Richmond daily times. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1853, 1851-04-04
LABOR IN ENGLAND

Those OF the leading periodicals in Great Brl-
tan the Edinburgh Review, the North British
Review, and Blackwood's Magazine, had in their
last issues long and able articles on the condition
of the poor in England and while it was a re-
markable coincidence that all these three Journals
should have taken the same subject into conside-
ration about the same time, it is still more re-
markable coincidence, that, differing as they do
on so many other Subjects they should all agree
in the main upon this. Their united testimony
founded upon intelligent observation of facts,
upon knowledge derived from authentic sources,
and upon the calm reflection of minds that would
gladly come to different conclusions ifthey could
bears evidence to the wretchedness, the hopeless
misery, the endless toll of muttudes in England
who are the slaves of social andan industrial sys-
tenn which for years has been reducing them
by its gradual yet resistless operation from one
state of degrade ton successfully to a lower
one.
How to direct the energetic spirit of benevo-
lence which exists to so large an extent in the
country, how to systemic it, so as to bring it to
bear with its full force upon the great mass OF un-
relieved misery in the lands problem which
is now attracting the attention of the ab!est think
ers in England 'sWe agree with The Socialists"
says the Edinburgh Review, sin holddg that the
world can never have been intended to be, and
will not long remain, what it is" BlackUood
u.
sions, the North British Review inquiries after
some mode and means for remedying the evils so
deeply seated in the body, polite and social, and
asks:
Con whom is the burden Of finding the solution to be
cast Are all these mseries OF competition these slop
systems these degradatons OF trades but the necessary
price we in this age pay for our Wanted freedom?-
Must we be either slaves and taken of, free
and take the anguish with it In Peru, they tell US,
all industry controlled and managed by the State,
the Inhabitants being laid out into castles orprotessions.
and the very hours of work regulated by the authority
of the lncas. There probably, though the facts by
means certain, was ample material prosperity. Can
we not have the without repeating the same set of
conditions without rerogradng into Peruvans! Is ma
erial misery the price of civilization? In word may
there not be i'll this modern and complex age, a
real and suitable Organization of Industry!
To this point all social inquiries finally read up. In
the repetition OF this hackneyed French phrase all Ii
erary studies ofthe of the working classes neces
sary end. Mr. Mayhem, with the phrase evidently
struggling through all that ne was written has scarce
y ventured formally to pronounce it.; The author of
"Alton Locke, on the other hand, boldly commits HIM
self. Not only does he pronounce the phrase organi-
cation OF industry phrase whchmen ofa varieties
OF opinion may legimaely pronounce; but he declares
himself to be believer in the Socialist version OF that
phrase.
"'Alton Locke is, upon the whole, as powerful
literary expression exists of the general conviction,
shared by all classes alike that the country has arrived
at state when something extraordinary, whatever it is
must be decided on and DONE if society is to be saved
Some of the statements made by Mr.. Mayhem,
referred to in the above extract, give view of
the condition of the poor in London too shocking
to contemplate. Of the vagrant race who find
their living in the streets or on the wharves and
docks, the number is estimated at fifty thousand.
The domestic life of the costermongers, about
thirteen thousand in number, exhibits a commu-
nifty in the very heart of civilization which cannot
be contemplated without wonder. These people
who live together and have done so from genera
ton to generation, have little or no regard for the
ceremonial of marriage, and know as little of the
rudiments of Christianity as the Hottentots.-
Their ignorance in every thing except what per-
tains to their calling brings them within the de-
signaton of barbarians Mr.. Mayhew's inquiries
into the general subject of the condition of the
poor in London, the squalid wretchedness of some
quarters of that city, the vice, the crme the des-
ttution which spread haggard aspect over such
mutitudes, abound in startling descriptions,
which, with the greater power of reality, may vie
in graphic power with those of the same class by
Dickens. But the subject is painful one to
contemplate, and it is the only only here and
there that one like Mr.. Mayhem is to be found
who has sort of idosyncratc turn towards such
inquiries. Very fortunate indeed that there are
such men-so courageous, so preserving, so de-
voted to explorations, which humanity demands,
but which so few have the bodness to undertake,
the knowedges to guide, or the fortitnde to con-
| tinue in and to support to the end.-BaA. An,er,
can