The Sun.
London, England, 1844-05-16 00:00:00

MEETING

AT COVENT-GARDEN THEATRE.

The usual weekly meeting of the League was held
last evening in Covent-garden Theatre, which was
as densely thronged as it generally is upon those
occasions. Among those present were, John Bright,
Esq., M. P. (in the chair), The Hon. Charles Pel-
ham Villiers, M.P., Major-General Briggs, James
Wilson, Esq., R. J. Burnet, John Travers, Esq.,
William Leavers, Esq., Dr. Cook Taylor, George
Offer, Esq., R. S. Johnson, Esq., John Lambert,
Esq., (Salisbury), Samuel Wilson, Esq., Colonel
Tucker, Isaac Mollett, Esq„ R. Woodgate, Esq., R.
Jupp, Esq., Francis Stokes, Esq., Press Granger,
Esq., Charles Geach, Esq. (Birmingham), Thomas
Gammon, Esq., Martin Thackery, Esq., Henry
Gunning, Esq., T. Bailey, Esq. (Colne), Thomas
Bexley, Esq., Richard Ware Cole, Esq., David
Blyth, Esq., Robert A. Blyth, Esq., Walton Little,
Esq., Samuel Tomkinson, Esq. (Liverpool), J.
Turner, Esq. (Othery, Somersetshire), Thomas Ro-
gerson, Esq. (Liverpool), W. D. Starling, Esq , Rev.
Richard Fletcher (Manchester), W. Geesin, Esq.,
J. B. Scott, Esq. (Manchester), F. Scheer, Esq.,
Edward Foster, Esq. (Cambridge), J. P. Burnard,
Esq., J. Brownsell, Esq., Leslie, Esq., J. W.
Langtree, Esq., John Pike, Esq. (Oxford), John
Poulter, Esq., &c.
At half-past seven o'clock the chair was taken by
Mr. Bright, M.P.
The minutes of the last meeting having been read
and confirmed,
The CHAIRMAN advanced to the front of the stage,
amidst the cheers of the meeting. He said it had
been intended that the Chairman of the Council of
the League should preside over the meeting that
evening, but when he (Mr. Bright) should explain the
cause of his absence, he was quite sure the meeting
would be satisfied that he was as usefully employed
where he was as he could possibly have been if he
were present there that night. He was engaged at
that moment in the preparations that were being made
in South Lancashire for the approaching election—
(Cheers)—and knowing, as he (Mr. Bright) did, how
many were his qualifications for the conduct of an
election, he was quite certain there was no man con-
nected with the contest who could be worse spared than
could George Wilson—(Hear, hear) —and when he
looked around upon that meeting, and thought how
often some of them had been there—how often that
building had been crowded with an enthusiastic
audience assembled—not for the purpose of being de-
lighted with the charms of oratory—but for the
purpose of exhibiting to the world their
full conviction that the League was right in the
position it had taken up, he was quite certain there
were thousands within those walls at that hour who
were anxious that that great contest which was now
commencing in Lancashire should end in the signal
triumph of the free trade cause.—(Cheers.) There
were small boroughs from which an independent voice
was scarcely to be expected. They viewed that con-
test, then, as one of infinitely greater importance than
the contests in a dozen, or a score of boroughs like
Woodstock or Abingdon. The present meeting sym-
pathised with that contest.—(Cries of " Hear,
hear.") It was anxious to convey to those electors
their sense of the importance of that contest ;
and he feared even they, anxious as they were,
did not regard that struggle as of all the importance
which it merited. He had met persons in the south
of England who spoke of Lancashire as if it were a
county of no more than ordinary importance—as
if they knew only this, that there were in that county
a number of grasping, avaricious, and some of them
rich manufacturers, with rather a dense population of
working men, brutalised, ill-paid, and degraded.
They seemed to think that Lancashire was merely a
county in which there were several considerable
towns of a very dull character, connected by rail-
roads ; that, in fact, every feature in that
county was one affording rather pain than
pleasure, and that it was to be looked
upon as a county only valuable for what
could be got out of it—one which the tourist and the
lover of the picturesque should on all occasions care-
fully avoid. Now, he (Mr. Bright) had been bora
in that county, and he had lived there something like
thirty years. He knew much of its population—
much of its trade, and much of its resources, and he
was quite convinced there was no other county in
England which could compare with it in real impor-
tance as affecting the welfare and power of this
empire.—(Hear, hear, and cheers.) It was the most
populous county in England; it was the most
manufacturing county, and, as far as its
productive power went, it was the richest county in
England ; and what had it done ? Time was when it
presented a very different aspect from that which it
now did. some 240 years ago it was considered a
wilderness. Camden, in his survey, after having tra-
velled the country from York to Durham, men-
tioned that he proposed to enter Lancashire, and
that his mind was filled with apprehension at the
prospect. His remark was " And first of
the people of Lancashire, whom I approach
with a kind of dread"—(in those latter days
there were some persons also who looked upon
Lancashire with dread (Cheers and laughter)
—" may it forbode no ill. However, that I may
not seem wanting to this county, I will run the ha-
zard of the attempt, hoping that the Divine assistance
which has favoured me in the rest will not fail me in
this." Camden mentioned some of the towns. Roch-
dale, (to which he had come first from York-
shire,) Bury, Blackburn, Preston, and Manchester.
But he spoke of those only as being towns of trade,
and as being principally connected with woollen
manufactures. He mentioned Liverpool, or Lithere
pool, or, as it was sometimes abbreviated, Lirpool, as
a small place on the sea coast, and as the most conve-
nient spot for setting sail to Ireland. But, of Ash-
ton, Bolton, Oldham, Salford, and many other towns
now existing in Lancashire, he did not say one word ;
and they had no reason to believe that such towns
were known at that time. It might be worth while
for a few moments to examine, and see how wonderful
was the increase in the value of property in that
county. In 1692, that was 150 years age, the whole
annual value was 97,0001. In 1841 the annual value
was 6,192,000/.—(Cheers.) Thus, giving an average
increase throughout that county, in the space of 150
years of not less than 6,3001. per cent. Now the
land-owners should look at that as showing how
trade was advantageous to them. Lancashire, as had
been truly said, contained just as much land as any
other county. That must be very clear.—(A voice,
" No, no.") He remembered a person standing on a
rising ground,andlooking over the neighbourhood,re-
marking to another who stood near him that they seemed
to have a great deal of land in that neighbourhood,
which remark occasioned him some surprise ; but he
(Mr. Bright) supposed that it might be mae with
equal truth of any other neighbourhood. Lan-
cashire had landowners, and was divided into districts,
called " hundreds."—(A voice—" Yorkshire," and
some interruption.) Of these hundreds, three were
agricultural, and three were manufacturing ; and the
improvement in the value of the agricultural portion
of the county amounted, in the time he had men-
tioned, to 3,5001. per cent., and that of the
manufacturing districts to 7,000/. per cent.
In one estate in the neighbourhood of Man-
chester—Charlton Hall estate—there was a mar-
vellous increase of its value. In the year 1590 it
sold for 3201. ; in the year 1644, that was, fifty-
four years later, it sold for 3001., the value thus not
having increased at all ; and in 1794 that same estate
was sold for 70,0001. The annual value of the town-
ship in which this estate was situate was 19,0001. in
1815 ; in 1829 it was 66,000/. ; in 1841 it was
137,0001.—(Hear, hear.) In a space of time of not
more than two hundred years, the value of this estate
had increased from 300/. to 3,000,000/.—(Loud
cheers.) There was another district in Lancashire
called the Forest of Rossendale, containing from
twenty-two to twenty-four square miles. In the
early part of the sixteenth century about eighty per-
sons lived in it ; now it contained twenty-one thou-
sand. Land for farming purposes in that dis-
trict now let for ten times as much rent as it did
one hundred years ago ; and there were men
now living who recollected the time when they cul-
tivated certain farms which paid seven or eight
times more rent now than in their youth. The dis-
trict in which Liverpool was situate was then known
as West Derby Hundred. It was then assessed to
the land-tax at 135,000/..; its annual value was now
2,124,000/.—(Cheers)—being an advance of more
than 5,900 per cent.—(Hear, hear.) Liverpool, 150
years ago, was not larger than Wigan at the present
time. It was a mean fishing village then—now it
was the largest sea-port in England, perhaps in the
whole world.—(Hear, hear.) What was it that pro-
duced this wonderful change in Lancashire ? Was
it the landed proprietors of the county ?—(No, no.)
About 44 years ago, Mr. Whittaker, in his " His-
tory of Whalley," describing the landed proprietors
of Lancashire as they were 200 years ado, says they
Were men fond of the married life.—(Laughter.)
He mentions they were fond of quiet, domestic com-
forts, and had little curiosity and ambition.—
(Laughter.) They resided much at home, and pur-
sued domestic amusements, which were more gross
than costly. He says he only met with one literary
character who was possessed of the family estate.—
(Laughter.) The landed proprietors, if they were
men of this character, did not make Lancashire
what it was now. There were a number of old
houses there, where old families used to reside.
Those families were now extinct ; they were passed by
in the race by a new class of men.—(Hear, hear.)
Their mansions were now inhabited by the thrifty
and industrious manufacturers, and the old families
had been swept away from the southern division of
the county. ‘Not that there was any war against