was then called 'Cobden's Testimonial,' but to which a very different term is now often applied. And I can tell you, with equal truth and honesty, that a great number of those who were thus cajoled into parting with their money, like myself, now bitterly repent their folly.

"With respect to your enquiry as to the proportion which the present home trade in cotton manufactures bears to its former extent, I think you can apply your own statistical knowledge to that subject with much more effect than anything which I can say will demonstrate. I can, of course, speak accurately for our own concern; and from the remarks of some of my neighbours, who, like ourselves, have been chiefly engaged in the home trade, I can also draw tolerably just conclusions as to their position being no better than our own. Down to 1848, we found matters much as they had been in previous years sometimes better, sometimes worse-but, on the whole, pretty steady. In 1849, our eyes began to be opened to the consequences of the present unwise policy; but it was in the last year, and particularly in the autumn or fall trade, that the full conviction of its ruinous tendency burst upon us. Our own business has fallen away fully one third; and many others, I hear, are still worse off. How can it be otherwise? The country shopkeeper, away from the large manufacturing towns, relies almost entirely for his trade upon the landowner, the farmer, and the agricultural labourer, with those dependant upon them -in general terms, upon the agricultural interest. And what is their present position? The proprietor of the soil is either compelled to lower his rents, or, which is equivalent, to make large abatements on their payment; with the prospect before him, that even that course will little avail him a year or two hence, if the present position of affairs should, unfortunately for the country, so long continue. As a natural consequence, which has occurred in many instances within my knowledge, he deems it prudent to reduce his establishment and abridge his expenditure. The farmer no longer derives an income from his labours, even if he does not dip into his capital; and prudence, at least, if no stronger reasons operate, compels him to abstain from any outlay which is not one of absolute necessity. As to the poor labourer, he can, at the best of times, afford to spend but little beyond that which will provide the necessary food for his family and himself. And although his loaf is cheaper, dire necessity has

compelled his employer, the farmer (reluctantly, I quite believe, in most cases) to make his election between reducing the wages of his labourers, or altogether dispensing with the services of many of them. Can such things be without producing an awful effect upon the general welfare of the British Empire ?

"The picture I have here drawn, applies to all other trades in the same way as to ours. An intimate friend of mine, who is largely engaged in the ironmongery trade, and employs two travellers, told me, a few weeks ago, that their two last journeys were the worst and least remunerative that they ever had since they have been in business. Neither money nor orders to compare at all with former years' results.

There

"You are, I think, aware that the steady character of our business for many years, has enabled us to give employment to a regular and large number of workpeople in various departments; but, since last Michaelmas, we have been compelled to discharge between 300 and 400 of them; and that, too, in despite of having had recourse to the practice to which you allude in the concluding portion of your letter-exporting our surplus production or stock. Your supposition on that head is perfectly correct. are numerous houses in this quarter, who, until within the last year or two, never exported a shilling's worth of goods; and that remark applies in many cases most distinctly to those who, like ourselves, have hitherto especially cultivated the home trade. But it is as you say. We never like to make sacrifices at home; preferring to run the risk-if we are to force sales and sustain losses -of doing so at a distance. When our stocks have accumulated, we have resorted to that mode of getting quit of them, and have, within the last eighteen months or two years, exported to a considerable amount; and, whether we received our returns in money or produce, I can have no hesitation in telling you that, with one single exception, the realized amount has invariably fallen short of what we could have obtained for the goods upon the spot; in some instances to a considerable extent. I cannot pretend to know what success attends the operation of other and regularly exporting firms. But, if they do no better than we have done, the export trade of the country is not worth following.

"You will infer, from what I have here said, that in our concern, at least, we are heartily sick of Free Trade. A sense of shame at having been made the dupes of a body of selfish theorists will, I

have no doubt, prevent most people, who have been equally victims with ourselves, from making the same frank avowals that I have here done. But, whether they confess it or not, you may rest assured that the feeling of great numbers, even in this town-the hot-bed of League and

Free-Trade doctrines-is going rapidly round to the same views that I have now expressed. And I shall be rejoiced to see that cause which you have so consistently, and, I must admit, so disinterestedly advocated-the cause of Protection to National Industry, without distinction of class-brought to a successful issue. Talk of Class Legislation, indeed! Why, I can see plainly enough, now, that the entire legislation of the last five years on commercial matters has been done at the bidding of that knot of men, who, to carry out their wild theories, or further their own selfish ends, have not scrupled to demand the sacrifice of any or every other interest, the most import

ant in the land.

66 But, thank God, there is now a promise of their race being nearly run; and it is not too much to predict that, ere long, as in the case of other quacks who have preceded them, the popular feeling upon which they have thus for years fraudulently traded-and which has already assumed a character of marked indifference towards them-will, with great numbers even here, change into one of absolute and merited contempt.

"You will make what use you please of this letter, with the restriction, obviously imposed upon me, of requesting that my name may be withheld."

This is the confession of a Manchester manufacturer; and we think our readers will agree with us, that it is difficult to overrate its importance. If such have been the results of the Free-Trade policy in so short a time from its commencement, upon that very interest which expected to profit the most, what ruin must it not have wrought to others, and what are we to expect from its continuance? What becomes of the cry so diligently raised by none more diligently than by the apostates to whose cowardice the mischief is principally chargeable that any return to our old and tried commercial policy is impossible? Are our manufacturers, or any considerable portion of them, so wedded to theory that they will despise the lessons of hard experience, and persist in ruining their own trade, simply because they were once seduced by

We

the "unadorned eloquence" of Richard Cobden ? We have not the least fear that they will do so. They must by this time be aware that the effect of the Free-Trade measures upon the value of agricultural produce has been far more serious than was ever contemplated by the parties who introduced them. We know that the late Sir Robert Peel was entirely mistaken in his calculations, and that the data upon which he proceeded, furnished to him by the most incorrigibly conceited and pedantic of statists, were utterly erroneous. shall do Lord John Russell the justice to believe, that even he would not have originated such measures, could he have foreseen their actual resultcertainly he would not have secured the acquiescence of many of his party, who are now only restrained from declaring themselves converts to Protection, by that surly obstinacy which a Whig invariably mistakes for adherence to solid principle. The manufacturers are perfectly cognisant of the fact that, within the country, consumption has dwindled to a very low ebb; and we presume there are few of them who will now be inclined to attribute that circumstance to the pressure of railway calls, which, two years back, was the favourite apology of Ministers in every case of financial emergency. They do not require to be told why our exports have increased so largely the history of their own transactions is sufficient to account for that; and we do not think that they are so blind as not to perceive that the competition amongst themselves, rendered greater by the additional surplusage which must be disposed of if production is to go on as formerly, must preclude the hope of their obtaining remunerative prices in those markets which are still open to them. The present depressed state of manufactures fully demonstrates the soundness of the position which we have always maintained, that no interest in this or any other country can expect to prosper apart from the prosperity of others--a rule which the magnates of the monied interest, secure as they now deem themselves, would do well to keep in mind; for they may rely upon it, that this experiment cannot be continued much longer, without

some question emerging in which they are especially involved.

Upon the coming great election depends the solution of by far the most important question of the age. We all know by what means Free Trade was carried. A shifty and plausible Minister, who throughout life had steered his course far more by expediency than by principle, yielded to a spurious agitation organised by selfish men, who believed that they might reap a profit by altering and disarranging the whole relations of the country. Before declaring him self a convert to their views, he took advantage of his position, being still under the guise of a Conservative, to prepare the way for this radical change; and this he did so artfully, that, up to the last moment, his intentions were hardly suspected. His own defection was of far less consequence than the baneful influence which he exerted, too successfully, over men who had not the virtue or the firmness to renounce their leader when he renounced his professed principles. The support which he thus received, honourable neither to him who asked nor to those who gave it, enabled him unconstitutionally, but without a direct violation of the Constitution, to carry a measure involving a great national change without the recorded assent of the constituences of the Empire. The act was suicidal, in so far as regarded his tenure of political power. Singularly enough, and with a blindness which will appear unaccountable to posterity, he seems to have supposed that the gentlemen of England would unhesitatingly ratify his acts, although these were opposed to his professions. A late addition to their class, he understood neither the sentiments, the morals, nor the honour of the men with whom he had to deal. They cast him from them, and he fell as Minister. But he bequeathed the legacy of his last set of opinions to his successors, albeit of the opposite State party; and, in their hands, the system which he had founded, progressed. All this time Free Trade was nothing more than a theory. Plausible theory it may have been-for most theories are plausible; but it certainly had

not undergone the test of experience. Were we to say that both those who were for it and those who were against it were equally in the dark, we should wrong our own position. We never had but one view as to the result, not only upon the interest more immediately assailed, but upon the other interests of the country inseparably connected with it. From the first we exposed the fallacy of the idea that manufactures could flourish whilst agriculture was decaying; and the issue, we think, has abundantly shown the correctness of the views which we entertained. Since then the question of Protection has undergone a large discussion; and the facts arising from the working of the other system have materially assisted the progress of the cause. The time has arrived when those who have hitherto abstained from taking an active share in the controversy, find it their imperative duty to come forward and declare their sentiments unreservedly; and, to a man, they have ranged themselves on the side of Protection. Hence those magnificent gatherings in every part of the kingdom-in London, in Edinburgh, and in Liverpool-which have carried such dismay to the hearts of those who dared, in their folly or their ignorance, to assert that the cause of Protection was dead. How could it die, being, as it is, the vital spirit of the British Empire? Hence the testimony of such men as Sir E. B. Lytton, of the highest talent, and the most undoubted integrity and honour, against the continuance of a system which is crushing industry, and rapidly threatening to assail the very foundations of property. And hence, we are sorry to say, the mean and impotent attempts of the renegade section in Parliament to stifle the rising cry for justice, by the threat of a coming revolution.

We do not know what number of the Peelite party are willing now to follow Sir James Graham as their leader. We are not honoured with the confidence of any of these gentlemen, nor do we desire it; for the course which they have pursued has not even the negative merit of manliness to render it decent in the eyes of the world. They have been powerless for practical good, and their sole

efforts have been limited to the task of reviling the cause which they abandoned at the bidding of their chief. Sir James Graham has gone further. He now stands in enviable proximity with Colonel Peyronnet Thompson, who regards foreign occupation as an evil of less magnitude than a return to Protective principles, as the defamer of the British army, whose swords, he insinuates, would be unsheathed against the people, should that people, in the exercise of their undoubted privilege, return to Parliament a majority of representatives who think differently from Cobden and his crew. We hardly know which most to admire the monstrous arrrogance, or the unblushing effrontery of the man. Did he really suppose that threats, coming from such a quarter, would deter any one in the exercise of his free individual opinions? Was he weak enough to think that his inuendoes could turn the scale of public judgment; or that the electoral body throughout the kingdoms would shrink from performing that which they esteemed to be their duty, because, forsooth, it pleased the Border Baronet to prophesy that no change could even be attempted without outbreak, violence, and bloodshed? He has heard his answer in the shout of indignation which has rung, from one end of England to the other, in reply to his mischievous menace; and we have little doubt that, by this time, he is convinced-if shame can penetrate into his bosom-that the most fatal act which a statesman can commit, with regard to his own position, is to proclaim that brute force has more might and majesty than the law within the limits of the British territory.

Before concluding, we must say a few words upon the position of her Majesty's present Ministers; and we shall confine our remarks simply to a topic connected with their commercial and financial policy, leaving out of view the graver question of security to the Protestant faith, which is now occupying the attention of Parliament, and elevating the character of the Irish nation, through the conduct of its chosen representatives.

Ministers have been at last compelled, by the vote of a hostile majo

rity, to limit the renewal of the Income and Property Tax to the period of a single year. We regard this as one of the most important events of the Session; since it unequivocally shows that the nation is writhing under the pressure of this unequal impost, and has the power, when it wills, to cast it off for ever. We do not, however, suppose that the Whigs have any such notion. They are treating the impost as a shipbuilder might treat a vessel which had been afloat for nine years, careening and coppering it afresh, preparatory to a new launch. Now, when we remember that Lord John Russell has given distinct notice of his intention to propose a new Reform Bill during the next Session of Parliament, the existence of the Income Tax, under any shape whatever, becomes a matter of most serious importance. What necessity there exists for an extension of the suffrage has not yet been explained to us, neither are we aware of the principles upon which that act of extension is to be framed. It may not be intended as a last desperate effort to maintain a bad commercial system

it may possibly be a wise and temperate measure suited to the requirements of the time but as to this we can offer no opinion; for the bill itself, if not also the principles upon which it is to be constructed, is yet in embryo. But we cannot help expressing thus early our decided conviction that the maintenance of the Income Tax is incompatible with any large extension of the franchise, if the rights of property within this country are to be preserved. At present, an income of £150 is chargeable with income-tax. If it is intended by any new electoral scheme to give a preponderance of votes to those who are not so directly charged, then we say that the promoters of such a measure are establishing a principle which, when carried out, must inevitably lead to confiscation. We all remember that, in 1848, Sir Charles Wood, with his usual intense stolidity, proposed to augment the rate from sevenpence to one shilling in the pound-a proof of what may again be attempted upon any occasion of emergency. Let us suppose a new Reform Bill carried, which shall have

the effect of lodging the political power in the hands of those who are exempt from direct taxation. An agitation rises for the removal of customs-duties upon articles of general consumption, such as tea, coffee, sugar, and tobacco; and the Minister of the day, unable to stem the torrent, is forced to yield. In such a case as this, which may very readily be imagined, and which indeed is sure to occur, how could the revenue be raised? Sir Charles Wood has already shown us how by augmenting the direct tax upon rated industry to an amount equal to the defalcation. There is no reason whatever why sevenpence, or even a shilling per pound, should be the limited rate. No tax can be more popular than a direct one, to which the majority of the people do not contribute; and much of that powerful support which the Whigs have hitherto received from the Irish members in their financial policy, may be traced to the fact that Ireland has all along been exempted from the operation of this obnoxious impost. Mr Henry Grattan lately declared, that Ministers might as well attempt to levy Income Tax in Siberia as in Ireland. If so, let us by all means get rid of it in Great Britain also. These considerations are well worthy of attention at the present time. The questions of taxation and of representation are closely bound together, and it is in vain to attempt separating the one from the other. The frequent shifts of Sir Robert Peel, and the principles of expediency which, in 1842, he thought fit to apply to taxation, have altogether unsettled

the minds of many, and equal justice is no longer regarded as the grand element in the distribution of national burdens. No greater evil than this can befal a country so eminently commercial as our own. To tamper with the public faith is to introduce the wedge of anarchy; and yet, how is it possible to deny that almost every one of Peel's fiscal and monetary measures have had a tendency in that direction, by disturbing the distribution of taxation, altering the value of produce, and rendering the burden of monetary payments more oppressive than it was before?

We do not believe that Lord John Russell will have the opportunity of proposing his new scheme in the character of Prime Minister of this country. Events are rapidly tending to their consummation; the Whig Cabinet exists by suffrance only, and in a few weeks it may be broken up. It has served its purpose of conducting the Free-Trade experiment to a point, when the miserable fallacy and deception of the whole system has become apparent to the nation; no one interest having been left unscathed by its noxious influence. If the manufacturers have rightly profited by the lesson, they must by this time be convinced that they cannot separate themselves from the interests of the great mass of the British people; that their boasted independence and monopoly of the markets of the world is a vain and illusory dream; and that the real prosperity of the nation can only be attained by fostering the labour and protecting the industry of the subjects of the British Crown.