Star.
London, England, 1831-10-10 00:00:00

PENSIONS AND SINECURES.
If any one will look into the Pension-list and
the list of Sinecures, he will find that, generally
speaking, they have been granted to persons who
it is impossible can ever have rendered any public
service whatsoever. A great part of them are fe-
males: and whole families of them, male as well
as female, stand on the Pension List. Lord Al-
thorp, some time ago, said that these pensions
were gifts of charity. Charity ! Good Goo !
When the Catholic Church made its institutions of
charity in this country, it acted on the principle
laid down by the apostle : namely, that it was
men's duty to give to the needy; but to give out
of their own property, and even out of their own
ear nings ; for, says he, " We worked with our
own hands, that we might have to give to him
who needed." Our Government has proceeded
iipn exactly the contrary principle ; for it has
taken the bread out of the mouth of the working
man, to give it to persons who did not need, in
order to keep them in luxury and without work.
" He who will not work shall not eat," says
the Bible ; but our Government says, by its
or.t..r, He that will not work shall eat, and
here plenty, and he that will work shall
be half starved. Upon the pension-list there
are two women of the name of Ricketts : there is,
besides, a Ricketts, who is the Collector-General
for the county of Hants, with a large salary. I
\vett to know why we should keep these two
amen of the name of Ricketts; and can discover
no reason other than that they are related to Lady
Northesk and to Lady Mildmay, whose son has
monied one of the Barings, and one of whose sons
is a Member for Winchester. Lord Althorp says
that these are gifts of charity. Let us see, then,
how this principle is observed in the treatment
of the working classes. They aro everlasta
inrly reproached for not laying by some-
thing of the earnings of their youth to keep them
in their old age. Wo know that the law sends a
man to jail and to hard labour and bodily punish-
ment of the most degrading kind if he will not
work to maintain his wife and children. We might
ask how a labouring man is to lay by any thing,
when the magistrates in Hampshire and Wiltshire
do nut allow him enough barely to find bread for
himself and his family. The magistrates of Hamp-
shire, of which Sir Thomas Baring was one, fixed
a scale of wages which would not give half enough
of tweed for the maintenance of a labourer and his
flmily, to say nothing of meat and drink and
c!othing and lodging and fuel.
But in the few cases which, in this state of things,
enables a man to get together, by extraordinary
csmil luck, combined with almost more than mortal
exertion, some little bit of property, a bit of ground
or 3 cottage, how do• s the law deal with him and
with his property ? Let me relate a fact. An old
man, all his life-time a hard labourer, and then at
on age touching four score, possessed two tene-
ments worth fifteen pounds a year or thereabouts.
Upon the rent of these cottages, and upon the
labour he was able to perform, he, at that extreme
age, kept himself from the parish, aud hoped to do
so the remainder of his life. Now mark, he had
had a son who had had several children, and who
Was dead, leaving the widow and these children.
The poor fatherless children were able to work and
did work for the farmers of the parish, and their
earnings were sufficient to maintain them. Now,
pray mark : the farmers gave them a certain por-
fon of their wages in the shape of wages ; but,
according to the custom which has long prevailed
in the South of England, gave them part of their
weekly pay out of the poor-rates ; which, accord •
iog to the law, made them paupers. Being pau-
pers, the law compelled the grandfather to main-
tain them if he had the means ! And the parish
officers, by order of the magistiates, went and de-
manded from the poor old grandfather a repayment
of that money which they paid the children
weekly out of the poor-rates. This money
amounted to a great deal more than the amount of
the rent of the poor grandfather's tenements.—
"Aye," said the magistrates, " but you can sell the
tenements " Yes," said the grandfather, " but
then I must, at last, come to the parish myself."
" We cannot help that," said the magistrates !
and they were right enough. The law autho-
rized them to do this thing ; the law athorized them
even to strip the eld grandfather of his last stick
of property to keep even his grand-childen : but
tl:e law has not prevented our Government from
keeping the familes of the aristocracy and their re-
lations and dependents out of taxes imposed even
upon this poor grar &ether and his miserable grand-
( lii!dr en.
With regard to this class of persons, not another
word need be said : the injustice of compelling
the people at large to maintain them is somonstrous,
especially while the working classes are thus dealt
v ith ; it is so monstrous, that the very thought of
it really half deprives one of one's senses. If such
a thing were proposed in the United States of
America, even in one single instance, the whole
country would be in an uproar; and, if attempted
In he acted upon, it would tear up the govern-
ment, root and branch, in a week.
So much for pensions, sinecures, grants, and all
money given to people with a notorious want of
any service s whatever to recommend them. But,
there are what are called elle% ances and half-pay,
v. holler civil, military, or naval. We have a pro-
digious army, a great navy, monstrous taxing and
other civil establishments ; but I very much ques-
tion whether all the ()dicers of the army and navy
and of those establishments. who are in employ,
take so much money in the year as those who have
been in those services or offices, and have retired
from them, or have ceased now to be in them.
Otherwise, how come we with three generals to
every regiment of foot and of horse, with two
admirals to every ship of the line. and with,
pt.: haps, four times as many commissioners and
clerks now in pay, at some rate or another ;
four times as many as are actually in employ !
How comes it that wet eve about four-score am-
bassadors and consuls in our pay, when about
a quarter part of the number is all :hat we have
in employ, and which quarter part it is perked,
evident to me receive ten times as much money
as they ought to receive for their services ?
Mark, I beseech you, what is said to the work-
ing people. They are everlastingly told to lay by,
in the days of their youth and strength, the means
of sustaining them ; aye, and even their children
and grandchildren, when that youth and strength
bled.. have been supplanted by age and by feeble-
ness. To induce the working classes to do this,
• bat bales of Acts of Parhament have been passed
to encourage " Friendly Societies," parochial and