THE OUTLOOK FOR THE 1VINTER. [TO THE EDITOR OF THE

" SPECTATOR."] SIR,—It seems to be considered on all hands that the Abyssinian Expedition is to be the main object of the Autumn Session. Yet there are home questions of very serious import which ought not to be overlooked.

1. All whose life is spent otherwise than in lounging in or out of their homes or their clubs know that we have an ugly winter before us. The merchant, the manufacturer, the artizan, all who are occupied in purveying for the wants of others, complain of the deadness of trade, which has now lasted over a twelvemonth, and of which few, if any, hope to see the end before next spring. Over twenty-one millions of gold lie in the Bank. Money can be had nominally at next to nothing; virtually, if otherwise than for the shortest periods, not at all. As you descend lower in the social scale the pressure, of course, increases, till you reach a point where it has swept away all savings, all tangible means of existence beyond the poor earnings of the day. Half the East End of Lon- don, both north and south of the Thames, is literally starving, and the same is the case in the seats of our cotton manufacture, of our iron trade, in many of our large towns throughout the country. Moat of the smaller mills in Lancashire, it is said, must come down ere long. Many a manufacturer is carrying on his works at a weekly loss. In luckless Bethnal Green a caprice of fashion, and not an unhealthy one, the substitution of velveteens for velvets, has, I am told, pulled down almost the last branch of the London silk manufacture in which a living could be got, and reduced the manufacturers to such straits that they actually insist on their weavers finding a market for their goods before employing them.

Meanwhile bread is rising, and is of course not generally stopped in its rise by food riots, though it has been locally,—the most dangerous of precedents.

2. If this were all, it would be no more than what we have had to pass through many a time. Our people know how to bear adver- sity ; Lancashire is used to clemming,'—aye, can clem ' with a will for the sake of a principle, as it showed during the American war. But there is no principle at stake now ; nothing to raise men above themselves, to brace them to heroism ; much, unfortunately, to irritate and tantalize. I doubt if since 1848 there has ever been a worse spirit abroad amongst large masses of our population than has grown up within the last few months.

3. Though the food riots (of which we probably have seen only the first) scarcely sufficed to ruffle the equanimity of the Three per Cents., though most of us only look upon them as strange accidents, it would be wrong to underrate their symptomatic importance. "It never smokes but there is fire," and viewed side

by side with Fenian, as well as anti-Romish or anti-Ritualist outrages, they indicate the simultaneous growth, far and wide, throughout the country, of a lawless temper to which we had for long years been unaccustomed. Without wishing in anywise to stand up for butchers or bakers, I must say that I believe the worst firebrands in this matter have been the Times and the other papers which followed it in its late autumnal crusade against the prices of provisions. The articles of the Times on this subject, the letters which appeared in it, have been either extracted, or reproduced• in a diluted form after the fashion of provincial journalism, throughout nearly the whole of the provincial press. Had these denunciations of high prices been accompanied with any serious remedial efforts, they would have usefully directed men's energiesiuto new channels. But to din constantly into men's ears that they are paying too mach, without urging on them any practical scheme whereby to pay less, is simply to incite them to take that practical means of doing so which involves no trouble of scheming at all, viz., to bully the seller ; which is precisely what men have done lately in the matter, and will do, £30111's by threats, sonic by brickbats. Every meat or bread riot shows where a co-opera - tive butcher's or baker's shop is needed. Of course "able editors find it much easier to abuse butchers and bakers than to set one up-.

Such riots, I say deliberately, may be looked for any day this winter in the metropolis. " If we can't get bread we must take it," has been freely said already in London streets. Those who have seen the squalid misery of Bethnal Green even at this early period of the season dare not wonder at the words.

4. Special causes of exasperation have, moreover, come into play. A widely operative one has been the suppression of the compound householder. No words can adequately stigmatize the childish false pride which led Mr. Disraeli to cling to his payment-of-rates nostrum, after it had once been shown that to pay a sovereign to a. landlord, out of which he- paid in turn 61. or is. to a collector, was precisely equivalent to paying 19s. or 19s. Gd. to him, and the odd Gd. or is. to the collector himself. The result of this obstinacy has simply been that all but the most benevolent landlords have been and are engaged throughout the whole country in an endea- vour to pocket the value of the rates, either by refusing any deduction from rent, or by claiming to enhance it, and pay the rate themselves. It is a fact, that at this period of extreme stag- nation of work rents are being largely raised upon the poorer class; the pretext of the abolition of the compound householder being, followed in practice even where it has no application. In some vases the process finds an excuse in the very ills which it aggravates- " Provisious are so dear that I must really raise my rents," said a small Landlord the other day to a friend of mine. If the Govern- ment were wise, it would instantly bring in a Bill of a single clause to restore the abolished compounder.

5. It has had, I am happy to see, the wisdom of endeavouring to remove one other cause of irritation in the metropolis, caused by the legislation of last session, in that clause of the " Metro- politan Streets' Act" which virtually suppressed the costermonger. But in repealing or modifying the clause, Parliament cannot annihilate the positive misery which it has produced, not only amongst the " Coster" class, itself a very numerous one, but amongst the whole mass of the poor who deal with it, and whose cost of living is probably enhanced from 15 to 25 per cent. so long as they are cut off frojn this source of supply,—still less the bitter sense of neglect on the part of the ruling classes which so great an evil, thus unthinkingly inflicted on large masses of people, has aroused. Nor dare I trust for the present in the completeness of the remedy proposed. The discretion of the police is surely but a broken reed to lean upon. If Sir Richard Mayne had had any adequate sympathy or familiarity with the condition of the people whom he has to protect, would he not haie been the first to warn the Government against such an enactment as the one now pro- posed to be repealed ?

6. The discontent amongst the poorest classes is most real. Experienced East-End clergymen hear again declamations against rich men's selfishness, mutterings and threats to which they hal long been unused. But in the better paid ranks of labour another sore rankles. The sheet anchor of the ordinary artizan's reliance, —the mainstay of his independence,—the barrier between him and the Union Workhouse,--Lhis Trade Society, is, by virtue of recent decisions, for the time being virtually ' hors la loi.' Its feuds are at the mercy of any swindler who can thrust his hand into its chest. No one can tell the consequences of belonging to it, or in any way dealing with it. I have myself had to advise a Co-Operative Society that by simply allowing the use of a .room for the board meetings of a branch of one of the moot respectable Trades' organizations, and of its shop for a house of call, its conspiracy. The best societies, those whose dealings have been EAST.

most straightforward and above-board, are precisely those which [To TIIF.

suffer most. The number of members in such societies has been SIR,—The language to which I was moved by your suggestion of late and is greatly falling off. But let no one imagine that of a permanent retention of Abyssinia, is certainly not such as I this state of things is attended with any alleviation of class should think of applying to the theory of Imperialism you drew jealousies. The weakening of the Trade Societies only embitters out last week. I am glad to think that my remonstrance may the feelings of the men towards their employers, towards society. have been the occasion of eliciting from you a declaration of This is equally true of those who fall off, and of those who remain. policy, which I freely admit is the best on whiCh the defence of The former leave not because they believe Unionism to be bad, but our Empire can rest. It was just because the tone in which you because they have lost faith in its power to protect them adequately; seemed to me to he ready to welcome a new province in Africa they carry with them abroad only a more reckless temper, a greater is precisely that temper which undoes our highest professions and indifference to means. Reductions of wages, necessary, no doubt, aims in the East, that the fire kindled within me, and at Nat I in many cases, but now growing very general, only add a sting to spake with my tongue. It was certainly in no spirit of invective, the legal insecurity of the Trade Societies. In various instances though I admit with a certain indignation.

employers are presuming on the temporary weakening of the Unions I had no iuteution whatever of discussing the good or evil of our to press iu many ways on the men ; thus, I am informed that Indian system. Nor did I mean to imply that the invasion of engine-drivers (who while on duty are only known by the number Abyssinia is precisely the same as the seizure of Rome. I did of their engines, and receive directions only on a sheet of paper mean to compare the Indian, whose " very heart was to be. taken hung up in the shed, so as to have no means of identification) find out of him" by retreat, with the Zouave, who equally resents themselves now refused a written character, even when emigrat- being baulked.

ing. Hence I cannot but say that I believe an extremely bitter But the question now between us need not be the exceedingly temper to be just now prevalent amongst many of our skilled trivial one, as to whether or not I have any turn for irony, about artizans, no less dangerous than that of the worse-paid and more which I feel sure you must be far the best judge ; nor is it indeed ignorant class below. as to whether you may have used language which to some of us 7. These discontents are all social, not political. Would to seemed inconsistent with your formal profession of faith. These God they were the latter ! Men's wants are always far more un- are personal matters of no concern, on which it is needless to reasoning, far more fearful than their opinions. One great danger enlarge. But I should like to say a few words with your leave on of the present state of things is that there is no political question that far more general question, whether even that high ground for at issue, that no political vent, so to speak, exists for noxious social Imperial policy which you have explained can itself be accepted as humours. I should have hailed with the greatest delight the true. •

prospect of a general election next spring. The clever trick by It would be idle in the limits of a letter to attempt any answer which the Tory conjuror has sought to protract his tenure of to a doctrine so matured and coherent as that which your paper power by deferring till 1369 any election under the new Reform last week propounded. But if I were to summarize the grounds Act will, I believe, prove most mischievous. For nearly two on which I think it answerable, I should do so briefly thus :- years the working-classes will have been tantalized with the 1. The idea of the high civilizing mission of our Eastern possession: of rights which they are hindered from exercising. Empire was not the idea out of which it arose. Historically Cabinet Ministers rise at banquet after banquet to declare them speaking, it was built on a basis of military and mercantile ambi- worthy of political power ; but with this and that need pressing tion. Nor is that history entirely forgotten, either by ruler or . upon them now, which they fancy at least might be cured at once ruled. Within a generation, it is true, the higher forces in both by the use of it, they must wait for at least a whole weary twelve- countries, amongst which you may justly count the Spectator, have month before they can cast the vote which they are told by their striven, and with great success, to break with the old idea, and to governors is their due, and has been wrongfully withdrawn from substitute the new. I am far from denying the Indian Govern- them since 1832. Can anything be more dangerous than this ment in its present form to be one which effects, and labours to giving and withholding at once? The channel of regular and effect, great immediate, and some abiding good to the people legitimate political action is closed upon the new voters ; can you within its charge, a good which we are bound to develop to every be surprised if they seek irregular and unlawful ones, if they try practical extent. But the first condition of that good appears to me to air iu "tall talk" the rights which they are debarred from realiz- this : the rigid suppression of the old lust of conquest, to which I ing in acts ? Mr. Finlam's bumptiousness is the logical fruit of certainly supposed your original remark was designed to appeal.

Mr. Disraeli's trickery. 2. The story of ' Imperialism' in the East has, however, a stage 8. Another most serious danger is the want of prominent far wider than even the Indian Peninsula. Let us admit that our political leaders to whom the masses can look up to and trust. Government there in its actual form has a great and honourable No political leader has come out of the ordeal of the last session function, which it fills. It is one, however, it must be allowed, otherwise than with a lessened share of public confidence. Even when, we think of the Mutiny, opium, indigo, laud tenures, and within a far lower sphere, Mr. Beales' position and prestige are commercial crises, which at present is far from perfect. In any case shaken, and the 'Reform League' is being split up by secessions. I should have thought that those eighty millions, with their coin- Hence a state of moral anarchy, in which here a Murphy, there a plex races and creeds, were enough to occupy the whole intellect Finlan is cast to the surface, and both together represent only the and force even of a nation like ours. Even then the mission aimless fluctuations of sufferings and discontents, which almost would be one of overpowering magnitude and difficulty. But any accident might lash up into purposeless fury. what Imperialism' in feet? India, vast as it is, is but an 9. Lastly, the fact must not be blinked that the execution of entrenched camp, as it were, from whence armaments incessantly the Manchester Fenians (which I do not presume to condemn, pour forth and sweep the Asian continent. Few are the years —I believe the taking away of life was to some extent needful), which pass but that armies and fleets from thence do not burst has not only given Fenianisin its martyrs, but through the across the face of the East with ' commerce' and Christianity' religious devoutness of the men at the last, for the time fills up on their banners, and havoc and anarchy in their rear. Time the chasm w.hieh once existed between Fenianiam ancl,the Roman after time has the "inchoate civilization" of China been battered Catholic Church, and identifies its cause for the great mass of and shaken till it reels, throwing up death and misery in forms as the Irish race with that of their country and their faith. If the Titanic as any in the history of mankind. Time after time has Government do not recognize that the execution of these men that other "inchoate civilization" in Japan been racke I by our imposes on them a solemn pledge to grapple with the Irish diffi- cannon-balls, till this also is writhing in social confusion. China, culty, to carry it through to a solution, to do thorough and Japan, Persia, Cahoot, Burnt* the Cape, and Abyssinia in turn unflinching justice to Ireland, the Manchester scaffolds will only feel the edge of the civilizing Sword. " Qum caret ora cruore inaugurate a war of races in our country. nostro ?"

10. To conclude : without in the least sharing the views of the And for all this blood and suffering what is there to show but 'foolish prophet' who could see a Niagara in Mr. Disraeli's Reform chaos and a glut of Manchester goods? These be thy Gods, Bill,—without the least fear for England's future,—I cannot help 0 Israel! Accidents, inseparable accidents, it may be, of our thinking that the strange political lull of the present day is only imperial task in India ; but I confess to the thought that the the calm before the storm,—and that this November Parliament, civilization, and almost the Christianization, of India itself (and we if worthy of its work, should find something else to do besides are still some way off either) might be bought too dear at the