the price has been so extraordinarily lessened, that before 1814 twenty per cent. was made in the India money market, while the interest now demanded has been reduced to five per cent. Moreover, that the countries which the free-trader has had open to him have been "all places eastward of the Cape of Good Hope (except China), viz. the various and improving British colonies in the eastern hemisphere, such as our settlements in Africa, New South Wales, Van Dieman's Land, Mauritius, Seychelles, Ceylon, the South Sea Islands, the rapidly improving commercial mart of Sincapore, and the numerous islets in the Indian archipelago; in fine, that since 1814 the import duties in India have been reduced to two and a half per cent. ad valorem on English manufactures, many staple articles admitted free of duty, transit duties modified, or in many instances entirely withdrawn,-permission given to Europeans to hold lands, and, even Mr. Crawfurd admits, that "considerable pains have been taken by the Company, since the commencement of the present charter, for the accommodation of private merchants in the sale of ing both less able to become consumers of articles of general manufactures; contrary to the wise policy which the East-India Company aimed at accomplishing. If, then, the exportation of cotton goods and twist be set aside, as a branch of commerce unforeseen by all parties in 1814, we shall see whether the free-trader, under all these advantages, has made the great progress which has been so vauntingly proclaimed:

Total Exports to the East-Indies and China in 1828, £5,212,358 Deduct Cottons

2,049,890

£3,162,468

Deduct East-India Company's Exports

..

1,098,810

Free trade natural Exports in 1828 ...... £2,063,658

East-India Company's Exports averaged by Mil-1 fil-}

burn to 1810.....

Balance in favour of the East-India Company, without any of the foregoing natural and artificial advantages

2,141,380

£77,722

goods."* If all this be reflected on, the wonder will not be, that the British unincorporated commerce with Asia has augmented so much since 1814, but that it has progressed so little.

It would be useless to give the whole of the tables in the Parliamentary returns; I shall quote such years as may serve to disprove Mr. Crawfurd's assertion, respecting "non-fluctuation" and "steady progression" being the characteristic of the Asiatic free-trader.

EXPORTS from GREAT BRITAIN to all places Eastward of the CAPE OF GOOD HOPE (except China), distinguishing the principal Articles, by Private Traders.†

1816

UNWROUGHT STEEL exported from Great Britain.

1817

20,354 1825

1,652

The first article which I have examined, " unwrought steel," is certainly not in favour of the opponents of the

* Evidence to Board of Control, 7th March 1832.

+ Appendix to the Report of the Select Committee of the House of Lords, No. 37.

From another Parliamentary document I derive the following figures, which gives the quantity of "Iron and Steel" exported by the private-trader at two periods.

East-India Company, who would fain make the British public believe that the private-trader was carrying all before him in the East;* I say nothing yet as to profit, that point also is entirely thrown overboard. Every person who knows the effects of improvement in machinery and blast furnaces which have taken place since 1816, and the consequent reduction of the cost price of iron and steel, will indeed be surprised that this is all the boasted advantage which, with so many and such wonderful facilities, the freetrader has conferred on a staple ranking high in British

Here we see a decrease on the last five years of nearly two million of pounds!

I now turn to the silk manufactures, and do not see what great benefit the free-trade has conferred on the starving weavers of Spitalfields and Coventry. The declared value of the exports is alone given in the returns :—

The total quantity of British shipping which entered the several ports of Great Britain from all Asia for the last six years, ending 5th January 1832, shew very little increase :

1826

1827

1828

tons 101,683 | 1829

103,436 1830

101,467 1831

H

at 15s. and 20s. per ton freight!

tons 111,359

106,054

106,828

Manufactured silks is one of the items which Mr. Rickards says, the free-traders have so vastly extended the export of, according to his infallible prediction in 1814. However, I pass over Mr. Rickards' unfair statements to quote another article in the return, the manufacture of which is of considerable value in England:

NUMBER OF HATS exported to the EASTWARD.

The decline in the foregoing article is considerable; and here it may not be amiss to state one instance out of many to shew the wild, insane speculation which the India trade has exhibited, and which the opponents of the Company blame them for not imitating or keeping pace with. The value of hats imported into Calcutta in 1819 was 2,69,000 rupees, which, at ten rupees or twenty shillings a hat, would

give 26,900 hats. Now, the number of hat-wearers in Bengal do not exceed three thousand persons; so that, taking the average consumption at a hat and a half yearly, the supply was about equal to six years' consumption ! In 1829-1830 the value of hats imported into Calcutta scarcely exceeded 29,000 rupees.

The next article is a valuable branch of British industry

VALUE of TIN and PEWTER WARES and TIN PLATES

Under the head of "lead," I find that, in 1816, 1817,

and 1818, the quantity exported was 10,238 tons; while the exports of the seven following years were—

So that the exports of the three first years were greater than those of the seven last years, by nearly eight thousand tons!