CIVIC RETRENCHMENT; COUNTING THE COST.
THE days of civic glory are passing—past !—never to return. Even the Lord Mayor's Day is to be shorn of its splendour. Mr. CHARLES PEARSON, that unsparing foe to Magisterial finery and feasting, turtle and hops, brought forward some resolutions in the Court of Common Council, the other day, for curtailing the Lord Mayor's expenditure. He said,
" The time had a/lived when the civic exhibitions, with the Mayor as chief performer, could no longer be tolerated. He had in disguise mixed with the attendant crowd on a Lord Mayor's Day, and he declared that the whole parade was the subject of the most contemptuous sneering, even amongst the children ; and that the apprentices, instead of being moved, as they were in the days of Whittington, with the spirit of competition and glory at seeing the gilt coach, laughed aloud as it trundled along. This scorn and contempt were the result of the attempt to call back to people the recollections of their childhood. This was no time for puerilities. Pantomime had been driven even from its proper sphere. The nursery tales of Cinderella and the Goose with the Golden Eggs were no longer endured, but gave way as the light of education advanced ; and surely the pantomimic and clownish displays of civic barbarisms ought no longer to be cherished."
The Court agreed with the orator, and unanimously passed the resolutions ; so that the next Lord Mayor's Day may be as sober, and the ceremonies as brief, as the most sturdy Utilitarian could desire. The fact is doubtless as Mr. PEARSON stated, that the people would no longer endure to be taxed for the support of these childish exhibitions. A wonderful deal of extravagance has been laughed at and tolerated, merely because the paying many were not aware that it was their money which went to pro- vide the finery with which Lord Mayors and Aldermen were decked out. Now, however, men begin to count the cost of every thing, from a palace to a potato, and are anxious to get a king and a supper at the cheapest rate. Every thing now is a question of money. Mr. PEARSON mentioned, that " His friend Mr. Joseph Parkes, upon coming to London, full of the great subject of the Reform Bill, happened to get into a cab; and the gentleman who drove the cab being a person of communicative disposition, Mr. Parkes asked him what he thought of the Reform Bill. The Reform Bill,' said he, ' why, I'll tell you what, Sir, it's all a question of witdes."fhe poor fellow answered the question as accurately as briefly ; and he could not better describe the matter before the Committee, than by telling them that it was nothing but a question of wittles."
This is very true. The Reform Bill has done little for the mass of the community-, unless it enables them to live in greater com- fort. If it tend to produce good government, it will have that ef- fect indirectly. The expenditure, and consequently taxation, will be diminished ; monopolies and other restraints on industry and the power of production will be abolished ; and thus, by a short process, the benefits of the Reform Bill will be felt in the pockets of the poor. It may be well not to push our conclusions too far; but all must see to what this determination to get every thing for as little money us possible must lead, when directed towards matters relating to the government of the country. Men are already asking themselves, whether a President is not cheaper than a Monarch, an Elective Upper House than a Senate of Hereditary Peers. They are already puzzling their brains to know why we should go to war with foreign nations ; and why, if we are to keep at peace, a national guard is not as good for defence, or better, than a standing army, which costs eight millions a year? When our Representatives are required to vote large estimates with the view of maintaining the dignity of the Crown and the integrity of the Constitution, let them ponder these things, and ask themselves whether an economical Minister is not the best support of the government of King, Lords, and Commons ?
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