Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 69, No. 427, May, 1851

"At the very eastern end of Cuba, within the triangle between the cities of St Jago and Baracoa and Point Mäysi, is a wild and rugged tract of country, and in the centre of all, an immense mountain, called the Sierra del Cristal, which I have often seen from the sea. Hither no adventurous topographer has yet directed his steps; but, were the proper admeasurements made, I am almost certain the Cristal would be found the highest eminence in Cuba. On this mountain range, every one unites in declaring that the runaway negroes have established a large settlement."

Such collections of wild Indians or negroes are called Palenques, and the men composing it are known as Apalencados. When more than seven are congregated, it is a Palenque. The pursuit and suppression of these is under the superintendence of an official, appointed for the purpose, and of a tribunal called a consulate.

"If the expedition be considered one of extreme danger, special rates of reward are offered. In that case, extirpation is probably determined on; but such cases have rarely happened… The great Palenque of the Cristal remains as much a mystery as ever; and some even doubt if the Spanish Government does not leave it purposely as a kind of safety valve for the discontented, for no expedition of importance enough to reduce it has ever been undertaken, although small parties are annually formed in Baracoa, who hover about it and capture a great many negroes. Common report says that the settlement is high up on an elevated plateau, only approachable by one pass, which is fortified by overhanging rocks, kept ready to hurl on the invaders, and strictly guarded by wary sentinels; and, that on this plateau, whose inhabitants are said to amount to many hundreds, grain, tobacco, &c. are grown sufficient for their wants. It is further hinted that some whites have more dealings with the Apalencados than they would wish generally known, and supply them with clothes and necessaries unattainable in the Palenque."

Spaniards are generally admitted to be much kinder slave-masters than most Americans. Were we to give implicit credence to the Countess Merlin, which her enthusiasm for her own countrymen and womanly partisanship prevent our doing, we must believe Havana the very paradise of slaves. "The humanity of the generality of the laws and regulations of the Spaniards in the particular of slavery," says Mr Taylor, "contrast favourably with that of some of the States of the American Union." M. Marmier considers the houses of the Havanese to be "the El Dorado of slaves, the plantations their purgatory." But all three authorities agree in preferring the condition of the slaves to that of the emancipados– slaves captured by our cruisers and liberated in the Havana, or confiscated by the Cuban authorities in some rare moment of zeal and good faith. These are hired out to taskmasters with a view of their being taught some trade, which they very seldom manage to learn; and, meanwhile, they drag on in bondage from year to year, often worse treated than slaves, because, as Mr Taylor says, the emancipado belongs to nobody, whilst the slave has an owner who is interested, to a certain extent, in not destroying his animal. It is the free black, in short, in these cases, who gets least victuals, hardest work, and most whip. Mr Taylor is rather good upon this head, and quotes with considerable effect the report of the Sugar and Coffee Planting Committee, printed by order of the House of Commons, and of which he received a copy in Ceylon, just as he was writing his book. The document, he says, singularly confirmed the impressions he had received five to eight years previously, during his residence in Cuba, as to the shameful manner in which the treaties respecting slavery are evaded in that colony. It shows how the emancipados are virtually sold (hired out for terms of years) in an underhand manner, for the profit of the Spanish Government and officials; how his Excellency the captain-general supplied the Gas Company, of which the chaste and tender-hearted Christina is the chief shareholder, with dark-complexioned lamp-lighters at five gold ounces a-head; how Mrs O'Donnell, (now Countess of Lucena) lady of the captain-general of that name, procured herself a snug little income by the labour of four hundred emancipados, transferred to the paternal care of the Marquis de las Delicias, chief judge, of the mixed court(!) and one of the greatest slave-holders in Cuba– all these statements being given upon the undeniable authority of a letter from the British consul-general Crawford, read by the chairman of the Committee above referred to. And there would be no difficulty in producing equally reliable authority for a host of similar iniquities, incredible to persons unacquainted with the atrocious immorality of Spanish colonial administration, with the insatiable greed of certain high personages in Spain, and with the immense fortunes amassed by Cuban captains-general. "It is said," says Consul-general Crawford, as quoted by Mr Taylor, "that upwards of five thousand of those unfortunate wretches (the emancipados) have been resold at rates of from five to nine ounces, by which upwards of six hundred thousand dollars have been made in the government-house, one-sixth of which was divided amongst the underlings, from the colonial secretary downwards." "I heard the other day," says Mr Taylor, "of a grand new ingenio having been set up by Queen Christina, with every latest improvement; behold the secret!" He makes bold to believe that not a few of the five thousand "unfortunate wretches," spoken of by Mr Crawford, might be found doing duty in the queen-mother's plantation and sugar-mill. A very probable hypothesis. There can be no doubt, however, that the means by which the estate is worked, and the gas-lamps lighted, would bear investigation quite as well as the mode of acquisition of the funds invested in them by the enormously wealthy widow of the Well-beloved Ferdinand.

Those recent visitors to Cuba who have written of what they there saw, have in few instances done more than glance at the subject. They have either treated it superficially, like M. Marmier, who, in his love of locomotion and eagerness to get afloat again, dismisses the Pearl of the Antilles in three or four hasty chapters; or, like Mr Taylor, their opportunities of investigation have been limited to a small portion of the island. Mr Madden's little volume is of a special and statistical class; and, as far as it goes, we think well of it, notwithstanding the attack made upon it by Mr Taylor, who is shocked at the faulty spelling of Spanish words and names, and who laughs at Mr Madden for deprecating the annexation of Cuba to the States, which he (Mr Taylor) inclines to advocate. Madame de Merlin's work is much more copious and comprehensive than any of the three above named; but if her sketches of Havanese society and manners are pleasing and characteristic, her descriptions of scenery vivid, and her retrospective historical chapters careful and scholarly, on the other hand she is frequently biassed, when touching on matters of greater practical importance, by the joint prejudices of a Frenchwoman and of a Spanish Creole; whilst her sex necessarily precluded her from acquaintance with various phases of Spanish colonial life, and from exploring those wilder districts, an account of which is essential to the completeness of a work on Cuba professing thoroughly to describe the island and its motley population. For such a work there is abundant room; and of such a one, in this century of intelligent and enterprising travellers, we confidently hope before long to welcome the appearance.

ONWARD TENDENCIES

TO AUGUSTUS REGINALD DUNSHUNNER, ESQ. OF ST MIRRENS

My Dear Dunshunner, – Is it too great a liberty to inquire into the nature of your present avocations, or to ask if you are occupied with any magnificent scheme to take the public mind by storm? You have of late maintained so mysterious and obstinate a silence, that your friends are becoming anxious regarding you. Like Achilles, son of Peleus, you seem to be sulking in your tent, whilst all the rest of the Greeks are abroad in the clear sunlight, making head against the Trojan army, and skirmishing in the front of their ships. We miss you, and the public miss you. Your red right arm was wont to be seen far in front of the battle fray, and, at the moment when the political strife is hottest, we cannot afford to lose the countenance of our bravest champion. I hope there is no Briseïs in the case? If so, tell us which of the Free-Traders has wronged you, and the damsel shall be immediately restored, with a corresponding recompense of plunder.

The fact is, Dunshunner, that we are in a devil of a scrape. Matters have not turned out exactly as we anticipated; and, although we are endeavouring to maintain the attitude of perfect confidence, I need not disguise from you my conviction that Free Trade has proved an utter failure. Of course you will keep this to yourself. We cannot venture to let it be publicly known that we have lost faith in our own nostrums; and we are doing all we can, by means of mitigating the tenor of the trade circulars, to keep the great body of the manufacturers, who of late have shown certain symptoms of revolt, at least neutral and reasonably quiet. Our friend Skinflint of the Importationist is fighting a most praiseworthy battle, and every one must admire the pluck which he has exhibited under extraordinarily difficult circumstances. He has had not only to defend the general policy of Free Trade, but to maintain that his own predictions have been fulfilled to the very letter – a task which most men would have considered rather arduous, seeing that figures are entirely against him, and that all the facts which have occurred are directly in the teeth of his prophecies. But Skinflint is an invaluable fellow to lead a forlorn-hope. He can prove to you that an unfulfilled prophecy is quite as good as one which has been accomplished, and he is truly superb upon the subject of the natural limits of capital. Political economy, as you know, has long been my favourite study; but I fairly confess to you that, with all my reading and acquired knowledge, I cannot cope with Skinflint. He has gone so deep into the science – he has dived so profoundly not only through the water but the mud, that to follow him is absolutely impossible; and – to pursue the metaphor – you can only ascertain the whereabouts of this unrivalled professor of the art of sinking, by the dirt which ascends to the surface, and the rising of the fetid bubbles. At present he has as much work on his hands as might stagger the stoutest Stagyrite. The farmers, the millers, the sugar-refiners, the shipowners – yea, the very delegates of the working-men – all are at him! You may conceive what a breadth of buckler and how many folds of brass are necessary to shelter him against such a multitude of weapons; yet still Skinflint combats on. I wonder if he is descended from the Berserkars, who, in consequence of abstaining from ablutions, succeeded at length in rendering their hides invulnerable?

The farmers – poor devils! – are entirely up the spout. I will admit that I am sorry for that; but my sorrow arises from no maudlin compassion for their misfortunes. You are aware that I never had any sympathy with things bucolic. I always considered the towns as the proper habitations for mankind, and have maintained the opinion that the sooner we could get rid of the country the better. What man of common sense cares one farthing for cows, or buttercups, or sheep? Are we in the nineteenth century to pin our faith to the Georgics, or to babble in senile imbecility about green fields? What care I about purling brooks? They may be useful for a dye-work, or as the means of motive power, but otherwise they are entirely superfluous; and we may thank those idiots, the poets – who, by the way, are perfectly useless, for not one of them pays Income Tax – for having created a false impression about them. I cordially agreed with Cobden, that the sooner we could lay Manchester side by side with the valley of the Mississippi, the better; and, had it not been for the obtuseness of those pig-headed scoundrels, the Yankees, who, forsooth, have got a crotchet in their heads about maintaining their own miserable industry, the job would have been done long ago. Had Jonathan acted by us fairly, as he was in honour bound to do – had he demolished his mills, blown out his furnaces, shut up his mines, and passed an Act of Congress to inflict the penalty of death upon any presumptuous loafer who should attempt to manufacture a single article in the United States, my life upon it that at the present moment we should have been driving a roaring trade! But the infatuated blockhead wont have our goods, and is actually heightening his tariffs to restrict their admission still further! The German ninny-hammers and pragmatical Spaniards are doing the same thing; and, in consequence, our whole anticipations have been violently frustrated. Perhaps you see now why I am sorry for the farmers. My regret is, that their power of purchase has decreased – that they can't buy from us as formerly – and that, in short, the home market is going to the mischief. Personally, I am connected with an exporting house; and yet I must acknowledge candidly that business is anything but brisk. We have overdone the thing in trying to get up an enormous increase of exportations; and the consequence is, that we have caused a glut in many of the foreign markets. It is not impossible that, before a healthy demand is restored, new competitors may step in, and our grand staple of calico, upon which the prosperity of Britain entirely depends, go down to a further discount. These are gloomy anticipations, but I cannot quite banish them from my mind. I look forward with considerable apprehension to the time when we shall fairly have eaten up the farmers. Of course, when that arrives, we must look out for another class to devour; and, according to my view, the Fundholder is the next in order. He will make a hideous row when he finds himself marked out for general mastication, but no doubt we shall, somehow or other, contrive to stifle his cries. His fate is perfectly natural. In all cases of shipwreck, when the supplies of provisions are exhausted, the fattest individual of the crew is selected for the sustenance of the rest. It would be absurd to pitch upon a lean victim; for the amount of suffering is the same in either case, and the economical principle is to secure the largest amount of supply. Of course he must be dealt with gently. We have the high authority of Seneca for supposing that gradual phlebotomy is an easy manner of death; and we shall not put an end to him in a hurry. He is unquestionably a full-blooded animal; and, when tapped, will yield as readily as a barrel of October.

All this, however, is mere anticipation; and doubtless you have already in your own mind maturely considered our prospects. What presses upon us most immediately, is the chance of a speedy dissolution of Parliament, and a new general election. I strongly suspect that the Whigs cannot hope to remain in office long. With all my regard for that party, I must admit that they are a shocking bad set, in so far as business is concerned, and their exclusiveness is really quite insufferable. Had they reconstructed the Cabinet upon a liberal footing, by taking in half-a-dozen of us original Free-Traders, there might have been no occasion for any dissolution until the expiry of the seven years. Our demands were not extravagant. Cobden would have done the business of the War-Office in a highly creditable manner. Bright would have been too happy to go out as Governor-General of India, and look after the growth of cotton. Joseph Hume is at least as fitted for the situation of Chancellor of the Exchequer as Sir Charles Wood; or if Joseph is rather too ancient, why not our undaunted M'Gregor? He is the only man alive who can improvise a budget at a quarter of an hour's notice. I myself should have been happy to have served in a subordinate capacity. Williams, Walmsley, or Kershaw, would gladly have relieved Earl Grey from the trouble of looking after the colonies; and I really think that, with such an infusion of new talent, the Government might have gone on swimmingly. Of course, we should have put an end at once to that ridiculous Protestant howl about Papal aggression, which is directly opposed to the spirit of Free Trade, and to the liberal tendencies of the age. Black cattle are admitted duty free; and I can see no reason why a cardinal should be considered contraband, merely on account of a slight peculiarity in the colour of his legs. Let him call himself anything he pleases – what need we care? Protestantism, my dear Dunshunner, is about the only obstacle in the way of our becoming perfect cosmopolitans. Why should we, of all people on the earth, affect eccentric distinctions? Luther was a sad fool. If he had played his cards properly, he might have been a bishop or a cardinal, or anything else he chose, and we should have been spared the trouble of this hubbub about a matter which seems to me of no earthly consequence. But our friend Lord John is, as you know, as obstinate as a whole drove of pigs, and will always take his own way. And a very nice mess of it he has made this time, to be sure!

However, the Whigs did not choose to come to us, though they were glad enough to make overtures to Graham and Gladstone, and the rest of that lot, who, after all, would have nothing to say to them. In consequence, they now feel themselves more ricketty than ever. The Protectionists are making powerful head, and gaining strength daily; and I cannot look forward to a new general election without feelings of great anxiety. I quite concur in the sentiments expressed by that patriotic creature, Colonel Peyronnet Thompson, that he would as lieve see London occupied by a foreign army, as the Protectionist party in power. I do believe that, in such an event, the cause of Free Trade would be desperate. You see we have no party whatever in the country to fall back upon for support. The artisans are declaring against us; the small traders have been unmercifully rooked; the shopkeepers are making no profits; and, as to Ireland, it is more than beginning to wince under the operation of a system which has destroyed its only product. We have tried to keep the Irish in good humour for a year or so by hinting at an immediate influx of English capital. That idea was mine. It was not by any means a bad dodge while it lasted, and our friends of the press took care to do it full justice. But, after all, it was merely a dodge. As for English capital going to Ireland, where no possible expenditure could insure a penny of rent, the thing is as preposterous as the notion of applying guano, for agricultural purposes, to the island of Ichaboe! Notwithstanding, we have done some good. We have ruined the proprietors, and starved a reasonable portion of the peasantry; and I am glad to see that the same operation is going on in the Hebrides. Labour in the towns will, no doubt, be considerably cheapened in consequence. But we cannot calculate with certainty on the support of Irish members after a new election. They won't work together as formerly. We miss our perished Daniel, who, with all his faults, was a capital ally, if you gave him a sufficient equivalent.

It is no use disguising the truth; the Protectionists are like enough to beat us. There is a vigour and a perseverance about that party which I am quite at a loss to understand. Two or three years ago, when they first began to look really formidable, we took the utmost pains to write them down; and, if good sheer abuse and hard hitting could have accomplished that object, we ought to have succeeded. We worked the old joke about a Protectionist being a spectacle as rare as a mummy in a glass-case, until it was perfectly threadbare. We sneered at and scouted their statistics. We questioned their sanity, and talked with mysterious compassion about Bedlam. We assured them, that to restore protection to native industry was as hopeless as an attempt to re-establish the Heptarchy. We used and abused, in every way, that fine metaphor touching "the winds of heaven and the waves of ocean;" and we pressed poets into our service to celebrate the cheap loaf in dithyrambics. We reviled Disraeli, misrepresented Newdegate, lampooned George Frederick Young, and insinuated that Lord Stanley was a traitor. Finally, we became affectionate, and warned the besotted Protectionists of the danger which was hanging, in a heavy cloud, over their devoted heads. We did everything which ingenuity could suggest to prevent the mummy from being resuscitated; but Cheops has come again to life with a vengeance, and has given us a shrewd blow on the skull as he started full armed from his sarcophagus. We must now deal with him as a reality, not as a shadow; and, for my own part, I cannot aver that I am inordinately eager for the encounter.

Still, something must be done; and our first duty, according to my notion, is to look out for new candidates. To the disgrace of human nature be it spoken, some of our most esteemed veterans have little prospect of being again returned by their present constituencies. There will be changes, and changes too of a most extraordinary kind; and that circumstance renders it the more necessary for us to prevent, at all hazards, a dissolution. You may now, my dear Dunshunner, fathom the real object of this letter. We want you to come into Parliament, on the independent, Ministerial, or any other interest you please, provided that, when returned, you give us the benefit of your vote, and the aid of your powerful eloquence upon any occasion when the cause of Free Trade may be in jeopardy. I know what your own private leanings are, but these are not times to be scrupulous. The League expects every man to go the entire hog. If you want a subscription, or – what would suit us better – the promise of a place, say so at once, and you shall have either. But, if you follow my advice, you will content yourself with a positive promise. We are strong enough to wring anything from the Whigs in case of emergency; and as in all human probability, judging from the past, no single week can pass over without the shadow of a crisis, we shall be able to make terms for you, better and earlier than you might suppose. Some few pickings there are still left, which are well worth a gentleman's acceptance; and it will be your own fault if, after having taken your seat, you do not make your parliamentary position advantageous in more ways than one.

I suppose there is no chance of an immediate vacancy in the Dreepdaily Burghs? Well, then, you must even make up your mind to come south and attack a Saxon garrison. I have one or two places in my eye, either of which you will be sure to carry in a canter, provided some fiery fanatical fellow does not start up to oppose you. They are cotton boroughs under the complete control of the millocracy; and I think you are certain to step in, provided matters are properly managed, at the expense of a small judicious outlay. And here, I know, you will begin to object – You cannot afford the expense, &c. My dear friend, you must afford it, if you wish to cut any figure in life, or to make yourself accounted worthy of purchase. No parsimony is so ill-judged as that which boggles at the outlay of an election. No matter how many firkins of beer may be consumed in the course of the canvass – how many hundred dozen goes of brandy-and-water may lubricate the throats of the thirsty potwallopers and freemen who espouse your cause, and bear your colours – the true principle is to consider these charges as a debt which a grateful Ministry must refund on the first convenient opportunity, with such rate of interest as you are fairly entitled to expect, taking into account the risk which you have run, and the labour which you have performed on their behalf. Altogether independently of this, a seat in Parliament is well worth the expense. It gives you a position in society which is otherwise difficult to attain; and any man who can talk as you do, glibly and off-hand, is certain, before a session is over, to push himself forward into notoriety.

I'll tell you why we want you, and I shall do so with the most perfect frankness and unreserve. Our best men are used up. In the opinion of the Secret Committee, of whose views I am the humble expositor, Cobden is no longer worth his weight in oakum for any practical purpose whatever. We committed a monstrous mistake in subscribing that unlucky fund. We ought to have remembered the story of the soldier who carried with desperate gallantry a redoubt the morning after he had been rooked of his last penny at cribbage, but who invariably declined to volunteer for any subsequent enterprise, in consequence of the injudicious douceur awarded him by the commanding officer. Just so has it been with Cobden. The testimonial turned his head. You remember the awful exhibition he made of himself, when, in attempting to lecture the farmers on the best method of cultivating land, he assumed the character of a country gentleman; and the undying ridicule which was excited by the immediate publication of a lithographed plan of his estate, which, in a good year, might pasture a couple of cows, and afford precarious subsistence besides to a brood of goslings? Then came his Peace platform tomfoolery, just at the very time when war was becoming universal on the Continent, and revolutions were springing like mines under the feet of every government. Then, again, instead of cajoling the bucolics, he chose openly to defy and insult them at Leeds; and the result has been that, from that hour, every man connected in the most remote degree with the landed interest has drawn off from our body. In the House of Commons he can hardly command an audience. The Liberal whippers-in say that a speech of his is equivalent to a dozen votes added to the Opposition minority, and they never see him crossing the threshold without quaking with terror lest he should take it into his head to commence a harangue. Bright's eloquence is usually smothered by cries of "Oh, oh," and derisive cheering. He is a sturdy chap in his way, but woefully injudicious; and he has been so exceedingly rude to Lord John Russell, that the Whigs will have nothing to say to him. Old Joe is rapidly becoming imbecile. He can no longer fumble with figures as he used to do; and his perception, in most cases, is not sufficiently clear to enable him to state the "tottle of the whole" with accuracy. I love and revere the veteran, but I am afraid his best days are gone by. Milner Gibson won't do; and of course we have too much respect for our cause to allow M'Gregor to come down to Westminster without his muzzle. We require, of all things, a new hand with gentlemanly manners, an easy address, some flow of language, and a slight dash of humour – one who will not weary the House with interminable statistics, or get into a passion because he is contradicted, or fasten upon his opponent with the brute ferocity of a bull-dog. We want some fellow not fully committed to Free Trade, who can keep, as it were, on our flanks, and amuse the enemy at times by suggesting articles of condition. He must have no one-sided predilections, no abstract preference for the Cottonocracy over the other interests of Britain. He must appear to be animated by a fine, generous, patriotic spirit – ever ready to listen to distress, and always eager to condole with it. Fine words, you are aware, butter no parsnips, but they are fine words notwithstanding. This is the part which we wish you to undertake, if you consent to come among us. The fact is, that we must do something of the kind if we wish to escape annihilation. I am afraid we have derived no benefit from sneering at the farmers. The proposals which were made in the public prints for their wholesale emigration have excited general disgust, and men are beginning to ask each other what crime the agriculturists have committed, to justify the infliction of such penalties? The question, of course, is a foolish one. Every sound economist knows that the farmers are mere creatures of circumstance, and that their interests cannot be allowed for one moment to stand in the way of the approaching supremacy of Manchester. But, unfortunately, all men are not political economists, and we must, for some time at least, humour their fancies. I should be the last man in the world to admit that any feelings of compassion should have weight in the settlement of a great national question; and you, who know me well, will do me the credit to believe that I could see every farm-house in England made desolate, and the inmates transported to the antipodes, without the weakness of shedding a tear. We cannot, however, expect so much Spartan stoicism from the masses. They are still by far too much under the influence of the clergy; and it will be some time before we can eradicate from their minds the lingering fibres of superstition. I agree in the main with the sentiments expressed the other night by that trump, Joseph Sandars of Yarmouth, that all we have or ought to regard, is the interest of the manufacturers. Did you observe what he said? Excuse me if I quote the passage. "Look at the fearful consequences which would result to the commercial classes of the country, if their powers of competition with foreign nations were weakened or crippled. If that large portion of the community did not spin and weave for the four quarters of the globe, the subsistence and happiness of millions of our population would be destroyed. That competition went on day by day, and year by year, increasing in force and intelligence, and formed the great social question of our times. If adequate provision were not made for that class of the population, there must be danger." Sandars was undeniably right; but what demon could have possessed Sandars to make him say so in as many words? It amounts to a pure and unqualified admission of the real truth, that Free Trade was intended to operate, and must operate, solely for the benefit of the exporting houses, to the ruin of all other interests in the country; but was it in any way necessary to tell the country that? These are the sort of speeches which are playing the mischief with us. How can we attempt to bamboozle the shopkeepers who are losing custom, and the artisans who have little or nothing to do, and the small tradesmen who are verging towards the Gazette, if members of our own party will have the consummate imprudence to tell them that they are merely parts of a general holocaust – infinitesimal faggots of a grand pile of British industry which is to be fired, in order that the aged phœnix of cotton-spinning may be regenerated, and soar, triumphant and alone, from the heart of the smouldering ashes? Our game is to keep all these things in the background. Three years ago, at one of our private Manchester conferences, I indicated the course which we should pursue. My advice was – on no account to break with the farmers. I represented that, when agricultural distress arrived, as it must do immediately, our first business was to attribute that entirely to exceptional causes – such as a good harvest, which we could have little difficulty in doing, considering the deficiency of agricultural statistics. That, I said, would gain us a year. Next, we could fall back upon the subject of rent, and sow dissension in the bucolic ranks, by alleging that the whole loss might be met by a remission on the part of the landlords, and that they were in fact the only parties interested. I explained that this line of policy, if properly and dextrously pursued, could not fail to add enormously to our strength, since, by radicalising the farmers, we must separate them entirely from the landlords, and make them ready tools for our grand final move – which, I need not say, is the repudiation of the National Debt. My advice was not only applauded, but adopted. We surmounted the difficulties of the first year pretty well; and, but for the folly of some of our own men, we should by this time have had the farmers clamouring on our side. Cobden, however, reviled them in all the terms which his choice and polished imagination could suggest; others told them to go to Australia or to the devil, whichever the might think best; and now Sandars deliberately comes forward, and lets the cat out of the bag! I ask you, Dunshunner, if it is not enough to make any man of parts and intellect as rabid as a March hare, when he sees his finest and best-adjusted schemes utterly ruined by such deplorable bungling? Our only chance is to gain time. Give me another year, or eighteen months more, at the utmost, of the present Parliament, and, I trust, the death-warrant of the Fundholder will be sealed. If we can extend the suffrage in the mean time, so much the better. We have managed to get up a tolerable hatred of taxation. The anti-excise party is very powerful, and, by giving them a lift, we might knock off several more millions from the revenue. Cardwell, and some of that soft-headed set, who call themselves Peelites, wish to take the duties off tea, and they ought by all means to be encouraged. Tobacco follows next, of course; and as smoking and snuffing are now almost universal, the repeal of the duties on these articles would be immensely popular. Malt goes, and so does sugar, – and then, my dear friend, where's your revenue, and where the means of paying the interest of the national debt? Don't you see what a beautiful field is open to us, if we can only keep our own men from making premature disclosures, and pander properly to the public appetite for getting rid of taxation? By itself, direct taxation cannot stand six months. That fact in natural history has been ascertained by so many experiments, and consequent revolutions, from the days of Wat Tyler downwards, that I need not fatigue you by recapitulating them. The reimposition of the Income Tax for three years is an immense point in our favour. I never felt so nervous in my life as during the Ministerial crisis, when it appeared possible that Stanley might come in. I knew that, if he succeeded in forming a Government, the Income Tax was doomed, and then, of course, we must have had a revision of the tariff; and probably he would have proposed to levy such duties upon imports as might put the British artisan, labourer, and grower, on a fair level to compete with the foreigner, at least in respect of taxation. Had he succeeded, our game was up. But, most fortunately, we have escaped that danger. I shall ever regard the glass house in Hyde Park with feelings of peculiar gratitude; for I am convinced that, but for that sublime erection, we should have lost the services of Sir Charles Wood, and, with him, lost all chance of carrying into execution those schemes which we consider most important for the entire ascendency of Manchester. Fortunately, Wood is spared to us. He is an excellent confiding creature – as innocent as a lamb who is tempted into the precincts of the slaughter-house by the proffer of a bunch of clover; and if we can manage to keep him in office a little longer, why, between ourselves, I think, Dunshunner, we may look upon the matter as achieved.