maintain the tranquillity and independence of the country, at two or three millions, we shall be very far indeed beyond the mark. And although we do not mean to say that a saving of this extent, by admitting of the repeal and reduction of some very oppressive and vexatious taxes, would not be of consider. able service in an economical point of view, still we cannot deceive ourselves so far as to imagine for a moment, that it would perceptibly increase the rate of profit, or afford that real and substantial relief which is so indispensable. We do not wish to exaggerate the difficulties under which the country is at present placed. On the contrary, we are fully satisfied that they may all be made to yield to good legislation, and the adoption of sound principles; and that no incurable evil has as yet fastened itself on our vitals. But we should only be exciting expectations that must be wholly disappointed, and fostering an unfounded delusion which cannot fail to be productive of the most mischievous consequences, if we attempted to make the public believe, that any measures of retrenchment, which it is in the power of government to adopt, can be of any material advantage in the way of lightening the pressure on the national resources.

The truth is, that this pressure is not occasioned by the expenditure on account of the peace establishment of the country, but by an erroneous system of commercial legislation, and the magnitude of the public debt. It will not, indeed, require any very elaborate statement to show that the burdens imposed on the country, not for any purpose of common utility or national advantage, but in order to support some of the most oppressive and ruinous monopolies that ever were devised, are decidedly greater than the whole expense incurred on account of the public service, exclusive of the payment of the interest of the debt. The abolition of these monopolies is the grand object to which the exertions of a really enlightened administration, anxious to improve the condition of the country, and to strengthen the foundations of her prosperity and power, ought to be especially directed. Compared with this, all other objects of domestic policy are of secondary, and, indeed, very inferior importance. And should the great and signal relief that would be derived from this source, not be sufficient to remove the unfavourable symptoms in the situation of the country, it would still be in the power of government, by paying off a part of the public debt, to make the work of regeneration complete, to give a new and powerful impulse to industry, and to add prodigiously to the opulence, power, and resources of the nation. When these things have been done, when the abuses that threaten to subvert the whole public economy have been removed, we may begin to feel some interest

in the praiseworthy efforts of those who endeavour to catch at a little popularity, by making proposals for stripping the facings from the jackets of the hussars, or by denouncing an abuse in the contract for spurs !

We endeavoured to show, in the article on the Corn Laws, in the 88th Number of this Journal, that the quantity of the different sorts of grain annually consumed in Great Britain and Ireland, might be estimated at about 48,000,000 of quarters; and that, in the event of the ports being opened to the importation of foreign corn under a constant duty of 5s. or 6s. a-quarter, prices would most probably decline, upon an average, 8s. a-quarter. The multiplied discussions that this subject has since undergone, have tended to impress us with a conviction that we have considerably underrated the quantity of grain annually consumed in the empire, and the reduction of price that would be occasioned by opening the ports under a duty of 5s. or 6s. But moderate as our estimate most certainly is, it shows that the corn laws are, in their operation and effect on the consumer, equivalent to a tax of 8s. a-quarter; and that they amount, on the aggregate quantity consumed in the empire, to L.19,200,000 a-year, or to about the whole cost of the peace establishment! Neither is this the worst view that may be taken of this monopoly. It does not merely force us to pay an artificially increased price for our bread; but it forces us to do this without securing a corresponding advantage to any one else. The principle of competition will not allow the farmers to obtain a greater rate of profit on the capital they employ in the raising of corn, than that which is obtained by the manufacturers and merchants. An increase in the price of corn may, it is true, be of advantage to them during the currency of their leases, but when they expire their rents are increased proportionally to the increase of price; at the same time that the rate of profit is lowered universally by the forced cultivation of inferior soils, and by the increased share of their produce, that must of necessity go to the labourers employed in their cultivation. The landlords form the only class who derive any advantage from restrictions on the Corn Trade; but they are not benefited nearly to the same extent that others are injured. When an ordinary tax is imposed, when, for instance, a duty is laid on malt, those who receive the produce of the tax get the whole of what is lost by the public-But such is not the case with the sums forced out of the pockets of the consumers by a restriction on the importation of foreign corn. The restriction raises the price of corn; but it does so only because it forces the supplies that would, but for its operation, have been obtained at a cheaper rate from the fo

reigner, to be raised from inferior soils at home; and the rise of price is proportioned only to the increased cost of cultivating such soils. That portion of the raw produce of a country which is over and above the expenses of its production, including therein the ordinary rate of profit on the stock belonging to the agriculturists, forms the rent of the landlords; and in so far as the price of this portion of the produce is raised by an artificial regulation, the landlords reap the benefit. But it is proved by evidence taken before the Committees of the House of Commons, on the Corn Laws in 1814 and 1821, and by the statements in the best agricultural works, that the proportion of the produce of the soil, which goes to the landlords as rent, does not in this country amount to a fourth-And supposing that those ruinously destructive fluctuations which are inseparable from the restrictive system, and which are fully as injurious to the landlords as to any other class, could be got rid of, still it is plain that they would not receive, on the most exaggerated estimate, FIVE millions of the NINETEEN which the Corn Laws force out of the pockets of the public! The rest are wasted without advantage to any individual whatever; are, in fact, as much destroyed as if they were cast into the sea or the fire.

The advocates of agricultural monopoly may rail, quibble, and carp at this statement; but the only objection to which it is really liable, is, that it depreciates the loss occasioned by the Corn Laws. Lords Malmesbury, Lauderdale, &c., were ready enough to condemn, in no very measured terms, the policy of Bonaparte, who loaded colonial sugar with an immense duty, in order to encourage its manufacture in France from the beet-root. But we take leave to say, whatever our hereditary legislators may think of this policy, that it is decidedly less vicious and absurd than that to which they are clinging with such desperate tenacity. Corn is an incomparably more important article than sugar, and an artificial increase of its price is, therefore, incomparably more injurious. We might, by exporting L.1000 worth of manufactured goods to Poland or Russia, obtain in exchange for them as much corn as would require L.1500 to produce in this country; and yet we interdict this exchange from being made! We force our people to give three days' labour, or the produce of three days' labour, for the same quantity of food they might otherwise obtain for two days' labour. We leave it to others to decide, whether this system be more disgraceful to the intelligence, or ruinous to all the best interests, of the country. By forcing the extension of tillage,

and consequently raising rents, it may, in the first instance, perhaps, be of some trifling advantage to the landlords. But it is clear that it must, by depressing the rate of profit, and forcing us to misemploy a large proportion of our capital and industry, be decidedly hostile to the manufacturing and commercial prosperity of the country; and, by consequence, to the real and lasting interests of the owners of land.

The selfish policy of the landlords, must,' to use the words of Colonel Torrens, counteract itself; and their unjustifiable 'combination for enriching themselves, at the expense of the industrious classes, must end in reducing their rents considerably below what they would have been under a system of free 'trade and open competition. The landed proprietors of England possess at this moment the important advantage of im'mediate vicinity to the largest and most flourishing manu'facturing towns in the world; and the consequence is, that, ' in proportion to its fertility, land in England must pay a higher rent than in any other country. Let not senseless avarice destroy the sources of the golden eggs-let not the proprietors ' of England, by restricting the importation of foreign agricultural produce, raise the value of such produce in our markets, ' and thus depress the rate of profit, until the seats of manufacture are transferred to France, or Holland, or Germany. No proposition in Euclid admits of a more rigid demonstration, than that the highest rents will be paid in countries in 'which manufacturing industry is carried to the greatest 'height. But it is obviously impossible that manufactures 'should continue to flourish in a country where restrictions on 'the importation of corn raise the value of raw produce in relation to wrought goods, and thereby depress manufacturing 'profits below the rate prevailing in the neighbouring countries. If we do not freely import foreign produce, our manu'facturing superiority cannot be maintained, and, by necessary consequence, our high comparative rents cannot continue to ❝ be paid.'*

The abolition of the Corn Laws, or the opening of the ports, under such a duty as may be sufficient to countervail the peculiar taxes imposed on the agriculturists, ought, therefore, to be the first object to which the attention of Ministers should be directed. Such a measure would confer infinitely more real

See the fourth edition, p. 169, of the very complete and valuable work of Colonel Torrens on the Corn Laws.

advantage on the country, than any other which it is in the power of the legislature to adopt. But the number, rank, and influence of those who imagine, however erroneously, that they have a material interest in the support of the Corn Laws, is so very great, that unless Ministers are strongly supported by the public voice, they will neither be able to bring forward a good bill, nor to carry it successfully through the Upper House. This is not a matter of party politics, but of great national interest; and it is out of the question to suppose that it should be carried, if the public appear supine or indifferent to its suc

cess.

The next monopoly, every vestige of which ought to be swept off, is that of the West India planters and mortgagees. We have not only given them a monopoly of the British market, against the Brazilians and other foreigners, but we have imposed an extra duty of 10s. a-cwt. on all sugar imported from our dominions in the East Indies. A variety of estimates have been formed with respect to the cost of this monopoly to the people of Britain; and the zeal with which it is supported by the West Indians, shows that it must be very advantageous to them, or, in other words, very costly to us. It has been repeatedly stated, that if the same duties were imposed on all sugars imported into Great Britain, we should be able to buy as good sugar for 4d., or at most 44d. per lb., as now costs 6d. But taking the difference at only 1d. per lb., it would make, on the total quantity imported into Great Britain, amounting on an average to about 380,000,000 lbs. a-year, a saving of no less than L.1,583,000. And it will be observed that we are obliged to incur this heavy charge for no object of public utility, but merely to enable a few West India merchants and planters to linger on in a disadvantageous employment, and to foster a system of slavery which we are constantly professing our earnest desire to abandon !

The monopoly of the tea trade enjoyed by the East India Company, is, if possible, still more injurious. For proof of this allegation, we beg our readers will take the trouble to refer to the article on the Company's monopoly in the 78th Number of this Journal. It is there established, by a comparison of the prices of the same descriptions of tea at Amsterdam, Hamburgh, and New-York, where the trade is free, with the prices of the teas sold in London by the East India Company, exclusive, in both cases, of the duty, that the latter receive, on the whole quantity of tea sold by them, about two millions a-year more than the same quantity of tea would cost if the Company's monopoly were abolished. No attempt has ever been made to