The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1847-03-23 00:00:00

A GOOD RESIDENT LANDLORD.

The indiscriminate abuse which is being levelled against
the landlords of Ireland by a portion—and, we regret to
say, an influential portion—of the press of this country,
and by some of our legislators, is not creditable to the
hearts or to the judgment of its utterers. There are
selfish men in Ireland, without doubt ; but we should
scarcely say that the most selfish are to be found amongst
the landlord class. Some of the owners of the soil in
that country we know to be kind-hearted men, unceasing
in their efforts to improve the condition of their mis-
guided or unfortunate tenantry. Many are anxious to do
all which their limited means will allow ; and if such men
do not succeed in meeting fully the emergencies of the
present crisis. it is only just, before condemning them for
their deficiencies, to weigh the extent of those emergencies
and the hindrances offered to their efforts by the character
and habits of the people.
The following letter, read in the House of Commons
by Mr. Labouchere, as affording a reply to the last
waspish attack of Mr. Roebuck against the whole body
of the gentry of Ireland, exhibits an instance of con-
siderate generosity scarcely to be paralleled in our own
own country, in which, happily, our sympathies are seldom
so seriously taxed. The party referred to is Sir ROBERT
GORE BOOTH, of the county of Sligo, and the letter is
addressed by Captain O'Brien, inspecting officer in Sligo,
to Mr. Walker, Secretary of the Board of Works. Cap-
tain O'Brien says :
" Sir Robert Booth's esthte is large, and the supplies he
has procured would keep those of his own well enough,
were he not pressed also to find his neighbours' tenants.
At his own place, Lissadill, he has established two soup
boilers, which make each 140 gallons of soup ; and I cal-
culated the cost of the soup in each boiler to be about
32s 6d. He gives, gratuitously, 280 gallons of this soup
per day, each day, including Sundays. He sells, six days
in the week, 150 loaves per day, each being 4 ounces
larger than the fourpenny loaf sold in Sligo, and sold by
him at 2d. per loaf. He also sells 30 tons of! Indian corn
per week at a reduced price, and gives a portion of Indian
corn to 30 persms daily. In this manner he has provided
for the poor, and sold through the agency of his chaplain,
Mr. Jeffcote, since the 29th of August—lndian meal, 393
tons ; barrel flour 70 tons ; whole wheat flour, 40 tons ;
biscuit, 9 tons ; rice, 3 tons ; oatmeal, .12 tons ; total,
527 tons. He has still a good deal in hand, and he has
ordered on his own account, in addition—lndian corn,
2375 tons ; new seed oats, 81 tons ; hogsheads of flaxseed,
10 tons. He has at this moment in Greenock, ready to
be shipped, but he is in difficulty respecting freight, 200
quarters of oats, 23 quarters of barley, 200 loads of beans,
18 tons of peas, 100 barrels of flour, 180 barrels of wheat,
99 tons of oats, 25 tons of barleymeal. Much good would
be done if the Government would assist Sir Robert Booth
in having this large quantity of food transported into
Sligo. What he has done for the part of the country in
which he resides has been so well done, that it would prove
a real blessing to enable him to do more."

SAWDUST.BREAD AND THE FIRST YEAR OF

FREE TRADE.

We quote the following paragraph from the Manchester
Guardian of Wednesday :
" Sir John F. W. Herschel, in his discourse on the
study of natural philosophy, states, ' That sawdust itself
is susceptible of conversion into a substance bearing no
remote analogy to bread ; and though certainly less pa-
lateable than that of flour, yet no way disagreeable, and
both wholesome and digestive, as well as highly nutritive.'
Note—' See Dr. Prout's account of the experiments of
Professor Autenrieth, of Tubingen. Phil. Trans. 1827,
p. 380. This discovery, which renders famine next to
impossible, deserves a higher degree of celebrity than it
has obtafned.'—The following is the passage in Dr.
Prout's paper, to which Sir John Herschel refers :—` To
illustrate the properties of lignin as an aliment, the only
point of view iu which we have to consider it here, I shall
briefly quote the experiments of Professor Autenrieth, of
Tubingen, who showed some years ago that, by proper
management, this principle might be rendered capable of
forming bread. The following was the method he em-
ployed for this purpose :—ln the first place, everything
that was soluble in water was removed by frequent mace-
ration and boiling. The wood was then reduced to a mi-
nute state of division, that is to say, not merely into fine
fibres, but actual powder ; and after being repeatedly sub-
jected to the heat of an oven, was ground in the usual
manner of corn. Wood thus prepared, according to the
author, acquires the smell and taste of corn flour. It is,
however, never quite white, but always of a yellowish co-
lour. It also agrees with corn flour in this respect, that
it does not ferment without the addition of the leaven ;
and in this case, sour leaven of corn-flour is found to an-
swer best. With this it makes a perfectly uniform and
spongy bread ; and when it is thoroughly baked, and has
much crust, it has a much better taste of bread than what
in times of scarcity is prepared from the bran and husks of
corn. Wood flour, also, boiled in water, form's a thick,
tough, trembling jelly, like that of wheat starch, and
which is very nutricious.'
Coming so closely after the measure which was to give
the working classes a large and a cheap loaf, this proposal
to give them a wooden loaf is rather'disheartening. We
cannot but suspect that the philosophers are only joking.
Would the Guardian himself try for a week or two the
article recommended,- and give his readers notice of the
commencement of his experiments ? We should watch
the effect produced upon the staple of his editorial lucu-
brations, from this wooden fare, with great interest.

-----
THE MERCURY VERSUS THE GENERAL FAST.

Our contemporary of Friday, in an article which we
would have quoted entire but for the offence which we
should have given to our readers by offering such revolt-
ing•sentiments to their perusal and the perusal of their
family circle, has characterised the proclamation of her
Majesty, enjoining a general fast and humiliation, " a
decree worthy of Nebuchadnezzar and the days of Sha-
drach, Meshach, and Abednego." Her Majesty must be
infinitely obliged to the Mercurial scribe, who also accuses
her of using a peroration to the document in question,
praying for " a selfish benediction on her own head."
It is " selfish " in her Majesty herself, whilst urging her
subjects to prostrate themselves before their Maker in a
time of trouble, to recognise the source of all consolation
by praying " God save the Queen" !
We venture to intrude upon the Mercury's notice the
different spirit in which the whole subject is regarded by
a class of her Majesty's subjects who, although not
Christian in faith, set an example here which it word be
well if Christians generally were to imitate. We refer to
the sublime prayer which has been ordered by the Rev.
the Chief Rabbi of the Jews to be offered up, on Wed-
nesday, in the various synagogues under his control.
The form is as follows :

PRAYER IN THE SYNAGOGUES FOR THE GENERAL

_
FAST.
PRAYER.—Thou who art great in counsel and mighty
in action, whose eyes watch the ways of men and their
doings, fortify our soul and strengthen our heart, when
we pray unto thee at eventide. Incline thine ear to
listen to the supplication of thy servants in the time of
their trouble ; for thou hast visited various parts. of this
country ; the staff of her strength, her stay and her prop,
is broken; famine has entered the dwelling of the poor,
desolation has come within our borders, and terror has
seized us. .

Verily, we know, 0 Lord, that thy decrees are just
and thy judgments pure; that because of our iniquities
thou art wroth with us ; for we have seriously trespassed
against thee, we have departed from the way which thou