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416 ¦ . . - . ¦ ¦ , ¦ ' .. ; ¦ ¦ . ¦ -T;...
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liir „' . ,T SATUBDAT, MAY 1,1852.
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There is nothing so revolutionary, becau...
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THE SEASON. Portentous has been the seas...
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COMING EVENTS. " The present Ministers,"...
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Transcript
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
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Liir „' . ,T Satubdat, May 1,1852.
liir „ ' . , T SATUBDAT , MAY 1 , 1852 .
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There Is Nothing So Revolutionary, Becau...
There is nothing so revolutionary , because there is nothing so -unnatural and convulsive , as the strain to keep things fixed when all the world is by the very law of its creation in eternal progress . —Da . Arnold .
The Season. Portentous Has Been The Seas...
THE SEASON . Portentous has been the season in many ways - —perplexing not only monarchs , but merchants , mariners , farmers , astronomers , and other practical philosophers . The East wind persevered for so mariywe ' eks that the Oldest Inhabitant does not remember the like . We , who have a better surviving memory , do remember something not altogether dissimilar in 1842 , just ten years ago , with somewhat similar results . Then , as now , vessels were kept back in " the Chops of the Channel" until the crews began to think , like the Ancient Mariner , that thev should never more get homebut remain at M ¦ mm ¦!¦—_¦_
, |/ J fc \ j * W Uf I » * ^^\^ - m ¦* rJ - ^^ Jk A ^ p *^^* ^^ G ^ ^^ V J *** »• w ^ ^^^ ,, —w ^ sea for ever , a fleet of "Vanderdeckens . At that time indeed , if we remember rightly , there were not the remissions which have , at rare intervals , broken the continuity of the wind and let in a ship or two to report the durance of the rest . It was a cold whiff of harsh Westerly wind , much like theEast , evidently , indeed , no other than the East going back again , like a tired wild goose going to the rear ~ in the unstaid flight of the flock . But in another respect the season has been
more obdurate than that of 1842 ; the more evidently so , too , since the spell of east wind has now happened later in the year . There was not then , if we can trust our memory , the same almost total suspension of rain . This year , not only does the farmer cry aloud , but the . parched moors and hills have taken fire both in England and Ireland ; and the home-keeping Britisher has seen the spectacle of the American prairie imitated , even in the " preserves" of the lordly Ellesmere and Stamford .
; While we have had East winds scouring the surface of sea and land , Schwarzenbergs and Napoleons vexing the nations , marvellous goldfloods newly disclosing themselves to perplex our commerce with riches infinite , we have also seen a strange portent in the higher heavens . Many times lately has it appeared . At first , cunning men took it only for an effect of moonlight ; some , indeed , only for earthly fires , and forthwith " fetched the engines . " But no hose could play so high . It happened about the middle of the month , not by any means for the first time , and subsequently , about seven , on the evening of the 19 tb ., as it is described by an observer at Chatham : —
" A brilliant crimson play of light , of , a fan-shaped appearance , and extremely vivid at the nucleus , was follqw ^ d by numerous columns of dazzling light shooting upvvtivilp . In three minutes the brilliancy ceased , and in five minutes wholly disappeared ; the clouds , however , in the immediate vicinity of the phenomena , retained a rich crimson tint , of unusual depth and brilliancy , for sorno minutes longer . " The day had been very cloudy and cold , and the evening proved too cloudy to discern the setting sun , but the apparent time of the phenomena occurring wiw a few minutes after sunset . For some considerable
time ufter the occurrence , while every other part of the heavens was obscured by dark and nngry -looking clouds , the extreme edge of the western horizon pre-Hcntcd a long-continued streak of a blood-coloured hue . " Again , on the evening of the 2 . 6 th : — " This evening , at ' 7 h . 22 m ., " writes Mr . E . J . Lowe , from Highfiold H ° l Observatory , " the singular phenomena |^ Mf iJ ^ ondicular ray of light from the «^ % "i ^™ ^ fi ^ H 7 ?^ L " ^ k ^ was oran g ° ' co'ourc ^» ^ 6 ° mfeiaJBj fe ^^ wi &(^ feF ^ inclined from the perpon-/ airo 3 wfetW' 0 e ^ i ^^ wW ^ / T " ° ^ moved northerly . ld ^^ A ' tWlkl ^^ ff 09 ^{«^\ eiV nn < 1 lcBS brilliancy * It y W ^ Jmt ^ S ^ ekWf 5 Om - Tho width ° r tho W ^^ S ^ m ^ m % ^ apparent diameter of the /^^^^^^| ^ S ? 'it ^ l ( lou 8 ton , of Sandwick-manae , Orkno ^ dflknu > nifonnB wo that it has boon plainly
visible several times lately after sunset / and also several times before sunrise > " The elevation above the earth must have been verygreat , as it was seen across the whole breadth of England and Scotland , and in the Orkney Islands . " Strange season of celestial apparitions * burning moors , golden revolutions at the antipodes , despotic triumphs on the Continent , stnothered labour questions at home ,- —of doubt , dread and
drought ! But hark ! what sound is that without , —soft and steady , vague , and yet familiar as the mother's hush of love to her sleeping child ? It is the rain / Come then , at last , harbingered by that West wind , that real West wind . Come and welcome ! Richer than gold ; more powerful than power ! The farmer smiles ; the leaves burst forth to meet the lifesome draught ; and the heart of man opens with delicious gratitude to the Giver of all good .
Coming Events. " The Present Ministers,"...
COMING EVENTS . " The present Ministers , " gays lord John Bussell , " are like pheasants , not to be killed until the 1 st of October ; " but then , it is to be presumed , Lord John will have a shot at thern , put Lord Derby out of his pain , and restore the tieloved Whigs ! \ Npt thait the division of Friday night is very favourable for the prospects of the Russell party . Lord John retains a preference for his own Militia Bill ; but evidently the House of Commons does not . A majority voted with Lord Pahnerston against the very first item of Lord John ' s billi the title ; a majority of two to one affirmed the second reading ^ and the principle of Lord Derby's bill , in opposition to Lord John . The Whig leader is deserted in his own House of Commons— -his party has fallen away from him . He knows it , and like a peevish child he lets it be seen that he knows it .
Will he be better off in the next Parliament P It is scarcely possible . So jar as it still retains political unity , the Liberal party seems to have resolved to take up its stand on the Free-trade ques tion ; and on that , the Freertrade party par excellence will have a victory—the Manchester School being the obvious and rightful leaders of the Liberals in the contest . But what then P The issue of that contest is already known : the very Protectionists decline to join battle on
the question , and in fact give up Protection ; so that , according to pre-arrangement , their doctrine is not to be restored , Free-trade is to be maintained : perhaps even extended and completed ? The quondam Tories or Protectionists intend to take the battle on a different issue , capitally set forth by " A Highland Farmer" who writes to the Tijnes , but wnom we suspect to be next of kin to something very different from what is ordinarily understood " by a Highland Farmer .
" It is not because we detest Mr . Cobden , or have a muddled association of ideas with respect to that gentleman , and the other gentlemen elsewhere , that we have pinned our faith to Lord Derby . No , sir , it is from no such contemptible motive . It is because he , when others deserted us , stood boldly apart from tho tagrag and bobtail who followed their leader , and left their colours to be trampled in the mire . Gallantly ho then strove to stem tho torrent that had burst its banks ; and , though he cannot now turn the course of the rolling water , ho is none the less our loader arid our friend . Would that the word was spoken—as it will
bo yet—that never again can tho slightest duty be imposed on corn ! Would that tho time was come when , without fear of injury to the great Conservative cause , tho whole truth may be plainly spoken , and th o same breath that sounds the latest knell of the corn law proclaims a nobler and a higher aim as the object of our future Government ! It is utterly unfair to comparo the relinquishment of Protection now with its abandonment before . Sir Robert Peel misled his pai * ty , but failed to transfer them . Lord Derby ' s party are
« i advance of him . Let him bo convinced that , though principles can never change , opportunities are tho effect of circumstances—that thoorotic opinions , as often lag behind real results as they precede absolute failures ; and , with a bold heart and fairness worthy of him , lot his cry bo addressed to tho Conservative and Protostant feelings of tho nation , and ho will find that tho farmers of Great Britain will as thoroughly rely upon his character , and far moro highly approve it , than if ho reawakened all the memories of injuries done , or proposed the most impossible remedy in Iub budget . "
Some such feeling as tins , though not so distinctly posited , oxists , not only in hard headed Scotland , where steam chimneys are invading the fields and converting agriculture into a manufacture , but in agricultural England , even to the
unintellectual South . ; Every T ^ 6 k ' s e ^ erience helpsto ^ confirm our calculation , 4 l ^ it the working Protectionists of the country ^^ aro ^ Lord Derby abandon Protection *; but tKat they cling to him in the belief that , after all , ¦ pr otection or no Protection , h « wjM ; ye * dp something Jbrthefarni & rs . ' Now what is that to be P V It is , we are sure , quite possible to do . ' ¦ ' something" for them * Cbut what !? The moral of Pro . teetion , which places the welfare of the hiitnan
being above the prosperity of the goods ; arid deems " men better th ^ raimentj" ^ t ; spund : "Live arid let live" is a -j ^ e as w ^ arid the instinct which dictated it is true . Lord Derby may well and wisely abandon Protection , but riot that just object of Protection . Yet how will he pursue it P By- '' ' : fallijig ''' . ba ^\ : upQii ' . the ' * Conservative" portion of his party traditions P That would hardly suffice . It is not by resistance to an imaginary " revolutiori" that Lord Derby will enable the farmers to pay rents and
wages ; still less by thepanacea of ' theday ^ - " Protestantism . '' He must be a bigot indeed that can expect to pay his landlord or his labourers by the stren Ah of anti-papal successes at the next election . It is , in trut ^ t , neither the Pope nor the Deniocrat that is invading the farmer—it is neither Pope nor Democrat that he expects to be shielded against / by Lord Derby ; the revolution which he has to dread does not await the advances of Chartism , which is falling to pieces , nor of Puseyism , which inclines to a
more generous spirit of landlordism ; but it as already making progress . The question which-has to be solved next after Free-trade is already darting its shadows across the ground we tread While Parliament is busying its routine brainsaboutalternations pf Derjbys and Russells * whilei exclusive middle-class politicians are devoting their souls to fighlo ' er again the battle of a thrice settled question , - gigantic events are still week after week marching inexorably forward to make a totally new " situation " at no distant date . Our present ideas are but the leavinffs of the past , arid our practical politic
cians have not yet begun to learn the art of handling the ideas of the next period . Although Freetrade has given the mechanic and labourer " cheap bread , " they are riot content , but are bent on going to seek something more than cheap bread in distant lands . Although " Chartism is dead , " immense numbers are leaving this country every month for the colonies * multitudes preferring the American Union , because it is Me ~ publican . Landlords who have been accustomed , to " improve" their estates in Ireland by driving off the people , are paid in kind , by the to drive
immense flight of the people they used away , leaving only the memory of wrong and a sectarian bitterness provoked by the sectarian intrigues of England's official representatives . We have seen an exode of 300 , 000 yearly from the United Kingdom : this year the number appears to be yet greater : the people are pouring out through Liverpool . At Now . York they are landing in large multitudes—26 , 000 in one day alone . JN " or is this drain of people confined to England ; Germany also sends multitudes to the country that is preparing to elect a Democratic President , and to welcome Thomas Francis Meagher because
he was an Irish insurgent . . Wo are not preaching theories , we are only stating facts , which anybody can ascertain lor himself : but every fact means something ; and we only ask whether those have not a meaning , deep yot clamorous P , Look to the other great fact . Tho raw material of our chief " medium of exchange is discovered in a British colonv in immense
abundance , and straightway tho bonds of society are all but dissolved . The instrument of trade w strengthened , and industry is in confusion ; so little does more trade suffice as tho regulator of industry ,. still less of society . The gold not only causes a collapse on industry uy JW > concentration , in Australia—it is adding to tue drain of labour from this country ; it w . pouring into Australia moro " Democrats ; " it is coming
over liere to " disturb prices . " i ' p nfF Labpur is undergoing a process of drafting o " to happier climes and moro expansive po ltics , capital is getting cheaper amongst us ; land aovo not increase in breadth at home . Our " P 1 > 08 P ° " rity" at present is enormous , and laughs to scorn any doubt of its own immortality ; just as wio French noblesse of the last century revelled tho undoubted immortality of their system .
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), May 1, 1852, page 12, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_01051852/page/12/
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