, _the harvest is great, and the
labourers are few_. The manorial powers, which alone could preserve
order, have slept for ages. Regularity has been long extinct. The desire
of trespass is so prevalent, that I have been tempted to question; if it
were not for the powers of the lamp act, feeble as they are, whether the
many-headed-public, ever watchful of prey, would not in another century,
devour whole streets, and totally prevent the passenger. Thus a supine
jurisdiction abounds with _street-robbers_.

There are cases where the line of the street should inviolably be
preserved, as in a common range of houses; therefore all projections
above a given dimension infringe this rule.

There are other cases where taste would direct this line to be broken,
as in buildings of singular size and construction, which should be
viewed in recess. Those of a public nature generally come under this
description, as the free-school, and the hotel, which ought to have
fallen two or three yards back. What pity, that so noble an edifice as
the theatre in New-street, should lose any of its beauty, by the
prominence of its situation!

As Birmingham abounds with new streets, that were once private property,
it is a question often discussed, In what point of time the land
appropriated for such streets, ceases to be private? But as this
question was never determined, and as it naturally rises before me, and
is of importance, suffer me to examine it.

When building leases are granted, if the road be narrow, as was lately
the case at the West end of New-street, the proprietor engages to give a
certain portion of land to widen it. From that moment, therefore, it
falls to the lot of the public, and is under the controul of the
commissioners, as guardians of public property. I allow, if within
memory, the grantor and the lessees should agree to cancel the leases,
which is just as likely to happen as the powers of attraction to cease,
and the moon to descend from the heavens; in this case, the land reverts
again to its original proprietor.

Though the streets of Birmingham have for many ages been exposed to the
hand of the encroacher, yet, by a little care, and less expence, they
might in about one century be reduced to a considerable degree of use
and beauty. In what light then shall we be viewed by the future eye, if
we neglect the interest of posterity?

RELIGION AND POLITICS.

Although these two threads, like the warp and the woof, are