Earl of Harcwood Forbidding the Banns.

New Zealander, Volume 7, Issue 564, 10 September 1851, Page 4

Earl of Harewood Forbidding the Banns.

Notice. — Inconsequence of the continued Practice of oveicrowding and tailing Lodgers into the cottages of Harewood Estate (more especially within the village of Harewood), contrary to the express agreement and regulations: Notice is hereby given that any Cottager being a Tenant of Earl Harewood, and who shall from the date hereof take in any Lodger, or whose Son or Daughter shall marry or biing home to the cottuge, Wife or Husband, without having previously obtained permission fiom the E. of 11., shall receive notice to quit, which notice shall be strictly enforced, and if in employment of the said E. H., shall be discharged. W. Maughan, Agent. A nobleman in the north of England, has issued the above notice to Ins tenantry, prohibiting them from taking- lodgers into tlievr cottages, or allowing a son or daughter to many or bring home a wife or a husband, u without having previously obtained permission" from the peer alluded to. 'I his mea -ure is adopted, on the plea — which is not a bad one— of preventing tbe overcrowding of cottages ; but we think we could suggest something better than a prohibition of those tii'S which Providence designed should be formed upon certain estates, without the sanction of the landlord, on pain of ejection from home, and dismissal from employment. If instead of pulling down cottages on their estates, landlords would build more, so that it would bo unnecessary to crowd those that exist, with lodgers ; and a son or daughter upon marriage, could find another loof beside that of the parent, the prohibition referred to in this case, would not be required. Perhaps, too, if wages were rather better, there would be no necessity for a landlord to forbid the banns, with a view to the prevention of what, instead of being as they ought to be and might be, happy and prudent unions, are in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, '* Improvident Marriages."

Town and Country People. — Every traveller on the continent must have observed that the town and city populations live much more apart and separate from the country population than with us ; each city or town is like a distinct island, or small nation, with its own way of living, ideas, laws, and inteiests, and having- little or nothing in common with the country population around it. The ancient municipal governments of the towns, with their exclusive privileges, their incorporations and town taxes on all ai tides brought to market, and levied at the town-gates in a rough vexatious way, keep alive a spirit of hostility rather than of friendly intercourse between town and country. Some of these grievances exist where the traveller least expecta to find them. In constitutional France, in constitutional Belgium, and even in the city of Frankfort, where a model constitution of civil and political liberty was being manufactured by all the philosophy of Germany in a constituent assembly, the country-gill's basket is opened at the town-gate to see if it contain any bread, cheese, beer, or other articles subject to town dues. The peasant's cart, loaded with hay or straw, is half unloaded, or is probed with a long rod of iron by the city official, to discover goods which ought to have paid town dues. The kind of domestic smuggling into and out of the continental cities which this system gives rise to, is of a very demoiahzing influence. These restrictions and town dues raise a spirit of antagonism, not of union, between the two populations. The towns and cities, in consequence of tliis estrangement, have less influence on the civilization of the country, on the manners, idetis, and condition of the mass of the population, than with us. Our town or city population form no mass so distinct in privileges, intelligence, and interests, from the rest of the community, as the town populations aie abioud.

The city on the continent sits like a guard-ship riding at anchor on the plum, keeping up a kind of social existence of her own, shutting her gates at sun-set, and having piivileges and exactions which separate her ftom thp main body of the population. In Germany and Fiance, the movements and agitations of 1848 were entirely among the town populations. The country population has not advanced either towards good or evil with the progress of the cities. In Hamburg;, Berlin, Munich, Dresden, Frankfort, nnd other great cities, taste, literature, refinement, wealth, or the pleasures and enjoyments proper to wealth, abound j but in the country, outside of these oases of civilizition, the people are in the same condition in which they have been for ages. The town civilization has not act< ! d upon them, as it has on the general population of England. The people of the continent have more coffee, sugar, tobacco, and music, and more school and drill, than their forefathers; but not more civil liberty or freedom of action, not more independence of mind, nor a higher moral, religious, and intellectual character. This isolation of the towns has a very prejudicial effect both on the town and country populations. It has kept the latter almost stationary, while the former has bi'en advancing out of all proportion. — Laings Notes of a Traveller.