166 RECORDS AND REMINISCENCES OF GOODWOOD 



highway rates and the poor rates were not burdens 

 upon land ? He should like to know whether one of 

 his tenants did not pay more than the whole league 

 put together? Lord Clanricarde had said that Mr. 

 Cobden had made cowards of the whole of the Cabinet 

 of Sir Eobert Peel, and the rest of the Ministers ; and 

 then said that he had made cowards of the people out- 

 of-doors ; if that were the case, then let the Ministers 

 dissolve Parliament and go to the country, and ask 

 the manufacturers of England (and the manufacturers 

 of this town, the English tailors and shoemakers) 

 whether they would consent to foreign articles coming 

 in free of duty ? He defied them to go to the 

 country ; let them go and appeal to those constitu- 

 encies that placed the present Government in power ; 

 and those constituencies w^ould say, ' We are against 

 Free Trade now.' " The noble Duke then proceeded 

 to show the benefits which the labourers had derived 

 from the system of protection, as evinced by the vast 

 accumulations in savings banks. " This measure 

 was only the first of a series of attacks that would 

 shake the foundations of the throne, cripple the 

 Church, endanger the institutions of the country, and 

 plunge a happy and contented people into misery, 

 confusion, and anarchy." 



Had the improved and expeditious mode of com- 

 munication and transit been foreseen in 1846, 1 doubt 

 whether the advocates for a repeal of the Corn Laws 



