ABSTRACT
The League had hitherto been the preserver of the peace. While there was hope that its labours would be successful, the representations of evil-minded men that nothing could be obtained without violent measures, were listened to with mistrust; but when Parliament was about to be prorogued, after declaring that it would enter into no consideration of the means to relieve the acknowledged distress, that peace-preserving hope was destroyed; and, in their despair, people were willing to give attention to those who recommended violent proceedings, with the view of bringing matters to a crisis. It was represented that a great commercial convulsion, which should compel employers to join the ranks of the employed, would render the demand for the Charter irresistible; and that the means of obtaining that, through reform of the representative system, would also be the means of gaining a great advance of wages. The plan was, that every worker should cease to work; one absurd enough at any time, but especially absurd at a period when employers had so little work to give. It was not asked whence the advisers came, or by whom employed. In their wretchedness and hunger, men did not reason much. Besides, thousands being convinced that some violent proceeding was necessary, tens of thousands would be compelled to join them. Thus, the outbreak, the almost universal “turn-out,” came at once; came, however, in a manner, which proved that the schoolmaster had been abroad; came not, as in former days, with attacks upon millers and corn-holders, flour dealers, and bread bakers, but with some reverence for law and regard to the rights of property. The deep designing wickedness of some, acting upon the despair of the multitude, originated a folly; but the foolish would only go a certain length with the wicked, and there was reason to believe that the few instances of pillage that occurred was mainly the work of thieves and vagabonds, who had mingled with the crowd for that purpose. Another characteristic of the period was the patience and forbearance of those whose duty it was to preserve the public peace. Persuasion was preferred to the constable’s staff, and to the soldier’s musket or sabre. An emeute like that of August, 1842, over in a fortnight, occurring in 1819, would have occasioned a civil war.
