as

honest pride and shame has pre- abstraction from the population of vented many of those, in the ex

the mother country. tremest distress, from applying for Under these impressions, your parish relief, while others, being committee, while they profess themfrom their remote situation less selves not yet prepared to lay beimmediately under the eyes of the fore the House the details of a perregular authorities, have lingered manent and continuous system of on, till found accidentally, as has emigration (which, nevertheless, been proved in evidence, in the they are persuaded may be so orlast stages of misery and disease. ganized as to produce very beneYour committee cannot butobserve, ficial results), confidently appeal to that while the greater destitution the House, under the present urof this latter class points them out gent circumstances, and strongly

requiring more immediate atten- recommend the grant of 50,0001. tion, their partly agricultural ha- from the national funds, in furtherbits render them more eligible for ance of an immediate emigration the particular kind of relief con- from the manufacturing districts, templated by your committee: and at once as a relief from present your committee cannot but express distress, and as an important naa hope that the hand-loom weavers tional experiment for the future. in general, and this class in parti- In applying for this grant of cular, will receive from parliament public money, your committee that attention and favour to which would have it distinctly understood, their sufferings and their patience that they place the grounds of amply entitle them.

their recommendation upon

the Your committee are strongly urgency and peculiarity of their impressed with the conviction, that case, which appears to them to rethe removal to the colonies of quire prompt and immediate actwelve hundred families, small as tion, even although the means of the number may appear when the carrying it into execution may not extent of the district is considered be so maturely or perfectly conover which it is proposed to spread certed, as they might have been, the relief, will tend in a far greater under circumstances of less immedegree than is commonly supposed diate and alarming pressure. to the diminution of general dis- Your committee have therefore tress ; and while those removed not paused to consider what porwill be placed in a situation of tion of the expenditure may ulticomfort and of ultimate independ- mately be repaid by the industry ence, those who remain will be and improvements of the settlers materially benefitted by the ab- in their new situations; although straction of their redundant la- they have little doubt but that the bour. And it is an object not to improvement of the lands will be be lost sight of, that these settlers a sufficient guarantee for a certain may by their success excite a strong proportion even of pecuniary refeeling in favour of emigration as turn, especially if allowed to be a general measure, should it ulti- paid in the colony, and in promately be carried into effect; and duce for the benefit of future may mainly contribute hereafter emigrants. to people our colonies by a volun- But your committee are yet furtary, unexpensive, and beneficial ther induced to solicit the immedi

VOL. LXIX.

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ate attention of the House to the In conclusion, while your comsubject of their present report, be- mittee recommend the present cause they cannot but be aware, grant wholly in consideration of the that the very circumstance of their present urgency, and peculiarity, of appointment has excited great and the distress which demand that reearnest expectation ; that exagge- lief, to be effectual, should be also rated and erroneous accounts of immediate, they cannot but express their proceedings are daily circu- their hope that an experiment now, lated, and that hundreds of fami- of the success of which they enterlies, prepared to emigrate, are look- tain no doubt, may lead to a more ing with anxiety to their report, extended, more organized, and more and the decision of parliament. effective, system for the future;

Your committee by no means and in such a system your commitexpress their opinion that upon fu- tee confidently anticipate not only ture occasions, and when the sub- a material and perpetual relief to ject shall be better understood, the British islands, but an augfunds may not be raised from parish mentation to the resourees of the rates, for the purpose of relieving colonies, and an additional link to themselves from the burthen of those connexions of blood and intertheir redundant populations : on est which now unite them to the the contrary, they have had free mother country. quent applications to this specific Your committee cannot, howeffect. But they deem it neces- ever, conclude this report, without sary in candour to state, that so expressing their deep conviction, far as their inquiries have gone, that whatever may be the imme the funds of the districts to which diate and urgent demands from their present report alludes are other quarters, it is vain to hope. so far exhausted that no such for any permanent and extensive assistance upon their part can advantage from any system of emifairly be calculated upon. It is gration which does not primarily hardly necessary to state, that in apply to Ireland ; whose popula. this, as in every other scheme for tion, unless some other outlet be emigration which has ever engaged opened to them, must shortly all the attention of your committee, up every vacuum created in Engit never has been for a moment land or in Scotland, and reduce the imagined that it should be other labouring classes to a uniform state than wholly voluntary; and your of degradation and misery. And committee are satisfied, that in the your committee therefore pledge execution of their projects, the themselves to devote their most main difficulty would be to select anxious attention to the state of the objects most eligible among the that country, and the practicability candidates who would offer them- of applying emigration as a means selves for the liberality of parlia- of relieving it from its present ment and the country.

overwhelming population.

EXTRACTS from the THIRD REPORT of the COMMITTEE ON EMIGRA

TEON, containing the Prospectus of the Viers which they entertain, and the result of their Examination of Evidence with regard to Ireland.

was

The Select Committee appointed of able-bodied and active labourers

to consider the subject of Emi- with their families, for whose gration from the United King- labour there

no effective dom, and to whom the Report demand. It maintained, that the of the last Session, and the several effect of this redundancy was to petitions which have been pre- reduce the wages of labour below sented to the House, in the pre- their proper level, by which much sent Session of Parliament, on destitution and misery were prothe same subject, were referred, duced in particular places, deteriand who were empowered to re- orating the general condition of the port their observations and opi- labouring classes: and that the nion thereupon, together with labourer, for whose services no real the Minutes of Evidence taken demand exists, consumes more than before them from time to time, he produces, and consequently adds to the House, have further con- nothing to the general annual prosidered the matters to them re- duction, but so far tends to diminish ferred, and have agreed upon the national wealth. It contrasted the following Report :

the general effects of a redundant Your committee having brought population in England, where it their inquiry into the general sub- is supported by a parochial rate, ject of Emigration to a close, have with the result in Ireland, where the satisfaction to present to the it is dependent for support on the House a general and final report. precarious funds of charity, or at There have been already laid be- times on the more dangerous refore the House three successive sources of plunder and spoliation. reports on this subject : the first at It recorded, that this redundancy the close of the session of 1826, by was found practically to repress the the former committee; the two industry, and even sometimes to others by your committee, in the end.nger the peace of the country, course of the present session. These creating mendicancy, outrage, and two last have been special reports, dim nution of occupation, with and relate to incidental points. every attribute of excessive pau

The first being of a more general peri sın. It adverted to the immenature, was limited to the record diate effect of a practice, now in of certain facts and principles, active operation, of clearing estates which, upon a careful re-examina- by the removal of a redundant

a tion, your committee are prepared pau er population, for the purpose conclusively to confirm and support. of placing such estates under imIt recorded the existence of a re- proved management in the hands dundancy of population in exten- of a few substantial tenants, and sive districts of Ireland, and in to the probable consequences of certain districts of Scotland and such clearing, in all cases, where England. It limited the meaning no measures were taken to provide of the term redundancy to a supply for the ejected parties; and it

a

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pointed out the manner in which adverted to the benefits which à judicious system of emigration would specially accrue to was calculated to effect such pro- colonies by the accession of such vision,

population; to the expense at It laid down theprinciple, that nei- which emigration, on an extended ther parishes in England nor Scot- scale, might be carried into effect; land, nor districts, nor proprietors of and to the probability of the repaylands in Ireland, could be expected ment of any capital advanced, by to contribute for purposes of emi- the subsequent contribution of the gration, unless it could be demon- emigrant. It adverted to the strably shown that their interests, market for the increased production both general and pecuniary, would of the colonies, which would arise

, be benefitted ; and the report anti- from the cultivation of the land by cipated the certainty of such de- each successive series of emigrants; monstration. It considered the and the demand for the manufacevidence on the state of Ireland to tures of the mother country, which have established the important fact, would accrue at a comparatively that although no direct levy for later period. the support of the poor takes place Another most important subject in that country, a burthen is yet of consideration in that report was, imposed upon it for their relief, the degree of probability of any which, though not legally assessed, temporary vacuum being

filled up is not the less a practical grievance, which might be produced by emiand a subtraction from national and gration. Such collateral measures, individual resources.

both of a legislative and practical It objected in the strongest nature, as might be calculated to manner to any system of emigra- repress, if not to prevent, the retion supported by public assistance, plenishment of such vacuum, were which was not essentially volun- also considered, and to some of tary on the part of the emigrants, these measures the report specifior which did not propose to remove cally referred. An object also of that part of the community, who, primary importance in the consibeing in the possession of health deration of emigration as a national and strength, were notwithstand- measure, was referred to in that ing in a state of permanent pau- report_namely, the effect of the perism.

removal of a comparatively small It recorded generally, that in excess of population, in benefiting the British colonies in North and improving the condition of the America, at the Cape of Good remainder; and the report finally Hope, and in New South Wales, concluded by expressing the deand Van Diemen's Land, there cided conviction of the committee, were tracts of unappropriated land, that its circulation, and that of the of the most fertile quality, capable minutes of evidence, throughout of receiving and subsisting any the united Kingdom and the coloproportion of the redundant popu- nies, would enable any future comlation in this country (of the nature mittee to resume the subject with and character to which that redun the means of proposing measures dancy had been limited), for whose sufficiently definite to justify their conveyance to those colonies means recommendation of them to the could be at any time found, It House for its adoption.

.

Your committee propose to class of parliament, who were also memthe results of their inquiry under bers of your committee ; eleven separate heads :

residents in Ireland, including the 1. The state of the population bishop of Limerick, three landin Ireland.

agents, whom the committee had 2. The state of the population an opportunity of examining, from in England ; including the subject their being accidentally present at of the poor-rates, and the distinc- election committees ; and Mr. tion between an agricultural and a Nimmo, a civil engineer; Mr. manufacturing population in refer- Blake, one of the members of the ence to the subject of emigration. late committee of Inquiry into the

8. The state of the population state of Education in Ireland ; and in Scotland.

the rev. T. R. Malthus. 4. Remarks on the application Your committee deem it unneof a system of emigration to the cessary to expatiate upon the excircumstances of the three coun- treme wretchedness of a great portries.

tion of the peasantry in many parts 5. The expediency of a pecuniary of Ireland." The evidence which advance, in the nature of a loan, has been produced before successive for the purpose of facilitating committees of the House cannot emigration : the probability of re- fail to have made a strong imprespayment of such a loan, and the sion on this subject, upon

the meminducements which the colonies bers who have not themselves been would have to facilitate such repay- eye-witnesses of the circumstances; ment. The success of former emi- and whatever complicated causes grations, as bearing upon the pro- may have led to this state of things, bability of repayment.

the fact is undeniable, that, gene6. Board of Emigration. rally speaking, there is that excess

7. The distinction between emin of labour, as compared with any gration and colonization and, a permanent demand for it, which regulated and an

an unregulated has reduced, and must keep down, emigration.

the labourer at the lowest possible 8. Concluding observations upon amount of subsistence.

It even the advantages of a regulated appears in evidence, that private emigration, both to the colonies individuals have frequently emand to the mother country. ployed labourers at this low rate,

rather from motives of charity than 1.-IRELAND.

from any beneficial interest acThe committee of 1826, and cruing to the party employing your present committee, have ex- them. amined twenty-five witnesses upon the subject of the state of the

2.-ENGLAND. labouring population in Ireland. Four witnesses were examined by Eight of those witnesses were the committee of 1826, respecting examined before the committee of the state of the pauper population 1826, and seventeen before the in parts of England. Your compresent committee; and two of mittee have examined on this subthose witnesses were examined ject, during the present session, before both committees. Those twenty-two witnesses, including witnesses consisted of five members the Bishop of Chester and Mr.