The Sun.
London, England, 1844-02-29 00:00:00

/1i
\-4- Jentil

LONDON, THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 29, 1844.

Another _meeting of the-Anti-Corn-law League
look place at Covent-garden_, last night, when the
same enthusiaiin inothe cause, and the same determi-
nation to fight the battle to the last, was displayed.
Sir R. PEEL'S announcement about " finality ". was
treated with the mine respect as Lord J. RussEL4'S
"finality." The audience, knew well that the words
of a Minister signify nothing unless they are in ac-
cordance with existing circumstances, and that,
though an announcementmay come from Downing-
street that the corn-laiw as as unchangeable as the
law of the Medes and Persians,'it must break down
before public opinion. No Minister can resist the
pnblic voice. Sir. R. Pxzt. is goaded on to speak in
support of the. corn-laws ; but no man who has care-
fully weighed his speeches on free trade—and in that
we inclUde the trade in corn—can fail to see that he's
waiting only for a fit Opportunity to . carry his wise
principles of trade into ftill effect. The Anti-Corn-law
League is lila hest supporter. . Its onward course' is
too rapid, and attendedi.by events too impressive and
too 4tartling, to leave' -rota for deliberation on any
of the mere... outlying circumstances and proper-
ties which are, incidental to the character of its con-
atruction.- It --is a spell which has awakened 'the
sltimberers of , half a Century- throughout the
breadth and length of the land. Its- most de=
termined opponents, cannot deny that its ap-i'
peal has been magical. '. It -has Spoken, trumpet-
tongued, in the north ; it has re-echoed alike through.
the waste and the,cultivated districts of the east ; it
has made head, .and. successfully too, against the
" sacred legion" of monopoly in the west; and ere
long it will doubtless have brought the fertile
counties of the "south. under its allegiance. - That
principle must be one of. irresistible cogency which
can thus, in defiance 'of long...transmitted opinions, of
hereditary prejnclices, and
.the authority of practical
and experienced, but not the less ill-informed and ill-
judging agricUltarists, assail 'the very fortresses. of
monopolY, and tumble down
,the long consecrated
idols of "protective duties" levied.on the introduction
of foreign corn. In the enterprise upon which the
. League embarked -its leaders felt how much there
' was to be done T-at what". powerful odds, with
established interests. and powers-.-under what stem
discouragement from class legislation.. But .in the
actual conduet,of that. enterprise they had incessantly,
to , grapple with obstacles mere formidable than
any they could have anticipated. False_ data-
and incomplete statistics had perverted, instead
of ' guiding, • the conclusions that highly gifted
' minds had, in many instances, arrived at,
touching the laws of -which it was, the first, the
avowed effort of the League 'tO procure the repeal.
And thus, not only-were-farmers and tenants found
amongst the most strenuous supporters of the unjust
monopoly-which lantifords had long exercised so. un-.
"li'ElYstirky,\kinjtiriously to their interests.; but even the
"poorer classes of consumers upon whom that mono-
poly supply of.dear bread had operated, as it ever
inu.st operate, so oppresSively, -were, at first, in not
~...,:i r. !Infrequent instances, vehemently opposed to its e*-
k\Lln. • . , ; ~..... - t ‘.... .-.-
.... whateTer the .cbtficilities, 1 e obstAclesi the
- • -
Al it . 0

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prejudices, the fo ces, the influence, which lay dearly
in prospect before them when the active spirits of the
League commenced their arduous crusade—what-
ever the ignorance or fatuity with which, as their
labours were advanced, they had to contend—they
brought to their mighty task faculties of mind and
body which have proved more than equa' to the de-
mands of each successive exigency. They have made
proselytes, by the force of argument and illustra.
tion alone, in every rank of society. From the
highest order of our long-descended and opulent
nobility, to the humblest, and poorest, and the
hardest-working sections of our working population,
they have equally recruited the ranks of their adhe-
rents. In every portion of the empire they have
pushed . their cause with the same indomitable
activity and spiAt—with the same average success.
The popularity and influence of the League are in-

creased and consolidated, in place of being exhausted
or endangered by these constant appeals to public
opinion. It carries about it a self-maintaining
excitement. The crowded attendance of last evening
demonstrates that the sympathy it has aroused in
all classes, on behalf of its great cause, is inex-
haustible—

" Age cannot wither it,
Nor custom sate its infinite variety."
And, in truth, the merits of that cause are of a
magnitude and character, intrinsically, which out-
weigh all the splendour of the brilliant success that
has hitherto attended its advocacy, and are a more
eloquent testimony to the merits of its champions
than twenty Such demonstrations as that, even,
of last night. For what is the constitu-
tional fight in which the League have en-
gaged ? It is a struggle on their part for
the abolition of a grinding Monopoly, vested by an
improVident and iniquitous Legislature in one " class"
of the nation. On the part of that 'class it is a des-
perate Struggle' to retain what they fondly imagine a.
'privilege, which it must, now and permanently, be for
their signal benefit to retain. The poor feel that
from this contest one of two alternatives must inevita-
bly result to them. The success of the League will
secure for their working hands, and for their half-
starved children, an abundant and cheap supply of
the first necessary of life at all times, and under any
of those often recurring fluctuations of trade and de•
rangements of the currency to which they have been
made the &rst and most certain victims. The failure
of the League must hand them over to the tender
mercies of that Legislature, which, after cheering
them on through all the sufferings ind burdens of a
wasting war of twelve years (reckoning from the
peace of Amiens) by their repeated pledges to relieve
them from their unnatural load of taxation on the
return of peace, profaned that auspicious event by
taxing -more heavily than ever, from that moment,
the *millions of bread consumers, for the palpable,
sordid; disgraceful, and fraudulent purpose of en-
hancing the rentals of themselves and some few
thousands of other bread growers. The in-
dustrious but ill remunerated mechanic and journey-
man—the struggling tradesinan—the reduced or in-
digent pensioner—they who struggle " to maintain
appearances," or the class with which they are un-
fortunately connected by family or other relations, in
the hopeless effort to obtain an adequate measure of
monopoly-taxed subsistence out of. their currency-
taxed pittances of income—these look ,forward
withintense solicitude to a consummation which may
enable them, at las 4 to participate in the bounties of
natural production from the enjoyment which the
iron hand of the monopolist has for nine-and-twenty
years rudely thrust them forth to pine in sickness or
perish. in despair. The pro-corn-law landlords—
neither satisfied with the excessive rentals they have
long derived in virtue of the excessive prices which
the working of that law has obtained.for the 'produce
of their acres, nor content to contribute their Volun-
tary sacrifice to -the mass of those compulsjry ones
which the circumstances of the-times' and the " de-
mands of Parliament" have so largely exacted from
every other class of the people—are mad enpugh to
protract that which would, even now, be accepted as
a concession by those who will, ere long, indignantly
extort it as a just, but contumaciously withheld,
debt to the nation at large. The final triumph of the
League is certain. The ultimate consequebces of
such impracticability in their opponents no 'tan can
venture to predict.

That insurrectionary movements and revoltst,which
I
have so incessantly agitated the ;
Southern S ates of
Europe within the last ten or twelve years, shoul4
still, even after that lapse of time, have lost so ittle :of
their activity as, at this moment, to convulse both
Spain and Portugal, is rather a moral necessity than
any political phenomenon. It is the result— ore to
be
vv;
deplored than marvelled at—of a reaction, xcited
by a recent experience of free institutions; ich is
still warring against the Governments and preiudices
of many past centuries—against the moral and social
habits, the tone of thought, and the bent of feeling
engendered by them. We must not to nar-
rowly scan the political 'errors "of parties whom
we assume
.to be in earnest .in their efforts
to consolidate their -newly-achieved libert es, -if
they , become somewhat reckless 'in the ursuit
Of; So favourite an object ; or if, distrac ed by
the various courses of action which present; them-
selves for their adoption, they dally with the !means
till they lose the end. Considerations of this ki-nd
especially apply to. the position. of . Portugal,
as contradistinguished from that of Spa.n, at
the present day. In Spain, all the elements" of
feverish excitement appear to have recombined:
of late, for the sole purpose of working out, in a war of
partisans, and, amidst
-the public ruin which has been
thereby entailed upon the country; a fierce and
grinding military ' deipOtism. In Portugal, not-
withstanding the strife, of parties, and the
'interruptions of nnprinciplei intrigue, I, the
advance of the people has been more gradua), but
more steady, and further, 'in the direction of ultimate
freedom. Yet it cannot he denied that the existing'
Government, of her Most Faithful MAJESTY has not
abstained' from serious, violations of what may be
considered the fundamental constitution of the
kingdom, namely, that of 1829, and her I Most,
Faithful MAJESTY'S decree of February 1842. It
is as little to be doubted that during the last
two years instances have occurred in which
her MAJESTY'S Ministers must be 'held to ' have
exercised an undue constraint and control over
the spontaneous acts of their Royal Mistress. This
species of virtual coercion; -on the part of Cosa
CABRAL' and others, and the delinquencies and de-;
fieiences of their administration of foreign and do-
mestio.affairs, appear to have induced the recent hostile
movement of Count BOMFDI, ex-Minister of War.
His proclamation, addressed " to Portuguese citizens
Queen
and. soldiers," breathes the •same fervent and doted
loyalty towards the person and authority of the
of PORTUGAL as he unquestionably manifested
throughout the whole of his career, after the death
of the Regent JOAO yi. to her Most Faithful MA-
JESTY'S Illustrious:father, Dorn PEDRO IV., the Duke
crf -13a.tuANZA. The Count declares- that his move-'
ment is against the present Ministry of the QUEEN?
whO, in cOnsequenee---Ortlhe violent restrairit'in which
they hold their Royal Mistress, "prevent her from
fulfilling her gracious: promises on promulgating the
decree referred to, and from attending to 'the desires
and petitiOns of her people."
The Count's proclamation thus designates the pre-
sent Minister- of Portugal :" . •
~ This Ministry, guided bY a man who his no creed, and
has no love of country, who looks to nothing but his own in-
terest, and who is blinded by the 'unbounded ambition, Vrhich
rules him, ready to alter his system or political' opinidii's .ae-
cording,to the profit which may result to him, always ready
to sacrifice those with whom he may have been most .inti-
mately, connected, and even to pronounce as enemies of the
State, theise who will.not lend themselves to become tools of
his caprices, or who do not aid in his brutal despotism. .This
Ministry has placed us 'on the frightful abyss which threatens
to engulf us.' . • • ' •" • ' '

The proclamation, after eulogizing the unalterable
loyalty of the people and the army to the Sovereign,
describes the grievances under which they labour,
" which have caused . the disappearance of ipublic
rights, and of individual security, , and the ov-erbur-
(-teeing Of the people with taxes." The wrongs of
the army are largely detailed and insisted on.'
The Count then appeals, by all the stirring recol-
lections and great names of Portuguese history, to his
fellow-citizens and soldiers to unite with him in
"saving their country, the QUEEN, and their liberty
The time, he says, has now arrived for so noble
an attempt.

It seems evident, both from the language of many
of these passages, and fmn that of a very remarkable':
farewell address to its readers in the Revoluao of the I