The Sun.
London, England, 1842-03-31 00:00:00

ROYAL SURREY THEATRE.

Real Novelty, and unprecedented Splendour.
THIS EVENING. MARCH 31,
Will be performed an entirely New Equestrian Spectacle, entitled
THE PF:A RE OF THE HAREM, HER KOORDISH LOVER,
AND HIS WAR STEED, BEDA.—With magnificent Scenery,
Costume, and Appointments; a Double Company, Equestrian and
Dramatic, arid the finest Stud of Horses in tha World.
After which, in a more extensive and splendid Arena than ever
before witnessed. THE SCENES IN THE CIRCLE, introduc;ng
Mr. B ATTY'S unrivalled Collection of Animals, consisting of nu-
merous and matchless Cream-coloured Horses, Andalusian Chargers,
Spotted Coursers, Fairy Palfreys, and PigmyPoneys, and the most
talented Vaulters, Riders, Gymnastics, and Contortionists in the
kingdom.
To couclu le with an entirely New Laughable Farce, called THE
FAMILY MAN; OR, HOW MANY MORE WIVES.

ROYAL VICTORIA THEATRE.
UNDER THE DIRECTION OF MR. OSBALDISTON.
Great and extraordinary attraction for the Easter Holidays.
THIS EVENING, MARCH 31,
Will he performed a most interesting New Domestic Drama, in
Three Acts, entitled THE LUCKY HORSE SHOE; OR, THE
LONE CHAMBER OF THE SILENT HlGHWAY.—Characters
by Miss Vincent, Miss Coveney, Messrs. E. F. Saville, Dale, Gard-
ner, Seaman, &c.
After which, with gorgeous scenery, dresses, kc., ALADDIN;
OR, THE WONDERFUL LAMP.—Aladdin, Miss Vincent; the
Pnncess, Mr:. E. F. Saville; Vs idow Mustapha, Mrs. Griffith .
'in conclude with THE RED ROVER —The Red Rover, Mr.
Dale; Fid, Mr. E. F. Saville; Hector Homespun, Mr. Gardner;
Madame de Lacey. Mrs. Lee.

THE WEATHER.—NooN, MAncit 30.
ROYAL GALLERY OP SCIENCE, ♦DELAIDE-STREET.
Thermometer... 48 Highest 57 1 Lowest 45
Barometer 29.92.—Wind W.—Freezing Point 22 Dog.

HIGH WATER AT LONDON BRIDGE THIS DAY.
Morning 50 minutes after 4. I Evening 10 minutes after 5.

home require any corresponding increase of a
fleet or army, the augmentation in both of which
being chiefly the fruit of foreign possessions.
But moreover it is well ascertained that pau-
perism and crimes decrease in proportion as a
nation is prosperous, and increase in proportion
as population is stinted in its food and comes to
a still stand. Consequently the Corn-law, by
lessening the supply of food, and checking the
progress of population, both augments the ex-
penses of Government caused by pauperism and
crime, and prevents the increase of the revenue.
We are pleased, therefore, to see the publica-
tion which now appropriately directs attention
to the effects of Corn-laws, inducing poverty and
want, and now creating the Ministerial necessity
for an income tax.

The Statistical Report is preceded by an ad-
dress from Mr. H. ASHWORTH to the Executive
Council of the Anti-Corn-law League, which al-
most at its commencement contains the following
passage:--

It is a truth which no Christian will be prepared to
deny, that the Almighty hath provided and promised
that by the sweat of man's brow the earth should yield
an abundance of food for the support of his creatures, to
maintain them in health and strength; we have there-
fore a right to assume that no law of man, or class of
men, should deny to any other man, or class of men, the
full enjoyment of their just and necessary portion—and
that if such a law has been made by man it is contrary tio
the law of God.

Under these impressions, I do not scruple to designate
the Ministerial measure, or any other contrivance inter-
posing between the choicest gifts of an all-wise Provi-
dence and the toiling hands of his people, a device nil less
wicked than cruel, and unworthy of men professing to be
Christian rulers.

It is now no longer within our power to administer
compensation to those who have suffered by the errors of
the past, and the country is too much enfeebled to bear
their repetition. _ _ _

You Will form some idea how efficiently the sliding
scale has answered the design of its originators in sus-
taining at a high price the food .grown at home, and in
excluding, at a cheap rate, the corn of other countries
frora;the-following outline of its operation during th ,
whole period of its existence, from July, 1828.
There have been entered for home consumption,
14,787,990 quarters of wheat, and out of that amount
12,452,562, or 84 per cent., were not admitted till the
price had been raised to above 70s. per quarter, although
it is probable that, under a free trade, the same pur-
chases would have been made abroad at little more than
half the money, and the payments effected by exports
of British manufactures, yielding employment and
profit, instead of an export of gold, deranging our cur-
rency for years together, and thereby inflicting other and
grievous hardships.
If we come to a proximate calculation of tha real loss
inflicted upon the country by this system, estimating the
difference of price betwixt this and other countries at 20s.
per quarter, which lam told is much under the mark,
and taking the consumption of this country at one quarter
of wheat per head per annum, now generally admitted,
we find that upon our population, 26,500,000, the annual
loss will be
Taking also our consumption of
other agricultural products,

which are equally "protected,"
such as animal food, barley,
oats, rye, potatots, cheese,
butter, milk, &c. &c., and re-
ducing them to their equivalents
in wheat, they will be equal to
another quarter of wheat for

each person, forming a second
sum of 20s. per quarter

26,500,000

Making a total of £53,000,000 a year.
Such an annual burden must necessarily have pressed
down the people, and wasted our national strength. It is
certainly a large slaughter to be the work of ONE mono-
poly, but you will judge of its certainty and efficiency
by the following outline of its mode of operating.
The writer then proceeds to illustrate, in de-
tail the manner in which the Corn-law system
limits..our trade, lessens the value of property,
and indicts grievous injury on the working
classes. We quote some of Mr. A SHWORTH'S
observations on this head :

But by far the largest amount of real suffering falls
upon the working classes, and as the same results are
common to all our manufacturing towns, allow me to
adduce instances from the case of Bolton, with the cir-
cumstances of which I am specially and particularly ac-
quainted.
You will have perceived, by the returns made, that
the deterioration of condition falling upon this class in the
town of Bolton, in the diminished amount of their earnings,
has been computed at the sum of £201,600 a-year,
and in the additional cost of their food 118,960 „

_ _ • £320,560 a-year.
or more than 1,000/. for every working-day, an amount
far beyond the power of charitable aid to alleviate and
if the poor-rates were increased to the extent of one
week's loss in the 52, they would be deemed too bur-
densome for the generality of rate-payers.
The working population are a noble-minded people ;
their dread of pauperism, and their sacrifices to avoid it
are strikingly shown in the extent to which they have
pledged and sold their furniture, and even their dothing,
as you will perceive by the returns. Amongst 5,305
persons their houses contain only two 'seats for every
three persons ; there are 104. persons for every blanket ;
53 families wholly without beds ; and 609 families with-
out a change of linen ; their food is deficient, their phy-
sical strength is westing, and the rate of mortality is
rapidly increasing.
By the return of the Bolton Poor Protection Society,
it appears that during the month, ending January 22,
there were 6,157 persons relieved, whose income did
not average more than 1 lid. per head per week.
If we deduct from the earnings of these the sums they
pay for fuel, &c., there will be left for food probably not
more than lid. per day, or less than l ld. per head per
week, and it may afford you, as it did myself, a painful
curiosity to discover how so small a sum could be ex-
pended in the support of a family.
It is now becoming a question how long the employers
can continue to carry on their business under this in-
creasing pressure.-

A suspension of business is immediately followed by '
the pledging and selling of workpeople's clothes and
furniture, and a rapid progress to a state of destitution.
The additional cost of their food, within the last five
years, has occasioned pressure to this class accompanied
by an uneasiness which has manifested itself in political
excitement, demanding a wider extension of representa-
tive power. I witnessed an example of this, about a
year ago, at a Corn-law meeting, where the work-
people
denounced the free-trade question as an agitation
for a reduction of their wages, and appeared to have
become persuaded that the pressure they felt arose from
the arbitrary dealing of their employers. As I ob,ierved
some present who were in my employment, 1 called a
general meeting of them to consider the subject.
Having assembled in the school-room, we proceeded to
take the sum of their earnings for the previous year,
1840, and to compare it with that for 1835, which they
called a good year; the amounts appeared so nearly alike
that they at once acknowledged that what they suffered
had not come from any changes in the amount of the
wages they had received. This disclosure startled them,
and caused an investigation of their expenditure, when
it appeared that the outlay of themselves and their de-
pendents in agricultural food, in 1840, had amounted to
18,500/., whilst that of 1835 was only 12,500 L, making
a difference of 6,0001. in a year's maintenance.
A discussion arose respecting this loss, and one of
them charged the shopkeeper with robbery ; another
defended them, and said the shopkeepers could not have
got it, for they were failing on all sides.
The high prices were then traced from the shopkeepers
to the farmers ; but it was admitted that they did not
appear enriched ; so at length, as with one voice, they
called out, " Why, the landlords have got it ;" a conclu-
sion which I left in their hands.

While it is a question amongst the manufac-
turers how long they can carry on their ,opera-
tions under this system, Sir ROBERT PEEL is to
add to its weight by an income tax. The
landlord's burden is not enough, be thinks; so he
will increase it by an additional State burden.
This may be bold and wise statesmanship, but to
us it looks like that madness which is the fore-
runner of ruin. Those, whether Whigs or
Tories, are the enemies of our future greatness,
and even our future safety, who admit, for one
moment, the necessity of adding to the burdens
now levied by the State on the people. Obvi-
ously the true policy of the country now is to
allow the population to increase, by permitting
them to draw supplies of food from every poisi-
ble quarter, to graciously permit trade to ex-
pand, by removing from it the noxious restric-
tions imposed by stupid, ignorant law-makers,
and so allowing the basis of the national power
to enlarge, and the streams which flow into the
national coffers gradually to swell bigger and
bigger. Sir ROBERT PEEL'S plan goes to narrow
them, to lessen productive employment, to check
the progress of population, and diminish the
resources of the State.

Some of our Correspondents have asked us,
how many crimes the income tax will cause ?
This is a question which our political arithmetic
is quite insufficient to answer. We can see,
however, that every law creating a restriction, or
imposing a tax, creates all the crimes which grow
directly or indirectly from the desire, or from
the attempt, to evade that law. It may be good
for Sir R. PEEL to talk about the depravity of
human nature, but, so far as the evasion of the
income tax is concerned, that depravity is called
into life by him. No person doubts that a great
many persons will make false returns under the
law ; will deliberately state untruths, and will
expose themselves to be summoned beti)re Com-
missioners, to whom they will repeat these un-
truths, where they will sometimes be exposed to

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