Who cares to calculate it now? Then as now it must be paid; and no penny. wisdom will be an educational economy.

I do not enter here into any lesser questions of saving in this or the other branch of the public service. Doubtless many are to be effected, and the service be no worse. But it is not little economies which can help our need. A million or more is of little consequence. The public expenditure will have to be altogether reorganized in accordance with republican requirements. But even allowing that the Republic might be as costly as the Monarchy, I submit to our political economists these three broad propositions :

1-The settlement of the National Debt, by Terminable Annuities, to be paid out of the profits of Mines and Railways: similar compensation being given to the present 'proprietors; the present railway-fares being also considerably reduced.

2-The consolidation of all charges for the maintenance and education of the Youth of the Country in one national system: with a saving to the public of the difference between wholesale and retail management.

3-The reduction of our war-establishment to a cost of five millions; thereby enabling the public service (excepting education, but including a sufficiency for the infirm and aged) to be provided for at a maximum of FIFTEEN MILLIONS, to be raised by one direct and uniform tax or rent-charge of five shillings for every acre of cultivable land. ↳

I believe indeed that this sum of fifteen millions would be far more than sufficiet for all the ordinary service of the State. I set it down as the very highest figure. The one tax of five shillings an acre would be scarcely felt by men freed from all tithes, poor-rates, and exorbitant rents. There would, of course, also be local taxation for local purposes,-improvements, police, bye-roads, etc.,—to be determined by each locality. But this enters not into the general question. It seems to me that such a measure of financial reform would be immediately feasible in the Republic, under the direct sovereignty of the People.

:

I have put down the cost of collecting this one tax at the rate of collecting one tax now it might however be much less. Let the tax be made payable on certain given days, with a grace of so many days, at the District Banks. If not brought there within the time, by the Landlord, (the holder directly from the State), process would issue against the occupied. And one receipt for the tax being the only legal title to possession of the land, the landlord by omitting payment, would forfeit all hold upon his tenant. This in the case of subletting. There would be no difficulty with those holding directly from the State. With them the tax would be their rent.

See Organization of Labour, page 121, for the way in which rents might be kept down. Tithes would be abolished, the expences of the Organization of Religious Worship being paid for out of the revenues of the State. Of the poor-rates I have already spoken.

A CARLYLEISM.

'You do not sufficiently bethink you, my republican friend! Our ugliest anomalies are done by universal suffrage, not by patent.'

And if so, I will yet prefer my own ugliness to being ugly by attorney. I will even sin for myself: and so have at least a chance of repentance and attainment of health! But 'the ugliest of all anamolies !' Is it not that very attorneyship'which pretends to be handsome for others, your self-patented kingship or governorship, which thinks it has found out God's blunder,- -the blunder of giving souls to all men,-souls, capabilities of growth. There is no growth by power of attorney.

John 'Pigsouled,' be he never so piggish, cannot be saved by John Russell,-nay, nor by Thomas Carlyle. God's law is that he save himself, whatever the difficulty. A sad error of Providence, Mr. Carlyle! altogether ugly and anomalous perhaps; but—since it is so: What might your Reverence advise? A 'reformation of Downing Street,' some new patent King Compost from the old Cess-pool, the Right Honourable Carlyle-Charlemagne-Russell as Prime Minister, Beneficient Whips' in ordinary, and heroic arrangement of our troughs and order of grunting? An excellent unanomalous recipe of salvation, may it please the Pigs!

OUR MARTYRS.

4-ROBERT BLUM.

ROBERT BLUM was born at Cologne, on the Rhine. His father was a cooper. The family were so poor, that they had no means of educating the boy; enough if he could learn to work: at an early age therefore he was apprenticed to a tinker. This occupation was, however, so little to his taste, that he left it, to become errand-boy to one Mr. Ringelhardt, the manager of a theatre. Here he learned many things: reading, writing; something, it is likely, from witnessing the representations of the dramas of the German Poets. So that by and bye Ringelhardt employed him as a secretary, afterwards as money-taker. The boy was manifestly a scholar and to be depended on. With Ringelhardt and his Company he sojourned in several German towns, selling tickets at the theatredoor; and thus at last became an inhabitant of Leipsic: Ringelhardt being for many years a successful manager there.

Blum first made himself known as a good speaker at dinner parties and such liberal meetings as in those days were allowed in Germany. The Saxon liberals found him useful, and got for him a small property in the city, sufficient to enable him to become a citizen and eligible as a town-commissioner. He was elected; and soon rose to be the leader of the liberal party in that body.

But neither

this leadership, nor the influential position it gave him in Leipsie, took him from his business of selling tickets at the theatre. It was only after a change in the management of the theatre, that he found himself compelled to lock out for other means of subsistence; and a year before the Revolution, Lis political friends helped him to set up a bookselling, or rather a publishing, office in Leipsic. On the 12th of August, 1815, a Leipsic crowd on the public promenade dared to hoot Prince John of Saxony, who was unpopular on account of his well-known protection of the Jesuits. Whereupon the Saxon guard shot twelve of the promenaders. The whole population of Leipsic rushed out in direful indignation. The prince fled; and the few soldiers in the town had certainly fallen victims to the people's revenge, but that Robert Blum had influence enough to quell the tumult and to persuade the excited people to rely rather upon the justice of the Saxon Courts of Law. For one or two days he was the sole authority in Leipsic; and all partics, except the Court, felt indebted to him for his conduct in preserving peace. The Court of course hated him, and bore its spite in mind for a future opportunity. It is almost needless to say, no justice was got from the Royal Courts of Law.

When in 1848, the Revolution broke out, upon the proclamation of the French Republic, the Court was specially fearful of Leipsic and Robert Blum. But after the People's triumphs at Vienna and Berlin, the King of Saxony followed his masters' lead, and pretended to be submitted to the People. Blum might have become Prime Minister of Saxony had the liberal fit continued.

In the beginning of the Saxon revolutionary movement there was no question of Republicanism. The Republicau held back the avowal of his principles, for fear of bringing discord into the popular camp. It was on this account that Blum repeatedly protested against the name of Republican. His policy was rather to act through legal channels. This same policy he followed out at Frankfort, whither he was sent as Member for Leipsic to the German Parlia ment. Indeed here he withstood his republican friends, Ruge, Struve, and Hecker; and voted with the constitutional (royalist) majority, the Gagern party, which afterwards betrayed the People. He was even so far trusted by the majority as to be elected a member of the Committee of Fifty, to which was confided the execution of the decrees of the Parliament. But as the open Republican Party progressed in public opinion, Blum took his right position among them; and at Vienna, where on the breaking out of the insurrection of November, 1848, he was sent by the combined Opposition, he stood faithfully beside the decided Republicans, fought with them at the barricades,-died for

them also.

Taken prisoner by the Royalist Victors, he was sentenced to be hanged; but the sentence was commuted to shooting, for fear of his popularity. Having Leard the verdict, he merely said—'I erpooted it; it does not surprise me. He wrote to his wife- Support with resignation the moirs of my death; and bring up my children so that my some may never be tarnished by them? At seven in the morning of the 9th of November, he was brought in a carriage to the square called the Brigittenau. There he uncovered his breast and wished to book death in the face. The executioners refused this. He then tad his own eros, kneeled

down, and fell, struck with two shots in his breast and one in his forehead. His dying words were few and simple; 'I fall for the freedom of my country?

Active, honest, temperate, and brave, he was too deadly an enemy to Royalty to be allowed to live. The special hatred of the Saxon Court also had followed him to Vienna. The Saxon Ambassador made pot even a show of interference to save the life of a Saxon Subject, the representative of a Saxon city. Had he not offended against the common cause of Despotism? But the love and admiration of Saxony attended him to the Brigittenau, on which his blood was shed, -which shall be a sacred place for all posterity when Germany shall have won her freedom.

Nor sacred to Germany alone, but to all Humanity. The Tyrants were one in that day of blood. Let the Peoples be one in their labour for redress.

HISTORY OF THE MONTH.

(From August 22nd to September 22nd.)

CORNELIUS GEORGE HARDING.

It is of its

Many of our readers no doubt recollect a little unpretending, but earnest, monthly publication called the Republican, issued in 1847-8. Editor that I have some few sad words to say.

Cornelius George Harding was born at Manchester, on the 16th of November, 1824. His father dying when he was quite a boy, he was forced at an early age to seek his bread, and to nourish in the toil and confinement of the warehouse and the desk the seeds of inherited disease. Weakly and debarred from much opportunity of cultivation, he yet on all occasions manifested a natural love of fair play, a disposition to help the oppressed, an active mind and a courageous heart, the elements of an excellence whose development was only stayed by the illness which repeatedly prostrated him, and which terminated his brief career on the 22nd of August last.

Harding was employed successively by a solicitor, a chemist, a manufacturer, a draper, a gas company, and a mining company. Most of these situations he left in consequence of illness. In 1847 he was employed by a gas company as inspector. His duties were very heavy, entailing much application and labour; but in the midst of them, and despite his delicate health and limited resources, he projected the Republican Magazine, whose first number appeared in November, 1847. His exertions in this helped to lay him again on a sick bed. Medical advice and change of air could only partially restore him, and though he resumed work, (his last employ being in the engineering department of the Great Central Gas Company) the fatal mischief of consumption was but delayed. Early in the present year he suffered a relapse; and since then gradually wasted away, yet clinging feverishly to the hope that he might recover, his heart so set on the desire to serve the

cause of Humanity. Clinging feverishly, but with no coward fear: when at last he knew that his hour was at hand, he resigned himself to his sufferings, and his fate with a serene peace which a saint might envy.

I speak of one whom I loved; but I speak of him because his example should be a light to the young men of our party. Harding was the type of what our young Republicans should be. Gentle as a child, pure as a girl, irreproachable as a saint. So unobtrusive that none could be offended with him; zealous and yet never violent; outspeaking without extravagance; ever at his post for the public service, never thinking of himself; and devoted without neglecting his daily work. Hard working and studious, though too fragile for fatigue, he shirked no duties, either of self-cultivation, toward his employers (whose esteem he held), or toward society. Poor, still poorer through his long illnesses, he was the sole support of his widowed mother; and had yet some help for his comrades. From his scanty means, from his little strength, from his great, noble, generous heart, he drew aid for the battle of Freedom. The Republican, of which fourteen numbers were published, was maintained like all works of its kind, with little help and much loss. During 1848 Harding was also active among the few who were then endeavouring to infuse some reasonable spirit into Chartism. At the committees and at the meetings of the People's Charter Union he was of the most punctual. Since then he has not failed to do the little his health allowed; and his last letter to me was an expression of regret that he could do so little. But some day, when health should be regained▬▬▬▬▬▬ Alas! the work is left to us; the recollection of his aspiring worth, the promise to do his share, like him at least to do our utmost, is the only wreath that we can lay upon his untimely grave.

He was not a man of genius; he had neither 'birth,' nor wealth, nor advantages. He was a simple, true-souled, poor man, who lived not only blamelessly, but actively and devoutly, and who, dying in the very morning of life, however little he may have accomplished, may be laid in honour beside the heroes of all time: for he fought the good fight; he too has done his duty.

REPUBLICAN CHRONICLE.

W. J. L.

The Press has not altogether forgotten us. The Trinidadian (a West Indian French and English paper) reprints from our first number the Address of the European Committee. It is a good beginning for the Colonies. The Nation has a garbled 'reprint' of our article on Socialism and Communism: and is horrified at the hypocritical application of' two Scriptural texts.' The Sheffield Free-Press misrepresents our views on the Direct Sovereignty of the People, in accusing us of omitting the right of the popular initiative in legislation. We would tell the Press and any others who may mistake us, that, on the contrary, we insist upon the right, though we maintain that it need not be exercised upon every matter of governmental detail_nor always prevent the preparative work of a committee. It will be for the People regularly assembling in the exercise of their sovereignty, (uot for M. Rittinghausen or any other theorist) to determine upon what occasions they will exercise this initiative, upon what occasions they will prefer to consider projects of law drawn up by their ministers, and upon what occasions they can trust their ministers to act, not to legislate, for them.

Our friends will be rejoiced to read the following extract of a letter from Mazzini to Mr. Charles Clarke of Glasgow, published in the North British Daily Mail of September 10.

'I shall most undoubtedly avail myself of the first opportunity to visit Glasgow. . I hope to see before this month is over my friend Kossuth here and it may be that I come