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The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. / From the Accession of George III. to the Twenty-Third Year of the Reign of Queen Victoria cover

The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. / From the Accession of George III. to the Twenty-Third Year of the Reign of Queen Victoria

Chapter 1411: GENERAL STATE OF GREAT BRITAIN.
By Edward Farr
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About This Book

The volume traces British political, parliamentary, and military developments from the accession of George III through the early nineteenth century, chronicling changes of ministry and cabinet, debates over colonial taxation and the American conflict, parliamentary controversies involving figures such as Wilkes and Warren Hastings, questions of Catholic relief and slave-trade abolition, and responses to the French Revolution and Napoleonic wars, including major naval and continental campaigns, the union with Ireland, and domestic legislation on finance, civil liberties, and parliamentary reform.

GENERAL STATE OF GREAT BRITAIN.

A.D. 1853

Great Britain was peaceful and prosperous—no internal strife, no civil feud, no general discontent disturbed her fair aspect, or impeded her glorious progress. The working classes were better off than in previous years. Pauperism declined, crime was greatly lessened. In 1852, the commitments in England and Wales were 3899 fewer than the average. In 1853, the favourable difference was seen not so much in decreased numbers as in the lesser gravamen of the offences. Much sickness was caused by the excessive severity of the weather during the spring quarter. From the 20th of-April to the 15th of May, the temperature on one day fell to 14° below the average, on another to 13°, and on others to 10°, 9°, and 8°. There was a heavy fall of snow in April, and still more heavily during the first fortnight in May. The snow in the north was so accumulated upon the ground that the lines of railway were occasionally closed, and trains embedded in the snow. The effect of such severe weather late in the spring and in the opening of summer was disastrous upon the crops, and entailed upon the harvest consequences which formed a check to this otherwise prosperous year. With a deficient harvest came the certainty of a war with Russia, still further embarrassing a year which opened with so many felicitations. The appearance of Asiatic cholera in the autumn tended also to depress the close of the year. That fell disease burst out with extraordinary violence at Newcastle-upon-Tyne in the month of August, where more than 2000 lives were sacrificed to its fury. The disease reached London the same month, and there also effected serious ravages, both in 1853 and in 1854.

The revenue of the year 1853, up to the 8th of January, 1854, was—receipts, £69,410,976 15s.; disbursements, £55,769,252 4s. The surplus revenue, after adding balances to the actual income, exceeded three millions and a quarter sterling—a financial condition of the country proving great prosperity: and one for congratulation at a time when war so imminently impended.