POLITICAL STATE OF ENGLAND.
Notwithstanding the humiliation of the Chartists in 1848, they still continued blatant. Some rioting occurred, and but for the conviction that the people at large would support the government in strong measures, the tendency to disturbance would have been still more decidedly manifested. The anti-freetraders were still a large and powerful party, and, led by Mr. Disraeli, formed an imposing array both in and out of parliament. The freetraders were also active and resolute, giving to the government a very general support. The agitations in the country assumed no new phases, and almost all political questions assumed a politico-economical aspect from the temper in which men discussed them, and the prevailing tone of the time. The alteration —virtually the repeal—of the navigation laws caused much excitement in the sea ports, as the agitation of the subject did the previous year; but the government and the freetrade party mustered all their strength, and succeeded with the measure. The government was not popular, but was accepted as a political necessity. Lord John Russell had great weight in parliament, “in the city,” and with the old whig party everywhere; but the more advanced liberals had lost confidence in him, and some of his colleagues were unpopular. Foreign politics engaged much of the attention of the nation, and the tide of reaction which began to roll back over the continent, sweeping away so many newly acquired liberties, was a cause of abundant regret, and even alarm to the English people.
COMMERCIAL AFFAIRS.
The year did not begin or end very prosperously in business and monetary matters. The successive blights of the potatoe crop, the advances to Ireland, the ruinous bankruptcies of 1848, the enormous railway calls, the many failures upon the continent of both banking-houses and commercial establishments, by which English firms sustained great losses, and the continued disturbance of commercial relations in consequence of the civil conflicts on the continent, were causes sufficiently numerous and potent to create and sustain apprehension, and embarrass the usual proceedings of trade. Still money flowed into England from continental Europe, as the place of security which, whatever might betide the world, was supposed to be beyond the range of political convulsion. Thus capital was plentiful, and money was easily obtained by all creditable establishments. The peace, good order, and constitutional liberty by which these blessings were established, afforded England a source of prosperity amidst so much that was calculated to impoverish. The wrecks of many nations floated around her shores, but within her borders all was safe; the shadow of the thunder-cloud passed over her, and she heard its peals, as it burst in lightning and torrent on less favoured lands.
THE CHOLERA.
There was one calamity, which befel so many nations, from which England was not spared. The mysterious cholera, which appeared in 1848 in some places, broke out in the autumn of this year with surprising fury. Its ravages were far more extensively fatal than in 1832. In 1832 the number attacked in London was 14,154, and the number of those who fell victims was 6729. In 1848-49, the number attacked exceeded 30,000, and nearly half the number perished. In 1832, one out of every 250 of the population died; in 1848-49, one out of every 150. More than 80,000 persons died of cholera and diarrhoea in Great Britain during the latter period. The disease spared neither sex nor age. It was found in London to prevail most near the banks of the Thames, and on the south side of the river, where the ground was lower and worse drained than on the north. In the higher grounds, north and south, the disease inflicted but little injury. Where the water supply was from the less pure portions of the Thames, the havoc was greater than where it was drawn from a portion of the river further up, or from other sources. The disease prevailed most during hot weather both in Great Britain and Ireland. The faculty was as little able to treat it as when it first appeared; and there was a disposition to rely too much on general sanitary measures, without regard to the specific virus of the disease.