The maximum production was 6,741,929 tons in 1872, and the total production in 1878 may be estimated at about 6,300,000 tons. Even in the face of unexampled depression, stocks have not increased to any great extent. tion of trade. In comparing our exports for 1878 with those of Diminu1868, we find that the falling away is confined to the our export trade with the United States, from which we have been shut out by a prohibitory tariff. Comparison with the year 1872 shows an immense loss in the American trade. There is also a reduction in the exports to Germany, which had been unduly expanded at the earlier date by the inflation which followed on the Franco-Prussian war. The dullness in the trade with other countries was caused by the cessation of the foreign loans. In no instance was the decay of trade attributable to the excessive price of British labour, apart from other and more potent causes of collapse. The following table, prepared by Messrs. Fallows, gives the principal changes in the last decade: Total Exports from United Kingdom of Iron, Steel, and Tin Plates to the following Countries, in 1868, 1872, and 1878. Reduced production In France, the profit realised in the great establishof France; ment of Creusot has fallen below the average maintained for several years. The value of the work turned out in 1874-5 was 3,256,000l.; it was reduced to 2,185,000l. in 1876-7. Nearly every undertaking of a similar character, formed since 1870, has proved a failure. The activity, exhibited in railway construction in Austria between 1870 and 1873, has completely subsided. In North Germany, between 1875 and 1876, the great works of Herr Krupp were reduced from 12,000 to 9,000 hands. The general condition of the trade may be gathered from a statement republished in 'Iron,' and prepared by the German Iron and Steel Trades Association. It shows the condition of the principal limited liability works in the years 1874, 1875, and 1876. The balance-sheets of forty-five iron works and fifty iron foundries were analysed. The profits of the iron works which paid a dividend amounted to 176,2967., while the losses of those which paid no dividend amounted to 1,013,305l. In the foundries the profits amounted to 229,4877., and the total losses to 454,998l. The capital invested in these works was 21,999,985l., and the total profit on this large amount was only 405,7831., against losses amounting to 1,468,2831. In April 1873, 95,035 workmen were in employment; in April 1877 only 60,624; and whereas, in April 1873, 371,1717. was distributed in wages, the amount distributed in April 1877 was 192,7937. In Berlin in 1877 the number of persons employed in the engine factories was reduced by 2,362 men, a reduction of 14.6 per cent. on the numbers employed in the previous year. German turers. The Times' stated that between April 1873, and Losses of April 1877, the number of workmen employed by manufac twenty-two of the principal companies engaged in the iron trade, excluding Krupp, fell from 27,700 to 14,600. Within the same period, the value of the stock of the Phoenix Company fell from 16,200,000 marks to 4,860,000 marks; of the Hörde Company from 15,000,000 marks to 3,210,000 marks; of the Bochum Company from 15,000,000 marks to 3,375,000 marks; of the Dortmund Union Company from 41,400,000 marks to 2,070,000 marks; and of the Donnersmarkhütte Company from 18,000,000 marks to 3,906,000 marks. Of thirty-two companies, whose united capital amounted to 15,600,000l., only six showed any dividend whatever for the year 1876, and the aggregate accounts published for that period showed a balance of loss on the year's operations of 359,000l. as compared with a loss of 195,000l. for the previous year. duction in The arguments urged by the British Iron Trade Over-proAssociation against the proposed protective duties in Germany. Germany tend to show that the trade of that country has suffered as much from over-production as our own. The increased price of iron and coal, in many cases as much as, or more than, 100 per cent., led to an immense increase in the number of iron and steel works, and, besides this, all the works then in operation were largely Exportation from Germany. Our exports thither. extended, causing expenses that could only be covered in the event of prices remaining high and steady. The report of the Cologne Chamber of Commerce for 1876 points out that old firms with good names, that had paid the highest dividends to their shareholders for years previously, found themselves placed in a false position by increasing their capital to three times its original amount. The increased exportation of iron from Germany was stated by the Berlin Börsen Zeitung' to be not really a sign of the approach of better times, but of the utter prostration of the German iron industries. German ironmasters were selling their products abroad for what they would fetch, because there was absolutely no demand at home. So soon as prices improved, the German trade would again be swamped by an enormous influx of British iron. The following is a table showing the fluctuations in the British exportations of iron to Germany: Exports to Germany. Quality of In France the iron and hardware trades are in the hands of a few wealthy monopolists, who have won deserved honour by their strenuous efforts to improve the quality of their productions. The Creusot works employ 8,000 men. They are renowned for the excellence of their workmanship. In certain articles they are at least equal to our best efforts, and they have not suffered their energy to be relaxed by the protective duty of 30 per cent., which the revised Tariff still gives them. In November last I saw the huge ironclad, the 'Italia,' in construction at Castellamare. All the armour plating and the steel frames, which were being worked up into the ship, had been supplied from Creusot. The marine engine exhibited. by the same establishment in Paris, and several specimens of their forgings and castings, excited the unreserved admiration of the most competent critics. manufac In order to make a fair comparison of the relative French progress of the mechanical trades in England and ture thirty France, the backward state of those industries on the years ago. Continent thirty years ago must be taken into consideration. When railways were introduced into France in 1842, the resources of that country were so limited that it became necessary for the English capitalists, who had undertaken the construction of the railway from Paris to Rouen, to establish works at Sotteville, in the vicinity of Rouen, for the construction of the locomotives and other rolling stock required. English materials were used, and English workmen were almost exclusively employed. The French labourers, employed by the contractors for the Paris and Rouen Railway, used wooden spades and huge barrows of antiquated shape. The iron shovel and pick-axe, and |