The Sun.
London, England, 1844-08-20 00:00:00

brientiv

LONDON, TUESDAY, AUGUST 20, 1844.

A Morning Contemporary observes, with reference
to the game-laws—" There is every reason to believe
that another session will not pass without a complete
revision of these laws. 'We may also add, that since
Sir JAMxS Gawn.A.3i has been at the head of the
home Department, the evidence on which committals
in "
every
convictions for poaching have been founded has,
very case of alleged severity, been required by
him from the convicting and committing
magistrates.
On every account it is most desirable that
the admi-
nistration of the game laws,
Should
s,duringthe approaching
autumn and winter
temper mercy
with justice; and a broad distinction be taken by
magistrates between Poachers from necessity, and
poachers from idleness and confirmed vicious habits."
There is both good sense and good feeling in this last
remark of our Tory Contemporary, though we doubt
much whether his suggestion will be acted on by
provincial magistrates, many of whom—if
our
not
the" majority—are ardent sportsmen, and, regarding
poachers as criminals of the blackest die, look on
them nith the same sort of shuddering horror with
which ST. DUNSTAN-11.5 the old legend tells us—
looked on the Devil. We must confess also that we
entertain strong doubts as to the probability of the
garne,laws being subjected to a searching revision in
the course of the next session. That their exceeding
rigor may be partially relaxed, and the amount of
their notorious injustice be diminished, is likely
enough ; but when we, bear. in mind of what Bass of
men the major portion of the House of Commons is

, composed, and consider.the=power which they have in
their hands, when united in a body--as they would

probably be on this question—we are far indeed
from anticipating that any very important altera-
tion will be made in the game-laws. At
least two-thirds of the country-gentlemen in
Parliament—who, whatever other good qualities
they may be endowed with, are by no means remark-
able for the possession of " absolute wisdom"—at
least two-thirds of this non-sapient fraternity, cling
to the despotic, feudal laws which regulate game; with
the same desperate tenacity with which they cling
to the laws which regulate the price of corn. In
their partial eyes, each of these oppressive statutes is
a miracle of senatorial sagacity—the most glorious,
monument of the wisdom of our ancestors ; and to
subject either to a process of sweeping revision, they
would look on as one of the most unconstitutional
acts possible—an act calculated to draw down the
vengeance of Heaven on this offending country, and
make it a byeword and a mockery among nations. As
a parson sticks to his tithes, and a placeman to
his sinecure, so does a sporting country gentleman
stick to his game-laws. He thinks of his preserves
and plantations—his moors, his marshes, and his
stubbles—and is impressed with a sickening apprehen-
sion that all would be rendered wholly valueless,
whether for the purposes of profit or amusement,
were the present statutes which regulate game once
to be subjected to a rigorous process of amendment.
We anticipate, therefore, a fierce opposition in Parlia-
ment to any measure which Ministers may bring
forward for an alteration in the game-laws--unless,
indeed, it be of a tame, inefficient, milk-and-water.
character; but we trust that they will not allow
themselves to be brow-beaten by the interested hos-
tility of sporting members, but carry out their scheme
in a bold, independent, impartial spirit, such as the
importance and necessity of the subject demand. Few
things indeed require the prompt and serious attention
of the Legislature more than the game-laws. They
are the origin of half the crimes that are perpetrated
in the agricultural districts ; they sow the seeds of
ill-will between the landholder and his tenant-farmers;
they fill our poor-houses with paupers, and our gaols
with criminals ; they people our convict-ships, and
send constant supplies of wretched victims to our
penal settlements ; and finally, they put the torch
into the hand of Swing, and light up county after
county in a broad, destructive conflagration. How
many a poor, simple-minded peasant who might'
otherwise have been a useful and creditable mem-
ber of society, may lay his utter ruin at the
door of the game-laws—laws the justice and
common sense of which, he, in common with thou-
sands of other people, could never be brought to com-
prehend ! If the Legislature had always been as
scrupulously attentive in providing for the amuse-
ments of the poor, as it has been in providing for
those of the rich_ ; if the peasant's common lands had
always been as. jealously guarded from invasion as
the nobleman's or squire's preserves, we should not
now have witnessed the ill-omened spectacle of a
sullen, discontented, alienated peasantry, who, instead
of regarding their superiors as their benefactors, re-
gard them only as their oppressors.

The Government are disposed, we think, to take an
important step, in reference to the great interests of
trade and navigation, in the right direction. We
perceive that the Treasury authorities have called for
returns of the dues and charges, of all kinds, levied
on shipping, "in each port, harbour, or creek in the
United Kingdom, stating the rate of the several dues
levied per ton on each vessel, whether under autho-
rity of Acts of Parliament, and what Acts—by orders
of municipal corporations, and of what date, or by
charter, consent, prescription, or any other autho-
rity, so as to exhibit the entire charges of every kind
on vessels at each of the harbours, ports, and creeks
of the United Kingdom, distinguishing the several
charges upon vessels taking refuge in the harbour
only, from those upon vessels delivering the cargo in
whole or in part ; and also on vessels in the coasting
or in the foreign trade ; distinguishing also the
charges levied for local lights and beacons in each
port (exclusive of those of the Trinity House, the
Irish Ballast Board, and the Commissioners of the
Northern Lights), the charges for pilotage into and
out of each harbour, and the charge for ballast, and
-whether under any and what board the same are
levied." The beneficial scope and tendency of such
minute and necessarily voluminous returns as these
may not be obvious, at first sight, to those who' are
accustomed to 'the common, but very absurd notion
that "harbour dues" can possess but little general
relation to the great interests of commerce. It will
be obvious to a moment's serious reflection, however,
that the numerous, and, in many instances, exorbitant
and oppressive charges which are levied under this
general title, from our own coasting vessels, as well
as from foreign shipping, trading to our coasts, have
a direct tendency to diminish and destroy the profits
of all maritime interests. The shipowner is the se-
verest sufferer by them ; but his liabilities re-act, in
the increased rate of freight, &c., on the merchant
and the producer, and finally, through these, on the
consumer, abroad or at home. Among the many
good services rendered by Mr. HUME in the course of
his long and indefatigable Parliamentary career, in
defiance of all discouragement, and disregard of the
entreaties of friends as well as foes (having a com-
munity of interest in keeping up the destructive pres-
sure of these imports), none have been more earnestly
performed by him, and at one period with so little ap-
parent chance of success, as his periodical motions for
returns connected with the receipts of light-houses,
harbour-lights, &c., by private individuals and cor-
porate bodies at different points of the United Kingdom.
For a long time all such information was steadily re-
fused ; but the Hon. Member returned to the attack
with that "dogged perseverance," as his political an-
tagonists have designated it, which is so characteristic
of his public energy ; and, by degrees, returns oozed
forth, slowly and reluctantly indeed, from the sealed
vessels of a few among those hereditary and mis-
chievous monopolies. The principle once conceded
was sure to be carried out to its legitimate
extent. We hear no more now of " the scandalous
interference with vested proprietory rights," which
used to be the mildest terms applied to any
proposal for ascertaining how much was an-
nually charged upon the trade and shipping of the
country, in the shape of dues for lights inefficiently
maintained, or for impracticable harbours,' the shelter
of which no wise or prudent mariner would dream of
seeking, though the track of his voyage might neces-
sarily compel him to run within their Parliamentary
jurisdiction. Government having taken up the
whole of this extensive and complicated sub-
ject, the most unreasonable cavillers at the
views of the Hon. Gentlemen in past years,
will doubtless discover now, that the institution of
inquries such as these bespeaks, on the part of her
MAJESTY'S Ministers, a vigilant and intelligent atten-
tion to the welfare and the protection of our national
commerce. We have no desire to depreciate the
merits of the Treasury, but we are anxious to re-
claim for Mr. HUME that just proportion of the
praise which is due to him who first pointed out the
direction in which the powers of the Legislature
might be advantageously exercised for the remedy of
a crying evil of almost unsuspected magnitude. In
an early period of the ensuing session we hope that
some Member of Parliament will move for papers
calculated to exhibit an estimate of the probable
amount to which these multifarious imports have di-
minished the sum of that trade which foreign
shipping would, under this partial mitigation or
their removal, have carried on with this country.
Besides numerous other lights, beacons, &c., the
claims of which are imperfectly or not at all
recognised by custom, common law, or Act of Par-
liament, there are 'forty-two lighthouses of England
(if we remember rightly) that compose the list of
those for which dues are or have been demanded. Of
these, fifteen are :on the eastern coast of England,
thirteen in the English Channel, and fourteen in the
Irish Channel. On the coasts of Ireland there are
twenty-six lighthouses ; on the Scotch coasts, seven-
teen. But there is a large numbef of points on our
very dangerous shores where these guides and bea-
cons for the " wanderers on the seas" are still want-
ing, and the deficiency of which is an actual reproach
humanity and policy of the empire--.-miti-
dgu ntoe nhe
dt
h onlythe
erbeyetien re
cousnstideimrpaetise oneohf
thet the
country.
In bur-
In offering these
undervaluing the prleeamarasksserwteed are
on
sobefhaarlffroomf
vested interests, that we very sincerely hope the
Government may devise some large scheme of con-
solidation, control, and management,
wihnichremspea;t,
of lighthouses and harbour
wherever private rights are
dues,involved in the title to

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