Daily National Intelligencer

STATE OF SCOTLAND.

FROM THE BALTIMORE MORNING CHRONICLE,

It may serve to reconcile our countrymen to bear, with christian dignity, their own sorrows and embarrassments, when they learn the great and pervading distresses of other nations. The situation of Scotland is at this season peculiarly awful. We are informed by a gentleman direct from that country, and whose character stands high and unquestionable, that, dreadful as he presumed the state of the country to be, from the letters of his correspondents, the actual sufferings of the people by far transcended all his expectations. He states that this distress is so general and pervading that it has afflicted the higher classes—the yeomanry of the land. The poor and industrious mechanic, who is compelled to labor 16 hours in a day, does not make more than five shillings in a week for his wages—some are only able to procure, by the most rigid economy, potatoes and salt for their wives, children, and families, and some are destitute even of that sorry meal. The same gentleman informs us, that in those abodes where formerly resided health, and comfort, and abundance, naked children are found crying for bread, while the lean, haggard, and ghastly countenances of the parents betray symptoms of starvation. Many of these families are in a state of almost absolute nakedness. Friends and neighbors are now converted into sharp-shooters; they meet and exercise daily for the purpose of putting down the Radicals. Glasgow, in the midst of all this general distress, appears like a garrisoned town. The government, not daring to embody Scotchmen, have quartered Irish soldiers upon the inhabitants. They made a call upon the yeomanry indeed, but not a man was found to answer the call of the government. Strong and urgent representations of the distresses had been made to the ministry, all of which had been systematically neglected. The attention of the cabinet seemed entirely engrossed with the trial of the Queen, and the approaching coronation of the King. Every other object is made to give way to this idle pageantry and ostentatious ceremony. In Manchester little fortifications are built up in the streets, and loopholes are made through the bricks for the military to fire upon the citizens, in case of any sudden popular insurrection. Large capitalists in Scotland, who formerly employed five or six hundred manufacturers, now employ but fifty. Other large capitalists, who behold the approaching storm, are disposing of their property at almost any sacrifice, for the purpose of providing a safe and timely retreat to foreign countries. So pervading is the alarm of riot and rebellion, that when our informant called at the house of his partner, on the night of his arrival, he immediately appeared with an instrument of offence in his hand, apprehending him to be a Radical.

He further states, that the best informed people look with horror and dismay at the approaching winter; when, in addition to hunger and wretchedness, this poor starving population will be compelled to endure the cold of that inhospitable climate. What is to be done? he declares is the general cry. The advice of our correspondent to the young and robust of his acquaintance was, to abandon the country, and to seek a residence elsewhere We have given this hasty and imperfect outline nor for the diabolical object of insulting the distresses of other nations, but to make our fellow-citizens patient and resigned under their own privations and embarrassments.

We have abundant cause of adoring gratitude to God, for his manifold mercies. To repine and to murmur is but to provoke divine judgment. What will be the issue of this disastrous state of things, unless some salutary change takes place, requires no spirit of prophecy to tell. Men cannot batten upon loyalty, or be bayonetted out of hunger; the cries of starving families cannot be silenced by the roar of the cannon. Nakedness will feel the severity of the howling storm, and desperation will act. Our informant adds, that the paper distinguished for its severity upon the American character, is worked by a Columbian printing press: an American invention is employed to disseminate slander and reproaches upon the American name. This information is derived from no bigotted American. The gentleman who communicates the intelligence is himself a son of Caledonia, partaking, and partaking largely, in all the sympathies of his native land.

Shall we then, in the midst of an harvest so abundant, insult the Supreme Dispenser of such bounty with complaint, when we see elsewhere such awful distress—a starving country, kept down by the iron clamps of military power!