The Portland daily press., 1873-08-14
Spirit Of the New York Press.

The Post, in an article on English and
American Laborers," says relative to The mis-
sion of Joseph Arch, the English farm laborer,
to this country:
Mr.. Arch has been himself farm laborer,
and is thoroughly familiar with the people
whom he aims to help. He knows how great
are the grinding poverty and enforced igno-
rance, and low social position to which they
are compelled TO submit, and having risen by
earnestness of purpose and fore of intellect,
to be their champion, he is looked up to as
one of the most powerful of the leaders in the
movement for the enfranchisement of labor.
He will probably fall into the hands of men
who, in this country, are at the head of the
Unions of one sort and another, and it is Gu
rious question which will be most benefited
by the relation, he or they.
His simple purpose is to discover whether
this country offers to laborers, whose condi-
tion at home is one just this side of starva-
tiOn, chance of comfortable subsistence,
with fair representation in the government,
aud a fair chance for the education of their
children. If he uses those powers of keen
observation and candid common sense for
which he has earned so wide reputation,
and if he goes into the western states and ter
ritories to see for himself the chances for the
poor man, he can hardly fail to ask with some
surprise what real ground for complaint the
laboring people of this country have; for his
idea of rosperity for the farm laborer is, not
that he should cease to work for wages, but
that his wages should give him sufficient food
and clothing of frugal kind, the right of
suffrage, and schooling for his children. He
will actually find that there are very few in
this country who are or who need to be con-
tented with this alone, but that absolute indie
pendence and ownership of farm are within
~ In,-
man. Looking, as he has been accustomed
to do, at absolute poverty, and seeking for his
class for relief from that, it will be new les
son to him to look at merely relative poverty.
Accustomed to consider the question of Ia
Dor where few shillings more or less week
is a question OF living or dying of starvation,
he will not easily understand how men can
''strike" for four OF five dollars day. De
manding at home that those he represents
should not be starved, without dreaming Of
the possibility of their ever reaching posi-
ton where the the necessity OF working for
wages should cease, he will be slow to COM
prehend what there is to complain of in a
country where an able-bodied man can in a
few years have home of his own, and be in
the enjoyment of an independence which is
never within the reach of the English labor
er. If he has good deal TO learn, he may
also have something to teach; and if he
brings to bear upon the subject the same
sound sense here that lie has shown at home,
his mission may possibly be as beneficial to
the laboring people of this country, as it
doubtless will to those he has left behind him.
1t is well that the American laborer should
strive to better his condition; it is mis- right
to demand a fair share of the general pros
perity; but it can do him no harm, and may
do him some good, if he can be brought to
make an intelligent comparison between his
own circumstances and those of his fellows
in other countries. The knowledge which
Mr.. Arch may gain at the West of how an
English farm laborer may cease to live in de-
peDdence by pecoming an American farmer,
will prove as valuable, should he learn arlght @
and see fl. TO impart his knowledge, 10 .ne
laboring men and mechanics OF Tue SIea.
cities of the Atlantic States as TO bis own
conntrymen.
The Tribune varies its usual dyspeptic war
.oa;ns, the Custom House, by a pathetic ap-
nea, that DR.. Ayers stores, rented at aIarge
r.te he retained by the Government. The
,,,o.;ve of this immaculate sheet, which makes
sncb sonorous claims of superior purity, be-
comes manifest, when it appears that this
same DR.. Aver owns largely of the Tribune
stock. The Times treats the subject in the
following livery iasnlon:
We found that the present public stores
are owned by man named Aver, aconcoctor
of some stnff which he calls Cherry Pectoral
Syrup. What the effects Of this syrup are
upon The human frame, we cannot say, for we
have never tried it-but it has clearly resulted
in bringing grist to the mill of the said Aver.
Now, why should the Tribune be so anxious
to prevent the Government giving up the
lease of Ayers building? Because Aver is a
proprietor of, the Tribune, and money is very
necessary in that establishment just now.
Jay Gould cannot be@expected to pour in a
fresh supply every day, and certainly the pa
per Is not in dourishing condition. Is II