The Sun.
London, England, 1821-08-29 00:00:00

FOR THE SUN.

success against fairs set up in the Country for
Teal business, what call be said in favour of those
which, so far from encouraging, are the very
means of preventing it in the lower orders ; and
throw thernout of their ordinary employ to revel in
wnntnnvitacc nf iltink;tta nnrl (lancing till
they can dance and drink no more; anti
in the midst of the metropolis (itself a fair)
and all around it, only to encourage suttlers and
tavern-keepers, or what Is far worse, pick-pockets,
conjurors and other 5%% hullers ; and all that gang
of impostors, who infest these places of resort, to
fatten upon the leanness and wretchedness of
their many dupes, who still go on from year to
year corrupted and corrupting in their turn :—a
great scandal and common pest and nuisance to
all the decent and respectable part of the popu-
lous neighbourhood. It is only wonderful how
such a nuisance should be even tolerated so long,
particularly in an age of so much zeal for the
suppression of vice. Would it not he wise in the
Legislature to interfere and prohibit any such
Fairs for at least ten miles round London, if not
further, that there may be no longer so many as
eighty days occupied every year, by a tribe of
vagabonds,. going from one fair to another, and
scattering the pesti'ence of their evil cormnuni-
cations wherever they can pitch their tent ?
I am, Mr. Editor,
Your obedient Se-Sant,
A CONSTANT READER.

..• We heartily concur with our intelligent Correspondent
in considering FAIRS as the source of profligacy and of every
species of vice ; they extend their baneful influence through
the remainder of the year in which they take place, and, per-
haps, through the lives of many who might otherwise have
been useful members of society. Our Correspondent has clearly
shown their use in former periods, as well as the reasons which
render them not only no longer necessary at present, but posi-
tively injurious to society. They injure the industrious trades-
men ; and the commodities provided for them are always in-
ferior in quality to what the purchaser can obtain of those who
have a fixed residence and a reputation to maintain, as well,
perhaps, as large families to support.

PR/CE OF STOCX3
Tuts DAY AT TWELVE O'CLOCK.
3 per Cent. Red. 76& 76 Bank Long Ann. 19 9-16th L
3 per Cent. Cons. 75:14 Imp 3 per Cents. 75i
:', per Cent C64 India B'onds s9s.
4 per Cent 962i Excheq. Bills 3 4 pr.
51per Cent. Navy Ann.loB3, 109 -Cons. for October 76 75;1

lIIGIUNVATE R AT LONDOI'
31arning, 35 minutes after 3. 1

r' BRIDGE TO-MORROW
Evening, 48 minutes aftef 3.

THE SUN.

SOLEM QUIS DICERS FALSUM AUDEATY

LONDON,
WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 29, 1821.

We received this morning the Paris Journals
of Sunday, which are nearly quite barren of in-
telligence respecting the important question now
depending between Turkey and Russia. An
article from Nuremberg says, that though war
is not wished for at Vienna, yet every person
thinks it inevitable, on account of the measures
adopted by the Austrian Government. The
troops continue to march into Transylvania and

FAIRS.
MR. Etwrost—As Fairs are now spreading
their ravages throughout the country,and up to the
metropolis, it may not be unseasonable, as soon
as you have the space, to collect some few opi-
nions as to their utility. Many of them profess
to be founded on charters ; and when they were
Fairs of real business, and at the period of their
first foundation, such charters might be wise.
Fairs might be absolutely necessary to commerce
when it laboured under the restraints of igno-
rance, or the terrors of robbers ; or when, from
long continued wars, mutual confidence was lost,
they might then be a general mart for the na-
tions of Europe, for the provinces of the same
empire, and even for the villages of the same
county, to exchange their several commodities
and relieve one another's necessities, under the
shelter of that temporary asylum which the pe-
culiar interest of the moment allowed to the
place appointed for their establishments. But
now they are no longer useful, even to the pur-
poses of commerce, the regulations which fix a
certain place and time for meeting, and other re-
straints which, if not necessary, are at least made
so by those who superintend them, and who are
the hest judges of that necessity, though some-
times they may use them only as a pretext, are
so many infringements upon civil liberty ; the
very essence of which is, to be under no other
restraints than such as tend to promote the gene-
ral freedom. Now, at least in this country, there
can be no seeh necessity, as Riders are commonly
sent about the country, as a much more easy me-
dium of intercourse with the buyer and seller;
and the roads are so excellent and the vehicles so
rapid, that the most distant inhabitant seems, on a
comparison with former times, a next door neigh-
bour. Besides there is something in Commerce,
like the Constitution of which e boast, that
abhors all unnecessary restraint ; and it is sure
to suffer when it is forced out of its natural
current by arbitrary laws, whether they proceed
from the individual or from Government. It is not
in the power of the most enlightened Government
or the ablest merchant, to fix the time, or the
place, or any other circumstance in the order of
commerce, so well to promote the common good,
as the merchants or the consumers at large, who
will in most instances be able to arrange their
own affairs, and accommodate the wants of their
mutual relations far better than all that the wis-
dom of the wisest statesmen, or the, paramount
ability of the most intelligent merchant, can by
himself contrive. such was the sentiment of the
wisest politicians of the old school in France,
when wisdom was more the order of the day ;
and we are reminded of the times of COLBERT,
who followed the advice of the merchants when
he asked what he could do for them :—" For
GOD'S sake, let us alone." But if these and
many other such arguments can be offered wit