1831.] Europe at the Commencement of the Year 1831. 123 



titles may be, would be in the humblest ranks of society, and whose 

 bread must be earned by the far honester labour of their own hands. 



Other objects of investigation must be the Sinecures, Pluralities^ and 

 Reversions. It is stated that the Privy Council receive, on an average, 

 5,000. per annum each, or the enormous total of upwards of 000,000. 

 a year ! that, of course, many of those individuals hold two, three, or 

 four places ; that the land is eaten up with sinecurism ; and that, on 

 this system, the worthless branches of noble families, the dependents of 

 ministers, and the general brood of the idle and useless, are fed out of 

 the earnings of the people. 



It is obvious, however, that these charges fall entirely short of strik- 

 ing at the Constitution ; that they merely advert to abuses, and leave the 

 principles untouched ; that the British Constitution is still the first object 

 of political homage ; and that even the most violent advocates for public 

 change declare that their views are directed, not to the overthrow, but 

 to the greater activity and supremacy of the Constitution. 



The state of property, as it refers to Agriculture, the Church, Manu- 

 factures, and Commerce, presents some new and anxious aspects. 

 Throughout England, the agricultural interests are in a state of de- 

 pression. Rents have generally fallen, or been voluntarily lowered. 

 The poor-rates have increased ; labour is failing ; and the agricultural 

 population is either in open riot, or latent discontent. The most singular 

 feature in all this, is the utter difficulty of ascertaining its cause. None 

 of the great casualties of nations famine, war, sudden loss of market for 

 manufactures or produce, have occurred ; yet, undoubtedly, the crisis is 

 now more severe than at any former period. The political economists have, 

 of course, all failed in discovering either cause or remedy. The theory 

 of one is, that the distress is owing to the return to a circulation in coin ; 

 but that return is now half-a-dozen years old, and it is totally impossible 

 to perceive how, by giving the extraordinary power to coin, to every 

 man who chose to call himself a banker, any end could follow except 

 that which has followed in every instance of the experiment an infi- 

 nite quantity of fraud, of baseless speculation, of loss among the poor, 

 of forgery and its consequent loss of life among the wretched people 

 tempted by the facility of the practice, and as a result of the whole 

 a trembling credit, which the first accident would throw into universal 

 bankruptcy. 



As matters proceed now, every man who has value can obtain gold ; 

 the circulation is unchecked by any paucity of the precious metals, and 

 the only sufferers on the subject are the country dealer in paper, which 

 he can now no more manufacture into pounds, and millions of pounds, 

 on his sole credit, which has so often proved not worth sixpence ; or 

 the speculator without capital, who is ready to embark in any des- 

 perate enterprize, and borrow at any interest, in the hope of realizing 

 something or other in the chances of the world. We are told, too, that 

 the restricted issues of the country bankers, by preventing the farmers 

 from being able to obtain notes by mortgaging their crops for the time, 

 prevent them from keeping back their produce until the season of the 

 highest prices. But why should the farmers, or any other men, be aided 

 to keep up the market thus artificially, and extract an inordinate price 

 from the public necessities, by the help of fictitious money?* Thus, 



* Somo remarks on this subject, from an intelligent correspondent, will be found at 

 p. 164. 



R 2 



