The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1853-04-05 00:00:00

THE LIVERPOOL STANDARD, TUESDAY, APRIL 5, 1853.

ABERDEEN drink Moselle, considering the weather. Un-
less during the glorious days of glowing summer, this is a
poor and cheerless beverage. Ido believe that the Earl's
general sour look is to be as much attributed to the use
of non-generous wine as anything else. What drank
your correspondent ?—the glass of fashion, of course. I'll
tell you : After my green turtle, three thimbles full of
punch ; no liquid else for above the space of two minutes,
then half a Blass of hock, in proper time two glasses of
champagne, (Moet,) two of old port, (as basis for future
proceedings,) afterwards the tipple of the evening—
CLARET, winding up all with a nightcap of Cognac. I
don't think Earl GRANVILLE (a capital fine art man)
made much mistake in following this course. The
speeches were nothing. GLADSTONE infringed on poli-
tics, but we would not have it, and the affair went off as
dinner parties usually do.
The Times, within the last few days, has called atten-
tion to the worse than Uncle Tom slavery and bondage of
the English milliner and dressmaker—girls whose situ-
ation at this period of the year is truly deplorable. One
or two sensible letters have appeared in the leading jour-
nal, signed " A First Hand," which means one of the
best paid, because a cleverer workwoman than the others
in the same establishment. The name of that amiable
lady, the Duchess of SUTHERLAND, has been invoked by
the dressmakers, and I think appropriately enough ; for,
unquestionably, her Grace is " a First Hand"—Mistress
of the Robes to the best-dressed woman in the world—
the QUEEN, GOD bless her ! If the Duchess, it is ob-
served, were but to set the fashion—not in the make or
material—that she does already,—but in not having gar-
ments made after ten o'clock at night, nor before eight
o'clock in the morning, slavery among thousands of our
countrywomen would have its "Quietus made with a bare
bodkin." I need not here refer to the hard work, long
hours, indifferent food,—bad cheese and dry bread,--cup
of tea at midnight to keep stitch, stitch, awake ; these
have been exposed already. I will attempt to describe a
yet greater grievance. The thorough-bred English beauty
possesses every point of the animals of the same genus all
over the world, —education and habit have their influence, as
that old pump or pink CHESTERFIELD is supposed to have
said,—but it is all the same in the long run ! English
female eyes, you will find as mildlyexpressive as those of the
childish idiots of Nova Zambia or Nootka Sound; others
flashing fiery indignation as those of the fieriest Italians
—eye-lashes prolonged, and silken—deeply and darkly
ciliated ; eyebrows, arcs, teeth, all to nothing • soundest
and pearliest in the world ; bust and body, the ethereal
litheness of the Hindostanee girl, yet real and plump
as becomes the daughters of Al)ion. These are not a
millioneth part of English women's charms. Many of
them are milliners and dressmakers, more have been—
yea, are—gay ! Doleful word. How effected ? We
shall see. There are several naturalists, writers about
birds and beasts, WILSON, AUDUBON ; and I am not sure
but a less ambitious man than either might suit my pur-
pose—WlLLlAM KIDD. These parties teil you many anec-
, dotes touching the training of one species of creature to
seduce another into its cage. The authors mentioned
write about "little warblers"—winged creatures who
have a deal of the evil one in them ! Caged in
the midst of limed twigs in the open field, they
commence their luring carol ; flap their wings, affecting
liberty at will. Anon, a silly one is trapped. So that
1 the arts of seduction belong not exclusively to human
nature. But to my purpose : in the streets at the West-
end the milliners' work-rooms are situated ; not in front
of the house, you may be sure, but in the back. The
windows open for light, and especially air, via a via with
those of the dressing-rooms of the gay West-end women
living in the full possession of youth and beauty, such as
I have already weakly described. These females are
lolling in voluptuous ease. They laugh loud, sing and
play, show their jewels in diarnonded bracelet, and so forth
—their satin attire made, perhaps, by the aching fingers
of the distressed dressmaker opposite. These women, the
former, live like queens. Fine horse-women many of
them are ! if not, the barouche, the brougham and the
britschka are at their command. All these blandish-
ments are not unobserved by the pale, but still young and
beautiful sempstress. They were intended to be seen,
heard, and envied. Is it to be wondered at that these
allurements should succeed ? hence, the needle and late
hours are abandoned in disgust, and—we can easily sup-
pose the rest.
If the rumours current at the West-end Clubs all yester-
day are well founded, the government of our Indian
possessions seems likely to cause HER MAJESTY'S Minis-
ters more perplexity and annoyance than they calculated
upon before the Easter holidays, when friend BRIGHT
brought the important subject under the consideration of
the House of Commons, and attempted to extract from
Lord JOHN RUSSELL an official promise, that during the
present session no measure of a permanent character
would be proposed with respect to the renewal of
the East India Company's charter. Upon that occasion
LORD JOHN, evidently not a little nettled at the Quaker's
rather inconvenient intermeddling, announced that the
Government, after much deliberation, had made up their
minds to grapple with the question at a very er.rly period;
and that the Cabinet, after carefully reviewiog all the
objections urged against tile policy and justice of sub-
mitting an enlarged scheme of legislation, without addi-
tional inquiry, of some two or three years' duration, had
come to the unanimous determination of proposing, im-
mediately after Easter, that measure which they believed
would best meet the requirements of the case, by providing
for the permanent, and not the temporary, government of
India, subsequent to the expiration of the East India
Company's present charter. Dame Rumour proclaimed
yesterday, that recent circumstances have brought
about an alteration in the minds of more than four
Cabinet Ministers anent this East India question.
CHARLEY Wool). and the Peelite section, protest
against any concession to the earnest entreaties of
the Manchester School, while the moderate Whig
enalitinnists .ra rprragentoa all juelined 4n 'ln not
BRIGHT and HUME something more than half way, by
postponing until next Session the permanent modification
of the charter, which the entire Cabinet agrees should
become the basis of our Indian Government. This, I
have good reason for believing, is the precise position of
the East India question. It remains to be seen whether
the Peelite or the Whig compartment of the Cabinet
will prove of more squeezable materials. Mr. RICH,
who was one of the junior Lords of the Treasury under
Lord JOHN RUSSELL'S Administration, but who no
longer retains that lucrative post, having been displaced by
Col. CHARTERIS, one of the PEEL clique, evidently thinks
that the experiment should be made without delay, and I
understand that, on Saturday evening, he undertook, at a
meeting of Radical M.P.'s, held in the Reform Club,
to submit a resolution pledging the House of Commons to
refuse their assent to any measure of permanent legisla-
tion until the subject is fully inquired into by commission.
or such other plan as those really anxious for the pros-
perity, peace, and happiness of Her MAJESTY'S subjects in
the East Indian dependencieS may consider most advisable.
This resolution will receive the support of a large number
of those who sit on the Opposition benches; and should
the majority of the Cabinet insanely determine upon
resisting so equitable a suggestion, I look on the defeat of
Ministers as inevitable.

COMMERCIAL AND MONETARY NETTS.

MONDAY NIGHT.
THE week having partaken of the holiday charac-
ter of Easter, the changes have not been of impor-
tance ; but the buoyancy which the public funds
attained at the commencement of the week was not
maintained towards the close, owing to the news
from the Continent being thought to be of not
quite so favourable a character. Notwithstanding
the receipts of gold from Australia, the returns from
the Bank of England show a small decrease in the
stock of bullion; but the arrival of the Great Bri-
tain and other vessels will very shortly swell the
return considerably. Some attention has been
excited to the question of establishing a mint in
Australia ; but the advantage to be gained has been
considerably overrated, as an immense quantity of
coined gold has already been sent from this country,
and the cost of transit on an article of such little
bulk is too trifling to be of any serious consequence.
Another question in agitation is that of a decimal
coinage, and the announcement, made a few days
since, that the Government had resolved on the
issue of 500 tons of a new copper coinage, created
some alarm among the money reformers. The
proposed change would cause incalculable confusion
in the ordinary transactions of every-day life, and
render almost impossible the well-understood divi-
sions of commodities in common use, while all that
would be gained would be the saving of a little
trouble in calculations by clerks, who are well
accustomed to the present system. The adoption
of a decimal system would be inflicting a positive
injury in order to attain a phantom advantage.
The later advices received from America corrobo-
rate the views which we expressed a short time
since as to the groundlessness of the fears of over-
supply of raw cotton professed to be entertained by
the manufacturers of Manchester. To take the
most moderate estimate of the requirements for
consumption, including our own demand, which,
as well as that for the Continent of Europe and the
manufacture in America, is on the increase, a crop
of 3,250,000 bales would be by no means an exces-
sive one, but rather the contrary, and the probabi-
lity, according to present appearances, is that that
quantity will be but little, if at all, exceeded. Should
this view prove to be correct, the holders in Liver-
pool will be completely justified in the confidence
which they have displayed, and nothing has at
present occurred to warrant a contrary: opinion.
In making comparisons with the quantities of pre-
vious years, hardly a fair test is afforded, unless
ample allowance be made, not only for the average
' rate of increase, but also for the new markets which
have been opened through the enormous emigration
to the Australian colonies, and the prospect of still
further augmentation as our commercial relations
with China and other parts of the East become
more firmly established. In Europe, also, the
consumption of cotton is largely on the increase,
and the demand, both for the raw material and
partly manufactured, is proportionately extending.
All these circumstances serve to show that, not-
withstanding the well-feigned alarm from Man-
chester, the apparent excess of supply, as compared
with last year, may be disposed of satisfactorily.
A cause which was tried in the Liverpool Assize
Court, on Wednesday, before Mr. Baron MARTIN,
I has naturally excited a considerable degree of atten-
tion—the more particularly as, while it is difficult
to dispute its legality, its want of equity is seemingly
apparent. A merchant in Liverpool had offered to
him by a broker a quantity of iron at a certain
price, which he agreed to give, and a note of the
MEMO= was rendered to him, The broker, Who