The New York herald., 1879-09-23
English Poverty and Gloom-Emigra-
tfon as a Means of Relief.

| depression and distress Great Britain is
the richest nation on the globe. Being the
centre of the worlds commerce, being the
chief seat of manufacturing industry,
having o greater command of money
than any other nation. owning shares
in the railroads and having investments in
the government bonds of many nations,
possessing more ships and greater COM
mand of the routes of commerce than any
other people, Great Britain, in spite of
recent misfortunes, retains as yet her posi-
tion of proud supremacy among the great
Powers of the world. II loan of hun
dred millions were to be suddenly called
for London is the one city in which such a
loan could be negotiated most promptly and
with the least disturbance to trade and
monetary arrangements. While this can be
said of q nation, it would be absurd to talk
of that nations poverty in any sense which
implied general lack of pecuniary ability.
But q nation may abound in wealth while
majority of its people suffer the extreme
evils of grinding poverty. The unequal
distribution of property in England is
such that in any sudden arrest of busi-
ness majority of the people may
suffer the direst extremes Of wretched-
ness, while there is no perceptible
abridgment Of the comforts of the rich.
But when, in a nation Of thirty odd mill
ions, twenty or twenty-five millions are
severe sufferers and six or seven millions
behold the gaunt wolf of hunger at the
door, it may be justifable to speak, in
modified sense, of the poverty Of the Eng
| lish nation.
In country where, at the present mo-
ment, multitudes without employment are
dependent on charity or parish relief for
escape from starvation, it would be idle to
dispute the existence of poverty. No swell
ing rhodomontade about the wealth Of the
great British nation can blind the world to
the existence Of SO much misery. If multi
tudes of individual Englishmen are rich
it is none the less true that the mass of the
English people are undergoing severe
trial, and that their sufferings are calcu-
lated to fix attention on the hardships en-
dured by the average British subject.
The inevitable tendency Of, the agricul-
tural distress and the lesser manufacturing
distress which prevail in the British
Islands is to turn attention to the easy
method of escape through emigration. Why
should any sane individual who has youth,
strength and little property remain in
England when voyage to the New World
is so cheap, and when the New World offers
golden opportunities for improving the
condition Of himself and his descendants !?
We have no doubt that the depression,
bordering on despair. which just now
weighs so heavily on the mass of English
laborers, will turn their attention to the
great advantages which await them on this
side OF the Atlantic. Whether they emil
CRATE to the United States or to Canada is
of comparatively small importance TO them
or their descendants In the Dominion of
Canada, as we'll as in the American Union,
they would find a great improvement of
their condition. On either side Of the
border they would come in contact
with O world favorable to their interests
Whether they emigrate to the United States
or to Canada they will find cheap lands,
political and social equality, and o hopeful
career for themselves, their children and
their children's children. II they remain
in England they have no chance of rising
no chance that their descendants will rise,
in the social scale. But if. under the
pressure of the present distress, they emf
CRATE to America, the possibilities of great
future open before them, whether they
future home.
We have no doubt that o large majority
of intending emigrants will prefer the
United States, where wages are higher If
the poverty OF emigrants compels them to
work for wages, where the facilities for ac-
quiring land on easy terms are superior
if they have money to invest in owner
ship Of the soil. 1t is the plain
and obvious interest of Britons to
emigrate if they have sufficient property
TO establish themselves in the British
colonies or in the United States Their in
dustrial, social and political condition
would be so immeasurably improved in
Australia or Canada or in the United States
that sentitnc ntal attachment to the country
of their birth must be powerful motive,
indeed, if it can stand between them and
the solid prosperity Of themselves and their
children Why should they stay in Eng
land when independence, social equality
and political rights beckon to them from
Her Majesty's many colonies and from the
rich, prosperous, English-speaking people
of the great American Republic3 Why
should native born British subjects con.
sent to endure the evils OF hopeless poverty
and social oppression in their own country
when cheap and easy transit across the
seas would put them in the road to pc.
cuniary independence and invest them al
once with all the advantages of political
and social equality2
We expect to see large immiQration