can shut up their mills, and turn their backs | have shipped off cargo upon cargo of coton the misery, to travel till affairs come round ton; and there might have been enough again. This kind of thing is the puzzle in sown to justify us in calculating on the disLondon and elsewhere; and so is the fact that tress as a difficulty of six months' duration. a large number of wealthy employers have as As it is, the sowing season is past, the monyet made no sign of intending to give with soon has arrived, and nothing in the way of any liberality; and so is, again, the shock- combined effort is done. Men go on investing certainty that there have been sales of ing their wealth in all sorts of foreign cotton in Liverpool for exportation, when schemes, under all manner of risks, while a there were thousands hungering for want of Cotton Importing Association, which can it within fifty miles. There have been em- honestly hold out a profit of from twenty to ployers who have refused such profits, and forty per cent, has to go a-begging for suphave worked up their cotton at a loss, for port. And Manchester talks pedantically their people's sake; but these good men are about demand and supply, and division of ill-neighbored; and if they save their own labor, unshaken by the very convincing facts peace of mind and fair repute, they will still before her eyes; and some would throw the have something to bear through the dead-work of getting cotton on government, and ness and lowness of neighbors to whom wealth has come before they were fitted to receive or to use it well. All the while, the months are rolling on, and nothing effectual is done by the Lancashire capitalists towards getting hold of the existing stock of cotton in India, or ensuring a larger produce next year. Mr. Villiers talked in the House of 400,000 bales coming from India after October; and in the House of Lords there was mention of 6,000,000 bales actually existing in India, while the whole consumption of Europe and America is only 5,000,000. These statements are loose and unsupported, and we need not rely on them; but how is it that, at the end of many months of alarm and suffering, we have no special agencies at work in the cotton countries to ascertain how much may be had this year, and how much more next? Why have not the Lancashire capitalists combined to send out agents, and to supply whatever is needed, in the way of advances, seed, and "plant" for dressing and carrying the produce? This is not "growing cotton," of which they have such a horror: it is buying it ;-buying it in the way which the Indian market requires. There are Indian officers and settlers by the score who would serve admirably for agents, being familiar with the country and the people, and the experiments already made, both successful and unsuccessful. Under Sir C. Wood's peculiar management, there are now adrift many Indian officers who are the very men to do what is wanted, to set Lancashire to work again. Long before this time they might some would leave it to chance, while the last thing that occurs to the general company of enriched employers is to invest their own money and pains in the work. The sooner they see their duty as others see it, the better. What others see is, first, that we are all under a stringent obligation to carry the four millions of sufferers through their adversity, in health, and with spirits unbroken. This obligation presses everywhere; in London and in Launceston, as in Lancaster. Next, there is for the mill-owners the further duty of trying every rational method of obtaining supplies of the raw material, to set their manufacture going again. Proposals are before them for this object. Their country requires of these fortunate citizens that they shall adopt such proposals or frame others. The one thing which will never be forgiven or forgotten will be their persisting in doing nothing,— waiting while their stocks are increasing in value every day on their shelves, from the very scarcity of raw material which is starying their work-people. The time has long been past for any pretence of expecting a supply from America: the question now asked, more and more loudly, is what the manufacturers are about, not to carry their demand up to the sources of supply, in the remote recesses of native life in India. If the duty of the manufacturers is twofold, the rest of us have a single duty so plain and urgent that we must look to ourselves that we do it. The plain duty of sustaining our cotton-operatives may, however, have many forms. The easiest is giving money. It should be largely, and may be best perhaps in instalments, when the sum of middle-class housekeepers whose estab is considerable. There are several agencies lishments are compact and economical: but through which it may be dispensed, either we hear of success where it has been tried. in aid of the parish payment, or to keep There are probably more farms and warefamilies off the parish, or to sustain them houses where an extra youth can be taken by loans, or otherwise in their position of on for training and service. There may be respectability till the mills open again. other ways, and not a few. The one certain Again, there is emigration going forward. thing is that every one of us can do someThere will be plenty of workers left for any thing. Assuming this, I will only further work likely to accrue for years to come, ask my readers to try to represent to themhowever many of the young people make selves what four millions of persons of all their escape now to a land of plenty. Let ages are like. Let them then think of that the lads and lasses be assisted to Queens-multitude as active, high-spirited, hitherto land and British Columbia, to send us cot- beholden to nobody, but now hungry, restton, or make comfortable homes in the colo- less in idleness, fretting about their rent, nies; and their parents and brothers at ashamed to appear in the streets, wistfully home will suffice for the manufacture when inquiring about the chances of better times, it revives. Then, there are the sewing- hating to borrow, and hating worse to take rooms, where the young women earn some- parish pay, and, in the midst of all this, thing, and learn what they most need to be steadily refusing to ask the government to taught. Then, there are swarms of children interfere in America, so as to cut off the wanting to be fed and taught :-how can we negro slave's chance of freedom;-let our open our schools to the greatest number of countrymen and countrywomen look on this them? Then, not a few of our kindly Eng- noble company of suffering fellow-citizens, lish matrons have contrived to take a Lanca- and say whether they shall endure one pang shire girl into their houses, to train for ser- that we can prevent. vice, or in domestic arts which will be useful to her for life. This can hardly be expected FROM THE MOUNTAIN. THE LAP OF LUXURY.-We notice that in the Western Annexe of the Great Exhibition that there is "a machine for milking the four teats of a cow at the same time." It is said in "point | of time, labor, and cleanliness, to far surpass milking by hand." Its lightness of touch, too, is wonderful, combining, we are informed, the "suaviter in modo" with the four-teat-er in re in a style that is sure to cast every dairymaid in the kingdom out of the milk-pail of society. We are only thinking if a few of these milkingmachines could be introduced into the milkyway what a lacteal deluge there would be, what a cat's millennium would ensue, to the great horror and bankruptcy of the dairymen, who, in their overflowing despair, would probably seek a watery grave by drowning themselves in their own milk-pails.-Punch. the Dutch Government. His inquiries may benefit, not the knowledge of history alone: they may also throw some new light on the Indian language and culture, of which curious remnants have been preserved in the islands of Java and Balé. Herr Friederich is to come to London first, to prepare himself for his task, by inspecting the Sanscrit inscriptions in the British Museum. AT a recent sale of choice violins in London, a Cremona of 1715 sold for £100, one of 1701 for £135, and one of 1697 for £210. The total amount of the day's sale was £1,717, and the number of violins disposed of was only seventeen. The average price realized was therefore over five hundred dollars a fiddle. SANSCRIT INSCRIPTIONS.-Herr Friederich has received an order from the Prussian Government to collect the inscriptions in the San- MESSRS. HERZLEN AND OGAREFF, editors scrit language, dating from the Indian reign, of the Kolokol, in London, publicly offer to which are still found in many places in Java.publish, free of charge, all the Russian reviews Herr Friederich, the German savant, has lived and journals which have recently been supfor sixteen years in the island, in the service of pressed by order of the Czar. From The Spectator. CURIOSITIES OF PARLIAMENTARY HIS TORY. payment was made in kind instead of in preparatory breakfast" which cost £750. The following is the bill of fare, as given in the Annual Register, 1761: 980 stone of beef, 315 dozen of wine, 72 pipes of ale, 365 gallons of spirits converted into punch. THE session just closed has been one of the least remarkable we have had of late years. It survived the average term, although, perhaps, it scarcely accomplished the average amount of work, and it was saved from utter dulness only by the personalities occasionally introduced into the debates. There is no circumstance connected with it which entitles it to be numbered among the curious Parliaments of which history bears record, and which are a good deal better worth recalling than the incidents of the past six months. Many of the members who were becoming impatient last week to depart for the grouse, must have envied their predecessors in the first Parliament which ever sat, in the reign of Henry the Third, who were released after an attendance of thirty-three days. The bur- Parliaments were ordinarily elected angesses, citizens, and knights had never be- nually, but the session was generally very fore been allowed to exercise legislative func- brief, and between the reigns of Henry VI. tions, and the writ which summoned them and Charles II. the sittings were frequently rendered it lawful for them to receive pay- adjourned on account of the plague. The ment for their services from their constitu- shortest Parliament that ever sat met in the ents. The sheriffs were directed to form a thirty-fourth year of the reign of Edward I., jury of "four lawful knights " to assess the and existed for one day only; the longest expenses of the representatives; and for was not that which is historically known as many years subsequently members received the "Long Parliament," which, according to wages during the session. The rate of pay the general computation, existed 16 years, was first fixed in the reign of Edward II.-it 145 days, or according to another (the outwas to be 4s. a day for every knight of the side limit) 17 years and three months. The shire, and 2s. for every burgess; but a second Parliament of Charles II. met on the smaller sum was sometimes taken, and there 8th of May, 1661, and was not dissolved till is one case, which a writer in Notes and the 24th of January, 1678, having thus had Queries suggests may be the first instance a duration of 17 years, 8 months, and 16 of bribery known, where a member con- days. This, therefore, is the real " "long" sented to serve for nothing. The expenses Parliament. It sat through, as Hume says, of travelling to the place where Parliament "the whole course of the reign, one year exassembled often deterred small constituen- cepted. .. Before their dissolution they' cies from sending members-they virtually seemed to be treading fast in the footsteps of disfranchised themselves on account of their the last Long Parliament, on whose conduct poverty. Petitions have been presented to they threw at first such violent blame." Parliament from constituencies begging to Down to the time of Henry IV., the longest be disfranchised on the ground of their ina- Parliament that had ever been known exbility to pay the expenses of their members. tended over ten months. He was the first The Parliament of 9 Edward III. sat at York king who prorogued Parliament by his own for eight days only, but the representatives will and act. Twenty days was the average from Cornwall had payment granted them length of the session during the half century for thirty-two days spent in travelling. This that Edward III. sat on the throne. This formed so serious a charge that it became a would have suited the blunt and dissatisfied luxury, which only well-to-do boroughs could Speaker who, in the course of the debate on afford, to have a member. In some cases the Triennial Bill in 1693, declared that .. "Parliaments resembled the manna which the Welsh princes. Old members of the God bestowed on the chosen people. They House may recollect an instance of a prime were excellent while they were fresh, but if minister being severely rebuked for a cheer kept too long they became noisome, and foul which he did not give. The incident ocworms were engendered by the corruption of curred during a debate on the state of Irethat which had been sweeter than honey." land, in the session of 1846. Mr. Disraeli It was not, indeed, without many prognosti- made it the foundation of one of his "encations of evil that Septennial Parliaments venomed" attacks upon Sir Robert Peel, were instituted, and some of the most pun- that he had cheered a statement of Mr. gent sarcasms of Junius are directed against Cobden, which was contrary to his (the those who could act as they liked for six prime minister's) own views. Sir R. Peel years, provided they took a little trouble to "totally denied" this, whereupon Mr. Dismake atonement in the seventh. The long- raeli, according to Hansard, exclaimed—" If est session of late years was that of 1847- the right honorable baronet means to say 48, which lasted 293 days, and was referred that anything I have said is false, of course to by the Speaker in his address to the I cease-I sit down." And sit down he did, queen, as well as from the throne, as a "la- in the middle of his speech. A scene enborious and protracted session." Mr. May, sued. Mr. Newdegate asked for an explanain a pamphlet published in 1849, states that tion of Sir R. Peel's words, and Major Mac"it sat 170 days; the average duration of namara, probably scenting a battle afar off, each sitting was 8 hours, 16 3-4 minutes; protested that if "any honorable member felt it sat 136 1-4 hours after midnight. There aggrieved, this is not the place to call him were 10,412 entries in the votes of res gestæ, (Sir R. Peel) to account." But Lord George and 255 divisions." Let members think of Bentinck, Sir James Graham, and other this, and consider how lightly they have members who are no longer living, interescaped from their duties in the present posed to make peace. Sir R. Peel repeated year. his denial that he had cheered Mr. Cobden's remark. Mr. Disraeli expressed himself satisfied, and the parties retired for the night, without any prospect of Major Macnamara's services being called into requisition. Among all the hot encounters between Sir R. Peel and Mr. Disraeli, this approached the nearest to an open personal quarrel. The present "forms "9 of both Houses have accumulated by slow degrees. In the reign of James I. a member brought forward a motion forbidding hissing in the House of Commons, and declaring it to be "a thing derogatory from the dignity, not becoming the gravity, and as much crossing and abating the honor and privileges of the House as any other abuse whatsoever." The mo- Formerly, members could not absent themtion was accepted "with approval," but the selves for a single night from the House practice of making unseemly noises does not without permission of the monarch, and in seem to have declined, and Mr. Erskine after times, of the Speaker and the House. May, in his valuable Law of Parliament, In every case they forfeited their wages durregrets that in our own time "the most dis-ing the time they were absent. Both Lords orderly noises are sometimes made." The and Commons were fined if they did not atironical "Hear, hear " is peculiarly offensive tend prayers. During the "Long Parlia to the nervous speaker, and even the prac- ment" the Commons made an order "that tised debater is sometimes discomfited by all members who climb over seats shall pay an unexpected chcer. A few years ago a 12d.," and in the same session it was agreed, Mr. Blewitt, representative of the Mon-"that every member standing in the passage mouthshire boroughs, was the butt of the House when he rose, and used to make, as a writer in Fraser's Magazine tells us, "imploring appeals, in plaintive tones and with aggrieved astonishment in his aspect, to know what it was the House were laughing at." It did not avail this unlucky gentleman that he was lineally descended from whilst the House is sitting shall pay 12d. to the Sergeant." It has often happened that members of Parliament have been mobbed, as in the time of Lord George Gordon's riots, or threatened, as in the case of Mr. Secretary Peel, who one night informed the House that he had received a letter complaining of his speeches, and threatening him with public contradiction from the gal- | her Commons very sharply for it, and once The Speaker, though a potent and generally revered authority, has sometimes fallen beneath the displeasure of the House and suffered rebuke. In the time of James I. there was a Speaker who seems to have been in the habit of leaving the House frequently, without apology or explanation. One evening he met with an unexpectedly warm reception on his return to the chair. A Mr. Mallory said he ought not to rise without leave, and Sir R. Phillippes complained that the Speaker "sometime neglecteth his duty to the House in intricating or deferring the question." Sir H. Manners was even more downright: "Mr. Speaker is but a servant to the House, not a master, nor master's mate." Sir H. Withrington declared that "the Speaker was the fault of all their faults, by preventing them with rising." The attack went the round of the House, the unfortunate object of it being compelled to listen to it with his accustomed impartiality and gravity. We are not aware of any similar instance of a combined and determined outbreak against the Speaker on the part of members; of late years, at any rate, an excellent understanding has prevailed. The loquacity of members is no new failing. Queen Elizabeth ridiculed and reviled The Act 7 and 8 Will. III. made it neces- During the past session a few journals ་ |