The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1833-10-22 00:00:00

THE LIVERPOOL STANDARD,

der the direction of the ghost of old ALLAN RAMSAY'S
miser, who lighted his hovel by means of a cods's head in
a state of putrefaction. In the army and navy the same
beggarly and shabby regime prevails. In the former a
plan has been devised to cozen and cheat the poor dis-
abled and worn-out veterans who fought our battles, and
who linger nut a weary life upon a pittance called " half
pay." As it is under-Whig management, we have no
doubt that the fraud—for a fraud it is—will be carr ie
into effect. When this is done a trifle will be saved—a-
few thousands per annum will be, wrung from the bones
and sinews—certainly not from the fat—of these unfor-
tunate gentlemen; but when it is done the army will be
reduced to the starving point, and further bleeding will
be impossible unless it be desirable to have a mutiny and
a strike among the bayonets. ,
In the navy the same sour trout practice has for a con •
siderable,space of time been in active operation. In
1816 we had eleven hundred ships of war, the most for-
midable navy that ever floated upon the oceans of the
globe; at present, thanks to him of the bright sword_
JAMES GRAHAM by name, a second Bailie NICOL JARVIE,
without the shrewdness of the original—a real weave',
who presides at the Admiralty—a writer of pamphlets
every sentiment of which he has turned into ridicule by
his official conduct—thanks to him, Sir J. GRAHAM, baro-
net, this mighty navy has dwindled down to five hundred
vessels of every kind, poorly provided, niggardly rigged
out, armed as if they belonged to the Tailors' Company,
and officered as if by the special appointment of the goose
polishers of the Lumber Troop. Oh, what a falling off
is there, my countrymen! "Britannia needs no bul-
warks," sings TnomAs CAMPBELL, one of our Whig
pensioners ; but, alas, the day ! the poet knows nothing
of our now emasculated English marine. We have no
bulwarks. The Whigs have sold our stores for ready
money. Our ships have been converted into hard cash
to swell Lord ALTHORP'S accounts. Our poverty has
shirt us out from the Black Sea. We dare not fire a gun
in any part of the world. We were unable to blockade
the coasts of Holland in the late raid against our ancient
ally. In short we,are in such a pitiful condition that
even the Americans laugh at us.
On these grounds we take our -stand, and we contend
that economy cannot be pushed one inch or one farthing
further. To conduct the bUsiness of the country in an
efficient manner, and collect the revenue as it should be
collected, additional officers are requisite, and these of
course would expect to be paid, a payment which the
present crippled state of our finances, crippled by the
narrow views and stolid ideas of a philosopher of the
mutton school, will not afford.

Well, then, what.is to be done ? " Sir," as the impera
tive creditor would say, " I must have my money."
How are the six millions per annum to be provided for ?
We have turned over. this question in our minds for at
least forty-eight hours—debating the point with the
still and inward monitor, while the great majority of
our readers have been asleep—doing that at the dead and
silent hour which other men do in broad day light----and
e can come to no other conclusion than this—the fund-
holder must suer ! We see it as clearly as we see the
pen, ink, and paper before us, that all these combinations
against the taxes, yielded to by his MAJESTY'S ministers,
must end in the spoliation of the fundholder. There is
no way of meeting the deficit but by drawing upon the
national annuitants—not drawing upon them in the mer-
cantile sense of the term, brit withholding from them
that rate of interest which has hitherto been paid. We,
admit that this is a serious point to raise. We are sensi-
ble that in mooting it we are trenching upon the feelings
and touching the most sensitive nerves, of many of our
readers. It is a disagreeable duty at all times to speak
the unpleasant truth. It has, however, been our fate to
speak it before; and we should be unworthy of any pub-
lie respect were we to shrink from the same openness
when the very credit of the country—the honour and
good faith of the country—the resources of the frugal—
the. hopes. of the sanguine—the settlements of the pro-
vident—are all at stake. They Must, however, make up
their minds to drink the waters of bitterness. The
shallow fools, having money in the funds, who cheered
Lord GREY on in his measures of revolution, and his
schemes of family aggrandtgVitient, must now, lire the"
bishops, set their honses.in order. Those who foresaw
the coming calamity, but made no exertions to avert it,
are not entitled to our sympathy. Tho<e who did not
forsee it are of a class utterly beneath our notice.

The three per cents. converted into tzco per cents, is, we
fear, the lastand only alternative of Lord ALTHORP. We
have some private reasons Par believing that some mea-
sure of this kind has been discussed, if not determined
upon.: It would be a measure, we admit, of barefaced
robbery ; it would be a measure of audacious dishonesty
and fraud; and one which none but an unprincipled and
desperate administration would ever dream of. But the
axe has already been laid to the root of the tree, and the
people who consented to the spoliation of the church,
and-who are making war upon the corporations,- cannot
surely lift their hands in astonishment at an attack upon
the funds. When national honour is once sacrificed,
even in the slightest degree, there are no limits to its
career of injustice. The hardened culprit, who is con-
victed of burglary, began his course of infamy by steal-
ing pocket handkerchiefs. It is the same with a nation
as with an'individnal2 When the executive government
of a country becomes relaxed, and its laws cease to be
enforced or respected, there is an end to the security of
property. One right or privilege is first swept away,
and then follows another. Link after link disappears un-
til the whole chain is gone. England, thanks to its mi.
nisters and patriots, is in this declining, absorbing, and
consuming condition. She has violated national co-
venants and acts of union—she has become dishonest—
she has committed robbery—she preys upon private pro-
perty—she interferes with vested rights, and how is she
to be restrained from doing acts of still greater audacity
and injustice ?
Nine millions of pouncli .sterling, we have said, have
to be raised next year. Well,• let us see how. By re-
ducing the three per cents. to two per cents, and all other
stocks in the same proportion, the result would bethat
one-third of the payments from the consolidated fund
would be saved. In other words, instead of. paying
twenty-eight millions to the national creditors we should
only have £18,666,667 to pay. This would rid us, at one
dash, of upwards of nine - millions per annum, la most
convenient and refreshing relief.--7a. nice little sum that
would 'cheer the heart and the coffers of honest. Lord At.—
THORP, and keep the Whigs in office, for, perhaps, two
years longer. Bless them ! it would be an ingenious
stroke of policy; for the family men might lie able to
make something by selling out in time.
But suppose all this done to-morrow—the fundholder
robbed—the assessed taxes gone—Would the unions de-
sist from their work of agitation ? We venture to say
that they would do nothing of the kind. On the con-
trary, having gained one victory over the Whigs and the
Government, they would endeavour to gain another.
I-Iving ascertained their strength and importance, they
would not slumber or sleep while any rate or tax re-
mained upon the books. This present concession to the
mob of London is one of the most 'fearful incidents in the
history of the present cabinet. It shows that they are
disposed to make a` sacrifice Of every institution and form
of law rather than give up the emoluments of office.
The revolutionary faction know thkwell. Hence their
repeated and successful assaults upon the Government.
They have carried one point, and they are confident of
being able to carry any other :which they may 'deem
worth their pains. Lord GnEy
.may depend upon it
that the police-rate will be the next ground of complaint
and clamour. Before the end of twelve months that tax
also will be resisted; and, if the same imbecility is al-
lowed to sway the Government, it would not surprise us
to see the whole burden of the London constabulary
thrown upon the nation. The church-rates too are sure
to be opposed, and as surely will they be abolished.
Tithes are already doomed—as the first act of the next
session will show. 'What remains—rent?—aye rent—
how long ? But no matter. •

The worst' enemies which the working classes have, in
Liverpool as well as other places, are of the peddling
order of retailers, the tape, counter, and change-shil-
ling politicians, who in general are not half so well in{

formed as the workmen, but who insult and traduce them
on all occasions. These upstart and conceited people
profess liberal opinions,,and are incessantly. talking of
liberty and universal benevolence, but they are. mean
and petty tyrants in domestic life, insolent to their ser-
-vents, who can hardly be called their inferiors, and not
very punctilious in other matters, which we have in our.
eye, but which it is unnecessary to mention at present.
.This sketch, which, we take it, is very near the life,
and will easily be identified, is done. in consequence of
some scurrilous and mendacious-observations which ap-
peared in a Liverpool paper of Saturday last. In a lead-
ing article Change-shilling writes as follows :

The freemen are a drunken lace, and their flatterers and
patrons know it. The election yesterday was alike condemna-
_tory of the system,' and the disreputable creatures it has
created.

.4 As is their wont, they grew thirsty on good St. Luke's, and
despite' the fears of Mr. Rathbone and•the flutnmery of Mr.
Ovimes, they would have bribes and beer A nominal candi-
date was also put in nomination, and for several hours the
town was disturbed by the turbulence and drunkenness of the
decent men who call themselves freemen."

This is as deliberate. lying, as plain and downright
falsehood, as it is possible to imagine. We have the
authority of a gentleman who stood at the bar, and wit-
nessed the whole proceedings of the election, for saying,
tlit during the day he only saw three men inebriated, two
of whom were strangers, and the ,other a ten-pound
householder, and not a freeman. As to the conduct of
the burgesses, it was decorous and good-humoured
throughout, and as far as we are judges of faces .and man-
ners, we did not see a man present who did not appear to
be quite as respectable as are any of the persons who
publish the detraction.
In the same article we observe some splenetic. allu-
sions to the new Mayor. We congratulate Mr. ALDER-
MAN WRIGHT on being made the object of these effusions.
It shows tliat the RATHBONE faction know his power, and
dread his influence. They recollect too with what ease
he refitted their unfounded charges before the late com-
mittee of the House of Commons. We further congra-
tulate the Macor on the fact, that his election was the
spontaneous_ work of the burgesses,- no canvassing, no
solicitation of any kind having been resorted to_