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MR. COBDEN ON THE TURN OCT.
honest man, of ordinary capacity, believes that either directly or indirectly, individually or collectively, have any connected with it, been, in the slightest degree, instrumental in inciting this 'insurrection,' unless it be by the incitement which must follow every forcible representation of a great and intolerable grievance. Does toryism stand as clear from the charge of instigating the people to violence?"
On Thursday, August 25th, an extremely crowded meeting of the Manchester Anti-Corn-Law Association was held, Mr. George Wilson in the chair. It was addressed at great length by Mr. Cobden, who congratulated the members that the question of the Corn Laws was settled in the House of Commons, so far as discussion was concerned. The deplorable proceedings around them were a natural corollary on the proceedings of that house, which had made the people despair of obtaining justice. He described the various efforts made during the session to procure a repeal of the laws which had occasioned so much misery, and, referring to the lamentable circumstances of the period, said:—
"What do we hear from the guilty authors and abettors of this confusion? Why that the Anti-Corn-Law League has produced it; yes, that we, who have been incessantly advocating the repeal of the Corn Laws, in order to give the people bread and employment, are the guilty cause of the people rising in insurrection for want of food and wages. This is the charge that is Brought against us. Now, gentlemen, so gratuitous a display of profligacy as has been manifested by the London press, and a portion of our press in this town, on this subject,—such a specimen of profligacy I believe never was equalled in the annals of the press. (Applause, and ' It never was.') Why, I should not, for the sake of meeting our opponents condescend to allude to it at all; but when you do see charges like this made against a body like the Anti-Corn-Law League, reiterated day after day simultaneously by a dozen newspapers; why our friends, even our dearest friends, might naturally say—'Surely after so many reiterated accusations there must be something in it.' And it is because I believe that some of our friends elsewhere, in spite of their experience of our conduct here, may by these reiterated accusations be led to doubt whether we are not to blame in
