The Sun.
London, England, 1858-10-09 00:00:00

THE-D(IER .OF RUTLAND AND LORD
J. MANNERS IN LEICESTE.RSIHRE.

WALTHAM, FRIDAY.
The annual meetingofthe Waltham Agricultural
Ase.ociation was held in this town yesterday, and
was numerously attended by the gentry and others
interested in the agriculture of the district. In the
afternoon a dinner was held in the Agricultural
Hall'under the presidency of his Grace the Duke
of Rutland. Lord J. Manners, M.P., the Chief Com-
missioner of Works, the Rev. G. E. Gillett, rector
of Waltham, Mr. G. Norman, Mr. Hubberstey, Mr.
Chowler, &c., were present.
The usual loyal toasts having been given,
The CrurnxlAN proposed " The Health of the Bi-
shop and Clergy of the Diocese." He believed there
was no one more anxious for the well-being and
welfare of the labouring classes than the British
agriculturist, for he knew it was by their means
and their labour that the good harvest which by
God's blessing he had just gathered into his barns
had been raised and brought home ; and there was
no body of men who, by their attention, their kind-
ness, and watchfulness, so materially conduced to
the well-being of the British labourer as the clergy.
The Rev. G. E. GILLETT, in responding, con-
fessed that the clergy were most interested in the
prosperity of these associations, inasmuch as they
brought together all classes connected with agricul-
ture, from the peer to the peasant. He was happy
to find that agricultural associations had at length
outlived and silenced the depreciatory remarks
which used to be made against them by one, and
that not an uninfluential, portion of the public press.
That, in his opinion, was no small testimony to
their value. He, however, augured still greater suc-
cess from another fact, viz., that in spite of agricul-
tural implements having wonderfully improved,
the wages of the labourer were much higher now,
in proportion to the price of corn and the other ne-
cessaries of life, than they were 25 years ago.
(Cheers.) For this reason, and believing that these
societies acted as a stimulus to agricultural improve-
ment, he and all the clergy could not fail to wish
them God speeed. (Cheers.)
The noble DUKE in the chair next proposed
" The Army and Navy." He said—There never was
a time when both services stood higher in the esti-
mation of this country, both for their fortitude and
bravery when before the enemy two years ago in
Russia and now in India. I believe that their
bravery and their fortitude have never been sur-
passed—not only their fortitude in the field, but,
what is still more trying to the British soldier,
their fortitude under the influences of a bad climate
and disease. (Hear, hear.) lam glad to see that a
feeling is now abroad in favour of keeping up our
establishments. With the rest of the world, I was
at Cherbourg this year, and I saw those magnificent
forts bristling with guns, and the magnificent fleet
that came from Toulon on that occasion. It was
indeed a magnificent spectacle. I am not, however,
one of those who are called alarmists. At the same
time that I wish to see our establishments kept
upon a proper and a secure footing, my belief is
that the Emperor of the French is perfectly sin-
cere and perfectly honest when he says that he
wishes to cultivate the alliance of this country.
(Hear, and cheers.) I believe it because, though I
believe him to be ambitious, I think his ambition
is of a higher nature than that of wishing to invade
a neighbouring . country. (Cheers.) My belief is
that he is ambitious of raising France still higher
than she is at present in the scale of nations ; that
he will do so by encouraging her industry—her in-
dustry in her agriculture, her industry in her com-
merce and her manufactures, and not by laying
waste, if he were even able, the fields of his neigh-
bours, for that must and would react against the
prosperity of his own country. (Cheers.)
The Rev. G. E. C41....,.LLETT proposed the "health of
his Grace the Duke of Rutland, as President of the
Association and Lord-Lieutenant of the County."
The rev. gentleman alluded briefly to the loss which
the association had sustained since their last meet-
ing in the death of the late duke.
The CHAIRMAN, in acknowledging the com-
pliment, said, that if Mr. Gillett had not
alluded to the position which he (the Duke
of Rutland) now occupied in appearing be-
fore them for the first time as president of the
society, it would have been impossible for him,
surrounded as he then was, and in that hall, in the
middle almost of the Belvoir estates, not to have
been carried back to the past, and to the recollec-
tion of all that they had lost. Since he had last
visited their hall he had lost the kindest and most
benevolent of fathers, and the kindest and most
benevolent of landlords. For himself he could only
say, that though he had no hope of being able to
fill the void which had been created, he trusted
that with such a bright example before him he
might be enabled to follow in the steps that his
lamented father had marked out for him, and that
he might be enabled to do his duty, however hum-
bly and inefficiently, in the sphere in which he had
been placed. (Cheers.) Mr. Gillett had alluded
to the great benefits which were conferred by agri-
cultural societies, and had expressed his gratifica-
tion at the vast amount of good which they effected
in connection with the labouring classes of the
country. There were many gentlemen then pre-
sent who were much more capable and much more
able by their practical experience and their intelli-
gence to give information upon agricultural subjects
than he (the chairman) was himself, and he would
therefore leave it to them to instruct the meeting
upon the successful experiments they had made
since last year. He was himself fully convinced of
the great advantage of such societies in bringing
people together, who, perhaps, otherwise might
not so often meet, and of enabling them to compare
the different experiments they had made, as well as
to impart to each other the information that might
have been derived since the prceding year. (Hear,
hear.) With respect to politics, he believed they
had generally laid down a rule which had not
always been carried out in other agricultural so-
cieties—namely, that whenever political measures
seemed to touch upon their interests, or upon the
general interests of the agricultural body, they
should form a proper subject to be discussed at their
meetings. (Cheers.) The object of their society
was the benefit and the extension of agriculture,
and they had therefore always considered that
whatever added to the prosperity of agriculture, or
took away from that prosperity, was a fit subject
for comment at their annual dinner. (Hear, hear.)
At the same time he did not think that at the pre-
sent moment there were any questions astir in the
public mind which peculiarly affected the agricul-
tural interest. He would therefore merely say that
though there was much that he regretted in the
Past, he looked forward with hope and confidence
to the future. (Cheers.) He begged to give them
" Prosperity to the Waltham Agricultural Associa-
tion." (Cheers.)
The toast having been drunk amid loud cheers,
the various prizes were awarded. After which
Mr. NORMAN proposed " The Health of the mem-
bers for the county," observing that, though party
politics were properly excluded fromtheir meetings
those who took a part in politics were not excluded.
The toast was drunk amid great cheering.
Lord J. MANNERS, M.P., responded. He said—
In rising to return thanks for the toast which has
just been proposed, I cannot help noticing, as, per-
aps, a pleasing fact that the first place in which I
am called upon to address a body of my present
constituents since my election is that in which I
was first called on to address any public assembly
whatever—l mean nearly 20 years ago. Although
I cannot pretend that I address you on this occa-
sion with-the same excessive nervousness and diffi-
dence which characterised my earlier effort, still I
confess that I am as unable at this moment as then
to address an agricultural assemblage with the
slightest hope of imparting anything of utility or
benefit to you. As my friend Mr. Norman has just
told you, all party politics are properly excluded,
and as my ignorance of practical agriculture is such
as to prevent the possibility of my affording you
information, the observations which I have to make
will be exceedingly few. At the outset I wish to
express my deep regret that I stand here alone to
return thanks for the toast which 3rou have just
drunk. I am charged by my hon. friend and col-
league, Mr. Farnham, to assure you that nothing
but ill-health would have prevented him from at-
tending,
to-day. I have said that it is nearly
years since 2
I first had the honour of speaking in
this hall, but for more than 20
years
_ Mr. Farnham
has served you in Parliament with
:
assiduity which well deserved the plauditsazeal and
With
with
which this toast has been received. (Cheers.)
regard to what has been said by my brother in the
chair in reference to the bereavement which we
have all sustained, he has so I
will not for a mo-
o truthfully expressed
all I feel on the subject that
ment attempt to add a word to what he has already
said. Passing on to other matters, lam bound to
confess that an enforced abstinence from all
sub-
jects calculated to stir up party Feeling, and also
from all sabjPcts connected with practical agricul-
ture, naturally induces me to say a word or two
upon the social aspect which these meetings bear.
It has been said by Mr. Gillett, and said very
truly, that at first the great philosophers of the day
were apt to look down upon and Wed to deride

these agricultural meetings. Now, I remember the
time when the same pseudo philosophy. pronounced
allotments to be an uninitigated curse to the coun-
try, and derided and sneered at all the efforts that
were being made to aid and stimulate agriculture
in the country through the machinery of associa-
tions of this character. But agricultural associa-
tions have now established themselves throughout
the length and breadth of the land, and I was en.
abled to-day by the kindnesS of your committee to
distribute prizes to the old warriors of agriculture,
and also to the striplings who have this day won
their spurs in the ploughing field, without fear of
the criticism of a hostile press, and totally disre-
garding the philosophers who used to be so indig-
nant at these meetings. (Cheers.) I, for my part,
am disposed to attach very great importance to
social gatherings such as these. It is not only that
they bring together members of the various classes
which compose our rural community, but at these
meetings hints are thrown out and suggestions are
made which lam bold enough to say have tended
in many instances most materially to promote, not
only the cultivation of the land, but to increase the
comfort and elevate the moral and social position of
those by whom the land is cultivated. I will take
one point by way of illustration. I can remember
some years ago the effect produced in this hall by a
speech of the admirable rector of this parish on the all-
important subject of the cottage accommodation of
the labouring classes, and yet at this moment I
know no sight more pleasing as one rides home
from hunting than to witness the progress which
has been made in improving the dwellings of the
peasantry. (Cheers.) It is not only by these en-
deavours that the social and moral condition of the
peasantry has been elevated, but we cannot help
seeing that the beauty of the landscape has also
been materially improved. (Cheers.) I hope the
position I now unworthily hold in her Majesty's
councils will plead my excuse in your eyes if I say
that in an architectural point of view it does not
cost a halfpenny more to erect a pretty than it
does an ugly cottage. (Hear, hear.) Politics being
most properly excluded from consideration at meet-
ings such as the present—l mean party politics,
and so little having occurred during the recent
session of Parliament worthy the attention of an
agricultural assembly except in a party point of
view, I really am at a loss to say anything in my
capacity as member for this division of the county.
There was only one measure that affected in any
material degree the interests or feelings of the agri-
cultural classes, and that was the bill for the collec-
tion of agricultural statistics. The reception that
bill met, however, was such as to preclude the ne-
cessity of my saying anything whatever upon the
subject. (Laughter and cheers.) But my brother
has touched upon a subject which undoubtedly at-
tracted far more attention than any of the measures
introduced in the late session of Parliament, or
which had any connection with the subjects which
have brought us here to-day. He has said—and I
entirely coincide in everything he said in respect
of Cherbourg—that he did not see in the great and
magnificent works which were presented to our
view anything to occasion unnecessary alarm in the
minds of the people of this country. But, although
I quite agree with him that there is nothing to
create alarm, I confess that I did read with pain
and surprise some of the observations which have
been made in public by other members of that illus-
trious body to which I (thanks to your kindness)
belong. (Hear, hear.) I can understand a man
being so essentially John-Bullish in feeling as to
abstain from going to Cherbourg at all, but I can-
not understand gentlemen in the position of mem-
bers of Parliament witnessing this magnificent ex-
hibition, receiving, as we all did, the most hearty
and cordial reception, not only from the Emperor
of the French, but from every one of his subjects
there present, seeing the cordial and amicable feel-
ings which pervaded all classes of that vast assem-
blage, and then coming home and venting all kinds
of unmanly sneers and sarcasms against a great, a
gallant, and friendly people. (Cheers.) So far from
seeing in the erection of the great works at Cher-
bourg any proof of towards England, or any
sign of impending hostility, I am myself disposed
to see in the cordiality, frankness, and openness
with which all the works were submitted to the in-
spection of the whole people of England, had they
been disposed or able to go thither—l am disposed
to see in these great works a pledge rather for
future peace, inasmuch as they afford, on the one
side (with the proper_ preparations Is hick this
country and her Majesty's Government may take
on the other), a natural means of defence from hos-
tile aggression, and thus give a pledge and security
for future peace. (Cheers.) I mentioned just now
one point by way of illustrating the social advan-
tages of these meetings. There is another to which
I am not less disposed to attach great importance
at the present day—namely, the great subject of
education. We all know how the education of the
children of the peasantry of this country has re-
ceived a great and wonderful influence from the
speeches which have been made and the sugges-
tions which have been thrown out at meetings of
this kind. But so much has been said on that sub-
ject, and so certainly do I think the progress of
education in its common and hacknied sense to be
secured in the country, that I will dwell no longer
upon it further than to say that I hope in our zeal
and our endeavours to promote the education of the
intellect we shall not altogether lose sight of the
education of the bodies of the children of the labour-
ing classes. (Hear, hear.) I attach such importance
to the manly and athletic games and pastimes which
have heretofore characterised all classes of our
English community that I would say to all men,
however wise, however stupid, however rich, how-
ever old, stimulate and foster every manly and
athletic game, commencing from marbles and ascend-
ing up to fox hunting, and if there be anything
above and beyond fox hunting, then teach the
labouring classes that. Tend them religiously,
and from the lowest and the humblest, up to the
maturest and the highest of our national sports and
pastimes, let us endeavour to promote them one and
all. (Loud cheers.) I say this because I have
noticed with pain and concern a heresy, as it seems
to me, growing up and spreading in this country,
the upshot of which will be that England will be
divided into two great classes—those who spin and
those who study. It is to promote some such con-
summation as this that we find that admirable
speaker and sterling member of Parliament, Mr.
Bright, recommend emigration to the whisky-drink-
ing, joint-stock bank-breaking people of Glasgow ;
and we have the Times, the great organ, as it used
to be called, of public opinion in England, warning
all the noblemen of England out of the hunting field.
As many present know, I am no great rider,
and do not profess to give much time or attention
to hunting, but this I do know, that I never jog
home after a day's hunting without feeling that I
have seen or heard something which has added
somewhat to my small stock of knowledge, and
without rejoicing as a politician—of course Ido not
use the term in a party sense—in the existence of
that manly and invigorating pastime. (Cheers.)
Then, gentlemen, say I, long may there be a race
of yeomen in England who, like my friends the
Guys of Hatton, the Vincents of Bottesford, or the
Blands of Marlborough, can carry off the prize in
the cattle show-yard and the brush at the head of
the hunt (Loud cheers.) I have said that in the
past session of Parliament there was not much to
attract the attention of an agricultural assemblage.
The future, of course, is dark, but at the same
time it isnnore than probable that the question
most likely to interest an agricultural assemblage
in the next session of Parliament will be the much
discussed question of Parliamentary reform.
Upon that question, of couse,
and I can only say that by one of those
my lips are
curi-
ous turns of the wheel which mechanises modern
politics it seems to be reserved fora Tory Govern-
ment to render less anomalous, and to make better
adapted to the
growing intelligence, property, and
numbers of the community, the Whig Reform Act
of 1832. (Cheers.) I can only say that her Ma-
jesty's Government will enter upon that most serious
task with the single and earnest endeavour so to
mend the representation of the people in Parlia-
ment as to secure the best electoral body and the
best representative body which can be obtained for
the people of this country. (Cheers.) But, gen-
tlemen, after all, hustings, registration courts, poll-
ing booths, speeches from the hustings, and even
speeches in Parliament, and divisions
consequent
thereupon, are only a means to an end, and that
end is the good self-government of a Christian and
civilised community. (Loud cheers.) Without
depreciating other pursuits and other ways of life,
every day I live more and more convinces me that
the art and practice of agriculture is the safest, the
surest, and the most beneficent of all the industries
in which the wit, intelligence, and capital of man
can lie employed. (Hear.) We shall do well, then,
I "tiiiffik, as I ventured to say at the outset of the
few observations which I have thought it right to
make—we shall do well to keep alive by every
means in our power the corporate character of our
relations one to another, and I know of no means,
of no human means—which can so fully impress
upon all our hearts the great truth that landlord
and tenant, farm servant and husbandman, clergy
and laity, all form one great Christian brotherhood,

The coast of Scotland on all its salient points is
ordered to be put in an efficient state of defence.
Several 32-pounders are to be sent from Wool-
wich to fortify the martello tower at Leith. The
fortification of the island of Inchkeith, for the
protection of Leith, is under the consideration of
,;the Government.
PEMBROKE DOCKYARD.—The construction of the
Howe, ship of the line, is now so far advanced that
she can be completed for launching early next year.
She is pierced for 130 broadside guns, besides
carrying her pivot. The Howe is a splendid ves-
sel of the same stamp as the Marlborough and
Duke of Wellington (though larger than the latter),
and will carry more than 4,000 tons. She was
chiefly put together by the superannuated ship-
wrights during the late Russian war, and from her
noble build and fine run she will doubtless prove a
first-class man-of-war. She has been built to
replace the ship of the line of the same name of
120 guns, broken up at Sheerness some years ago
from dry rot. The slip on which the Howe has
been built has been lengthened. When all the
alterations and additions to the slips and docks at
Pembroke are completed, the establishment will be
able annually to produce a small squadron of men-
of-war of the largest size of their respective classes.
The next launch will be that of the Immortalize,
originally for a first-class sailing frigate of
guns, but which has since been lengthened alma
and
ships to the extent of 32 feet, and by the
stern 13 feet and five feet respectively, being a total
additional length ofif
jogoatefe,etcarr.S3l4ne
gnowheraanvyksgunae
gong,
powerful 51-gun
afeestistanerd ship horse-
power. The Immortalite pto the
with a total length of 240
Melpomene, recently launched from this yard, and,
she has been upon the stocks for some time.