COTTON TWIST 
 
 REDIYIYUS. 
 
 TWENTY COPIES REPRINTED 
 
 W E E K L Y c H H O i\ : IC L E. 
 
cr-'tffo n Twjr 
 
 
 FREE TRADE! PLENTY Tit pu! HIGH PROFIT* 1 
 GOOD WAGES! AKI> CHEAP BREAD! 
 
 TO TIIH EDITOR OK THE WEEKLY CHRONICLE. 
 
 Sm-In vour advertised Address lu your Readers on tie. 
 live of tlie opening of Parliament, you speak of the coining 
 Session 11 s one “ which, if it do not terminate the Struggle, 
 must at least he looked on as the Herald of the Advent ol 
 Free Trade and, looking at the time current, and through 
 the intervening two yoars to that 2!)th of January, 1812, on 
 which I wound up my first series of Letters in a final one 
 to Sir Robert l’eei, it does seem to me that your prophecy 
 may he turned into certainty, if we all combine to muster 
 tip the help that is in us ; and, with “ a long pull, a strong 
 pull, and a pull altogether”—excuse the homeliness and the 
 triteness of the phrase, for the sake of its descriptive force- 
 heud ourselves to the task, seeking no end but that one end, 
 and knowing no one in the struggle but those wito are for 
 us, and those who are against us. 
 
 T have spoken of my last Letter in the January of 1812: 
 wo were then upon the eve of “ the promise-to-tlie hope and- 
 the-break-it-to the-heart ” Parliamentonly then it was 
 all-promise-to-the-kope, and it is extraordinary how readv 
 men were to he deceived—from the Artizan to the Agricul¬ 
 turist! Even “Cotton Twist" prayed to partake of the 
 general delusion, and took merit to himself for leaving, as 
 far as in him lay, the Judas aud the Joseph of the Standard 
 to take his course, wishing him well through his purgation ; 
 
 and, expecting nothing, ready, and avowedly so, to take any 
 
 good that might he forthcoming, promising to pay for it in 
 praise and thanks, and in recantations, even, of alt the' 
 
iu the oilier sense hero imputed, the end 01 .til is much 
 nearer than wc think ; and l’cel, seeing that the crash is 
 inevitable, will he but lending his hand to accelerate it, that 
 the whole may be the sooner over. 
 
 Nevertheless,if these men will be deceived, they must; 
 and, possibly, after all, there may bo a satisfaction in dying, 
 when a man must so die, with a woollen nightcap over the 
 eyes! 
 
 COTTON TWIST. 
 
 London, 2Gth January, 1814. 
 
No. II. 
 
 THE EDITOR OF THE “WEEKLY CHRONICLE 
 TO COTTON TWIST. 
 
 Dear Cotton Twist— I am sincerely, and unaffectedly, 
 glad to see you alive again, and in very decent health, 
 and spirits, considering all that you have undergone since 
 your last appearance in January, 1842. For everybody, 
 who, like myself, has the felicity of your personal 
 acquaintance, knows, that, in the Third Paragraph of 
 your last Week’s Letter, which describes the victimization 
 of your Section of the Community, as you call it, by 
 Sir Robert Peel, (I should like to know what Section has 
 escaped ?) there is no humbug,—no attempt at fine writing,— 
 though you apologise for long sentences, and “ Sesquipeda¬ 
 lian words,”—but a simple transcript of feelings, which have 
 been dinned into my oars every time, that I have had the 
 
and fighting the common battle in jour own racy stvlo, 
 without the slightest reference to my opinions upon any 
 particular point. 
 
 Believe me, with great pleasure in the prospect of \oe 
 co-operation, Dear Cotton Twist, 
 
 Yours, most Truly, 
 
 COTTON TWIST TO THE EDITOll OF THE WEEKLY 
 CHRONICLE. 
 
 Sin,—I would say—“My Dear Sir," were I pursuing the 
 current of my personal feelings; but “My Dear Sir” is for 
 the gentler intercourses of private life—no preface for the 
 stern public realities with which Cotton Twist has to deal: 
 
principle;’’ and you state that you “never in your life 
 advocated any proposition more sincerely, or more 
 heartily!” 
 
13 
 
English Shopkeeper, who offered him six eggs for sixpence, 
 that he could purchase twelve for the same money in his own 
 country, and who on being asked—why he did not stay there? 
 replied— that he could not get the sixpence at home ! That 
 is an Irish story: I will put it into English. The eggs here 
 are six for sixpence, by the operation of the laws you so sin¬ 
 cerely and heartily approve of, whereas, but for these laws, 
 they might be twelve ; and by, the operation of the same 
 laws, the poor Englishman is prevented from getting the 
 
 “No ten men could be found who would agree in any 
 Corn Bill that could be proposed, and you, therefore , voted 
 for alterationI congratulate you on your extraordinary 
 
16 
 
 “ Loid Palmerston managed the Foreign Affairs of this 
 kingdom with great ability and great aculcncss, but not 
 with great prudence:” aye, marry, how prove yon that, in 
 the great heap of your wisdom? “He wrote smart diplo¬ 
 matic notes, and left us without a notion who was to take our 
 goods:” Oh! that it were worthy of Lord Palmerston to anni¬ 
 hilate such a perky specimen of official juvenality! “Tha 
 was the reciprocity they must expect. Yet the Anti Corn-law 
 League would have them try them; if they did, they would be 
 like the man who went home on foot after having parted with 
 his £100! ” And this Young-man, who can talk so disjoint- 
 edly, is not only a member of a Government, so vast in 
 
18 
 
 You say—“I know there is every disposition on the 
 part of those who hold the reins of power, to uphold, and 
 maintain, the laws as they now are.” 
 
 Sic, the Hon. Sidney Herbert, M.P., Anglo-Catholic, 
 Tractarian, Secretary, and cetera. Now for the Post: the 
 Post says, that it is “ An Administration which protects 
 ;ricuiture, certainly, blit—as a matter of expediency, and 
 f of principle I” 
 
20 
 
 slow !—What was to be done ? Conte qui coute, the House 
 must be brought down ! and he bent himself to the struggle, 
 at achieving the fiftieth—a half-jubilee of twirls ! The 
 
 either by pleading benefit of clergy, or otherwise, as the case 
 may be. 
 
 In reference to the silly (for it must bo admitted to be the 
 silly) argument that a secret agreement is an essential con- 
 
21 
 
22 
 
 for Ireland; you will find no convenient Shaw-hoy here to 
 make a farce ef Trial by Jury; and, unless you could lay 
 your venueinBerks or Bucks, or some cognate county, as the 
 
23 
 
t aid, knows beforehand what will be done.' 
 
26 
 
 have failed to seize upon, and to convert into a means of 
 establishing his reputation and of consolidating his power: 
 What did Political-necessity Peel? 
 
 I stop not to recapitulate all the blunders, large and 
 small, which go to make up that great aggregate blunder, 
 which, from all the materials, decently managed, of a great 
 triumph, has manufactured the most disgraceful and 
 deplorable defeat that ever rendered ministry discreditable 
 in the eyes of a free and a thinking people;—I stop 
 not to recapitulate these, in my admiration of that great 
 resulting blunder to which I have last adverted. 
 Why Repeal, wild and visionary though it be in its concep- 
 
28 
 
29 
 
 Capital and industrial skill will follow. We will show them, 
 arithmetically and practically, that the two Countries can 
 go on best together; and that, united, both English and 
 Irish may expect to be much better fed, and much better 
 clothed, and much better taught, and much better governed, 
 than as separate and independent Kingdoms. 
 
 COTTON TWIST. 
 
 London, Feb. 23 1844. 
 
32 
 
which sells everything on 
 followed by the back-way 
 at the Pawnbroker’s, the fr 
 the Scotchman who sells T< 
 —the Duffer, who supplies' 
 
worse scrapes than a Minister may get into, through a 
 momentary fit of rashness, in asking a Queen to honour 
 his poor dwelling by the way, lest it should be thought 
 strange that her Majesty should pass the Manor without ad- 
 
 Yes, Sir Robert, open that door which the im-policy of 
 your Protectionist friends has double-locked and bolted 
 between imprisoned England and the vast World, and aU 
 
THE INCOME TAX. 
 
 Act 2d, Scene 1st.—S/. Stephen's Chapel. (A period of two 
 years is supposed to have intervened between this and the pro 
 ceding act.) 
 
 The Man-with-two-left-Legs.Sir Robert Peel. 
 
 Forethought (Member for Coventry)-Mr. Williams. 
 
 Rival Forces by the rest of the Company. 
 
 ARGUMENT. 
 
39 
 
 make a groat experiment on the Tariffand, if we are to 
 understand a plain man speaking a plain meaning, 
 when we hold public converse with you, and not feel it 
 requisite to speak by the card, lest your equivoca. 
 tiou should undo us,—if we are to consider our¬ 
 selves, confering on such questions, as Englishmen talk¬ 
 ing with an Englishman, in that good old English spirit 
 which speaks and acts upon the square, and would sacrifice 
 an advantage rather than break through an honourable un¬ 
 
 political morality, shuffling along on its two left legs. The 
 reply was, it appears, received with “much laughter” by 
 the Marriage-Settlement and Mortgage-Deed Mem¬ 
 bers behind you—let us hope that we are not to 
 accept that as ominous of an intended re-imposition of 
 
40 
 
43 
 
employment for the poor:—that is ] 
 it may be Hypocrisy—and “Somett 
 should steal broad cloth and don 
 
raence and conclude his labour for the day, b; 
 authority. Let every man bring this to the testi 
 experience.—Apply it to the prices of the Butchi 
 Baker, and the Tailor, and the Shopkeeper of ei 
 not forgetting its self.applicationapply it to 
 day workings of every-day life, not forgetting its si 
 
led by the Royal Assent, 
 Ingland to pay the same 
 
 the farther exclusion 
 ight be brought into fartl 
 
No. X. 
 
 A SECOND LETTER TO LORD ASHLEY, M.P., 
 ON THE SHORT-TIME, AND SHORT FOOD 
 BILL! 
 
 My Lord—A man must have a very deep feeling of 
 the gravity of the question, or a very dull sense of the 
 ridiculous, to avoid flying off at a tangent just now, merging 
 all consideration of the importance of the principle in¬ 
 volved in a shriek of laughter at the very queer position of 
 parties at the present juncture. For never, “in the 
 memory of the oldest inhabitant” of this, our England, 
 have political landmarks been so confounded, or public 
 men so shaken up and jostled with each other, as now. Free 
 Trader and Monopolist have formed a bond of union; 
 Whig has severed from Whig, and Tory from Tory; the 
 man of fact has gone into the same lobby with the man of 
 fancy—the man of fun with the man unconscious of a 
 joke; old heads have been knocked together till ali clear 
 perception of their whereabout has escaped them; there 
 has been a split upon the matter among the Six l'oung 
 Men who make up the party of Young England; Peel 
 stands marvelling, in spite of his experience, at the mag - 
 nitude of human folly; Graham seems beset with a notion 
 that, somehow or other, he is about to be very wrongfully 
 ejected from office, and, in anticipation of martyrdom, 
 speaks Com and Currency Pamphlets, treading the stage 
 with a sort of dignity, one hand thrust into his bosom, the 
 other into his breeches pocket: Lord John enacts the part of 
 the “ Scurvy Politician,” affecting to “ see the thing he does 
 not,”—i. e. a possibility of office, on a principle as tenable 
 as Bitting astride on a grindstone; and— 
 
 “ Yon, the great Toe of the Conspiracy," 
 out of which all this absurdity arises, have been christened 
 Jack Cade for your pains! 
 
 It seems to me, my Lerd, that that sobriquet should stick, 
 for never was nickname more appropriate; and, save and 
 excepting the gentlemen, who fought so heartily iu the 
 struggle, each to draw the cap over his own particular head, 
 
if performed bj 
 
 they can eat, an 
 Item—That, 
 
59 
 
No. XI. 
 
 TO THE WORKING MEN OF ENGLAND, EN 
 GAGED IN THE AGITATION FOR A TEN- 
 HOURS’ BILL. 
 
 Wobbikg Men— In a Letter addressed, last week, to 
 the Lord Ashley, I said that I should despair, indeed, 
 of the condition of the Labouring Population of England, 
 if they could be misled by such folly as that of which 
 this Sou of an Earl has self constituted himself the 
 coxcombed and tuubled Leader. I am now about to 
 tell you why; and, in so doing, I may come the more 
 readily and frankly to you, if I set out with the statement 
 that I am, not to say, born, but that I have been bred, and 
 now am, a Working Man. I have no patrimony but 
 the labour of my hands,—no expectancy but that which I 
 derive from their continued occupation. 
 
 Now, having said that, let me also say, that I have 
 as ready an inclination to take my ease,—as good a will to 
 do nothing,—or, at least, as little os I can help, as most 
 men ; and that, so far from beiug under-worked, “ a Twelve- 
 
 relieve me from several hours average of daily toil. I 
 often work eighteen hours per day; seldom, very seldom, 
 so few as ten, oftenest,—most often,—twelve, and more. 
 
 If, then, there be a case for legislative interference, 
 
 reaching me, by Act of Parliament, than there is in 
 dealing with any other Liibourer,—Factory Labourers 
 included. I am on a par with you all in that 
 respect; and, in some respects, I am more accessible than 
 many of you, the profession I follow having long expe¬ 
 rienced the blessing of Parliamentary interference, and 
 being, in consciiuence, afflicted wiih tile curse of Fiscal exac¬ 
 tion and Statutorial impediment. Nevertheless, I have so 
 perfect a horror of the “ tender mercies” of these People, 
 which, in fulfilment of Scripture, are no better than cruel¬ 
 ties, that, were any three Barristers of three years’ standing’ 
 
63 
 
 our local Dii 
 each Surgeo 
 
 rectories contain a Doctor’s Almanack, showing 
 on and Physician’s several turns for the year ? 
 
 i labour; for though the principle maybe of 
 It application to the cases of Doctors and 
 s only a difficulty of degree, since such a fixed 
 
64 
 
Free Trade. By so doing, you may help yourselves, and 
 get rid of all Humbugs, who do but help themselves in meal 
 or in malt, while they are misleading you. 
 
 London, April 4, 1844. 
 
 COTTON TWIST. 
 
No. XII. 
 
 A LETTER TO THE RIGHT HON. SIR ROBERT 
 REEL, BART., M.P., ON IRRESPONSIBLE 
 LEGISLATION. 
 
 ourable Sib,—W e were talking—I and ■ 
 
 Right Hose 
 
69 
 
70 
 
nation accordingly.” I never 1 
 body acting otherwise: they do 
 
76 
 
No. XIV. 
 
 RICHARD COBDEN, ESQ., 
 
80 
 
81 
 
 Gth. We have got rid of the reproach of “ Shakspere by 
 Act of Parliament;" but some of our legal friends might 
 lecture on Commerce end Manufactures in the Bame point 
 of view ; and the Statutes at Large supply materials enough 
 to make the hair of Common Sense stand on end. 
 
 7th. Opportunity might be taken, at the proper periods of 
 the year, to Lecture upon a very important branch, if not of 
 the subject of Free Trade, at least of the means of success— 
 i. e. on—The mode of getting and keeping a Vote. It does 
 appear to me that by so doing not only would Free Traders 
 be stimulated to take care of their own qualifications, but 
 thousands of unpaid Registration Agents would be called 
 into the field to counteract Clerical, and Official, and Paid 
 Agents on the other side. 
 
 8th. We might, possibly, procure some Minister of the 
 Church of England to lecture on the folly and wickedness 
 of treating the food-monopoly as a question of Tithe. And 
 
 9th. A similar Lecturer, or a Dissenting Brother, might 
 point out the facilities which an extended Commerce could 
 
r HON. SIR ROBERT PE 
 four Budget: I call it your 1 
 
annuitants. The Philosophers were wrong for once; the 
 Working Classes had no surplus cash, and, consequently, 
 the Savings’ Banks have been resorted to, principally, by 
 Benefit Societies, by small Tradesmen,by Clerks, and by the 
 poorer class of "Respectables. The interest they derive is 
 
86 
 
 2d, from 4d, is wise—indeed, nearly the only wise thing in 
 the Budget, and this idea you stole from the Whigs. 
 
 I may say pretty nearly the same of Marine Insurances; 
 although you retain the same unwise policy of taxing those 
 highest, which are most hazardous, and therefore are, as 
 I think, less obnoxious to taxation. 
 
 The last article is Wool; and the free importation of this, 
 is to benefit the Home Growers, by the opportunities it will 
 give for mixing! Then, of course, the Home Growers in- 
 intendto become Importers? or the process seems rather 
 difficult. Wool pays, if not of one shilling value, fd per lb; 
 and at and above that value, Id per lb. If a man will weigh 
 his coat, he may ascertain this set-off against the Income 
 Tax, always supposing that the Importer, and the Dealer, 
 and the Clothier, and the Tailor, give the public the dif¬ 
 ference—a very moot point, indeed, for these fractions sel¬ 
 dom torn into significant figures. 
 
 I don’t say that these things will benefit nobody; but this 
 I do say, that the benefits will not reach those who pay for 
 them in ten times their money value; and that, as a set-off 
 to the Income Tax, it is all Bottle-Conjuring. 
 
 In all things, there is a point of Taxation which does not 
 materially affect prices, or check consumption; and the true 
 relief to Trade is not so much the freedom from all impost 
 as the ascertaining of this point, and the removal of absurd 
 restrictions and Excise surveillance in the processes of manu¬ 
 facture. If you would propose to yourself the elucidation of 
 this problem, you might save yourself the trouble of taking off 
 Taxes, and, with much greater popularity, economy, and 
 public benefit, pnt a great many more on; since it is by 
 equalising the pressure, not by heaping it upon one part of 
 the body politic, that relief is afforded; and I feel certain 
 that,not only might industry be left practically free,but that 
 trade might be stimulated, and the national energy so 
 brought out that our fifty-two millions of Taxation would be 
 felt as nothing,—if your great experiment would take this 
 direction, instead of repealing duties, in toto, which 
 have a scarcely sensible effect upon prices, and are, indeed, 
 in that view, unworthy of public regard. 
 
 May 3,1841. COTTON TWIST. 
 
No. XVI. 
 
88 
 
91 
 
 counts wanted? We have a few undisposed thousands 
 of the Peel limitation at your service, on approved 
 securitiesor, “ Really, Sir, we have not the remotest 
 objection to this Bill, or to the parties to it; and we should, 
 indeed, be happy to do it for you; but we have already 
 reached the average issue of the last two years, and Peel 
 forbids us to go further!” 
 
 Thirdly, I want to know upon what principle you dare to 
 say that the wantB of thiB country are limitable, or ought to 
 be limited, to £14,000,000 of Paper Money of the Bank of 
 England, and to that of the last two years’average of all 
 other Banks of Issue ? What do you mean—to raise the 
 value of money in relation to the products of industry ? 
 What do you fear—the bugbear of an over-issue? No doubt 
 the first of these propositions may seem a fine thing to the 
 Squires, with their rent-rolls—to the mere Money-Monger, 
 
 
judicial care of the House of Lords, i 
 assembly was likely to bring all the r 
 fair and full enquiry, deliberation, am 
 also, to me highly indecorous to inter! 
 full hearing before a competent tribvn 
 
claim, which should and must be left 
 judges,—it is time that all this was put t 
 People should demand with one voice t 
 
No. XIX. 
 
 . SUFFERING FOR CONSCIENCE SAKE. 
 
 A LETTER TO THE RIGHT HON. THE LORD 
 LYNDHURST. 
 
 My Lord,—You hare been lately trying your hand at 
 Legislation, with the benevolent object of keeping the 
 Dissanters from scratching one another to pieces for a very 
 inadequate object, since it does not appear that much benefit 
 would arise from the full liberty of litigation, in the 
 
90 
 
 Ashworths ut Turtun, and by some dozen others, resident at 
 Liverpool, Manchester, and the like, who would be men of 
 mark and likelihood, eveu upon ’Change—which is submit¬ 
 
 ting them to the severest i 
 indeed, if, searching the fi 
 looking for aught to be said i 
 I should search no further th 
 out of the House of Peers < 
 
less than fifty-£ 
 In two of th( 
 
102 
 
 common fairness in its administration? It is high time 
 
 they asked that question: to have ren 
 such intolerable wrong would have beer 
 festation of a weakness, but of a crimipa 
 cause of justice which should bo, at o 
 sacred, to us all. 
 
 One other question they have not ask 
 them. I desire to know what this treatm 
 Is it the reward of Quaker Loyalty? Th 
 are among the surest subjects of the C 
 ward of Quaker Morality ? The Sociel 
 example to the world in all their socia 
 tions! Ib it the reward of Quaker Char 
 
105 
 
 Graham, in a manner marvellous to behold. “He," 
 quoth the Standard of May 31,—“ He," meaning Sir 
 ■Tames Graham, “may think that every other Home 
 
 the same sagacity, and the same humanity, which dis¬ 
 tinguish his administration of the department; but though 
 the opinion is natural to an honourable, candid, and modest 
 man, it is not our opinion.” No ; it would not be natural, 
 the Standard being neither honourable, candid, nor modest. 
 —Drunken men are so careless! Again, quoting as before, 
 “ It is a rare and happy accident to have a Home Secretary 
 
106 
 
 fashion of a penny candle, with a premonitory stink. This 
 stage may be termed “ Logically Drunk," and is thus illus¬ 
 trated by the Standard of June 4: “ If the Noble Lord, 
 (Russell) after a Robbery of his House, should detect his 
 Silver Spoons in the hands of Ben Coningsby, the notorious 
 
 ■ respectable nobleman 
 
107 
 
108 
 
 other alterations from the printed copy than the sup¬ 
 plying a few interjections, which the Amanuensis, em¬ 
 ployed for the occasion, and anxious to lose “no drop 
 of this Immortal Man,” faithfully recorded in the M.S.;— 
 which the Compositor, whose duty it became to “ follow his 
 copy, even through a window,” as the Printers say, as faith¬ 
 fully set up; but which the Reader, without any regard to 
 the interests of science, most rigorously expunged from the 
 
No. XXX. 
 
 A LETTER TO THE LORD BROUGHAM, ON 
 CODDLE-IFICATION OF THE LAW. 
 
 Mx Loud,— It was once said of you in Westminster Hall, 
 that, if your Lordship had but a little Law, you would have 
 a little of everything! It is seldom that so much wit is 
 pointed by so much truth; and I suppose that, of all the 
 Admirable Crichtons of modem times, there never was one 
 yet whose greatness was made up of such a host of small 
 matters. Law, Legislation, Science, the Arts, Political Eco¬ 
 nomy, Criticism, General Literature, History, Diviuity, 
 
 Catalogue of your pretensions, in subjects, on all of which 
 you undertake to pronounce, ex-cathedra, until you remind 
 one of those dirty blue wrappers to the Old Monthly Maga¬ 
 zines, on which the title of every branch of human knowledge 
 
110 
 
112 
 
i own honour, 
 to requires a 
 use: Keeptho 
 
120 
 
 a different opinion as to tho moral proprieties; bat coute 
 qui coute, the Home Secretary must be saved from the perils 
 of a committee, and why? Because this Act—a British 
 Act of Parliament, passed for British purposes, must 
 have come under inquiry, and it could not have failed to 
 be perceived, on inquiry, that tho Act gives no such power 
 as has been exercised. The exercise of this power thon, 
 it would follow, would be clearly illegal,—and if, upon 
 farther advice, this shenld appear, as no doubt it would, to 
 
 be the true reading of the statute, Mr. Mazzini cannot do 
 
 better than place the matter in professional hands, and 
 indict your Home Secretary for the misdemeanour. 
 
 PHILO TWIST. 
 
 29th June, 1844. 
 
PRECEPT AND PRACTICE-A DIGRES: 
 
 City in the West of England, who rendered biros 
 rious by playing “Morgan Rattler,” on a fid 
 Sunday morning! On being remonstrated with by l 
 
122 
 
 a carpenter’s plane, and plough it array, putting the tub 
 thenceaftor to her own use solely,—what would be thought 
 of that? 
 
124 
 
125 
 
 Yes, the “ noblemen and the gentlemen of rank ” bid the 
 “ men of low rank,” who are “ infinitely below them in 
 society,” not to “ do as they do, but as they tell them;"— 
 singing the Psalms of David, to the tune of “Morgan 
 Rattler,” played in uncommon slow time. 
 
 July 5,1814. PHILO TWIST. 
 
A NEW EIGHT ON AN OLD SUBJECT. 
 
 To the Editor of the Weekly Chronicle. 
 
 The old stock argument of the Agriculturist Pro- 
 nists was,—nay is,—for they are not ashamed of it yet, 
 have recently re-produced it with considerable force— 
 it is not good to be dependent on Foreign Countries for 
 od: thatis the principle upon which they set out; and, 
 
is your Covenant. “ Good sweet; 
 
129 
 
 from the uller impossibility to get any suitable employ¬ 
 ment," were ranged in a line, each to receive Sixpence from 
 the Poor-box, coupled with a threat of—Two months’ im- 
 
No. XXYI. 
 
 THE PEEL GOVERNMENT A REPUBLICAN 
 ADMINISTRATION. 
 
 A LETTER TO SIR ROBERT, AFORESAID. 
 SIB: You have been, within the experience of the 
 existing generation, Ultra-Tory, and Liberal Conservative— 
 
132 
 
133 
 
 my demand,—he i» cheated of all; and out of this plunder 
 Government purposes to reduce the Welch Tolls! 
 
 If this be not teaching violence the way to confiscate 
 property, and how well a Crowned Monarch and two Houses 
 of Parliament may be dispensed with, there is no force in 
 example. Truly, Sir Robert Peel, you move with the 
 
 What remains is a small matter by comparison, and I 
 mention it only to have a parting kick at the Bill. It is 
 proposed that the future management of the Roads should 
 be in Boards, appointed by the Local Magistrates ? Oh, 
 Lord! 
 
 PHILO TWIST. 
 
 London, July 19,1844. 
 
No. XXVII 
 PAUPERISING INFLUENCE 
 
 POOR 
 
136 
 
No. XXVIII 
 
 LORD BROUGHAM’S CODIFICATION OF TIIK 
 CRIMINAL LAW. 
 
 (i Continued from the Weekly Chronicle of June 1G) 
 
 My Lord—I would apol.op.isc for neglecting you so long, 
 but thatyour restless egotism is self-fed,and in such quantity, 
 as to render you alike jealous, as impatient, of notice and 
 praise from external quarters; and sensible to external cen¬ 
 sure no further than as it affords you the agreeable excite- 
 
140 
 
 standard 6ize for Tailors to make coatB to, is calculated to 
 provide against misfits. 
 
 That which is really required is—a cheap reprint of the 
 Statutes at Large, with full indexes, carefully digested, and 
 pointing out how each subject and section have been progres¬ 
 sively modified, altered, amended, repealed, and otherwise 
 provided for: this, with regard to past Statutes; and, 
 with reference to new cases, every Bill in Parliament should 
 be submitted to competent legal authority, charged with the 
 duty of reporting to Parliament in what manner overv 
 proposed Bill is calculated to operate, not only in relation 
 to its object, but with reference to existing laws. Other 
 measures might be resorted to, to check hurried legislation 
 at the end of the Session; and full indexes should be ap¬ 
 pended to every annual volume of the Statutes, with a 
 periodical consolidation of such indexes—at stated intervals 
 of years apart. 
 
shallow, sort of person, 
 
 The two difficulties in construeiug an Act of Parliament 
 arises, first, in clearly ascertaining the moaning of its words, 
 and, next, in applying them properly to the question in issue. 
 And it is only by tho rival ingenuity of counsel, each devoted 
 to find out the wealr parts of the other side, and by judicial 
 care, in weighing the reasons adduced, and watching over 
 the practical application of legal principles, that the 
 correct decision is ultimately arrived at. A new law, there¬ 
 fore, must always ha of more uncertain application than on 
 old one, which has been subjected to legal analysis and 
 decision, und of which, therefore, the meaning, force, and 
 effect have been pretty fully ascertained. 
 
 And here it is proposed to re-tviite the whole body of 
 Statutory Law as it relates to ono principal division j—and 
 
145 
 
151 
 
NO. XXXI. 
 
 LORD BROUGHAM’S CODIFICATION OF THE 
 CRIMINAL LAW. 
 
 (Concluded from the Weekly Cbhonicle of July 27.) 
 
 My Lobd,— In my Letter, under date 26th July, I re¬ 
 marked upon another evil of Codification, “ that of giving 
 new life to tyrannical Statutes, which now remain in 
 deserved oblivion, but which, if included in a New Code, 
 as they would be, and are in yours, would become in¬ 
 tolerable nuisances and scourges to the People.” For, 
 in the midst of all this bending to nominal changes, there 
 is a clinging to substantial defects, which you have so far 
 sacrificed to, in setting yourself up for a Brummagem 
 Justinian, that we find in your Code all these old 
 enormities retained, revived, and put into available shape, 
 for the purposes of oppression. 
 
 Thus we have the absurd nonsense of the Statute of 
 Treasons (25 Ed. 3, St. 5, C. 2) sought to be restored into 
 a state of galvanised existence; and it is gravely pro¬ 
 vided that, as cases of Treason may arise not specified 
 in the Statute, the Judges, in all cases of doubt whether 
 the crime amounts to Treason or Felony, shall “ tarry, 
 without any going to judgment, till the cause be shewed 
 and declared before the King and his Parliament, whether it 
 ought to be adjudged Treason or Felony !” 
 
 All the old No-Popery follies are also reduced into an 
 intelligible form; and Jesuits are warned to abstain from 
 the Kingdom; and lay subjects of the Crown,in course of 
 education in Popish Seminaries abroad, are ordered home, 
 under the exceedingly Elizabethian penalty of suffering 
 death for these very facetious Treasons! 
 
 The 82d article sets up a new offence—“ any contempt 
 against the Person of her Majesty or her Royal Dignity, 
 by means of any contumelious, insulting, or disparaging 
 words, acts, or gestures.” But surely the experience of the 
 age has outgrown the imagination of Lord Brougham in 
 this respect; and can any ono tell me what is a con¬ 
 tumelious or disparaging gesture ? The Omnibus-box, in 
 
receive a Legacy, or become possessed of any properly by 
 deed of gift! This is to defeat all the rational purposes of 
 punishment, and is dictated, setting aside its folly, by the 
 Spirit of the Devil, rather than by the Spirit of Christ- 
 Unity. 
 
156 
 
 daughter unmarried,” “ shall ho deemed to signify the King’s 
 eldest, or only daughter for the time being who shall not have 
 
157 
 
 been married!" From all which we infer a danger of con 
 founding married life with single life, and of mistaking the 
 Son for the Daughter, or of fancying the Crown might be 
 held on the tenure of Borough-English, or of imagining 
 the Sister, or some other relative of the monarch, was 
 intended by his Son—if herd Brougham had not kindly 
 stepped in to define the word Son, by Son,—and the word 
 Eldest, by Eldest,—and the word Daughter, by Daughter, 
 —and the word Unmarried, by Unmarried;—from all 
 which the Reader may be inclined to define the word 
 Brougham, by Ass; and so, my Lord, I commend you to 
 your native thistle! 
 
 London,23d August, 18M. PHILO-TWIST. 
 
No. XXXII. 
 
 PHILANTHROPY MIS-SPELT. 
 
 That Saxon.headed, and English-hearted, Old-man (how 
 ever wrong in many thingB he might have been,—I mean)—■ 
 Cobbett,had a peculiar mode of euphonising his contempt 
 of a certain sort of Modem Philosophy in general, and of 
 Scotch Philosophy in particular, by writing it thus -Feel- 
 osophee! and, in all probability, had he directed his shafts 
 against a certain sort of Philanthropy, too current in these 
 
 similar euphonization. A man, now, by a very slight stretch 
 of imagination, might discover a much better solution for 
 this than that of a mere idle fancy; and Cobbett, no doubt, 
 intended to say, that the thing he despised was as mis¬ 
 spelt a thing in spirit, as he had made it in fact: it is even so 
 with the Pseudo-Philanthropy of the day, whether patronised 
 by high names, or fulminated through the Press; and a 
 thing more contemptible in itself, more vicious in its princi¬ 
 ple, and more eminently calculated to mislead the well- 
 intending, does not, perhaps, exist. 
 
 Turning over the other day a provincial paper, “ which” 
 (as excellent Charles Mathews used to say, in his Law. 
 Report of Goody Grimm versus Lapstone—which) “ for 
 obvious reasons shall be nameless,” I chanced upon an 
 article upon the melancholy subject of the Suicide of two 
 poor Shirt-makers, and in which the Editor, now lashing 
 himself into a state of great Gin and Bitterness, did fiercely 
 inveigh against all Slop.sellers, Jews and otherwise; and 
 then, soothed by the influences of tobacco, finished off with 
 a touching appeal to their bowels—as if the bowels of a 
 Slop-seller were made of anything else but thread and 
 bobbin—appealing to them rather blasphemously, I thought, 
 and, with regard to the Jews, rather curiously—in the name 
 of God and their common Redeemer, that these things may 
 not be! 
 
 Now all this is very silly, if not very dishonest. I give 
 the writer the benefit of the “if;” nevertheless, in many 
 cases, theso '< cry aloud and spare nots” of the Provincial 
 
159 
 
 anil the facility of taking up the howl of a London Daily 
 Paper, into whose columns, by a little judicious toadyism 
 and interlarded puffing, the article may find its way in 
 whole or in part. It is astonishing what a Trade somo of 
 the Provincial Papers drive in this way : an exchange of 
 Papers is the common practice; this may be called an 
 exchange of Advertisements. 
 
 But, at all events, it is very silly; for thougli it may be 
 very true that no man, in conscience, is entitled to the labour 
 
160 
 
 brother—the child of her mother’s old ago, and the very joy 
 of her own heart, looking on him as she does, with a mingled 
 sisterly and motherly feeling—enabling her to send him to 
 
 But it is otherwise with the “ Slop-seller’s Victim,” as 
 
161 
 
 in making taxation a source of Revenue, and of nothing else 
 —in restricting it so that it shall not press at all upon con¬ 
 sumption—and in so far modifying our Poor Laws as to 
 afford a safety-valve for the accumulated consequences of a 
 long career of oppression and wrong, until opportunities 
 have been furnished to the Poor for self-extrication from 
 that degree of wretchedness and want, into which they have 
 been dragged, confessedly in order that the wealthy might 
 provide good settlements for their children. This, with an 
 extension of Education, and a broader basis for our Repre¬ 
 sentative System, may save the Country: the reverse of 
 this can only end in misery and in violence. 
 
 August 30,1844. COTTON TWIST. 
 
No. XXXIII. 
 
 SHIFT TO ESCAPE DOING JUSTICE. 
 Correspondent of yours, who considers that I havo 
 
164 
 
 Army contracts as the Slop-cutter confessed does of the 
 Shirt-making. In the crazy imagination of either they would 
 both he examples of the operation of Free Trade,—and it is 
 remarkable how those who ought to know better, than even 
 the Slop -Post or the Slop-cutter, walk equally aside from 
 the question, trying it by teste with which justice or expe¬ 
 diency have little to do. 
 
 It appears by the Census that a very material alteration 
 has taken place in the relative numbers of the Agricultural 
 and Manufacturing sections of the People; and the Times 
 
No. XXXIV. 
 
 {To the Editor of the Weekly Chronicle.) 
 SILENT GRIEFS! 
 
 Passing along the streets of a Provincial Town, on Satur¬ 
 day night, a thin, wretched, plaintive voice, which seemed 
 to eome from the very pavement under my feet, exclaimed, 
 “ Please, Sir, to buy a box of Lucifer Matches!” I looked 
 down upon a diminutive boy—dirty, ragged, and haggard, 
 with hair that had been flaxen, and a face that had been 
 pretty, for there was the blue Saxon eye, and the full, intel¬ 
 ligent, Saxon face; but want had marred what God had 
 made; and the image of the Almighty bad never, perhapB, 
 been moro effaced, and disfigured, than in the specimen of 
 
166 
 
damp and cheerless cottage, at the squalor of his children, 
 who moan for the food it is not in his power to give them 
 There he sits, with the Devil whispering in the ear of a 
 
168 
 
 ready listener, and with no good Angel to win him back on 
 the other side: she hath quitted him long ago! Preach to 
 him, Parson Orator; but, unless your words drop loaves of 
 bread and slices of bacon, you may spare your undeniable 
 truisms; they are no truths to him. 
 
 Yes, these People have been neglected,—grossly neglected, 
 not only as to their physical wants, but as to their moral 
 necessities/ Worse still, they have been legislated at—not 
 /or; and, before we hope to drive away the Devil at their 
 ear, and to recall the good Angel to their hearts, we must 
 begin a work upon ourselves, by enlarging our sympathies, 
 and extending, or rather creating, a practical knowledge of 
 the material we have to deal with; and, then, putting aside 
 a selfish regard to monopolist interests, and becoming 
 Christian in thought, and word, and deed, the silent griefs 
 of the Pour may be confided to the sympathies of the rich, 
 and the noiseless artillery of Swing set bonfires alight 
 throughout the length and breadth of the land. 
 
 COTTON TWIST. 
 
 Bristol, Oct. 3,1844. 
 
170 
 
172 
 
afford to British industry, and would not even object 
 to its being fabricated of cast iron! This may bo 
 insanity; but, in the midst of tergiversation, trickery, 
 
A Tale of a Washing Tub. 
 
better to offer the Poor than Sope and Water miles away 
 from their places I thinks the Lord Mayor might just as 
 well offer me the use of a billis to bo Mowed with ony at the 
 Mansbin Hous; and if 1 can’t get it any other way, I in¬ 
 tends to remain one of the grate unwashd. So no more at 
 present, from, Respected Sir, Hi ours humbly, 
 
 GEORGE JONES, 
 Bellhange;, 7 Dials. 
 
 30th Octobir, 1841. 
 
 [We have altered the more glaring defects of spelling in 
 the above letter, because we do not wish, in inserting it, to 
 excite mere idle laughter; but we have not carried our cor¬ 
 rections, either in spelling or in grammar, to the fullest pos- 
 
187 
 
 Boric, Ihe result of au after-attempt. However, we.leave 
 John Booth to George Joues, to whom, having referred an 
 early proof of the above, we are indebted for the follow¬ 
 ing reply.] 
 
 TO THE EDITOR OF THE WEEKLY CHRONICLE. 
 
188 
 
 what Efluvia moan, and he said—stink! But, Sir, if John 
 Booths close do stink why not say so in plane English. 
 
 Sir, some wives and some husbands, ool be cross any 
 
189 
 
Cotton Twist Redivivus. 
 
 No. XXXVIII. 
 
 A GHOST STORY: 
 
 BEING ONE OF A REGULAR SERIES OF STANDARD 
 TALES FOR AGRICULTURAL NURSERIES. 
 
 The Standard sees nothing in the fact that the League 
 has given £3,000 for the use of Covent Garden Theatre for 
 the Agitation Season of 1845, to invalidate its theory that 
 the League is dead! Indeed, the Standard looks upon tho 
 fact as a collateral proof of the truth of its assertion; for, 
 the League being dead, it is the more essential to its pur¬ 
 poses to establish a case of existence; and where so much 
 is at stake, it might have been expected that £3,000 
 
192 
 
No. xxxvni. 
 
 WHAT SHALL BE DONE WITH THE 
 INCOME TAX? 
 
 A LETTER TO COTTON OR PHILO TWIST, BY A 
 MAN OF A HUNDRED AND FIFTY! 
 
 Sir: The Chancellor’s Budget is booked for a surplus, 
 next year, of income over expenditure—that may be taken 
 as a safe prophecy. What the surplus may be, no man 
 
r, he is a respectability 
 Wherefore the differ- 
 
197 
 
198 
 
geminated some years ago by Lord Brougham, and his Patent 
 Royal Road Society, on Capital and Labour, in which the 
 helpless working man was taught, ex cathedra, the doctrine 
 of supply and demand, an'dInstructed in the mystery of 
 fetching his. price by withdrawing from the labour market ? 
 
203 
 
 paupor-making laws of tlio Monopolists, at tho bottom of 
 it all. 
 
 i,et the Ilicli do juatico and love mercy, and tho Poor 
 could well spare, and livo without, their charity. 
 
 I shall pursue this subject in my nest. 
 
 COTTON TWIST. 
 
 T.ondon, Gth Dee., 1841. 
 
that word in its popular, if not in its more Christian accept¬ 
 ation ; and Moses and Son—quoting them as the type merely 
 of the class of patent-thread-aud-bobbin-bowolled people— 
 uro infinitely less to be consured: they only take advantage, 
 and, as times go and tradesmen reason, a legitimate advan¬ 
 tage, oi the state of the labour market: Lord Ashley, am! 
 
up a shoy-hoy to divert public attention, so far as may be, 
 from tlio real evil—get up a mock society for tho fallacy of 
 relieving a distress themselves have created, and then cm. 
 ploy the funds to advertise—what? their own piety, virtue, 
 and philanthropy I 
 
 " Pish! fig! tho gallows! a cart's tail 
 And Drummors—threo, say I, for such humanity 
 A Meeting is got up of the" Society for tho Protection and 
 Employment of the Distressed Neodlewomen,” which has 
 been nino months in existence; and it is, previously, an. 
 nounccd that Lord Ashley has consented to remain in town— 
 livo or three days, for the purpose of attending it! In due 
 timo it is held; and out come tho Ministerial Papers, who 
 
206 
 
 Noodlos tliemsolvos have not more “ sorts’ than Needle¬ 
 women. First, thoro is tho family drossmakor, who takes 
 her work homo; and, if she is a “ good fitter,” manages to 
 pick up a decent living. Many talos, however, might he told 
 of her struggles and late hours, and Mrs. Hall, or Mary 
 Howitt, might make something of the subject in tho Monthly 
 Magazines. Secondly, thero are the fashionable milliners' 
 assistants—for tho most part apprentices—who pay dearly 
 enough for learning tho business, who are nearly blinded 
 by the effects of ono good soason, and who must continue 
 to labour for existence and opthalmia, so long a6 ladies will 
 havo drosses home by a certain timo, and will not givo thoir 
 orders until half an hour beyond the lost moment in which 
 itis poBsiblo to got ono of thorn up, with any docent dogree of 
 industry. Thirdly,thero arc tho uoodlowomcn who go out for 
 so much a day and thoir food, their price varying from Is fid 
 to Is, and, in tho case of the vory young, to fid per day; and 
 experienced housewives will toll you that tho eightconpenny 
 stitcher is, for the most part, tho most economical of the 
 three—she is the least oater, and tho steadiest and best 
 worker. Fourthly, and lastly, como the helots, who do slop¬ 
 work, getting less money and no food. 
 
 Now the Report of this Society informs us that they havo 
 “ rccommonded” 975 applicants to places, at 9s per week; and 
 as no food is mentioned, no food, I presume, was stipulated 
 for. This number, tho Report adds, was only ono-third of 
 tho applicants, and as the Society has only boon in existence 
 nino monthB, and threo wintor months more are duo to 
 make up tho year, it follows that throe times 975, with the 
 same averago for the threo months wanting to completo the 
 yoar, would givo 3,900 applicants willing to work for 9s 
 a wook and no food; and to pay those, at that rate, would 
 take a capital of £91,260. 
 
 Does any one suppose that this Society, or any Society, 
 is competent to create, or to mannge, a patronage of this 
 oxtont? The whole thing is, solf-demonstrably, impossible 
 to overy reasoning man. What doos tho Socioty do itself '! 
 Its total receipts is £792 7s 5jd: this is made up of £456 Cs 
 subscriptions, and £336 Is 5§d received for nocdlowork. 
 Tho disbursements, which consist “ chiefly of wages to 
 uoedlowomon, and of materials bought and made up fin 
 distribution to tho destitute,” amount to £730. 
 
 Now lot us apply these figures. Had tho wliolo of the 
 sxpendituro been applied to wages alone,—and wo arc told 
 
the soil; and something might be done by Titmarsh, could 
 wo take that Artist-eye and Truthful-hand into our wretched 
 garrets, our miserable cellars, our blind alleys, and our in¬ 
 fected rookeries, bidding him paint what ho saw in all its 
 hideous reality. But what have the current illustrations of 
 the day—the mixture of beastly caricature and lay-figure 
 rags and wretchedness, or the misspelt vulgarities, and 
 Royal Victoria Heroics of the fry, who ape Boz, and strain 
 after Dougias Jorrold,to do with the real living and breath¬ 
 ing state of the case ? IIow near, indeed, does Boz himself, 
 with his fierce impracticable sympathies—his benevolent 
 
 those, and loss near by far than Jerridd, who, but for tlnd 
 
211 
 
 The condition of the people—their positive, substantial, 
 permanent Well-being, must be looked after and cared for, 
 and the rest will follow. Agitate, Legislate for that: the 
 people will look after their own comforts in eating, lodging, 
 and washing. You have neglected that, snd sickness has 
 followed want, and filth sickness, and a miserable abode the 
 lack of means to rent abetter; until one misery, reacting 
 on the other, has produced the present almost hopeless 
 depth of distress—a depth of distress, to alleviate which is 
 heyond charity;—at least, it is beyond all such push-pin 
 play as that very silly piece of self-sanctification, the much 
 and ingeniously advertised Lord Ashley indulges in. 
 
 COTTON TWIST. 
 
 London, January 3, 1815. 
 
a Repeal of the Corn Laws;—and, item, it appears that a 
 Local Genius has discovered one great cause of Incen¬ 
 diarism, and has submitted to the kindred Gothamites of 
 some Maidstone Agricultural Association a project for very 
 satisfactorily Sir Peter Laurieing—that is, uniting down— 
 the crime! 
 
 “It was a curious fact,” remarked the Learned Judge 
 
213 
 
214 . 
 
 the Duodecimo Bibliomaniac; hut Bolton Cerney—a 
 
 That Lucifers, being solely an article of domestic utility, 
 any person found in possession of them out of doors, under 
 any pretence, except in conveying them from the manufac¬ 
 turer to the vendor, or from the vendor to the house of the 
 purchaser or their employer, should be considered guilty 
 ef a misdemeanor, and punished accordingly !” 
 
 This is clearly the result of an intellect which sees an evil 
 in its full force, and goes straight at a remedy with a truly 
 ancient simplicity ! In the same straightforward, inartihcial 
 
216 
 
THE FULL LENGTH OF THE TETHER. 
 
 A RECEX ^’DISCOVERY OF THE TENANT-FARMERS. 
 
 honorary Member of Young England, without compromis- 
 
 sand, and collecting subsidies by the hundred thousand,— 
 if, iustead of being and doing all this, Mr. Cobden had alone 
 taught the Tenant Farmers oi irngumu to touk a little iuto 
 
218 
 
No. XLIII. 
 
 POSITION AND PROSPECT! 
 Editor of the U 
 
principle, givir 
 the Miller at h 
 with an unprot 
 way of allayir 
 
 wealthy Ship- 
 them the pri 
 
 Bond, of feedi: 
 England, who | 
 
f a Turpin, or with the courtly air of a 
 ■ Robert should ever desire to Ledger the 
 lalie himself Debtor to what he took out 
 
Lord ! The Earl of Wharncliffe! 
 stumble by accident upon a given 
 on an O’Connell Appeal, and to 
 rom a difficulty, with the additional 
 t. Then Lord Stanley? Yes, if the 
 spirit can be brought to the calmer 
 
228 
 
from Peel’s own mouth, as recently spoken as last night in tl 
 
232 
 
 over a chain of fortuitous circumstances kept in office, 
 against all reasonable calculation, and in the very teeth of 
 experience. 
 
 Peel, then, in this view, is weak; but he is also strong, 
 
233 
 
 excitation of the principle of fear in the Agricul¬ 
 tural Majority; because that is a reason against de'ualiug 
 and dividing upon the Corn Laws; whilst the League is a 
 standing fact, which at once, and conclusively, negatives all 
 force in such a proposition. But, given the energy and pur¬ 
 pose of the League, aud take the Evidence and Reports of 
 the Import Duties Committee; set up the principle, that 
 Revenue, and Revenue alone, is the proper object of tax¬ 
 ation; take fur your compass tiie guiding poiut, that tax¬ 
 ation, pressed beyond this principle, is tyranny ; direct com¬ 
 mon sense and experience to ascertain the point at whiob 
 taxation affects price, aud price iuterieres with consumption; 
 decide, upon consideration of these things, that all things 
 shall bo taxed proportionately and fairly, and guard your¬ 
 selves from tile theoretical fallacy that the cost of 
 
 a Tariff, or that, because the bulk of the receipt 
 is derived from u few articles, you may, therefore, 
 save tire difference numerically by declaring all minor 
 
 Committee sat at the Reform Club to digest such a matter, 
 charged with the duty of puttiug it into the tangible shape 
 of a Bill for I’arliament, to be introduced by the acknow¬ 
 ledged leaders of the Opposition, with the, full concurrence 
 mid support of the Opposition itself,—had this been done, 
 the Room-up-Stairs might have been much better, and 
 more cheaply occupied; and it is a small thing to say that 
 the position of Reel, aud our position, would have been, 
 relatively, materially better for the party, and the people 
 also. 
 
 In the absence of this, how strong is Peel in that geolo¬ 
 
 gical similitude of our party—its friable nature? We are 
 so independent, that each man of one-fourth of our common 
 soldiery individually sets up Commander-in-Chief on ilia pri¬ 
 vate responsibility, and fancies himself born to lead Armies 
 and conquer Kingdoms on his own particular account! And 
 then wc are so honest, that we proclaim our anxiety to treat 
 
 giving them ten times the credit they are entitled to; and wo 
 disclaim, earnestly, the very supposition of a factious oppo¬ 
 sition, which operates in suspecting the motives and discou¬ 
 raging the policy of our friends, for no other practical 
 end but the continuance of our enemies in power. And 
 who is llie Leader of the Opposition? Lord John? or 
 
ndard to point to the Elections, 
 ,o he a strong Government! No- 
 of its Members. But it is quite 
 of a mind to cry “ Play out the 
 of the piece so palpably near, it 
 
235 
 
 moment's notice; and, whatever Peel does, it will he sure, 
 more or less, to partake of the nature of Peel: tho mystery 
 is part of his system—most like him in the manner of doing 
 
 Meautimo the Mountain labours, but I am not among 
 the spectators; I look back at the absurdities of the Tariff 
 —at the violated promise of a set-off to the Income Tax; 
 at the positive, unmitigated oppression, and unequal taxa¬ 
 tion, on the one hand; at the money thrown into the sea, on 
 the other. Sir Robert Peel says that Agricultural Distress 
 has not arisen from his measures: I answer—nor Manu¬ 
 facturing Prosperity. If any man should know what effect 
 these measures have had on family expenditure, the man 
 with thirteen mouths dependent on him for existence should 
 know, and my Household Book tells me that the Income 
 
236 
 
 Electors of the Duke’s Town, in which he declares his 
 principles to be, “ To secure the Agricultural Classes that 
 protection to which they are justly entitled.!’ Is it possiblo 
 that these People can read, and that they do not compare this 
 declaration, of asubordinato member of Peel’s Government, 
 with the declarations by Peel himself, made in Parliament? 
 Again,a vacancy occurs in the County of Bucks: it was 
 generally understood that Mr. Murray was merely put in 
 to keep the seat warm for the Marquis of Chandos, who has 
 now attained his majority; and at an Agricultural Dinner 
 one of the Clansmen Tenant Farmers tenders the seat to 
 the Duke. But the Duko said, “ It was not considered 
 advisable that the Marquis of Chandos should offer to 
 represent them at that lime. On some future occasion he 
 would come forward and sceh their confidence. (Great 
 cheering.) At the present time Mr. Towers, a gentleman of 
 considerable property and influence, would ofler himself, 
 and he should have bis best support. (Hear, hear.)” Now 
 take this with the fact of the Duke’s Garter,—the pocket 
 borough, held at the Government disposal,—the circum¬ 
 stance that the Duke is not, grammatically, up to tlio pro¬ 
 per protection point at agricultural meetings, where ho talks 
 fine words not inconsistent with further anticipated changes, 
 and that lie does not identify himself with the Malt- 
 Tax-repealing Deputation in its interview with Peel,— 
 and should it not bn plain to reasoning men that the Duke 
 is clear-headed enough to see that all this humbug must go 
 by the board—that he does not wish to put a son of his in 
 a position where he could hardly choose but oppose Peel— 
 that the Duke feels ho cannot prop up the shattered pile, 
 but is anxious to save himself and his family influence in 
 his own County from sharing in the fall—and that, there¬ 
 fore, Mr. Towers is put forward, not only as Warming-pan 
 for the Marquis, but as Cat’s-paw for the Duke ? Men 
 should seo this, and men not seeing it contribute to tlio 
 strength of Peel. 
 
 London, 14th February, 1845. 
 
 COTTON TWIST. 
 
238 
 
scale of participation. 
 , except for the doublo 
 Farmers, and keeping 
 Member of the Agri- 
 
242 
 
246 
 
No. XLVI. 
 
 PEEL’S PRICE FOR “ONE” YEAR! 
 
 PEEL’S “OWN” PRINCIPLE 
 OF •' BUYING IN THE CHEAPEST AND SELLING IN 
 THE DEAREST MARKETS” 
 
 IS FULLY EXEMPLIFIED IN, AND CARRIED OUT BY, 
 
 PEEL'S “OWN” PRACTICE! 
 
254 
 
 would be a very fair cry, or that the highest of these Esti¬ 
 mates for Ireland gives an amount unduly low. However, 
 let us take it at that, and the item will be £200,000. 
 
 2. Sugar.— The paper to which I alluded in the com¬ 
 mencement of my Letter—the Economist — taking the 
 different Scales of Duty proposed by Peel on the several 
 classes of Sugar, and calculating them upon the estimated 
 consumption of the ensuing year, which formed part of the 
 Premier’s Financial Statement, deduces an aggregate 
 
 £3,079,999. The Working Classes may set that against the 
 three ounces additional of Moist which Peel proposes to 
 give them under this magnificent arrangement! But that 
 is not all: Mr. Wilson, a sufficient authority, calculates that 
 a Revenue of £7,000,000 a year might be derived from Sugar, 
 bv the Equalization of the Duties. The Revenue which 
 Sir Robert Peel calculates upon from the same source for 
 the year ensuing, is £3,916,000. Loss, therefore, [to the 
 
 a year, £3,081,000; making the total item for Sugar, adding 
 together what the Country will pay for Protection, to what 
 it will lose in Revenue, in all £6,163999. 
 
 3. Coal. —There is nothing which can he said against a 
 Tax on Exported Coal, which cannot be said with ten times 
 the force against a Tax upon any other branch of industry 
 at Home; for it must be evident, that, whether the Tax he 
 paid at the Pit’s mouth,—the Manufactory,—or at the Ship’s 
 
 corned; and when the Premier takes credit for removing all 
 Taxes on Exports, Coal included, he does but juggle with 
 the principle, after his wont, unless it can be shown that 
 Home manufacture, or Produce, is totally free from Taxa¬ 
 tion. So long, however, as that is not the case, a more unde¬ 
 serving plea of exemption was never set up than that set up 
 in the case of Coal; and it would never have been listened 
 to but for the powerful and cnmbiued nature of the interest 
 devoted to the Trade. We have seen that Peel himself 
 tacitly admitted the worthlessness of the Monopoly, in the 
 reference made by him to the two prices—one to the 
 Foreigner, and one to the Englishman; yet to that interest 
 he remits a large sum, which taxes the Consumer in the 
 bounty it offers to exportation, and also in the sum it 
 abstracts from the Public Treasury. In this latter view 
 
are to pay, by way of lightening ibe pressure of the exist¬ 
 ing taxation upon them, to the public benefit, as a matter 
 
 hut, as I am not anxious to press a hard case more hardly, 
 I shall only charge to Peel’s account the balance of loss 
 £250,000. 
 
 7. The Glass Duties.— Sir Robert Peel said in his 
 speech, that somebody had told him, who had been told by 
 somebody, that somebody else had said, that, if the Glass 
 Duties were removed, he thought he could do glass work, for 
 which he was now charging one shilling per foot for, pro¬ 
 bably, as low as four-pence. Everybody who knew anything 
 of glass, knew at once, that, whatever might be deemed tho 
 value of so loose a statement, it could only refer to Crown 
 (common window) Glass; but Everybody who did not know 
 anything of glass—that is to say the bulk of the hearers, 
 and readers, have run away with the idea that this referred 
 to glass generally, and the wildest expectations of reduction 
 have consequently ensued. Itwas a very natural, yet, if viewed 
 in relation to the facts, a very absurd, inference; but it will 
 
convenience of llio thing, to the very clear statement of 
 Feel’s propositions, contained in your leading columns a 
 fortnight ago, it will he seen that these reductions are to take 
 place in the year ensuing, upon an anticipated surplus to 
 accrue during the year ending April, 1846; but Peel admits 
 that a surplus of £5,000,000 will accrue in the Receipts and 
 Expenditure of the year ending April, 1815; and, deducting 
 the £2,000,000 applied to the payment of Exchequer Bills, 
 issued on account of the Opium Compensation, there still 
 remains £3,000,000 in hand. What is to be done witli that ? 
 Why, Sir, an Executor or Trustee retaining money in his 
 hands, though he place it at his Bankers, and no interest 
 accrue on it, is liable in Equity for £4 per cent.; and what 
 is Peel but a Trustee,in the matter of the National Revenue, 
 for the Nation at large? What right has he to impose a Tax. 
 of £5,000,000, with an admitted balance of £3,000,000 in 
 hand? It is but common justice to charge the interest to his 
 account, and if he objects to the rate—that money may be 
 had for less—let him ask his Chancellor, Lyndhurst, who 
 will tell him '-hat £4 per cent, is the lowest figure in Equity ; 
 and thatit ought to he £5 per cent., on the score of its being 
 notoriously employed in trade: and £4 per cent, on Three 
 Millions Sterling is £120,000. 
 
the Matter of Consumption for one Year,upon the 
 Items of his Budget for 1845:— 
 
 To the Income Tax (Peel's Special). 5,200,000 
 
 - Irish Hush Money . 200,000 
 
 I Monopolists Protection.... £3,079,959 
 
 Revenue Prevention . £3,084,000 
 
 -6,163,9!)!) 
 
 —- Coal Monopoly Encouragement . 118,000 
 
 - Scattered for a Scramble, m different ways 213,334 
 
 - Lancashire Capitalists (A Donation). 680,000 
 
 - Tax on Distress, remitted to the Distrainers 
 
 (N.B. without constraint). 250,000 
 
 - Glass Iron Pipes, Glass Earthenware, and 
 
 Glass everything . 126,667 
 
 - Interest on a balance of £3,000,000, cash in 
 
 hand, and employed in business, at £4 pa¬ 
 rent. A Very Low Rate. 120,000 
 
 £13,372,000 
 
 Cr— (Taken on Credit) 
 
 By 3or in the 1 lb of Moist.subject to a probable 
 
 deduction of two-tliirds . 1,300,000 
 
 — Cheap Physic, Zinc, Spanish Nuts, Cats' 
 
 Skins, Tracies, and Tar, the public pro¬ 
 portion, to be shared among 28,000,000 
 of people . 106,666 
 
 — Cheap Window Breaking, in the like pro¬ 
 
 portion . 213,333 
 
 £1,619,999 
 
 To tal Debit down . 13,372,000 
 
 Credit . 1,619,99!) 
 
 Cos! of a Pudg-t, under Peel.... £11,752,00! 
 
down, bis party, i 
 Trade, to the fi 
 result of his polii 
 
No. XLVII1. 
 
 A CONFESSION OF FAITH. 
 
 It is as true of flattery, as it is of Blander, that, if you do 
 but heap on enough, some of it will be sure to abide by its 
 object. White lies are notoriously accredited things, and a 
 white-beaded lie comes to bo generally admitted at last. 
 Lord Melbourne once declared, that he looked at the con¬ 
 sequences of falsehood, applied to the purposes of traduce- 
 ment, with a mournful apprehension : here is consolation 
 for his Lordship; he has only to countermine with false¬ 
 hood, applied to the purposee of flaitery, and all is well- 
 nay, better than well, again. Let it be suggested that Kings 
 are not only men, but that they have been, in great part, very 
 bad men, and courtiers start at the traitorous expression 
 —it is so unusual; yet upon what better authority have 
 
om the prime, though silent, mover 
 o keep on speaking, and visiting 
 .brink from the meanness of prompt ■ 
 lively to deny concession, reserving 
 unexpectedly conceding what waB 
 after it had been, by his own in- 
 
for Money in the abstract, and that Sir Robert Peel has 
 done. The object of his currency dabblings is to depre¬ 
 ciate prices by the enforced elevation of the value of Money; 
 its immediate effect has been to fatten the monopoly of 
 Threadneedle-street, and so far to increase its present and 
 future strength and power. Sir Robert Peel may justify 
 yet the hyperbole of his father; and this, whatever it be, 
 whether design or a simple idiosyncrasy, is not greatness, nor 
 a sign of greatness: nevertheless, X believe in the greatness 
 of Sir Robert Peel—as Candide believed in the existence of 
 Griffins. 
 
 Greatness is large in its views, and censistont in their 
 application. It does not bluudor in the dark, lest the world 
 
266 
 
267 
 
 dification of the Sliding Scale was a bitter pill— bo 
 Canada Cora Bill—so was Grinding in Bond—so 
 reduction on the Importation of Cattle—but they wt 
 
and your guides; and, though you will not pretend to assert 
 that you have been right, you can safely declare that you 
 believed yourself not to have been wrong!’’ 
 
 And thus it is that, according to the old saying, “ Hell' 1 
 becomes paved. As Fuistaff was a coward upon instinct, 
 so are you a sinner upon principle ! Upon principle in¬ 
 tolerant to the Catholics, — upon principle a persecutor 
 of the Jews,—upon principle a Borougbmonger,—upon 
 principle an usurper and a corruptionist in Municipal 
 Corporations, — upon principle a Bread-taxer, — upon 
 principle as favourable to the least utility at the largest 
 cost in Church as in State,—on principle an oppressor 
 of Ireland,—and upon principle the enemy of National 
 Education. — Why, what principles are yonrs ! For 
 
 “convictions;” you aronotejuito sure you wero “right;” 
 but quite clear that you did not think yourself “wrong;” 
 and the end is, amid all this uncertainly, the certainty of 
 wounds so painful, that you cannot hide your sores from 
 the public gaze; and you stand forward to enact,« M mode 
 do Grecian Statue, the weeping figuro on the monument of 
 your own departed greatness, asking for tho sympathy 
 
pay Yeomanry system, and aspired to something higher than 
 a Robin-Hood-ship of Sherwood Forest. Cleariy you would 
 have never invested £200,000 in the purchase of nomination 
 Seats in the House of Commons; and this you would have 
 
THE MAYNOOTH GRANT. 
 
 To the Editor of the Weekly Chronicle. 
 
 Sir,— When tho late King William gave token, in 1835, 
 of the hereditary failing, by dismissing the Whigs, on the 
 accession of Lord Althorp to the House of Peers, much was 
 said and made on the concentration, for the time, of all the 
 great offices of the State in the. person of tho Duke of Wel¬ 
 lington. Is this constitutional doctrine a mere question of 
 form, or of principlo? because, if of principle, it is very cer. 
 tain that the same objection applies at present to tho course 
 
273 
 
274 
 
itual tyranny. To aup- 
 y, and an equally sense- 
 
277 
 
No. LI. 
 
 THE MASNOOTH T 
 
 To the Editor of the Weekly Chbonic 
 
279 
 
280 
 
 There cannot be a doubt about this, and for what purpose 
 or good is it done f Peel’s purpose we can readily under¬ 
 stand. Ireland has its price, and he pays it: “ Small blame 
 to him," as O’Connell might say, he pays it with Money not 
 hiB own. Plenty to get and nothing to do, is to feed future 
 Beresforda fat, in the Irish Church, as by Orangemen 
 established; and with £30,000 to begin with, and £26,000 
 a year secured, not forgetting “ possibilities,” Peel buys off 
 
 naries so supported? Looh at the immensity of good 
 effected by the Protestant Dissenters of this Country — 
 the Baptists—the Wesleyanstheir Missionary efforts, 
 no less in the cause of Education than of Religion 
 
281 
 
 general; tho word of promise to the ear had been pretty 
 palpably broken to the heart of the mere dupe: and, at the 
 very last shift, with scarcely a point left to turn upon,it helps 
 him out of the diflieuHv, supplies him with a new cry, 
 enables him to add Peel to .Repeal, and to point the atten¬ 
 tion of his M fighting men” to the safety valve of America, as 
 to a place where the superfluous pugnacity of his hearers 
 
No. L1I. 
 
 A PLEA FOR THE PROTESTANT! 
 
 To the Editor of the Weekly Chronicle. 
 Sir,— Among the questions which quiet people as 
 each other, whenever a momentary lull in the univi 
 shout gives them opportunity for hearing their own vo 
 
284 
 
from the back of ibe Apostle, 
 
LOED JOHN'S OMNIBUS MOTION. 
 
 To the Editor of the Weekly Ciibonicle. 
 
 Sir,—Peel is a lucky man;—beginning, and carrying out, 
 the end of Liberal dealing, in principle, on that most Tory 
 practice of rendering the means as expensive and injurious 
 aB possible, he wants nothing to secure himself from 
 consequent failure but the universal nssent of all 
 parties in Opposition, or in quasi Opposition, to play 
 into his hands, by a demonstration of their own greater 
 incapacity to deal with things as they are, with reference to 
 
hen a total abolitiou 
 i country ” 
 
 lilletunte style, calls 
 fraph, which, /or its 
 the Globe— 
 
 by Mr. 
 
290 
 
No. I.V. 
 
 PRIVILEGE! PRIVILEGE !! PRIVILEGE !! 1 
 
 Sir: I presume Cotton Twist may be spared for a time 
 I mean from questions of Free Trade; for it must be evi¬ 
 dent to every one who beard, or has read, the Debate of 
 Tuesday night, that Protection has been tried, convicted, con¬ 
 demned, and left for execution. Mr. Buck and Mr. Bankes 
 memorialise the Government on behalf of the Unfortunate 
 Principle “ now lying under Sentence of Death;” but the 
 Home Secretary sees no sufficient reason for interposing 
 himself between its fate and the “ finishing off” by the 
 “Constitootional officertho “ Oonstitootional officer,” who 
 performs the last duties upon his private and political 
 friends with tho stoic virtue of a Brutus, raps it on the 
 fingers and bids it stop howling and wait his final plea¬ 
 sure;—and when it turns a despairing look to the Whig 
 Sheriff, whose Fixed Duty was,-after all, a protecting one, he 
 admits the principle of Death-punishment, at once, and is 
 
302 
 
 under r warrant which authorised him to tahe into“ custody” 
 thePrisoner, solely! It was a clear consequence in Law,that, 
 under such a warrant, Sir William Gossett was only justified 
 in touching the Prisoner on the shoulder and discharging 
 him from custody in the same breath with which he de¬ 
 clared his arrest; for had he paused, but in the estimation 
 of a second—to take a pinch of snuff—to breathe, there 
 would have beeD excess, and the plaintiff, however unwor¬ 
 thily, must have recovered. 
 
 And let not the unlearned reader call this quibbling, or spe¬ 
 
 cial pleading, or affix to it any of the opprobrious terms too 
 common in the mouths of those who, in their ignorance of 
 the importance of these decried frivolities, as they are 
 blindly designated, adopt the current cant of the day, and 
 laugh at the surest existing safeguards of their liberties and 
 lives. Constitutional Law ie at once the sheet anchor of 
 Crown, State, and People; and well and wisely did that 
 great Constitutional Judge, if not great technical Lawyer, 
 Air. Justice Coleridge, observe, that “Experience has 
 shown that the liberty of the subject, with which we (the 
 Judges of the Court of Queen’s Bench) are entrusted, is 
 involved in the accuracy, in point of form, of legal proceed¬ 
 ings; for that reason accuracy is required; and, in that 
 view of it, it is no paradox to say that form becomes sub- 
 
 liiglier in point of rank, the more strictness ought we to show, 
 
 With the same vivid feeiing of the importance of this pro- 
 position, the Reverend Sydney Smith has, in his character¬ 
 istic mode, remarked that “ Guilty men must be hung 
 technically, and according to established rules; upon a 
 statutable gibbet, with parliament rope, and a legal hangman, 
 sheriff, and chaplain on the scaffold, and the mob in the 
 foreground.” 
 
 It is, therefore, no argument to fall back on the worth¬ 
 lessness of those, if worthless they be, who may accidentally 
 benefit by the mere mistakes of the House of Commons 
 and its legal advisers. The Petition of Right must not be 
 invaded, and a precedent established for imprisoning the 
 
 Stockdale’s” attorney ; for ' whatever the" merits of Sir 
 William Gossett, as the law knows no distinction in fact 
 
Ns. LVIL 
 
 PRIVILEGE OF PARLIAMENT, AGAIN ! 
 
 To the Editor of the Weekiy Chronicle. 
 
 Sir,—I n the May of 1844 a Committee of the House of 
 Commons was Bitting, under the anspiceB of Lord Ashley, 
 upon the subject of Medical Relief,—the object of the 
 
313 
 
2 
 
 cut his steaks, Abyssinian i ; 'cc, from the living carcass of the 
 great Agiicultnral Calf, and to play off his grand juggle of 
 sel'ing penny cakes to John Bril at a shilling a-piecc! So 
 the game went merrily on until this present writing; and, 
 now the Barometer has sunk, the strength of the Admi¬ 
 nistration is smitten in the loins; the Political Barometer 
 yet sinking, where are the Ducal Supporters ? and, when the 
 Political Barometer has found Zero, where will he Fair- 
 
 But, first, where is the value received of the Bill which 
 Sir Robert Peel accepted in my favour, as a payer of his 
 Income Tax? The Tariff was to pay the Tax ; and how is 
 that practically carried out? The Quartern Loaf has risen 
 ■om Sovenpence-halfpenny to Tenpence; Meat is two¬ 
 pence a Pound dearer; Sugar has got back to its old price, 
 r id monopoly is pocketing the difference; and, as to printed 
 Cottons, unless Mr. Goulburn will issue his half-farthings, 
 there is nothing appreciable to be got. in the shape ofRr- 
 
 These things by the way—just to keep them in remem¬ 
 brance, as it were; but—“ Wbat are they to the deep, greet 
 want of the Country— Bread? England is on the threshold, 
 nay, upon the very threshing floor—oh! the frightful 
 mockery 1— of a grievous scarcity : Ireland is upon the eve 
 of Famine! The Grain Crop is not equal to our wants,— 
 the Potato Crop a wreck—a rotten heap of disease, from 
 which Science is trying to extract a poor, weak, watery 
 
the Premier, who would pitch “ My Dear Wellington” to the 
 Devil—as Guizot did Soult, like any other old firelock, 
 which has rusted beyond all utility—even the utility of 
 show,—and the “ Angry Boy,” the measure of whose foot 
 Peel ought to know, the after-Dinner custom of Lord Stan 
 ley, when a Whig Minister, having been, to exhibit the soles 
 of his boots to the Opposition, the heels kicking amongst 
 
 the Papers on the table beneath the Speaker’s nose,_and 
 
 the “ Dirty Boy,” who has given up Corn, Currency, and 
 
7 
 
 save, or woleome Sir Robert Peel, let us do it frankly and 
 cordially, forgetting the past, welcoming the present, and 
 looking with a rejoicing hope to the future. 
 
 In the midst of all this, however,—not for the sake of the 
 fun—Btill le‘S for the sake of the mischief, I rather hope 
 thau otherwise, for a Tory interregnum. Such a revivifica¬ 
 tion would be as amusing as Death and the Devil in the 
 puppet show of Punch. Besides, we want a little brushing 
 up, we Liberals! and the stimulus would be as hoalthy 
 while it lasted, as the lesson, which the end of the farce 
 might read to our Aristocracy, would be important to them, 
 in a sanatory point of view. 
 
 COTTON TWIST. 
 
 London, 7th November, IS 15. 
 
11 
 
 Oh! for one hour,—even of that King who wrote from 
 amid his defeat and captivity—“ All is lost— except Honour!" 
 and ," Good Heaven! the souls of all my Tribe defend" from 
 that Hour of Peel, when be might with equal truth—but 
 what of the dignity, and the credit, and the melancholy pride 
 
12 
 
No. LXI. 
 
 THE COMING CRISIS. 
 
 To the Editor of the Weekly Chronicle. 
 
19 
 
21 
 
25 
 
who has only to burn his Shillelagh, and di[ 
 crock into the next brook, to render himself it 
 the Potato crop for ever! 
 
27 
 
 the art of cookery; and he, therefore, suggests two pleasing 
 varieties of this Dish,—1st, a stir-about, or porridge, made 
 
, who won’t die; for why shouh 
 
MANGEL WURZEL! 
 
34 
 
 a cheaper rate. But then the ilanger is that, food being cheap, 
 the people would buy of it, and eat of it to such excess, that 
 the feast of to-day would of itself create a famine to¬ 
 morrow ! “ Wherefore,” says Mr. Cayley, “ it is desirable 
 to strike an average of starvation, by keeping up a healthy 
 check upon the excesses of the universal stomach, in a 
 continual drain upon tho universal pocket: argal , iest the 
 people should improvideutly eat too much now, and so 
 
 come to want hereafter, it is policy, wisdom, and humanity, 
 
 in me to continue to use ray legislative power, so long as 
 the League machinations in freeholds permit me, to in¬ 
 crease the price of that food which I have to sell!’’ 
 
 No doubt, the man who could thus reason, and reason 
 thus sincerely, for it is out of the question to suppose 
 any insincere man would be goose enough to suppose it 
 possible that folly so palpable as this could pass current in 
 the worldno doubt, then, the man who could reason thus 
 sincerely, might very well bring himself to the belief that 
 the Corn Laws “ have been founded in a comprehensive 
 principle of public advantageand when he adds, “ I may 
 be wrong in my view of this great subject; if I am, I hope 
 to be corrected, and the truth will prevailand, modestly 
 says—“ I am not so presumptuous even as to suppose that 
 I can be entirely right in my estimation of all the hearings 
 of so large a question—and naively asks —“ What human 
 being ever was absolutely and perfectly right in his judg¬ 
 ment of any one subject?”—and stoutly asserts of himself 
 —“ I have tried to steer clear of error as far as my feeble 
 light will permit; and if I have erred, I have erred with an 
 
 honest intention-one can readily refer that to the inept ■ 
 
 ness of his folly, which one would be loth to ascribe to the 
 wickedness of his selfish perversity, regretting only that his 
 pecuniary interests, according to his own shortsighted views 
 ot things, should be so intimately and inseparably con¬ 
 nected witlr Mb virtuous intentions, his exquisite logic, and 
 his sage (and onions ’) conclusions. But when Mr. Cayley— 
 
 “ Doubting the infallibility of human powers in judging of 
 the future, and having already seen too many instances in 
 which as legislators fto the subsequent cost and injury of 
 thousands) our anticipations have been lamentably disap¬ 
 pointed," declares with the same pronominal sagacity that— 
 
 “ I would, in matters where small mistakes may breed great 
 
lid the Agricultural Major 
 , on the Confirmation of F 
 
)wnand, 4thly, He declares “ That the deficien 
 tsed by the potato failure will be, in some measure, co: 
 
 the unusually large crops of oats, barley, a 
 
40 
 
45 
 
The Ducal Sliding Scale. 
 
 A DIGRESSION, BY COTTON TWIST. 
 
 The Duke of Wellington was “convinced,” in 1830, that 
 the Corn Laws could not be repealed without injury to the 
 Country; and he declared that the measure of 1828 had 
 «• worked well to promot“ the objects which the Legislature 
 had in view in passing it, by preventing the price of Corn 
 from rising so high, in a season of scarcity, as to be injuri¬ 
 ous to the Country at large," and in seasons of plenty to 
 render the price “ sufficient to give the Agriculturist a fair 
 value for his commodity 
 
 Intermediately we have heard much of Agricultural Dis¬ 
 tress, and of Manufacturing Distress; and, singularly 
 enough, no party seems to have been satisfied with the 
 working of this thing except the Landlords, for the money 
 value of protection to the Farmers, when the price was low, 
 has never made itself apparent to their Breeches Pockets; and 
 the sudden vanishing of Protection when the price was high, 
 was equally distasteful to them, whilst it afforded small con¬ 
 solation, indeed, to the poor and hungry purchasers of their 
 Daily Bread. The thing has been gradually culminating 
 to a point; the perfect Sliding Scale has been changed to 
 
been at first represented, not even in Ireland and further, 
 “ he thought, from what he had the means of becoming ac¬ 
 quainted with, that no class of persons in this country had 
 cause of complaint!" And this is said with Corn at 71s 
 the Quarter,and the Duty at 14s—with the “top-price” of 
 
51 
 
 six in a hothouse, which he watches daily, and has already 
 reported that, hitherto, he has arrived at no results! The 
 Hereditary Grand Marshal of England should plant a pine¬ 
 apple in a potato field; and, in all probability, he would 
 arrive at two striking horticultural facts simultaneously, 
 both converging to a point, and very aptly illustrating the 
 extent of intellect sufficient for a Monopolist Duke. 
 
 Duke A 5 has consulted with an old lady, who, having 
 signed the teetotal pledge, has, between shame and repent- 
 auce, set her wits to work to discover a substitute for Old 
 Tom ! She has hit upon a pinch of curry powder in a glass 
 of hot water; and,having found it exceedingly stomachic, 
 she has suggested it to his Grace as a very nice thing to 
 
 exclaims tho Hereditary, “ and a very nice thing, too—like 
 curry myself—curried rabbit—curried fowl!’ And in the 
 
should mistake it? T 
 descriptive words—“ 5 
 the laughter be supp 
 
No. LXIV. 
 
 TO THE FREE TRADERS OF THE UNITED 
 KINGDOM. 
 
 My Undoubted Fbiends Whom the Gods desire to 
 ruin, they first reduce to insanity! The quotation maybe 
 trite, but the application is good and sound. Whom God, 
 or rather whom the Devil,—for, as the Standard would 
 say, the Gods of the Heathen are Devils, and the most con¬ 
 siderably hoofed and horned of the lot, is the modern 
 Dagon, cut from the same dead Upas-wood —the Devil 
 MonopolyWhom the Devil, then, desires to ruin, he first 
 renders mad; and, of all insane men, with a disposition, 
 incontrollable, to rush howling into the jaws of their own 
 Tnphet, there are no such examples in History, as the 
 History of our time furnishes in the Food and Famine Mo¬ 
 nopolists,—the men who claim not only to do what they lik« 
 with “ their own,” but who set up a vested interest in picking 
 pockets which are not their own. 
 
 How great, indeed, must the necessity for a total abolition 
 of the Corn Laws be, when a man so cautious as Sir r Robert 
 Peel, so tenacious of office, so mixed up with the Party 
 connections of a life, so imprinted with Protection, gives 
 up all these to his matured conviction that Repeal, and 
 nothing but Repeal, will satisfy the National Exigency, 
 Past policy,—party ties,—office,—nay, the Great Duke him¬ 
 self, surrendered to a consideration of his respon-ibilities, 
 and the wants of the People! 
 
 Chattering Politicians talk of Lord John’s Address to his 
 Constituents as if it were the very Fulcrum of Archimedes. 
 That is the highest view; the lowest reduces the question 
 to a sort of Hare and Tortoise fable—a mere race for Office 
 between the Rival Premiers of tbe day. I think better of 
 them both ; and I should, indeed, despair for my country if 
 I could’not think better of them both, in my most assured 
 
 Lord John's Loiter was magnificent—unshrinking in 
 principle, and timed well as a matter of policy. It was a 
 
No. I.XV. 
 
60 
 

 »h»t all thing! cannot be done at one time. It i9 at the 
 perkinesst'.-ahd-dogmatism of individuality that my re¬ 
 marks point. Eyes will be npon us, sharp enough to 
 ipy-out all bickerings and flaws; clever intellects will be at 
 work to detect what is weak, and then to submit it to 
 merciless exposure;, and, without even this—the false¬ 
 hood, , and the detraction, and the abuse, will be quite 
 enough, to call for the fall sympathy of an undivided—a 
 frank, a trusting, and a manly support and confidence of 
 the Administration just now formed. 
 
 . A Great Work—as I said last week—the Greatest Work 
 of Modem Times, is not only to be launched, as a Cabinet 
 Measure, with the full assent of the Crown, but it has to be 
 piloted through an Agitation, and a Crisis, fraught with 
 events and consequences which the wisest of us cannot 
 pretend to foresee or to estimate; and, with the certain 
 fact before our eyes, and imprinted on our hearts and 
 judgments, that the Strugg':. at hand is a struggle of Prin¬ 
 ciple and not of trick—that the Country has been rescued 
 from the degrading position of being placed, bound hand 
 and foot, at the feet of a Dictator, or the more disgraceful 
 consequence still, of being subjected to the insulting 
 imbecillity of a purely Agricultural and Monopolist Admin¬ 
 istration, let us keep the One Purpose fairly before us all 
 —be even Monomaniac for a time—that One Purpose being 
 Free Trade with all the World, and a Full Emancipation 
 from the thraldom of Protection,—to which Purpose it is 
 the part of wisdom, justice, and good policy, that all other 
 considerations should succumb for a time. 
 
 That is the road not only to Success, but to what is the 
 next best consideration—a Speedy Success; and, with that 
 view, I conclude as I began, with—“ Three Cheers for Lord 
 John and Free Trade!” 
 
 COTTON TWIST. 
 
 London, Dec. 10,1845. 
 
A SONG Foil LOItD JOHN. 
 
 Newly arransed to an Old Tune, and to be Sosa 
 
 BY ALL COMPASSIONATE FREE TRADERS, AS A COM¬ 
 FORTER to the “ Melancholy Twins !” 
 
 “ Nay, we will have a Starling taught to speak 
 Nothing but John, John, JOHN ! mid give it them 
 To keep their anger still in motion!" 
 
 -Or watch them when they lie asleep, 
 
 And in their ears we’ll bellow —Lord John RUSSELL ?' 
 
 Shakspeare adapted to Free Trade. 
 
 I’ll sing you a bran new Song, to an ancient Melody, 
 
 Of a brave, true-hearted Nobleman, of a Good Old 
 Family; 
 
 Which never bore a single Branch on its Ancestral Tree 
 That did not shadow and support the Loyal and the Free : 
 A Palm Crown for the Throne, a Staff—for the hand of 
 Liberty! 
 
 Some have Bled in the Battle-field, and on the Scaffold 
 
Cardinal Points of Conservatism. 
 
 GEEAT MEETING OF DUKES. 
 
 (From our own Reporter.) 
 
 Yesterday (Thursday) a grand Dinner Party, consisting 
 of Dukes A 2, A 2, A 4, and A 5, took place at Cambridge 
 House. Covers were laid for Five, it having been fondly 
 anticipated that Duke A 1 would have lent the Meeting 
 the sanction of his name, and the support of his presence, 
 at least in a “ 11011-natural sensebut the F. M. sent a 
 written excuse, accompanied by a verbal expletive, which, 
 being highly explosive, would not pass through the Post! 
 
 The Dinner Service was of Gold, and real Dresden 
 China; and the Dinner itself of the most recherche cha¬ 
 racter. Among the soups were Turtle, made from the 
 fish, as prepared in the Honduras; “ Potage tie Maccaroni 
 a la Bossini,”—manufactured from the real Neapolitan 
 article, and “ Mullagliee Taunee,” or Curry Soup, made 
 with Hot Water, and—something more. Among the 
 Dishes were “ Casserole an l'is a l’lndienue,"—a prepara¬ 
 tion made also with “ Curry;” “ Khieharee,”—•an Indian 
 Dish in which Pens were treated with “ Curry, Pepper, and 
 other hot things of that kind,” “ Truiiles, jiu vin de 
 Champagne,"—the Truffles, as well ns the Champagne, 
 being from France, as Duke A 2 thought them superior 
 to the product of Sussex; “S-hni de Beeassc;” “Que¬ 
 nelles de Lamporeaux aux Trufles and “Filets de 
 Grouse a la Bohemienne,” whilst the “ Pates de Perigorde” 
 were of the veritable importation of Fortuum and Mason! 
 The vegetables were no less exotic, consisting of “ Choux 
 de Bruxelles ala Creme;” and “Jerusalem Artichauds 
 a la Bechamele!" Even the humble Potato disdained to 
 appear in an English Dress, but took the shape of 
 “ Pomme de Terre Frite,” and “ a la Mnitre dTIoteland 
 a few Turnips—not Field ones—had been elaborately cut 
 into the shapes of pears, boiled in good broth in a but¬ 
 tered stew-pan, and glazed with a combination of Sugar 
 and Cinnamon ! 
 
66 
 
67 
 
 liis experience—a pretty extensive one—us Chairman of 
 Charity Dinners, which all must allow to he strictly in 
 point, he did not believe in the reputed scarcity—he had 
 never seen anything of the sort. As to high prices, he 
 thought that a delusion; the more our best customers got 
 for their produce, the better it was for them and for the 
 manufacturers; besides, if it was true that the Poor could 
 not purchase Beef and Bread, the price of Beef and Bread 
 could not concent them. He thought the best Keform— 
 he begged pardon for using such a word—but he thought 
 the best alteration of the Poor Law would he to take all 
 the Poor into the hands of the Dukes, who knew best what 
 was good for them, whilst the Poor were notoriously igno¬ 
 rant and wasteful. The third pointwas the Disfranchise¬ 
 ment of Ireland, and he (the Boyal Duke) would only sav, 
 in reference to that, that he was a steady supporter of our 
 Protestant Constitution in Church and State. The fourth 
 and last point was Protection—a question which came 
 home to all their Incomes,—he meant to all their hearts ! 
 He (the Boyal Duke A 2) would not, however, enlarge on 
 that point, as all which he had said proved its necessity. 
 He looked with horror at the ruinous consequences of 
 Cheap Food, ns it was plain that the cheaper food was the 
 less able would anybody be to buy it; and, if England were 
 dependant on Foreign Nations, it would be in the power of 
 Foreign Nations to starve us all to death. lie thought, 
 however, that, masterly as the summary of the Post was— 
 Taxation, Disfranchisement, Protection, and the Poor Law. 
 
 have to take their stand 
 less and ruinous rage fo 
 as a preliminary and fut 
 “That, ns notl 
 
 cause to complain : 
 
 The resolution having been Curried hit .in-lmnulitm. 
 Duke A 3 rose and said—He wa« quite'prepared to take 
 
 office upon the principles so ably expm 
 Duke, if his Bovnl Mistress should see 
 with Her Commands Indeed, he was q 
 or break, any Administration upon tin -\ 
 tion. He would go further—he would 
 he had, but he would get what he eouh 
 Duke A 3) would repeal the Canada Co 
 ing in Bond Bill, and the Tariff Bill. 
 
 ded by the Boyal 
 take. 
 
 d only keep what 
 He'(the noble 
 i Bill, the Grind- 
 ile would slop » 
 
Countrymen threw them away—and the other refuse scraps 
 of the Kitchen. He believed it was known by the name 
 of Hogs’-wash—a name expressive of its cleanliness; and 
 his (the Noble Duke A 4’s) Pig-breeder had assured him 
 that the Pigs throve oil it, and found it relishing. He 
 thought the Pigs might be fed upon Oil-cake, and the 
 Wash be reserved for the Poor: tile Beverend Gentleman 
 who had recently officiated before them, had informed him 
 that the Pigs of our Forefathers had eat of it both hot 
 and cold, and even when it had acquired the age of nine 
 days! He would now conclude by moving:— 
 
 “ That Public Hogs’-wasli-liouses be provided for the de¬ 
 serving Poor, and that this Meeting trusts the Objects of 
 its Charity may find it relishing!”— Carried by Acclamation! 
 
 Duke AS said that he had often been laughed at: in¬ 
 deed he was mostly laughed at; but he did'nt care for 
 that, so long as he meant well. He had met an old Lady, 
 who had called his attention to the very extraordinary vir¬ 
 tues of a bottle which she carried in her pocket—or, ra¬ 
 ther, to the contents of that bottle. It might seem very 
 ridiculous, but he hoped they would hear him. Perhaps 
 Noble Dukes might not know so much about it, but they 
 might learn more of their Wives and Daughters—for La¬ 
 dies generally used it—he meant Smelling Salts! It was 
 made of Ammonia—and other volatile things,—of that 
 sort; and was to the better classes wliat burnt feathers 
 and brown paper were to the lower orders—he meant the 
 Smelling Salts. He did not know what it cost, but he had 
 bought several ounces, and intended to try it on his La¬ 
 bourers. People might laugh at him, but lie wanted to 
 do the Labourers good, and make them comfortable in 
 the winter. 1-Ie had been told that sometimes the 
 Labourers had not salt to their Potatoes, — but 
 common salt, however palatable it might be to those 
 whose appetites were fastidious—that was, to people 
 who took pickles—could not have the reviving effect of 
 smelling salts. He would not advise it to be given in 
 quantities. He did not say that it would make Bacon ; 
 but, if a man were fainting from hunger, it would revive 
 him a little, and make him feel comfortable. If Noble 
 Dukes thought the Poor of this Country would object to it, 
 it might be first tried in Ireland, like (he disfranchisement 
 of the Ifls freeholders, and other measures of necessary 
 protection. I-Ic would therefore beg to move :— 
 
COTTON TWIST REDIVIVUS. 
 
 THE MINISTERIAL CRISES. 
 
 To the Editor of the Weekly Chronicle. 
 
 A recapitulation of the very extraordinary chain of recent 
 circumstances, connecting the Government of the Country, 
 as such, with the question of Corn Law Repeal, may read 
 a lesson, or teach a duty, or afford amusement, according to 
 the light in which they are looked upon, and ihe disposition 
 which is brought to their consideration : in either case, some 
 interest must attach to the subject; and, therefore, not en- 
 
74 
 
75 
 
76 
 
 propose his own measures. We expect—every one expects, 
 changes, at least as extensive as the published division lists; 
 the new Cabinet appears; and the third Ministry of the last 
 three weeks consists of the same men—two excepted, one of 
 them a death, and only one a secession,—as the 6rst; 
 strangely enough, that secession is the somewhat impracti¬ 
 cable Colonial Minister, Lord Stanley! 
 
 Why the whole reads like the travestie of a Nursery 
 Rhyme, which may be called the Rhyme of the Great 
 Doer! 
 
 To Osborne, to Osborne, to sell an old shoe; 
 
 Home again, home again, Russell’s to do: 
 
 To Windsor, to Windsor, to keep up the fun; 
 
 Homo again,home again, Stanley is done!