The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1841-12-07 00:00:00

TO CORRESPONDENTS

We believe there can be no truth in the report mentioned by
our correspondent, " A Liberal," that Mr. W. Rathbone
had the smallest hand in the composition of the " Letters
of Junius." His juvenility, in the first place, forbids the
supposition ; and the superior elegance of style and powers
of reasoning displayed in a recently-published letter of
Mr. Rathbone, addressed to Mr. George Hall Lawrence,
although " written amidst the interruptions of business,"
most convincingly rebuts the assumption that he could
possibly be Junius.
We cannot find room for the letter of a correspondent, who
signs himself " Ego," upon the school question, and con-
sider his proposed mode of settling it quite inadmissible in
principle and impracticable in detail. The proportion of
the number of Romanists and Dissenters paying taxes to
that of Protestants, has really nothing whatever to do with
the allotment of the funds of the corporation to the pur-
poses of education ; and the admission of the principle of
our correspondent would at once establish the right of
sectarians to claim a similar portion of the funds devoted
at present by the corporation to the payment of the clergy
of the established church within the borough. Upon the
same principle we might be required to contribute to the
payment of Social missionaries, and to the purchase, for
educational purposes, of the New Moral World, as the
intellectual food of the infidels who congregate at the Hall
of Science.

ter Zthrrpool gtatibatt.

TUESDAY MORNING, DECEMBER 7, 1841

The ex-Colonial Secretary was quite safe in intimat-
ing to the Plymouth Deputation that trade would be
set free according to their desire, when the " peaceful
but powerful voice of the people of England and Scot-
land had declared in its favour. When that event
takes place, there can be little difficulty in conceding
to his lordship, that the landlords of the kingdom may
begin to tremble for their rents, and the agriculturists
for a remunerating price for their produce in the mar-
ket. We are not to mistake the voice of hired agita-
tors and well-paid lecturers, nor even the voice of the
factory millionaires in their leagues and connections,
for that of the people of England and Scotland. The
mere class interest of cotton spinners or manufactures
is not the people; nor, much as this class may desire
to impress the public mind with the opinion that the
prosperity of every other is involved in those measures
which they consider of prime importance to them-
selves, have they yet been successful, to any extent
worth speaking of, in producing the required impres-
sion.

The noble lord, when speaking in this way—when
telling them, in another sentence, that " if the people
are united, prohibitions and prohibitory duties will
share the fate of civil disabilities on religious grounds"
—in using this language, we say, could only have in-
tended to administer a cordial to the drooping spirits
of agitation. He felt that it was necessary. Nobody
doubts that the little lord is thorough game; and,
without a revival of agitation of some sort, and of this
as the most feasible at the present moment, how should
he enter the arena as leader of the opposition, in the
approaching session, with that fierce and well-supported
attitude which he feels within himself a spirit so
doughtily predisposed to assume ? The union and
voice of the people of England and Scotland, if the
last general election be any criterion on the subject,
have been exhibited in pretty strong and direct contra-
riety to the views of the anti-corn protection abolition-
ists. " Free Trade" could then call no spirits from
"the vasty deep;" and the substantial flesh and blood Of
the yeomanry, as well as a considerable portion of the
bourgeoise and handicraft population, or, in a word,
of the conservative democracy of the kingdom, de-
clared, in a voice not to be mistaken, that our home-
grown corn must not he sacrificed to the visionary
theories of a class, however importunate or influential.
We make no doubt, however, that the " pack" will
respond to the call of the opposition leader ; the very
crack of his whip is music to their ears; and the chase
is, in itself, their greatest delight, independently of all
results. It was perhaps in obedience to this summons
that the gallant Colonel Thompson, " whoever he is,"
made his bow to a Liverpool audience, at the Queen's
Theatre, last week, and delivered himself of the lecture
which we have since read in the Mercury. The com-
mittee of the " Operative Anti-Corn-Law Association "
were, it seems, quite in dudgeon because the eminent
and gifted minister of St. Jude's did not appear to
have any knowledge of the anti-corn law colonel.
"Not to know him," said they, "would argue thyself
unknown." But that ignorance on the subject might
no longer be pleadable, they invited Mr. M`Neile to
attend at the lecture, and be astonished.
" By attending at the theatre," said they, " you will
learn a few particulars of a steady and consistent op-
ponent to the absurd and cruel corn laws." New we
will not say but that this might be so; we will not say
so, because we were not present at the lecture ; hut
this we will affirm, that, judging from the report in the
Mercury, if a person had gone to the theatre desiring
only to gather a few particulars concerning the ances-
try and personal history of the gallant lecturer, he
would have returned home just as wise as he went.
The colonel neither commenced—"My name is Thomp-
son ;on the Grampian hills," &c.—as he should have
done, to satisfy the expectations held out by the com-
mittee of the Operative Anti-Corn Law Association ;
nor, modest man, did he speak at all of himself in any
part of his address. Mr. Charles Holland, the chair-
Ilan, in introducing him to the meeting, deemed it
quite superfluous to give any account of so well-known
a warrior in the anti-corn law army. It was sufficient,
he said, to name the individual—they all knew him ;
so that on whichever side we turned, there Was no such
information to be gained as that so distinctly promised
by the inviting committee. Anything on this subject
was only to be collected from the talk about Corn; and

perhaps it was real!

way that the operative
committee meant that the colonel and Mr. M.Nella
should be made better acquainted. The colonel, they
conceived, would make himself known in a workman-
like way—as a carpenter by his chips, or a good fiddler
by his performance,—and were anxious to direct atten-
tion merely to this point.

Now as we were not present when the colonel
" wiped his mouth and thus began," nor at any part
of the oration, (as we have already intimated,) we shall
speak of his merits only as we are enabled to judge of
them from the efforts of the reporter. And with this
proviso, we must say that whatever laurels the gallant
officer may have gathered on the battle-field, either of
love or war, we are inclined to think that if he has ob-
tained any in the corn-field of political economy, it
must have been less from any extraordinary prowess
of his own than from a singular defect of it in the
enemy, or perhaps from his never having any enemy
to cope withal.

His first argument proceeded upon the pleasant as-
sumption (exceedingly pleasant, to be sure, to the own-
ers of the soil) that when machinery and manufactures
begin to press on the supply of food, the native agri-
culturists must give place to foreigners. If they at-
tempt to defend themselves, and insist upon an equit-
able protection, they are to be denounced as bread-
taxers, illiberals, and monopolists ! " Had they," (viz.,
the agriculturists) asked the colonel, " any patent from
the Almighty for the possession of the upper soil more
than others had to the under soil and the water ?
Did Heaven create them first ?" Yes, most potent
~4
colonel, Heaven did create th m first ; did create agri-
culturists before cotton-spi 'rs; at least it is com-
monly supposed so. y are in possession before
you; and all the plans of confiscation and robbery are
not the agriculturists' but your own.
His colonelship next speaks most complacently of
our outward-bound veg.els returning home with corn,
and all the advantages which would result from the
exchange of our manufactures for the corn of foreign
A pleasant picture, doubtless, so long as

countries.

prices are maintained at an amount remunerative to
the domestic agriculturist, and so long as this foreign
trade is free from interruption. So far, all is smooth
water and fair weather; but, on the other hand, de-
press the agriculturist by ruinously low prices, or let
this foreign trade be disturbed by war, or other causes,
and what will then be our position ? We shall be
more dependent upon foreigners; our native self-sup-
port will be at an end ; we shall be enslaved to enemies
or rivals ; and England will be England no more.
The other arguments of this great gun of the opera-
tive anti-cornists are neither one whit more far-seeing
nor more provident than the first we have noticed. As
to his opinions on machinery, emigration, and other
topics, they may be vastly profound; but as we are
still unanswered as to who the propounder is, we have
not thought it necessary to examine them at length.
We shall only say, in conclusion, that if all the anti-
corn law meetings which may take place between this
and the meeting of parliament, in pursuance of Lord
John Russell's or any other liberal agitator's sugges-
tion, prove as harmless and inefficient as this small
affair at Liverpool, in which the gallant colonel has
cut so poor a figure, home-fed England may very well
consider herself safe from the hands of the destroyers
for another twelvemonths at least.

Amongst the other business to be disposed of at the
meeting of the Council to-morrow, is the motion of
which Mr. Bolton has given notice, and which is in