of free importation of corn, and the last | the papers from which the comparison three of them years of very low prices purports to be made, a number of addifor corn. My noble Friend took the tional articles, amounting to no less than amount of pauperism in the year 1846-two millions and a half sterling, which the last year of import duties, and the last articles did not exist at all in the acyear, comparatively speaking, of high prices counts from which these papers were for corn, and contrasted it with the amount prepared; consequently, the increase of pauperism in the year 1850, the year from 53,000,000l. in the year 1845 to of free trade and low prices, and, upon com- 58,000,0007. in the year 1849 must have parison, showed that the amount of pau- a reduction made from it to the amount perism in the year of import duties and of 2,500,000l. or 3,000,000l.; and to high prices was less than the amount of that extent the papers, which show the pauperism in the year of free trade and state of the export trade, afford, in my low prices. And then my noble Friend mind, a most fallacious view of the case. says — “ "But I am happy to congratulate But it is not alone to the export trade that my noble Friend-let him look to his own I look. I admit that your export trade immediate district, and he will see a dimi- may have increased, and has increased ; nution of pauperism." We have shown an but I say, and those who act with me say, increase of from 4,000 to 7,000 in one that, important as your export trade unplace, and from 3,000 to 6,000 in another doubtedly is per se, it is unimportant as and we have shown this even by the compared with the amount of your home papers upon your Lordships' table, which trade; and, unfortunately, though you have exhibit by far too low an estimate, for the statistical means of ascertaining the they only give the number of paupers ac- amount of your export trade, you have not tually receiving relief in 1850, as compared the corresponding means of obtaining the with statements made of the number of amount of consumption in the home marpaupers, with their families, who received ket; and it is my firm belief that whatever relief in previous years. So that the real advantage the manufacturing and comincrease of pauperism is greater than ap-mercial interests may have derived from pears by these returns. But, setting that an increase of exports, these advantages aside, the noble Earl opposite says that my noble Friend will find a diminution of pauperism even in his own immediate district; and, on referring to the papers, and comparing the amount for the year 1846 with that for the year 1850, it appears that the glorious result to which the noble Earl points so triumphantly is a diminution of pauperism in the agricultural district of Christchurch to the extent of one single individual! But we point to other circumstances, independent of the amount of pauperism, and we say-if these things do not arise from free trade-if they do not arise from diminished means-if they do not arise from the poverty of the home market, and the inability to consume, the results of free trade, we are entitled to ask Her Majesty's Government from what it is they do proceed? Accounts are, I know, sometimes deceptive, and, among others, I would call your attention to the accounts of the exports. Great credit has been taken for an increase in the declared value of the exports between 1845 and 1849, apparently of above five millions; and of ten millions, or more, between 1848 and 1849. But, when we come to sift these papers, we find that, for the first time, in the year 1849, there are introduced into

have been far more than counterbalanced
by a diminution-the amount of which we
are unable to guess, but the effects of
which we see in every part of the country,
and practically feel in every direction-of
the power of the home consumer to take
up manufactured articles. Take the case
of cotton, for example. I hold in my hand
an account of the imports of cotton, and
find that, whilst in the first three months
of 1849 the imports of cotton were 547,000
bales, in the corresponding period of 1850
they had fallen to 468,000 bales. The
consumption of cotton in the home market
from the 1st of January to the 12th of
April, 1849, was 432,500 bales; but for
the same period in 1850 the consumption
had fallen from 432,500 to 338,000 bales,
being a decrease of 94,500 bales, or of
twenty-one per cent upon the whole con-
sumption of the first three months of 1850,
as compared with the corresponding pe-
riod of 1849. With regard to the exports
of cotton goods, it is true that in the year
1848 there were 22,000,000l., and in
1849, 26,000,000l., the increased ex-
portation amounting to 4,000,000l. Now,
of that increased exportation there was to
foreign countries 1,735,000l.-w
-we pre-
sume exclusive of exports to slave-trading

countries and I pray you to observe, as classes of our population who have heretoone of the principal effects of the free-trade fore been placed beyond want. The artisystem, that the increased exports to the cles to which I allude are not absolute nethree slave-trading points alone exceeded cessaries-they are luxuries of an humble 2,000,000l. I know how wearisome your description-perhaps it would be more Lordships must be with figures; but re- correct to describe them as comforts-but member it is upon figures that this ques- they are articles the diminished consumption mainly turns, and by figures alone we tion of which is an evidence as melancholy can show the effects of the present sys- as it is incontestable of the petty shifts to tem of free trade upon the country. Our which our people are obliged to have reobject is to show that under free trade course, and of the small economies they the consuming power is diminishing, and are compelled to exercise in order to make if the consuming power is diminishing, and both ends meet under the system of uniyou contend that it is not in consequence versal prosperity which has been estabof free trade, on you rests the onus of lished amongst us under the designation showing to what that diminished consump- of "free trade." The five articles in tion is to be attributed, you having pro- question do not furnish, I admit, an infalmised us a large increase of consumption lible testimony as to the general working as the consequence of free trade. With of the free-trade system; but I do think regard to the sale of wheat, barley, and that they are precisely those articles the oats in England, I tell the noble Mar- increase or diminution in the consumption quess, who moved for them to show that of which supplies a fair criterion of the the decrease in price is owing to the extent to which our poor people are engoodness of the harvest, that they will abled to enjoy the small and homely comnot answer his purpose. Why, my Lords, forts of life. They are cocoa, coffee, dried this paper which has been laid upon the fruits, including currants, figs, and raisins, table of your Lordships' House, so far as unrefined sugar, and tallow. Now, let us it is good for anything, is valuable as see how the consumption of these articles. proving the very opposite of that which has varied during stated periods in each the noble Marquess wished to demonstrate of the last three years. The consumption when he called for its production. It may of coffee during the first three months of be true that the amount of corn sold in 1848 was 877,000 lbs.; during the corres1849 exceeded that sold in 1848; but let ponding period of 1849 it was 922,000 lbs., the noble Marquess opposite refer to the and during the corresponding period of 1850 year 1850, the first four months of which it was 724,000 lbs. The consumption of he justly describes as the produce of the coffee has fallen from 9,900,000 lbs. in the harvest of 1849, and he will find that, first three months of 1848 to 9,368,000lbs., with the exception of the first four months in 1849, and to 7,460,000 lbs. in 1850. of 1849-which is the produce of the de- Currants have fallen in the following profective harvest of 1848-this boasted con- portion; In the first three months of 1848 sumption of corn in the British markets the consumption was 73,000 cwt.; in 1849 is, in 1850-with that single exception of it was 88,000 cwt.; and in 1850 it had 1849-lower week by week, and lower sunk to 66,000 cwt. Of figs there were on the whole, than it was in any other consumed, in 1848, 47,046 lbs.; in 1849, year mentioned in the paper moved for 53,004 lbs.; in 1850, only 39,011 lbs. Of by the noble Marquess. This document, raisins there were consumed only 21,000 therefore, if I have read it aright, is fatal cwt. in 1850, against 32,000 cwt. in 1849, to the very purpose for which it was pro-and 37,000 cwt. in 1848. The decline in duced. It goes to prove the very reverse the consumption of sugar is also remarkof the argument which it is the object of able. There were consumed, in the first the noble Marquess to maintain. Free three months of 1848, 1,494,000 cwt.; trade has impaired the condition and in 1849, 1,469,000 cwt.; and in 1850, straitened the circumstances of the labour-1,413,000 cwt. The returns under the ing classes of this empire. Such is the position which I am prepared to take up, and I trust that your Lordships will not deem it irrelevant if I should take leave to justify myself in that position by referring to the diminished consumption of some few articles of domestic use amongst those

head of tallow give a result not less disheartening. There were imported for home consumption, in the first three months of 1848, 292,000 cwt.; and in the three first months of 1849, 313,000 cwt.; while in 1850 the importation did not exceed 194,000 cwt. Moreover it is worthy

ment will have to retrace the steps they have taken, and revert to a sounder and a wiser policy.

EARL GREY: I cannot help expressing the satisfaction with which I have listened to the concluding observations of the noble Lord. It is clear from what he has said, that he is desirous of returning to a system of moderate import duties for the protection of British interests, that the noble Lord himself has given up the sliding scale of 1842, and that that Act is abandoned by noble Lords opposite.

LORD STANLEY: I am glad that the noble Earl is satisfied at hearing my statement; but allow me to say that I hope I may not be judged by the inferences which the noble Earl has drawn from my observations.

EARL GREY: Oh, I am quite satisfied.
House adjourned till To-morrow.

www.

HOUSE OF COMMONS,

Monday, May 27, 1850. MINUTES.] PUBLIC BILLS.-2° Petty Sessions (Ireland): Court of Prerogative (Ireland). Reported.-Conviet Prisons; Metropolitan Interments; Municipal Corporations (Ireland); Vestries and Vestry Clerks; Acts of Parliament Abbreviation.

of remark that the diminution in quantity taken into home consumption was co-existent with a large exportation in the shape of candles and soap. Now, my Lords, these facts may possibly be coincident with a state of great prosperity-I do not say they are conclusive evidence of the failure of your free-trade system, but they are evidence, and particularly when taken in conjunction with increased pauperism and diminished employment-for the noble Earl will not venture to deny, though he spoke of the prosperity of the manufacturing districts, that an increased and increasing number of mills are working short time, that wages in the manufacturing districts have fallen, and that in the agricultural districts they have fallen, and must and will fall still further-I say, when we have these facts before us, indicating a diminished power of consumption. in the home market, we cannot agree to congratulate the noble Earl on the success of that which I will still call "an experiment;" and we will continue to point the attention of the Government and the country to the practical working of that experiment, and leave it to Her Majesty's Ministers to justify their perseverance in that policy to its full extent, notwithstanding the failure which it manifests in its effects-notwithstanding the diminished consumption of the country-notwithstanding the increased distress and ruin which BIRTH OF A PRINCE-HER MAJESTY'S have been brought by that system upon a large portion of the community. We do not bring forward a specific measure; but if it will be any satisfaction to the noble Earl to hear again the declaration to which he has referred, and which I had the honour of making to a numerous and important deputation which waited upon me a short time since-I will repeat to him my confidence that this country will not be restored to a state of prosperity until it does not only deal with the unjust taxation under which certain interests of the country are labouring, but also until it shall return to a just, and moderate, and equitable system of import duties for the protection of British industry of all descriptions. I am satisfied that that policy will prevail in the long run; and as confidently as the noble Earl speaks of the success of the experiment, so confidently do I feel that its failure is becoming day by day more manifest, and that in some shape or another I will not gratify the noble Earl by telling him in what precise shape-he will have, or, in defiance of him, Parlia

3o Court of Chancery (Ireland).

REPLY TO THE ADDRESS.

MR. LASCELLES brought up Her Majesty's gracious Answer to the Address presented by this House on the Birth of a Prince: :

"I thank you sincerely for your dutiful and affectionate Address; and I receive with much satisfaction your Congratulations on the Birth of another Prince, and the assurance of the interest you take in My domestic happiness."

CHESTER AND HOLYHEAD RAILWAY
BILL.

Bill read 3°.

MR. O. GORE moved a clause which, he said, he felt it his duty to propose as chairman of the Shrewsbury and Birmingham line, and still more so as Member for Shropshire-a county which, without it, would be seriously prejudiced by being deprived of due means of communication with the north. Unless Parliament prevented railways from becoming monopolies, they would become the greatest curses to the country. The clause was proposed

only to prevent monopoly, and ought to
have been acceded to on the part of the
promoters of the Bill.
If the Bill passed
without the clause, the traffic of the
Shrewsbury and Birmingham Company
might be stopped at Chester, by the pro-
moters of the present Bill, the leviathan of
railway companies, the London and North
Western Company, which exercised a huge
and unjust monopoly, and lived upon liti-
gation, selfishly and constantly oppressing
the smaller companies, as in the present
instance. Irish Members were as much
interested as he was in resisting such a
system, and supporting the proposed clause,
which had originally been inserted in the
Bill, and had been omitted by mistake.

Clause brought up and read 1°.

ther, which formed the continuance and the line of communication of both, there must be conflicting interests, and it was possible that the interests of the public might be prejudiced. The question was one of great difficulty, and which, in 1844, had been considered, and the conclusion arrived at had been that it was impossible to settle it by any general regulation. It was now proposed to leave it to the Railway Commissioners to adjust and regulate the traffic at the point of junction; but he warned the House against deciding, in the case of a particular Bill, what ought to be decided on general principles. The House had, indeed, already declined to sanction a general measure founded on the same principle-the Bill of the hon. Member for Stoke-and he thought they would do well to reject this clause.

Motion made, and Question put, "That the said Clause be now read a Second Time." MR. SHEIL wished Shrewsbury to be MR. GLYN entered into a defence of in close communication with Dublin, and the proceedings of the London and North apprehended that, if the clause were reWestern Company. He wished the Housejected, and the London and North Western to understand that the London and North Company were left to its own ideas of selfWestern Company were not the promoters interest, the communication might be inof the present Bill. The Bill had origi- tercepted. The Committee had sanctioned nated with the Chester and Holyhead the clause, and he should abide by it. Company, in the full belief that unless the leasing to the London and North Western was sanctioned, or unless Government came forward with assistance, it would be impossible to complete that great undertaking. He could assure the House it was not his desire or wish to see the Bill pass in its present form, for he thought it would be more advantageous to the London and North Western Company to have existing arrangements between the two companies remain in their present state. He objected to the insertion of the clause, as it had been sanctioned by the Committee on ex parte evidence, and would operate injuriously.

MR. SLANEY said, that this clause had been recommended by the Committee. He hoped it would be adopted. As for the stopping of the express trains, he was au thorised to say the opposers of the Bill were ready to give up that point.

The ATTORNEY GENERAL supported the clause. It had been unanimously inserted by the Committee, and had been expunged by an accident: if the House was not disposed to reinsert it, he thought they at least ought not to reject the proposition of the hon. Mover, and refer the question to the Railway Commissioners.

MR. GLADSTONE said, in such a case as this, where one railway ran into anoVOL. CXI. [THIRD SERIES.]

MR. C. VILLIERS said, the Shrewsbury line had authorised him to agree to a proviso referring to the Railway Commissioners, not, indeed, as erroneously stated by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the University of Oxford, the regulation of the traffic, but the settlement of such points of difference as might arise between the two companies.

LORD R. GROSVENOR said, he had before this had experience of the manner in which the larger companies were prone to oppress the smaller; and the London and North Western Company had actually made it a stipulation of their amalgamation with another company that all facilities should be withdrawn from the Shrewsbury and Birmingham line. The Earl of Dalhousie's scheme for giving the great companies the power of supplying the smaller lines had been rejected, on the ground of its interfering with competition; but if the House desired to retain a rag or shred of competition in this case, it must protect the Shrewsbury Company by inserting this clause.

SIR C. DOUGLAS wished to know whether the Committee who had sanctioned the clause were aware that it was in contravention of other decisions of Committees.

CAPTAIN DUNCOMBE said, between conflicting decisions they had endeavoured 0

to take the course consistent with common supplying the New River Company. sense and justice. was supported on the false grounds of remedying the navigation of the River Lee, it being notorious that the River Lee, so far from not being in the position of affording sufficient accommodation, already furnished accommodation for three times the amount of traffic it could ever possibly have.

RIVER LEE TRUST BILL-SUPPLY OF fering with the regular course pursued with