The Sun.
London, England, 1844-04-02 00:00:00

FACTORIES BILL.

The present interval of time and rest allowed to the
various parties on the Factories Bill, while it gives opportunity
for some arguments beyond the reach of public discussion;
will also enable honest and serious minds to acquire more
deliberate and deeper views of the subject, as a whole. This
reconsideration will be useful to everybody. The promoters
of the ten hours' clause may learn to give it a less objection-
able and factious aspect; and its opponents may be brought
to a better and more humane mind. Some have voted for it, with
the admission that they had found a difficulty on the subject,
which, even at the point of voting, had not been entirely re-
moved. Some had no hesitation as to the intrinsic merits of
the proposed measure, but could not agree to its paramount
importance. They liked the article well enough—it was the
very thing they wanted, and they had not a fault to find
with it ; but they stuck at the price, it was exorbitant—a
whole Cabinet ! Like Mrs. Ramsbottom, they did not like
"to be composed upon ;" so they left the factory women
and children on the counter, and walked out of
the shop with their fifteen Cabinet Ministers in their
pocket. Thus the cause of humanity, like virtue, laudatur
et alget. Among other considerations which may now find
a way to hearts as well as to minds, there is one great and
simple fact, which the present animated and searching dis-
cussion has brought to the surface, and which we do not
remember to have been so much as noticed on former occa-
sions. We mean the important position of these factory
women and young people in the State, and the consequent
'claim to sufficient and even peculiar. protection. We have to
thank the Premier for the form in which we state the fact,
though we regret to find ourselves forced to view it very dif-
ferently. An hour or two before the first majority against
Ministers, on the 19th ult., Sir Robert Peel having stated the
difference between a wee's work under the existing system,
and under the operation of a Ten Hours' Act, proceeded—
" Let us consider to ' what extent this restriction is to
apply. It is to apply to all labour in cotton factories, in
woollen factories, in worsted, flax, and silk factories. . . .
Now, look at the foreign trade of this country. In the last
returns there is an account of the declared value of the prin-
cipal articles of British produce and manufacture. The value
of British produce and manufactures exported in the last
year, if I recollect right, was about 44,000,0001. The return
for the whole of the articles of British manufacture was not
given, but for all the principal articles. What proportion do
you suppose of the manufactures which you are now about
to deal with was exported ? Your cotton manufactures, in-
cluding yarn, amounted to 23,500,0001.; linen manufactures,
3,700,0001.; woollen goods, 7,500,000/. ; making a total of
about 35,000,000/. out of 44,000,0001. of British manufactures.
exported from this country, in respect of which you are
going to -impose restrictions upon labour.—(Hear, hear.)
That is to say, five-sixths of the exported manufactures of
this conntry'are about to be subjected to a new law, which
shall provide that it shall not be legal to labour at them more
than 59 hours a week, instead of 69 hours.—(Hear, hear.)"
Now, we,will not demur to the Premier's assumption that
the -proposed measure affects all the labour employed' in
these manufactures, because we admit it does virtually
affect all. But why does it affect all? Because the women
and young persons constitute the great majority of
the ..whole number employed, and pull the minority
along with them.. Bearing this in mind, look now to the
above most important and not less affecting statements.
Five-sixths—nearly all, one may say—of the exports, the
foreign trade, of this greatest commercial country in the
world, is the work of the factory operatives—that is, chiefly
of the factory women and young persons. Hear this, you
who talk of the factories as a national nuisance I—you who
talk of the millowners as the enemies of their country !—you
who think we should not be much the worse for it if Lanca-
shire, and one or two other counties, were effaced from the
map of England !—but, above all, you who think that the
miserable bondage of these factory women and young per-
sons, monstrous as it is, is not sufficient to justify an excep-
tional departure from the general rule of non-interference
between the labourer and his employer The position of this
country among the nations of the earth, its empire east and
west, and its sovereignty over the sea, all depend on its foreign
trade ; its foreign trade depends on its exports ; and its ex-
ports are nearly all the wo'rk of a labouring class consisting
chiefly of these poor women and children. Talk as we will of
our wooden walls, and the British bayonet, and indomitable
courage, and so forth ; your factory women and children are
at the bottom of all ; they are your real soldiers and sailors ;
theirs is our truest and most efficacious heroism. We demand,
therefore, that they be considered accordingly as an arm of
the national service. Whatever peculiar care England takes
of her soldiers and sailors—that they be properly fed and
clothed, and not over-worked, or oppressed by the tyranny of
any adverse circumstances—let her extend, as the magnitude
of the occasion requires, to the factory women and young
persons. Turn it over again. The customs are about two-
fiths of the revenue—some twenty millions or thereabonts ;
the customs are on the imports ; the imports depend on—
that is, they necessarily balance—the exports ; and the
exports are, five-sixths, the work of our factory women
and young persons, who thus may be considered as making
up nearly two-fifths of the revenue—i. e. defraying nearly the
whole amount of our national expenditure, after deducting
the interest on our debt. This appears on the face of our
financial returns. But if it strikes anybody as too astonish-
ing to be believed on the credit of naked figures, we will re-
mind him of a recent great historical fact. Six years since the
trade of this country, its exports and imports, began to de
cline ; the Customs and Excise also declined accordingly ; and
the revenue fell so considerably under an unhappily increas •
ing expenditure, that a Ministry popular until then sank un-
der the general despair, and another came in whose first
step was to lay on us an income-tax, which, though pro-
ducing between 5,000,000/. and 6,000,0001., is barely enough
to keep the ship afloat. All this, besides what is far more
important—an immense and long-continued pressure of dis-
tress, which neither Sir Robert Peel nor anybody else, we
should hope, will ever forget. So, then, these factory women
' and young persons, besides contriving to maintain themselves
without coming on the land—of itself alone an incal-
culable boon to the landowner—besides clothing the
whole population of the empire better • and more
cheaply than it or any other population ever was clothed
before—besides submitting hitherto to give a much greater
quantity of clothing, the sweat of their brow, in exchange for
the landowners' corn than that corn is worth in the market
of the world—do also with the peaceful weapons of their ach-
ing fingers create and preserve the greatness of this empire, its
trade, its comforts, its imports, its customs, its army, its
navy, its royal, its judicial establishments. " Take care,"
says the financial Premier, " how you restrict this labour.
The whole fabric of England's greatness and glory—we our-
selves—rest upon it." True ; but do these women and young
persons deserve nothing for the great work they are dosing
for us—no return of peculiar love and protection ? Are they
to make England great and glorious, and not themselves be
free ? After so great a fact is established, so boundless an
obligation revealed, are we still to suffer,our national glory
to be sullied by the misery of those who have worked it?
Hardly even to brute labourers can we bear to say Sic vos
non vobis. Much less to our own flesh and blood—our fel-
low-Christians.— Times.

MR. CATLIN, MR. RANKIN, AND THE OJIBBEWAY
INDIANS.—The exhibition at the Egyptian-hall of the Ojib-
beway Indians, which was, until within a week or two, the
joint speeulation of Mr. Catlin, who is well known to the
public, and of Mr. Rankin, who held during the late rebellion
in Canada a commission in the British army, and who brought
the Indians over to this country, is now the sole speculation
of the latter of these two gentlemen. Some animadversions
have, we understand from Mr. Catlin, been made upon him in
certain journals, imputing to him the having made from the
exhibition the larger share of the profits, and of having made
a bargain by which he has secured " the cream" of the
speculation, and left his co-partner the " skim milk." With
this we have nothing to do, nor can we interfere in any
arrangement between him and Mr. Rankin. At present the
Indians are exhibited under the sole management of Mr.
Rankin, and Mr. Catlin has an exhibition of Indian curio-
sities and pictures at the Egyptian-hall, which is well worth
being seen, and which derives greater interest from the able
manner in which he illustrates what he exhibits by his ex
planations. Both exhibitions will reward a visit from the
curious, end both gentlemen are, in our opinion, deserving of
success in their pursuits.
Tan COAL TRADE.—The deputation from the coal
mining interest of Northumberland and Durham, which was
sent to London to endeavour to induce the Government to
repeal the duty on coals sent foreign, consisted of Messrs.
Morton. Pease, H. Taylor, Johnson, and N. Wood, who were
joined in London by other gentlemen from Wales, Scotland,
and Yorkshire, and accompanied by other parties connected
with the coal mining interest, viz., Messrs. Plews, Turnbull,
Price, Cadell, Briggs, &c. The following Members of Par-
liament united with the deputation in calling upon Sir R.
Peel and the Chancellor of the Exchequer on Wednesday
last, viz., Lords Marsham and H. Vane, Sir E. Filmer, and
Messrs. Bell, Bowes, Wawn, D. Barclay, H. Mitcalfe, Smol-
lett, Ord, Cayley, Bright, and M'Lean. The deputation
having enforced their views of this obnoxious and injurious
impost, retired with polite acknowledgments for the informa-
tion convisyed, but without any intimation of the views of
Government. The deputation_ further begged that any at-
tempt to increase the London taxation, as contemplated by
the Commissioners for Improving the Thames, might be dis-
countenanced. They afterwards saw the Earl of Lincoln, as
Chairman of the Commissioners, on the same subject.—
Durham Advertiser.
METROPOLIS IMPROVEMBNTS.—Yesterday, in con-
sequence of the entire removal of the houses adjoining the
workhouse of St. Giles-in-the-Fields, in Belton-street, Long-
acre, the site for a new church to be erected there was being
marked out, the tower of which will be built upon the exact
area where stood the public-house the Guy, Earl of Warwick,
which existed for about 200 years. The sacred edifice,
which will be called " Christ Church, St. Giles-in-the-
Fields," will be constructed with Caen stone and Kentish
rags, and will be made capable of containing abou 1,000
persons, all the sittings being free. There will be galleries,
and the interior of the edifice will be 50 feet wide, by 70 feet
long. A part of the sittings in the gallery will be allowed to
the paupers of the workhouse, who will have an entrance for
themselves at the east end. The tower will be upwards of
100 feet high. The cost of it will be rather more than 4,0001.,
a portion of which is provided from the Metropolis Churches'
Fund, but the greater part has been raised by voluntary con-
tributions from the principal inhabitants. A sum will also
be subscribed for the endowment of the church. Adjoining
this building will be some spacious houses erected according
to the plans of the Commissioners of the Woods and Forests,
which, when completed, will make a very great improve-
ment in this part of the metropolis.
FATAL ACCIDENT ON THE DOVER RAILWAY.—
Yesterday afternoon a fatal accident occurred on the above
line to a poor fellow named Nunn, an under-guard. The
man, it appears, was proceeding with his train from Dover to
London, and while passing under one of the arches, at the
Maidstone-road station, he got up, and his head came in con-
tact with the trickwork, killing him instantly. When the
train arrived at Tunbridge, his mate discovered him lying on
the carriage where he had previously sat, his head being
literally dashed to pieces. He was married, and was a sober
and steady men.