The Sun.
London, England, 1844-03-27 00:00:00

MASTERS AND SERVANTS' BILL.

Mr. T. DUNCOMBE said, he believed the question
now was, the reading of the Order of the Day ; if they
allowed the Order of the Day to be postponed on one
Bill, there could be no objection to its being postponed
on another ; and he had an objection .to the Bill that
stood No. 7 on the paper—the Masters and Servants' Bill,
which he intended to' propose should be postponed till
after Easter. This was one of the most important
Bill that had been introduced during the present
session, not excepting even tho' Factories Bill, or
the Commons Inclosure Bill. The labouring popula-
tion had been taken quite by surprise by this Bill.
The Bill was totally different in principle to any which
had preceded it ; and it had been altered in almost every
word, from the preamble to the last clause contained in
it. The Government, under such circumstances, ought
to discharge the order for its committal, and bring in a
new Bill, as they proposed to do on the Factory ques-
tion. He had several petitions to present against the
Bill, all of which went boldly to the point, by calling on
the House to scout it from their consideration.

Sir J. GRAHAM thought, after what had fallen from
the Hon. Gentleman, he ought to state that the Bill was
disclaimed by the Government as a Government Bill.
There was but one new enactment in this Bill, and that
was the 4th clause, which applied to contract work ; and
he thought ithighly.expedient that it should be well con-
sidered. He (Sir J.: Graham) was for the most part
favourable to the new enactment, but he was not at all
pledged with 'respect to it. He certainly thought this
Bill ought not to be proceeded with in the absence of
the lion. Member for Somersetshire. •
Mr. FERRAND said, he had that morning received
numerous letters from persons in the manufacturing
districts, all expressing
the greatest alarm as to the
effect of the 4th clause of this Bill, if it should become
law. That clause provided that if a working man should
not fttlfll a contract—

• The SPEAKER said the Hon. Gentleman could not
,go into the merits of a portion of the Bill upon the mo-
tion benrelfOMthNeCHoußseE
ilir then. said he should then move
that. the. Order of the Day_ be read, for the purpose of
having the. Bill disposed of.
On the motion tharthe Order of the Day be read,
" Mr. HUME objected to the Bill, because he thought
it would tend seriously to impair the interests of the
working classes.
Mr. GALLY KNIGHT said the motive of this Bill
was to enable magistrates to assist the working men in
deciding the points of difference between masters and
servants. He thought if Honourable Gentlemen knew
as much as he did of the difficulties which surrounded a
magistrate, in the cases between masters and servants,
they would not oppose this Bill.
Mr. FERRAND denounced the principle of the
and said he was confident that before the Bill again
came under the consideration of the House the table
would be covered with petitions against it.
Mr. HAWES thought the Bill in its present shape
was much more satisfactory than when it was brought
forward by the Hon. Member for Somersetshire.
Mr. T. DUNCOMBE said that he had a perfect right
to riress his motion, and if he stood alone he would do
so. He did not Care a straw for any man.—(Hear, hear,
laughter, and cries of " Chair, chair.")
Mr. Hume attempted to address the House amidst
loud cries of "Hear, hear," "Chair, chair," and great
confusion.
The SPEAKER thought that the Hon. Member for
Finsbury and the Member for Montrose had a perfeo

right, according to the rules of the House, to press their
motion; .but the effect of it, if carried, would be to
prevent the other Orders of the Day from being read.
After a few words from Mr. DUNCOMBE and Sir R.
PEEL, the motion was withdrawn.
THE ESTIMATES.

Sir GEORGE GREY wished to ask the Right Hon.
Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether, in
the event of the Factories Bill being withdrawn on Fri-
day next, he would bring-on the miscellaneous estimates?
The CHANCELLOR of the. EXCHEQUER said he
would take the Commissariat Estimates and the Miscel-
laneous Estimates on Friday next: • - -
In answer to a question from Mr. BERNAL,
.-Sir ROBERT PEEL said he would take the British
Museum Estimates- on Friday night.
- • THE INCLOSURE ACT. -

Lord WORSLEY said that he regretted he had given
many of his friends the trouble of coming down to make
a House as he found himself quite incompetent, through
indisposition, to the task of conducting his Bill in a Com-
mittee. He should, therefore, move the postponement
of the Order of the Day to the 24th of April.—Agreed to.
The Night Poaching Prevention Bill was read a_ third
time, and passed.
COUNTY COURTS.

Sir JAMES GRAHAM gave notice that he should,
on Friday next, move for leave to bring in a Bill to re-
gulate county courts in England and. Wales.
The House then adjourned.

COMMON LANDS INCLOSURE
BILL:

• We wish to draw public attention to the importance
of Lord Worsley's Inclosure Bill, for when it is car-
ried, which • we suppose will be the case, it will be
the basis of many similar measures. We assume the
principles—First, that the land that we have ought
to be turned to the most productive account ; and,
secondly, that it is bad policy to force bad lands into
cultivation at a great expense, when we can procure
land-produce at a much less price from other coun-
tries. We believe • that a very large potion of the
common land brought under culture within the last
half century might, to our advantage, be again
turned into wilds and wastes, and we are sure that
a great many of the owners of these inclosed commons
would be very glad to get rid' of their property if they
could find a fair price,' or purchasers of any sort. But
let Inclosure Acts be what they may, they ought not
to trespass on the.rights of the poor. Lord Worsley
draws nice distinctions between common and waste
land, and commonable land. The end of these qUib-
blings is, that the poor are to be robbed of whatever
they possess. Let lawyers quibble as they may about
the extent of the poor man's rights, certain is it that
of those rights he is to be deprived. Common and
waste land is attached to certain tenements, and al-
though those who may take leases of tenements,
with this'right attached to them, may not care to
avail themselves of it, still, having paid the landlord
rent in proportion to the aequisition, such tenants
ought not forcibly to be deprived of that for which
they have actually. paid. The principle is too
clear to be disputed. Commonable land may be
productive of corn, and some parts of it be productive
of only grass; the arable produce is always claimed
by some landowner or lord of the manor, whilst the
pasturage is the personal right of the inhabitants.
Here the cloven foot of lordly power is seen trampling
on the poor, for whilst the rich can pasture their cat-
tle all the year round, the pooi can use the grasi for
only two seasons. The Bill provides for the inclosure
and improvement of common and,commonable lands.
The exchange of lands, the division of intermixed
land, and for the defective or incomplete execution of
the powers of general and local inclosure Acts. No
Bill ever brought into Parliament aimed at a hun-
dredth part of such arbitrary power. how is this
tyrannical •Bill to •be executed ? Hitherto no
inclosure, however small, could take place with-
out an Act of Parliament having • passed the
Lords and Commons and having received
the Royal assent. Now, Lord Worsley is to
execute his law by a set` of Commissioners,' who, he
assures us, will be unpaid. They need no payment,
for they will have pickings and parcellings, 'allotments
and opportunities, of preferences and denials, sufficient
to make their places immensely profitable. But no
man ever yet entertained the idea of a Commission
with a power -of • superseding;: Acts of Parliament.
Lord Worsley's Bill is nothing' but an indirect prop
to the corn-laws. He tells us that his Bill will
call the industrious poor into 'employment, and pro-
duce a greater investment of capital in the land.
There is too much capital locked up in land already,
and- as to the poor'man s labour, abolish the corn-laws,
and employment for our poor will be ample ; whereas
Lord Worsley's Bill would not give to the poor through-
out England a four-pound loaf in a year for each in-
dividual. But food is not the only thing to be con-
sidered. The health, the ventilation, the recreations,
the sports, and general enjoyments of the poor are to
be taken into account. A • great source -of morals
proceeds from early associations, and the poor man,
in middle life, and especially in old age, is broken-
hearted at seeing torn from, and inclosed, in favour of
the rich, the land on which he gambolled in his child-
hood, and on which, perhaps, his mother kept a
goose or a pig. His Lordship's Bill holds out the
lure of draining commons, in too many of which
there is stagnant .water. This drainage ought to
be effected by the magistrates, or the parishes ;
but the new Commissioners having drained the
land, take it all as possessions of the rich. A
large common may have stagnant pools, pestilential
to all persons around it ; but surely we are not driven
to the alternative of letting the nuisance continue, or
of sufferiug a landlord, in reward for draining the
pond, to seize upon the land ? • The new Commis-
sioners are to let ground for burial-places, for
chapels, and for schools; &c.; in fact, a Commission
with more 'arbitrary or more extensive powers,' never
was proposed to Parliament. The petty commoners
go sadly to the wall. • His Lordship boasts that his
Bill will throw no charges on-the Consolidated Fund.
It need not do so, for it robs the poor to such an
extent, that the Bill can pay its own expenses.
Lands, in England, are much intermixed, that is to
say, a humble man may possess a few acres, sur-
rounded by larger estates. He refuses to alter his
course of husbandry to meet the wishes of
his richer neighbours. This Bill presumes
that such a division of land is inconvenient.
Inconvenient to whom ? Of course to the
rich man, and the Bill gives the Commissioners a
power to alter the arrangement or possession of pro-
perty ; thus a humble man, who may be as proud of
a small possession, inherited from his virtuous fore-
fathers—as proud even as ' those Dukes that inherit
their large estates from the profligacy of their an-
cestral mothers with Charles 11., may be huitled out
of his property with very little ceremony, whilst, if
we attempt to invade the pensions, of immense
amount, granted by Charles IL to his six or eight
mistresses, we are reproached, with designs of attack-
ing the right of property. In the woodlands of
England there are glades, or intervening small
pasturages, of course belonging to the humble
classes. The woods are' the possession of the rich,
the small pasturages are the property of the poorer
proprietors. It is urged that these owners of pas-
turages have an interest in injuring the wood. What
is to be the remedy? The owners of forests are to
be empowered to do what they please with the owners
of the small pasturages. There is no appeal to a
jury; no not even to the quarter-sessions. But the
Commissioners are to do all—these Commissioners,
of course, being of the upper classes, and having local
interests, prejudices, and attachments. It is com-
pletely a Bill of spoliation. Great evils unquestion-
ably exist in our tenures of land ; but they are not to
be removed by a sweeping measure of this sort.—
Weeny Dispatch.

WILSON'S SCOTTISH ENTERTAINMENTS.—It would
seem that the public appetite for Mr. Wilson's delightful
entertainments is sharpened by the numerous imitators that
are constantly springing up, and as constantly evanishing ;
for last night the Music Hall, Store-street, was crowded to
excess, as usual, and every private box occupied, to listen to
the Adventures •of Prince Charles, and the heart-stirring
Jacobite strains, connected with them. This is one
of Wilson's most popular entertainments, equalled
only, perhaps, by his " Nights wi' Burns," and it
went off with as much freshness as ever, this being only the
first time he has given it this season. It will have to be re-
peated many times, of course; but the Scottish Minstrel will
never give it with more thrilling effect than he imparted to
every strain last night. We see by the provincial papers,
that Wilson was at Liverpool, Chester, and Zlanchester, last
week, and was greeted with his usual success in each lace.
ROBBERY AT THE HAYMARKET THEATRE.—Yester-
day information was received by
.the police that on the pre-
vious . night a gentleman belonging to the firm of Messrs.
Hodge, Horne, and holesale druggists, Nos. 102 and
103, Blackman-street, Co.,gouthwark, was robbed •in the pit of
the Ilaymarket Theatre, between ten and half-past ten
o'clock, of a brown silk purse, containing ten sovereigns and
some silver, and a Bank receipt for the sum of 451. and 40/. in

MR. O'CONNELL AND TII GOVERNMENT.
People are-be-ginning to ask themselves what effect will the
defeat of the Ministers on the Factory question have on the
fate of Mr. O'Connell ? It was supposed to be a very hazardous
policy, when Sir Robert Peel's Government was surrounded
with the halo of undivided power, and appeared to have the
support of the great majority in England and Scotland, to
bring O'Connell up for judgment. It has lately been dis-
tinctly proved that the " convicted conspirator" is regarded
by an immense number of Englishmen as Ireland's best
patriot; and while the Ministry was strong, and, appa-
rently, almost omnipotent, they made common cause with
him against the Government. But now the Government has
suddenly become a mere rope of sand. It cavot hold its own
followers together : it is damaged beyond healing. Half the
Commons of England have decided against it. From the
agricultural saints, led on by Lord Ashley, it is obliged to
flee for refuge to the manufacturers who are opposed to it. In
carrying the law into execution against Mr. O'Connell, who
is supported by all Ireland and a great portion of England, it
can only look for feeble assistance. Will this damaged Go-
vernment, then,•denuded of popular support, venture to give
effect to a verdict which no person defends as just, after a
trial which no man describes as fair ? It is concluded,
therefore, that the Ministerial defeat on the Factory Bill
will be a shield for Mr. O'Connell.
The admirers of Fornasari will regret to hear that
phreevisenntoNhvissaffsinerglnng
;soansedveriteliys frinomcnwnatatlrpolantitohne
tcho essetnaas to
for
Tamburini, who will shortly be in Paris.
The reigning Count of.Solms-Rcedelheim, died at
Assenheim on the 18th, of pulmonary paralysis. He. was 54
years of age.