The Sun.
London, England, 1845-11-06 00:00:00

THE CORN-LAWS.

Whilst the public mind has been kept in a state of sus-
pense, the Ministerial Councils have been distracted with
divisions as to the extent and remedies of the famine crisis,
It has ever been so. The tenacity of human hope clings to,
and the weakness of human reason parades, slight pretexts
in the presence of impending calamities. It is not until the
danger becomes too great to be resisted with success or con-
fronted with courage that the errors of a rash confidence
and the folly of a specious procrastination are confessed; and
then the immensity of the crisis is put forward as an excuse
for acts which were once justifiable on the score of prudence,
but have finally become inevitable from necessity. It is
no use for men, whether in the Cabinet or out of it, to
disguise or to understate the magnitude of the impending
danger. It is no use for them to argue that, because
wheat is cheap in England, there is no chance of famine
here; or that the failure of the potato crop in Ireland
cannot affect the corn markets in this country. The facts
are known to every man who has had the will and op-
portunity for inquiry. Wheat is cheap. But what wheat?
The very worst that is brought to market. Good wheat—
the wheat which supplies the table of all middle-class fami-
lies—is already dear. What, then, may it be expected to
be four, five, six, and ten months from this time? The juggle
of the averages returns a fictitious price just now by con-
founding the good with the bad. The averages determine
the duty, and the duty is such as to exclude a supply from
abroad. Under any circumstances, therefore, it is reasonable
to anticipate that before the period of another harvest arrives,
the staple food of all classes will have become dear; that of
the poorest and lowest, dear beyond the possibility of pur-
chase. But when we take into consideration the state of
the continental markets—the deficient crops in France,
Belgium, and Holland, and the prospective demands
of those countries on the granaries of Europe—the case
is complicated with new difficulties and new absurdi-
ties. It is not many weeks since a large quantity of corn
was taken out of bond in England and shipped to foreign
ports ; let the present duty continue but a few weeks longer,
and much of that which remains in bond will be exported to
countries whose wants may not be greater, but whose wis-
dom is more provident than our own—who know the advan-
tage of laying in a store against a season of distress, and
who know not the slippery virtues of the sliding-scale. We
shall thus present to the eyes of the civilised world the sin-
gular spectacle of a nation voluntarily poor in the midst of
great wealth, hoarding up stores which it forbears to touch,
and starving itself for the good of its neighbours. However
the philanthropy of such a country may be admired for its
vastness and its novelty, yet mankind will question its sense
of justice, especially when they remember that this tempo-
rary self-denial is to be compensated by a future extrava-
gance; and that though we abstain from buying when we
might buy cheaply, we shall enter the markets when com-
petition has created dearness, and dearness has been
followed by general distress. The guests in Lucian's ghost
banquet passed each delicacy by in succession, because me-
mory and imagination taught them to expect that the latter
viands would be daintier than the first. We have no such-
hope. We lose the opportunity that nature offers and pru-
dence should accept, with the certainty that it will not re-,
turn. We are enamoured of scarcity for its own sake, and
embrace the haggard nakedness of dearth with inexplicable
fondness. And when at last we fly to our resources, it is to
drain ourselves and famish our neighbours. But let the
merit be given where it is dae. To the finisher and per-
fecter of the sliding-scale be attributed this our virtue or our
weakness. His measure and its working are easily described.
Take his own elaborate eulogism, and insert one little word,
expressive of negation. He told us that it would guarantee
us against the perils of famine and the vicissitudes of
prices ; that it would save us from alternations of un-
profitable redundance and pinching scarcity, and would
fill our granaries with a perpetual plenty of corn that
should be never too dear or too cheap. Insert one
little not," and the description is literally correct,
All its merits are illustrated by the converse of the
Premier's praise. It is now found—whether or no by men in
office we cannot say—but by all others, that Providence is
mightier than Prime Ministers; that it is poor sport gamb-
ling with harvests; that prices will not adjust themselves to
Acts of Parliament or the exigencies of sellers; in a word,
that a fluctuating duty adds embarrassment and uncertainty
to speculations which must always be uncertain and con-
tingent. That men should hesitate before they believe in
the approximation of danger is natural. That they should
delay or deprecate a change in their own measures, and the
work of their own hands, is natural also. But State necessity
is more powerful than self-love or self-delusion. It works by
signs and by wonders—by the popular voice, by the opera-
tions of nature, by the distress of nations. Let no man say
that his work is final—that his wisdom is paramount—that
his counsels are for all time. It is not so. It never was,
and never will be so. The great chain of events coils round
and round us, imperceptible, inevitable, inextricable. Every
movement of human will has its check ; every im-
pulse its deflection ; every principle its modification. Even
the wisest statesmanship must in a great measure be an adop-
tion of expedients. That which is not the wisest must be
their slave. But of all things that claim the name of states-
manship, that is the most foolish and fatuous which clings
with doting tenderness to a denounced principle or a con-.
demned practice, and which looks around with piteous mien
and moistened eye for some pretext to abandon a theory
which it can no longer keep with safety or honour. Be it so.
A pretext is at hand—a twofold pretext—a prospective dearth
in England, a present one in Ireland. The last carries its own
warning with it. You who fear not the steady earnestness of
the English people may dread the violence of an Irish popu-:
lace. Ireland you pronounce to be your difficulty. Will you
add to it? You say that in England there is no fear of
famine; can you say the same of Ireland? Already that
niggardly food which supports life to four millions of our fel-
low-subjects is doomed. Its duration is a thing to reckon
by months. After that, Ireland will be dependent
on your wisdom or your alms. Charity she depre-
Cates with scorn. She demands leave to purchase
food, and to get employment. You will not be rash
enough to refuse her request. You will open the
ports and admit, at any rate, maize and coarse grain. But
on what principle can you rest there ? How will you reduce
or abolish the duties on the staple food of one country with-
out doing the same to another ? Will you vote money to
give employment to the Irish people ? It would be an act
of munificent charity, if it were not (as it probably would be)
perverted into a monstrous job. But remember, if you do
this you will be taking away the money of the English
people at a time when money will be scarce, and employment
much rarer that it is now, to feed the Irish. Will this be

just ? Do you think it will be tolerable ? No. A great
opportunity has arrived—an opportunity, not (as our French
Contemporaries say) for pauperising an aristocracy or de-
stroying a class, but for regulating the machinery of com-
merce, for preventing great uncertainties in the price of
bread, and the great embarrassments which follow its scarcity.
This is an age of low prices. Our prosperity is now found to
be coincident with low prices. High prices interfere with
trade and hamper industry. Sooner or later restrictive
duties must be narrowed to their lowest limit. The people'
will gain by it ; and it would argue a great ignorance of
human wants and human capabilities to imagine that those
who are engaged in the tillage of the soil and the production
of food have no higher chart er, no more prevailing shield,
than the parchment Acts of Parliamentary protection. That
which enriches all besides cannot beggaralanded aristocracy.,

The present corn-laws are doomed. -It is for the Premier to
decide whether he will sign the warrant of their execution.
Self-love, the tenderness of sponsorship, and a lingering
regard for the graces of consistency, may stay his hand.
But his mercy will be suicidal. If he delays, others will be
found ready to act for him. He will only gain the equivocal
praise of having been unseasonably, and on one point only,
consistent. But there is much in " the look of the thing"
with Premiers as well as prudes. And the most prudish of
Premiers may hesitate before he condemns what he has
sanctioned, and sanctionswhat he has strenuouslydenounced.
If this be so, there is only one course for him to take—to ab-
stain from taking.an open pan in this important discussion—
to leave to others the merit of settling the question—and to
resign.— Times.

MINING.—A correspondent, upon whom we can
depend, informs us that the lead mines in the neighbourhood
of St. Teath are likely to become of great importance.
Several new discoveries have lately been made, in which the
reins of ore are rich both in silver and lead. Some few
years ago Treburgett mine was worked there at a great
profit; and the lodes now discovered are to the full as good
in quality as those in Treburgett. On Wheal Trewennan the
adventurers have decided on forthwith erecting a powerful
steam-engine, which will put the mine in full work, and
give great employ to the neighbourhood.— West Briton
WEYMOUTu.—Large quantities of herrings art
now being caught here and on the neighbouring coasts. Cod
fish are beginning to pay us a visit from the north, as usual
at this period, and if the weather continues moderate, large
quantities may be anticipated. —Somerset County Gazette.
• [ADVERTISEMENT.]—BAD LEGS AND WOUNDS OF
ALL RINDS SPEEDILY CURED BY HOLLOWAY'S OINTMENT
awn these very valuable medicines be used toge-
ther, according to the directions given with them, there is no
case, however obstinate, bad, or lorg-standing, but may be
shortly cured by their surprising efficacy. Thousands of per-
sons, who had been patients of large hospitals, and under the
care of the greatest surgeons of the day, without deriving the
least benefit, as a last resource use Holloway's Ointment and
Pills. which always cure them, and frequently in as little time
as a cut finger would require when treated in the usual way.—
Sold by all druggists, and at Professor Holloway's establish-
ment, 244, Strand, London.:
POTATOES.—We have thought it our duty to insti-
tute rather a searching inquiry into the state of the potato
crop in this part of the West Riding of Yorkshire; and
though that inquiry
is at present incomplete, we are sorry to
say that, as far as it has proceeded, it leads to a result less
favourable than we had anticipated. In many places, even
upon dry and sound land, the number of infected potatoes
amounts to at least 20 per cent. of the whole crop, and in
some low and damp situations, to a. much larger proportion.
We are still pursuing our inquiries, and shall not fail to
report their result. In the meantime, we may state, that
the price of sound potatoes, for the weight of 481b5., has ad
vanced in the Leeds market considerably this year, on a
comparison with the last, the relative proportions being last
Tear Is., this year ls. 3d. As an indication of the appre•
pension that is entertained, that a large part of the winter
stock of potatoes will not keep till the approaching spring, it
may be mentioned that many samples are ,offered in the
Leeds market at 6d. or 7d. a weigh, which would last year
have 641 at 10d. or 10.--Lewis Mercury.