The Sun.
London, England, 1842-06-14 00:00:00

litg 11.
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• s`-- wire.**

LONDON
TIrI:DAY MORNING, JUNE 14, 1842.

.A new art has arisen in England. Our ingenious
pile, heretofore so renowned for inventions that
hare contributed to the power and enjoyment
of mankind, have now fallen on a contrivance of
a totally different character. They are learning
and praetising the art of now TO STA RYE. It
has made rapid progress amongst them, and the
the same genius seems to have taught them it at once
in different quarters of the country. In Scotland they
nail up the windows, or shut out the day-light, in order
to keep the children in bed, and keep them quiet, for the
pa rents say they have nothing to give them to eat,
ana' cannot bear to hear their cries. In Yorkshire
and ,r,ancashire they lie a-bed for two days together, and
pray, we are told, when they lie down, that they may
never 011:ke more. They are quite ingenious in their
contrivai IckLls• They can get water, and they say, which
is worth th'e knowledge of physiologists, that by taking a
drink of wai,te, and laying down, they lessen the pangs
of hunger. It is ~solemn, serious earnest, that the people
of the manufactwing districts, are learning the new art
of how to starve.

Lord ASHLEY IS V.I.X,Itt to take the children out of
coal pits ; the following Letter written by a lady de-
scribing the condition of the people between Wakefield
end lluddersfield, may make bi:n pause in his career.
By getting a child to work in coal. pit, a family is
saved from starvation. . Lord AsuLtY, and every friend
to the Corn-law, will read with a,4tontion this coxn-
spunk:at:ion :

The worsted weavers in the Grange Moor an`d Whitting dis-
trict are, and have been for seven or eight mon.thspast, suffer-
ing the greatest privation. With sixteen famiiie,r lam per-
son-illy acquainted ; those living at some distance frilm me, I
have only known since their distress; not any of them average
more than one week's work in four, and this higher that smost ;
for this work they are very insufficiently remunerated. s Due or
two have had a child employed in the coal-pits, and their s 'Gages
have supplied food for a day or two in the beginning of ',the
-week, turnip-tops during the winter furnishing frequently tile
rest. If Lord Ashley's Bill passes, this employment in thC
*s must also cease, and then their condition will indeed be
hopeless.
Nettles have almost supplied the place of other food in si jme
families. These families work for employers living nearly I 'our
miles from them; day by day they travel this distance, hop drag
to find a i iece ready. One day, in calling, I foi and
one of the women in a very exhausted st, ate,
having a child of six months old deriving all its
meriutent from her, who to our inquiries of " How they hay'}
',been getting on this week ?" replied, 1 have not at this no.
n'ent one thing eatable in the houFe, nor a farthing to pure! lase
ate v. I ;vent yesterday to Norton's to try for work, an dit
raised very hard as I retui tied. I felt so weak snd'.
disheartened, for I had not met with any wctrke
that 1 had to sit down many a time on my r• nt..l
home. and I knew I wai coming home wet through to a ho Its
without fire, to field seven hungry children, and nothing to give
therm. The younger ones er,eit, as it' their hearts w otild brisal
h for miger, when 1 put them to bed. You see, Ma 'am, they
have not the sense to be patient when they are hungry,
as older ones are." This woman had not the means
4af buying a little thread, a• nd therefore, coul 3 not: ,
make up the clothes given to her. Two or thrt to of k
these families have ten children each, and though their c lothes
are very poor its almost all, there is much cleanliness press irved.
Perhaps the most distressed among them is a saddle r, his
wife, and seven children. The people, have been sold u p for
rend, and they child
a a betsl7tw and table in the ho use.
They have been so respeatabie, that the
them,
not make.! .up
their minds to asit ; ;Olen we founetlYtem, they had . all
remained in bed, two days being entirely without food, or the
means of procuring any. I name these sixteen families, I sting
samethe at liar
under my particular notice, but have not a doubt
miles round, the people are suffering in thedegre e„ or'.
nearly ,sofas each day add to the list of our distressed 'Leg, Saint-
_

With all this suffering, a lesson of patience and trust in ,God

is taught us—few complaints, much hope, and great thankful-
ness to those whose hand is stretched out to comfort and assist,
is every where exhibited.
- •

From Leeds an influential person writes thus
Since the Relief Society terminated: its benevolent labours
there has been no improvement in the condition of the dis-
tressed poor here but that to which I have before adverted,
nor is there any present prospect of any amelioration of their
condition. The employers are sinking rapidly into decay in
large numbers, and means of employment are this way weekly
reduced.
One alarming feature, we think, of the general de-
bility which prevails amongst the people was mentioned
to us by a Dissenting Minister. It is no longer an un-
usual thing for members of his congregation who have
crept to church to faint when there from hunger.
Amongst the poorer classes epileptic and other
fits are increasing, and the medical men ascribe
the frightful disorder to insufficient nutriment. We
were positively assured by a gentleman recently
come from the north, who is in the habit of visit-
ing the people, that he knows at this time three
houses, containing four tamilies, in which houses for two
days there was not one morsel of food. When the peo-
ple are in this wretched condition, having nothing, and
unable to procure anything, unable to buy anything, it is
a necessary consequence that there are many material
signs of distress. Grass farms, for example, which were
employed to supply them with butter and milk, are no
longer of any value ; and in the neighbourhoods
of Saddleworth, Stockport, and several other places,
such farms can find no occupiers, and their produce no
purchasers. Owners of houses can find no tenants to
pay rent, and they are obliged to abandon them to the
landlords for the ground rent. Several persons about
Nottingham and Leicester, who were living at their ease.
on the hire of the frames they let out to stocking-
weavers, have been reduced to beggary, and have taken
refuge in the workhouse. A greater increase has taken
place in the poor-rates within the last three months than
in the previous six months, and nothing but dismay and
ruin stare the manufacturers in the face.

The most extraordinary symptom of this is, that when
you meet with any of them by chance, they no longer dis-
cuss the price of cottons, but at what period the patience
of the people, or their physical strength, will be exhausted
They care nothing for the tariff ; they dread to see the
towns blazing about their ears ; they dread to hear of an
insurrection ; they know that the people are gathering
about the hill sides to tell their griefs to one another ;
to plan means of redress—perhaps violent means ;
and all the talk of men and women, all the
burden of their letters, are dreadful apprehensions.
To justify them too, we see that the yeomanry have
been ordered in some places to hold themselves in
readiness ; in others, they have been sent out to drill; so
that if the poor are starving, the middle classes are suf-
fering the worst forebodings. The Manchester Times
discusses the now important question " Will the people
fight or die," and the strangest thoughts are now engen-
dered in the heads of those who ere while thought only
of scorching muslin or piecing cotton ends. The dread-
ful poverty of the people is generating a prodigious dan-
ger, which already can only be guarded against by great
additional expense and trouble. That will fall on the land
and on the farmers ; and those who have obstinately de-
nied justice to the people will probably be taught, through
their pockets, that it would have been more politic to
have been honest.

It was reported about the House of Cominons last
night, that the Ministers do not mean to carry through
an amended Poor-law this session. Such is the condi-
tion of the people in the different manufacturing dis-
tricts, that the law has been found inadequate, we be-
lieve, to give them relief. Thereto must be added, the
great increase of rates, which together make the Minis-
ters think it at present, it is supposed, unadvisable to
enter into any amendments of the law. The report is,
therefore, that they mean to divide their Bill into
two parts, one providing for the continuance of the
Commission, which they will pass this session ; the
other for the amendment of the law, in various particu-
lars, which they will allow to stand over.till next session.
If this report be correct, it betokens both an appre-
hension in the Cabinet, and a speedier termination
of the session of Parliament than has generally been
anticipated.

The Tory and anti-free-trade Press, can see at a
glance, in the case of France, the folly of protective
duties. The most ultra of our anti-commercial journals
cries out against the sacrificing " the bounteous match-
less growths of the soil of France," in order " to create
a linen trade." In the commercial regulations of Eng-
land, they see nothing but mere protective duties to en-
courage domestic industry ; in the commercial regula-
tions of France, they behold only absurd prohibitions
which isolate France, and destroy her prosperity. They
see at once the mote in the eye of our neighbour, but
j they cannot be made sensible of the beam in our own.
To the folly of France, it is said, England gives no
countenance, and the example of England is held up for
the imitation of France. But what is England at this
moment doing by her tariff, and the host of differential
duties which it contains ? Acting on the very prin-
ciple the anti-free-traders censure in France. In every
clause of that tariff, in each of its separate columns ap..
propriated to different duties on foreign and colonial pro-
duce, lies the principle that commercial prosperity can be
promoted by discriminating duties. That is the principle on
which French statesmen now act, and the more or less,
so as to make the principle just and correct in applica-
tion, algebra cannot very easily solve. The French say
20 per cent. ad valorem on linen yarns is the right figure
to encourage native industry ; the anti-free-traders cry
out against its exorbitancy, and, for the same purpose of
protecting native industry, insist on levying a duty on
wheat, which, when the price is 505., is twice the sum.
For the protection, too, of native industry in our colonies,
the persons who condemn the folly of the French levy a
duty of 300 per cent. on sugar, another important article
of food. We rejoice that our anti-free-trade Contem-
poraries have found out the folly of the French ; it is
great, but the folly of the English is stupendous.
The French only keep out lir.en yarn and ruin the linen
manufacture; the English keep out food, and are at once
starving a part of the community, and hastening the
decay of every manufacture in the country.
The Legislature, of course, cannot attain its object.
Neither in France nor in England does this protective
system foster the growth and extension of native indus-
try. It is in full vigour now, anti has been for years, and
never was our industry in a worse condition. It is the
standing complaint of the anti-free-trade journals, that
what the people want is not cheap food but employment
to enable them to find the means of purchasing food. In
that complaint lies the unanswerable proof that the pro-
tective system to encourage and foster native industry
is a calamitous and a terrible failure. Our cotton trade,
our silk trade, our iron trade, our corn trade, our colo-
nial trade, are all amply and admirably protected by
duties, and the consequence is that every branch of
industry is distressed, and in all employment is wanted.
Should the present condition of the country not make
the anti-free-trade party sensible of the existence cf a
huge beam in their eye, they must have been, for some
etas purpose. struck with judicial blindness.
But we have a proof in detail to lay before them of
their error. In a petition lately presented to the
House of Commons by Mr. M. PHILLIPS, from the
Manchester Chamber of Commerce, it is remarked that,
notwithstanding the enormous bounty given for the pro-
duction of West Indian sugar, the quantity sent to Eng-
, sand has decreased very much during the last ten years.
the figures in our possession, derived from a late re-
turn, No. 293, laid before the House of Commons on the
6th instant, on the motion of Mr. PAKINGTON, differ
somewhat from those quoted from former returns
by the Chamber, and we shall make use, there-
:ore, of the later return. By that it appears
that the quantity of sugar imported from the West
Indies and British Guiana, in the year 1831, was
4,103,800 cwt.; and, in 1841, it was only 2,151,217
cwt., or very little more than one half ; demonstrating
that the bounty annually given, of between 2,000,0001.
and 4,000,0001, for the encouragement of sugar-growing
industry in these colonies, has completely and unanswer-
ably failed. On that pretence, the Legislature has plun-
dered the consumers annually- of a large sum, and put
an end to all the trade we might have carried on with
other sugar-growing countries ; but the pretence has
turned out a false one. It is a great system of humbug,
as well as plunder. Every wrong doer expects great ad-
vantages from kis ill deeds, and is invariably disap-
pointed. The rule holds good for nations ; and we are
as much cheated of the promised benefits of our legisla-
tive wrong doing, as ever was a caught and convicted
pickpocket or burglar.
In spite of these facts, which must have been known
to Sir ROBERT PEEL, Mr. GOULBURN, and Mr. GLAD •
STONE, those statesmen have continued the nefarious
scheme for another year. They boasted of the increased
supply, which to some extent has come, and is to come,
from the Mauritius and from the East Indies. But what
does that prove ? Why, that under the pretence of
protecting the growth of sugar in the West Indies,
and saving the blacks there from harm—while
the whites here are actually starved, to fill out their
I.,;lossy skins—the discriminating duties on sugar are rais-
if,,g up a sugar interest in India and the Mauritius,
wit;ch will by and by ask for compensation for the loss
of tile plunder which has been promised them. Al-
ready that interest stands in the way of doing justice to
the people, and the continuance of the sugar duties for
another year will strengthen its claims, whether the
quantity of sugar imported be much increased or not,
With the Manchester Chamber of Commerce we agree,
that this source will not, in conjunction with the drying

up of the source in the West Indies, yield us a sufficient
supply; and the Legislature will only create, by its in-
judicious and unjust system of protecting native or colo-
nial industry, a huge mass of grasping pupas and pen-
sioners, who will claim to be nourished by differential
and protective duties.

We know not on what principle Sir ROBERT PEEL
can.justify his present line of policy in regard to the
alarming distress throughout the country. While one-
half of our manufacturing population are out of employ-
ment, and tens of thousands cannot find bread to satisfy
the cravings of hunger, while trade is daily becoming
worse, and rivals from the cheapness of living are spring-
ing up in every part of the Continent, he passes laws to
make bread dear, to exclude foreign sugar, to cripple
industry by an income-tax, and then, last of
all, issues a proclamation respecting light gold,
to add to all the burdens with which the afflicted people
are already loaded. Unless he has some ulterior object
in view for placing the currency on a different footing,
this last scheme must be regarded as the most ill-timed
and absurd measure that has yet been put forth by a
Tory Government. About its injustice all are agreed.
Why make the last holder of gold suffer all the loss it
has undergone by wear and tear, or nefarious
tricks, fur the last twenty years ? The loss should
be borne equally by the whole community ; the
light gold should, as in 1817, be withdrawn, and a
new coinage issued at the expense of the public Trea-
sury. But even in that ease what remedy is there
against tampering with it for the future ? Must the
scale-system still be continued, and business delayed to
an enormous extent by weighing every piece of gold ?
We have heard that the measure has been brought for-
ward for another purpose, namely, to pave the way for a
return to small notes, as in Scotland, and should be glad
to find that the rumour was well founded. All the gold
in the world would not suffice for half the circulation of
Great Britain, and is it not absurd to make a certain
metal the only standard, when it is so manifestly defi-
cient for that purpose ? Paper must, in any circum-
stance, be the representative of a vast majority of pro-
perty in every great commercial country, and why
should not that be issued by the Government, and
guaranteed on the public income and the wealth
of the nation at large? Were a plan of this kind
adopted, trade would soon feel the effects. The
Bank of England should be deprived of the power
of issuing paper, of contracting and extending the cur-
rency at pleasure, and of injuring the property of indi-
viduals, to keep up the price of stock, or draw gold inio
its coffers. And even with all the power it already pos-
sesses, it cannot regulate the amount of bullion, or pre-
serve itself fvom insolvency. But a year or two ago
it was on the brink of a crisis, and had to apply
to a foreign country for relief. What has oc-
curt•ed once— nay twice—may occur again, and that at
a time, too, when neither France nor any other country
may be able or willing to render assistance. In Scot-
land a bank-note, of any of the respectable banks, is as
good as gold, because the public have full assurance that
the managers never issue paper beyond their
means, and that their whole property is liable
for payment. Would not the property of the nation be
as good security ? In addition to this, the cost of
manufacturing paper may be said to be nothing ; for
that is more than counterbalanced by the amount of notes
lost or destroyed by accident ; the wear and tear may
also be put down at nothing ; paper is infinitely more
commodious, and saves a man the trouble of carrying
weights and scales in his pocket, like a travelling
huckster.

Pending the inquiry now instituted relative to the
recent massacre at Ennis, in the county of Clare, we feel
the delicacy of making any remarks which might have
the effect of prejudicing public opinion against any of
the persons implicated in that tragic occurrence. We
have carefully read over the evidence given at the in-
quest, as it appears in the Limerick Reporter; and it
appears most conclusively to us, that there was a gross
neglect of duty on the part of some of the public
authorities. In the conclusion of the verdict de-
livered at the inquest, we find it impossible
to concur. That a body of police should fire upon an
unarmed mob of not more than a hundred persons, in the
presence of two Magistrates, not only without orders,
but against them, is altogether incredible. Moreover,
two of the witnesses, PATRICK GARRAHY and MICHAEL
HAIRE, distinctly deposed on oath that they heard
one of the Magistrates present order the police to
fire, and that they fired, not one volley, but several.
However, as the Lord Lieutenant has sent down an
able and highly respected Queen's Counsel, Mr. T. B. C.
SMITH, to make a special inquiry into all the circum-
stances of this tragedy, we have every reason to believe
that the real facts of the case will soon be made public.
Mr. SMITH is a Tory, but he enjoys too high a character
at the Irish bar to suppose it possible that he would be
a, party to defeating the ends of impartial justice. The
Limerick Reporter, commenting upon the evidence given
at the inquest, and which will be found in another part
of this Journal, says :
The facts detailed on the inquest—the evidence given by a
portion of the populace designated, in the conventional lan-
guage of a certain class, "the mob "—the evidence of the hu-
mane and intelligent Resident Magistrate, L. C. Smith, Esq.,
whose qualities of head and heart must be approved of, when-
ever they are known—the evidence of the Rev. Mr. Hennessy,
the excellent Catholic Curate of the town of Ennis, all go to
prove to demonstration, to satisfy the most prejudiced mind,
that there was not the shadow of a shade of justifiable
reason for this atrocious murder—that the firing on
the people was unprovoked, uncalled for—that it
was, in fact, wholly gratuitous—that it was per-
severed in with a thirst which could not have been anticipated
from savages and cannibals—that, even while the people were
retreating before the deadly fire of their armed aggressors,
bullets were poured after them in constant and disastrous suc-
cession—that so indiscriminate, so reckless, was this fearful
slaughter, that such persons as Mr. Smith and Mr. Hennessey,
who were among the crowd, narrowly escaped with their lives.
Read the evidence of Mr. Smith. That worthy Magistrate so-
lemnly swears he would have been able, by his own unaided exer-
tions, to separate and appease the crowd, which consisted, ac-
cording to the testimony of Michael Haire, of about one
hundred individuals, the far greater portion of whom consisted
of women and boys—mothers and children, in all likelihood,
who had not broken their fast that day—whose greatest strength,
perhaps, consisted in their being able to cry for the food that
had been denied them—food which they could not possibly ob-
tain otherwise than by letting their wants and miseries be known
to those capable of mitigating the woes, the indescribable
woes, they labour under ! Mr. Smith, we repeat, swears
that he alone could have induced the people to disperse quietly.
Why do we advert to this tragedy at so early a stage
of the inquiry ? Because we see in it one of the usual
consequences of the existence of a Tory Government in
Ireland. The ascendancy of Toryism and the butchery
of the people stand towards each other in the relations of
cause and effectin that country. From north to south—
from the Giant's Causeway to Cape Clear, Lord DE GREY'S
Government has fostered the fiercest political and reli-
gious feuds in every part of Ireland. Lord ELIOT, and the
Lord CHANCELLOR, are known to do all in their power
to mitigate the rash counsels of the Lord Lieutenant,
but to no purpose. The mild and merciful sway of
Queen VICTORIA, is unfelt in Ireland. There, all autho-
rity emanates from the Castle, and reaches the people
through a variety of conduit pipes, each surpassing the
other in prejudice and impurity.
Let advantage, then, be taken of this massacre to rid
Ireland of the nuisance of a Vice-Regal Court and esta-
blishment. Such a mockery of regality is no longer
necessary. Steam, by land and water, has incorporated
Ireland with England, and the former has a right to in-
sist upon being governed in the same way as the former.
Wherefore should a Lord DE GREY, or any other Lord,
interpose between the QUEEN and her loyal and devoted
Irish subjects ?

We have received advices from Madrid to the
Bth instant. General RODIL, appointed by the
REGENT to form a Cabinet had signally failed.
We fear the REGENT will be compelled to dissolve the
Cortes—a measure of some danger, especially as the
factions are again at work to kindle the flames of
civil war in the provinces. Never had man more
enemies to fight against than the REGENT. The
partisans of CHRISTINA A— the Carlists the Ultra-
Republicans—and the French faction, are all opposed
to him. His great support is in the fidelity of the
army. The troops are devotedly attached to him►
and hence it is that so little is gained by his enemies
when they have succeeded in frustrating his views. They
prevent him from doing anything, but they can do no-
thing themselves.

The Five per Cents. were done on the 4th at 34i 35
33 311 for cash, and at 36 35 33 at sixty days. No
business was done in the Three per Cents.

Our Foreign Summary contains the latest news in the
I,rench journals. The legislative Session is over at last,
tuulthe new Chambers are to be convoked on the 3d
August. Their assembling will be postponed, periodi-
cally, by the Royal Ordinances, till December.

The articles in the Courrier Frammais, National, and Presse,
on the discussion in the Belgian Chamber of Representatives
on the intended augmentation of the duty in France upon
foreign linens and threads, has produced a notice from the
Debats, which is important from its semi-official character;
indeed, a portion of it has all the air of a Ministerial declara-
tion. After an introduction, the object of which is to show
that the present duty of 10 per cent. is insufficient as a fair
protecting duty to the present manufacturers, and that, in other
countries, where a duty of 15 to 20 per cent. upon foreign
linens is considered very moderate, the Debate says :
" The determination of the French Government to raise
the duty on foreign linens and threads, excited complaints in
the British Parliament, and in the Belgian Chamber. Sir R.
Peel intimated that our wine-trade ran the risk of being
punished for any opposition made to the introduction of Eng-
lish thread into France, and in the Belgian Chamber the Mi-
nister was violently urged to use reprisals towards French
trade, if Belgian industry was in any way affected. There
is nothing in all this that ought to surprise the country or
the Government. Besides this latter has taken its determina-
tion, and it is not threats that will cause it now to draw