The Sun.
London, England, 1844-04-20 00:00:00

Monday he would • call attention to certain omissions
in the papers recently laid on the table relative to
G walior.

Adjourned at Half-past Five o'Clock.
In the Commons several petitions were -presented
against the Masters and Servants Bill. Mr. T. Dux-
COMBE presented thirty-six petitions of this descrip-
tion from some of the most populous towns in Eng-
land, among others Manchester, Birmingham, Bolton,
Norwich, Nottingham, and Rochdale.
Dr. BOWRING gave notice that on Tuesday be
should move for the newspaper stamp returns.
Mr. BRIGHT called the attention of the Home
Secretary to the conviction of an unfortunate woman
at the present assizes in London, for the murder of
her child. It appeared from the evidence that she
had attempted to commit suicide and destroy her
child at the same time, from the utmost destitution.
The Judge in passing sentence held out no hope of
mercy.
Sir JAMES GRAHAM said his attention had not
been called to the fact till that moment. He could
not, however, enter into a discussion on such a sub-
ject, but the Hon. Member might rest assured he
would do his best to exercise a sound and dispas-
sionate judgment on all the circumstances of the
case. It is singular that while this melancholy affair
has excited general attention, the Home Secretary,
who, above an others, should have known the merits
of the case, had never heard of it.
In answer to a question from Mr. Ross, Sir JAMES
GRAHAM said he had every reason to believe that a
Bill would shortly be brought into the other House
on the subject of Presbyterian marriages in Ireland.
On the motion of Lord ELIOT, the Irish Municipal
Corporations Bill was read a second time, and ordered
to be committed on the 29th.
The Committee on the County Courts Bill was
fixed for Monday next.
Mr. TUFNELL asked why a writ had not been
issued for Horsham on the accession of Mr. SCARLETT
to the Peerage.
Sir T. FREMANTLE presumed that the writ of sum-
mons to the House of Lords had not been issued, and
consequently the Hon. Gentleman was still a Member
of the House.

Lord J. RUSSELL blamed such a slovenly mode of
proceeding, and intimated his intention of bringing
the subject formally before the House, in case such
negligence should again occur.
On the Order of the Day being read for the House
resolving itself into a Cornmitiee of Supply, Sir C.
NAPIER moved for certain returns respecting the
timber received into the royal dockyards during the

last ten years.
Mr. SIDNEY HERBERT did not find himself justi-
fied in giving the returns, but he was willing to give
every information to the Gallant Member wilich he
could, without prejudice to the public service.
A discussion took place on the appointment of
stipendiary magistrates in Ireland, and chiefly on the
late appointment of Mr. O'BRIEN, but it led to no
result. _ _ _

_
The House then went into Committee of Supply.
Several votes for colonial establishments were agreed
to. On a vote of 13,6801. being proposed for the
civil charges of St. Helena, Mr. HumE moved as an
amendment that the sum be reduced by 2,0001., when,
on a division, the amendment was rejected by a ma-
jority of 45. Several other votes were agreed to,
and the House resumed.
The other Orders of the Day were then disposed
of, and the House adjourned at Twelve o'clock.

The advance of a country in wealth and civiliza.

tion—that progress to which all legislation and policy
are subservient—is, after all, a benefit dearly pur-

chased at the price inevitably to be paid for it; for, 1
the test of present experience, and the records of all
history show, that the price consists in the displace-
ment of many thousands of families from a position
of comparative competence or ease, and the sacrifice
of many more in the competition between the exclu-
sive privileges of the distinguished few, and the sordid
wants of the indigent multitudes, which seems to wait,
like a shadow on the march of opulence and refine-
ment. No State on the globe, perhaps, exhibits a
more remarkable instance of these conflicting elements
of extensive pauperism and accumulated capital, than
Great Britain. But it is not our purpose to write,
at present, of her extraordinary, her almost incon-
ceivable wealth. We may, indeed, epitomise the idea
of it by stating, on the authority of Mr. PORTER's
last Statistical Paper, that the total sum paid by
railway passengers, last year alone, on the several
working lines of the United Kingdom (58 in Eng-
land and Wales, 10 in Scotland, 2 in Ireland),

amounted to 3,063,000/. sterling! Our wish at pre

sent is to direct attention to the enormous pressure 01

poverty and destitution on our social system ; and this we
may evidence in three words, by the statement of the
last authenticated Poor-rate aggregate return (Ses-
sional Paper, H. C., 1844, No. 63). From that paper
it appears that the total amount of money levied for
poor-rate, for the year ending Lady-day 1842, was
6,552,8901. for England and Wales, atone
The most disastrous aspect which this pauperism
presents is, that it " grows by that it feeds on." In
four short years, as we lately took occasion to show,
the levy for this rate has increased one million ; on an
average, at the rate of 250,0001. per annum for Eng-
land and Wales only. There have been, in the same
►nterval, railroads and other mighty public works in
full activity of construction ; yet the market of labom
has been so greatly overstocked that at no former pe-
riod, probably, was the number of able-bodied paupers
larger than it is at the present moment. In the ma-
nufacturing districts the demand for labour has fluc-
tuated as usual, and just now may be somewhat more
active than for some time past ; but it is not even pre-
tended that this improvement is one for which an 3
permanency can be safely anticipated. And, indeed,
as to manufacturing labour, we see nothing, either in
the general state of trade, or the bearings of improved
commercial relations with foreign countries, to induce
us to look for any other but the usual circle in which,
from some cause or other, our manufacturing energy
seems destined to revolve,—sudden excitement; in-

tense activity ; rapid and unparalleled production ; de-
clining, because glutted and overstocked, markets;
lassitude, panic, decay ; displaced labour, on a scale
the most appalling. We are now once more com-
mencing this series of phases ; and we wish we could
add that, with our still crippled system of commercial
polity, aggravated by the mischiefs of our monetary
system, we could look forward with any confidence
to the cessation of those fatal sequences which have
so often followed close upon the same cheering pro-
mises of a largely increased demand for labour.
The real remedy for this destructive tendency
our pauperism to re-produce and multiply itself co-
incidently with—and as if in mockery of—capital,
would be an extended permanent demand for able-
bodied labour. If any plan-, could be devised by
which able-bodied pauper labour, in its more simple
forms, and without the requisition of extreme manual'
dexterity or technical facility of manipulation, could
be, at all times, largely employed throughout the
country, the market of independent, in contradistinc-
tion to pauper-labour, would be proportionably relieved,
'and the wages of those able-bodied pauper labourers
would be paid by municipal and other communities,
not in the shape of an unproductive and annoying tax
upon their own capital or incomes, but of a legitimate
consideration for value received.
- - •

vv
We are much disposed to think that we can see in
the further progress of the efforts of the " Committee
for promoting the greatest attainable cleansing in
the public thoroughfares, courts, and alleys of
the metropolis"—a deputation from which, a
day or two since, had a satisfactory conference
with the LORD MATon, on the mode of car-
c. permanentcocuu
Ali demand
statedrying out their objects—the germ of some such
ma forthat able-bodied
o
hject of
labour.the d e p
u3tfar:
tion in waiting upon his Lordship
was to read to him
the substance of resolutions which had been passed at
a meeting at the Hanover-square Rooms, relative to
the immediate employment of the able-bodied
poor, in the hope that he would •
assist by
his
powerful co-operation, in accomplishing an object
calculated to do the most important service
to the
physical and moral condition of the public--
keeping the streets free from mud and dust, according
to an experiment which had
,been most successfully
tried in Regent-street and Oxford-street. No objects
immediately connected with the ornament, salubrity,
and pleasantness of all large towns, as well as of our
own noble capital, could be suggested more legitimate
in themselves, or more easy, we should think, of
practical attainment. The report proceeds thus :
" The cleanliness of the thoroughfares word, it