Mar. 16,] 



THE NEWSPAPER. 



[1844. 



tions.— On the bringing up the report on the Committee of 

 Supply, Captain Berxal moved for a copy of any letter or cor- 

 respondence which has passed between the Secretary-at-War and 

 the widow of the late Lieut. -Col. Fawcett, relative to the with- 

 holding of her pension. He alluded to the utter dead lettcrism 

 of the article of war prohibiting duelling; reminded the Houseof 

 the terms and nature of the challenge sent by the Duke of Wei- 

 lington to the Earl of Winchilsea, which was conveyed by Sir 

 II. Hardinge; and stated that, if Col. Fawcett had sold his 

 commission one week before his death, his widow would have 

 had 3200/. at her disposal. Mr. Attorney-General Smith had 

 made a manly apology, and was not debarred from legal promo- 

 tion, and he appealed to the House, amid general cheers from 

 both sides, that Mrs. Fawcett should not be the first victim of a 

 rigid application of the rule. — Sir H. Hardivok explained that 

 there were special circumstances in the case of Lieut.-Colonel 

 Fawcett, which brought it within what was the general rule and 

 practice of the War-office. The near relationship of the parties 

 rendered this unfortunate duel one of those in which precedent 

 ruled the refusal of the pension ; there were no palliating cir- 

 cumstances which could mitigate censure on the conduct of 

 brothers- in-law, who hastily rushed out to shoot one another, 

 on account of differences which might have been settled easily 

 in another manner; and the Government, though anxious to 

 manifest their respect for the memory of a gallant officer, by 

 giving the most favourable construction to the claims of Mrs. 

 Fawcett, were yet of opinion that they could not consistently 

 grant the pension. He had received Her Majesty's sanction for 

 an amendment of the Articles of War relating toduelling,and he 

 read the terms of the contemplated alterations, which arc to take 

 effect during the present year, and are as follow :— " We hereby 

 declare ou r approbation of the conduct of ail those who having had 

 the misfortune of giving offence to, or injured, or insulted others, 

 shall frankly explain, apologise, or offer redress for the same, or 

 who, having had the misfortune of receiving offence, injury, or 

 insult from another, shall cordially accept frank explanations, 

 apology, or redress for the same, or who, if such explanations, 

 apology, or redress are refused to be made or accepted, shall 

 submit the matter to be dealt with by the commanding officer of 

 the regiment or detachment, fort, or garrison, and we accord- 

 ingly acquit of disgrace or opinion of disadvantage all officers 

 and soldiers, who, being willing to make or accept such 

 redress, refuse to accept challenges, as they not only have acted 

 as is suitable to the character of honourable men, but have 

 done their duty as good soldiers, and subject themselves to dis- 

 cipline. Every officer who shall give or send a challenge, or 

 who shall accept any challenge to fight a duel with another officer, 

 who, being privy to an intention to fight a duel, shall not take 

 active measures to prevent such due!, or who shall upbraid 

 another for refusing, or for not giving a challenge, or who shall 

 reject, or advise the rejection, of a reasonable proposition made 

 for the honourable adjustment of a difference, shall be liable, if 

 convicted before a General Court-Martial, to be cashiered, or 

 suftVrsnch other punishment as the Court may award. In the 

 event of an officer being brought to a Court-Martial for having 

 acted as a second in a duel, if it shall appear that such officer 

 had strenuously exerted himself to effect an adjustment of the 

 difference on terms consistent with the honour of both the parties, 

 and shall have failed through the unwillingness of the adverse 

 parties to accept terms of honourable accommodation, then our 

 will and pleasure is that such officer shall suffer such punish- 

 ment as the Court may award." These regulations, he thought, 

 would tend to check the practice of duelling, which was already 

 greatly on the decline in the army, as compared with former 

 years; but these amended articles are not to apply to half- pay 

 officers, for he would not be a party to any restraint being laid 

 on military men in private life to which other gentlemen were 

 not subjected.— Mr. T. Duncombe read a statement by Lieut. 

 Munro, in which he alleged circumstances in order to show that 

 he had strenuously laboured to avoid the unhappy alternative of 

 meeting his relative, for whose death he expressed the deepest 

 contrition. But he had been driven into it by the imperious calls 

 of that barbarous codeof which his superior officers were amongst 

 the most determined supporters. If we wished to put an effec- 

 tual stop to these proceedings, we must go a step farther, and 

 include half-pay officers within the operation of the new regula- 

 tions.— Sir C. Xapier expressed an opinion that the proposed 

 new Articles of War would be ineffectual. Seconds to a duel 

 ought to be made as amenable as principals; and "good shots" 

 1 in pistol practice, an accomplishment not absolutely essential 

 in the army, should be rendered peculiarly liable to punish- 

 ment. But in making new laws against duelling, he would not 

 look exclusively to the army. Civilians ought to be controlled as 

 much as military men; and he would punish them all for 

 duelling, from the First Lord of the Treasury downwards. 

 But nothing would so effectually stop the practice as a regula- 

 tion prescribing firing across a table, one pistol being shotted 

 and the other loaded with a blank cartridge; we might thus let 

 the one duellist be shot and then hang the other.— After a few 

 •words from Colonel Wood, Lord Palmerstox thought that as 

 Colonel Fawcett was the challenged and not the challenger in 

 this unhappy transaction, his widow might have been favourably 

 considered at the Horse Guards, unless there were circumstances 

 privately known tj them which precluded it. But after all, 

 seconds in a duel, acting as they did, with the honour of the 

 principals in their hands, ought to be charged with serious re- 

 Bponsibitity. As to the new Articles of War, if they were not 

 enforced more stringently than the existing ones, which were 

 sufficiently rigid, he ieared that little would be done to check the 

 practice of duelling.— Sir R. Peel briefly adverted to the circum- 

 stances in which the duel originated. Colonel Fawcett had 

 grossly insulted his relative, turning him out of his house in 

 presence of servants j he had selected for his second a very young 

 man, inferior to him in years, rank, and experience, and who 

 could not be supposed to exercise any influence over the mind of 

 his principal; and all these circumstances justified the Govern- 

 ment in the course which they had adopted, and which was in- 

 tended to mark a decided disapprobation of such transactions. 

 A3 to Lieutenant Munro, he had allowed two sessions to pass 

 over without submitting to an inquiry into his conduct before a 

 lesal tribunal, and was therefore properly visited with superces- 

 fiion. The new Articles of War were calculated to prevent the 

 recurrence of similar scenes; and he hoped that they would 

 icceive general approbation, as tending more effectually to the 

 repression of duelling.— Mr. Berxal was of opinion that there 

 were circumstances in this affair not generally known, by which 

 Lieutenant Munro, under the operation of the conventional code 

 of honour, and acting on the decided opinion of officers of high 

 rank, was placed la a situation from which he could not 



£l C ^ n ^ of callin S ou * Colonel 



Fawcett. He hoped that the Government would reconsider the 

 case of the widow, who was the unhappy victim of a system 

 deriving its sanction from the general feelings and practice of 



and others, as a deputation, with a memorial to her Majesty, which ought rather to be previously settled with the mast 



. .__ ._„_, w. „^ : „, -^icardos of the science. As little benefit 



quines of 16 gentlemen into so compre- 



7 • «*»«* woa vwfuwwu co lower or discredit 



nic opinion. He argued at some length, that unless a 

 ended and comprehensive course was to be adonted for 



in pub! 



more deciuvu mm comprehensive course was to be adopted for 

 the suppression of duelling, it was extremely hard to deprive 

 Mrs. Fawcett of her pension.— After some observations from 

 Lord C. Frrznov, Mr. Cowpkr expressly declared that on reli- 

 gious grounds he would refuse to fight a duel, considering the 

 practice condemned by thelawofGcd as well as of man, and 

 not to be justified under any circumstances whatever. There 

 was precedent iti the history of the army (as a case which 

 occurred in 1783) for riving facilities for constituting a Court of 

 Honour, to which all inquiry might he delegated, ai.d which 

 would take upon itself adjudication with respect to personal 

 quarrels.— Sir R- IT- Inglis paid a compliment to Mr. Cowper, 

 whose declaration he had heard with great pleasure. But he 



complained that Sir J. Graham, when waited u;>on by himself 



praying that the Government would take some measures for the 

 more effectual discountenancing of duelling, had returned a cold 

 official answer.— After some farther discussion, in which Mr. O. 

 Stanley, Mr. Turner, Lord R. Grosvenor, and Mr. Brother- 

 ton took part, the motion was withdrawn, and the report on the 

 committee of supply was received. — Mr. O'Connkll asked leave 

 to bring in a bill to alter and amend the law relative to Roman 

 Catholic charities, and the tenure of lands for the purposes of 

 Roman Catholic worship in Ireland. He very briefly stated his 

 objects; and, after a few remarks from Mr. Shaw, leave was 

 granted, Mr. O'Connkll saying that he only at present wished 

 the bill to be printed, and he would move the second reading on 

 the 19th of April.— Mr. Hume then moved for a select committee 

 to inquire into the present state'of the law relating to the tobacco 

 trade, and the best mode of checking smuggling in the article. 

 After a few remarks from the Chancellor of the Exchequer 

 and Mr. F. Barivg, the motion was acceded to. 



Tuesday .—In reply to Mr. Gilt-, Sir II. Hardinge explained 

 the circumstances under which two officers of the ;Gth Regiment 

 had been arrested in July last, and kept ever since under arrest 



at Dcvonport, by order of the Commander-in-Chief. One of thorn, 

 a junior officer, was the bearer of a challenge to a senior officer, 

 which the latter accepted ; both having thus violated their duty, 

 therefore rendered themselves liable to arrest; but the Com- 

 mander-in-Chief, as their,punishraent had continued so long, and 

 bearing in mind that the aggressor was under 18 years of age, 

 meant to release them immediately, after a suitable admonition. 

 — Mr. Cobdev submitted his motion to the House for a select 

 committee to examine into the effects of protective duties on 

 imports, on the interests of the tenant-farmers and farm-labourers 

 of this country. He argued that there was no danger of such a 

 fall of prices as would throw land out of cultivation, and that the 

 parties who profited by the high prices arising out of the present 

 law were not the farmers, but the speculators. He denied that 

 corn could be grown abroad, or conveyed from foreign countries 

 hither, at the low rates generally supposed. Corn could not be 

 brought from Dantzic at less than 10s, 6d. a quarter when all 

 charges were included, and this was a tolerably large protection 

 to the English farmer, who had his market at his own door. 

 Every prediction now uttered about corn had formerly been 

 uttered about wool j but was there at this day a lack of mutton ? 

 Were all the sheep-dogs dead, and all the shepherds in the work- 

 house ? So far from it that, when wool was at the highest price, 

 the largest quantity had been imported; when at the lowest 

 price, the smallest quantity. A high price from prospeiity 

 might be permanent ; a high price from scarcity never could. 

 The diminished consumption of one great town in distress 

 did more to reduce prices than the importations of the 

 whole Continent. He did not believe that the tariff had 

 lowered prices ; that pretence was only set up to enlist 

 the fears of the farmers against reduction of the import 

 duties. The landlords went about assuring their tenants that 

 even if the land were let rent-free, the competition of foreigners 

 could not be resisted ; but there was a larger margin than they 

 avowed, for the proportion of rent to other expenses was about 

 one-half. He could prove that out of 52s. per quarter paid for 

 wheat in the Lothians 26*. went to the landlord ; and so likewise 

 throughout England, half of all that was eaten went to the land- 

 lord. But it was not the Corn-law that gave the landlord these 

 large rents; they would be equally large if there were no such 

 laws. Now, as to the labourers. Their wages were too low, 

 and consequently their diet and whole maintenance were insuf- 

 ficient. And the further south he went from the much-maligned 

 district of tall chimnies the smaller he found the wages and the 

 worse the condition of the labourers. He could prove that when 

 the price of corn was highest, wages were lowest and employment 

 scarcest. la the last 50 years renta had increased three-fold : 



what had been the increase in wages? 150 years ago, the wages 

 of a labourer in Gloucestershire were 10s., wheat being then at 

 365. a quarter ; wheat now costs between 505. and 60s. a quarter, 

 and the labourers' wages were under 9*. The lodging of the poor 

 was a matter in which the character of the landlord was still 

 more implicated than in their food ; and as to lodging, he 

 instanced some cases of very unwholesome, unseemly, and 

 indecent crowding in bedrooms. There might be crowding in 

 towns, too, but then in towns there were no individuals 

 having control over the land and houses; whereas in the 

 rural districts the landlord had the whole ownership of 

 the cottages, and their wretchedness was his disgrace. This 

 wretchedness in the rural districts was no accident of tem- 

 porary distress ; it was their permanent state, and the fear 

 of falling into this permanent state of the rural labourers was 

 what caused the strikes of the workmen in the towns. It was 

 not the farmers who were responsible for all this ; they could 

 not afford to give larger wages than they gave. But on those 

 wages the labourer was starving, and this starved population 

 formed the body who were held out to the manufacturers as the 

 valuable class of home customers ! He dwelt especially on the 

 miserable state of the labourers in four of the southern counties 

 of England, whence he passed to Scotland and to Wales; and 

 observed that even in Ireland, where misery was proverbial, 

 there was a duty on the importation of corn. Did this general 

 state of your population form a case on which to justify the 

 Corn-law? If you could show a thriving agricultural popula- 

 tion, the manufacturers might submit to some disadvantage for 

 the prosperity of their fellow subjects; but with such a popula- 

 tion as this, he wondered that the opposition to the required 

 change was not abandoned for very shame. He wanted not a 

 commission, but a select committee, for which the House, as 

 now constituted, could furnish members of great information, 

 and of great experience on this particular subject. He should 

 like to sec the great landlords produced before such a commit- 

 tee ; let Lord Ducie and Lord Spencer be called on the one side, 

 and let him be at liberty to cross*examine the Dukes of Buck- 

 ingham and of Richmond en the other. He had no objection to 

 have a majority of protectionists on the committee ; nor did he 

 wish to sit in the chair of it. On what ground was such a com- 

 mittee to be refused? The danger of excitement ? There would 

 be much more excitement occasioned by the refusal than by 

 the concession of it.— Mr. Gladstove praised the moderate tone 

 of Mr. Cobden, but could not see the connection between his 

 speech and his motion. Both sines of the House felt deeplv on 

 the subject of the condition of the agricultural labourers," and 

 landlords were anxious to ameliorate it. The proposed com- 

 mittee, instead oJ aiding in the development of agricultural im- 

 provement, would be made a party handle by the opponents of 

 the Corn Law. He did not deny the truth of many of Mr. Cob- 

 den's propositions, as in the case of wool ; but he questioned the 

 calculations he had adduced as to the prices of agricultural pro- 

 duction, and the relation which produce bears to rent. It was 

 the great fault of the school of political economy to which Mr. 

 Cobden belonged, that it looked upon man in the abstract, and 

 talked of his transference from place to place, without reference 

 to early and local associations, family ties, &c. ; in fact, 

 they looked exclusively to production, and forgot distri- 

 bution. But Mr. Cobden had not traced the enhancement 

 of price to the Corn-law ; and his present statement of the 

 slight effect which free-trade in corn would have on price 

 was very different from the language he was in the habit of hold- 

 ing elsewhere. Even the allegation of fluctuation of price, as 

 attributable to the Corn-law was a questionable proposition. It 

 could also be demonstrated that the interest of the landlord was 

 the least in the cultivation of the soil j the other two parties, the 

 farmer and the labourer, affected as they would be by an altera- 

 tion in the proportion of capital and labour applied to its cultiva. 

 t;on, had a greater interest. The question was not whether dis- 

 tress might exist coincident with a corn-law, but whether the 

 Corn law was the cause of that distress. Nor could he see what 



political economy, the Ricardos of the science. As little w2 

 would arise from the inquiries of II gentlemen into so compS 

 hensive a subject as the condition of the agricultural noDnknl 

 of the United Kingdom. The inquiry might be protracted fr£I 

 session to session-especially if the committee had a maioritv 

 of protectionists on it, as Mr. Cobden seemed willing to allow 

 So long as agitation was confined to the surface, this count™ 

 could bear a larger amount of it without detriment than any other 

 and notwithstanding the activity of the Anti-Corn-law League' 

 there was a general impression that its agitation consisted more 

 in parade and ceremonial than in reality. Still, he was opposed 

 to the granting of this committee, if not for the agitation, at leas* 

 for the apprehension which it would create. It would excite 

 fears of farther changes and legislation on a subject on which 

 security was essential to the progress of agricultural improve- 

 ment and the employment of the agricultural labourer; and on 

 these and other grounds he resisted the motion.— Mr. II awes 

 considered that the refusal of the committee, accompanied by the 

 speech of the right hon. Gentleman, was only an invitation to 

 agitation. The landlords could not have faith in the stability of 

 the present law, and therefore they were depressing enterprise 

 by adhering to it. — Lord Pollington believed there could be no 

 greater blessing to a people than free trade j but for it to be 

 a blessing it should be really free, and not that freedom which 

 consisted in admitting the productions of countries that system- 

 atically placed prohibitory duties on our productions. He hoped 

 the time would come when all countries would agree to tradetoge- 

 ther without import duties at all. — Mr. Scott, asa Scotch Mem- 

 ber, opposed the motion, and argued that while the landlords 

 derived small profit from their capital the gains of the roanufac* 

 turers were enormous. The poor man*s capital waa his labour, 

 and they were determined to defend it against those who 

 sought to deprive him of it. The high wages which it was 

 boasted were paid in the manufacturing districts were not main- 

 tained during the year ; and while the average duration of life 

 in the rural districts was 38 years, in the manufacturing it was 

 only 17. If the price of corn would not be materially reduced by 

 free trade, what was all the agitation about ? He strongly denied 

 that the Scotch farmers were in favour of the doctrines of the 

 Anti-Corn-Law League. — Lord Worslky adduced some docu- 

 mentary evidence in order to show that Mr. Cobden's statistics 

 as to the relation between produce and rent were erroneous. la 

 Lincolnshire the labourers were well paid and fed, and they 

 were consequently more contented, more willing, and indus- 

 trious ; similar results would follow similar treatment in other 

 counties. The motion would be a revival of the Import Duties 

 Committee, and its inquiries would be very different from its 

 professed object, and therefore he could not support it.— After 

 Mr. Cochrane had explained that Mr. Ferrand was detained in 

 Yorkshire, and was not therefore able to be present to move an 

 amendment, Mr. Curteis and Col. Wood opposed the motion ; 

 Mr. Brothertov and Lord Shelburke supported it.— Colonel 

 Sibthorp expressed his amazement that Mr. Cobden should 

 have broughtonthis motion instead of appearing with his white 

 wand at theO'Connell dinner. The agricultural agitators now 

 rising up to confront the delusions of those miserable individuals 

 who composed the Anti-Corn-law League, were not going to 

 ride like quack doctors through the country, nor to circulate 

 the atrocities of the League, a paper he would not tolerate on 

 the table of his house. He would vote for the motion 

 if he thought it were sincere; but it was only another 

 specimen of the humbug by which Messrs. Cobden and Bright tried 

 to gain credit by speeches for being friends of the poor. We were 

 better Christians, friends, and neighbours, in the good old times, 

 when we had more agriculture and fewer manufacturers. —Mr. Vil- 

 li ers remarked upon the silence of the members connected witl 

 the Anti- League Associations. He insisted upon the evidence 

 adduced by Mr. Cobden of the distress prevailing among the la- 

 bourers. The population was rapidly increasing, and the means of 

 their employment were not; and this was not a state of things whici 

 could be cured by sitting still and doing nothing.— Mr. Bakkei 

 would willingly vote for the motion if he thought, as he did not, that 

 it would do any good to the agricultural labourer, whose condition, 

 he admitted, required improvement. He went into details on the 

 subject of the condition of the Dorsetshire labouring population; 

 and adduced the silk trade as one ruined by free trade. The motion 

 was one intended to unite the incoherent elements of the oppositios. 

 —Mr. Bright had heard nothing to invalidate any one argument 



of Mr. Cobden, whose motion, whatever might be its fate * n J* c 

 House, would receive the general approbation of the country- The 

 Anti-Corn-law League was accused of exciting the people; they did, 

 and they would. It was impossible to go amongst the agricultural 

 population, and advert to their condition, without exciting theic- 

 All the expectations and promises of all the promoters of every Corn- 

 law since 1815 had been falsified in experience, and had only lea to 



one result— the ruin of that industrious and deserving body, the tenant 



it or to con- 





creased population and pauperism, compelled them to ab * D ~^ 

 it ? It had become the scorn of all intelligent men ab ™J {,, n a ™ 

 the hatred of masses at home ; and the question would cou* 

 back to them again and again ; every constituency shouia 

 that they sat in that House to legislate in order to keep up 1 

 price of corn.— Mr. Newdigate charged the Antl - L0 ;;V r t ur 

 League with having excited the disturbances in the waning 



repeat 01 metuiu-w\>3. — ,«. -- T PaP ue' 



pelled the charges brought against the Anti-Corn-law £** £ 

 and, after some remarks from Mr. O. Stavlbv, a divis ^" nst itf 

 place, when there appeared— For the motion, 133 As H '^ 

 244-Majority, 91.— On the motion of Mr.Gf-ADSTONE,"ien 

 went into committee on the laws relating to the maKing u * 

 and silver wares, and a resolution was parsed to rcmu nd 

 penalties now in force, and to afford some effectual c0 "\ nt 

 security over the dealers in such articles.-The House a *" ^ 

 into committee on the law respecting international cop> 1 6 ^ 

 and passed a resolution to enable her Majesty to con ^ 

 foreigners the same privileges with respect to copyngni 

 country as were possessed by British subjects, theoeti- 



Wednesday.— The S?RAKKiL informed the House tnat ™ *J^ 

 tion against Mr. L. Bruges' return was withdrawn, * ^ bc5 

 PHiNSro.vK postponed the second wading of his Courc ct 



Bill, to give time for the Government Bill on the same ^ 

 to come down from the other House. A discussion "' f 



place on the second reading of Lord Worsley s law wh0 

 Commons Bill, which was opposed by Mr. S ; M CRA V;" n f e r in 

 objected to the wholesale power which the bill wou.u c ^^ 

 depriving the people of their rights of commonage, ax ^ gC- 

 that it be read a second time that day six moiuii=. « ^ dc ^ 

 condedby CoI.Sibthorp, who opposed the bill j£J„. p mi every 

 dared his determ 

 one of its 149 clan 



agreed in many of the observations of Mr. H«mb a uvv , 



commonage for the inhabitants of all populous, p .act , 



was much of the waste land of the c 



i 



deliberate consideration. The secomi reading "-- ;- f gc hool* 

 to 23.-The Masters and Servants Bill, the Teacher*" ralIy 

 (Ireland) Bill, and the Three-and-allalf per Cents. B«« 



passed through Committee. w stavl** 



. „. Tkurs'.ay.— After various notices of motion Mr. vv .v _ me0 t 



good result would arise from delegating an investigation into the read a letter from Mrs. Munro, in correction of a *»*■ . ^ m 

 abstruse doctrine of rent to a select committee— a question made by him on a former night, in which she exonci* 







