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    November 26, 1850.] T H E L EAJ)ES, 1141

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    Mr. Bennoch's Tlan. Of All The Witnesses...

    the expense for administering 400 , 000 ? . in the City of London considerably exceeds 100 , 000 £ . "W " e are quite ready to admit that there is a distinction between Manchester Corporation and that of london . If it were properly suited to the actual state of the metropolis at the present day , London Corporation would be more important than that of Manchester in something far beyond the ratio of comparison between the

    populationsmore than ten times as important as Manchester Moreover , the London Corporation inherits traditions and the memory of services performed to the State , which really confer upon it a degree of respectability not to be acquired'within a few generations . But when we look into the details of the finance , we find that much of the money expended is laid out , not only for the purpose of small utility , but for purposes which do not in

    any degree conduce to the dignity of the Corporation . Eor example , the Town Clerk receives 1892 ? . ; the Secondary , who is a species of Town Clerk , 1249 ? . ; and the Remembrancer , 17651 . The last officer has very few duties to perform ; the principal appears to be , to sit under the gallery of the House of Commons , and to take note of any enactments which ma y invade the privileges of the City ; and against these he makes a protest , generally with the effect of causing the City to be exempted from general

    enactments . By these means he has secured the City against infraction of such privileges as those which enabled the Corporation to dispose of property belonging to freemen who die intestate , to preserve intact their right of meeting pleas of the Crown by ordeal of fire or water , or by wager of battle , with other privileges equally important . This duty of the ^ Remembrancer could be disposed of , once for all , by a rule in Parliament which should exclude the City .. from all general enactments not expressly made to include

    it ; and any other duties of record could he performed by the Town Clerk or his subordinates . Mr . Bennoch proposes to throw the three offices of Town Clerk , Secondary , and Remembrancer into one , with a salary of 1250 ? . ; allowing the holder three clerks at 300 ? . each , —a total cost of 2150 ? ., instead of 4906 ? . This is a specimen of the manner in which a judicious economy might reduce the expenditure of the City , without reducing the efficiency or the dignity of any office in the Corporation .

    The finance is bad , we have said , for vicious levying . Of this the coal tax is an example . It amounts to one shilling and one penny per ton . There is no great objection to the manner in which this tax is divided—one penny to collection , and fourpence to improvements of the City ; eightpence being returned to the general Government for improvements outside the City . By this tax New Oxford-street has been constructed , Trafalgar-square lias been improved , Victoria-street has been made , and other improvements are destined in Southwark and elsewhere . But if a ,

    rato is dosirablo for improvements , how excessively inconvenient and unjust to impose a rate , not upon the household of the ratepayers , who would benoiit by the improvement , but ' upon the coal-cellar ; thus especially press ing upon a vital necessity of the poor ! The expenditure is bad , partly for those payments to the occupants of offices which arc useless , and do not conduce to the di gnity of the City , because the services which

    they perform might be quite as effectually performed by persons who receive payment oil other grounds . " The Jt-cinombrmwor , for ' example , might be dispensed with , and tUo name AvntcU upon the general income might be kept ; by tho J -owii Clerk , who could do it without diflimlty . the pageantry of the Lord Mayor's show , not " 'together so objectionable in itself as Mr . Boiiiioch and some others regard it , may also be conquered to cost an exorbitant mini .

    But we have never regarded I ho more gross expenditure an any tost of abuse . Wo believe , in the ( irnt place , that the service which would bo required ft , r fio ^ ,. |; „ < . jf ; y a > s | ;| , ; H jt , iHh U 1 C . li'opolis in ji commodity of high price , and can on y bo . purchased by a payment ;' reckoned at jHUulrodH and thousands . Bui ; boyond that wo Jl <> 'd that there in a payment Avhioli tho market < loen uo | , indicate . You might perhaps go I ; a Particular Hei-viee performed at a certain price . *¦ ou can procure a lawyer for a specific , service atn ' Wo "" ' f"ownrate ; you can get an article fora , iiowk-1 Por according ton , tarifl ' w Inch is woll understood ; jindyou buy ;» , hn , t in the , shop formica which can 0 ^ ortained beforehand . When , however , . you

    seek to have a service performed , not only up to the standard of a class , but up to a standard quite peculiar and sui generis , with something thrown in of a spirit , freedom , and dignity beyond what a mere money payment could give , then you must place the man from * Avhiom you expect such sendee above the ordinary level of paid servants . If a great journal requires a style of writing above that of other journals , it can secure it in the first place by getting the pick of men who write , and paying them the highest salary , and then adding to the salary a something of generous surplusage which shall discharge the

    writer from sense of mere salaried performance and endow him with a spontaneity of superabundance . So if you want a man to exeute the office of Mayor , you might procure an intelligent , a competent , and assiduous person , who could execute the work say for five hundred a year ; but if you require a man to feel that he does not belong to mere paid officers , that he represents the hereditary Lordship which embodies the old traditions , and the present power of London city , you must place him amongst the category , for

    the year at least , of magnates whose income is reckoned by thousands . A great city can always afford to be open-handed ; and unless it is openhanded , it will find its public services executed in a mean , carking spirit , altogether unworthy of a great city . A better economy of the state finance might , as Mr . Bennoch calculates , save forty or fifty thousand a year—equal to a capital of one million and a quarter for improvements . But to our experience , a far greater thing than the mere saving of pounds is the securing of something better for the money . .

    This Mr . Bennoch ' plan appears to us to do . What he proposes fn brief is this . He would erect the present City and the Parliamentary Boroughs into nine Municipalities , namely , the City Proper , the Tower Hamlets , JFinsbury , Marylebone , Westminster , Kensington , Lambeth , Southwark , and G-rcenwieh-and-Dcptford ; each Municipality to have twelve Aldermen , and seventy-two Councillors . He would also erect a Central Council , to consist of thirty-six Aldermen and one hundred and eight Councillors" elected

    by the Corporations ; each Corporation in turn to appoint a Lord Mayor for the year , who shall preside over the Central Council . The Central Council would sit in the City of London , from which Corporation would be purchased , by the united Municipalities , the Guildhall , Mansion-Louse , and every public building necessary for the new Corporation . The Central Council would have the management of lighting , police , water , sewers , river , bridges , improvements , streets , finances , rates , and rents , education , and charities . The

    execution of the behests of the Central Council to devolve upon the local Municipalities . Thus , for example , improvements and streets would be annually laid out under the sanction of the General Council ; but the execution of the streets would devolve upon the Municipality of the place . Some of the larger privileges now enjoyed by the City would devolve upon this Central Council—¦ the Lord Mayor to be an ex-oflicio Privy Councillor ; the Central Council to retain the right of approaching the throne Avith addresses , or presenting petitions to Parliament through the

    Sheriffs ; of being represented in Parliament by an official , timl of continuing other privileges secured to the Corporation by charier , for services rendered to the Crown in days gone by . It appears to us that this plan has tho two-fold advantage of continuing the traditional dignify which still lianas round the City , appreciated n ' s it mny have been more forcibly in times gone by , and an it may ho in times to come ; at ; the same time that the plan secures for the administration of local adairn a machinery comnienRiirate to tho grandeur , wealth , and importance of the metropolis .

    November 26, 1850.] T H E L Eaj)Es, 1141

    November 26 , 1850 . ] T H E L EAJ ) ES , 1141

    Tmk Koyal Vhanckuamt At Oambrii)G Tt. Tu...

    TMK KOYAL VHANCKUAMt AT OAMBRII ) G tt . Tu ic Commissioners who inquired into the " state , discipline , studies , and revenuea" of the University of" Cambridge furnish heir MajoHty with . some information on the duties of the (/ 'hancellor . The extract is very ( short , and wo . shall give it at length : — " The highest academical , office is that , of Olnui' -ellor . JjW many yearn past it lian boon fuiceoHMivi'ly ( illcd by individuals of exalted rank and honourable name , in tho' Holeetiou of whom tho University hmt mnight | , render ; i graceful homage to eminence in public and private virtue .

    It is only on rare occasions of extraordinary interest that the Chancellor is present in th " e University . " The . Chancellorship , is the highest compliment which the , University authorities have it in their power to pay , and Cambridge ; in search of a Chancellor , discovered that Prince Albert united m his person that amount of public and private virtue to which , she ever seeks , on such occasions , "torender her graceful homage . " . Really , we do not know that she could have made a better choice . Every one is Wettv well

    acquainted with the internal condition of an English University . It is an institution possessed of enormous wealth—it holds some fixed opinions , which it is bound to inculcate on all whp come within the range of its influence—it manufactures believers in Thirty-Xine Articlesit is the most conservative phenomenon that these days can produce—and is the refuge of all the antiquated notions which the world has long rejected . Under such circumstances , it was no easy thing for the University ' of Cambridge to select Prince Albert for her Chancellor . In spite of

    all his disadvantages , the man has made himself a name in England . He , breathing the atmosphere of courts , has identified himself to no small extent with the cause of education . He has no sympathy with the ancient systems to which Oxford clings with the stern tenacity of despair . Cambridge has always been more ready to keep pace with the development of knowledge . She really doos atttempt to send her students into the world , not sunk in blackest ignorance of the wants of modern days , and the

    meaning of this struggling epoch . Oxford , before the Great Duke was laid in his grave , ran , richly clothed in silk and purple , to lay its highest honour at the feet of a Protectionist Premier , with no undisguised aspirations after the honours which that Premier -could bestow . Cambridge , if she meant what the world -would have her mean , proclaimed by her election of a Reforming Chancellor , that she was determined , to move onwards .

    So much for encouragement . We should like , however , to sec some stronger signs of improvement . The little that has been accomplished already should be the earnest of greater things to follow . But it is true that in these days —• when Maurices are denounced as heretics , and the whole intellectual and religious aspect of the Church is 0 ne of darkest confusion—when the prophets call each other false , and there is no light , but only faint glimpses of truth , clouded by conventional forms and Athanasian dogmas—is it true that ; Cambridge still refuses

    her honours and her Avenlth to those whom she brands as . Dissenters ? How Prince Albert must have scorned the thought that the men who made him Chancellor would have denied him the honour if he had not avowed his belief in surplices ! The Duke of Brabant , too ! The t . hou ^ lit may surely have crossed his mind that the doctrines must be hard to be understood , which

    can only he taught in tho pomp of wealth and luxury , and by the imposing force of * medieval establishments . " When will the day arrive that professors , fellows , and . scholars shall unite to throw off tho groat chain which was forged in days of blighting superstition , and open out ( heir halls , their honours , and theirAvenlth , to all who will show their Avorth , even if they do not con form to the texts of the dogmatic Compromi . se .

    Perhaps this in too much to expect . Bui : surely there in nothing to prevent an alteration in the system of education . Nothing to prevent the teachers of that groat University from learning and proinulgiit inu , " ( ho truths * Avhieh . lhin century ban brought to light . Lord . John {{ . u . shcIL pledged bin faith , in . spirit , if not in words , that the Univcnsitic . s ishoiild be reformed . ' Where i . s the fulfilment P It is to bo found in two Bluo Books , which . some curious antiquarian may ono day discover in House of Pm-linnient libraries , Avhen ( ho Uiiivertfities , too late in yielding , havo fallen victims to that bugboMi" of ecclesiastics- 1—¦ the Spirit of the Times ..

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• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Nov. 26, 1853, page 13, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_26111853/page/13/