The Sun.
London, England, 1829-12-16 00:00:00

without them. A better prooreannot be afforded

of the want of connection between property and
representation, for the Aristocracy possess a very
small share of property compared with that of
the body favourable to the object of yesterday's
meeting. If the country were really and not
virtually represented, such a marked insult to the
people durst not be shown. Lord Teynham
stated some striking particulars respecting the
condition of the labouring poor throughout the
country. In 26 parishes in Kent, with which
he was acquainted, not one in fifteen marriages
tool; place till the female was ready for the straw.
Mr. Sinclair Cullen took the opportunity of de-
menstrating how intimately connected the
Leensing system was with the evils of which the
meeting complained ; and, indeed, every man
who Las at all reflected on the subject, must be
aware that the monopoly engendered by the
licensing system is directly opposed to the object
of supplying cheap and good beer. The mono-
poly, in the first place, gives au additional value
to the house, which is necessarily charged to the
consumer. In the next place, where a man !me
the power of supplying without rivalry what he
pleases, it would be- a miracle indeed if he cared
much about the quality of the commodity. Dr.
Bright, in his " Travels in Hungary," observes,
that the public-hodses of that country are ob-
ligsd to sell the wine of the respective estates on
which they are ; and that though the country
wealuces the most delightful wine, what is to be
obtained in inns is absolutely nauseous. The
same effect always flow from the same causes ;
and an English brewer can nauseate the public
with his beverage as well as a Hungarian Arch-
bishop. And yet, it was decided at the meet-
ing yesterday that the licensing system was not
within the scope of the meeting— that is, that
the condition on which alone good beer can be
obtained was not within the scope of the meet-
ing. They had better have said at once, our
professions are a false pretence—we care nothing
for the public, or the supply of the public,—
Morning Chronicle.
The Dublin Evening Post of Saturday last
contains a long article, commenting on some
very injudicious remarks on the cause of the
wretchedness of Ireland in the last number of
the Quarterly Review. The Reviewer had
observed, that au English or a Scotch popula-
tion would have made Ireland another Flanders,
.Grenada, or Lombardy. Our Dublin contem-
porary very properly observes, that the object of
Government long was to prevent the improve-
ment of Ireland, and he quotes from the Dublin
Morning Register a long list of Acts of Par-
liament passed for the express destruction of
almost every conceivable branch of industry
in Ireland, in compliance with the grasp-
ing but stupid jealousy of England. Scotland,
on the other hand, he observes, has been a
highly favoured country. " At the time of the
Union," he observes, " Scotland was over-run
with beggars and vagabonds ; While the High-
lands were no more than dens of robbers, under
the orders of sanguinary and ferocious chieftains.
A little wholesome severity in hanging the
thieves, and abolishing the villainous hereditary
jurisdiction of the thick-blooded robbers, has
made Scotland, if not one of the most moral, at
least one of the best behaved and most com-
fortable people in Europe. This was followed
by the British Government undertaking a radical
reform, and taking Scotland to her bosom. . .
What was the state of Scotland only little more
than a hundred years Iwo ? What was the state
of England at the Reformation, when coleworts
and lettuces were imported from Holland for the
table of Queen Catharine Parr? Onehad a Scotch
population, the other an English population, as
well as now. But in what state were the people ?
They were worse—or historians are fabulists—
than the Hahlans of Ireland are at this moment ;
they were worse, although the population was
not, perhaps, a third of its present amount, in
point of cleanliness and comfort, than the re-
motest villages in Connaught. What produced
the gradual change ? Better government, bet-
ter Jaws—Justice. In the reign of James I. the
Commons had become impotent ; the union of
the Crowns manifestly tended to ameliorate the
condition of Scotland, by rendering the titled
ruffians, who were called the nobles of the an-
cient kingdom, place-hunters at the Court of
England, instead of robbers of their neighbour's
goods and murderers of their own serfs. In Ire-
land, instead of stabilitating property, and bring-
ing the Irish ruffian,who happened to have a title
to his tail, to justice, and protecting the people,
they began to rob master and slave with
the same impartiality, and a whole province
ewes forfeited to the Crown. But this was not
deemed sufficient. Instead of making the com-
mon people comfortable, and imparting to them
the advantages of equal and impartial justice,
which we have the authority of a contemporary
placcman they were willing to receive with eager-
ness and gratitude, they attempted to oust the
entire population, and to plant an English and
Scotch colony in their stead." There can be
no question thar the treatment of Ireland and
Scotland has been very different. Indeed, when
the union between Scotland and England was
in agitation, one of the arguments on which
most stress vets laid by Fletcher, of Salton, the
opponent of the measure, as may be seen in his
writings, was—See with what injustice you treat
Ireland, a colony of your own ; and what are we to
expect, if we connect ourselves with a people so lost
to every sentiment of justice as you are, when you
treat your own children in Ireland with such
cruelty and inhumanity ? Boswell, in his Life
of Johnson, mentions that his hero having be-
haved in a very rude manner to Dr. Adam
Smith, in Mr. Cadell's shop, having observed
Robertson, the historian, about to enter, he said
—I dare say you will treat Robertson as roughly
as vou have treated Smith ? Johnson behaved,
on the contrary, with the utmost polite:we to
Robertson. It might be said, that the difference
of treatment of Scotland, originated in a sort of
humoursomo spirit, as if to show that the nation
could be both kind and cruel. The real cause,
however, was the fear with which two 6UCCCS-
sive rebellions inspired the Government. It was
only after the extinction of the rebellion of 1745,
when Government was obliged to apply itself in
good earnest to Scotland, that the improvemeot
commenced.—lbid.

We refer our readers to a Report which will
be found in another part of our columns, of a
Meeting held at the London Coffee-house yes,.
terday, for the purpose of receiving the Report
of a Committee appointed at a previous Meet-
ing to procure the repeal of the Malt and floor
Duties. There is no doubt that these duties
are unequal in their operation and impolitic in
principle. The high price of beer drives the
working classes to the consumption of cheap gin,
which enriches the revenue at the expense of the
comfort aad morality of the people. Hence the
increase of crime, and a dreadful aggravation of
existing misery. It cannot be denied; however,
ttnit the Malt and Beer Duties arc not the sole
liquid
cause of the spreading of the plague of