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    November 19, 1853.] THE LEADE1 1115

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    CONCERT IN TEE COAL CELLAR. " Patee-fami...

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    THE TRUTH ABOUT CUBA. Tjie Government of...

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    Diplomatic Bungling Of The Easteen" War....

    is at wort , and a systematic process on foot fox rooting out the Mazzinian leaders , and them only , over the entire Peninsula . Some curious information on this head is contained in the 'November ' number of the Monthly . JJecOrd of the Society of fhe Friends of Italy , just published . Facts tending in the same direction are—the proposals of the French Government to strengthen their hold in the JRoman States by increasing their army there ; and the recent attempts of the French in Rome to gain popularity among the

    citizens . Clearly the meaning of it all is , that if the war extends to Italy the conduct of the war in that peninsula shall be left to the Piedmontese and French Governments , acting in concert , and unembarrassed by Mazzini and the real national patriotism . Nor is there wanting reason to believe that Downmg-street knows all about this , and is quite on an understanding in the matter with Piedmont and France . It is said that among the most active of those who are secretly disseminating in the Papal States the notion of trusting the conduct of the future Italian war to the

    monarchy of Piedmont , and not to the native democracy , is one of our own British consular agents . When we consider what is the real motive of all this , so far as our own Government is concerned , we find that , underlying the general and rague horror of democracy which afflicts our own and every other government , there is a more specific and palpable political reason . Examine all the speeches and all the antecedents of all our Ministers , and you will find that they are all infected to the very core with what we consider the most wretched political fallacy of our time—the notion

    that the conservation of Austria as a European power is necessary and desirable . The ruinous ingredient in the foreign policy of Great Britain is this paltry notion of the necessity of conserving Austria .. Give us a statesman who places the p hrase , Delenda est Austria , in the foreground of his policy , and we will pardon that statesman almost any crime , and pronounce him to be the man fittest ; for the Foreign Office . But no such man is forthcoming . On the contrary , there is no man among our present Ministers who will not

    get up and talk , to-morrow , the old everlasting rubbish , about the necessity of having Austria as a preponderant power in the map to balance against liussia . Are men blind ? Austria to balance against Russia ! Why , what is Austria ? Austria is nothing in herself ; she is no country , no nation . There is no mountainrange , no tract of wheat-plain or desert , no distinct fragment of humanity , Avhich the God of the world has christened by the name of Austria . Itussia is a country , France is a country , Spain is a country ; but thero is not such a thing , geographically or ethnographically , as Austria . What we call Austria is a factitious

    bureaucratic union of four or five nationalities , or fragments of nationalities , struggling to be asunder . Snnp the bureaucratic strings , and the fragments will fly apart—what of Gorman blood there is attaching itself to Germany , Lombardy rushing towards Italy , Hungary forming a power by itaolf , the Slavonian populations grouping themselves round their Polish , tjioir Bohemian , and their Illyrian centres . And this is the power to balance against Itussia ! You have four or flvo dogsstrong mastiffs allto keep

    , , oit a robber from , your house ; and what you do is to Hpiggot thorn together , tie their legs with Rfcrings of red tape , and place the ends ' of the strings in fclio hands of the robber himself . Oh ! thai ; we had Borne political' invention among us . ' 'Ji . that wo had some man to see what is as plain an maps can mako it , that what is necessary for that "balance of jxwor , " about which diplomatists talks ho iriuoh , in nothing else- than a rearrangement of tho Eastern nations according •< o their natural tendencies—not an Austria

    roquinng perpetual bolstering up and perpetual pa . k-. ljea of sticking-plaster / but a self-Rullicient ' ¦ "land , a solf-Huiliciont Hungary , and a Ctfocki . sh oivlJohemian confederacy . I ho desire to conserve Aimf / ria . we Hay , explains our own diplomatic bungling and secret conduct With a view to the war . It is desirable to pre-? orvr < s Austria ; therefore wo do not call Hungary . ' " to "y lion . fit in desirable to preserve Austria ; 'jHii-elbi-o ftro coivi , ivi ,, ^ wiUi Piedmont sin d -I ' lviyce to I land over tho impending Italian war «> Ihcur guidance . While Franco pours now wroos mto the Papal States and Naples , ho as to ° « uo n French conquest of the south of Italy ,

    Piedmont , renewing the Carlo-Alberto game , will do the fighting against Austria in Lombardy and Tuscany , to prevent others from doing it , who might do it more dangerously for existing monarchical and bureaucratic interests . Then , at the end of the chapter , when the diplomatists make up their books , France will be allowed to keep her conquest of the South , and Piedmont will be obliged to disgorge the main part of her Lombard conquest , if she has made any , back to Austria , getting as her reward an Italian Duchy or some such extension of her territories . And so , if Diplomacy succeeds , the eternal vicious circle will move on repeating itself , and wars will never cease . .

    November 19, 1853.] The Leade1 1115

    November 19 , 1853 . ] THE LEADE 1 1115

    Concert In Tee Coal Cellar. " Patee-Fami...

    CONCERT IN TEE COAL CELLAR . " Patee-familias" writes angry letters to the Times , . demanding why the price of coals has advanced . Last year he was paying twenty-two shillings a ton , and now he cannot warm his fingers at less than thirty-two shillings for the same quantity . It is evident that " Pater-familias" has Lever been in the north of England , or that if he has he has come away and seen nothing . Tlie position occupied by coalowners , the condition of the pitmen , the causes which regulate the price of coal , are a riddle to the unhappy Londoner , who can understand a rise in the price of bread , but is fairly baffled by an advance in the price of coal .

    To the monks who were searching for a place in which they might deposit the body of St . Cuthbert , the neighbourhood of Durham offered irresistible attractions , and no one can quarrel with their choice . JSTow , as then , tlie City of Durham possesses remarkable advantages of position-and scenery . But a strange contrast is presented by tlie surrounding country . Its beauties are confined to a few favoured spots , while the remaining portions have been freely

    sacrificed to coal . Coal is the great idol of the north . Its presence is felt everywhere . Travel where ~ you will you cannot escape from it . The trains which intersect the northern district flash rapidly through a country black , hideous , and desolate by day , but which night converts into a range of fire-heaps . The houses are built from coal ; the ships are laden with it ; it forms the universal subject of conversation ; it has changed Newcastle into the metropolis of the north , and is one great secret of the prosperity of the

    empire . Btit it would be foolish to imagine that coalowners are always successful , and nover fail to accumulate large fortunes . Tho history of coalowning in the North of England is as full of tales of ruin and distress as tho history of any other trade or speculation . At this moment , there arc pits which cannot be worked , and pits which would be worked if capital were forthcoming . A few years ago , speculation in coal was synonymous with bankruptcy . J ^ Tono but thoso who had a supply of accumulated capital could survive a crisis which ruined thousands .

    The effects of that over-speculation still press heavily upon the coalowners . Time has not yet been allowed for recovery , and , in spite of the more favourable turn which affairs have taken , many years must elapse before the injury then inflicted , can be repaired . Besides , tho recent impulse which has been given to the eoal trade lias brought with it fresh demands from the pitmen , who seek to share in . the prosperity of their masters . And never was thero a race of men more difficult to deal with than tho miners of the north . It is in their power to make

    enormous wages ; but they prefer indolence to work when a less amount of labour will satisfy their demands . Five days in a fortnight in sometimes tlunvhole extentof labour which tho pitman will , persuade himself to undergo . Hois exposed to risks above those of men engaged in other occupations . Ho Jives , during his hours of work , almost in the fare of death , for a breath of wind may spread destruction in m \ iuBtant over many miles of ground . The children aro sent so early into fclio it that the

    p men grow up in greater barbarismthan any other class of persons in the country . Nothing will persuade a pitman to work an hotu- longer than lie chooses , in times when tho value of . labour to the master jh . incalculable . At this thm . ywhon " Pater-familias" in complaining of the pricoof coals , the owners aro paying- wages up to the advanced standard , and aro unable to transport their coals for want of triiipH , ami to produce them for want of labour . This iu the

    from an original want of concert between the coalowners and the Londoners . There'is" a huge bed of coal in the north of England , and some thousands of coal-cellars in the metropolis . Two processes are requisite : to bring the coal to tire mouth of the pit , and convey it to the coal-cellars . In the performance of this second process there has been the greatest bungling conceivable , and hence the numerous complaints about the price . of coal . First of ' all , there are no ships ; gold has beaten coal out of the market , and our Australian

    simple state of the case , and if " Pater-familias " would take a journey to the north , and see tho actual condition of the coalowner , and the number of coUiciies which he might buy up , if ho wished , he would probably cease to complain . JNo doubt it is a very hard thing to Day thirty- ' . two . shillings a ton for coal ; but who is to blame for it ? It is quite as much a subject for discontent that coal should have cost twenty-two shillings a ton last year , as that it should now cost thirty-two shillings . The whole difficulty arises

    emigrants have monopolized the merchant fleets of England . Railways are utterly : useless ,- so much money has been spent on their construction , that directors are positively unable to make arrangements for the conveyance of goods , which ,., under other circumstances , would have paid shareholders , and conferred a benefit on the public . Again , fancy more than the necessity of trade has had the principal share in the selection of

    lmes of country . We wanted a railway from Newcastle to . London , and we liavc lines from Harrogate to Kipon , and ail infinity of others of a similar description , which serve only to perpetuate the short-sighted folly of directors . When , therefore , we complain about tlie ' price of oxxr coals , it is only fair to remember that we are paying the penalty of previous improvidence , and an obstinate refusal "to make both ends meet . "

    The Truth About Cuba. Tjie Government Of...

    THE TRUTH ABOUT CUBA . Tjie Government of Cuba is one of . thoso that can't bear discussion , and- accordingly , as the Daily News discusses Cuba , that journal is hateful to the local Government ; which prohibits ifs admission to the island . With our contemporary we have differed strongly on tlie subjects that come uppermost in Cuba ; but we cannot fail to

    recognise the great ability with which his journal is conducted , nor to express our sense that his exclusion from Cuba is a proof of tho service which lie has done in throwing light on the iniquitous government of that colony . When so many interests , great and small , are engaged in promoting a bad intelligence between . England and America , it is not opinion that we want , but facts ; and happily we have facts .

    The Daily News supplies an important share of thoso facts . Our readers will remember the cock-and-bull story of English designs on Cubaa , project to Africaniso the island , and then emancipate it , in order to render it a nuisance to the United States . Our own opinion on that story has already been expressed : it is a newspaper " canard , " got up for elFect at the moment ; but mischievous men , who would like to embarrass General Pierco ' Government , or to sow

    dissent-ion between England and America , improve tho opportunity . The first explanation . ^ sup plied from C uba itself , i n tl ic co rrcspon den ce of the Da i / yJVews , which states that the plan of freeing the Blacks by a form of apprenticeship is nothing bettor than ono to continue slavery in a form as effective for tho owner , while it may escape some of the attack which slavery undergoes when it is called b ; y that name .

    This is clear enough ; but thero is yet further explanation . Ono -part of the story wan , that the British Ambassador at Madrid was negotiating n conspiracy between . Franco , England , and Spain , for the pin-pose mentioned above . A Virginian gentleman— Mr . ( ' ( "'I '' — - '' . -is taken a straight road to a knowledge of tho ( . ruth , and asked Lord Il . Owdon himself how it stands . Lord llowdeu replies by a . categorical explanation , of what ho has been , ' doing—endeavouring to obtain

    performance of ( Spanish promises in declaring slave-trade p iracy , in Hotting free those JNogrow who havo ludicrously been called Einaucipadas , and' in . otherwise ' honestly doing tho exact reverse , of what Himiii has been uoing . Lord Jlowdon'sr letter will Hoareely bo needed by our own readers for their enlightenment , but it in fla ( isfactory as n , direct and authenticated contradiction of tlio idlo tales ho industriously circulated at Washington , Men may dillar an to tho expediency of

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), Nov. 19, 1853, page 11, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_19111853/page/11/