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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.
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Still tess can any one promise him better chances . Wherefore , lie takes tip * the unmanly yard measure , or the clerical quill , or even the badge of household servitude . Because , in the first case , he hopes to set up in business for himself ; in the second , he may marry upon a neat little income , and visions of a junior partnership make "bright the dingy wall beyond the desk ; in the third , he may rise to be butler , and then—who knows—he may keep a tavern , and mellow into old age a respected , comfortable landlord . Anywhere but the barracks . There is no social thoroughfare in that direction . That is why Englishmen are not rushing to arms ; and why me are groping about in Shoa , Ashantee , and Calabria , in search of imaginary xegiments .
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MlSSING— £ 5000 REWAJRD . What about Reform ? There appears a certain disposition to sink the very subject . " We almost suspect that .- "' the party' has absconded . A suspicious silence in certain quarters invades the ear . India is a godsend to those who are in hopes of preserving the British Constitution , not in its original state of healthy vigour , hut in its collapse . Still we are inclined to doubt whether the British public will be quite content to miss its adopted . Last session ILord Paimeeston announced . that .-although Reform must go into retirement for a time , it should reappear next session . But in wlaat state ? Has it been put out to nurse for the express purpose of being overlaid ? Sometimes unjust guardians have used that objectionable process with sicldy infants or superannuated persons in a ' soft' state , of course with an eye to the property . Lord Palmerston is for the time guardian of Reform ; but it is an ominous fact that he never talks about it ; just as Jane Eyre's Mr . Rochester never talked about his wife , or King John never talked about Prince Akthub . We are not in the habit of
raising questions that we intend to drop . This pointed silence lias somewhat exd ^ ted the popular interest . The noble public has made up its mind that it will not be balked of its Reform , and is quite content to wait for six months with a full confidence in its own power of attaining its rights ; nevertheless , it would like to know how Reform does at present . Luckily the dear departed has some influential friends . We have no great trust in Reform demonstrations at present , especially where the commanding officer , like . Sir Chahges Napiek in the good ship Bui'y , makes a grand parade as a Reformer , but is evidentl y on tho best of terms with the opposite party . Tho Emperor of Russia is said to have a great esteem for Sir Charms ever since that distinguished officer resided in the Baltic ; and as a Reformer , Sir Charles ia now earning the esteem of Lord DaitBr , Lord Palmisustobt , Mr . Disraeli , Sir Edwauu Buiwku Ijytton , and
other upholders of the ' Oh no we never mention it' policy . But thero is Lord Join * Russell , who ought to have been guardian to-the ward , and whose past conduct as guardian hm been so much misrepresented . And then , there is a very smart fellow who wears the lively of Iho great guardian ' u houso , and Who , in apite o f his liking for his present master , has a real attachment to 'the old family , ' and cannot in his heart forgot the vfttrd . His name is Oshounb , and ho has been talking to the pooplo at Dover on the subject . Thero is no chauce , therefore , that JKfeform can be smugged ' over to ' tho Plantations , ' a « many a ward lms boc-n ; for Ktrsspi / L , and OsBoitNio , and others , can always give us information , of hia whereabouts . However , tho matter will not be left altogether to chance , for wo understand that some public-spirited gentlemen nro
determined not to let the question of poor Reform and his whereabouts drop . We have not yet heard what arrangements will be made ; but , probably , at the next session of the Court of Parliament , some learned gentleman will move for a writ of habeas corpus to bring up the missing party . And , already , we are authorized to state that , should other proceedings fail , a handsome reward will be offered . Any gentleman , properly qualified , who shall produce the missing party in the proper place , will be rewarded with 5000 Z . a year , and the post of Premier .
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LADIES IN INDIA . Stones are hard , and cakes of ice are cold , said BoLiN&iBiiOKE , and women are not meant for camps . Better scrape the streets ., as of old in Liverpool , or saw stone , as in Paris , or carry earth for railway embankments , as in Naples , or administer the weekly whippings of men and girls , as in Southern IRussia , than approach the blaze , the stench , the unimaginable brutality of war- —sucn a war as that provoked by the
Bengal Sepoys . British India is for the present one vast camp , and it is unfit that women should go there . Xet we hear of twentynine young girls who went out by one packet a short time ago . With what objects ? Not as nurses or as sisters of charity ; if women undertake those harrowing duties , "their devotion is sacred , and whatever fate they meet is hallowed . But , even allowing that they do not venture to the East with the idea that it
is an unrivalled marriage-market , and that they yearn to rejoin husbands , " brothers , or parents , we would put it to those ladies who are among our readers not to offer or encourage so injudicious an example . What can young girls do in India at this crisis of darkness and misery but embarrass and encumber their countrymen , and paralyze their eiforts ? By many it is believed that , had a decent vigilance been exercised at Calcutta , the Christians at Cawnpore , Agra , and other stations , might have been brought down to the maritime cities and placed in security ; but that is a question to be settled hereafter . Certain it is , however , that had there been no women and children to guard , Wheeler and Lawrence might have cut their way out , effected a juncture , and fought a passage to Aexa or Allahabad . Scores of officers
and civilians have fallen , simply because , true and noble-hearted as they were , they stood by their wives and died with them . As men , they could not do less ; but it was by an unhappy chance that these poor women , with their families , were at the post's of clanger . Some , it is true , contributed to the defence of besieged places ; Juxta . Skene loaded her husband's rifle while he fought the enemy , until , with deadly fortitude , he fulfilled that last act of love and mercy which spared a thousand agonies to both . The daughter of G-encral WnisErvETt . died fighting like Artemisia ; and it was "b y a Portuguese girl that was inflicted tho only retaliation upon women and children that we have heard of . She was shut up in the house of a native who had reserved her to bo the
victim or his brutality ; a Hindoo woman was left in charge of her . This woman she killed , with two infants , "bcibro slaying herself . Now , no part of India is absolutely secure from horrors , like 1 these . The more women go out , tho more soldiers maist follow to protect them ; so serious is the inconvenience , that it is by no means an arbitrary act to issue a positive order against the embarkation of women for India du . ring disturbances . When a woman fought a gun in Kouney ' s flagahip , he told her who was a line creature but a great nuisance . Pine creatures andpardon us—great nuisances , are the ladies who now go out to Bombay , ' Madras , or Calcutta .
We doubt whether Queen DtnEGHXTTTi herself , of the Hindoo kingdom of Ghirrah , would be welcomed in the camp of Havejock although she was a brave champion of the Hindoos against their Mohammedan invaders , wore armour , shook a "burnished lance , plucked arrows fro m her "bosom without tainting , and at last died in . the field . But the young girls bound for tlie East are not DtraGHUTTis or Maids of Saragossa . They carry to India only so many forms of grace , bloom , and delicacy , within cool circles of crinoline ; and at a glimpse of their white throats the knives of a hundred Nan a
Sahibs would be sharpened for another licentious butchery . Let them think of the worst that might happen . It is not probable that there will be any dividing of maidens' limbs , or hanging up of school-girls fresh from Brighton by hooks passed through , their loins , where these ladies are going ; but such horrors have been enacted , and are possible anywhere within the limits of British India . Calcutta itself is in the position of a town expecting a bombardment- Every European goes armed . The Europeans
suspect their own servants ; no one feels sure that an attempt will not be made to massacre the Christians ; as a proof that the alarm is intense , the English , even in- 'Calcutta , ' Madras , and Bombay , are hastily sending home their families . " We implore our countrywomen , therefore , not to aggravate the difficulties of the Europeans in India by going out to the scene of the conflict before peace has been restored . ~ We repeat , by doing so they only paralyze the energies of soldiers and civilians alike , while they risk the most peculiar of fates for themselves .
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SHIPWRECKS . Cjjn we diminish the number of shipwrecks , which occur annually on our coast ? Is the large catalogue of casualties we have so frequently to lament the result of violent gales , or do these terrible accidents arise from preventable causes ? Turning then to the . Statistics of Wrecks , which we find in the Wreck Register , a work commenced in the year 1850 , at the suggestion , we believe , of Captain "Washington , K . 3 ST ., now hydrographer to the Admiralty , we find some remarkable details .
Taking the five years from 1852 to 1856 , it appears that the total number of wrecks amounted to 5128 , whilst in the same period 4348 lives were lost , of which 787 resulted from collisions at sea . The year most destructive to vessels was 185 ( 5 , when 1153 craft of all kinds either foundered or were wrecked . The greatest number of lives lost in one year was in 1854 ' , when it attained the maximum of 1549 . Confining , however , our examination of casualties to the year 1856 , we find January , February , and September
trio most fatal months , and June , July , and August tho least destructive , representing less than one-third of the accidents occurring duriug the winter season . The fleet of vessels of all descriptions—sailing ships , steamers , colliers , and country vessels—afloat during the same year averaged 229 , 936 tons , and employed altogether 10 , 014 hands , of whom 521 perished . ITrom tho tables supplied to us , but which it would "bo impossible to transfer to our columns , wo ascertain that tho coasting-trade , and our coal-trade in particular , suifers most severely , yielding one-third of the whole losses and co'lliaious . This reveals to us a most painful page in our marine history , for wo arc assured that this unhappy pro-cminenco arises not so much from violent storms aa from tho disgraceful condition of tho vessels . Only a few months ago , it is reported that a am all schooner from S ' and-
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yro . g 94 , October 10 , 1857 . ] THE LEABEB , ^_^ 975
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Oct. 10, 1857, page 975, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2213/page/15/
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