally and strongly joined in it ; and Dr. Living-
stone and the men who were with him, being supposed to
be connected with the Portuguese, at first found a very
cold and even hostile reception ; but the joy of the people
was indescribable when the men declared that they were
not Portuguese, but English, and enemies to the slave
trade, which the Portuguese had been to a certain degree
justly charged with upholding. Another fact was that they
found up the river, and on both sides, a most general, easy,
and economical cultivation of cotton, the soil and the climate
appearing to be both singularly adapted to its production.
No doubt whatever existed that with very little encourage-
ment, a very little addition to their means in point of ma-
chinery, cotton might be largely and profitably cultivated,
and that the habits of the people were strongly in favour of
it, the negroes having already largely—largely at least,
according to their means—engaged in the cultivation. In
conclusion, his lordship, who appeared greatly moved, said
—I cannot name my rev. friend Bishop Wilberforce without
adding that that is a name which must ever awaken in my
bosom an emotion in which veneration, love, and affection
strive for the mastery ; and it is most pleasing to me to be
able to say so in this town of Liverpool when I recollect
that 46 years ago, during the great contest in 1812, one of
'the most powerful appeals that was made by a certain part
of the people against me upon that occasion was the pla-
carding of the words that I had used in the House of Count
mons the session before, declaringtrading slave to be not a
traffic, but a felony. That was held at the time to be a
most judicious and useful squib, as it were, against a can-
didate, that he had dared to lift his voice in the House of
Commons as against that part, at least, of the trade of the
borough of Liverpool. Ido not believe there is to be found
in all the town of Liverpool one single individual at the
present day who would promote such an attack upon me.
(Hear, hear, and cheers.)
The remainder of the day was occupied with discussions
rather of local than of general interest.
In section 2 of this department the chair was occupied
successively by Lord J. Russell, Mr. Kinnaird, M.P., and
Sir B. Leighton.
During the discussion upon the " Great Social Evil"
Lord J. Russell presided. His Lordship suggetted that a
considerable discrimination should be exercised in reporting
the proceeedings. He could not say that every individual
reporter or editor had exercised the most wise discretion
upon this or any other subject; and, as a case in point, he
referred to a letter which appeared in the Times some
months ago, which, his lordship added, was from a woman
who was leading an abandoned life, who spoke of it in
glowing terms.
Mr. N. CAINE then read his paper " On Prostitution; its
Aids and Accessories." Of late years' there have sprung
up, not only in our large towns, but even in populous vil-
lages, certain establishments, licensed for plausible purposes,
but which, in offering special attractions for the immoral
of both sexes' are in reality aids and accessories to vice.
Their true character, the law in reference to their preven-
tion, and the laxity of its administration form [the subject
of the paper now presented to the Association for the Ad-
vancement Social Science. The alarming increase of pros-
titution, and the bold attitude it assumes in large towns,
must be observed with painful solicitude by the social eco-
nomist. Whoever has watched the growth of this evil
must have been struck with the effrontery of certain noto-
rious establishments, evidently instituted for the purposes
of assignation and prostitution, as harbours of prostitutes
and marts for procuresses. Our national. jealousy of
infringing upon the liberty of the subject affords them
impunity ; and thus, through the misapplication of a
principle, and a mistaken view of the quesfion, are these
hotbeds of vice tolerated. Much of the leniency ex-
hibited has its origin in a misplaced compassion for the
so-called " unfortunates." Unfortunate, indeed, they
are in every sense of the term ; as fallen sisters they
claim our most tender sympathies ; but let us take care
that our feelings do not betray us into a false 'estimate of
the facts. That a certain proportion of these wretched
women are the victims of seduction is sadly too true ; but
that proportion is by no means So large as many suppose ;
by far the greater number take up this vile pursuit deli-
berately and designedly, to be followed just so long as it
yields pleasure or profit, and when it ceases to yield either
one or the other to be given up. It is not the mere
animal gratification, but the great profits and guilty plea-
sures connected with prostitution that form its chief
attraction ; curtail these, and its principal inducement
will be removed. Let prostitution be treated- as it is—
a trade, an infamous trade ; let all who aid and abet its
traffic be treated as infamous traders. Let the same prin-
ciple of legislation which bears upon other illicit com-
merce (to smuggling and slavetrading) be applied to prosti-
tution, and its dimensions would soon be reduced. Much
may be done for its mitjgation—its extinction can hardly
be expected. Instead, however, of looking upon it
in this light, we find it treated with great delicacy ; or,
as is too commonly the case, with great levity. Any
one listening to the defence, often made, of the dons
of
.profligacy about to be described, if ignorant of
their real nature, would almost infer that the proprietors
were men and women impelled by benevolence to open
casinos and divans as asylums for the unfortunates, or as
harbours for the homeless, and that their presiding mis-
tresses were patterns of matronly kindness, anxious only to
provide some refuge for the fallen. While the nature and
extent of those evils which result 'from places used as
public resorts of prostitutes is admitted by many, they
shrink from dealing with them, under the impression that
they are lesser evils, serving probably to prevent greater.
A closer examination, however, shows too clearly their end
and aim, and it is impossible to resist the conviction that
they are monster evils, engendering the foulest vices that
can degrade humanity. The time allotted will not permit
minute description of the various places under discussion ;
a cursory glance at them must therefore suffice. Some take
out a licence for wine, some for beer, and others again
merely for tobacco. The price of admission varies from 2d.
to ls., females being usually charged one half. Some are
pronounced to be "free," or the cost of the entrance ticket
is returned in drink or cigars. The halls or rooms, in
many instances, are elegantly and most expensively deco-
rated. Some have attractions for the eye, in pictures and
poses plastiques ; some for the ear, in vocal and instrumental
music ; while others offer various allurements. But at all
the prevailing licentiousness in speech and gesture is such
that it may not be described even to a male audience.
While some make the pretence of bringing their revels to a
close at an earlier hour, most of these modern yandemonia
keep up their orgies till 3 and 4 and even 5 o'clock in the
morning ; alike on Sundays as on week-days, the Sabbath
making no difference. The frequenters consist of prosti-
tutes from 14 years of age and upwards ; and those places
are specially used as training grounds for the initiation
of young girls into their career of vice, procuresses
teaching them their infernal lesson. Among the men
may be seen flash fellows, fancy men, and bullies, known
to the police as gamblers and pickpockets ; and
in this most respectable assemblage are to be found,
if the term may be allowed, " gentlemen," at all
events men of wealth and station, and of influence in society.
Mingling with this throng are men holding offices of high
trust and appointments of great responsibility—cashiers
and merchants' clerks, and even apprentice lads just merging
into manhood. All these may be seen in familiar inter-
course—hail fellows I—with the blackleg, the thief, and the
harlot. It is of little moment where the resorts of vice
may be, by what name they may be called, or under what
pretence they may be covered. The lounge of the theatre,
the casino, the dancing saloon, the free-and-easy, free con-
cert, supper-room., cafe, or divan—all are alike in character ;
these two elements of evil, the two great causes of all crime
—drink and prostitution—are the characteristics of each.
The practices of each are alike vicious, and they have
all .one object; all are established for the purpose, and
for the purpose only, of affording facilities to assigna-
tion and prostitution. Whatever may be the allure-
ments which bring viciously-disposed persons of both
sexes together, they are dangerous to society. Matrons
and employers of females little suspect the common
use made of dancing saloons by- domestic servants and
shopwomen ; and parents little think what their daughters
Are exposed to when suffered to frequent flitch places. LA