The life of Richard Cobden

A i Bn Wi ai CC Ug 4 Ns y oY Pu a ,Quly X. 2 | 7 g , iw LET % J) Clg 1G. PE be Sp BA Eh AF Ril gh g 2 ean Bh : 3 5 LH Biter ¥ Fig AR BIE. % fa EP ZL J £ TT I. LIFE OF RICHARD COBDEN RICHARD COBDEN rom a Portrait by Lowes Dickinson, THE LIFE RICHARD COBDEN BY JOHN MORLEY BARRISTER-AT LAW | M.A, OXFORD |! HON, LL.D. GLASGOW London T. FISHER UNWIN 1 ADELPHI TERRACE MCMV First Rdition, 2 vols, demy 8vo, cloth, 82s, London: Chapman & Hall 1879 Second Edition, 7 7 “ 1881 Third Edition, " " " Shillang Edition (Abridged), demy 4to, paper covers 1882 Fifth Edition, 1 vol. crown 8vo, cloth, 7s. 6d. vi 1883 Sixth (* Jubilee ) Edition, 2 vols, crown 8vo, cloth 7s. London: T, Fisher Unwin 1896 Free Trade Edition (Abridged), demy 4to, psper covers, 6d. ,, 1902 Fighth Edition, 2 vols, crown 8vo, cloth, 7s. , 1903 Vinth Edition, 1 vol, crown 8vo, cloth, 2s, 6d. net a Tenth Edition, ' woo Tleventh Edition, " w Twelfth Edition, » ”» 1905 Thirteenth Edition. in b parts, each 8d. net , 1906 3 dmerican Edition. Boston: Roberts Brothers French Translation (by Sopbie Raffalovich), Paris: Guillaumin et Cie 1885 . 1890 2 © LAL rights reserved.) on m Nn OQ - ¥ wn < Wo 2 £ Q [&] ; ~ P-~ om ~ [&] CONTENTS -— oO oN [=Pe] oO OHAPTHR L Harry Lire. Corpxw’s birthplace . His family and early education Business in London . . Character as a young man Commercial journeys . Family troubles . Boging business on bis own account OHAPTER II. COMMERCIAL AND MeNTAL PROGRESS, Oobden’s early enterprise At Sabden w . Belf-edueation . . . . Visits France and Switzerland Death of his Father OHAPTER IIL Travers IN West AND Hase, Voyage to the United States . Vindication of his own country Niagara . . . . . Estimate of American charsoter Publication of pamphlets Btarts for the East . Gibralter . . Malta and Alexandria Alexandria % ¥ From Alfeh to Oairo The Pyramids . Oairo . . . Yiait to Mshemet All raGE 1 n 18 15 18 22 26 27 29 81 33 1 Rg 1 % 109 “1 " 58 Ky » o o ays 1% 13 Lis el -— - 1 : | ~~ | 0 E | QQ oN 3 uD 0} oN oN mn ON &) T — YX) CONTHETS, Egyptian Manufactories Magssore of Scio . Constantinople v Voyage to Bmyrna I Conversations at Smyrna At Smyrna. . Athens and the Greeks From Athens to Patras Malta and the navy CHAPTER IV. Tee Two PimpHLZYS Mental activity after the Reform Act Combe's influence on Cobden . 3 Application to English policy. . The new problem . . . . - Material well-being and political stability Russia and Turkey. . Intervention judged by experience . The Great Usage . . # . Decisive importance of American competition Extravaganoces of intervention Shelburne as a precursor * PAGE 67 69 71 78 75 77 1 33 27 = 28 95 w 93 101 . 108 » 105 . 107 « 108 - 111 CHAPTER V. Lire IN MANCHESTER, 1887-9 Letter on factory legislation . . Rejection at Stoolport . Busines and position in Manchester Opinion in Manchester . . Struggle for a Charter . x . . Coldness of Whigs for local self.governmen The Radicals and the people . The Zollverein . . . The Prussian Government . A Sunday at Berlin . . . Manchester and Germany contrasted Acquaintances in London . Incorporation of Manchester . . 118 « 117 . 118 . 121 . 128 . 125 . 187 . 189 » 181 » 183 . 185 » 187 . 189 OEAPTER VI. Tre FGUNDATION OF THE LEAGUE. Narrow beginning of the struggle . . The London Anti.Com-Law Associstion s+ 14 « 148 The Chamber of Commerce Tze idea of the League . . The corn question in Parliament Resentment of the Repealers . The lecturers in the country Hostilities jn the press . Condition of the rural poor New settlement in huginess Marriage DONTENTS, X11 AGN , 146 147 149 151 168 . 156 157 169 181 OBAPTER VII. Tax CoN Laws. Huskisson’s legislation . The Corn Bills of 1827-8 Attitude of political parties The Whig budget . . Defeat of the Whips , CHAPTER VIII. COBDEN ENTERS PARLIAMENT—F1RST SESSION. I'he new Parliament . . . First speech in Parliament . . Protest against the philanthronists 163 165 167 - 169 . 171 175 » 177 . 185 CHAPTER IX. COBDEN AS AN AGITATOR Friendship with Mr. Bright Their different characteristios Jobden’s oratorical qualities . His personality ® . . Feeling toward his countrymen His faculty of veneration . Conditions of usefulness . Practical energy Genial idaag 191 193 195 197 199 201 203 206 «YT CHAPTER X. IF'ex Nzw Corx Law. The autnmn campaign The Lesgue press 211 213 iv CONTENTS, Thackeray and Carlyls . Discussion in the Cabinet The Minigterial plan . Feeling in the country . Cobden’s speech on the plan . The country party and the Manufacturers Disappointment of the League New Projects . > . Attitude of the Clergy. . PAGE . 216 . 217 . 218 , 221 . 228 . 225 , 227 , 329 . 229 CHAPTER XI. Bim Rosser Pexr’s New PoLicY. The Imports Committee . Sir Robert Peel's position The new tariff i ® Oobden’s impressions . Speech on the state of the country . Reply to Sir Robert Peel .» 236 . 287 . 289 . 241 . 245 . 847 OHAPTER XII. RENEWED ACTIVITY OF THE LEAGUR—CoBDEN AND Sik Romer PrEr— RuBAL CAMPAIGN. The League and the workmen Renewed activity . . Cobden in Bootiand . Mr, Bright upon Scotland Speech on Lord Howick’s Motior Boene with Sir Robert Peel . Mr. Roebuck’s attack . . Feeling in the country . . Reply to the Manchester address Meetings at Drury Lane Agitation in the counties Cobden’s position . Questions in Parliament Occupations in the recess Digtrust of the Whigs » 249 » 261 , 2563 . 266 . 287 . 2569 . 268 . 265 . 267 . 269 . 271 . 279 . 283 » 288 . 9280 CHAPTER X11, Tyg RrssioN oF 1844— Factory LEarsuaTioN-—Tar CONSTITUENCIES. Btatistios of agitation The Bensgion of 1844 . 201 90173 The condition of England Factory legislation . English forms of Socialism The forty shilling franchise , Cobden’s views on this franchise OONTENTS. L ? Xv pic » 297 » 299 » 303 » 305 807 CHAPTER XIV. BasTIAT—NEW TACTICS8~~ACTIVITY IN PARLIAMENT—MAYNOOTH GRANT— PRIVATE AFFAIRS, Bastiat’s visit to England Bastiat and Cobden . Seventh year of the Leagne Change of tactics . . Effect of Cobden’s speech Argument of the speech . The argument , . » Cobden’s influence on Peel Prospects of the question The Maynooth Grant Letters to Mrs, Cobden . Private embarrassmenta Letter from Mr, Bright , 809 , 311 » 313 » 815 , 817 . 319 821 » 828 , 825 827 , 829 . 831 . 838 CHAPTER XV. Tae AUTUMN oF 1843. The Edinburgh letter The Ministerial crisis Renewed agitation . . Proffer of office to Cobden Sir Robert Peel and his party Sir Robert Peel’s conversion Operations of the League . Reconciliation with Sir Robert Pas) , 839 , 841 ,» 343 . 346 . 347 . 849 » 8561 , 853 CHAPTER XVI, BEPEAL of ©BEE CorN Laws AND FALL oP THE (JOVERNMENT. State of public opinion on repeal Difficulties of Peel’s position . Attitude of the Whigs . . Proceedings in Parliament , Letter to George Combe . oe Cobden’s view of his own position . , 857 , 869 861 363 866 BET xvi JONTHENTS. Letter to Mr, Hunter ‘ The miseries of popularity Miscellaneous correspondence Progress of the Corn Bill London society . . Third reading of the Bill in the House The Bill passes the Upper House Peel’s final tribute to Cobden . rich 871 878 875 877 881 383 387 BRO OHAPTER XVII. CoRrpBSPONDENCE WITH SiR RoBERT PEEL—OCESSATION oF THE LEAGUE. Jobden’s letter to Peel . Peel’s reply . . . Letter from Lord John Russell Peculiar work of the League . New projects . . Reflections on social progress The National Testimonial 390 397 103 405 409 411 413 CHAPTER XVIIL Tour ovER EUROPE. Jmens of revolution in Paris . Cobden’ popularity among strangers [nterview with Louis Philippe in Spain and Southern France mltaly . + At Rome . * . Interview with the Pope Che Campagna » Naples and Turin . Che Italian Lakes « . Venice and Trieste Interview with Prince Metternich At Babelsberg . Berlin and Potsdam Jtettin . . . I'he Russian Frontier Moscow . . « St, Petersburg . Arrived at home 417 419 421 423 425 427 433 435 487 439 441 443 145 447 449 151 453 459 4/3 CONTENTS xvii CHAPTER XIX. ELECTION FOR THE WEST RIDING—PURCHARE OF DUNFORD—CORRESPONDENCE. ELECTION for the West Riding Purchase of Dunford . Picture of rural life in Sussex . The Spanish marriages .. Letter to Mr. Bright . “ On a mischievous foreign policy Complaints from Bastiat . The Revolution of 1848 The revolution in France . Work in Parliament . The Education question , Cobden’s plan of Reform . To Combe, on Ireland On dissent from one’s party Cobden’s position in Parliament The people’s budget. . PAGE 465 467 , 469 . 471 , 478 . 47b 477 . 479 481 483 485 489 491 495 497 499 CHAPTER XX. MISCELLANEOUS CORRESPONDENCE ON SOCIAL AND POLITICAL MOVEMENTS, New plans for political reform . To Mr. Bright, on a new programme A triumphal celebration . . To Combe, on national expenditure , The motion for arbitration The peace congress at Paris InParis . , , To Mr. Bright, on Ireland s ¥ To Mr. Bright, on Parliamentary Reform On the English land question . To Mr. Bright . On temperance . 501 503 505 507 , 609 , B11 . B13 . 515 .» 517 . B19 « 521 . D238 CHAPTER XXI. Tue Dox Paocrrico DEBATE—THE Parar, AGGRESSION—CORRESPONDENCE WITH MR. BRIGHT ox REFORM—KO0SSUTH. The Hungarian war of independence Cobden’s denunciation of war loans Root of Cobden’s feeling about war , The affair of Don Pacifico 529 533 635 637 xviil CONTENTS (sgues of the debate . . » . Death of Peel—The Papal aggression tock exchange creditors « Miscellaneous notes . , Peace congress at Frankford The No-Popery cry . . The Ecclesiastical Titles’ Bill . Deadlock of parties . . . ; Motion for negotiations with France Doubts on reform . . 4 To Mr. Bright, on the land question To Mr. Bright, on reform . , Kossuth in England . . . , To Mr. Bright, in explanation , Mr. Bright and Kossuth , . . English opinion on Russian intervention PAGE 539 541 543 545 547 749 551 365 557 59 361 563 565 567 . 569 B71 CHAPTER XXIL THE PROTECTIONISTS IN OFFICE. Tate of the Whig ministry I'he Protectionists in office Revival of the League Growth of the military spirit . Cobden’s urgency for a dissolution The general election . . . The free traders and the ministry Humiliation of the protectionists Mr. Disraeli’s budget . . Tate of the first Derby ministry 573 575 577 579 581 583 586 687 . 589 B91 CHAPTER XXIII, I'mg Panic or 1853, The invasion panie . Excitement of public opinion His pamphlet: 1792 and 1853 . The war of 1768 . Social state of France and of England French feeling for Napoleon . Peace conference at Manchester Events of the Session . . . Misrepresentation of the peace movement 7isit to Oxford 593 595 597 599 801 603 805 &07 809 311 CONTENTS xix CHAPTER XXIV. THR CRIMEAN WAR, Origin of the War . 5 . Cobden’s policy compared with Palmerston’s Mortifying position of Cobden and Bright Their steadfastness . . J Difficulties of a peace party . Cobden’s speeches on the war Letters to Mr. Bright ys to Colonel Fitzmayer » to Mr Bright to M. Chevalier , to Mr. Ashworth PAGR 8156 617 819 621 823 625 627 633 635 , 641 , 543 CHAPTER XXV. DraTH OF HIS SON, Sudden death of his son at Weinheim . Violent grief of Mrs. Cobden , Mr. Bright's illness , hy 645 . 647 . 649 CHAPTER XXVI. CHINRS® AFFAIRS-—COBDEN'S MoTION—THE DISSOLUTION. The affair of the * Arrow” . Cobden’s motion and defeat of the ministry The repulse in the country . Letter from Mr, Bright on their defeat Cobden’s feeling . v . . Mr. Bright's election at Birmingham Cobden at Midhurst , . Views of parliamentary life . 658 855 857 659 661 663 666 . 6887 CHAPTER XXVII THE INDIAN MUTINY —PRIVATE AFFAIRS—~SECOND JOURNEY TO AMERICA. The Indian Mutiny . 3 . On contact with inferior races, Sombre outlook in India , Misgivings as to the future On the transfer of land 671 673 875 877 879 CONTENTS On the demoralization of England by India Change of Government . Private anxieties . Munificent friendship PAGE 681 683 685 &R7 CHAPTER XXVIIL RETURN FROM AMERIOCA—THE NEW MINISTRY, The new Ministry . . Arrival at Liverpool . 3 Interview with Lord Palmerston Refusal of Office 691 693 895 A090 CHAPTER XXIX, Teg FRENCH TREATY With Mr. Gladstone at Hawarden Return to London . . Arrival in Paris , . Interview with the Emperor The French Minister . The Ministers at home . The Emperor's hesitation , 3econd interview with the Emperor Cobden receives official powers The Emperor's deviations y Hostile feeling in France . The treaty signed . . Morality of negotiation with the Empire 708 706 707 709 716 77 719 721 725 721 729 781 739 CHAPTER XXX, HOLIDAY AND RETURN TO PARIS, The Italian question . . [nterview with Prince Metternich At Cannes « . . Return to Paris . . The Question of Savoy + Disoussion with the Emperor Cobden’s vrivate circumstances , 735 787 74] 743 748 747 I: CONTENTS < al CHAPTER XXYXI. THE TARIFF—THE FORTIFICATION SUHEME, Debates on the treaty Nature of the treaty Fresh labours in Paris The Commission . Social intercourse | « Count Persigny on the Empire . Conversation with Prince N. apoleon , The proposal for fortifications . Lord Palmerston’s distrust Mr. Gladstone's position , Cobden’s remonstrance |, Lord Palmerston's reply Lord John Russell's reply Effect in Paris . . ’ M. Rouher on Lord Palmerston’s speech , Prince Napoleon and Count Persigny Delay in signing the Convention , The Conventions signed , ; . . Cobden and Mr. Bright with the Emperor Abolition of passports ” . Reception of the tariff in England , His feeling about the English Government Letter from Lord Palmerston PAGE 758 756 757 759 761 763 765 767 769 mn 773 775 777 779 781 783 785 787 789 791 793 785 797 CHAPTER XXXIL THE POLICY OF THE COMMERCIAL TREATY, State of the question in 1843 | Cobden’s vindication of the treatv Peculiarity of Cobden’ treaty . Double operation of the treaty The economic circulation . 801 803 805 807 R800 CHAPTER XXXIIL. MISCELLANEOUS CORRESPONDENCE, 1859-60—~PARIS—RETURN T0 ENGLAND, Miscellaneous correspondence, 1859-60 Mr Bright's public appearances Condition of political life , Napoleon III. as a writer. The state of Europe. I'he Turkish question 811 818 815 817 819 821 xii CONTENTS Sober polities of Pesl and Aberdeen British rule in India se Great producers—The counties The English working class , Last interview with the Emperor PASS 823 835 B27 829 Qa1 CHAPTER XXXIV. THE AMMBIOAN WAR—FORTIFICATION SCHEMES~—INTERNAYIONAL LAW. Reception in England , The American War . . ) Proposed changes in maritime law Battles with Lord Palmerston . On maritime law 3 On China . 9 . " . On traders and missionaries in China On Lord Brongham—On secession On the Trent affair . . To Mr. Sumner on the war On maritime law. On the commercial class . On Lord Palmerston ¥ Dn the American blockade Debate on Turkey . . On the Polish Insurrection . ‘ To Mr. Sumner on the American war On the American war ’ . . Visit to the fortifications of Portsmouth To Mr, Bright on the war . . On the political torpor of the day . On privateering 835 837 839 841 843 45 847 849 851 866 859 861 863 866 867 869 871 878 87% 877 881 RRS CHAPTER XXXV. NORRESPONDENOE WITH MR. DELANE. Feeling towards the Times newspaper Charge of the Times against Mr, Bright Cobden’s protest and Mr. Delane’s replv His letter to Mr. Delane , 7 Continuance of the controversy Mr. Delane’s virtual surrender . The merits of the controversy Letter to the Daily Telegraph . Cobden’s view of journalism , 885 887 , 880 8g 898 897 89f 90! aos CONTENTS xxiii CHAPTER XXXVI. THE DANISH WAR—LAST SPEECHES IN PARLIAMENT-—COBRESPONDENOE. 905 907 909 911 913 , 916 . 017 Denmark and the British Government Humiliating position of Lord Palmerston Cobden’s speeches during the session On Garibaldi’s visit to London ¥ On Frees Trade in France . . . On the triumph of non-intervention Nn blockades—On the Danish War CHAPTER XXXVII. SPEECH AT ROCHDALE~THE LAND QUESTION—CORRESPONDENCE—LAST DAYR AND DEATH. Cobden’s views on the Land Question illness after his return from Rochdale On minority representation . . To Mr. Bright . y . . . Offer of a Post by the Government . To Mr. T. B. Potter ' X To Mr. Bright , ‘ . 3 On Canadian Affairs v . . Journey to London—Iliness and Death 921 p28 925 927 929 931 938 935 037 JHAPTER XXXVIII COXOLUSBION, Craits of Private Character Views on Culture . ’ . His Contribution to Social Reform Tha New Possassors of Power . 941 948 945 047 APPENDICES. Letter on the Hours of Labour ; The Last Letter written by Mr Cobden A Bibliography of Richard Cobden: . NDR % 951 954 957 363 TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE JOHN BRIGHT THIS MEMOIR OF HIS CLOSE COMRADE [N THE CAUSE OF WISE JUST AND SEDATE GOVERNMENT IS INSCRIBED VITH THE WRITER'S SINCERE RESPECT. 1906. ACK AND Ck Are now on Sale at every Bookseller's Shop in the Three Kingdoms And at every Railway Bookstall A WEEKLY REVIEW OF h C C cl al 0 r POLITICS, LITERATURE, THEOLOGY, AND ART. Established 1828. Every Saturday, 6d. : by Post, 64d. Qirculates throughout the educated classes in the United Kingdom, the Empire, and America. Scale of Cha’ © Tor Advertisements. OvuTsIDE PAG. (v ABLE), FOURTEEN GUINEAS, Page . . . Narrow Column (Third of Page) £4 4 0 Half-Page (Column) . ’ Half Narrow Column. . 2 20 Quarter-Page (Half Column) “ .. , Quarter Narrow Column . ¥ 110 Column. two-thirds width of page. £8 85. COMPANIES. Outside Page . . . £1616 0 | Inside Page ' . . £1414 0 Five lines (45 words) and under in broad column (half-width), 58.; and 1s. a line for avery additional line (containing on an average twelve words). Narrow column, one-third width of page, 8s. an inch. Broad column, half-width of page, 12s. an inch. Across two narrow columns, two-thirds width of page, 16s. an inch, Broad column following ** Publications of the Week,” 15s. an inch. Displayed Advertisements according to apace. Terms : Net. Terms of Subscription. Payable in Advance. Tr i « to any part of the United Kingdom . ~~ £1 8 i is to any of the English Colonies, America, 8 Franco. Germany, India, China. Japan. &c. v 112 6 016 3 0 “ » Ltd., 1 Wellington Street, Strand, London, W.C. SPECTATOR,” sale at all Booksellers. Newsvendors, amd Bookstalls, Tr LIFE OF RICHARD COBDEN. CHAPTER 1. RARLY LIFE. Hrysrorr is a hamlet in a sequestered corner of West Sussex, not many miles from the Hampshire border. It is one of the crests that, like wooded islands, dot the great Valley of the Weald. Near at hand the red housetops of Midhurst sleep among the trees, while Chichester lies in the flats a dozen miles away, beyond the steep escarpments of the South Downs, that here are nearing their western edge. Heyshott has a high rolling upland of its own, part of the majestic wall that runs from Beachy Head almost to Portsmouth, As the traveller ascends the little’ neighbouring height of West Lavington, he discerns far off to the left, at the end of a dim line, the dark clump of sentinel trees ab Chanctonbury, whence one may look forth over the glistening flood of the Channel, or hear the waters beat upon the shore. The country around Midhurst is sprinkled thinly with farms and modest homesteads. Patches of dark forest mingle with green spaces of common, with wide reaches of heath, with ponds flashing in the sunlight, and with the white or yellow clearing of the fallows. The swelling turf of the headland, looking northward across the Weald to the loved companion downs of Surrey, is broken by soft wooded 1804. LIFE OF OOBDEN. [oHAP. hollows, where the shepherd finds a shelter from the noontide sun, or from the showers that are borne along in the driving flight of the south-west wind. Here, in an old farmhouse, known as Dunford, Richard Cobden was born on June 8, 1804. He was the fourth of a family of eleven children. His ancestors were yeomen of the soil, and it is said, with every appearance of truth, that the name can be traced in the annals of the district as far back as the fourteenth century. The antiquarians of the county have found out that one Adam de Coppdene was sent to parliament by the borough of Chichester in 1314. There is talk of a manor of Cobden in the ninth of Edward IV. (1470). In 1562 there is a record of William Cobden devising lands on the downs in Westdean. Thomas Cobden of Midhurst was a contributor of twenty-five pounds to the fund raised for resisting the Spanish Armada. When hearth-money was levied in 1670, Richard Cobden, junior, is entered as paying for seven out of the seventy-six hearths of the district. In the Sussex election poll-book for 1734 a later Richard Cobden is put down ss a voter for the parish of Midhurst, and four or five others are entered as freeholders in other parts of West Sussex. The best opinion seems to be that the settlement of the Cobdens at Midhurst took place sometime in the seventeenth century, and that they were lineal descendants of Sir Adem and Sir Ralph of former ages. However all this may be, the five hundred years that intervened had nursed no great prosperity. Cobden’s grandfather and namesake was a maltster and farmer, and filled for several years the principal office of bailiff for the borough of Midhurst. When he died in 1809, he left a very modest property behind him. Dunford was gold, and William Cobden, the only son of Richard the elder, and the father of the Richard Cobden with whom we are PARENT GR AND FAMILY MISFORTUNES ; concerned. removed to a small farm on the outskirts of Midhurst, owas a man of soft and affectionate disposition, but wholly without the energy of affairs. He was the gentlest and kindest of men. Honest and upright himself, he was incapable of doubting the honesty and uprightness of others. He was cheated without suspecting it, and he aad not force of character enough te redeem a fortune which gradually slipped away from him. Poverty oozed in with gentle swiftness, and lay about him like a dull cloak for the rest of his life. His wife, the mother of Richard Cobden, had borne the gracious maiden-name of Millicent Amber, Unlike her kindly helpless husband, she was endowed with native sense, shrewdness, and force of mind, but the bravery of women in such cases can seldom avail against the shiftlessness of men. The economic currents of the time might seem to have been all in their favour. The war and the scarcity which filled ll the rest of the country with distress, rained gold upon farmers and landlords. In the five years during which William Cobden was at Guillard’s Oak, (1809-13), the average price of wheat was just short of five pounds a quarter, In spite of tithes, of war-taxes, and of tremendous poor-rates, the landowners extracted royal rents, and the farmers drove a roaring trade. To what use William Cobden put these good times, we do not know. After the harvest of 1813, the prospect of peace came, and with it a collapse of tho artificial inflation of the grain markets. Insolvency and distraint became familiar words in the farmhouses that a few months before had hoon revelling in plenty. William Cobden was not the man to contrive an escape from financial disaster. In 1814 the farm was sold, and they moved from home to home until at length they made a settlement ab Westmeon, near Alton in Hampshire. His neighbours were as unfortunate ss himself, for Cobden was sble to pay in later venrs that when he returned to his native 1809.18. LIFE OF GOBDEN. [omar 1814-19. place, he found that many of those who were once his play-Fr, 10-16. fellows had sunk down to the rank of labourers, and some of them were even working on the roads. It is one of the privileges of strength to add to its own she burdens of the weak, and helpful kinsfolk are constantly found for those whom character or outer circumstance has submerged. Relatives of his own, or his wife’s, charged themselves with the maintenance of William Cobden’s dozen children. Richard, less happy than the others, was taken away from a dame’s school at Midhurst, and cheerful tending of the sheep on his father’s farm, and was sent by his mother’s brother-in-law, a merchant in London, to a gchool in Yorkshire. Here he remained for five years, a grim and desolate time, of which he could never afterwards endure to speak. This was twenty years before the vivid genins and racy style of Dickens had made the ferocious brutalities of Squeers and the horrors of Dotheboys Hall as waiversally familiar as the best-known scenes of Shakespeare. The unfortunate boy from his tenth to his fifteenth year was ill fed, ill taught, ill used; he never saw parent or friend; and once in each quarter he was allowed such singular relief to his feelings as finds official expression in the following letter (March 25, 1817) tm “ HoNourEp Parzwmis, “ You cannot tell what rapture I feel at my once more having the pleasure of addressing my Parents, and though the distance is so great, yet I have an opportunity of conveying it to you free of expense. It is now turned three years since our separation took place, and I assure you I look back with more pleasure to that period than to any other part of my life which was spent to no effectual purpose, and I beg to return yon my most sincere thenks as being the means of my gaining such a sense of learning as will enable L} EDUCATION AND EABLY DAYS IN LONDON. EF me $0 gain a genteel livelihood whenever I am called into 1819-26. the world to do for myself.” 2lr. 16-21, It was not until 1819 that this cruel and disgusting mockery of an education came to sn end. Cobden was received as a clerk in his uncle’s warehouse in Old Change. It wags some time before things here van easily. Nothing is barder to manage, on either side, than the sense of an obligation conferred or received. Cobden’s uncle and aunt expected servility in the place of gratitude, and in his own phrase, “inflicted rather than bestowed their bounties.” They especially disapproved of his learning French lessons in the early hours of the morning in his bedroom, and his fondness for book-knowledge was thought of evil omen for his future as a man of business. The position became so unpleasant, that in 1822 Cobden accepted the offer of a situation in a house of business at Ghent. It promised considerable advantages, but his father would not give his approval, and Cobden after some demur fell in with his father’s wish, He remained where he was, and did not quarrel with such opportunity as he had, simply because he had missed a better. It is one of the familiar puzzles of life, that those whose want of energy has sunk their lives in failure, are often so eager to check and disparage the energy of stronger natures than their own. William Cobden’s letters all breathe a soft domesticity which is more French than English, and the only real discomfort of his poverty to him seems to have been a weak regret that he could not have his’ family constantly around his hearth. Frederick, his eldest son, was in the United States for several years; his father was always gently importunate for his return. In 1824 he came home, having done nothing by his travels towards bettering forbunes that remained stubbornly unprosperous to the end Div OF DOBOEN. [crarp, 1824. of hig life. Between Frederick Cobden and Richard there Zr. 20, always existed the warmest friendship, and when the former found a situation in London, their intercourse was constant and intimate. There were three younger brothers, Charles, Miles, and Henry ; and Richard Cobden was no sooner in receipt of a salary, than he at once took the place of a father to them, besides doing all that he could to brighten the shabby poverty of the home at Westmeon. Whenever he had a holiday, he spent it there; a hamper of such good cheer as his purse could afford was never missing at Christmas ; and on the long Sundays in summer he knew no happier diversion than to walk out to meet his father at some roadside inn on the wide Surrey heaths, midway between Alton and the great city. His little parchment-bound diary of expenses at this time shows him to us as learning to dance and to box, playing cards with alternating loss and gain, going now and again to Vauxhall Gardens, visiting the theatre to see Charles Mathews, buying Brougham on Popular Education, Franklin’s Hssays, and Childe Harold. The sums are puny enough, but a gentle spirit seems still to breathe in the poor faded lines and quaint French in which he made his entries, as we read of the little gifts to his father and brothers, and how he is debtor by charité, 1s. —donné un pawvre gargon, ld.—un pauvre gargon, 2d. By-and-by the sombre Shadow fell upon them all. In 1825 the good mother of the house helped to murse a neighbour’s sick child, in the midst of an epidemic of typhoid ; she caught the fever, and died at the age of eight and forty. “Our sorrow would be torment,” Frederick Cobden wrote to his father, “if we could not reflect on our conduct towards that dear soul, without calling to mind one instance in which we had wilfully given her pain.” And with this gentle solace they seem to have had good right to soothe their affliction. feel a PROMOTION IN BUSINESS. 5 The same year which struck Cobden this distressing bibrought him promotion in his business. The early dif. °nces between himself and his uncle had been smoothed %way by his industry, cheerfulness, and skill, and he had Won the approval and good-will of his employers. From the drudgery of the warehouse, he was now advanced to the glories of the road. We may smile at the keen elation with which he looked to this preferment from the position of clerk to that of traveller; but human dignities are only relative, and a rise in the hierarchy of trade is doubtless as good matter for exultation, as a rise in hierarchies more slaborately robed. Cobden’s new position was peculiarly Suited to the turn of his character. Collecting accounts and Soliciting orders for muslins and calicoes gave room in their humble sphere for those high inborn qualities of energy, and sociability, which in later years produced the most active and the most persuasive of popular statesmen. But What made the life of a traveller so specially welcome to Cobden, was the gratification that it offered to the master-Passion of his life, an insatiable desire to know the affairs of the world. Famous men, who became his friends in the years to coms, agree in the admission that they have never known a man in whom this trait of a sound and rational desire to know and to learn was so strong and so inexhaustible, It was not the curiosity of the infantile dabbler in all subjects, random and superficial ; and yet it was as far removed from the dry parade of the mere tabulist and Statistician. It was not bookish, for Cobden always felt that much of what is best worth knowing is never written in hooks, Nor was it the curiosity of a speculative under-Standing ; yet, as we shall see presently, there soon grew p in his mind a body of theoretic principles, and a philo-Sophie conception of modern society, round which the knowledge so strenuously sought was habitually grouped, and ~ or - <n D = = 86, LIFE OF COBDEN. [omar. 1825. by which the desire to learn was gradually directed and ir. 2).. configured. The information to be gathered in coaches and in the commercial rooms of provincial hotels was narrow enough ‘n some senses, but it was varied, fresh, and in real matter. To a man of Cobden’s active and independent intelligence this contact with such a diversity of interest and character was a congenial process of education. Harsh circumstance had left no other education open to him. There is something pathetic in an exclamation of one of his letters of this period, not merely because it concerns a man of Cobden’s eminence and public service, but because it is the case of thousands of less conspicuous figures. In his first journey ‘ August—October, 1825) he was compelled to wait for half a day at Shrewsbury, for a coach to Manchester. He went bo the abbey, and was greatly impressed by its venerable walls and painted glass. “Oh that I had money,” he says to his brother, in plain uncultured speech, to be deep skilled in the mysteries of mullions and architraves, in lieu of black and purple and pin grounds! How happy I should be.” He felt as keenly as Byron himself how The lore Jf mighty minds doth hallow in the core Jf human hearts the ruin of a wall, Where dwalt the wizsa and wondrous. R98. Tn his second journey he visited the birthplace of Robert Burns, and he wrote to his brother from Aberdeen (Feb. 5, 1826) :=—“ It is a sort of gratification that I am sure you can imagine, but which I cannot describe, to feel conscious of treading upon the same spot of earth, of viewing the same surrounding objects, and of being sheltered by the same roof, ps one who equally astonished and delighted the world.” He describes himself as boiling over with enthusiasm upon approaching Alloway’s auld haunted kirk,” the brig o’ | VISITS BUBNS'S BIRTHPLACE, Doon, and the scene of Tam o’ Shanter’s headlong ride. 1826. With a pang of disillusion he found the church so small that er. 22. Cuttie-Sark and her hellish legion can have had scanty space for their capering, while the distance to the middle of the old bridge, and the length of the furious immortal chase, can have been no more than one hundred yards. The party on this occasion were accompanied by a small manufacturer from Paisley, who cared little for the genius of the place, and found Cobden’s spirit of hero-worship tiresome. ¢ Our worthy Paisley friend remarked to us, as we leaned over the Bridge of Doon, and as its impetuous stream rushed beneath us, ‘How shamefully,’ said he, ¢is the water-power of this country suffered to run to waste : here is the force of twenty horses running completely idle.” He did not relish groping among ruins and tombstones at midnight, and was particularly solicitous that we should leave matters of discussion antil we reached Burns’s birthplace, where he understood that they kept the best whiskey in that vicinity.” To Burns’s birthplace at length they came, where at first their reception was not cordial. “But my worthy friend from Paisley had not forgotten the whiskey; and so, tapping the chin of the old dame with his forefinger, he bade her bring a half-mutchkin of the best, ‘to set the wheels going,’ as he termed it, and, having poured out a glass for the hostess, which she swallowed, I was pleased to find that it did set the wheels of hex tongue going. ‘Ye would maybe like to gang and see the verra spot where poor Robbie was borned,’ she said, and we instantly begged her to show it to us. She book us along a very short passage, and into a decent-looking kitchen with a good fire. There was a curtain hung from the ceiling to the floor, which appeared to cover one part of the wall. She drew aside the curtain, and it disclosed a bed in a recess of the wall, and a man who had been hidden in the clothes first pub his head out and looked round in [826., Ar. 22 [15 LIFE O° JOBDEN. [omar sbupid amazement, and then rose up in the bed and exclaimed, ‘What the deil hae ye got here, Lizzie?’ ‘Whisht, whisht, gudeman!’ said the old dame, out of whose head the whiskey had driven all thoughts of her husband, ‘the gentlemen will be verra pleased to hear ye tell them a’ about poor Robbie.” Our Paisley friend had again poured out a glass of whiskey and presented it to our host, who drank it off, and, bringing his elbow round with a knowing flourish, he returned the glass upside down, to show he drank clean. ‘I knew Robbie weel,’ said he, wiping his mouth with his shirt-sleeve. ‘I was the last man that drank wi’ him afore he left this country for Dumfries. Oh, he was a bonnie bairn, but owre muckle gien to braw company.’ ‘And this is the spot, gentlemen,” said the impatient gudewife, catching the narrative from her husband, ‘where Robbie was borned, and sic a night that was, as I have heard Nancy Miller, the coachman’s mither say ; it blew, and rained, and thundered, just like as if heaven and earth were dinged thegither, and se corner of the house was blawn away afore the morning, and so they removed the mither and the bairn into the next room the day after.” Now I believe if these two bodies were put upon their oath to all they told uns, that they would not be guilty of falsehood or perjury, for I am quite sure they are both persuaded that their tale is true, and from no other cause than that they have told it so often. And yet I would venture to bet all I possess, and what 's more, all I owe, that they never saw Burns in all their ives. ? The genial eye for character and the good-humoured solerance of foibles, which so singularly distinguished Cobden in the days when he came to act with men for public objects, are conspicuous in these early letters. His hospi-1 To F. Cobden, Feb. 6, 1826. table observation, even this rudimentary stage, secmed 18%. to embrace all smaller matters as well as great. Though Zr. 21. he was little more than one and twenty, he had already a sense for those great facts of society which are so much more important than landscape and the picturesque, whether in books or travels, yet for which the eye and thought of adolescence are usually trained to be so dull. On his first journey in Ireland (September, 1825), he notices how immediately after the traveller leaves Dublin “yon are reminded by the miserable tenements in the roadside that you are in the land of poverty, ignorance, and misrule. Although my route afforded a favourable specimen of the Irish peasantry, it was a sight truly heartrending. There appears to be no middle class in Ireland : there are the rich, and those who are objects of wretchedness and almost starvation. We passed through some collections of huts called towns, where I observed the pig taking his food in the same room with the family, and where I am told he is always allowed to sleep. Shoes and stockings are luxuries that neither men nor women often aspire to. Their cabins are made of mud or sometimes stone. I observed many without any glass, and they rarely contain more than one room, which answers the purpose of sitting-room and sleeping-room for themselves and their pig.” Even in Dublin itself he saw what made an impression upon him, which ten years later he tried to convey to the readers of his first pamphlet. * The river Liffey intersects the city, and ships of 200 tons may anchor nearly in the heart of Dublin; but it is here the stranger is alone disappointed ; the small number of shipping betrays their limited commerce. It is melancholy to see their spacious streets (into some of which the whole tide of Cheapside might with ease move to and fro), with scarcely a vehicle through their whole extent. Whilst there is so little circulation ip LIF COBLEN, [omaP. 1826. the heart, can it be wondered at that the extremitios ars Ar. 22. poor and destitute P *'? If one side of Cobden’s active and flexible mind was interested by these miserable scenes, another side, as we have said, was touched by the strange whimsicalities of man. In February, 1826, he crossed from Donaghadee, on the north-east coast of Ireland, to Portpatrick. “Our captain was named Paschal—he was a shorb figure, but made the most of a little matter by strutting as upright as a dart, and throwing back his head, and putting forward his little chest in an attitude of defiance. It appeared to be the ambition of our little commander to make matters on board his little dirty steam-boat wear the same air of magnitude as on board a seventy-four. I afterwards learned he had once been captain on board of a king’s ship. His orders were all given through a ponderous trampet, although his three men could not be more than ten yards distant from him. Still he bore the air of a gentleman, and was accustomed to have the fullest deference paid him by his three seamen. On approaching near the Harbour of Portpatrick, our captain put his huge trumpet down the hole that led below, and roared out, ab the risk of stunning us all, ‘Steward-boy, bring up a gun cartridge, and have a care you don’t take a candle into the Magazine I> The order was obeyed, the powder was carried up, and after a huge deal of preparation and bustling to and fro on the dock, the trumpet was again poked down to a level with our ears, and the steward was again summoned to bring up a match. Soon after which we heard the report of something upon deck like the sound of a duck-gun. After that, the order was given, ‘All hands to the larboard—clear the gangway and lower the larboard steps,” or in other words, ¢ Help the passengers to step on to the pier.’ ’’? t To F. Coliden, Sept, 20, 1825. t To F. Qobden. THR DISASTERS OF 1826. i” In the same lester he congratulates himself on having been fortunate emough, when he strolled into the Court of Session, to see Jeffery, Cockburn, and Sir Walter Scott. One cannot pass the mention of the last and greatest of the three——the bravest, soundest-hearted, and most lovable of men,—without noting that this day, when Cobden saw him, wag only removed by three weeks from “that awful Seventeenth of January,” when Scott received the staggering blow of desperate and irretrievable ruin. It was only ten days before that he had gone .to the Court for the first time, and like the man with the large nose, thought that everybody was thinking of him and his mishaps.” This, in fact, was the hour of ome of the most widely disastrous of those financial crashes which sweep over the Country from time to time like great periodic storms. The fain of 1825 and 1826 was never forgotten by those who hed intelligence enough to be alive to what was going on before their eyes. The whirlwind that shook the fabric of Scott’s prosperity to the ground, involved Cobden’s humbler fortunes in a less imposing catastrophe. His employers failed (February, 1826), as did so many thousands of others, and he was obliged to spend some time in unwelcome holiday at Westmeon. Affairs were as straitened under his father’s roof as they had always been. The sun was not likely to be shining in that little particular spot, if the general sky were dull. The perturbations of the great ocean were felt even in that Small circle, and while retail customers at their modest shop Were reluctant to buy or unable to pay, the wholesale provider in London was forced to narrow his credit and call in his debts. The family stood closely to one another in the midst of a swarm of shabby embarrassments, and their neigh~ bours looked on in friendly sympathy, impotent to help. Strangely enough, as some may think, they do not seem to 1826. Ar, 22. rd Cr GoBDEMN. [omar 1826. have been very unhappy. They were all blessed by nature = 2a. with a kind of blissful mercurial simplicity, that hindered their anxieties from eating into character. Their healthy buoyancy would not allow carking care to put the sun out in the heavens. When things were dreariest, Richard Cobden rowed himself across the Solent and back, and with one of his sisters enjoyed cheery days in the Isle of Wight, and among his kinsfolk at Chichester and elsewhere. Perhaps it was fortunate that his energetic spirit was free for the service of his family, at a moment when they seemed to be sinking below the surface. It was clear that means for the support of the household could only be found in some more considerable place than Westmeon. Presently it was resolved to migrate to Farnham, renowned for the excellence of its hop-gardens, for the stateliest of episcopal sastles, and for its associations with two of the finest writers of English prose, William Cobbett who was the son of a Farnham cottager, and Jonathan Swift who had been Sir William Temple’s secretary at Moor Park a mile or two away. Thinking less of any of these things, than of the hard eternal puzzle how to make sure of food and a roof-tree in the world, William Cobden migrated hither in the beginning of 1827. “The thought of leaving this dear village,” one of his janghters had written (July, 1826), “endeared to us by a thousand tender recollections, makes me completely miserable.” This dejection was shared in a supreme degree by the head of the household. He found some consolation in the good-will that he left behind him; and his old neighbours, when they were busy with turnip-sowing, hay-making, and sheep-shearing, were wont to invite him, partly for help and work, and partly for kindly fellowship’s sake, to pay them long visits, never failing to send a horse ap the road to meet him for his convenience and the further ance of his jonraey. 1 NEW SITUATION. 5 Richard Cobden, meanwhile, had found a situation in London, in the warehonse of Partridge and Price. Mr. Zr 22 Partridge had for seven years been ome of Cobden’s emoloyers in the house which had failed, and he now resumed business with a new partner, He had learned, in his own words, Cobden’s capacity of rendering himself pre-eminently useful, and he re-engaged him after a certain effort to drive » hard bargain as to salary. In September, 1826, Cobden again set out on the road with his samples of muslin and calico prints. He continued steadily at work for two years, travelling on an average, while on his circuit, at what was then thought, when the Manchester and Liverpool railway was only in course of construction, the brisk rate of forty miles a day. Two years afterwards, in 1828, Cobden took an important step. He and two friends who were in the same trade determined to begin business on their own account. The scheme of the three friends was to go to Manchester, and there to make an arrangement with some large firn of calicoprinters for selling goods on commission. More than half of the little capital was borrowed. When the scheme first dccurred to Cobden, he is said to have gone to Mr. Lewis of the well-known firm in Regent Street, to have laid the plan before him, and asked for a loan. The borrower's sanguine sloquence, advising a project that in itself was not irrational, proved successful, and Mr. Lewis’s advance was supplemented by a further sum from a private friend. Cobden wrote many years afterwards: “I began business in partnership with two other young men, and we only mustered a thousand pounds amongst us, and more than half of it was borrowed. We all got on the Peveril of the Peak coach, and went from London to Manchester in the, at that day (September, 1828], marvellously short space of twenty hours. We were literally so ignorant of Manchester houses 182K > LIFE OF OOBDEN. [oma: 1828. that we called for a directory at the hotel, and turned to the &r. 24. lish of calico-printers, theirs being the business with whick we were acquainted, and they being the people from whon we felt confident we could obtain credit. And why Because we knew we should be able to satisfy them that we had advantages from our large connexions, our knowledgr of the best branch of the business in London, and our supe rior taste in design, which would ensure success. We intro duced ourselves to Fort Brothers and Co., a rich house, anc we told our tale, honestly concealing nothing. In less thar two years from 1830 we owed them forty thousand pounds fo! goods which they had sent to us in Watling Street, upon nt other security than our characters and knowledge of ou business. I frequently talked with them in later times upor the great confidence they showed in men who avowed 1ha! they were not possessed of 2001. each. Their answer was that they would always prefer to trust young men with connexions and with a knowledge of their trade, if they knew them to possess character and ability, to those whe started with capital without these advantages, and that they had acted on this principle successfully in all parts of the world.” * This is from a letter written to express Cobden’s firm: belief in the general circumstance, “ that it is the character. experience, and connexions of the man wanting credit, his knowledge of his business, and opportunities of making it available in the struggle of life, that weigh with the shrewd capitalist far more than the actual command of # few thousands more or less of money in hand.” We may find reason to think that Cobden’s temperament perhaps inclined him to push this excellent truth somewhat too far Meanwhile, the sun of kindly hope shone. The situation is familiar to all who have had their own way to make frox 4 Letter to Mr. W. 8. Lindsay, March 24, 1856, BUSH EME ON 4148 OWN LODO, OHADR o the ahich vhom why! vl We ledge mpentro- than a for n no 2 ont 1pU t hat was with they who they the f+m nter, . his king the Ff 9 may haps far. tion from nbscurity to success, whether waiting for good fortune wm Temple chambers, or a publisher’s anteroom, or the com- Zr. 24 mercial parlour of some provincial Crown or Unicorn. “During the time we have been here,” Cobden wrote from Manchester, while affairs were still unsettled, ‘we have been in a state of suspense, and you would be amused to see us buat for one day. Oh, sucha change of moods! This moment we are all jocularity and laughter, and the next we are mute ns fishes and grave as owls. To do ourselves justice, I must say that our croakings do not generally last more than five winutes.” Intense anxiety for the success of the undertaking was brightened by modest hopes of profits, of which a share of one third should amount to eight hundred pounds a year. And in Cobden’s case these hopes received a suffusion of generous colour from the prospect which they opened to his affectionate solicitude for his family. “I knew your heart well enough,’ he wrote to his brother Frederick, “ to feel that there is a large portion of it ever warmly devoted to my interests, and I should be doing injustice to mine if I did not tell you that I have not one ambitious view or hope from which you stand separated. I feel that Fortune, with her nsual caprice, has in dealing with us turned her face to the least deserving, but we will correct her mistake for once, and I must insist that you from henceforth consider yourself as by right my associate in all her favours.”—(Sept. 21, 1828.) The important thing is that all this is no mere coinage of fair words, but the expression i « deep and genuine intention which was amply and most diligently fulfilled to the very last hour of Cobden’s life. 1820 CHAPTER Ii, JOMMERCIAL AND MENTAL PROGRESS. 1829. Xr. 25. Cospex had not been many months in his new partnership before his energetic mind teemed with fresh projects. The arrangement with the Forts had turned out excellently. The Lancashire printers, as we have seen, sent up their goods to the warehouse of Cobden and his two partners in Watling Street, in London. On the commission on the sale of these goods the little firm lived and throve from the spring of 1829 to 1831. In 1831 they determined to enarge their borders, and to print their own goods. The conditions of the trade had just undergone a remarkable change. It had hitherto been burdened by a heavy duty, which ranged from as much as fifty or sixty, to even one aundred, per cent. of the value of the goods. In addition to 3xcess in amount, there was a vexatious eccentricity of incidence; for woollens and silks were exempt, while salicoes were loaded with a duty that, as has been said, sometimes actually made up one half of the total cost of the sloth to the purchasers. As is invariably the case in fiscal history, excessive and ill-adjusted imposts led to systematic fraud. Amid these forces of disorder, it is no wonder that from 1825 to 1830 the trade was stationary. The Lancashire calico-printers kept up a steady agitation, and at one bime it was proposed fo raise four thousand pounds for the purchase of a seat in Parliament for a representative of their Jap. 113 LATICO BEIRE. NG grievances. The agitation was successful. The duty was 1829. taken off in the spring of 1831, and between 1831 and 1841 Zr. 25. the trade doubled itself, This great change fully warranted the new enterprise of Cobden and his partners. They took over from the Forts au old calico-printing factory at Sabden,—a remote village on the banks of a tributary of the Calder, near the ruined gateways and chapel of the Cistercian abbey at Whalley in Lancashire, and a few miles from where are now the fine mills and flourishing streets of Blackburn. The higher part of the Sabden valley runs up into the famous haunted Forest of Pendle ; and notwithstanding the tall chimneys that may be seen dimly in the distance of the plain, the visitor to this sequestered spot may well feel as if the old world of white monks and forest witches still lingered on the bleak hillsides. Cobden was all with the new world. His imagination had evidently been struck by the busy life of the county with which his name was destined to be go closely bound up. Manchester, he writes with enthusiasm, is the place for all men of bargain snd business. His pen acquires a curiously exulting animation, as he describes the bustle of ite streets, the quaintness of its dialect, the abundance of its capital, and the sturdy veterans with a hundred thousand pounds in each pocket, who might be seen in the svening smoking clay pipes and calling for brandy.andwater in the bar-parlours of homely taverns. He declared his conviction, from what he had seen, that if he were stripped naked and turned into Lancashire with only his experience for a capital, he would still make a large fortune, He would not give anybody sixpence to guarantee him wealth, if he only lived! And so forth, in a vein of selfconfidence which he himself well described as Napoleonic. “I am ever solicitous,” he wrote to his brother (Jan. 80. Letters to Froderick Cobden, Aug, 11, 1831. Tan. 6 1822, &o. $1 LIFE OF COBLEN. lor AY lssz. 1832), “for your future prosperity, and I wish that 1 could Ax. 28. convince you, as I feel convinced, that it all depends upon gour bringing out with spirit the talents you possess. 1 wish that I could impart to you a little of that Bonapartian foeling with which I am imbued—a feeling that spurs me on with the conviction that all the obstacles to fortune with which I am impeded, will (nay, shall) yield if assailed with snergy. All is lost fo you, if you succumb to those desponding views which you mentioned when we last spoke. Dame Fortune, like other fair ones, loves a brisk and confident wooer. I want to see you able to pitch your voice in 8 higher key, especially when you are espousing your owp interests, and above all, never to see you yield or become passive and indifferent when your cause is just, and only wants to be spiritedly supported to be sure of a triumph But all this must proceed from within, and can be only the fruits of a larger growth of spirit, to the cultivation of which without further lecture I most earnestly commend you.” A more curious picture still is to be found in another letter, also to his brother, written a few months later (Apri 12, 1832). He describes his commercial plans as fall of solidity, ““ sure for the present, and what is still better, oper mg a vista to my view of ambitious hopes and scheme? almost boundless. Sometimes I confess I allow this sort of feeling to gain a painful and harassing ascendancy over mé [t disquiets me in the night as well as day. It gnaws mJ very entrails (a positive truth), and yet if T ask, What is al this yearning after ? I can scarcely give myself a satisfying answer. Surely not for money; I feel a disregard for it, and sven a slovenly inattention to its possession, that is quit dangerous. I have scarcely ever, as usnal, a sovereign in 10f pocket, and have been twice to Whalley, to find myself with out the means of paying my expenses. I do not thinlk the! 1 1 y i ir wn d 0 3 ne RA 1. COLFIDENOE TH HIS PROSPHOTS. the possession of millions would greatly alter my habits of sXpense,” As we might have expected in so buoyant and overflowing A temperament, moments of reaction were not absent, though the shadow was probably as swiftly transient with him as with any msn that ever lived. In one of the letters of this period he writes to his brother: —1 know I must rise rapidly if not too heavily weighted. Another doleful letter from poor M. [one of his sisters] came yesterday. Oh, this is the only portion of the trials of my life that I could not go through again—the ordeal would send me to Bedlam | Well, I drown the past in still hoping for the future, but God knows whether futurity will be as great a cheat as ever. I sometimes think it will. I tell you candidly, I am somebimes out of spirits, and have need of co-operation, or Heaven knows yet what will become of my fine castles in the alr. So you must bring sprife——: dte—spirits.” Few men indeed have been more heavily weighted at the start than Cobden was. His family were still dogged and tracked from place to place by the evil genius of slipshod fortune. In 1829 Frederick Cobden began the business of a timber merchant ga’ Barnet, but unhappily the undertaking was as little successful as other things to which he ever put his hand. The little business at Farnham had failed, and bad been abandoned. William Cobden went to live with hig son at Barnet, and amused a favourite passion by watching the hundred and twenty coaches whick each day whirled up and down the great north road. Nothing prospered. Death carried off a son and a daughter in the same year (1830). Frederick lost health, aud he lost his brother's money, and spirits followed, He and his father make a strong instance of the deep saying of Shakespeare’s Enobarbus, how men’s judgments are a parcel of their fortunes, and things outward draw the inward onaliby afar them to suffer all alike, 183%. Ar, 28. » LIFE "F OOBDEN. ORESE. 832. Stubborn and besetting failure generally warps good sense, zr. 88. and this is the hard warrant for the man of the world’s anxiety to steer clear of unlucky people. ; Richard Cobden, however had energy enough and t0 spare for the rest of his family, He pressed his brother bo join him at Manchester where he had bought a house in what was then the genteel private quarter of Mosley Street.’ Gillett and Sheriff carried on the business at the London warehouse, and Mr. George Foster who had been manager ander the Forts, was now in charge as a partner at the works at Sabden. It is at Sabden that we first hear of Cobden’s interest in the affairs of others than himself and his kinsfolk. There, in a little stone school-hounse, we see the earliest monument of his eager and beneficent public spirit, which was destined to shed such prosperity over his country, and to contribute 80 helpfully to the civilization of the globe. In no part of England have the last forty years wrought so astonishing a change as among the once lonely valleys and wild moors of east Lancashire. At Sabden, in 1832, though the printworks alone maintained some six hundred wage-receivers, there was no school, and there was no church. A diminutive Baptist chapel, irregularly served, was the only agency for ! To those who care for & measmre of the immense growth in the great aapital of the cotton trade, the following extract will have some interest :— “I have given such a start to Mosley Street, that all the world will be at my heels soon. My next door neighbour, Brooks, of the firm of Cunliffe and Brooks, bankers, haa scld his house to be converted into a warehouse. The owner of the house on the other side has given his tenant notice for the same purpose. The house immediately opposite to me has been announced for sale, and my architect is commigsioned by George Hole, the caligoprinter, to bid 6000 guineas for it; but they went 8000 for what they paid 45600 only five years ago. The architect assures me if I were to put np my house to-morrow, I might have 6000 guineas for it. So as I gave but 3000, and all the world is talking of the bargain here, and there being but one opinion or oriterion of a mare abiliby-—the making of money—~-T am alvendv thought a olaver follow.’ — Leiter to Prodenish Oobden, Sent. 1022. SABDEN, > 3 bringing, so far as it did bring, the great religious tradition 18s of the western world within reach of this isolated flock. Ar. 28. The workers practised a singular independence towards their smployers. They took it as matter of course that they were free, whenever it was their good pleasure, and without leave asked or given, to quit their work for a whole week at once, and to set out on a drinking expedition to some neighbouring town, whence they would have been ashamed toreturn until their pockets were drained to the last penny. Yet if there was little religion, there was great political spirit. There is a legend still surviving, how Mr. Foster, a Liberal of the finest snd most enlightened type, with a clear head and a strong intelligence, and the good oldfashioned faith in freedom, justice, and progress, led the Sabden contingent of zealous voters to Clitheroe for the first slection after the Reform Act, and how like a careful patriarch, he led them quickly back again after their civil duty was done; leaving the taverns of Clitheroe behind, and refreshing themselves at the springs on the hill-side. The polities of Sabden Were not always so judicious, for it appears that no baptismal name for the children born in the valley between 1830 and 1840 was so universally popular as that of Feargus O’Connor. It was in this far-off corner of the world that Cobden began hig career as an agitator, and for a cause in which all England hag long since come round to his mind, His earliest speeches were made at Clitheroe on behalf of the education of the young, and one of his earliest letters on What may fairly be called a public question is a note making arrangements for the exhibition at Sabden of twenty children from an infant school at Manchester, by way of An example and incentive to more backward regions. It vas characteristic of him, that he threw as much eager enthusiasm into the direction of this exhibition of school. LIFE OF COBDEN. Tomar. 882. children, as ever he did afterwards into great affairs of ax. 26. State. His partner was a worthy colleague. «You have ground,” Cobden wrote to him, “ for very great and just self-gratulation in the movement which you announce to have begun in behalf of infant schools ab Sabden. ‘There is never the possibility of knowing the extent to which a philanthropic action may operate usefully—because the good works again multiply in like manner, snd may continue thus to produce valuable fruits long after you cease to tend the growth of them. I have always been of opinion that good examples are more influential than bad ones, and I like to take this view of the case, because it strengthens my good hopes for general and permanent ameliorations. Look how perishable is the practice, and therefore how little is to be dreaded the eternity of evil; whilst goodness or virtue by the very force of axample, and by its own indestructible nature, must go on increasing and multiplying for ever! I really think you may achieve the vast honour of making Sabden a light to lighten the surrounding country, and carrying civilization into towns that ought to have shed rays of knowledge upon your village; when you have furnished a volunteer corps of gour infant troops to teach the tactics of the system to the people of Clitheroe, you should make an offer of a similar service gratis to the good people of Padiham. Let it be done in a formal and open manner to the leading people of the slace and neighbourhood, who will thus be openly called apon to exert themselves, and be at the same time instructed how to go about the business. There are many well meaning people in the world who are not so useful as they might be, from not knowing how to go to work.”* His perception of the truth of the last sentence, coupled ag it was with untiring energy in coping with it, and showing 8 To Mr. George Foster, Apri wh i538. i JELF-EDUCATION. 5 a people how hey could go to work best, was the secret of 3882 one of the most; important sides of Cobden’s public service. Zr. 28 It was this which, along with his acute political intelligence, made him so singularly effective. “You tell me,” he wrote on one occasion to his partner, “ to take time and be comfortable, but I fear quiet will not be my lot this trip. 1 sometimes dream of quiet, but then I recollect Byron's ling, — Quiet to quick bosoms is a hell, wd I am afraid he is nearly right in my case.” * Yet this disquiet never in him degenerated into the sterile bustle which so many restless spirits have mistaken for practical energy. Behind all hig sanguine enthusiasm as to public ands, lay the wisest patience as to means. What surprises one in reading the letters which Cobden wrote between 1833 and 1836, is the quickness with which his character widened and ripened. We pass at a single step from the natural and wholesome egotism of the young man who has his bread to win, to the wide interests and generous public spirit of the good citizen. His first motion was towards his own intellectual improvement. Even at a moment when he might readily have been excused for thinking only of money and muslin, he felt and obeyed the necessity for knowledge : but of knowledge as an instrument, not as a luxury. When he was immersed in the first pressing anxieties of his new business at Manchester, he wrote to his brother in London (September, 1832) :— “Might we not in the winter mstruct ourselves a little in Mathematics ? If you will call a Longmans and look over their catalogue, I daresay you might find some popular slementary publication that would sist us. I have a great disposition, too, to know , little ” ‘ir. and six months would suffice if J bad . few books. Can you trust your ¢ To Nv, Foster, May 1-1532.8 36 LIFE OF COBDEN. [oHAF 1833-6. perseverance to stick to them? I think I can. Let me jr. 29-32. hear from you. I wished Henry to take lessons in Spanish this winter ; it is most useful as a commercial language; the two Americas will be our best and largest customers in spite of tariffs.” He had early in life felt the impulse of composition. His first writing was a play, entitled The Phrenologisi, and Cobden offered it to the manager of Covent Garden Theatre. He rejected it—* luckily for me,” Cobden added, “ for if he had accepted it, I should probably have been a vagabond all the rest of my life.” Another comedy still survives in manuscript ; it is entirely without quality, and if the writer ever looked at it in riper years, he probably had no difficulty in understanding why the manager would have nothing to do with it. His earliest political work consisted of letters addressed anonymously to one of the Manchester newspapers (1835) on the subject of the incorporation of the borongh. But it was the pamphlet of 1835, England, Ireland, and America, which first showed the writer's power. Of the political teaching of this performance we shall say gomething in another chapter. Here we mention it as illustrating the direction in which Cobden’s thoughts were busy, and the kind of nourishment with which he was strengthening his understanding during the years previous to his final launch forth upon the sea of great affairs. This pamphlet and that which followed it in the next year, show by their references and illustrations that the writer, after his settlement in Manchester in the autumn of 1832, had made himself acquainted with the greatness of Cervantes, the gemiality of Le Sage, the sweetness of Spenser, the splendid majesty of Burke, no less than with the general course of European history in the past, and the wide forces that were then actually at work in the present. Nina who had intimate relstions with Cobden in these earlior I 1 Vis F w S17 3 N *R, RA N an om AND N sw TY Hi HEL LAN iv, 2 7 It A 1 ~ 1 years of his career, described him to me a3 always writing nnd speaking fp tho top of his knowledge.” The real meaning of this, I believe, was that Cobden had a peculiar gift for turning everything that he read to useful purpose in strengthening or adorning his arguments. He only read or listened where he expected to find help, and his quickness in assimilating was due to a combination of strong concentration of interest on his own subject, with keen dexterity in turning light upon it from other subjects. Or, in saying that Cobden always spoke and wrote to the top of his knowledge, our informant was perhaps expressing what any one may well feel in reading his pamphlets and speeches, namely, that he had a mind so intensely alive, so penetrative, 80 real, as to he able by means of moderate knowledge rapidly acquired, to get nearer to the root of the matter, than others who had laboured after a far more extensive preparation. Very early in life Cobden perceived, and he never ceased to perceive, that for hig purposes no preparation could be so offective as that of travel. He first went abroad in the summer of 1833 (July), when he visited Paris in search of designs for his business. He did not on this occasion stay long enough to derive any ideas about France that are worth recording now. He hardly got beyond the common English impression that the French are a nation of grownup children, thongh he described the habit of Parisian life in a happy phrase, ag pleasure without pomp.” ® In the following year he again went to France, and continued his Journey to Switzerland, The forests and mounbains inspired him with the admiration and awe that no nodern can avoid, Once in after-years, a friend who was about to visit the United States, asked him whether it would be worth while to gy far out of his way for the sake of seeug the Falls of [3 ingars, Yes, most assuredly,” was ¢ To 3, Cobden, July 27, 1888. 1833.8. Aor, 29.32 1534 I! LIFE OF COEDEN, r {CHAP 1834. (Cobden’s reply. * Nature has the sublimity of rest, and the Z&r. 80. sublimity of motion. The sublimity of rest is in the great snow mountains ; the sublimity of motion is in Niagara.” Although he had to its fullest extent this sentiment for the imposing glories of the inanimate universe, yet it is characteristic of his right sense of the true measure of things, that after speaking of Swiss scenery, he marks to his brother, as “ better still,” that he has made acquaintance with people who could tell him about the life and institutions of the land. “The people of this country are I believe the best governed and therefore the most prosperous and happy in the world. It is the only Government which has not one douanier in its pay, and yet, thanks to free trade, there is scarcely any branch of manufacturing industry which does notin one part or other of the country find a healthy occupation. The farmers are substantial. Here is a far more elevated character of husbandry life than I expected to see. Enormous farm-houses and barns; plenty of out-houses of every kind; and the horses and cows are superior to those of the English farmers. The sheep and pigs are very, very bad. They have not adopted the Chinese breed of the latter, and the former they do not pay much attention to. I did not see a field of turnips in all the country. Cows are the staple of the farming trade.” It was to the United States, rather even than to Switzerland, that Cobden’s social faith and enthusiasm turned ; and after his pamphlet was published in the spring of 1835, he resolved to see with his own eyes the great land of unsounted promise. Business was prosperous, and though his partners thought in their hearts that he might do better by attending to affairs at home, they allowed some freedom to the enterprising genius of their ally, and made no objection to his absence, § Tp F. JUndden. Trow Conews, June §, 18234, DEATH OF 170 “THER. 21, Meanwhile his father had died (June 15, 1833). When Frederick Cobden had joined his brother in Manchester, the old man had gone to live with his daughters in London. But he could not bear the process of transplanting. He pined for his old life in the beloved country, and his heonlth foiled rapidly. They removed him shortly before he died to Droxford, bub it was too late, and he did not long survive *he change. The last few months of a life that would have oeen very dreary but for the undying glow of family affection, were gilded by the reflection of his son’s prosperity. It is the bitterest element in the vast irony of human life that the time-worn eyes to which a son’s success would have brought the purest gladness, are so often closed for aver before success has coma, 1883. Ar, 29 CHAPTER IIf, TRAVELS IN WEST AND EAST. 1885. On May 1, 1835, Cobden left Manchester, took his passage Zin. 31 in the Britannia, and after a boisterous and tiresome voyage of more than five weeks in the face of strong west winds, arrived in the port of New York on June 7. His brother, Henry, who had gone to America some time previously, met him on the wharf. In his short diary of the tour, Cobden almost begins the record by exclaiming, ©“ What beauty will this inner bay of New York present centuries hence, when wealth and commerce shall have done their utmost to embellish the scene!” And writing to his brother, he expresses his joy at finding himself in a country, “on the soil of which 1 fondly hope will be realized some of those dreams of human exaltation, if not of perfection, with which I love to console myself.” ! It is not necessary to follow the itinerary of the thirtyseven days which Cobden now passed in the United States. He visited the chief cities of the Eastern shore, but found bis way no farther west than Buffalo and Pittsburg. Cobden was all his life long remarkable for possessing the traveller's most priceless resource, patience and good-humour under discomfort. He was a match for the Americans themselves, whose powers of endurance under the small tribulations of railways and hotels excite the envy of Europeans. ¢ Poland {in Ohio],” Cobden notes in his journal,“ where we changed To FQ. June 7, 1885. HAR TL] VOYAGE 10 YIM UNITED STATES. 31 coaches, is g pretty thriving little town, chiefly of wood, with il bwo or three brick houses, quite in the English style. We Ai. 31. proceeded to Young’s Town, six miles, and there again changed coaches, but had to wait three hours of the night until the branch stage arrived, and I lost my temper for the first time in America, in consequence.” He remarked that politics were rarely discussed in public conveyances. “Here [in Ohio] I found, as in every other Company, the slavery blot viewed as an indelible stain upon, and a curse to, the country. An intelligent old gentleman said he would prefer the debt of Great Britain to the coloured population of the United States. All agreed in the hopelessness of any remedy that had been proposed.” Cobden’s curiosity and observation were as alert and as varied as usual, from wages, hours of labour, quality of land, lown to swift trotters, and a fellow-traveller “who wore gold spectacles, talked of © taste,’ and questioned me about Bulwer, Lady Blessington, and the Duke of Devonshire, but chewed tobacco and Spat incessantly, clearing the lady, out of the window.” He felt the emotions of Moses on Pisgah, 3s ho looked down from ome of the northern spurs of the Alleghanies :— “ Passing over the last summit of the Alleghanies, called Laurel Hill, we looked down upon a plain country, the beginning of that vast extent of territory known as the Great Mississipi Valley, which extends almost without variaion of surface to the base of the Rocky Mountains, and nereases in fertility and beauty the further it extends westward. Here will one day be the head-quarters of agricultural and manufacturing industry ; here will one day centre the civilization, the wealth, the power of the entire world. The country is wel] cleared, it has been occupied by Europeans only eighty Years, and it is the best soil I have seen am this side of the Atlantic, Any number of able-bodied FZ LIFE OF COBDIEN, {omar 1835. labourers may, the moment they tread the grass west of she Ar, 1. Alleghanies, have employment at two shillings a day and be “found.” We arrived at Brownaville at four o’clock, the only place I have yet seen that uses coals for fuel. We are now in the State of Pennsylvania. Thank God 1 am m longer in the country of slaves.” ? On coaches and steamboats he was constantly struck as all travellers in America have been, by the vehemen! and sometimes unreasonable national self-esteem of the people. At the theatre at Pittsburg he remarked the enthusiasm with which any republican sentiment was caugh! up, and he records the rapturous cheers that greeted th magniloquent speech of one of the characters,—“N¢ crowned head in Christendom can boast that he ever com manded for one hour the services of this right arm.” The Americans were at that time suffering one of their to common fits of smart and irritation under English criticism. They never saw an Englishman without breaking out agains! Mrs. Trollope, Captain Basil Hall, and, above all, Fanny Kemble. “Nothing but praise unqualified and unadulteratet will satisfy people of such a disposition. We passed by the scene of Bradock’s defeat by the French and Indidns or Turtle Creek. Our American friends talked of New Or leans,” Their self-glorification sometimes roused Cobder bo protest, though he thought he saw signs that it was likelr to diminish, as has indeed been the case :—— «Tt strikes me that the organ of self-esteem is destined be the national feature in the craniums of this people. The] are the most insatiable gourmands of flattery and praise the over existed. I mean praise of their country, its institutions great men, etcetera. I was, for instance, riding out with Judoe Boardman and a lady, when the Judge, speaking ¢ t J F. Cobden, June 15, 1825. » Tp PF. O.. June 16. 1835. fee below. 1. 24 a. x.) VINDIOATION OF HIS OWN OOUNTRY. 33 16) 12] 10 re 10 1: nt HO = ht tz] Jo nhe 00 Ne 180 ay 1 add he 0 irar Al Id ey gt 18; a af Daniel Wobster, said, quite coolly, and without a smile, for 1 Joss, looked for one very closely, thinking he Joked, “I do not ar. 81. know if the great Lord Chatham might not have been his aqual, but certainly no British statesman has since his day deserved to be compared with him.” And the lady, in the ame serious tone, asked me if TI did not find the private “arriages handsomer in New York than ours were in Eng. land ! I have heard all sorts of absurdities spoken in referance to the glorious incidents of this nation’s history, and very often have been astonished to find wy attention called fwith a view to solicit my concurrence with the enthusiastic praises of the speaker) to battles and other events which I bad never heard of before, and which yet the Americans consider to be ag familiarly known to all the world as to themselves. I consider thig failing—perhaps, as a good phrenologist, I might almost term it g discase-—to be an unfortunate oeculiarity, There is no cure for it, however. On the conrary, is will go on increasing with the increase of the wealth, bower, and population of the United States, so long as they wre United, but no longer. 1 have generally made it a rule io parry the inquiries and comparisons which the Americans ATO 80 apt to thrust at an Englishman. On one or two secasions, when the party has been numerous and worth powder and shot, T have, however, on being hard pressed, wd finding my British blood up, found the only mode of slaying their inordinate vanity to be by resorting to this mode of argument, ;—t | admit all that you or any other Person can, could, may, or might advance in praise of the Past career of the people of America, Nay, more, I will myself assert that 00 nation ever did, and in my opinion a0me ever will, achieve such a title to respect, wonder, and gratitude in BO short a period; and further still, I venture bo allege that the imagination of statesmen never dreamed of beountry that should in half 4 century make such pro- 1885. Ar. 381. [pe wp TOBDEN, {mes digious advances in civilization and real greatness ag youve bas dove. And now I must add, and I am sure you, 88 intelligent, reasonable men, will go with me, that fifty years are too short a period in the existence of nations to entitle them to the palm of history. No, wait the ordeal of wars, distresses, and prosperity (the most dangerous of all), which centuries of duration are sure to bring to your country. These are the test, and if, many ages hence, your descendants shall be able only to say of their country as much as I am entitled to say of mine now, that for seven hundred years we have existed as a nation constantly advancing in liberty, wealth, and refinement ; holding out the lights of philosophy and true religion to ail the world ; presenting mankind with the greatest of human institutions in the trial by jury; and that we are the omly modern people that for so long a time withstood the attacks of enemies 80 heroically that a foreign foe never put foot in our capital except as a prisoner (this last is a poser?);—if many centuries hence your descendants will be entitled to say something squivalent to this, then, and not fill then, will you be entitled to that crown of fame which the historian of centuries is entitled to award” There is no way of conveying # rebuke so efficiently as npon the back of a compliment. So in like manner, if I have been bored about New Orleans, ] have replied, ‘I join in all that can be said in favour of General Jackson, Asa commander he has probably achieved more than any other man by destroying two thousand of his enemies with only the loss of twenty men, Bub the merit rests solely with the Genersl, for you, as intelligent men, will agree that there could be no honour reaped by troop: who never were even seen by their enemies,” * 4 The reader will remember, as Cobden’s listeners did, that Washingtor wag occupied by British forces in 1814. © 4, F. Cobden, from Boston, July §, 1825. Cohden’s reference is to thf TH FH - 7 | Ma Of the great glory of the American continent, Cobden thought gg repturously as any boaster in the land. We have Previously quoted his expression about Niagara being the sublimity of motion, and here is the account of his firs visit to the incomparable Falls, “From Chippewa village, the smoke (as it appears to be) rising from the cataract is visible. There was not such & volume of mist as I had °xpected, and the noise was mot great. I reached the Pavilion Hotel near the falls at one o’clock. I immediately went to see this greatest of natural wonders alone. I iealously guarded ™y eyes from wandering until I found myself on the Table Rock, Thank God that has bestowed °n me health, time, ang means for reaching this spot, and the spirit to kindle at the spectacle before me! The Horseshoe is the all-absorbing portion of the scene from this point; the feathery graceful effect of the water as it tumbles in broken and irregular channels over the edge of the rock has not been properly described. Nor has the effect of the rapids above the shoot, seen from this point, as they come nmrging, leshing, ang hissing in apparent agony at the terrific destiny before them. This rapid above the falls might be called rush of the waters preparatory to their laking their awful leap. The water is thrown over an irrogular ledge, but in falling it completely hides the face *t the perpendicular rock down which it falls. Instead of an ven sheet of glassy water, it falls in light and graceful festoons of foaming, nay almost vapoury fluid, possessing 15 ‘mEagement of the 8th of January, 1815, when Andrew Jackson at New Orleans repulgeg the British forceg under Sir Edward Pakenham. The Amerioang mowed the enemy down from behing high works. The British 1088 wag 700 Eilled, 1400 wounded, and £00 prisoners ; Jackeson’s logs, eight cilled, and thirteen wounded. Ag i happened, the two countries were no ‘onger at war at the moment, for pence had been signed at Ghent a fortaight before (Dec. 24, 1814). General Pakenham, who was Wellington's orobher-in.low. fail while brevaly rallying his columns undor a murderoor 1885. Ar. 81. 16 LIPW 7 JOBDEN. {cal 1835. just enough consistency fo descend in various-sized and Zr. &, hardly distinguishable streams, whilst here and there on of these foaming volumes encounters a projecting rock in it? descent, which forces it back in heavy spray into the still descending torrent above; thus giving indescribable beauty and variety to the scene. In the afternoon I crossed the river below the falls, and visited Goat’s Inland. At the foot the staircase there is a view of the Ameyican fall at a poid! of rock near the bottom of the cascades, terrific beyond ect ception, and totally opposite to the effect of the Horse-shof Fall as seen from Table Rock. I ascended the stairs and passed over the bridge to Goat’s Island. The view from th platform overhanging the Horse-shoe Fall, when you look right down into the abyss, and are standing immediatel] over the descending water, is horrible. I do not thik people would take any pleasure in being placed in phe fearful position, unless others were looking on, or unless for the vain gratification of talking about it. In the evening again looked at the Horse-shoe Fall from Table Rock unt dark—oh, for an English twilight! The effect of this fall improved by the water which flows over the ledge being o very different depths, from two to twenty feet, which 0! course causes the water to flow more or less in a mass, & that in one part ib descends nearly half way in a blue, 15° broken sheet, whilst not far off it is scattered into the whites foam almost as soon as it has passed the edge of the rock The water for several hundred yards below the fall is # white as drift snow—not a mere white froth, but wherev? it is disturbed it shows nothing but a white milk-like etfe® anlike any water I ever saw.” ® sk Ld i « In the morning I went in a coach with Messrs. Cunninf pam and Church, and Henry, to see the whirlpool three mil® $ To & (., June 21, 1835. ur] NIAGA™ ] 0 d 1 ¥ a ye dl 2 iq} 1” al down the stream. I was disappointed ; I dou’t know if it was that the all-absorbing influence of the falls prevented my taking any interest in other sceues. After dinner, I descended to view the Horse-shoe T-]1 from behind the curtain of water ; the stunning noise and the heavy beating of the water render this a severe adventure, but there is no danger. The effect of the sound is that of the most terrific thunder. There js very little effect for the eye. We went to view the burning well, which would certainly light a town with gas, Putting a tub over the well produces a complete Zasometer. A tree wag thrown into the rapid, but the effect is not great, it dropred immediately it passed the ledge more perpendicularly than the cascade, and so disappeared. Tn the balcony looking over the falls there was a stupid-looking man, telling a stupid story, about a stupid lord. Tt assured me that I wag amongst my own countryfen again, The negro barber here is a runaway black from Virginia, “ From Table Rock Wo 8aw a rainbow which formed nearly a complete circle. We crossed again to the American side with Mr, Cunningham, ang took a bath, for there is not one on the Canada side, The ferryman told us of a gentleman who swarm over three times. I felt loss digposed than Sver to quit thig spot, so full of ever-increasing attraction. Were I an American, I would here strive to build me a Summer residence, In the evening there were drunken People about. I have Seen more intoxicated persons ab this first Canada town, than in any place in the States. The view from Table Rock was rather Cbscured hy the mist. At dinner a crowdeq tabla was w* Treat d Ui twenty minutes | Think of sixty persons gt - 1 watoring-place dining and leaving the table in twe- 38! Ttook a last and reluctant leave of this greatest | nature’s works’? T june. sn 1885. mm gL MIEN. {CLAP 1836. Cobden summed up his impressions in a long letter te Er. 31. his brother at Manchester :— “I am thus far on my way back again to New York, which city I expect to reach ou the Sth inst., after completing a tour through Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington, Pittsburg, Lake Erie to Buffs]: Niagar ™ Us Albany (ii Auburn, Utica, Schenectady) and th~ =a-sticut valley to Boston, and Lowell, etc., to-morrov + my return to New York, I purpose giving two days t- "_adson river, going ap to Albany one day, and returning the next; after which I shall have two or three days for the purpose of taking leave of my good friends in New York, previously to going on board the Britunnia on the 16th. My journey may be called a real pleasure trip, for without an exception or interruption of any kind, I have enjoyed every minute of the too, too short time allowed me for seeing this truly magnificent country. No one has yet done justice to the splendid scenery of America. Her lakes, rivers, forests, and above all her cataracts are peculiarly her own, and when I think of their superiority to all that we own in the Old World, and, still. more, when I recollect that by a mysterious ordinance of their Creator, these were hid from learned ken’ till modern times, I fell into the fanciful belief that the Western continent was brought forth at a second birth, and intended by nature as a more perfect specimen of her handiwork. But how in the name of breeding must we account for the degeneracy of the human form in this otherwise mammoth-producing soil? The men are but sorry descendants from the noble race that begot their ancestors ; and as for the women! My eyes have not found one restingplace that deserves to be called a wholesome, blooming, pretty woman since I Lave been here. One fourth part of the women look as if they had just recovered from a fit of the jaundice, another quarter would in England be termed TARAOTER. 29 n a state “"ided consumption, and the remainder are fitly likened sur fashionable women when haggard and jaded with th, dissipation of a London season. There, haven't oui-irolloped Mrs, Tr-ilope, and overhauled even Basil Hall p “But leaving the physique for the morale. My estimate f American character *~ = contrary to my expectations, bv this visi. “Wee —v previons esteem for the qualities Y myself in love with "heir intelligence, t; 1 the decorous selfrespect that actuate: 1 -lageen, “he very genius of activity seems to have found © 9+ bode in the souls of this restless aud energetic race .-w have not, ’tis true, the force of Englishmen in perso} veight or strength, but they have compensated for this © 5 ai- aoe hy quickening the momentum of their enterprises favour of celerity of action and the saving of tim. -+ d, speed, speed, is the motto that is stamped ia te fom of their ships and steamboats, m the breed of their res, (ad the light construction of Sheir waggons and cartr: and in the ten thousand conbrivances that are met with here whether for the abridging of the labour of monthy or minutes, whether a high-pressure Sngine or a patent boot-juck. Allis done in pursuit of one Common object, the economy of time We like to speculate pon the future, ang I have sometimes tried to conjecture what; the industry and ingenuity and activity of that future people of New Holland, or of some cther at present unknown continent, will amount to wallush ll surpass and supersede the Yankees in the carver of -rovements, as effectually as these have done the native. "11 World. They must be a race that will |, ral vent) with food and sleep altogether, for th, | aericer Lo= cortawal, discovered the winimum ime thy i, required for the services of their beds an. boards. Their mechanical engines must work "838. LI¥E OF QOBDEN. {omar 1835. miracles ill panting time toils after them in vain.’ In fact mg 81. I regard it as almost as improbable for another community to rival the population of these states in prosperity, as for an individual to surpass ovr indefatigable friend and selfsacrificed free-born alas —, in the race of hard-earned fortune. You know I predicted when leaving England for bhis continent, that I should not fin? it sufficiently to my taste to relish a sojourn here fir life. My feelings in this respect are quite altered. I know of no reasonable ground for an aversion to this country, and none but unreasonable minds could fail to be as happy here as in England, provided friendly attachments did not draw them to the Old country. My own predilection is rather in favour of Washington as a residence. Baltimore is also, I should imagine, a pleasant town, These two are now by means of the railroad almost identical. By-the-bye, when running through those towns on my way to the west, and in the design of extending my journey as far as Montreal, which I have since found to be impracticable, unfortunately I resisted all kind invitations to remain even for the purpose of being introduced to old Hickory, which would have delayed me only a day. I have since regretted this very much.” ® Cobden arrived in England in the middle of August, after an uneventful voyage, in which he found no better way of amusing himself than by analyzing the character of his fellow-passengers, and reducing them to types. Early in life his eager curiosity had been attracted by the doctrines of phrenology, and however crude the pretensions of phrenology may now appear, it will always deserve a certain measure of historic respect as being the first attempt to popularize the study of character by system, and the arrangement of men’s faculty and disposition in classes. To accept phrenology to-day would stamp a man a8 un-To FO, July Bb, 1835. From Boston. m.] HIS GEIURN, PUBLICATION OF PAMPHLETS, 4! wienfifie, but to accept it in 1835 was a good sign of Yas mental activity, Cobden’s portraits of his shipmates, if they Zr. 21. re not so deep-reaching as La Bruyére, serve to illustrate is habit of watching the ways of men, of studying the differences among them, and of judging them with the kindly nentrality of the humourist or the naturalist. How useful this habit became to the leader of a political agitation, in which patient and versatile handling of different characters ls 80 important gift, we shall soon see, After his return from America, Cobden remained ab home for fifteen months, from the summer of 1835 to the autumn of 1836, He began by making up all arrears of business, and discussing new projects with his partners. But public affairs drew him with irresistible attraction. Tt Was probably in this interval that he made his first public speech, The object of the meeting, which was small and unimportant, was to further the demand of a corporation for Manchester. Cobden was diffident, and unwilling to speak. He was at length induced to rise, but his speech is described a8 a signal failure. “He wag nervous,” says the chronicler, “confused, and in fact practically broke down, and the chairman had to apologize for him.” The first occasion on which his name appears in the newspapers is the announcewent that he wag chosen to be on the committee of the newly established Athensmum at Manchester, and he modestly seconded a resolution at, the meeting.* The important piece *f work of this date was the pamphlet on Russia, which was bublished in the Summer of 1836. The earlier pamphlet, ¥ Oot. 1, 18385, . i The original advertisement ig ag follows :—“ On Monday, July 25, will 08 published, price 8d., Russia, by a Manchester Manufacturer, author of England, Ireland, ang Americ. Coutenta—1. Russia, Turkey, and England. L. Poland, Russia, ang England, 8. The Balance of Power. 4. Protection ’f Commerc, . , , This is not g party pamphlet, nor will Russia be found 28 the title might seem to imply, to be exolurively the subject of inquiry in she following Drag? {oral England, Ireland, =v = “1 been published, as 1 have already mentione?. = “77 and within twelve months had gone thr--- "1s, ab what we shoul” now consider the bh’ +» “lings and sixpence; it had in An" 77 ¢Jition ab sixpences The newspaper: * its praize, and its author had bean o-oo? - c~norous style of the nonventional leas 2 «vi? © * liberal and comprehensive mind, =n acut- ar "‘aker, a clear and interesting writer. “-nd ia it~ host F---nse not an exclusive sense of the torm— tru» + T- Ridgway, the publisher, informe” 77-1 *hat nobody ought to print a pamphlet unless he Lad svmo ~ther object in view, besides publication. I have another chir+t "Cobden adds, “in distant and dim perspective.” ” “Ve may assume that, whep he said this, he was thinking, with nataral ambition, of the pedestal from which a place in Parliament enables a mab to address his audience. These two pieces are important snough in Cobden’s history t» deserve a chapter of their own, but it will be convenient before dealing with them 0 complete the travels which f-llowed the publication of the 1836. second of them. Shortly afterwards the strain of s¢ Fo many interests affected Cobden’s health. He had suffered severely from an illness at the end of the previous year, and the doctors counselled a winter abroad. As the business was in good order, and the mainspring, to use Cobden’s ow? 1 Mamchester Guardian, May 28, 1835. The London Times, May 5, 16% desoribes the pamphlet as having * some sound views of the true foreig? policy of England, and some just and forcible reflections on the canses whicl keep us in the rear of improvement,” &o. The Manchester Guardian—we may notice as a point in that important matter, the history of the periodical press—was from Jan. 1, 1830, t° Bept. 15, 1836, published once a week, and sold for sevenpence. After the duty on paper wus reduced (Bupt. 15, 1836), it was published twice n wal ad its price brought down to fourpeuoce, t To F. Cobden, March 81, 1835. A 1 ¥ » os STARTS — figure in the matter, wae not ne-essary until the following spring, he resolved *- fo “word On the 22ud of October he sailed fret "emousk He arrived in Falmouth harbour, on his return, on the 21st of April, 1837. The ship touched r* Tishon end Cadiz, and Cobden wrote lively accounts to his friends at home of all that he saw. Hig description of Cadiz was stopped short by recollecting Byron’s famous account, and the only subject on which he permitted himself to expatiate repeatedly and at length was the beauty of the ladies and their dress. “ At Cadiz too,” he writes to his partner at Sabden, “you may see the loveliest female costume in the world—the Spanish mantillal All ‘he head-dresses in Christendom must yield the palm to this, It is, as Jou may see in the little clay figures of Spanish ladies which are sold in England, a veil and mantle combined, which falls from a high comb at the back of the top of the head, down t~ the elbow in front, and just below the shoulders behind, fan, which is universally carried, 8 twirled and brandished about, with an air quite murderous "0 the hearts of sensitive bachelors. Black silk is the nations] costume, and thus these sable beauties are always seen in the streets or at the promenade. Judge of the climate, judge of the streets, end of the atmosphere of their tities, where all the ladies rrmear in public in full dress! Sorry, however, am i - | that the demon innovation is making war unon the mV ip the shape of foreign fashions—Frenc} ~nnets cr- keginning to usurp the throne of the bla: mani). twformer as I am, I would ain be a conserve + «I that ancient and venerable institudon, the mar The French will Lave much to answer for, if they Wroreede with their frinpery and finery this beautifi’ | Now, as in the busiest d-v. Cobden was a - Foster, from Alexandria, Nov. 28, 1838. 1838. Ar, 32. 1838. HT. 82. LIN. . ©" JOBDEN. [cELr. voluminous and untiring letter-writer. In the hottest time of the agitation against the Corn Laws, he no sooner fiung off his overcoat on reaching the inn after a long journey or & boisterous meeting, than he called for pen and ink, and sat lown to write letters of argument, remongtrance, persuasion, direction. And when, as now, he was travelling for relaxation, the same impulse was irresistibly strong upon him, the same expansive desire to communicate to others his impressions, ideas, and experiences, “I am writing this,” he says on one occasion, “whilst sailing down the Nile on my return bo Alexandria, and it is penned upon no better desk than my knees, while sitting cross-legged upon my mattress, in the cabin of a boat not high enough in the roof to allow me even to stand.”’* No physical inconvenience and no need of repose ever dulled his willingness either to hear or to speak. The biographer’s only embarrassment is difficulty of selection from superabundant material. Journals and letters alike show the same man, of quick observation, gay spirits, and a disposition that, on its serious side, was energetically reflective rather than contemplative. I wish that I could reproduce his journals, but they are too copious for the limits of my space ; and the statements of commercial fact which they contain are no longer true, while the currents of trade which Cobden took such pains to trace out, have long since shifted their direction. He was an eager and incessant questioner, and yet his journals show a man who is acquiring knowledge, not with the elaborate conscientiousness of a set purpose, but with the ease of natural and spontaneous interest, There is no overdone earnestness ; life is not crushed out of us by the sledge-hammer of he statistical bore ; there is the charm of disengagement, nnd the faculty of disengagement is one of the secrets of the most effective kind of character. Elaborate inquiries as to * To Qharles Cobden, Jap. 8, 1887. SIBRALTAR. imports and exports do not prevent him from being well 1836. pleased to go ashore at Tenos, “to amuse ourselves for a day with leaping, throwing, and jumping.” As the Serious interests of hig journey—the coramercial and political oir cumstances of Egypt, Greece, and Tarkey—are no longer In the same case, it can hardly be worth while to transcribe his account of them. } The following extracts from his letters to his sisters will serve to show his route :— Gibraltar, 11 Nov., 1836.— Before us arose the towering and impregnable fortress i on every side land was distinctly visible; my first inquiry was, Where is the coast of Africa? It was a natural cariosity. A quarter of the globe where white men’s feet have but partially trod, whose sandy plains and mountains are unknown, and where imagination may revel in unreal creations of the terrible, was for the first time presented to my view. Can you doubt that the thought which arose in my mind for a time absorbed all other reflections? Yet all [ could see was the dark sable outline of the coast of Barbary, a congenial shroud for the gloomy scene of pagan woes and Christian crimes that have been enacted i the regions beyond ! “The two particulars,” he continued, “which strike most strongly the oye of the visitor who has passed from Spain ang Portugal to this place, are the bustling activity of Gibraltar, 438 contrasted with the deserted condibion of Lishon and Cadiz, and the variety of the costumes and characters which suddenly offer themselves to his notice. To see both to advantage, it is necessary to visit the open Square opposite to the Exchange, where the auctions and other businesg draw a concourse of all the inhabitants and sojourners in thig rocky Babel, # Fortunately our hotel opens immediately upon this lively scene, and I have spent hourg in surveying from above the or. 83. Yr TRLEN, [usr 1236. variegated lines of the motley multitude below. By far the gr. ge. most dignified and interesting fgure is the Moor, who, with his turban, rich yellow slippers, ample flowing robes, and bare legs, presents & picturesque figure which is admirably contrasted with that of a Catalonian, who—with a red cap: which depends from a black band that encircles his head, like a long bag down nearly to his waist, pantaloons which are braced up to his armpits, and short round jacket, —may be seen jostling with the idle smuggler, with his leather embroidered leggings, his breeches of velvet adorned with side rows of bright basket buttons, his sash, embroidered jacket, and grotesque conical hat; whose life is a romance and probably a tragedy, and every one of whose gestures is viewed with interest as the by-play of one who by turns acts the part of a contrabandista, a bandit, or an assassin. Next is the Jew, who is here beheld in the most abject guise of his despised class: a rude mantle of the coarsest blanketing covers his crouching figure, bent by the severe toil with which he here earns a miserable subsistence; he is waiting with a patient and leaning aspect the call of some purchaser. His bare legs and uncovered head and the ropes indicative of his laborious calling, which are probably fastened loosely about his waist, altogether give him the appearance of one who has been condemned to a life of penance for the expiabion of some heinous crimes :—alas, he is only the personification of the fate of his tribe! But I could not find space to portray the minor features of the scene before me. Here are English, French, Spanish, Italian, Mahometans, Christians, and Jews, all bawling: and jostling each other, some buying, others selling or bartering, whilst the fierce competition for profit is maintained by a mingled din of the Spanish, Arabic, Lingua Franca, and English tongues. This is a scene only to be viewed in Gibraltar, and it is worthy of the pains of a pilgrimage from afar to behold it. ABBALTAR, Gibraltar, 1. Nev 1836. A trip was made by a party _ 1838. of five of us on horseback to a convent fifteen miles off. Zr. 82 The road lies through sa cork wood, and it is a favourite exenrsion from the garrison. It was delightful, after seeing nothing but barren rocks, and being confined to the limits of this fortress—which js seven miles in circumference—to find ourselves galloping thrcogh woods where hundreds of pathways allowed one ."" nited range, and where thousands of beautiful trees an? ints poouliar to this part arrested our attention. Th dcctur’ was in a botanical mood ab once, and we ail gathered about to learn from him the names and properties of such plante as were to us new acquaintances. After filling our pockets with seeds and specimens, we pursued our Journey to the convent, which is a dilapidated building, in which we found only one solitary monk. A Jarge courtyard, in which were two or three gaunt-looking dogs, who from their manners appeared unused to receive visitors ; extensive stables, in which we found only the foals of an ass, in place uf a score of horses ; a belfry without ropes; vast kitchens, but no fire; and spacious corridors, dormitor:-3, and refectories, in which I could not discover g vestige | £, uisure, revealed a picture of desolation and loneliness. 7 v.alked into the gardens and found oranges ripening, and the fig-tree, pomegranate, Sago palm, olives, ang grape-vines flourishing amidst weeds that were almost impervious to our feet. The country around was wild, and harmonized with the ruined and abandoned fortunes of the couvent. After partaking of some brown bread, ©g8s, und chestnots, from the hands of the monk, and after enlivening his solitary cloisters with the unwonted echoes of our merriment, in which we found our poor ojg host willing to indulge, we left him, * Dr. Wilson, his travelling companion, whose soquaintance he had fiat made in his Yoyare home from the United Statea. Ld LIT ay “MEN, {op 1238, and returned through the cork wood to our quarte Fir. 22 here.” Alexandria, 30 Nop. 1836, Tn consequence of arrival of the governor. wa were greeted with much no and rejoicing by the good folks of Malta. The town ¥% luminated, bands of singers paraded the streets, the oper was thrown open, and all was given up to fun and revel} We saw all that we could of the proceedings, and hea! luring the night more than we could have wished, conside” ing that we wanted a quiet sleep. However, it was nect® sary for us to be up betimes in the morning, to make son preparations for our journey in Egypt. The good doct” #88 in a great bustle, purchasing the biscuits, brandy, and other little commodities; it was necessary also that ¥ should engage a trusty servant at Malta, to accompany ¥ through the voyage. Our friends recommended a m# named Rosario Villa, who had made the excursion up Nile several times with English tourists—spoke Arabio Hnglish, and Italian, and knew the whole of Egypt and Syria thoroughly. Rosario was introdzced to us. NoW [ask you, does not the name at once tell yon that b¢ was a smart elegant young fellow, with a handsome fact good figure, and an insinuating address? Such is the ide? which you will naturally have formed of a Maltese name’ Rosario Villa. Stop a moment till I have described hi? He is a little elderly man with a body as dried and shriveled a8 a reindeer’s tongue, only not so fresh-coloured—for bi face is of the hue of the inside of tanned shoe-leather, put wrinkled over like & New Zealand mummy ; a low forehead » mouth made of two narvow strips of skin drawn bad nearly to the ear over white teeth, and with his hair ¢% close, but leaving a little fringe of stragglers round th ‘ront—such is the picture of Rosario! We had no time t ho fastidious, and his character being unquestionable, w cagaget worldly ar. the steamie y duces, who t 7. could not doud,s I kisses at hig pari’. . “It was five -i the evening and the sun was beginning to prepare tu leave this latitude for your western lands, when we slipped ont of the boat upon the quay of Alexandria, A scene ullowed which I must endeavour to describe. Our luggage and that of an Irish friend was brought from the boa, aud depositzd en a kind of platform immediately in front of ? wl. is ennobled by the name of Custom- House bene, a little raised, sab a fab little Toyl ~ “ware face, whose fat cheeks hung d:w on each side of his mouth, aft -. Inglish mastiff dog shown as rp Sven - A Gardens. Our servant Rosaric 1 qc WoL T3 ~ camel to put our lnggrage up:or Here ww neac | hand, A crowd of Arab porters ered al. af offering their services, and cach ig TL ©. .% his voice; after due bargaining, ory Lo. rug, haggling, and gesticulating, the agreement 15 Ciewio 7.1 » dozen of the shortest of the hsmaals of DOUTLL aay roceeded to adjust their Several portions , vio luggage, when whack, crack, thwack, a territle rout jg her “The little fat Turk whorg + verily Leliove to have been dreaming a8 ho sap ¢, ti - 7 pipe, whose glowing ashes | racted my eye by its glare in tac a. yo caused this panic. Throwing aside his « ,__, Jeo» ~~ 1a8ping a short cane, without troubling himself tq speak a word, he has rushed with the suddennesg of inspiration into the midst of 18386. Ar, 52, 80 " "LEN. fas? -. qe 1836. the screaming aud litigious gung, and plying his baton right and left over tha shoulders, head, and arms, dealing out an extra share of chastisement upon those who, from having been loaded with our chattels, could not so easily escape his fury, until he has cleared the ground of every burbaned rogue of them, and left us standing amidst ou! scattered and disordered trunks, bags, and portmanteans, not knowing what was to follow. I am soon able, however, to guess what is at the bottom the meaning of this nnexpected apparition of the little dignitary, and the sudden Hegira of our porters; for after calmly resuming his pipe; snd giving it two or three inspirations to reanimate the decaying embers, he takes Rosario on one side and whispers a few words in his ear, the import of which yon may suppose is that the luggage must all go to the custom-house, but 10 save us that trouble he will allow us in consideration of some backshish (or a present of money) to take them with us. “This little difficulty being got over, our luggage and ourselves are wuder weigh through the dark streets of Alexandria, whose houses appear to have rudely turned their back premises to the front, for you can see nothing but blank walls without windows or doors. The English hotel lay at some distance, and we had occasion to pass through one of the gates of the town, where we were met by a guard, a fellow in a white turban, who laid violent hands upon the leader of our party, who happened to be the good doctor himself, and arrested our further progress under some protence which I could not comprehend, but I distinctly again caught the sound of the word backshish. We hesitated whether we should give the rascal a shilling or good beating ;—the doctor had raised his heavy umbrella io favour of the latter alternative, when my vote, which yo? know is always in favour of peace, decided it in behalf of 8 fee, to the extent v8, and with this subsidy te the Pachg’y representative. ~ 7 -apted amicably, On the way through the narrow Streets « [..lexandria we met many Turks, whoge attendants bore small lamps of paper or gauze, with which they always politely showed us our road. I begin to think that these are well-bred barbarians, after all my abuse of them and their religion | “Mrs Hume’s hotel is a large detached building situated & long distance from the Turkish quarter, and surrounded by date-trees of luxuriant growth. I ran out and wandered here by moonlight the very night of my arrival. The Scene was indeed delicions after a tedious and unpleasant voyage. I thought of you all, and only wished for one of you at least to share my exciting enjoyment. Well has it been said that “happiness was born q twin,’ and you, my dear M., somehow or other seem naturally associated with 06 in my ideal pleasures, = fancied that you were with me, and that we were equally happy. “When I arose in the morning, T found that it was the season for guthering the dates, The Arabs were swinging about in the branches of this elegant tree by means of ropes, and gathering in large baskets the ripe fruit, which hung in luxuriant bunches. I am an admirer of the useful, you know, but how much more do I love the combination of utility ang elegance! On the date-tree you find both In perfection, There is the handsomest tree in the world, bearing the sole fruj; which afforded nourishment to the Wandering children of the desert, and a charming fruit is the date, I have subscribed a trifle to the Turk who rents thig Plantation, for the privilege of walking through it, Whenever I please, and helping myself freely to its produce. Thee are very few curiosities to detain the traveller in Alexandria, Pompey’s Pillar, and Cleopatra’s Needle, and the catacombs, and a few other half-buried ruing 3 18835. OE 1.) Vem al 1886. aro all that now remains t+ attest the ancient splendour of 8 Zur. 82. city which once contained 4000 baths, and counted a population of 600,000 souls. These carious fragments of departed grandeur have been often described, and are so little intrinsically interesting, thst I shall say nothing about them. “The monuments called Cleopatra’s Needles are enormous masses of granite. One only stands, the other was thrown down and half buried in the sand in an attempt to remove it to England, Mark the folly and injustice of carrying thesé remains from the site where they were originally placed, and from amidst the associations which gave them all their interest, to Liondon or Paris, where they become merely objects of vulgar wonderment, and besides are subjected to the der stroying effects of our humid climate. It is to be hoped that good taste, or at least the feolings of economy which no pervade our rulers’ minds, will prevent this vestige of the days of the Pharaohs from being removed. * «I dined with Mr. Muir at twelve o’clock. His Greek servant, a man of remarkable elegance and gracefulness, quiet, grave, and full of dignity at every gesture. What 2 power such grace has over my mind |”? 3 Théophile Gautier makes the Paris obelisk muse in Cobden’s sense :— Sur cette place je m’ennuie, Obélisque dépareillé; Neige, givre, braine, et pluie Glacent mon Janc déja ronills Et me vieille aiguille, rongie Aux fournaises d'un ciel de fou, Prend des paleurs de nostalgie Dans cet air qui n'est jamais blew. La sentinelle granitique, Gardienne des énormités, Re dresse entre nn faux temple antiqee Ht la chambre deg députds. And no forth. Journiosh ar} DATED. £3 Oairo, Dee, 20 7 “elopt tolorably well after having 1896. been for the first time made acquainted with my old torment, Zi. 82. the fleas. You will wonder when I tell you that use has since made me almost indifferent to such trifles, The Arab sailors who formed our crew were miserable wretches, half clothed in dirty rags, and two of them were suffering from ophthalmia. I bad heard much of the character of the degraded population of Egypt, and was told by those who krew no better, that severity and harshness were the only methods of making them work. My ides is, you know, that rewards and not punishments are the most effectual means of stimulating men, and so it proved. The backshish kept; the boat going, when stripes would have only made it stand. At Atfoh we paid the reis er captain his five dollars, and gave his men a few piastres, and I parted with my usual good opinion of human nature, “ Scarcely had we reached the shore, when we were followed by the reis, bringing three bad pieces of money which he accused the good doctor, the cashier, of having paid him. If was clearly an imposition, and Rosario told us we should encounter similar conduct at every stage. We changed the money, resolving to he on our guard in future. My ideas of human mature were less exalted for a minute and a half than usual. “To proceed from * Cairo, a distance of 150 miles by the Nile, it was _ "» embark on board a larger boat, but here we fo= _..at the ladies, who had just preceded us, had taken the good boats. We learnt, however, that a new an. commodious boat was lying st the town of Fooah on tI 5. .ile side of the river, rather higher up the stream, and we took a ferry, and carried our luggage over, accompanied by the Vice-Consul, a little Italian, who, politely as we thought, agreed to bargain for us, The boat with twelve men was hired for BOO piastres, 3 4 LIE OF COBDEN. losar 1836. _ or 51, and it was agreed that we should start as soon as our Air. 32. luggage was on board. In the meantime I went into a cotton-mill in the neighbourhood, which presented a miserable appearance. Upon leaving, I gave backshish to one of the managers, who followed me immediately with a bad piece of money, which he accused me of having paid him. I threatened to shoot him, or something equally improbable, and thus escaped this attempt. Our Vice-Consul now left us, and we proposed to start, but the owner of the boat very coolly ordered a cargo of wood to be laid alongside, which he was determined to take along with its owner to Cairo. As this would have left no room for Rosario or Hussein for sleeping, we resisted, and all began to grow out of humour. We threw the wood out of the boat, and drove the porters, who were attempting to load, ashore. A fresh difficulty now arose. The owner of the boat refused to let her start until the next day, and very soon all the crew, reis and all, disappeared. My opinion of humanity sank several degrees. It now grew towards evening. We were moored alongside of the town of Fooah, and just opposite to a khan or coffee-house, in the balcony of which sat the owner of the boat, smoking his long pipe and surrounded by a party of lazy rascals like himself, who were all singing and laughing, probably amused at our dilemma. Much as it is against my principles, I now resorted to brute force. I took the pistols out of the portmanteau where Fred had placed them loaded and primed, but not without secret resolves that I would not injure any one. The doctor also arrived, and we went ashore to find the governor of the town, intending to make a complaint. It was dark, and we had a difficulty in finding out that the principal officer of Fooah was from home, but on inquiry for his deputy, we were told that the owner of the boat against whom we complained, was the man himself! Thus the judge and criminal were one person, which was certainly against mr. “A, oR our cause. However, we proceeded straight to the khan, and by means of Rosaric fur an interpreter, we made the vicegovernor nnderstand tZa* La was a rascal, and threatened to have him punished ™v -ur friend the Pacha. He protested that he only acted for the safety of ourselves; that the Vice Consul had entrusted us to his charge as travellers of the first consideration ; that the sky predicted a storm; and that he could not, out of regard for such valuable lives, suffer us to go out that night. So finding there was no help for our difficulties but in patience and submission, we went on board, laughed at ourselves, supped, and slept.” “In the morning (Sunday, December 4th,) we started with a favourable wind up the Nile. On looking round, however, we found that we had only six sailors instead of twelve, and we now learnt that this was the reason why the boat could not venture out at night. We found also from our man Hussein, that the Vice-Consul had received a handsome backshish out of the 5I. we were to pay for the boat. Altogether my opinion of the Fgyptians received a smart shock —they were for an hour or so down at zero. The aspect of the scenery of the Nile at and above Foosh, though flat, was very interesting to usat first. The minarets in the distance, the palms on the banks, the brilliant foliage, all gave it a pleasant effect to a stranger to such scenes. The river, which is of a yellow-red complexion, is here of the width of the Thames at London.” “This day (December 16th,) is an era in my travels. I went with Captain E. and Mr. Hill to see the Pyramids. They disappoint the visitor until he gets close to them. My first feelings, along with a due sense of astonishment, were those of vexation at the enormous sum of ingenious labour which here was wasted. Six millions of tons of stone, all shaped and fitted with skill, are here piled in a useless form. The third of this weight of material and less than a tenth 1838. Air, 82, 56 fl? Tr JF COBDEN, {mar 1836. part of the labour sufficed to construct the most msefw Zr. 82. public work in En~'--"- the Plymouth Breskwater.”® Oairo, December £0*7 10°8.-— Last evening twas the interesting time er 2*~ fr an interview with no less ® personage than .lchemet Ali, the Pacha of Egypt. OW Consul, Colonel Chad the day before waited upon this celebrated person, to say that he wished to present some British travellers to his Highness, and he appointed the following evening at six o’clock, which is his usual hour of receiving visitors during the fast of Ramadan. At the appointed hour we assembled, to the number of six individuals, at the house of Colonsl (., and from thence we immediately proceeded to the palace, which is in the citadel and about half an honr’s ride from the Consul’s. “Our way lay through the most crowded part of the town: It was quite dark, but being at the season of the Ramadan (the Mahommedan Lent) when Turks fast and abstain from business during the day, but feast and illurainate their bazaars and public buildings during the night, we found the street? lighted up, and all the population apparently just beginning the day’s occupations. . . . Away we went through street? and bazaars, some of which were less than eight feet wide; and all of them being crowded with Turks, Arabs, camels; horses, and donkeys. All, however, made way at the epproach of the janissary and the uplifted grate of fire, both of which are signs of the rank of the persons whe followed. Besides, to do justice even to Turks, I must add that I never saw a people less disposed to quarrel with you about trifles than the population of Cairo. You may ran over them, or pummel them with your feet, as you squeeze them almost to death against the wall, and they » Journal. ® « A martinet taken from the regimental mess, to watch and regnlate tb sommerocial intercourse of a trading people with s merchant pacha.” Forrsnal. 2% only seen astonish. d that yon give yourself any concern 1888, afterwards, to kn-— 7 = > 2+ in the land of the living. Zr 82 As for the focy. Laer dro Tow Di bo placed gently on their toes, «..2 . i... .Jrawa in time for them to light their pipe or say their prayers, which are the only avocations they follow, why, they say nothing about such trifles. “ As we proceeded along the streets, or rather alleys, of this singular city, it was curions to observe the doings of the good Mussnimans, who had just sn hour before been released from the observance of the severe ordinance of the prophet. Some were busy cooking their savoury stews over little charcoal fires ; here you might ses a party seated round a dish, into which every individual was actively thrusting his fist; and occasionally we passed a public fountain, around the doors and windov f whizl. crowds of half-famished true believers were pressing, eager 3 juonch their thirst, probably for the first time since sunrise, Some, who no doubt had already sai.sfic] the raore pressing calls of nature, were seated round : ¢ mp.» of musicians, and listening with becoming g..v .. shicus of Larbsrous musie, whilst in another placa «ov? of turbsns had gathered about a juggler, who wes reising the ercdulity of the faithful by his magical dec’ ,.._... fur the greater portion, however, of those we passed w.1, sitting cross-legged, enjoying the everlasting pine, .itznb were they mpon the occupation that they sca siraed to cast a glance at us as we passed. “As we the citadel, the scene changed. « ry Jf all ranks who were issul soma accoutred for the night we .. .p-.udid spits and mounted upon Lpiiw Lo... .-w some officers in the Mameluke costume, which yon may sce pictured in old books of travel in this country Contracted with those was the dress of the 1836. Fe. 32. 3 LIFT OF CODEN. [omak private troops who led the way, and whose white cotio? garments, close jacket, and musket with bayonet, gave the? a half European aspect. Here too we found onrselves sur” rounded by numerous horsemen, who like ourselves wert vroceeding at this, his customary hour of levée, to pay thei? respects to the Pacha. At length we entered the gates of the citadel, and immediately the road assumed a steep winding character admirably adapted for the purposes of defence, On each side, az we advanced, we found ourselves snclosed by lofty walls, and, by the light of the burning grate of pine-wood which was raised aloft in our van, 1 could distinguish the embrasures and loop-holes for musketry I shuddered as I thought of the massacre of the Mamelukes: which was perpetrated near this very spot, a deed unparalleled in the annals of the world for perfidious and cold-blooded atrocity. “The circumstances of the massacre are briefly these Mehemet Ali having by a series of daring attacks, and aided by much cunning artifice, deposed the Mameluke rulers who had governed Hgypt for more than seve? centuries, and placed himself upon the throne of the country: made a kind of capitulation with the fallen chiefs, by which he agreed to give them support and protection. In conse juence they came to reside in great numbers in Cairo: where they conducted themselves peaceably. On the occasion of a f8te in honour of his son, the Pacha invited the Mamelukes to attend and assist at the festivities. They tered the palace of the citadel, to the number of 470; Iressed in their gorgeous and picturesque costume, but without arms. Mehemet Ali received them with smiles and it was remarked that he was more than usually cour beous. They departed, their hearts lighted up with a glow by his affability, and proceeded in a gay procession dow? 1 The massacre of the Mamelukes took place on Maron 1. 181%. Ir, } VISIT TO MEBEMET ALL 1G to the gate which we had just passed; it was closed ; as 1826. the first victim reached the gate, a hundred discharges of Zr. 82. musketry from the walls on each side opened upon them. They turned to retreat, but the gate behind was also closed, and they were fast in the toils of their betrayer and destroyer. Only one man is said to have escaped, who rode his horse up a steep bank, and forced him over the battlement and into a gulf seventy feet deep below. The horse was killed, but the rider escaped, and made his way to Europe. Such is the substance of a deed of blood which had no provocation, no state necessity, nor a semblance even of justice, to palliate its unmitigated character of treachery, ard yet here am I—I recollected with emotions of shame—passing over the scene of such a bloody tragedy, to do obeisance to the principal actor! “The citadel is in extent and appearance something like a considerable town. As we proceeded through the steep and winding avenue, we came upon a thoroughfare lighted up like a bazaar with shops or stalls on each side, before which the soldiers were loitering and buying fruit or other articles from the lazy dealers, who sat cross-legged upon their mats, enveloped in tobacco smoke. Having passed under another gateway, and along a winding arched passage of massive masonry, an abrupt turning or two brought us to a large open square, the opposite sides of which were lighted up. Here as we approached the centre of power from whence all rank, wealth, and authority sre derived in this region of despotism, the throng of military of all ranks became more dense, just as the rays of light or the circles of water are closest where the heat or motion which gives them existence has its origin. We dismounted at the principal entrance and found ourselves in a hall, which, with the stairs that we immediately ascended, was almost-impassable for the crowds of military who lounged and loitered in no very orderly £ - Li COBDEN. fons 1826. manner by the way. At the head of the stairs we emteret Zr. 32. 8 very large hall, which presented a curious spectacl Along its whole length and breadth, with only just suff cient interval towards one of the sides to afford room fo passing to a door ab the farther extremity, were soé cross-legged upon the floor, on little mats, an immen number of Turkish and Arab soldiers, whose arms sn¢ olippers were lying beside them. We passed along the entire length of the large room, too quickly to allow of mor than a moment’s surprise at the scene before us, whe? entering another apartment we found ourselves in a gresh lofty chamber, from the centre of which hung a chandeli®’ holding probably twenty yeliowish-white wax candles, and in the centre of the floor stood a row of four gigantic silve’ candlesticks like those used in Catholic chapels, and each holding & huge candle of four feet in length, and a propo™ tionate diameter, By their united light we could very indistinctly see to the extremities of the room, from whos? farthest corner ome or two persons hastily retired as We entered, leaving us, as ” thought, alone in this hug? apartment. “Colonel C., who preceded our party a few steps, nov bowed towards the farthest corner of the room—a move ment which we all imitated as we followed. A dozen step? brought my feet close to the bowl of along, superbly enriched pipe which rested in a little pan on the floor, the other extremity of which was held by a short and rather fat per sonage, who was seated alone just to the right of the corn’ of the room upon a broad and soft divan, which ran round the apartment like a continual sofa. He laid aside his pip® uttered several times a sentence, which we guessed was 87 expression of welcome, from its being delivered in a good: natured and affable tone, and accompanied at each repetitio? by the motion of his hands, as he pointed with mora of hurr? WE 1 than dignity to the divan on each side of him, as signs for us 1836. to be seated. The colonel tcok hie place to the right, and A 82. the rest of the party sat down upon the divan in the order in which they were standing. It chanced that I was placed immediately to his left, and thus I found myself quite close, or at least as near as I desire ever to be, to Mehemet Ali! It happened that ab the moment of our arrival the dragoman or interpreter was not in attendance, and therefore as soon as we were seated a slight embarrassment ensued. The Pacha did not appear in the least ruffled by the neglect of his officer; he looked towards the door, called for somebody, but not impatiently; then turned to the colonel, uttered a few words, but immediately laughed as if at the recollection of his not being understood. Again he turned his eye towards the door, called in a louder but still not angry tome for some person, but nobody appearing, he then turned to Colonel C. and to us, smiled, fidgetted on his seat, rubbed his knee, and twisted the fingers of a remarkably white and handsome little hand in the handle of his sword. All this was but the affair of a minute or two, when an attendant of apparent rank entered, and walked quickly up to the Pacha, who appeared to explain goodhumouredly the nature of our predicament, and he instantly began the duty of interpreting. The Pacha commenced the conversation by offering us a welcome; upon this the colonel made an observation about the weather, which however excusable it might have been ina country where Englishmen have adopted it as the habit of introducing themselves, is little suited to this latitude, where uninterrupted sunshine prevails for seven years together. Let me leave the speakers to settle the preliminaries of their interview, whilst in the meantime I describe a little more minutely the principal character before me. Mohemet Ali is, I am told, about five feet six or mevem Lr COBRA, Togs 1836. inches high, but as he now sat beside me, sunk deeply in air. 33. soft divan, he did not appear even so tall; he was plait’ dressed in a dark and simple suit, and wore the red fez? tarboosh cap, which is now generally substituted for t turban by men of rank. His features are regular and goo and his face might be called handsome, but being somewh? rounded by fatness, I shall use the term comely as mo" expressive of its character. His beard is quite white, but’ have seen many amongst his subjects with richer-lookiss tufts upon their chins, I glanced at the form of his head which is, as far as I could discern through its cover, confi” matory of the science of phrenclogy—its huge size accordiss with the extraordinary force of character displayed by t&* successful soldier, whilst a broad and massive forehead ba” monizes with the powerful intellect he has displayed in bY schemes of personal aggrandizement. Yet upon the whol? there is nothing extraordinary or striking in the countenan of Mehemet Ali. He appeared to me like a good-humoured man, and had I been called upon at a cursory glance to gi*° an opinion upon such a person in a private station, I might have pronounced him an amiable and jocular fellow! Ho ever as I was seated beside an extraordinary person, it w#* natural that I should scrutinize the expression of his featur®® with the hope, nay the determination, of finding somethin? more than common in his physiognomy. In doing soIe™ countered his dark eye several times, and thought it ai not improve upou closer acquaintance. His mouth, 10% which is almost concealed beneath his white moustachi® seemed only to pretend to smile; and once or twice * observed that whilst the lips were putting on the semblan® of laughter, his eye was busily glancing round from und? its heavy brows, with anything but an expression of w¥ guarded mirth. If the eye do not reveal the hums sharacter, it will be vain to look for it in the more igmobk \(3 rH 30 4 ag 3 d i vi «© A 1” J in} 63 features of the countenance, and the constant workings of 88 this ¢ mirror of the soul’ alone revealed the restless spirit Zr. 32. of Mehemet Ali. I never beheld a more unguiet eye than hig, as it glided from one to another of the persons around him; it was incessantly in motion. Its glance, however, had none of that overpowering character which beams only from the soul of real genius;—there was neither moral nor intellectual grandeur in the look of the person before me, and I could not help thinking, as he stole furtive glances first at us and next at the door, that that eye might have been employed in watching the store of his gquondam tobacco shop from the pilfering hands of his Albanian connbrymen, with greater appropriateness than in now looking down upon us from the divan of a pacha.’ “ Altogether there was as little dignity as possibly can be conceived in the personal appearance of Mehemet. Were 1 to confess what were the feelings which predominated in my mind as I regarded him whilst he sat, or rather perched, upright on the middle of the divan, without resting or reclining upon its pillows, and with his legs tucked beneath him, so as to leave only his slippers peeping out from each gide of his copious nether garments, they certainly partook largely of the ridiculous. “Coffee was brought to us in little cups enclosed in covers of filagree-work made of silver, and which I was afterwards told by one of the party (I did not myself notice them) was richly set with diamonds. “When the first civilities had passed, the Pacha, as if impatient of unmeaning puerilities, took up the conversation with an harangue of considerable length, which he delivered with great animation. I felt curious to know what was the * Mehemet Ali, the founder of the present system of government in Egypt, was born in 1768 at a small town on the Albanian coast, of an obscure family, For some years he dealt in tobacco, and he was thirty years eid or mors before hie effectively beprun hig military career. 18386. er. 52. BIEN. { thd subject which seerne -se5s8 so much interest with practical mind of wx "wrhe. Judge then of my astonish ment when I found that the burden of his discourse cotton / The speaker was bcasting of the richness #8 fertility of his territory. nd to illustrate the producti? ness of Egypt, he gave us en account of the harvest of * particular village in his favourite article of cotton: I entered into a minute calculation of the population, numb? of acres, the weight of the produce, the cost of raising, 8% the value in the market, and then gave a glowing picture the wealth and prosperity . this village, which bore ¥ resemblance to any place ever seen by myself or any othe’ traveller in his miserable country. It was certainly th most audacious puff ever practised upon the credulity of # audience, when Mehemet Ali vaunted the happiness aud wealth of some ©sweet Auburn’ in his wretched and oF pressed Pachaziick. In repli tu his statement, whic savoured so Little of truth that I thought it harmonize! completely with the fale- ression of the lips whic nttered it, the Consul ¢ir'. * i the Pacha’s attention to the gentleman immediately his left, who was from Manchest® in England, and whom L: described to be. better acquainte? than any person present with the subject he was speakits apon. At this remark, he turned sharply round, and di rected a look towards me, in which, as in every glance o! his eye, suspicion and cunning predominated. He pause for a moment, and the Colonel, not knowing whether b¥ hesitation arose from having imperfectly understood him repeated in substance his observation, and explained tha! Manchester was the chief seat of the British manufacture and that Liverpool was the port by which the materis! reached that place. Mehemet Ali had not apparently eve’ heard of either of these cities. There was another pause © half a minute, and a slight embarrassment in his manner [1% MAHEMET ATL. 65 was told by oue of the party afterwards that it appeared as though a slight flush came over his face at the same instant), when he abruptly changed the topic of conversation, and began to talk of his navy. I was puzzled at the moment to divine the cause why the Pacha shunned a discussion about his favourite cotton; it afterward occurred to me, and the idea was confirmed by the opinions of others of the party, that he avoided talking on a subject on which he was conscious that he had greatly exaggerated, with one whom he believed, from the too favourable account of the Consul, to be better informed than himself, “The Pacha now proceeded to maintain stoutly that the quality of his Syrian pines was equal to that of British oak for the purposes of ship-building. There was nothing remarkable in the conversation that followed, excepting the practical shrewdness which characterized the choice and handling of his subjects on tho part of Mehemet Ali. After an interview of about half an hour, in which, from the defective tact and address of Colonel C., no person of the party but himself took any share, we made our parting salutations, and retired from the audience-chamber, which, as I again traversed it, I thought was on a par with a ball room in a second-rate English country town. On proceed. ing through the large anteroom, we found the company listening to the address of their spiritual guide. On our way down the declivity from the citadel we passed the menagerie, and I heard the lion growling in his den. 1 thought of Mehemet Ali.” Cobden had another interview with Mohemet Ali on December 26, in which they had an hour’s conversation on the Pacha’s way of managing his cotton factories, He confesses himself to have been particularly struck with the Pacha’s readiness in replying and reasoning, with his easy handling of his 2} per cents. and 20 per cents., and with his 1886. Hr. 82. 1838. Zr. ]%, J LIN OOBDEN, ronal “love of facts and quickness of calculation.” “Tt is the calculating talent, aided by higher powers of combmatio® and reflection, that b~s contributed so greatly toward alevating him tu b' - “nb position ; for whatever dari or courage he may have shown upon emergencies, if i notorious that he has always preferred the use of diploma? to the more open tactics of the sword,” Cairo, Dec. 22nd, 1836.— Mehemet Ali is pursuing ’ course. of avaricious misrule, which would have torn the vital from a country less prolific than this, long since. As it is everything is decaying beneath bis system of monopolie® It is difficult to understand the condition of things in Egy?! without visitio= if The Pacha has, by dint of force 28° fraud, possessed himself of the whole of the property of the country. I do not mean that he has obtained merely the rule or government, but he owns the whole of the soil, th houses, the boats, the camels, etc. There is something quite unique in finding ouly one landowner and one mer chant in a country, in the person of its pacha! He has bef” putfed by his creatures in Furope as a regenerator and # teformer—I can trace in him only a rapacious tyrant. Ib i true he has, to gratify an insatiate ambition, attempted ¥ give himself a European fame, by importing some of the arts of civilized countries into Egypt; but this has bee done, not to benefit his people, but to exalt himself. Hie cotton factories are a striking instance of this. I ha®™ devoted some time to the inspection of these places, of which I am surprised to find there are twenty-eight in the country altogether presenting a waste of capital and industry o% paralleled in any other part of the world. Magnificent buildings have been erected, costly machinery brought fro? Fugland and France, and the whole after a few years pre sents such an appearance of dilapidation and mismanag? ment that to persevere in carrying them forwards must I my wo - "TORIES. 69 to incur fresh ruin ever year. Af first, steam-engines were put down at the principal mills; but these were soon stopped, and bullock-wheels were substituted, which are now in use at all the establishment.’ I saw them carding with engines almost toothless ; the spinning, which is of low numbers, running from 12 to 40, is of the worst possible kind; and, in weaving, the lumps and knots keep the poor weaver in constant activity cutting and patching his web. There is one mill, built at the side of the river, which presents a splendid appearance as you approach from Alexandria; it contains the finest room-full of Sharp and Roberts’s looms that I ever saw. The engine of this does not work, and they have therefore turned these power-looms into handlooms, and are making cloth that could not be sold at any price in Manchester. All this waste is going on with the best raw cotton, which ought to be sold with us, and double its weight of Surats bought for the manufacturer of such low fabrics. This is not all the mischief, for the very hands that are driven into these manufactures are torn from the cultivation of the soil, which is turned into desert for want of cultivation, whilst it might be the most fertile in the world. But the most splendid of all his buildings is the print-works. Think «f » couple of block shops, each nearly 2 hundred yards lon; sud fifteen feet high; imagine a croft enclosed with solid wally, containing nearly fifty ncres, and conceive this to be intersected with streams of water in all directions, and with taps for letting on the water at any particular place; think of such a place, compared with which ours or the best of the Lancashire works are but as barns, and then what do you say when I tell you that one of these block-shops contained about fifteen tables ab work, whilst in the other the tables were all piled up in one corner, and the only occupants of it were a couple of carpet-weavers trying to produce a hearth-rug! All this 1888. Br 82, £0 oh prem = GO0BDEN. (oni 1838. ig not the work of Mehemet Ali. The miserable adver Zr. 82. turers from Europe, who have come here to act the parasit? of such a blood-stained despot—they are partly the cat® of the evil. But they know his selfish nature, and his 168 of fame, and this is only their mode of deluding the Oo and pandering to the other.” * 1837. On the 19th of January Cobden left Alexandria, 8 Xx. 33. arrived at Constantinople on the 1st of February :— On board, the Sardinian Brig, La Virtu, in the Sea of M0 mora, Jan. 29th, 1837.— On the 24th we found oursel? becalmed under the island of Scio, the most fertile and th largest of the Archipelago. In the evening the moon 0% and diffused over the atmosphere, not merely a light, bub’ blaze, which illuminated the hills and vales of Scio, and sb? a rosy tint over every object in the island. The sea was ® tranquil as the land, and everything seemed to whisp® security and repose. How different was the scene on tH very island twelve years ago, when the Turks burst in up” a cultivated, wealthy, and contented population, and spre? death and destruction through the land, changing in o¥ short day this paradise of domestic happiness into a thes!” of the most appalling crimes. I must recall to your mind the particulars of this dreadful tragedy. Scio had taken * part in the revolution of the Greeks, and its inhabits? who were industrious and rich, voluntarily placed hostag’ of their chief men in the hands of the Turkish Governme™ as a proof that they were not disposed to rebel against the! rulers. It happened, however, that some young men of # neighbouring islands of Samos and Ipsara landed at © extremity of the island, and there planted the standard revolt, which, however, was not followed by the Sciotes. 0 the contrary, they protested against it; and, as they B* delivered ap their arms as a proof of their peaceful int? b To Mr, George Foster, from Cairo, December 22, 18386. | MASSAORE OF SCI0. 69 fions, they could do no more. The pretence, however, was seized upon by the Government of Constantinople, and the Zr. 33. island was doomed to a visit from the Turkish Admiral, and. & body of ruffianly troops who were promised a free licence of blood and plunder. “The riches of the island, the beauty and accomplishments of the females, were held out as inducements to draw all the ruffians of the capital to join in the expedition of rapine and murder. The situation of the island, too, afforded the opportunity of passing from the mainland across a narrow strait of about seven miles, and thousands of the miscreanta from all the towns of the cosst of Asia Minor, including Smyrna, flocked to the scene of woe. Now only picture bo yourselves such a scene as the Isle of Wight, supposing it to be one third more populous and larger in circumference, and then imagine that its inhabitants in the midst of unsuspecting security were suddenly burst upon by 20,000 of the butchers, porters, thieves, and desperadoes of London, Portsmouth, etcetera. Imagine these for three days in unbridled possession of the persons and property of every soul in that happy island ; conceive all the churches filled with mangled corpses, the rich proprietors hanging dead at their own house doors, the ministers of religion cruelly tortured—imagine all that could happen from the knives, swords, and pistols of men who were inured to blood, and suppose the captivity and sufferings of every young female or male, who were without exception torn away and sold into captivity ;—and yer will not then picture a quarter part of the horrors wa, happened at the massacre of Scio. Of nearly 100,05 =ersons on the island in the month of May, not more than 700 were lef alive there at the end of two months after, Upwards of 40,000 young persons of both sexes were sold into infamous slavery throughout all the Mahometan cities of Europe and Asis, snd not one 1837. 70 He MBDEN. [OHAY 17. house was left standing except those of the Europe Ar, ez, Consuls! Oonstantinople, February 14th, 1837.—* Do not expe a long or rhapsodical letter from me, for I am at th moment of writing both cold and cross. A copper pan © charcoal is beside me, to which I cannot apply for warmth because it gives me the headache, There is a hole in the roof, which lets down a current of melted snow, which trickles over my bed and spatters one corner of the table 07 which I am writing. To complete the agreeable position o the writer, he is ledging in a house where the good ms? falbeit a tailor I) has a child of every age, from the mos! disagreeable and annoying of all ages—eighteen months— npwards to ten. My landlady is a bustling little Greek with a shrill voice which is never tired; but I seldom hes! it, becanse, as her children are generally in full chor? daring the whole day, it is only when they are in bed and she takes advantage of the calm to scold her husband, ths! her solo notes are distinguishable, But you will say that 1 have very little occasion to spend my time indoors, sul” rounded as I am by the beauties of Constantinople. Alas: if I sally out, the streets are choked with snow and water: the thoroughfares, which are never clean, are now a thot sand times worse than Hanging Ditch or Deansgate in the middle of December, If one walks close to the houses, the? there are projecting windows from the fronts which just serve to pour an incessant stream of water down on you! head and neck; if, to escape drowning, he goes into the middle of the street, then the passenger is up to his knee? every step, and sometimes by chance he plunges into a hole of mud and water from which he must emerge by the charity of some good Turk or Christian. Then, to complete the pictaro of misery, every man or women you meet dodge you in order to escape contagion, and it would be as dificult 17,1 — rg rE v rey almost in Pera, the Fr nk quarter, to touch a person, a» the whole population were '-~ing ~ game of prisoner’s base. With this multitude « * misaries t+ encounter without and within doors, I have seen little here to amuse or gratify me; and if it were not for the extreme kindness of all the merchants here, with almost &ll of whom I have dined or visited ; and if I had not had other objects in view than merely to see this city and :+ ch -wrhood, I should scarcely have stayed a week ¢° ~ ws! atinople. The plague has been more than commc- destructive; various accounts give from 50 to 100,” deaths, and I have little doubt that more than one eig! ” c.f the population has been swept away. I must, however, tell you for your satisfaction that it has now almost disappeared, and thet it has quite lost its viralence. Fortun.*-'~ th very day of my arrival a north wind set in, and breaght w.lh it the snows and frosts of the Black Sea, against which the pestilence could not exist. Had I arrived a week earlier, the weather was as mild as summer. That would have given me a better opportunity of seeing the country, bu’ not with the same security from the plague as at present. As I entered the harbour of Constantinople, the country was free from snow, and therefore I aw the view t¢ pre.'y good advantage considering that it was the winter-time. It is too fine, too magical, for descrip-Sion, and all the sw ,.unts that you read of it do not do justice to it.” Smyrna, Feb, 24... 1037.—“ After I wrote to you from Constantinople, I made an excursion up the Bosphorus to see the scenery which all concur in praising as the most beantiful in Europe. I wisu i had seen it before I landed in Turkey ; ~—the misery, the dirt, the plague, and all the other disagreeables of Constantinople, haunted me even in the quiet and solitude of natural beauntios which, apart from soch associations, are certainly enouch to excite the romantic fervour 1887. Tr. 38. 7% L™™™ ( COBDEN. [cHA® 1887. of the most chilly-hearte® From these causes I am afro zi; <2. I have not done justice to the scene of the Bosphorus. could not look upon the palaces, the kiosks, and woode” houses which crowded the bunks of the beautiful channe with the interest which they might have imparted, if I had nob known the poverty, vice, and tyranny of their possessor Must I confess it? I think the Hudson river a much mos beautiful scene than the Bosphorus. But let the scenes b¢ ceversed—if the Bosphorus were in the United States, and the Hudson in Turkey—and I should consider probably th former incomparably the most beautiful; so much are We the creatures of association.” * Sinyrna, Feb. 247" 1837.— In the steamer which brought me from Constantinople to this place, we had a great number of passengers, chiefly Turks: there were a few Persian® They all rested on deck during the whole time. For theif souvenience little raised platforms were placed along each side of the steamer, to prevent the wet, if any rain fell * In the pamphlet on England, Ireland, and America, Cobden had alresd? indulged a joyous vision of what Constantinople might become under th genius of a free government :—* Constantinople, outrivalling New York may be painted, with a million of free citizens, as the foons of all the trade of Bastern Europe. Let us conjure up the thousands of miles of railroads sarrying to the very extremities of this empire—not the sanguinary satrap out the merchandise and the busy traders of a free state ; conveying —not the firman of a ferocious Sultan, armed with death to the trembling slave but the millions of newspapers and letters, which stimulate the enterprist ind excite the patriotism of an enlightened people. Let us imagine the 3osphorus and the Sew of Marmors swarming with steamboats, connectit8 he European and Asiatic continents by hourly departures and arrivals; ssuing from the Dardanelles, to reanimate once more with life and fertility the hundred islands of the Archipelago; or conceive the rich shores of the Black Sea in the power of the New Englander, and the Danube pouring down its produce on the plains of Moldavia and Wallachia, now subject #0 the plongh of the hardy Kentuckian. Tet us picture the Carolinians, the Virginians, and the Georgians transplanted to the coasts of Asia Minor, 818 behold its hundreds of cities again bursting from the tomb of ages, to recal religion and civilization to the spot from whence they first issued fort apon the world, Alas! thai thin should only be an illusion of the fanoy!” (11. VO +E r NTIVRNAL 73 reaching their beds. Hereon they spread their mats and arranged their clcaks, and it was amusing to watch each drawing forth h. no pipe, and preparing with the aid of a bag of tobacco t .. _ the fatigues and sufferings of two nights’ exposure in such a position. These Turks are the most quiet and orderly peonle in the world when their religious fanaticism is untouched, in which case they are at once changed into the most sanguinary savages imaginable, Some of our passengers were people of good quality, with servants accompanying them, and they slept in the cabin; but the whole of the day was spent in reposing upon their mats, their legs tucked under, and their long pipes in their mouths. A few words sometimes were exchanged, but the conversation seemed always to be a secondary affair to the enjoyment of the pipe. “= found great amusement ir. viking up and down the deck between these rows ¢ ve 37 .ussulmans, whose picturesque dresses . 7 urms «* various kinds afforded me constant interest, ls’ the honest Turks felt equal amusement in rue’. i over their pipes upon the motives which could cause : Cinour like me to set mysclf the task of walking to and fro on the deck for nothing that they could understand, unless for some religious penance. There wero two old men with green turbans, who five times during the doy put aside their pipes, turning to the east, and, bowing their foreheuds to their fees, uttered with great fervour their Prayers. All this passed unnoticed by their very next neighbours—for the Turks are not (what nurses say of children) arrived at the cov fre faking notice. I have seen all sorts of strange sceneu L-nmen without disturbing the dreaming sttention of the Turk. Once in Cairo I was looking out of & window, beneath which three smokers were sitting upon their mats: a boy was drivin g an ass loaded with gravel aad sand, which tripped just as it was passing full trot by the 1837. ALT. 33. 7 « “NHBDEN. [ORAS 1837. _ place, sud fell close to the smokers, upsetting the content? Zr. 83, of the panniers upon their mats, The boy immediately set to work shovelling up the sand with his hands, and scraping it as well as he could from amongst their legs, and having loaded his donkey, he cantered away. Not a word or look passed between him and the smokers, who never moved from their seats; and two hours afterwards I passed by them when their posture was precigely the same, and their leg? were still surrounded “~ the remains of the load of sand | * Smyrna, Feb, 244% *°37,—« The house in which I am stay” ing is a large, elegant'v-furnished one, and the management is of the solid kind w*!~i: Xr, Rhoades’ establishment used 0 be characterized by.* Old, queer-looking servants trot about large corridors ; there are rooms for Monsieur, snuggerie# for Madame, little retreats for visitors, in one of which I am sitting, writing; and all have good, substantial fires, In the evening after a six o’clock dinner, parties of ladies walk in without ceremony ; they and the young gentlemen of the house, with Madame W—— (who does not speak English), sit down to the faro-table, around which you soon hear 8 babel of tongues, English, French, Greek, and Italian, whilst Mr. W—— and I cause over Russian politics or political economy. One by one the company disappears, after taking a cup of coffee the size of a pigeon’s egg; and so noiseless and little ceremonious are their appearances and disappearances, that a spectator would imagine the visitors to be members of the family, who joined each other from different parts of this great house to an evening’s amusement, and then retired again for the night to their several apartments. Thif 8 visiting as it should be done” The following extracts from his journal may serve to show the chief topics of conversation in these very useful visits :— Smyrna, Feb, 3rd.—* At Mr, Crespin’s, in a conversatio? ¥ Mr. Rhoades was the husband of ona of his année. m.] id roy » ze upon the trade - “ Turk-~r I heard that 350,000L of British 1857 goods are now Ivi-~her- “rp t5_ P-rgian markets, full one Zr. 38. half of the goods t' * ~~. fp: ? os year were fcr Persia. The Persian trad- + 7 reine’ lly from Bombay, or thr- present; these currents are ch-- =v: that he has been at Coustantinop!~ from sevonteen t~ -Lf--n years, and he recollects when t= sel cleared out hence for England. At present an s+. c+ "ig being made to impose transit duty upon the Porsian ail}: coming through Constantinople. The trade of France ic © =v =u 4 diminished ; query is the whole demand for Turk vy rreater now than forty years ago? Smyrna has di -lin-? Won) which formerly went to France OW goos t- 7 -1d~- lin: nw exported from Turkey.” Fee ~hor meme spfined to the house during the d-- the 7 - * recompanied Mr. Longworth to visit - $19 "1 gentleman who hag spent thirty-five wears Turley. Like almost all the residents, he is favourable t : the Turks, and anxious to support them against the Russians ; his experiments in farming the high lands for thy first time, tolerably successful. In the course of conversation he said that last year the government sent a firman to Salonica, and intercepted the grain crops which were ready for exportation, ordering them to be delivered to its stores at ten piastres and thirty paras the kilo (about a bushel) | he went to the Seraskier and coms plained, and advised him of 44- im ~%e3 of such a step, upon which he promised to incuire "he government then sent its agents t »-; Jeven or twelve piastres from the - had not been withdrawn, sold - ~. . however, had been sent to th- LiTUBS GS tari ms of the vicinity of the capital, declaring that they could not produce their grain ab less than fifieen pisstres the kilo. . .. It snowed ai 78 LIFE OF COBDEN. {oxes? 1837. day. I remained at home, and read, and made extracts fro¥ Ar. 33. pamphlets, ete.” Feb. 5th.— Inthe morning received a call from Mr. Perkiné He spoke of the steamer which goes in about three days Trebizond. She sails every fifteen days, and is usually ful of freight and passengers; the deck passengers pay 200 piastres, or about two pounds, cabin passengers te’ pounds. She carries a great number of porters, who com to Constantinople for work, remain perhaps for six months and then return. The goods sent to Trebizond are forwarded chiefly to Erzeroum, from whence they are distributed throughout Persia and the surrounding countries. Long cloths and prints are the principal articles. I received visit from Dr. Millingen.® Says Mr. Urquhart is Scotch was educated at college, went out to the aid of the Greek’ at their revolution, was severely wounded on two occasion® afterwards travelled for some years in Turkey, discover’ ‘the municipalities, direct taxation, and freedom of trades which were the secret preservers of Turkey. Afterwards be went to England, agitated the press, the ministers, and the king in favour of Turkey. He succeeded in making everS newspaper editor and reviewer adopt his views, excepting Tait. He afterwards wrote his Resources of Turkey, and then his pamphlet. He was patronized by Lord Ponsonby until he received his appointment of Secretary of Legato? when his active and personal exertions in promoting his ow” peculiar policy produced a coolness between them, He w# sent out by the English Government to arrange the cor mercial treaty. He, the ambassador, and the %onsul arf all at daggers drawn. “There are no associations at all amongst the Turks, suck as are alluded to by Urquhart. under the name of Munic® § The well-known physician who attended Myron in kia last illnegs. »™ who died at Copatantincplae lsat yaar (187%), Ys, | AT PMY RNA, br palities. Those amongst the rayahs have reference to the regulation of their own affairs in the manner of the English Quakers or Methodists, excepting that in their own disputes they are allowed to arbitrate without appealing to Turkish tribunals. The term, Municipalities, is misapplied, and only calculated to deceive. In taxing the rayahs, the amounts levied are arbitrary, and the only privilege the various sects possess is to raise the money in the best way they can, as a body amongst themselves, instead of the Turkish authorities coming in contact with individuals. The system was no doubt originated for the purpose of enabling the Turks to levy their imposts with greater facility. The Greeks, Armenians, Jews, etc., have no protection from these imaginary municipalities.” Feb. 7th~—“1In the morning I called on Mr. Perkins, who is opposed to the belief in the regeneration of the Turks. The municipalities are aptly ridiculed in the novel of Anastasius (by Hope), where the Turk sits upon the ground smoking under a tree, and leaves the people of the village, where he had been sent to levy contributions, to raise the money in the best way they can. Mr. Ralli attributes the evils of Turkey to the radical vices of the institutions, to the monopolies, and above all to the depreciation of the standard of value in the money. The trade to Persia through Constantinople has increased very much, but fluctuates greatly. One year it has been probably 7 to 800,0001.; at another, owing to a glut, not half of that amount. But he is certain that the trade to Persia, ete., is double that of Constantinople for Turkey. In the evening I dined with Mr. Thomasset, and met Mr. Boudrey, a French gentleman of intelligence. He says the trade direct with France has nearly fallen away entirely with Turkey. Belgian, Swiss, and German fabrics have superseded those from France. No regular impost is levied by government 183%. =r. 38. 73 LIBDEY Toma 1887. all through its dominions; every pacha is to raise a certs Ar. 38. sum, and he does it in his own way Mustapha Pacha, of Adrianople, when ordered to send a certain quantity of cor? to government at a certain price, fixed 12 piastres as the value, because the Europeans would give it, and he would not let his people supoly it for less ™- “5 an exception, ant popular.” Feb. 8th~“In the evening I dined with Mr. Perkin? end met Mr. Webster, &c. I was told that no fortune? have been made by British merchants at Constantinople: that the business is so insecure, and that they are beginning bo wish for the Russians, more money being made by th residents at Odessa.” Feb, 9th.—“Mr. Cartwright, the consul, called. It speaking of trade to Persia, he said that, previous to 1790; the commerce went by way of Aleppo, where there were twenty-eight English houses, The shipments were made af two seasons of the year, in six large vessels to Scanderoon: or Ladikiyeh, where there were large warehouses for depdté After that epoch the stream of commerce went in the direc tion of Bombay for the lower division of Persia, and by way of Russia for the other quarters of it. The modern rout by Constantinople is not more than fifteen years old. After our treaty of 1820, Turkey began its system of imposts apor internal commerce. He thinks that Mehemet Ali gave the impulse to Mahmoud in many of his reforms. The change is only in the dress and whitewashing of the houses, nothing fundamental being altered. After the destruction of the Janissaries, it seems that he has been quite at sea. Ruined: worn-out country.” Feb. 11th. Mr. Hanson thinks that matters are worse since the time of the Janissaries, who were the oppositio? and check of the government. Then the people were only plundered and oppressed by the Sultan snd his Grand Ir Waa 7G Vizier, but now - ~~~ sne f the pachas about the person of il the Sultan « “Hind firmans, oppress the poor Zn 38 agricultnralist “a3 thinks the trade for Turkey does not, in Constant, . 7", exceed 400,000L ; he was told that Persia took in one year 1,200,000. The trade to Persia is new for the last few years by this route; he thinks it both a creation and a transition; some of it is merely removed from Bombay. A ship or two in the year comes from Trieste, bringing goods from the German fairs to the Black Sea. In the evening I dined with Mr. Cartwright, and met a party of merchants. After dinner we discussed the trading prospects of Turkey. All agreed that the money amount of the consumption of British goods 1s diminishing, and that the trade to Persia forms two-thirds of the imports into Constantinople. Mr. Cartwright spoke of a person who, in Turkey, told him he had bought cloth for his coat which cost him only half as much as he would have paid for it in England. The company are obliged by their charter to take so much woollen cloth, which they sold ab a loss. Russia, Mr. Cartwright thinks, will again let the trade go through Georgia, by which route it formerly reached Persia; he says that, after exhausting the fortunes of the Armenians and others, he, the Sultan, has since been preying upon agriculture. The Exchange operations of the government are merely depreciating his currency, and robbing the people * v purchasing the non-interference of the foreign merchant. Russi is continually increasing the number of her subjects ~~ taralization. The rayahs, whe form the most indu~tr.... nd best, besides the most numerous part of the con. ~, would certainly benefit by a Christian government. f.. Cartwright and all present agreed that the Turks have not themselves the power of regeneration, and that, unless foreign aid prevent it, they must fall to pieces in less than twenty years. But absolute 0 LT"2 OF COBDEN. [cpt 1837. occupation and authority must be possessed by the pow¢ Zr 33. that would regenerate Turkey. Every public servant, fro? the highest to the lowest, must be dismissed, as they are J corrupt. A Turk, the moment he enters the public servic? is necessarily a rascal. England must, if she interposes all, take the part of a principal, not an auxiliary.” From Smyrna, after a fortnight’s cruise among the island? Cobden arrived at Athens, March 19th, where the politic? and economic circumstances of the new Hellenic kingdo? interested him more keenly than the renowned monument? though he did not fail in attention to them also, His i¥ quiries filled him, as is usually the case with travellers, wit admiration for the gifts of the Greek people, and confident in their future. The perverse diplomacy which settled t¥ limits and constitution of the kingdom, he viewed with ! contempt which the course of Eastern events in the fort} years since his visit has fully justified. His hopes for thf future of the Greeks were not coloured by the convention? acceptance of the glories of their past. He was amaze’ bo find the mighty states of Attica and Sparta within 8° area something smaller than the two counties of Yorkshirt and Lancashire. ¢ What famous puffers those old Greek! were! Half the educated world in Europe is now devotin? more thought to the ancient affairs of these Lilliputis® states, the squabbles of their tribes, the wars of the! villages, the geography of their rivulets and hillocks, the? they bestow upon the modern history of the South and North Americas, the politics of the United States, and th charts of the mighty rivers and mountains of the ne" world’? “ The antiquities of Athens may be cursorily viewed in hal e day. Iwas not so hig-'y impressed with the merits © these masterpieces from reading and plates, as I found myse! ¥ Te P. Jobden, from Smyrna, March 8rd, 1837. UL] ATT TOREKS, oq to be on looking at she actual remains of those monumonts aud temples, whose ruins crown the rocxy platform of the Acropolis. I am satisfied that there is nothing now in existence which for beauty of design, masterly workmanship, and choice of situation, can compare with that spectacle of grandeur and sublimity which the public tewples of ancient Arhens presented two thousand years age. What a genius and what a taste had those people! And, mind, the genius is there still, All the best dends of ancient times will be again rivalled by the Grezks cf « futare age. Do not believe the lying and slanderins __.. ats which the dulness of some travellers, the envy of I.ovant merchants, and the Franks of Constantinople, utter aguinst the Greek character. The raw material of all that is nokle, brilliant, refined, and glorious, is still latent iu the character of this people overlaid, as is natural, wita {he ¢rrning, falsehood, meanness, and other vices inher. 2’ - + wula of slaves. “ Do not, however, © n predicting the revival of Greek greatness, ©. 1eans of the present little trumpery monarchy _ which will pass away like other bubbles blo ~ "ow statesmen. All the East will be Greek, 1. no matter under what nominal sovereig, will by the force of the indomitable geniu. sks become in fact the capital of that peoplc Athens, March 22. sevoning at Sir E. Lyons’ I met Captain Fisher, who - haste with which he was ordered to sea for ti. . ft his own son behind him, whom I met i. dia, and for whom he had not dared “Lars. He also left behind two guns, ..... . «ao lives and fortunes of a nation were at . .» not have used more pressing expedition—y.. _, ior no purpose that can be ® To F. Cobden, April 18, 1837. a 1837. Er. 38. 1837. Ar. 883. rn £1e “IBDEN. {uaa discovered * Tho I' nd is carrying home Count Armans perg, the dismis- "~*~ € (freece, after bringing th King and Ne--- * saw this ship at Malta on mJ wey out ti; Fo vembor. She was fitted up superb] for this yo-- and gentleman, and their maids © honour and ¢it-nd-ut:. She went to Venice, and was U waiting for the royal holiday folks for two months, Th Madagascar, Capt. Lyons, brought out the Regency and th¢ young king. The wives of the members of the Regent quarrelled even on the passage. Sometime ago the Mede? steamer was carrying the old King of Bavaria and his son the islands of the Archipelago and the coast of Asia Minor We are general carriers for erratic royalty all over the world: witness, Donna Maria Miguel, old Ferdinand of Naples, tb¢ King of Portugal and their precioas minions, were the choict freights of our ships of war, When will this folly have 8 end ? March 24. At twelve o’clock at night {in the Pirav* harbour] I went on board a little boat, which set sail imme diately for Kalamaki [in the Isthmus of Corinth]. It was? clear, fresh, moonlight night, and a favourable breeze s00" carried us from among the ships in the harbour.” March 25.—~“ In the morning we were halfway across th? * The now kingdom was entrusted to a Regenoy until the completion d King Otho's twentieth year (June 1, 1835). Connt Armaneperg wae Prof” dent, and Von Maurer was his principal colleague. The pair showed aa Germans are capable of rivaling the Greeks themselves in hatred 8% intrigne. “Count Armansperg, as & noble, locked down on Maurer 69 : pedant and law professor. Maurer sneered at the count as an idler, b only to be a diplomatist or a master of the ceremonies” (Finlay, vii. 18) When King Otho returned to his kingdom in the Portland (Feb., 1887), 1 brought with him his young bride, Queen Amelia, and Rudhart to be 157 prime minister. Armansperg was recalled to Bavaria, after disastro® fulure in his administration. Cobden might have found an exooeilent we! for a germon, iu the childish perversity which marked Lord Palmerstot® dealings with Greece in these yeurs, from his stubborn defence of Cou! Armansperg down to hig disputes about court etiquette, and his emplo® ment of the fleet to enforoe the payment of a trifling debt. 1. | ¥ YORAM, “a2 gulf [the Saroni une o'clock. .. . At eight iid o’clock in the ever 1 at Kulamaki. On the Zn. ss. beach were two person “ith a blazing torch and spear. We entered she 4: mhials were on a littie bar, behind which sat the master. Lt the other ends of the room were raised platforms of wo stages, reaching to the ceiling, or rather roof (for there was 10 1nterior covering), on which the travellers nad spread mats, and ou some of which their snoring occupunts were reposing for the night, whilst others were sitting smoking their Pipes. An oflicer in the new uniform, and another in the Albanian dress, were sitting ata little table taking their supper with their fingers from the same dish. A little wood fire was blazing at one side of the room, upon which was some hot water, and by the side huang coffev-pots of every size, from the bigness of a thimble upwards. A large mortar of marble stood by the side of the fire, into which the coffee-gruins were thrown by the servant, and pounded with a pestie, previous to being boiled for his customers, This custom of pounding instead of grinding the coffee, is I believe, universal in the Easy, “We found a proprietor of a boat from the other side of the isthmus, and engaged with him to take us to Patras for twelve dollars. "V. hired horses and set off across the isthmus, a distancs “ab sli miles to Loutraki, The night was clear and cool, and the moon at early its full ; the scenery of -- mountainous end rugged neck “of land which we tr cv and of the gulfs on each side, was POMANtC. +. ou te raw 1s caves and hollows in the sides of the i. »¢ women and children were thrug, . WAT. “We g-. --, and set sail down the gulf « - oul. for Patras. Parnassus on our Fighy, covered wiwa saow—a cold bed for the muses! On #1 sido the hills ave crowned vith muow. 2: might tha 84 LIF® TORPMN., | ora 1837. wind was foul and contrary, and our boat took shelter in’ Zz. 38. port on the Roumeliot sid» f the gulf, and, on the morning of the 27th of May’ £-ding that there was no chance © getting forwar®, T +arn-3 ++ the opposite coast, and ran fo a little village, where T determined to hire horses, and push forward for Patras by land. We came to anchor near ? shop, where the proprietor sold every variety of petty mer chandise, such as wine, paper, candles, nails, &c., and W¢ book some coffee, whilst a person went in search of horses The owner of the cattle arrived soon afterwards, to make # bargain of a dollar each horse for Vostizza. He had left hif animals concealed behind a bridge, and, as soon as we had agreed to his terms, éhey were produced. This cunning ¥ the result of a long experience of Turkish violence. We sé! off with some companions for Vostizza, along a road border ing close upon the gulf, at the foot of lofty banks or hillf that bound either side of the water. We passed some ric little valleys, finely cultivated and all planted with the little carraut-trees. Stopped at a hut in the middle of the day: and ate some black bread and olives, and drank some wine and water. Again set forward and reached Vostizza, a little sea-port situated in a rich and well-cultivated valley, all planted with currants. The people appeared industriousf at work. On walking out into the town of Vostizza, I found a few stone houses, apparently lately erected, and of publi utility. “Saw a concotirse of people around one of these, 1 which there was to be an auction of public lands. “In the khan or lodgings where I put up, there wad nothing to be had to eat but eggs and caviare. I went #0 bed early, intending to be called at three o’clock, but could not sleep from the noise of Greeks, who were laughing and dancing in the next room. When I had by dint of threst? and vociferations quieted these fellows, I was beset by suck multitudes of fleas that I could not obtain a moment’ md EY To AR 8x repose. I therefore arcse at two o’clock, and, as the horses soon efterwards appeared, we set off for Patras. The moon was bright and the air cool, and we proceeded along a path close to the gulf; passed some shepherds’ huts in which the lights were burning, and the dogs gave note of watchfulness. As daylight appeared, I looked anxiously to the coast for the spectacle of a sunrise behind the mountains of Roumelia. The first rays lighted vp the summits of Parnassus and the other lofty mountains, whose snowy peaks were tinged with rosy hues. By degrees the sky assumed a dark dull red aspect, above the eastern range of hills; this shade gradually grew more lurid, until little by little the horizon, from a sombre red, assumed a dazzling appearance of fiery brightness, and shortly afterwards the sun flamed above the mountainons outline over the gulf, bills, and valleys around us. The path sll the way lay through a thicket of shrubs of a thousand kinds, some evergreen, others aromatic, and the whole wearing the appearance of a pleasure-ground in England. The flowers, too, were fragrant, and the whole scene was full of luxuriant richness and beauty. “We stopped at a hut at nine o’clock to breakfast, where we found a poor mud cottage, containing a few coarse articles of use for sale, as well as some bread snd cheese of a very uninviting quality. I saw Lepanto on the opposite side of the gzlf, and soon afterwards the Castles of Patras and Roumelia, which guard the entrance of the Gulf of Lepanto. Af half-past twelve o'clock we entered Patras and went str “*— - 45 the “'onsul’s house, to learn the time when the st: id sil T washog, dressed, and dined, and "=r? went on board the Hermes stear . +. seus which arrived from Corfu. We set sail a. ...s ociock In the evening, at ten, we called off Zante fur letters, and then proceeded with favour able breezes for Malta? 1837. Ar, 33. TTRANY. fo At Malta Cobden formc some very decided opinions * to the policy of naval administration, as illustrated at th’ station. “The Malta station is the hot-bed for naval patronsgt and the increase of our ships of war. They are sent to tI Mediterranean for five years, the large ships are for six ¢ eight months of each yesr anchored in Malta harbour, ¢ else in Vourla or Tenedos. In the summer, for the space ¢ four or five months, they make excursions round Sicily, or ¥ the Archipelago as far as Smyrna or Athens, and then the! return again to their anchorage to spend the winter in i? activity ; the officers visiting in the eity, or perhaps enjoyiné a long leave of absence, whilst the men, to the number of six, seven, or eight hundred, are put to such exercise of employment as the ingenuity of the first lieutenant can devi on board ship, or else are suffered to wander on shore upo? occasional leaves of ahsence. This is not the way either 0 make good sailors, or to add to the power of the British empire. The expenses are borne by the industry of the productive classes at home. The wages of these idlers ar paid out of the taxes levied upon the soap, beer, tobacco, &¢-consumed by the people of England, But what a prospect of future expense does this state of things hold out to the nation. Every large ship contains at least forty or fifty quarter-deck officers, each one of whom, from the junio’ supernumerary midshipman up to the first lieutenant, haf entered the service, hoping and relying that he will in due course of time, either hy means of personal merit or aided by the influence of powerful friends, attain to the command of a ship of war, and oll these will press their claims upon. the Adwir" | Zr future employment, and will be entitled to hop? a8 th or. v= J1d~ ‘hat their emoluments, rank, and pros pects wi - improve every year with their increased necessities: What then is the prospect which such a state of things hold? x1. ] A out to the two parties ~~meernec’, the nation on the one hand and its servant = gervants, on the other: Uawise to encour-- ref the navy, parents might find a much bett wowed regions abroad’! Leaving 11.1 * touching at Gibraltar, he there in the ¢.=v sable questioning found new confirmetir * ‘mpetent and disinterested informen: versation Waghorn said that the admire, ", ad that ns accounts for the service being 1... .._ ._ 3% lL. i heretofore; that the ships are put wn» for si wr hs ia the winter months nk Malta, during ~~ * © ©" thurse no exercise in seamanship for the mer Tews told me that there are sometimes twenty sng at one time in Malta, The mode of prom: 1 ar worse now than under the Tories; there : * "Ow ‘n the command of ships who five years ag. ‘& a8 midshipmen, and there are hundreds of - lieutenancies, who have passed ten years. presses upon the Admiralty for the promotion -48 tnd Gependants of the ministers of the day, and tu “vor fur the exercise of justice towards the ¢!” flicers. This was more excusable at the . ro. °n boroughs than now, when no such interest can ne. sary There are thirty or forty midshipmen in on: ide first-raters how much incipient disappointmen’ rover 1, nd neglect! i. Lciniral states that it is enc .g. Seals Litt by ser oung men, some f t+ ding the best sia, ay Young Baily in conv v.. ~ a he Portland was fitted up for che wu. areto and her maids of honour, twenty guns removed and the space converted inte v Journal, March 31. 1837. 1837. Tre 48 88 ‘NBDHN, [cEAP. I 1829, elegant rooms draped ar furnished for the king, queen, and 4.83. suite. The queen, on arriving et Athens, was so pleased wit! her lodging on board, that she sent an artist to take a drawing of her rooms. The vessel waited a couple of months 8t Trieste and Venice, for the royal pair. After bringing thew and their ministers, the Portland carvied back Count Arman® perg to Malte.” ? On the 21st of April Cobden arrived at Falmouth, after an absence of six months, 7” must repeat here what I sail at the beginning of these extracts, that the portions of hi¢ letters and journals which record the most energetic of bis interests and his inquiries, ~re precisely those which are 1 longer worth reproducing, because the facts of commerce and of politics, which formed the most serions object; of his investigation, have undergone such a chan ge as to be hardly more to our purpose than the year’s almanack. When we come to the journals of ten years later, the reader will be able to judge the spirit and method with which Cobden travelled, and perhaps tc learn a lesson from him in the objects’ of travel i-av "(Cobden could hardly have spent & more profit» ": *" for he had laid up a great stock of political ; “1, >nd acquired a certain living familiarity with the ¢'r~>mstances of the eastern basin of the Mediterranean anl ..« Terkisk Government—then as now the centre cf our active diplomacy—and with the real working cf t= =~ © * "lag of national policy which he had already co 7 © 7* “native common sense and reflection, CE! In IV THE TWO PP! MPHLETS. Ir is not at the first glance very easy to associate a large and theorizing doctrine of human civilization with the name of one who was at this time a busy dealer in printed calicoes, and who almost immediately afterwards became the most active of political agitators. There may seem to be a certain incongruity in discussinc: - »uple of pamphlets by a Manchester manufacturer, us , . ore the speculations of an abstract philosopher. Ye... _ . trained pretension to say that at this time Cobden ws -vssessed by the philosophic gift of fecling abeut ©. v 88 a whole, and thinking about the problems of society in an ordered connexion with one another. He had definite and systematic ideas of the way in why. aca cn rht now to travel in search of improvement ; and > . "' Dew meaning and more comprehensive purpose ty ri. Life, The agitations of th - ~resl Reform Act of 1832 had stirred up social aspirations, wis - Liberal Government of the next ten years afics “2onng of the Act were utterly mable to satisfy. a. . v7 arose partly from their own political ineptitede . w. .. like of conviction ard courage ; and partl; fiira the fact that many of these aspirations lay wholly outside of the sphere of any govern. ment. To give a vote to all ten-pound householders, and to abolish a few rotten boroughs, was seen to carry the nation 1835-6. Er, 31-2 90 [onl 1835-6. a verylittle wayon t+ ~~~ for which it had girded iteel =. 21.2. up. The party — -~rriad the change seemed ¥ have sunk - thy “47 faction, blind to Hf demands of “* va ~ + 5 strong and comm?” doctrine, wit: =. national «is, ~x1 bardly even with 85f vigorous pergonzl =e Maanls suddenly felt that tH interesting thing wr r 5 mechonism but policy, and © fortunately the men vw hed am<~~ 7 the mechanism wer in policy found emp*~ = - "at resource. The rest! of the disappointmc- degree of fresh 8% independent acti~ better minds of t° time, that the snce-- we 1, esiy from 1840 to 187) practically lived or thonrhy and sentiment of tH seven or eight year ~~ . :rco-Jing the close of tH Liberal reign in I wel during those years that tbe schools were formed and the principles shaped, which hs® attracted to themselves all wt were serious enough to f¢¢ the need of a school or the use f ~ principle. If the change in institutions which had taken place in 18% bad brought forth hardly any of the fruit, either bitter sweet, which friends had hoped and enemies had threatentd it was no wonder that those who were capable of a larg earnestness about public things, whether civil or eccl® siastical, turned henceforth from the letter of institutions % their spirit; from their form and outer framework to t operative force within; er? "~~m stereotyped catchword® about the social union t* # r- Ilestination. It was no" the day of ideals in every cam: The general restlossne® was as intense among reflecting Conservatives as amobé reflecting Liberals; and those who looked to the past agre?® with those who looked to the future, in energetic dissat® faction with a sterile present. We need only look aro?’ to recognize the unity of the original impulse whit animated men who dreaded or hated one another: 8" re MTT TIRM AUT. 01 inspired books thet were as f vb es humoristic novel 1825.8, and a treatise on {> ~ pagan great wave of hu- Hr. 81-2 manity, of benevoler- © 1 7 = improvement—a great wave of social sentime 1 vo. poured itself among all who had the faculty . Lorge an? disinterested thinking. The political piri’ wa. "pv--1 :. its most comprehensive sense, the desire of strengthening society by adapting it to better intellectual deals,and enr’ * .. from new resources of moral power, 2 "7 for social regeneration, under what its apostles conceive ' t- be a purer spiritual guidance, penetrated ecclesiastic --Iamoxn-rooms no less than it penetrated tha mewnt “districts. Tt was in 1835 that Dr. Pusey threw linc-clf with new heartiness into the movement at Casfird, that ©. Newman projected Catenas of Anglican divines, .- began to meditate Tract Ninety, In the opposite Tuarier 7 the horizon Mr. Mill wag still endeavouring, it tL 7i-tai-ster Review, to put a new life into Radical politics by giviag a more free and genial character to R.dical speculations, and—a far more important task—wag compesing the treatise which gave a decisive tone to English ways of thinking for thirty years afterwards. Men like Arnold anc lik. Maurice were almost intoxicated with their passion for making citizenship into something loftier and more generous than the old strife of Blues and Yellows ; unfortunately ‘icy were so beset with prejudices against what confusedly denounced as materialism and utilif ar’ nis, that * v turned aside from the open ways of rrp > 2d trath to fact, to nourish themselves on veo “urch which, though it rested on the gre. Jub oo 4, yet for purposes of action could « LoAor ld ue sae ma instrument for the secular teaching of Adam Smith and Bentham. To the fermentation of those years Carlyle contributed the vehement; apostrophes of Ohartism and Past and Present, glowing 2 LIFE OF OORDEN, {oHAP 18358. with eloquent contempt for the aristocratic philosophy of Ar. 81-2. treadmills, gibbets, and thirty-nine Acts of Parliament ¢ for the shooting of partridges alone,” but showing no more definite way for national redemption than lay through the too vague words of Education and Emigration. Finally, in the same decade, the early novels of Charles Dickens brought into vivid prominence among the objects of popular interest mach types of social outlawry as the parish apprentice, the debtor in prison, the pauper in the workhouse, the criminal by profession, and all the rest of that pitiful gellery. Dickens had hardly any solution beyond a mere Christmas philanthropy, but he stirred the sense of humanity in his readers, and from great imaginative writers we have no right to insist npon more. Notwithstanding their wide diversity of language and of method, still to all of these rival schools and men of genius the ultimate problem was the same. With all of them the aim to be attained was social renovation. Even the mystics of Anglo-Catholicism, ag I have said, had in the inmost recesses of their minds a clear belief that the revival of sacramental doctrine and the assertion of apostolic succession would quicken the moral life of the nation, and meet social needs mo less than it would meet spiritual needs. Far apart as Cobden stood from these and all the other sections of opinion that I have named, yet his early pamphlets show that he discerned as keenly as any of them that the hour had come for developing new elements in public life, and setting up a new standard of public action. To Cobden, as to Arnold or to Mill, the real meaning of his activity was, in a more or less formal and conscigus way, the hope of supplying a systematic foundation for higher social order, and the wider diffusion of a better kind of well being. He had none of the pedantry of the doctrinaire. but he tv. COMBR’S INFLONNOE ON COBDEN. 93 was full of the intellectual spirit. Though he was shortly to Amel become the leader of a commercial movement, he never Zr. 81-2 Ceased to be the preacher of a philosophy of civilization ; and his views on trade were only another side of views on education and morality. Realist as he was, yet his opinions were \nspired and enriched by the genius of social imagination. Some readers will smile when I say that no teacher of thay day was found so acceptable or so inspiring by Cobden as George Combe. He had read Combe’s volume before he wrote his pamphlets, and he said that “if Seemed; like a transcript of his own familiar thoughts.’ * Foy emphatically second-rate men have done better work than the author of the Constitution of Man. That memorable book, whose principles have now in some shape or other become the accepted commonplaces of all rational persons, Vas a startling revelation when it was first published (1828), showing wen that their bodily systems are related to the rest of the universe, and are subject to general and inexorable conditions; that health of mind and character are Connected with states of body; that the old ignorant or ascetical disregard of the body is hostile both to happiness and mental power; and that health is a true department of morality. We cannot wonder that zealous men were found bo bequeath fortunes for the dissemination of that wholesome gospel, that it was circulated by scores of thousands of Copies, and that it was seen on shelves where there was Rothing else save the Bible and Pilgrim’s Progress. It is easy to discern the attraction which teaching so fresh and inspiriting as this, would have for a mind like Cobden’s, constitutionally eager to break from the old grooves of things, alert for every sign of mew light and hope in the sombre sky of prejudice, and confident in the Wrge possibility of human destiny. To show, as Combe Tafs of Georg Combs, i. 11. > T2DEN, fous 1835-6. ghowed, that the character and motives of men are CO Zr. 31-2. nected with physical predispositions, was to bring ¢ vacter and motive within the sphere of action, because ™ may in that case modify them by attending to the requ? ments of the bodily organization. A boundless field is th opened for the influence of social institutions, and th opportunities of beneficence are without limit. There * another side on which Cobden fouud Combe’s teaching ’ harmony with the impulses of his own temperament : rests upon the natural soundness of the human heart, ol its methods are those of mildness and lenity. In his trepid faith in the perfectibility of man and society, Cobd®” is the only eminent practical statesman that this count) has ever possessed, who constantly breathes the fine spit’ of that French school in which the name of Turgot is th most illustrious, The doctrine of the pamphlets has its avowed source the very same spirit which has gradually banished violenc® harshness, and the darker shapes of repression from th? education of the young, from the treatment of the insat® from the punishment of criminals, and has substituted fo those time-honoured but most ineffective processes, a rationd moderation and enlightened humanity, the force of lenied! and considerate example and calm self-possession. Nov’ intervention was an extension of the principle which, r¢ nouncing appeals through brute violence, rests on the nob? and more powerful qualities of the understanding and the moral nature. Cobden’s distinction as a statesman w% not that he accepted and applied this principle in a gener? way. Charlatans and marauders accept such principles in hot way. His merit is that he discerned that England, at any raté whatever might be true of Germany, France, or Russia, wot in the position where the present adoption of this new spi’ of policy would exactly coincide with all her best and lero AFT LICLTION T NCTIBH 20LICY. G5 interests. Now aud at all times Cobden was far too shrewd 1835-6. and practical in his temper to suppose that unfamiliar truths will shine into the mind of a nation by their own light. It was of England that ke thought, and for England that he wrote ; and wh.t ho did was not to declaim the plabitudes of rose-colourci merality, but by reference to the hardest facts of our national existence and international relations, to show that not only the moral dignity, but the material strength, the solid interests, the real power of the country, alike for improvements within ang self-defence without, demanded the abandonment of the diplomatic principles of a time which Was a8 unenlightened and mischievous on many sides of ita foreign policy, as everybody knows and admits it to have been in the schoolroom, in the hospital, and in the offices of the national revenue, The pamphlets do not deal with the universe, but with this country. Their writer has been labelled a €Oosmopolitan,—usually hy those who in the same breath, by a violent contradictior, reproached him for Preaching a gospel of national selfishness 5." ;., Jation. In truth Cobden was only cosmopolitan 1; thes 8€S-- 1 which no other statesman would chonse to de 17 bw “osmopolitan also; namely, in the sense of air: ~ ~y which, in benefiting his own country, sh. ~~ ~~ vbe rest of the world a the same time, ‘I - Taglish citizen,” be would have said, “and whe wntending for is that England is to-day so situated : “77 particular of her domestic and foreign circumgt Cao leaving other governments to settle their sivess and fight out their own quarrels, and | y. 2g to the vast and difficult affairs of her own enormous realm and the condition of her people, she will not only be setting the world an example of noble morality which no other nation is 50 happily free to set, but she will be following the Very course which the maintenance Ar 9 1835-6. Ar, 31-2. g6 Lr JOE OBDER fas of her own greatness most imperatively commands. It ¥ precisely because Gres* Britain is so strong in resources g courage, in institutions, in geographical position, that sf can, before all other European powers, afford to be mor?! and to set the example of a mighty nation walking in tl paths of justice and peace.” Cobden’s political genius perceived this great mark 0 the time, that, in his own words, “at certain periods in ihe history of a nation, ib becomes necessary to review it principles of domestic policy, for the purpose of adapti’s the government to the changing and improving condi” of its people.” Next, “it must be equally the part of ¢ wise community to alter the maxims by which its foreig” relations have in times past been regulated, in conforms with the changes that have taken place over the enti” globe.”* Such a period he conceived to have come for England in that generation, and it had come to her ot? from her internal conditions, and from the nature of her c0¥ pexions with the other nations of the globe. The thoug! was brought to him not by deliberate philosophizing, but by observation and the process of native good sense, offerit? a fresh and open access to things. The cardinal fact gh struck his eye was the great population that was gatheri®f in the new centres of industry in the north of Englan® in the factories, and mines, and furnaces, and cyclope?’ foundries, which the magic of steam had called into sc? sudden and marvellous being. It was with no enthusiasm that he reflected on this tran® formation that had overtaken the westorn world, and ” his first pamphlet he anticipated the cry, of which he hes?’ more than enough all throngh his life, that his dream ww to convert England into a vast manufactory, and that br political vision was directed by the interests of his ord¢’ ? Advartisament to Russia (1838). v.] THE "ROBLEM. 97 “ Far from nourishing any such esprit-de-corps,” he says in unr, the first pamphlet, “our predilections lean altogether in &r. 31-2. an opposite direction. We were born and bred up amid the pastoral charms of the south of England, and we confess to 80 much attachment for the pursuits of our forefathers, that, had we the casting of the parts of all the actors in this world’s stage, we do not think we should suffer a cotton-mill or a manufactory to have a place init. . . . But the factory system, which sprang from the discoveries in machinery, has been adopted by all the civilized nations in the world, and it is in vain for us to think of discountenancing its application to the necessities of this country ; it only remains for us to mitigate, as far as possible, the evils shat are perhaps not inseparably connected with this novel jocial element,” To this conception of the new problem Cobden always kept very close. This was always to him the foundation of the new order of things, which demanded a new kind of statesmanship and new ideas upon national policy, Tt is true that Cobden sometimes slips into the phrases of an older school, about the rights of man and natural law, but such lapses into the dialect of a revolutionary philosophy were very rare, and they were accidents, His whole scheme rested, if ever any scheme did so rest, upon the wide positive base of a great social expediency. To political exclusion, to commercial monopoly and restriction, to the preponderance of a territorial aristocracy in the legislature, he steadfastly opposed the contention that they were all fatally incompatible with an industrial system, which it was beyond the power of any statesman or any order in the country to choose between accepting and casting out. Fifty years before this, the Younger Pitt, when he said that any man with twenty thousand pounds a year ought “0 he wade a peer if he wished, had recognized the neces. 08 Li¥E UF OOBDEN, fous? 1835-6. sity of admitting bankers and merchants to a share of th sz. 31-2. political dignity which had hitherto been confined to tH great families. It had now ceased to be a question of ° few peerages more or less for Lombard Street or Cornhill Commercial interests no less than territorial interests Wer now overshadowed by industrial interests; the new diff culties, the new problems, the new perils, all sprang fro? what had taken place since William Pitt’s time, the porte? tous expansion of our industrial system. Between the date o Waterloo and the date of the Reform Act, the power-loo® in Manchester had increased from two thousand to eight/ thousand, and the population of Birmingham had gro® from ninety to one hundred and fifty thousand. The sa® wonders had come to pass in enormous districts over tb land. Cobden was naturally led to begin his survey of society’ as such a survey is always begun by the only kind of historian that is worth reading. He looked to wealth and its distribution, to material well-being, to economic sources, to their administration, to the varying directi?® and relative force of their currents. It was here that b¢ found the key to the stability and happiness of a natio® in the sense in which stability and happiness are the object? of its statesmen. He declined to make any excuse for ® frequently resolving questions of state policy into matters o pecuniary calculation, and he delighted in such business-li¥¢ statements as that the cost of the Mediterranean squadro® in proportion to the amount of the trade which it was pr’ fessedly employed to protect, was as though a merchavt should find that his traveller’s expenses for escort alo® were to amount to 6s. 8d. in the pound on his sales. Be pointed to the examples in history, where some of t greatest and most revolutionary changes in the mode” world had a fiscal or economic origin. And if Cobden b#' v.] MATERIAL WELL-BEING AND POLITIOAL STABILITY. g9 on his visit to Athens seen Finlay, he might have learnt _3aabis, from that admirable historian the same lesson on a still Zr. 81.2 more imposing scale in the ancient world, He would have been told that even so momentous an event in the annals of human civilization as the disappearance of rural slavery in Europe, was less due to moral or political causes than to such a decline in the value of the products of slave-labour 88 left no profit to the slave-owner. From the fall of the Roman Empire to the mortal decay of Spain, and the ruin of the ancient monarchy of France, history shows that Cobden was amply justified in laying down the principle that the affairs of a nation come under the same laws of common sense ang homely wisdom which govern the prosperity of a private concern, In material well-being he maintained, and rightly maintained, that you not only have the surest foundation for 8 solid fabric of morality and enlightenment among your people, but in the case of one of our vast and populous modern societies of free men, the only sure bulwark against cease. less disorder and violent convulsion, It was not, therefore, from the side of emotional Sympathy that Cobden started, but from that Positive and scientific feeling for good order and right government which is the statesman’s true motive and deepest passion. The sentimental benevolence to which Victor Hugo and Dickens have appealed with such power, could give little help in dealing with the surging uncontrollable tides of industrial and economic forces. Charity, it is trae, had been an accepted auxiliary in the thinly peopled societies of the middle ages; but for the great Populations and complex interests of the western world in modern times, it is geen that prosperity must depend on policy and institutions, and not on the compassion of individuals, It is not necessary that we should analyse the contents 100 IT COBDEN, [oaar 1835.6. of pamphlets which any one may read through for himsel Fr. 31.2. in a fow hours, and which well deserve to be read throug! even by those who expect their conclusions to be most re pugnant. The pamphlet on England, Ireland, and Americt is a development of the following thought: —A nation ¥ growing up on the other side of the Atlantic which by the operation of various causes, duly enumerated by the writer, must inevitably at no distant date enter into seriou competition with our own manufactures. Apart from the natural advantages possessed by this new competitor, ther? are two momentous disadvantages imposed upon the Eng lish manufacturer, which tend to disable him in the struggl® with his formidable rival. These two disadvantages ar first, protection and the restriction of commerce; seconds the policy of intervention in European feuds. The one loads us with a heavy burden of taxation and debt; the other aggravates the burden by limiting our use of our ow? resources. The place of Ireland in the argument, after 2 vivid and too true picture of the deplorable condition of that country, is to illustrate from the most striking exampl® within the writer’s own knowledge, “the impolicy and ir” justice of the statesmen who have averted their faces fro? this diseased member of the body politic; and at the same time have led us, thns maimed, into the midst of every conflict that has occurred on the continent of Europe.” In fine, the policy of intervention ought to be abandoned: because it has created and continues to augment the debts which shackles us in our industrial competition; becans? it has in every case been either mischievous or futile, and constantly so even in reference to its own professed ends; and because it has absorbed energy and resource that wer imperiously demanded by every consideration of nation®! duty for the improvement of the backward and neglecte’ portions of our own realms. v.] RUSSIA AND TURKEY. IO In the second pamphlet the same principles are applied ‘0 the special case which the prejudice of the time made Ar. 31-2. rgent. David Urquhart, a remarkable man, of prodigious tivity, and with a singular genius for impressing his Opinions upon all sorts of men from aristocratic dandies down to the grinders of Sheffield and the cobblers of Stafford, had recently published an appeal to England in favour of Turkey. He had furnished the ministers with Arguments for a policy to which they leaned by the instinct of old prejudice, and he had secured all the editors of the dewspapers. Mr. Urquhart’s book was the immediate provocation for Cobden’s pamphlets. In the second of them the author dealt with Russia. With Russia we were then, as twenty years later and forty years later, and, as perhaps Some reader of the next generation may write on the margin of this page, possibly sixty years later, urged with passionate imprecations to go to war in defence of European law, the valance of power, and the security of British interests. Disclaiming a spirit of partiality for any principle of the foreign or the domestic policy of the Government of St. Petersburg, Cobden proceeded to examine each of the arguments by which it was then, as now, the fashion to defend 80 armed interference by England between Russia and Turkey. A free and pointed description, first of Turkey, and next of Russia, and a contrast between the creation of St. Petersburg and the decline et Constantinople, lead up bo the propositions i—first, that the advance of Russia to the countries which the Turk once wasted by fire and sword, and still wastes by the more desi~ “recesses of misgovernment, would be a great step in th aress of improvement ; second, that no step in the [ress of improvement and the advance of civilization can be inimical to the interests or the welfare of Great Britain, What advantage can it be to us, a commercial and manufacturing people, that 102 LIFE OF COBDEN. [omar 1835.6. countries placed in the healthiest latitudes and blessed wit Ar. 51-2. the finest climate in the world, should be retained in # condition which hinders their inhabitants from increasing and multiplying ; from extracting a wealth from the sof which would enable them to purchase the products of wester? lands; and so from changing their present poverty-stricke? end plague-stricken squalor, for the manifold enjoyment of their share of all the products of natural resource and human ingenuity. As for Russia, her treatment of Poland was cruel and unjust, but let us at least put aside the cant of the sentimental declaimers who, amid a cloud of phrase about ancient freedom, national independence, and gloriow republic, obscure the fact that the Polish nation meant only a body of nobles. About nineteen out of every twenty of the inhabitants were serfs without a single civil or politics! right ; one in twenty was a noble; and the Polish noble were the vainest, most selfish, most cruelly intolerant: most violently lawless aristocracy of ancient or moder? times. Let us join by all means in the verdict of murder robbery, treason, and perjury which every free and honest nation must declare against Russia, Prussia, and Austri# for their undissembled wickedness in the partition. Let 1° go further, and admit that the infamy with which Burkes Sheridan, and Fox laboured to overwhelm the emissaries of British violence in India, was justly earned at the very same period by the minions of Russian despotism in Poland: But no honest man who takes the trouble to compare the condition of the true people of Poland under Russia, with their condition under their own tyrannical nobles a century ago—and here Cobden gives ample means of compariso® —will deny that in material prosperity and in moral order of life the advance has been at least as great as in anf other portion of the habitable globe. Apart from thes? historic changes, the Russo-maniac ideas of Russian powe' v.] INTERVENTION JUDGED BY EXPERIENCE. 103 are demonstrably absurd. With certain slight modifica- 1835-6. Hons, Cobden’s demonstration of their absurdity remains ur. 31-2 38 valid now as it was forty years ago. The keen and vigorous arguments by which Cobden attacked the figment of the balance of power are now tacitly accepted by politicians of all schools. Fven the Tost eager partisans of English intervention in the affairs of other nations now feel themselves bound to show as Plausibly as they can, that intervention is demanded by Some peril to the interests of our own country, It is In vain that authors of another school struggle against Cobden’s position, that the balance of power is not a fallacy nor an imposture, but a chimera, a something incomprehensible, undescribed, and indescribable, The attempted definitions of it fall to pieces at the touch of historic analysis. If we find the smaller states still preserving an independent existence, it is owing, Cobden said, not to the watchful guardianship of the’ balancing system, but to limits set by the nature of things to unduly extended dominion ; not only to physical boundaries, but to the more formidable moral impediments to the invader,— unity of language, law, custom and traditions ; the instinct of patriotism and freedom ; the hereditary rights of rulers; and, though last, ot least, that homage to the restraints of justice, which nations and public bodies have in all ages avowed, however they may have found excuses for evading it.” That brilliant writer, the historian of the Crimean War, has described in a well-known passage what he calls the great Usage which forms the safeguard of Europe. This great Usage is the accepted obligation of each of the six Powers fo protect the weak against the strong. But in the same Page a limitation ig added, which takes the very pith and marrow out of this moral and chivalrous Usage, and reduces 1t to the very commonplace principle that nations are bound 104 LIFE OF COBDEN, [oma? 1835-6. to take care of themselves. For, says the writer, no Power Hr. 31.2. is practically under this obligation, unless its perception o the wrong that has been done is reinforced by a =ense of its own interests.’ Then it is the self-interest of each nation which is the decisive element in every case of inter vention, and not a general doctrine about the balance of power, or an alleged common usage of protecting the weak against the strong? But that is exactly what Cobden started from. His premise was that “no government ha? the right to plunge its people into hostilities, except iB defence of their own honour and interests.” There would seem then to be no difference of principle between the military and the commercial schools of foreign policy. The trader from Manchester and the soldier from Aldershot or Woolwich, without touching the insoluble, because only half intelligible, problem of the balance of power, may agree to discuss the propriety of a given war on the solid ground of national self-interest. Each will be affected by professional bias, so that one of them will be apt to believe that our self-interest is touched at a point which the other will consider too remote to concern us; but neither can claim any advantage over the other as the disinterested champion of public law and the rights of Europe. If there is a difference deeper than this, it must be that the soldier or the diplomatist of the old school has really in his mind a set of opinions as to the ends for which a nation exists, and as to the relations of class-interests to one another, of such # colour that no serious politician in modern times would venture openly to avow them. If the two theories of the duty of a nation in regard to war are examined in this way, we see how unreasonable it is that Cobden’s theory of non-intervention should be called selfish by those who would be ashamed to base an opposite 3 Kinglake, vol. i. ch. ii. v.] THE GREAT USAGH. 105 policy on anything else than selfishness. # Our desire,” Cobden said, is to see Poland happy, Turkey civilized, and Russia conscientious and free: it is still more our wish that these ameliorations should be bestowed by the hands of Britain upon her less instructed neighbours: so far the great majority of our oppouents and ourselves are agreed. How % accomplish this beneficent purpose, is the question whereon we differ.” They would resort, as Washington Irving said in a pleasant satire on us, to the cudgel, to promote the good of their neighbours and the peace and happiness of the world. There ig One unanswerable objection to this, Cobden answereq experience is against it; it has been ried for hundreds of years, ang has failed. He proposed to Brive at the same end by meang of our national example, by remaining at Peace, vigorously pursuing reforms and improvements, and so Presenting that spectacle of wealth, prosperity, power, and invineible stability, which reward an ora of peace wisely and diligently used. Your method, he said, cannot he right, because it assumes that yon are ab all times able to judge what will be good for others and the world—which you are not. And even if your judgment were infallible, the method wonld be equally wrong, for you 1ave no jurisdiction over other states which authorizes you to do them good by force of arms. The source of thege arguments lay in three convictions. First, the government of England muss always have its hands full, in attending to its domestic business, Second, it can seldom be sure which party is in the right in a foreign quarrel, and very seldom indeed be sure that the constituencies, ignorant and excitable ag they are, will discern the true answer to that perplexing question. Finally, the government which keeps most close to morality in its political dealings, will find itself in the long-run to have kept most close to the nature of things, and to that success which rewards conformity to the 1835-6. Lr, 31.2 1835.6. Br. 31-2. 106 LIFE OF COBDEN. fom? nature of things. It followed from such reasoning as thi that the author of the pamphlets denounced by anticipatio? the policy of compelling the Chinese by ships of war to ope? more ports to our vessels. Why, he asked in just scor® should not the ships of war on their way out compe} the French to transfer the trade of Marseilles to Havre, and thus save us the carriage of their wines through the Strait? of Gibraltar? Where is the moral difference? And as 0 Gibraltar itself, he contended, that though the retention of conquered colonies may be regarded with some complacency because they are reprisals for previous depredations by their parent states, yet England for fifty years at Gibraltar is 8 spectacle of brute violence, unmitigated by any such excuses: “Upon no principle of morality,” he went on, “can thif unique outrage upon the integrity of an ancient, powerful and renowned nation be justified ; the example, if imitated, instead of being shunned universally, would throw all the nations of the earth into barbarous anarchy.” Here 8° everywhere else we see how wrong is the begetter of wrong: for if England had not possessed Gibraltar, she would not have been tempted to pursue that turbulent policy in the Mediterranean, which is still likely one day to cost her dear.’ Again, the immoral method has failed. Why not try now whether commerce will not succeed better tha? war, in regenerating and uniting the nations whom yoo would fain improve? Let governments have as little t© do with one another as possible, and let people begi® to have as much to do with one another as possible. of 4 Tt is perhaps not out of place to mention that several years ago, the present writer once asked Mr. Mill's opinion on the question of the possession of Gibraltar. His answer was that the really desirable thing # the case of strong places commanding the entrance to close seas is that they shonld be in the hands of a European League. Meanwhile, as the state of international morality is not ripe for such a League, England is perbaPf of all nations least likely to abuse the possession of a strong volace of thet kind. [2 v.] pROISIVE IMPORTANCE OF AMERICAN COMPETITION how many cases of intervention by England does &w Englishman now not admit that they were monstrc and inexcusable blunders, and that if we had pursued the alternative method of doing the work of government well at home and among our dependencies, improving our People, lightening the burdens of commerce and manufacbureg, husbanding wealth, we should have augmented our Wn material power, for which great national wealth is only Snother word ; and we should have taught to the govern-“06nts that had been exhausting and impoverishing themselves jn war, the great lesson that the way to give conbent, enlightenment, and civil virtues, to your people, nd a solid strength to their government, is to give them Peace. Tt is thus, Cobden urged, that the virtues of nations Operate both by example and precept; and such is the Power and rank they confer, that in the end * states will all burn moralists in self-defence.” These most admirable pages were no mere rhetoric. They represented no abstract preference, but a concrete necessity. The writer was able to point to a nation whose example of pacific industry, wise care of the education of her young, and abstinence from such infatuated intervention as ours in the affairs of others, would, as he warned us, one day turn us into moralists in self-defence, as one day it assuredly will. Tt is from the peaceful nation in the west, and not from the military nations of the east, that danger to our strength will come. “In that portentous truth, The Americas are Sree, teeming as it does with future change, there is nothing that more nearly affects our destiny than the total revolution which it dictates to the statesmen of Great Britain in the commercial, colonial, and foreign policy of our Government, America is once more the theatre upon which nations are contending for mastery; it is not, how-Bver, a struggle for conquest, in which the victor wili 4 ‘ox - > = [oe £5 IB & *85-6. iL ol-Z 108 LIFE OF COBDEN, [oma? 1835.8 acquire territorial domain—the fight is for commerci® Zr, 81-2. supremacy, and will be won by the cheapest.”? Yet ? the very year in which Cobden thas predicted the co% petition of America, and warned the English Governme?' bo prepare for it by husbanding the wealth of the count!y and educating its people, the same assembly which W# with the utmost difficulty persuaded to grant ten thousa®! pounds for the establishment of normal schools, spe actually fifty times as much in interfering in the prive® quarrels of two equally brutal dynastic factions in Spai® Our great case of intervention, between the rupture of t¢ peace of Amiens and the battle of Waterloo, had left a def and lasting excitability in the minds of Englishmen. Thef felt that if anything were going wrong in any part of t world, it must be owing to a default of duty in the Britis} Government. One writer, for instance, drew up a serio® indictment against the Whigs in 1834, on the ground tha they had only passed a Reform Bill and a Poor Law Bill # home, while abroad the Dutch question was undecided ; th b “Looking to the natural endowments of the North American contine? —a8 superior to Hurope as the latter is to Africa—with an almost imme? surable extent of river navigation——its boundless expanse of the most forth soil in the world, and its inexhaustible mines of coal, irom, lead, &o-i~ looking at these, and remembering the quality and position of a peop! oniversally instructed and perfectly free, and possessing, as a consequen® of these, a new-born energy and vitality very far surpassing the charac of any nation of the old world—+the writer reiterates the moral of his form? work, by declaring his conviction that it is from the west, rather than fro? the east, that danger to the supremacy of Great Britain is to be apP™® hended ;—that it is from the silent and peaceful rivalry of American 00% merce, the growth of its manufactures, its rapid progress in intern? improvements, the superior education of its people, and their economic? and pacific government—that it is from these, and not from the barbar® policy or the impoverishing armaments of Bussia, thai the grandeur of ov’ commercial and national prosperity is endangered. And the writer stk? his reputation upon the prediction, that, in less tham twenty years, this wit be the sentiment of the peopls of England generally ; amd that the sam conviction will be forced wpon the Government of the country” If Cobde’ had allowed fifty years, instead of twenty, for the fulfilment of his or Riotion. he would perhaps have bear pate. re EXTRAVAGANCES OF INVER VENTION, 109 French were still at Ancona; Don Carlos was fighting in 1835-6. Spain; Don Miguel wag preparing for a new conflict in Zr, 31.2 Portugy) ; Turkey and Egypt were at daggers drawn; Switzerland was quarrelling about Italian refugees ; Frank. fort wag occupied by Prussian troops in violation of the treaty of Vienna; Algiers was being made & French colony, in violation of French promises made in 1829; ten thousand Polis nobles were still proscribed and wandering all over Europe ; French gaols were full of political offenders. This Pretty list of wrongs it was taken for granted that an English ministry and English armies should make it their first business to set right. As Cobden said, if such ideas Prevailed, the Whig government would leave Providence Dothing to attend to. Yet this was only the reductio ad absurdum of that excitability about foreign affairs which the long war had left behind. The vulgar kind of patriotic Sentiment leads its professors to exult in military interventions even so indescribably foolish as this. What Cobden Sought was to nourish that nobler and more substantial kind of patriotism, which takes a pride in the virtue and enlightenent of our own citizens, in the wisdom and success of our institutions, in the beneficence of our dealings with less advanced possessions, and in the lofty justice and indevendence of our attitude to other nations. No one claims for Cobden that he was the first statesman who had dreamed the dream and seen the vision of a great pacification, Everybody has heard of the Grand Design of Henry the Fourth of France, with its final adjustment of European alliances, and its august Senate of the Christian Republic. In the eighteenth century, so rich as it was in great humane ideas, we are not surprised to find more than one thinker and more than one statesman enamoured of the policy of peaceful industry, from the Abbé de Saint Pierre, who denounced Lewis XIV. for seeking agpgrandize- 1835-6. Aor. 31-2. [IO LIFE OF COBDEN. [ons went abroad while destroying prosperity at home, down fe Kant, who wrote an essay on perpetual peace; and to the French Encyclopwdists, who were a standing peace pars down to the outbreak of the Revolution, Apart from thes utopias of a too hopeful philosophy, there is one practic? statesman whom the historian of political opinion in Eng’ land may justly treat as a precursor of Cobden’s schoo This is Lord Shelburne, the political instructor of th younger Pitt. He was the first powerful actor in 0% national affairs, in whom the great school of the Economist found a sincere disciple. It was to Morellet, the writ®’ in the Encyclopaedia and the friend of Turgot, rather eve” than to Adam Smith and Tucker, that Shelburne professed to owe those views on peace and international relatio?® which appeared in the negotiations of his government wit? France after the war with the American colonies, and which, alas, after a deplorable interval of half a centwT: the next person to enforce as the foundation of our politiod system, was the author of the two Manchester pamphlet? In the speech which closed his career as a minister (1783) Shelburne had denounced monopoly as always unwise, but for no nation under heaven so unwise as for England. With more industry, he cried, with more enterprise, with mor’ capital than any trading nation in the world, all that we ought to covet upon earth is free trade and open markets. Hi defence of the pacific policy as most proper for this country was as energetic as his enthusiasm for free trade, and b¢ never displayed more vigour and conviction than when 1 attacked Pitt for allowing himself,—and this was before th war with’ the French Republic,—to be drawn again int the fatal policy of European intervention in defence of th integrity of the Turkish empire. The reason why Shelburne’s words were no more th? » passing and an unheeded voice, while the teaching of w.] BHELBURNE AS .. PRECURSOR. III Cobden’s pamphlets stamped a deep impression on men’s 1835-6. minds,—which time, in spite of inevitable phases of reaction Zr. 31.2 and the temporary recrudescence of bad opinions, has only made mop definite,~—is the decisive circumstance which has already peop sufficiently dwelt upon, that the huge ex-Pansion of the manufacturing interests had, when Cobden aPPeared, created a powerful public naturally favourable to the new principles, and raised what would otherwise have been only the tenets of a school into the programme of a Rational party, As we shall see when we come to the Crimean War, the ROW principles did not at once crush out the old ; it was not to be expected by any one who reflects on the strength of prejudice, especially prejudice supported by the conscions-Bess of an honourable motive, that so sudden a change should take place. But the pamphlets are a great landmark in the history of politics in England, and they are still as well worth reading as they ever were. Some of the Statements are antiquated ; the historical criticism is sometimes open to doubt ; there are one or two mistakes. But they are mostly like the poet's, who spoke of “1 miei non falst errors? If time has weakened their literal force, it has confirmed their real sienificance. In a personal biography, it is perhaps not out of place to dwell in conclusion on a point in the two pamphlets, which is of very secondary importance compared with their Political teaching, and yet which has an interest of its own; I mean the literary excellence of these performances. They have a ringing clearness, a genial vivacity, a free and confident mastery of expression, which can hardly be surpassed. Cobden is a striking instance against a favourite plea of the fanatics of Latin and Greek. They love to insist that & collegian’s scholarship is the great source and fountain oP LIFE OF COBDEN, [cmar. IF 1835-6. of a fine style It would be nearer the truth to say th? Ar. 81.8. our classical training is more aptly calenlated to destroy bt qualities of good writing and fine speaking, than any oth? system that could have been contrived. Those qualiti® depend principally, in men of ordinary endowment, up® % certain large freedom and spontaneousness, and ner upon a strong habit of observing things before word? These are exactly the habits of mind which our way ° teaching, or rather of not teaching, Latin and Greek © evitably chills and represses in any one in whom liters!) faculty is not absolutely irrepressible. What is striking * Cobden is that after a lost and wasted childhood, a yout! of drudgery in a warehouse, and an early manhood pass’ emid the rather vulgar associations of the commercial ® veller, he should at the age of one and thirty have stepp®’ forth the master of a written style, which in boldne® freedom, correctness, and persuasive moderation, was 20 surpassed by any man then living. He had taken pains wit his mind, and had been a diligent and extensive reader, bv! he had never studied language for its own sake. It was fortunate for him that, instead of blunting be spontaneous faculty of expression by minute study of be verbal peculiarities of a Liysias or an Isocrates, he ghoul have gone to the same school of active public interests and real things in which those fine orators had in their differe?’ degrees acquired so happy a union of homeliness with purity and of amplitude with measure. These are the very qualiti® that we notice in Cobden’s earliest pages; they evident! sprang from the writer's singular directness of eye, and eager and disinterested sincerity of social feeling, undi® turbed as both these gifts fortunately were by the vic® of literary self-consciousness. CHAPTER V. LIFE IN MANCHESTER, 1837-9 A FEW weoks after Cobden’s return home from the East, 1887. William the Fourth died (June 20), and the accession of Zur. 33 Queen Victoria to the throne was followed by a general election. For some months Cobden’s name had been before the politicians of Stockport, and while he was abroad, he had kept his brother constantly instructed how to proceed in the various contingencies of electioneering. Frederick Cobden seems even at this early stage to have expressed Some not unnatural anxiety, lest public life should withdraw the indispensable services of his brother from their business, He had even remonstrated against any further pamphlets. “Do not fear,” replied Richard Cobden, “I am not authormad. Bat I have written a letter to the editor of the Globe, in which,” —and so forth! He was in no sense author-mad, bus still he was overflowing with thoughts and arguments and a zeal for the commonwealth, which made publication in one shape or another as much a necessity to him, as it is a Becessity to a poet or an apostle. In the same letter, in &nswer to a friend’s warning that he should not spoil his holiday by anxiety as to affairs at home, he said :—“1 am not, I assure him, giving one moment's thought to the Stockport electors. The worthy folks may do as they Please. They can make me M.P. by their favour, but they cannot mar my happiness if they reject me. It is ‘the t To F. Cobden. Nov. 11, 1838. 1837. AT. 38. 114 LIFE OF COBDEN. [ost cause’ with which I am in some degree identified, that make me anxious about the result. Personally, as you well kno I would rather have my freedom for two years more.” . «+ “Let me say once for all, in reference to the Stockport affair, that I shall be quite happy, whichever way the die fall® You know me better than any other person, and I am sure you will believe that my peace or happiness does not depend upon external circumstances of this or any similar nature.” Yet even in this free mood, Cobden knew his own mind, ag he never failed to do, and he intended to be elected i possible. He belonged to the practical type, with whom 1 have once decided upon a course becomes in itself a stron8 independent reason for continuing in it. “One word 8 to your own private feelings,” he writes to his brother “which may from many causes be rather inclined to lead you to wish that my entrance into public life were delayed a little. I shall only say that on this head it is now to? late to parley; it is now useless to waver, or to shrink from the realization of that which we had resolved upo® and entered upon, not as children, but as men knowing that action must follow such resolves. Your temperament and mine are unequal, but in this matter I shall only remind you that my feelings are more deeply implicated than yous own, and that whilst I can meet with an adequate share of fortitude any failure which comes from insuperable canse® whatever may be the object I have in view, yet if in thi case my defeat should spring from your timidity or sensi tiveness (shall I say disinclination ?), it would afflict me severely, and I fear lastingly.” * As the election drew nearer, Cobden was overtaken bY that eager desire to succeed, which gradually seizes even the most philosophical candidate as the passion of battle waxe? hotter arcund him. He threw himself into the strnggle * To F. 0. Jan. 4, 1887, 3 Jo F 0. Jan. 38, 1857. rj LETTER ON FAOTORY LEGISLATION. 115 with al] hig energy. It is historically interesting to know 1887. What Liberal electors were thinking about in those days. Zr. 28. We find that they asked their candidate his opinion as to the Property qualification for Members of Parliament, Primogeniture, the Poor Law Amendment Act, and the Factory Question, The last of the list was probably the most im-Portant, for Cobden had taken the trouble many months before 0 set out his opinions on that subject in a letter to the chairman of his committee. The matter remains of vital importance in our industrial system to the present time, ang is still, in the face of the competition of other Wations, the object of a controversy which is none the less alive in the region of theory, because the legislature has decided it in one way in the region of practice. As that 18 80, it is interesting still to know Cobden’s earliest opinions °0 the matter; and I have therefore printed at the end of the volume the letter that Cobden wrote, in the autumn of 1886, on the restriction by Parliament of the hours of labour in factories + What he said comes to this, that for plain physical reasons Bo child ought to be put to work in a cotton mill so early 88 the age of thirteen, but whatever restrictions on the hours of labour might be desirable, it was not for the legislature to impose them : it was for the workmen to insist pon them, relying not on Parliament, but on their own action. A workman by saving the twenty pounds that would Carry him across the Atlantic, could make himself as inde-Pendent of hig employer, as the employer is independent of him ; and in this independence he would be free, without the emasculating interference of Parliament, to drive his OWn bargain as to how many hours he would work. In Meeting his committee at Stockport, Cobden repeated his Conviction that the factory operatives had it in their power * Bee Appendix, Note A. 1837. At. 33. 116 LIFE OF CORDEN. [onal bo shorten the hours of labour without the aid of Parliament but to infant labour, as he had suid before, he would afford the utmost possible protection. He laughed at the mock philanthropy of the Tory landowners, who took so lively 8” interest in the welfare of the factory population, and ye declined to suffer the slightest relaxation of the corn laws though these did more to degrade and pauperize the labour ing classes, by doubling the price of food and limiting employment, than any other evil of which they had complain. Whether these views alienated any of those who would otherwise have supported him, we do not know. Probably the most effective argument against Cobden’s candidature was the fact that he was a stranger to the borough. O08 the day of election he was found to be at the bottom of the poll®* He wrote to his uncle, Mr. Cole, explaining hi defeat :— “The cause of failure was that there was too much con fidence on the part of the reformers. We were too satisfied: and neglected those means of insuring the election which the Tories used, and by their activity at Stockport as else’ where they gained the victory. If the battle had to be fought again to-morrow, I could win. To revenge then selves for the loss of their man, the Radicals have sinc? the election adopted a system of exclusive dealing (no! countenanced by me), and those publicans and shopkeeper® who voted for the Major now find their counters deserted The consequence is that the Reformers place printed placards over their shops, Voted for Cobden, inscribed ir large characters, and the butchers and greeugrocers in the market-place cry ont from their stalls, Cobden beef, Cobder potatoes, ete. So you see I have not lost ground, by mJ é Henry Marsland (Reformer) 480; Major Maraland (T Teicher Cobden (Reformer) 418. (Tory) 471: Rich REJEOYION AT BTOCKPORT., 117 failure at the poll, with the unwashed. But the truth is 1 157, Am quite reconciled to the result. There are many considera- Ar. 83 tions which make me conclude it is all for the best.” His friends made arrangements for presenting him with & piece of plate, and seventeen thousand subscribers of one Penny each raised the necessary fund. For some reason, Danie} O’Connell was invited to be present. He and Cobden drove together in an open carriage to Stockport (November 13, 1837), where they addressed an immense meefing in the open air, and afterwards spoke at a public dinner, To the great Liberator the reporter of the day generously Accords three columns, while Cobden’s words were cone densed into that scanty space which is the common lot of orators who have won no spurs. His chief topic seems to bave been the ballot ; he declared that without that protection, household suffrage, the repeal of the corn laws, the shortening of parliaments, would all be insecure benefits, There is in this a certain inversion of his usual order of thinking about the proper objects of political solicitude, for he commonly paid much less heed to the machinery, than to the material objects of government. It was quite as well for Cobden’s personal interests that he was left free for a little time longer to attend to his business, The rather apprehensive character of his brother made him little able to carry on the trade in an intrepid and enterprising spirit, and at every step the judgment, skill, and energy of a stronger head were wanted. At this time the scale of the business which had started from such small beginnings, bad become so extensive that Cobden estimated the capital in it as no less than 80,0001., with a credit in acceptances of at least 25,000. : he re-Presented the turn-over ag 150,0001.7 In 1836 the books * To Mr. Qole. Sept. 6, 1837. ' Lotter tc B., Cobden. Peb. 34. 1837. 11° LIFE O¥% OGBDEN. [oms? 1838. show that the nett profits of the firm had exceeded 23,0000 &r, 34. for the year; and though the trade was so fluctuating tho! the firs half of the following year only showed a profit o 4000!., Cobden’s sanguine temperament led him to speak 8s if their capital were being regularly augmented at the rate of 2000L. a month. We can easily understand Frederick Cobden’s unwillingness to be left to his own resources i? the administration of a business of this size, and his brothe? promised repeatedly not to throw so heavy a responsibility upon him. From the time of Cobden’s return from the East they had both nourished the idea of separating from the London firm, as well as from the Sabden factory, and the idea remained in their minds for a couple of years. Then; as we shall presently see, it was carried into execution. Cobden, however, had made up his mind after the Stock port election that to push his material fortunes was not to be the great aim of his life. “I am willing to give a few years of entire exertion,” he wrote in 1838, towards making the separation successful to ourselves. But at the same time all my exertions will be with an eye to make myself independent of all business claims on my time and anxieties. Towards this, Henry and Charles [their two younger brothers] will for their own sakes, I expect, contribute. And I hope and expect in five years they will be in a situation to force me out of the concern, a willing eile. At all events I am sure there will not want talent of some kind about us, to take advantage of my determination to be at ease, and have some time for leisure to take care of my health, and indulge tastes which are iD some degree essential to my happiness. With reference t0 health, both you and I must not omit reasonable precautions; we are not made for rivalling Methusaleh, and if we can by care stave off the grim enemy for twenty years longer, we shail do more than nature intended for us. At all eventé r} BUSINESS AND POSITION IN MANCHESTER. 119 let ug remember that to live usefully is far better than living long. And do not let us deprive ourselves of the gratifica- Zr. 34 tion at last, a gratification which the selfish never have, that We have not embittered our whole lives with heaping up Toney, but that we have given a part of our time to more rational and worthy exertions.” ® Even now, when the indispensable work of laying a base of material prosperity was still incomplete, and when his Wn business might well have occupied his whole attention, he Was always thinking much more earnestly about: the Wherests of others than his own. The world of contem-Poraries and neighbours seldom values or loves this generous and unfamiliar spirit, and the tone of Manchester was in this respect not much higher than that of the rest of the world, Tt cannot surprise us to learn that for some time Cobden made no great progress in Manchester society. He wag extremely self-possessed and self-confident, and as & consequence he was often thought to be wanting in the respect that is due from a young man to his elders, and from & man who has a fortune to make, towards those who have made it. His dash, his freedom of speech, his ardour for new ideas, were taken for signs of levity ; and ® certain airy carelessness about dress marked a rebel against the minor conventions of the world, The patient endurance of mere ceremonial was ab this time impossible to him. He could not be brought to attend the official dinners given by the Lord of the Manor. When he was selected to serve as assessor at the Court-leet for manorial Purposes, though the occasion brought him into contact with men who might have been useful to him in his business, he treated the honour very easily. He sat restlessly on his bench, and then strolled away after an hour or two had shown him that the proceedings were without real ® ToF. 0. Oct. 26. 1838. 1838. [20 LIF® OF COBDEN. [oBAf 1838. gignificance. He could not even understand the urgency Ar. 34. of more prudent friends that he should retwrn. 1 was 1 conceit nor conscious defiance, but the incapacity inbo?® in so active and serious an intelligence, of contented! muffling itself even for half a day under idle forms. B was born a political man; his most real interests in bb world were wholly in affairs of government and institution and his dominant passion was a passion for improvement His whole mind was possessed by the high needs and gros opportunities of society, as the minds of some other mer have been possessed by the aspirations of religion, and he had as little humour for the small things of world} punctilio as Calvin or as Knox may have had. I have already described the relation of some of Cobden’ ideas to those of George Combe. It was, above all othe! things, for the sake of the prospect which it held out o supplying a sure basis and a trustworthy guide in the intricate and encumbered path of national education, the! he was drawn for a time to Combe’s system of phrenology His letters during the years of which we are now speaking abound pretty freely in the terms of that crude catalogue but with him they are less like the jargon of the phreno” logical fanatic of those days, than the good-humoured language of a man who believes in a general way that there is something in it. In 1835 he had been instruments in forming a phrenological society in Manchester, and the first of a series of letters to Combe is one in 1836, pressing him to deliver a course of lectures in that town. It if teresting as an illustration of the amazing growth both in rational tolerance and scientific opinion, when we com” pare the very moderate heterodoxy of phrenology with the doctrines that in our own day are publicly discussed without alarm. “The Society which we profess to have here,” Cobden writes, “is not well supported, and for nearly OPINION IN MANCHESTER. Ta bwelvemonth it can hardly be said to have manifested meny signs of existence. “The causes are various why phrenology languishes, but Probably the primary one may be sought in that feeling of fashionable timidity among the leading medical men and Others who, although professing to support it privately, have Rot yet openly avowed themselves disciples of the science of Spurzheim and Gall. But phrenology is rapidly disenthrallng itself from that ‘cold obstruction’ of ridicule and obloquy, which it has, in common with every other reform and improvement, had to contend against, and probably the mind of the community of Manchester presents at this Moment as fine a field, in which to sow the seeds of instruction by means of a course of lectures by the author of The Constitution, of Mam, as could be found anywhere in the world, . ,, , The difficulty of religious prejudice exists here, and it requires delicate handling. Thanks, however, bo the pursuits of the neighbourhood, to the enlightening chemical and mechanical studies with which our industry is allied, and to the mind-invigorating effect of an energetic devotion to commerce, we are not, as at Liverpool, in a condition to tolerate rampant exhibitions of intolerance here. » «+. The High Church party stands sullenly aloof from all usefnl projects, and the severer sectarians restrict them-Selves here, . as elsewhere, to their own narrow sphere of xertion, but the tone of public opinion in Manchester is Superior to the influence of either of these extremes. How L pity you in Scotland, the only country in the world in which a wealthy and intelligent middling class submits to the domination of a spiritual tyranny.””* Though he was intolerant of the small politics of the Borough-reeve and the Constables, Cobden did not count it 28 small politics to agitate with might and main on bebalf ? To George Combs. Aug. 23. 1588. 1888. Kr 83 | al - LIF? © COBDER, [ons 1888. of the incorporation of the great city to which he belonged His large comprehension of the greater needs of civilizati” and his country never at any time in his life dulled his i terest in the need that lay close to his hand. The new papers of the time show him to have been the movin g pir in the proceedings for incorporation, from the first requis" tion to the Borough-reeve and Constable to call a meetin? of the rate-payers (February 8, 1838), down to the fin? triumph. The Municipal Reform Act had been passed by Lord Melbourne’s Government in 1835, on the return of the Whigs to power after the short ministry of Sir Rober! Peel. It was the proper complement to the greater Refor® of 1832. By extending the principle of self-government! from national to local affairs, it purified and enlarged the organs of administrative power, and furnished new field of discipline in the habits of the good citizen. In 18% Brougham had introduced a measure for immediately i corporating such towns as Manchester and Birminghat® and directly conferring local representative government upon them by Act of Parliament. But between 1859 and 1835 things had happened which quenched thes spirited methods. A process which had been imperative in 1833, had by 1835 dwindled down to the permis sive, Places were allowed to have charters, on condi” tion that a majority of the ratepayers, being inhabitant householders, expressed their desire for incorporation by petition to the Crown in Council. A muddy sea of co™ ruption and chicane was stirred up. All the vested in terests of obstruction were on the alert. The close and self-chosen members of the Court Leet, and the Street? Commission, and the Town Hall Commission, could not endure the prospect of a system in which the publi business would no longer be done in the dark. and thf BIBCUULE FoR r93 Public money no longer expended without responsibility to those who paid it. The battle between privilege und —..34 Popular representation which had been fought on the great S¢ene at Westminster in 1832, was now resumed and fought Out on the pettier stage of the new boroughs. The classes "ho had lost the power of bad government on a large Dationa] scale, tried hard to retain it on » small local scale, The low-minded and corrupt rabble of freemen and pot-Wallopers united with those who were on principle the ®mbittered enemies of all improvement, the noisy, inglorious Bldons of the provincial towns, and did their best to thwart the petitions. The Tories and the Residuom, to use the Phrase of 5 later day, made that alliance which Cobden calls unholy, but which rests on the natural affinities of bigotry und ignorance. The Whig, as usual, was timid and Incomfortable; he went about murmuring that a charter Was unnecessary, and muttered something about expense. “When your former kind and friendly letter reached me,” Cobden writes to Tait, the Edinburgh publisher, “1 was Sngaged before the Commissioners, employed in exposing the trickery of the Tories in getting up their petition against the incorporation of our borough. For three weeks I was in-Gessantly occupied at the Town Hall, By dint of hard work 8nd some expense, we got at the filth in their Augean stable, 80d laid their dirty doings before the public eye. I beliove ow there is little doubt of our being chartered before the bext November election, and it will be a new era for Manchester when it shakes off the feudal livery of Sir Oswald Mosley, to put on the democratic garb of the Municipal Reform Act, “So important do I consider the step for incorporating the borough, that 1 have been incessantly engaged at the task for the last six months. T began by writing a letter of which I circulated five thousand copies, with a view oi 1 2 4 LIYE OF COBDEK. [oma 1838. gaining the Radicals by showing the popular provisions © #~ 84. the Act. Will you credit it—the low, blackguard leaders ¢ the Radicals joined with the Tories and opposed us. TH poor-law lunatics raised their demented yell, and we wer menaced with nothing but defeat and annihilation at the public meeting. However, we sent a circular to every 0 of the 101. parliamentary electors who support liberal me® calling upon them to aid us at the public meeting, and the] came forward to our rescue. The shopocracy carried Bh day. Two or three of the Tory-Radical leaders now entered the service of the Tories, with a view to obtain the signatus® of their fellows to a petition against incorporation, TheJ pretended to get upwards of thirty thousand names, f° which they were well paid. But the voting has shown the! four-fifths were forgeries. So much for the unholy allian of Tory and Radical ! “1 mention all this as my best excuse for not having written to you, or for you, for so many months. What wit} going twice to London on deputations, and fighting th battle with two extreme political parties in Manchester, | have been so constantly engaged in action, that I have not had time for theorizing upon any topic. Still I have no’ abandoned the design of using my pen for your magazin® I have half collected materials for an article on convulsion® in trade and banking, which when published will probably attract some notice from people engaged in such pursuits.” “ Not having received a word of news, good or bad, fro you since I came here,” he wrote to his brother, «I con” clude that nothing particularly important can have occurred: You will have heard, I dare say, the result of our intervie® with the Lords of the Council. There is, I think, not shadow of doubt of the ultimate result of the applicatio® but I am not pleased with the Whig Ministry’s wmode ¢ & To Mr. W. Tuid, of Edinburgh. July 3, 1858. "-] COLDNESS OF WHIGS FOR LOOAL SELF-GOVERNMENT. I 25 Proceeding in these Corporation affairs. It is quite certain that they are willing we should be put to quite as much trouble by the Tories, as that party is able to impose on US. Tn the case of the Sheffield petition, I do not think the Charter will be granted at all, merely because the Tories have contrived to get a greater number of ragamuffins to S180 against it, than have subscribed for the Charter. 1 WW one of the deputation to-day, who is quite disgusted With the whole set ; and Scholefield of Birmingham told Me that if he and Attwood had not bullied the Whigs, and threatened to vote against them, the Birmingham petition Would not have been acceded to. They are a bad lot, and the sooner they go out, the better for the real reformers.” * “That truckling subserviency,” he writes later in this year, “of the Ministry to the menaces of the Tories, is just in character with the conduct of the Whigs, on all questions great or little. Without principle or political honesty, they are likewise destitute of any atom of the courage or independence which honesty can inspire, and the Party which bullies them most will be sure to command their obedience. In the matter of municipal institutions their hearts are against us, C. P. Thomson ?® told us plainly *hat he did not like local self-government, and are his Whig colleagues more liberal than he? Tam sorry Iam not at home to give a helping hand to my old colleagues. 1 will never desert, and if the matter be still in abeyance when U get back, I shall be ready and willing to give my assistance ? 1838. Ar. 84 ? To PF. W. Cobden London, May 4, 1838. } Charles Poulet Thomson, afterwards Lord Sydenham, wag one of the *Cpresentatives of Manchester from 1832 to 1839. On the reconstruction of the Whig Government under Lord Melbourne, he was appointed to be President of the Board of Trade—a post which he afterwards gave up, in order to go out as Governor-General of Canada. As we shall see in a later chapter, he has a Place in the apostolic mcoession of the Board of Trade, after Huskisson and Doncon Hama “ef LIFE OF COBDEN. (ons? 1838, In the autumn of 1838, Lancashire was disturbed bf torchlight meetings, destruction of property, and oth? formidable proceedings, under the lead of the Chartists,~ Stephens, Oastler, and others. This superficial outbres! had no alarms for Cobden. In a vein which is thoroughly characteristic of the writer, he proceeds in the letter fro” which I have been quoting :— “As respects general politics, I see nothing in the present radical outbreak to cause alarm, or make oD dread the fate of liberalism. On the contrary, it is pre ferable to the apathy of the three years when prosperity (or seemingly so) made Tories of all. Nor do I feel at 8) inclined to give up polities 1m disgust, as you seem to do because of the blunders of she Radicals. They are rash and presumptuous, or ignorant if you will, but are not th° governing factions something worse? Is not selfishness or systematic plunder, or political knavery as odious as th¢ blunders of democracy? We must choose between th? party which governs upon an exclusive or monopoly priz ciple, and the people who seek, though blindly perhaps, th good of the vast majority. If they be in error we must tr¥ to put them right, if rash to moderate; but never, never talk of giving up the ship. . . . . I think the scattered elements may yet be rallied round the question of the corn laws. I appears to me that a moral and even a religious spirit may be infused into that topic, and if agitated in the same manned that the question of slawery has been, it will be irresistible I can give this question a great lift when I return, by pub lishing the result of my inquiries into the state of things 0? the Continent, and particularly with reference to the Prussia? Union.” ¢ Yet Cobden bad in his heart no illusions on the subject of his countrymen, or their special susceptibility to eithe" 4s Po 0. Ock. Bb Us THE RADICALS AND THE PEOPLE. 129 light or enthusiasm, He was well aware of the strong vault 1838. of bronzed prejudice which man mistakes for the luminous Jr. 34 firmament, of truth, and with him as with the philosophic reformers in France on the eve of the Revolution, the foundatioy of his hope lay in a peuple éclairé, the enlightenent of the population, “Do not let your zeal for the cause of democracy,” Cobden Wrote to Tait, the Edinburgh bookseller, « deceive you as to the fact of the opaque ignorance in which the great bulk of the people of England are wrapt. If you write for the masses politically, and write soundly and honestly, they will ot be able at present to appreciate you, and consequently will net support you. You cannot pander to the new Poorlaw delusion, or mix up the Corn laws with the Currency Quackeries of Attwood. N othing but these cries will go down With the herd at present. There is an obvious motive about Certain agitators’ movements. They hold up impracticabilities ; their stock in trade will not fall short. Secondly, these Prevent intelligent people from joining said agitators, Who would be likely to supersede them in the eyes of their followers. There i no remedy for all this but improved education, Such as the taj] and the body are, such will be the character of the head. Nature does not produce such monsters as an ignorant or vicious community, and virtuous and wise leaders. In Scotland you are better off because you are better educated. The great body of she English pea-Sants are not a jot advanced in intellect since the days of their Saxon ancestors. “I hope you will join us in a ery for schoolmasters as a first step to Radicalism. . , . Whilst I would caution you against too much political stuff in your magazine, let me bray you to strike a blow for us for education. I have inbounded faith in the people, and would risk universal suffrage bo-morrow in preference to the progent franchige. 1888. A=128 LIFE OF COBDEN. [omAf But we shall never obtain even an approach towards such a change, except by one of two paths—Revolution or th? Schoolhouse. By the latter means we shall make permanent reform; by the former we shall only effect convulsive and transient changes, to fall back again like Italy, or Spai® into despotism or anarchy.” * In August, 1838, Cobden again started for a month’s tof in Germany, partly perhaps to appease that spirit of restles® ness which made monotony the worst kind of fatigue, snd partly to increase his knowledge of the economic condition of other countries. What nonsense,” he once exclaimed, “1 uttered even by the cleverest men when they get upon tha! least of all understood, and yet most important of all topic the Trade of this country! And yet every dunce or arist?” cratic blockhead fancies himself qualified by nature ¥ preach upon this complicated and difficult question.” * He was careful not to lay himself open to the same reproach o trusting to the light of nature for wide and accurate kno® ledge, and he turned his holiday in the countries of the Elb® and the Rhine to good aceount by getting together, as b said, some ammunition about the corn laws. This subject was now beginning definitely to take the chief place in his interests. There remains among his correspondence with his brothe during this trip, one rather remarkable letter, the doctrine of which many of my readers will certainly resent, and ib is indeed open to serious criticism. The doctrine, howeve’ is too characteristic of a peculiarity in Cobden’s gocis) theory, for me to omit this strong illustration of it; chara” teristic, I mean, of his ruling willingness, shown particularlf in his dealings with the Emperor of the French in 1860 and on some other occasions, to treat political co¥ ® To W. Twit. Aug, 17, 1888, ?P To W. Tadt. May 5, 1837. THE ZOLLVERERIN, [20 siderations a8 secondary to those of social and economic well-being, “Although,” he says, “a verv roid one, my journey has given mq 4 betier insight £: an character and the Prospects of central Europe t& *. "" have ever gained from the eyes of others, I. - cast he looked upon as a rising State, whose greatness vill b bas=d upon the Com-Meri] League [the Zollverein] ~ « « The effect of the League must inevitably be tu throw the preponderating influence over thirty millions of people into the bands of the Cabinet of Berlin, By the terns of the Union, the money 18 to be collected and paid by Prussia; a very little financial Skill will thug very easily make the smaller states the pensioner of the Paymaster. Already, I am told, Prussia has been playing this game; she is sald to be two millions of dollars g year out of pocket by her oflice, owing to her having guaranteed the smaller partners certain amounts of tovenue. Besides the power that such a post of treasurer will confer upon Prussia, other causes must tend to weaken the influence of the lesser states’ governments. A common standard of weights and measures, ag well as of money, is Preparing, and these being assimilated, and the revenue received from Prussia, whose literature and modes will become the standard for the other portions of Germany, What shall prevent this entire family of one common lan. Buage, and possessing perfect freedom of intercourse, from Merging into one nation ? In fact they are substantially be nation now, and their remaining subdivisions wil] ’ The Zollverein op Customs Union had been planned ag far back as 1818, but it wag not until 1835 that the treaty was signed which bound Most of the German states, except Austria, {0 a policy of free trade among themgelves, while protective duties wore maintained agaings foreign nations, Poulett Thomson and other English officialy of the same liberal stamp, Nightly regarded the Dew system without apprehension, for it recognized bhe expediency of abolishing commercial restrictions rver a great area, though the wren was not quite great enonen 1838. Ar, 24 130 LIFE OF COBDEN, [oB* 1838. become by-and-by only imaginary; and some Radicals wil Ar, 84 hereafter propose, as we have done in Manchester, to go! rid of the antiquated boundaries of the townships of Hes: Oldenburg, ete., and place the whole under one Comm?” Council at Berlin. There are heads in Berlin which ha% well reflected upon this, and their measures will not dis appoint their country. “T very much suspect that abt present, for the great me of the people, Prussia possesses the best government i Europe. I would gladly give up my taste for talking politics to secure such a state of things in England. Hd our people such a simple and economical government, # deeply imbued with justice to all, and aiming so constant! to elevate mentally and morally its population, how mud better would it be for the twelve or fifteen millions in the British Empire, who, while they possess no electoral right? are yet persuaded they are freemen, and who are pystife’ into the notion that they are not political bondmen, by the! great juggle of the ¢ English Constitution’—a thing # monopolies, and Church-craft, and sinecures, armorial hoot® pocus, primogeniture, and pageantry | The Government J Prussia is the mildest phase in which absolutism ever pe sented itself. The king, a good and just man, has, by P* suing a systematic course of popular education, shatter? the sceptre of despotism even in his own hand, and has fo ever prevented his successors from gathering up the frag ments. . . . Yon have sometimes wondered what econ? of the thousands of learned men who continually pass fro? the German universities, whilst so few enter upon: mercant’ pursuits. Such men hold all the official and Govern? appointments ; and they do not require 10001. a year go I respectable or respected in Prussia. Habits of ostentatio” expenditure are not respectable there. The king dines’ two. rides in a plain carriage, without soldiers or atten dan THE PRUSNIAN GOVERNMENT, 13] and dresses in a kind of soldier's relief cap. The plays 1838. begin af six and close af nine, and all the world goes to bed mp. 24 o ten or eleven,” ® It is to be remembered in reading this, that it was written forty years ago. Not a few considerate observers even now Bold that tne prospect of German progress which Cobden sketches, would have been happily realized, if Prussian Statesmen of 5 bad school had not interrupted the working of orderly forces by a policy of military violence which Precipitated unity, it is true, but at a cost to the best Causey in Germany and Europe, for which unity, artificial 8nd unstable as it now is, can be no worthy recompense. As for the contempt which the passage breathes for the English constitution, it is easy to understand the disgust Which a statesman with the fervour of his prime upon him, and with an understanding at once too sincere and too Strong to be satisfied with conventional shibboleths, might well feel alike for the hypocrisy and the shiftlessness of a Sysbem, that behind the artfully painted mask of popular "opresentation concealed the clumsy machinery of a rather dul] Plutocracy. Tt is not right to press the phrases of the hasty letter of a traveller too closely. If, as it is reasonable bo think, Cobden only meant that the energetic initiative of central authorities in promoting the moralization of a Country is indispensable in the thick populations and divided interests of modern times, and that the great want of England is not a political equality which she has got, nor ® natural equality, which neither England nor any other Sountry is ever likely to get, bub a real equality in access to justice and in chances of mental and moral elevation, — then he was feeling his way to the very truths which, of all others, it is most wholesome for us to understand and to Becept. Whatever we may think of the good word which 5 To P. Oobden, flapt, 11, 1838. 1838. Fr. 24, 132 LI¥8 GF JORDAN, [onal Cobden seems to have for beneficent absolutism, ib 18 of least a mark of true sagacity to have discerned that manne” may have as much to do with the happiness of a people, ® has the form of their government. In a letter to his sister, he shows that his journey ba supplied him with material for an instructive contrast” “Let me give you an idea of society here by telling ¥' how I spent yesterday, being Sundey. In the first plac I went to the cathedral church at nine o’clock in tH morning, a very large building, pretty well filled (the ladi€* were as five to one in the congregation, against the nurab? of male attendants). “The singing would have been a treat; bub unhapp!! [ was placed beside a little old man whose devotion was & great, that he sang louder than all the congregation, in screaming tone that pierced my tympanum, I heard nothin but the deep notes of the organ, and the little man’s not® still ring in my ears, and his ugly little persevering face wil haunt me till I reach the Rhine. The sermon lasted fort! minutes; the service was all over in one hour and a half and at eleven o’clock I went in a coach to the count!’ palace of the king at Charlottenburg, where is a splendif mausoleum and a statue of his late wife to be seem. TH statue is a masterpiece of the first Prussian sculptor, and # I always criticise masterpieces, I thought it stiff, Passio? through a wood laid out in pleasant walks, interspersed wit? sheets of water and provided with seats, T saw number’ of the cockveys strolling about, and again I might ha" fancied myself in Kensington Gardens. But the variet of head-dress, the frequent absence of the odious bonnet which seems a part of the Englishwoman’s nature, and th¢ substitution of the lace or gauze covering, which aids rath?” than hides the prefitiest accessory of a womsn’s face, b¢’ well-managed hair, reminded me that I was from Yin, I TOUBBLIN, 133 a3 8 quarter to two pa T returned, and I met the king’s Sons going to dine with their father, who takes that meal mr. 84 Oxactly at two. 8a you gece we are not so unfashionable in Quay Street as we imagined. After taking a hasty dinner YSelt, T hired a horsn and rode again into the country by Another road, and visited the Tivoli Gardens. On the way I passiod Some good houses, the families of which were all Putside, either in balconies or in the gardons before the door, with tables laid out with refreshments, at which the gentlemen wera smoking, the ladies kritting or sewing, and Perhaps the children playing around with frolicsome glee. All thig close to the great thoroughfare to Tivoli, along Which crowds of pedestrians of all ranks, and great numbers of Carriages and horsemen, were proceeding. Yet nobody burned hig head to sneer, or to insult others ; there wag no inbrusion qr curiosity. = I thought of old England, and as I knew it would be impossible there to witness suck a scene, I hope I dig right in condemning the good people of Berlin for bheir religious conduct, At the Tivoli Gardens, which are #hout two miles from the town, they have a good view of the city. Hore are Montagnes Russes and other amuseents, The day was splendid, and such a scene! Hundreds of well-dressed and still better behaved people were lounging OF Sitting in the large gardens, or several buildings of this BY retreat; in the midst were many little tables at which groups wore sitting. The ladies had their work-bags, and vere lnitting, or sewine ~ “ling, or sipping coffee or lemonage ; the gentlemer smoking, or perhaps flirting With their Perty. TL. 4 Ceome at the Montagnes Rnsses ! The little carviapes w =r down one after another along this undulat-, — 7 wit parties of every kind "ud age, from the OUT Boar {y the Kitten-lilke child, whe chung with al its claws to the nurse, or mister, or mamas he gave ib the tress Then thape wes manic, and albor. re LIFE OF COBDEN, fons’ 1888. wards fireworks, and so went off the day at Tivoli, witho? = clamonr, rudeness, or drunkenness. After Tivoli I looked ¥ at the two principal theatres, which were crammed ; and § ended the day which to me was not a day of rest. If J” think this is an improper picture of a Protestant Sund®f on the other hand, the sober and orderly German think the drunkenness, the filthy public-houses, the miserable oo moping mechanic that pines in his dark alley in our Engl cities on the Sabbath-day, ave infinitely worse features of ! Protestant community, than his Tivoli Gardens. Are ot wrong 7” * With one other and final contrast, we may leave th memorials of the foreign tour of 1838 :— “YT do hope the leather-headed bipeds who soak thet? selves upon prosperous market-days in brandy and water ® the White Bear, will be brought to the temperature 0 rational beings by the last twelve months’ regimen of Jo® prices. And then let us hope that we may see them tryiné at least to bestow a little thought upon their own interes? in matters beyond the range of their factory walls. J humiliates me to think of the class of people at home, wh’ belong to the order of intelligent and educated men th? I see on the Continent, following the business of manuf®” turing, spinning, etc. Our countrymen, if they were po? sessed of a little of the mind of the merchants and msh” facturers of Frankfort, Chemnitz, Elberfeld, otc. wou become the De Medicis, and Fuggers, and De Witte g England, instead of glorying in being the toadies of a clo? pole aristocracy, only less enlightened than themselves Pr In other words they would become the powerful as’ independent statesmen of the country, the creators od champions of a new policy adapted to the ends of a gre" trading community. Thrusting aside the nobles by for! $ To Miss Cobden. Soph. 8, 1838. 1 ZF. 0. Oct. 6. 1858 v.] MANOHESTER AND GERMANY OOGNTRASTED. 135 of vigorous intellectus]! and moral ascendency, the wealthy 1837. middle class would place themselves at the head of a Zr. 88. National life with new types and wiser ideals. Any ore who reflects on the gain for good causes in England, if only the foremost, men of this class would dare to be themselves, and showy by grave and self-respecting example that a great Citizen is beyond the rivalry of the great noble, will cherish the vision that passed for an instant before Cobden’s social imagination. As for his contrast between the educated traders of the continent, and the haunters of the White Bear with their leathern heads, we may be sure that all this wag the result of true observation, and was due to 10 childish propensity to think everything abroad better than anything at home. Cobden had far too much integrity of understanding to yield either to the patriotic bias, or the anti-patriotic bias; and he knew able men when he saw them, as well in his own country as elsewhere. In the summer of the previous year he had, in one of his visits to London, sought the acquaintance of some of the Prominent journalists and politicians, and he wrote down his impressions of them. “ Yesterday,” —this was in J une, 1837—* we went along with Cole to see the print-works of Surrey, and dined with Makepeace, The day before, being Sunday, I went in the morning to hear Benson (in the Temple Church) abuse the Dissenters and the Catholics, and compare the persecuted Church of England to the ark of the Israelites, when encom-Passed by the Amalekites, . : . Then I went to the Zoological Gardens, and after staying there till the last minute, I accompanied Cole home to his house, . nd dined and slept. © + + On Saturday in the mornin" "tae Clubs ; was introduced to Fonblangue (Jws.’ abn! Spectator), Bowring, Howard Elphinstone, etc. ln the evening of the Same day I dined with Hindley, and met —— =. —0 1837. Ar. 33. [36 AT Li¥E OF JORDEN. fod ete. ete. [a party of north-country members of parliames! and candidates.] They are a sad lot of soulless louts, and TI was, as compared with the intellectual atmosphere of tbe morning, precipitated from the temperature of blood hes” down to zero. . . . I have not seen C. P. Thomson. I hav? left my card and address, bat he has not noticed it, and i he does not send, I'll not call again. “I hear queer accounts of our Right Hon. Member ; they tell me he is not the man of business we take him for. We shall see. The move I see of our representatives from Lame? shire, the more ashamed I feel at being so served, and 1K Falstaff I begin to dread the idea of going through Covent!’ (for at Coveutry they are generally to be found) with such # crew. I suppose you will have more failures by-and-by amongst the people at Manchester and Liverpool. I begi® now to fear that our distress will be greater and more pe” manent than I had expected at first. . It will be felt here too, for some time, in failures amongst those old merchan? princes who are princes only at spending, but whose getting? have been and will be small enough. The result of ail wil be that Liverpool and Manchester will more and more agsum® their proper rank as commercial capitals. London must content itself with a gambling trade in the bills drawn bY those places, “1 have had invitations without’ end, and shall if I staf a year still be in request ; but too much talking and running about will not suit me, and 1 am resolved to turn churlis? and morose. I have seen, through S——7s friend T— some of the Urquhart party : they are as mad as ever. J have called upon Roebuck, but have not been able to 6° him.’ ? “1 was yesterday introduced to Mrs. and Mr. Grote 8° their house. I use the words Mrs. and Mr. because she 1 2 To F, Cobden. June 6. 1837, =F AUQUAINTANCES IN LONDON. 137% the greater politician of the two. He is a wild and philosophical man, Pposscssing the highest order of moral and intel- Zr. 33, lectual endowments ; bub wanting something which for need of a better phrase I shell call devil. Heis too abstract in his bone of reasoning, and does not aim to influence others by any Proof excepting that of ratiocination ; tusy musy, as Braham calls it, he is destitute of, Hed she been a man, she would have been the leader of a party; he is not calculated for it. “Tet at their house (which hy "he way is the great resort of all that is clever in the opposition ranks) Sir W. Moles-Worth, a youthful, florid-looking man of foppish and conceited air, with a pile of head at the back (firmness) like a vogar-loaf. I should say that a cast of his head would furnish one of the most singular illustrations of phrenology. For the rest he is not a man of superior talents, and let him 5ay what he pleases, there is nothing about him that is democratic in principle. . . . . “I have been visiting, and visited by, all sorts of people, the Greek Ambassador, Win. Allen, of Plough Court, the chemist and Quaker philanthropist, Roebuck, and Joseph Parkes, of Birmingham, amongst the number. I spent a couple of hours with Rocbuck at his house. He 4s a clever fellow, but I find that his wind is more active than powerful. He is apt to take lawyer-like views of questions, and, as you may see by his speeches, is given to cavilling and special pleading. , . , , “ Easthope of the © Chronicle,” is very suxious that 1 should see Lord Palmerston, but 1 told him I had made up my mind that hig Lordship is incurable. He says that he is open to conviction, and a cleverer man than most of his colleagues, What a beautiful ensemble they must be! I have seen nothing of (, P, Thomson; I would have called again, bus I think it better to reserve myself till he calls on me, I hear from all sides that he in not the man 1837. 138 ? LIFE OF COBDER. [oss 1837. of business we take him for in Manchester. Although’ &v. 33. have been so much taken up with new acquaintances, I hatt not failed to make calls upon all our old friends 8% relations.” ? “One of the very cleverest men I have ever met with * Joseph Parkes, late of Birmingham, the eminent constit? tional lawyer and writer. He was employed to prepare the Municipal Bill and other measures. He is not only profound in his profession, but skilled in political economy, and quit? up to the spirit of the age in practical and popular acquir® ments. He has been very civil to me. He received a lette’ from his friend Lord Durham requesting him to find 07! who the author of Russia, ete., was, as those pamphlets co?’ tained more statesmanlike views than ali the heads of th whole British cabinet. His lordship goes thoroughly and entirely with me in my principles upon Turkey. Perhaps th? truth is he went to St. Petersburg with opposite views, bub having been wheedled by the Czar and his wifo, he is glad to find in my arguments some useful pleas for justifying bi® change.” * One general impression of great significance Cobde® acquired from this and some later visits to London. Comb? had in one of his letters been complaining of the bigotry with which he had to contend in Scotland. * What yo! say of the intolerance of Scotland,” said Cobden to him 1* reply, “ applies a good deal to Manchester also. There 3 but one place in the kingdom in which a man can live with perfect freedom of thought and action, and that is London.” However, he acted on the old and worthy principle, Sparta % To F. Cobden. June 12, 183% 4 The Czar said to Sir Robert Peel :—* Years ago Lord Durbam was gos! to me, & man full of prejndices against me. By merely coming to olo® gunarters with me, all his prejudices were driven clean out of him.” Btockmar, quoted in Mr. Martin's Life of the Prince Oonsort, i. 2186. V To 1. Combe. March 9 1841 v.] INCORPORATION OF MANCHESTER. 139 nactus es, hane exorna, and did not quarrel with the society 188. in which his lot was cast, because if preferred the echoes of Ar. 84. its own prejudices to any unfamiliar note. Manchester did not receive its charter of incorporation until the autumn of 1838. Cobden’s share in promoting this important reform was recognized by the inhabitants of the new borough, and he was chosen for alderman at the first election. The commercial capital + © Lancashire was now to show its fitness to be the source and centre of a great national lause, CHAPTER wr THE FOUNDATION OF THE LEAGTR 1828. Tyr French economist who recounted to his countrymen Ar. 34, the history of the great agitation in which Cobden now gradually rose to a foremost place, justly pointed out that the name and title of the Anti-Corn-Law League gave to foreigners a narrow and inadequate idea of its scope, its depth, and its animating spirit. What Bastiat thus said with regard to foreigners, is just as true with regard to ourselves of a loter generation. We too are as apt as French men or {fermans to think narrowly and inadequately of the scope and animating spirit of this celebrated confederation. Yet the interest of that astonishing record of zeal, tact, devotion, and courage, into some portions of which the biographer of Cobden bos now to enter, lies principally for us in the circumstance that the abolition of the protective duties on food and the shattering of the protective system was, on one side, the beginning of our great modern struggle against class preponderance at home, and on another side, the dawn of higher ideals of civilization all over the world. It was not of himself assuredly that; Cobden was speaking, when at the moment of the agitation reaching its height, he confessed that when it first began they bad not all possessed the same comprehensive view of the interests and objects involved, that cae to thom later. “I am afraid,” ha suid, OAR. VL] NARROW BAGINNING OF THE STRUGGLE. 14) “ that most of ng entered upon this strugele with the belief 1838. that we had some distinot class-interest in the question, Zin. 84 and that we should carry it by a manifestation of onr will in this district, against the will and consent of other portions of the community”! There was in this nothing that is either astonishing or discreditable. The important fact was that the clags-interest of the manufacturers and merchants happened to fall in with the good of the rest of the com-Munity ; while the class-interess against which they were going up to do battle, was an uncompensated burden on the whole commonwealth. Besides this, it has been observed on a hundred occasions in history, that a good cause takes on in its Progress larger and unforescen elements, and these in their urn bring out the nobler feelings of the best among its soldiers. So it was here. The class-interest widened into the consciousness of a commanding national interest. In raising the question of the bread-tax, and its pestilent effects on their own trade and on the homes of their workmen, the Lancashire men were involuntarily opening the whole question of the condition of England. The backbone of the discussion in its strictly local aspect was in the question which Cobden and his friends at this bime kept incessantly asking. With a population increasing at the rate of a thoussnd souls a day, how can wages be kept up, unless there be constantly increasing markets found for the employment of labour; and how can foreign countries buy our manufactures, unless we tale in return their corn, timber, or whatever else they are able to produce ? Apart, moreover, from increase of population, is it not clear that if capitalists were free to exchange their productions for the corn of other countries, the workmen would have abundant employment at enhanced wages? A still more formidable Argument even than thege lay in the months of the petitioners. ! Spesoh at Munchester, Oot. 19. 1848. I - LIFE OF OORDEN, [oma®: 1838. They boldly charged Parliament with fostering the rivalry of Zr. 84. foreign competitors; and the charge could not be answered: By denying to America and to Germany the liberty of e changing their surplus food for our manufactures, the English Legislature had actually forced America and Germany © divert their resources from the production of food, in orde” to satisfy their natural demand for manufactures. It wad the corn laws which nursed foreign competition into full vitality. But this strictly commercial aspect could not suffice: Moral ideas of the relations of class to class in this country: and of the relations of country to country in the civilized world, lay behind the contention of the hour, and in the course of that contention came into new light. The prompt” ings of a commercial shrewdness were gradually enlarged into enthusiasm for a far-reaching principle, and the hardbeaded man of business gradually felt himself touched with the generous glow of the patriot and the deliverer. Cobden’s speculative mind had speedily placed the conflict in its true relation to other causes. We have already seen how ample a conception he possessed of the transformation for which English society was ripe, and how thoroughly he had accustomed himself to think of the corn laws as merely part of a great whole of abuse and obstruction. But he was now, as at all times, far too wise 8 man to fall into the characteristic weakness of the system~ monger, by passing over the work that lay to his hand, and insisting that people should swallow his system whole. No body knew better how great a part of wisdom it is for & man who seeks to improve society, to be right in discerning at a given moment what is the next thing to be done, of whether there is anything to be done at all. His interest in remoter issues did not prevent him from throwing him wolf with all the energy of apostolic spirit upon the pal” i] THE LONDON ANII-CORN.LAW ASSOCIATION. 143 Reular point at which the campaign of a century first opened. _ 1588. As he sid to his brother in a letier that has already been Zr.34 quoted, he had convinced himself that a moral, and even a religious, spirit might be infused into the question of the corn laws, and that if it were agitated in the same manner as bhe olq question of slavery, the effect would be irresistible. Cobden was in no sense the original projector of an organized body for throwing off the burden of the corn duties. In 1836 an Anti-Corn-Law Association had been formed in London; its principal members were the parlia~ mentary radicals, Grote, Molesworth, Joseph Hume, and Mr. Roebuck. But this group, notwithstanding their acuteness, their logical penetration, and the soundness of their ideas, were in that, as in so many other matters, stricken with impotence. Their gifts of reasoning were admirable, but they had no gifts for popular organization, and neither their personality nor their logic offered anything to excite the imagination or interest the sentiment of the public. “The free-traders,” Lord Sydenham said, with a pang, in 1841, “have never been orators since Mr. Pitt’s early days. We hammered away with facts and figures and some arguments ; but we could not elevate the subject and excite the feelings of the people.” An economic demonstration went for nothing, until it was made alive by the passion of suffering interests and the reverberations of the popular voice. Lord Melbourne, in 1838, sharply informed all petitioners for the repeal of the corn-laws, that they must look for no decided action on the part of the government, until they had made it quite clear that the majority of the uation were strongly in favour of a new policy. London, from causes that have often been explained and are well understood, 18 no centre for the kind of agitation which the Prime Minister, not without some secret mockery, invited t Above, p. 126 {4.4 7 LIFE OF OOEDEN. [BA 1838. the repealers to undertake. In London there is no effective «we 34 unity; interests are too varied and dispersive; zeal 105¢° its directness and edge amid the distracting play of so an] miscellaneous social and intellectnal elements. It was 2 until a body of men in Manchester were moved to take the matter in hand, that any serious attempt was made ¥ inform and arouse the country. The price of wheat had risen to seventy-seven shilling® in the August of 1838; there was every prospect of a wet harvesting ; the revenue was declining; deficit was be" coming a familiar word; pauperism was increasing ; and the manufacturing population of Lancashire were finding it impossible to support themselves, because the landlords and the legislation of a generation of landlords before the insisted on keeping the first necessity of life at an artificially high rate. Yet easy as it is now to write the explanation contained in the last few words, comparatively few men had at that time seized the truth of it. That explanation was i the stage of a vague general suspicion, rather than the defi” nite perception of a precise cause. Men are so engaged by the homely pressure of each day as it: comes, and the natural solicitudes of common life are so instant, that a bad institu bion or a monstrous piece of misgovernment is alway? endured in patience for many years after the remedy ha8 been urged on public attention. No cure is considered with an accurate mind, until the evil has become too sharp bo be borne, or its whole force and weight brought irresistibly before the world by its more ardent, penetrative, and indomitable spirits. In October, 1838, a band of seven men meé at a hotel iB Manchester, and formed a new Anti-Corn-Law Associations They were speedily joined by others, including Cobden, who from this moment began to take s prominent part in all conneel and action. n.] THE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE. 14.5 That critical moment had arrived, which comes in the End history of every successful movement, when a section arises Air. 84. Within the party, which refuses from that day forward either to postpone or to compromise. The feeling among the older men was to stop short in their demands at some Modification of the existing duty. This was the mind of *he President and most of the directors of the Manchester Chamber of Commerce. A meeting of this important body "aS held in December (1838). The officers of the Chamber had, only for the second time in ten years, prepared a Petition to the House of Commons, but the petition spoke only of modifications, and total repeal was not whispered. The more energetic members protested against these faltering voices, Cobden strack into the debate with that finely tempered weapon of argumentative speech, which was his most singular endowment. The turbid sediment of miscellaneous discussion sank away, as he brought out a lucid Proof that the corn law was the only obstacle to a vast increase of their trade, and that every shilling of the profection on corn which thus obstructed their prosperity, Passed into the pockets of the land-owners, without conferring an atom of advantage on either the farmer or the labourer, The meeting was adjourned, to the great chagrin of the President, and when the members assembled a week later, Cobden drew from his pocket a draft petition which he and his allies had prepared in the interval, and which after a discussion of many hours was adopted by an almost Unanimous vote, The preamble laid all the stress on the alleged facts of foreign competition, in words which never fail to be heard in times of bad trade. It recited how the existing laws prevented the British manufacturer from exchanging the produce of his labour for the corn of other countries, and so enabled his foreign rivals to purchase [46 LIFE % JORDEN, fv: 2% 1839. their focd at one half of the price at which it was sold is Rr. 85. the Baglish market; and finally the prayer of the petitio” called for the repeal of all laws relating to the importatio” of foreign corn and other foreign articles of subsistenc? and implored the House to carry out to the fullest exten’ both as affects manufactures and agriculture, the true a0 peaceful principles of free-trade. In the following month, January, 1839, the Anti-Cor® Law Association showed that it was in earnest in the intention to agitate, by proceeding to raise a subscription of en effective sum of money. Cobden threw out one of thos expressions which catch men’s minds in moments Whe” they are already ripe for action. Let us,” he said, “ inves! part of our property, in order to save the rest from co¥ fiscation.” Within a month six thousand pounds had hee? raised, the first instalment of many scores of thousands stil to come. A great banquet was given to some of the parliamentary supporters of Free Trade; more money WH subscribed, convictions became clearer, and purpose waxed more resolute. On the day after the banquet, at a meeting of delegates from other towns, Cobden brought forward 2 scheme for united action among the various association® throughout the country. This was the germ of what ult mately became the League. It is worth noticing that mort than four years before this, he had in his first pamphle! sketched in a general form the outlines of the cours eventually followed by the Leagne,~so fertile was his mind in practical methods of enlightening opinion, even ‘without! the stimulation of a company of sympathetic agitators: There he had asked how it was that so little progress had been made in the study of which Adam Smith was the great luminary, and why, while there were Banksian, Linnea Hunterian societies, there was no Smithian society, for the purpose of disseminating a more just knowladre of Bf THE IDEA OF HE LFAGUR, 149 brinciples of trads, Such a society might enter into 1889. Correspondence with similar bodies abroad, and so help to mr. 35, dmend the restrictive policy of foreign governments, while 8 home prizes might be offered for the best essays on the orn question, and lecturers might be sent to enlighten the “ericulturalists, and to invite discussion upon a subject Which, while so difficult, was yet of such paramount interest % them and to the rest of the country. The hour for the Partial application of those wv ideas bad now come. Before the month of January, the Manchester Anti-Corn-Law Association was complete'> organized, and its pro-Sramme laid before the pulic. Te object was declared to be to obtain by all legal and cor titutional means, such 38 the formation of local associations, the delivery of lectures, the distribution of tracts, i? the presentation of Petitions to parliament, the total and immediate repeal of the corn ang provision laws, Cobden was appointed to ba ¥ member of the execoutive committee, and he continued in that office until the close of the agitation. In the February of 1839, as Cobden geily reminded a great audience on the eye of victory six years later, three of them in a smell room at Brown’s hotel in Palace Yard Were visited by a nchleman who had taken an active part in advocating s modification of the corn laws, but who could not bring himself to the point of total repeal. He asked what had brought them to town, and what it was thas they Wanted. They had coms, they said, to seek the total and immediate repeal of the corn laws. With an emphatic shake of the head, he answered, “You will overturn the monarchy ag soon ag you will accomplish that,”* For the raoment it appeared ag if this were really true. Me. Villiers moved in the Hongo of Commons (Feb. 18), that a * Coben's Politionl Writings, i. 83. * Coliden's Broanlina i. RAK 1889. Al. 3b. 148 LIFE OF COBDEN. [mas number of petitions against the corn laws should referred to a Committee of the whole House. The moti was negatived without a division. The next day he move’ that certain members of the Manchester Association ghoul? be heard at the bar, in support of the allegations of petition which they had presented three days befor Though this was a Whig parliament, or becanse it was Whig parliament, the motion was thrown out by a majority of more than two to one in a House of more than fi hundred members. We cease to be amazed at this deliberate rejection o information from some of the weightiest men in the king dom, at one of the most critical moments in the histor} of the kingdom, when we recall the fact that notwithstand ing the pretended reform of parliament in 1832, four-ffth of the members of the House of Commons belonged to the old landed interests. The bewilderment of the governme®! was shown by the fact that Lord John Russell and Lor Palmerston went into the lobby with the Protectionist while the President of the Board of Trade followed MI Villiers. Yet Lord John had declared a short time befor® that he admitted the duties on corn as then levied to bf untenable. The whole incident is one of the most striki® illustrations on record of one of the worst characteristics © parliamentary government, its sluggishness in facing que® tions on their merits. In this instance, the majority foun’ before long that behind the industrial facts which they wer too selfish and indolent to desire to hear, were political foro? which they and their leader together were powbrless to resis A few days later (March 12) Mr. Villiers brought forms? his annual motion, that the house should resolve itself int’ committee to take into consideration the act regulating the importation of foreign corn. Across Palace Yard wort sssemblod delegates from the thirty-six principal towns i" I] THE CORN QUESTION iN ...” LIAMEXT, 149 the kingdom, to enforce a prayer that had been urged by belf & million of petitioners. But the motion, after a debate A. 85. which extended over five nights, received only one hundred and ninety.seven votes out of a House of five hundred and forty-one, The delegates returned to their homes with the conviction that they bad still a prolonged struggle before them, In the picturesque phrase of a contemporary writer, their departure was like the break-up of a Mahratta camp; i did not mean that the war was over, but only that attack would be renewed from another quarter. Some of them Were inclined to despond, but the greater part almost instantly came round to the energetic mind of Cobden. He recalled the delegates to the fact that in spite of the House over the way, they represented three millions of the people. He compared the alliance of the great towns of England to the League of the Hanse Towns of Germany. That League had turned the castles which crowned the rocks slong the Rhine, the Danube, and the Elbe into dismantled memorials of the past, and the new league would not fail in dismantling the legislative stronghold of the new feudal oppressors in England. No time was lost in strengthening their organization by drawing isolated societies to an effective centre. Measures were speedily taken (March) for the formation of a Permanent union, to be called the Anti-Corn-Law League, bo bo composed of all the towns and districts that were re-Presented in the delegation, and of as many others as might be induced to form local associations and federate them with the League. The executive committee of the old Manchester Anti-Corn-Law Association was transformed into the council of the new Anti-Corn-Law League. With the same view of securing unity of action, the central offices were established in Manchester, whence from this time forward the national movement was directed. The impatience of the free-traders had been irritated. 1889. {50 LiF& CU OOBLEN., fost 1889. rather than svothed, by a speech of two hours in fongth fro? #35. the greab leader of the Conservative opposition, in which b¢ carefully abstained from committing himself to any opinio? on the principle at issue. He devised elaborate trains of hypothetical reasoning ; he demolished imaginary cases; hf dwelt on the irreconcilable contradictions among the best economists. But there was not a single sentence in the whole of Sir Robert Pecl’s speech, that could be tuken to ti his hands in dealing with the corn laws, while on the con trary there was one sentence which to any one who ghould have accustomed himself to stady the workings of tht strong but fartive intellect, might have revealed that the great organ and chief of the landowners was not far removed from the Manchester manufacturer. He had at least placed himself in the mental attitude which made him accessible their arguments. “I have no hesitation in saying,”—$0 Sir Robert Peel told the house—— that unless the existence of the corn law can be shown to be consistent, not only with the prosperity of agriculture and the maintenance of the landlord’s interest, but also with the protection and the maintenance of the general interests of the country, and especially with the improvement of the condition of the labouring class, the corn law is practically at an end.” * Although such a position was rational and political, 28 compared with the talk of those who could not get beyond the argument that the proprietors of the soil had a right do as they pleased with their own, still there remained # long road to travel before Peel could be regarded as # probable auxiliary. The repealers folt that they must depend upon their own efforts, without reference either to SI Robert or Lord John. They had started a little organ of their own in the press in April; and the Anti-Oorn-La Oiroular used language which was not at all too strong fof ¥ March 18. 1889. ERSENTMENT OF U4E RBEPFALERS. 151] the taste of most of thom, when it cried out that all political __1889. factions were equally dishonest and profligate ; that the Zr. 36. *epealers ab any rate would not suffer their great question f bo made a mere official hobby-horse ; that they would Pursue an undeviating course of strenuous protest to the Ration at large, knowing well that repeal would never be granted by either the one or the other faction of political Pettifoggers by which the kingdom was alternately cursed. It they could only get the honest, simple-hearted, and intelligent portion of the people to see the justice and the Decessity of their canse, then they would not be long before they dragged both sections of the state quacks at their chariot wheels, each striving to outbid the other in tenders of service and offers of concession.® In less violent tones, Cobden kept insisting on the same Point, after the rebuffs of the year had shown them that the battle would be long, and that its issues went too deep into the social system to suit the aims of traditional parties, for the traditional parties in England were of their very essence superficial and personal. Towards the end of 1839, Dr. Bowring came to Manchester to report on what he had found on the subject of trade with England during a recent official visit to the countries of the German Customs Union. His points were that in consequence of the English obstruction to the import of grain and timber, capital in Germany was being diverted to manufactures ; that the German agriculturists were naturally eager for the removal of the protective duties on manufactures, which they could purchase more cheaply from England; but that they were met by the argument that England would never reciprocate by Opening a free market, for return purchases of grain, as ber landlords and agriculturists were far too mighty to be overthrown or even shaken, Cobden, with his usual high 8 Docomber 10. 1830. 1889. Ar 85. 152 LIFE OF COBDEN. oma? confidence of spirit, replied to this by asking how ever) social change and every religious change had been accom plished otherwise than by an appeal to public opinion, HoW be exclaimed, had they secured the penny postage, whic happened to have come into force on the very day o the meeting ? Not by sitting still and quietly wishing fo’ it, but by a number of men stepping out, spending thei! money, giving their time, agitating the community. And in the same way, how could they think that the corn law would be repealed by sitting still at home, and lamenting over their evils? He appealed to them, not as Whigs Tories, or Radicals, but as men with a sense not more © commercial interest, than of unmistakable national duty. We have to remember that at this date the admissio? of Catholics to Parliament was not so remote, that men had forgotten the means by which that triumph of justice and tolerance had been achieved. Catholic emancipation wa? only ten years old, and it was present to the mind of every politician who wanted to have anything done, that this great measure had been carried by the incessant activity of 0’Connell and the Catholic Association. That was a memorable example that the prejudice of the governing classe? was to be most effectually overcome by the agitation of 8 powerful outside confederacy. No two men were ever much more unlike than Cobden and O'Connell, but Cobden had been a subscriber to the great agitator’s Rent, and we may be sure that the Irish example was not lost on the leaders of the association against the corn laws. In truth here was the vital change that had been finally effected in our system by the Reform Act. Schemes of political improvement were henceforth to spring up outside of Parliament) instead of in the creative mind of the parliamentary leader; and official statesmanship has ever since consisted lese in working out principles, than in messuring the force ant vs] THE LECTT "RY ;N THE COUNTRY. 153 direction of the popular gale. Tt is thus the non-official statesman who, by concentrating the currents of common Sentiment or opinion, really shapes the policy which the official chiefs accept from his hands. The first year’s campaign convinced the repeslers that agitation is not always such smooth work as it had been in Ireland, They learnt how hardly an old class interest dies. They had begun the work of propagandism by sending out & small band, which afterwards became a large one, of 8Conomic missionaries. In Scotland the new gospel found 8 temperate hearing and much acceptance, but in England the lecturers were not many days in discovering at what peril they had undertaken to assault the prejudice and selfishness of a territorial aristocracy, and the brutality or Cowardice of their hangers-on. Though there were many districts where nobody interfered with them, there were many others where neither law nor equity gave them protection. At Arundel the mayor refused the use of the town hall, on the ground that the lecture would make the labourers discontented; and the landlord refused the use of his large room, on the ground that if he granted it, he should lose his customers. A landowning farmer went further, and offered e bushel of wheat to anybody who would throw the lecturer into the river. At Petersfield, a paltry little borough mn Hampshire, almost in sight of Cobden’s birthplace, either Spite or the timidity of political bondage went so far, that When the lecturer returned, after his harangue in the market-Place, to the Dolphin, Boar, or Lion, where he had taken his ea and ordered his bed, the landlord and landlady peremprlly desired him to leave their house. In the eastern counties, again, they were usually well received by the Pre People, but vexed and harassed by the authorities. iy Louth they wire allowed to deliver their address in © town hall one night, hut a8 the lecturer had the fortune 1839. Fr. 25 {84 LIFE OF COBDRN, fut: 1889. to discomfib a local magnate in the discussion which fo a. 35. lowed, the permission which had been given to use the ba on the next night was arbitrarily withdrawn, and the lecture’ were driven to say what they had come to say from a gig the market-place. Nor was this the end of the adventure As they were about to leave the town, they were served with a warrant for causing an obstruction in a thoroughfare; they were brought before the very magnate over whoo they had won so fatal a victory, and by him punished with a fine. At Stamford they were warned that the mob would tear them to pieces; but they protected themselves with ® body-guard, and the mob was discovered to be less hostil® than a small band of people who ought to have deserved the name of respectable. At Huntingdon the town clerk W3¢ the leader in provoking an outrageous disturbance, which forced the lecturer to give up the ground. In the Duke of Newcastle’s country, at Newark and at Retford, ther was not an innkeeper who dared to let the lecturer a room; and at Worksop, not only could the lecturer not find # room, nor a printer who should dare to print a placard, but he was assaulted by hired bullies in the street. - it wag reserved for a seat of learning to show that 1° brutality can equal that which is engendered of the union of the violent inherited prejudice of the educated clagses, with the high spirits of youth. No creature is a more unbridled ruffian than the ruffian undergraduate can be, and at Cam” bridge the peaceful arguments of the lecturer were inte™ rupted by a destructive and sanguinary riot. The Joos! newspaper afterwards piously congratulated the furiou® gownsmen on having done their duty as “the friends of good government, and the upholders of the religion? institutions of the country.” ? It is only when people want to get something done that 7 Muy 14, 1839. i HOSTILITIES 1¥ 7% PREs, i595 all the odd perversiies of the human mind spread themselves "U6 in panovamic fulness. A long campaign of reckless aud virnlent calumny was at once opened in the party organs. One London newspaper described the worst members of the Association as unprincipled schemers, and the best as self-Souceited socialists. Another declared with authority that it wag composed in equal parts of commercial swindlers and Political swindlers. A third with edifying unction detounced their sentiments as subversive of all moral right and order, their organization as a disloyal faction, and their Speakers as revolutionary emissaries, whom all peaceable and well-dispoged persons ought to assist the authorities in per-®mptorily putting down. The Morning Post, the journal of London idleness, hailed the Manchester workers in a style that would have been grotesque enough, if only it had not "epresented the serions thought of many of the most impor-"ant people in the dominant class. “The manufacturing People exclaim, ¢ Why should we not be permitted to exchange the produce of our industey for the greatest quantity of food which that industry will anywhere command?’ To which we answer, why not, indeed? Who hinders you? Take Your manufactures away with you by all means, and exchange them anywhere you will from Tobolsk to Timbuctoo. It nothing will serve you but to eat foreign corn, away with you, you and your goods, and let us never see you more!” This wag a quarter from which the language of simpletons as to be expected, but as the repealers had a thousand SPportunities of discovering within the next seven years, the lnguage of situpletons has many dialects. One of the lowest Perversions of the right sense of place and proportion In things, was reached by those who cried out angrily that the great and decisive test for candidates at the next general lection would not be corn laws or anti-corn-laws, but “How ara your views on the Sabbath question?” The 1889. Z. a5. 156 3 _. JYOBDEN., [os 1839. Chartists, of whom we shall say something in anoth® Zr. 35. chapter, began a long course of violent hostility by trying at the very outset of the agitation to break up a meeting of Leeds, insisting that the movement was a cheat put on 9° work-people of the country by cunning and rapacio® employers. Even in places where so much strong politics intelligence existed as at Birmingham, members of the to¥* council of the borough were found to talk about “ the interested movements of the Whig corn law intriguers) and to urge that the discussion of the corn laws was merely a Whig device to embarrass the patriotic champions of parliamentary reform. Of all this the Leaguers heard much more, and from more troublesome people, in the yes to come, Meanwhile the information which their lecturers brought back to head-quarters at Manchester, as to the state of so of the rural districts, inspired the leaders of the agitation with new zeal, and a stronger conviction of the importance of theif cause. In Devonshire they found that the wages of the labourers were from seven to nine shillings a week ; that they seldom saw meat or tasted milk; and that their chief food was a compost of ground barley and potatoes. It was little wonder that in a county where such was the condition of labour, the lecturer was privately asked by poor men at the roadside if he could tell them where the fighting was to b? Nor need we doubt that he was speaking the simple truth when he reported that, though ignorant of Chartism as * political question, the great mass of the population of Devo? were just as ready for pikes and pistols, as the most excitt.ble people of the factory towns. In Somersetshire the budge! of a labourer, his wife, and five children under ten yes of age, was as follows. Half a bushel of wheat cost fo? shillings ; for grinding, baking, and barm, sixpence; firiv§ $ Bunce's History of the Cornoration of Birmingham, i. 166-7. mn] UONDITION OF THE RUBAL POOR. 15% Sixpence ; rent, eighteen pence; leaving, out of the total 8arnings of seven shillings, a balance of sixpence, out of which to provide the family with clothing, potatoes, 0d all the other necessaries and luxuries of human existence, With facts like these before them, the leaguers read with tockery the idyllic fastian in which even the ablest men of the landlord party complacently indulged their feeling for the picturesque. Sir James Graham, in resisting Mr. Villiers’s motion this year, spoke of the breezy call of incense-breathing morn, the neat thatched cottage, the blooming garden, the cheerful village green. The repeal of the corn laws would lead to a great migration from all this loveliness to the noisy alley, and the “sad sound of the factory bell” «Tell not to me any more,” the orator called out in a foolish ecstasy, “of the cruelfies of the con-Veyance of the Poles to the wintry wastes of Siberia; talk not to me of the transportation of the Hill Coolies from Coromandel to the Mauritius ; a change is contemplating by Some members of this House, far more cruel, far more heartvending in the bosom of our native land.” * If this nonsense Was the vein of so able a man as Graham, we may infer the depths of prejudice and fallacy down into which Cobden and his allies had to follow less sensible people. And the struggle had hardly begun. The landlords were not yet Awakened into consciousness that this time the Manchester wen were in earnest, and resolutely intended to raise the tountry upon them. They still believed that the corn laws Were as safe as the monarchy ; and many months passed before they realized that the little group who now met Reveral times in each week in a dingy room on an upper Boor at Newall’s Buildings in Market Street in Manchester, Were not to be daunted either by bad divisions in Parliament, March 15 1820. 1839. Zr. 35. 158 Li¥E 3% UOBDEN. opal o Yn { 1839. or bad language in the vewspapers, because they had beco™ ir. 35. fired by the conviction that what they were fighting agsi®® was not merely a fiscal blunder, but a national iniquity. Cobden lived at this time, along with his brothers and sisters, in a large house in Quay Street, which he had bough very shortly after settling in Manchester, and which wit known to the next generation ss Owens College. Hs business was in a flourishing condition, and it would ba" saved him from many a day of misery if he could have be” content to leave it as it was. It was from no selfish * personal motive that he now proceeded to make a chang? in the arrangements. The reader has already seen how at the beginning of his career Cobden affectionately insisted with his brother, “that you will henceforth consider your self as by right my associate in all the favours of fortune. And it was in the interest of Frederick Cobden and his tW° younger brothers that he now broke up the existi’§ partnership. The firm had previously consisted of fiv? members, carrying on business under three titles, one ab the warehouse in Watling Street in London ; the second st the print works at Sabden; the third, specifically known # Richard Cobden and Company, at Manchester and Cross Hall, near Chorley in Lancashire. Frederick Cobden W8° not a member of any of these allied firms, and there seem to have been no willingness to make room for him, At th° end of July, 1839, Cobden withdrew from his old partners He left them to carry on the London warehouse and the Sabden print works on their own account. He then pro ceeded himself to form a new partnership with Frederick Cobden, to carry on the Manchester warehouse and th print works at Crosse Hall. This wss the arrangemon? of Cobden’s business during the six years of agitatio? sprainst the Corn Laws, .] NEW BEMYLuM ENT Tu SUSINESE. 156 Though his motive in making the change was the desire ~ bo raise the position of his eldor brother at once, and to pave am, 35, the way for his younger brother in the future, yet Cobden had no donb, convinced himself that the change was sound "0d prudent in itself. A less sanguine man would have foung pe altered conditions formidable. In the business Which he left, though he did mot find himself in entire Ympathy with one of the Loudon partners, all had been Managed with the greatest exactitude, and there had been abundance of capital in proportion to the extent of the busi. Hess. At Crosse Hall he found himself much less favourably Placed. He was thrown entirely on his own unaided re-Sources, for his letters show that Frederick Cobden, with all his excellent qualities, yet was ope of the.men who mistake feverish anxiety for business-like caution, and then Suppose that they repair the errors of timidity by moments of hurried action. Tnstead of coming into a factory, like the works at Sebden, perfectly organized and superintended by an experienced eye, Cobden had now to find a new stafl, and what wag perhaps at least ag arduous, he had to find new “apital, and to earn interest as well as profit from its working. He hag, moreover, so early as 1835 made speculative purchases of land in various quarters of Manchester, where his 00 cheerful vision discovered a measureloss demand for houses, shops, and factories, as soon ag ever the corn duty should be repealed, and the springs of industrial enterprise Sob free. For five and twenty years waste spaces between Victoria Park and Rusholme, in Quay Street, and Oxford Street, bore melancholy testimony to a miscalenlation 3 and for five and twenty years Cobden paid a thousand pounds a Year, in the shape of chief rent, for a property which thus brought him not a shilling of reburn, In spite of the grave drawbacks which I have named, it is not doubted by those who have the best means of knowing, that the new 1889, 150 Yi¥F# .. OOBDEN. fod AF 1840. firm was for some time reasonably successful, and was eve" air. 36, visited by gleams of genuine prosperity. But the unde’ taking was hardly launched, before its chief was drawn 8% from effective interest in it by a strong vocation which k could not resist, to be the leader of the great national caus of the time. Meanwhile within a few months of the re-settlement © his business, he took another momentous step in marryit8 (May, 1840). His wife was Miss Catherine Anne Willia®# a young Welsh lady, whose acquaintance he had made a school-friend of one of his sisters. She is said by al who knew her to have been endowed with singular persons! beauty, and with manners of perfect dignity and chsr® Whether in Cobden’s case this union was preceded by mu? deliberation, we do not know; perhaps experience sho® that the profoundest deliberation in choosing a wife is little better than the cleverness of people who boast of a scientifi’ secret of winning in a lottery. Although marriage is usually so much the most important element in deciding whether # life shall be heaven or hell, it is that on which in any give? imstance it is least proper for a stranger to speak. It would seem that to be the wife of a prominent publi’ man is not always an easy lot. As Goethe’s Leonora says ©’ men and women ‘e=— Ibr strebt nach fernen Ghitern, Und ewer Streben muss gewaltsam geyn. Ihr wagt es, fiir die Ewigkeit zu handelu, Wenn wir ein einzig nab besohrinktes (Gut Anf dieser Hrde nur besitzen méchten, Und wiinschen dass es nuns bestindig bliche.? If the champion of great causes has to endure the loss Of domestic companionship, he is at least compensated bY ! “Ye strive for far-off goals, and strenuous your battle, For immo" tality to toil, do you aspire. But we one single narrow good, and that nigh to vs, wonld fain possess upon thig oerth, and only ask 4 it ahonl teed fant dwall' y ask that it eho v1} MABRIACE. 161 Patriotic satisfaction in the result; but unless the woman be of more than common strength of public zeal, the thousand lonely days and nights and all the swarm of undivided householg cares may well put temper and spirits to a sharp strain. In the 1agt, year of Cobden’s life, as he and Mrs. Cobden were *Oling up to London from their home in the country, Mrs, Cobden said to him,—“T sometimes think that, after all the 8ood work that, you have done, and in spite of fame and 8Teat position, it would have been better for us both if, after YOu and I married, we had gone to settle in the backwoods of Canada.” Ang Cobden could only say, after looking for % Moment or two with a gaze of mournful preoccupation through the window of the carriage, that he was not sure that What she said was not too true. But in 1840 evil days had Dot yet come, and as they took their summer wedding trip through France, Savoy, Switzerland, and Germany, Cobden had ag good right as any mortal can ever have, to look forward to a future of material prosperity, domestic happi-1633, and honest; service to his contr, 1840, Air 286. CHAPTER VIL THE CORN LAWS. It will perhaps not be inconvenient if I here pause in 2} narrative, to introduce a short parenthesis setting forth wh! actually were the nature and working of the Corn Laws # this time. Their destruction was the one finished triump’ with which Cobden’s name is associated. The wider do trines which he tried to impress upon men still await tH* seal of general acceptance; butitisa tolerably safe prophecy that no English statesman will ever revive a tax up® bread. Cobden was much too careful a student of the facts of question to fall into the error of the declaimers on his 0%" side, who assumed that none but the owners of the soil hal ever claimed protection by law for their industry. In the first number of the little organ which was issued by tb Association,' he wrote a paper on the modern history of he Corn Laws, which began by plainly admitting, what it would have been childish to deny, that down to 1820 manufacture™ probably enjoyed as ample a share of legislative protectio® as the growers of corn. Huskisson’s legislation from 1824 to 1825 reduced the tariff of duties upon almost every article of foreign manufacture. This stamped that date, in Col” den’s words, as the era of a commercial revolution, mor? important in its effects upon society, and pregnant with | April 16, 1889. Ox, ve} HUBKISSON'S LEGISLATION. 163 Weightior consequences in the future, than many of those 1826. Political revolutions which have commanded infinitely greater nr. 21. Attention from historians, The duty on cotton goods was lowered from a figure ranging from between seventy-five and fifty per cent. down to ten per cent. Imported linens somebimeg Paid as much as one hundred and ei ghty per cent. ; they Were henceforth to be admitted at twenty-five. Paper had been Prohibited ; it was now allowed to come in on paying twice the amount levied as excise from the home manufacfrer, The duty on a foreign manufacture in no case exteeded thirty per cent. The principle of this immense reform wag that, if the article were not made -either much better or a4 a much lower price abroad than at home, then Such a duty would be ample for purposes of protection. If, on the contrary, the foreign article were either so much better op 80 much cheaper as to render thirty per cent. insufficient for purposes of protection, then, in the first place, 8 heavier duty would only put a premium on smuggling ; and, secondly, said Huskisson, there is no wisdom in bolster. ing UP & competition which this degree of protection will Dot sustain, These enlightened opinions, and the measures which followed from them, were the first rays of dawn after the long night of confusion and mediocrity in which the Castlereaghs, Sidmouths, Bathursts, Vansittarts, had governed their unfortunate country. Even now political power was 80 distributed that, though the new school thus saw the better course, they dared not to venture too rapidly upon it. There wag one mighty and imperious interest which, ag the Parliamentary Bystem was then disposed, even Canning’s 0urage shrank from offending, The Cabinet, which had *adically modified host of restrictive laws, wag logically *2d politically bound to deal with the most important of them sll—that which restrained the importation of food. 1826. Ap pr 164 LIFE OF COBDES. rom’ By the law of 1815 corn conld be imported when whest ha risen to eighty shillings a querter. By the lew of 1822 oh’ wag improved to the extent of permitting importation whe? the price of wheat was seventy shillings » quarter. The landlords vowed that this was the lowest rate at which © British farmer could live, and not a few of them cried ov for total prohibition. They had powerful allies in the cabinet, and even the Liberal wing in the Cabinet whic! was led by Canning, never dreamed of being able to pus? the landlords very hard. When pressed by a motion fo extending to the case of grain the same principle which pad just been so wisely glorified in the case of cotton, wool?” silk, linen, and glass, Huskisson resisted it on the to? familiar ground that the motion was ill-timed. He did zo deny that it would presently be necessary to revise the Cor? Laws ; and he added the important admission that gover? foreign countries were not only in distress, owing to ov exclusion of their corn, but that in revenge they wolf proceeding to shut out our manufactures.” Two years elapsed before the Ministry ventured to oud the burning subject. The new measure was not broug” forward by Huskisson. It was officially given out a8 is reason for this that he was ill, but this was only one of tbe peculiar blinds that serve to open people’s eyes. Everybod) suspected that Huskisson’s illness was in reality the chag” of the good economist at a bad measure. It was Conni® who, in the spring of 1827, introduced the new Corn pil It proceeded on the plan of making the duty vary inverse’ with the price of the grain in the home market. When tb price of wheat in the home market reached sixty shilling® quarter, foreign wheat was to pay on importation a duty ° one pound. For every rise of a shilling in the home pric the duty was to go down two shillings; for every fall of ®t April 28, 1885. $ March 1, 1887. TH: (OBRN BILLS OF .82%.8. 165 shilling in the home price the duty was to go up two shil- ici lings. The increase and decrease in the duty was always to Er. 28. be double the fall and rise in the price. In other words, "hen the average price reached seventy shillings, wheat Wight be imported with a nominal duty of one shilling; on the other hand, when the average price fell to fifty shillings, the duty on foreign wheat would be forty shillings. After the bill had passed the Commons, the Liverpool Ministry fell to pieces, and a season of odious intrigue was followed by the accession of Canning. The Corn Bill went Up to the Lords in due course. The Duke of Wellington, though he had been a member of the Liverpool cabinet by Which the bill had been sanctioned, now moved an amend-Ment on it, and the new Ministry was defeated. Canning tnd Huskisson let the bill drop, The event which so Speedily followed is one of the tragic pages in the history of English statesmen. Canning died a few weeks after the close of the session ; Lord Goderich’s abortive Ministry flickered into existence for four or five months, when it flickered out again ; and before the end of the year the Duke of Wellington was prime minister. The great soldier was a berrow and sightiess statesman, and with his accession to Power all the worse impulses of the privileged classes d¢quired new confidence and intensity. In every sphere the en of exclusion and restriction breathed more freely. The Duke introduced a new Corn Bill. This bad measure accepted Canning’s principle, if we may give the name of Principle to an empirical device ; but it carried the principle farther in the wrong direction. In the bill of 1827, the Starting-point had been the exaction of a twenty shilling duty, when the home price was sixty shillings the quarter. According to the bill of 1828, when the price in the home Harkey Was sixty-four shillings, the duty was twenty three Shillings sud eightpence, The variations in the amount of i166 LI¥E OF UOBDER, Tans? 1628. duty were not equal as in the previous bill, but went Tm leaps. Thus, when wheat was at sixty-nine shillings, th duty was sixteen and eightpence ; and when the home pri rose to seventy three, then the duty fell to the nominal raft of a shilling. This was the Corn Law which Cobden and 2 friends rose up to overthrow. So far back as 1815, when that important measure 2 been passed restraining the introduction of wheat for hot consumption unless the average price had reached eight’ shillings for the quarter, the mischief of such legislation ad been understood and described in Parliament. In the How" of Lords the dissentients from the measure, only ten p number, had signed a protest, drawn up, as it has alwef’ been believed, by that iydependent and hard-headed stato” man, Lord Grenville. The grounds of dissent were thes’ That all new restraints on commerce are bad in principle’ that such restraints are especially bad when they affect the food of the people; that the results would not. conduce ¥ plenty, cheapness, or steadiness of price ; that such a meas® levied a tax on the consumer, in order to give a bounty ¥ the grower of corn. This was a just and unanswersbl® series of objections. Within six years (1821) a parliaments!) committee was appointed to inquire into agricultural de pression. If we turn to the effect of our regulations upon foreig? countries, there too they brought nothing but calamity’ When grain rose to a starvation price in England, ¥° entered the foreign markets; the influx of our gold d* turbed their exchanges, embarrassed their merchants, and engendered all the mischief of speculation and gambling As it was put by some speaker of the day, the questio” was—‘ Are you to receive food from a foreign count 4 9 Gag, IV. ro #0, or] ATTITUDE OF THE POLITIOAL PARTIES. 16% quietly, reasonably, in payment for the manufactures which 48s You send to them? Or are you to go to them only in the Zr.24. Moment of perturbation, of anxiety, of starvation, and say, Now we must have food at any rate, and we will pay any Price, though the very foundations of your society should be shaken by the transaction.” There was no essential bond between the maintenance of Agricultura] protection and Conservative policy. Burke, the wot, magnificent genius that the Conservative spiri has evep attracted, was one of the earliest assailants of legislative interference in the corn trade, and the important Corn Agcy of 1778 was inspired by his maxims. There ' 10 such thing, Burke said, as the landed interest separate from the trading interest; and he who separates the interest of the consumer from the interest of the grower, Starves the country. Five and twenty years after this, in 8 luminous tract often praised by Cobden, he again attacked 3 Dew form of the futile and mischievous system of dealing With agriculture as if it were different from any other branch of Commerce, and denounced tampering with the trade in Provisions ag of all things the most dangerous.” Although, however, Conservative policy was not necessarily bound up with Protection, the Tory party were committed to it by all the ties of personal interest. The Whigs ruled the country, save for a few months, for eleven years from 1830 to 1841. Im Lord Melbourne’s Cabinet, in 1839, the Corn Laws were, as we have already ¥ This Was the most liberal piece of legislation until the Act of Bepeal in 1848. When the home price was at or above 48s., imported wheat paid a “Oming} duty of 6d., and the bounty on exportation ceased when the ome Price wag 445, « The Act of 1773 should not have been altered,” says ¥eCullooh, « unless to give greater freedom to the trade.” ¢ Fop, 28, 1771. " Thoughts and Detasls on Scarcity. 1798. 1°41. zy a LIFE <¥ JUBDEN, j OHAP: seen, an open question.! But t'vo years later the financisl position of the country had become so serious, and the credit and forces of the party had fallen so low, that it became necessary to enter upon a more decisive course. The ex: penditure had undergone a progressive increase, amounting in six years to four millions sterling on the annual estimates for the military and naval services alone, a rise of more than thirty per cent. For each of the last four years there had been a serious deficiency of income. In 1840 it was & willion and a half. For 1841 it was given out as upwards of one million, eight hundred and fifty thousand. Nor was this the result merely of an absence of fiscal skill in the government of the day. It was the sign, confirmed by the obstinate depression of trade and the sufferings of the population, of an industrial and commercial stagnation which could only be dealt with by an economic revolution. Besides such considerations as these, there were the considerations of party strength. Macaulay’s biographer quotes a significant passage from his diary. “The cry for free trade in corn,” he wrote in 1839, and Macaulay was in the Cabinet, “seems to be very formidable. If the Ministers play their game well, they may now either triumph completely, or retire with honour. They have excellent cards, if they know how to use them.””* Unluckily for themselves, they did not know how to use them; and everybody was quite aware that their conversion towards Free Trade was nob the result of conviction, but was only the last device of & foundering party. In 1840 a committee on import duties had sat, and produced a striking and remarkable report, recommending an abandonment of the illiberal and exclusive policy of the past, and a radical simplification of the tariff by substituting for a multitude of duties, imposts on a small number of the 8 dbove, pp. 148 and 148. * Trovelyan'n Lifs, ii. 87. my THR §. 7¢ RITDGHN. 16g most productive articles, the amount of the impost being calculated with a view to the greatest consumption. This was in truth the base of Peel's great reform of 1842. But Lord Melbourne’s Cabinet had no member of sufficient Brasp and audacity in finance to accept boldly and com-Prebensively, as Pecl afterwards did, the maxim that reduction of duties is one way to increase of revenue. The Whig government made the experiment timidly, and they met the common fate of those who take a great principle With half-heartedness and mistrust. They picked it up for want of a better. “I cannot conceive,” said Peel, “a more lamentable position than that of a Chancellor of the Excheque, seated on an empty chest, by the side of bottomless deficiencies, fishing for a budget.” The proposals which the government had hit upon were these. They returned to the general principle of the budget which Lord Althorp had brought forward at the beginning of the Whig reign (1831)—the boldest budget, as it has Justly been called, since the days of Pitt.’ The main object of the commutation of duties, Lord Althorp had said, is the relief of the lower classes. The best way of relieving them is by giving them employment; and this can only be Secured by reducing the taxes which most interfere with Danufacturing industry.” Among other devices for carry-0g this principle into practice, Lord Althorp had proposed fo regulate the timber duties; He had failed to carry that Teasure against Peel’s opposition, which was aided by a general opinion that the budget was unsound—an opinion Mainly due to the startling proposal to levy a tax of a half Per cont. on transfers of funded property. Lord Althorp’s Successor now came back to some of his ideas. The qnes-1841. Br. BT. . Welpole's Histo i ry of England, ii. 634. . The 10s, duty on Oanadian timber was to be raised to 20s., and the 5s. uty ou Norwegian aad other Enronean timber lowerad to 20s. [70 LIFE OF COBDEN, [omar 1841. tion for the Cabinet to decide, as Lord John Russell describe? Ar. 37. the situation, “ was whether they would lower duties of # protective character on a great number of small articles, of whether they would attack the giant monopolies of sugar, of timber, and of corn.” They adopted the latter course, bub in the spirit of Huskisson, and not of Cobden. They pre ferred an ineffectual approach to Free Trade, to a complete repeal of protective duties. To touch the differential duties on sugar was to attack one at least of the strongest protective interests in Parliament, and every other protected interest moved in sympathetic agitation, The more sanguine of the ministers hoped to beat them by conciliating the manufacturing interest. This they expected to reach through the Corn Laws. Lord John Russell moved (May 7) to abolish the sliding scale of 1828, and to establish instead 8 fixed eight-shilling duty upon wheat.® The battle turned upon the comparative merits of Free Trade and Protective duties, and in the special question of the Corn Laws upon the comparative merits of a graduated and a fixed duty. In a debate on a vote of confidence in 1840, Peel seemed bo have advanced a step from the position which had irritated the Leaguers in 1839. He still considered # liberal protection to domestic agriculture indispensables both in the special interests of agriculture, and the genera! interests of the community. He did not tie himself to the details of the existing law; but he maintained that # graduated duty, varying inversely with the price of corm was far preferable to a fixed duty. He objected to a fixed duty on two grounds: first, on account of the great difficulty of determining the proper amount of it on any satisfactory data ; secondly, and chiefly, because he foresaw that it would be impossible to maintain that fixed duty under a very high 8 bs, on rye; 4s. 8d. on barley: 8s. 4d. on outs. nr DESEAT 0 ER —— ER Price of corn, and that if it were once withdrawn, there would be extreme difficulty in re-imposing it. He now, in 1841, repeated what he had said the previous year. ¢ Notwithstanding the formidable combination which bas been formed against the Corn Laws,” he said, “notwithstanding the declarations that either the total repeal or the Substitution of a fixed duty for the present scale, is the Wevitable result of the agitation now going forward, I do Rot hesitate to avow my adherence to the opinion which I ®xpressed last year, and now again declare, that my preference i decidedly in favour of a graduated scale rather than any fixed duty.” Lord Melbourne had foreseen the fate of his Chancellor’ budget. He was shrewd enough to be sure that a half-Measure could never raise up so many friends among the Manufacturers as to outweigh the united force of the agricultural and colonial interests.* In fact, no friends were raised Zp. No great body was conciliated, nor attracted, nor even “ouched with friendly interest; and the chief reason for this Stubborn apathy was, as Sir Robert Peel said, that nobody believed that the proposals of Ministers sprang from their Spontaneous will, or that they had been adopted in consedence of the deliberate convictions of those who brought them forward, The conversion was too rapid. Only two Years bad gone since the Prime Minister had declared in his Place that the repeal of the Corn Laws would be the most "sane Proposition that ever entered a human head. Lord Palmerston made a fine speech against the system of probective duties; but men remembered that, two years beiore, he hed voted against Mr, Villiers’s motion to hear ne Members of the Manchester Association at the bar of ® House, And the motives of so speedy a change were $00 plain. 1841. Zr. 87. ‘ Torrens’ Infs of Mslbowurne, ii. 858. [ 2 LIFE OF OCOBDEN. {ou Vik 1841. The first division as to the new budget was taken upo® Xr. 37, the sugar duties; the Ministers found themselves in # minority of thirty-six. They still held on, and instead of either resigning or dissolving immediately, astonished par liament and the country by an announcement that they wonid go on with the old sugar duties, and would bring forward the question of the Corn Laws in the course of tWO or three weeks. Sir Robert Peel declined to give them the chance, brought forward a vote of want of confidence, and carried it by a majority of one, The Ministers could not believe that the House of Commons represented the wishes of the country, and to the country they now appealed. CHAPTER VIII COBDEN ENTERS PARLIAMENT——FIRST SESSION. Tre dissolution of Parliament took place at Midsummer. El The League went actively into the campaign, though not Ar. 37. With that inflexibility in electoral policy which afterwards marked their operations. They had to face the question which always perplexes the thorongh-going advocates of any political principle, when they come to deal with political Practice. In all such cases a section springs up which is Prepared to go half way. The Government had given to bhis section a cry. They were not prepared for total and immediate repeal, but they would go for a moderate fixed duty, The proposal of a fixed duty furnished the com-Promisers with a comfortable halting-place. They could thus claim to be Free Traders, without being suspected of the deadly sin of being extreme. The Council of the League were called upon to settle the proper attitude towards the Wen of the middle course. Were they to offer a fanatical resistance to the men of the middle party, thus shocking timid but reasonable sympathizers, and forfeiting their own character for prudence and discretion, qualities as essential to success ag sincerity itself? They answered this question 2 might have been expected at that time. For themselves, they held to their own demand for the entire liberation of the provision trade. Wherever there was a constituency pe for carrying a candidate of this colour, every exertion “OBDEN, [oHA? 1841. was to be made for securing a good candidate and ensuring Ar. 87. his return, Where friends of the League were in a con stituency not yet enlightened enough to return a candidat of League principles, then they ought to vote for a candidate who would support the measure of the Government. Cop sidering both the moderate strength of the League at that time, and the state of the question in men’s minds, it seem? that this was the natural and judicious course. Some of the more dogged, however, among members of the League were hurt by what they took for a Laodicead halting between two opinions, and talked of withdrawing or lessening their subscriptions. Subscriptions are alway® a very sensitive point in agitations ; and Cobden found if worth while, after the elections were over, to write a letter to one of the more important of the protesters, explaining the principle on which the League had acted. © With reference to your complaint,” he says, “that the League did not oppose the measure of the Government, I must remind you that the real governing power, the landed and other monopolists, held fast by the old law; they never attempted to force the fixed duty upon us. We regarded the Government proposal, not as an offer from a party strong enough to concede anything, but merely as a step ID advance taken by a portion of the aristocracy. It was not our business to attack them, whilst another party, more powerful than the Government and the people, were resolutely opposed to any concession. To my humble apprehension, it is as unwise as unjust in any kind of political warfare to assail those who are disposed to co-operate; however slightly, in the attempt to overthrow s formidable and uncompromising enemy.” In the elections in the north of England the repealers were successful against both Whigs and Tories, and smong those who succeeded was Cobden himgelf. “1 #37] _ Sig TU IYENT. 175 "0 afraid,” he wrote to his brother, “ you will be vexed 1841. °1 lending in England t) find me Member for Stock- Zr. 87. port. I had fully, as you know, determined not to ‘go to Parliament. I stood out. The Bolton and Stockport folks both go requisitions to me insuring my return. I declined. 1 was then that the Stockport people put the screw upon me, by a large deputation confessing their inabiity to agree amongst themselves upon any other man who could turn Out the Major. They offered me carte blanche as to my attendance in London, and as to the time of my retaining the seat. I was over-persnaded by my Manchester partisans and have yielded, and the election is secure. You must Dot vex yourself, for I am quite resolved that it shall not be the cause of imposing either additional expense on my Mode of living, or any increased call upon my time for public objects, I did not dream of this, as you very well know 1 “I have a right to expect other men of business,” he Wrote to a manufacturer at Warrington, urging a contest in tha borough, “for I am doing it myself much against Dy wish, I offered to give a hundred pounds towards the ®Xpenses of another candidate in my stead for Stockport, and to canvass for him for a week; and it was only when the electors declared that they could not agree to another, 3d would not be able to oust the bread-taxers without me, that T consented to stand.” The League, in fact, put a strong pressure upon him, and We may perhaps believe that Cobden’s resistance to the Urgency of his political friends was not very stubborn. He must have felt by invincible instinet that only through % Seat in Parliament could he secure an effective hearing for hig arguments. It is uncertain whether the opinion of the constituency which had rejected him in 1837, bad really 1 To F. Jobden, June 16, 1841. ry. LT®% "= OOBDEN. cma? 1841. been excited by the Free Trade discussion, or whether the Er. 97. motives of the voters were merely personal. Shrewd electionecrers have a maxim that a candidate is sure to Wi any given seat in time, if he is only tenacious enough Cobden was returned by a triumphant majority, © The Stockport affair,” he wrote, “ was carried with unexpected éclat. We drubbed the Major so soundly that at one o’clock he resigned. We could have beaten him easily by two to one: My committee worked to admiration. Two hundred elector were up all the night previous to polling, including the mill-owners . . . . who neither changed their clothes nf closed their eyes for thirty-six hours. These men wer? against me at the former election. Upon the whole the slections will give Peel a majority of thirty or forty. 5° much the better. We shall do something in opposition.” It proved that Sir Robert Peel had a majority, not of thirty or forty, but of more than ninety. Lord Melbourn however, did not anticipate the practice of our own day by resigning before the meeting of the hostile Parliament: The Ministers put into the Queen’s speech as good 82 account as they could of their policy, and awaited the fate. Cobden took his seat on the first day of the session: “ Yesterday,” he says, “I went down to the House to b? sworn to renounce the Pope and the Pretender. Then I went into the Treasury, and heard Lord John deliver his last dying speech and confession to his parliamentary minority: He gave us the substance of the Queen’s speech, which. is i? the Chronicle to-day. I cannot learn what the Tories intend t0 do to-night, but I suppose they will try to avoid committing themselves against the Free Trade measures. It is allowed on all sides that they fear discussion as they do death. Ib ig reported that the old Duke advises his party not to force themselves on the Queen, but to let the Whigs go on till the 3 To F. Qoliden. July 8. 1841. Hy RIRET BPERCT © © IAMENT. 17% Peng fairly drop out of their hands. The Queen seems to it be more violently opposed than ever to the Tories.” Zr. 87. The Queen had no choice. An amendment was moved pon the address in both Houses, and carried in the Commons by the irresistible majority of ninety-one. The vote was taken gt five in the morning (August 28), and in the afteroon of the same day, Lord Melbourne went down to Windsor to resign his post. Within a few days that great ministration was formed which contained not only able Tories like Lord Lyndhurst, but able seceders from the Whigs like Lord Stanley and Sir James Graham ; which “ommanded an immense majority in both Houses; which a8 led by a chief of consummate sagacity ; and which was 8 last, five years afterwards, slowly broken to pieces by bhe work of Cobden and the League. Cobden made his maiden speech in the debate which Preceded this great official revolution. “I was induced,” he Writes to his brother, “to speak last night at “bout nine o’clock. We thought the debate would have been brought to a close. The Tories were doggedly re-“olved from the first not to enter upon any discussion of the main question, and the discussion, if it could be calle one, went on as flab as possible. My speech had °18 good effect. I called up a booby who let fly at the Manufacturers, very much to the chagrin, I suspect, of the leader of his party. It is now thought that the Tories St come ont and discuss in self-defence the Free Trade dnestion, ang if not, they will be damaged by the argn-Tents on the other side. All my friends say I did well. But 1 feel it very necessary to be cautious in speaking too Much, I gha)l be an observer for some time.” * We now see that Cobden’s maiden speech was much more than 4 Success in the ordinary sense of attracting the atten-' Top, Cobden, August 24, 1841. 4 To F. Oobden, August 26, 1841. [75 LIFE OF COSDEN, [oHA? S4L tion of that most dificult of all audiences, It sound® r a new key, and startled men by an accent that was strang® in the House of Commons. The thoughtful among the? recognized the rare tone of reality, and the note of a ma’ dealing with things and not words. He produced that singular and profound effect which is perceived in English deliberative assemblies, when a speaker leaves party recrim!” nations, abstract argument, and commonplaces of sentiment in order to inform his hearers of telling facts in th? condition of the nation. Cobden reminded the House tha? it was the condition of the nation, and not the interests of a class, or the abstract doctrines of the economist, that cried for a relief which it was in the power of the legis” tabure to bestow. This was the point of the speech. IP spite of the strong wish of everybody on the side of the majority, and of many on the side of the minority, to keep the Corn Law out of the debate, Cobden insisted that th Corn Law was in reality the only matter which at tha? moment was worth debating at all. The family of a noble” man, he showed the House, paid to the bread tax about 0%° halfpenny on every hundred pounds of income, while £he effect of the tax on the family of the labouring man W#* not less than twenty per cent. A fact of this kind, as they said of Pericles’s speeches, left a sting in the minds of his hearers. The results of the injustice were seen in the misery of the population. A great meeting of ministers of religion of all sects had been held in Manchester a fow day before, and Cobden told the House something of the Jest tution throughout the country, to which these men had borne testimony. “ At that meeting,” he said, “ most important statement* of facts were made relating to the condition of the labouring’ classes. He would not trouble the House by reading tho statements ; but they showed that in every district of the Ti] FIGST SPAKOH IM I. wh. 1a INT, 179 “Ountry , , , . the condition of the great body of her Wii Majesty's labouring population had deteriorated woefully Zr. 37. Within the last ten yours, and more especially within the last three years; and that, in proportion as the price of food increased, in the same proportion the comforts of the Working_classes had diminished. One word with respect to the manner in which his allusion to this meeting was Teceived. He did not come there to vindicate the conduct of these Christian men in having assembled in order to take this subject into consideration. The people who had to judge them were their own congregations. There were at that mesting members of the Established Church, of the Church of Rome, Independents, Baptists, members of the Church of Scotland and of the Secession Church, Methodists, ang indeed ministers of every other denomination ; 3d if he were disposed to impugn the character of those Givines, he felt he should be casting a stigma and a reproach Pon the great body of professing Christians in his country. He happened to be the only member of the House present 8 tha meeting ; and he might be allowed to state that "hen he heard the tales of misery there described ; when he heard these ministers declare that members of their “ongrogations were kept away from places of worship during the Morning service, and only crept out under cover of the darkness of night ; when they described others as unfit to FeCeive spiritual consolation, because they were sunk so low 14 physical destitution ; that the attendance at Sunday-Schools wag falling off ; when he heard these and such-like Statements ; when he who believed that the Corn Law, the Provision monopoly, was at the bottom of all that was ®udured, heard those statements, and from such authority, ho must say that he rejoiced to see gentlemen of such Character come forward, and like Nathan, when he addressed the owner of flocks and herds who had plundered the poor 2 £20 Lipm UOBDREN. fos? 1841. man of Gis only lamb, say unto the doer of injustice, Who" ever he might be: ¢ Thou art the man.’ The people, throug! their ministers, had protested against the Corn Laws, . . - When they found so many ministers of religion, without any sectarian differences, joining heart and hand in a great cause, there could be no doubt of their earnestness. . . Englishmen bad a respect for rank, for wealth—perhaps 10 much ; they felt an attachment to the laws of their country; but there was another attribute in the minds of Englishme? —there was a permanent veneration for sacred things; and when their sympathy and respect and deference were enlisted in what they believed to be a sacred cause, yOU and yours [addressing the Protectionists] will vanish like chaff before the whirlwind.” One or two simpletons laughed at an appeal to evidenc® from such a source; but it was felt that, though they might jeer at the speaker as a Methodist parson, and look do” upon him as a manufacturer, yet he represented a new for? with which the old parties would one day have to deal. I? the country his speech excited the deep interest of that grest class, who are habitually repelled by the narrow passions and seeming insincerity of ordinary politics. His friends in the north were delighted by the vigour and alacrity of their champion. With the sanguine assurance of all people who have convinced themselves of the goodness of their cause, and are very earnest in wishing to carry it, they were certain that Cobden’s arguments must speedily conver Parliament and the Ministry. “It is pleasant,” Cobde? wrote to his brother, “to learn that my maiden effort ha? pleased our good friends. I have some letters from Man” chester with congratulations. It is very pleasant, but I must be careful not to be carried off my legs. Stanley scowls and Peel smiles at me, both meaning mischief. There is no othe man on the other side that I have heard, who is at all for VIL FIRST SPEECH oe MNT. 1ST Widable. I ohserve there are & great many busy men of mn. Ur party who like to see their names in print, and who Zr 87. therefore take up small matters continually ; they are very little attended to by the House. With these men I shall Lot interfere, and they will all sid me in obtaining a fair Bearing on my great question. We had s curious scene of Jealousy and bickering to-day. Sharman Crawford brought on an amendment to the address without consulting anybody.s Roebuck, who is as wayward and impulsive as he is clever, walked out of the House with a tail of four or five, whilst hearty old Wallace of Greenock cried out, ‘Who Cares for you ? who cares?’ amidst the roars of the House. I can gee that Roebuck will never do any good for our Free Trade party. | He does not see the importance of our princi-Ple, and therefore cannot feel a proper interest in it. Heiss good deal in communication with Brougham, who, by the way, Sent word by Sturge to-day that he wants to see me. 3 find myself poset by cliques, but my abstemious and romi-Rating turn will make me entirely safe from all such intrigues 80d influences.” © “From what I can hear,” he wrote a month later, “it Appears that Peel has no plan in view of any kind, with *espect to the corn question. The aristocracy and people ia gaping at him, wondering what he is going to do, and bis head will be at work with mo higher ambition than to gull both parties. Iam of opinion that there never was & better moment than at present for carrying the question out of doors, If there be determination enough in the Winds of the people to make a vigorous demonstration 288, * When the House met to receive the Report on the A AT Mr. Crawford proposed sn amendment, to the effect tha resentation of doploreq in the Speech was to be attributed to the nor-rep pimons, and the working classes in Parliament. The Radicals were not uns "he amendment, wes defeated by 298 against B9. ' Top, Cobden, Augnst 2¢ = 1. 1841. [Ra LI¥R OF UOBDEN. fora? during the recess, he will give way; if not, he will stick to his sliding scale and the aristocracy. There is a rumo” very industriously spread in London that we are going ¥ have a better trade. This is one in the chapter of acciden® apon which Peel depends for an escape into smooth water Now, as throughout the whole of the struggle, Cobde” kept up the closest relations with the local leaders of the movement in the north. One of the most baneful effects © the concentration and intensity of parliamentary life is that members cease to inspire themselves with the more whole some air of the nation outside. From the beginning to the end of his career, Cobden cared very little about the opinio” of the House, and hoped very little from its disinterestednes® He never greatly valued the judgment of parliamentary coteries. It was the mind of the country that he alway’ gonght to know and to influence. And though he had proper confidence in the soundness of his own judgment, he was wholly free from the weakness of thinking that B® judgment could stend alone. He was invariably eager % collect the opinions of his fellow-workers at Mancheste® and not only to collect them, but to be gnided by them. “It is quite evident,” he wrote to Mr. George Wilso™ towards the end of September, “that Peel has made up BP miné to prorogue without entering upon the consideratio? of the Corn Law. The business of the session will now hurried on and brought to a close probably by the end of the week. Under these circumstances I wish to know th opinion of our friends in Manchester as to the course which it would be advisable for the few Anti-Corn Law membe™ now in London to pursue. Will yon be good enough 8! rnce to call together the whole of the Council, and consult with se many judicious people as you can, and determit® whether you think anything, and what, can be done ¥ promote the cane? The main question for you to decide i in. FIRST SPEECH IN PABLL'TYENT. 133 Whether it bo advisable for Mr. Villiers to give notice of a 184% Motion for discussing the question before the Houses are Ar 37. Prorogued. The Tories would shirk the discussion in the same Way as heretofore. Do you think under such circumstances that it would advance our cause by persisting in a one-sided debate? I think the general opinion up here is that the Way in which Peel has hitherto evaded the question, has done by good service by dissatisfying the public mind with the new Ministry, But we are not good judges of the public feeling, Who are actors in a sphere of our own, where we are apt to be acted upon by our own preconceived opinions. You are in 8 better position for forming a correct judgment as to the State of the public mind. The question for you to decide really is whether the feeling out of doors would back a small party in the House struggling for a hearing of their cause now. Do you think there is a desire for us to make a pertinacious stand now ? Be good enough to take the matter into your calm consideration, and give me the result of your delibera~ bion by return. Mr. Villiers, who is now installed as our leader, would, I have no doubt, act upon your well-considered judgment. I would merely add that you would do well to take into consideration the probable amount of public demonstration to be made by memorials to the Queen during the next week. You will be able to form an estimate of the ®xtent to which the example of Manchester will be followed n other places, and which must form a material considerafon. ‘in deciding upon the course we ought to take in Carliament,” 7 Cobden made two other speeches in the course of the autumn session, after the re-election « f the Ministers (Sept. 16--Qct, 7). Lord John Russel —nroached the now Premier for asking for time t» prepare his schemes for pairing the national finances. P-~-? justly asked hive why, 7 To §. Wilson, Baptember, 1841 84 LIFE OF COBDEN. [oma! 1841. if they were so convinced of the urgency of the evils inflicto Zr. 87. on the country by the Corn Laws, if they thought ths! commercial distress was to be attributed to them, and that these laws were at; the root of the sufferings of the workin? class—why they had allowed them to remain an ope? question, and why they remained in office, allowing Lord Melbourne to hold opposite opinions. Cobden rose t0 protest against treating the subject as a party questiod; and against making the House a mere debating club. He insisted on trying to keep the mind of the House fixed 03 the privation and distress in the manufacturing district and he urged the Minister not to postpone the question of the Corn Laws over the coming winter. “+... I sat through the voting of money, vastly edified and scandalized at the way in which the poor devils of tax: payers are robbed. The sum of 100,000! for arming and clothing militia in Canada, light-houses in Jamaica, negro education, bishops all over the world, &c., &c., in goodly proportions. . . . The people are, I am afraid, fit for nothing better. I did not offer an objection, for it would have been ridiculous to do so. It did, however, cost me some efforts to hold my tongme. I am glad that you did not think my second speech too strong. I was not quite satisfied with it myself. It was, however, badly reported. I was rather better pleased with my third on Friday, when I found there was an effort made at first to annoy me, on the part of some young obscures, one of whom followed me with ab evidently ¢ conned reply,’ in which he had quotations from my speech at Manchester, about the Oxford education, the Ilissus, Scamander, &c. His speech was not reported. If was & mere prize essay oration, which, thanks to the prac tical turn that has been given to subjects of debate, finds no relish in the House now-a-days. It is quite clear that ] am looked upon as » Gothic invader. and the clasaicals will vu) PROTERT AGAINST THE PHILANTHROPISTS. 185 “Titicize me unmercifully. But I have vitality enough to 1841. f18e above the little trips which my heels may get at first. Zr.87. Ultimately these attacks will only give me a surer foothold. The Part of my last speech that struck home the most was 8 the close, I had observed an evident disposition on the Tory side to set up as philanthropists. Old Sir Robert Inglis sat with his hands folded ready to sigh, and if needful, % Weep over a case of church destitution; he delivered a Reming panegyric upon Lord Ashley the other night, styling him the JSriend of the unprotected, after he had been canting about the sufferings of lunatics. Added to this, Peel has been Professing the utmost anxiety for paupers, and Sir Eardley Wilmot, is running after Sturge. When 1 told them at the tlose of my speech that I had been quietly observing all bhis, but it would not all do unless they showed their consistency by untaxing the poor man’s loaf, there was a still-1088 and attention on the other side very much like the conduct of men looking aghast at the first consciousness of being foung oy, My style of speaking pleases the gallery people, ®1d has attracted the notice of the Radicals out of doors. Bug the Tories, especially the young fry, regard me in no Other way than as a petard would be viewed by people ma Powder-magazine, a thing to be trampled on, kicked about, Or put out in any way they can.”* When Cobden rose on this last occasion there were cries patience from the ministerial side of the House, but this did not prevent him from persevering with an argn-Tentative remonstrance against the incredulity or apathy "Ih which the Government treated the distress of the so ufacturing towns. The point which he pressed most bY Was the interchange of food and manufactures be-Color England and the United States that would instantly W repeal. He quoted from a petition to the Congress 2 To P. Cotden. Eapt. 07. 1011. +368 LIFE OF COBDEN. [oms® 18L of the United States. The petitioner argued that if the #7 87. English landowners would only be satisfied with a moderst? duty in lien of the existing sliding scale, there would the” be a constant market for wheat in England, and the whole of the return would be required in British manufactured goods ; the consequence of which would be that every spindle, wheel, and hammer in the manufacturing district io this country would be set free. “ Suppose now,” Cobden went on, * that it were but th Thames instead of the Atlantic which separated the t¥ countries—suppose that the people on one side Wwe mechanics and artisans, capable by their industry of pr’ ducing a vast supply of manufactures; and that the peop! on the other side were agriculturists, producing infinitely more than they could themselves consume of corn, pork, and beef—fancy these two separate peoples anxious and willing W exchange with each other the produce of their common in dustries, and fancy a demon rising from the middle of th river—for I cannot imagine anything human in such position and performing such an office—fancy a dem? rising from the river, and holding in his hand an Act d Parliament, and saying, ¢ You shall not supply each other wants; and then in addition to that, let it be supposed that this demon said to his victim with an affected smil® ¢ This is for your benefit; I do it entirely for your" prote? tion!’ Where was the difference between the Thames #87 the Atlantic?” It was after a vigorous and persistent description of the privations of the people in the North, that he turned sharp! round upon the men whom he denounced for drawing the attention of Parliament away from the real issues to vag questions of philanthropy. “When I go down to the man¥ facturing districts,” he said, “I know that I shall be ™ borning to a gloomy scene, I know that starvation ¥ I] THE PHILANTHROPISTS. 18% Stalking through the land. and that men are perishing for 1841. Want of the merest necessaries of life. When I witness this, Zr. 37. and recollect that there is a law which especially provides for keeping our population in absolute want, I cannot help Wtributing murder to the Legislature of this country: and Wherever 1 stand, whether here or out-of-doors, I will denounce that system of legisiative murder.” He then burned to one member who was a great friend of negro slaves, and to another who was a great friend of Church Establishment, and who had lately complimented Lord Ashley as the great friend of humanity generally, and of factory children in particular. “When I see a disposition Bong you,” he said, “to trade in humanity, I will not Question your motives, but this I will tell you, that if you Would give force and grace to your professions of humanity, 1 must not be confined: to the negro at the antipodes, nor to the building of churches, nor to the extension of Church Sstablishments, nor to occasional visits to factories to talk Sentiment, over factory children—you must untax the people’s bred » Cobden’s intervention in debate was more than a parlia-Mentery incident. It was the symbol of a new spirit of self-“Sertion in a great social order. The Reform Bill had 2dmiteq manufacturing towns to a share of representation Cobden lost no time in vindicating the reality of this repre-Sentation. The conflict of the next five years was not merely 2 battle about a customs duty ; it wes a struggle for political Wuence and social equality between the landed aristocracy "nd the great industrialists. Of this, an incident in the debates of the following session will furnish us with a saf-Relently graphic illustration. It is only by reading the cor-"*Spondence of that time, and listening to the men who atill "Wrvive, without having left its passions behind them, that ¥4 reslize the angry astonishment with which the old society 188 LIFE OF OOBDEN, [om Vik 1841, of England beheld the first serious attempts of a new clas Ar. 27. to assert its claim to take a foremost place. Many years after the fight began, when Mr. Bright was unseated 8b Manchester, we shall find that Cobden laid most stress OF the ingratitude of the manufacturers of the northern capite! in forgetting that Mr. Bright had been the “ valiant defende’ of their order.” CHAPTER IX. COBDEN AS AW AGITATOR. 1641. d to be a —— hat prove ’s Zr. 87. 1 there happened Bi and in Gobcon's 1 the autumn of 184 als of the Teng made that soles Signal event in the an jo Mr. Bright to the movemen . ) , Personal history. so strong an Ire n and noble friend: “ompact which gave of an affections jar until Cob 20d was the Semi of a cloud or a] ship that lasted wi death Mr, Bright, who was seven yesrs younger than Cobden, 15d made his acquaintance some time before the question of the Corn Laws had come up. He had gone over in the year 1836 or 1837 to Manchester, to call upon Cobden, ‘to ask him if 1g would be kind enough to come to Rochdale, and to SPeak at an education meeting which was about to be held in "he schoolraom of the Baptist chapel in West Street of that town, found him in his office in Mosley Street. I introduced myself to him. I told him what I wanted. His ountenance lis up with pleasure to find that there were Others thag were working in this question, and he withoub hesitation agreed to come. He came, and he spoke; and though, he was then go young as a speaker, yet the qualities °f hig speech were such as remained with him so long as he "as able to speak at all—clearness, logic, & conversational Sloguence, a persuasiveness which, when conjoined with the {ile} LIr# OF COBDEN. [nsf 1841. absolute trath which there was in his eye and in his cot™ Ar. 87. tenance—a persuasiveness which it was almost impossible resist.” Then came the gradual formation of the League, Cobden” election to Parliament, and the close of his first sessio® “It was in September, in the year 1841,” said Mr. Bright “ The sufferings throughout the country were fearful; and you who live now, but were not of age to observe what W&° passing in the country then, can have no idea of the state of your country in that year. .... At that time I was # Leamington, and I was, on the day when Mr. Cobden called upon me—for he happened to be there at the time on visit to some relatives—I was in the depths of grief, I might almost say of despair; for the light and sunshine of mJ house had been extinguished. All that was left on earth of my young wife, except the memory of a sainted life and of 2 too brief happiness, was lying still and cold in the chambe’ above us. Mr. Cobden called upon me as his friend, and addressed me, as you might suppose, with words of co dolence." After a time he looked up and said, There ar thousands of houses in England at this moment where wives: mothers, and children are dying of hunger. Now,’ he said; ‘when the first paroxysm of your grief is past, I would advise you to come with me, and we will never rest till the Corn Law is repealed.” I accepted his invitation. I kneV that the description he had given of the homes of thousand was not an exaggerated description. I feltin my conscienc that there was a work which somebody must do, and there fore I accepted his invitation, and from that time we neve! ceased to Jabour hard on behalf of the resolution which W¢ bad made.” “Por seven years,” Mr. Bright says, “the discaesio? 1 Mr. Bright lost his wife on the 10th of September, and Cobden’s vi to him was on the 18th. FRIENDSHIP wind MB. BRIGHT. 19] 0 that one question~—whether it was good for a man to 184 have half a loaf or a whole loaf——for seven years the dis- Ze. 31 CUssion was maintained, I will not say with doubtful result, for the result was never doubtful, and never could be in “ch a cause; but for five years or more [1841-6] we devoteq ourselves without stint ; every working hour almost Vas piven up to the discussion and to the movement in *uexion with this question.” This is an appropriate place for considering some of the alifications that Cobden brought to the mission which he and his ally thus imposed upon themselves. In speaking of bir may seem to ignore fellow-workers whose share in the 3gitation was hardly less important than his own ; without Whose zeal, disinterestedness, and intelligence, the work of bimself and Mer. Bright would have been of little effect, and “ould never have been undertaken. No history of the League could be perfect which did not commemorate the “ames and labours of many other able men, who devoted themselves with hardly inferior energy to the exhausting Work of organization and propagandism. But these pages have no pretensions to tell the whole story; they only are ®Oncerned with so much of it as relates to one of its heroes. “We Were not even the first,” said Mr. Bright, “though after-Wards, perhaps, we became the foremost before the public. Bug there were others before us.” The public imagination Was struck by the figures of the pair who had given them-3 Ives up to a great public cause. The alliance between ther, far more than doubled the power that either could have exerted without the other. The picture of two plain Wen leaving their homes and their business, and going a : This and the preceding passages are from the very beautiful address bo iverad by Mr. Bright, when he uuveiled the statue of his friend 5} roy Ford, July 25,1877. The address is to be found in Mr. Thorold Rogere’s 0 of Public Addresses of John Bright, pp. 854-—868. qr (G2 [5 "OBDAN. Tog over the length and bresdth of the land to convert the natio® had about it something apostolic : it presented something 5° far removed from the stereotyped ways of political activity? that this circumstance alone, apart from the object for which they were pleading, touched and affected people, and gave ? certain dramatic interest to the long pilgrimages of the tW0 men who had only become orators because they had som® thing to say, which they were intent on bringing their hearer to believe, and which happened to be true, wise, and just The agitator has not been a very common personag®é in English history. The greatest that has ever been seen Wa? 0’Connell, and I do not know of any other, until the time of the League, who may be placed even as second to him. In the previous century Wilkes had made a great figure, and Wilkes was a man of real power and energy. But he W8° rather the symbol of a strong popular sentiment, than it8 inspirer ; and he may be more truly said to have been born® on the crest of the movement, than to have given to it forc® or volume. Cobden seemed to have few of the endowments of #2 agitator, as that character is ordinarily thought of. He had no striking physical gifts of the histrionic kind, He had one physical quality which must be ranked first among th secondary endowments of great workers. Later in life b° said, “If I had not had the faculty of sleeping like a dead fish, in five minutes after the most exciting mental efforts and with the certainty of having oblivion for six consecuti?® hours, I should not have been alive now.” In his early day® he was slight in frame and build. He afterwards gre” nearer to portliness. He had a large and powerful head; and the indescribable charm of a candid eye. His feature? were not of a commanding type; but they were illuminated and made attractive by the brightness of intelligence, of gympathy, and of earnestness. About the mouth there W8¢ ~ FURIE DIFFERENT CHARACTERISTICS. i032 A curiously winning mobility and play. His voice was clear, "aried in its tones, sweet, and penetrating; but it had Scar cely the compass, or the depth, or the many resources that have usually been found in orators who have drawn great Multitude of men to listen to them. Of nervous fire, indeed, he hog abundance, though it was mot the fire which fares up in the radiant colours of a strong imagination. It Was rather the glow of a thoroughly convinced reason, of tellactyal ingenuity, of argumentative keenness. It came from transparent honesty, thoroughly clear ideas, and a very definite purpose. These were exactly the qualities that Cobden’ share in the work demanded. Any professor could have supplied a demonstration of the economic fallacy of Wonopoly, Fox, the Unitarian minister, was better able to ir men’y spirits by pictures, which were none the less true for being very florid, of the social miseries that came of Monopoly, In Cobden the fervour and the logic were Wixed, and his fervour was seen to have its source in the Strength of his logical confidence. It has often been pointed out how the two great gpokes-Wen of the League were the complements of one another; how their gifts differed, so that one exactly covered the ground Which the other was predisposed to leave comparatively Untouched, The differences between them, it is true, were of 50 many as the points of resemblance. If in Mr. Bright there was a deeper austerity, in both there was the same bomelin egg of allusion, and the same graphic plainness. Both avoided the stilted abstractions of rhetoric, and neither W8S ever afraid of the vulgarity of details. In Cobden as Bright, we feel that there was nothing personal or small, "ud that what they cared for so vehemently were greab Causes, There was a resolute standing aloof from the Smal] thingy of party, which would be almost arrogant, if the whole texture of what they had to say were less 1841. “me. 37. E31 i TR oe "TRDEN. Co 1841 thoroughly penewrs’~d with polirical morality end with mr. 87. homanity Then thore came the points of difference. Mr Bright bad all th> resources of passion alive within bf breast. He was carried along by vehement political ange” and, deeper than that, there glowed a wrath as stern as thot of an ancient prophet. To cling to a mischievous err?" seemed to him to savour of moral depravity and corrapti® of heart. What he saw was the selfishness of the aristocrs”) and the landlords, and he was too deeply moved by hatte’ of this, to care to deal very patiently with the bad reasonité which their own self-interest inclined his adversaries ¥ mistake for good. His invective was not the expressi®” of mere irritation, but a profound and menacing passio”” Bence he dominated his audiences from a height, while by companion rather drew them along after him as friends and equals, Cobden was by no means incapable of passions of violent feeling, or of vehement expression. His fightin8 qualities were in their own way as formidable as Mr. Bright’® and he had a way of dropping his jaw and throwing psd his head, when he took off the gloves for an encounter 7 good earnest, which was not less alarming to his opponent than the more sombre style of his colleague. Still, it was of passion to which we must look for the secret of his oratoric® success. I have asked many scores of those who koe him, Conservatives as well as Liberals, what this secret wat and in no single case did my interlocutor fail to beg” end in nearly every case he ended as he had beg™ with the word persuasiveness. Cobden made his way 2 men’s hearts by the union which they saw in him o simplicity, earnestness, and conviction, with a gingnl®” facility of exposition. This facility consisted in a roma able power of apt and homely illustration, and a curio® ingenuity in framing the argument that happened t0 p rtd, Dovides He Salt tn thas Wiley un fo 7 x) COBDEN’S ORATORICAL QUALITIES, i953 Stment, Cobden had the oratorical art of presenting it in _184L the Way that made its admission to the understanding of a Zr 87. Ute fagy and undenied. He always seemed to have Rady exactly the right degree of allowance for the difficulty ith which men follow a speech, as compared with the ease of following the same argument on a printed page which they nay con and ponder until their apprehension is com-Plete, Then men were attracted by his mental alacrity, by ‘ho Instant readiness with which he turned round to grapple ¥ith & new objection, Prompt and confident, he was never a loss, ang he never hesitated. This is what Mr. Disraeli Meant, When he spoke of Cobden’s “sauciness.” It had ¥ Sxcellong effect, because everybody knew that it sprang, = from levity or presumption, but from a free mastery of hi Subject, th If ip One sense the Corn Laws did not seem a promising or for a popular agitation, they were excellently fitted & bring out Cobden’s peculiar strength, for they dealt with oo Matter and demonstrable inferences, and this was the = Where Cobden’s powers naturally exercised them. vos, In such an appeal to sentiment and popular pe sion 8% the contemporary agitation of O’Connell for el, he could have played no leading part! Where % tWledgyg and logic were the proper instruments, Cobden “a Master, perms masses of material for the case poured every Col to the offices of the League. All the day long hing den Was talking with men who had something to tell hing Correspondents from every quarter of the land plied the With information. Yet he was never overwhelmed by For lume of the stream. He was incessantly on the alert % a Usefi] fact, a telling illustration, a new fallacy to expose. *Xterougly did he move through the ever-growing piles * Boe Mr, MoGnrthy’s History of Our Own Times. i. 340. $48. [15 LEE CORDEN. Fama? 1841. of matter, that it seemed to his companions as if nothitd Ar, 37. apposite ever escaped him, and nothing irrelevant ove! letained hira. A political or religious sgitator must not be afraid of incessant repetition. Repetition is his most effective inst™® ment. The fastidiousness which is proper to literature, and which makes a man dread to say the same thing twice, 18 3» she field of propagandism mere impotency. This is on? reason why even the greatest agitators in causes which hav? shaken the world, are often among the least interesting me? n history. Cobden had moral and social gifts which invest him with a peculiar attraction, and will long make Ly memory interesting as that of a versatile nature; but he was never afraid of the agitator’s art of repeating his for mula, his principles, his illusirations, his phrases, with mtiring reiteration. Though he abounded in matter, Cobden can hardly be lescribed as copious. He is neat and pointed, nor is We argument ever left unclenched; but he permits himself 2° large excursions. What he was thinking of was the matt? immediately in hand, the audience before his eyes, the pois? shat would tell best then and there, and would be most 1ikely 50 remain in men’s recollections. For such purposes copio®® ness is ill-fitted ; that is for the stately leisure of the pulpt® Cobden’s task was to leave in his hearer’s mind a comp answer to each current fallacy, and to scotch or kill as ms] protectionist sophisms sg possible within the given tio? What is remarkable, is that while he kept close to the ratte” and substance of his case, and resorted comparatively little “ sarcasm, humour, invective, pathos, or the other elements the sre catalogued in manuals of rhetoric, yet no speaker was oo further removed from prosiness, or came into more real 8% sympathetic contact with his audience. His speaking wo thoroughly businesslike, and yet it was never dull 1b WW x. HIB PBRSONALITY. 197 wh cording to the old definition of oratory, reason fused genial on, but reason fused by the warmth of personal zr. 27. wry ao + No one has ever reached Cobden’s pitch of sucb eyond : platform spenker, with a style shut seldom went 2d con © vigorous and animated conversation of a bright Af Pamcnaiile spirit. pt 15 is nok tropes snd perorations that make the We lo ; ibis the whole impression of his personality. in Gobo yread them, cau diseern certain admirable qualities Present : Spheres ; aptness in choosing topics, lucidity in Bug thon em, buoyant confidence in pressing them home. this, iy Wi listened to thm felt wuch more than all TN were delighted by mingled vivacity and ease, by offers by spontanecusness and reality, by the charm, A and so uncommon between a speaker and his dint ot Persons] frinniiiaony and undisguised corhag 3 or wg give an ilinstration of this, Cobden once i, npc with Rowland Hill, some time in 1838, the poste evidence in favour of the proposed reform in — — Rowing Hill, in writing to him afterwards, “Your o self for troubling Cobden with his private affairs : ® Solty Dvorsstion, svidenn, and letters, have created towards, ‘mind so like that which one entertains ot, yon he a Bion, that I 20 apt to forget that I have en ggg ub “nue Ie was just the same with bodies of Yor go © iia with individuals. No public speaker was elation om and 80 successful in establishing genial fail, respect without formality, and intimacy without Words y. Gu great source of this, in Mr. Bright's ia co. Was “the absolute truth that shone in his eye and in : po enanc, haping pre of Cobden’s patience in acquiring and Potienc 1. ho, This was surpassed by his inexhaustible - Gssling with the wrentel lrmitice of those 184%. 1841. Kop, £7 198 LITE 7 UOBDEN, ona: whom it was his business to persuade, He was wholly freo from the unmeasured anger sgainst human stupidity, which is itself one of the most provoking forms of that stupid Cobden was not without the faculty of intellectual contemp® and he had the gift of irony ; but in the contempt was 2° presumption, and it was irony without traculence. Ther? same a time when he found that he could do nothing with men; when he could hardly even hope to find an audien® that would suffer him to speak. But during the work of the League, at any rate, he had none of that bias agains’ his own countrymen to which the reformer in every nation is so liable, because upon the reformer their der fects press very closely and obstructively, while he has 2° reason to observe the same or worse defects in othe 1ations. It has often been said that Cobden was a good Englist” man, and he was so, in spite of finer qualities which 0% neighbours are not willing to allow to us. London society and smart journalists who mistook a little book-knowleds® for culture, were in the habit of disparaging Cobden 88 2 common manufacturer, without an idea in his head peyond buying in the cheapest market and selling in the dearest. ThE was not the way in which he struck the most fastidious, crit” cal, and refined man of letters in Europe, accustomed to mi with the most important personages of literature and affair then alive. Prosper Mérimée saw a great deal of Cobden 1860, when they both spent part of the winter at Canné® “ Cobden,” he wrote to his intimate correspondent, “is 2 ®#* of an extremely interesting mind; quite the opposite of 8 Englishman in this respect, that you never hear him talk co?” monplaces,and that he has few prejudices.” 1t was just beers? he was not a man of prejudice, that he had none against hie pwn countrymen. We saw how when he was travelling » America, he found kis British blood np, as he said, sud x] FEELING FOB HIE COUNTRIMEN. 194 dealt faithfully with the disparagers of the mother country.” Returying from France cn one occasion, Cobden says in his Zr. 37. 1°Wnal, that they all remarked on the handsome women Who were seen oy the Ta 1h platforms, and ail agreed that thoy Were handsomer don those whom they bad left on the other side. “The race of men and women in the British Islands,” Cobden goes on to himself, “ig the finest Wn the world in a physical sense; and although they have Many moral defects aud some repulsive qualities, yet oo the Whole I think the Binglish are the most outspoken, trathful en in the world, and this virtue lies at the bottora of their Political and commercial greatness,” This conviction inspired Lim with a peculiar respect for his great popular andiences, and they instinctively felt the Presence of it, making & claim to their good-will and their 8tention, Cobden differed from his countrymen, as to what it is that will make England great, but he was as anxious that England should be great, and as prond of English Virtueg and energies, as the noisiest patriot in a London Qusic hy], Cobden always said that it was an advantage to him as an "8itator that he was a member of the Church of England. He used to tell of men who came up to him and declared that their confidence in him dated from the moment when they learnt that he was a churchman. It was, perhaps, a 8reater advantage to him than he knew. However little we 18y admire a State establishment of religion, it is certain tha Where such an establishment happens to exist, those who bave been brought up in it, and have tranguilly confermed bo ity usages, escape one source of & certain mental asperity 50d the spirit of division. This ir no credit to them or to the Institution ; any more than the asperity is & discredit to hose who do not conform to the institntion. Nay, one Ahrve nn, og 1841. Tir. 87. 100 LIFE OF COBDEN. [CHAT strong reason why some disapprove of systems of ecclesias fical privileges, is exactly that in modern societies it neces” sarily engenders this spirit of division. But in itself the spirit of division is no element of strength, but rather of weakness, for one whose task is to touch doubtful or uD~ willing hearers. Temperament, however, bad a larger share than institu” sions in Cobden’s faculty of moral sympathy. There if scanty evidence of anything like an intense spirituality i? his nature; he was neither oppressed nor elevated by the mysteries, the aspirations, the remorse, the hope, that constitute religion. So far as we can have means of knowing: he was not of those who live much in the Unseen. But for moral goodness, in whatever association he came upon it, he had a reverence that came from his heart of hearts, While leaning strongly towards those scientific theories of motive and conduct, of which, as has been already said, Georg® Combe was in those days the most active propagandist, be felt no contempt, provided only their practical endeavou® was towards good, for those who clung narrowly to older explanations of the heart of man. In a letter written t0 Combe himself, when the struggle against the Corn Laws was over, Cobden allows himself to talk freely on his ow2 sttitude in these high matters ;— . + . “With reference,” he says, “to your remarks as t0 the evangelical dissenters and religionists generally, and their views of your philosophy of morals—I will confess to you tha [ am not inclined to quarrel with that class of my countrymen. I see the full force of what you urge, but am inclined bo hope more from them in time than any other party in the State. Gradually and imperceptibly to themselves they 81° catching the spirit of the age, so far as to recognize the moral laws as & part of our natural organization. They lo not accept your views to the superseding of their ow x.] HIS VZNERATIOR. 201 but, like geology, your science is forcing ita way elongside 13g. of preconceived idens, and they will for a time go together Zr. 87 Without perceptibly clashing. “I do not quarrel with the religionists, for I find them Eenerally enforcing or at all events recognizing and professng to act upon (they do not, I admit, sufficiently preach it) the morality of the New Testament, and you can do no more. The only difference is that John Calvin and George Combe &ct upon different theories, and rely upon different motives, and start from very different premises, but they recognize the self-same ends secularly speaking, and I cannot quarrel with either , . . Tam by nature a religionist. I was much Struck with your remark when you mapped my head eleven Years ago," Why, if you had been born in the middle ages, you would have made a good monk, you bave so much venefation 1” That was a triumph for phrenology, for you could have formed no such notion from anything yon had seen or heard of me. Ihave a strong religious feeling,—a sympathy for men who act under that impulse; I reverence it as the great leverage which has moved mankind to powerful action, I acknowledge that it has been perverted to infinite mischief, I confess it has been the means of degrading Men to brutish purposes . . . but it has also done glorious deeds for liberty and human exaltation, and it is destined bo do still better thin gs. It is fortunate for me that whilst Possessing s strong logical faculty, which keeps me in the Path of rationalism, I have the religions sympathy which *nables me to co-operate with men of exclusively religions “entiment, I mean it is fortunate for my powers of useful 1688 in this my day and generation. To this circumstance Lam greatly indebted for the success of the great Free-Trade struggle, which has been more indebted to the organ of veneration for its success, than is generally known. “Tam not without hopes thet the same fortunate cirenme [84]. 202 AFR GF J3EDEN. Tom LP. stance in organization may enable me to co-operate efficiently with the most active and best spirits of our day, in the work of moral and intellectual spucarion. I could insist upon the necessity of secular teaching and training without wounding the religious prejudices of any man, excepting the grovelling bigots whether of the High Church party or the opposite extreme, against whoa I could make war in the same spirit which has in the case of the Corn monopolists enabled me to deprive them of the pretence for personal resentment, sven in the hour of their defeat and humiliation. “I have said that I have a strong feeling of sympathy for the celigious sentiment. But I sympathize with all moral men who are not passive moralists : with them it is difficult to sympathize, but I venerate and trust them. Especially do I sympathize with those who labour and make sacrifices for the liffusion of sound moral principles. I will own, however, thab ‘t is unpleasant to my feelings to associate with those who, whilst they indulge in coarse sceptical allusions to our faith, Jo not in their private life manifest that they impose a better restraint upon themselves than is to be found in the New Testament. My active public life has sometimes thrown me into such company, and with these esprits forts, as the french call them, I have no sympathy. My maxim is in such predicaments to avoid theological discussions (here gain is my veneration over-riding causality), and to avow hat IT am resolved to follow Bonaparte’s advice—to adhere “0 the religion of my mother, who was an energetically pious woman.” ® No whisper was ever seriously raised against Cobden’s iransparent honesty. What is worth remarking is that his sincerity was not of that cheap and reckless kind, by virtue of which men sometimes in one wild outburst of plain speech cut themselves off from chances of public usefulness ¥ To Geurgs Combe, Aug. 1, 1548, CONDITIONS OF USEFULNEES. 2073 for the remainder of their lives. Ho laid down certain LL Social ends, which he thought desirable, and which he &ir.37 believed that he could promote. And when one of these Was fixed in his mind, and set definitely before him, he became the most circumspect of creatures. Being a man of action, and not a speculative teacher, he took care not to devote hig energies to causes in which he did not see a good chance of making some effective mark, either on legislation Or on. important sections of public opinion. “I am cautious to a fault,” he once wrote, “and nothing will be done by Mo that has not the wisdom of the serpent, as much ag the harmlossness of the dove in it.” i This wag only another way of saying that strong enthusiasm I him was no hindrance to strong sense. Instead of increasing the elements of friction——the besetting weakness of reformers and digsidents of all kinds—he took infinite trouble to reduce these elements to the lowest possible point. Hence he was careful not to take up too many subjects at once, because the antagonism generated by each would have been made worse by the antagonism belonging to every other, and he would have called up a whole host of enemies together, instead of leaving himself free to deal with one at a ime, A correspondent once wrote to him on this point. “You have opened a very important question,” Cobden teplied, «in respect to the duty of a public man to advocate all the changes to which he may be favourable. I have often reflected upon this. Bacon says, if you have a handfal of truths, open but one finger at a time. He is not the Safest mora] guide, I admit, but I am not sure that he is not bo some extent right in this view. If we are to declare our Convictions upon all subjects, and if abstract reason is to be our guide, without reference to time and circumstance, why should pg I, for instance, avow myself a republican? « 1841. b Po 8. Lucas, Jan. #7. 1883. 204 LIFE CF COBDER, Tomar. 1841. republic is undeniably the most rational form of government gr »7. for free men. But I doubt whether I should enhance my power of usefulness by advocating that form of government for England. But whilst I do not think I should act wisely by putting forth all I think, in a practical way I so far admit the principle that T would not advocate the opposite of what I am convinced is the truth abstractedly. And this brings me to my old ground of trying to do one thing at & time. By this I mean merely that I have an aptitude for certain questions. Other people have a talent for others, and I think a division of labour is necessary for success in political, as in industrial life.’ ? This wise economy brought its reward. Cobden did not carry the world with him in his own lifetime, but what he did by his method was to bring certain principles of human progress into line with the actual politics of the day. He did not create a majority, but he achieved the first difficult step of creating a strong minority, and this not merely of sympathizers in the closet, but of active followers in the nation. It was what he called his wisdom of the serpent that gave Cobden his power in the other arts of a successful agitator, which are less conspicuous but hardly less indispensable, than commanding or persuasive oratory. He applied the same qualities in the actual business of the League which he brought to bear in his speeches. He was indefatigable in his industry, fertile in ingenious devices for bringing the sbjects of the League before the country, constantly on the alert for surprising a hostile post, never losing & chance of burning a foe or a neutral into a friend, and never allowing his interest about the end for which he was working, to confuse his vigilant concentration upon the mesns. The danger of great confoderecies like the League is that they Tu the Bev, Thomas Spencer, April 83, 154% - % PRACTICAL BN RAY. 208 become mechanical. Machinery must of necessity play a _ 184 large part. Circulars, conferences, subscriptions, advertise- Air. 37 ments, deputations, eternal movings and secondings-—ali these things are apt to bury the vital part of a movement der a dreary and depressing fussiness, that makes one Sometimes wonder whether the best means of saving an stitution might not be to establish a society for overthrow-Ing it. A society of this kind seems often a short way for choking the most earnest spirits with dusty cabch-words, that are incessantly being ground out by the treadmill of agitation, It was Cobden’s fresh and sanguine temper that bore him triumphantly through this peril, though none of the energetic men with whom he worked was more busily intent on every detail of their organization. He had none of that fastidionsness which is repelled by the vulgarities of a proselytizing machine. He was like a general with a true genius for war. The strategy was a delight to him; in tactics he was one of the most adroit of men ; he looked to everything ; he showed the boldness, the vigilance, the tenacity, the resource, of great commander, Above al, he had the commander's gift of encouraging and Simulating others, He had enthusiasm, patience, and good humour, which is the most valuable of all qualities in campaign. There was as little bitterness in his nature as in any human being that ever lived : % little that he was able to say, at the end of seven years of as energetic an agitation as could be carried on, short of physical force, that he believed he had not made a single enemy, nor wounded a single man’s personal feelings, Critics usually singled oub Cobden’s logical faculty as his Strongest, trait, and it was so; but he was naturally inclined bo think of the conclusions of his logic in poetized forms. He always delighted, in spite of the wretched simile with 208 LIFE O™ [OBDEN, {omar 1841. which they close, in the lines in which Cowper anticipated ~ a7, the hich economic doctrine se. Again—the band of commerce wag design’d, To associate all the branches of mankind, And if a boundless plenty be the robe, Trade is the golden Girdle of the globe. Wise to promote whatever end he means, Bod opens fruitful Nature’s various scenes, Bach climate needs what other climes produce, And offers something to the general use 3 No land but listens to the common call, And in return receives supply from all, This genial intercourse and mutual sid Cheers what were else an universal shade, Calls Nature from her ivy-mantled den, And softens human rock-work into men. From Cowper, too, he was never weary of quoting the lines about Liberty :— Tis liberty alone that gives the flower If fleeting life its lustre and perfume, And we are weeds without it. All constraint Fixcept what wisdom lays on evil men Ia evil. It was this association of solid doctrine with genial enshusiasm and high ideals, that distinguished Cobden from too many preachers of what our humourist has called the gospel according to McCrowdy. It was this kindly imaginativeness in him which caught men’s hearts. His ideals were constantly sneered at as low, material, common, unworthy, especially by the class whose lives are one long course of indolence, dilettanteism, and sensuality. George Combe ‘lls how one evening in 1852 he was in the drawingroom of some great lady, who, amid the applause of her friends, denounced Cobden’s policy as never rising beyond » mere “ bagman’s millennium.” This wag the clever way, among the selfish and insolent, of saying that the ideal 5 Life of George Combe, ii, 809. or . Pen pos —-bo fm ~r YS, Ca “hich Cobden cherished was comfort for the mass hixury for the fow. He kuew much better than they, Material comfort is, as little as luxury, the highest satis faction of men’s highest capacities ; but he could well afford bo scorn the demand for fine ideals of life on the lips of a class who were starving the workers of the country in order bo save their own rents. There is one more point on which it is worth while to say % Word in connexion with Cobden’s character as an agitator. The great danger of the career is that it may in time lessen 3 man’s moral self-possession. , Effect becomes the decisive Consideration instead of truth ; a good meeting grows into 2 final object in life ; the end of existence is a paradise of loud ang prolonged cheeriz~: and character is gradually destroyed by the parasites cf self-conscivnsness and vanity. On one occasion, in 184F. as we shall see, Cobden was betrayed, excusably enough, into some strong language about Sir Robert Peel. Miss Martineau, George Combe, and others, rebuked him rather sharply. He took the rebuke with perfect temper and humility, and in seeking to excuse himself, he described his feelings about public life in Words of which it is impossible to doubt the exact truth. “Yon must not judge me,” he said, “by what I say ab these tumultuous public meetings. I constantly regret the Necessity of violating good taste and kind feeling in my Public harangues. I say advisedly n: sity, for I defy anybody to keep the ear of the public for seven years upon one Question, without studying to amuse as well as instruct. People go not attend public meetings to be taught, but to be excited, flattered, and pleased. If they are simply lectureg, they may sit out the lesson for once, but they will "0b come again; and as I have required them again and 8g8in, T have been obliged to amuse them, not by standing °0 my head or eating fire, but by kindred feats of jugglery, ‘RAT .~ 52 5, ies wn 3 hg 2 "R41 basa LIFR C7 QOBDEN, (om, 4 such as appeals to their self-esteem, their combativeness, OF their humour. You know how easily in touching thes feelings one degenerates into flattery, vindictiveness, snd grossness. I really sometimes wonder how I have escaped so well as I have done. By nature I am not a mob orator It is an effort for me to speak in public. The applause of # meeting has no charm for me. When I address an audienc® it is from a sense of duty and utility, from precisely the motive which impels me to write an article in the Leag¥? newspaper, and with as little thought of personal éclat. 1? not, therefore, be alarmed with the idea that my head will be burned with applause. It would be a relief to me if I kne¥ there was no necessity for my ever appearing again ab ? public meeting.” * bh To George Combe, Deo. 28, 1845, CHAPTER X. THE NEW CORN LAW. I the interval between the prorogation and the great 1842 session of 1849 it was commonly understood that the mr, ss. Government would certainly do something with the Corn Law, Expectation was not sanguine among the men in the north, Some of the more impatient were so irritated by the delay, that they even wished to agitate for the overthrow of a government which had just been appointed, “ud which commanded an overwhelming majority. Cobden 38 Wiser. To one of the shrewdest of his allies he wrote %ome useful {ruth “Ido not like your idea,” he said, “of getting the deputies % pass a vote for dismissing the Ministry. That would be ken gg Partisan movement—which it really would be— nd we should lose moral influence by it. Let us not forget that we Were very tolerant of the Whig Ministers, even after Molbogry had laughed in our faces and called us madmen. the Present Government will do something. It is the House 8 Commons, and not the Ministers, that we ought to attack. Lo 10t see how with decency we can worry the Queen to hangs her Ministers, whilst the people’s representatives tare Wade her take to Peel against her consent, And ong the representatives who have done this are those Liverpool, Warrington, Wigan, Leeds, Blackburn, 210 LIFE OF OOBDEN. [omat 1842. Lancaster, etcetera, Really when we think of these piace® ar. 88. it ought to make us modest. “T have been thinking a good deal of the plan of district meetings alluded to in a former letter to Mr. Rawson, and am more and more favourable to it. Iam convinced hsb spontaneous efforts through the country would tell more powerfully upon the aristocracy, than another great meeting in Manchester. The question has been too much confined to Manchester. The cotton lords are not more popular tba” the landlords.” Although hedeprecated the agitation of impatience, Cobder was as eager and as active as anybody else in the agitatio® of persuasion. He spoke at a great conference, held at Derby of the merchants of Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire, and Let cestershire, where he made a vigorous onslaught upon whet he called the Land-tax fraud. From the Trent he found way to the Clyde, while Mr. Bright went to Dublin, as wel as to every place nearer home where he could get men to listen to him. In all the centres of industry people were urged to form associations, to get up petitions, and to hold district meetings of deputies. They were to collect inform#” tion as to the state of trade, the rate of wages, the extent of pauperism, and other facts bearing upon the food monopolf? as all these things affected their local industry ; the woollé? trade at Leeds, the iron trade at Wolverhampton, the earth” enware trade in the Potteries, the flax trade at Dundee. the sotton trade at Manchester and Glasgow. The lecturers continued their work. One of them wos? among the farmers and labourers on Sir James Graham? sstate, where he did not forget the landlord's idyllic cat” logue of the blessings of the rural poor. * What!” cried the lecturer, “ six shillings a week for wages, and the mors” ing’s sun, and the singing of birds, and sportive lambs, #” 4 Y Po F. Wilson. Leexndngton, Cot. 12, 1841. 1 THE AUTOMN CAMPAIGN. 211 Winding streams, and the mountain breeze, and a little 1842. Wholesome labour—six shillings a week, and all this! And Zn. 38. nothing to do with your six shillings a week, but merely to pay your rent, buy your food, clothe yourselves and your families, and lay by something for old age! Happy People!” In many rural districts the only arguments which the lecturers were called upon to resist were stones Bnd brickbats ; and even in some of the towns they still *hcountered rough and unfair treatment from members of the respectable classes, and their hired ruffians. The Chartists were for the time less violently hostile. Among other devices this autumn was that of a great bazaar, which should both add to the fands of the League, 20d bring the friends of its objects into closer personal conch. The bazaar was held in the beginning of the followng February, in the Royal Theatre at Manchester, It was ® great success, and produced nearly ten thousand pounds. The following may serve to show Cobden’s eye for the Sal] things of agitation, and the unconsidered trifles that affect public opinion tm “I have just got your letter, and am delighted that you “6 Satisfied with the bazaar prospects. Really I wonder how you and your four coadjutors endure the immense ®Xertions called for in this undertaking. You must not look Pon the mere money return as the sole test of success. It Will give ug a position in the public eye worth all the outlay. I Temember twelve months ago feeling apprehensive that the onopoligg papers would have deterred the ladies from “Ppearing as sellers ab the stalls by their blackguardism. Certainly three years ago that would have been the tone of the Herald, Post, and Bull. Now what a marked change is S%en in thoge papers; not a joke or attempt at ribald wit. Al i8 fair and even laudatory. In this fact alone I see the S¥idence of great moral triumph of the League. Could 1842, Air, 88. 2% 0 Li¥R OF CORDEN. [omaP. your not get a succession of notices in the papers similar t0 the (lobe last evening? Might not R. employ his pen in that way? Tell him not to be too rhapsodical or eulogistic in his descriptions, but to give from day to day a few facts and scraps of information which would induce the papers t0 insert the articles as news. There should be a description of the arrivals of the great trains filled with country Leaguers. In the next League let as long a list as possible of the people »f rank who have attended be given—this is very important.” Their newspaper deserves a word. Its energy was a8 striking as the energy of their speakers. Its leading articles, many of them written by Cobden and Bright themselves, were broad and weighty statements of the newest aspect of their case. Any unlucky phrase that fell from a monopolist was pounced upon and made the text of a vivacious paragraph. No incautious admission from the other side was ever allowed to escape, until all the most damaging conclusions that could be drawn from it had been worked out to the very uttermost. All the news of the day was scanned with a vigilant eye, and no item that could be turned into an argument or an illustration was left unimproved. This ingenuity and verve saved the paper from the monotony of most journals of a single purpose. It8 pages were lighted up by reports of the speeches of Cobden, Bright, and Fox. The pictures with which it abounds of the condition of the common people, are more graphic than the most brilliant compositions of mere literary history. It Joes not affect us as the organ of a sect; though it preaches from one text, it is always human and social. There were Poor Men’s Songs, Anti-Corn-Law Hymns, and Anti-Bread-Tax Collects. Nor did the editor forget Byron’s famous lines from the Age of Bronze, a thousand times declaimed in this long war i=} To &, Wilson, Novamber, 1841, THE LEAGUE PRESS. “Bee these Inglorious Cincinnati swarm, Farmers of war, dictators of the farm ; Their plonghshare wag the sword in hireling hands, Their fields manured by gore of other lands ; Safe in their barns, these Sabine tillers sont Their brethren out to battle—why P for rent! Year after year they voted cent. per cent., Blood, sweat, and tear-wrung millions—why ? for rent! They roard, they dined, they drank, they swore they meant To die for England—why then live? for rent! The Peace has made one general malcontent Of these high-market patriots; war was rent! Their love of country, millions all mispent, | How reconcile ? by reconciling rent! And will they not repay the treasures lent P No: down with every thing, and up with rent! Their good, ill, bealth, wealth, joy, or discontent, Being, end. aim. relicion-——rent, rent, rent ! 213% 1842. Zr. 38. 4 volunteer in Preston this winter began to issue on his OWn account a quaint little sheet of four quarto pages, called The Struggle, and sold for a halfpenny. It had no coun-Nexion with any association, and nobody was responsible for ite contents but the man who wrote, printed, and sold it. In two years eleven hundred thousand copies had been circulated, The Struggle is the very model for a plain man who wishes to affect the opinion of the humbler class, without the wasteful and, for the most part, ineffectual machinery *f'a great society. It contains in number after number the whole arguments of the matter in the pithiest form, and in language as direct if not as pure as Cobbett’s. Sometimes the number consists. simply of some more than usually Braphic speech by Cobden or by Fox. There are racy dialogues, in which the landlord always gets the worst of iti; and terse allegories in which the Duke of Buckingham or the Duke of Richmond figures as inauspiciously as Bunyan’s Mr. Badman, The Bible is ransacked for appropriate texts, from the simple clause in the Lord’s Prayer about our daily bread, down to Solomon’s saying: “ He that withholdeth the com, the people shall earse him ; but blessings shall be 184%, 214 LIFE OF COBDEN. [OHAP. apon the head of him that selleth it.” On the front page of each number was a woodcut, as rude as a schoolboy’s draw” ing, but fall of spirit and cleverness, whether satirizing the Government, or contrasting swollen landlords with faminestricken operatives, or painting some homely idyll of the industrious poor, to point the greatest of political morals; that * domestic comfort is the object of all reforms.” Cobden had, at the beginning of the movement, been very near to securing the services, in the way of pictorial illustration, of a man who afterwards became very famous. This was Thackeray, then only known to a small public as the author of the Hoggarty Diamond. * Some inventor of a new mode of engraving,” Mr. Henry Cole wrote to Cobden, told Mr. Thackeray that it was applicable to the designs for the Corn Laws. Three drawings of your Anglo-Polish Allegory have been made and have failed. So Thackeray has given up the invention, and wood engraving must be used. This wil materially alter the expense. . . . . I hope you will think a8 well of the accompanying sketch—very rough, of course— a8 all I have shown it to, do. It was the work of only & few minutes, and I think, with its corpses, gibbet, and flying carrion crow, is as suggestive as you can wish. We both thought that a common soldier would be better understood than any more allegorical figure. It is only in part an adaptation of your idea, but I think a successful one Figures representing eagerness of exchange, a half-clothed Pole offering bread, and a weaver manufactures, would be idea enough for a design alone. Of course, there may be any changes you please in this present design. I think for the multitude it would be well to have the ideas very simple and intelligible to all. The artist is a genius, both with his pencil and his pen. His vocation is literary. He is fall of humour and feeling. Hitherto he has not had occasion t0 think much on the subject of Corn Laws, and therefore THACRT RAY. 215 Wants the stuff to work upon. He would like to combine 1842 both writing and drawing when sufficiently primed, and Zr. 38. then he would write and illustrate ballads, or tales, or anything. I think you would find him a most effective auxilary, and perhaps the best way to fill him with matter for Unstrationg, would be to invite him to see the weavers, their mills, shuttles, eteetera. If you like the sketch, perhaps you will return it to me, and I will put it in the way of being engraved. “He will set about Lord Ashley when we have heard Your opinion of the present sketch. Thackeray is the writer of an article in the last number of the Westminster Review, 0 French caricatures, and many other things. For some time he managed the Constitutional newspaper. He is a college friend of Charles Buller. We think the idea of an Ornamental emblematical heading of the Circular good. The lower class of readers do not like to have to cut the leaves “a Paper. Another, but a smaller class, like a small-sized Page, because it is more convenient for binding. Corn Law readers lie, I suppose, chiefly among the former. Will you “nd your circular to Thomas Carlyle, Cheyne Street, Chel-“a? He wag quoted in last week’s Circular, and is making Studies into the condition of the working class.” ? The approach of the time for the assembling of Parliament drew men’s minds away from everything else, and expecta~ tion became centred with new intensity on the scheme which the Minister would devise for the restoration of national Prosperity. The retirement of an important member of the Cabinet, during the recess had greatly quickened public PXcitement among both Protectionists and Free Traders. Both felt that their question was at stake, and that the Prime Minister would not allow the duty on corn to stand 3 1b wag, Peel has told us, in the Memoirs published after tH, Oole to R. Cobden, June 22, 1839. 216 LIF® OF COBDEN., [omaP-1842. his death, exactly what happened during the autumn of &r. 88. 1841. In conformity with his general practice, he brought the subject under the consideration of his colleagues if written memoranda. These memoranda, he said, afforded the best opportunity for mature consideration of facts and arguments, and were most effectual against misconstruction and hasty, inconsiderate decision. In them he now pointed out with unanswerable force the evils of the existing system-He dwelt more especially on the violent fluctuations in the corn duty, and the consequent derangements and unsteadiness of the markets. He showed how little the duties oP importation could do towards keeping up a permanent high price. All that law could effect was to provide that, 50 long as corn grown in this country should not exceed a cerlain price, there should be no serious danger from competi lion with corn grown in other countries. What was that price? The law of 1815 had assumed that wheat could not be profitably grown at a lower price than eighty shillings & Juarter. Events had shown that this was absurd ; the aver ages of a number of years came to fifty-six shillings. It seemed wise, then, so to readjust the machinery of the sliding scale as to tend to secure that price. The Duke of Buckingham, whose name figures so often if the sarcasms and invectives of the League, at once resigned his seat in the Cabinet rather than be a party to any med: dling with the Corn Law of 1828. Even those who remained; seem to have pressed for an understanding, as was after wards openly done in Parliament, that whatever amount of protection was set up by the new law should be permanently adhered to. This guarantee, Peel was far too conscientious to consent in any form to give. The Cabinet at length, with many misgivings, assented to their chief’s arguments, ané for the time the party was saved. t Memoirs, ii. 26. DISCUSSION IN THE CABINET. 217 ’ 1842. bden’s 18 one of Co ; nL RL PH the episode I ay as well quote po Due io: a i Ch Ce as Peel’s mo e bo much the sam tive Pe “ Whilst T was with McGregor, he showed me a copy of the Scale of duties which he had prepared under Peel’ directions, and which he proposed to the Cabinet, causing Buckingham’ retirement, and nearly leading to a break-up “together. The scale was purposely devised to be as nearly * possible equal to an 8s. fixed duty. It was 8s. at 56s., "Sing & shilling of duty with a shilling fall of prices ill it *eached 16s., which was the maximum duty, and falling a “hilling in duty with the rise of a shilling in price. With the ©xception of Ripon, he could get no support in the Cabinet, Lyndhurst, like an old fox, refused to vote (as I am told), not knowing whether Peel or the monopolists ight be conqueror, and being himself equally happy to “ve God or Mammon. The Duke of Bucks got hold of Richmond, who secured Wellington, ‘who by the aid of Maley and Graham frustrated Pecl’s intentions. The latter ak them that no other prime minister after him would ever T ® office to give the landlords even an 8s. maximum duty. ®8n from several quarters that Stanley is one of Peel’s Stoutest Opponents against any alterations of a beneficial “haracter in the monopolies. Last autumn I remember Triting to Langton (at Heywood’s) a letter for Birley’s eye, - Which T told him that if Peel’s Cabinet were pressed- for on] corn law by the Lancashire Conservatives, it would be a In forcing his colleagues to go along with him, and © very thing he would like. McGregor now confirms ty View,” & The Leagne resolved that they at any rate would leave To F, Cobden, June 55. 1842. 1842, Ar. ar, 218 LI¥E OF OOBDER. [omA?. nothing undone to support or overawe the Prime Minister: On the eve of the session several hundreds of delegate® including Cobden, 0’Connell, Mr. Bright, Mr. Villiers, and Mr. Milner Gibson, assembled at the Crown and Anchor They learned that the Prime Minister had that morning refused to receive a deputation from them, on the ground of his numerous engagements. The Times had a contemptuous article, mocking at them for the presumption and impertinence of their conduct. These deputies from country asso ciations and religious congregationalists, instead of settling their differences with one another, had yet on one single point, forsooth, discovered a system so pure that in a single interview the greatest and most experienced of statesmen would be thrown on his haunches. Perhaps these gentle men would be willing to offer their services as members of Her Majesty’s Privy Council. And so forth, in that vein of cheap ridicule with which the ephemera of the leading article are wont to buzz about all new men and unfamilia® causes. Ridicule notwithstanding, the deputies thronged down to the House of Commons with something so like tumult, that the police turned them out and cleared the lobbies. As they crowded round the approaches to the House, the irritated men hailed with abusive names those whom they knew to be champions of the abhorred monopoly: [t was noticed that they did not agree in their cries, While all shouted out, * No sliding scale,” some called for a fixed duty, and others clamoured for “ Total and immediaté repeal.” The ministerial plan was soon known, and brought scanty somfort to the men of the north, as their friends rushed down the corridors to tell them what it was to be. Sif Robert Peel could not accept their explanation of the prevailing depression and distress. That was due, he contended, to over-investment of borrowed capital in manufactures; © - THE MINISTERIAL PLAN, 219 the displacement of hand-loom weaving by steam power; to Monetary difficulties in the United States, and consequent Er. 38. diminntion of demand for our manufactures ; to interruption of the China trade ; finally, to alarms of war in Europe, and the stagnation of commerce which always follows such alarms. To alter the Corn Law would touch none of these sources of the mischief, and would be no remedy. At the same time he thought that the Corn Law, as it stood, was capable of improvement. The working of the sliding scale of 1828° Was injurious to the consumer, because it kept back corn til it wag dearer ; to the revenue, by the forced reduction of Tuty; to the agriculturist, by withholding corn until it reached the highest price, which was then suddenly snatched from him, and his protection defeated; and to commerce, becauge it introduced paralysing uncertainty. How then Ought the Corn Law to be improved? Not by changing a Variable into s fixed duty, because a fixed duty could not bear the strain of a time of scarcity and distress, and could 006 be permanent. It must be by modifying the existing Principle of g duty varying inversely with the price. Now What wag the price which would encourage the home-growth of corn? Qn the whole it was for the interest of the agri-“wburist that the price of wheat, allowing for its natural Oscillations, should range between fifty-four and fifty-eight Shillings, The legislature could not guarantee that or any Other Price, but the scale might best be constructed with a View to this range of prices. ‘What he proposed, then, was 3 New scale, considerably decreasing the protection hitherto wfforded to the home-grower.’ ® See g) rag pritdiat Corn Law denounced by Cobden during the nghtation Beale an 1846, it is well to describe the difference between x be Dem 59. ang po” of the Act of 1828 in Pecl’a a oo shal a reaon those ny - 60s., id duty at present - . ys E00 £16 Sitting dut 16 duty I propose is 13s. When he gel a a iii I Y ig 883. 8d. increasing as the price 3 > AY LIFE OF COBDEN. {orAP 1842. Peel concluded a long exposition with a statement of thos? Zr. 88. general ideas about an economic and national system, which his proposals rested. They were these. It is of th highest importance to the welfare of all classes in this countrys that care should be taken that the main sources of you supply of corn should be derived fromedomestic agricultur® The additional price which you may pay in effecting that object, cannot be vindicated as a bonus or premium to agri” culture, but only on the ground of its being advantageous ¥* the country at large. The agriculturist has special burdens and you are entitled to place such a price on foreign corn 8 is equivalent to these special burdens. Any additional profection to them can only be vindicated on the ground that it is for the interest of the country generally. And it is fo* the interest of all classes that we should be paying occ? sionally a small additional sum upon our own domestic pro” duce, in order that we may thereby establish a security and insurance against the calamities that would ensue if We became altogether, or in a great part, dependent upo? foreign countries for our supply.® When the Minister sat down, Lord John Russell said # few formal words, and Peel added some explanation which took & moment or two. Cobden, according to a hostil® reporter, had been “looking very lachrymose all the ever ing,” and he now rose—it is interesting to notice conte” porary estimates of important men whose importance ha? not yet been stamped—* for the purpose of inflicting 01° of his stereotyped harangues on the House.” He did not propose, when corn is at 50s., thet the duty shall only be 20s., and thet that duty shall in no case be exceeded. (Hear, hear.) At 56s. the existing duty is 80s. 8d.; the duty I propose at that price is 16s. At 60s. t5° existing duty is 26s. 8d. ; the duty I propose at that price is 12s. At 65% the existing duty is 23s. 8d. ; the duty I propose is 9s. At 64s. the existing duty is 22s. 8d.; the duty I propose is 8s. At 70s. the existing duty 3 10s, 8d. ; the duty I propose is Es." tt Februsry 9, 184%. FERLING IN THE COUNTRY. 2} this, bug, he wound up the proceedings by & short and Bll Yehemen declaration that he could not allow a moment to Zr. 88. Pass in denouncing the proposed measure as a bitter insult oa suffering nation. Cobden’s reception of the Ministerial plan was loudly "echoed in the northeof England. The news of the retenbon. of the sliding scale was received with angry disgust throughout the manufacturing districts. Thousands of petitons, with, hundreds of thousands of signatures, were sent IP to Cobden and other members to lay before Parliament. The ordinary places of public meeting were not large enough hold the thousands of exasperated men, who had just foun from the newspapers that the Government would not 8lve way. In cold and rain they assembled in the open "Paces of their towns to listen to speeches, and to pass reso-(ation, denouncing Sir Robert Peel’s measure as an insult wud 2 mockery to s distressed population, The Prime Minister was formally accused of offering indignity and “Ontempt to the working classes ; of sacrificing the rights of the Poor to the selfish interests of an unfeeling and avaclon aristocracy ; of creating wealth, luxury, and splenour for a class, out of the abject misery of the millions. Hs effigy was carried on gibbets in contumely through ho streets of towns like Stockport and Rochdale, to the wound of drums and fifes, and then, amid the execration of Multitndeg, hurled into the flames. In some places the free Ceremony was preceded by a mock trial, in which the ming] yg swiftly condemned, sentenced, and thrown into tho bonfire ag a traitor to his country, while the crowd honteq their prayer that so might all oppressors of the People perish, Considering Cobden’s untiring promptitude in seizing Overy Occasion of enforcing his cause upon the House, it 18 *d tha he should not have spoken in the debate in which 1842, ~ ag Ah LIFE OF COBDEN. Moma? the new plan was most directly under discussion. The debst? ended in a majority for the Minister of one hundred and twenty-three. Mr. Villiers, however, with the judicio®® neglect of tact that is always so provoking to neutrals, and without which no unpopular cause ever prospers, Imm diately after the House had decided that corn should b® subject to a variable and not a fixed duty, proceeded to invite the same House to decide that it should be subject to no duty at all (Feb. 18). The first debate had lasted fof four nights, and the second upon the same topics now Jasted for five more. On the last of them (Feb. 24) Cobden made his speech.’ He dealt with the main propositions which P el had laid down as the defence of the new Bill. The Ministé” had confessed, and he now repeated it in reply to a direo? challenge, that it; was impossible to fix the price of food PY legislative enactment. Then for what were they legislating’ At least to keep up the price of food. Why not try in the same way to keep up the price of cottons, woollens, and silks? The fact that they did not try this, was the simple and open avowal that they were met there to legislate for a clas® against the people. The price of cotton had fallen thirty per cent. in ten years, and the price of ironmongery had fallen as much. Yet the ironmonger was forced to exchang® his goods with the agriculturist for the produce of the land; ab the present high price of corn. Was this fair and reas?” able? Could it be called legislation at all? Agsuredly was not honest legislation. Why should there not be # sliding scale for wages? If they admitted that wages could not be artificially sustained at a certain price, why should # law be passed to keep up the price of wheat? But th® land, they said, was subject to heavy burdens. For every 02° special burden, he could show ten special exemptions, Eve? % Oobden’s Speeches, Mr. Bogerg’s edition. Vol. {. 15—34. [Edition do 1670, - "] COBDEN’S SPEROUA ON THE PLAN. 223 if the exclusive burdens on land were proved, the proper remedy was to remove them, and not to tax the food of the People, 1849. Br. 88 An excellent point was made by the exposure of the fallacy, that low wages are the same thing as cheap labour, And this proved to be of the highest importance, as an ele-Ment in Sir Robert Peel’s conversion. He admitted after-Wards that he had accepted this fallacy without proper SXamination, and that jts overthrow was one of the things Which mogt powerfully affected his opinions on a protective “stem, Apart from his general demonstration of the truth 0 this respect, Cobden now showed that the highly paid labour of England was proved to be the cheapest labour in the world, The manufacturers might have credit for taking ® More enlightened view of their own interest than to sup-Pose that the impoverishment of the multitude—the great con-Sumers of all that they produce—could ever tend to promote the Prosperity of the manufacturers. I will tell the House, that Yy deteriorating the population, of which they ought to be so proud, they will run the risk of spoiling, not merely the animal, but the intellectual creature. It is not a Potato-fed race that will ever lead the way in arts, arms, OF Commerc,” In the course of his speech, which was not in the strong vein that greater experience soon made easy to him, Cobden had talkeq of the ignorance on the question which prevailed “ong the Tory members. © Yes,” he exclaimed, when his versarieg cried out against this vigorous thrust, “I have U8Ver seen their ignorance equalled among any equal Number of working men in the north of England.” And he "®0inded them that when the Corn Law of 1815 was passed, “2d when eminent men of both parties honestly thought that ages followed the price of corn, the great multitude of the "ation, without the aid of learning, © with that intuitive saga- 1843, Ar. 38. 324 Li¥® OF COBDEN. [cHAP. oity which had given rise to the adage, <The voice of the people is the voice of God,”” foresaw what the effect of the measure would be upon wages, and from 1815 to 1819 there never was a great public meeting at Manchester at which there was not some banner inscribed with the words, No Cor Laws. For these taunts, the House took a speedy revenge: When Cobden sat down, the benches were crowded, and the member for Knaresborough got up. In a speech ten day® before, Mr. Ferrand had said that the member for Stockport had during the last twelve years accumulated half a million of money ; and that when night after night, during the last session, he was asserting that the Corn Laws had ruined the trade in Lancashire, he was actually at that very time running his works both night and day. This was only one item it B gross and violent attack on the whole class of northern manufacturers. He now returned to the charge with greater excitement than before. He quoted a great number of instances, where the system of truck was forced upon the helpless workmen. The artisans, he said, were compelled bo live in cottages belonging to the employer, and to pay rent higher by one-tenth than their proper value. They were poisoned by the vile rags and devil’s dust with which they had to work, and which the masters used for the fraudulent adulteration of their cloths. As for scarcity of flour, it arose from the consumption of that article by the manufac turers, in a paste with which they dishonestly daubed the “ace of their calicoes. The country gentlemen shouted with exultation., They were ill qualified to judge the worth of these extravagant Jenunciations. The towns of Lancashire were more unfamiliar to them in those days than Denver or Omaha are in our own, and any atrocity was credible of those who lived and worked within them. The whole conception of moder? x i pecs A « » of -] THE COUNTRY PARTY “TH THE of. NUPACTORERS. 225 Manufacturing industry was as horrible as it was strange in their eyes, We bave alveady seen Sir James Graham’s Zr 38 description of thom as more cruel then the icy wastes of Siberia, or the burning shores of Mauritias, The chief Uewspaper of the country party boldly declared that England would be as great sad powerful, and all usefal Englishmen would be as rich as they are, though sll the Manufacturing houses in Great Brifain should be eugulfed ™ rain, The same paper pleased the taste of ite sub-Scribers by saying that there was nob a single mill-owner "ho would not conpound for the destruction of all the ma-Dufacturing industry of England, on condition that during that period he should have full work and high profits for hig mill, capital, and credit! It is no exaggeration to say that by the majority of the Parliament of 1841, the cotton-“Plnners of the north were regarded with the same abhorrence a8 was common twenty years ago towards such "®presentatives of Trade Unionism as were discovered in Sheftieid. Coliden was not cowed by the furious scene. Amid cries of « oxplain,” he rose to tell the House very quietly, that it V88 not his mission to indulge in gross personalities. He assured the members who desired a partisan warfare of this king, that nothing should drive him into a personal alterca-Sion; ang he considered the dignity of the House it some danger when he found langvage such as they had been lisening to for the last half-hour, received with so much com-Placency by the Ministers, and with such cheers by the party 8 their back. There was violent irritation among his friends ah the Bftack on him and their class, cansed less by the exaggeration of the attack itself, than by the exultant spirit in which 1 wag received by the House. Neighboars iv Lancashire Nuoted in Prontice’s History of the Leagus, 1, 28% 1843. 1842. Ar, 38. 226 LIFE QF COBDEN. {oaAP. same forward to testify that both at Sabden and at Crosse Hall he hed set up a school, a library, and a news-room for the benefit of old and young in his employ; that the work: men of his district were eager for a place in his works; and that to no one did Mr. Ferrand’s remarks apply with less truth than to Cobden and his partners for the last ten years: Cobden cared little for what had been said about him, bub be seems to have felt some dissatisfaction with the momentary hesitation of the League as to the larger question of the new law. He wrote to his brother ;-— “ You never witnessed such a scene as that in the House of Oommons when Ferrand was speaking the other night. The Tories were literally frantic with delight. Every sentence he uttered was caught up and cheered by a large majority far more vehemently thau anything that ever fell from Peel or Macaulay. It was not ironical cheering, but downright hearty approbation. I have not the least doubt that the M.P. for Knaresborough spoke the honest convictions of # majority of the members present. The exhibition was premeditated and got up for the occasion. I was told several lays before at the club that Ferrand was to follow me in the debate. He was planted (to use a valgar phrase) upon me by his party. I finished speaking at about a quarter-past sleven, and it was remarked by two or three on our side that just béfore I sat down, Sir George Clerk of the Treasury went and whispered to Green, the chairman of committees and directed his eye towards Ferrand, so that notwithstanding that others tried to follow me, he called straight for the Knareshorough hero. Away he went with the attitudes of # prize-fighter, and the voice of a bull. . . . . Just at the time when I was speaking the members swarmed into the House from the dinner-tables, and they were in a right state for supporting Master Ferrand. Colonel S——ro plied the fellow with oranges to suck, in an affectionate way that \ DISAPPOINTMENT OF THR LEAGUE. 22% "oSembled a monkey fondling a bear. What do your Tories think of their party in the House? I find that nothing Seems to bo considered so decided a stigma, as to brand ® man as a mill-owner. Thus you see that the charge “gainst me of working a mill at night would not be given UD, even although it was proved to be a print works, I hope Ferrand by getting rope enough will settle himself Soon. Tory praise will goon carry him off his logs. “From all that I hear, your people in Lancashire seem to be swayed to and fro like the grass by a summer’s wind, Without any particular progress. I suppose it will settle down into more quiet work in the way of tracts and lectures. I should like to have carried it by a coup, but that is not Possible. It seems generally admitted up here by all parties that it is now only a question of time. Lord Lowther said to a friend of Villiers the other day, after the division of Uinety, that he did not thiak it would take more than three years to abolish the Corn Laws; and Rawson and I were ‘aking ton, at Bellamy’s, when a party of Tory members at Another table agreed that it would come to a Bs. fixed duty about, three years. The Tories have not liked the debate. Peel feel that he has not come out of it well. He looks Gissatisfiod with himself, and I am told he is not in good health, What will he bo by the end of the session?” The truth seems to be that the Leaguers, in spite of their Moderate expectations, were taken aback by the heavy blow Which the Minister had just dealt them. They had hoped “88inst hope, and hed been too fall of faith in their own “*guments to doubt their effect upon others. The ways of Parliaments were ag strange to them, as the ways of mill-O¥ners were to the House of Commons. For a single Moment they were staggered ; Cobden was for an instant or "Wo freq by a violent impulse, which soon, however, yielded 184%. Ar. 88, ¢ Tn F. Cobden, Feb. 28, 1848. 1848. Am oe 228 LI¥® OF (OBDEN, [HAP fo his usual good sense. “I feel some little difficulty,” bo wrote to Mr. George Wilson, “in offering my advice as 0 the course which the League should henceforth pursue That course depends very much upon the spirit of the people who are acting with us. If they were all of my temper io the matter, we wonld soon bring it to an issue. I presumes however, that your friends are not up to the mark for 8 general fiscal revolt, and I know of no other plan of peaceful resistance. The question is, then as to the plan of agitation for the future. The idea of ever petitioning the presen? House of Commons sgain upon the Corn Laws should be publicly renounced. It involves great trouble and expenses and will do no good. If we had another election, the case would be different, hut there is no mse in petitioning the present House. I think our lecturers shonld be thrown. upo? she boroughs, particularly in the rural districts where We have been opposed. A well prepared account should be ‘aken of the state of all the boroughs in the kingdom if reference to our question. They should be classified, and put into lists of safe, tolerably safe, doubtful, desperate, hop? less. Our whole strength should be then thrown upon the loubtfuls. Electoral Committees should be formed in each borough to look after the registration, and we ought, if needful, to incur some expenditure in this department. Much will depend cu our getting a good working Committee in every borough to look after the register, and 0 agitate our question. “Now as respects any great demonstration of numbers against the passing of the present law. It has been suggested that we ought to hold a meeting on Kersall Moor: But I presume that would be a joint Suffrage and Corn La® meeting, which would not sid our cause at present. The middle class mast be still further pinched and disappointed befors they will go to that. I quite agres with vou that ¥2 wor x DROJROTS, 252) nos keep the League ss a body wholly distinet from the Sufftage movement, But at the same time I think the more that individuals connected prominently with the League join the suffrage party the better. I shall take the first op-Portunity in the House of avowing myself for the suffrage bo every man. “After all, I hardly entertain a hope thet we shall effect Sur object by old and regular methods ; accidents may aid U8, but I do not see my way in the ordinary course of things to beating down the power of the aristocracy.” ® My, Bright made vericus suggestions, and Cobden replied fo them with provisional assent :—-“T am afraid you must not calculate on my attending ab your tea-party. : During the recess I shall have some private Watters to attend to, and I shall endeavour to avoid public Meetings ay far as possible. I have been thinking of our future plans, and am more and more convinced of the Decessity of keopiug ourselves free from all other uestions. Lam much more of opinion upon reflection, of the necessity of some such bold demonstration in the way of organization and the securing a large fond, as you were alluding to. Something must be done to secure the ground, and thus Prevent its being occupied by sny other perty. Nothing would 80 much aftain that. object as to get a large fund Secured. I like the idea of en anti-Corn-Law rent. Unless Bome such demonstration of renewed life and resolution be ade iramediately after the passing of the Corn Law, it will be Suspected that we are giving up the cause.” * Cobden seems to have cooled down to a sober view of the Situation when he wrote to his brother, a fortnight after the *fsir of Mr. Foorand i “There is a eurious symptom breaking out in the Tory 1848. re. 88. s» To 3. Wilson, Feb. £7, 1842. \ Wo Mr. Bright, Maxob ¥, 154%, 1042, Be 58, 230 LIFE GF OORDEN. © [ous ranks, Several of the young aristocrats are evidently more liberal than their leaders, and they have talked rationally about an ultimate Free Trade. I hear a good deal of thi® talk in the tea and dining-rooms. In fact the Tory aris bocracy are liberals in feeling, compared with your genuin® political bigot, a cotton-spiuving Tory. I see no other course for us but & renewed agitation of the agricultural districts, where I expect there will be a good deal of discontent ere long. I mean in the small rural towns, Bad trade in the manufacturing towns will, I suspect, very soon conver the Tories, or break them, the next best thine.” No new line of action was hit npon until the end of the session. In the meantime, so far as the agitation out of doors went, Cobder’s mind was incessantly turning over plans for strengthening the connexions of the League. TO Mr. Ashworth he wrote ;— “Tt has struck me that it would be well to try to engraft our Free Trade agitation upon the Peace movement. They are one and the same cause. It has often been to me a matter of the greatest surprise, that the Friends have nottaken np the question of Free [rade as the megns—and I believe the only human mesns—of effecting universal and permanent peace: The efforts of the Peace Societies, however laudable, cat never be successful so long as the nations maintain their present system of isolation. The colonial gystem, with all it lazzling appeals to the passions of the people, can never be got rid of except by the indirect process of Free Trades which will gradually snd imperceptibly loose the bands which unite our Colonies to us by a mistaken notion of selfinterest. Yet the Colonial policy of Europe has been the chief source of wars for the last hundred and fifty years: Again, Free Trade, by perfecting the intercourse, snd 8 To ¥, Oobden, March 10, 1343. NEW PROJECTS. 231 curing the dependence of countries one upon snother, Wh inevitably snatch the power from the governments to Zr. 88 Plunge ther people into wars. What do you think of Changing your plan of a prize essay, from the Corn Law to “Free Trade as the best humsn means for securing universal and permanent peace.” This would be a good and appro-Priate prize to be given by members of the Society of Friends. At all events, in any way possible I should like to see the London Friends interested in the question of the Corn Liaw ®nd Free Trade. They have a good deal of influence over the City moneyed interest, which has the ear of the Govern-Ment 2? $ 184%. Besides these tentative projects of new alliances, he Watched vigilantly every chance of suggesting a point to tis allies onside. To Mr. Bright he wrote :~ “If you have a leisure hour, I wish you would write an article upon the subject of the Queen’s Letter to the par-Sous, ordering collections in the churches for the distressed. Here is a good opportunity for doing justice to the Dissent-0g ministers, who met last year to proclaim the miseries of the People, and to propose a better remedy than almsgiving. The Church, clergy are almost to a man guilty of causing the Present distress by upholding the Corn Law, they having themselves an interest in the high price of bread, and their Present efforis must be viewed as tardy and inefficient, if “ot hypocritical. “ Again, show how futile it must be to try to subsist the farufacturing population upon charitable donations. The Wages paid in the cotton trade alone amount to twenty millong 5 year. Reduce that amount even ten per cent., and bow could it he made up by charity? If you have also leisurg for another article, make a swingeing assault upon he lag general election, and argue from the disclosures } To Harry Ashworth, And) 12, 1843. 3232 Lrg OF OOBDRY. [ORAZ 1842. made by the House of Commons iteclf, that we the Anti £2.86. Corn Law party were pot defeated, but virtually swindled and plundered of our trinmph at the hustings.” 7 With reference to the first of the two themes which 18 here suggested, Cobden always felt keenly the wrong part taken throughout the struggle by the clergy of the Est blishment. The rector of the church which he was in the habit of attending, Saint John’s, in Deansgate, appealed him for help towards an Association for providing ten new churches in Manchester. Cobden in reply expressed W# opinion of the project with wholesome frankness :— “It will be always very gratifying to me to second your charitable efforts to reliove the distresses of our poor neigh bours; and if I do not co-operate in the plan for benefitting the destitute population on a large scale by erecting ten new churches, it is only because, in the words of the appeal, 1 ‘ differ about the means to be adopted.” You, who visit the abodes of poverty, are aware that a great portion of the working population of Manchester are suffering from 89 insufficiency of wholesome nourishment. The first and mos? ! To Mr. Bright, May 12, 184%. Tn the following number of the Anf¥ Bread-Tex Circulor (May 1%), avticlss on the two subjects here sug’ gested by Cohden, duly appearsd. * The clergy of the establishment says the writer, with good strong plainness of speech, “would do well reflect upon their position in this matter. They have, with very fo¥ axceplions, upheld to the nitermost the unnaboral system, which, after working during a period of Swenty-seven years, causing more or less of suffering throughout the whole of ita existence, has at length brought the nation to the verge of ruin. They have almost to a& man been the ever” active agents and allies of the monopolist party, and their restless energy in the worst of cases hag been mainly instrumental in carrying into office 8 Ministry whose only pledge was that the interests of the nation should P8 held subservient to the interests of the land and colonial monopolists . « + We foar that any aftenipt to raise contributions from the clergy, or by thet agency; oan only subject that body to the charge of gross ignorance or gross hypoorigy. . . . , Their conduct contrasts strongly with the nobl® sfforte of the Christian ministers who last yorr a:sembled in Menohester in Carnarvon, aod in Bdinburgh, to dsolare their entire abhorrence of 59 anjast and murderous gysiem by which mulsitudes of honest and industrion! men are made to suller wrongs mors grievous than can sasiiy he dasarined | AYTITUDE Of THE CLERGY. 233 Pressing elaim of the poor is for food : all other wants are 1842. Secondary to this. Tf is fn vain to try and elevate the moral Zr. 38. ind religions character of a people whose physical condition 8 degraded by the privation of the first necessaries of life; 80d hence we are taught to pray for ‘our daily bread’ before spiritual graces. There is a legislative enactment Which prevents the poor of this town from obtaining a Sufficiency of wholesome food, and I am sure the law only TeQuires to be understood by our clergy to receive their Uhanimous condemnation. Surely a law of this kind, Opposed alike fo the laws of nature, the obvious dispensa~ lions of divine providence, and the revealed word of God, ust be denounced by the ministers of the Gospel. So Convinced am T that there is no other mode of raising the Condition of the working classes in the scale of morality or religion, whilst they are denied by Act of Parliament a suffitency of food, that I have set apart as much of my income I can spare from other claims for the purpose of effecting the abolition of the Corn Law and Provision Law. Until this Object be attained I shall be compelled to deny myself the Satisfaction of contributing to other public undertakings of Brea importance in themselves, and secondary only to the first of all duties——the feeding of the hungry. It is for this *ea50n that I am reluctantly obliged to decline to contribute bo the fung for building ten pew churches. My course is, 1 Submit, in gic harmony with the example afforded us by the divine author of Christionity, who preached upon the Mountain ard in the desert, beneath no other roof than the S&nopy of heaven, and who yet, we are told, was careful to feed the multitude that flocked around him. You will, I Sm Sure, excnse me troubling you at such length upon a *ubject which I conscientiously believe to be the mont Wportaut in relation to the peor of any thai can engage Tome gttantion 9% F Bohroayy, 164d CHAPTER Xi. SIR ROBERT PEEL'S NEW POLICY. 1848. Hr. 38. Per new Corn Bill was the first of three acts in the great drama which Peel now unfolded to Parliament and the natio? Things looked es if the country were slowly sinking int decay. The revenue, which had been exhibiting deficits for several years, now fell short of the expenditure for the yet current by two millions and a half. The working classes all over the land were suffering severe and undeniable distres® Population had increased to an extent at which it seemed 2° longer possible to find employment for them. To invite all the world fo become our customers, by opening our ports their products in exchange, ‘was the Msachester remedy: It would bring both work snd food. The Priree Minister believed that the revenue could be repaired, and the spring? of industry relieved, without that great change in our eco” nomic policy. But he knew that the crisis was too deep f° half-measures, and he produced by far the most momentos? budget of the century. The Report of the Committee of 1840 on Import Dutié® wag, as I have already mentioned, the starting-point of th0 revolution to which Peel now proceeded. It passed a strong condemnation on the existing tariff, as presenting neither congruity nor anity of purpose, and conforming to 70 general principles. Eleven hundred and fifty rates of duty were enumerated as chargeable on imported articles, and all om, x) THE IMPORTS COMMITIEE. 235 Other. articles paid duty as mmenumerated. In some cases the duties levied were simple and comprehensive ; in others they fell into vexations acd embarrassing details. The tariff often aimed at incompatible ends. A. duty was imposed both for revenue and protection, and then was pitched so high for the sake of protection 2s to produce little or nothing bo tevenue, A great variety of particular interests were Protected, to the detriment of the public income, as well as of commercial intercourse with other countries. The same Preference was extended by means of discriminating duties fo the produce of the colonies ; great advantages were given bo the colonia] interests at the expense of the consumers in the mother country. It was pointed out that the effect of prohibitory duties Was to impose on the consumer an indirect tax often equal to the whole difference of price between the British article and the foreign article which the duty kept out. On articles of food alone the amount taken in this way from the con-Sumer exceeded the amonat of all the other taxes levied by the Government. The sacrifices of the community did not ond here, but were accompanied by injurious effects upon Wages and capital. The duties diminished greatly the productive powers of the country; and they limited our brade. The action of duties which were not prohibitory, bub only Protective, was of a similar kind. They imposed upou the consumer a tax equal to the amount of the duty levieg on the foreign article; but it was a tax which Went not, to the public treasury, but to the protected manufacturer, Bvidence was taken to show that the protective system a8 not on the whole beneficial to the protected manufactures theme] veg, The amount of duties levied on the plea of Protection to British manufactures did not exceed half a Willion, sterling, Some even of the manufacturers supposed 1842, Alt, 38. | 230 LIFR OF COBDEN. i of AF 1842. to be most interested in retaining the duties, were Quite Ax. 35. willing that they should be abolished, With reference to the influence of the protective syste? on wages, and on the condition of the labourer, the Repor? was equally decided. As the pressure of foreign competitio? was heaviest on those articles in the production of which the rate of wages was lowest, 80 it was obvious in a country exporting so largely as England, that other advantsg?® might more than compensate for an apparent advantage in the money price of labour. The countries in which the rat of wages is lowest, are not always those which manufachur most successfully. The Committee was persuaded thet the best service that could be rendered to the industrio®® classes of the community, would be to extend the field of labour by an extension of our commerce. The conclusion was a stroug conviction in the minds of the Committee, of the necessity of an iramediate change the import duties of the kingdom. By imposts on a smal aumber of those articles which were then most productive —the amount of each impost being carefully considered with a view to the greatest consumption of the article, and therefore the highest: receipts at the customs—the revent® would not only suffer no loss, but would be considerably sugmented.* This Revort waa the charter of Free Trade The Whig ! Seventeen articles produced 243 per cent. of the total revenne, and these with twenty-nine other articles, or forty.six articles in all, produc 98 per cent. ? Much of the evidence which led to this Report is, in the present rec descence of bad opinions, ag well worth readiag to-day as it was forty yes* # ago—especially the evidence of Mr. J. Deacon Hume, who is not to be €98° fused, by the way, with Josopk Hume, the chairman of the Commitito® Cobden said that if the Committee had done nothing else but elicit tH? evidence, “ it would have been sufficient to produce a commercial revolabio” ail over the world.” Mr. Hame's answers were largely ciroulnted as 02° of the League tracts. This impor bine.bnaok. Inport Duliss, No. 0b wae ordered to ba orinted. Ang. € 1840 irl. } SI% ROBERT PREL’S POSITION. 237 Government, as we have seen, had taken from it in a timid snd ~~ blendering way a weapon or two, with which they hoped that ar. 88. they might be able to'defend their places. Their successor 8Tasped its principles with the hand of a master. “My OW conviction,” seid Cobden many years afterwards, is that Peel wes always a Free Trader in theory; in fact, on ail Politico-economical questions, he was always as sound in a abstract as Adam Smith or Bentham, For he was pecu-Jarly o politico-aconomical, and not a Proteciionist, intellect. But ho never believed that absolute Free Trade came within the Category of practical House bf Commons measures. Ib as & question of numbers with him; and as he was yoked With 5 majority of inferior animals, he was obliged to go their bacw, and not his own”? This is trus of Sir Robert Peel’s mind throughout from 1843 to 1846. But it seems only to be partially true of the momen when he brought in the great budget of 1842. Notwithstanding its fatal omiseion of the duoties on corn, ib V8 & Free Trade budget. Corn was excluded partly from the leader's foar of the « inferior animals’ whom it was his bonourape but unhappy mission to drive, but partly also by 80 honest, doybi in Peel’s own mind, whether it was safe to depend on foreign countries for our supplies. The doubt Vag Strong enough to warrant him, from his own point of VOW, in trying an experiment before meddling with corn; ud a magnificent experiment it was, The financial plan of 1842 wag the begiuning of all the great things that have been done since, Its cardinal point was the imposition of a rect tax, in order to relax the commercial tariff. Ultimately effect of diminishing duties was to increase revenue, but on effect was a fall in revenue. It was expedient or “8pentable for the revival of trade to lower or remit duties, "ud to Parge the tariff, To bridge over the interval before To J. Parkes, Mev 58, 115K, 1842. 1842. Ap. 8%, 218 LIFE OF OOBDEN. fome? increased trade and consumption made up for the loss th" incurred, the Government proposed to put on the income t4* ab the rate of sevenpence in the pound. They expected ght the duration of the imposi would probably be about five years, At the end of that time the logs-caused by remission would, they hoped, have been recovered. The new tariff was not laid before Parliament for som? weeks.* The labour of preparation was enormouns. MI" Gladstone, who was then at the Board of Trade, and 0% whom much of the labour fell, said many years afterwards that he had been concerned in four revisions of the Tarif namely in 1842, in 1845, in 1854, and in 1860; and he old Cobden that the first cost six times as much trouble as 80 the others put together. There was an abatement of duty on seven hundred and fifty articles. The object, as sot forth by the Minister himself, speaking generally, was reduce the duties on raw materials, which constituted the elements of manufactures, to an almost nominal amount; 5° reduce the duties om half-manufactured . articles,’ which entered almost as much as raw material into domestic manufactures, to a nominal amount. In articles completely manufactured, their object had heen to remove prohibition? and reduce prohibitory duties, so as to enable the foreig? producer to compete fairly with the domestic manufacturer The general principle Sir Robert Peel went upon, was to mak? a considerable reduction in the cost of living. It is true that the duty on the importation of fresh and salted meat was lowered. It is true, too, that he could point to the new Corn Bill as having reduced the duty on wheat by mor than a half. While he spoke, it was nine shillings under the new law, and twenty-three under the old one. But the sugar duties were untouched. Tt seemed a fatal abeurts + The speech proposing the Income Tox was Mavch 11. It wae Ma? 5 when Bir Robert Poel moved to xo into Cormmittes on the Tar xr} THE NEW TALIEL. 2139 Miserg he flaw in the new scheme to talk of the main object iid being to Jessen the charge of living, and then to leave bread am. 38 i Sugar, two great articles of universal consumption, burdened with heavy protective taxation. Many a League Meeting in the next three years rang with fierce laughter at the ®xpense of a Minister who talked of relieving the Consumer, when he had taken the tax off dried fruits, cos-Wetics, satin, caviare, and left it upon the loaf of bread. The Tories followed reluctantly. The more acute among the Protectionists felt that the colonial interest would *Peedily he forced to surrender its advantage over the sugar of Cuba and Brazil; and one member warned sympathetic hearers that, when the Tariff was passed, the next step to in Xpected was the repeal of the Corn Laws. The Minister found one remarkable champion on his own side, whose Benius he failed to recognize. Mr. Disraeli laughed at the Whigs for pretending to be the originators of Free Trade. I Was Mr. Pitt, he said, who first promulgated its docbrines; and it was Fox, Burke, and Sheridan who - then denounceq the new commercial principles. The prin-“Ples of Free Trade were developed, and not by Whigs, fifty Years before ; and the conduct now pursued by Sir Robert Peel was in exact accordance and consistency with the Principles for the first time promulgated by Mr. Pitt. So far ag jf went, Mr. Disracli’s contention was perfectly Correa the Protectionists were puzzled as well as annoyed by the low Policy, so were the Free Traders. The following extracts from letters to his brother convey one or two of Cobden’s Sarlier impressions about Pesl. Of the measure he always though the same, and the worst. By the end of the session Cobden kad clearly discerned whither Peel’s mind was turnng. We who live a generation after tte hattle was won, aay feel for. % moment disappoinied that Cobden did not at once 240 LIYE OF COBDEN. [oms* 1842. judge the Minieter’s boldness in imposing the income tax 58 Zr. 38. a means of reforming the tariff, in a more appreciative spirit It is just, however, to remember that in his letters we 867° the first quick impressions of the hour; that these first impressions were naturally those of chagrin in one who 88% that the new scheme, however good in its genaral bearing? omitted the one particular change that was needful. We must not expect from an energetic and clear-sighted actor, €0™" mitted to an urgent practical cause, the dispassionateness of ® historian whose privilege it is to be wise after the event. “What say the wise men to Sir Robert's income box! In other words, how do cur mill-owners and shopkeepe™ like to be made to pay 1,200,0001. a year out of ther profits, to insure the continuance of the corn and sug® monopolies ? I should think that the proposal to plac? profits upon a par with rent before the tax collector will 29° be vastly popular, unless the law can contrive to keep "WF the former as it-does the latter. The only importan? change after all, annomnced last night, was timber. . « * Peel delivered his statement in a clear and clever way, never faltering nor missing a word in nearly a foar hours’ speectt This has gone far to convince our noodles on the Wh§ side that there is a great deal of good in his budgel’ and I find even our friend J—— is inclined to prais the budget. But I fully expect that it will do much % render Peel vastly unpopular with the upper portion of th? middle class, who will see no compensation in the tariff 0 a tax upon their incomes and profits. If this be the result of the measure, it will do good to the Corn Law cause, PY bringing the discontented to our ranks. Let me know what your wiseacres sav about it." * “Both the corn and income tax will he thrown over faster bE To ¥. Cobden, Moxch 12. 1845, X11 Xi, SOBGEN'S IMPRESSIONS. 241 1 ®Xpoct, Peel is very anxions to force on both measares, which I am not surprised at, seeing how he is badgered "&r 38. both in the House and out of doors. He gets at times very Irritable, ag you will have seen. It is a hard task to govern for 4 class, under the pretence of governing for the people. Ihe should be killed in the vain attempt to serve two such “Pposite masters, it is to be hoped he will be the last man foolish enough to make the attempt. He is certainly looking ery fagged and jaded. The income tax will do more than the Corn Law to destroy the Tories. The class of voters in the towng upon which they rely, are especially touched by his Schemes, The genteel shopkeepers'and professional men who depend upon appearances, and live by a false external, will lever forgive him for exposing their tinsel. You will nob bear of auy public demonstration against the tax, but a "ch more effective resistance is being offered by the private ‘“Mmonstrance of Tory voters. There is very little feeling 2 the manufacturing districts compared with that of the Southern boroughs, Peel is also nndermining his strength m the counties hy displeasing everybody, and putting everything In disorder without settling anything. The worst Tanger is of the Whigs coming in again too soon. The back would be np on their hind legs, and at their ‘old Dancing tricks again, immediately they smelt the Treasury erily 22s 1843, " “The truth ig, your accounts make me feel very uneasy uy position. No earthly good can I do here. The thing ot be allowed to work itself into some new shape—time ut 7 can tell what, We are nowhere on the opposition side dap Peel must bead a milien party soon. If the N . uke were dead, he would quarrel with the ultra-Tories enth, He is no more with them in heart than you or 5 To FP. Cobden, March 22. 1842. 242 LIVE 2 UOBDEN. [ora 1842. 1, and I suspect there is mow an accumulation of grudge Hr. 88, betwesn him and the more violent of his party, that C8 hardly be suppressed.” ' “Peel is a Free-trader, and so are Ripon and Gladstone The last was put in by the Puseyites, whe thought they had insinuated the wedge, but they now complain that he he® been quite absorbed by Peel, which is the fact. Gladston® makes a very clever aide-de-cump te Peel, bul is nothins without him. The Goverument are at their wits’ end about the state of the country. The Devonshire House Whig? are beginning to talk of the necessity of supporting th Government in ease of any serious troubles, which mest? a virtual coalition; a point they are evidently being drive? to by the force of events: Peel will throw overboard th bigots of his party, if he have the chance. But the res! difficulty is the present state of the country. The account? from every part are equally bad, end’ Chadwick says th poor-rates in the agricultural districts are rising rapidly” A great deal of land has been offered for sale during th last three months, and everything seems working beautifully for a cure in the only possible way, viz., distress, suffering and want of money. I am most anxious to get away and come to Manchester; I know the necessity of my presenc® and shall let nothing but the corn question keev me.” * The last fortnight has done more to advance our cau than the last six or twelve months. The Peel party 87° fairly beaten in argument, and for the first time they 8 willing to listen to us as if they were anxious to learn 6%” cuses for their inevitable conversion. If T were disposed © be vain of my talk, T have had good reason, for both sided ¥ Wo ¥. Cobden, April 11, 1842, V To PF Oobdew. June 28 To X1, 1 OOBDENS TMPRUSHIONS, 243 "Peak in praise of my two lest efforts. The Reform and 1848. Carlton Clubs are both agreed as to my having pleaded the "zu sg ®4use successfully. The real secret, however, is the irre-Hstible pressure of the times, and the consciousness that the Party in power can only exist by restoring the country to Something like prosperity. If nothing happens to revive trade, the Corn Law goes to a certainty before spring.” * “Peel and Lis squad will be right glad to get rid of the House, and 1 suspect it will not be his fault if he does not Bet & measure of Corn Law repeal ready before next session, ha 8t0p the mouths of the League ‘men. He has been ex-Sossively worried by our clique in the House, and I have reason to flatter myself with the notion that I have been a frequent thorn in his side. If distress should continue to favour us, we shall got something substantial in another bwelve months, and I suspect we may bargein for the continusnee of bad trade for that length of time at least.” op ething must bo said of the two speeches of which Tal en speaks so lightly in one of these extracts. It was oe before he made any prominent attack on the financial In eme, In March, when Peel bad wished to press the Come Tax Bill forwards, Cobden had been one of a small Broup who persisted in obstructive mosicns for adjournment, oa Pp sal was ub length forced to give way. He had also iy remarks from time to time in Committee. Bub the for on was far advanced before he found a proper occasion Putting forward all the strength of his case. To July 1 a great debate was opened by Mr. Welliee of boing upon the distress of ths counbry. Mr. Disraeli d out, witk much force and ingenuity, that the languid ? Fo F. Cobden, July 14, 1842. 1 4B Jobdew, July 30, 1848, 184. Ae, 38. 244 Lir® OF COBIGEN, (oma? tirade froma which they were suffering would receive # for more powerful stimulus than the repeal of the Corn Lav® could give, if Lord Palmerston had not, by a raischievor political treaty, put an end to a freaty of commerce with France, which would have opened new markets for al the most heavily stricken industries of Hngland. Joseph Hume urged that the Government should either agree © an inquiry, or else adopt the remedy of a repeal of the Cor Laws. Lord John Bussell lamented the postponement of remedies, but would leave to the Government the respo™ sibility of choosing their own time. The Prime Ministe’ followed in a speech in which he confined himself to very narrow ground. It was rather a defence of his financial policy, than a serious recognition of the state of the country This provoked Cobden to make his first great speech in the House (July 8). Mr. Roebuck, who spoke the same evenit8’ described it as “a speech fraught with more melancholy instruction than it had ever been his lot to hear. A speec® in the incidents which it unfolded, more deeply interesting to the people of this country, he had never heard in his life ; and these incidents wers set forth with great ability and great simplicity.” As a debating reply to the Prim’ Minister, it was of consummate force and vivacity. The facts which Cobden adduced snpported his vigorous charg’ that Peel viewed the matter too narrowly, and that circu?” stances were mors urgent than he had chosen to admit It wag exactly one of those speeches which the House of Commons naturally delights in. It contained not a sing! waste sentence. Every one of Peel’s arguments was met by detail and circumstance, and yet detail and cirenmstance the mosh minute were kept alive by a stream of eager and 0% pressing conviction, Peel nd compared the consumptio? of cotton in two-half-years; Cobden showed that for prrpos?® of comparison they sere the wrong balf-years., Peel pd XU] coroom GN THEY STATE OF THE OOUNTBY. ¥ 248 talked of improved machinery for a time turning people out of employment ; Cobden proved with chapter and verse Ziv. 38. bow gradual the improvement in the power-locms had been, 0d pointed out that Manchester, Bolton, Stockport, snd other towns in the north, were really the creation of labour-Ving machines. Peel bad spoken as if it were merely a cotton question and a Manchester quesfion : Cobden, out of the fulness of his knowledge, showed that the stockingframes of Nottingham were as idle as tho looms of Stock-Port, that the glass-cutters of Stourbridge and the glovers °f Yeovil were undergoing the same privation as the potbers of Stoke and the miners of Staffordshire, where five-andbWenty thousand were destitute of employment. He knew of a place where a hundred wedding-rings had been pawned IR & single week to provide bread ; and of another place Where men and women subsisted on boiled nettles, and dug Up the decayed carcase of a COW rather than perish of hunger, «7 say you are drifting to confnsion,” he exclaimed, “Without rudder and without compass, . . . . Those who are 80 fond of laughing at political economy forget that they have a political economy of their own: and what is it? That they will monopolize to themselves the fruit of the Wdustry of the great body of the community—that they slow the productions of the spindle aud the loom to go abroad to furnish them with luxuries from the farthest Corners. of the world, but refuse to permit to be brought back in exchange what would minister to the wants and comforts of the lower orders. What would the consequence be? Wo are sowing the seeds broadeast for a Plentiful harvest of workmen in the western world. Thou-3ands of workmen are delving in the mines of the western “Ontinent, where coals can be raised for a shilling a ton. We are sending there the labourers from our cotton mantfactoricg, from omy woollen, and from our silk, They ave 1842. 245 LIFE OF COBUHN, [oma? 1842. not going by dozens or by scores to teach the people of Zin. 38. other countries the work they have learnt—they are goiv8 in hundreds and thousands to those states to open work® against our own machines, and to bring this country to's worse state than it is now in. There is nothing to atone fof a system which leads to this; and if I were to seek for ® parallel, it would be only in the Revocation of the Bdict of Nantes by Louis XIV., or the decree of Alva in Belgiu® where the best men were banished from their country.” Cobden gave additional strength to his appeal by showit8 that its eagerness was not due to a merely official partiss?” ship. He saw no reason, he declared, why they should no take good measures from Sir Robert Peel, or why they should prefer those of Lord John Russell. “The noble Lord 1® called the leader on this side of the House, and I confes® that when I first came into the House I was inclined to 100% apon him as a leader ; but from what I have seen, I belieV® the right hon. Baronet to be as liberal as the noble Lord. I the noble lord ig my leader, I can only say that I believ® that in four out of five divisions I have voted against him He must be an odd kind of leader who thus votes against those he leads. I will take measures of relief from the right hon. Baronet as well as from the noble Lord, but upon som? measure of relief I will insist. . ... I give the Prim® Minister credit for the difficulties of his situation; but this question must be met, and met fully; it must not be quibbled away ; it must not be looked upon as a Manchester question ; the whole condition of the country must be Jooked ab and faced, and it must be done before we separate thi® session.” Three nights later (July 11), Sir Robert Peel took occs” sion to deal with some of Cobden’s economic proposition especially an assertion that in prosperous times improvement? in machinery do not tend to throw labourers ont of employ” LVR BEPLY TO SiB ROBERT PEEL, + 3 ment, At the close of his speech the Minister revesled the 848, tentative #pivit tn which his great measares had been Ar. 38. framed, and the half-pen mind in which he was beginning bo stand towards the Corn Law. If these measures should not prove adequate to meet the distress of the country, in that case, he said, “I shall be the first to admit that no adherence to former opinions ought to prevent their full and “areful revision.” Cobden, in the course of a vigorous reply, poiuted to a historic parallel which truly described the political situation. He warned the aristocracy and the landowners never to ®Xpect to find another Prime _Jinister who would take office t0 uphold their monopoly. © They had killed Canning by thwarting him, and they would visit the same fate on their Present lesder, if he persevered in the same attempt to 80vern for the aristocracy, while professing to govern for the people,” At this there were loud groans from some Parts of the Homse. Yes,” repeated Cobden, undaunted, “ they had killed Canning by forcing him to try and reconcile their interests with those of the people, and no human Power could enable the right hon. Baronet to survive the Same ardent.” CHAPTER XII. RENEWED ACTIVITY OF THE LEAGUR—-COBDYN AND SIR ROBERT PEEL—RURAL CAMPAIGN. 1842. Arr the close of the session, Cobden hastened back to Man Zr. 38. chester, where his business, as he too well knew, urgently required his presence. As we have seen, his brother’ letters had begun to moke him seriously uneasy as to bi? position. Affairs were already beginning to fall into diforder at Chorley and in Manchester, and in telling the story of Cobden’s public activity, we have to remember that almost from the moment of entering Parliament he began be harassed by private anxieties of a kind which depres® and unnerve most men more fatally than any other. Cohden’s buoyant enthusiasm for his cavse carried him forward; if drove these haunting cares into the background, and his res! life was not in his business, but in the affairs of the nation: In September he made an important speech to ‘the Council of the League, at Manchester. It explains their relations to political parties, and to social classes. They had been lately charged, be said, with having been if collision with the Chartist party. But those who made this charge had themselves been working for the last three years to excite the Chartist party against the League, and that, too, by means that were not over-creditable. Thesé intrigners had succeeded in deluding a considerable portio? of the working olasser upon the subject of the Corn Laws "0. XL] ggp LWAGUE AND THE WORKMEN. 249 “And T have no ohjection in admitting here,” Cobden went to say, “as I have admitted frankly before, that these Ar. 38 artifices and mancouvres have, to a conaiderable extent, ®ompelled us to make our agitation a middle-class agitation. [do not deny that the working classes generally have attended our lectures and signed our petitions ; but T will 8dmit, that so far as the fervour and efficiency of our Bgitation has gone, it has eminently heen a middle-class "Gitation. We have carried it on by those means by “hich the middle class usually carries on ibs movements. We bave hed our meetings of dissenting rainisters ; 76 have obtained the co-operation of the ladies; we have fosorted to tea-parties, and taken those pacific means for ®rrying out our views, which mark us rather as & middleclagg get of agitators. . . . We are mo political body; we have refused to be bought by the Tories; we have kept 8loof from the Whigs ; and we will not join partnership with tither Radicals or Chartists, but we hold out our hand ready to give it to all who are willing to advocate the al and immediate repeal of the corn and provision wa 184%. In another speech, he ssid the great mass of the people Stuck to the bread-tax because it was the law. He did hot, charge the great body of the working classes with taking part agains the repeal of the Corn Laws, but he thargeq the great body of the intelligent mechanics with Standing aloof, and allowing 8 parcel of lads, with hired kngyeg for leaders, to interrupt their meetings.” As time Went, on, the shave of the working class in the movement became more satisfactory. Meanwhile, ib is important to R0tice that, they held aloof, or else opposed it as interfering With those claims of their own to political power, which the Reform, Act had so unexpectedly baulized. Recovering themselves from the disappoinvuent and cor. 260 LIF# OF (OBDEN, [HAP B48. fasion of the spring, the agitators applied themselves with Ar. 38. invigorated resolution to their work. They had been spending a bundred pounds a week. They ought now, said Cobden, to spend a thousand. Up to thus time the Council of the League bad bad twenty-five tho?’ wand pounds through their hands, of which by far the larger portion had heen raised in Manchester and the neighbouring district. About three times that sum had been raised and expended by local associations elsewher: In all, therefore, a hundred thoussad pounds had gone, and the Corn Laws seemed more iramovshle than ever, With admirable energy, the Council now made up their minds ab once to raise a new fund of fifty thousand pounds, and, uot withstanding the terrible condition of the cothon trade, the amount was collected in a very short time. Men co™ tributed freely because they knew that the rescue of their capital depended cn the opening of markets from which th protection on corn excluded them. “Yon will have observed,” Cobden wrote to Mr Edward Baines, “that the Council of the Leagme 8° determined upon a renewed agitation upon a great scale provided they can get a coramensurate pecuniary help fro® the country, aud my object in troubling you is to beg that you will endeavour to rouse the men of the West Riding fo another effort. . “The gcheme which we especially aim at carrying oub is this :~—To make an attack upon every registered elector of the kingdom, county and borough, by sending to each ® packet of publications embracing the whole argument 5° it affects both the agricultural and trading view of he question. We are procuriag the copies of the registers for the purpose. But the plan involves an cwxpense of 20,0000 Add to this our increased expenditure in lectures, eto pnd the contemplated cost of the spring deputations in ¥1.) RENEWRED ACTIVITY. 25 1 London, and we shall require 50,000L to do justice to 184% the cause before next June. And we have a Spartan band Ar. 38. of men in Manchester who are setting to work in the full tonfidence that they will raise the money. The best way to levy contributions on the public for’ a common object 18 to set up a cloim, and therefore Manchester men must Dot in public declare the comnfry in their debt. Bub between ourselves this is the case to a large extent. The agitation, though a national one, and for national objects, has been sustained by the pockets of the people bere to the extent of 10 to 1 against the whole kingdom ! “ A vast proportion of our expenditure has been of a kind to bring no delat, such as the wide distribution of tracts in tho purely agricultural districts, and the subsidizing of literary talent which does mot appear in connexion with the League. If I hed the opportunity of a little gomsip with you, I could give you proof of ranch efficient agitation for which the League does not get credit publicly. There is danger, however, in the growing adversity of this district, thet we may pump owr springs dry, and % 88 more and more necesssry to widen the circle of Our ‘contributors. We confidently rely on your influential ®0-0peration. “Recollect that our primary object is to work the Printing Press, not upon productions of our own, but producing the essence of amthoritative wiiters, such as Deacon Hume, Tord Fitzwilliam, etc., and scattering them broad-®t over the land. Towards such an object no Freetrader can scruple to commit himself. And in no other human war that I am acquainted with, can We accomplish Ir end by moral and peaceable means. There is no use n blinking ths real difficulties of our task, which is he education of twenty-seven millions of people, an object Bt 0 he accomplished except .by the cordial assist 252 LI%E OF COBDEN, {oma¥ 1842. ance of the enlightened and patriotic in all parts of the Zir. 38. kingdom"! The staff of lecturers was again despatched on ite missionary errand. To each elector in the kingdom w#* sent a little library of tracts. Tea parties followed bY meetings were found to be more attractive in the norther? towns than meetings without tea parties. Places where meetings had been thinly attended, now produced crowds: Cobden, Mr. Bright, Mr. Ashworth, and the other chief speakers, again scoured the country north of the Trent; and at the end of the year, the first two of these, along with Colonel Perronet Thompson—the author of the famous Catechism of the Corn Lows, sud styled by Cobden, the father of them all—proceeded on a pilgrimage to Scotland: “ Our progress ever since we crossed the border,” Cobden? writes, ““ has been gratifying in the extreme. Had we bee disposed to encourage a display of enthusiasm, we might have frightened the more nervous of the monopolists with our demonstrations, As it is, we have been content 1° allow honours to be thrust upon us in cur own persons, oF rather mine, by the representatives of the people. Glasgo™ Edinburgh, Kirkcaldy, Dundee, Perth, and Stirling, hav® all presented me with the freedom of their burghs, and 1 have no doubt I could have become a free citizen of every corporate town in Scotland by paying them a visit.? All this is due to the principles we advocate, for I have don? all T could to discourage any personal compliments to myself. Scotland is fairly up now, and we shall have more iP future from this side of the Tweed upon the Corn Law. We t To Edward Baines, Oct. 25, 1842, % It ig worth noticing that in Glasgow this honour was conferred npo? him, not merely on the ground of his pablic action, but because, in. the word? of his proposer, by his ingenuity as a calico printer, he had brought tha marnfuciure to suck a state of perfection that we were now able to cone? with the printers of France and Switzerland. kn} GOBDEN IN SOUTLAND, 253 80 to-day to Glasgow to attend another Free-trade banquet. To-morrow we procoed fc Tdinburgh, where I shall x. 39 femain a fow days te go through the ceremony of becoming % citizen of Auld Reekie, aud then go forward to Neweastle to join (Jol snel Thompson and Bright (who have both been working rairacles), who will take Hawick by the way for a meeting on Thursday evening.”* “I shall be with you at the end of the week. The work has been too heavy for me, and I have keen obliged to throw an extrs share upon Bright and the old veteran Colonel, 1 caught cold in coming {rom Carlisle to Glasgow by night, and have not got rid of it. To-day has, however, been very fine, and I have enjoyed a long walk with George Combe into the country, looking at the farm-houses, each of which has a tall chimney attached belonging to the engine Bouse, 1 am obliged to come from Glasgow here on Thursday to go through the ceremony of receiving the freedom of this city. Upon the whole, I am satisfied with the aspect ot things in Scotland. I am nob afraid of their going back froma their convictions, and there is scarcely a man Who is Rot against the present law, and nearly all are going on to botal repeal. Fox Maule’s conversion is important. He is heir to 80,0000. a year in land, 40,000 acres under the Plough.” 4 From Dundee, throngh Hawick, the deputation crossed the border to Newcastle, Sunderland, Darlington, and other Yowns of that region, On their reborn to head-quarters, Mr. Bright recounted to a crowded meeting of Manchester What they had dome, and he summed up their impressions of Beotland in words that deserve to be put on record. There were some general features, Mr. Bright said, which Struck him very strongly in their. tour throngh Scotland. 1848. 3 To Georg: Wilson, Btirling, Jaan. 18, 1848, i He FW. Cobden, don. 15, 1643, 234 ae TOORDEN, {{omaF » 1845. “In the first place, I believe that the intelligence of the peopl? &r. 39. in Scotland is superior to the intelligence of the people of England. TI take it from these facts. Before going to the meetings, we often asked the committee or the people with whom we came in contact, * Arve there sny fallacies which the working people hold on this question? Have they 217 orotchets about machinery, or wages, or anything else?’ And the universal reply was, “No; you may make a speech about what yon like; they understand the gquestiol thoroughly ; and it is no nse confining yourself to machinery or wages, for there are few men, probably ne man here, who would be taken in by such raw jests zs those” Well, if the working men are so intelligent in Scotland, how are the landowners? You find, in that country, that the science of farming is carried to a degree of perfaction which. is almost anknown in England. Yon find them with a climate not so kind and genial as ours, for thoy often fai] in gather ing in wheat when the farmers in. the south of England succeed ; they have land not naturally so fertile as ours, snd many are not so near a market to take off the whole of their produce as our farmers are; but we find there thab the landowners are intelligent enough to know that the monopolists themselves rarely thrive under the monopolies they are so fond of, und that it would be much better for them to be subjected to the same wholesome stimulus which persons in other pursuits feel, and which is alike beneficial to the people so engaged, and to those who purchase the articles they produce. . . . . Well, then, as to the middle classes of Scotland, I hold that the municipalities of Scot land represent the opinion of the middle classes. In Glas gow, Edinburgh, Perth, and other towns, we found thst the members of the eorporations were 2 true index 10 the opinion of the main body of the inhabitants of the bown in which it was situate. Now, in Glasgow, Edinburgh 23, —_ cer A ART WE, BRIGHT Tenn SUOTLANT, 255 Kirkealdy, Dundee, Perth, and Stirling, the highest honour 184 Which the municipal suthorities of these cities and towns Zr. 89. Can give, has heen conferged mpon that man who is in all Parts of the country, and thronghout the world, recognized % the impersonation of Free Trade principles, and of the Aati-Corn.- Law League. “Beotland, in former ages, was the cradle of liberty, civil ad religious. Seotland, now, is the boms of liberty ; and there are more men in Secctland, in proportion to its population, who are in favour of the rights of maa than there are Mm any other equal proportion of the population of this fountry, , , , I told them thai they were the people who should have repeal of the Union; for that, if they were oparate from England, they might have a government Wholly popular and intelligent, to & degree which I believe does not exist in any other ebuntry on the face of the earth. However, 1 believe they will be disposed to press us ou, 80d make us become more and more intelligent ; and we Nay yaceive benefit from our contact with them, even though, for some sges to come, our connexion with them Way be productive of evil to themselves.” In England, at least, it is certain that the amazing vigour aud resolution of the League were regarded with intense Bisfavour by great and important classes. The League was thoroughly out of fashion. It was regarded as violent, ®xtreme, and not respectable. A year before, it had usually been described as a selfish snd contemptible faction. By the end of 1842 things had become more gerions. The Rotorious pamphleteer of the Quarterly Review now de-Nounced the Leugue as the foulest and most dangerous Combination of recent times. The Times spoke of Cobden, Brighs, snd their allies as © capering mercenaries who go trigking abont the country:” os sattors of incendiary Raptpan: pe peripabetic orators puffing themselves into 250 LIFE QP JOBIEN. [HAE 1848. an easy popularity by second-hand arguments. They wer? Air, 38. constantly accused of retarding their own cause, and frightening away respectable people, by their violence Violence, as usual, denoted nothing more than that they knew their own minds, and pressed their convictions as i they were in earnest. In the earlier part of the auturm? there had been a furious turn-out of the operatives in the milly, and later on in the season ricks had been burnt in the midland and southern counties. The League, in spite of the fact that its leaders were nearly ‘all mill-owners, or cob” nected with manufactures, was secused of promoting these outrages. There were loud threats of criminal proceeding® against the obnoxious confederacy. It was rumoured oP the Manchester Exchange that the Government had resolved to put down the League as an association constituted against the law of the land. If necessary, a new law would be made to enable them to suppress a body so seditious. This heat in the minds of the ruling class made them anxious 8b almost any cost to destroy Cobden, who was now openly recognized as the foremost personage in the detested organization. This partly explains what now followed. The session of 1843 opened with the most painful incident in Cobden’s parliamentary life. It is well to preface 2B account of it, by mentioning an event that happened on the ave of the session. * Mr. Drummond, the private secretary of the Prime Minister, was shot in Parliament Street, and in a few days died from the wound. The assassin was Daniel M‘Naghten, a mechanic from Glasgow, who at the trial was acquitted on the ground of insanity. From something that he said to a police inspector in his cell, the belief gob nbroad that in firing at Mr. Drummond he supposed that he was dealing with Sir Robert Peel. The evidence at the irial showed even this to be very doubifal, and in any caso £11, SPEEOH ON LORD HOWIOK'S MOTION. 257 ho act wag simply that of a lunatic. But it shook Sir 1848, Robert, Peol’s nerves. He was known by those who were Zr. 39. Whmate with him to have a morbid sensibility to whatever was Physically painfal or horrible. It has always been “lieved that his distress at the circumstances of Mr. Drammongrg death was the secret of the scene with Cobden Which we have now to describe. Lord Howick on an early night in the session moved that the House should resolve itself into a committee to consider % Passage in the Queen’s speech, in which reference had been ade to the prevailing distress. The debate on the motion va 8 a great affair, and extended over five nights. It was a Yisonsgion worthy of the fame of the House of Commons—a %erious effort on the part of most of those who contributed % it, to shed some light on the difficulties in which the ®untry was involved. Cobden spoke on the last night of the debate (Feb. 17). He answered in his usual dexterous and "Qumentative way the statements of Lord Stanley, Mr. Hadstone, and other opponents of a repeal of the Corn Law, "2d then he proceeded to a fervent remonstrance with the Pring Minister. I quote some of the sentences which led % what followed: «If you (Sir Robert Peel) try any other *Medy than ours, what chance have you for mitigating the “ndition of the country? You took the Corn Laws into Your own hands after a fashion of your own, and amended thery according to your own views. You said that you were influenced in what you did by any pressure from without °% your judgment. You acted on your own judgment, and "ould follow no other, and you are responsible for the con-“quences of your act. You said that your object was to fing more employment for the increasing population. Who 0 likely, however, to tell you what markets could be exfended, a8 those who are engaged in carrying oun the trade 4 manufactures of the country ? . . - You passed the law, 1843. Ar. 39. 258 LIFE OF COBDAN. [omaf: you refused to listen to the manufacturers, and I throw 24 you all the responsibility of your own measure. . . The right hon. Baronet acted on his own judgment, and he ** bained the duty on the two articles on which a reduction of duty was desired, and he reduced the duties on those or which there was not a possibility of the change being of much service to the country. It was folly or ignoranc® (Oh! Oh!). Yes, it was folly or ignorance to amend 0% system of duties, and leave out of consideration sugar and corn. The reduction of the duties on drugs and such thing® was a proper task for some Under-Secretary of State, dealing with the sweepings of office, but it was unworthy of 897 Minister, and was devoid of any plan. It was one of the least useful changes that ever was proposed by any Gover™” ment. . . . It is his duty, he says, to judge independently’ and act without reference to any pressure; and I must tell the right hon. Baronet that i is the duty of every honest and independent member to hold him individually responsible fo the present position of the country. . . . I tell the right hoo gentleman that I, for one, care nothing for Whigs or Tories: I have said that I never will help to bring back the Whigs but I tell him that the whole responsibility of the Jamentab® and dangerous state of the country rests with him. 15 ill becomes him to throw that responsibility on any one at tH side. I say there never has been violence, tumult, or cot” fusion, except at periods when there has been an excessi’® want of employment, and a scarcity of the necessaries of Life The right hon. Baronet has the power in his hands to do #* he pleases.” When Cobden sat down, the Prime Minister rose t0 hié feet, with signs of strong agitation in his usually impassiv® bearing. “Sir,” he said, “the honourable gentleman ha8 stated bere very emphatically, what he has more than onc? stated at the conferences of the Anti-Corn-Law League, that RIL) SCENE WITH $i8 ROBERT PERL. 259 6 holds me individually—" Here the speaker was inberfupted by the intense excitement which his emphasis on the Zr. 39 Word, and the growing passion of his manner, had rapidly Produced among his audience. Individually responsible,” be resumed, © for the distress and suffering of the country; that he holds me personally responsible. But be the consequences of these insinuations What they may, never will I be fluenced by menaces, either in this House or out of this House, to adopt a course which I consider—”’ The rest of the sentence was lost in the shouts which now rose from all Parts of the House. Cobden at once got up, but to little Purpose, “I did not say,” he began, «that I hold the ¥ight hon. gentleman personally responsible.” Vehement tries arose on every side; Yes, yes ’—“ You did, you did #—t¢ Opder —* Chair.” «You did,” called out Sir Robert Pool, Cobden went on, “I have said that T hold the tight hon, gentleman respongible by virtue of his office, as the whole context of what I said was sufficient to explain.” The enraged denials and the confusion with which the Ministerial benches broke into his explanation, showed Cobden that it was hopeless for the moment to attempt to clear himself, ' Sir Robert Peel resumed by reiterating the tharge that Cobden had twice declared that he would hold the Minister individually responsible. This inauspicious beginning was the prelude of a strong and carefnl speech ; 8 strong a speech as could be made by a minister who was ot prepared to launch into the full tide of Cobden’s own policy * and had only doubtful arguments about practical 1843. * The peroration of this speech is an admirably eloquent comparison between the pacific views of Wellington and Soult —¢ men who have seen se Morning sun rise upon living masses of fiery warrjorg, so many of whom Were 10 be laid in the grave before that sun should set ”’-——and “ anonymons 14 irresponsible writers in the public journals, who are doing all they 633 fo eXasperate the differences that have prevailed ; and whose efforts werk Rot direated by geal for the national honour, bub employed for the base 1848. Ar. 39, R80 LIFE OF COBDEN. {cmap sonvenience to bring against the stringent pleas of logics! consistency. What astonishes us is that such a performance should have followed such a preface. Those who have written about Sir Robert Peel’s character have always beet accustomed to say that, though there was originally a vein of fiery temper in him, yet he had won perfect mastery over it; and his outburst against Cobden was the only occasion when he seemed to fall into the angry impetuosity thab was familiar enough on the lips of (’Connell, or Stanley, or Brougham. He was tauated before long by Mr. Disraeli with imitating anger as a tactical device, and taking the choleric gentleman for one of his many parts. Whether his display of emotion against Cobden was artificial or & genuine result of overstrung nerves, was disputed at the time, and it is disputed to this day by those who witnessed the scene. The display was undoubtedly convenient for the moment in damaging a very troublesome adversary. Lord John Russell, who spoke after the Minister, had no particular reason fo be anxious to defend so dubions # follower as Cobden, but his honourable spirit revolted against the unjust and insulting demeanour of the House. “Iam sure,” he said, “that for my own part, and I believe I can answer for most of those who sit round me, that the same sense was not attached to the honourable member for Stockport’s words, as has been attached by the right honourable Baronet and honourable members opposite.” When Lord John Russell had finished = speech that practically wound up the debate, Cobden returned to his explanation, and amid some interruptions from the opposite benches, a8 well as from the Speaker on a point of order, again insisted bhat he had intended to throw the responsibility of the Minister's measures upon him as the head of the Governpurposes of encouraging national anira #ity, or promoting personal or party mtarest.” SCENE V™™1T “17 ROBERT PEEL. 261 Dent, In using the word individually,” he used if as the 1848, Minister himself used the personal pronoun when he said nr. 89. “I passed the tari,” I treat him,” Cobden concluded, “a8 the Government, as he is in the habit of treating him-Reif»? Very stiffiy Peel accepted the explanation. “I am bound to accept the construction which the “onourable member buts upon the language he emplry~” He used the word individually’ in so marked & w~y, that I and others put Won it a different explanation. He supposes the word ‘individually ? to menn public responsibility in the situation 1 hold, and I admit it ab once. I thought the words he ®mployed, <I hold you individually responsible,” might have an effect, which I think many other gentlemen who heard them might anticipate.” The sitting was not to end without an assault on Cobden from a different quarter. Sir Robert Peel had no sooner Becepted one explanation, than Mr. Roebuck made a state-Went that demsnded another. He taxed Cobden with faving spoken of Lord Brougham as a maniac; with having threatenod his own seat at Bath; and with having tolerated the use of such reprehensible and dangerous language by Wemhbers of the League, as justified Lord Brougham’s ®xhortation to all friends of Corn Law Reform to separate themselves from such evil advisers. This incident sprang fom some words which Brougham had used in the House of Lords a week before. They are a fine example of par-Yamentary monthing, and of that cheap courage which Consists in thundering against the indiscretions of sn un-Popular friend, If anything could retard the progress of the doctrines of the League, he had said, “it would be the ®Xaggeratod statements and violence of some of those con-Bected with their body—the means adopted by them at some of their meetings to excite—happily they have not much suc. 262 LIFE OF COBDEN, ad 1848. ceeded-—to excite discontent and breakings-out into violent x. 39. in different parts of the country; and, above all, I cannot discharge my duty to your Lordships and to my own con” science, if I do not express the utter abhorrence and disgust with which T have noted some men—men clothed with sacred functions, though 1 trust unconnected with the League, who have actully in this very metropolis of # British and Christian community, and in the middle of the nineteenth century of the gospel of grace and peace, nob scrupled to utter words to which I will not at present more particularly allude, but which I abhor, detest, and scorn, 8° being calculated to produce fatal effects—I will not 887 have produced them-—but calculated to produce the taking away of innocent life.” } Cobden, as we might expect, had spoken freely of this rebuke as the result of a reckless intellect and a malignant spirit, or words to that effect.’ Nobody can think that Mr Roebuck had chosen his moment very chivalrously. Ever now, when time and death are throwing the veil of kindly oblivion over the struggle, we read with some satisfactio? the denunciation by Mr. Bright, of the Brummage™ Brougham, who, when the whole Ministerial side of the House was yelling at the man who stood there, the very impersonation of justice to the people, stood forward and dared to throw his puny dart at Richard Cobden.” Ther is hardly an instance which illustrates more painfully tho ungenerous, the unsparing, the fierce treatment for which man must be prepared who enters public life in the Hous? of Commons. The sentiment of the House itself was agains? Cobden. It always is more or less secretly against anyon’ of its members who is known to have a serious influenc s Mr, ight Mi. Begs ek che mat fe somtpondns, 7, 1 1. (Bab, 16-34) oth sides is ws pithy aa might be ox 17.1 MR. ROBBOCK'S ATTACK. 263 otside, and to be raising the public opinion of constituencies to an inconveniently strong pitch. Cobden. was scarcely wllowed to explain what he had really said to Mr. Roebuck. It was simply this :— If you justify Lord Brougham in this attack on the ministers who attend the conference of the Anti-Corn Law League, you will get into trouble at Bath, and you will be considered the opponent of that body, and you will have your Anti-Corn-Law tea parties, and some embers of the League visiting Bath. So far from wishing bo see Mr. Roebuck out of Parliament,” Cobden concluded, “he is the last man I should wish to see removed from the seat which he now holds.” 1843. “siz. 39. Cobden’s own remarks on this unhappy evening are better than any that an outsider can offer. To his brother Frederick he wrote as follows :— “The affair of last Friday seems to be working more and more to our advantage. It has been the talk of everybody here, from the young lady on the throne, down to the back-parlour visitors of every pot-house in the metro-Polis, And the result seems to be a pretty general notion that Peel has made a great fool of himself, if not something Worse. He is obliged now to assume that he was in earnest, for no man likes to confess himself a hypocrite, and to put Up with the ridicule of his own party in private as a coward. Lord —— was joking with Ricardo in the House the Other night about him; pointing towards Peel as he wag leaning forward, he whispered, ‘ There, the fellow is afraid Somebody is taking aim at him from the gallery.” Then the pack at his back are not very well gatisfied with them-Selves at having been so palpably dragged through the mud b him, for they had evidently not considered that I was threatening him. Indeed the fact of their having called for Bankes to spesk after I sab down, and whilst Peel was 264 LIFE OF (CUBDEN. ToHAT 1843. on his legs, clearly showed (and they cannot escape from the wr.39, unpleasant reflection) that they were unconscious of 82Y grievance being felt by the latter, and that they considered the personality to refer to the former. They now feel the selves convicted of having taken the cue from Peel and joined en masse (without a conviction in their own minds sanction the course they took), in hunting me down as 82 assassin, They will hear more of it. But the best parb of the whole affair is that everybody of every shade of politic® has read my speech carefully, in order to be able to judg? of Peel’s grounds of attack upon me. The consequence is that all the Tories of Oxford, as I learn, have been criticizing every word of it, and the result, I am told, is unfavourable to Peel. . . . He is looking twenty per cent. worse since I came into the House, and if I had orly Bright with m% we could worry him out of office before the close of the session.’ “The thing is on its last legs. The wholesale admissions of our principles by the Government must prove destructive bo the system in no very long time. The whole matter turn? upon the possibility of their finding a man fo fill the office of executioner for them, and when Peel bolts or betrays ther the game is up. It is this conviction in my mind which ipduced me after some deliberation to throw the responsibility upon Peel, and he is not only alarmed at it, but indiscreet enough to let everybody know that he is so. . . . Our meet” ing last night was a wonderful exhibition. In the course of a couple of months we will have entire possession of th metropolis. Nothing will alarm Peel so much as e* hibitions of strength and feeling at his own door. I a2 7 Mr. Bright, as it happened, was returned to Parliament before the end of the session. He contested Durham in April, 1843, and was beaten by Lord Dungsnnon. The new member was unseated on petition, on the ground of bribery. bir. Bright again offered himself, and was elected (July, 1343). te FEELING IN THE COUNTRY. 265 Overdone from all parts with letters and congratulations, bw and ean hardly find time to say a word to my friends.” ® &r, 39 The enemies of the League made the most of what had happened, They spoke of Cobden as politically ruined, “nd ruined beyond retrieval. Brougham, with hollow pity, Wrote shout the © downfall of poor Mr. Cobden.” It soon Wppeared that there was another side to the matter. Meetings were held to protest against the treatment which Cobden had received from the Minister and the House ; SYmpathetic addresses were sent to him from half the towns W England, and ell the towns in Scotland ; and for many Wecks afterwards, whenever he appeared in a public “88embly, he was greeted with such acclamations as had Seldom been heard in public assemblies before. We may believe that Cobden was perfectly sincere when he said % one of his friends :— I dislike this personal matter for any good reasons, public and private. We must 0id any of this individual glorification in the future. Yy forte is simplicity of action, hard working behind the Scenes, and common sense in council; but I have Reither taste nor aptitude for these public displays.” * At Manchester some eight thonsand men and women Wet to hear stirring speeches on the recent affair. Mr. Brighs moved s resolution, for an address to Cobden, in Words that glow with noble and energetic passion, while they keep clear of hero-worship. “I do not stand up,” be said, «to flatter the member for Stockport. I believe big 4 be 4 very intelligent and very honest man; 1 believe that ho wil) ach with a single eye to the good of his country ; ! believe that he is firmly convinced of the truth of the Beat principles of which he is so distinguished an advocate.” 8 To F. Oobdon, Fah, 88, 1842, » To E. Busnes, March 8, 1848. 266 Lig SF OOBDEN. joBaF IB. It was in reply to this address from Manchester, that &r. 39. Cobden wrote a letter to Sir Thomas Potter, with which we may close a very disagreeable episode :— “TI have just received an address signed by upwards o 31,000 inhabitants of Manchester, declaring their approve of my public conduct as an advocate of the principle of commercial freedom, and their indignation at a late atten’ to give a perverted and hateful meaning to my languag® i» Parliament. Allow me through you, who have done me the honour to place your name at the head of the list signatures, to convey to your fellow-townsmen the expro’” sion of my heartfelt gratitude for this manifestation of thet sympathy and confidence. “ Whilst I unfeignedly profess my unworthiness to recei?® such & flattering and unexpected testimonial in reward for my public services generally, I should feel degraded indeed if I could not conscientiously accept the prompt repudiatio® of the conduct imputed to me on a recent occasion. Nay I should feel it to be derogatory from my character 88 8 man and a Christian, that my countrymen should com™’ forward to repel the misinterpretation which has bee” given to my words, were it not necessary ou public ground? to prevent the First Minister of the Crown from evading ander any misconstruction of language, his responsibility for the alarming consequences of the measures of is Government—a responsibility not to the hand of the assa® gin, but a constitutional and moral responsibility which has been defined in the language of Edmund Burke * Where I speak of responsibility, I do not mean to exclud® that species of it which the legal powers of the country have a right finally to exact from those who abuse & publi‘ trust : but high as this is, there is a responsibility which attaches on them, from which the whole legitimate power of this kingdom cannot absolve them. Thera is a respons” i, } REPLY TO THE MANCHESIEE ADDRESS. 207 bility to conscience and to glory, & responsibility to the wa ®Xisting world, and to that posterity which men of their 23% *Minence cannot avoid for glory or for ghame—a responsibility to g tribunal ab which not only ministers, but kings tnd parliaments, but even nations themselves, must one day angwer?! “ Never at any period of our history did this constibutional and moral responsibility attach more strongly to a Minister than at the present moment, when the country is Struggling, amidst distress and embarrassment the most alarming, against a system of monopoly which threatens the ruin of our manufactures and commerce. That this System, with its disastrous consequences of a declining trade, & sinking revenue, increasing pauperism, and a growing disaffection in the people, owes its continuance to the Support of the present Prime Minister more than to that of his entire party, few persons who have had the opportunity of observing the manner in which he individualizes in his Own person the powers of government, will deny. “That the withdrawal of his support from this pernicious System wonld do more at the present moment than all the efforts of the friends of Free Trade to offect the downfall of monopoly has been proclaimed upon high authority from his own side of the House. If the right hon. Baronet,’ said Mr, Liddell, member for North Durham, in the debate, Fob, 3, chad shown any symptoms of wavering in the Support of the Corn Law, which he had himself put upon 8 sound footing last year, uch conduct would have been Productive of » hundred times more mischief than all the denunciations of the Anti-Corn-Law League! With such ®Vidences of the power possessed by the First Minister of the Crown, I should have been an unworthy representative of the people, and a traitor fo the suffering interests of my ' These are the closing words of the Third Latter on a Regivide Peace. 268 LIFE . . OOBDEN, Tuas 1848. constituents, had I failed in my daty of reminding him o Ar. 89. his accountability for the proper exercise of his power. “Sanctioned and sustained as I have been by the approving voice of the inhabitants of Manchester, and of my countrymen generally, I shall go forward undeterred bY the arts or the violence of my opponents, in that course © which a conscientious sense of public duty impels me; and whilst studiously avoiding every ground of personal irritd” bion—for our cause is too vast in its objects, and too good and too strong in its principles, to be made a mere topic of personal altercation—I shall never shrink from declarin§ in my place in Parliament the constitutional doctrine of the inalienable responsibility of the First Minister of the Crows for the measures of his Government > A few days after the scene in the House of Commons, the first of those great meetings was held, which eventually turned opinion in London in good earnest to the view? of the League. The Crown and Anchor and the Free masons’ Tavern had become too small to hold the audiences: Drury Lane Theatre was hired, and here seven meocting® wore held between the beginning of March and the be ginning of May. The crowds who thronged the theatr® were not always the same in keenness and energy of per ception, but their numbers never fell short, and their enthusiasm grew more intense as they gradually mastered the case, and became better acquainted with the persons and characters of the prominent speakers. In the following letter to his brother, Cobden hints at the special advantage which he expected from these gatherings :— “There is but one of their lies,” he says, referring to the gossip of the Tories, “that I should care to make them prove; that is that our business is worth 10,0001, a year | 2 To Bir Thomos Potisr, Marok 1, 1843, ar] WEETINGS AY DRURY I. NH. 264 By the way, it is & wholesome sign thet my middle-class 184% Popularity seems rather to be increased by my avowal Ar 39. of Dy origin; and for the first time probably a man is Served by that aristocratic class, who owes nothing to birth, Parentage, patronage, connexions, or education. Don’t listen to the nonsense shout our being prosecuted. The enemy hag hipng his fingers already by meddling with the Leaguers. Wait, till we have held two or three weekly meetings in Drury Lane Theatre, and you will see that we are not the Ten to he put to the ordeal of a middle-class jury. Our Wetropolitan gatherings are bonh-fide demonstrations of Sarnest energetic men of the shop-keeping class, a large Proportion under thirty years of age. There is this advantage from a middle-class movement in London, that it always %arries with it the working men, who are all intermingled by their occupation with the class above them more com-Pletely than in any other large town. I observe what you Say about the spirit of our Manchester Tories. The base-1958 of that party exceeds anything since the time of the old Egyptian worshippers of Bulls and Beetles. But depend Upon it, the hostility to the League is confined pretty much %o the leaders, and you will see when a general election turns Upon the Corn Laws (and we must have a dissolution upon the Question before setiling it), that the rank and file of fe Party, the shopkeepers and owners of small cottage Property, will either desert the Tory masters, or fold their “Is ang refuse to go into action ab their bidding. But Our Salvation will come from the rural districts, The mers are already half alienated from the landlords, and & Schism will widen every rent-day. Araidst the deluge of lottery that I have received since the Peel blunder, IN 10s of commune tions from farmers. My declaration bat 1 4m a farmer's son, seems to have told as I ex-Poetd) nna it is a point of too much importance not 3 "ey Ld OF OOBDFEN. FRAP 1848. to be made the most of, even at the risk of being Ar, 89. egotistical”? “The meeting at Taunton was a boné-fide farmers gathering from all parts of the division of Somerset, and there was but one opinion in the town amongst all partie? who attended the market, that the game of the ¢ politics landlords’ is all up. I find our case upon agricultw grounds far stronger and easier than in relation to the trading interests. Now, depend upon it, it will be. just 2° we have often predicted, the agricultural distriets of £ho south will carry our question. They are as a community in every respect, whether as regards intelligence, morality’ politics, or public spirit, superior to the folks that surround you in Lancashire. I intend to hold county meetings every Saturday after Easter.”* The year 1843 was famous for a great agitation in each of the three kingdoms. O’Connell was rousing Ireland bY the cry of Repeal. Scotland was kindled to one of its most passionate movements of enthusiasm by the outgoing of Chalmers and his brethren from the Estabhshment. In Bngland the League against the Corn Law was rapid'y growing in flood and volume. If ever the natural history of agitations is taken in hand, it will be instructive to compar he different methods of these three movements, two of which succeeded, while the third failed. Cobden never disdained large popular meetings, to be sounted by thousands. These gatherings of great multitud®® were useful, not merely because they were likely to stir ? certain interest more or less durable in those who attended them, but also because they impressed the Protection’ party with the force and numbers that were being arrayed ! To F. Cobden, March 11, 1843, f To F. Cobden, Avril 10, 1843, fn] AGITATION IN THE COUNTIES. 271 "Bhinsg them. But he did not cverrate either their signi- 1848. ficance or their value. Chalmers, in his great work of Zr 89 "organizing the broken Church, always expressed strong distaste for large meetings, compared with small conferences attended by none but those who could be persuaded to do What he commended. He wanted, he nsed to say, not the ®Xcitoment of emotion, bub the sturdiness and endurance of 800d working principles. It was the same kind of feeling Which made Cobden always look back with peculiar sabisfaction to his share in the education of the farmers in sound Sonomic principles by dialectical disputes from waggons, wud close debate over the beef and ale at market ordinaries. The Teague had shown the evil effects of the Corn Law pon operatives, shopkeepers, manufacturers, and merchants. They now turned to another quarter, and set to work to Prove that the same law inflicted still greater injuries upon the tenant farmers and the labourers. The towns were already convinced, and the time was a good one for an inva-Sion of the agricultural districts. The farmers were getting lo prices. They were disgusted at the concessions to Free Trade which had been made in the budget, especially in the article of meat. They suspected their parliamentary friends of trickery, and a selfish deference to a plausible Minister. The meetings in the counties were highly successful for their immediate purpose, and they are full of interest to look back upon. They are, perhaps, the most striking and original feature in the whole agitation. There was true political Sourage and profound faith, in the idea of awakening the 0st torpid portion of the community, not by any appeal to Passion, but by hard argumentative debate. It was generally accepted that the controversy was one to be Settled by arguments and not by force. Sir George Lewis 3d thay if the proposal had been to annihilate rents instead of reducing them, the Protectionists would as certainly have 2% 2 LIFE OF COBDEN, fomar: 1843. gone from words to blows, as the American slaveholder® ar. 89. afterwards did when their peculiar institution was touched: One reason why ine shock, when it came, was accepted without disorder, was that the League had succeeded it thoroughly loosening, if not in overthrowing, the prejudices of those who expected to be immediately ruined by the change The discussion was usually conducted in a fair and manly spirit on both sides. The speakers for the League told their hearers that they did not wish to say anything personally offensive to anybody ; that they were simply anxious that what was true on the subject of protection should be discovered; and that they gave the gentlemen in the opposition waggo? credit for anxiety to do the same thing. As a rule, thing? were conducted with order and good temper. Land agents valuers, and auctioneers were angrier disputants than either farmers or squires. At Dorchester there was an attempt fo storm the hustings, but the Leaguers were prepared, and a stout party of their friends, aided by the labourers, repulsed the attack. At Canterbury, where the canse of protection was advocated oddly enough by Mr. G. P. R. James, the renowned novelist, one or two corn-factors insulted Cobden and Mr. Bright, and there was some uplifting of sticks: There were occasional threats of violence, tossing in 2 blanket, and so forth, beforehand. But when the time came: all passed off peaceably. Farmers who were afraid of attending meetings in their own immediate district, used to travel thirty or forty miles to places where they could listen to the speakers without being known. Enemies came to the meetings, and begat bo take notes in a very confident spirit, but as the arguments became too strong for them, the pencil was laid aside. and 3 When a visit from Mr. Bright was announced at Alnwick, the Newcastl Journal had & most brutal paragraph to the effect that some stalwsvt yeoman should take the matter into his hada, te] OALIPAIGN IN THE COUNTINS, . 273 the paper was torn up. At Norwich, the leading yeoman of the county pat a number of questions to Cobden, which Were go neatly and conclusively answered, that the farmers ho were listening to the controversy burst ouf into loud "pplause, The terse sentences in which Cobden condensed bis matter carried conviction home. Though it was im-Possible for him to invent mew arguments or discover Unfamiliar facts every dsy, yet even those who were best S%quainted with the facts and the arguments, were struck 8 every meeting by his power of selecting and concentrating the important points, with a conversational strength tha brought every word within the easy comprehension of the most careless listener. Antagonists were sometimes “bute, but were often stupid even to impenetrability. 1% one place, a clergyman firmly contended that scarcity bad nothing to do with dearness. In that case, Mr. Bright "plied, he need not be afraid of repeal, for of course on bis Principles abundance csuld not produce cheapness. At Hertford the Shire Hall was so crowded, that the Meeting was held in the open air. The multitude was Mainly composed of farmers, and on the skirts of the mul-Mtnde some of the most important squires in the county %t on horseback to hear the discussion. Cobden spoke for wo hours, and obtained a sympathetic hearing by his an-Youncement that he wae the son of a Sussex farmer, that he tag kept his father’s sheep, and had seen the misery of a *ont-day, Tt was ab this meeting at Hertford that he first "et Mr. Lattimore, the well-known farmer of Wheathamp-“ead, to whom he was in the subsequent course of the “Ovement, greatly indebted for agricultural facts bearing 0 Frog Trade * 184%, Ap. 30, to. . nt ta have not forgotten the trouble you took fo iustroob me in the o Cultura) view of the question; how you visited me in. London for that PUSS, 1 reoolicct after making my apeech in the House on the agri- 274 Lift OF COBDEN, FomAR. 1843. At Aylesbury, which was the stronghold of the Duke of Hr. 39, Buckingham, after his address, Cobden was confronted by # long list of guestions from an anonymous inquirer, Would not Free Trade lower the price of corn and the means of employing labour, from thirty to fifty per cent.? Did the members of the League think the existing price of the yuartern loaf, which was then fivepence, too high for eithe” producer or consumer? Cobden answered them with bi asual dexterity, and wound up with the crucial questio® on his own part; namely, in what way farmers and farm” labourers had profited by the Corn Laws since 18157 A resolution approving of the principles of Free Trade wa then put and carried with a few dissentients—so fow, thal Lord Nugent, who was in the chair, said they were aboub a8 many as would have held up their hands in favour of Free Trade five and twenty years before. At Uxbridg® the farmers who usually attended the corn-market, invited Cobden. to explain his views fo them. The arrangement? for the meeting were left entirely in their own hands. The tickets of admission were issued by the farmers, and dis posed of by them ; the county was ransacked for supporters of monopoly, and the discomfiture of the prophet of the League was confidently predicted. The audience was more sxclusively composed of farmers than any that had yeb been held. When the time came, four gentlemen, on after another, advocated the cause of monopoly as ably as they could, and the discussion between them on the on hand. and Cobden and Josenh Hume on the other lasted sultural view of the Free Trade question—the moat successful speech I over made—that several county members asked me where my land lay, thinking { must be an experienced proprietor and farmer. I told them I did not 0W2 sn acre, but that I owed my knowledge to the best farmer of my acquaint” tence, which I have always considered you to be.” —Cobden to R. Lattimor® April 20, 1864. The speech referred to as the most successful he ever rade | presume to be that of March 18. 1843. No. xv. in the collected wneechot. te) OAMT Corn El, 295 a our Bon and a half. Tu the end, the arguments of blo Traders were Vic to be so absolutely unanswertopos] at a resolution in favour of total and immediate uel, — carried hy five to one. The circumstances were Vhong a same, snd the result was the same at Lincoln, Thun obden was eccompsmied by Mr. Bright. Af Hottp” the church bells were rung, flags with free-trade insisog were hung from the windows, snd a brass band fo th on sucompanying the deputation from the railway Moore place of meeting. Cobden, Mr. Bright, and Mr. Nine oe listened to with unwearied attention for with g an four hours. The farmers listened at first Yigg oubt and suspicion. Gradually their faces cleared, in ction began to warm them, and at last such an of Phen had been made, that eight hundred farmers out tote) Tseting of twelve hundred persons, voted in favour of and immediate repesl. Bedford Cobden had not a single friend or acquaintby : He had simply sunounced as extensively as he could Tho gos that he meant to visit the town on a given day. dwg had been canvassed far and wide to attend to put The he representatives from the Anti-Corn-Law League. hag ssembly Rooms could nob hold half the persons who side oe together, and they adjourned to a large field ont-Sug e town. Three waggons were provided to serve as Cobges but the monopolist party rudely seized them, and Lord had to wait while a fourth waggon Was procured. The harles Russell presided, snd the disenssion began. WO went on from three o’clock in the afternoon. tui nine o’clock in the evening, in spite of heavy showers of but i, o first Cobden wes listened to with some impatience, ing © warmed to Le subject, and began to deliver telltnd of illustration and srgument, the impression lv suroad that he was right. The chairman Was 1848. Ar 38. 28 LIFE % JOBDEN. Poms? 1848. unwillingly obliged to declare that en amendment in favou® of ir, 39. Free Trade was carried by a large majority. “We fought a hard battle at Bedford,” Cobden writ®® bo his brother, © against brutish squires and bull-frogs, buf sarried it two to ono, contrary to the expectations of every man in the county. Lord Charles Russell is the man WE opposed even his brother John’s fixed duty, declaring ab she time that it was to throw two millions of acres oub of cultivation. After Bedford, we can win anywhere ; and 1 is giving great moral power to my movements in the rus) districts to be always successful. The aristocracy #%° becoming savage and alarmed at the war going on in thelr wn camp.’ “On Satorday next,” he continues, “I shall be at By® where there will be a grand muster from all the eastern part of our county and from parts of Kent. These county meetings are becoming provekingly interesting and afr sractive, so far as the landlords are affected. They begi® bo feel the necessity of showing fight, and yet when theJ do come out to meet me, thoy are sure to be beaten O% their own daaghill. The question of protection is now #° open one at all the market tables in the counties where 1 have been, and the discussion of the question cannot fail 1 1ave the right issue.”? This discussion sometimes broke down for lack of repr” sentatives of the opposite cause :— “ Our meeting at Rye was a very tame affair for want of any open spirit of opposition. The audience was almost 3 quiet as a flock of their own Southdowns, I fear the squire? and parsons will give up the old game of oppositics, and fry to keep the farmers away, However, we have sown the seeds in the South of Hngland which nothing will eradicat® ? Tp BT. Cobden, London, True §, 1943, 8 Magiriare Sole, Jene . 1443. tu) oARY TEN ER 27 SATITIES, 77 Wherever T go, I make the Corn question sn open question 1843. all the market tables. And everywhere ars strong-headed Zr. 89. en who teke up our cause. Ab Winchester I found many Wtelligent farmers. Mr. M., who moved the Free Trade resolution, is, with his brother, the largest occupier in the tounty, A very quiet man, bighly respected : his very ame a passport. A Mr. EH. was ab the meeting, who rents 3000 acres. After hearing our statements, he remarked, "These facts and arguments are quite unanswerable, Xvery Word ig ype??? At Penenden Heath (June 29), three thousand of the men of Bent assembled to hesr @ close argumentative debate between Cobden and @ local landowner. Two days later there wag an open-air meeting ab Guildford, where Cobden Stated his case, tided over interruptions, and met objections from all comers for several hours. We need not further Prolong the history f this summers campaign. Hereforg, Lewes, Croydon, Bristol, Salisbury,’ Canterbury, and Reading, were all visited before the end of the session bY Cobden snd 7 =~ °°’ or some other coadjutor. ban of them, r. . groab variety of illustrations, and With a constantly tnerc>="n. atock of facts, he pinned hi opponents to the § ~~ -low, When, or where, have farmers and farm labourers benefited by the Corn Law? His greatest victory was ab Colchester, the chief town of * county which kept its parliamentary representation unfullieq by a sinole “Liberal. The whole district had been : To P. W. Qobden, London, July 20, 1843. I wag ap Salisbury, on sovond visit later in the year, thet Cobden fru keported to have pointed to the cathedral and aid: “He thought the vost thing thet could happen would be to see that huge monster turned into % Eo od factory.» Even his foes admitted that this story was & gross fabricabow, ys it wag often revived sgninss him in the days of tho Crimesn War. probably gore cme gaid that this was what he wag capable of saying 2 Wy by wellknown mybhoucein processed, it Was boliaved that he sotually NE gpict 3a yi 8 LIFE « COBDEN. rgHAE 1843. astir with angry ezpectation for many days; the dra? Ar. 39. ecclesiastic had been vigorously besten all over the county Sir John Tyrrell, at this tirne one of the dovghtiest follower of Peel, promised or threatened to attend; passions waxed very high; special constables were sworn in; and the violent and the timid alike declared that the agitator would find themselves in no small bodily peril. Husting® were erected in a large field, nod when the dey ca™ several thousands of people assembled from all parts of the county. At the appointed honr Cobden and Charle? Villiers were at their posts, and they were soon followed PJ Sir John Tyrrell and Mr. Ferrand. Then the journament began. The battle raged for six hours, and the Leag™ shampions achieved a striking victory. The amendment u his resolution was pn fo utter rout, and when night fell, Si John Tyrrell was found to have silently vanished. Ab 0P° point in the controversy, he had irrelevantly defied Cobd®® to do further battle with him at Chelmsford. Cobde” instantly took up the glove, and on the appointed day ¥ Chelmsford he went. Sir John, however, had already hed snough of an unequal match, and Cobden carried on the controversy in the usual way and with his usual success. “ Will these repeated discomfitures,” cried the Morni®d Post, “induce the landowners of England to open their eye’ to the dangers that beset them? What may be the cans®® of Mr. Cobden’s success? The primary cause is assuredly that which conduces to the success of Sir Robert Peel Why, indeed, if parliamentary landowners deem it honest and wise to support the author of the Tariff and the ne% Corn Law, should not the tenant farmers of England sup” port Sir Robert Peel's principles when enunciated by Mr Cobden? With what pretensions to consistency could Sir John Tyrrell oppose Mr. Cobden on the hustings ab Col chester, after having supported all the Free Trade measure? x} COBDEN 8 PURITION. 2970 that had made the session of 1842 infamous in the annals of our legislation? . . . Mr. Cobden’s speech is by no means Wanswerghle, But Sir John Tyrrell assuredly wade no Stberapt to answer it. Ho uttered some things not devoid of shrewdness, but they bore as slight reference to the fallacies on which Mr. Cobden traded, as they did to the f alse doctrines of the Koran. It is not, we fear, by such men as the present race of the parliamentary landowners that the deadly progress of the League is to be arrested.” Mr. Bright once said at a public meeting,’ that people had talked much more than was pleasant to him about his friend Cobden and himself, and he would tell them that in the Council were many whose names were never before the Public, and yot whe deserved the highest praise. He was Sorry that it should for a moment be supposed, that they "ho were more prominently before the public, and who were but two or three, should be considered the most praiseworthy, Nor was he singular. Cobden took every opportunity quietly and modestly of saying the same thing, The applause of multitudes never inflated him into a demagogue, “it was truly observed, any more than the atmosphere of Parliament and of London society ever depressed him into ®onventionality.! I cannot find a trace or & word in the ost private correspondence, betraying on the part of any Prominent actor in the League a symptom of potty or '8uoble egotisa. They were 500 much in earnest. Never OR a scene where the temptations to vanity were so many, was vanity so entirely absent. Cobden’s incessant activity, his dialectical skill, the + October, 184, had ao wero subject to great tempbations in London, il those he bo een behind the scones little knew the perils and dangers they 80 through, It was very difficalt for a man, hosrever clothed jn the ply of prineipls, to go through the ordeal of a London season, withou! nt i dy con; of mail perforated from ons auarter or another.’ —Cobden, “under.Lyne. January, 1843. 1848. Ar. 89, 1843. Rr. 80. 250 LIFE (7 OORDEN. [oms? scandal of the recent scene in the House, and perhaps tbe fact that he was a meraber of the House, all contributed to make his position at this time conspicuous and unique, bat his simplicity of spirit filled men with an affection and lov for him, which made his success their own. As a speake™ nobody knew better than he did the more stately geni®® of his chief friend and ally. He once told an audience ab Rochdale that at this time, for reasons which they would be at no loss to guess, he always stipulated that Mr. Bright should let him speak first. From Winchester Mr. Bright wrote to him, that they had promised faithfully that B¢ should attend the meeting, and that if the train failed bring him, they should run the country. If Cobden’s name was mentioned at a meeting, the audience would rise and give three times three for the member for Stockport, th riend of the people. At Manchester, an immense gathering assembled to present an address to him, formally describin8 him as the leader of the movement; and the cheers gre¥ more enthusiastic when a letter from Lord Ducie was red declaring that there was no man alive to whom the country was more indebted than to Richard Cobden. In the sam? way the men on the other side singled him out for special vituperation ; and people who had never seen a print-work? in their lives, excited agricultural audiences by assertit8 that Cobden was making enormous wealth at the expense of the strength, the happiness, the limbs, and the very 1ives of little children. . As ho said afterwards, Cobden lived at this time in publi meetings. Along with the county meetings, there was OF some time a weekly gathering at the Commercial Rooms in Threadneedle Street, where the League speakers reiterated their arguments to crowded audiences of merchants and bankers, There were the enthusiastic assemblies at Drury Lane and afterwards at Covent Garden, in which the I ELLY COBDEN'S POSITION. 2% forest of the London public was so great that the report of them doubled and trebled the ordinary sale of the news-Papers on the following morning. Besides all this, Cobden Mitended to everything that in any way concerned his own Breat subject in the House of Commons. There his position by this time had become really formidable to the Minister. His complete knowledge of every aspect of the cage, his tenacity, his skill in debate, and the immense influence Which if was perceived that he was acquiring out of doors, had brought him to a front place; and the man who in Feb-*Uary had been spoken of as politically ruined, was by August ®Xercising a pressure on the mind of Sir Robert Peel, as Strong on the one side, as the pressure of a whole group of "Msurgent dukes on. the other. The serious subjects of discussion in Parliament were all related to the social condition of the people, and men noticed Bow af one point or another they all touched the question of Free Trade, The Government brought in their famous measure of national education, as we shall afterwards see. The Leagne, though not formally opposed to the measure, pointed out the folly of first by the Corn Law taxing the people into poverty, 0d then taxing the impoverished to pay for the instruction of the starving. Charles Buller pressed his scheme of statebded emigration The League retorted that if the Corn 18438. Fr. 39. * In his speech, Buller reproached Cobden w7ith condescending to practise ™ the ignorance of his audience by resort to stale theatrics! clap-trap, which Must have been suggested to him by the genius of Drury Lane—where he "a5 speaking, Ag this particular passage hes been much applanded by Sobdenty sdmirers, both abroad end at home, I venture to reproduce it: Did the men who signed that memorial ever go down fo St. Catherine's Docks, and gee an emigration ship about to start on its voysge ? Had they Som hogs poor emigrants sitting 4ill the moment of departure on the stoned f the quay, ag if they would cling to the last to the lund of their birth? they need not inquire what were their feelings ; they would read their arts in their faces, Had they ever seen them taking leave of their Criondy p He hed watched euch scenes over and over again, He had seam ® Yonerable woman, taking lewve of ber grandchildron, snd be had meen a Lo + ~ ITT OOBDNN, fons? 1843. Law were repealed, there would be no need for emigratio™ ir. 39. A Free Trader moved for a committee to inquire into tho burdens and exemptions peculiar to the landed interest. A county member proposed an amendment that the Hous? should direct its attention to Associations which, in matber® affecting agriculture and commerce, pretended to influence the Legislature, and which by their combination and proceeding® were dangerous to the public peace and inconsistent with the spirit of the constitution, Cobden retaliated with # vigorous account of the state of the labourers on the county member’s own estates, and by the telling fact that in the! very county of Dorset one out of every seven of the popul#” bion was a pauper. On the occasion of Mr, Villiers’s annus) motion for a committee to cousider the duties on foreig® corn with a view to their immediate abolition, Cobden made one of the most spirited of his speeches on a subject on which it appeared that everything had been said.® It was circulated by hundreds of thousands of copies, and produced a great affect upon opinion. The Government introduced a bill ff the repeal of the restrictions on the export of machinery Cobden supported the removal of this last prohibition on the Statute book. Later in the Session, he made a vigorod attack on the Sugar-duties, and the policy of giving a pre ference to the produce of the British colonies, when the colonies contributed nothing to the revenue, and burdened struggle between the mother and the grandmother to retain possession of shild. As these emigrant-vessels departed from the Mersey to the United States, the eyes of all on deck were directed back to the port whenoe they hed started, and the last objects which met their gaze, as their native Jan receded from their view, were the tall bonding-houses of Liverpool, wher? nnder the lock—he was going to say the Queen's lock, but under the look of the aristocracy—were shut up some hundreds of thousands of barrels of the finest flour of America~—the only object that these unhappy wanderer were going in quest of.” Hie friends, he wag told, did not know he had #0 mnch sentiment and eloquence in him, i No. 17. in the oollected speeches ye a.) GQUARTIONS IN TARLIAM ENT. 203% "8 With civil and military expenses. The whole colonial trade “mounted only to 10,000 "001. & year, and to maintain this, 5,000,0001. were spent hy the mother country. The West Indian sugar-grower was the natural ally of the British corngrower,’ and with equal zeal the Protectionist organs took Up both causes against Cobden’s penetrating attacks. These organs persisted in reproaching their party in the two Houses with weakness in defonce of the sacred cause. There wags disunion and went of confidence throughout the 1848. Ap. 85, * The following extract from one of Cebden’s gpeaches at Covent Garden tates hig argument, and is a characteristic illustration of his style :— “Now, what is the pretence for monopoly in sugar? They cannot say that it benefits the revenue; neither is it jutended to benefit the farmer in England, or the negro in the West Indies. What, then, is the pretence seb UP? Why, that we russ not buy slave-grown gugsar! I believe that the ¥mbnsgador from the Brozils is here at present, and T think I con imagine M interview between him and the President of the Board of Trade. He delivers hig credentials; he hag come to arrange a tresty of gommerce! I think I seo the President of the Board of Trade calling up a solemn, earnest, Ploug expression, and saying, ¢ You are from the Brazils—we shall be happy 0 trade with you, but we cannot gonscientionsly receive slave-grown Produce!’ Hig Excellency is & good man of business; 80 he says, * Well, then, wo will sea if wo can trade together in some other way. What have you to sell usp’ ¢ Why,’ returns the Progident of the Board of Trade, Sotton goods ; in these articles we are the largest exporters in the world 1* Indeed 1? exclaims his Excellency ; ¢ cotton, did you say ? Where is cotton bronght from?’ ‘Why, replies the Minister, ‘hem—ohiefly from the Uniteq States,” and at once the question will be, ¢ Pray, ig ib free-grown Botton or slave-grown cotton ?°> Now, I leave you to imagine the answer, 424 I leave you slgo to picture the countenance of the President of the Board of Trade. . . . Now, have any of you had your humanity entrapped 2d your sympathies bamboozled by these appeals against slave-grown Produce ? Do you know how the law stands with regard to the sugar trade B Present} We mond our manufactures to Brazil as ib is; we bring back Brazilian sugar; that sugar is refined in this couniry—refined in bonding Warehouses, that is, warehouses where English people are not sllowed to B8t at it— and i4 is then sent abroad by our merchants, by those very men "ho are now preaching against the consumption of slave-grown sugar. Ay, those very men and their connexions who are loudest in their appeals Ming slave.grown sugar, have bonding warebouges in Liverpool and London, and sond this sugar to Russias, to China, to Turkey, to Poland, to BYP; in short, to avy country wader the sun-—to countries, too, having a Population of B00.C00,0001 and yet thesn men will not allow you to have AY grourn grier herad! 1845, a ag. y8a4 LiF? 07 OURDEN, logs? party. Mr, Gladstone eloquently expounded the principle? of Free Trede, thongh it was true that he gave the adroitest reasons for not applying them. Mr. Cobden, they said, Wo a man of great energy, shrewdness, and strength of will, bub the true cause of his successes in debate was the want of spirit in those who should have been his active adversavief: Was it not melancholy and even insufferable to witness “the landholders of England, the representatives of the blood of she Norman: chivalry, shrinking under the blows aimed ob shem by & Manchester money-grubber ” ? Unhappily there was nobody in Manchester to whom ths evil designation was less applicable. Only a week before the close of the session, Cobden wrote te his brother :— “Your account is surely enough a bad turn up. Ther? must be something radically fallacions in our mode of calctilating cost or fixing prices. Not that I expected very much this year, because our lost antamn must have been # gerions loss, and the spring business squeezed into too small a space of time to do great things in. We must have a rigid overhauling of expenses, and see if they can be reduced ; and if not, we must ab all events fix our prices to cover all charges. I rather suspect we mado a blunder in fixing them too low last spring. But with our present reputation we must not give our goods away. The truth is, a gread portion of our Manchester trade bas always been done ab 1° profit or at a loss, Still T do not fall into your despai™ We have the chance of righting ourselves yet. For after all, our great losses have always arisen from fluctuations i the value of the stock, and there is no risk in that way for sor® years to come, As to other mafters henging over us, they can only be righted by a general revival of the district, and we shell get Free Trade from the necessities of the Exsheauer.””’? ' To ¥, W, Cobden, London, Ang. 17, 154k, en, OCOTUPAYIONS IN THD BREOESS. 285 The session came to an end; it does not appear, how- 184% over, that he suffered himself to be long detained from the am: 23. Sreat work by private affairs. He went for two or three Weeks with his family to the south of England for a breath of calm. By the middle of September, he and Mr. Bright were again at work at Ozford, Lancaster, and slsewhere, They were ubiquitous; to-day at Manchester, Yo-morrow at Lincoln, this week at Salisbury, the next in Haddingtonshire. A day without a meeting was seid to be 8 deplorable to them, as the merciful emperor's day without 8 good deed. The following extracts from letters to his Wife and his brother, from October to January (1844), will Serve to show how Cobden passed the autumn and winter. “I have been incessantly occupied travelling or talking Since I gay you, having made the journey across Northumberland, Cumberland, and Haddingtonshire twice. We go bo-moreow to Kendal to give Warburton a lift, and I shall be home on Tuesday. I have seen much to gratify and Wstruct me, We spent a couple of days with Hope, and his Reighbours the Hast Lotbian farmers. They are a century before our Hants and Sussex chawbacons. In fact, they are, by comparison, educated gentlemen and practical philoso-Phers, ang their workpeople are more like Sharp and Roberts’s skilled mechanics than our round-frocked peasantry. Our farmers cannot be brought to the Scotch standard by Lord Ducie or g hundred Lord Ducies. The men are wanting. We have better soil and climate, and the live and dead stock ay be casily brought to match them, bub the two-legged “Mimals will nob do in the present generation. ‘We have %een much to encourage us. 1 have no doubt the Haddingbonshire farmers will commence an agitation against the Corn Laws, which will be a nucleus for independent action Mmongst their class elsewhere. The Northamberland farmers “Dacially fn the north ave newrly npon a par with them, and $4345 LIvL 4% 00RD, Iy #E HE. 1844. they are just as likely to oid wi Altogetnor I em full of #we.40. hope from the experience of the last week. I feel no doubt that we shall, before Parliament meets, get a declaration signed by 1000 formers in all parts of the kingdom, der daring the Corn Law fo have been a cheat upon the senantry.”*® « Aberdeen, Jan. 14, 1844.—Here we are happily at the far end of our pilgrimage, and on Tuesday morning we hope bo turn our faces homeward. It has been a hard week's work. After finishing our labours at Perth, I expected 0 have had a quiet day yesterday. We started in the morning by the coach for this place, but in passing through Forfar we found all the inhabitants at their doors or in the streets: They had heard of our intended passage through their tow and a large crowd was assembled at the inn where the coach stopped, which gave us thres cheers; and nothing would do but we must stop to give them an address. We consented, and immediately the temperance band struck up, and paraded through the town, and the parish church bells wer? set a ringing, in fact the whole town was set in a commotion We spoke to abont two thousand persons in the parish church, which, notwithstanding that it was Saturday avening, was granted to us. It was the first time we ever addressed an Anti-Corn-Law audience in a parish church. Forfar is a poor little borough with a great many weaverg of coarse linens, and their enthusiasm is nearly all we cal expect from them. A subscription of about a hundred and fifty pounds will, however, be raised. We expect better things in the way of money here. Aberdeen is a fine large town with several extensive manufactories, and = good shipping port. But strange to say it is almost the only place in Scotland where the capitalists seem to have taken no part in the Free-trade movement. But I hope we ghall 8 To P. W. (obdsv., Corbale. Ost. 27. 1843. xu | GOOUPAYIONE IN THE BREOUSS. 287 be able to stir them up to-morrow. We shall depart from thi on Tuesday morning at half-past five for the gouth, &. "2. “topping at Montrose for & midday meeting, and then Proceeding on to Dundee for a great meeting in the evening. Thug you see we are working double tides, travelling miles by couch and holding two meetings a day. I hope we shall lost; 4 out for another week. We are to have two large Meetings here to-morrow. The deputation separated into bo Parties at Edinburgh. Moore and 1 came north, and Bright and Colonel Thompson went to the west of Scotland, taking Paisley, Kilmarnock, and Greenock, and we shall all Meet again at Newcastle on Saturday next. We find a 8Teat change in the temperature in these northern regions. There ig & hard frost, and the highlands are covered with ow, I have thus far escaped a cold, and find my health 800d; in fact, notwithstanding my hard work, I have been better this winter than ever, having escaped my usual fit of "fammation in my eyes. 1 think there is a special Provi-Tonge watching over the Leagners.”’ “ Dundee, Jan. 17, 1844.1 am nearly overdone with Work, two meetings at Aberdeen on Monday, up at four on Thesday, travelled thirty-five miles, held a meeting at Mont-1980, and then thirty-five miles more to Dundee, for a meeting the Same evening. To-morrow we go to Cupar Fife, next UY, Leith, the day following, Jedburgh.” “N ewcastle-on-Tyne, Jan. 22.—1I got here last night from Tedburgh, where we had the most extraordinary meeting of Al The streets were blocked up with country people as we “tered the place, some of whom had come over the hills for Went miles, It is the Dukes of Buccleuch’s country, bit he vould be puzzled to find followers on his own lands to Sight Hs battles as of old. To-night we meet here, to-morrow at Sunderlang, the day after at Sheffield, where you will please Wdregg me to-morrow, on Thursday we shall be at York, 1844. 3 IQ IEE OR OORDEN. ra Ar and on Friday at Hull, and in Menchester on Saturds] evening,” “ Hull, Jan, 26, 1844.—1 shall leave this place to-morro¥ by the train at half-past ten, and expect to reach Manches ter by about five o’clock. I am, I assure you, heartily glad of the prospect of only two days’ relaxation after the terrible fagging I have had for the last three weeks, To-day We have two meetings in Hull. I am in the Court House With a thousand people before me, and Bright is stirring up the Lieges with famous effect. He is reminding the Hull people of the conduct of their ancient representative, Andre? Marvell, and talking of their being unworthy of the grave of their ancestors over which they walk. We shall hav® another meeting this evening.” There was one drawback to the Scotch. Before they crossed the border, the Leaguers had held meetings in Leicester, Nottingham, Sheffield, Leeds, where they got 2 couple of thousand pounds before they left the room, Ab # Scotch meeting, Cobden tells Mrs. Cobden, “we found that to name money was like reading the Riot Act, for dispersing them. They care too much for speeches by mere politicisds and Whig aristocrats.” But the results of the campaign were in the highest degree valuable. The deputation strengthened the faith in all the places that they visited, revived interes? and conviction, and brought back to Manchester a sub" stantial addition to the funds of their association. The following letter to Mr. George Wilson belongs to this late, and illustrates a point on which Cobden and his friends were always most solicitons. It is written from Durham for which Mr. Bright had been returned as member in the previous July :— “You will remember that when Bright won this place the Whigs {that is, the Chronicle) tried to make it a Whig Y Te KF. W. Qobden, Mewcastle-on-T'yne, Jan. 22. 1844. wu] DISTRUST OF THE WHIGS, 2809 iumph, which Bright spoilt by his declaration at the 184. Crown and Anchor, ¢ that it was not a party victory.” Now Er 40. your best plan at Covent Garden on Thursday will be to Prevent thy Whigs playing us off against the Tories, by Joclaring that the- City election was a trial of strength not between the League and the Ministry, or between the League "1d the Tory party, but between Free Trade and Monopoly. There is no way so certain of bringing the Whigs to our tanks, ag by showing them that they will not be allowed to Make a gham fight with the Tories at our expense. Depend 0 it the Whigs are now plotting how they can use us and throw us aside. The more we show our honesty in refusing 0 be made the fools of a party, the more shall we have the “nfidence of the moderate and honest Tories. You have “OW an opportunity of putting us right with both parties, ad Thope you will give the right tone to the speaking ak “Ovent Garden?! Ta George Wilson, Durham, Uctober 24, 1848, CHAPTER XTII. PP? SESSION OF 1844— FACTORY LEGISLATION—THE constr TUENCIES. 1844. THE statistics of agitation sometimes raise a smile. The x 4p, nice measurement of argumentative importunity in terms of weight and bulk, seems incongruous in connexion with any” thing so complex, so volatile, so invisibly rooted as opinio® We all know how at each annual meeting the listeners ceive these figures of tracts, pamphlets, and leaflets with the same kind of enthusiasm with which a farmer surveys bi mountains of quickening manure. At Manchester, in the autumn of 1843, the report was stupendous. Five hundred persons had been employed in distributing tracts from hous? to house. Five millions of such tracts had been delivered © parliamentary electors in England and Scotland ; and the sotal distributed to non-electors and others had been UP" wards of nine millions. The weight of papers thus circ™ :ated was no less than one hundred tons. One hundred and forty towns bad been visited, and there had been five and twenty meetings in the agricultural districts. It was res solved that the new campaign should be conducted with redoubled vigour. In October (1843), after a veheme?! contest, in which the Monopolist candidate was backed by all the influence of the Government, a Free Trader was I¥’ turned for the city, and this great victory gave new heart 1 the movement throughout the country. Fifty thonsand CR. xp, : STATISTIOS OF AGITATION. 291 Pounds had been expended in the current year. A fund of 1844. 2 hundred thousand pounds was demanded for the year to Zr 40. ome; and before the end of 1844 pearly ninety thousand Pounds of that sum had actually been raised. Of this “Mount, nearly fourteen thousand pounds were subscribed 8 a single meeting in Manchester. Cobden had, at that time a4 any rate, supreme faith in the potency of this Vast propagandism. He till believed that if you brought ruth to people’s doors, they must embrace it. Projects for the establishment of newspapers for the spread of the views of hig school, always interested him keenly. The following letter to Mr. Bright describes the beginnings of one of the Most excellent journals of the time :— “I wish I could have a little talk with you and Wilson #bout the removal of the Circular to London. James Wilson? Las a plan for starting a weekly Free-trader by himself and his friends, to be superintended by himself. But he does not intend this unless he can have the support of the League, or at least its acquiescence. He has a Notion that a paper would do more good if it were not the organ of the League, but merely their independent Supporter, But then what is the League to do for an gan? If we start another weekly paper, it would clash With his, Villiers seems to have been rather taken with James Wilson’s plan, and it would undoubtedly be desirable bo haye Wilson’s pen at work. It is quite clear that the League must have its organ. The question for us to decide 8 What kind of paper shall we have? Is it to be simply a moval of the Anti-Bread-Taw Circular to London with the “henge of the title to the League Oircular and to be still Confineg exclusively to the one object and movement of the i 0 Afterwards Secretary to the Treasury, snd Financial Member of the in neil of India. A most interesting acoount of Mr. Wilson is to be found the Literary Studies of the late Walter Bagehot (vol. i. pp. 867—406.) 202 LI¥H OF COBDEN. {oma®: 184. League, or must we enlarge to a sixpenny paper, and whilst &r. 40. keeping corn prominent, attack collaterally sugar, and coffee? If we stick to the Circular in its present characte’ then another Free-trade paper might be started; if ° adopted the enlarged paper, then it would be folly in James Wilson to undertake another, and he would not attempb it.” In the long-run Mr. Wilson sterted his own newspapels which he called the Economist. The Oireular was suppressed; and the League was published in its stead, conveying, 8° Cobden said, every syllable of their speeches to twenty thousand people in all the parishes of the kingdom. Before describing a more important move in the Mancheste® tactics, I have to say something of Cobden’s action in Par liament, where a very momentous subject presently engaged attention. In the session of 1844 the Corn Laws fell into the back: ground. Mr. Cardwell, in se onding the motion on the Address, made a marked impression by a collection of evi dence that trade was reviving, The revival of trade weakened the strongest argument of the agitators, because it diminished the practical urgency of their question. Parliament is always glad of an excuse for leaving a questio® alone, and the slightest improvement in the markets wa welcomed as a reason for allowing the Corn Law to slumber The Prime Minister took advantage of such a state of thing® to quell the sullen suspicion of the agricultural party, by e®” ohatic declarations that the Government had never conte” plated, and did not then contemplate, any alteration in the existing law. Repeal he hardly deigned to notice; it would; he said, produce the greatest confusion and distress. Ther? was, no doubt, the alternative of a fixed duty; bub if it should happen that the agriculturists should come to pref’ that to his sliding scale, then he was inclined to think that t To Mr. Bright. Jane 21. 1848. Ru.) THE SESSION OF 1844. 293 Bot he, but Lord John Russell would be the proper person 1844 to make the change. So closely did Peel habitually trim Zr. 40. his sails to suit the shifting of the winds. In consequence of this declaration of the Minister, and of the improvement in the condition of the population, com-Paratively slight ~ttention was paid fo the discussion on Mr. Villierg’s annual Motion (June 25). The League was violengly abused by the Mileses, Bankeses, Ferrands, and Sir John Trollopes. It was again and again asserted that the rite of wages was regulated by the price of corn, and that the avowed object of the agitators was to lower wages by lowering corn. Cobden replied to such serious argu-Ments ag he could find in the course of the debate, but the front bench on the side of the Opposition was empty for Dost of the evening ; Lord John Russell declined to vote ; Mr, Bright was listened to with so much impatience that he "as forced to sit down; and a very hollow performance *nded with a majority of 204 against the Motion.” In the earlier part of the session (March 12), Cobden had Woved for a Select Committee to inquire into the effects of Protective duties on agricultural tenants and labourers. This wag a new approach. The main argument for repeal hag hitherto been from the side of the manufacturing population, I7 what way, save by the admission of foreign corn In exchange for British manufactures, could we secure extended markets ; or, in other words, extended demand for the industry of the people? Cobden now turned to the ®ricultural side of the question, and asked the House of Commons, as he had asked the farmers during the pre-Tous year, to examine what advantage the Corn Lew bag brought to the agriculturists themselves. He described the condition of the labourer, morally, socially, and ecomically ; said that it was the fear of falling into this con-3 828 againgt © 4 204 LIFE OF COBDEN. [oma 1844. dition which cansed the strikes of the workmen in tH Ar. 40. towns; and asked how a starved population of this Jind could form that valuable class of domestic consumers, who were held out by the landlords to the manufacturers as ader quate compensation for loss of customers abroad. The official duty of reply fell to Mr. Gladstone. His ansWe' turned mainly on the inexpediency of assenting to a moto? which would imply that the Corn Law was an open questio® and which would therefore tend to unsettle trade, disturD the revenue, and increase the excitement in people’s minds. At present, Mr. Gladstone said, the League was thought © be a thing of no great practical moment : its parade and ceremonial were perhaps the most important features abot it; but if Parliament should take up the subject, the assuredly the League would acquire a consequence to which it had really no title. Cobden’s motion was rejected by? vote of two hundred and twenty-four against one hundred and thirty-three, being a majority of ninety-one. This bad division had perhaps less than the general feel ing of the House, as gathered from talk in the lobbies, 0 do with the changed view which Cobden now took of be prospects of the cause. The ardour of his hopes was I laxed, though not the firmness of his resolution. He 87° expression to this in writing to his brother ;— “Tt is now quite certain that our Free Trade labours mush be spread over a larger space of time than we contemplated at one time. The agitation must be of a different kind © what we have hitherto pursued. In fact we must merely bave just so many demonstrations as will be necessary keep hold of public attention, and the work must go on in the way of registration labours in those large constituencio® where we can hope to gain anything by a change of publi¢ opinion. The little pocket boroughs must be absolutely given over, They will not weigh as a feather in the gottle” fi THE SESSION OF 1844. 2935 pt of the question. Time can alone effect the business. ¢annot be carried by storm. We were wrong in thinking of i, In the meantime Peel’s unsettlements are making “hemes in the ranks of the united monopolists, and everybody is making up his mind to more change. As my labours Must henceforth be loss intense than heretofore, I shall be able to give more attention to my private affairs, which, Heaven knows, have been neglected enough.” The following passage relates to a subject which kindled More excitement in the country than any other question before Parliament. It was an episode in the endless battle between bigotry and the sense of justice. The judgment in the famous case of Lady Hewley’s bequest, finally delivered after fourteen years of litigation, exposed endowments which hag been for several generations in the hands of Unitarians, bo the risk of appropriation by Trinitarian Dissenters. The Ministry brought in a Bill to confirm religious bodies, Whether Trinitarian or Unitarian, in the possession of pro-Perty of which they had been in the enjoyment for twenty This measure was regarded by fanatics, alike of the Episcopalian and the independent churches, as favouring the oadly heresy of Unitarianism. The storm raged with Tous violence ; but the Ministry held firm, and the Bill, Which wag conservative of the rights of property in the right “ense, happily became law. Sir W. Follett’s speech broke down the opposition. We may be sure on which side in the tontroversy Cobden was found. ; “I never entertained an idea of voting for the monopolists otters of faith. Nor have I had a line from anybody at tg Fort to ask me to do so. As at present advised, I Certainly vote for the Bill. What a spectacle we shall a, if the intolerance of the Commons should reject a “asure which the Lords and the Bishops have passed! It 1 9 PF. W. Qobden, London, June 4, 1844. 1844. ar 40. 206 LIFE OF COBDEN, {CHAR 1844. would confirm one’s notion that the Government of thE mr, 40. country is in advance of the people. “ Lord Duncan’s reply to a deputation was not amiss: He told them drily, ‘It may be a question whether th° founders of the chapels in question intended them for the benefit of Unitarians or Trinitarians, but one thing * certain, they did not intend them for the lawyers, who wil have every kick of them, unless the Bill is passed into ? law.” This young chip of the old block who stood such hard knocking at Camperdown, said an equally good thing to the short-time delegates who called on him to abuse tho factory masters. He told them to go home and thank God they had not the landlords for masters, for if they bad, their wages would be reduced one-half.’’® It is now time to turn briefly to a subject which sprang 2° directly as Free Trade itself from the great Condition of England Question. Throughout this memorable parliament; which sat from 1841 to 1847, we are conscious of a genuin® effort, alike on the part of the Prime Minister and of i" dependent reformers and philanthropists of all kinds, grapple with a state of society which threatened to beco® unmanageable. We see the Parliament diligently feelin8 its way to one piece after another of wise and beneficen? policy, winding up with the most beneficent of all. The development of manufactures, and the increase and redist™” bution of population which attended it, forced upon all th foremost minds of that time a group of difficulties with which most of them were very inadequately prepared to desl: One fact will be enough to illustrate the extent of the change. In 1818 it was computed that 57,000 persons wer? employed in cotton factories. Within twenty-one year their numbers had increased to 469,000. How was this vast $ To F. W. Cobden, London, June 5, 1844, an THE CONDITION OF ENGLAKD. 207 "0d rapid influx of population into the cofton towns, with 184% “4 the new conditions which it implied, to be met? Or was An 40. % to the statesman indifferent? The anthor of Sybil seems to have apprehended the real magnitude and even the nature °f the social crisis. Mer. Disraeli’s brooding imaginativeness of Conception gave him a view of the extent of the social volution as a whole, which was wider, if it did not go deeper, than that of any other contemporary observer. To Acidents of his position in society and necessities of personal Mubition, i must, I suppose, be attributed that one who Sonceived so truly the seriousness of the problem, should have broughs nothing better to its solution than the childish bathos of Young England. Mr. Carlyle, again, had true vision of the changos that were sweeping the unconscious nation "Way from the honds and principles of the past into an nnknown future. Bub he had no efficient instruments for controlling or guiding the process. He was right enough in declaring that moral regeneration was the one thing needful bo set the distracted nation at ease. In a particular crisig, however, moral regeneration is no more than a phrase. Cobden answered the question on the economic side, You must, he said, accept and establish the conditions of free exchange. Only on these terms can you make the best 0 of capitel, and ensure the highest attainable prosperity % labour, But at this point—they were then close upon the ever-memorable date of *48—the gigantic question of that generation loomed on the horizon. How are you to Settle the mutual relations of capital and labour to one “nother? Abolition of restriction may be excellent in the Shere of commodities. Is it so clear that the same con-Lition suffices for the commonwealth, when the commodity % be exchanged is a man’s labour? Or is it palpably false ad irrational to talk of labour as a commodity? In other Words, cap the relations between lshour and capital be 298 LIFE OF COBDEN. [oHAD 1844. safely left to the unfettered play of individual competition Zr. 40. The answer of modern statesmanship is, that unfettered individual competition is not a principle to which the regu” lation of industry may be entrusted. There may be €O ditions which it is in the highest degree desirable to impos on industry, and to which the general opinion of the indus trial classes may be entirely favourable. Yet the agsistanc of law may be needed to give effect to this opinion, because —in the words of the great man who was now preparing th exposition of political economy that was to reign all ghrong? the next generation,—only law can afford to every individual a guarantee that his competitors will pursue the same cours? as to hours of labour and so forth, without which he cannot safely adopt it himself.® Cobden, as we have already seen (pp. 115-16), when he was first a candidate for Stockport, dissented from thes theories. He could not adjust them to his general prin ciple of the expediency of leaving every man free to car™y his goods to whatever market he might choose, and to mak? the best bargain that he could. The man who saw such good reasons for distrusting the regulation of markets bY Act of Parliament, was naturally inclined to distrust parli® mentary regulation of labour. In the case of children, Cob” den fully perceived that freedom of contract is only anothe® name for freedom of coercion, and he admitted the necessity of legislative protection. He never denied that restriction? on the hours of labour were desirable, and he knew PJ observation, both at home and abroad, that the hours of labour are no measure of its relative productiveness. What he maintained was that all restrictions, however desirable ought to be secured by the resolute demands and inde ¢ J. 8. Mill's Political Economy was not begun until 1845, but it bee abundant traces how closely he watched the course of legislation durics the years immediately preceding. ir) FACTORY LEGISLATION. 299 Pendent action of the workmen themselves, and not by Wervention of the law.’ Singularly enough, while he thus trusted to the independence of the workmen, he objected to workmen’s combi-Uationg, « Depend upon it,” he said to his brother, ‘ Dothing can be got by fraternizing with trades unions. They are founded upon principles of bratal tyranny and Monopoly, I would rather live under a Dey of Algiers than % Trades Committee.”® Yet without combination it is difficult to gee how, on the great scale of modern industries, the Workmen can exert any effective influence on the regulation of their labour. That in the first forms of combination there was both brutality and tyranny, is quite true. That these vices have almost disappeared is due in no small degree to an active fraternization, to use Cobden’s own word, with the leaders of the workmen by members of the middle class, “ho represented the best moral and social elements in the Public opinion of their time. The protection of the labouring population had in various forms engaged the serious attention of Parliament for several Years. So far back as 1802 there was a Factory Act, which Was Sanitary in its main intention, but also contained clauses regulating hours, Others followed in 1819 and 1825, and ® very important factory law, containing the earliest pro-Visions for education, was passed in 1833, by which time the Vorkmen were partially able to make themselves heard in Parliament, In 1842 Lord Ashley had procured the passing of the Mines and Collieries Act, a truly admirable and benefons piece of legislation, excluding women from labour un-Jergroung, and rescuing children from conditions hardly less Borriplg than those of negro slavery. In 1843, still under the impulse of Lord Ashley, Sir James Graham brought See Appendix A, at the end of the volume. 2 Ts F. W. Cobden, Angust 16, 1842, f 1844. Zr. 40. 300 [HAP LIFE OF COBDEN. 1844. in a Factory Bill, not only regulating the hours of labow: &r. 40. but proposing a system for the education of the children o the industrial class in the manufacturing towns. Cobde? took an early opportunity of saying a friendly word for he education clauses of the measure, as being a step in he right direction. Popular education had been the most 1% portant of all social objects in his mind from the first; and in spite of drawbacks, which he did not despair of sei’ amended, he saw more good than harm in the new propossl® These clauses, however, beyond doubt conferred advantzg® on the Hstablished Church, in which the Dissenters justly and wisely refused to acquiesce.” It might well seem to be bette that popular instruction should still be left to voluntay machinery for some time longer, then that new authority and new fields of ecclesiastical control should be opened to the privileged church. The opposition was so vebe” ment that the education clauses were dropped, and $he Bill withdrawn, In 1844 Sir James Graham reintroduced it, without th° education clanses, simply as a Bill for regulating the labo? of children and young persons. The definition of a child 3° extended to mean children between nine and thirteen; a child was only to be employed half time, that is to say, not mor than six and a half hours each day. The definition of you?8 persons remained as ib was, covering persons from thirteé” to eighteen ; their hours in silk, cotton, wool, and flax msn? factories were not to exceed thirteen and a half in each d2¥/ and of these one hour and a half were to be allowed fF meals and rest, leaving twelve hours as the limit of actus] labour. Lord Ashley moved that the hours should be 2 twelve but ten, and on this issue the battle was fought ® The provisions for trustees of the schools were undeniably and il liberately caloulated to give the clergy of the Established Church 8 UF¢ dominant power on every hoard. Sa FACTORY LBGISLATION. 301 The factory question from this time, down to the passing of the Ten, Hours Act, was part of the wider struggle between the Country gentlemen and the manufacturers. The Tories Were taunted with the condition of the labourers in the fields, ud they retorted by tales of the condition of the operatives " factories. The manufacturers rejoined by asking, if they Were go anxious to benefit the workman, why they did not, by Yepealing the Corn Law, cheapen his bread. The landlorgs and the millowners each reproached the other with Xereising the virtues of humanity at other people’s expense. This Was not Lord Ashley’s own position. He was ab this time in favour of the Corn Law, but his exertions for the factory population were due to a disinterested and genuine “erest in their welfare. In 1842! Cobden took a more Boneroyg, or rather a more just, view of Lord Ashley’s Charg cpp than he had been accustomed to express in his lottery and conversation. He would confess very frankly that before he entered that House, he had entertained doug, in common with many of the employors in the north, Whether those advocates of the Short Hours Bill who sup-Ported the Corn Law were really sincere. But since he hag had an opportunity of a closer observation of the noble lorg, he wag perfectly convinced of his genuine philanthropy.” That, kowever, was no reason why Lord Ashley should not be tesisted, if his philanthropy led him wrong; and Mr. Bright, while not denying that the hours of labour were longer than they ought to be, made a vigorous onslaught on bi, “It was a perilous effort,” Cobden wrote, ‘“ especially ‘0 the canting tone of the country, but our friend came off well, ang there is much credit, due to him for taking the bull by the horns. The Tories have gained nothing bv the last Week q debate.” ? Charles Buller defended Lord Ashley’s proposal in what Tug g, 2 To F. W. Cobden. London, March 16, 1844. 1844. Zr. 40. 302 LIFE OF OOBDEX. Fos? 1844. Ar. 40. was a very wise speech, though it may have been made #8 party move against Peel. Brougham poured outa torrent © invective in the House of Lords against all interference with labour. Most of the official Whigs, on the contrary, went 0° the limitation of ten hours, though they had stoutly oppose’ the same proposal when they were in power ; but in the end the Government carried their Act for twelve hours. “I did not vote upon the Factory question,” Cobden wrote: “The fact is the Government are being whipped with 8 od of their own pickling. They used the ten hours’ cry, and ol other cries, to get into power, and now they find themselve® unable to lay the devil they raised for the destruction of ne Whigs. The trickery of the Government was kept up til the time of Ashley’s motion, in the confident expectation that he would be defeated by the Whigs and Free Traders. TheS (the Government) were calculating upon this support, and $0 they gave liberty to Wortley and others of their party to vote against the Cabinet in order to get favour at the husting® The Whigs very basely turned round upon their forme’ opinions to spite the Tories. The only good result is that no Government or party will in future like to use the factory question for a cry. The last year’s education question, and this year’s ten hours Bill, will sicken the factions of such? two-edged weapon. One other good effect may be that 1" like Graham and Peel will see the necessity of taking anchor upon some sound principles, as a refuge from the Socialis doctrines of the fools behind them. But at all events £09 must come out of such startling discussions.”? It cannot be seriously denied that Cobden was fully just fied in describing the tendencies of this legislation as social istic. It was an exertion of the power of the State in its strongest form, definitely limiting in the interest of tho 8 To PF. W. Cobden, March 28, 1844, a] ENGLISH FORMS OF SOCIALISM. 303 abourer the administration of capital. The Act of 1844 ds. "as only g rudimentary step in this direction. In 1847 mr 40 he Ten Hours Bill became law. Cobden was abroad ab the time, and took no part in its final stages. In the thirgy years that followed, the principle has been extended With astonishing perseverance. We have to-day a complete, Winute, and voluminous code for the protection of labour ; buildings must be kept pure of effftuvia; dangerous machinery Must be fenced ; children and young persons must nob clean ¥ while in motion ; their hours are not only limited but fixed ; Sontinuous employment must not exceed a given number of hours, varying with the trade, but prescribed by the law in given cages ; go statutable number of holidays is imposed; the children must go to school, and the employer must every Week have a certificate to that effect; if an accident happens, Utice must be sent to the proper authorities ; special pro-Visions are rade for bakehouses, for lace-making, for colliories, and for a whole schedule of other special callings; for the due enforcement and vigilant supervision of this immense host of minute prescriptions, there is an immense host of 'Dspectors, certifying surgeons, and other authorities, whose business it is “to speed and post o'er land and ocean” in *estless guardianship of every kind of labour, from that of the Woman who plaits straw at her cottage door, to the Winer whe descends into the bowels of the earth, and the Seaman who conveys the fruits and materials of nniversal industry to and fro between the remotest parts of the globe. Bug all this is one of the largest branches of what the most Mportumnate Socialists have been accustomed to demand; and 1 we adq to this vast fabric of Labour legislation our system of Poop Law, we find the rather amazing result that in the Country where Socialism has been less talked about than any Other country in HKarope, its principles have been most Xtensively applied. 304 LIFE 0 B® CO OLDEN [oga P 1844. If the Factory Law was in one sense a weapon with which Fr. 40. the country party harassed the manufacturers, it was pot long before Cobden hit upon a plan for retaliating. For tW0 or three years the League had confined its operations to the creation of an enlightened public opinion on the subject of the Corn Laws, Then it began to work in the borough? and Cobden was able to say that never at any previous date had so much systematic attention, time, and labour bee? given to the boroughs in the way of registration. The power which had thus been given to the Free Trade party i nearly one hundred and fifty boroughs, was expected 10 make an immense, if not a decisive, difference in the nex’ parliament. In the great county of Lancashire alone, such changes had been wrought by attention to the register, that it was calculated that a new election would only leave the monopolists five out of the six-and-twenty members for the entire province. It now occurred to Cobden that these constituencies could be dealt with even more effectually: In the last division, not a single county member had gor into the lobby with Mr, Villiers. Cobden’s thought was to turn the counties by an indefinite increase of the ¢o8" stituencies. They were to be won through that section of the Reform Act which conferred the franchise in countie® upon possessors of freehold property of the value of forty shillings a year. The landlords had already availed them” selves to an immense extent of the Chandos clause. By the Chandos clause tenants at will, occupying at a yearly value of fifty pounds, had the franchise. The monopolists, i# Cobden’s words, worked this clause out ; they applied them selves to qualifying their tenant-farmers for the poll, “by making brothers, sons, nephews, uncles—ay, down to the third generation, if they happened to live upon the farm— all qualify for the same holding, and swear, if need be, that they were partners in the farm, though they were no more un) THE FORTY SHILLING FRANCHISE. 305 rine than you are. This they did, and successfully, and 1844. o that means gained the counties.” But,” Cobden con- Ar. 40. ued, “there was another clause in the Reform Act, which We of the middle classes—the uuprivileged, industrious men, Who live by our capital and labour—never found out, namely, the forty-shilling freehold clause. I will set that 8gaingst the Chandos clause, and we will beat them in the Counties with it. . . . . There is a large class of mechanics Who save their forty or fifty pounds; they have been ac-Customed perhaps to put it in the savings’ bank. Twill not 885 a word to undervalue that institution; but cottage pro-Perty will pay twice as much interest as the savings’ bank. Then what a privilege it is for a man to put his hands in his Pockets, and walk up and down opposite his own freehold, tnd say, ¢ This is my own; I worked for it, and I have won 1s. There are many fathers who have sons just ripening nto maturity, and I know that parents are very apt to keep their property and the state of their affairs from their children, My doctrine is that you cannot give your son your confidence, or teach him to be entrusted with property, too early. When you have a son just coming to twenty-one Years of age, the best thing you can do, if you have it in your power, is to give him a qualification for the county ; it accustoms him to the use of property, and to the exercise of % vote, whilst you are living and can have some little ludicious control over it if necessary.” The reader will observe that Cobden’s design was free from the sinister quality of manufactured voting. He supposed that men would acquire property in their own neighbourhood, the natural seat of their political interests and activity. What ig politically mischievous in this franchise only happens When a number of strangers in possession of a factitious Yualification invade a district and help to nullify the wishes ¢ Speech st Covent Garden, Dec. 11, 1844. 300 LIFE OF OOBDEN. [cHAP 1844. and opinions of the majority of those who reside in it. Such w= 40, a practice as this seems at no time to have been in Cobder® contemplation. Still many people demurred. The pl” wore the look of manufacturing votes; it secraed, they said; mechanical, unworthy, and barely legitimate. No, replied Cobden, there is nothing savouring of trick or finesse of ay kind in it; the law and the constitution prescribe the con” dition ; you have a bond-fide qualification, and are conforming to the law both in spirit and in fact. This was quite tri® and no plan ever proposed by the League met with 5° unanimous a response from all parts of the kingdom. It took two hours a day to read the letters that came from every part of the country, all applauding the scheme. BY the beginning of 1845 between four and five thousand nev electors had been brought upon the lists in Yorkshire Lancashire, and Cheshire. Not less than two hundred and fifty thousand pounds were invested in these counties if the forty-shilling qualification. It was believed that eight or ten times as many persons in other parts of the country had taken Cobden’s hint to qualify. It was to be an immense enfranchisement, on old constitutional lines and secured by the spontaneous effort and civil spirit of the population itsolf. “ Wherever there is 2 man above the rank of an unskilled labourer, whether 2 shopkeeper, 8 man of the middle class, or of the skilled working class that has not got a county vote, or is BOY striving to accumulate enough to get one, let ns point the finger of scorn at him ; he is not fit to be a freeman. It 1° an avenue by which we may reach the recesses of powers and possess ourselves of any constitutional rights which we are entitled to possess.” In one of his speeches of tha date, Cobden allowed it to be perceived that this gros’ process had come into his mind not simply as a means of quickening the triumph of Free Trade, but as an agency ALUTe Xu, 1] COBDEN’S VIEWS ON THE FRANCHISE. 4 for éffecting a deep and permanent political transform “Some people,” he said, * tell you that it is very danger ad unconstitutional to invite people to enfranchise them-Selves by buying a freehold qualification. I say, without being revolutionary, or boasting of being more democratic than others, that the sooner the power in this country is transferred from the landed oligarchy, which has so misused i, and ig placed absolrtely—mind, I say absolutely—in the hands of the intelligent middle and industrious classes, the better for the condition and destinies of this country.” * Cobden’s eloquent colleague, Fox, placed the movement deeper still, by dwelling on the moral elements that lay beneath it. If it was wise and good, he said, to endeavour fo make all who could save their pittance become fundholders, it must be at least as prudent and just to induce them according to their proportion to become landholders Blso—joint shareholders in this lovely and fruitful country, Which is their country as much as it is that of the wealthiest obleman whose lands cover half a county. It would give them g tan gible bond of connexion with society ; it would pub them in 4 position which was deemed necessary to citizen-Ship in the republics of ancient days; and it was better *dapted than anything else to cherish in them those emobons which best accord with consistency and dignity of characte, y 5 2 = cn [ee] 2 > Speeches, i. 256. Jan. 16, 1845. CHAPTER XIV, BASTIAT—NEW TACTICS —ACTIVITY IN PARLIAMENT—MAYNOOTH GRANT—PRIVATE AFFAIRS. 1845. IT was in this year that Cobden made the acquaintance of Ar. 41. ® French thinker who has done more than any other of his countrymen to give vivid and imaginative colour to the principles which in England we usually call Cobdens: Bastiat was born in 1806. He lived on a meagre ancestral property on the banks of the Adour, in the remote obscurity of the Landes. For twenty years he had been almost solitary among his farms, studying the great economic writers discussing them from time to time with the only friend he had, occasionally making a short journey, and always prac tising what Roussean calls that rarest kind of philosophy which consists in observing what we see every day. BY chance he fell on an English newspaper. He was amazed to find that a body of practical men in England were at the moment actually engaged, and engaged with the reasonable prospect of success; in pressing for that Free Trade of which he had only dared to dream as a triumph of reason possible in some distant future. For two years he watched the progress of the agitation with eager interest. As Was natural, what he saw rapidly stirred in him a lively desir® for a similar illumination in his own country. He sat do" to write an account of the English movement. In the summer of 1845 he went to Paris to see his book through the press. With his long hair and unfashionable hat, Bi on, uv. ] BASTIAT'S VISIT TO ENGLAND. 309 Tustic clothes and ‘homely umbrella, he had the air of an 1845 honest countryman come to see the marvels of the town. Zr. 41. Bu there was a look of thought on his square brow, a light 0 his ful) dark eye, and a keenness in his expression, which told People that they were dealing with an enthusiast and a Man of ideas. Bastiat took the opportunity of being in Paris 40 push on to London, there to behold with his own 676s the men who had so long excited his wonder and his Admiratioy, He hastened to the office of the League, with ®0Pies of his book in his hand. “They told me,” he wrote bo hig friend, ¢ that Cobden was on the point of starting for Manchester, and that he was most likely preparing for the journey at that moment. An Englishman’s preparation Sonsist of swallowing a beefsteak and thrusting two shirts to carpet-bag. I hurried to Cobden’s house, where I founq him, and we had a conversation which lasted for two houyg, He understands French very well, speaks it a little, "0d T understand his English. I explained the state of ®Pinion jn France, the results that I expect from my book, “0d 80 on,” Cobden in short received him with his usnal Sordiality, told him that the League was a sort of free-Wasonry, that he ought to take up his quarters at the hotel of the League, and to spend his evenings there in listening to the fireside talk of Mr. Bright and the rest of the band. A day or two afterwards, at Cobden’s golicitation, Bastiat Vent down to Manchester. His wonder at the ingenious Methods and the prodigious scale of the League increased "0h all that he saw. His admiration for Cobden as a Public leader grew into hearty affection for him as a private frieng, and this friendship became one of the chief delights °f the fo busy years of life that remained to him. There had never been any anxiety among the men of the Leagn to stir foreign opinion. “We came to the conlugion » Cobden eaid, *f that the less we attempted to 1846. Pe 310 LIFE OF CUOBDEN. [cHar persuade foreigners to adopt our trade principles, the better; for we discovered so tauch suspicion of the motives of England, that it was lending an argument to the probe’ bionists abroad to incite the popular feeling against the Free Traders, by enabling them to say— See what these mel are wanting to do: they are partisans of Englishmen, and they are seeking to prostrate our industries at the feet of that perfidious nation” . . . To take away this pretence ¥° avowed our total indifference whether other nations beca® free traders or nob: but we should abolish Protection fo sur own sakes, and leave other countries to take whateve” course they liked best”! When Bastiat came to the work of agitation in his own country, he found all the diffic ulties that his friends of the League had foreseen. His book, Cobden et la Ligue, came gradually into greate” vogue as the movement grew more important, and whe? the hour of triumph came in England, Bastiat shared 18 glory in France, as one who had foreseen its importanc® ab a time when no French newspaper had been courageous or intelligent enough to give its readers any information OX 8 subject which was necessarily so unwelcome in a country of monopolies. Bastiat felt that the title of his book had per” haps wounded some of Cobden’s fellow-workers, and among men less strenuous and single-minded he might have bee? right. He defended himself by the reflection that in Franc and perhaps we are not very different in England, it is neces” sary that a doctrine should be personified in an ipdividuah A great movement, he said, must be gummed up in a prop®’ name. Without the imposing figure of O'Connell the agit” tion in Ireland would have passed without notice in the French journals. The human mind,” he wrote to Cobde® “has need of flags, banners, incarnations, proper name?’ and this is more true in France than anywhere else. Who 1 Oobden to Mr. Van der Masren., Oot. 5, 1858. fy) BATPTAT AND COBDEN. knowg that your career may not excite the emulation of "oe man of genius in this country {** Bastiat was always conscious of the difference between Cobden’s gifts and his own, and nobody knew better than himself how much more fit he was for a life of speculation than for the career of an agitator. But there was no one 15 in France to begin the work of propagandism and the O'ganization of opinion. Cobden told him that the moveent which had been made from those below to those above xn Englang, ought in France to proceed in the opposite ours, There they would do best fo begin at the top. In France in 1846 they had scarcely any railways, and thoy had no penny postage. They were not accustomed to Subscriptions, and still less were they accustomed to great Public meetings, Worse than all this, the popular interest Was at that epoch turned away from the received doctrines of Political economy in the direction of Communism and Pourierism, These systems spoke a language infinitely OTe attractive to the imagination of the common people. Bastiat, firod by Cobden’s example, set bravely to work to eke converts among men of mark. Besides being a Serious thinker, he had the gifts, always so valuable in France, of irony, of apt and humorous illustration, of Pungent dialectic. The style and finish of the Economic Sophisms, in which he refuted the fallacies of Monopoly, are ven declared to be worthy of the author of the Provincial Letters, But the movement did not prosper. At Bordeaux, deed, where the producers of wine were eager for fresh Markets, go free trade association was formed, and ib throye, Elsewhere the cause made little way. Political Uiferon con ran go high as to prevent hearty co-operation a purely economical platform. The newspapers were Written by lads of twenty, with the ignorance and the 2 Dac. 1548 Gwe. 1 117. 18405. Zr. 41. 72 LIFE OF COBDEN. (oma? 1845. recklessness proper to their age. They were conducted by Zr. 41. men who were in close connexion with the politicians; 5 that everything in their hands became a question betwee™ Ministry and Opposition. Worst of all they were vensl Prejudice, error, and calumny were paid for by the line: One was sold to the Russians, another to Protection, his 80 the university, that to the bank. “Our agitation,” Bastiat wrote to Cobden, “agitates very little. We still need 2 man of action. When will he arise? I cannot tell I ought to be that man; I am urged to the part by the unanimous confidence of my colleagues, but I cannot. The character is not there, and all the advice in the world cannot make an osk out of a reed” We know BO what encouragement Cobden gave to his friend, for by an evil chance his letters to Bastiat were all destroyed. Their correspondence was tolerably constan’ and if Bastiat was indebted to Cobden for the energy of his views on Free Trade, Cobden may well have had ns own views strengthened and diversified by Bastiat’s keer and active logic. Bastiat always said that he valued the spirit of free exchange more than free exchange itself, and Cobden had already been approaching this doctrine before Bastiat became his friend. The League was now in the seventh year of its labours In 1839 their subscriptions had only reached what after wards seemed the modest amount of 50007. The followin8 year they rose to nearly 8000. In 1843 the Council asked for 50,0001. and got it. In 1844 they asked for twice 8° much, and by the end of the year between 80,0000. and 90,0007. had been paid in. They were now spending 1000 a week. In spite of the activity which was involved in thes® profuse supplies, the outlook of the cause was, perbap® 3 Bastiat to Cobden. Mar. 20, and April 20, 1847, Eww. i. 156-8. uy, i ] SEVENTH YEAR OF THE LEAGUE. 313 "sver less hopeful or encouragmg. The terrible depres- 1845: on which had at first given so poignant an impulse to the Zr. 41. *gitation had vanished. Peel's great manipulation of the 2iff had done something to bring about & revival of trade. Much more had been done by two magnificent harvests. Wheat which had been up at sixty-seven shillings when Coben came into Parliament, and then at sixty-one shillings 2 1843, was now down at forty-five. Trade and commerce Were thriving, The revenue was flourishing. Pauperism bd declined. The winter had lasted for five months and had been very rigorous, yet even the agricultural labourers bad suffered less distress than in the winters before. This happy state of things was in fact a demonstration of the ruth of what Cobden and his friends were struggling to "Mpress upon the country, namely that a moderate price of food was a condition of good wages and brisk trade.* The Plain inference from what had been going on for two years before men’s eves, was that every impediment in the way of ' At a meeting held in Oldham, a workman got up in the body of the ll He had been thinking, he said, on the subject of the Corn Laws for bony years; ag there was no possibility shat he should ever see Sir Bober Peel, as he never came down into that neighbourhood, and as be, the speaker, could mot bear the expense of a journey to London, he begged Mr. Cobden to convey to the Prime Minister the following train of though +—% When provisions are high, the people have so much to pay for them tha they have little or nothing left to buy clothes with; and hen they have little to buy olothes with, few clothes are sold ; and when there ar faw clothes sold, there are too many to sell; and when there are “i many to sell they are very cheap; and when they are very cheap, there not he much paid for making them; and consequently the mannfoturing working man's wagos are reduced, the mills are shut up, business S ruined, ang genera] distress is spread through the country. But when "8 now the working man has the said 25s. [the fall in the price of wheat] left, 4y, his pocket, he buys more clothing with it, ay, and other articles °F comfort t00, and that increases the demand for them, and the greater the demand, you know, makes them rise in price, and the rising in price ®uables the working man to get higher wages and the master better Profits, This therefore is the way I prove that high provisions make lower ee, and cheap provisions mnke higher wages." —Quoted in Cobden’s Peoches, i. £51. 374 LIFE OF COBDEN. {ome 1848. abundant food was an impediveent in the way both of the Zr. 41. comfort of the population and the prosperity of nations industry. What good harvests had done for two year repeal of the Corn Law would help to do in perpetuity’ “The present state of our finances and manufactures,” aid Cobden, at the beginning of 1845, is an illustration of the truth of the Free Trade doctrines.” Yet oddly enough, the very circumstances which showed that the Leaguers wer right, made people for the moment less in earnest for the success of their programme. So long as times were good; the Ministers were safe and the League was powerless: Meetings were still thronged, and a great bamaar W868 opened at Covent Garden in the spring, which was a nine” days’ wonder. This notwithstanding, there was a certs!” pause out of doors in the actuality of the struggle. The change did not escape the acute observation of the League. They at once altered their tactics. ‘The previos® year had been devoted to agitation in the country. TheS now came round to the opinion that Parliament, after all, was the best place in which to agitate. “You speak with a lond voice,” snid Cobden, “when you are talking on the floor of the House; and if you have anything to say that hits hard, it is a very long whip and reaches all over the kingdom.” It was in Parliament that they were best able to conduct an assault on the Monopolist citadel from a ne¥ side. They had tried in their short campaign to show tho farmers themselves that Protection was no better for the than for other people. They now made a vigorous effort bring the same thing home to the farmers’ friends in Par liament. “It gives me increased hopes,” Cobden wrote his friend, George Combe, “to hear that you, who are calm observer, think that we are making such rapid progres? in our agitation. We who are in the whirl of it, can hardly form an opinion whether we are advancing or only revolving: x] OHANGE OF TAOTIOS. 315 But 1 think there are symptoms that the enemy is preparing _ 1845. for 5 retreat. The squires in the House are evidently with- Zu. 41. %8% confidence in themselves, while the farmers are losing “l faith in their old protectors, and Peel is doing his best to thake the confidence of both landlords and tenants in any Winigter, Good will come out of this. People will be throwy back upon their own resources of judgment. In fact, the public will be taught to think for themselves. With respect to Mr. W., he and I are very friendly; I have had nothing but civility, and indeed kindness, at his bends ever since I came into the House. He is a man o very great kindliness of nature, full of bonhomie in fact. It he has a fault, ib is in being too placable, possessing 600 much love of approbation, which makes him rather fong of praising people, especially his opponents. He is, boweyer, upon the whole, a fine-hearted man.” * In the midst of the general prosperity, there was one Zreat interest which did not thrive: this was the interest of the tenant-farmer. Deputations waited upon the Prime Minisber to tell him that the farmers in Norfolk were paying rent Wb of capital ; that half the small farmers in Devonshire Were insolvent, and the others were rapidly sinking to the Same condition ; that the agriculturists of the whole of the South of England, from the Trent to the Land’s End, were WN a state of embarrassment and distress’ There was Scarcely a week in which these topics did not find their way to the Parliamentary debates. Cobden brought forward a Lotion for a Select Committee to inquire into the causes of the alleged agricultural distress. A few nights afterwards %18 of the country gentlemen in the House moved a resoluton fp affording relief to the landed interests in the appli-“ation of surplus revenue. Then came a proposal from & } To George Combe. London, ¥eb. 23, 1848, + Qobden’s Speeches, 1, 261. 316 LIFE OF COBDEN. [omar 1845. Zr, 41. League member for a Committee to find out what was really the nature and amount of the peculiar burdens of which th? landed interest had to complain. Mr. Bright moved for 2 Committee on the Game Laws. Mr. Villiers pressed PS regular annual motion for total and immediate repeal. Lord John Russell introduced a string of nine resolutions, deli? with the Corn Laws, the law of parochial settlement, D#” tional education, and systematic colonisation, all with a vie¥ to the permanent improvement of the condition of the working class, and especially of the labourers in husbandry’ “ Bright did his work admirably,” says Cobden, « and W078 golden opinions from all men. His speech took the squire quite aback. At the morning meeting of the county member at Peel’s, to decide upon the course to be taken, the Prime Minister advised his pack not to be drawn into any discussioB by the violent speech of the member for Durham, but to allow the Committee to be granted sub silentio! This affair wil do us good in a variety of ways. It has put Bright in a right position—shown that he has power, and it will draw the sympathy of the farmers to the League. The latter convi¢” tion seemed to weigh heavily upon the spirits of the squires: They seemed to feel that we had put them in a false position towards their tenants, and the blockheads could not conceal their spite towards the League. I pleaded guilty for the League to all they charged us with on this score.”’ The result of these incessant challenges to the landlords and to the Ministers was a thorough sifting of the arguments and the establishment of a perfectly clear and intelligible position. No Committee was granted, except Mr. Bright's but discussion brought out the main facts as clearly as any Committee could have done. It became stamped on men’s minds, that while abundant food stimulated manufactures and promoted the comfort of the whole body of workme? T To Mr. George Wilson. London, Fob. 88, 1848. XIy, ] COBDEN’'S IMPORTANT SPEECH. 317 "ad labourers, legislative protection was nob saving, and 1865. ould nop save, the farmers. The contention, again, that Ar. 4L the landlords were subjected to special burdens, and were therefore entitled to special exemptions, had completely broken down. The whole process went on under the tosely pttentive eyes of the Prime Minister. The year before, said Cobden, he had not penetrated the quality of hig protectionist friends. This year they set up for them-Selves; they found out their weakness, and, what is more, they Jet Sir Robert find it out also.® _ Cobden himself helped to the result by one of the most Mportant speeches that he ever made. “ We are cer-‘ainly,” ho wrote to his wife, © taking more prominent Sfound this session than ever, and the tone of the farmers’ friends is very subdued indeed. They never open their Routhy jf they can help it, and then they speak in "Very humble strain. I am quite in a fidget about my ®Peech on Thursday. You will think it very strange in an old hack demagogue like me, if I confess that I am as OrVous ag a maid the day before her wedding. The reason 81 Suppose that I know a good deal is expected from me, "0d I gm afraid I shall disappoint others as well as myself. Thaye sent for Mr. Lattimore, who came up and spent an *Vening with me, on purpose to give me a lesson about the frmers’ view of the question.” ® “Twas terribly out of sorts with the task,” he said, after % wag al) over, © and when I got up to speak, I was all in a Maze” Tp fact, an intimate friend who had stood on many 8 platform with him, found him in the lobby, pele, nervons, Md confident that he should break down in the middle of bi Speech. “No, you will not,” said his friend; “your Rervousness convinces me that you will make a better speech ¥ Spoeches, i. £90. To Mrs. Cobden. March 11, 1845. 318 LIFE 'E OF COBDEN [oBA? 1845. than you ever made before in your life” And that i® what Ar il, actually happened. In sending his wife a copy of al Times containing a report of his speech, Cobden wrote ; her that everybody in the House on both sides spoke nigh'y of it, and declared it to be his best. «But I don’s think) he adds, “ that it was as good as it ought to have beel: The Prime Minister had followed every sentence with earnest attention ; his face grew more and more solemn as the 878% ment proceeded. At length he crumpled up the notes which he had been taking, and was heard by an onlooke who was close by, to say to Mr. Sidney Herbert, who “ next him on the bench, “ Yow must answer this, for cennot.” And in fact Mr. Sidney Herbert did make tH answer, while Peel listened in silence.! This speech should be read in connexion with the won panion speech made the year before, and already refer™ ; to (p. 298). Much of Cobden’s speaking, and especially # this time, though never deficient in point and matter, wa loose in its form and slipshod in arrangement. That B should be so, was unavoidable under the circumstances 1 which his addresses were made. These two speeches, 08 the contrary, show him at his best. They are models of the we in which a great case should be presented to the House © 1 To Mrs. Cobden. March 14, 1845. dis 2? In the course of his speech Mr. Sidney Herbert said that it was very g tasteful to him, as a member of the agricultural body, to be always ge to Parliament “whining for protection.” The expression was di and gave Mr. Disraeli the hint for one of his most pungent sallies. ob agriculturists, he said, reforring to Peel’s inconsistencies, must not oont™” too nicely the hours of courtship with the moments of possession. * et ; was little said now about the gentlemen of England; when the belo” object has ceased to charm, it is vain to appeal to the feelings. Ins E of listening to their complaints, he sends down his valet, a wall-boba™, person, to make it mown that we are to have no ‘ whining’ here. se is the fate of the great agricultural interest 5 thet beanty which everyP wooed, and one deluded.” iy, 4 ARGUMENT OF THE SPEECH. 319 Commons, as well as admirable examples of effective seleebon, luminous arrangement, and honest cogency of reasoning Ibricate and dificult matter. Besides all this, they show ho W completely Cobden had worked out the whole concepfon, of economic policy and the whole scheme of statesanship, of which the repeal of the Corn Law was only a eta) and a condition precedent. Many of the subscribers % the League were no doubt only thinking that Free Trade would bring them new armies of good customers. The Whigs, on the other hand, while sincerely concerned for ne Social state of the realm, picked up the notion of Free rade vaguely, along with education and colonization, as "5 remedy among others. Cobden alone seemed to discern What Free Trade weant, how it was being forced upon us by increase of population and other causes, and how many “hanges it would bring with it in the whole social strucbre, was this commanding grasp of the entire policy °f hig subject, which gradually gave Cobden such a hold "Ver the recoptive intelligence of Sir Robert Peel that at las i amounted to a fascination that was irresistible. Why are the farmers distressed? Cobden asked. Why Bre English farmers less successful than English manufacturepg ? Because they are working their trade with sufficient capital. Throughout BEugland, south of the Trong and including Wales, the farmers’ capital is not more thug five pounds an acre, whereas for carrying on the : "Sines successfully is ought to be twice as much. How it that in 5 country overflowing with capital, where every ther pursuit is abounding with money, when money is Bog to France for railways and to Pennsylvania for bongs, when it is connecting the Atlantic with the Pacific by Canals, and diving to the bottom of the Mexican mines for investments, it yet finds no employment in the most Wractive of all gpots, the soil of this country itself? The 1845. Er, 41. 320 (cma? LIFE OF OOBDEN. 1845. answer is plain, There is no security of tenure such # air. 41. will warrant men of capital in investing their money i 9 soil. But what is the connexion between this insecurity © tenure and agricultural protection? The reply is that we protectionist landowners are in a vicious circle. They think the Corn Laws are a great mine of wealth; they wal! voters to retain them, and therefore they will have de pendent tenants on whom they may count at the election If they insist on having dependent tenants they will ne! get men of spirit and of capital. The policy reacts up?” them. If they have not men of skill and capital they cannot have full provision and employment for the labour®” And then comes round the vicious close of the circle, pa% perism, poor-rates, county-rates, and all the other “ speci? burdens >’ of the landed interest—special burdens of the” own express creation.’ Their fundamental error ley ” thinking that rents could only be kept up by Protecti® Even if this had been true, Protection had become 1m possible, from the pressure of population. But it was pol trae. To the farmers Cobden had never given a probab? reduction of rents as one of the reasons for repealing a Corn Law. He told them something still more jmportat® “ Though I have not promised reduction of rent,” he said “I have, however, always maintained that with Free Trad? in corn, and with moderate prices, if the present rents are to be maintained, it must be by means of a different gyste” of managing property from that which you now pur” You rust have men of capital on your land ; you mus? i your land on mercantile principles ; you must not be 8ff® of an independent and energetic man who will vote 2° be pleases; yon must give up inordinate game-preserving.” Speaches, i. 264-5. Spesches, i. 402-3. March 8, 1849. gy, ) TED ARGUMENT, 221 This was the skeleton of Cobden’s argument, and each 1845. Retaber of was clothed with exactly the awount of Zr 4l Eaphic illustrations from sound authorities that was calcnlatog ¢, bring the cage effectively home. The representatives of the farmers were gurprised to be told of many things, Which they immediately wondered that they had not thought of before, The farmers of Kent, Suffolk, and Surrey, *joyed protection in their hops, but they had in return to Pay for the protection on other articles which they did 06 produce. Those: of Chester, Gloucester, and Wilts had 0 interest in protecting cheese, but they were heavily taxed for the oats and beans which they wanted for their beasts. The farmers in the Lothians had the bensfit of a restrictive taty op, wheat, but this was a trifle compared with the disad-Tibtage of having to pay duty on linseed cake and other items *f provender for cattle. Everybody, in short, was taxed for the benefit of everybody else. If the farmer derived so little 800d fro, protection, the labourer derived still less. Members ero startled $0 be told that more goods had been exported to Brae. in & year than had been consumed in the same time by the whole agricultural peasantry and their families in Boglang ; that no labourer in England spent more than thirty “billing a vear in manufactures, if the article of shoes were Xoepted ; that the same class did not pay fifteen shillings a beag Per annum to the revenue, and that the whole of their “ntributions to the revenue did not amount to three quar-B18 of 5 million a year. This, said Cobden triumphantly, is the Pass to which thirty years of Protection have brought the *Briculinry] interest. © There never wag a xnore monstrous Selugion than to suppose that that which goes to increase the trade of the country, and to extend its manufactures nd Commerce ; that which increases our population, enlarges te Ramber of your customers, and diminishes your burdens J Dultiplying the shoulders that sre to bear them, and 1047 322 LIFR {+t QOURDEN. roms? giving them increased strength to bear them, can possibly tend to lessen the value of land.” * Mr. Disraeli once said that Free Trade was not a principl® it was an expedient. In Cobden’s hands just the reverse is true; Free Trade is not an expedient; it is ® pri ciple, a doctrine, and a system. Ho is often charged with arguing his case too exclusively on the immediate exigent? of the situation. It was hardly possible for him 0 do otherwise. Neither the House of Commons nor the multitude at Covent Garden would have listened wit? patience to a lecture on international exchanges. Bu! whenever he had a chance, Cobden took care to rest big argument on the importance of a free circulation iB be currents of exchange. In his speech of the previo? year, he had blamed Sir Robert Peel for promising ches? prices as the result of his tariff. The price of cor’ modities, said Cobden, may spring from two causes =? temporary, fleeting, and retributive high price, produced R) scarcity ; or a permanent and natural high price, produced by prosperity. The price of wool, for example, had bee? highest when the importation was greatest; it sprang fro?” the prosperity of the consumers. Peel, therefore, took the “least comprehensive and statesmanlike view of 8 measures when he proposed to lower prices, instead of aiming to maintain them by enlarging the circle of exchange.” Prices would teke care of themselves withoo! detriment; to the consumer, provided only that the stres® o commodities were allowed to flow freely and without artifici®! interruption. (See below, vol. ii. 344.) This important idea was probably far beyond the esc? of most of Cobden’s hearers. I know thers are M7 § Speeches, i. 882. Some extremely interesting supplementary critiol#™ en Cobden’s view of the effects of Protection on agriculburs! interests 55° ¥ be found in Mr, Fawcett’s Free Trade and Protection, pp. 87 —47. roy | COBDEN' 3 TNFLUTNCOR ON “HL, 323 heads, he once said, who cannot comprehend and master * Proposition in political economy, for 1 believe that that “udy is the highest exercise of the human mind, and that the exact sciences require by no means go hard an effort.’ i, bowaver, Cobden’s economic language was a desperate Brgon to the country gentlemen, it came with the power of “Volation to heir leader. “Sir Robert Peel,” said Mr. Disras;, in his subtle and striking portrait of his great emy, “had a dangerous sympathy with the creations of “thers, He was ever on the look-out for new ideas, and When he did go he embraced them with eagerness and often With Precipitancy. Although apparently wrapped up in him-~ Self ang supposed to be egotistical, except in seasons of rare ®Xaltedneys, as in the year 1844-5, he was really deficient in Self-confidence, There was always some person representing Some theory or system exercising an influence over his mind. In hig “sallet days’ it was Mr. Horner or Sir Samuel Romig ; in later and more important periods it was the Duke of Wellington, the King of the French, Mr. Jones Loyd, some others, and finally Mr. Cobden.”” I Was in this session that Mr. Disraeli first opened his faking fire upon the Prime Minister. In 1842, as has been thready seen (p. 239), he declared that Peel’s policy was 0 exact, permanent, and perfect consistency with the prin-“Pley of Free Trade Inid down by Mr. Pitt. But clonds had risen on the horizon since then. Things had happened Which made the rising gladiator change his mind, not as bo the national expediency of Free Trade, but as to the Persona) expediency of carrying his sword to the opposite mp, Sir Robert, soon after coming into power, observed % & friend that he knew too little of the young men of the Party, and expressed a wish to know more. The friend WVited him to dinner, and among the men of promise who Spsochas, § 288. Feb. £7, 1048. 7 Lord Qeerge Bontinck, p. 201 1848. need) Ar. 41. 324 LIFA OF (ORDEN, romal. J - wore presented to their chief wes Mr. Disraeli. Feel, 00° a. of the moss formal and even pedantic of men, was ropell?d by the extravagant dress, the singular mannerism, the o¥ businesslike air of the strange genius who sab at table with him. Nothing came of the interview, and the mortified aspirant had to bide his time. Tn 1845 Mr. Disraeli felt; # be afterwards said, that Protection was in the condition in which Protestantism had beer in 1828. With shrewd instinct than Peel, he scented the elements of & formidable and destructive mutiny. Success was not certain, bub i was possible enough to be worth trying. With unparalleled daring he hastened to sound the attack. In the session of 1845 Peel seemed to be at the height of his power. Yeb this was the session in which Mr. Disraeli mocked him 8° 8 fine actor of the part of the choleric gentleman; 89 be great parliamentary middleman, who bamboozled cone party and plundered the other; as the political Petruchio, a had tamed the Liberal shrew by her own tactics ; as the Torf who had found the Whigs bathing and stolen their clothe ¢ For my part,” he said on one of these occasions, “if we are to have Free Trade, I, who honour genius, prefer that such measures should be proposed by the member fr Stockport, rather then by one who by skilful parliaments’ manceavres has tampered with the generous confidence of a great pecple and a great party.” Yet Mr. Disraeli, whose sagacity was always of far boo powerful a kind to allow him to blink facts, knew very well as ho afterwards said, that practically for the moment tho Conservative Government was stronger at the end of 8b session of 1845 than even at the commencement Of the session of 1842. “If they had forfeited the hearts of the! adherents, they had not lost their votes; while both is Parliament and the country they had succeeded in 8pP™, pristing & mass of loose, saperficial opinion, not grarmmelled R23 PROSPECTS OF THE QUESTION. 323 by Party ties, and which complacently recognized in their 184. Teasureg the gradual and moderate fulfilment of a latitu- Zr. 41. Yanrian policy both in Church aud State.” The same keen Observer goes on to remark of those with whom we are Miediately concerned, that in spite of their powers of lebate and their external organization, the close of the ssion found the members of the Manchester confederacy “duced to silence, The state of prices, of the harvests, of “merce had rendered appeals varied even by the per-Wagive ingenuity of Mr. Cobden a wearisome iteration. Cobden himself, however, knew exactly how things stood, “2 foresaw with precision bow they would move. Ia the Wmer of 1845, when Parlisment had found his appeal s Vearisome iteration, he had before him one of those immense Wltity des, such as could only be assembled, he said, in *Wient Rome to witness the brutal conflicts of men, ov ™ ean now be found in Spain to witness the brutal conflicts °f animals, What, he asked, if you could get into the "Mermost minds of the Ministers, would you find them thinking as to the repeal of the Corn Laws? “I know it "8 well ag thongh I were in their hearts. It is this: they "re lf afraid that this Corn Law cannot be maintained—no, 10% 4 rag of it, during a period of scarcity prices, of a fing season, such as we had in *52, 40, and ’41. They Sto it. They are prepared wher such a time comes, to “bolish the Corn Laws, and they have made up their minds bo it, There is no doubt in the world of it. They are going s T8peal it,” he went on, “as I told you—meark my words “3% a season of distress. That distcess may come ; aye, three "ook of showery weather when the wheat is in bloom or "Poning, would repeal these Corn Laws.”® You cannot call Matesmanship, he scornfully argued, a policy which leaves the industria] scheme of such a couniry a8 ours to stand J Li wf Bontenak, we 7. Hicarad rz, 1 ROR, He 326 BIFR OF OURDEN. [omsF 1845. or fall in such a way as this on the casi of a die. Ib #8 Xr, 41. not long before events put Cobden startlingly in the right The great popular agitation of the year, as it happened, was cansed by a measure which touched a very different kind of sensibility, This session Peel introduced the memorable Pro” posal for the augmentation of the grant to the Catholic Colleg® at Maynooth. That laudable measure was a small detail 10 the policy of breaking up the old system of Ascendancy—> policy made necessary by the revolution of Catholic Banc” pation, in which Peel had assisted in so remarkable a way ‘ Unfortunately, Peel never saw, what clear-sighted men like Lord Clare saw atthe time of the Union, that the tenure of and was the only real object of interest to the people to whom he had given political emancipation. Hig attitude in referenc® to the Encumbered Estates Act showed that he did not possess the key to the Irish question. But his views on the solution of the religious difficulty were thoronghly statesman like, so far as that particular difficulty went, Nothing that he ever did showed greater courage than the Maynooth grant’ for though he carried his second reading by the enormot® majority of 147, Mr. Gladstone was undoubtedly right when he reluctantly affirmed that the minority represented the pr” vailing sense of a great majority of the people of England and Scotland! The principles on which Peel defended the 1 creased grant to Maynooth, pointed very directly towards 2 scheme for the endowment of the Catholic clergy. It wae fF this reason, among others, that Lord John Russell supported the increased grant. “The arguments,” he said, © which are 0 1 Mr, Gladstone hod resigned the office of President of the Bosrd of Trade ab the beginning of the Session, on the rather singular gronnd thot while he approved of the Maynooth grant and waa going to support ibs es had once written a book in which a different view of the proper relatio? ’ between Stats and Church had been Jsid down. “ Au a general rule, thos who hava borne yolemn testimony on great constitutional questions, ought pot fo he packion to proposing & material demartore Seopa thse” te) THE MAYNOOTH GEANT. 327 “und, and ag I think so incontrovertible, for an endowment 1k. br the education of the Roman Catholic priesthood, would Zs. 41. Prove on another occasion equally sound and incontrovertible foray endowment to maintain that priesthood.” It is doubt-"whether any Liberal leader will ever again be able to take “hat wag once so wise and just a position, but there is still "om for the position which Cobden took. Mr. Bright °Pposed the grant altogether, on the ground that no purely *elesiastical institution should be paid for ont of the pubtaxes, Cobden, on the contrary, both spoke and voted for the Ministerial Bill. He was unable to find in it anything relating to the endowment of the Catholic clergy: "hat he voted for was simply and purely an extended educatons) grant. What objection could there be to giving a Boog education, in any manner in which it can be most Hoctually given, to a body of men who are to be the Wstructors of many millions of people? You give large Sranty to elementary schools in Ireland ; you vote money to the university, from which the Catholic clergy cannot bone bus if you support instruction to Roman Catholics "all, it is wise and politic to give it to the clergy before Very other order. On the merits he would support the Proposal, and he would do so all the more cheerfully on the Brounq that it was acceptable to the Irish people This is Wise ag political wisdom can be, but the present state of "ho Ligh University question looks ag if Mr. Bright's view, ud not Cohden’s, had won. the day. The following extracts from letters to his wife will show how Cobden passed the time from day to day, during this “dons and wearisome session i— “London, Feb. 11, 1845.—I met Lord Howick [the Apri . Bright only went twice 0 Ela am i Hn other concerned the reg re 2b South Kensington. Cobéan as a Commissioner for hibition supported Princa Albert's policy. 1845. Xr. 41. 128 LIFE OF COBDEN. [oms® present Earl Grey] at dinner, as was told you by Mi Bright. He did not convert me to Whiggery, nor did Be make any attempt wpon wy virtue, He is in very good temper with the League, and quite disposed to help us, and to throw the fixed duty overboard. Bright made 8 very powerful but rasping speech the other night. The milk" and-water people will find fault with him, but he is a noble follow, and ought to be backed up by every genuine Free trader.” “ April 11.—Woe are all being plagued to death with the fanatics about the Maynooth grant. The dissenters and the charch people have joined together to put the screw upo? the members. However, I expect that Peel will carry hi? measure by a large majority.” “ April 14.—We are still being very much persecuted bY the fanatics ; all the bigots in the country seem to be using the privilege of writing their remonstrances to me.” “ April 28—1 can’t fix the day, I am sorry to 88% when I shall positively see you. There is a notice of motio® 3tanding by Lord John Russell upon the state of the labouring population, which I am almost compelled to take a part 1 If I were to be absent, it would be construed into a slight 02 the Whig party. It stands for Friday, bu I am not without hope that he may put it off till after the Whitsun holiday® I will learn his views to-morrow if I can.” “June 19.~O0n Wednesday I was to speak at Covent Garden, and being confined all the day in the Committee room, and having to prepare my speech after four o'clock I knew I should be excused writing, 1 find it very difficult to get up my spirits to appear before a large audience like that at Covent Garden. Indeed I feel myself to be only acting a part, in appearing to spesk with energy’ hope, and confidence. I can’t go through another period such as the present session, to be harassed and sanoyed 88 av] LRTTRELS TO MEd. COBDEN. 329 have been in every possible way ; it would kill me. Ihave _ 1845. 10% the least ides when I shall be released from my at- dir 41. “ddance at the Committee, To-day we have been bored With & three hours’ speech from a counsel, who would have Bothirg else to do if he releazed us from our confinement. L expect we shall have another week of it at least.” “ June 20.—Now 1 will give you a specimen of my day’s York. Our Committee meets at twelve and sits till four. They, the House commences, and lasts on an average il twelve, Twice last week I sat till two o’clock in the Houge, having been under the roof for fourteen hours. Next Morning I can’t be down till nine o’clock, and scarcely have 1 got breakfast, and glanced at the Votes and Proceedings for the day, when I must start again for the House. You will, | think, excuse me after this, if I am not a very good *Orrespondent.’? “June 24.—There never was such a case of petty perse-“ution gg I am enduring in this Railway Committee! We have been now nearly five weeks sitting, hearing wit-Resses, and listening to the tedious harangues of counsel Bout, g, ot of paltry lines among the little towns and "llages in Norfolk and Suffolk. T thought we should have 89% to the end of our work in a fortnight or three weeks, but Dow we ave threatened with another week or ten days. Aad te great misfortune is, that we have no power to put "0Y resiraint upon the tongues of the counsel, who are paid 2 proportion to the length of time they can waste. But I hive made up my mind te go down to Manchester on Friday Nght gf any rate, although I shall be obliged to come up Bain on Sunday night, to be here in the Committee at Welve o’clock.” “ June 26.~-The meeting at Covent Garden was as usual ® bumper, but I did not think the speaking was quite "W to the merk. I hsve bad a succeasfol motion for » 1845. 287, 41. 250 Lr “m GOBDEN, {omar Commission to inquire into the subject of the Railway gauges, I moved it again yesterday as a substantive motion, and it was agreed to by all parties. It is well to 0 something practical in the House occasionally, as it give? one the standing of a man of business.” Over all these busy interests hung a heavy cloud of the gloomiest thoughts. Throughout the session Cobden’ mind had been harassed almost beyond endurance by a host of dark’ cares ; and it is only by knowing what these amounted to, that we can measure the intensity of a devotion to public concerns which could sustain itself unabated under this galling pressure. The following extracts from letters to his brother will suffice to show us what was going on, At the end of the session of 1844, he had allowed a groan to escap® him, extorted by the reports which his brother had sent him of the state of their business :—* I shall have a month OF two for private business, and, Heaven knows, it is not before it is required. It is a dog’s life I am leading, and I wish 1 could see my way out of the collar.”® But in the recess of 1844, as in that of the previous year, he had been speedily dragged back from his own affairs to those of the Leagu® and the country. Throughout the spring of 1845, howevers things were rapidly approaching a crisis from which there seemed to be no escape :— “ April 7.—1 shall certainly be down a week before the Whitsuntide holidays, so as to have at least a fortnight. The fidgets have so got possession of me that I cannot master them. For the first time I feel fairly down and dead-beaten: It is of no use writing all one feels, Entreat J. S. to work down the stock of odds and ends of cloth, and keep down everything as low as possible. And remind Charles agaid of the critical importance of finding something for the machinery to do in the interval between the seasons. It.is of ® Te F. W. Gobden. Leamington, Sth August, 1844 A J PRY eevee ARR A NIN BNA, 3351 n oe your writing bad news to me. I can’t help it while 0. 1845. Br, 41. “ April 18.~1 do not see sny difficulty in giving adequate tention to the business, and still retaining, ostensibly at all "Vents, the game public position as heretofore. Bub whether "his can he done or not, I shall of course make everything Ise subservient to the one point in which honour is involved. There in no dovbt that our pattern department, 80 far as the home trade is concerned, has been a failure this spring. This ig now irremediable, and it is of no use dwelling on it. But ig cannot be overlooked in any estimate of the manage-Bent at, the works and the warehouse, and of the cause of failgpe 2 “ May 26.1 am fixed in the Norfolk Committee to-day, “ad do not feel the least chance of being released for a week, ud if may be a month ; and for this there is no help, forif I Were to leave for twenty-four hours, the Sergeant-at-Arms Would be after me.” “June 6,—I am sorry to say it is impossible for me to come down even for a day. Our Committee have determined to sit " Saturdays, and the rule of the House precludes me from being absent even for an hour. God only knows when this odious Committee will come to a close. If you should wish bs Say anything abont money-matters, write to me. If you “ant a little temporary assistance, pray see Mr, ——, and ge him 4 message from me to the effect that I shall feel Sbligeq if he will try to get a few thousand pounds in a “ilar manner to the former transaction. “But when I come down after the Session, we must pub 0 business upon a different footing, so ae to be able to Wold troubling anybody. I would have written to.—— ba really, in my prominent position, it is a very delicate Water to write about. You had better, therefore, take an Pportunity of seeing him privately, end pray beg him 8 332 LIFE OF QOBDEN. {oral i845. treat the matter as very confidential. I have so MALY Ar 41. vigilant foes, that a whisper about my credit would Pe exaggerated a thousandfold,” “June 19.~—Your letters keep me on the tenter-hooks, for I know not in what extremity you may be placed. Iam i® the same predicament as ever. The committeo will in 2. probability last a week more. To-day we have been rested to a three hours’ speech by a counsel upon a mere fractiol of the group. What makes it more difficult to escape *® that the cornmittee does not give a decision on any Po until we have heard the whole, and consequently nobody not acquainted with the evidence already taken could step in to fill my place. Sir Benjamin Hall, very luckily for bi was pitched from his horse on his head the second day of our meeting, and he was excused from further attendances and as we have nobody else in his place and as four 8% the quorum, we can’t proceed to business in the absence of one.” “ June 24.~1 will try to put off any meeting of the co mittee on Saturday, so as to be able to come down on Friday night, but I shall be obliged to be in town again on Monday morning by twelve. I see no end to this tedious sf We have an appointment for another branch to begin an Monday. The trath is, the rival schemes fight for time, I order to delay the passing of the bills during the presen’ session. But I will at all risks come down on Friday after noon by the express train which will land me in Manchester 8 ten o’clock, and I should like to have a bed at your lodging? and there I must see John Brooks privately on the Saturday morning. I have turned the subject over in every way, and I see no other solution of it than in absolutely withdrawing myself from public life, first having secured such a promise of support from some of ny friends as shall secure me fro the sifscta of the shock. I have meds np my mind to hid av] PRIVATE HUBARBASEM TIA, 3:2 3 “ud shall not have a mement’s peace of mind until 1 have 8 fairly got oui of my presert false position. In fact, I would Ar. 4. 10% go through another four months like the past for any tarthly consideration whatever.” A friend of Cobden’s, who was engaged in the same busi-Ress, has told me how he received a message one afternoon 1 the winter before this, that Cobden wished to see him. Ho went over to the office in Mosley Street, and found him 0 the edge of ‘dark sitting with his feet on the fender, booking gloomily futo the languishing fire. He was evidently 0 great misery. Cobden had sent for him to seek his 8dvice how to extricate himself from the difficulties in Which his business had become involved. They summoned ® second friend to their sombre councils. There was no doubt either of the serioasness of the position or of the Causes to which ib was due. His business, they told him, wanted a head. If he persisted in his present Course, nothing on earth could keep him from ruin. He Mast retive from public life, and must retire from ib Without the loss of a day. Cobden struggied desperately Against the sentence. The battle, he said, was so momen-Yous, ang perhaps so nearly won. One of his counsellors atked him how he could either work or resi with a black load like this upon his mind. Oh,” said Cobden, * when Lam about public affairs I never think of it; it does mot fouch me; I am asleep the moment my head is on the Pillow.” A few mouths later the difficulty could no longer be evaded. In September Cobden, at the cost of anguish which Ve may imagine, came to the terrible vesolntion to give up Public affairs. He wrote a letter, describing his position and the resolve to which: it had driven him, to the friend Who had for four unresting years been his daily comrade and follow-soldiar. and whose mere presence at his side, he 334 Liem he CORDES [omar 1845. once said, was more to him than the active support of * " ' hondred other men. Mr. Bright was then travelling i" Scotland. The letter found him one evening at a hotel % Inverness. It was the wettest autumn in the memory © man, and the rain came over the hills in a downpour that never ceased by night or by day. It was the rain that rained away the Corn Laws. Cobden begged of Mr. Bright © burn what he had written, and the injunction was obeyed It was a beautiful letter, Mr. Bright has said: surely 7° may say no less of the reply :— “ Invernees, Septombeor 20th, 1845. “My pear Coepen,—I received your lefter of the 15th yesterday evening, on my arrival here. Its contents have made me more sad than I can express; it seems as if this untoward event contained within it an affliction perscmal for myself, great public loss, a heavy blow to one for whom I feel a sincere friendship, and not a little of danger to the great cause in which we have been fellow-labourers. “I would return home without a day’s delay, if I had # valid excuse for my sisters who are here with me, We ha® now been out nearly three weeks, and may possibly be 28 much longer before we reach home; our plan being pretty well chalked out beforehand, I don’t see how I can greatly change it without giving a sufficient reason. But it does not appear needful that you should take any hasty step the matter. Too much is at stake, both for you and for the public, to make any sudden decision advisable, I m&Y therefore be home in time for us to have some conversatio® before anything comes before the public. Nothing of i chall pass my lips, and I would urge nothing to be done till the latest moment, in the hope that some way of escape mey get be found. T am of opinion that your retirement would be tantamount to a dissolution of the Lesgne; its main” tre.) LOPTER FROM MB. BRIGET 335 Pring would be gone. I can in no degree take your place. 1845. Asa second I can fight; but there are incapacities shout me, Ar. 41. of which I am fully conscious, which prevent my being more than a second in such a work as we have laboured in. Do not think I wish to add to your trouble by writing thus ; but I BM most anxious that some delay should take place, and therefore I urge that which I fully believe, thab the League’s ®Xistence depends mostly upon you, and that if the shock Cannot be avoided, it should be given only after the Weightiest consideration, and in such way as to produce the least evil, “Be assured that in all this disappointment you have wy heartfelt sympathy. We have worked long snd hard aud cordially together; and I cen say most truly that the Wore T have known of you, the more have I had reason to admire and esteem you, and now when a heavy clond seems Upon us, I must not wholly give up the hope that we may yet labour jn the good cause until all is gained for which we have striven. You speak of the attempts which have been made to raise the passion which led to the death of Abel, 2d to weaken us by destroying the confidence which was Deedful to our successful co-operation. If such attempts have been made, they have wholly failed. To help en the cause, T am sure each of us would in any way have led or followed ; we held our natural and just position, and hence Our success. In myself I know nothing that at this moment would rejoice me more, except the absence of these difficulties, than that my retirement from the field could in Bly way maintain you in the front rank. The victory is Wow in reality gained, and our object will before very long be accomplished ; but it is often as difficult to leave a Victory as to gain it, and the sagacity of leaders cannot be dispensed with while anything remains to be done. Be Assured T shall think of little else but this distressing turn LIFE OF COBDAN, [ox ZV YR48. of affairs till I meet you; snd whilss T am sorry Hout sich should be the position of things, I cannot but applaud the determination you show to look thera full in the face, and grapple with the difficulties whilst they aro yet surmountable: “I have written this letter under feelings to which I hav® not been able to give expression, bug you will believe that I am, with much sympathy snd esteem, Yoar sincere friend, Jorn Brier.” The writer, however, felt the bad tidings lying 0° heavily on him to be able to endure inaction, A day or tWO later Mr. Bright changed his plans and hastened southwards. Helpful projects revolved in his mind, as he watched the postboys before him pressing on through the steaming rain, When he reached Manchester, he and one or tW¢ friends procured the sum of money which sufficed to tide over the emergency. For the moment Cobden was free 0 return to the cause which was now on the eve of victory: CHAPTER XV. THE AUTUMN OF 1845. Ti story of the avtumn of 1845 has often been told, 1845 nd it ig not necessary that it should be told over again in “En 4. ay detail in these pages. It constitutes one of the most Memorable episodes in the history of party. It was the burning. point in the career of one of the most remarkable of English Ministers. It marked the decisive step in the Breatost of all revolutions in our commercial policy. And it temaing the central incident in the public life of the statesman who is the subject of these memoirs. In his powerful speech in 1844 Cobden bad reminded the House of Commons, for men were apt to forget ¥, he said, that in Ireland there was a duty st that day of eighteen Shillings a quarter upon the import of foreign wheat. Will it be believed in future ages, he cried, that in & country Periodically on the pointi of actual famine—at a time when its inhabitants svbsisted on the lowest food, the very foots of the earth—there was a law in existence which Virtually prohibited the irzportation of bread? The crisis bag now arrived. The session was hardly at an end before disquieting rumours began to come over from Ireland. AS the autumn advanced, it became certain that the potato €Top was a disastrous failure. The Prime Minister had, in his own words, devoted almost every hour of his time, after 216 : BOEN fomat LR oF cospEx, 1845. the severe labours of the session, to watching chances and dir. 41. reading evidence night and day, in anticipation of the heavy calamity which hung over the nation, By the middle of October the apprehension of actual scarcity had becom? very vivid, and he wrote to Sir James Grabam that the ony effectual remedy was the removal of impediments to import: On the last day of the month, the members of the Cabinet met in grent haste. Three other meetings took place With? the week, A marked divergence of opinion instantly became manifest. Sir Robert Pesl wished to summo? Parliament, and to advise the suspension for a limited period of the restrictions on importation. Lord Aberdeen, MT Sidney Herbert, and Sir James Graham supported this view: The other members of the Cabinet, following Lord Stanley and the Duke of Wellington, dissented. Peel did nob disguise, and the dissidents were well aware, how difficult if might be to put the corn duties on again if they had onc® been taken off. It wes folt on hoth sides that the great struggle which had been going on ever since the Whig® proposed their fixed duty, and in which Peel had shown £0 many ominous signs of change, was now coring to 8° issue. On both sides there was & natural reluctance t° precipitate it. On the 6th of N. ovember Ministers separated without coming to a decision, A skilful enemy was intently watching their proceeding? from the northern metropolis. On the 22nd of November Lord John Russell launched from Edinburgh his famou® letter to his constituents in the City of London. He hsd Seen in the public prints that Ministers had met; that they had consulted together for many days; and that nothing had been dove. Under these circumstances he thought that the Government were not performing their duty to thelr Sovereign and their country. The present state of the sonntry oculd nok be viewed without approhension, Fro” py kr THE EDINBURGH Lid, 339 astination might produce a state of suffering that was 184 frightfu) to coutemplate, but bold precaution might avers Zr. 41. Serious evils. If was no longer worth while to contend for 4 fixed duty. Let them all then waite to put an end toa System which had been proved to be the blight of commerce, the bane of agriculture, the source of bitter division among “lasses, the cause of penury, fever, mortality, and crime Mnong the people. If this end was to be achieved, it mush bo gained by the unequivocal expression of the public Olce, The Edinburgh Letter was the formal announcement that Lord John Ruseell had come round to Cobden’s pro-8ramme, the winning of Free Trade by agitation. Sir Robert Pools conversion, as everybody lkmows, was very freely puted both ab the time and afterwards to interested and Bbitious motives. Ibis hard to nuderstand on what ground the same imputation might not have been sustained in the %ase of the corresponding conversion of Lord John. The Obvious trath is that they were both of them foo clear Sighted not to perceive that events had, at last, ghown that Oohden and his friends were in the righi, and that the time had come for admitting it. Lord John Russell's adhesion made the victory of the League certain. Mr. Bright happened to be on the platform at a railway station in Yorkshire, a5 Lord John Russell passed through on his way from the north to Osborne. He stepped into the carriage for a few moments. “Your letter,” said Mr. Bright, “has now Made the total and immediate repeal of the Corn Law evitablo; nothing can save it.”” The letter had in fact fone no less thas this. Immediately on its publication Sir Robert Peel summoned his Cabinet, His view had been that Parliument ought to be called together, on the awumption thet the measure of tolisf which he wes or-nered fo intwodece would virsasily 240 LIFE OF OOBDEN. [oBAE 1845. compel a reconsideration of the whole question of P yo-&- +, tection. After the Edinburgh Letter he considered that thi step would appear to be a servile acquiescence in the vie"s of the leader of the Opposition. Still he was prepared stand to his post, and to run the risk of this reproach, provided that his colleagues were unanimous, They were nob £0: Lord Stanley was intractable, and others in the Government were nearly as hostile, Thinking, therefore, that he should fail in the attempt to settle the question, and that after vehement contests and the new combinations that would be formed, probably worse terms would be made than if sore one else were to undertake the settlement .of the questions the Minister felt it hig duty to resign. That event 00K place on the 5th of December. For a fortnight the country remained without a responsible Administration, . The share of the League in this startling catastrophe did uot escape Cobden’s eye. The prospect of famine jn Irelsud had no sooner become definite, than the League at once prepared for action. Before the end of October, and before the first of the Cabinet Councils, they held a great meeting of many thousands of persons at Manchester, and announced & series of meetings in the other great towns of the kingdom The Ministers were quite aware what this meant, and that they could not face it. Sir James Graham warned Peel that the Anti-Corn-Law ferment wag abont to commence. It woulds he said, be the most formidable movement in modern times: There was a pause for a fow days during the deliberations of the Government, because everybody expected that each successive mail would carry to him the welcome decision of the Cabinet that the ports had been already opened, - And why were they not opened! asked Cobden, Because the League was known to be Strong enough to prevent them from being shat again, If there had been no Anti-Corn-Law League in ihe middle of November, the ports pe PIE MINTSTREIAL ORIAES. 241 "ould have heen opened a month ago. It was because thoy knew well in the Cabinet, and because the landlords Cae well, that the question of total and immediate repeal °F the Corn Law was at stake, that they were ready to "sk, like desperate gamblers, all that might befall during the Uext six months, rather than part with that law. When the Cabinets came to an end withoub any action being taken, then genuine alarm spread through the country, and the Storm of agitation began in good earnest. People knew Pretty well where the difficulty lay. They were told that it ¥a8 the Duke of Wellington snd Lord Stanley who had Socided that the people of England and Ireland should not be allowed to food themselves. Cobden went to a great Bathering at Birmingham (November 18th). If I mistake Tot, he said, you have tried the metal of the noble warrior before in Birmingham. The Duke is & man whom all like to honour for his high conrags, his firmness of resolve, his indomitable perseverance. “ But let me remind him,” cried Cobden, amid a storm of strenuous and persistent approval, “ that notwithstanding all his victories in the field, he never Yet entered into a contest with Englishmen in which he was Wbheaten” Hven the Edinburgh Letter, in spite of Cobden’s brust in the high integrity of the writer, did not disarm bis Vigilance, The letter had transformed Liord John “from the Most ohsoure into the most popular and prominent man of the day» But the Whig party was nothing without the Free Traders, The Tory party was broken to atoms by the rupture dmong their leaders. The League alone stood erect and Bloft amid the ruins of the factions. The ‘activity of the League was incessant. Now that their question had become practically urgent, and an O%casion for the fall of ministries and the strife of parties, 1848. Fr. 41. Apoachss, i. 388. Nov. 18, 1845. Bosachor, i, 848. Yeo. 17. 342 1378 OF COBDEN, FORAY 1848. public interest in their proceedings acquired a new kesnnet® w= 1, “I had reckoned upon geting home on Saturday,” Cobder writes to his wife from Stroud (Dec. 4), “but Lord Duo hae put the screw upon us. We have no alternative bat 1 sleep at his house on Saturday night, in order to attend 8 meeting on the afternoon at his neighbouring town of Wooton-under-Edge. We could not resist his sppes: This throws me out in my plans, and I shall not see yO© till Wednesday. We shall go up to London on Sundsy afternoon to sleep there, and meet Villiers, and others for 2 balk, and on Monday. we shall go to Notts, next day © Derby, and on Wednesday home. The Times newspaper of to-day, which has just come to hand here, reports that the Government has determined to call Parliament together the first week in January, and propose total repeal 1+ If ph he true, the day of my emancipation is nearer than I expected. But we must be on our guard, and not expect too much from the Government. They will attempt 1° cheat us yeh. Our meetings are everywhere gloriously attended. There is a perfect unanimity among all classes; not a syllable about Chartism or any other ism, and not 8 word of dissent, Bright and I are almost off our legs, five days this week in crowded meetings.” “ Bristol, Dec. 5, 1845.—I slept last night at Jame? Rhoades’s, and had many kind inquiries and invitations. We had a very delightful meeting at Bath in a splendid Tow? Hall, the Mayor in the 'chair. We are having meeting? every night, and I see no other prospect now but to ran the gauntlet every night till the meeting of Parliament. Bub I * The publication of the Oabinet secret made a wonderful stir at the time. The Standard and the Herald denounced it as an atrocious fabriod” tion. Bub the Times stuck to ita text, and laughed nb the two *melsnsholy prints* who had heen *hobbling about the Corn Laws to the very Jani,” wonoonscious that the repeal of the Corn Laws was fa thing for watsmuan to do, not for old women to maunder ahout ? xv} BRANTVED AGITATION. 143 Kops wo are getting to the death-struggle. Have you seen 1845. Punsh with me on horseback and Lord Jobn offering to hold “Zr 41 the horas, and also as the shadow when Peel is opening the gate of monopoly.” “London, Dec. 15, 1845.—We have had a good meeting @ the City to-duwy. The knowing people say that they have Lever seen so large and unanimoos @ gathering, There is 00 doubt that the City will return four Free-traders at the ext election. By the way 1 don’t hear anything decided about the decision of the Government question. People begin to doubt whether Loed John will form an Administralion after sll. Some knowing folks say Peel will be sent for again.” London, Dec. 18. (To George Combe.)— Politics are like g, magic-lantern just now, every doy brings some new and uplooked-for change. What a righteous retribution has fallen upon the late Ministry! The men who passed the prosent Corn Law in the face of starving millions in the spring of 1642 bave been driven from power and Place by their own sliding scale! May their successors profit by the example! There ie still a great struggle before us, but we will bent the anrighteons few who wish to Profit by the saflerings of the many.” Two days after Cobden had been talking to the pecple of Birmingham in & triumphant strain about the League Wanding erect amid the ruins of the factions, he bad an Opportunity of measuring the estimate in which he was held by ome at least of the factions. Sir Robert Peel resigned on the 5th of December. The Queen sent for Lord John Russell, and commissioned him to form an Administration. Lord John wrote two letters to Cobden on the same day. In the first, he gave the leader of the body which had shaken down a great Ministry and compelled an important revolution in policy, a provisional 144 LIFR OF COBDEN, {CmAR: 1% invitation to take one of the humblest posts in the ministerial Air, 41, hierarchy sees " Ohaham Place, Deo, 19, 1845. “Drak Bre,—I donot expect that T shall be able to form an Adwinistration. If I should, however, on this occasion or a future one, I shall ask you to assist me by accepting the office of Vice-President of the Board of Trade, Lord Clarendon being the President, and the Vice-President having bo represent the department in the House of Commons. I remain, yours faithfully, J. Rosser” The reader will smile at this proposal, when he thinks of the composition of Liberal Governments since the death of Lord Palmerston. The difference between then and now marks the decay of Whig predominance within the five-andthirty years that have intervened. Cobden’s reply to the unflattering offer might have been foreseen. There is little doubt that it would have been the same, even if the offer had been of a more serious kind. * Manchester, Dee, 20, 1845. “Dear Lorn JorN,—I feel greatly honoured by the offer of the office of Vice-President of the Board of Trade, in the event of your being able to form an Administration, . In preferring to remain at my post as the out-of-doors advocate of Free Trade, I am acting from the conviction that I can render you more efficient assistance in carrying out onr principle by retaining my present position, than by entering your Government in an official capacity. Again assuring you how highly I esteem this expression of your confidence, I remain, dear Lord J ohn, Most faithfully yours, Bierary Corpry” tv] OFFEE OF PLAOR TO COBDEN. 345 i reply crossed the second note which Lord John lass, “ell bad written to him on the previous day :— Zr. AL. ” Dec. 19, 1845. ng Da Ste, —In consequence of what I wrote this mornfo Low write to inform you that I have not been able wo 0a Ministry. the ol those who were to be my colleagnes had agreed to og tal repeal of the Corn Laws. Other differences on Or subject have caused our failure, I remain, yours faithfully, J. Rosse.” The differences which were the cause of failure were with NE Greys He objected to Lord Palmerston as Foreign Sotretapy, The intrigue, says one who was very competent fo Indge such matters, was neither contrived with dexterity " ®nducted with temper, but it extricated the Whig “olor from an embarrassing position Lord John Russell’s ble, Was not only that in face of the risks to be encountered oy Was indispensable, but that as Lord Grey was among © first of his party who declared for complete Free Trade in oo, it would be unjustifiable to attempt to carry it without in Viewed from this distance of time, and in the Light of Present docline of the Whig caste, the plea, it must be i lossag, is one of singular tenuity. No one doubts the CXity either of Lord John’s attempt to form a governou OF of his honest acquiescence in its failure, It was "ously mach easier for Sir Robert Peel to settle the Corn Ration, because he would have the votes of the Whigs and , Eis Lord Howick of the previone Chapter. Heo had become a peor on Sigg of bin futher in July, 1845. The seat which he FP Thosiell ug ort Was won by Mr, Hudson, the spitmay ing, e gr Chor, Thompgon, Cobden spoke with « clon A gency : ¥y 9 Candidate soon afterwards. Bee Speeches, i. e : Dixeneisa Lord Geores Bentinck, p. 28. 1845. the Free-traders, ag woll as that of a large body, if not the Ar. 41. majority, of his usual supporters. It was nob certain thst Tord John conld have settled it, for the simple reason thot many of the Conservatives, especially in the House of Lords would have declined to follow him in a policy which they hardly persuaded themselves to accept from Wellington snd Peel. On the failure of his rival, Sir Robert Peel went © Windsor, withdrew his resignation, and returned to Londo having already resumed the functions of the First Minister of the Crown. He hoped by speaking to his colleagit® fro the point of a definitely accepted position, to secure tho SOP” port of those whe had dissented from him at the beginnit of the month. One at least of the survivors, who was in # position to know Peel’s mind at this moment, holds it for certain that the Minister returned to town in the afterno®” of the 20th, in full confidence that hs would carry his potty with him in the tremendous step which he had resolved take. Lord Stanley withdrew ab once,’ but Peel persisted 1B thinking that the schism would end there. It was pot 11827 weeks before he found out his mistake. Thirty years aft? these events, when Peel’s bitterest assailant had bY ° singular destiny raised himself to the height of power fro” which Peel was now looking down upon him, he made * interesting remark on & criticism that had been publish? npon his career. “The writer,” said Lord Beaconsfield % fails to do justice to a striking distinction in my politic? history. The Duke of Wellington in passing Catholic Ema” 346 LIFE ® (OBDER. roms? ? Lord Stenley’s placa at the Colonial Office was taken by Mr. Ginde?0 who had left the Ministry under circumstances already desoribed {p- 326) Ho had 10 seat in Porlisment during the important session of 1846: paviZé cemigned Newark, for which he had been returned by the D ake of pe castle. The Duke was one of the stoatest opponents of Ire Ten suocessfully using all his influedce to secure the defest in North Nott? hig own son, whom Peel now promoted to the office of Irish Recretaty > a seat in the (ebinet. AA 8B | i LABYY, 347 “Ipation, and Sir Robert Peel in repealing the Corn Laws, 1846. ®noeded necessary measures ~f progress, but they broke up Zr. 41. the Party. 1 passed Household Suffrage, but I kept the party “gether and brought it into power.” It has often been Contendeq by contemporaries with good information as to the state of things, that Peel would have been as successful % Mr. Disraeli afterwards was, in getting hig party through awkward gap, if he had only consented to call them together and had candidly laid before them the political con-“erations on which his new policy was founded. Those "ho hold this opinion are possibly right. It is, however, easy fo perceive that Peel’s situation was distinguished by two fata} Peculiarities. One was that he had gone through the "6 process before : he had already done by Protestantism ® he wag now doing by Protection ; he had suddenly carried °% a policy of which he bad been the declared and con *Plcuoug opponent. If was the champion of Protestantism Ad the Church, who had repealed the Test and Corporation 3 8, who had carried Catholic Emancipation, who had creased the Maynooth Grant, and who was believed to be Reditating the endowment of the Irish priests. Feats of this kind do not bear repetition. In the second place, it was “liparatively easy to persuade the Conservatives to assent toa lower franchise, because few of them in their hearts believeq that any manipulation of the suffrage would take "Way from them anything which they really valued. Very any of them, on the other hand, did believe firmly that the Peal of the Corn Laws would take away from them their "eng, which they valued extremely. Political plansibilities "Ul reconcile men to everything, save the deprivation of oir Property. It seems doubtful then whether Sir Robert %l could under any circumstances have prevailed npon his Party to follow him. Itis not to their dishonour that it hou) have been so The Minister was honestly convinced, 2," LIX® OF CORDEN, [oma® 1845. but the party was not. Even Cobden, when looking ab the Ar. 41. battle from a distance, thought that it wonld be wrong “ that the House which was elected to maintain Protection ghould abandon its pledges and do the very reverse.” Long ste” wards, when Peel’s Memoirs were given to the world, Cobde? still held that there would be “much that is difficult © reconcile in his conduct in this question, after everything 1 said and confessed that he can urge in his defence.” * Tho simplest explanation is the true ome. It is a mistake bo assume that because Peel was a great parliamentary 0%” meander, he had been mastered by the parliamentary ¥i% of measuring national welfare by the conveniences of b# party or the maintenance of a majority in a division. A colleague of Sir Robert Peel in this Administration, who haf had unrivalled opportunitiesof seeing great public personsg®™ speaks of him as the most laboriously conscientious * m#” that he has ever known.! It was his conscience that hed become involved in the change of commercial policy. He could, as he believed, and as he afterwards told Cobden him golf, have parried the power of the League for three or four gonrs. But he had come to the conviction that the mainte” nance of restriction was both unsound and dangerous, wal not only impolitic but unjust. It was impossible for hi Po conceal his conviction, or to act as if it did not exist. Con fidence in public men, he said, is shaken when they chang? their opinions, but confidence ought to- be much mor® shaken when public men have not the courage to chang? bheir course when convinced of their error. But why did be not consult political decorum by allowing Lord John Russel bo carry repeal, or at least by taking the opinion of she country ?! Becanse Lord John could not have carried ¢ Letter to J. Parkes, May 26, 1856, «iho ?» « Allowing for differences in grasp and experience,” he went of: Prince Consort waa in this respect of the same type.” Lb 1 Myr. Disrssll walt much on » eertein incongistensy om thig poi® §iB BORERT PEEL'S CONVERSION, 349 "Peal; acd Poel could neither see any advantage in indecision 1948. °F irstional delay, nor could he admit the incompetency of Ar. 41. tho Present Parliament to deal with that, as with every other Object of public concern: n “I haye reason to believe,” eaid Cobden afterwards, that gome discussions which I raised in the House with } View go proving that the sgricnlturists themselves were, ® a Whole, injured by Protection, gave him some confidence 0 the Practicability of a change of policy.” This may well fave been go, The speech in which Peel announced and "dicated the new policy, is little more then an echo of Cobden’ Parliamentary speeches of 1844 and 1845, and this *county for the extraordinary prominence which he after-Tard gave in go remarkable a manner to Cobden’s share in That Was done. Peel has explained the course along which tig Mind wag travelling, His confidence in the necessity of Erotetion was lessened by the experiment of 1842. He fl from the first the increasing difficulty of applying to icles of food the principles which had been applied to so UA0y other articles. Later experiments pointed in the same "ay, Certain important articles of agricultural produce Vere How ad mitted at low rates. Among these were oxen, “hoop, Cows, salted and fresh meat. A chorns of sinister Prophecy rose from the injured interests. There was even + Pan, Forced sales of stock took place. It would be "Possible to compete with the foreign prazier. Meat rel Always said that be felt that he was not the person who ought to 5 *epesl ; snd he repudiated as a foul calumny the fgsertion thet he Buy *d t6 interfere in the settlement of the question by Lord John Essel. wy Wked Me, Disraeli, what wos it but your wish to interfere in this Po °F Which broke up your Cabinet at the beginning of December? As bo *Xpressly said that it was only the refusal of his colleagues to assent of ol Which prevented him from remaining in office on the Platform tity 2burgh Letter, Mr. Disraeli’s charge, so far a8 it goes, caunot bp wor, Lester, 1847. For other reasons nee Poel’s Insbor bs Cobden, + D Anw jse "4%. would be reduced to threspence a pound. The faloificatio® Cl of these prophecies, as Peel reminded his constituent? sh his fall, was destined to have a great effect on the gours® g public opinion. People began to be less apprehensi™ ’ the probable consequences of a more liberal intercours® i other articles of agricultural produce.’ ie Then he perceived an increase of consumption of articl® of first necessity, much more rapid than the increas® z population, and this greatly augmented the rosponsib 2 of undertaking to regulate the supply of food by logislati” { restraints. It greatly aggravated, moreover, the peri ° these restraints in the case of any sudden check 0 po sperity.* } Besides these considerations, Peel says that his faith » restrictions on the importation of corn had been wake’ by general reasoning ; by many concurring proofs that o wages of labour do not vary with the price of cor?’ po serious doubts whether, in the present condition of § 0 country, the preseut plenty were not ensured for the fut?” g in a higher degree by free intercourse in corn, that J restrictions for the purpose of protecting domestic ag’ o ture. Clear as all thisis to a generation whose vision 1° m 1 obscured by the passions of contemporaries, resentment > " suspicion at the time were emotions that might have be i” expected. It speedily became certain that they yo violent enough to endanger the new policy, to wreck i» party, and to overthrow for ever the great Minister v had been its chief. v0 Meanwhile the League made ready to give him effe? sie support. Whatever may have been the case with or? Robert Peel himself, it is certain that other people w , ofraid of the operations of the League, It was this © Tosa: b Mawnoirs, ii. 108, I Mawaworkh Letter of 1347. in Mamoirs, i. 108. I> 3 OPERATIONS OF THRE LEAGUX, 351 federation which kept both the Whig advocates of a fixed 1845. Tuty and the Protectionist advocates of the existing law in Er 41 der, In the last week in the year a meeting was held at Manchester, at which it was resolved to raise the enormous mg pf quarter of a million. of money for the purposes of *Ritation, The scene hag often been described, how one Ua after another called out in quick succession, “A thousang pounds forme!” “A thousand pounds for us!” fd go forth, until, in less than s couple of hours, sixty thongang pounds had been subscribed on the spot. There Vere twenty-three persons or firms who put down ome housang pounds each, and twenty-five persons half as Muck, Cobden, who was always received at every public 8athering daring this stirring crisis with an indescribable "ehemence of sympathy and appiause, addressed a few Oras go the excited and resolute men before him. This oeting.» he said, “will afiord to any Administration the best Possible support in carrying out its principles. If Sir Bohors, Peel will go on in an intelligible and straightforward "use, he will see that there is strength enough in the “Ountry t, support him ; and I should not be speaking the “Ntitients of the meeting, it’ I did not eay that if he takes the Siraightforward, honest course, he will have the support of the League and the country as fully and as cordially as "7 other Prise Ministor.”* At thie time circumstances naturally began to work a com-Plot change in Cobden’s attitude towards Sir Robert Peel. Uhre weeks befors, when the Minister left office, Cobden hag allowed the excitement of the hour to betray him inte Pui, Sxpressions of exultation, which were almost ferociona 0 that severity. Miss Martinean has explained how this foreg outburst shocked some of his friends. They appear, a8 ta “ready been mentioned in another connexion (p. 207), “wmbioa’s Hickory of the Lsegus, ii #18. 152 LPR OF OOBOHEW, poms? 1846. to have used the friends’ privilege of dealing very faitbi’y Zr. 41. with him, Cobden had speedily become conscious of 1 error. One of those who remonstrated with him was his old friend, George Combe, to whom he replied as follows i “It was wrong to exalt in Peel’s fall, and yet the goer? of my indiscretion was calculated to throw me off my guard and give my feelings for a moment the mastery of my judg ment. I was speaking in the face of nearly the entire adult male population of Stockport, whose terrible suffering? i 1841, when Peel took the government from the Whigs ¥ maintain the very system which was starving them we fresh in my memory. The mews of the retirement of we Peel Ministry reached Stockport a couple of hours befor? the meeting took place. When it was announced; Be whole audience sprang up, and gave three times thre? cheers. I was quite taken aback, and out came thot virnlent attack upon Peel, for which I have been gently rapped on the knuckles by Miss Martineau, yourself and many other esteemed correspondents. It was an np” meditated ebullition. Tell your good brother I will keel & more watchful guard over the old serpent that is with” me for the future. You must not judge me by what I #6 at these tumultuous public meetings.”* The rest of this letter, describing his feelings about publ life, has been given in a preceding chapter (pp. 207-8): ’ a second letter, replying we may suppose to a request ° Combe’s that he might be allowed to show the first to gon of their common friends, Cobden referred fiercely enough he had previously done in public, to the extremely pinf? incident of 1843: it has been already described if place ¢ To G. Jombs. Manchester, Deo. 20, 1845. Bee Miss Marsinesn¥ a iography, il. 368303. 7 Above, chap. xii,, pp. ¥v.] BROONCILS TION WITH SIR BOBERT PEEL. 353 - You are at liberty to make any use you please of that ter of mine, and I resl’y tol gratified and proud that youn take go much interest in preserving for me the good opinion *f those whose esteem is worth having, Now let me add, tha although, as between yon and myself, I am eager to "VOW my regret at having been betrayed into & vindictive Attack upon Peel, although I admit that Christian principle Was violated in that speech, and that I should have better Consulted what was due to myself if I bad shown greater Magnanimity on the occasion, still as between any other looker-on and myself, I mast say that Peel’s atrocious con-Tuc towards me ought not to be lost sight of. I do not ®mplain of his insinuating that I wished to incite to his “sessination, and hounding on his party to destroy me in the eyes of the world. His conduct might have been SXcused on account of his state of mind, from the recent feath of Drummond, and the distress and anxiety of his wife “nd daughter, who, I believe, unnerved him by their alarm for hig safety. But although this excused him at the inant, it did not atone for his having failed to retract or *Xplain his foul charge subsequently, which, in fact, made nd now makes it a deliberate attempt at moral assassina. ro which I cannot and ought not to forget, and therefore should feel justified in repeating what I said at Covent Harden, that I should forfeit my own respect and that of my ends if I ever exchanged a word with that man in Private »e n No nature was ever less disposed for the harbouring of Lo resentments, and it was not many weeks from this time ei a curious incident had the effect of finally effacing e last trace of enmity between these two honoured men. er attack happened to be made in the course of “Pate on the Chairman of the League, which drew & rebuke 3 To Gee. Combe. Manchester, Feb, 1840. 1848, Aly. 42. 354 LIFE OF OOBDEN. fom. XT 1848. from a member who wag himself renowned for bitterness of Air, 42. speech and the unbridled licence of his imputations. Mr. Disraeli defended the original assailant by appealing to the example of the Prime Minister, who bad, if he did not m1 take, accused & member of the League of abetting assassin?” tion. Sir Robert Peel immediately rose to explain that be intention at the time was to relieve Mr, Cobden in the most distinct manner from the imputation which by misappr® hension he had put upon him. If any one present hed stated to him that his reparation was not so complete, and his avowal of error not so unequivocal, as it ought to ba? been, he should at once have repeated it more plainly and distinctly. Cobden followed, saying that he had felt, and the country had felt, that the Minister’s disavowal bad nob been so distinct as was to have been expected. He was glad that it had now been explicitly made, because it gave MI” an opportunity of expressing his own regret at the terms which he had more than once referred to Sir Robert Peel And so with the expression of a hope that the subjeck might never be revived, the incident came to an end. CHAPTER XVI. "EPRAL OF THE CORN LAWS AND FALL OF THE GOVERNMENT. Tig Public excitement and private anxieties of the year 184s. Which hag just come to an end, had seriously shaken Cobden’s zo health, Before Parliament opened he was laid up with a *omplicated affection of head, ears, and throat, the result of laborious speaking to great andiences in the open air or in "st halls. He remained liable for the rest of his life to deafness and hoarseness. All through the Session of 1846 he sag out of health. Fortunately, circumstances had now taken a turn which no longer demanded much more from him than silent vigilance. A few days after the Session opened, the Prime Minister “Mounced his proposals. The repeal of the Corn Laws was fo he total, But it was not to be immediate. The ports ere not to be entirely open for three years. During this ‘Nerval there was to be s sliding scale, with a maximum duty of ten shillings when the price of wheat should be “dey forty-eight shillings, and a minimum duty of four “hillin gs when the price reached fifty-four shillings a quarter. The Views of the League therefore would not be fully realized "tl February, 1849. The opponents of the Minister began to talk of an appeal ' the country, and Cobden addressed himself to this critical Ping in the one speech of any importance which he felt “leg upon to make through the whole of these protracted Tehateg, He plied the Protectionists with defiant tests of the i846. Ar. 42. 3556 LIAR OF COBDEN. t national opinion. The petitions for repeal had ten timo 2 many signatures as petitions for Protection. But, they ried; the most numerously signed were fictitions. Then let ther? try public meetings. He challenged them to hold 8 singl® public and open meeting anywhere in the land. The? for parliamentary representation. “I ought to know,” he gaids “ a3 much about the state of the representation and of he registration as any man in this House. Probably no ove has given so much attention to that question as 1 have don? and I distinctly deny that you have the slightest probability of gaining a numerical majority, if a dissolution took plac? to-morrow. Now I would not have said this three month ago; but your party is broken up.” Four-fifths of th Conservatives from the towns in the north of England were followers of Sir Robert Peel, and not of the Protection’! Dukes. They had been for ¥ree Trade all along, but they had confidence in the Minister, that he would do what was necessary at the proper time. But let them suppose that the Protectionists might have a numerical majority. What would be the character of the minority ? It would cont” the whole twenty members for the metropolis and th? metropolitan county. Edinburgh and Dublin would follo® London. There was not in all Great Britain a town of five and-twenty thousand inhabitants, not even Liverpool or Bri¥ tol, which would not send members pledged to Free Trad What would a majority of twenty or thirty men in poe?” boroughs and nomination counties do in face of such & mind” rity as this? They would shrink aghast from the positio? B which they found themselves. The members who cam® oP under such circumstances to maintain the Corn Laws fro? their Ripons and Stamfords, Woodstocks and Marlborough” would not defend their views a day after they had found oot go vast a moral preponderance of public opinion as this! } Svecshes, i. No. xxi. Feb. 27, 1848. tv] STATE OF PUBLIC OPINION ON REPEAL. 357 _ The characteristic of all Cobden’s best speeches was a 1848. 1st distribution of facts as the groundwork of his reasoning, Zr. 42 "Md this for its particular purpose was one of his best SPeeches, No attempt was made at the time, nor has been Made since, to weaken his striking statement of the conlition of the public mind. Even the Prime Minister was %0t prepared for such an overwhelming force of opinion. Towards the close of the session, when all was over, Peel met Mr. Bright in the division lobby and had some talk with hi, He had no conception, he said, of the intense feeling * hatred with which the Corn Law had been regarded, More especially in Scotland. The first reading was carried by a majority of 837 to 240. Bug an acute observer gave Cobden what was perhaps the Superfluons warning, not to allow the victory to throw bing og his guard. The difficulties were stil! to come, and they were very serious. In spite of the extraordinary Position in which they had been left by the desertion of Peel *0d all the rest of their leaders in both Houses of Parliament, ®Xcepting only Lord Stanley, the Protectionists were unniably strong. The bold and patient politician, of whom _" then thought so lightly, but who was in fact the sustaini, genius of their group, has described the steps by which ®y found new leaders and a coherent organization. Lord George Bentinck was not a great man, but then the most Hextoron and far-seeing of parliamentary manceuvrers had o far and was constantly by his side. Mr. Disraeli must be ud to have sinned against light. His compliments to Peel oe Free Trade in 1842 prove it. Lord George Bentinck b "med some views on the merits of Protection by-and-by, the first impulse which moved him was resentment " betrayal, It is easy to say that the key to his action 8 incensed party spleen, but the emotion was not wholly Yiscraditabe, One day be walked away from the House in 1846. ar, 43, 358 LIFE OF OOBDEN, ( company with a conspicuous member of the League. with thet amicable freedom of remark which parliaments™y habits permit and nourish even between the stoutest adve™ saries, the Leaguer expressed his wonder that Lord Georg® Bentinck should fear any evil from the removal of the duty’ “Well,” Lord George answered, “I keep horses in three counties, and they tell me that I shall save fifteen hundred & year by free trade, I don’t care for that. What I can! bear is being sold.” This was not the language of mag” nanimity or of statesmanship, but it aptly expressed the dogged anger of the Manners, the Somersets, the Lowther® and the Lennoxes, the Mileses and the Henleys, the Do combes and the Liddells and the Yorkes,” and all the res of that host of men of metal and large-acred squires whom the strange rhapsodist of the band has enumerated in a list 3° sonorous as Homer’s catalogue of the ships.” These honest worthies did not know much about the Circle of the BX" changes, but they believed that Free Trade would destroy rent, and that the League was bent on overthrowing the Church and the Throne; while they saw for themselves the? their leader had become an apostate. But this county’ a8 Cobden said at the time, is governed by the ignoran® of the country. Their want of intelligence did not Pr* vent them from possessing a dangerous power for the moment. The majority on the first reading was a hollow and not 8° honest majority, and the Protectionists were quite aware of ib The remarkable peculiarity of the parliamentary contes? was that not a hundred members of the House of Commo8® were in favour of total repeal, and fewer still were in favo™® of immediate repeal. Lord Palmerston, as Cobden wrote © n friend long after these events, showed unmistaksb! signs that ho was not unwilling to head or join a part? i Et Lord Georgs Bondineh, », 218. ak, ov. tw] DIFFICULTIES OF PEEL J POSITION, 359 keep 4 fixed duty, but he was too shrewd to make such 1846. 5 aitempt when success was impossible? In the Upper Jr. 43. Houge it was notorious that not one peer in ten was ® his heart inclined to pass the Corn Bill. If the Lords "ere to be coerced into giving their assent, it was in-Yispensable that the entire Whig party in the Commons shoal keep together and vote in every division. It was Wdonbtedly the interest of the Whigs to help Peel to get the Cory Law out of the way, and then to turn him out. But there ¥83 & natural temptation to trip him np before the time. The curious balance of factions filled the air with the "Pit of intrigue, and until the very last there was good "ason to apprehend that the Peers might force Peel to Accept the compromise of a fixed duty, or else to extend the berm for the expiration of the existing duty. No episode in dur history shows in a more distressing light the trickery 8d chicane which some thinkers believe to be inseparable from parliamentary institutions. In this case, however, as Wao many others, the mischief had its root not in parlia-Wentary institutions, but in that constitutional paradox, as Perplexing in theory as it is equivocal in practice, which B1ves o hereditary chamber the prerogative of revising and *hecking the work of the representative chamber. The session had mot advanced very far, before other Tanger loomed on the horizon. The Ministry was doomed tn any case. Whether Peel succeeded or failed with the Cory Bill, nobody at this time thought it possible that he *oulq carry on & Conservative Government in a new Parlialent, and he could hardly become the chief of a Liberal Government, The question was whether and how he should "Peal the Corn Law. Difficulties arose from a quarter where "hey were not expected. The misery of the winter in Ueland had produced ite natural fruits in disorder sud ® To J, Parkes. June 10, 1857, 18486. Adm 49, 360 LIFE OF COBDEN. (cms? violence. The Ministry resorted for the eighteenth time since the Union to the stale device of a Coercion Bill, that stereotyped avowal,—and always made, strange 10 says without shame or contrition,—of the secular neglect and 10° competency of the English Government of Ireland. T° perilous inconveniences followed. The first was thab the Irish members, led by O’Conmell, persistently opposed by all the means in their power every step of this violent snd shallow policy. It would have been ignoble if they had done less. * But their just aud laudable obstruction of the Coercion Bill interposed dangerous delays in the way of the Corn Bill This, however, was not the only peril. The Coercion Bill laid the train for a combination which could hardly have been foreseen, but which was eventually irresistible. Cobden and his friends were hostile to the measure on the policy and the merits, nor in any ©8% could their votes have saved the Ministry. Lord Job» Russell and the Whigs had no objection to a Coercio® Bill, of which for that matter they have been the steadios? patrons, but they could not resist the temptation to pay of old scores when the Minister declared Coercion to be urgent and then actually let it slumber for five months. Lord George Bentinck discerned very early the elements of an invincible dilemma and a promising plot. If the Minister pushed the Coercion Bill, that would keep back the Corn Bill. If he gave the priority to the Corn Bill, th? would prove that the Coercion Bill was not nrgent, and therefore ought not to be supported. 4 Wo have an excellent ilinstration of the practioe of making Ireland the shutilecock of English parties, in the faot that the Whigs who had gmrned ont Peel on the principle of Non-Coercion, had not been in office a month before they introduced an Irish Arms Bill The opposition, however, Wo* so sharp that the Bill was withdrawn in a fortnight. This Whig levity ** » matoh for the Tory levity which had declered Coercion nxgent in Januar! and taken no steps tO spoure It nutil Iroe. Tv, | ATTITUDE OF THE WHIGH. 301 Thug by an extraordinary and unparalleled state of political 1248. Parties, 5 measure for which the country was sincerely Zr. 42. "iXions, which was confessedly required by the circumstances °f the moment, and which the leader of the Opposition Was as desirous of passing as the Prime Minister, seemed to be in constant risk of miscarrying at every moment, and Ws attended by every circumstance of embarrassment alike fo Supporters and opponents. The great disadvantage that Cobden saw in the critical state of the Government through-%8t the session, was the encouragement that it held out to the House of Lords to delay Repeal. This made his own tourse and that of the League all the clearer. It was their Policy loudly and pointedly to denounce all compromise on the part either of the Minister or of equivocal friends. Cobden did not fear that the Whigs would take means to "eject the Bill, for this reason, and perhaps for no loftier *hs, that its rejection would afford Peel an opportunity of Hissolving on the question; and a dissolution, as Cobden "other rightly or wrongly believed, would snuff the Whigs out, obliterate all old party distinctions, “and give Peel % five yoars’ lease at the head of a mixed progressive Party”s Heo was equally puzzled to understand why Peel Shoulg press the Coercion Bill forward, and why the Whigs ould show ench eagerness to avail themselves of monopolist “Wport to throw Peel out. He could only explain the “cond of the two perplexities, by supposing that “the Whigs are hugging the delusion that the country wants them back in office. For my part, I cannot meet with anybody whose face does not drop like the funds at the bare Prospect of the change.” We shall see presently what Peel himself had to say to thi idea of a mixed progressive party. Meanwhile, Cobden’s Lslike and distrush of the ‘Whigs was as intense as ever, aud ¥ To Me, Sturge, June 10, 15448, Pa wy I a2: LIE OF QOBDEN. i 1846, even drew upon him remonstrances from some of his 0% allies. “What are the old Whig party,” he asked impatiently ! “going to do for us in North Notts?* There is a divisio? with under 4000 voters, and a strong Liberal party. It was considered Whig until the base selfishness of the landlord? of that party led them to desert their colours there and '° every other county upon the bread question. My old friend) Bean, of Nottingham, reckoned the Liberal party safe upo® the last register, and it is improved upon the present 00% But he, honest man, has been reckoning all Whigs a8 Free Traders, Now, however, Peel’s plunge must have prough? over some of the Tories to Free Trade, and if there were 847 disposition on the part of the Whig proprietors to bring i # repealer, they could do it with the aid or neutrality of the Peclites. I look to the conduct of the Whigs in the countie® 88 the test of their honesty on our question. Hitherto they have done nothing except to revile and oppose us, Not county has been gained to Free Trade but by League money and at a terrible cost of labour to the Leaguers. I invaded the West Riding, in November, 1844, and held public mee” ings in all the great towns to rouse them to qualify 2000 votes. Lord Fitzwilliam wrote me advising me not to com as I should do more harm than good! Had I followed B® advice, Lord Morpeth might still have been rusticating 6 Castle Howard.” You will perhaps tell me, that the leado™ of the Whig party can’t control their old friends in tb counties upon the Corn question. True. But then, what * Beat vacated by Lord Lincoln. Sve above, p. 848 n. . I Lord Wharneliffe, who held the office of President of the Oonnoil, died mddenly in the midst of the ministerial crisis. Mr. Stuart Wortley? consequent elevation to the peerage vacated the seat for the West Ridi®8’ “Yon know,”——go Cobden told the story three years later— that the west Riding of Yorkshire is considered the gruat index of pablie opinion in hi? country. In that great division, at present containing 87,000 voters, Lord Morpeth was defeated on the question of Free Trade, and two Protectioni®® were returned. I went into the West Riding with this 40s. freehold PIS™ I stated in every borough and distriot that wo mast Lave 5000 analifiestion? ] PROCEEDINGS {9 TABLIAMENT. 363 "hold farce is it now to attempt to parade the Whig party 1846. " the Free Traders par excellence! I will be no party to Zr. 42 “eh a frand as the attempt to build ap its ruined popularity "Pon & question in which the Whig aristocracy and pro-Prietors in the counties either take no interest, or, if so, “ly to resist it. I see mo advantage but much danger to id cause from the present efforts to set up the old party Gistinetions, and calm reflection tells me that isolation is more "0d more the true policy of the League.” * This idea held Wrong possession of him until the day of Peel's final defeat “2d resignation. Before coming to that, it will be convenient to state very briefly the course of proceedings in Parliament. The motion ¥28 made to go into Committee on the Resolutions, on the Yh February. Eighteen days later, after twelve nights of dobage, and after one hundred and three speeches had been lelivereq, the Government were successful by a majority of Uinety.soven. On March 2, the House went into Committee the Resolutions, and Mr. Villiers’s amendment that Repeal ould be immediate as well as total, was lost by an im-Menge majority, barely short of two hundred. The Corn By was then read a second time on March 27, by a majority f 6ighty-eight in a House of five hundred and sixteen ; and wag finally carried in the House of Commons at four o’clock 1 the morning of May 16, by a majority of ninety-eight in % House of five hundred and fifty-six. The Lords made a Much Jessy effective opposition than, as is shown by Cobden’s otters, was commonly expected. The second reading was ®rried by two hundred and eleven against one hundred and ty four, or a majority of forty-seven. Amendments were i» i, They were made. . .. Men qualified themselves with a view of og the ~epeal of the Corn Laws, end in consequence of Sat eesisn 1 Morr: + wnlked over the sourse at the next alaction. paachss. . Ne 14a. Ss 364 LIFE OF QOBDEN. [oma 1846. moved in Committee, but none of them met with succes i542. and Lord Stanley, who led the Protectionists, declined Bb divide the House on the third reading. The Conservative’ acted on the policy laid down by Peel himself seven ye&r* before, as one of the working principles of the great party which he had formed—"“a party which, existing in he House of Commons, and deriving its strength from the popular will, should diminish the risk and deaden the ghock of collisions between the two deliberative branches of fe legislature.” * The battle had been fought in the House 0 Commons, and as it had been lost there, then by P eel ® salutary rule, the defeat was accepted as decisive. } This is the proper place for Cobden’s own story of hus interests and occupations during that agitated session. We must not forget that his private affairs had only been Pr” visionally arranged in the previous autumn, and that the7 were as gloomy as his public position was trinmphan? Before giving the shorter correspondence, written from day to day to his wife and his brother, it will be convenient “ give three longer letters, affording a more general view © what at this time was engaging his thoughts, March 7, 1846. (To @Q. Oombe.)—=1 am pretty well recovered from my local attack; a little deafness if al that remains. But the way in which I was prostrated by an insignificant cold in my head has convinced ™° (even if my doctor had not told it) how much my constitt” tion has been impaired by the excitement and wear and tear of the last few years. The mainspring has been 076" weighted, and I must resolve upon some change to wind ap the machinery, before I shall be able to enter upon 827 renewed labours, My medical friend boldly tells me thab I ought to disappear from political life for a year or two, and seck a different kind of excitement in other scenes abroad" * Pasl’s Bpoech at Merchant Taylors’ Hall in 1328, vl LETTER TO GEOBGE COMBE. 365 He talks to me of the hot baths of the Pyrenees as desirable 1845. for such cases ; of a low pulse, feeble circulation, and a dis- Zr. 42. Ordered skin, and he speaks of a winter to be passed in a “outhern latitude. Heaven knows what I shall dol Bub oe thing is certain, I neither feel in health nor spirits to take that prominent place in the political world which the Public voice seems to be ready to demand. The truth is, I have gradually and unexpectedly been forced upwards, by the accident of my position in connexion with & great prin. tiple (which would have elevated anybody else who had only tenacity of will enough to cling to it), and I feel, in the Present state of my health, and from other private and domestic considerations, letting alone my mental incapacity, Unable to pursue the elevated career which many partial friends and supporters would expect from me. But Iam Tesolved to give primary consideration to my health, and to the welfare of those whom nature has given the first claim % my attentions. This, I think, no one will deny me. For Lassare you that during the last five years so much have I been involved in the vortex of public agitation, that I have almogg, forgotten my own identity and completely lost sight of the comforts and interests of my wife and children. “ Besides, to confess the truth, I am less and less in love With what is generally called political life, and am not sure that Leong play a successful part as a general politician. Party brammels, unless in favour of some well-defined and useful Principle, would be irksome to me, and I should be restive and intractable to those who might expect me to run in their harness. However, all this may stand over till we have really accomplished the work which drew me into my Present position. I am afraid our friends in the country are 3 little too confident. The Government measure is by no Meang gafe with the Lords yet. They will mutilate or reject it if they think the country will suffer it. Bear in mind, if 19 LIFA OF (OBDEY. [oHAT: 1846. you please, that there are not twenty men in that assembly Fr. 42. Who in their hearts earnestly desire total repeal. Nay, 1e2 of opinion that not one hundred men in the Commons would be more disposed for the measure, if they could obey thelr own secret inclinations, without the influence of outward considerations. Amongst all the converts and conforme™ I class Sir Robert Peel as one of the most sincere sud earnest. I have no doubt he is acting from strong conv% tion. His mind has a natural leaning towards politi” economical truths. The man who could make it his hobPY so early to work out the dry problem of the currency que® tion, and arrive at such sound conclusions, could not fail 80 be equally able and willing to put in practice the other theories of Adam Smith. It is from this that I rely upo® his not compromising our principle beyond the three yesr™ But I must confess I have not the same confidence in Lord John and the Whigs. Not that I think the latter inferior I» moral sentiment, but the reverse. But Lord John end bus party do not understand the subject so well as Peel. The Whig leader ig great upon questions of a constitutions! character, and has a hereditary leaning towards a popu?” and liberal interpretation of the Constitution. But his mind is less adapted for the mastery of economical questions, and he attaches an inferior importance to them. Nor does he weigh the forces of public opinion so accurately as Peel: He breathes the atmosphere of a privileged clique. His sympathies are aristocratic. He is sometimes thinking of the House of Russell, whilst Peel is occupied upon Manchester. They are in a false position ; Peel ought to be the leader of the middle class, and I am not sure that he is nob destined to be so before the end of his career.” London, March 12. (To Mr. T. Hunter.)— Many thanks for your warm-hearted letter. I have often though? of you, snd our good friends, Potter and Ashworth X 1] CUBDEN'S VII OF . JR POSITION. 367 “4d of the snomalons position in which I was left when 1846. Ur consultations ended ist antumn, Had it not been Zr 42. for the potato panic, which dawned upon us within a few Weeks after we came to the wise decision respecting my own "ourse of action, I should then have been bound by the Uecensity of circumstances to have abandoned my publio “oer. That providential dispensation opened out a pro-‘Pect of 5 speedy termination of our agitation, which has not been disappointed, I therefore made arrangements of a “mporary kind for the management of my private concerns. This, I concluded, was understood by you and my other privy *ouncillors, But the arrangement was only provisional ; and "OW that I trust we are really drawing towards a virtual “ttlement, of the Corn question, my private concerns again Press upon my attention. I am in a false situation, and Very day increases its difficulty. My prominent position Sefore the world leads the public to expect that I shall ‘ake g leading part in futare political affairs, for which I do 10% foe] in health or gpirits to be equal, and which private ®nsiderations render altogether impossible. “The truth is, that accident, quite as much as any merit 0 my own part, has forced me gradually into a notoriety for which I bave not naturally much taste; but which, Wider 4) circumstances, is a soorce of continued mental em-~ berrassment to me. How to escape from the dilemma has been for months the subject of cogitation with me. My own Ndgment leads irresistibly to one solution of the difficulty, by Tetiring from Parliament as soon as the corn question is fe. 1 observe your allusion to a public demonstration ; "Ud the jdes of a testimonial has reached me through so Many channels, that it would be affectation to conceal from Myself that something of the kind is in contemplation. I ig not, I confess, sanguine ahout the success of such an “Tort, pecuniarily speaking, on the part of my friends. Public 1658 ona TOBDEN, ( 1846. ebullitions of the kind never realize the expectations of thet promoters, and there are reasons against such success in PF own cade. Out of Manchester I am regarded as a rich m8” thanks to the exaggerations of the Duke of Richmond and the Protectionists, } “ But, besides, there are others who have as good clam? as myself upon public consideration for the labours give to the good cause. I have been often pained to see that © fame, both in England and on the Continent, has eclipsed bhat of my worthy fellow-labourers. But it would be #2 wr justice which neither I nor the public voice would sanctiot if I were to reap all the substantial fruits of our joi exertions, to the exclusion of others whose sacrifices and devotion have hardly been second to my own. ) “ As respects my own feelings on the subject of a test” monial, although I see it in a different light after the work is done to that in which I viewed it before, still, I must confess, that it is not otherwise than a distasteful theme Were I a rich man, or even in independent circumstancé® I could not endure the thoughts of it. But when I think of my age, and the wear and tear of my constitution, and reflect upon the welfare of those to whom Nature has given the first, and for them, the only claims upon my consideratio® I do not feel in a position to give a chivalrous refusal ¥ any voluntary public subsidy. Like the poor apothecarSs my poverty and not my will consents. Still, consulting 27 own feelings, I should like to be out of Parliament befor any demonstration were made. I could hardly explain why I should prefer this, it is so peculiarly a matter of feeling’ It is not with a view to escape from public nsefulness bere” after. Iam aware that success in my Free Trade labou™ will invest me with some moral power, which, after my healt? wus thoroughly wound up agzin for a renewed effort 1 should feel anxious to brieg to bear upon great question i VIEWS OF HIS OWN POSITION. 369 for the benefit of society. But I have a strong and in- 1848. Sinctive feeling that an interregnum in my public life would Zr. 43. “ther increase than diminish my power of usefulness, Besides and independent of considerations of health, I am 2% anxious to be a party in any more political arrangements turing the next year or two. Assuming even that the Public placed me in a new position, free from anxieties of a Privatg kind, still I should shrink from undertaking the "ico of a party politician. Ido nob think I should make a ofa] partisan, unless in the advancement of a defined and ple principle. Now the next year will witness a de-Wruction of old, and a combination of new parties, to which Lshontg be called upon to give support, and probably invited 0 tae office. Official life would not suit me. My only path public usefulness is in pursuing the same independent *Ourge a respects parties which I have hitherto followed. I iim 8Ware that others might take a different view ; but still 5 One can be so fair a judge as myself of that which Wolves a knowledge of my own aptitude, springing from Private tastes and feelings. } “1 might add as a motive for leaving Parliament, a growing slike for House of Commons life, and a distaste for mere Barty political action. But this applies to my present views ly in ag far as it affects my health and temporary purposes. Lis 8 repugnance which might and ought to be overcome for the sake of usefulness ; and there are enough good men Parliament who sacrifice private convenience for public 800d, 44 compensate for the society of the herd who are ough, there for inferior objects. “I have now poured ont my inward thoughts to you im Wregerved confidence-—thoughta which have not been com-Nitteq to paper before. And I do it with the fullest satisaction, for I know that, whilst you sympathize with my "tings, you will bring & oool judgment to my Besistasioge » 370 AL LIFE Gi COBDEN. fou 1846. T may add that it is prematare yet to consider the ghrngele gr. 42. at av end. The Lords sre net yet decided what to do with the Government measure. There wre rumours still of & ftompt to compromise. It is reported that Lord Fitz willism is returning from Ltely to hesd a fixed-duty party and there is still a stroug body in the Cowmens snxiov for such a course. In fact there are not un hundred men in the Commons, or twenty in the Lords, who at herb 87° suxious for total repeal. They are coerced by the out-of” doors opinion, and nothing but the dread of the Leag™ organization enables I’eel to persevere. But for our forty” shilling freehold bludgeons, the aristocracy would hav resisted the Government measure almost to a max. My strongest hopes centre in Peel. I have far more confiden® in him than the Whig leaders. He is acting from stron8 convictions. He anderstands politico-economical question? better than Lord John, aud attaches far more importance $0 sound principles in practical legislation. He and Sir Jone? Graham make no sccret of their determination to stand °F fall by their measure. Such being their decision, fhe only delay that can take place is in the event of a dissolutio® i and I think the Lords will skrink from such a desperate and fruitless alternative when the critical moment arrives.” April 2. ( ,, )=“So far as I can control wy fature course of action, I am prepared to do so; & g the first step which duty requires, is fo place mysell © a private position ab the earliest moment when I 87 make the change, withont sacrificing the public ingeres? which is to some extent involved in my person. In fact I should have long ago retired into private life, bub for this consideration. Tt is still a little uncertain whet, wo shall escape from the temter-hooks of delay. Hvem if the Lords pass the Government measure without attempts Bb mutilation, of which, by the way, 1 ara still not so saagein® bd te] LE sh WINTER, 371 “eny pecple, then it will be two months yet before the royal 1846. hang oan reach the Act for the total repeal of the Corn Law. ar. 42. Shoulg the Peers attempt a compromise, I have reason to foo] satisfied that the Government will be firm ; and then "e may possibly have a dissolution. A. sharp stroggle in the Country would in all probability be followed by total “1d immediate repeal, carried with a high hand. But, “SSuming the most probable event, viz. that the Lords do Pass the Bill, then my mind is made up to accept the Chiltory Hundreds the day after it receives the royal A38ent “Now, my dear sir, the rest must be lef to the chapter *f tate, and I shall be preparc i to meet it, come what may. This decision is entirely the result of my own cogitations. y have consulted nobody. If the rumour got abroad "Wongst; my friends, I should be persecuted with advice or *omonstrance, to which I shonld be expected to give answers "volving explanations painful to me. And it is quite Marvellous how apt the newspapers are to get raw material “ough for an on dif if a man suffers bis plans to go beyond his own boson, I could, of course, make my health honestly the Plea for leaving Parlisment, aud can show, if need be, the advice of the first medical men in London sed Edinburgh to justify me in seeking at least a twelvemonth’s *slaxation from public Life. “I have thus given you au earnest of my determination ® do al) that I can to acquit myself of ray private as well as Public duties. It has always been to me a spectacle Worthy of reproach fo see a man sacrificing the welfare of hiy own domestic circle to the cravings of a morbid desire for public notoriety. And God, who knows our hearts, will free tae from any such unworthy motives. I was driven Nong 4 groove by accident, too fast and too far to reiresl With honour or without the risk of some loss to the country, [omak. 1846. put the happiest moment of my life will be that which Ar. 42. releases me from the conflicting sense of rival duties, by restoring me again to private life.” A few days later he wrote to Mr, Edmund Potter i=“Many thanks for your friendly letter. Though I app slate your kindness even where it restrains you from writing to me, let me assure you that your handwriting alway® gives me pleasure. ¥ou would not doubt it, if you could have a peep at the letters which pour in upon me. } 1 have sometimes thought of giving William Chambers 8 hin for an amusing paper in his journal upon the miseries of & popular man. First, half the mad people in the count who are still at large, and they are legion, address the incoherent ravings to the most notorious man of the how™ Next, the kindred tribe who think themselves poets, WhO are more difficult than the mad people to deal with, send their doggerel and solicit subscriptions to their volumes with occasional requests to be allowed to dedicate thew Then there are the Jereray Diddlers who begin the epistles with high-flown compliments upon my services 3 the millions, and always wind up with a request that I wil bestow a trifle upon the individual who ventures to lay D1 distressing case before me. To add to my miserie® people have now got an idea that I am influential with the Government, and the small place-hunters are at DP Yesterday a man wrote from Yorkshire, wanting the siti” tion of a gauger, and to-day a person in Herts request me to procure him a place in the post-office, Then ther? are all the benevolent enthusiasts who have their Pe reforms, who think that becsuse a man has sacrificed himself in mind, body, and estate in attempting 10 do one thing, he is the very person to do all the rest, The good people dog me with their projects. Nothing in thei Byes is impossible in my hands, One worthy man calls 1 LY ee | T™™ Crag @% POL ITY. 373 WSUre we that I can reform the Church, and unite the 1848. Wesloyang with the Establishment. Ar, 42 “That zealons and excellent educationalist, Stone, of Hasgow, seized upon me yesterday. ¢I have often thought,’ %id he, ¢ that, Lord Ashley or Mr. Colquhoun was the man "carry a system of National Education tirough Parliament. Bug they have not moral courage; if you will take it in hang, in less than four years you will get a vote of twenty Williong, and reconcile all the religious parties to one uniform stem of religions education’ I replied that I had tried My hand on s small scale in the attempt to unite the sects in Lancashire in 1836, but that I took to the repeal of the Com Laws as light amusement compared with the difficult task of inducing the priests of all denominations to agree " suffer the people to be educated. The next time I Meet Dickens or Jerrold, I shall assuredly give them a bint o a new hero of the stage or the novel, ‘The Popular J an? “In answer to your kind inquiries after my health, I am happy to say I am pretty free from any physical ailment. 1b ig only in my nervous system that I am out of sorts. The last two or three months have kept me on the rack, 4 worried me more than the last seven years of agitation. But if 1 could get out of the treadmill, and with a mind ab %%0 take a twelvemonth’s relaxation and total change of “ene and climate as far off as Thebes or Persepolis, hers there are no post-offices, newspapers, or politicians, Ls0e no reason why I should not live to seventy; for I have faith in my tongh snd wiry body and a temperament Uturally cool and controllable, excepting when my mind 5 harassed as it he been by circumstances connected With my private concerns, which I could not grapple With and master, solaly because I was chained to another yw NO 1848. Ar 274 EY AF, “BREN, fom The extracts that now follew are from letters fo Mrs. CoP” . den, except in the fow cases where & footnote gives the name of some other correspondent :— “ London, Jun. 23.—~Peel’s speech last night would ha¥ done capitally for Covent Garden Theatre, and Lord Franc’ Egerton’s would have been a capital address from the obs’! if he had filled George Wilson's place. The Tories sre 12 state of frantic exciteraent, and the Carlton Club is all in 0% fusion. Nobody knows his party. I have no doubt Peel wil do onr work thoroughly, or fall in the attempt. He will Ly able to carry his measure easily through the Commons, with the aid of the Opposition, but I have my suspicions that the Lords will throw it out and force a dissolution. Whatevo" happens, I can see a prospect of my emancipation at 00 dis tant date. I am going to-morrow to Windsor, to spend the Sunday with Mr. Grote.” “Jan. 26.—~I spent yesterday at Grote’s, aboub four miles from Slough, and met Senior the political economist Parkes, and Lumley the lessee of the Italian Opera. We had a long walk of nearly twelve miles round the count’ and for want of training I find myself like an old posting” horse to-day, stiff and footsore. . . . There are reports day of some resignations about the Court, but I don’t bes of anybody of consequence who is abandoning Peel. sil there is no kuowing what to-morrow may bring forth We hear nothing as to the details of Peel’s plan to-morro™ for which we are all looking with great anxiety. But tho report is still that he intends to go the whole hog. A very handsome gold snuff-box hes just been presented to me by Mr. Collett, the member for Athlone.” “Jan. 28.—Peel is at last delivered, but I hardly kno¥ whether fo cull it a boy or & girl. Something betwee” the two, I believe. His corn measure makes an end of 8 i Announcing she neoessity of a new commercial aysbernm, mi] WIT ~~ BA. CL RAVRON DENCE, 375 "On Jaws in 1949, and in the meantime it is virtually a fixed 1846. Tuty of 46. He hag done more than was expected from him, Zr. 43. "ud 61} but the rigght thing Whether it will satisfy our ardent tends in the north is the gnestion., Let me kreow all the 808sip you hear about it. I abstained trom saying a word Whe House because 1 did not wish to commit myself, and I Bssuaded Villiers and the rest of the Leaguers from speak-Ug. If was foo good #» measure to be denounced, and nob Tuite good enough for naquulified approbation, and therefore though it best bo be quiet. To-day I have attended a Westing at Lord John’s of the leaders of the Whig party. They seemed disposed to co-operate with Peel. But Villiers will bring on his motion for total and immediate repeal, and When that is lost we must do the best we can. The measure will pats the Commons with a very large majority, some People say seventy to one hundred, but the question still is hat will be done in the Lords? I asked Lord John to-day What hie thonght the Peers would do with the Bill, and he Says if Lord Stanley heads the Protectionists they will reject % but that the Lords will not put themselves under the Dukes of Richmond and Buckinghar, I hear that Lord Stanley ® not for fighting the battle of Monopoly. So much for the Breat question.” “Jan, 29.:—My own opinion is that we should not be lstifind in the eyes of the country if we did anything in the Houge to obstruct the measure, and I doubt whether any such %op out of doors would be successful. In the House, Villiers will bring on hie motion for total and immediate repeal, and Tshall not be surprised if it were successful simply on agri-“ulturg] grounds by our being able to demonstrate unanswer-Wly that it is better for farmers and landowners to have the Change at once rather than gradually. But we should have 0 chsnee on any other than agricultural grounds. To make 2 Po Geo. Wilson. 376 LIP =v CODEN. I 1846. the appeel from the manufacturing districts simply onthe ple mw a9, of justice to the conswmers, would not have mach gymapathy hers or elsewhere, and would have no effect upon Parliament’ while the question is merely one of less than three years timn® Therefore, while I would advise you to petition for the whole mensure, I can’t say I think any great demonstration 8° against Peel’s compromise wonld have much sympathy else where. Understand, would not shift a hair’s-breadth from 09 ground, but what I mean strongly to impress on you is 2Y belief that any attempt at a powerful agitation against Peel's compromise would be a failure. And I should pot like the League Council to take a step which did not at once receive # national support. For myself in the House I will undertak® bo prove unanswerably that it would be just to all, and especially politic for the agriculturists, to make the repes! immediate, but if we fail on Villiers’s motion to carry the immediate, I shall give my unhesitating support to Peel, and I will not joiu Whigs or protectionists in any factions pla? for tripping up his heels. can’t hold any different languag® from this out of doors, and therefore can hardly see the ase of a public meeting till the measure comes on in Parla ment.” “ Feb. 9.—The Queen’s doctor, Sir James Clark (a good Leaguer at heart), has written to offer to pay me a friendly visit, and talk over the state of my constitution, with # view to advise me how to unstring the bow. He wrote me 8 croaking warning letter more than a year ago. As it is pos” sible there may be a paragraph in some newspaper alluding to my health, I thought it best to let you know in case of inquiry. But don’t write me a long dismal letter in retur® for I can’t read them, and it does no good. If Charle® sould come up for a week with a determination to work and think, he might help me with my letters, but he will make P To 2. W. Oobden. A PROGEESS OF Paw oawk BILL, 7 my head worse if he requires me to look after him, and so _ 1846. You must gay plainly.” Zr. 43. “London, Feb. 19.—Your letter hag followed me bere. Peal’s declaration in the House that he will adopt immediate "peal if it is voted by the Commons, seems to me to remove all difficulty from Villiers’s path ; he can now propose his old Votion without the risk of doing any harm even if he should 106 succeed, As respects the future course of the League, the loss that is said now about it publicly the better. If Poel’ measure should become law, then the Council will be Compelled to face the question, ¢ What shall the League do during the three years 7’ It has struck me that under such Yroumstances we might absolve the large subscribers from 3 further calls, put the staff of the League on a peace footing, and merely keep alive a nominal organization to Prevent any attempt to undo the good work we have ®ffected, Not that I fear any reaction. On the contrary, I believe the popularity of Free Trade principles is only in its fancy, and that it will every year take firmer hold of the head and heart of the community. But there is perhaps “mething due to our repeated pledges that we will nob Yissolve until the corn laws are entirely abolished. In any ®ss the work will be effectually finished daring this year, Provided the League preserve its firm and united position; "d if js to prevent the slightest appesrance of disunion that I would avoid now talking in public about the future COurge of the League. It is the League, and it only, that frightens the peers. It is the League alone which enables Peel 4 repeal the law. But for the League the anstocracy ¥ould have hunted Peel to a premature grave, or consigned him like Lord Melbourne to a private station at the bare Mention of total repeal. We must hold the same rod over "he Lords until the measure is safe; after that I agree with S$ Th HH. dshaooril, 378 145s CORDRAN,. [oust 1848. you in thinking that ib matters little whether the Leag™ “Wr as dies with honours, or lingers out a few years of ingloriod® existence.” “ March 6.'—Nobody knows to this day what the Lords will do, and I believe all depends wpon their fest® of the country. If there was nob something behind €O™ which they dread even still more, I doubt if they would ever give up the key. of the bread basket. They would bmn out Peel with as little ceremony as they would dismiss a groom or keeper, if he had not the League ab his back. It is strange to see the obbuseness of such mer 2s Hume, who voted against Villiers’s motion to help P col. I have reason to know that the latter was well pleased al the motion, and would have been glad if we had had # larger division. It helps Peel to be able to point to some” thing beyond, which he does uot satisfy. I wish we Were out of it.” « March 25.%—1 have received the notes. Moffatt mentioned bo me the report in the city to which you refer. There is 80 help for these things, and the ouly wonder is that we have escaped Bo well. If you can keep this affair in any Wey afloat till the present corn measure reaches the Queen’ hands, I will solve the difficulty, by cutting the Gordis® knot, or rather the House; and the vest must take it® chance. I don’t think I shall speak in this debate, It doe® no earthly good, and only wastes time. People are nob likely to say I am silent because I can’t answer Bentinck and Co. The bill would be out of the Commons, accord: ing to appearances, before Easter.” “ March 80.—~We are uncertain which course will Pe taken by the Government to-night, whether the Corn oF Coercion Bill is to be proceeded with. If the latter, I fea? 5 To F, WW. (obden. 5 To B, W. Qobden.