The Sun.
London, England, 1842-12-19 00:00:00

mills that were at work belonged to persons of great
capital, but the smaller mills, that worked only for
orders, were shut up. From what he could make out,
he thought they were remarkably well off in the
island. The price of their meat was higher than it
was in the north, because they consumed all that they
wanted amongst themselves. In the north the la-
' bourers were habituated to eating meat, but here they
were not, and if their wages were much higher, he
did not think they would eat mutton, for they were
fond of their bacon, which was a very good thing for
them. In the north every labourer eat meat. Wages
were lower than they had been for a long time ; they
were 2s. a day. In Yorkshire they were 2s. 3d. a
day; but they were higher there because they were
near the manufacturing towns, and good agricultural
labourers were difficult to be got. From the distress
that existed in the north, the demand for meat had fallen,
and a butcher that generally averaged seven bullocks
every market day, now did not average two. If meat
were a penny a pound, the distress amongst the manu-
facturers was so great that they could not buy it. The
distress was frightful.—(A Voice—" They want more
employment.")
The Noble Earl is quite correct in ascribing
the present fall in the price of meat to the inabi-
lity of the manufacturing population to buy
meat, the consequence of which is, as the Noble
Earl knows, that the oxen from Lincolnshire,
which used to be sent to the manufacturing
towns in Yorkshire, are now sent to Smithfield,
where the competition with the Hampshire and
Sussex stock beats down the price of all. The
Noble Earl is wrong, however, in accusing the
manufacturers of ever having wished to sacrifice
everything to cheapness. That is the slang and
unfounded charge of the Tory journals. The town
population were first made sensible of the evils of

he Corn-laws by a great rise of prices, and they

naturally inveighed against that exorbitant price.
Gradually the still more mighty evils of restricted

trade, want of employment, want of wages, in-
creased poor-rates, augmenting destitution and
crime, and much actual starvation, becatoe mani-
•fest ; prices fell without giving relief, and then
the manufacturers, without relaxing their hosti-
lity to prices artificially forced up by the law,

urged against the law these graver charges.
They never wanted mere cheapness; they
wanted plenty, they wanted brisk trade,
they wanted free trade, they wanted justice,
and were only led to demand low prices because
high prices was the primary effect of the unjust

law. As the Noble Earl has seen the real cause
of the decay of the agricultural interest in the
destitution of the manufacturers, we hope that
he will relax his hostility to that repeal of the
Corn-laws which would give work and wealth to
the manufacturing districts, and that in another

session we shall not find Lord WORSLEY one of
the foremost and most distinguished opponents
both of a reduction of duty and of total repeal.
The Earl of HARBOROUGH'S remarks throw a
clear light on the effects of Sir ROBERT PEEL'S
policy in abolishing the prohibition on the im-
portation of cattle. The Premier grasped at
that little relaxation because it bad not been
mentioned by the Whigs. He could say that
was his own. He taunted them with not having
thought of cattle, and boasted of his great
achievement on that head. Short-sighted, igno-
rant statesman ! He ought to have known that.

the condition of the Manufacturing classes was
such that their consumption of meat was nearly.
at an end, and that the price would fall whether
he allowed fbreign cattle to be brought in or
not. To gain a triumph over an 'antago-
nist, rather than promote the public good, he
only slightly altered the Corn-law, and
he did away with% the prohibition to import
cattle. Now, poor man, he has to bear, amongst
his uninformed agricultural friends, to whose
ignorance and prejudices he has pandered, all the
blame of the whole reduction of the price of
cattle, as if it had every farthing been caused by
a few lean cows brought from Holland and
Spain. He has suffered in character and
popularity, and the good cause of free trade
has in some degree suffered from his
alliance. His injudicious relaxation has
brought additional unpopularity on free trade
amongst the agriculturists, by making them at-
tribute their sufferings to his relaxation of the
restrictive system, whereas all the blame of them
really belongs to those restrictive laws which
have deprived the manufacturers of trade, and
disabled them from purchasing beef and mutton.
We can trace in this case, as in many others, a
distinct connexion between the adoption of a
party policy and the loss of popularity and repu-
tation. So always was it, and so will it ever
he, and so shall cunning men always find out in
the end—at least whenever they apply their cun-
ning to national affairs—that they overreach
themselves.

We must now quote from the report of the
same meeting, which we find in the Hampshire
Independent, some observations of the Rev.
WALTON 'WHITE. They were, it is true, but
the echo of Mr. H. D. GORING'S speech of the
previous week, at Steyning, but being spoken in a
district purely agricultural, and much eulogised
by the agriculturists present, they are a strong
additional evidence of the progress of sound doc-
trines. Very soon there will be no person--
neither agriculturists nor manufacturers—favour-
able to the Corn-law; and if Sir ROBERT PEEL
does not repeal it, he will have the demerit of
upholding a law which he knows to be unjust
and mischievous, against the voice of the whole
empire.

The Rev. Walton White said they knew they must
depend on their own exertions in future. They could
not look forward to protection.—(Hear.) The principle
was broken down, and they would go on until they
returned to first principles. It would hare been well,
perhaps, for them, if these first principles had never
been departed from, for in that case they would not
have been in the difficulties in which they now found
themselves. It seemed to him that the principle of
protection would in every way gradually he with-
drawn—(Hear)—and that all classes of society, in all
pursuits, whether in trade or agriculture, would be
left to their own exertions. He had no fears for agri-
culture; he believed that all eventually would be well.
Capital, intelligence, and industry must be successful,
and would succeed better in agriculture than in any
other way. The demand for agricultural productions
could not fail. They (the agriculturists) were not
liable to those revulsions which extended to trade;
and when they returned to first principles, those changes
which from time to time caused panic and alarm, would
be at an end.
Returning to first principles, means returning
to the natural laws which regulate the production,
price, and sale—the demand and the supply of
all commodities. It means totally repealing the
Corn and all other laws restricting trade, and
it means the overthrow of our present mis-
chievous system of meddling with, and attempt-
ing to regulate, everything. It tells men:that the
cure for panics is reliance on the natural laws
which regulate society. To find a clergyman
espousing and recommending such opinions to
aviculturists will he as useful to his class as it is
creditable to the individual. It redeems the body
from the accusation of having defended the Corn-
laws because they were supposed to increase the
tithe-rent charge. We are not without hope that
more of the clergy will follow this example, and
be anxious, by their conduct, to clear themselves
fr )m the suspicion of heartless sordidness which
now weakens their influence, and inflicts irrepa
rable damage on the Church.

Two specimens of summary conviction by Mr.
GREENWOOD, the Magistrate of Clerkenwell,
have appropriately called forth the censure of
our Contemporaries. A boy was selling pictures
in the street to gain a few pence, he was pounced
on by the police, and fur this innocent and even
virtuous action, made an offence by the law, he
was sentenced by Mr. GREENWOOD to be im-
prisoned fourteen days. The prisoner, who is
described as an innocent, intelligent-looking
child, about eleven years of age, begged of his
Worship not to punish him, as he sold the prints
"for the support of a widowed mother." But the
Magistrate was inexorable, the law must be car-
ried into execution. Selling prints was, in. his
eyes, only an excuse for begging; and to prison
fbr fourteen days, to herd with felons, was the
widow's son sent for endeavouring to procure
food for his mother.

The other case was a poor lad, about fourteen
years old, with scarcely as many garments about
him as covered his nakedness, whom a policeman
saw begging. The Magistrate satisfied himself
in this case, as in tfie other ease, 'of the boy's
iniquity by his own imagination. He supposed'