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to claim them as hia property . The game is as much so , which feed themselves for it is his grain th » y eat . The best plan of preservation would be to say to the tenants , thus : — "Look ye , neighbour , J understand you shoot . Do so ; kill what game you want for your own consumption ; and , in return , help to keep-a sharp eye on my preserves . " - After some highly pertinent , and therefore useful , observations on betting and * bettino- mea / and the degrading exhibitions of the cock-pit , dog-fights , rat-killing and other similar sports , the author concludes his amusing book with the following seasonable advice to the younger generation : — A morbid kind of enthusiasm frequently induces men , particularly young men , to patronize and mix in scenes ( sports , they are called ) that cannot be justified . Will these misguided persons permit one who has seen much , to observe that such pursuits will exclude them from the notice of sportsmen , and can only procure for them the very undesirable and purchased civility of the lowest characters in the sporting world .
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CENTRALIZATION" OR SELF-GOVERNMENT . Local Self-Government Unmysiified . By Toulmia Smith . Stanford To see a live lord holding forth to the common , unperfumed , everyday workpeople , and not to applaud , is a ' moral self-restraint' scarcely to be expected from human flesh and blood . The feeling that one of the great of the earth has lowered himself to the plane of temperance apostles and guinea lecturers in general , is so sweet , so intoxicating to the vanity of poor mortals , that few can withstand the desire to sip the honeyed words of such noble speakers . However , the very fact that this indulgence is a kind of inebriation carries in its train certain disagreeable consequences , which Germans denominate katze » jammer . It is the reaction of the body over the soul , of matrimonial reckonings over the fleeting dreams of love . Mr . Toulmin Smith has performed these reactionary duties towards the members of the Social Science Association , of blessed memory . Their days
of glory are past now , and their days of katzeiijammer have arrived . Ihe long reports of Birmingham speeches begin to be forgotten ; but the short , cutting little pamphlets of London critics Tail after them , smashing the brilliant card-houses which had been erected with such an expenditure of fine phraseology and benignant smiles . According to Mr . Toulmin Smith , those sweet speeches were all humbug : — The whole Social Science Association was planned and carried out in the sole interests of centralism ; and those , well known as they were , who are identified with the maintenance of the spirit of liberty and self-govertimeiit , were never coifferred- with , or even asked to take a part in the proceedings of the association , or had any notice of its intentions , or opportune of either making a suggestion or ^ securing fair play ; while centralists crowded its committees , and managed and controlled the papers that
were to be read . The Birmingham speech-makers , self-exalting philanthropists , weak sentimentalists , pretended reformers , ' and others , have been either the dupes or the tools of that ' grasping hand of centralism which is eager to curtail parochial power , to benumb throughout Ihe land the spirit of all that is noble and manly and genial , to dwarf the completeness of manhood , to close the door to the only practical education , to stop improvement , violate common sense , and coerce every honest and right effort at local duty . ' The association has been nothing more than a new move of those ' unscrupulous tacticians , whose only ideas of government are Germanism and influence , the realization ot which they have ceaselessly pursued for the last quarter of a century . ' . '
, _ . What Mr . Toulmin Smith thinks necessary for the true progress of Great Britain is not an appeal to the central government to do everything for the people—to educate it , guide it , and protect it and tax it at all times ; but , on the contrar }' , to give aid to the real development of local self-government , the basis of which lies in the Ward system . Such local government is as old as England itself , and , therefore , beat adapted to British feelings and habits . History proves that three , five , eight , ten , and more centuries ago , local selfgovernment did exist in England , and was of force to keep in check tho most ambitious moiiarchs , as well as to fulfil the neetU of every community in the laud , and to defend tho state against every foreign flgressor . We find that , whether it were in tho crowded city or tho rural parish , the men of England , including the
* villeins' wore , heretofore , in the habit of handling their own business ami knew how to handle it . The things they handled were of the same nature , exactly , us those to do , or interfere in tho doings of which , we are now told that ' centralism is a necessity . ' But if tho men of England wero able to handle these things formerly , how comes that they arc less able to haudio thorn now ? Surely they do not less concern them now . la it , then , education , or progress , or civilization , —or what is it that has unfitted them ? By what process baa it happened that tho understandings of men have become disabled to comprehend flinl gniap what wore formerly ' conunou things'to all men ? Is it tho natural dogenorucy of tho race V Or is it that the importation into England of tho centralizing system has chilled the sense of men ' s duties to their neighbours , and drawn them from those habits , by keeping up ^ yhioh alone can tho true practical education of free nnd intelligent men bo made a living thing ? Have superficial book pedantry ami ' u ); i tactics' boon nuulo to suporsoilo tho
practical training of men iu tho duties of li ! W Yes ; ' superlicial book pedantry' or , us the new phrase calls it , Red Tape , is fust becoming one of tho fundamental institutions of Grout lirituin . It 18 in full bloom just now ; and Mr . Smith himself , who scorns to question , gives an interesting evidence of its vitality . In 1855 , a select committee of Furliamont had under consideration tlio Nuisances Komoval Act , and Public Health Bill , in which Mr . Toulmin Smith , by unceasing perseverance , sucpoeded in embodying his ideas of local solf-governniont . The j ^ ill ^ i ^ d ^ d ^ oj ^ y twice pusse < l tho House of Commons to the joy of tho secret ' author , wlloii on uliirdlleiT , ^ a'S"if ~ bynnngicrPortuin-w <» vd 8-aiid-, plu'ftsoa wero interlarded with the text us if for the solo purpose of crouting eonftision . Evidently Rod Tape was at full work ! Vainly did Mr .. Toulmin Smith appeal to Sir Benjamin Hull " who owed his position to hia having culled sumo flowers from tlio garden of tho author ot Local fck ' lf-Governmont , vainly even did ho explain to Lord Pal mow ton tho clauses ho desired to have altered in order to make tho Bill one that woujd roully worjc and bo usoful . Her Majesty ' s Secretary of State fur the Home Department listened attentively , tho President of the Board , of Health assented graciously to
all propositions , but the noxious phrases remained , and the lawyers of th < Court of Queen ' s Bench had some neat work cut out for years to come It was as clear as sunlight that Red Tape was infinitely stronger than eithei Mr . Toulmin Smith , Sir Benjamin Hall , or Lord Palmerston . We might almost conclude that 'everything , great or good ^ hithertc accomplished by legislative enactments , had been the fruit of individual energy ; as soon as the central authorities interfere , mischief only seems tc be produced . Mr . Toulmin Smith , a private man unpaid and unrecognized , spent a large amount of time and money in getting a Public Health Ac ! for England : -while those who are employed at a high remuneration to dc
the work , not only did nothing to further it , but raised innumerable difficulties and obstructions in the way of accomplishing anything real anc practical . Again , when the Act had at last been passed , Sir Benjamit Hall ' s particular attention was called to the importance of making it kuowr to the local authorities , as otherwise the Act would be as good as non-existent The health department , however , did not stir in the matter , and to get th < thing done Mr . Toulmin Smith had to do it himself ; and the labour , incon venient as it was to him , promptly proved a positive boon to the public Instances like these show the practical working of centralism in a clearei lirrhfc than anything else which might be said either for or against it .
Mr . Toulmin Smith may cast at the British public the reproach of Phocion He has fastened upon a truth which lies at the very bottom of Englisl politics . He has explained to us the orig in and working of those lawi which constitute our strength in political freedom . But the public of oui day , instead of seizing upon that lever for the maintenance and extension 01 popular freedom , has turned a lazy ear to the historical admonition ; and has preferred to muddle on with Reform Bills , ' bills to > amend , ' and ' bills to amend amendment on act , ' until we have come to consider any recognition of the liberties which we possess already by our great statutes as a ' ministerial concession . ' I £ Englishmen throughout the country would take up Mr . Toulmin Smith ' s principal book , study its principle , and resolve to carry it out , we should not be dependent upon ministers , or new charters , oi anything else , but should soon make our own House of Commons carry out our own laws according to our existing rights .
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CHRISTMAS AT THE TIIEATBES : A JUCRSEY THROUGH FAJUT LAND . At this festal season of the year , the utmost dreams of youthful imaginations seem to be realiEed by the art of the scene-painter , the machinist , the balletmaster ,, and the costumier ; and Fairy Land is brought visibly before our eyes at some score of places in this vast , drab-coloured world of London . A few shillings afihe utmost—a single shilling , or less , if we are humble folk—a scrap of-paper , duly signed , if we are ' gentlemen of the press '—will unlock the gates which open on these golden regions , and send us ~ home like people who have wakened from the dreams of hasheesh . Behold , as you walk along the sfcree | s , the black and red announcements of these wonders ! Do they not come upon you like reminiscences of the old days when you thought a theatre at Christmas time the true summum bonum f Do they not lull the watchful dragon of the present with the enchantments of the past—opening , as it were , a strange , long sliut-up door that shows you , iu the keen flash of a moment , what you were once , and have long ceased to be ? Well , well , you are a man of business now , deep in speculations and ' hypothecations , ' and have no time to be sentimental . But vour own childhood is renewed in that of your little ones , and , as of course they must go to the play during the holidays , you , like a good Paterfamilias , will not object to take a rapid flight with us through the Fairy Lauds now blossoming , like gorgeous oases , over the length and breadth of London . Away then into the air above the chimney-pots , that so , like another Asmodeus we may take off , for your especial behalf ,. the roofs—not of the dull , common houses , but—of those huge caskets wherein ( as under the magic tent which the hero of the Arabian story carried about with him ) lie the gardens of Mysuim , the palaces of the genii , the lands of Faery , and the waters of enchantment . Stav ! We will pause here , at the portals of tins castle , known to the dull world as the Theatre of Dkuuy Lanm :. All around us , for miles every way , lie tho deserts—dry , dusky , husky , foggy , brawling wastes of brick and mortiir ; but in a moment all is changed . We have taken off the roof of this castle , O 1 atorfamilius ! lifted it even as you lift the top of your egg at breakfast ; and here we are in a quaint , bright world , wherein is unfolded to us the history ot Lutle Jaok Homer or Harlequin A B C . We behold how Intdtujcnce is engaged in a strife against fonorance , and how InuufumtUm conveys tho former to a gorgeous castle in the air where a hundred maidens , headed by a syren known to the world by the name of Miss Kosina Wbight , enchant our eyes and ravish our hearts by ' dancincr in duliffbt , ' liko those other hundred damsels whom the knignt in Spkkbkii saw upon a day , which day shall last for ever within the eternal ring of genius and poetry . Many other wonders do we see , and at length are talcqn to the bottom if tho ocean , whence wo arc roseuod by the electric cable , and are conducted to a Palace of Coral , or Fairy Aquumun-a homo of ljt > ' ' ^ , ^" ' "f with the hidden splendours of the watery world , as it all tlio sunsets that hud ever fallen and sunk into the western waves were hero preserved ami e £ ««> a-At this point , lot us pay homngu to tho ' so potent art' of tlio enchanter Bbv * . ut : v \ il , 5 ha * conjured up this vision for our delight . Tho nymphs of Greece and tho fays of modern Europe people tho warm and flashing glories of this roKioii , ami hover unsupported in the f lowing air . Electric light and blue flro stU further kindle the nlroady dazzling splendour , and , as wo g « zo and wink , wepM . from the wondertal world below tho sea to tho ordinary P £ ntoniinM rcffions , and find ourselves In the company ul two Clowns ( Messrs . J . < i . hXMORb ami Bo ' lISo ) . two 7 Waft ™ - ( Messrs . ii ^ ii and W . A . Ba ., *•«) , tvro " ^«»<* ( Messrs . Mi . v « o ami St . Main 19 , Sprit * * ( Messrs Lui-iorr ) , t « a C « J ««* & *»« Agnus ) , and a Dandy ( M . l ) . ; ui . tN ) -tho last a now character in « ImntWMmc . Wo arc In tho thick of life nnd ' business ' -of a «« rtam sort . Mr . 1 *« J j ' J * every 0110 know ., is tho best of clowns and also an « xcolient dai toi , 11 m lie hero performs , in company with one of tho ladies of the pniitoimmo , a very pretty a t ! f £ ; C tft tho II at ««™ , irhoro Mr . n ™ - ™*^^ tort ! Kxrz ;»^^ --
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No . 406 , January 2 , 1858 . J T HE _ LE _ AI ) EE , 19 _
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Leader (1850-1860), Jan. 2, 1858, page 19, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2224/page/19/
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