The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1849-10-09 00:00:00

The distinct and startling answer was—

" Yes ' • the prostration of the small trade and 'the
large trade of the country !"
The other striking feature in the case is the fact
that the diminution of the issues is chiefly in the
small notes, which, added to the increase in the
amount of silver in the banks, skews that distress
is most severely felt amongst the poorer classes.
Thus, in Jan. 1846 the notes under £5 amounted
to £4,364,509 ; and those above £5 to £3,039,855.
In May, 1848, there was in circulation, in small
notes, £2,279,211 ; and notes over £5, £2,561,459.
In August last, the small notes were to £1,723,367;
and the large notes, £2,109,704. Thus, of the money
of the trading and industrious classes, since Jan.
1846, £2,641,142 has disappeared from circulation ;
and of the more wealthy classes only £930,151. The
decrease apparent in the circulation of silver is still
more significant. Silver coin is emphatically the
money of the consuming classes. Wages, food,
clothes, and all articles of daily use for those classes,
"resolve themselves into half-crowns, shillings, and
sixpences. Yet the returns above skew that this
money, held by the banks in January, 1846, was
only E. 267,308 ; and had increased in August,
1849, to £641,708, skewing a deficiency in circula-
tion, or in the pockets of the consuming classes, of
£374,400 ! This, however, is in all probability
only an approximation to the truth. The banks
were not at all likely to hold a stock, after they felt
that it was not wanted; and would part with it, as
it became in excess.
It may be said that the same state of things has
taken place in England ; that we have lost a por-
tion of our ordinary circulation. The following
table, however, will spew that this argument is no'
tenable ; and that Ireland has suffered the mos.
signally :

Jan. 1846. Aug. 1849.
England—circulation 28,696,565 24,434,738
Scotland—
Ireland— , .
Thus England has lost little over one-seventh ;
Scotland about a tenth ; and unhappy Ireland
nearly one half of the life-blood of commerce and
industry !
We shall make no further comment upon the
facts which we have above placed before our rea-
ders. They tell their own sad tale. They exhibit
to us the spectacle of a country rapidly progressing
towards destruction and universal beggary, yet
whose population of every grade refuse to lay aside,
even for an hour, their senseless quarrels, their
rancour of sect, of party, and of class, and make
one effort for salvation !

ONE of the most unfortunate features of the
Rivington Pike scheme is the fact, which is day by
day made more apparent, that its merits cannot be
discussed with good temper, or even gentlemanly
feeling. The " water question " forsooth ! Why it
might be a brandy and water question, discussed
by tipsy disputants in a tap-room. The world, be-
yond our own locality, looks on with amazement at
the spectacle which social Liverpool just now pre-
sents—at gentlemen hurling fishwife epithets

against each other, and journals making shipwreck
of the dignity of the " fourth estate," and contend-
ing for degrees at the University of Billingsgate,
the object of contention being one which not one
man in ten thousand could have imagined as

likely to afford the provocative for an angry word,
or a thought, beyond the eliciting of truth upon a
question of a purely practical nature. We could
have accounted for such a state of things—for such
a water war to the knife—occurring in a ship be-
calmed in the tropics, with its crew upon half a
pint a day; but in Liverpool, with no pressing
urgency for the element, the prevailing fury is most
unaccountable.

We have not referred to the subject with any
intention to claim for ourselves the merit, if there
be such, of being able to talk or think of water
supply, without foaming at the mouth, or feeling a
disposition to bite somebody. We wish merely to
urge upon honourable town councillors, and espe
cially upon some of the members of our own body,
the desirableness of a little more calmness and

philosophic temper. It is painful to observe such a
paper as the Liverpool Times—the organ of the
pro-pike party—the gentlemanly and aristocratic
organ, par excellence—referring to a respectable and
intelligent opponent of his own, or his patrons,-
views as "so great a goose." Such objurgatory
language might befit the lips of the big bully of a
parish school, and even there would probably in-
voke a kick or a handful of well-directed mud ; but

it scarcely becomes the character of an educated
journalist. Mr. Thomas Baines, individually,
would pause before addressing such language to
Mr. William Bennett ; and we conceive that the
editorial "We" ought not to screen the man, who
uses it, from the blame of forgetting altogether the
decencies and courtesies of life. We have a graver
charge than the mere use of Billingsgate, to bring
against another contemporary—the Mercury.
Irritated, it would seem, by some allusions to his
change of opinions upon the subject of the Pike
scheme, our contemporary on Friday gave us the
following threatening revelation :

" When the bill was in progress, Messrs. Rathbone and
Earle repeatedly called at our office, and often either vo-
lunteered information, or gave it at our request. The
advice of one or both in reference to this bill, was fre-
quently in substance this :—" Let us keep as quiet as pos-
sible, and get the bill. It is the best measure for the
town that ever was devised." We acted on that advice.
We never saw the bill, and we knew nothing of its actual
provisions until they had received the royal assent. We
admit that it was wrong so to trust any men; but surely
it is too bad in the very persons in whom we so confided,
now to come forward and reproach us with our credulity.
Let " No. 1" beware, for it may so happen that some of
the articles to be quoted as proofs of our inconsistency
were written at their dictation, or on their information,
if some of them be not in their own handwriting. When
we became acquainted with the real nature of the measure
we denounced it : when we became convinced that we
were wrong, we acknowledged it."

We do not complain at all of our contemporary's
confessions of his " credulity," although it would
be sufficiently humiliating to the press of our town,
if it could be believed that, as a general rule, edi-
tors are in the habit of-adopting, without inquiry,
whatever is thus pumped into them. Week after
week during the progress of the Pike bill through
parliament, the Mercury lauded its proposed enact-
ments as the very best which could possibly be
devised ; and yet he now confesses that he " knew
nothing of its provisions until they had received
the royal assent." For ourselves we can only
say that we speak upon no man's " advice ;"
and endeavour to make ourselves acquainted
with public questions, before giving them our
advocacy. We write nothing at any man's
" dictation ;" and should feel no slight shame
in making a confession like our contempora-
ry's. But we do object to the betrayal of con-
fidence which is threatened. What object will it
serve, beyond weakening the value which the pub-
lic may be disposed to attribute to the Mercury's
expressed opinions, if he can even show that Mr.
Rathbone or Mr. Earle, has been in the habit of
acting as amateur editor of his journal ? How are
we to know whether his present Stop the Pike "
is not as much a borrowed note as the " Rivington
for ever " of other days ?

IN recording the proceedings at the meeting last
night for the Toxteth wards, we cannot resist the
opportunity which thus presents itself of expressing
our great gratification that Mr. Richard Harbord
has been induced once more to emerge from private
life and devote a portion of his business talents and
practical information to the benefit of his fellow
townsmen. We have few men in the Council whose
labours have been more missed than have those of
Mr. Harbord, and we are sure his old constituents
will restore him triumphantly to a seat in the
Council chamber. He is well acquainted with the
wants of the town, and has not to be initiated, like
too many of the candidates, into the arcana of
municipal proceedings.

IN our last publication we felt it to be our duty
to express a strong opinion upon the proceedings
of the local body, which styles itself the National
Confederation of Liverpool. We conceived that no,
quasi public body. composed of such anomalous
materials, and guided in its course of action by no,
fixed and intelligible principles, should be per-
mitted, by means of a cunningly-selected stalking
horse, to foist its nominees upon the acceptance of
the constituencies of Liverpool. for the management
of a trust so important as the conducting of the
affairs of this great port. The occurrences of the
past week, and the opportunities which have been
afforded us of testing the opinions of our fellow
townsmen of all classes, have confirmed us in the
views which we then expressed. A deep and just
feeling of indignation has been aroused by their
arbitrary proceedings, and the evident party bias
by which they are dictated. Inaependent and
thinking men object, most naturally, to see the
power of deciding important local questions grasped
by an unknown clique, sitting in Church-street,
and prompted by Mr. Jeffrey, Mr. John Smith,
Mr. Urquhart, or any three or four of the body,
who may happen to be most at leisure to save the
public, or the constituencies, the trouble of think-
ing for themselves.
Do we want proof of this feeling of general re-
pugnance to the dictation of this body ? It is
supplied us by the result of Saturday's contest in
Exchange Ward. Mr. George Horsfall, the Con-
servative candidate, whose seat was vacated by a
long absence from the country, was a known advo-
cate of the unpopular Pike scheme. He made no
reserve as to his opinions. His address was a
simple re-tender of his services to the constituency,
combined with a direct repudiation of the pre-
tensions of the Confederation to dictate a member
for their acceptance. The opponent—Mr. Johnson
—selected to contest the ward against him, pos-
sessed peculiar claims upon the confidence of the
public. He had been long connected with the
town; owned considerable property in it; was a
large employer of labour, and was one of its oldest
burgesses. In personal character his fitness was
undniable; and he had been a prominent antago-
nist of the Rivington scheme. The Confederation
staked the prestige of their influence in other
wards upon the success in Exchange Ward. The
Confederation organ, on Friday last, proclaimed
that here was tobe stricken their first decisive blow.
Exchange Ward, in fact, was to be the La Haye
Sainte of the coming municipal Waterloo, The
Confederation put forth all their energies to ensure
a triumph. The printed circular, calling the meet-
ing, at which Mr. Johnson was selected as a candi-
date, was dated from the central rooms, and signed
by tha secretary of the body.
The result to them was a most signal discom-
fiture. Never was a more overwhelming majority
polled in the ward. On this occasion, Mr. Hors-
fall received the votes of numbers who had never
previously interested themselves in our local con-
tests, and a large number of these were the votes
of gentlemen opposed to Mr. Horsfall, not only
upon questions of general politics, but upon that
of the Rivington question itself. The best can-
vassing card, produced by his committee, was
the Confederation's own circular ; the most power-
ful incentive to a vote for Mr. Horsfall the Con-
federation's audacious attempt to ride roughshod
over the constituency of the ward ! We wish the
body joy upon this first attempt ; upon the result
of the application of this touchstone of their in-
fluence over the community.
No doubt the Confederation anticipate greater
success at the approaching first of November elec-
tions. Our own impression, however, leads to a
directly opposite conclusion; and perhaps we are
not far wrong in believing that the truth—espe-
cially when it is one of an unpalatable charkter to
the Confederation—is quite as likely to come to
our ears as to theirs. We can tell that body that
they have contributed themselves more to hurry
forward the Pike scheme by their late proceedings,
than all the efforts of its supporters could have