or private charity, provision should be made for assisting those to emigrate, with their families, who cannot be supported in this country by the exercise of independent labour.” (!) This is no slip of the pen.  Almost every word of every resolution, the noble chairman said, was carefully discussed.  The suggestion, then, is, that those who are unable to work, from age, weak health, or, who, having got chronic coughs, asthma, or rheumatism, by working for 6d. or 8d. a day, “wet and dry,” on the land that gave them birth, and are now unfit to work any longer; or, in rosewater phrase, “who cannot be supported in this country by the exercise of independent labour,” are to be “shot,” like so much rubbish, upon the shores of the western hemisphere—­provided the crazy barques into which they are to be huddled do not go down with them bodily, in the middle of the Atlantic.  Surely, of all other people, such were unfit for emigration, being unfit to earn their bread; but they were a burthen, a real burthen on the soil here, and so that the clearance took place, the manner of it and its results to the exiled were held to be of small account indeed.

Parliament was opened by the Queen in person, on Tuesday, the 19th of January.  She read the speech from the throne, about two-thirds of which related to Ireland exclusively.  No wonder.  The state of that country had become the theme of public writers, politicians and philanthropists in both hemispheres.  England was on her trial before the civilized world.  Could not she, the richest nation of the earth, whose capitalists searched the globe for undertakings in which to invest their vast and ever accumulating wealth—­could not she—­or would not she—­save the lives of those starving Irish, who were her subjects, and who, if not loved by her like others of her subjects, were at least useful in giving size and importance to the empire, and in fighting those battles which helped her to keep her place among first-class nations; useful in opening up, with the bayonet’s point, those foreign markets so essential to her iron and cotton lords—­nay, to all her lords?  England was on her trial; England’s Government was on its trial; and the Queen’s speech was to shadow forth their line of defence for past legislation, and to indicate those future measures which were to stay the famine, and prevent its recurrence.  Here is the portion of the speech relating to Ireland: 

“My LORDS AND GENTLEMEN,—­

“It is with the deepest concern that, upon your again assembling, I have to call your attention to the dearth of provisions which prevails in Ireland, and in parts of Scotland.

“In Ireland, especially, the loss of the usual food of the people has been the cause of severe sufferings, of disease, and of greatly increased mortality among the poorer classes.  Outrages have become more frequent, chiefly directed against property, and the transit of provisions has been rendered unsafe in some parts of the country.