Sitting of 20 April 1826

MR. JACOB'S REPORT ON THE TRADE IN CORN, AND ON THE AGRICULTURE OF NORTHERN EUROPE.
The following Report, ordered to be printed on the 14th of March, was this day delivered to the members:—
Instructions to Mr. Jacob, respecting the Prices of Foreign Corn.
Office of Committee of Privy Council of Trade, 25th June, 1825.
Sir; It being the desire of the lords of the committee of his majesty's privy council for trade, to obtain the most correct information on every subject connected with the supply of foreign corn, I have been directed by their lordships to acquaint you with their intention to avail themselves of your services for the examination of the state of those countries, the productions of which find an outlet by the river Vistula into the Baltic. You will, therefore, be pleased to proceed with as much expedition as you can make convenient, to commence the examination, beginning at the city of Dantzic where the Vistula enters the sea.
Though you will direct your chief attention to that division of ancient Poland now comprehended in the Austrian province of Gallicia, situated between the river Bugg towards Lemberg, and the river Wisla towards Cracow, yet, in your route towards that district, the province of West Prussia, belonging to Prussia, and of Masovia, which now, under the government of Russia, forms a part of the viceroyalty of Poland, will require your examination.
At Graudentz or Thorn, in the Prussian part, it is understood that a toll is collected on wares in their passage down the Vistula; and you may, therefore, probably ascertain the quantities of corn which, in a series of years, have been annually conveyed down that river to Dantzic.
In the Russian provinces you will endeavour to make yourself acquainted with the nature of the transit trade in corn, with the state of the magazines of this article at Warsaw, Praga, and other places, and the modes in which, and the description of persons by whom, it is collected, for the purpose of transmission to Dantzic.
It will indeed be desirable to learn, with as much accuracy as possible, the quantity in warehouse, not only at the places you visit but at other places, and especially at Hamburgh, Konigsberg, Memel, Elbing and Riga.
In the Austrian province of Gallicia, as well as in the territories of Prussia and Austria, which will precede it in your route, you will obtain all the information in your power, regarding the condition of the soil; the manner of its cultivation; the average increase of the several kinds
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of grain; the proportion of ploughed land to that in pasture, in woods, or in waste; the relative numbers which the other inhabitants bear to those employed in agriculture; the descriptions of grain or other food which supply the wants of the inhabitants; the rate of the wages of labourers in agriculture, in handicraft, and in manufacturing; the condition of the farmers and labourers, as regards their dwellings, their clothing, their utensils, their furniture and their food; the hours devoted to labour; the assiduity and skill with which labour is performed; the number of days abstracted from labour by the festivals of the Catholic church; the extent of the military service or conscriptions imposed on the rural inhabitants; the pecuniary and personal demands for the repairs of roads, bridges, the poor and other local purposes; the rate of rent, whether tolerably paid, and in what proportion (if any) it has been reduced since the peace; the average price at which the present extent of bread corn could continue to be grown; how far the price of corn has been reduced since the peace; what increase in price would stimulate to more extensive cultivation; and what proportion of bread corn or wheat is consumed in the country, and by what classes.
With respect to the higher classes, it will be desirable to obtain as much information as possible, how far they have advanced in that knowledge which is applicable to the improvement of their domains; what zeal is felt for such improvement, and what unemployed capital is to be found which, in case of an increased demand for corn, would be likely to be applied to the advancement of agriculture and the increase of its productions.
It will be important to ascertain the prices of the several descriptions of corn at the places of their growth, as well as the expenses of conveying it to Dantzic or to Elbing, when it is carried to that port. This should not only comprehend the past and present period, but should be viewed prospectively, so as to estimate what would be the effect, if a constant sale could be found for the surplus corn of the country in the English markets.
You will endeavour to learn what the actual surplus of grain has been in a series of years, by ascertaining, with all possible accuracy, what quantities of each kind of corn have been sent out of the

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country by land, and what quantities have been brought in from the neighbouring territories of Silesia, Bohemia and Moravia, on one side, and from the Russian dominions on the other.
Besides acquiring information on the present condition of Poland, including the dominions of the three great powers, their lordships would wish your attention to be turned towards all facts that bear on the subject of the changes that might be produced in that country, if such an alteration were made in our laws as would leave our markets at all times accessible to the corn grown in Poland.
You will consider, from the view you take of the country, what increase of cultivation would be likely to take place in consequence of such a stimulus being constantly in action; what effect the extension of cultivation to poorer lands would have on the general prices; endeavouring by every means in your power to arrive at some estimate of the additional quantities which, in years of medium productiveness, might be imported into this kingdom from Poland.
As it may be necessary to assume some given price in this country, in forming such an estimate as that to which I have now referred, it is thought desirable that you should proceed upon a supposition of an average price of wheat at home of from 60 s. to 64 s. a quarter.
Although I have not noticed the several kinds of animals in the country you are about to visit, their lordships would be pleased to know what proportion the food supplied by them bears to that supplied by corn, and other vegetable substances; and also if the quantity of live stock is such as, upon a more extended system of tillage, would be likely to afford the means of renovating the fertility of the soil, in a degree equal to the exhaustion which would be occasioned by a greater growth of corn.
There are other subjects which will present themselves to your observation, and engage your attention, which, in an immediate or indirect degree, may bear on the subject which has induced their lordships to employ you on this business; and these they trust you will report with all the exactness and accuracy in your power.
In every part of your journey you will bear in mind, and direct your inquiries towards the influence which the price of food in general, and of corn in particular,
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has had on the rates of labour in manufactures, and learn in what proportion the wages of that description of labour have been lowered, as compared with the decline in the price of corn.
In the report you may prepare for the notice of their lordships, when you have completed your examination, you will reduce all the monies, weights, and measures, of the different districts you examine, into those of this country; having reference, as far as regards the first, to the actual value of the paper currencies of Russia and Austria, circulating in the territories of those sovereigns; and to that of the metallic money circulated in the dominions of Prussia, as well as to the fluctuations in the rates of exchange. I am, &c. &c. (signed)
THOMAS LACK.
William Jacob, esq.
Mr. Jacob's Report on the Trade in Corn, and on the Agriculture of the North of Europe, 21 st February, 1826.
To the right honourable the Lords of the Committee of his Majesty's Privy Council for Trade.
My lords; In pursuance of the instructions communicated by your lordships on the 25th June last, I proceeded to the continent, passing through the Netherlands, the Prussian provinces on the Rhine, and the dominions of Saxony, to Berlin, and from thence by Stettin to Dantzic.
From Dantzic I travelled through the kingdom of Poland, visiting Thorn, Warsaw and Cracow; deviating in several directions from the main road, returned through Gallicia, Moravia, Austria, Bavaria and Wirtemburg, to Strasburgh, where I entered France, and by way of Paris reached England.
I was induced by my instructions, to direct my principal attention to the supplies of grain, and the nature of the commerce in it, within the districts whose surplus finds a vent through the mouths of the Vistula; and also to collect information on the subject in the other parts of the continent through which I passed.
I heard every where among landowners, farmers and corn merchants, complaints of the distress in which they were involved; and their complaints were far too general to leave room for the suspicion, that they were not founded on the existing state of their respective circumstances. The prices of produce of all

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kinds within the last three or four years, when compared with the period which had preceded them, or indeed with any past period, in which prices are accurately recorded, confirmed the conviction, that their complaints were justified by the losses they had sustained.
It appeared of some importance to collect, where it could be done with any assurance of accuracy, the prices of corn for a series of years. The wars, of which these countries have been the theatre, gave a degree of uncertainty to some of the accounts before the year 1815, and that uncertainty was, in several places, increased by the variations in the value of the circulating medium, which had taken place during the continuance of hostilities. Except at Dantzic, where a register had been kept for near two centuries; at Berlin, where, from the minister of the interior I received the prices for fifty years; and at Warsaw, where I obtained them from the Stadthouse, for thirty years; I confined my inquiries to the last ten years. The several accounts which were collected, form a part of the Appendix to this report.
As the facts collected, and the remarks made during my journey, are of very various kinds, and were committed to writing as they occurred, it may be more satisfactory to your lordships, if, after shortly describing the nature of the corn trade as carried on by the Vistula, which, as far as concerns wheat, is the most important; and, after recounting, according to my instructions, the quantity of wheat accumulated in the several exporting places, I state, whatever relates to the raising of corn, to the cost of its production, and the supplies yielded, in the different divisions of Europe, which have hitherto conveyed their grain to our markets, in the order in which I viewed the several countries.
The commerce of corn generally, in the countries whose connection with the sea is maintained by the river Vistula, has been extensive during a long series of years. The shipment to foreign countries was, during a long period, almost exclusively confined to the city of Dantzic.
The government of Prussia viewed with some jealousy the trade of that city, which was then one of the independent Hanse Towns, and having the land on both sides the river, from the boundaries of Poland to those of Dantzic, endeavoured, by forming the city of Elbing into a free
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mart, to draw the trade through that place and its port of Pillau.
Some success attended this plan, and the trade was carried on through the two rival channels, with a competition which has been continued to the present time; for though Dantzic has been since added to the Prussian territories, and the preference given to Elbing consequently withdrawn, the latter city seems to have retained its proportionate share of the export of corn.
Attempts are at this time making by Russia, to divert the corn trade of Poland, but especially of the provinces of that country which have been separated from it and are now comprehended in Russia, to the port of Riga, as the place of shipment. For this purpose, canals are now constructing, which are intended to facilitate the conveyance of goods to the river Duna. It is not however probable, that a very great proportion of the trade will be drawn into that channel. The port of Riga is closed by frost a much longer time than that of Dantzic; the passage from it to the countries where corn is wanted is longer; the climate is less favourable for drying the grain after removing it from the barges, preparatory to shipment; and it, at present, has not those spacious, and well-adapted warehouses, for the secure deposit of corn, by which Dantzic is eminently distinguished.
Some portion of the corn is at present brought down to the sea shore, by the river Neimen; and, after paying a transit duty to Prussia, at the town of Schmaleningken, is conveyed to Memel. This branch of the trade is, however, but small, as it appears that, in the three years 1816, 1817 and 1818, a period when the general trade was the greatest, the whole quantity that paid the transit duty was only 49,596 quarters of wheat, 21,830 quarters of barley, 185,292 quarters of rye, and 108,482 quarters of oats.
From the southern provinces of Poland, viz. Sandomir and Cracow, in which the greatest quantity of the best wheat is produced, a portion is annually sent into the neighbouring Prussian province of Silesia, by land, where a part of it is consumed by the few inhabitants of Breslaw, and the other cities, who eat wheaten bread. The greater part is, however, conveyed by the river Oder, and then by the canal which unites that river with the Havel, to the city of Berlin. It forms an article in the weekly returns of the corn

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market of that capital; and, by the whiteness of its flour, is preferred for pastry and confectionary. In those years, when the prices of grain have been the most raised in England, some of it has been sent here from Stettin, whilst those of the inhabitants of that neighbourhood who used wheat were supplied with an inferior kind of their own growth.
Those other channels, by which the surplus corn of Poland is distributed, bear, however, but a small proportion to that which passes by the mouths of the Vistula, at Dantzic and Elbing; and the manner in which the trade by these places is carried on may deserve detailed notices.
The cultivators of that corn which is supplied to trade, are almost universally both owners and occupiers of the soil on which it grows. They cultivate it by the labour of their tenants or subjects, who raise sufficient for their own support, but have scarcely any surplus. It does not, as in most other countries, come to the several markets in small parcels. As wheat, particularly, can scarcely be there considered an article of food, it would scarcely ever find purchasers among the inhabitants of the countries in which it is grown, if it were brought to the weekly or other markets in their own towns. It is almost exclusively an article for foreign consumption.
The whole of the internal commerce of Poland is in the hands of the Jews, who are very numerous, comprehending nearly one-seventh of the whole population, and not being engaged in cultivation, nor inhabiting villages, forming the majority in most of the market towns. They are acute, temperate, economical, rather active than industrious, and are said to be possessors of the far larger proportion of the floating capital of the country. Almost every transaction passes through their hands, and few persons can either buy or sell, borrow or lend, without the aid of some individuals of that race. Though not allowed by the law to call themselves brokers, or factors, they are effectually such to the whole of the nation.
They are accused of nourishing a most implacable hatred towards all other people, and of deeming it no moral crime to deceive and cheat christians. Whatever of truth there may be in these charges, these supposed feelings of the Jews are met on the part of the majority of the other inhabitants, by a degree of con-
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tempt and degrading treatment, of the most aggravating nature; a treatment so remote from what is exercised towards that people in England, Germany, France, and Holland, that it may have perhaps mainly contributed to form the character which they are accused of bearing.
It will not appear surprising, on referring to the changes undergone, the ravages she has suffered from wars, the demands for the personal services of her proprietors in the armies, of the successive masters that have ruled the country, the exclusion from all foreign trade, and, till of late, the total absence of all manufactories, that there should be now great, individual distress, even whilst the country, as a whole, may be advancing in prosperity.
The individuals who most suffer are the landed proprietors, and they have, with a few exceptions, become dependent, in a greater or less degree, on the more monied Jews.
There is every reason to believe, that few landed proprietors are wholly free from incumbrances, and that many of them are involved to such an extent, that they are compelled to deliver to their creditors the whole surplus produce of their estates, as soon as it can be prepared for removal. The Jews, by their universal connection with others of their nation in distant places, have far better opportunities of knowing what prices they are likely to obtain for corn, than the gentlemen who raise it; and the latter, from their situation, must take that as the price which their creditors may determine.
On the banks of the Vistula there are many warehouses well adapted for preserving corn, at the places whence it is most convenient to embark it. The crops are generally removed from the farms of the proprietors as speedily as possible, and remain there in the power of the creditor, who either allows for it a stipulated price, or undertakes to convey it to Dantzic, to be sold at the risk of the debtor; but with the proceeds to be received by the creditor.
The charges for warehousing, shipping, freight, tolls, commission, and other demands, have been lately so high, in proportion to the prices, that very small sums have been carried to the credit of the landholder; and where estates are mortgaged, they have been generally insufficient in amount to keep under the growing interest.
There are two modes of conveying wheat to Dantzic by the Vistula. That which grows near the lower parts of the river, comprehending Polish Prussia, and part of the province of Plock, and of Masovia, in the kingdom of Poland, which is generally of an inferior quality, is conveyed in covered boats, with shifting boards that protect the cargo from the rain, but not from pilfering. These vessels are long, and draw about fifteen inches of water, and bring about 150 quarters of wheat. They are not, however, so well calculated for the upper parts of the river. From Cracow, where the Vistula first becomes navigable, to below the junction of the Bug with that stream, the wheat is mostly conveyed to Dantzic in open flats. These are constructed on the banks, in seasons of leisure, on spots far from the ordinary reach of the water, but which, when the rains of autumn, or the melted snow of the Carpathian mountains, in the spring, fill and overflow the river, are easily floated.
Barges of this description are about seventy-five feet long, and twenty broad, with a depth of two feet and a half. They are made of fir, rudely put together, fastened with wooden trenails, the corners dovetailed and secured with slight iron clamps, the only iron employed in the construction.
A large tree, the length of the vessel, runs along the bottom, to which the timbers are secured. This roughly-cut keelson rises nine or ten inches from the floor, and hurdles are laid on it, which extend to the sides. They are covered with mats made of rye straw, and serve the purpose of dunnage; leaving below a space in which the water that leaks through the sides and bottom is received. The bulk is kept from the sides and ends of the barge by a similar plan. The water, which these ill-constructed and imperfectly caulked vessels receive, is dipped out at the end and sides of the bulk of wheat.
Vessels of this description draw from ten to twelve inches of water, and yet they frequently get aground, in descending the river. The cargoes usually consist of from 180 to 200 quarters of wheat.
The wheat is thrown on the mats, piled as high as the gunwale, and left uncovered, exposed to all the inclemencies of the weather, and to the pilfering of the crew. During the passage, the barge is carried along by the force of the stream, oars being merely
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used at the head and stern, to steer clear of the sand-banks, which are numerous and shifting; and to direct the vessel in passing under the several bridges. These vessels are conducted by six or seven men. A small boat precedes with a man in it, who is employed in sounding, in order to avoid the shifting shoals. This mode of navigating is necessarily very slow; and, during the progress of it, which lasts several weeks, and even months, the rain, if any falls, soon causes the wheat to grow, and the vessels assume the appearance of a floating meadow. The shooting of the fibres soon forms a thick mat, and prevents the rain from penetrating more than an inch or two. The main bulk is protected by this kind of covering, and when that is thrown aside, is found in tolerable condition.
The vessels are broken up at Dantzic, and usually sell for about two-thirds of their original cost. The men who conduct them return on foot.
When the cargo arrives at Dantzic or Elbing, all but the grown surface is thrown on the land, spread abroad, exposed to the sun and air, and frequently turned over till any slight moisture that it may have imbibed, is dried. If a shower of rain falls, as well as during the night, the heaps of wheat on the shore are thrown together, in the form of the steep roof of a house, that the rain may run off, and are covered with a linen cloth. It is thus frequently a long time after the wheat has reached Dantzic, before it is fit to be placed in the warehouses.
The warehouses are very well adapted for storing corn. They consist, generally, of seven stories, three of which are in the roof. The floors are about nine feet asunder. Each of them are divided by perpendicular partitions, the whole length, about four feet high, by which different parcels are kept distinct from each other. Thus the floors have two divisions, each of them capable of storing from 150 to 200 quarters of wheat, and leaving sufficient space for turning or screening it. There are abundance of windows in each floor, which are always thrown open, in dry weather, to ventilate the corn. It is usually turned over three times a week. The men who perform the operation, throw it with their shovels as high as they can, and thus the grains are separated from each other, and exposed to the drying influence of the air.
The whole of the corn warehouses now left (for many were burnt during the siege of 1814) are capable of storing 500,000 quarters of wheat, supposing the parcels to be large enough to fill each of the two divisions of the floors, with a separate heap; but as, of late years, it has come down from Poland in smaller parcels than formerly, and of more various qualities, which must of necessity be kept distinct, the present stock of about 280,000 quarters is found to occupy nearly the whole of those warehouses which are in repair, or are advantageously situated for loading the ships. Ships are loaded by gangs of porters with great despatch, who will complete a cargo of 500 quarters in about three or four hours. It is seen by table, No. 19, in the Appendix, that, within the last five or six years, the whole quantity that has been brought down has been diminishing; but I was told that no sensible decrease had been observed in the number of the separate bulks, only that each bulk, or the growth of each estate, or of each consignor, was smaller.
The trade in wheat from Poland and Prussia, through Dantzic, is said to have been attended with most ruinous losses to all the persons who have been engaged in it. The growers asserted that none for the last eight or nine years had yielded sufficient to cover the expenses of cultivation, and that it has been regularly getting worse and worse ever since the year 1818
The Jews, who have taken the crops from the growers, have found the decline of the prices such, that, if they sold on their arrival at Dantzic, it was attended with loss; and if they were in a condition to withhold from selling, and placed in warehouses, the loss was eventually much greater. The trade of Dantzic, which is chiefly confined to corn, has been for several years in a very distressed state. The commodity in which the traders have dealt, has of late so vastly declined in value, that what was purchased cheap at one period, became in a short time dear; the advances they made on what was consigned to them for sale, with the expense of conveyance, and of storing and preserving, soon amounted to more than the value of the wheat; and the consignors, in Poland, seldom united the ability and the disposition to make payments to indemnify them.
The corn now in the warehouses has
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cost the merchants much more than the present value. The royal bank of Prussia, which has branches in the different cities of the kingdom, has advanced, on the security of the wheat now in store, half of what was the value at the time the several advances were made, and, as the price has declined, has required additional security.
In calculating the stocks of wheat in the several ports of the Baltic, as I did not visit the whole of them, I was under the necessity of relying on the accounts that I could procure. His majesty's consuls offered their assistance, and furnished me with the following list, vouching for their accuracy to the best of their judgment.
Mr. Leutze,the consul at Stettin, gives the following as the stocks in Pomerania.

Quarters.

Stettin

24,265

Anclam

10,586

Demmin

4,799

Stralsund

15,495

Griefswald

6,691

Wolgast

5,289

67,103

Mr. Gibson consul at Dantzic, to whom I am obliged for much other useful information, gave me the exact quantity at Dantzic and Elbing; viz.

Dantzic*

288,000

Elbing

73,500

361,500

Accounts of the quantities of corn in store at Memel could not be procured; and, in the absence of better means of forming an opinion, I have compared the trade of exporting corn at Memel, with that at Elbing, and find that, in a series of years, the exports of wheat and rye together from the latter port, have been about double that at the former. I scarcely know if it be fair to infer, that the accumulated stock bears the same proportion to the annual returns. If so the stock on hand must be but small.
I can only judge of the stocks accumulated in Riga and Petersburgh, by
* By an account taken the 31st December 1825, since received, the stock appeared to be about 20,000 quarters less than when I was there.

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comparing their trade in wheat, for a series of years, with that of Dantzic and Elbing. The exports have not been larger than those of Elbing, and it is probable their stocks together, do not exceed those of that port. In the absence of all definite information, and trusting to the reports I received, I should be disposed to think, that, in the three ports of Memel, Riga, and Petersburgh, there were not 100,000 quarters of wheat, in August, when I was at Dantzic.
The state of the stock of corn at Lubeck, with the prices for the last eleven years, are shown in the Appendix, No. 33. It appears that the wheat in store there was 29,900 quarters.
Some small stocks may have been collected from the territories of the duke of Mecklenburg Schwerin, and accumulated in the ports of Rostock and Wismar. I have no information of the quantity, but should not be disposed to judge, from the general trade of those places, that more than a few thousand quarters were to be found in them. The greater part of the surplus corn of Mecklenburg finds a vent by Hamburgh, and is included in the imports, from the interior of that city. The access to the Elbe from all the southern ports of the Duchy, is easier than to the Baltic; the freights from thence to foreign markets is lower, and the passage shorter. It is in fact, only from the northern division of the Duchy, that the wheat finds a vent through its own ports.
Although not within the Baltic, nor within the limits of my late journey, yet the wheat, which descends by the rivers Weser and Elbe, have too much influence on the general corn trade, to be overlooked in this estimate of the stocks on hand.
The wheat stored at Bremen, comes by the Weser, chiefly out of the Duchy of Brunswick, though some of it is grown in Hanover; and, when the prices are very high, supplies are conveyed from Hesse Cassel, and even from some of the western districts of the Saxon duchies through Münden. That from Brunswick is of a moderate quality, but much of the other is very bad, and only fit for the English market in times of very great scarcity.
The stock in the granaries at Bremen, in the latter end of December last, consisted of 27,972 quarters of wheat and
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other corn, as is shown in Appendix, No. 34.
Hamburgh is an important dépôt for corn, of some that is brought from Russian and other ports in the Baltic, as well as for the surplus of the several countries through which the Elbe in its long course is directed. Prussia, especially near Magdeburg, is a great corn country; but the chief grain cultivated in that division is rye. In the kingdom of Saxony, as well as in the Prussian province of that name, the quantity of rye very far exceeds the wheat, both in quality and quantity. In the years when prices are very high, the wheat of Bohemia comes down the river to Hamburgh; but the expense of conveyance, the length of the navigation, and the loss to which it is subject, act as a prohibition, except in seasons of great scarcity. The freight from Prague to Hamburgh is 12 s. per quarter, and the tolls to the several sovereigns, through whose dominions the river runs, is 3s. 6d. The commissions and other charges, amount to near 1s. 6d. more.
From the shipping places below Prague the freight is lower; but the wheat grown near them is said not to be of so good a quality as that from the vicinity of that city, and the districts to the south of it.
The export trade in wheat of Hamburgh by sea, appears during the last ten years to have reached an annual average of 48,263 quarters; the greater part of the corn imported there being for the consumption of the city, and the surrounding territory belonging to it. In the Appendix, No. 32, is seen the course of the trade; the prices of all corn for the last ten years, the prices of wheat from 1791 to 1822, and the stock about 100,000 quarters, as taken at two periods in the last year.
Although the price of wheat as well as of other grain is very low in Denmark, yet the surplus quantity is very small; and the depressed prices may be in a great measure attributed to the restrictions upon Danish corn in the dominions of Prussia, its nearest and most populous neighbour. The wheat exported from the whole kingdom, in the six months which followed the abundant harvest of 1824, is seen in the Appendix, No. 35, to have been 57,561 quarters. By that account, it appears, that more than half the wheat was from the provinces of Hol-

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stein and Sleswick, which are in close contact with Hamburgh. In the market return of prices from that city, the wheat of Holstein forms one of the quotations; it is then fair to conclude, that a portion of the wheat exported from Holstein, if not from Sleswick, is that which subsequently becomes a part of what is included in the exports and stock of Hamburgh. I should much doubt if the whole quantity of wheat in store in October last, in the kingdom of Denmark, amounted to 20,000 quarters.
These are the returns of the several places mentioned in the months of August or September, before the corn of the last harvest had made its appearance in the markets. I had reason from all my inquiries, both among cultivators and merchants, to conclude that very little corn remained in the hands of the growers, except in the very rare cases, where in the same person was united a confident expectation of an advance in the prices with a sufficiency of capital, to enable him to withhold from making sales.
The circumstances of far the greater number of the occupiers of land were too much embarrassed to allow of their keeping corn, when the importunities of claimants upon them were urgent for the discharge of their demands. The general accounts were, that all which could be sold had, from necessity, been turned into money. In some of the small towns in Prussia, when movements of the troops were making, and a squadron of cavalry on a march was quartered on them for a day, so little horse corn was to be found in the granaries, that the standing oats were cut and given to the horses, as they were taken from the fields.
When in Berlin, I was told by baron Von Bulow, minister of the Interior, that the government had recently instituted inquiries into the stocks of corn in the country, and the result of those inquiries showed, that the quantity in the whole of Prussia was much smaller than usual.
A very intelligent writer, a part of whose memoir [see Appendix, No. 9] I have translated, states the whole quantity of corn in the different countries of Europe, at 3,680,000 quarters. He includes in his estimate, rye, oats, and barley, as well as wheat, noticing the portions of each, which make up his total. Without attaching any great credit to the calculation, I allude to it because his views are those which I found commonly
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entertained among the more intelligent cultivators, of whom, though writing anonymously, he was said to be one.
I made it my particular business to inquire into the state of the stocks at the warehouses on the banks of the Vistula, where corn is collected until a sufficiency of one quality is accumulated to load a vessel. In former times, as I was informed, these stores used to have a large quantity placed in them when the water was low, to be ready to take advantage of the first autumnal rains.
The water was low when I was in Poland, from the long draught and great heat of the season; few or no vessels were navigating on the upper part of the river, and yet the storehouses on the banks were empty.
At Warsaw there are large warehouses, but in them there were not 200 quarters of wheat.
At Pulaway is a large magazine, capable of storing, and adapted for keeping in good order, 6,000 quarters of wheat; but it did not contain a single bushel.
At Cassimir there are several large warehouses, some of them from having had no business of any extent during the last four years, seemed to be in need of repairs. Others were, however, in good condition. The whole are capable of storing 80,000 quarters of corn.
In none of them was any wheat, though they contained some rye belonging to the government, which its agents had received for rent and taxes, from cultivators who could not pay money.
Rachow has warehouses for storing 14,000 quarters, but in them was neither wheat nor any other corn to be found. At Cracow the case was the same; the warehouses, which are extensive, were empty. The places I have noticed are the chief, where there are ferries over the river, and to which the roads from the surrounding districts lead. They are the most convenient for shipping goods, and most of the trade is despatched from them. There are a few others of smaller moment, which I did not visit, and only on hearsay know that they are alike without wheat.
From the view I have thus taken, I am led to the conviction, that neither in the sea ports, from which wheat is usually shipped, nor in the interior of the countries where it is grown, was there a stock which, if removed to the sea ports, would increase the amount of what is collected there to any sensible extent.
There is an accumulation in the Russian provinces of Podolia and Volhynia, which was reported to me to have been stored in caves under ground, containing four or five years growth.
Owing to the situation of those provinces, and the difficulties and expenses of conveyance, it is more likely to perish in the dépôts than to be conveyed to any places from which it can interfere with the trade of this country. The cost of conveying it to Dantzic would be equal to the price for which it would sell, and the shorter but more hazardous distance to Odessa would lead to a market there, lower than even that of Dantzic.
The produce of these two provinces was never large, and has only found its way to the sea shore, when very high prices have enabled it to bear the expense and risk of conveying it thither.
The whole stock of wheat may be now brought into one point; and appear as follows:

Quarters.

Pomerania

67,103

Dantzic and Elbing

361,500

Lubeck

29,900

458,503

Conjectural:

Denmark

25,000

Rostock and Wismar

25,000

Petersburg, Riga and Memel

100,000

608,503

In ports of the North Sea as ascertained:

Hamburgh

105,000

Bremen

27,970

Total

74,1,473

Of the wheat to which we have referred, as accumulated in the several ports, I was assured nearly one-fourth part is of so bad a quality, as to find no market in this country, except in seasons of uncommon dearth. If, then, out of the whole 741,473 quarters, 556,330 quarters were to be sent to England, it would not be more than the consumption of ten days.
The provinces, forming since the adjustment of territory, at the termination of the late war, a part of the Prussian monarchy, which have access to the Baltic sea, comprehend East Prussia, West Prussia, and Pomerania. They appear by the official accounts [see Appendix, No. 10] to have exported
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447,183 quarters of wheat, and 1,218,916 quarters of rye, barley and oats, beyond their own growth, in the last nine years, up to the end of 1824; exclusive of the year 1818, the returns of which, for East Prussia, are wanting, but which probably were 350,000 quarters of wheat, and 340,000 quarters of the other grains.
It is possible that some portion of this quantity may have been produced in the internal contiguous provinces of Posen, Silesia, and Brandenburgh. As the trade in corn, between one province and another, is free in Prussia, there are no official accounts by which we can ascertain whether what is exported by sea, is the produce of the province from which it is shipped, or of some inland district.
As the special object of attention pointed out by my instructions, was the state of the countries, from which corn had been exported to England, I shall, therefore, in representing the state of the agriculture, confine my observations chiefly to the three maritime provinces before mentioned, but including in some degree the province of Brandenburgh.
Before the year 1807, the landed estates in Prussia, as in most other parts of Europe, were in the possession of large proprietors. Many of them could only be held by such as were of noble birth; and the merchant, the manufacturer, or the artisan, however much money he might have accumulated, could not invest it in such land until he had obtained a patent of nobility. These restrictions were removed by the king, about the year 1807, when the French had over-run the country.
A tenantry, in our sense of [the term, was then, as it still is, almost unknown. The land was worked by a class of persons, in some respect slaves; and in most respects but little removed from that condition. In many cases they had an hereditary kind of right to some use of the land, such as to grow one crop of corn according to a prescribed course, whilst the lord had the right of pasture between the crops. These peasants were sold with the land, or descended to the heir, and were bound to perform certain labour or services for the lord. They could not, on the other hand, be dismissed from their holdings, nor had their superior any power over the property they might happen to be able to accumulate.
The conditions upon which the peasants held their portions of land, were

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very various, come having a greater, and others a less share of the use of them; some doing greater and others less service for them.
By a series of legislative measures, marked by a character of peculiar boldness, which were enacted from 1807 to 1811, the whole of the enslaved peasants have become converted into freemen and freeholders. In some cases the holdings have been equally divided, and the peasant has his moiety in perpetuity. In cases where the lords claims for personal services were more extensive, the peasant had a smaller share in the land. In some instances, compensations in money were settled by compact between the lords and the peasants, sometimes by the payment of a fixed sum, or by a security on the land allotted in perpetuity to the peasant, for the payment of such sum. Sometimes the peasant retained the whole of the land he had before used, paying to the lord the value of that portion which might otherwise have been given up to him.
The successive measures by which the peasants were raised to the rank of freemen, were not received by all, with equal readiness. The lords were compelled, but the peasants were allowed to decline compliance; and, even to the present day, some few prefer the ancient mode of their holdings, to that which the laws have allowed.
Although the foundation is laid for a new and better order of things, yet its effects on the agriculture of the country have not hitherto been fully realised. The abolition of personal services, and of hereditary ownership of such services, has been too recent for the full operation of the change of the parties, from the relation of master and slave, to that of employer and employed, to produce the effect which is its natural tendency. It is obvious, that all the operations of agriculture are still performed by the labourers, with a listlessness and slovenly indolence which was natural to their former character, and which their new condition has not yet had time to remove.
The land in the three maritime provinces, as indeed in almost the whole of Prussia, may be considered as either in very large portions belonging to the nobility, or to the new class of proprietors; or as very small portions, such as under the ancient system were deemed sufficient for half the maintenance of the family of
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a peasant. There are but very few of that middle class of capitalists, resembling our farmers, who can hire land to that extent, which one able man can most advantageously manage, and after stocking and working it, pay for the hire to the proprietor.
With some few exceptions, and those very few, no rent is paid, but each occupier, whether a large or a small one, is his own landlord.
The deviations from this general view are to be found, for the most part, on the banks of the great rivers, where meadows, either for the purpose of fattening cattle, or of saving hay, for the supply of large towns near the mouths of these rivers, are let to tenants for money rents. On the banks of the Oder, near Stettin, I saw some meadows let from 10 s. to 12 s. per acre, the landlords paying land-tax. They are said to yield about one ton and a half annually, of hay, when mowed. The after-feed is worth little, from the early floods in autumn, and the deep snows and severe frosts in winter. The hay is not very good, which is attributed to the great quickness of the growth, after the frosts disappear. Land of this description is of less relative value than with us, from the severe cold, and its long duration; from there being scarcely any of the interval of spring, and from the great drought and excessive heat of the short summer. I was informed, that similar land, higher on the Oder, near the cities of Schwet, Custrin and Frankfort, was let at nearly the same rate. Lands in the vicinity of the large towns, and in other situations, from local convenience may be sometimes let for money rent, but these are exceptions to the general plan, and the whole of such land bears but a very small proportion to that which is cultivated by its owners.
The domains of the Crown are differently circumstanced from other land, and are let to farmers. The greatest part is in the occupation of persons, whose ancestors had long held them at low rents, without their being charged to the land-tax or Grund Steuer. When by new laws the taxation on land was extended to the estates of nobles, those of the Crown were included, and charged with the tax. At first the high prices which corn bore, enabled the occupiers to pay the trifling rent, as well as the tax; but as corn declined in price, they became unable to pay both. The taxes were in

417
most instances paid, but the rent was suffered to run in arrear, from the impossibility of extracting it from the tenants. I was informed by a very intelligent gentleman, who had sufficient means of information, that most of the occupiers of the royal domains, whose rent was ten years in arrears, had been forgiven the whole, on promising to make the payments regularly in future; a promise they are in general unable to fulfil, from the great additional fall in the price of corn which has since taken place.
These national domains are of such various qualities, and in such different localities, that it is difficult to find what is the average rent of them per acre. Some of them are let as high as 3s. 8d. per acre, a much larger proportion at 1s. 2d. and a larger still from 6d. to 9d. As far as my means of information can enable me to form a judgment, I should not estimate the average rent to exceed, if it reaches, 1s. 3d. per acre. The farm of Subbowitz, whose produce is noticed in the Appendix, No. 11, which is considered fair average land, consists of about 1,720 acres, and is let for 158 l. 12 s. 7d. sterling per year. That of Subkau, also noticed in the same statement, consisting of 3,054 acres, is some of the best land, the rent of which is about 552 l. 11 s. 8d. sterling per annum.
These two farms, with the others noticed in the same paper, are occupied by some of the most skilful cultivators of the district; and yet the accounts show, that small as the rent is, and judicious as the management may be, the produce falls short of the cost of production even, though the rent should be given up.
Although the royal domains are here noticed, they bear a small proportion to the whole land, in the province of West Prussia, where they are situated, not exceeding one-sixtieth part of the whole.
The value of land generally is low, as may be inferred from the low price of produce, and of rents for what little is rented. An estate of medium soil was put up to auction, and not producing an offer equal to the sum for which it was mortgaged, was taken by the mortgagee. The extent is about 6,000 morgens, or about 4,200 acres. It is chiefly a thin sandy soil, in some few parts approaching to loam. The principal and interest due to the mortgagee was 3,000 l. for which sum he took the estate. The barns, and other tenements, were in need of some
418
repairs and the land; far from being in a clean state. On taking possession, as he could not let it, he had, and calculated to expend, as he told me, betwixt 2,200 l. and 2,300 l. to repair the tenements, and to stock it with 1,500 Merino sheep, 40 cows, and with bullocks, horses, and the requisite implements. This gentleman, who had acquired his money by trade, and knew how to calculate, hoped by the fleeces of his fine-wooled sheep, to draw some interest for the investment he had been compelled to make in land.
In the same part of Prussia, another estate, one of the best in the district, with a good house, with all the buildings in good repair, and the land in a high state of cultivation, was offered for sale, and though when I was there the 6ale was not completed, I had reason to believe an agreement for it would speedily be concluded.
The soil is good sandy loam, chiefly arable, with some pasture, the extent 2,800 acres. The price, at which I believe the contract to have been since made, was between 5,200 l and 5,400 l.
If these two instances may be taken, as nearly the highest and the lowest price of the average arable land of the maritime provinces of Prussia, the highest limit will be somewhat less than 40 s. the acre, and the lowest not quite 15 s. per acre. This estimation of the value of land, if correct, in the maritime provinces, cannot be extended to the other parts of the Prussian dominions, where both the soil and climate are far more favourable to production. It is well known in England, that, under a great depression in the price of corn, the poorer lands suffer a much greater proportionate depreciation, in their sale price, than the more fertile soils. It is not then extraordinary, that the landed property of these maritime provinces should be reduced to the low value which is here represented.
This tract of land forming the maritime provinces of Prussia, is a portion of that vast sandy plain which extends from the shores of Holland to the extremity of Asiatic Russia. It has scarcely any elevations that merit the title of hills, and, where not covered with woods, spreads out in open fields of great extent. The soil in some places is barren sand, occasionally with no appearance of vegetation; in many parts with no attempt at cultivation, and what is cultivated appearing to yield-but scanty returns. The land is too

419
poor to yield even middling crops, without manure, and the portion of cattle of all kinds is too small to create such a quantity of that necessary ingredient in husbandry, as to keep the land up to its present low standard of fertility.
According to the official documents which I collected, it appears that the three maritime provinces of East Prussia, West Prussia, and Pomerania, including in the latter the late Swedish territory, contain about 25,500,000 acres, or more than half the extent of England. By an official account, made up in 1821, the stock of cattle appeared to be as follows, at the latter end of the year 1819; viz., 556,839 horses and colts; 1,171,434 oxen, cows, and calves; 2,049,801 sheep and lambs; and, 617,310 swine.
The lowest estimate of the stock of cattle in England, which I have ever met with, gives three times this number of horses, and more than four times the number of cows and sheep, to the same extent of land; and most of those who have calculated on the subject, have carried the proportion of cattle to the surface in England, much higher. I had reason to believe, though not from official sources, that the number of sheep, between 1819 and 1824, had increased at the rate of from 20 to 25 per cent, and that the proportion of fine-wooled sheep, to those of coarse wool, had been augmented beyond that proportion.
From this deficient stock of the animals, from which manure is derived, it will naturally be inferred, that the increase of grain must be very small. I was satisfied, from my own observations, and it was confirmed by the opinion of intelligent natives, that much of the land in cultivation could not yield on the average more than three times as much corn as the seed that had been sown.
The calculations made by the most intelligent statistical inquirers, and the most observing cultivators, have not estimated the average increase of the four kinds of grain; viz., wheat, rye, barley, and oats, taken together, to be more than four times the seed.
The general course of cultivation is, to fallow every third year, by ploughing three times, when designed for rye, or five times if intended for wheat, and allowing the land to rest without any crop during the whole of the year, from one autumn to the next. Most of the land is deemed to be unfit for the growth of wheat, under any cir-
420
cumstances. Where it is deemed adapted to that grain, as much as can be manured, from their scanty supply of that article, is sown with wheat, and the remainder of the fallow ground with rye. The portion which is destined for wheat, even in the best farms, is thus very small; and, as on many none is sown, the whole of the land devoted to wheat does not amount to one-tenth of that on which rye is grown.
I have reason to believe, that, of late years, the proportion of rye to wheat has been increasing. The first is an article of domestic consumption and of universal demand; the far greater number of the inhabitants eat only bread made from it from necessity, and those who can afford wheaten bread, eat commonly that of rye from choice. At the tables of the first families, both in Germany and Poland, though wheaten bread was always to be seen, I remarked that the natives scarcely ever tasted it; and I have met many Englishmen, who, after a long residence in those countries, have given the preference to bread of rye.
From the time I left the Netherlands, through Saxony, Prussia, Poland, Austria, Bavaria and Wurtemberg, till I entered France, I never saw, either in the bakers' shops, in the hotels, or private houses, a loaf of wheaten bread. In every largetown, small rolls made of wheaten flour could be purchased, and they were to be seen at the tables at which foreigners were seated. In the small towns and villages only rye bread can be obtained; and travellers commonly take in their carriages sufficient wheaten rolls to supply them from one large town to the next. Wheat is only used by the natives for making what our English bakers would call fancy bread, or in pastry and confectionery. If there be no foreign demand for wheat, the difficulty of selling it, at any price, is great; and that little, which the very limited demand of other countries has of late years required, has been confined to wheat of the best quality; for rye, on the other hand, sales may be always made at a market price; and the price of that grain has not been depressed in the same proportion as the price of wheat.
Although the increase of wheat is greater than that of rye, yet as it absorbs all the manure of the farm, and requires the land to be ploughed twice more, it is now deemed to be the least profitable of the two crops, by many of the farmers.
As the rye receives the full benefit of the fallow, its increase is greater than that of the spring crops which follow it.
Barley and oats are sown in the spring which follows the harvesting the wheat and rye, and these complete the course, which is again followed by a whole year's fallow. By this rotation of crops, the land bears corn only two years out of every three; and the crop of the last year scarcely produces three times the quantity of the seed that was sown.
This opinion, formed by my own observations, strengthened by the reports of the most intelligent persons with whom I conversed, who were connected with practical agriculture, receives some confirmation from a paper furnished to me by Mr. Leutze, his majesty's consul at Stettin; according to which, in 1805, the year previous to that in which the country was over-run by the French, the quantities of corn sowed and harvested in the province of Pomerania, when the Swedish part was not incorporated with it, are as follow:

Bushels.

Bushels.

Wheat sown

155,936

produced

996,224

Rye-sown

1,254,960

produced

4,383,584

Barley sown

619,992

produced

2,757,688

Oats-sown

1,245,704

produced

2,975,880

This view of the low rate of increase is further confirmed by the official accounts of the produce of several farms in West Prussia [see Appendix, No. 11, B.], by which it appears, that on six farms, on which 4,864 acres are cultivated with corn, the produce was only taken at 10,000 quarters in 1824, which is represented to be a favourable year.
Though some few of the large proprietors may, by the increase of their flocks of sheep, and by the assiduous attention to every branch of cultivation, have improved their land and raised the increase of their seed, I see no reason to believe that to be the case to an extent, which can have a sensible influence on the average of the whole mass of production.
If we consider the calamities which Prussia endured, and the strenuous exertions she made to terminate them, we shall scarcely suppose that the interval from 1815 to 1825 has been sufficient to regain what she had lost; in the eight years which preceded that period, more especially as up to the present time, the market prices of her chief productions have been suffering a regular decline.
I should not deem the other maritime provinces of Prussia to be much more productive than Pomerania, as a whole,
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though in East and in West Prussia there is rather a larger proportion of the land that is capable of producing crops of wheat and oats. It will happen to a traveller, in pursuit of agricultural information, even in England, and much more in countries where the business of cultivation is conducted in a much lower manner, that his attention will be invited to those properties which are best managed, where, the several processes of husbandry are most sedulously performed, and where the produce is the greatest. Hence almost every writer on agricultural subjects has been led to over-rate the actual average produce of land, in the several countries which he may have visited.
Like others, I was prevailed upon to pay the closest attention to the details and face of the land of the most skilful, the most affluent, and most productive proprietors. I visited several noblemen, whose knowledge of and attention to agriculture was fully equal to that of any men in this or any other country; and, if the produce of the land was not equal to that raised by our best farmers, the difference must be attributed rather to the soil and climate, than to any deficiency either of capital, of skill, or of assiduity.
On such property the wheat sown was very insignificant, and the proportion of that grain to rye, had gradually declined of late years. One nobleman, who farmed his estate of 26,000 acres, of which two-thirds was tillage, and one-third woodland, grew but a few acres of wheat, and of late had sold no corn of any kind. From the ports of England being shut against corn, he had turned his attention to the production of fine wool. On this estate there is a flock of 15,000 Merino sheep, yielding on an average two and a half pounds of fine wool, the annual sales of which amount to one half more than the value of the sheep. Through the five winter months, the sheep are fed with corn, chiefly rye, at the rate of one pound per day, which is estimated to be equal to three pounds of hay. The proprietor calculated, that sheep thus kept, yielded nearly as much more wool as, added to the benefit which the manure of the animals received from that kind of food, was equal to the price he should have received for the corn, if he had sold it; and that the profit, on this system, was the value of the whole of the hay, which would have been otherwise consumed. Instead of selling he finds it more profitable to buy corn.
On the same property, the extent of land planted with potatoes, was upwards of 1,500 morgens, or about 1,000 acres, the chief part of which were used in the distillery, which seems an indispensable adjunct to every well-managed farm. The calculation made there was, that two bushels of potatoes yielded as much ardent spirit, as one of barley; and that the residuum, after extracting the spirit, was equal in alimentary power, for the draft bullocks, which are fed with it, to two-thirds of its value, before the wort was extracted from it. By the process on this estate, nine bushels of potatoes are mixed with one of malt, to draw the wort, which is afterwards distilled, so as to produce a spirit containing 80 per cent of alcohol, in which state it pays a duty (much complained of) of sixpence per gallon. It is reduced, before it is sold, till it retains 50 percent of alcohol; and the price charged to the retailers is about fourteen-pence per gallon.
Another person of the same rank, who bad turned his attention to the improvement of his property, boasted that his corn land already yielded near six-fold for the seed that was sown, and could be further increased. He, too, cultivated potatoes very extensively; and, by convening them into starch and treacle, made that land yield a profit which had it been devoted to corn would have produced a loss. He had tried to make sugar from potatoes, and found it not advantageous; but he assured me that treacle paid him well, and he could afford to sell it at 18 s. per cwt. whilst that from the West Indies cost 24 s. I could perceive no difference between the sweetness of this treacle and that from the tropics, but it has less consistency.
A nobleman whom I had before known, to whose hospitality I am much indebted, and whose estate I viewed in detail, took the trouble to furnish me with the course of cultivation he pursued on the property on which he resides [see Appendix, No. 12.3 Though cultivated with care, and though fairly productive, I readily give credit to what he assured me, that the whole benefit which he derived from the estate of 6,300 acres, in his joint capacity of landlord and cultivator, had not exceeded the amount for which he had sold his annual clip of the wool of his flock of 4,000 sheep.
On the several other estates that I viewed, the recurrence of corn crops was
424
equally distant; the superior portion of land devoted to green crops and pasture, the same; and the stock of cattle bore nearly a like proportion. These, however, were exceptions, few in number and confined in extent, when compared with the general condition of the estates of the three provinces.
A number of proprietors, residing on their lands, devoting their time and attention to its improvement, and acquiring the practical and economical habits which their affairs render necessary, must have a beneficial influence on the cultivators around them. In this view, perhaps, the distress which has been occasioned by the depressed prices of agricultural produce, may, at some future time, under happier auspices, be highly advantageous to the community. But, in the mean time, the influence of the best specimens of cultivation have been very limitted. Few of the proprietors have any capital to buy sheep or other stock, or to enable them to wait for those returns of their outlays, which come in with the most dilatory pace where the management of land is the best. He who has to answer the demands of the labourers, the tax collectors, and, where it occurs, of the gatherer of rent, or of interest on mortgages, must sell his corn at any price that is offered for it, without waiting to convert it into wool, as the nobleman to whom I have alluded is enabled to do. It is more the state of embarrassment, in which almost all the proprietors are placed, than the want of knowledge or assiduity, that prevents the Agriculture of the Prussian dominions from making more considerable advances.
Formerly, the majority of the estates, as belonging to nobles, and only capable of being held by that class, were nearly inalienable; but the necessity of relieving the most harassed of that body, induced, the government to form a plan by which money might be borrowed on the security of land. At first this power was confined to the lands of the nobles, but was afterwards extended to all others.
The Landschaft, or States, a local assembly of the principal proprietors, were authorized to make a valuation of such estates as were to be mortgaged, and to issue writings denominated pfandbriefe, or mortgage debentures, which bore interest, and were transferable with little trouble and expense, on which one-half, and in some, instances, six-tenths of the Landscbaft's

425
valuation was easily borrowed. As the valuations of the estates were made upon a low scale of the prices of produce, and on a low estimate of the annual quantum of such produce, they were deemed the best security that could be offered. In a country where no government funds were in existence, or none in which the public bad much confidence, these kind of securities became the natural deposits of such accumulations of money as were not intended to be exposed to any risks. Hence the fortunes of widows and orphans, the capital of churches, schools, hospitals, and charitable institutions of various descriptions, were invested in such securities. From 1794, when the valuations were made, the gradual rise of the prices of the produce made the payment of the interest on the debts very slightly burthensome, and such was the regularity with which the interest was paid, and such the confidence in the security, that those pfandbriefe became worth a premium of ten per cent, and sometimes even of more.
At the time of the valuation, the system of duty work, as known in France by the name of corves, was general. The taxes on the land, for the families who fell in defence of their country in the late war, and for such as were disabled, were not imposed, and those for the local purposes of roads, bridges, the poor, and other objects, were much lower than they are at present. Whilst, by gradual steps, for the last ten years, the price of all kinds of corn, except of wheat, which is the smallest portion, bas fallen below those at which the valuations were calculated in the year 1794, the increase of taxes and of the prices of labour have been advancing. Thus many of the estates, which, for the first twenty years, could easily discharge the demands upon them, are now become utterly unable to meet those demands. I bad heard so many tales of the distress occasioned by this course of events, that I wished to ascertain the extent of it as accurately as possible. Having found in Mr. Rothe, the president of West Prussia, as well a disposition to communicate information of every kind, as the qualities of accuracy and discrimination, I was induced to submit to him, in writing, some queries on this, as well as on some other subjects, which he very politely and speedily answered.
The replies, in Appendix, No. 11. (A.) show, that of 262 estates, within the limits
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of the landschaft's authority, 195 are incumbered with mortgages, and only 67, about a quarter, are free from those incumbrances. Of the 195 estates so incumbered, 71 were already in a state of sequestration, a remedy to which none of the mortgages would have recourse but in cases of extremity. I was more than once told, with what truth I would hesitate to say, that most of the 67 large estates not appearing in the hypothecation books to be incumbered, had been prevented by testamentary, or other family settlements, from being brought within the circle of the landschafts valuation, I was informed by an intelligent man, who is a member of the states, that many estates have been suffered to remain in the possession of the nominal proprietors, because the interest of the money lent on them ceases as soon as a process is commenced, and because they cannot be sold for so much as has been advanced on them; besides which, when in a state of sequestration, they are so carelessly managed by officers of the government, that they become from bad to worse.
The mortgagees are thus induced to leave them in the hands of the apparent owners in the hope of a change of times, and from the fear of diminishing still more, the value of their slight security. Besides these mortgages, which are registered in the hypothecation books of the landschaft, many of these large estates, when the value of the produce was very high, were enabled to borrow, on subsequent mortgages; which, as they are of no validity till those registered are liberated, have in many instances, been attended with a total loss to the lenders.
It is obvious that, when that which for a long period has been deemed the most secure, if not the only secure investment for money, becomes of no avail, the consequence must be highly distressing, and peculiarly so, because the principal suffering must, of necessity, fall on those least able to contend with the adverse circumstances in which they are placed.
The new proprietors, who have been raised to that condition by the abolition of the ancient feudal tenures, though they can scarcely ever want the bare necessaries of life, have very little beyond them. If they happen to be both industrious and economical, their own labour, on the small portion of land which they possess, will supply them with potatoes and some little bread corn, as well as provision for their

427
two oxen. They all grow a small patch of flax, and some contrive to keep five or six sheep. If disposed to labour beyond the time required for their own land, there is a difficulty in obtaining employment; and in the winter months, which are long and severely cold, no agricultural work can be performed. The flax and the wool spun in their cottages must supply the cloathing of the family; and the fat of the animals they kill must be converted into soap and candles. Meat of any kind can be rarely afforded to be eaten by such families; and only the few who are more prosperous than their neighbours can keep a cow to supply them with milk. They consume nearly all they produce, and are considered happy if they have a sufficient surplus for sale to meet the demands of a few shillings annually for the payment of their trifling taxes and local assessments. It was the universal opinion of all with whom I had any conversation on the topic, that this description of peasants were hitherto in a worse condition than under the old tenures; and, as this was attributed to the depression of agriculture, and the want of capital, and of incitement to the large occupiers to employ their spare time, it was not considered to be an impeachment of the wisdom which had planned and executed their emancipation.
Though the rate of wages is very low [see Appendix, No. 11], not averaging more than five-pence per day, yet the day labourers who have constant employment, with a cottage, potatoe ground, and flax patch, are said to be somewhat better circumstanced than those persons who have been recently raised from the feudal ranks to that of freehold proprietors.
Those labourers who are boarded in the houses of their employers have a sufficiency of food, consisting of rye bread, potatoes, of buck-wheat made into soups of various kinds; and in many instances are provided with meat, commonly bacon, twice a week.
The aged and infirm poor have demanded consideration only since the abolition of the feudal tenure. Before that period, each lord considered himself bound to assist in their support, and generally attended to that duty, where the deficiency of means in the power of the relations of the aged and infirm made it requisite. A regular system of taxation for the poor has not yet been introduced, though the first steps towards it have
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been taken. The assessment for the widows and orphans of those who fell in the late conflicts, and for such as were disabled in the service, has been already noticed. It is kept distinct from all other levies, and is, of course, gradually diminishing in amount, as the persons entitled to receive it are removed by death. The money requisite for the other poor, is supplied from local funds, arising from general assessments, made for the maintenance of bridges, for repair of roads, drains, and embankments, for the support of schools, and for some other similar purposes. The practice of supporting the indigent is of very recent date, and has not hitherto produced the effect of lessening the sympathy which the needy feel for each other, or the charity which the more affluent exercise towards their distressed neighbours; and the sense of shame yet remains as a bar against application to the communal taxes, except in the greatest extremity.
A very intelligent and benevolent nobleman, at whose house I spent a few days, assured me, that in the extensive, but thinly-peopled district where he had a share in the directing the assessments and expenditure of the local taxes, there was but one family which subsisted wholly on those taxes; and that others depended on the kindness of relatives and friends, with some occasional assistance from the local fund.
In general the soil of the maritime provinces of Prussia is so light, that it may be easily ploughed with two oxen, and those of diminished size, and no great strength. I have not unfrequently seen, on the smaller portions of land, a single cow drawing the plough, and whilst the plough was guided by the owner, the cow was led by his wife. The more tenacious soils, on the banks of the streams, are commonly but of small extent. There is indeed a large portion of land in the Delta, formed by the separation of the Nogat from the Vistula, between Derschau and Marienburg, which, under a good system of management, would be highly productive, and which requires greater strength to plough. There are some others, especially near Tilsit, of less extent; but the whole of them, if compared with the great extent of the surface of the country, are merely sufficient to form exceptions to the general classification which may be made of the soil. The various implements of husbandry are quite of as low a

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description as the working cattle. The ploughs are ill-constructed with very little iron in them. The harrows are made of wood, without any iron, even for the tines or teeth. The waggons are mere planks, laid on the frame loose, and resting against upright stakes, fixed into its sides. The cattle are attached to these implements by ropes, without leather in any part of the harness. The use of the roller is scarcely known, and the clods, in preparing the fallow ground, are commonly broken to pieces by hand with wooden mallets. In sowing, the seed is carried in the apron, or the skirts of the frock of the man who scatters it on the ground.
The monied value of the live stock on the farms is low. The best flocks of Merino sheep, exclusive of the wool, is averaged to be worth about 6s. or 6s. 8d. per head. Cows are worth from 30 s. to 65 s. A dairy, which I saw, of the best description, was let to a dairyman at 36 s. per year. The owner told me he valued them at 75 s. per head, and thought the average weight of the butter from each, the calf being taken from the mother when ten days old, was about 120lbs. each year. The variation in the price of cows is much greater than in that of sheep, according to their race, to the soil on which they are pastured, and to the distance from large towns requiring supplies of milk and butter. The price of hay varies, according to the situation and quality, from 14 s. to 20 s. the ton.
The general burthens of the state in Prussia, are the subject of complaints among all classes; and, although they may appear to us to amount to a very small sum, rated by the number of persons, they must be considered heavy, in a country so destitute of little other capital than that of land, now vastly depreciated in value. The whole taxes in Prussia amount to about 10 s. per head; but the effective value of money, in exchange for commodities, may be considered to be double what it is with us.
Those taxes pressing peculiarly on the land are, first, the grund steuer or land-tax. This is not, however, imposed on each province, but only in those where it existed before they were united to the Prussian monarchy. This is not levied in Brandenburg, though it is collected in each of the three maritime provinces, which are the subjects of more immediate consideration. This tax was designed to be
430
25 per cent on the nett value, or annual rent of the land, and when imposed was an equable burthen. In process of time, from the improvement of some estates, and the neglect of others, and from a variety of other causes, that rate which was originally equal has become, in practice at the present day, very unequal.
The land is divided into six classes, the rent of the lowest of which is estimated to be about 7d. per acre, and that of the highest about 4s. an acre. On this amount the tax is 25 per cent, and averages in the three maritime provinces somewhat less than 3d. per acre. The gross amount collected in the three provinces annually, according to Hassel, is about 265,000 l. sterling.
The local taxes, which have been already noticed, do not fall wholly on the land. That for the disabled soldiers, and the families of such as fell in the conflicts, is in part borne by the cities and towns, though the chief weight falls on the land. The same, in some measure, is the case respecting the tax for roads, bridges, schools, and the poor. These are various in different districts, so that it is impossible to form any general estimate of their amount. In some parts of the country, I was told, that the local taxes were equal to the grund steur in their district; in some, that it was higher; and in others, that it did not amount to one-tenth. Among the cultivators, I heard much complaint of the heavy tax on the distilleries. As far as the tax operates to diminish the consumption of the grain, or other products of the land from which spirits may be extracted, it is a burthen on the land; but I have reason to believe that, from the mode in which the tax is collected, those who have distilleries on their farms, by paying the tax at a high degree of strength, and supplying it to the retailers at a lower strength, are so far from being aggrieved, that they are really benefitted by the tax.
The village clergy have commonly a house, some glebe land, and a fixed annual portion of corn, which, in most cases, is delivered to them by the lord, in pursuance of an ancient arrangement. The quantity has been long since defined, and not being subject to any alteration is scarcely ever spoken of as a burthen on the land.
The other taxes bear no more on the persons employed in agriculture than on those engaged in pursuits of a different

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kind. They are chiefly on the consumption of foreign commodities attaching to the consumers, from whatever sources they may draw the revenues by which they are enabled to indulge in the use of them.
The military service is extremely onerous, as every young man is compelled to serve three years, from the age of twenty to twenty-four, as a soldier. This, though not precisely a tax, and not peculiar to the agricultural class, is a burthen which perhaps presses as much on the productive industry of the country, as the heavier taxes that are collected in other countries. To this must be added the quartering of the troops, who are billetted on private houses; and however well discipline may be maintained amongst them, must be a great annoyance, and in most cases an expense, which, though apparently trifling in amount, becomes weighty to those whose means of supporting it are small.
In a country where four fifths of the inhabitants subsist wholly by producing food, and depend for the conveniences besides bare food, on the price which they can obtain for their surplus, the low rate at which that surplus can be disposed of must be felt and observed in every rank of society.
The scale of living in the country we are considering, corresponds with the low prices of the objects in which their labour is employed. The working class of the inhabitants, amounting in the maritime provinces to upwards of a million, including both those who work for daily wages and those who cultivate their own little portions of land, cannot be compared to any class of persons in England. This large description of the inhabitants live in dwellings provided with few conveniences, on the lowest and coarsest food; potatoes, or rye or buck wheat are their chief, and frequently their only food; linen, from flax of their own growth; and wool, spun by their own hands, both coarse and both worn as long as they will hold together, furnish their dress; whilst an earthen pot that will bear fire forms one of the most valuable articles of their furniture.
As fuel is abundant, they are warmed more by close stoves than by the shelter of their wooden or mud houses, covered by shingles, which admit the piercing cold of the severe weather through abundant crevices. If they have bees and a plot
432
of chicory, their produce serves as a substitute for sugar and coffee; but too often these must be sent to market to raise the scanty pittance which the tax-gatherer demands. Though the price of whiskey is low, yet the farm produce is still lower, and neither that nor the bad beer which is commonly brewed, can be afforded by the peasantry as a usual drink.
In common seasons this description of people suffer much in the winter; but in times of scarcity, such as followed the disastrous harvest of 1816, their distress and their consequent mortality is largely increased.
It is not intended to insinuate that all the small farmers are in the circumstances here described. In some situations there is a most pleasing difference; on the banks of the Oder, below Kustrin, a colony is established on a rich tract of land, called the Neiderung, recovered by embankment from the river; The inhabitants were invited here on account of a persecution of the Protestants in Bavaria and the Palatinate, during the reign of Frederick the Great. They are exempt from most burthens, the soil is highly fertile, and the district more resembles some parts of Flanders than the other districts of Prussia. The properties are from six to twenty acres, but subdividing as the population increases, as each of the sons share the land alike. It is thickly peopled, and most of the produce is consumed on the spot where it grows.
A similar district near Dantzic, on the banks of the Vistula, called the Neherung, exhibits a similar picture. The chief inhabitants are a religious sect, called Menonites whose principles forbid them to become soldiers, from which they are excused, on condition of paying a higher rate of taxation.
On the banks of the Nieman, and in some other spots, are similar groups of small occupiers in tolerably easy circumstances. They are, however, not a thirtieth part of the whole of the class, and where they occur are only exceptions to the general description.
As these people happen to be placed in spots of rare fertility, to be freed from some imposts, and to be distinguished by their sobriety, industry and economy, they are going on increasing in numbers, till, in a few years, the division of land will be so great as to cause the necessity of removal to less-peopled districts.
The representation of the distressed

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state of the agricultural inhabitants of this part of the Prussian dominions, which has been here given, receives confirmation from the proceedings of the Landschaft, or assembly of the provisional States of Prussia, in their last session. The address of the assembly has not been made public, but is said to have been framed in very melancholy strains, and to have urged the king to take some measures of a decided nature respecting the introduction of British goods, in order to induce our government to make some alteration in the Corn laws. Whatever may have been the representation of the states, the reply of the king, which has been published, gives an air of probability to the rumours, that it had an object, in some degree of this kind:
"With regard to the prayer for an intercession with the English government to repeal the Corn bill, his majesty expressed a hope, that to improve the intercourse between the two nations, a change will take place in the English Corn laws."
"Berlin, 26th November, 1825, from the Hamburgh paper, 'The Correspondent.'"
One of the effects of the agricultural distress, which was visible in the condition of the inhabitants, seemed to be a decrease in the cultivation of bread corn.
The replies of the president Rothe, [see Appendix, No 11, B.] shows that on six farms, amounting together to 10,390 acres, of which eight years ago 6,926 acres were cultivated with grain, there are at present only 4,864 acres applied to that purpose. Mr. Gibson, his majesty's consul at Dantzic, states, in a letter received since my return, dated 24th November, 1825, that the "cultivation of wheat has been much circumscribed of late years; and that it will take much time to extend it; that flax is cultivated now to a much greater degree than formerly in East, and parts of West Prussia; that the export of butter is increasing very much; that rape seed is attracting much attention; and that these circumstances, with the breeding of sheep, will further operate in diminishing the production of grain." It appears, too, by the official returns of exports [see Appendix, No 10,] that the excess of exports of corn in the years 1821, 1822, and 1823, had much declined from those of former years; and that in the year 1824, the maritime provinces of Prussia, instead of having any surplus of wheat, imported 47,236 quarters more than they exported.
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This quantity may probably have been added to the former accumulation, but, if so, it is still evidence of a decline in the actual produce of wheat in the Prussian territories.
Those Prussian provinces to which my chief attention was directed have never been manufacturing districts, although they have, during a long series of years, made both linen and woollen cloths for their own use. They have had rather domestic labour than any establishment for the purpose; of late, however, attempts have commenced upon a larger scale, and projects were in agitation of various kinds, for making woollens and cottons in manufactories where the aid of machinery was to be applied. The chief inducement to these attempts was the low price of provisions, and the consequent expectation of a low rate of labour; they were, however, but attempts, and were not viewed with any very promising expectations by the persons I had any opportunity of conversing with on the subject. They seem to be rather the creations of the government, than the spontaneous issue of the deliberate calculations of capitalists seeking for beneficial modes of employing their money.
The only kind of goods that I heard of, calculated for distant markets, are some made of the native coarse wool, dyed deep blue, trials to introduce which have been made in England. These are made by some small farmers who were employed in the summer on the land. They are made out of 181bs. or 20lbs. of wool, worth about sixpence per pound. The spinning is performed by the females of the family, whilst the father weaves them. It employs him three days to weave a piece, which is about sixteen yards in length, and forty-two inches wide. The value of his day's work was slated to be 9d. thus making that part of the labour which he executed, to be 2s. 3d. The fulling is performed at a public mill, and the finishing and dying is executed in Berlin, by persons who send their agents to the farm-houses to collect the cloths in their rough state. I was told that these kind of cloths might be afforded in London at little more than 2s. per yard, and were calculated for negro clothing. As the spinning is the most material part of the labour, and that is performed at leisure time, the maker's gain is the whole of that, as the time would be otherwise unemployed. Manufactures of this kind are useful in the state

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of society which exists where these goods are fabricated, but the limits to their extension are necessarily very confined.
I have no reason to think that hitherto the low price of corn has had the effect of lowering the price of manufacturing labour, in any degree approaching to the depression which the products of the soil have experienced. In the building of ships, which is indeed the chief manufactory of the maritime provinces, the rates of wages have very considerably fallen, not, indeed, so much as bread, but to an extent that has increased the building of vessels, and induced some English houses to contract for the building of Prussian vessels to be employed in distant voyages.
The effect, however, of the low prices of agricultural produce, is more experienced in the provisions for the crew, than in the cost of the constructions of the ships. This may be seen in the cost of food for a Prussian ship in the Appendix, No. 13. It is true that our seamen are accustomed to better food than the Prussians, but their superior professional skill makes up for the difference. Besides, as the Baltic is frozen several months in the year, the loss of time seems to be more than a compensation for the differences in the price of food.
In pursuance of the instructions that were given to me by your lordships, I made every attempt in my power to ascertain the actual cost of the wheat to the growers of that grain in Prussia. Whoever has made similar attempts in this country, however well he may have been acquainted with all the practical details, even if he could obtain with most scrupulous accuracy the amount of seed sown and harvested, has found them attended with such difficulties, as to afford no great degree of confidence in the results obtained.
Thus, for instance, in our common four years course of turnips, barley, clover and wheat, though it may be easy to ascertain the whole expenditure in rent, taxes, labour, manure, interest of capital, and deterioration in the working cattle and utensils during the four years, yet scarcely any two persons will agree in the apportioning that expenditure to each of the four crops. The relative value of those crops to one another will vary in every year, one will be good, another indifferent, another very bad. The value of the feed to the cattle fed on the produce of the first and
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third years will be very differently estimated by different persons. The proportions of the expense of fallowing and manuring will be distributed among the several crops, according to the arbitrary rules of adjustment which the individual making the calculation has formed in his own mind, from his own local and particular observation.
It is an easy task, if farming accounts are regularly kept, to ascertain at the end of the four years how much has been gained or lost during the rotation; but the distribution of that loss or gain is subject to so many variations of opinion, and so many vicissitudes depending on situation, soil and weather, as to prevent reliance from being placed on any estimate of the real cost of either one of the descriptions of grain.
The same obstacles will present themselves to the attainment of accuracy, where any other rotation of crops is adopted.
If the difficulty is thus great in attaining, or even approximating to certainty in the cost price of any particular description of corn in this country, it may well be deemed much more bold to hazard an opinion on that subject, in a foreign country, where many circumstances, which can be but imperfectly known to a stranger and temporary visitor, may have a powerful influence.
I received many statements from the different persons with whom I conversed on the subject, as to what they considered to be the actual cost in a number of years, of wheat and other corn. These, as may be supposed, widely varied from each other. Although I was fully convinced that for several years the loss on the mass of agricultural products throughout the maritime provinces of Prussia has been very great; and that, instead of leaving any thing for rent, that has been much more than absorbed, yet I could place no reliance on the accuracy of any statements which attempted to define the exact limits of the loss on each kind of corn.
In founding a calculation on the answers of president Rothe, though I give to that gentleman's facts the most implicit confidence, yet I should hesitate, if he had stated what was the cost price of wheat and rye, to yield to him the same assent; I have no doubt, however, he is accurate in stating, that the loss on the corn grown in the year 1824, without allowing any thing for rent, was 20 per cent. Accord-

437
ing to the paper in Appendix, No. 11, the price at which the wheat on the estate described was sold in the year 1824, when the crops were good, was one thaler and a half per scheffel, or three shillings per bushel, by which a loss of 20 per cent was incurred, besides the whole of the rent, according to which the cost price to the farmer would be about 28 s. 9d. per quarter on the spot.

s.

d.

Sale price 3s. per bushel or per quarter

24

0

Loss, estimated at 20 per cent

4

9

28

9

Allowance for rent, calculated at 1/10 of the gross proceeds

2

3

Which would make the cost If to this be added,

31

0

Shipping charge, and merchant's commission or profit

2

9

Freight, primage and insurance to London

8

0

Lighterage, landing charge and commission in England

1

3

43

0

The cost of wheat may be in some degree approximated to, by ascertaining the selling prices for a series of years. If that series be short, it may be affected by various intervening events, such as war, invasion, or deficient harvests; but by being spread over a long series, the effect of adventitious circumstances became lessened. It is reasonable to calculate, that in a long series, the profit on corn cannot be much above that on other branches of industry in the same country. If the profits on raising corn are much above those of other occupations, an increased quantity, to the production of which the augmented capital might contribute, would cause the price to fall; if those profits were much lower, a diminution of supply, to which the loss of capital would contribute, would tend to raise the prices.
Although from the fluctuation in the productiveness of different years, corn is Jess subject to the general abstract principles by which supply and demand, as regards other commodities, are regulated, in a short period; yet, in a long period such as thirty or forty years, or longer, it also must be governed by them.
Without going back to the long list of prices for the last hundred and sixty years, for which, see Appendix No. 24, we may
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adopt that which begins in 1791, and ends in 1825, Appendix, No. 13; for five of those years no prices are given, because the ports were shut. The average of the whole of these years, taking the lowest and highest price of each year, and disregarding the difference of the quantities sold in the several years, gives the price at 2l. 5s. 11 d. per quarter. The largest quantity was sold in the years when the price was highest, being, probably, the stocks which had accumulated during the years of low prices. The price of those years may therefore be considered as speculating prices. If the years 1800, 1801, 1805, 1817, and 1818 be struck out, the average price of the thirty remaining years will be 1l. 13 s. 6d. If we suppose a profit to be made often per cent by the dealers in corn, these thirty years will give, as the cost price to the grower, after paying rent, a price nearly approaching to that which is given before, as calculated on the data furnished by president Rothe.
Without placing much reliance on it, yet some corrobation is received, by the market prices of Berlin, for the last eleven years, where the average price of the best Polish wheat has been 1l. 16 s. 6d. or about ten per cent higher than the average of Dantzic, for the thirty years to which we have referred. This may be accounted for, partly by the quality of the wheat, and partly from the additional conveyance and consequent expenses. The returns from Berlin, taken on St. Martin's day in each year from 1774 to 1821, for which, see Appendix, No. 17, give, as the average price for the fifty years, 1l. 14 s. 6d. As the best of the wheat is probably brought to the capital, some allowance must be made for the superior quality, and also something for the profit of the dealers, through whose hands it has passed. This will bring it sufficiently near to the price here assumed, to give probability to the calculation.
Although since the return of peace, no alleviation of the public contributions have been applied, and no diminution of the other subjects of expenditure which compose the cost of growing corn, has been experienced, yet the contrast between the first and last five years since that event took place in the prices of corn is so striking, that it deserves to be noticed. In Dantzic the average of the five years, from 1816 to 1820 inclusive, gives for wheat 2l. 14 s. 5d. per quarter, and that for the years 1821 to 1825 inclusive, 1l.

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6s. 2d. In Berlin the average for the first five years, is 2l. 6s. 4d. and for the second 1l. 6s. 7d.
The far greater part of that division of ancient Poland which is now comprehended in the viceregal kingdom of that name is a level country, with scarcely an ascent or descent, except where the courses of the rivers have formed channels below the general level of the country. As these rivers, though in summer they appear small streams, are swollen by the rains of autumn, and the melting of the snow on the Carpathian mountains in the spring, they form large channels, extending on both sides to a great distance; and their deposit, in many parts, enriches the land, and it presents in the summer the aspect of verdant and luxuriant meadows. In other parts the periodical swellings of the streams have formed morasses, which, in their present state, are not applicable to any agricultural purposes. The plains, which extend from the borders of one river to another, are open fields, with scarcely any perceptible division of the land, and showing scarcely any trees even around the villages. The portion of woodland on these plains is very extensive; but they are in large masses, with great intervals of arable land between them.
The soil is mostly sandy, with occasional mixture of a sandy loam; it is very thin, resting chiefly on a bed of granite, through which the heavy rains gradually percolate. Such a soil is easily ploughed; sometimes two horses or two oxen, and not unfrequently two cows, perform this and the other operations of husbandry.
This representation of the kingdom of Poland is strictly applicable to six of the eight waiwoodships or provinces into which it is now divided.
To the south of the river Pilica, which comprehends the two provinces of Sandomir and Cracow, the appearance of the land, and the face of the country improve; and, in proceeding south to the banks of the Vistula, there is to be seen a more undulating district and a more tenacious and fruitful soil. Much of the land is a clayey loam, requiring three or four horses to plough it, yielding, when tolerably managed, crops of excellent wheat and oats; and, where the husbandry is so good as to have adopted the practice of sowing clover between the two corn crops, the produce is very abundant.
The southern point of this district, forming now an independent republic,
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called, from the name of its capital, Cracow, is very fertile. It extends along the Vistula about 20 miles, and contains in 500square miles or 320,000 acres, about 100,000 inhabitants.
Some of the estates in Poland, belonging to the nobility of the highest rank are of enormous extent; but, owing to the system of dividing the land among all the children, unless a special entail secures a majorat to the eldest son, which is in some few instances the case, much of it is possessed in allotments which we should deem large; but which, on account of their low value, and when compared with those of a few others, are not so. Of these secondary classes of estates, 5 or 6,000 acres would be deemed small and 30 or 40,000 acres large.
There are besides these, numerous small properties, some of a few acres, which, by frequent subdivisions, have descended to younger branches of noble families. The present owners are commonly poor, but too proud to follow any profession but that of a soldier, and prefer to labour in the fields with their own hands rather than to engage in trade of any kind. As titles descended to every son, and are continued through all the successors, the nobility have naturally become very numerous; but since the emperor of Russia has gained the dominion over Poland, the use of titles has been restricted. No one can assume that of baron, unless his clear income from his estates exceed 1,000 gulden, or 25 l.; none that of count, whose rents are less than 3,000 gulden or 75 l.; and none that of prince, who has less than 5,000 gulden or 125 l.
The whole of the lands are made alienable, and may now be purchased by persons of any rank, and are actually held by some who are burghers or peasants; the Jews alone are prohibited from becoming proprietors of the soil, though they have very numerous mortgages upon it. When they foreclose, the lands must consequently be sold; and, as these Jews, the monied capitalists, cannot become purchasers, the prices they yield are very trifling.
The most numerous class of cultivators are peasants, they have a limited property in the lands which they occupy, and the cottages in which they live, under the condition of working a stipulated number of days in each week, on their lord's demesne, and paying specified quantities of produce, such as poultry, eggs, yarn

441
and other things, in conformity with ancient usage.
The extent of these holdings vary, according to the quality of the land, and the quantity of duty work, or of payments in kind, which are to be fulfilled.
On a large property which I examined, the peasants had about forty-eight acres of land each, for which they were bound to work for two days in every week with two oxen. If their labour was further required, they were paid three-pence per day for two other days; and, if beyond that number, sixpence per day: on another property, I found the peasants had about thirty-six acres, for which they worked two days in each week, with two oxen; when called upon for extra labour, they are paid sixpence a day for themselves and oxen for the next two days, or if they work without their oxen, three-pence.
If their labour is demanded the remaining two days in the week, the sum to be paid is made the subject of a special agreement; on one estate the peasants had but twenty-four acres, and did one day's work themselves, with one horse; the rest of their labour was paid for in money, by agreement made at the time it was required. Another proprietor, on land somewhat exhausted, granted to each of his peasants more than fifty acres of land, for which they worked with two horses three days in a week. It would be easy to give instances of more various rates of duty-work, and of the quantity of land which is appropriated for its performance. Some are of a luxurious and of a ludicrous kind. I was told that the inhabitants of two whole villages, near a princely domain, hold their lands on condition of employing a certain number of days in each week, in cleaning the walks, and keeping in good order the pleasure-grounds, which surround the vast castle of their benevolent and hospitable lord.
In general, this peasantry is in a condition of great distress, and involved in debt to their lord. They are no longer slaves, or adstricti glebæ. By the constitution promulgated in 1791, they were declared free, and that part of the constitution suffered no alteration under the dominion of the Russians and Prussians; was confirmed when the king of Saxony became sovereign, and was again assured in 1815, when the emperor of Russia was enthroned as king of Poland.
The practical effects of the privileges
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thus granted have hitherto been very inconsiderable. The peasants can leave their land, but must first acquit the pecuniary demands of their lords. Few are able to do this, as most of them are in arrears. The lords must supply them with their oxen, in case one dies; their plough and other implements must be furnished to them by him; and in years of scarcity they become involved in debt, for the requisite subsistence of themselves and their cattle. This, together with local attachments, and the habit of respect for their feudal superior, has, in general, prevented the peasants from wandering away from the houses of their fathers, and from the protection of their chief. It thus rarely happens that the peasants quit the estates on which they have been born; and the instances that do occur, are chiefly to be attributed to the embarrassed circumstances into which their lord may fall. A declining property produces a necessitous peasantry, and such may sometimes be induced to try their fortune under another proprietor.
A gentleman, with whom I formed are acquaintance, had been compelled to take an estate which was mortgaged to him. He found no peasants on it; the land was neglected, and the buildings delapidated. As no tenant would take it at any rent, he was under the necessity of farming it. To induce peasants to come to him, he granted them a larger portion of land than was customary on that quality of soil, built them houses, supplied them with oxen and implements, sowed the corn of the first year, and fed them till it was fit to be converted into food. By these means, though he was enabled to get his labour performed, yet he assured me it was by persons of the least skill, industry, and sobriety.
The want of peasantry is a general subject of complaint, especially among those (who are far the greater number) whose estates are loaded with mortgages or other incumbrances; such sometimes lose them, but cannot command the means of inducing new ones to settle on the lands.
Though no longer slaves, the condition of the peasants is but little practically improved by the change that has been made in their condition. When a transfer is made, either by testament or conveyance, the persons of the peasantry are not indeed expressly conveyed, but their services are, and in many instances are the most valuable part of the property.
It is said, that when the freedom of the peasants was first decreed, it was viewed by them with great distrust. They were alarmed with the apprehension that in age or sickness, or other incapacity, they should be abandoned by their lords, and left to perish in want; by the form that society has taken in the course of the thirty-four years that have passed since the alteration was enacted, their alarms have been dispelled; and the same acts of kindness being exercised in most cases as were formerly customary, they can perceive no alteration in their condition that is either materially more beneficial or injurious to them.
These people live in wooden huts, covered with thatch or shingles, consisting of one room with a stove, around which the inhabitants and their cattle crowd together, and where the most disgusting kinds of filthiness are to be seen. Their common food is cabbage, potatoes sometimes, but not generally, pease, black bread, and soup or rather gruel, without the addition of butter or meat. Their chief drink is water, or the cheap whiskey of the country, which is the only luxury of the peasants; and is drunk, whenever they can obtain it, in enormous quantities. They use much salt with their vegetable food; and, in spite of the heavy tax on that commodity, can never dispense with the want of it at their meals. I was informed, and saw reason to credit the accounts, that when the peasants brought to the market towns their trifling quantities of produce, a part of the money was first used to purchase salt, and the rest spent in whiskey, in a state of intoxication that commonly endured till the exhaustion of the purse had restored them to sobriety. In their houses they have little that merits the name of furniture; and their clothing is coarse, ragged, and filthy, even to disgust.
Very little attention has been paid to their education, and they are generally ignorant, superstitious, and fanatical. They observe about twenty holidays in the year, besides the Sundays; and pass much of their time in pilgrimages to some favourite shrine, in counting beads, and similar superstitious occupations.
This representation of the condition and character of the peasantry, though general, cannot be considered so universal as to admit of no exceptions; some rare instances of perseverance in economy, industry and temperance are to be found;
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and, unfavourable as their circumstances may be for the creation of such habits, they are here attended by the usual correspondent results. Some few peasants have been enabled to gain three or four allotments, and to employ their sons or hired servants to work for them; and there are instances of such persons making a still further progress, and being enabled to purchase estates for themselves. Such cases as these, however, occur so rarely, that though they produce individual comfort and wealth, they have no perceptible influence on the general mass of society, or on the surplus quantity of agricultural productions.
As may be naturally inferred, from the system under which labour is applied to the land, that labour is performed in the most negligent and slovenly manner possible. No manager of a large estate can have his eye constantly on every workman; and, when no advantage is gained by care in the work, it will naturally be very imperfectly executed. All the operations of husbandry struck me to be very ill performed: the ploughing is very shallow and irregular; the harrows with wooden tines do not penetrate sufficient to pull up weeds in fallowing; the roller is almost unknown, and thus the land is filled with weeds of all descriptions. I observed the same want of attention in threshing; and it appeared to me that a much greater proportion of the grain was left among the straw, than in that which has passed under an English flail. In short, the natural, effects of the system of duty-work was visible in the whole of the administration of the large estates where it is followed, with the exception of those few proprietors who have intelligent and active managers, and are free from pecuniary embarrassments.
The common course of cropping is, the old system of a whole year's fallow, followed by winter corn, and that by summer corn, and then a fallow again-. Thus one third of the land bears nothing. The winter crop in the northern part of Poland consists of wheat and rye; the proportion of the latter to the former is nearly as nine to one, and the wheat enjoys the benefit of what little manure is preserved. Thus the wheat actually cultivated does not occupy more than one thirtieth part of the arable land. In the southern part of the kingdom, the wheat bears a larger proportion to the rye, amounting, on the more tenacious soils, to a fifth; and even in some cases, to a fourth part of the rye.
The statements I could collect, and my own observations, led me to conclude the stock of cattle to be very small, in proportion to the extent of land, and to the number of inhabitants. The government of Poland has not collected those statistical facts, which are so regularly registered by the Prussian, and some other of the governments of Germany; where they have been collected, as in the case of the population of the year 1817, I believe but little accuracy is to be discovered. I found, in a conversation with one of the ministers, to whose immediate department it belonged, that no great dependence could be placed on the census of that year.
In the absence of a more recent authority, I avail myself of a Prussian document, which shows the numbers of the different kinds of cattle in the provinces of Plock, in Poland, when it was under the dominion of that power. I have no reason to suspect the accuracy of this official statement, or to believe that this province is not equal in live stock to the average of the whole kingdom. I was told there was in the province of Podolachia, a greater number of black cattle, and in the province of Lublin, a greater number of sheep than in Plock; but those provinces were represented to me as deficient in other cattle, the former having fewer sheep, the latter fewer cows.
In the year 1803, the returns from Plock were thus: 45,028 horses and colts; 196,540 oxen, cows, and young cattle; 194,133 sheep and lambs; 95,634 swine.
The extent of this province is nearly one fourth of that of the three maritime provinces of Prussia; and, thinly as those are stocked with cattle in comparison with England, it will be seen, by the following statement, how much they exceed that of the district in question:

—

PRUSSIAN Maritime Provinces.

POLISH Province of Plock.

Acres.

Acres.

Horses and Colts

1 to 42

1 to 106

Oxen, Cows, and Calves

1 to 18

1 to 24

Sheep and Lambs

1 to 10

1 to 24

Swine

1 to 35

1 to 52

If it be considered, that since the year in which the facts exhibited in this statement were collected, the country has suffered severely from being the theatre of war, from three changes of sovereigns,
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and from the low prices of all produce, it will scarcely appear probable that it has so increased in wealth as to have added materially to its stock of cattle, or even to have kept up that stock to the standard which it had reached before those visitations. It appears by the statistical account of the lordship of Pulaway and Konskowla, in the province of Lublin, which is considered to be one of the best managed estates in Poland, consisting of 119,232 English acres, that the stock of cattle, including those of the proprietor and his subjects or tenants, is somewhat below what the Prussian accounts show of the average of the province of Plock, in the year 1803. It appears to be [see Appendix, No. 18] thus,

Acres.

1 Cow or Ox to

26¾

1 Sheep or Lamb to

19

1 Horse to

156

1 Pig to

146

No country can be much better adapted for the breeding of sheep than the greater part of the kingdom of Poland. Wherever it is attended to with due skill it is found to be beneficial; but the poverty of the landholders, and their want of knowledge of the advantages to be derived from that kind of live stock, keeps them from devoting their land to their propagation.
A very intelligent physician, a native of Germany, whose acquaintance I had the pleasure to make in Poland, and who devotes the money acquired by his medical practice to the purchase and the cultivation of land, told me that he purchased, four or five years before, a flock of fine-woolled sheep of the Saxon electoral breed; that he had already sold in fleeces and lambs as much as had replaced the whole capital expended, and had at present double the number which he had originally purchased. This striking instance of success, in an experiment in rural economy, is known to most of the cultivators; and yet it has been able to produce such few followers, that I was assured there were yet in Poland only two other flocks of unmixed fine-woolled Merino sheep. This gentleman was one of the first that had cultivated green crops on an extensive scale for feeding sheep; and, though the benefit of it was obvious, both in the produce of the wool, and the increase of the quantity and quality of his corn, it has had but little influence hitherto on the conduct of others, and

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that little is confined to a small spot near the capital.
Of the sheep in Poland, the best are those in the province of Lublin; but they are very far inferior to the breed of Saxony. The cows are a smallish race, and generally kept in bad condition, both as to food and cleanliness. They are for the most part stall-fed; but, from negligence, yield very little butter and no tolerable cheese.
With the exception of a part of the two southernmost provinces, as before noticed, the soil of Poland is of such a thin nature, that where it is moderately farmed it can scarcely be made to bear a medium crop of wheat more frequently than once in nine years. I examined a farm in the province of Lublin, the proprietor of which is in easy circumstances, and possesses several other estates. The extent of this farm is about 5,500 acres. The live stock consisted of sixty milch cows, which are let to a dairyman at about 19 s. per year each; some few young cattle, eight or nine horses, and between five and six hundred sheep. The ploughing is performed by two oxen, for which and for his own labour, two days in each week, the peasant has a house, firing, and about forty acres of land, to which the manure made by his oxen is applied. About 2,000 acres is in this way in the occupation of the peasants. The manure, therefore, of the cows, sheep, and horses, is applicable to the lord's portion of somewhat more than 3,000 acres, and supplies it with more liberality than is practised on any other land near it. The whole is under the plough; there is neither meadow nor permanent pasture. The rotation of crops is as follows: the first year a clean fallow three or four times ploughed; the second year potatoes are planted; the third year wheat is sown; and in the following spring clover amongst it. The fourth and fifth years the clover is either made into hay, or used for the stall-fed cows and the horses, or fed on the land by the sheep; the sixth year, pease, or buck-wheat are grown; then it is fallowed for a year; and the eighth year a crop of rye is grown; and the ninth, or last year of the course, the land is sown with barley, oats, and buck wheat.
On this, which is considered a pattern farm, on which I have reason to believe the increase is greater than on any other in the district, the seed and produce are as follows:—potatoes, about twenty
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bushels to the acre planted, and about two hundred bushels raised; wheat, two bushels sowed, and from sixteen to twenty reaped; rye, two bushels sowed, and from twelve to fifteen reaped; buckwheat, three bushels sowed, and from ten to fifteen harvested. The barley and oats scarcely yield four times the quantity sowed; manure is applied after the potatoes for the wheat; the latter have the benefit of the fallowing, and the former of the manure. The manager, who was a man of skill, thought that when they had more cattle, and consequently more manure, he should be disposed to try the plan of sowing wheat once in seven, or even in six years, if the future prices of that grain should present sufficient inducement. This farm is one of the few in which all the labour, except that of the oxen and their drivers, is paid for in money, and not in produce. The common plan of threshing is, to give the thresher a certain proportion of the corn. This varies with the productive nature of the soil and the season, from the fourteenth to the eighteenth bushel. Here it was paid for at the rate of a florin, a trifle less than sixpence, for the korzec, a Polish measure, somewhat more than three bushels and a quarter; the mowing, reaping, and other kinds of labour, were agreed for at proportionably low prices.
Although this estate is well managed, and no rent is paid for it, I was induced to believe the assurance which was given to me, that it had not yielded any revenue to the proprietor in the last four or five years, in his joint capacity of owner and farmer. He had, however, a distillery, and near it is a village, with some establishments, on a small scale, for making coarse woollen cloths. There is no duty on the whiskey sold in country places; and the supply of that commodity in the neighbourhood, which is rather populous, leaves a profit, though not equal to the interest of the capital invested in the land, the farming stock and utensils, and the erection of the distillery.
I have dwelt the longer on the circumstances of this particular farm, not because it may be considered as showing the average increase on the usual scale of farming, but because the accounts of the receipt and expenditure, both in money and produce, are kept with great regularity. In the generality of farms which are under inferior management, the increase would be found much below the

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rate which is stated in the farm whose management I have described. If I were to generalize the whole of Poland, except the southern parts of the province of Sandomir and Cracow, I should not estimate the produce of grain to be more, if so much, as two thirds of that which appeared to be raised on the estate in question. In thus estimating, I should depend not only on my own observation of the state of growing crops, and of those which were being harvested, but on the opinion of the persons best qualified to judge, by being in the habit of looking at the amount of produce, upon a large scale, and by being furnished with the best means of judging the average of the whole.
With that description of persons, including the chiefs of several departments of the government, the prevailing opinion was, that the average produce of wheat was not more than fourteen bushels; of rye, ten; of barley, fourteen; of oats and of buck wheat, from eight to ten to the acre. Although the southern parts of Sandomir and Cracow yielded rather more, yet their corn, being celebrated for its excellent quality rather than for its much greater produce, and extending to but a small proportion of the whole even of those provinces, it was not calculated that it would have the effect of raising the average of the whole kingdom, in any sensible degree, above the rate here stated.
Upon this subject, I could have wished to have been enabled to give statistical details, rather than my own estimates, or those of persons better acquainted, than any foreigner can be, with the state of the country. If I had met with any agricultural writings expressly Polish, and had understood the language, I might have gleaned from them some facts to rectify, or to corroborate the estimate of the actual acre-able produce of grain; but as every manager of a farm, that I met with, understands the German language, and obtained whatever knowledge books could give him, from the writers of that nation, there is little inducement to compose works in Polish, on such subjects; and the German authors, though very accurate, and copious, in their statistical reports of their several districts, can know little, and can have no inducement to learn much of the statistical details of Polish agriculture.
The managers of the farms of the
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greater nobles, are commonly men of good education, as well as good manners, having been most of them officers in the army, and I found them well acquainted with the agricultural writings of Thaer, Schwartz, and other Germans; and, by means of German translations, with those of Arthur Young, sir Humphrey Davy, and other Englishmen. Being almost cut off from society, and the sports of the field not being, as with us, an object that engages much attention, they have recourse to books to relieve their solitude in the long nights of their tremendous winters.
Having noticed the two provinces which yielded the best wheat, it may not be useless to observe in addition, that but some small portions of each are highly productive, and those at that extremity of the kingdom which is the furthest removed from the ports in the Baltic, at which alone their corn can be shipped for this country.
I first entered the province of Sandomir from that of Massovia, and went through it, by the towns of Kozience and Granica, till I reached the Vistula, and crossed it at Pulaway. In this route there was nothing in the face of the country, or in the appearance of the crops, to distinguish them from those of the other parts I had noticed. On my way from the province of Lublin, I again entered Sandomir, passing the Vistula at Rachow. Prom that river, for sixty or seventy miles, the fertility, of the land was not sensibly greater than the general appearance of the other provinces. After passing Stobnica, the country vastly improved, and continued good through Nowe-Miastow, Kozyce, and Przecla-wice, till I entered the province of Cracow, at Iwanowice. It is an undulating district, somewhat hilly: the soil, a good brown loamy clay, rather stiff to plough, requiring three, or even sometimes, four horses to work it. The stubbles of wheat were tolerably thick, and proved that the crops must have been good; they were, however, far from clean, and the wheat, having been sowed after a fallow, there would have been more appearance of young clover, if the management had been well conducted. The wheat grown here is that which is known in London by the name of Dantzic white wheat; it is of the most excellent quality, very white and heavy; I did not learn that the average growth was much beyond, if it

451
reached, twenty bushels to the acre; though I heard of individual instances of a greater quantity being yielded in good years. The district is about sixty miles in length, but not broad, extending from the left bank of the river, to various, but none great, extents inland. The province of Cracow, as far as I saw it, is of nearly the same kind; I was informed that some of the northern divisions of it were poor in its agriculture, but rich in its mines of iron, coal and calamine. The territory of the republic of Cracow is like the province of the same name, in the kingdom. The marks of more freedom allowed to exertion are visible in the extensive fields of flax, and the inclosures with tobacco, maize and a great variety of garden vegetables; a part of it is likewise rich in mines of coal and calamine; and great quantities of zinc, made from the latter, have been beneficially exported to England, since the passing of the late law, by which the duty on it was reduced.
This tract of country which appeared to me so fertile, and in which I remarked more of the outward signs of comfort, does not, including the territory of the republic, in extent amount to one sixtieth part of the present kingdom of Poland. There is in it, the same suffering from the low prices of produce, and a disposition to invest any capital that can be found, in mining, rather than in cultivating the soil.
The province of Gallicia, a part of the ancient kingdom of Poland, but now added to the dominions of the Austrian empire, which stretches along the right bank of the Vistula, is, I believe, nearly as fertile as the southern part of the present kingdom of Poland, or the territory of the republic of Cracow. I passed through only that portion which lies between the salt mines of Wieliezka, and the frontiers of Moravia. I found by the accounts I obtained at Thorn [see Appendix, No. 193, that very little wheat from that rich and extensive province had been conveyed down the Vistula to the Baltic, though the access to the sea is as easy as from the south parts of the kingdom of Poland, or from Cracow; yet the trade in corn is impeded by transit duties both in Poland and in Prussia. No transit duty is charged in Poland, on the corn of its own growth; and by a treaty of commerce, concluded in the month of March last, with Prussia, the duty at Thorn is reduced to a rate that
452
is almost nominal. There is no such treaty with Austria; and the corn from Gallicia thus continues loaded with the duty, on entering the Prussian boundaries, from which that of Poland is now exempt.
I believe some of the surplus corn of Gallicia finds a vent by land carriage into the Prussian province of Silesia. It must however be but in small quantities, forming a part of that stated to be exported from Austria [see Appendix, No. 20.]
It was difficult in such a country as Poland to attain to any accuracy on the rent of land; the owners generally occupy themselves their domains, and cultivate them by the hands of their peasants.
The lands of the Crown are differently circumstanced; they comprehend one third of the whole surface, or about tea million acres; somewhat more than two millions of these are woods, which are managed by a department of the government. The remainder is chiefly arable land, and is leased to tenants. The labour of the peasants is a part of that which is leased. The tenants of the Crown are exempt, as well as their peasants, from some taxes, to which all other occupiers of land are subject, and in consequence of it the estates are better stocked with peasants. Hence, as I was assured by the chief of the department, that the peasants on the Crown lands form nearly one fourth of the whole population of the kingdom. To the farmers of these, this must be a great advantage, which but few, and only the richest and most humane lords, can partake with them.
With this freedom from taxation and ample supply of labourers, the lands are let very low; the nominal rent of eight million of acres of land, is stated in the public accounts to be four millions florins, or about ninety-five thousand pounds sterling, or somewhat less than threepence the English acre. In the average are included many acres literally of no value. I was informed, that the land actually under cultivation might be fairly stated to be worth from eight-pence to fourteen-pence per acre. It is however found that the present rent cannot be afforded, that the tenants are falling into arrears, that the hope of recovering some parts must be abandoned; and in other cases, the rent can only be paid in corn.

453
The woods belonging to the Crown, consisting, as before stated, of more than two million acres, and under the administration of a public board, are felled in portions arthually, so as to cut them every fifty years. The fiftieth part, which was cut last year (the price of wood having improved) produced, as stated to me by the chief of the department, the sum of forty-eight thousand pounds sterling, being at the rate of five-pence halfpenny the acre on the whole of the woods, or twenty-four shillings on the part actually cut.
So little land belonging to individuals is let, that it is difficult to form an opinion of what is its actual average annual value. That it is much lower than formerly, I have no doubt.
One instance came under my own observation. The proprietor of a large domain had let a farm, consisting of about seven thousand acres, on a lease, for the usual term of six years, at a rent of eight hundred and fifty pounds. That lease had expired just before I visited the place. The tenant had lost a great deal of his property, and the peasants had diminished in number; and a new lease had been taken by the same tenant, for no other could be found, at the rate of one hundred and seventy pounds.
I knew of one farm of about four thousand acres, let on a lease for six years, about four years ago, for one hundred and eighty pounds. The proprietor of it assured me, that though he received his rent regularly, he was convinced the tenant paid the whole of it out of his capital, and was only enabled to maintain his engagements from having other pursuits which were profitable. This estate is not more than twelve miles from Warsaw, and has an excellent road to within one mile of it.
Another instance of an estate recently let on lease, was related to me by the gentleman who had engaged to take it. It consists of about two thousand three hundred English acres: two-sevenths of it is water-meadow, on the banks of the Vistula, producing good hay; about three hundred acres are woodland, and the rest arable. There is a castle or capital mansion on it, which I believe was the chief motive for taking it. The rent agreed for was about ninety-five pounds a year. The lessee, who is engaged in other pursuits, told me he should try the experiment of working the land by hired annual
454
labourers, to be paid in money. He proposed to keep a flock of 400 Merino sheep, and a dairy of fifty milch cows, for the butter of which he flattered himself he should find a vent in a neighbouring manufacturing town.
These two last instances appeared to me to be exceptions to the general rate of value of rented land; and I should rather estimate the average to be much nearer that price at which the lands of the government are let. There is, in fact, scarcely any of that class of capitalists, as is familiar to us in England by the term farmer. The state of society is totally different.
Among the real Poles, there is no regular gradation of ranks between the noble proprietor and the wretched peasantry. There may be, and visibly are, differences in the condition of the peasantry, depending on the personal character of their lords, and upon the more or less embarrassed state of the property on which they may be settled. There is also a difference between the landed proprietors, owing to the different degrees of activity, economy, and attention that they exercise; but there is not a middle class of Poles. The Polish gentry are too proud to follow any course but the military career; and the government, by its large standing army, encourages the feeling, though the pay is scarcely sufficient to supply the officers with their expensive uniforms. The church has too few prizes among many thousand blanks, to induce any but the lower classes to enter on that profession. The offices of government can employ but few, and those are ill paid, and said to depend on small peculations, rather than on their salaries. Whatever difficulties may present themselves to the placing out young men of good family, none have had recourse to commerce; and, if they had, such would be treated by others as having lost their caste, and descended to a lower rank of society. The manufacturers and the artisans in Poland are almost all of the German nation. If a joiner, painter, mason, tailor, shoemaker, or a person of other similar occupations, including, too, the medical profession, is wanted, he will commonly be found only among the Germans. The merchants, bankers, and traders, are nearly as exclusively of the Jewish race, and that too of all classes from the importer of wines and colonia produce, to the dealers in rags and ok

455
clothes; from the monied man, who traffics in foreign loans and foreign exchanges, down to the lender of small sums, which the poor can obtain by pledging their miserable furniture or implements.
Examples have been recently set by some individuals of the first families and wealth, of establishing manufactories, by forming colonies, with a view of raising a race of consumers on their domains, among whom a vent may be created for the productions of the soil; but they have in almost every instance, employed foreigners to conduct their concerns, and to perform all the work above the lowest kinds of drudsery. The Germans look too earnestly forward to a return to their own country with the money they acquire, to invest it in cultivation; and the Jews are not disposed to engage in agricultural, or in any pursuits or occupations in which their shrewdness in making bargains would be of less avail than the practice of hard labour and the most rigid economy.
When estates are sold, the timber, houses, and barns are not subjects of a separate valuation, but are included in one sum in the purchase. The buildings on estates are, of necessity, more numerous and more extensive than are required in this country. From the indolent manner in which all labour is performed, a greater number of cottages is indispensable for the workmen. The corn is seldom or never formed in stacks in the open air, but is housed in barns, and the same is the case with the hay. The snow is so deep in the winter, that there is no food for cattle to be found in the fields; and such is the severity of the cold, that it is indispensable to build houses large enough to contain the whole herds of cattle, and the whole flocks of sheep. Besides the severity of the climate, the number of wolves is so great, and, in spite of all excitement by the government to destroy them, is so fast increasing, that no cattle can be left in the fields, in the winter. These animals range the country in bodies of from four to fourteen; and, when pressed by hunger, will attack any of the domesticated animals; and, indeed, no winter passes without several human beings, particularly children, falling a sacrifice to their voracity. Instances, it is said, are not uncommon of wolves undermining the foundation of sheep-houses to get at their prey.
From these circumstances, the relative expense of building on estates, compared to the value of the mere land, in spite of the low price of timber, of which those buildings are chiefly constructed, is greater than with us.
An estimate was made by a person eminently skilled in the value of land, who formed it upon actual sales made in the last four years. He divided it into three classes, according to their fertility. The lowest land in a state of cultivation, with good buildings and a competent number of peasants, he stated to be worth one thousand florins the huff. Valuing the florins at sixpence, though worth a fraction less, and taking the huff of thirty Magdeburg morgens, as equal to twenty-two English acres, the estimate would be a fraction less than twenty-two shillings sterling the English acre. The other kinds of arable land of superior qualities: vary. The great mass is of the second class, or worth about thirty shillings; but some is estimated at five thousand florins the huff, or five pounds ten shillings; but little, however, is in this class, and that little is in the vicinity of the cities, on the banks of the great rivers, or in some favoured spots in the southern provinces. This estimate was rather founded on the slate of affairs three or four years ago, I than on their present condition; for I was told that such a number of estates had lately been offered for sale, that no price could be obtained for the greater part. All the inquiries I was enabled to make, in various parts of the country, led me to the belief, that the estimation here stated was, in the main, as correct as could be expected to be framed.
The Jews are almost exclusively the dealers in money. They are precluded from becoming lauded proprietors, and their exclusion from the market tends to depress the prices in a very great degree. Though some of the richer individuals of that people pass through the ceremony of baptism, especially when they have mortgages on large estates, and mean to foreclose; the whole number of those who thus become qualified to purchase, bears but a small proportion to that of the properties that are offered for sale. I was assured from so many, and such various quarters, that I have no reason to doubt of the report, that almost every estate is deeply involved in debt. The fact is so notorious, that few proprietors feel any delicacy in acknowledging themselves to

457
be partakers of the common lot of their neighbours. More than one, without any reserve, spoke to me on the sum annually required to pay interest on his mortgages, with as much coolness as an English farmer would speak of his rent, tithes, and taxes.
Among the mortgagees, the king of Prussia, and some of his monied subjects are by far the greatest, in that part of Poland which was included in his dominions, till Poland was erected into, a grand duchy by Buonaparte, under the government of the king of Saxony. It had long been the practice of the court of Berlin to assist agriculture, by loans to the proprietors of estates. This practice began under Frederick the Great, and was continued to the disastrous period that followed the battle of Jena. This assistance was extensively afforded to the newly-acquired subjects of the part of Poland which, in the division of that un-fortunate country, fell to the share of Prussia. Though the king of Prussia has lost the government, his claims, and those of his subjects, on the individuals indebted to them, have been recognized; and though in many instances the interest has gone on increasing, the claims have not been rigidly enforced. It was rumoured in Warsaw, but not on any authority, that the emperor Alexander, in his character of king of Poland, was negociating a treaty with the court of Berlin, which had for its object the relief of the Poles, by purchasing the claims of the Prussians, and assuming the debts to himself.
The amount of the claims of Prussia was stated to me to be two millions of Prussian dollars, or three hundred thousand pounds sterling, secured on various estates extending over near fifteen hundred thousand acres.
A more numerous class of mortgages comprises the corporations of cities and towns, the trustees of hospitals, schools, colleges, monasteries, convents and charitable institutions; whatever capitals these may possess is lent on land, and the difficulty of obtaining the interest as it accrues, and in some instances of getting any, causes those establishments to languish and decrease in their capacity to relieve distress.
Family settlements are mostly made on the security of land; for a long period there was no other means of making provision for the young and the helpless; and in the flourishing periods of agricul-
458
ture, the interest was paid with punctuality; of late, however, the widows and ophans, whose incomes were deemed free from risk, have become victims to the general depression of the value of the produce of the soil.
The Jews, with all their characteristic shrewdness and sagacity, have become, in many instances, from mere necessity, mortgagees. When the debts of proprietors accumulated, and the price of produce fell, the monied men were often induced to secure themselves, as well as they could, by accepting of mortgages, where no payment could be obtained.
The representation here given is abundantly confirmed by the proceedings adopted in the Diet when assembled in May last. The two houses, consisting almost exclusively of landed proprietors, settled a plan to administer relief, which received the emperor's sanction.
A National Bank is to be established, in which landowners who are in debt, whether on mortgage or on simple contracts, may deposit a schedule of their estates, and a valuation of them: this valuation is to be made by themselves, and it is calculated it will not be made too high, because, as the present land-tax is collected on the income, and future imposts are to be levied according to this valuation, few will be induced to give in more than the true value. On the valuation, an annual interest is to be paid to the Bank, at the rate of six per cent, for twenty-eight years. This is to be considered as interest at the rate of four percent; and two per cent is to form the means of discharging, by compound interest, the principal in twenty-eight years. The Bank, on receiving the documents, is to deliver to the proprietors its debentures or certificates; which, twenty per cent being deducted from them, they are made a legal tender for the payment of all debts; and on which four per cent interest is to be paid by the Bank. When the instalment of the first year is paid, the two per cent is to be divided among all the holders of the Bank debentures, by a lottery. The drawers of the fortunate numbers will then be paid in full. The others will receive their interest, at the rate of four per cent, till their numbers are drawn prizes, some of which must, of course, wait till the expiration of the twenty-eighth year; at which period, upon this plan, if it should work well, all the debts will be liquidated.
I have only noticed this project as a corroboration of the accounts collected of the general state of embarrassment in which the landowners in Poland are involved. It may, however, be remarked, that the assumption of the proprietors being able, in their united capacity of landlord and tenant, to live on their estates, and have a surplus of six per cent on their value, is quite gratuitous, and founded on a rate of prices for produce which of late years has not been nearly realized. It leaves, too, an opening to fraud in the power of desperate proprietors, who may neglect the amount of future imposts for the sake of temporary relief. In fixing the rate of interest so low as four percent, this project sacrifices the interests of the creditors to those of the debtors; for money is worth much higher interest on the best of all securities.
The bankers of Warsaw discount their own acceptances at the rate of half per cent per month. There are but few bills, it is true, drawn on them; but, when accepted, they become to the acceptors a secure mode of making interest of their capital. The number of bills drawn in Warsaw is few, and the amount small; but the rate of interest on them may be considered as the best criterion of the actual worth of the use of money, when no risk is incurred. The bankers are said to find the most advantageous employment for their capitals in speculations in Russian and Austrian funds.
The interest of money in Poland, as elsewhere, varies much, according to the necessity of the borrower, and the greediness or suspicions of the lender, as well as the nature of the security that is offered. The Jews lend small sums frequently at two per cent per month; any sum may be easily lent at ten per cent per annum on the security of jewels, plate and other valuables; but this lending is viewed with distrust by monied men. When the interest becomes due, if it is not paid, recourse must be had to the courts of law; and a judgment must be obtained before the articles pledged can be sold. The suit may be protracted for several years, whilst the high interest is accumulating; and, at the period of decision, the sum originally lent, with the interest upon it, may amount to more than the value of the pledge.
In Poland I was forcibly impressed, by remarking how much the actual use of
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money is dispensed with in poor countries, and how much of the traffic can be carried on by barter without its intervention. It is in this kind of traffic that the lower class of the Jews are enabled to make themselves the almost indispensable agents in every transaction of buying and selling. The numbers of the country people that attend at fairs and markets, with minute quantities of commodities, excite much surprise in one who remarks the thinness of the surrounding population, whilst the number of Jews, apparently mere spectators, sauntering through such collections of peasants, seems no less extraordinary.
No paper, or any other substitute for metallic money, circulates in the country; and the value in specie of every commodity that is produced at home, is very low, and the productions of foreign countries, exclusive of the taxes that are imposed, very high.
Cows are of various races, and, I think, differ more in their value than in any country I have ever visited. The common breed of the country are worth about 27 s. or 28 s. per head. The Ukarine, or the best, from Podolia, are estimated much higher, averaging 3l.; and some few, very good, are worth 4l. 10 s. Flocks of sheep vary too, but not so much as cows; the lowest of the native breed are worth per head 3s. and the best about 5s. 6d. or 6s. Merinos are very rare at present, and worth from 8s. to 9s. per head.
The corn spirit, or whiskey, is sold in the country at 10 d. per gallon; but paying a high duty, or being a subject of monopoly, farmed by the government to distillers on the entrance of the cities and towns, is retailed in them from 3s. to 3s. 6d. per gallon. Horses, except those of foreign races, are as low in proportion as cows and sheep. The price of meadow hay in the capital was from 14 s. to 15 s. per ton; so little is sold in the country that it would have been difficult to state what is the value before the expense of conveyance is paid.
There are few burthens laid exclusively on the land, except the tenth Groschen tax. That was originally a war tax, and is so still denominated, though continued after ten years of a peace, and there exists no present probability of its being speedily withdrawn. A small sum is levied in each district for the repairs of roads, bridges, and other local purposes; but that and the land-tax scarcely ex-

461
ceed twenty-five per cent on the presumed annual value of the land.
The tithes are very moderate, and chiefly compounded for at fixed rates, which can never be altered without the consent of the owner. Under one of their monarchs, the clergy were called upon to pay contributions to the state, at a rate which they gave as the annual value of their livings; and, upon these valuations, compositions have been settled. As the patron, with the consent of the archbishop (a consent seldom withheld), can remove an incumbent, they are necessarily too dependent to enter into contests about tithes. The secular parochial clergy are commonly men of slight education, usually the sons of peasants, to whom the somewhat elevated character of priest, with its small emoluments and freedom from hard labour, forms a sufficient inducement to enter on the ecclesiastical profession. I was told, but cannot vouch for its accuracy, or for the extent to which it may be carried, that since the Jews have been prohibited from keeping public-houses, the parochial priests have become in the villages the chief retailers of whiskey, and thereby increase their otherwise scanty incomes.
The other taxes fall no more on the landed interest than on other classes of the community. They are chiefly on consumption; that on beer forms a part, and is collected by a monopoly let to farm by the government, to brewers. All foreign commodities, such as sugar, coffee and wine, have heavy duties imposed. These are collected from all the consumers of them; and few of the agriculturists can at present afford to purchase such luxuries, but must be content with honey, dried chicory roots and whiskey, as substitutes for them.
The whole revenue, according to the statements of official men, does not exceed two millions sterling. As one fourth of the population, the tenants and peasants of the Crown, are exempted from paying the tenth Groschen tax, the heaviest of all the imposts; the sum extracted from the rest of the subjects, amounts to 15 s. per head annually. The whole population of the present kingdom is between 3,800,000 and 4,000,000, having increased since its establishment 250,000.
The revenues do not pay the expenses of the government, but the deficiency is made up by remittances from Petersburgh, which usually amount to 4,000,000 silver
462
roubles, or nearly five hundred thousand pounds sterling. The forced military service, and quartering of troops, are burthens on the land, which are difficult to reduce to any money estimation. The young men of good families are expected to become cadets in a service whose pay will scarcely clothe them; and the strongest of the labourers are selected as privates, without the formality of asking their consent, or drawing lots. When in quarters, the officers occupy the best apartments in the houses of the proprietors, whilst the privates are lodged in the peasants cottages. At present, the military are under good discipline; but still they have means of extorting from those on whom they are quartered, something beyond the use of bare walls.
Of late years the attention of the government, of those private nobles who have adequate means, and of the richer Jews, has been drawn to manufacturing. The very low rate of all mere manual labour, the extensive market of the vast Russian dominions being opened to the Poles, and the cheapness of raw products, have contributed to the establishment of numerous but not large undertakings, which, as far as I could form a judgment, promised to be beneficial to the individuals concerned in them.
I was assured by two noblemen at the head of different departments of the executive government, that within the last six years more than 250,000 foreigners, chiefly Germans and almost all manufacturers, had emigrated from their own country and established themselves in Poland. They have some privileges in regard to taxation. Those of them who are Protestants are supplied with churches and ministers, at the expense of the government, though on a low scale; and they are, for a prescribed period, free from the military conscription.
The cloth made from the native wool is coarse, and may not be very neatly fabricated; but as it reaches the markets of Russia without any impost, and enters into competition there with goods manufactured in England, the Netherlands, and Germany, which are subject to high duties and the expenses of conveyance,—it can be sold at correspondent low prices. These manufacturing establishments are, for the most part, on a small scale; but some of them of a higher class, for making finer cloths, have imported machinery of various kinds from England, or have copied it

463
from what has been imported. In the application of that machinery they have not been very successful,; but as long as it continues to be the maxim, that it is better to wear dear cloth and bad cloth made at home, than to buy good cloth and cheap cloth from foreign countries; and whilst the maxim is practically applied by impoposing heavy duties on the cloth of all other countries, there will be a considerable demand for what is made.
I did not hear of any other goods than woollen cloths made for distant markets; but of late establishments have been formed for making linens, cottons, iron wares and paper, solely for domestic consumption, and chiefly by the aid of capitals to which the government has contributed.
The project which was the chief favourite when I was in Poland, was the working of mines. It had been brought under the immediate attention of the government, by an offer from a joint-stock company formed in England, to take the mines on lease for a term of years. Though the proposal was not accepted, it produced an excitement both on the ministers and on private individuals, and became the general topic of discussion. The mines have hitherto been worked but to a small extent, barely sufficient iron being extracted to supply the scanty domestic demand. The iron is said to be of an excellent quality, the ore capable of being raised but with little labour, and the mines situated in the districts where both coals and wood are abundant.
Besides the mines of iron and coal, there are others hitherto slightly worked, of calamine and copper. The attention awakened by the English proposal has not yet had time to produce any actual effects on the part of the government. From the state of the finances nothing can be undertaken till the consent of the cabinet at St. Petersburgh is obtained. In the mean time several Poles have arrived in this country on a mission from the ministers at Warsaw, to examine the machinery used for diminishing labour in our mines, and to acquire the knowledge of the most improved methods practised here for separating the metals from the ore. One individual, too, who has mines of calamine and coals, with whom I became acquainted at Cracow, has resolved to visit the mining districts of England early in the next spring, to learn the most economical modes of conducting his operations. The low prices of food and of
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labour must facilitate the business of mining extensively contemplated, if capital can be found to pay for that labour, and to wait for the returns till the produce of the mines can be re-converted into money.
My efforts to make computations of the cost price of wheat were as little satisfactory to myself in Poland as in Prussia. The same difficulties presented themselves, and the same doubts attach to every attempt at accuracy. As may be seen by the estate at Pulaway, in the province of Lublin, the book-keeping on the large estates is well conducted, but not in such a manner as to distinguish the cost of one kind of corn from that of another, or even to distinguish the cost of all the corn from that of the general mass of productions. Any calculation in Poland, as in other countries, can be but an approximation to accuracy, and must be received with hesitation, however high may be the authority, or however abundant the means of information, of the persons making it. In a conversation with count Mostoski, the enlightened minister of finance, whilst viewing his farm near Warsaw, he stated, as the result of his calculations, that the cost price in that neighbourhood was double as much as it was selling for at that time, which was indeed at considerably less than half of the average price it had borne in past periods for a series of years; that during those periods, the benefit on its cultivation had been somewhat less than the profit on the other branches of industry; or that, in the double capacity of landland and farmer, the annual gain to the cultivator had not been equal to that derived from the same amount of capital employed in any other way.
On referring to the prices of Warsaw [see Appendix, No. 21 and 22], it will be seen, that for a period of twenty-four years, from June 1796 to June 1820, the average of the period was 33 s. per quarter; and that in the ten years from 1815 to 1824, it was 31 s. The price, at the time of my visit to this gentleman, was 14 s. 9d. The tables will show that the fluctuations in the price of wheat during the longest period, have had much narrower limits than have been experienced in the other markets nearer the sea shore.
It is highly improbable, that if the cost price of wheat had not been tolerably near to the selling price, efforts would not have been strenuously directed to augment the

465
growth of it, and that the quantity raised would not have been regularly increasing; but this is so far from having been the case, that only so long as the price was 30 s. or upwards, was the production kept up to the regular standard; and that when it fell but a few shillings below that price, the quantity sent to market diminished, and remarkably so, since the declension has gone on increasing till it has reached the present very ruinous limits.
The view taken by count Mostoski was confirmed also by prince Lubetski, another of the ministers, who is a cultivator of his own estates, and has officially paid attention to a subject, which has become of the highest importance, to every public officer, and every landed proprietor.
It is worthy of remark, that the present burthens on the land are quite as great as existed during any period of the twenty-four years whose prices are quoted; and that the heaviest of these burthens, the tenth Groschen tax, was not collected in the earlier years of the series. It was originally a war tax, but (as before stated) has been continued through the ten years that have passed since the peace was concluded. The expenses of cultivation have been undoubtedly somewhat reduced with the reduction of the selling prices of the produce; thus the cost of seed, and of the food of working cattle, if valued in money, would appear to be less, but they can scarcely affect the cultivator, who raises them, and consumes them, as he only can derive a profit or incur a loss according to the high or low price of that surplus quantity which he sells at market.
I am disposed, under all circumstances of the case, to pay much attention to the estimations I have related, which were also corroborated by the opinions of most of the cultivators with whom I conversed. With as much confidence as can be felt on a subject which no investigation could have made very clear, I should suppose the cost of wheat in the province of Massovia, to have been nearly between twenty-seven and twenty-nine shillings the quarter, for the last thirty years. Assuming that the cost price of wheat was at the medium, between the points to which in its fluctuations it had approached, we may calculate the cost in England thus:—

s.

d.

Cost of the quarter of wheat at Warsaw

28

0

Conveyance to the boats, and charges for loading and stowing, and securing it by mats

0

6

Freight to Dantzic

5

0

Loss on the passage, by pilfering, and by rain causing it to grow

3

0

Expenses at Dantzic, in turning, drying, screening and warehousing, and loss of measure

2

0

Profit or commission, as the case may be, to the merchant at Dantzic

1

6

Freight, primage, insurance and shipping charges at Dantzic and in London

8

0

48

0

In ascending the Vistula, beyond Warsaw, as the quality of the grain improves, the expenses on the conveyance of it to the mouths of that river increase also.
I could have wished at Cracow to have obtained the prices for a longer series of years than are to be found in the Appendix No. 23. Before the time with which that account begins, that part of Poland had used as the medium of exchange the depreciated paper money of Austria; and I had no scale by which to measure the variations, at different periods, between that currency and the silver money, which has been since the sole medium for the exchange of commodities. An account, therefore, for an earlier series of years, would have produced only perplexity and uncertainty; the verbal information I obtained was, in general terms, that there had been no fluctuations in the price of corn, before the return of peace, nearly approaching to those which have been experienced since that event. I was told by one merchant, that the price for many years of the war, had generally been between 24 s. and 26 s. per quarter, if the paper money had been valued according to the proportion which it bore to silver money, at the several periods of its depreciaiton.
The account obtained at Cracow [see Appendix, No. 23], shows that for ten years and two half-years, the average price of wheat was 25 s. 1d., though between the first and last part of that period, the difference is enormous; the first part showing an average of 33 s., and the last of only 17 s. 5d. If the mean of those two parts be taken, it will show 25 s. which nearly corresponds with the information of the merchant before referred to.
If, in the absence of better data, it be assumed, that the selling price of wheat near Cracow, has been fur a series of years at 25 s. and that the growers profit has been ten per cent; and the cost price thus taken, at 22 s. 6d. the rate at which

467
it would reach this country, may be thus estimated:—

s.

d.

Cost of wheat at Cracow

22

6

Conveyance to boats, loading, &c

0

6

Freight to Dantzic

7

6

Loss by pilfering, and damage from wet

3

6

Expenses at Dantzic, as in the former estimate

2

0

Profit or commission, as before

1

6

Freight, &c. to London

8

0

45

6

Some allowance should be made for risk beyond insurance, as corn is covered by the underwriters only in the stranding of the ship, and in the loss which may be to be paid when there is a general average. In both the statements of the expenses of conveyance, the rate of freight on the river Vistula to Dantzic, as well as that by sea from Dantzic to London, is stated at the present price, when there are scarcely any operations of that kind carrying on. During the demand of 3802, 1803, and 1804, and in 1817, I have been told the freight from beyond Warsaw was 10 s. per quarter, and that from Dantzic to London was, including primage and insurance, from 11 s. 6d. to 12 s.
If, from any circumstances, a demand should be created for as much wheat as is consumed in England in six days, it would raise the price of freightage on the river, probably thirty or forty per cent, and half of that proportion in the sea freight from Dantzic to this country. If that demand should extend to twelve days supply, it would exhaust the whole stock of wheat, fit for our market, and cause it to advance in a much greater degree than the shipping of such a limited quantity in any former period has witnessed.
In stating the several expenses incurred in the conveyance of wheat from Warsaw to Dantzic at 10 s. 6d. per quarter, and from Cracow to Dantzic at 13 s. 6d. per quarter, it seems that those sums fall very far short of the difference in price, which is exhibited by comparing the accounts collected at those several places. The merchants at Dantzic too, appear not to be satisfied with the small sum here presumed, of 1s. 6d. per quarter for commission and profits. Whether, from the higher expenses of conveyance, or the larger commissions, or profits of the merchants, the excess of the prices, beyond the cost of conveyance here stated, is very striking, especially in those years when the demand was the greatest.
Comparative view of the prices Of wheat, in the several years enumerated, in Cracow, Warsaw, and Dantzic:—

YEARS.

Price at Cracow.

Price at Warsaw.

Price at Dantzic.

Average of 1796, 1797, 1798 and 1799 together

24/10

41/9

Average of 1803, 1804, 1805 and 1806 together

38/4

57/3

Average of 1815, 1816, 1817 and 1818 together

35/8

42/4

60/4

Average of 1821, 1822, 1823 and 1824 together

18/2

21/2

26/10

It will be seen by this contrast, that in the years from 1796 to 1799, when the exports by sea from Dantzic and Elbing were 1,493,480 quarters, the expenses of conveyance, from Warsaw to the port of shipment, with the profit or commission of the merchants, was 16 s. 11 d. In the years from 1803 to 1806, when the exports were 1,660,352 quarters, the conveyance and profit of the merchants was 18 s. 11 d. per quarter.
Since the great decline of prices, which began in 1819, it appears that the average prices at Dantzic, are so near to those at Cracow and Warsaw, that the rate of freight which has been actually paid, is greater than the differences between them. In the four years from 1821 to 1824, when the whole quantity shipped from Dantzic and Elbing, has been no more than 299,000 quarters, the difference in price between Iracow and Dantzic has been only 8s. 8d. and between Warsaw and Dantzic, only 4s. 8d.
According to several representations which I received, and which cannot be materially erroneous, the quantity of wheat raised in the interior of Poland has been gradually lessening, but with much more rapidity since 1819, than before that period. During the years 1821, 1822, and 1823, very little wheat passed down the Vistula, as appears by the accounts obtained at Thorn. By the official accounts, the whole in the three years was only 83,606 quarters; the growers being then induced to withhold from shipping, as long as their necessities would allow. In the year 1824, the pressing demands of creditors and mortgagees forced the holders to sell, and in consequence of it, there was sent down in that year, 93,968 quarters. The pressure of distress still continuing, and the harvest of 1824 being very good, there was forwarded in 1825, by the commence-

469
ment of the harvest of that year, 176,215 quarters, or as much as in the four years which had preceded it.
These two last years exports had completely drained Poland; and, hence when I was there, before any of the new wheat had appeared at market, the price, for what little was wanted, had rather advanced. I was informed by more than one merchant, that if 10,000 quarters had been required, there was so little left in the country, that it could be collected with difficulty; and that the knowledge of such demand would cause the price to be doubled. In the mean time the stocks at Dantzic and Elbing had been accumulating, in spite of the comparatively small quantities which had been brought down the Vistula.
At the end of 1818, there only remained in store in those cities 92,279 quarters, [see Appendix, No. 13]. In the following seven years, up to August 1825, the quantities which paid duties at Thorn, were

Quarters.

From Russia

366,648

—Austria

17,343

—Poland

621,119

1,005,110

During the same seven years, the exports from the two ports, were

824,622

leaving

180,488

To this is added the stock at the end of 1818, as above

92,279

272,767

It appears, however, that the stocks really in store in the two places in August last, amounted to about 350,000 quarters, and therefore there must have been exported, or be in store, about 80,000 quarters of wheat, of the growth of Prussia, in the seven years under consideration.
Poland, and probably the Russian provinces, which once were parts of Poland, though drained of their whole stock of wheat, have not, in seven years, caused an accumulation at the exporting cities, of more than about one-tenth of what was shipped from them in the seven years, from 1800 to 1806. Those stocks are, however, higher than appears to have been left on hand at the end of the former years, and hence it may have arisen, that the prices have been reduced far below what it has cost the holders, though they have bought from the growers at rates to discourage the farther cultivation of wheat.
The abandonment of a losing business is most likely to begin at the fountain head, and the effect of that abandonment will be first experienced by a rise of price at the spot where the depreciated commodity is produced. This seems to be the case in Poland, and this may naturally account for the prices of corn at Cracow and Warsaw, being higher with the addition of freight and the other charges, than at Dantzic and Elbing.
It has been frequently remarked, that the exportation of corn from any country, if long continued, must tend to exhaust the soil, unless some articles, capable of becoming converted into manure, are introduced to compensate for the injury. Many parts of the north of Africa, and of Asia Minor, which formerly supplied large quantities of corn to Europe, have since become deserts. Perhaps one of the chief causes of the progress we have made in agriculture, and of the superior productiveness of our fields, has arisen from our exporting but few, and importing many of those articles which are capable, when decomposed, of becoming manure, and being applied to renovate the soil, as much or more as it is exhausted by cropping.
From Poland, for nearly two centuries, according to the Document in Appendix, No. 24, the exports of corn have been very large, whilst, on the other hand, nothing has been imported, deserving of notice, which could be converted into nutriment to the soil.
The system of rotation by which two crops of corn are raised in succession, and nothing is administered to refresh the land but a fallow, would exhaust the best soil with which we are acquainted.
In every part of my journey through Poland, the impression communicated, in looking at the fields, whether with growing crops, in stubble, or under the operations of the plough, was, that they were approaching to a state of exhaustion from excessive cropping.
This view, which the rotation of crops, and the face of the country suggests, is confirmed by the statistical facts, which show that its power of supplying the wants of other countries is greatly diminished. The return of peace, after more than twenty years of extensive warfare, is commonly supposed to have increased the productions of the soil, and to be the cause of the depreciation of prices, which has been the general subject of complaint

471
in every part of Europe. In Poland there has been no sensible increase of numbers, except within the last six years, when Germans, emigrant work people, to the number of 250,000, have established themselves in the different trades to which they have been accustomed in their native country.
On comparing the surplus quantity of bread corn which Poland has exported in a series of the same number of years, we shall see what has been the falling off.
In the eleven years [see Appendix, No. 15], beginning with 1795, and ending with 1805, the exports of wheat from the mouths of the Vistula, were 5,059,163 quarters, or 438,263 a year, on the average of the period. In the eleven years, beginning in 1815, and ending with 1825, the exports from the same ports were 1,669,027 quarters, or on the average of the period, 151,729 quarters per year. In the latter period indeed 78,265 barrels of flour were exported, supposing them to be all wheaten flour, it will increase the quantity 39,132 quarters, reckoning that two barrels are the produce of one quarter of wheat. In the first of these two series of years, the rye shipped at the same ports was 1,680,096 quarters; and that in the last series only 456,192 quarters.
The periods here contrasted were both seasons of general tranquillity, except that, during the first part of them, the opposition of Kosciusco and his partisans to the last dismemberment of Poland, caused partial and temporary disturbances; but they do not appear to have affected the quantity of its agricultural products.
It is true, that in the first series, there were in England two or three deficient harvests, and in the last series but one; the effect of that one was to raise prices so high as to induce the export of the whole that could be got away. Had there been more grown, it would have been eagerly exported; and we find at the end of the year 1818, the stock, both at Dantzic and Elbing, was only 96,900 quarters. Though we imported in the year 1818 from all parts of the world a greater quantity of wheat than in any former year, yet much less of that was shipped from the ports by which the corn conveyed down the Vistula is exported. The three years of our greatest importation, as appears by accounts laid before the House of Commons, have been 1802, 1810, and 1818; in the first of those, the exports from Dantzic and Elbing were 680,494
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quarters. In the year 1810 [see Appendix, No. 15,] the French were in possession of the country, and the exports, all carried in a contraband way, were 267,277 quarters. In 1818, with high prices at Dantzic, viz. 64/11, the ports of England being open, the exports were 335,769 quarters.
If we calculate that the consumption of wheat in Great Britain is one quarter for each person for food, and about a seventh part more for seed and minor purposes, it will appear that in the first of the series we have been comparing, the quantity of wheat exported from Dantzic and Elbing would, with the then amount of our population, 11,000,000, be equal to twelve days consumption. In fact however, out of the 5,059,163 quarters of wheat, which Dantzic exported, 1,300,014 were dispatched to other countries. As we have only the gross exports from Elbing, without distinguishing what was sent to Great Britain, from what was sent elsewhere, it may not be incorrect to assume, that one-fourth as from Dantzic was not sent to our markets, and then there will be a further reduction of 299,205 quarters. This will leave the whole quantity really furnished to us in the eleven years 3,459,944 quarters, or an annual quantity of 314,540 quarters, being equal to about nine days of our consumption.
At the second series our population had advanced as numbered in 1821, the middle year of that series, to 14,000,000. The quantity of wheat sent to us from the Vistula had declined, and, during the eleven years, had been 1,252,271 quarters, or 113,842 annually. This would be equal to the whole of our consumption for betwixt two and three days.
In the Appendix, No. 24, is shown the whole export of corn from Dantzic, for the last 166 years. By those tables, it appears that the wheat exported from that city, during that long period, was 19,581,947 quarters, or 117,963 quarters on the annual average of the period. In fact, the whole that Dantzic has exported in 166 years is not equal to the consumption of this kingdom, with its present population, for more than fifteen or sixteen months. The annual importation would not now amount to two days and three quarters consumption.
It appears by the official account of the duties paid at Thorn, on wheat descending the Vistula [see Appendix No. 19], that a very large proportion comes out of territories now forming an

473
immediate part of Russia, which once were, but no longer are, parts of Poland. I had communications with several proprietors of estates whose property is partly in one, and partly in the other country, and availed myself of all means within my reach to acquire a knowledge of the actual produce of grain in both.
The provinces from which the best, and most of the wheat is transmitted, are Volhynia and Podolia, which were seized by Russia, in the division of Poland in 1796, and are now distinct provincial governments, retaining their ancient names and usages.
Volhynia is represented to be a district of extraordinary fecundity. The pastures are said to be luxuriant, the grass growing so high as almost to hide the cattle, and yielding the richest nourishment to them. The corn is said to increase in common years ten-fold, in spite of bad agriculture; and a failure, or very deficient harvest, does not occur two or three times in a century.
On referring, however, to the official harvest returns of the Russian empire, as quoted in the Erdebeschreibung of Hassel, a German work of the highest authority, it will be seen that, in this province, the increase of grain in the year 1802 was very little more than four times the quantity sown.
The Russian tschewert, being reduced into English quarters, reckoning the tschewert at two-thirds of the quarter, the following result appears:—

Quarters.

Sowed

Winter Corn

322,456

Ditto

Summer ditto

313,244

635,700

Harvested

Winter Corn

1,349,522

Ditto

Summer ditto

1,277,310

2,626,832

Used for Seed, for the next year

Winter Corn

327,804

Summer ditto

316,996

644,800

There consequently remained, of Winter Corn

1,021,718

Summer ditto

960,314

1,982,032

Of which

1,431,566

were consumed within the province; and

550,466

were exported, or remained in the country at the next harvest. Of this surplus,
474
some part must have been barley or oats; and, as the winter corn consists of six times as much rye as wheat, it is not probable that this district, very rich when compared with the other parts of the Russian dominions, could have furnished to commerce fifty thousand quarters of wheat in a year, when the exports from Dantzic were very great, and the prices of the year preceding had been in England very high. As the communication by water from this province is more easy to the Black than to the Baltic Sea, its surplus corn will more frequently be conveyed to Odessa than to Dantzic.
Podolia, like Volhynia, is represented as highly fertile; and, by the official accounts extracted from the statistical writer before quoted, appears to present, in the year referred to already, a greater rate of increase in the seed that has been sown, than Volhynia. Being to the south of Volhynia, it is still more easy of access to the Black Sea than that province, and further removed from commmunication with England through Dantzic. It however deserves to be remarked, that the navigation of the Bug and the Vistula is better than that of the Dniester, because the latter river has many shallows and rapids, and some dangerous falls. The passage of the surplus wheat will be hence determined on by the state of the markets at Dantzic and Odessa. The access to both those markets is so difficult, that only when a scarcity in some part of Europe raises the price to an unusual height, is any considerable quantity attempted to be transported
When the corn is cut it is left a long time in sheaves in the fields till it can be threshed, or rather trodden out with oxen and horses. When the separation from the straw and chaff is effected, the grain is preserved in excavations in the earth, till it is either called forth by high prices, or, which frequently happens, till it is destroyed by corn-worms, or other insects. It appears from the official accounts that in the year 1802, the following were the results of the cultivation of corn:

Quarters.

Sowed

Winter Corn

293,183

Ditto

Summer ditto

351,620

644,803

Harvested

Winter Corn

1,640,271

Dittto

Summer ditto

1,427,575

3,067,846

Used for Seed for the next year

Winter Corn

297,254

Summer ditto

358,476

655,730

There consequently remained

Summer Corn

1,343,017

Winter ditto

1,069,099

2,412,116

Of which

1,172,211

were consumed within the province, and

1,239,905

were either exported, or remained in the province till after the following harvest. The consumption here appears so much less than in Volhynia, that it can only be accounted for by the fact, that the culture of culinary vegetables, and the produce of the fruit trees, is far more abundant; and that the cattle are very much cheaper. The difference of more than two degrees of latitude may make some difference in the mode of living, as the warmer the climate, the less corn in general is consumed in brewing and distilling.
The only other province in Russia, which conveys its corn to market by the Vistula, is Byaly stock. It was formerly a part of Poland, and the inhabitants still generally speak the language of that country. The chief corn raised for bread is rye, but a small portion of that grain, as well as of some very indifferent wheat, finds a passage by the river Bug into the Vistula. The best of the land is appropriated to the growth of flax, hemp and linseed, or to breeding of cattle. The whole surplus of wheat, which must be small, cannot be distinguished in the returns, from that stated generally to come from Russia.
There are two other of the Russian provinces whose surplus corn finds a vent through the territory of Prussia. The south-west part of Wilna, formerly Lithuania, has the navigable river Niemen for its boundary, by which the corn is conveyed to Memel. Its produce is but small in proportion to its population; and, by the official accounts, the increase appears to be less than in the other provinces. In 1802 the sowing and reaping is thus stated:—

Quarters.

Sowed

Winter Corn

530,245

Ditto

Summer ditto

315,798

846,043

Harvested

Winter Corn

2,099,324

Ditto

Summer ditto

1,220,466

3,319,790

476
By this statement, it appears, that the increase of grain is somewhat less than four for one.
The province of Grodno, which also has access to the sea by the Niemen, appears to be so nearly equal in fertility to that of Wilna, that a return of the sowing and harvesting of the same year, give results differing only by a small fraction.
The terms of distinction, winter corn and summer corn, instead of Autumn and Spring corn, which we use, are descriptive of the climate. The violent heats and severe colds, succeed each other with so much rapidity, that they scarcely leave any interval for Spring or Autumn.
The only accounts I was able to procure of the quantities of corn brought by the Niemen, comprehends merely the three years 1816, 1817, and 1818. No others were to be found in the office of the minister for internal affairs at Berlin, and I did not go to Schmalleninken, where the transit duty is collected. The year 1816 was one of moderate production and demand, till after the state of the harvest was known, when it was too late in the season for the navigation of these northern rivers. The trade of that year may therefore be considered a fair average, and likely to produce annually 10,000 quarters of wheat, and about 40,000 quarters of other corn, chiefly rye. The two following years, when the exportation was excessive, produced but 38,700 quarters of wheat, and 276,000 quarters of other grain.
From some parts of the two provinces of Wilna and Grodno, the communication by the Duna to Riga is easier than by the Niemen to Memel; and it is hence probable that the largest share of their produce in corn, finds a market in that direction. It is shown by the returns from Riga [see Appendix, No. 8], that in the last twelve years, the exportation of wheat from that port has only been 256,658 quarters, or on the average of the period, 21,381 quarters annually; that of rye, has been 1,618,000, or on an average, 134,822 per year; and that of both kinds of grain, the exportation in the two years 1817 and 1818, exceeded that of the other ten years.
Although the route by which I returned from Poland was through countries which have no direct influence on the corn trade of England, yet as remotely connected with countries that do affect it, it may not be improper to add a few of the obser-

477
vations and facts which presented themselves as I passed through them.
The Austrian province of Moravia is very fertile, and, with the exception of some districts of the Netherlands, scarcely any part of the Continent is so well cultivated. It bears, too, a larger proportion of wheat than in other districts in the East of Europe. Of the winter corn, wheat is estimated at one-fourth, and rye three-fourths; whereas in the adjoining province of Silesia, the land sown with rye is nearly ten times that sown with wheat. Moravia is defended by the Carpathian mountains from the east winds; and the harvest, the whole way from Teschen to Olmutz, and indeed to Brunn, is nearly six weeks earlier than in Silesia. I certainly heard complaints of the distressed state of agriculture there, but less of it, and I think with less reason, than in any other part.
Wheat, at Olmutz, was selling for 20 s. per quarter, whilst on one side at Cracow, it was selling for 14 s. and on the other side, at Vienna, for 14 s. 7d.
This better state of things arose from the circumstance of Moravian agriculture finding domestic consumers. It is the chief manufacturing province of the Austrian empire. A greater proportion of the population can afford to live on meat and to use wheaten flour; and hence the agriculturists find a market near home for their productions. The demand for animal food, too, being greater, a greater stock of cattle is kept, more of the land is destined to clover and other green crops; and I should judge from their flourishing apperance, that, like England, the growth of corn does not exhaust the land so much, as the stock of cattle, by their manure, renews its prolific qualities. The woollen, linen, and cotton manufactures are numerous, and, I was told, flourishing; and, as all manufactured goods from foreign countries are either excluded or charged with high duties in Austria, the demand of that extensive empire creates a vent for the native goods, though at the expense of the consumers, who perhaps in most, certainly in many, cases, might get better and cheaper goods. After passing through poorer districts, I was much impressed throughout Moravia, with the striking practical exemplification of the beneficial effects of manufactures on the prosperity of the agriculturists.
In Vienna I had opportunities of hearing much of the condition of the landed
478
proprietors in Hungary. The want of vent for their surplus corn basso depressed the prices of that and other productions of the soil, that they are said to be losing by every article they raise, excepting wool; though, from farming their own lands, they have no rent to pay, yet the greatest difficulty is encountered in collecting the trifling taxes that are levied upon them.
Although so near to Moravia, the Carpathian mountains are too lofty and rugged to admit of conveyance thither. The mouths of the Danube are so infested with marauders, Wallachians, Besarabians, and Turks, that no safe export can be made to the Black Sea. In times of great scarcity in the maritime countries, some wheat may be conveyed to the port of Trieste; but it will be seen by the prices in the Appendix, No. 31, that it is too low at that market to afford a land carriage of four hundred miles. Though Presburgh is the chief market for the wheat of Hungary, yet, being but little more than twenty miles from Vienna, the price there cannot differ very much from that of the capital, for which see Appendix, No. 27. In some of the smaller towns in Austria, on the borders of Bavaria, where little wheat is consumed, I found the price of wheat and rye nearly the same. The harvest of the latter kind of grain was reported to be deficient, and had raised the price, whilst for the former there was little or no demand.
It will be seen by the returns of the prices of corn at Munich £see Appendix, No. 28], that the bread corn in Bavaria is not so much depressed as in Austria. This may be attributed to a law prohibiting the introduction of corn from the surrounding countries, from whence, chiefly from Bohemia, it had been the practice to import it. Tin's prohibition had rested on an order from the king to the officers of the Customs at the different frontier stations; but at the last assembly of the states a formal law was passed, enforcing the former regulation, and enacting penalties on the breaches of it.
Notwithstanding the restrictions, I found on inquiry at the Board of Agriculture that the value of land had greatly declined. According to the statements given to me there, within the last eight years, the fall in the selling price of meadow land had been about thirty-five per cent, and that in the price of arable land full sixty per cent.
The complaints of the losses by farming were as heavy here as in the neighbouring countries where the prices we lower, and in which no laws to prohibit importation are in existence.
In the kingdom of Wirtemburg, wheat is so little an object of attention, from the small quantity which is consumed, that I was unable to obtain any other returns of the prices, than the imperfect list in the Appendix, No. 29, wherein, though the price of rye is regularly stated, that of wheat, for many periods, and at several markets, is wholly unnoticed. In the beautiful but narrow valley of the Neckar, the land is well cultivated; but, in other parts of the kingdom, the soil seemed to be poor, and the cultivation in a very backward state.
As I passed through France rather hastily, and spent but a few days in Paris, I had not opportunities of gaining minute information, as to the state of Agriculture. I was, however, satisfied, that, in spite of partial advances towards a better rotation of crops, the far greater part of the cultivation is still carried on upon the ancient and, in England, long exploded, system of a fallow followed by two crops of corn.
I was assured that, for several years past, every cultivator of grain has been selling at far less than it has cost him. Some of the best judges of the subject have calculated that wheat, in the four classes of districts formed of the departments for the purposes of regulating the importation and exportation of corn, costs to the grower on an average, from 20 to 22 francs the hectolitre, or from 6s. 4d. to 6s. 11 d. the Winchester bushel.
How far this calculation may be correct, it would be presumption in me to assert. The corn laws of France are, however, founded on a supposition of this being the price necessary to secure a profit to the farmer. The kingdom is divided, for the purposes of the Corn-law, into four districts, each including departments in which the prices of grain are nearly alike. When wheat is below 18 francs the hectolitre, or 5s. 7½d. the bushel in the cheapest of those districts, 20 francs, or 6s. 4½d. in the next, 22 francs, or 7s. 0½d. in the next, and 24 francs, or 7s. 8d. in the highest, the importation of foreign wheat is prohibited. As the whole of the four districts form the regulating price, the average of wheat throughout the whole kingdom must rise to 6s. 8d. per bushel,
480
before any foreign wheat can be introduced.
The laws which regulate the corn trade of France, were passed in 1819 and 1821, and the price of corn has not, since the end of the year 1818, ever risen so high as to effect the opening of their ports. Since that year the price has been fluctuating, but declining in the following ratio. [see Appendix, No. 30.]
Average of the whole of France.

s.

d.

1820

5

3½

1821

4

11

1822

4

3½

1823

4

11

1824

4

6½

1825

4

3½

Your lordships have been pleased in my instructions, to direct me "to consider with reference to the provinces communicating with the Baltic sea by the Vistula, from the view I take of the country, what increase of cultivation would be likely to take place in consequence of such a stimulus being constantly in action, as would be applied, if an alteration were made in our laws, so as to leave our markets at all times accessible to the corn grown in Poland;" and further, I have been instructed, "that, as it may be necessary to assume some given price in this country, in forming such an estimate, it was thought desirable to proceed upon a supposition of an average price of wheat at home, of 60 s. to 64 s. per quarter."
This question involves so many considerations depending not only on the present condition of the country, but on the political regulations to which it may hereafter be subject, that any reasonings applied must be in a great measure hypothetical and speculative; and any conclusions we may arrive at, must be liable to be affected by changes which cannot now be contemplated, or taken into calculation.
The utmost that can be done is to approximate to a result, by a consideration of the principal circumstances on which it will depend, by reference to the fluctuations in past periods, and by an examination into the causes from which those fluctuations have proceeded.
In obedience to this direction, I presume, with the diffidence which must be always felt in anticipating the effects of untried, and consequently doubtful experiments, to state my views on the subject.
The effect of the stimulus here proposed

481
must depend, in a great measure, on the assurance of its duration. The market for wheat which England presents, is the great object of attention to the cultivators in Poland, and to the merchants at the ports from whence its coin must be exported. Those persons have been accustomed to observe such frequent alterations in our laws relative to the corn trade, that any new enactments would, at first, be thought temporary and mutable, like those of former periods. This uncertainty has been the cause of heavy losses to them, and would therefore have the effect of causing the cultivators to pause before they made any great changes in their rotation of crops, or in the kinds of corn they would sow.
The statements which are given in the part of this report, more immediately relating to the kingdom of Poland, will show that the want of capital among the cultivators has proceeded to such an extent from the losses they have sustained, that they must, in a great degree, be disabled from making any considerable improvement in cultivation, or of raising any very large increase of produce in a short period. The great deficiency of live stock, which indeed may be resolved into a deficiency of capital, would be an impediment in the way of a rapid extension of the growth of wheat. Without manure wheat cannot be grown beneficially, and without a stock of cattle, in some degree commensurate to the extent of the land, manure cannot be obtained; and though to a certain degree the profit arising from the wool, and not from the meat, enables the landowners to support some few sheep, yet the want of a class of consumers who can afford to make animal food their subsistence, must operate to prevent any great increase in the stocks of cattle. Such a class is not to be expected there till a great improvement, or an increase of manufacturers, shall have taken place. The greater portion of the population of Poland is too poor to allow of their using animal food; the want of it is scarcely felt by persons always accustomed to live, with very little variation of diet, on rye bread.
The labouring classes too, being assured of a supply of the bare necessaries of life, are little disposed to any great changes in their mode of work, or any exertion of strength or skill beyond that to which they have been accustomed.
They have been, perhaps, and not without some reason, always represented as indolent, unskilful, filthy, and drunken, and averse to the improvement which their wiser and better superiors have attempted to introduce.
Whilst the present low price of corn continues, and the corresponding low rate of wages, and the markets of Russia are open to the woollen cloths of Poland without duty, the profit of capital employed in that branch of industry must offer to it temptations that agriculture does not present. But if by any alterations the cloths of Poland should in the Russian Custom-houses be placed on the footing of the cloths of other countries, or if a rise of corn and of wages should take place to such an extent as to make the Polish cloths dearer than those which are charged with duty, the effects might be, to drive the capital from the cloth trade to the business of cultivation. The present want of capital may possibly be supplied by influx from other countries, but this must depend in a great measure on the internal government and political regulations of the country. The increase of manufactories in Poland, and the augmented population which they usually induce, might produce such a number of internal consumers as to leave much less surplus corn to export to other countries. It is true that wheat would be but little eaten by the manufacturers, but the increased demand for rye might make that kind of grain the most profitable to the grower, and he would then devote to the cultivation of it some portions of the land which, under different circumstances, would have been appropriated to the growth of wheat.
The manufacturers in Poland are however of too little importance, at present, to make it desirable to hazard any conjectures on what the effects of their increase or diminution would be on the surplus quantity of exportable grain.
A view of the past exportation from the Vistula, at different periods, and under different circumstances, will perhaps give some assistance in forming an idea of what may be the result of future changes.
It is worthy of remark, that in the long period of 166 years, of which the returns are given [see Appendix No. 24], there has been but little variation in the actual quantities of corn exported from Dantzic when taken by periods of twenty-five years. At the commencement it is seen,

483
that the quantity of rye far exceeded that of wheat; that they gradually approached each other, till the produce of wheat exceeded that of rye, and constantly so up to the present time. The physical circumstances of the country are as they were during that long period. The course of the several streams that convey their supplies of corn into the Vistula has been without alteration; and the facilities of internal conveyance have been scarcely improved by any new or better roads. There is no ground to suppose that any material, certainly not any observable or recorded, increase of population has taken place, except the recent immigration of Germans.
The whole period of 166 years, returns of which, as extracted from the city records of Dantzic, are in the Appendix, No. 24, when divided into periods of about twenty-five years, exhibits the following annual exportation of wheat and rye from that port.

WHEAT.

RYE.

TOTAL.

YEARS.

Quarters.

Quarters.

Quarters.

1651 to 1675

81,775

225,312

307,087

1676 to 1700

124,897

227,482

352,379

1701 to 1725

59,795

170,100

229,895

1726 to 1750

80,624

119,771

200,395

1751 to 1775

141,080

208,140

349,220

1776 to 1800

150,299

103,045

253,344

1801 to 1825

200,330

67,511

267,841

The average of the whole period gives an annual quantity of wheat and rye, of 279,794 quarters; and this surplus may be fairly considered as the nearest approach that can be made, with existing materials, to what is the usual excess of the production of bread corn, above the consumption of the inhabitants, when no extraordinary circumstances occur to excite or check cultivation.
In some of the early periods of this series, there have been great variations in the quantity exported, but not so considerable as within the last thirty-six years; we have, too, from 1791, the returns of exports from the rival ports of Dantzic and Elbing since that date, and thus, from both outlets of the Vistula, can trace the advance or decline of the surplus produce of corn, from the countries bordering on that stream.
Exports of wheat and rye from the cities of Dantzic and Elbing:—

YEARS.

WHEAT.

RYE.

TOTAL.

Quarters.

Quarters.

Quarters.

1791

256,680

25,714

282,394

1792

224,492

259,402

488,894

1793

303,597

336,660

640,257

1794

269,545

180,757

450,302

1795

247,842

24,517

272,359

1,302,156

827,050

2,129,206

Average of the five years

260,431

165,410

425,841

This considerable advance beyond former periods was the commencement of a still greater progress in the five next years.

YEARS.

WHEAT.

RYE.

TOTAL.

Quarters.

Quarters.

Quarters.

1796

416,235

111,720

527,955

1797

348,705

177,796

526,501

1798

385,862

290,11

414,873

1799

342,940

164,660

503,600

1800

554,202

26,617

580,819

2,047,944

505,804

2,553,748

Average of the five years

409,588

101,160

510,748

In the next five years the quantity still increasing reached its greatest height, and more corn was then exported than in the following twenty years.

YEARS

WHEAT.

RYE.

TOTAL.

Quarters.

Quarters.

Quarters.

1801

484,150

138,085

622,255

1802

663,222

345,820

1,009,042

1803

460,047

444,537

904,584

1804

544,267

134,400

678,667

1805

595,129

17,700

612,829

2,746,815

1,080,842

3,827,357

Average of the five years

549,365

216,108

765,471

Of these 2,746,815 quarters of wheat, exported in the last-noted five years, 1,754,114 being a yearly quantity of 350,820 quarters was consigned to England, and the greater part of the remainder, to France.
The year 1806 was the unfortunate time when the war, first with England, and afterwards, or rather before, its close,

485
with France, reduced Prussia to a low ebb, and for several years put a stop to the corn trade from the Vistula.
The state of the exportation for the last five years, forms a striking contrast with the corresponding term in the periods here seen.

Export from Dantzic and Elbing.

YEARS.

WHEAT.

RYE.

TOTAL.

1821

126,136

16,128

142,264

1822

44,352

111

44,463

1823

68,450

74,370

132,820

1824

59,996

5,943

65,939

1825

118,681

15,414

134,095

417,615

111,966

519,581

Average of the five years

83,523

22,933

101,916

The circumstances which produced that great exportation of corn, from 1801 to 1805, are of much importance in the consideration of the prospects of future exportations; and the causes by which, in the space of the previous years, they were enabled to attain to that height, deserve to be traced.
Under the act 31 Geo. 3. cap. 30 (1791), the ports of England had been constantly open, for ten years, for the importation of wheat. If the average price of wheat was below 50 s. the quarter, it was charged with a duty of 24 s. 3d.; if above 50 s. and below 54 s. a duty of 2s. 6d.; and if above 54 s. with a duty of only 6d. From the year 1791, when that act was passed, the price of wheat, with the exception of a short period in 1798, was constantly above 54 s.; and what was imported was therefore charged with only the duty of 6d. per quarter. During two of the ten years, wheat in England had been above 80 s. per quarter, and in the last of them rose as high as 127 s.
Our laws at that time laid restraints on the import of corn from Ireland, and that part of the empire had not made the progress it has since done in the cultivation of corn.
The ports of England were not merely open during this term, but by the act of 36 Geo. 3. c. 21, large premiums were given on corn imported, to secure the importers, whether in British or in neutral vessels, certain prices, till 500,000 quarters should have been imported, after which the premiums were to be reduced. This act passed in 1796 for a year, was continued by another act in 1797; and, with
486
different intermediate modifications, premiums to indemnify the importers of corn and flour were established till 1801.
During the ten years, from 1791, to 1801, there was a constant demand in France for foreign corn; several deficient harvests had been experienced at the beginning of the revolution. The agents of France were employed both in Europe and America, in purchasing corn and hiring neutral vessels to convey it to France; paying but little regard to the price they gave for it, or to the rate of freight at which it could be transported. Holland, which scarcely has ever grown corn sufficient for its own consumption, felt a great want, owing to its internal sources of supply from Germany and Flanders, being diverted from the usual channels, by the circumstances of the war.
Sweden for many years had looked for some supply from Prussia, not, indeed, of wheat to any extent, but chiefly of Rye. During the period we are now considering, that country had been afflicted with several successive deficient harvests; and such was the distress from want of corn, that a large part of the population had been compelled to use the bark of trees as a substitute for rye. That kingdom thus became a market which could take as much as her poverty could find the means of paying for. In addition to these external circumstances, the land in Poland was less burthened with taxes than it is at present. The tenth Groschen war-tax was not then enacted. Some other taxes then imposed have not been since abandoned. In Prussia, likewise, taxation is higher now than from 1801 to 1805.
These combined circumstances gave to the agriculture of Poland and Prussia, a portion of capital and motives to exertion, which produced the vast surplus that was exported from 1801 to 1805. Ten years of unexampled prosperity were, however, needed, to reach the point which those years exhibit, and it was only by gradual steps that it was attained.
The impulse given by the open markets, and by the high prices which had opened them, acted with accumulated force in the next five years, and raised the surplus, as we have seen, somewhat higher.
If the same powerful stimulus could now be applied to excite the cultivators, in Poland and in Prussia, to increase their supplies of corn, as were experienced from 1791 to 1801, it would be reasonable to conclude, that the result might be the

487
same as is exhibited in the quantities of wheat exported from 1801 to 1805. It might produce, with ten years increased exertion, and with the application of the capital created in those ten years of prosperity, a quantity equal to that which was exported in the years of the greatest surplus. I was told, when in Poland, that during those prosperous years, wheat was brought by land-carriage to the Vistula, from distances far too great to bear the expenses without the enormous prices which it bore in the markets of England and France. It was sent, not only from the furthest parts of Gallicia, but even from the vicinity of Brunn and Olmutz, in Moravia. It was said, that some of the wheat of Hungary was conveyed over the Carpathian mountains to Cracow, and there shipped in flats for Dantzic and Elbing, whilst Volhynia and Podolia were emptied of their stores.
Whether these reports are true, or to what extent they are true, it is natural to suppose that the very high price which wheat had reached in the years under consideration must have vastly extended the limits of the circle from which it would be collected, and would induce the inhabitants to despatch to the high markets whatever could be spared by the exercise of the most rigid economy.
By the constant application of all these powerful stimuli, which were in operation during ten years, we have seen that at length the surplus of wheat, which the Vistula and its borders, extended to unusual dimensions, could yield, amounted to 550,000 quarters annually, or about sufficient, supposing the whole to be sent here for the consumption of this kingdom, with its present population, during the space of twelve days.
It is scarcely to be calculated, that the same occurrences of circumstances, propitious to the agricultural prosperity of the lands on the border of the Vistula, should again present themselves. Neither the demands of France nor England are likely to be so great, or to continue for so long a period, as at that time. It is scarcely to be calculated upon, that any future wars will be so long in duration, or spread over so extensive a field of operations, as those which rose out of the revolution of France; and it is therefore not likely that the quantity exported will ever rise to so great an amount. Whatever stimulus may be applied to excite the agricultural improvement of the banks of
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the Vistula, its effect must be weak and powerless, when compared with the excitement it received, from 1791, to 1805.
If we suppose the cost of wheat to the grower in the vicinity of Warsaw, to be about 28 s. per quarter, and all the expenses of conveyance to our markets, to be 20 s. more, and that it could be sold here for 60 s. or 64 s. we may presume that such a stimulus would produce great exertions, and a correspondent increase of supply; some abatement in the force of that stimulus would be probably felt in an increase of freight, and other charges, but the prospect of a profit of 12 s. or 14 s. would give a powerful impulse to cultivation. What is here stated is upon the supposition, of course a mere supposition, that no duty would be imposed on foreign wheat, on its introduction into this kingdom. Supposing a duty should be imposed, it will, of course, weaken the force of the stimulus; and if it should be so high, as, when added to the costs and charges, to raise it above the price at which it could be sold in our markets, it would become a repellant instead of a stimulus, especially if it should be viewed as a permanent enactment.
If a duty in this country of 10 s. or 12 s. per quarter was imposed, it would not allow of such a profit, on the supposition of the price being from 60 s. to 64 s. as to induce any great exertions to increase cultivation in the bordering districts on the Vistula. The chance of a rise occasioned by war, by a winter so severe as to injure vegetation, or by a rainy harvest season, might induce those of a speculative turn, to increase their growth of wheat; but those who have that turn, and have the means of indulging it, are so few, that they would produce no sensible increase in the general surplus.
I see no reason to believe, that with such a duty as I have mentioned for England, and a price from 60 s. to 64 s. and with some similar regulation in France, that the surplus corn produced in Poland, including all the countries near enough to the Vistula, to send their corn to that stream, would materially increase in common seasons, or very much, if at all, exceed the average produce of that country; the greater part of this might probably be wheat, and if the duty were alike on all the various qualities of that grain, none would be sent here but that part which is the driest, heaviest and whitest. The inferior descriptions would not pay for

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importation, unless the average in England was much more than 64 s.
WILLIAM JACOB.
Corn-Returns Office,
21st February, 1826.

PETITION OF WEST-INDIA MERCHANTS FOR PROTECTION OF THEIR PROPERTY.
Mr. Baringpresented a petition from the Merchants of London trading to the West Indies, Mortgagees, and others, having claims upon West-India Estates, praying the interference of the House to give them some further protection for their property, or else compensation. He bespoke the earnest attention of the House to the complaints and representations of this respectable body of petitioners upon a subject of very considerable importance to the ultimate welfare of the empire. He could not but think this appeal to their consideration somewhat superfluous when he reflected that the petition which he was introducing to their notice was a claim of right upon the protection of the British parliament, in behalf of a species of property which was formerly reckoned, however now reduced below that standard, among the most sure and valuable in the possession of British subjects. And, that property in these colonies was no longer regarded with the same feeling of confidence as to its stability, it did not need this petition to tell them. The fact had long since established itself in the minds of those whose attention had been called to the subject. It had become matter of notoriety, and, at length, had reached that alarming point at which it was deemed necessary for the preservation of individual property, to call in aid the specific interference of parliament. He professed himself to be an anxious friend to the emancipation of the negroes from slavery; but it did not therefore follow that he was a disciple of the sect called the Abolitionists; or that he would league himself in any of the rash schemes proposed for the precipitation of that measure. If done at all, it could only be done, with safety and justice, by gradual approaches, by moderate and well-digested measures, preparatory in their nature, and carried into execution under the guiding hand of wisdom and discretion. In no other way could this most desirable end be attained. Valuable property, however, was tampered with by those who sought, by exaggeration, to excite the feelings and mislead the minds of the people of
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this country. It was not to be wondered at that the West-India planters and proprietors acted under the undue influence of heat. The proprietors in those colonies could not but feel alarmed at what they saw going on in this country. They could not refrain from feeling indignant at the unfounded aspersions cast upon them by the overheated advocates of emancipation in England; and when they considered that it was by the representation of those individuals that public opinion in this country was guided, and at their instigation that the government was induced to act, what else but alarm for the security of their property could they feel? If the planters and proprietors in the West-India colonies could be made to believe that the House would not go further in their plans of amelioration than was proposed by the instructions of his majesty's government, he was convinced they would make no resistance to those plans. But, seeing the exaggerated statements, the highly-coloured pictures, and; the personal aspersions on themselves, their conduct, and designs, put forth on this occasion, it was not strange they should conceive these to be the work of their enemies, and that there was an ulterior intention of carrying the case far beyond the views at present promulgated.
Mr. W. Smithsaid, he rose merely to repel the insinuations of the hon. member, against the abolitionists, and to deny every word and every assertion to their prejudice uttered by the hon. gentleman, or contained in the petition on the table. He thought he could not better illustrate the question at issue between himself and the hon. member, than by reading a few lines from a petition which was presented to that House on Friday last, from the Board of Council and House of Assembly of the island of Antigua, which set forth, "That, year after year the memorialists have represented the distressed situation of that colony, produced by the continuation of the war-duties on their staple commodities, during a period of twelve years' peace, in utter disregard of the pledge given at the time of the augmentation of those duties by the ministers of the day, that such duties should cease on the return of peace and tranquillity; that, although no notice has been hitherto taken of the just claims of the memorialists to relief, they trusted the time would yet arrive when they should be allowed to participate in the prosperity enjoyed

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by all other classes of his majesty's empire; but so far from such expectations having been realized, the memorialists find that accumulated burthens, and measures tending still further to their oppression and ruin, have lately taken place; the sense of these grievances, however, is lost in the astonishment with which the memorialists view the malignant feelings excited against them by certain dangerous demagogues and interested persons, acting, to suit their own immediate purposes, in coalition with the canting pretenders of the day to religion, who, not content with usurping the rights of the established church, seek also to invade the private property of his majesty's loyal West-Indian subjects, many of whose ancestors sought in those climates formerly, a refuge from puritanical persecution, and, having lost their all, supporting the royal cause against the disciples of hypocrisy, in the time of the unfortunate Charles, were content to seek an asylum under the Tropics, and to leave their hard-earned acquisitions as a poor equivalent to their children; this inheritance, guaranteed by the imperial parliament for more than one hundred and fifty years, the memorialists now see placed in jeopardy; they are weary of refuting the never-ending calumnies propagated by designing individuals against them, fully convinced, that the ultimate object in view is, not the welfare of the negro, but to tamper with his feelings, to rouse him to the destruction of the colonist." In reply to the language of that petition, he would only say, that he had concurred in almost every measure which his majesty's ministers had taken with respect to the slave-population of our colonies; and, whether for those measures ministers deserved the character given of them by the Antigua petitioners or not, he was content to share in the obloquy attached to them by those petitioners. But he had a still better answer to what he had just read. He could show, from evidence taken before a committee, respecting the state of the slaves in the island of Antigua, that formerly there were very few christian slaves in the island, and that their condition was very ignorant and barbarous; but that now the number of christian slaves had considerably increased, chiefly by the exertions of the Moravian missionaries; that the character of the slaves had improved; that they were much better
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treated, and that they deserved it; that they went to the Methodist meetings on Sundays, and conducted themselves well, but that the regular clergy were not known to have paid any particular attention to the subject. This was one instance, at least, to show how ill deserved had been that species of abuse which had been heaped upon those who endeavoured to procure an amelioration of the condition of the slaves.
Mr. Warresaid, that although he was an advocate for the amelioration of slavery, and although he admitted that much had been effected towards the attainment of that measure, he thought that the conduct pursued by persons in this country who professed themselves to be the advocates of emancipation, had retarded rather than promoted the great cause which they had espoused. Many members of the House, and more particularly those gentlemen who were interested in the West-India question, had most likely read a pamphlet, written by a master in Chancery, who once had been a member of the House. Whatever might be the opinion of hon. gentlemen of that work, he could not but think that it contained passages of a highly inflammatory and injurious nature. Mr. Stephen had dragged into the discussion persons and circumstances that had better have been omitted. What necessity, for instance, was there for the introduction of a passage like this: "You are zealous in the cause of the oppressed Greeks, and the feeling does you honour. You reprobate strongly the illiberal despotism that presses down its yoke on the necks of the unfortunate Spaniards; and it is a right and generous indignation. Can you then be insensible to the far more intolerable wrongs, to the far more goading oppression, which the poor Africans suffer under your own dominion? The Greeks have not yet been driven by the cart whip; and many a tyrant, more illiberal and ungrateful than Ferdinand, are maintained by British bayonets, as he by French ones, on the petty thrones of the plantations." He again contended that such exaggerated and illiberal language as this had a direct tendency to retard the march of genuine improvement. He was no enemy to the cause of negro improvement, when temperately and properly conducted; but he felt deeply the difficulties of the question; and whatever evils belonged or had belonged to the slave system, it ought to

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be remembered that that system had not originated solely with the slave proprietors, but had grown up, not only under the protection, but under the encouragement and control of Great Britain. He had always voted, and was willing to vote again, for every thing practicable in the shape of amelioration; but he could not but deprecate such language as that which he had quoted. It did appear to him, that the West-India planters had cause to complain of the manner in which they were spoken of by those who supported the question. They had been assailed by invective instead of argument; and aspersions the most unjust and unhandsome had been used against them.
Dr. Lushingtonsaid, he was sorry that on the mere presentation of a petition on this subject, he could not feel himself at liberty to remain silent; but he must say something respecting the observations of the hon. member for Taunton. The hon. member had said, that there had been great exaggerations on both sides. Now, he would be glad to know who they were that thus exaggerated, and to whom the blame chiefly belonged. He maintained, that if there had been any, it was very little indeed, on the side of those who were anxious to ameliorate the condition of the negroes. Every document from the colonies showed that their statements had not been exaggerated; and he invited the hon. member for Rochester, who said "hear, hear!" to read those statements, and then to prove, if he could, that the charges of the degradation and oppression of the negroes by West-India planters were unfounded. Every charge made by the abolitionists would be borne out by these documents. Out of a pamphlet of a hundred pages, written by a distinguished individual, the hon. member who spoke last had quoted one short passage, which he considered as intemperate and exaggerated; but the hon. member had made no allowance for the very great provocation which that distinguished person had received from the zealous endeavours of the slavery partizans to hold him up to public indignation. It ought to be recollected, that the very able pamphlet in question had been written by a gentleman of high character, and great personal information on the subject. Whoever read that pamphlet, would find that it was the work of one who had great personal knowledge of the subject, as
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well as a work of the greatest ability that had ever appeared on the subject. He would not then enter into the general merits of the question; but he could not help raising his voice, even on that occasion, against any general charge of exaggeration on the part of those who advocated the cause of amelioration. The documents from the colonies themselves proved that the exaggeration, if any, had been extremely little indeed.
Mr. Bernalsaid, he could not but feel that the pamphlet contained many exaggerations, although he was not prepared at present to point them out. There was one mis-statement in that work, however, to which he should now refer, for the purpose of supporting his assertion. He alluded to the branding of slaves. During the time that the slave trade was in existence, and slaves were imported in a state of the grossest barbarism, the practice had been resorted to, and was generally prevalent; but, as the black population became a Creole or native population, it was abandoned, and any one who should now attempt any thing of the kind, would be stigmatised and scouted by the planters. He did not mean to say that those who had been convicted in courts of justice might not be so branded; but the practice, as applicable to the creole population, under any other circumstances, had no existence whatever. He had heard it, however, repeatedly asserted, and within those walls, as well as in a variety of pamphlets, that it did exist, and the proprietors were stigmatised in consequence, as barbarous and inhuman monsters. He would also ask the hon. member whether, when the Legislative Assembly of Jamaica passed an act, to exempt slaves from working on Saturdays, it was not an exaggeration to say, that the act had been passed as much for the benefit of the masters as of the slaves? He challenged any hon. member to say, that it was for the benefit of the masters. If the hon. member would meet him fairly, and bring forward specific cases, he would pledge himself to convince him, that there had been gross exaggerations, and in channels where it was difficult to contradict them. It was easy, when the main party resided at a distance of four thousand miles, to bring forward accusations against him. It was not so easy to find the means of gainsaying those accusations, and this was a consideration which ought to weigh with the House, whenever any

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of those extraordinary statements were put forth, by which the public mind had been so violently and so unjustly agitated.
An hon. member, whose name we could mot learn, observed, that all he wished to know upon the subject, wa6 really required of the West-India planters. It was easy to deal in general declamation and undefined charges, but he would give no support to the petition, or to any resolution which might be brought forward, unless it denned the concessions which were required.
Mr. Manningsaid, it was impossible to refute such general charges as those which were always brought forward in discussions on this subject. He had read the pamphlet which had been alluded to, and entertained the highest respect for its author, but he could not justify the language which was used in some parts of it. He would appeal to the under Secretary of State for the colonies, whether the petitioners stated the truth or not, when they asserted that there were 800,000 slaves in a state of degradation and misery. He knew, from personal experience, that there was gross exaggeration in the pictures which had been drawn of the state of the slave-population in the West Indies. Abuse was not the way to promote improvement, but, on the contrary, to obstruct it.
Mr. Sykessaid, that, on which ever side the alleged exaggerations might have preponderated, he held a paper in his hand which showed how far the zeal of the hon. member for Rochester would carry him. The hon. member had asserted, that it was not the general practice of the Jamaica planters to brand their negroes. Now he had happened to look at the Jamaica Gazette, and he found from that paper that it was still as common a practice to brand the negroes of the soil, or the freehold negroes, as to brand any others. There were freehold negroes, of the names of Bullock and Cæsar, stated to have been so branded on the shoulders and other places; and in the whole it appeared, out of a list of three or four columns, that twenty freehold negroes had been branded in the same manner. This was, therefore, an unfortunate instance, to prove that the Abolitionists had been guilty of exaggeration. One word as to Mr. Stephen. It was certainly not fair to read a single passage of a long pamphlet, as a proof of general exaggeration on the part of those who promoted
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the amelioration of the slaves, when the writer of that pamphlet was not present to defend his language. He was not sorry, however, that the pamphlet had been mentioned, as it might have the effect of calling attention to its contents; for it certainly appeared to him the ablest pamphlet that had ever been written on the subject.
Mr. Canningsaid, he did not think it fair to call upon persons in official situations to answer questions put by members on the presentation of petitions, as had been done by the hon. gentleman behind him. He, therefore, thought that he was doing the House a favour when he in-treated his hon. friend (Mr. Horton) not to answer such questions.
Mr. Thomas Wilsondid not think, that the planters ought to suffer unfounded statements against them to pass uncontradicted. It was due to them to repel such statements when made. A learned friend of his had denied that any exaggeration had been used by those who supported the question of amelioration. Now, a petition from London, signed by 70,000 persons, had been presented in favour of amelioration. And how had that petition been got up? The representation of a negro in chains had been exhibited all over London, and by means of this exhibition, which had a tendency to create the most unfavourable impression against the planters, a great part of these signatures had, no doubt, been obtained. In truth many of the petitions had been got up in a manner disgraceful to the cause. The Anti-slavery Society had sent round the country printed forms of petitions, and used many other unfair means to promote their object; and, if any thing could be more unfair than another, it was the holding out to the people, that the ministers expected their petitions, in order to enable them to carry their purposes into effect. He trusted ministers would know their duty better titan to pay any regard to popular clamour; and that they would proceed upon a sound, temperate, and deliberate view of what the real interests of the country demanded. Another point in some of these petitions deserved notice. They spoke of a protecting duty on West-India sugar, which the petitioners seemed to wish done away with, and so to put an end to slavery. But we had done much more for the amelioration of the slaves than had been done by the Brazilians, some of the

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Spanish, and other colonies; and, if the protecting duties on West-India sugars were to be repealed, the effect would be, to ruin the British colonies, to make sugars dearer, and to establish a system of slavery ten times more grievous than ours! He trusted, ministers would not act upon these wild views. Some of the petitioners stated, that they did not wish to injure private property, and offered indemnity; but indemnity was of two kinds; first, indemnity when the thing should be done; and indemnity accompanied by a previous inquiry. The inquiry ought to take place first. The St. Domingo negroes did not produce nearly so much sugar, nor so good, as the sugar produced by the negroes in our colonies.
Mr. Evanssaid, that if the hon. gentleman would take the trouble of looking at the petition, he would find that it did not pray for the introduction of sugar by free labour, and not by slave labour, to the prejudice of the West-India manufacturers. He confessed, however, that he did not think it fair that sugar made by free labour should be subject to a higher duty than that which was produced by the labour of slaves.
Mr. W. Smithentreated the attention of his hon. friend, the member for Rochester, for whom he had the greatest respect, while he undertook to convince him that gentlemen of his description on this side of the water were ignorant of what was passing on the other side. His hon. friend had stated, that branding negroes was a practice now never heard of in the West Indies. Now, he held in his hand the supplement to the Royal Gazette of Jamaica, published on the 16th of February, 1826, in which was an account of the apprehended deserters then in the Clarendon workhouse. The first mentioned was Dick, a Creole negro, marked with the letter H. The next was named Richard Smith, also a Creole negro, five feet four inches high, and marked with the letters W. S. and a diamond above them. The hon. gentleman read several other instances of the same kind in St. Mary's Workhouse. One half of the deserters, he added, were Creole negroes, and they were all marked. For his part, he solemnly declared, that if he lived in Jamaica, he would rather run the risk of never getting his Creoles again, than offend the eyes and the ears of the British people by inflicting so inhuman and degrading a stigma. The slaves thus treated must be
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creoles, as it was 19 years since an African negro had been imported into Jamaica.
Mr. Bernalsaid, it should be borne in mind that there were upwards of 300,000 slaves in the island of Jamaica. His hon. friend, in his zeal against slavery, had taken up a copy of the Jamaica Gazette, and finding that some deserters were there stated to be marked, he concluded that all the negroes were branded. What he had stated was, that branding was a practice generally going into disuse. The negroes who had taken refuge in the workhouse were, it was to be presumed, notorious runaways, and that disposition rendered it necessary to mark them. They, however, bore but a small proportion to the whole negro population. He was a decided enemy to the practice himself, even with regard to runaways, and he was satisfied that it was by no means general.
Mr. C. R. Ellissaid, that the practice of branding, where it was unnecessarily applied, was not only regarded as cruel, but condemned as illegal. He knew an instance in which the owner of a slave had been prosecuted for this offence, under an act of the colonial legislature. If any doubt existed as to the fact, he pledged himself to produce the case.
Ordered to be printed.

ALIENS REGISTRATION BILL.
Mr. Secretary Peel,on rising pursuant to notice, to introduce a bill for the Registration of Aliens, observed, that when the Alien Act was last under discussion in 1824, a hope was expressed by his right hon. friend the Secretary for Foreign Affairs, and by himself, that at the period to which the duration of that act was limitted, it might be possible to dispense with the powers of compelling aliens to leave the country, given by that measure to the executive government. The period had now arrived when those powers would cease, unless by the intervention of the House they were prolonged; as the act of 1824 would expire in November next. He was extremely happy to have it now in his power to fulfil the expectation which he had just alluded to, and to inform the House, that it was not the intention of his majesty's government to call for the prolongation of this law. In proposing the Registration bill on the present occasion, it was merely wished that the government should have that to which he thought there could be no possible objection; namely, a Registration of the

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names of such aliens as thought proper to take up their residence in this country. He did not mean to propose any further measure as affecting aliens, nor to take any steps whatever for compelling them to leave this country, under any other circumstances than those which would be operative upon the natural-born subjects of his majesty. He could sincerely assure the House that no man could be more willing to part than he was with the authority which this bill had officially in-trusted to his execution; and, in relieving himself from such a burthen, he had the satisfaction to reflect that, during the five years in which he had exercised it, not a single instance of abuse had been laid to his charge. It was true, that the mere circumstance of an abuse of the power would not have been conclusive against the propriety of the measure itself; but it still would have naturally enough indisposed the House to afford a too great facility for its re-enactment. He repeated, however, that he had the satisfaction of knowing that no abuse of the provisions of this act had been imputed to him, and, indeed, he had only in a single instance applied them. It was also due to his predecessor to state, that he had only resorted to the measure five or six times, so that altogether its extraordinay powers had been but rarely brought into operation. The single case in which he had been under the necessity of applying it was not at all of a political character. It was where an individual had threatened to resort to personal violence against a foreign ambassador, in such a manner as to induce a rationally-grounded expectation that he would, if left unrestrained, have carried his threat into execution; and he really believed that it afterwards proved of great advantage to the individual himself, that it was not left in his power to offer the violence he had premeditated against a high public functionary, who was undoubtedly entitled to all the protection which the laws furnished, while he resided officially in this country. From what he had stated, the House would see, that not only had no abuse been committed through the means of this bill, but that in this single instance, and one quite unconnected with politics, had it been used at all. And he could further state, that he had taken the utmost pains to prevent any use from being made of this measure against foreigners, by any of the subordinate agents who were placed under his control. The act
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which he meant, on the present occasion, to propose in the place of the Alien act, was intended not as a temporary, but a permanent law; and it merely required that every alien should upon his landing in England, under a certain penalty for omission, be compelled to give a true designation of his name and place of intended residence in this country, and that the Secretary of State should also have the power of requiring a renewal of this registration of names, at certain intervals, while the same parties remained in England. He certainly should not consent to part with this power, if he had not observed the conduct of the aliens who were exposed to the operation of the act, and of them he could say, that he had not the smallest idea that they would abuse the new privileges (for such they might be called) which were about to be conferred upon them. Many of the foreigners who were now in this country had been compelled to seek its shores, in consequence of the intestine troubles and dissensions which unfortunately raged in their native land. They had here, he was glad to say, found an asylum, and received the generous and humane sympathy and assistance of all parties. It would, therefore, be a bad return for British generosity, were they to make this land, where, under their misfortunes, they had sought and found a resting place, the scene of cabals or conspiracies against their own governments, while Great Britain was in alliance with them. If, however, (which he had no reason to anticipate) these foreigners should hereafter by their conduct defeat his sanguine expectations, then he should feel no hesitation in calling upon parliament for a renewal of the Alien bill. He did, however, hope that such a step would be unnecessary, and it was therefore with the greater cheerfulness he consented to relinquish a power, which he had the consolation of feeling had passed through his hands without abuse. The right hon. gentleman concluded by moving, for leave to bring in a bill to provide for the Registration of Aliens.
Lord Althorpcongratulated the right hon. gentleman on the liberal course which he had just taken, and expressed his perfect confidence that no inconvenience whatever would arise from the expiration of the Alien bill, but that, on the contrary, the relaxation of such a; system of uncongenial policy would operate beneficially for the country.
Mr. Hobhousebegged to express his entire concurrence in the opinion which had just been delivered by his noble friend. He was quite sure that the proposal of the right hon. gentleman would be hailed with gratitude, not only by those in that House, who were, upon constitutional grounds, the opponents of the Alien bill, but by the friends of just and liberal principles in every quarter of Europe. Indeed, he believed the government were hardly aware of the extent of benefit they were conferring by the abandonment of this measure. The Alien bill, whether in actual or threatened operation, was always reckoned by enlightened foreigners as one of those measures by which England had suffered herself to become connected with the arbitrary system of the continent. He could assure the right hon. gentleman that every intelligent traveller was impressed with the prevalence of this belief. The abandonment, therefore, of a system so abhorrent to the principles of the British constitution would be hailed all over Europe as the principal step—(in conjunction with those other liberal measures which had been lately taken by the Secretary for Foreign Affairs)—on the part of Great Britain to a return to that policy which had so long made her, through a bright succession of years of triumph, also the protectress of the oppressed, and the great patroness of public liberty all over the world. He was quite confident that his majesty's government would have no reason to repent the confidence they were disposed to place in the foreigners who had sought an asylum in this country, and that they would find themselves quite safe in reverting to the old policy and laws under which England had so long flourished. Before he sat down, he must say, that he could hardly find adequate terms in which to express his gratitude to the right hon. gentleman for the course he was about to pursue on the present occasion.
Sir R. Wilsondid not rise to detain the House while he paid a tribute of justice to the right hon. gentleman. But it was due from him to say, that not only had the powers of this bill not been abused during the administration of the right hon. gentleman, but he could, from his own personal communications, bear testimony, that he had, upon various opportunities, found him most anxious to do justice to the claims of foreigners, and
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correct most rigidly any tendency to abuse on the part of the subordinate agents, who had to execute some of the provisions of this bill. He had always found the right hon. gentleman most desirous of respecting the rights and interests of these proscribed individuals. There was one point which he wished to notice respecting the proposed registration of the names, a measure to which he had in itself no objection; in times of political troubles abroad, when individuals were more likely to seek shelter here, they were often compelled to use wrong names, to escape the vigilance of their persecutors. He trusted that no delay would, on that account, be interposed with regard to their passage into the interior.
Mr. Peelsaid, that the difficulty might be obviated by the alien telling the officer, confidentially, what his name really was. The regulation he considered necessary as it might be desirable, on some occasions, to know the number of aliens in the country, and the particular points to which they were resorting.
Mr. Denmanentirely concurred in the praise which had been bestowed upon the right hon. gentleman on the present occasion. He was glad of the abandonment of this measure, for he knew that it was a modern innovation of only thirty three years standing, and that it was a most unnecessary measure; for this country had, through all previous times, maintained her policy towards strangers without the infliction of such oppression. Still he was glad of the change, and congratulated the House upon the termination which it would put to a system in itself unjust and oppressive, and which no existing circumstances could make longer necessary.
Leave was given to bring in the bill.

SLAVE POPULATION IN DEMERARA AND BERBICE.
Mr. William Smith,in rising to make his promised motion, respecting the treatment of Slaves in the colonies of Demerara and Berbice, observed, that the subject was so interesting, important, and fertile in difficulties, as well as in the many considerations it involved, that he deemed it better to treat it by piecemeal, than bring the whole bearings of the question at once before the House. The angry discussions which took place on the subject were caused by the claim set up on the part of the planters, to a property in the body of man. They all contended, that they had an

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equal right to their slaves as to their other property. This pretence was the root of all the evil, and the source of the mischief, and demoralization, which it became the duty of the House to remedy. That a man might have a right to a certain extent of the labour of another he was free to admit; but when he proceeded to make an absolute claim, such as that set up by the planters, he confounded all the dictates of common sense, and advanced principles as repugnant to justice as to common humanity. What! would it be contended that a man had an equal right to his horse as to his chair? or could it be supposed, that he might chop off the leg of the one as capriciously, and with the same impunity, as that of the other? Indeed, so far had this doctrine been carried, even in this country, that a few years ago, if you remonstrated with a brute, whilst he was abusing his superior brute in the streets, his answer would be, "Is not the animal mine? He is mine, and I will abuse him as long as it is my pleasure." Every man of common humanity must have revolted at the feeling which such an expression conveyed; and he protested that, when a similar right was claimed by the slave-proprietors of Demerara, it struck him with horror:—a feeling which he entertained in common with others who could not be suspected of prejudice; for it appeared from a despatch of governor Elliot's, that the Attorney-general of the colony over which he presided, expressly said, that he was shocked to hear a lawyer declare, at the trial of a slave, "that there was no more harm in killing a negro than a dog." He was free to admit that a great change of opinion had taken place on this question, owing principally to the discussions in that House, since the subject was first brought under its consideration in 1787. The colonies of Demerara and Berbice were now selected, and the motion made respecting the slave-population of those colonies, because they had both signalized themselves by their resistance to the recommendation of government, although the proprietors in those Islands had, in fact, less semblance of reason for complaint than any other, inasmuch as they had not embarked their capital in slave property until within a few years before the slave trade was abolished, and not until long after the discussions in parliament ought to have led them to expect such a consummation. If, therefore, they
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chose to vest their money in Dutch colonies, which, at the time, were likely to be subjected to the dominion of this country, they certainly could now have no just claim on the mercy of the House. After stating, that when these Islands were conquered by us, it was provided in the capitulation that they should enjoy their own laws until it was finally settled to what nation they should belong, the hon. member observed, that, if the Dutch institutions, which now existed in Demerara and Berbice, were examined closely, it would be found that their courts of policy had no more right to enact laws to bind the inhabitants, than they had to interfere with the government of any other West-Indian island. These courts were solely empowered to put in force the laws of the States-general, or of this country, which was now the representative of the Dutch government. So strictly true was this observation, that, shouldany contumacious planter oppose or resist a law passed by the courts of policy, they had no authority to enforce it. The hon. member deprecated the obstinate and unfeeling conduct of the colonists of the islands in question, in having refused obedience to the order in council sent out by lord Bathurst. Had they acted differently, the discussions on the subject would have now been at an end, and the slave-population would have reaped the benefit of an order transmitted in May 1823, and which nothing but the cruelty of the colonists prevented from being carried into execution, at least two years and a half ago. The planters of Demerara had, it was understood, urged the late insurrection in that colony, as a reason why the recommendation of government had not been adopted. On that subject he should say nothing: it had been discussed in that House in a manner not soon to be forgotten, and the trial of the unfortunate and injured individual connected with it would long remain fixed in the recollection of every man who had a heart to feel for the undeserved sufferings of an innocent fellow-creature. That insurrection had been, by some interested persons, attributed to the missionaries; but the petition presented a few days back from Antigua went a great length to exonerate those individuals from the imputation of being its instruments or promoters; for it would be most unreasonable to argue, that their exertions could have produced a beneficial effect in Antigua, and an opposite one in Demerara. There

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were many circumstances, which, in his mind, accounted for the disturbances in Demerara. That colony had been loaded with fresh negroes, imported by English avarice and folly. There had been a great abuse of power exercised towards the slaves, so that long before and after it became a British colony, there prevailed that discontent and alienation of feeling, which could not but break out into insurrection. If they compared the atrocities of former rebellions with the incidents of the recent one, it would enable them to form a somewhat accurate estimate of the purposes to which missionary influence had been directed. In 1789 there was a violent insurrection in Demerara; the negroes then fled to the woods, and perpetrated acts of cruelty, which even the greatest provocation (and their sufferings had been great indeed) could not justify. It was stated in Mr. Bryan Edwards's history, that a system of oppression then obtained in that colony, of so atrocious a character, as to make the blood of an Englishman run cold, and the blood of a negro to boil; and it had boiled, and had remained boiling ever since. Let the House look to the progress of the two insurrections, and then judge of the conduct of the missionaries. In 1789, when there was not a single missionary in the island, the negroes murdered many whites, burnt the farm-houses, destroyed the plantations, and rioted in the commission of every species of cruelty. During the last insurrection, there were many missionaries on it, and owing to their influence it was, that not one white life had been lost, except that of an individual who had been killed accidentally. This forbearance on the part of the slaves was the more deserving of approbation, when it was considered that they rose to force from their masters that freedom which they believed had been granted to them by government. Another predisposing cause of the recent insurrection was, the ill treatment of the slaves; and, if he were asked to produce authority for the assertion, he would at once turn to the trial of that individual Mr. Smith, to whom he before alluded. He would direct the attention of the House to the private journal of that amiable man, which, as it was not intended for publication, might be relied on as containing only a true detail of facts. Let them look to that journal, and there they would find irrefragable proofs of the existence of a sys-
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tem of cruelty which it was impossible to contemplate, without shuddering.—The hon. member, after some further remarks, observed, that the manner of treating the slaves, and the attention paid to their complaints, however well-founded, would appear from the Fiscal returns. On examining the complaints of these unfortunate persons, as detailed in the returns in question, it would be found that but in one instance was the accused individual punished, and that not for cruelty, but for a more tangible offence, for starvation; that was to say, for not giving the slave that quantity of food to which he was by law entitled; and yet it was most strange that the slaves had, in many instances, been themselves punished; and the people against whom these charges were made, were, in nine cases out of ten, discharged on their testimony. But the injury which most of all was calculated to irritate the negro was the liberty taken by the manager or overseer with his wife or daughter. It was notorious, that in all the colonies the manager took whatever liberties he pleased with the female slaves; and, while he possessed the authority of inflicting such annoyances and punishment as he pleased On the wretched being, it was of course to be inferred that the slave was wholly in his power; for, though he might guard against violating the law, he had still the means of harassing, even if he never inflicted more than one lash every hour. One of the complaints on this subject, as given in the Fiscal's returns, was made in August, 1822, by Felix, a slave belonging to plantation Scotland. Felix states to the Fiscal:—"That he had a black woman upon the estate for his wife, now two years; and the reason of his coming to complain is, that the manager of the estate takes her from him, although he has a wife of his own. He is always taking the negroes wives, particularly his wife (Felix's), for she has had a child by him: and since the child has been born, the manager is always punishing him and his wife without a cause. Some time ago, ten of the gang came to complain to their master, Dr. Broer, to report to him that the manager had connexion with their wives: their master promised to them that he would remove the manager from the estate, and place another one there. Upon this promise, the negroes returned to the estate; but since that they have never heard of another manager."—"On

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hearing this complaint, the acting Fiscal proceeded to the state, accompanied by Dr. Broer, the owner; and on questioning the manager and negroes, in presence of each other, on the subject-matter of the complaint, it appeared that Felix had neglected his work, and was told he would be punished if he did not finish his task the next day, which he did not do; and therefore, supposing the manager would punish, him, he went to the Fiscal to complain. This being proved, Felix was punished for his misconduct, and the manager severely reprimanded for taking improper liberties with the women on the estate, which it was evident he had done! and Dr. Broer was therefore strongly recommended to discharge him from his employ" But, although he was dismissed for a short; time, it appeared that he was afterwards employed. In another case, where an individual had been guilty of several bar-barities towards the slaves under his control, the sentence, upon prosecution and conviction, was only three months' imprisonment, and a fine of twenty-five pounds; to be sure there was, in that case, too, a recommendation to dismiss him from exercising any further control over the slave population; but, as in the case to which he had alluded, the moment the time of imprisonment expired, he was employed as before. It was a rule of philosophy, which had his full concurrence, and which he intended to abide by in the present case, that when there was sufficient for the support of a cause, it would be an unnecessary waste of labour to go further. That he had stated enough in proof of the positions he had advanced, he was fully satisfied, and he would now revert to what was more immediately connected with his present motion. His majesty's government had intimated it to be their intention, if they had not already Carried such intention into execution, of appointing a protector or guardian of slaves in the colonies. Now, although he approved most heartily of the principle of such a measure, yet he would contend, that, unless they carried that principle much further, and absolutely prohibited all such inspectors from being in any way connected with the employment or employers of slaves, they would do little or nothing by such appointments towards those objects which he believed his majesty's government to be as sincerely interested in, as the abolitionists themselves. He had proofs in abundance, that, in the
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colony of Demerara, of which he was particularly about to speak, nine out of ten of the persons appointed to guard against abuses were themselves the most interested in their continuance. The burgher captains, the persons who decided the disputes between slaves and freemen, were themselves the owners of slaves; and the friends, companions, and connexions of the whites. Upon what principle of reason or common sense, then, could it be supposed, that they would decide impartially in those cases which were brought before them? The very idea of such authority being a protection to the slave, was an absurdity. Mr. Henry, who had published some curious statements with regard to the island of Berbice, represented the criminal and civil law of that colony, and all those islands which once belonged to the Dutch, as being a matter of extreme nicety. The code of laws left by that nation to their colonies was like their own, chiefly founded on the old Roman law; and Mr. Henry observed, that both in its method of taking examinations, and in the whole of its proceedings, it involved great legal niceties; that it was difficult to acquire, and very little understood by those who were called upon to decide according to its dictates; and that the burgher captains in particular knew little or nothing about it. He did not mean to censure any men, or body of men. It could not, perhaps, be expected, from their situation in life, that these persons should be profoundly versed in legal technicalities; but it was, he thought, obvious, that if they were totally unfit to administer justice among the whites, they were not fit to be in-trusted with the protection of the blacks; and when it was recollected, as he observed before, that they were in every instance the friends, companions, and even relations of those who might be supposed the aggressors, it could not be expected that the slaves would derive much benefit from their interference. Now, it was proposed, he understood, to send out only one principal inspector, who was to be, in every instance, a man as impartial and as free from all local prejudices as human nature would admit. But he distinctly laid it down as beyond contradiction, that unless the minor inspectors were equally impartial, and equally free from the operation of local interests, there could be no protection to the slave. It was impossible for any man, however endowed with bodily or mental energy, to

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be present in every place where persecution and cruelty might be practised; and, unless the subordinate inspectors were made as free from interest as the principal, the whole end of their labours would be defeated. We declared in this country, by our actions and our expressions, that Roman Catholics were incapable, by their religious tenets, of understanding or practising the relations enjoined by civil society; but it was somewhat strange, that in every colony which had been subject to Roman Catholics, the laws were more favourable to the slaves, and productive of effects infinitely more beneficial to their interests, than in the colonies belonging peculiarly to those who were styled the liberal Protestants. In Demerara, it was one of the great objections to the missionary Smith, that he had gone about asking questions with regard to the condition of the slaves, for the purpose, as was alleged, of ingratiating himself into their favour; but his astonishment might be conceived, when he found that what was objected to the missionary Smith, by Protestants, and censured in such unmeasured terms, was one of those things enjoined and commanded by Roman Catholics. In the Spanish colonies, the Roman Catholic priests were commanded to go about, and visit, and comfort, and inquire into the wants and complaints of the negroes. Was it not astonishing, that those who had first imported the Africans, and worked up the Aborigines, should have left us the model upon which we had since framed our resolutions? The order in council sent to Trinidad was, in part, if not wholly, founded on the old Spanish laws. And was it not disgraceful in the highest degree, as Protestants, that we should thus adopt so tardily the measures left us by Roman Catholics; and that, adopting them, we had not more speedily carried them into execution, to their full extent? It was said, that the negroes were not in a fit state to be emancipated. This he believed most truly, and sorry, very sorry, should he be to see any order promulgated for their immediate freedom; but if they were not fit for the enjoyment of freedom, to whom was that to be attributed but to the masters? They had brutalized these unhappy beings, and deprived them of the capacity to appreciate the advantages which might be conferred upon them. They had left them in that state which would make it
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dangerous to intrust them with liberty. He was not speaking of individuals, but of the general body of slave-owners. These individuals had possessed an unlimited authority over their slaves. Had they used it for the purpose of humanizing them? On this point he wished for no other concession than that which had been made, over and over again, by Mr. Bryan Edwards, who was himself a West-India proprietor. That gentleman had admitted that the state of the West Indies was truly deplorable; that the example set by the colonists to their slaves was such that it was no wonder that the slaves, instead of improving in their conduct and morals, actually deteriorated. And how, indeed, could it be otherwise, when nothing was attempted by the slave-proprietors in the way of education or religious instruction? Except a law, passed ages ago, he believed in 1669, for building churches and educating slaves in the island of Jamaica, and which law was almost a dead letter, nothing had been done to make the slave acquainted with his moral or religious duties. There was an old story told of the king of Prussia, a martinet in his way, but a great pretender to philosophy, that when a soldier was brought before him for some infamous offence committed against good order, he asked if the man was a good soldier; and upon being told that he was a very good one, he replied, "Then, what have I to do with his morals?" So it was with the slave-owners: provided a negro worked well, they did not consider they had any thing to do with his moral or social duties. It was, therefore, very true, that the negroes were not fit for deliverance from thraldom. But what could be said to those who had for forty years—from the first time when his valued friend, Mr. Wilberforce, sounded that note, which had been repeated still louder by Mr. Pitt and Mr. Fox afterwards—what could be said to those who had neglected every opportunity of providing for that crisis which they saw must come, and shuffled off every recommendation which was offered them as a provision against the danger? If all the negroes who had been in the hands of their masters for the last forty years had been properly treated and instructed; if a redress of their wrongs, and a cultivation of their minds, had been set about in good earnest, he entertained no doubt but that we should now have had our West-India colonies filled with a

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sound, moral, and intelligent population. Indeed, of all the charges he had to make against the colonists, none was so heavy in his opinion, as their neglecting so wantonly those signs of the times which were so distinctly apparent, and which not only reminded them of their duty, but also pointed out the path to its performance, and the consequence of their neglect. Speaking, however, of those duties which, as men and as Christians, they were bound to fulfil, what terms were strong enough to express their sense of such gross neglect and indifference? If slavery was only a civil crime, a malum prohibitum, the slave-owner might have considered that he did all that was required, when be evaded the commission of a felony or a piracy, and virtually obeyed the injunction of the legislature; but he knew, that when he took upon himself the right to the labour of the slave, be also took upon himself duties of a higher and more sacred character than any which were either enjoined or claimed by the laws of his country; he knew that he took upon himself duties which existed before the 30th of George 3rd was ever contemplated; and though the penalty of the omission of one kind of duty might depend on the statute, he knew that an attention to the other was more imperiously, though perhaps more silently demanded from every man who pretended to be worthy of an admission within the pale of civilization, or to have made himself acquainted with the precepts contained in the book of the Christian Word.—There was only one point more to which he would advert; but he thought it came so home to the question of the humanity of the Slave-trade, and was so highly deserving of their serious consideration, that he could not avoid troubling them with a few observations upon it. It had very recently come to his knowledge, that the cultivation of sugar was more injurious to human life than any other of the West-India productions. The assertion had been made before; but he was now possessed of proof upon the point, which must be considered conclusive. A commission had been sent out from St. Christopher's to inquire into the state of the island of Anguilla, and the reporter states in these terms the result of his investigation:—"The ground is poor; the slaves have no cattle; they acknowledge no government; crimes are left without pun-
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ishment. They have no sense of morals to act as a restraint upon their actions. The slaves are few, and totally destitute of clothing. They have no food; and to sum up all, it is impossible to conceive a system more ruinous to the master, or more degrading to the slave." But let the House bear in mind this picture of misery, and consider how it was to be compared with the state of those in more favoured soils. In the four great sugar islands there was a decrease of human life, varying, according to the production of sugar, from eight hundred weight per man down to two hundred and a quarter. In these colonies—and they were the richest in soil—.when about seven or eight hundred weight of sugar per man was produced, the decrease of the number of slaves averaged from two to three per cent. In colonies where the production was three, four, or five hundred hundred weight per man, the number of slaves remained nearly the same; but in Barbadoes, and some others, where the quantity of sugar produced was smaller, there was a small annual increase. But the great and conclusive confirmation to this theory was to be found in Anguilla; where the slaves, living in a poor soil, without clothing, food, morals, or government, were—as the reporter stated—vigorous, healthy, and increasing rapidly, and yet they produce only two hundred weight of sugar each. Was not this an establishment, beyond all question, of the truth of the principle, that the cultivation of sugar was pernicious to human life? The hon. gentleman concluded by observing, that he did not mean what he had stated as a reflection upon any body of men. He merely pointed out these facts as proofs of the evils of the system under which the negroes suffered—evils which, he trusted, would not now long remain without remedy. He would not trespass further upon the attention with which the House had so kindly favoured him, but conclude by moving the resolution he had to propose, and which, he believed, would be found to contain recommendations of the utmost importance to the success of those measures which parliament had pledged itself to carry into execution; namely,
"That, from the official documents laid before this House, and other authentic information respecting the colonies of Demerara and Berbice, it appears that although protection has been held out to

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the slave-population of those countries, either by the fiscal or chief judge, in the capacity of protector of slaves, or by some other person acting in that character, yet that the slaves have generally been, and still remain, exposed to numerous vexations and grievous oppression, demanding effectual relief; and that the House has therefore observed with great satisfaction the declared determination of his majesty's ministers to promulgate in those colonies an order in council on this important subject, to which unqualified obedience will be required: But that from all reasoning and experience, this House is led to conclude that me legal enactments, however well devised and strongly framed, can prove sufficient for such effectual safeguard of the slave, unless the officers, both principal and subordinate, to whom the execution of the law is to be intrusted, shall be appointed and supported by the government at home, and absolutely prohibited from possessing or employing slaves in any capacity, either prædial or domestic."
Mr. Wilmot Hortonsaid, that the greater part of the hon. member's speech was so little in keeping with the resolutions that he had submitted to the House, that he felt some difficulty in knowing whether he was to address his observations to the speech or the resolution. In the first instance he must object to a part of the hon. gentleman's resolution; for to say that the slaves still remained in a state of insecurity, was to say that the course which had been pursued by his majesty's government, and which had been sanctioned by the approbation of parliament, was insufficient to remove the existing evil. At that moment, the order in council which was issued in Trinidad was, with a few modifications, in full operation in Demerara, and would soon be so in Berbice. Under these circumstances, he owned he was at a loss to discover what practical advantage there could be in looking back to see what the law, and the usages under the law, had been. It would be much better, in his opinion, to look forward, and to anticipate the benefits which would result from the measures that had lately been adopted. It was perfectly true that a protector of slaves had been appointed for the colony of Demerara. He was an individual who, after a full inquiry into his qualifications and character, appeared to be perfectly competent to the important situation to which he had been
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appointed by the Crown. This gentleman's instructions were to the following effect:—"It is your particular duty, as protector of slaves, to watch over all the regulations that may exist at present, or that may be introduced hereafter, respecting the treatment of slaves in Demerara. You are to apply to the local government for such facilities as may enable the slaves to communicate to you any complaints they may have to make against their owners; and you are not to fail to report to the lieutenant-governor any impediments which may be thrown in the way of such communication. You are not, on all occasions, to wait for the spontaneous complaints of the slaves themselves; but if you hear of any mal-treatment to which they have been subjected, you are to repair to the estate on which that reported mal-treatment has occurred, and institute a diligent inquiry into the circumstances of the case. You are not, however, to forget, in the execution of your office, that it is as much your duty to secure the legitimate rights of the proprietors, as it is to protect the slaves from injustice and oppression. On those points you are to endeavour to exercise a sound discretion, and to adopt such measures as, while they secure the slaves, may not interfere with their industry or with the obedience which they owe to their masters. For that purpose, although you ought to exercise the utmost vigilance in protecting the slaves from injurious treatment, you ought at the same time to discourage all frivolous and unfounded complaints. One of your earliest studies ought to be, the means of fixing on the minds of the slaves, by such statements and arguments as may be capable of comprehension by them, the principles of these instructions." He should be able to place these instructions in a few days on the table of the House; but he trusted that the extracts which he had read from them would be sufficient to meet the statement of the question which had that evening been made by the hon. member for Norwich. The House would see from them that the protector had power given him to enforce the duties of his office, and that, if that power were not sufficient for his object, he was authorized to apply to the governor for more. The plan which had been tried in Trinidad was already carried into execution in Demerara, and was preparing to be carried into execution in Berbice—an improvement to which the

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hon. member ought to have referred in preference to the acts of exasperation which had taken place at former periods. Indeed, he thought that it would be wiser for the hon. member to draw the attention of the House to the favourable prospects of the future, than to involve it in these inconvenient discussions on the past, from which no advantage could be derived either to the question which the hon. member had at heart, or to the more general and more important interests of society. The hon. Secretary then proceeded to notice that part of the speech of the hon. member for Norwich in which he had declared it to be desirable that all the persons connected with the tribunals in these colonies, subordinates as well as principal, should be prohibited from having any property in slaves. In the case of the protector of slaves, of the chief justice, and of the attorney-general of the colony, he was prepared to say, that the government was determined to enforce such a regulation; but he doubted whether it was prudent to say, that, in all the minor officers of judicature, all property in slaves should be prohibited. A regulation to that effect would render property in slaves a degradation contrary to the resolutions unanimously assented to by the House in 1823, which secured to the planters that species of property, and gave them all a beneficial interest in it. In the progress of his speech, the hon. member for Norwich had adverted to the insurrection which had broken out in Demerara two or three years ago. He had said that it was calumnious to attribute that insurrection to the causes to which it was usually attributed, as it arose principally from the unsatisfactory situation of the slave-population. He had likewise made an admission on the subject which he was very glad to hear. The hon. member had said, that the slaves had risen to attain that freedom which they erroneously supposed had come out to them from England. Now this was what had always been asserted on the ministerial side of the House, and as roundly denied on the opposition side. The hon. member for Norwich, and those with whom he was in the habit of acting, said the insurrection did not arise from any misconception on the part of the slaves, but from the mistreatment to which they had severally been subjected. The hon. member now unsaid his former declaration; and if there had existed a doubt of his
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policy in so doing, it was entirely done away by one of the last despatches of sir B. D'Urban to lord Bathurst. That despatch, in which sir B. D'Urban said that he had been doing every thing in his power to teach the slaves to look up to him for protection, contained the following paragraph among others: "I can now have no doubt that the opinion I expressed to your lordship on the 5th, was well-founded, and that many of the slaves had still continued under the delusion which I then described; indeed several of them avowed it, and evidently took leave of the hopes they had so long cherished, with strong feelings of sorrow. Their eyes, however, are opened now; and they will no longer have that strong excitement to revolt which arose from the belief that they were contending for rights (and by that belief they were unquestionably actuated in the late revolt) which they supposed had been granted them in the mother country, but suppressed by the colonial authorities. At the same time that they have been now made aware that freedom, in the manner they had anticipated, is out of the question, they have also learned that many real advantages are preparing for them, if they deserve them by quiet and subordinate behaviour; and I have assured them that, as on the one hand the severe punishment of any disorder among them will be certain, so on the other, if any individual shall at any time think himself oppressed or ill-treated, I shall always be ready to receive his complaint personally, and redress it if it be well-founded." This despatch did honour to sir B. D'Urban, and must convince the House that the recent insurrection of the slaves arose from misconception on their parts, and not from ill-treatment on the part of the masters. That misconception, he was happy to say, appeared to be removed at present entirely from the minds of the slaves, and he trusted that nothing would pass in that House calculated to renew it. He agreed with the hon. member for Norwich, that the statements made by the fiscal of Berbice were extremely unsatisfactory; but at the same time it ought to be recollected, that his explanation of them had not yet been received. As to the observations of the hon. member, on the condition of the island of Anguilla, and as to the instances which he had cited, to prove that the mortality among the slaves was always greater where

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sugar was cultivated than it was where any other article was cultivated, he had only one word to say. Admitting the fact, what inference would the hon. gentleman draw from it? Did he mean to say that all employments were equally healthy in this country? The colliers of our mining counties and the agricultural labourers of our villages were by no means on a footing with respect to health. Firedamp, and other evils, rendered the occupation of the former much more destructive than that of the latter. But what was the inference? Were coal-mines not to be worked; and in the West-Indies was sugar not to be cultivated? If the plantations were cultivated by free labour; if free labour prevailed over the whole of the West-India islands; the probabilily was, that the case would be the same. If the planters had landed property, that property must be cultivated. If they overworked their slaves, if they neglected their health, there they were in error; but as to the comparative mortality of the occupation itself, no useful inference that he could see could be drawn from it.—He now came to the last point to which he was desirous of calling the attention of the House. His hon. friend behind him, the hon. member for Lymington, had appealed to him against the accusations so freely thrown out, of uniform cruelty and mal-treatment on the part of the planters in the West-Indies towards the negroes; and had called upon him to state, whether the information received at the office of the Colonial Department tended to confirm or contradict those accusations. He would answer that call in a few words. To suppose that no instance of cruelty or oppression on the part of the planters existed, would be to suppose a gross absurdity. Even where there was no such relation as master and slave, such instances occurred in the intercourse of the employer and the employed. It was inseparable from the intercourse between man and man. But he was bound to declare, that if the authorities from which his majesty's government received their information were to be credited (and he knew no reason why they should not be so), he most conscientiously believed that the statements on that point were generally exaggerated, if they were not wholly unfounded. He admitted, however, that that fact did not bear on the question under discussion so as in the slightest
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degree to justify a relaxation in any effort to secure the good treatment of the slaves. But he thought it extremely unfair to keep pressing forward an opinion, that the slaves were cruelly used; and to work on the feelings of the people at large, for the purpose of inducing them to go beyond his majesty's government, acting as the latter were on the solemn pledge contained in the resolutions of parliament. He was quite willing that the conduct of government should be judged by its conformity to those resolutions. If any hon. gentleman fancied that to the spirit of those resolutions his majesty's government did not sufficiently adhere, let him come to that House and make his statement; but he trusted that if any such assertion was made, he should be able to convince parliament and the country that it was totally without foundation. He wished the hon. member for Norwich to consider whether he would not consult the true interests of the cause he advocated by not pressing his motion in its present form, He did not wish to put a direct negative on it, because he agreed with many parts of it. He had endeavoured in the course of his speech to show that in Demerara and Berbice all the measures of amelioration which he had proposed were actually carried into effect. That met the first part of the hon. member's resolution. That the property of slaves should not be vested in the high functionaries in the colonies he had already conceded; but that the subordinate officers should be trusted with the possession of such property, from the instance that had been afforded, as an example, he was not disposed to condemn it. Under these circumstances, and under the progressive improvement of the slave-population, he felt himself justified in moving the previous question.
Mr. C. R. Ellissaid, he could not allow the conduct of the West-India planters to go undefended. He asserted that they treated their slaves with kindness and humanity, and, whenever they acted otherwise, it was well known that they were subject to the control and animadversion of parliament. It was equally well known, that their property was secured to them by the faith of parliament, and that, if any encroachment was made upon it, it was the bounden duty of parliament to afford them an adequate compensation. He was quite willing, however, to agree with what the

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right hon. Secretary for Foreign Affairs had said on a former occasion, that for any measures calculated to promote the future improvement of the slaves, the planters had no right to compensation; but, he contended, on the other hand, that for any measures tending to their future emancipation, the planters had a right to compensation, if the measures proved injurious. He bore testimony to the general humane treatment of the slave-population, and lamented that, when any exception to it occurred, the odium which it excited extended to all the planters, instead of being confined to the individual who deserved it. He coincided with many of the remarks which had been made on the report furnished by the fiscal of Berbice, and admitted that it was impossible to read many of the complaints which had been made to him without feelings of disgust and horror. He was grieved that in the report none of the evidence by which those complaints had been substantiated or refuted was given; and still more that, during the last twelve months, there was an omission of any record of the decisions which the fiscal had made. To judge properly of that report, the House ought to know in how many cases redress had been claimed and afforded, and in how many it had been claimed and refused. He had made an analysis of that report; and he had found that, in the first section of it, out of forty-three cases of complaint, which had occurred in the last thirteen months, twenty-seven were judged to be altogether groundless; eight were cases in which both parties were declared to be in the wrong; and eight only were cases in which the complainant was declared to be in the right. Applying the same analysis to all the cases in the report, he found that out of three hundred and thirty-three cases of complaint, two hundred were declared to be unfounded. Of the other hundred and thirty-three cases, in one half both parties were in the wrong; leaving sixty-seven cases only of real complaint in fourteen years, or about five cases yearly, with a population of twenty thousand negroes. The hon. member continued to argue, that the statements generally put forward against the planters were exaggerated, and in many instances wholly unfounded; but at the same time he was, he said, entirely favourable to every fair and rational scheme of amelioration. With respect to awarding punishment against
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those who had preferred unfounded charges, he would merely say, that the practice was consonant with the practice of the courts of justice in this country, where punishment, either pecuniary or personal, was inflicted upon persons who defamed the characters of others. He had no objection to afford every protection to slaves which would not destroy that due subordination, without which the business of the world could not be carried on; and for that purpose he would not object to the appointment of protectors of slaves, but he trusted that the persons appointed to those situations would be professional men, possessed of legal experience, and wholly unconnected with the Anti-slavery Society. Whilst on his legs he would observe, that according to the general usage of the colonies, the governors presided in the court of Chancery. Now, it was a well-known fact, that those governors were almost without exception, military men, possessed of no legal knowledge; and, considering the importance of the cases which they were called upon to decide, he thought they ought to be relieved from that duty; or, if it should be determined that it should be performed by those gentlemen, they ought to have the assistance of professional assessors.
Mr. R. Martinsaid, if he thought that by passing the resolution, the good contemplated by the hon. mover, would be the consequence, he would give it his decided support; but as he was satisfied that, taking the sense of the House (be the result what it might) would produce consequences diametrically opposite to those anticipated by his hon. friend, and would have the effect of encouraging the colonial assemblies in their opposition to the wishes of his majesty's government, he would suggest the propriety of withdrawing the motion.
Mr. Denmansaid, he did not think with the hon. member who had last addressed the House, that the pressing of this resolution to a division could have the effect of better enabling the colonial assemblies to resist the wishes of parliament and the government. The hon. gentler man who last but one had addressed the House, had, very unjustly, accused the hon. mover, with having indulged in a desultory speech, but that hon. member, appeared to him to have followed the course which he had so much deprecated. He had not heard any observation from

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that hon. member, which did not appear to him in support of the resolution. If the real intention of the parliament and the government was, to remedy the evils under which the slave-population laboured, he thought the only means of effecting that object was, to state in plain terms, that the parliament and the people of England would not be trifled with, and that a complete reformation must be carried into effect. With respect to the pamphlet which had been the object of so much abuse, he must say, that he had never seen a document upon the subject, which was more entitled to the confidence and thanks of the public; and, for this reason, that not a fact was stated without referring the reader to the official document from which it was taken. The observations made in the pamphlet might, perhaps, sound too strong to the ears of gentlemen connected with the West-India colonies; but, by the candour and fair dealing of the writer, in referring to the official documents, the reader was enabled to judge for himself, whether or not those observations were justified. Let hon. gentlemen talk as they might about property in slaves, the root of the evil consisted in the recognition of the right of property in slaves to another set of persons. To that recognition were to be traced all the oppressions and perversions of law, to which the unhappy negro was exposed. The way in which the arguments against slavery were met by the friends of that system were rather curious. When facts were stated by the opponents of the system, they were denied by the other side; but when those facts were proved, those gentlemen exclaimed, "Oh those things might have happened in times gone by, but it is impossible they can happen now, for the slaves are well-treated." Even admitting that the slaves were well-treated, that would not, in his view of the question, be any argument against the abolition of slavery. His hon. friend had said, with great humour and truth, that the present tense had been struck out of the grammar of the West-India planters; but the hon. Secretary wished to strike out of that grammar the future. Every abuse was now said to have happened formerly, to belong to time gone by, and which ought therefore not to be remarked upon. The House had heard a great deal about the representation of a black man in chains being placed at the head of the petitions against slavery; and it had been asked, if
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such representations were not a perversion of justice? He begged, in return, to ask the House, whether, if the real condition of the slave, as it appeared from the West-Indian newspapers, were described in those petitions—if it were stated, that the slave was confined within the walls of a prison for the default of his master, in not paying his taxes or his debts—if it were stated, that the slave might be taken in execution for his master's debts, as cattle were sent to pound in England—would such a statement be less likely than the representations so much complained of to excite the honest indignation of the people of England. When, in support of the charge of cruelty against the slave-owners, the brand was mentioned, the answer was, "Oh, that was done in times gone by, but now is considered illegal." He believed it was considered illegal, but he believed there was no colonial law declaring it to be illegal.
Mr. Wilmot Hortonsaid, it was illegal under the general law of cruelty.
Mr. Denmansaid, he certainly understood that the brand mark was considered as coming within the operation of that law, but he repeated, that there was no specific act of the legislature declaring it to be illegal. What possible objection there could be to the motion of his hon. friend he was at a loss to imagine. It had been admitted on all hands, that the office which had been instituted of nominal protector of the slaves was an inefficient one; and the effect of this motion would be, to give to the slaves the benefit of real protection. The fiscal had made, in the cases alluded to by his hon. friend near him, some very incorrect returns. By those and other returns, it was clearly shown that great and excessive cruelties had been practised upon the negroes. And could any man deny that the penalties which had been, in a few instances, inflicted upon those who had been guilty of such cruelties, were disproportionate to the enormity of the offence? For his own part, he had been exceedingly astonished to hear an hon. member say of them, "that they were not in unison with the feelings of his own mind." Now, really, when a gentleman of the cultivated mind and kindly feelings which that hon. member was known to possess, could content himself with applying so mild an expression to a case where the most enormous and disgusting atrocities had been visited with so lenient a hand, he felt that

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no better proof could be furnished to parliament of the effect which familiarity with a terrible system of slavery would have, even upon the most amiable and accomplished individuals, in dulling their sensibility to the sufferings of those who were the victims of that system. But, it was contended that the motion was an attack on his majesty's government. Now, how was that assertion made out? If their exertions had not been hitherto sucessful as to the objects which this motion sought to attain, and government was desirous of prosecuting them, could that be an attack upon its proceedings which was intended to arrive at the same end which those proceedings proposed to accomplish? He did not understand why the resolution was objected to, as it only required what every one acknowledged to be necessary; namely, that the proprietors of slaves should not be eligible to certain offices, in which the latter would come in contact with them.
Mr. Wilmot Hortonsaid, he had not opposed the motion on the ground that it was an attack on the government. His objection to it was, that all which it pro-posed to do had already been done by government.
Mr. Denmansaid, that if that were the case, he had misunderstood the hon. gentleman, and the time of the House had been wasted in useless discussion. He thought, however, that it would not be improper to confirm what had been done by government, by a resolution of that House, and on that account he would vote for the motion, if his hon friend should press it to a division.
Mr. C. R. Ellis,in explanation, said, the phrase "not in unison with his own feelings," was applied to the sentences passed upon the culprits. Upon the details of the cruelties themselves, he had said, that they could not be read without horror and disgust.
Mr. Denmansaid, he could not retract the remark he had made; inasmuch as, in his view of the matter, the conduct of the fiscal in inflicting light sentences, where the most enormous offences had been committed, was even more reprehensible than the commission of such acts of violence, under certain circumstances.
Mr. Baringsaid, it appeared to him, that the House was called upon to decide this question; namely, whether it was proper that the management of" the colonies should be placed in the hands of the
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executive government? If the House were of opinion that the executive government should not have the power of governing the colonies, let them once declare so; but if they were not of that opinion, it would be most dangerous to control or interfere with the government by any resolution of that House. He would beg the House to consider how the case stood. The House some time ago adopted certain resolutions, proposed by the right hon. the Secretary for Foreign Affairs, having for their object to ameliorate the condition of the slave-population in the West-India colonies; and those resolutions were now in the course of being carried into effect in the colonies over which the government possessed direct control. Now, if his hon. friend, the mover, and others around him, thought that government did not proceed fast enough, he could understand their conduct, which otherwise he could not do. Although very inflammatory language was put forth to the country elsewhere, his hon. friends in that House admitted that it would be dangerous to proceed at once to immediate emancipation. That being admitted, he asked what could be done more than government was doing; namely, preparing the minds of the negroes by degrees to receive the blessings of freedom. He regretted very much that any thing like an interference with government should take place on the part of that House; for experience had proved that such a circumstance operated most injuriously on the minds of the slave-population. Government had settled the minds of those poor creatures by declaring what their intentions were; and no sooner was that done, than an attempt was made to render them discontented. He did not mean to impute such an intention to his hon. friends; but he could not conceal from himself that there were persons who, finding that the system of gradual improvement would not suit their purposes, wished to infuse into the minds of the negroes an idea that parliament was goading on the government to do something further for them. He believed that most of these proceedings were caused by a society in this country, of whose course he could not approve. He believed their proceedings were not only totally irreconcileable with common prudence, but that they were opposed to the true interests of those people for whose advantage they were intended, and calculated to produce irremediable mischief and

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most extensive confusion. He had not wasted his time in reading the pamphlets issued by this society, but he thought he had not been mistaken in his description of them. The members of this House, who concurred in the proceedings of the society to which he had alluded, in some measure followed up the example, by frequent notices on this subject. An hon. and learned gentleman near him had given, on the first day of the session, a notice of a motion with respect to the state of slavery in the colonies. That motion had since been postponed; but, in the mean time, the paper had been crowded with incidental notices upon the same subject, one of which had been given by the hon. member for Weymouth. He should say that their object was obvious, if he could reconcile their conduct with the honourable principles which he knew they possessed; but, from what he knew of them, he must say, that their conduct was totally irre-concileable with their principles. As the hon. member who proposed this motion did not require the immediate emancipation of the negroes, he could not possibly understand what could be his object. He trusted that these gentlemen would see that the steps of government could not be accelerated without the greatest danger to the colonies. It was already on record, that the partial insurrection which had taken place in Jamaica had been caused by the same means. The negroes laboured under the most complete delusion. They believed that there was a conflicting power at home, acting in opposition to the government under which they were living. This belief led them into those errors so dangerous to the peace of the colonies. The negroes of the best conduct and characters were the most deceived. Their masters had so described them in their account of the insurrection. He trusted that this instance of the effect of unnecessarily agitating the colonies, would serve as a warning to hon. gentlemen. In his opinion, the measures already adopted by government would, in the course of time, bring about a state of freedom amongst the negroes, after their minds had been prepared for its reception. To go further would be to produce mischief. The hon. mover, in some degree, admitted what had been done for other colonies, since his selection of this showed his acknowledgment of their improvement. He believed that the Methodist missionaries had done more to introduce
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moral and religious instruction amongst the negroes than any other set of men; but even they had come to the resolution, that the state of slavery in Jamaica had nothing in it repugnant to Christianity. This did not please the people in this country, who, from one end of the year to the other, were talking about slavery without knowing any thing of it, and asserted that the resolution must be recalled. Such indiscreet conduct must produce a bad effect. In conclusion he would oppose the motion, because he thought that emancipation would be much sooner effected by the gradual progress of the measures adopted by government, than by the rash and inconsiderate guidance of persons who, without any intention to do so, were injuring the cause which they were anxious to serve.
Mr. Broughamsaid, he was compelled to complain of the gross misrepresentation of his hon. friend, both of members of that House, and of individuals out of that House forming the Anti-slavery Society. His hon. friend had charged that society with agitating the country on the subject of negro slavery, and with creating the feeling which existed abroad, and which would exist until it had produced an effect on the deliberations of that House, if necessary; on the conduct of government, if that conduct should require such influence; and last, but not least in this question, even on the West-India legislatures themselves. He, however, denied that the feeling which pervaded the country on the subject, was attributable to the agitations of the society, to the publications emitted by them, or to the speeches made at its meetings. No misrepresentations had been put forth by the society. They had made no appeal to the passions of mankind, but had only repeated facts stated in the first place, out of the mouths of the West-Indians themselves; and by those facts had the feelings of the people of England been unanimously roused. His hon. friend had stated, that he had not time to read the publications put forth by the society. In justice to the society, he wished his hon. friend would not find time to condemn publications which he could not find time to read. He himself had read the accounts of almost all the Anti-slavery Society meetings and, although the persons attending those meetings were naturally excited by the nature of the question with which

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they had to deal, he had never observed, an instance in which emancipation—rash, sudden, and immediate emancipation—was recommended by the most ardent friends to the improvement of the negroes, or the most inveterate enemy of slavery. With respect to the publications put forth by the society, they consisted only of abridgments of papers laid before parliament. His hon. friend had accused him of having given notice of a motion on the subject of slavery, and of having put it off from day to day, which it was said had a mischievous effect. It was true he had given notice of a motion on the subject of negro slavery, and he had attended from day to day, prepared to bring it on, but he was prevented by a petition presented by his hon. friend the member for Weymouth. The discussion on that petition had drawn from the right hon. the Secretary for Foreign Affairs, a statement in which was given a detail of facts, of which he alone as a minister could be supposed to be possessed. He was bound to give credit to the statement then made as a correct one, but he had since found that the right hon. Secretary was himself deluded in the information conveyed to him, that something had been done by the colonial legislatures towards ameliorating the condition of the slaves. That the right hon. Secretary was himself deluded in the statement he then made, he had no doubt; and he now felt that he was wrong in postponing his motion, in consequence of the information then conveyed to the House by the right hon. gentleman. He had been led to suppose that something had been done; but he had since reason to believe, that what was done by the colonial legislature was only a mock compliance with the wishes of the government on the subject of slave treatment. He would pledge himself to prove, that nothing of what was then stated as having been done had been accomplished by the colonial legislatures. Having, for the reasons he had mentioned, been induced to postpone his motion, he was obliged to postpone it for six weeks; for he had something else to do in the interim. After the period at which he could attend, he found that the earliest day at which he could bring on his motion was the 11th of May, on which day he was determined to bring it on; but if circumstances should prevent him on that day, he would fix it for the next Wednesday following, if the frail tenure of the session
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allowed him that time. He thought that parliament ought not to separate without coming to some decision on this important question. Without going into further details, he would give his vote in favour of the proposition of his hon. friend.
Mr. Secretary Canningsaid, that the view which he took of the question would not require that he should trespass for any length of time on the attention of the House. Whether he viewed the motion as tending to excite the fears of those connected with West-India property, or to stimulate the zeal of those opposed to negro slavery, he thought it at the present moment unnecessary. One of his objections to it was, that it professed to be in furtherance of the views—as all those motions were said to be—of those who were favourable to such an improvement of the condition of the slaves as would lead to a gradual abolition of slavery. Such a motion, he would say, was at the present moment unnecessary. He spoke not so much in objection to this particular motion, as to the motives of which it was an evidence, and to the system of which it formed a part. If the motion were made from a suspicion that government was not sincere in what it proposed to do, it was not well-founded; and it was worse, as it might tend to counteract the effect of what was proposed to be accomplished. He would be satisfied that government should be judged by what it had proposed to do, and by the endeavours which it had made to carry its intentions into effect. If it were intended to do more than government had already proposed to do, the time for discussing that question would come when the motion of the hon. and learned gentleman came for consideration; but it was hardly fair thus to introduce as fractional parts, what was afterwards intended to be proposed as a whole. Mention had been made of public meetings on the subject of West-India slavery. He spoke of those meetings with every respect for the parties and the object they had in view; but when they proposed their resolutions as in aid of the objects of government, he must say that, in many instances, they were rather an incumbrance than an aid. For what was the object to be obtained? The over-weening zeal of parties on one hand was intended to meet what was called the obstinate resistance of the local legislatures on the other. But he would ask, would the meetings to which he bad alluded

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counteract this resistance? Would they not rather tend to make obstinacy more obstinate, and resistance more to be dreaded in its consequences? If those resolutions were intended to aid the efforts of government, the government disclaimed them; if they were not so intended, they were still more injurious. If meant to assist government, he would beg to say that they wanted not that aid; if otherwise, and intended to counteract the measures which government had proposed, they must, of course, submit; but at the same time he must say, that the opposition was only creating a new difficulty, which would tend to retard the object of both parties. The hon. member for Norwich had observed, with regard to the situation of the negroes, that there were certain disgraceful facts which could not be denied, and certain cruelties, the record of which could not be effaced. But that was not the question. If the question were as to whether the present system were to be upheld, then indeed it might be necessary to remind the House of such revolting facts, and to come before it armed with such arguments: but, when all parties were agreed in the desire of terminating such a system, and which desire was expressed in the unanimous resolution of that House on their Journals, then he must say that such arguments were adduced otiose, and brought forward only with a view of exciting feelings, which, in his opinion, ought to be controlled, if any practical good was to be produced by the efforts that the government were making. On these grounds, therefore, without going at all into the details of the question then before them, which was not the first time that it had been agitated during the session, nor was it to be supposed to be the last, by rive or six—he considered the motion not only unnecessary, but calculated to aggravate the difficulties which they had already to encounter. At the same time he would state what, perhaps, might be unpalatable to both parties; namely, that it was the unalterable intention of government to carry the resolutions already agreed to into effect. Those means would be found in the orders in council, which he was persuaded would be carried into operation without realizing the apprehensions of those who on the one hand were afraid that nothing would be done, or who, on the other, thought that in what was proposed to be done the security of colonial property would be endangered.
The motion was put, and negatived without a division.

CRUELTY TO DOGS.
Mr. R. Martin Mr. R. Martin moved for leave to bring in a bill "to prevent the cruel and improper Treatment of Dogs."
Sir M. W. Ridleyopposed the motion. The House, he said, had already rejected a motion to prevent cruelty to domestic animals, dogs of course included, and therefore they could not, consistently, support the present motion.
Mr. Humeexpressed a hope, that the hon. member would include cats in his bill. It was well known that cats were worried by dogs, and were, therefore, entitled to equal protection. Speaking seriously, he thought the House by admitting this bill for the protection of dogs, without including cats, would act inconsistently; and that by admitting it at all, they would turn legislation into ridicule. He would submit it to the House, whether it should not endeavour to preserve itself from the ridicule which these legislative measures would cast upon it.
Mr. Martinsaid, he would make only one observation, and that was, that the hon. member for Montrose had promised him his support to the bill.
Mr. Humesaid, that to the best of his knowledge, he had never made such a promise.
Mr. Martin.Then you did it without your knowledge.
Mr. Secretary Peelsaid, he would oppose the present motion of his hon. friend, on the same ground that influenced his opposition to the last. He believed there was more injury done to the cause which his hon. friend wished to support, by the manner in which he brought forward the subject, than by any other circumstance. He would recommend his hon. friend to recollect, and act upon the advice of the hon. and learned member for Knares-borough, given on a former occasion; namely, to let public opinion and the acts of individuals remedy the evil complained of. Now, without wishing to be otherwise than serious, he could not help concurring in the remark, that if the House were to legislate for dogs, there was no reason why other animals ought not to be equally protected. We were now about to clear the Statute-book of an immense number of laws; but, if such measures as the one now proposed were adopted, it would be working at the web of Penelope, and the

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labour would be interminable. He, therefore, trusted, that his hon. friend would withdraw his motion.
Mr. W. Smithopposed the motion, though he thought it desirable that acts of cruelty should be punished as misdemeanours.
Mr. Martindefended the motion and himself against the ridicule which had been directed towards both. When he brought in a bill three years ago to prevent cruelty to animals, a noble lord who took the lead in the other House told him, that if it included dogs he would support it. He saw no reason why cattle should be protected, and, at the same time, that an animal so attached to man, as to be called the friend of man, should go unprotected. The cruelties practised on dogs were frequent and notorious. One instance occurred at Oxford, which, on account of its atrocity, deserved to be mentioned. He alluded to the act of a miscreant who sawed off a part of his dog's jaw because he thought it too long. Another case, communicated to him by Mr. Hall, the magistrate of Bow-street, was, that of two boys, who flayed a dog alive; after which, one of them led him upwards of two miles, and would have gone much further, had not a gentleman thrown him and the dog into a river. Notwithstanding the mirth it had excited, he saw no reason why cats should not be protected against cruelty, and he thought it was not very creditable to the hon. member for Montrose to attempt to throw ridicule upon the subject. He had already informed the House that the hon. member had promised him his support. He had now to communicate that hon. gentleman's reason for having, on the contrary, opposed his motion—"Because," said the hon. member for Montrose, "you did not vote against flogging in the army." He thought the House was bound, in consistency, after the support they had given to previous measures, not to oppose the bringing in of the bill.
Mr. J. Benettsaid, he lamented much the difficulty there was in legislating upon such matters. It would be very desirable if some measure could be contrived that would be more general in its operation. He should be ready to give his support to any bill which had for its object to prevent such a brutal exhibition as that of dog-fighting.
Sir F. Burdettsaid, that the public were much indebted to the hon. member for his exertions. Great good had been de-
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rived from the measures brought in by him for the purpose of preventing cruelty to animals. No one could hear the cases mentioned by him of brutal treatment to dogs without shuddering. He could not comprehend how such acts could pass without punishment. It appeared to him that they were punishable at common law, as being contra bonos mores. He thought the best way would be to allow his hon. friend to bring in the bill. The evils against which it was directed were of more importance than many persons might suppose, and it was desirable that some remedy should be provided. If a remedy were possible, he did not see how any member could withhold his assent to a measure calculated to effect it. If leave was given to bring in the bill, it should have his support. It was, in his view of the subject, calculated to act more beneficially on society than the House was aware.
Sir T. Aclandsaid, he did not think it the most advisable course to bring in, year after year, separate acts of this kind. The hon. mover had produced two instances of cruelty towards dogs, and said he could produce hundreds of cases of cruelty towards cats; yet the former he protected, and the latter He left without protection. He could not help thinking, with the hon. member for Norwich, that all cases of excessive cruelty might be fairly left to a British jury, as the law now stood.
Mr. Martinexpressed his readiness to withdraw the present bill; but stated, that he would on a future day, introduce a measure of a more comprehensive nature.
Mr. Peelobserved, that while he felt as much as any man the justice of the principle on which his hon. friend proceeded, he much approved of his determination to withdraw this bill. Still, he must guard himself from being supposed, from the course which he took on this occasion, to say one word in favour of a more extensive measure, of which his hon. friend had given notice; and of which he could, of course, know nothing.
The motion was withdrawn.

AFFAIRS OF GREECE.
Earl Grosvenorrose to ask a question of great importance, to which he hoped the noble earl opposite would favour him with a reply. The information which he wished to obtain related to the war between the Greeks and Turks. A letter had been published in the newspapers respecting the result of the siege of Missolonghi, from which it appeared that that place had fallen. The heroic defence made by that place must be looked at with admiration by every one. It had sustained no less than seventy-three attacks in the course of eighteen months, and greater gallantry had never been displayed. The defenders of Missolonghi had shown themselves worthy descendants of the heroes of Thermopylae. He wished to know whether ministers

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had received any information respecting the fall of Missolonghi, and whether there was any hope of the Greek cause being at last taken up. That cause, if not entirely desperate, appeared to be almost so; but he was anxious to be informed if there yet remained any hope that the unfortunate Greeks would not be entirely abandoned. It was understood that there was a disposition on the part of Russia to come to rupture with the Porte, but he hoped and trusted that the annihilation of the Greeks was not to be made the price of the independence of Wallachia and Moldavia.
The Earl of Liverpoolsaid, he could not give any other answer to the noble earl as to the report of Missolonghi being taken, than that he believed it was not taken at the date of the letter to which the noble earl had alluded. Whether the place was taken or not he could not say; but as it was not taken at the date of the letter, the fact contained in it could not be true. With respect to the other question put by the noble earl, as to whether the Greek cause was now desperate or not, he should only say, that the contest being one with respect to which this country was perfectly neutral, he did not consider it a subject for discussion in that House. The policy of his majesty's government had been that of strict neutrality, and that policy, whether right or wrong, was before the House and the country.

PETITION OF WEST-INDIA MERCHANTS FOR PROTECTION OF THEIR PROPERTY.
Lord Redesdalepresented a petition from certain merchants and others of the city of London, who hold mortgages, or have made advances on West-India property. In presenting this petition, the noble and learned lord dwelt at length on the distress to which persons interested in West-India property had been reduced. At present, no person would advance a shilling on West-India estates. But, amidst their distress, the unfortunate proprietors were obliged to go on, or the slaves would starve. Thus, there was no hope for them, since they could not get rid of their property; and if they continue to cultivate, it was at a loss. Married women, whose settlements depended on plantations, and orphan children, were left entirely destitute. Persons who held mortgages, if they applied to the proprietors of plantations, could ob-
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tain no money. They had no resource but to institute proceedings in the West-India courts for the sale of the mortgaged estates; and if they adopted that course there were no buyers to be found. The noble and learned lord implored the House to reflect on the unfortunate situation in which the petitioners were placed, and to take into consideration the object of the petition, which was, to induce the legislature to do something towards restoring, in some degree, the value of this property, by the deterioration of which they suffered so much injury. With regard to the emancipation of the slaves, the noble and learned lord agreed with those who were of opinion that that measure could only be brought about by the operation of time. Rash and precipitate measures might be attended with the most mischievous consequences, and lead to all the horrors which the decree of the National Assembly had produced in St. Domingo. The prudent course would be, to teach the negroes to feel the value of property, and of some distinction of rank in society. Time was necessary for the cautious and prudent measures which this preparation for a state of freedom required. While the negroes remained all in a state of equality, this preparation could not be accomplished. It did not become him to throw out suggestions to the colonial assemblies for their guidance; but he thought that the steps towards such an object would be with most advantage taken entirely by the colonial assemblies themselves. The petitioners deprecated any interference with the colonial legislatures, as acts of power might produce effects which, at present, could not easily be foreseen. It seemed to be suggested as a principle, to be adopted on the other side of the Atlantic, that no further European influence should be allowed to extend itself there. He trusted, however, that, under all the circumstances which might arise, the colonies would always look for protection to this country, and would find it afforded them. Something, he thought, ought to be speedily done, to give confidence to the persons interested in the property of our West-India islands.
The following is a copy of the Petition:—
The Petition of the undersigned Merchants trading from London to the British West-India colonies, and others holding Mortgages and other Securities upon Slaves and Lands in the said Colonies, humbly shewcth—
"That your petitioners form a portion of those British subjects who have embarked capital upon the security of slaves, lands, and other property in the West-India colonies, in full reliance upon acts and declarations of the British legislature, which, during nearly two centuries, have sanctioned and encouraged such investments in furtherance of the cultivation and prosperity of those colonics.
"That among the statutes of the realm to which your petitioners refer, that of the 6th Geo. 2, c. 13 (entitled an act for better securing and encouraging the trade of his majesty's sugar colonies in America), declares by its preamble, 'that' the welfare and prosperity of his majesty's sugar colonies in America are of the greatest consequence and importance to the trade, navigation, and strength of 'the kingdom,' and proceeds to enactments advantageous to the colonies. The act of 13th Geo. 3, c. 14, invites loans from aliens, on the security of freehold or leasehold estates in his majesty's colonies in the West Indies; and that of 14?th Geo. 3, c. 79, legalizes the taking interest by British subjects for sums advanced on mortgages and securities of any lands, tenements, hereditaments, slaves, cattle, and other things, at the rate allowed by the law in the colony where the mortgaged premises lie.
"That the cultivation of the British West-India colonics, by the labour of negro slaves imported from Africa, had, in this long period, not the cognizance merely, but the express sanction and encouragement of the legislature, which, in the preamble to the act of the 23rd Geo. 2nd, cap. 31, declares, that 'the trade to 4 and from Africa is very advantageous to Great Britain, and necessary for the supplying the plantations and colonies there unto belonging, with a sufficient number 'of negroes at reasonable rates,' and proceeds to enact that 'the said trade shall' be free and open to all his majesty's subjects.'
"That occasional efforts made by the colonial legislatures to check an excessive importation of slaves have been repelled and reproved by the mother country, whose deliberate counsels had established her African slave trade, and encouraged it upon grounds distinct from colonial interests before her colonies existed; that your petitioners, therefore, must protest against the injustice of throwing discredit upon West-India commerce and se-
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curities, by mixing up the case of those connected with that trade and property with the odium which in this free country is excited by the bare knowledge of the existence of slavery, an odium which, so far as the British West-India colonies are concerned, attaches not to your petitioners, but to the nation.
"That it cannot be disputed that the well-being and comforts of the slaves in our colonies have been materially and progressively bettered since the time when the nation was holding out the strongest inducements to an increase of that number, during which period, and even subsequently, when great Britain abandoned and abolished her African slave trade, no intimation, with any semblance of authority, was announced, of effecting an extinction of slavery in the colonies, otherwise than by the means which an able writer, zealous for the attainment of that object, has pointed out, 'the same happy means which formerly put an end to it in England, viz.—by a benign, though insensible revolution in opinion and manners, by the encouragement of particular manumissions, and the progressive melioration of the condition of the slaves, till it should glide insensibly into general freedom:' the emancipation looked to was declared to be that of which, 'not the slaves but the masters, should be willing instruments and authors.'
"That your petitioners, by means of their constant intercourse with the colonies, are enabled confidently to assert that there prevails throughout the proprietors thereof, a liberal and constant attention to the wants and comforts of the slave-population, which is evinced by a plentiful supply (even in times when the returns may be inadequate to the costs) of such articles as will contribute to their well-being, and this resulting as well from considerations of humanity as from the known and acknowledged fact, that, upon the effective strength, comfort, and contentment of the labouring population attached to it, essentially depends the value of any West-India plantation.
"That your petitioners are well aware that your right hon. House may command from the highest and most unquestionable authority, evidence which will fully bear out these assertions respecting the existing comforts and progressively improving condition of the slaves in our West-India colonies.
"That representations of a contrary

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tendency, which, having been addressed to popular meetings, have excited those petitions which, from various parts of the kingdom, have been presented to your right hon. House, are not grounded upon such information and acquaintance with the subject as your petitioners have access to, nor upon that respectable evidence to which they have alluded, and to which they fearlessly appeal; but originating in exaggeration or misrepresentation, have, by zealous persons associated for that purpose, been successfully applied in irritating the feelings of the public, and inducing a hasty call for an emancipation of the slaves, with but small regard either to the advantage of the slaves themselves, or to the justice due to your petitioners.
"That the measures which, from motives of regard towards the slaves, have been adopted by his majesty's government, have unfortunately, and doubtless unintentionally, already caused a great deterioration of the property of your petitioners. These measures having been generally understood, as expressly preparatory to, and directly connected with, the emancipation of the slaves, and having not been accompanied with a distinct and explicit pledge of indemnification for the injury which property must sustain, not only in the attainment of the final object, but in the progressive operation of the means for its attainment. That owing to these causes, the confidence of capitalists has been influenced to such a degree, that West-India securities are become nearty valueless as transferable property—a circumstance which, at a period of general alarm and panic, similar to that which has lately occurred, must subject the holders of such property to extreme and peculiar difficulties. That, to this effect must powerfully contribute the measure announced of offering, as an adequate compensation in cases of compulsory emancipation, the estimated value of the liberated slave or slaves—a proceeding pregnant with alarm to the mortgagees and others of your petitioners holding various securities upon lands cultivated by slaves. And your petitioners humbly represent, that, until it shall be proved by experience that free negroes will work for hire, and carry on the ordinary cultivation of estates in a regular and effectual manner, the slaves must be considered as forming the essential part of the securities held by your petitioners, since land in the colonies would cease to be of any worth when
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deprived of its labourers; and that, therefore, without the test just mentioned, or full and immediate indemnification, the process of compulsory emancipation cannot even be experimentally commenced upon a West-India estate with justice to the various parties holding legal claims upon the property.
"That it has been the wise and just practice of parliament, when authorizing in this country any infraction of private: right or private property, to provide that the individuals so deprived shall receive from the public (for whose objects the sacrifice is demanded) a full and fair compensation for what is taken away, and even to admit that there be included in the price a consideration for the inconvenience and contingent loss which the individual may suffer from being compelled to part with his property. And your petitioners trust that the like measure of justice may be extended to their case; and that what would be considered to be injustice to a British subject holding property in Britain, will equally be considered to be injustice to a British subject holding property in the colonies.
"That your petitioners are persuaded that the reluctance and distrust with which the suggestions of the British government respecting an amelioration of the condition of the slaves have been received in various colonies, have been caused or aggravated in many instances by an indignant sense of those offensive misrepresentations of the conduct and motives of the colonists, which, in speeches and writings by eminent persons, have been so profusely addressed to the British public; and more especially and universally by the apprehension of danger threatening their properties and political rights; and your petitioners are confident, that were those feelings removed, together with the delusion which has been excited in the minds of the slaves by the prolonged discussions on the subject, the colonial legislatures would, with sincerity, zeal, and discretion, apply themselves to the deliberate consideration of all the communications made to them, with a view to correct whatever may be amiss, and to supply what may be wanting towards improving the condition and promoting the civilization of the slave population.
"That those independent colonial legislatures upon which for a long period has practically rested (subject to the

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sanction of the king in council) the right of municipal and internal regulation, will, however, claim that themselves from their local experience and immediate knowledge of all that is passing around them, can best judge of the fittest time and manner of introducing any changes in their law and practice; and will plead, that while they feel the responsibility of their situation, they cannot consistently be required to do what they conscientiously consider as dangerous to the tranquillity and prosperity of the colonies over which they preside.
"That your petitioners have embarked their property in colonial securities, greatly induced thereto by their confidence in the experience and practical knowledge of the colonial legislatures, and in the advantage of having the laws and internal regulations of the colonies framed by those most competent to adapt them to the immediate character, habits, and intelligence of the various classes which compose their population; that if the slaves be taught to look for their protection and government to any other authority than that of the king and the legislative, or other local power which they have been long accustomed to respect and obey, the tranquillity of the colonies, and consequently the security of property therein, will be greatly endangered.
"That your petitioners would therefore regard an interference by the Imperial Parliament with the established jurisdiction of those legislatures, as a removal of one of the securities of property invested in the colonies; and they know that the bare suggestion of such interference has contributed to the discredit which already attaches to West-India securities.
"That the conduct of the colonial legislatures respecting the registry laws, together with the zealous reception and liberal support of the religious establishments with which they have been favoured, prove the good-will of the colonists, and their inclination to acquiesce in those views of the parent legislature which are directed to objects of unquestionable utility, provided they be secured against attacks upon their constitutional privileges, and those rights of property which have been established under titles and sanctions as valid as the law could give them.
"That your petitioners feel themselves authorized to declare, that the opinions
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which in 1823 were expressed to his majesty's ministers by several possessors of colonial property, resident in this country, and which have often, in discussion upon this subject, been referred to, were directed solely towards measures of amelioration, and did neither contemplate any compulsory emancipation of the slaves, nor any constraint upon the independence of the colonial legislatures.
"That Great Britain, if she have the will, may doubtless impose upon her colonies a constraint which they cannot resist; and it is equally true that precipitate acts of power might produce ruinous extremities which the mother country did not contemplate, and which she might in vain attempt to remedy; but the attribute of the British legislature is justice, and to that your petitioners will make their appeal. Confident in their undeviating attachment to his majesty's person and government, and conscious of no crime by which their title to protection is forfeited, they do respectfully, but firmly, prefer their claim to full indemnification for all injury which constraint and force may inflict upon that property which, whatever may have been the circumstances of its original acquisition, is held, as it now stands, under the solemn guarantee of British laws.
"That your petitioners cannot conclude without noticing, that in many of the petitions to your right honourable House, which ask its interference with the colonial legislatures, there is a prayer that, in respect to the West-India colonies, the mother country will depart from that established policy by which the produce of capital and industry, which is purely and intimately British, and situated in parts of the empire whose commerce the mother country strictly controls, has a protection afforded to it in the home consumption over that which is foreign, or brought from appendages of the empire not so controlled, and less identified with the resources and interests of the mother country.
"That this prayer, if traced to its source, would, as your petitioners believe, be found to originate in interests of commercial rivalry; since it is at variance with a spirit of humanity towards the slave, whose well-being cannot possibly be promoted by any proceeding which tends to impoverish his master.
"Upon the grounds which your petitioners have now staled, they humbly

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pray, That your right honourable House will, by a legislative declaration, or by such other means as to your wisdom shall appear most expedient, restore to the property of your petitioners, and of other British subjects connected with the West India colonies, that credit and confidence which is ever due to property protected by British laws, and also that your right honourable House will forbear to adopt towards the local legislatures in the West-India colonies any measures which may be at variance with the rights of internal legislation which they have so long exercised."
The Earl of Liverpoolsaid, he was sure that the petition which had just been presented would be received by the House with that respect to which, from the subject and the manner in which it was drawn up, it was entitled; but he wished to take that opportunity of saying a few words, in consequence of some observations which had fallen from his noble and learned friend. He could assure his noble and learned friend, that if there existed an intention in any party in this country to precipitate the emancipation of the negroes, without due preparation, no man could be more opposed to such intention than himself. He had always felt, that that was a measure which ought to be approached with caution and deliberation. The great interests and property at stake demanded this caution, and it was also to be considered, that the government and parliament of this country had been parties to the evils of slavery, in consequence of the direct encouragement which had, for a hundred and fifty years, been given to the state of things existing in the West Indies. Having said thus much, he must express his deep regret that the colonial legislatures should have proceeded in the course which they had hitherto thought fit to pursue. That in some of the colonies, from special circumstances, the measures recommended by the government might appear inapplicable was possible; but that could not afford an excuse for the conduct of the assemblies in refusing to legislate. It had been thought proper to mark out the course which appeared proper to be followed to accomplish the object which government and parliament had in view, and to hold up an example to the colonial legislatures. For this purpose instructions were sent out to the colonies under the immediate control of government. The
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example had been set in Demerara and Berbice, and it was the desire of government and parliament that similar measures of amelioration should be adopted in the other colonies. If their lordships looked at what had thus been done, they would find nothing like precipitation. On the contrary, they would see a series of measures recommended to the adoption of the colonies, which had for their object the gradual improvement of the slaves, and which required a certain course of time to be carried into effect. If the colonial assemblies wished to be regarded as really disposed to acquiesce in the views of parliament, let them lend themselves to the counsels of those who recommended measures of amelioration. On the contrary, they had shown a disposition, not to amelioration, but to resistance. British protection would not be withheld from those to whom it ought to be given; but it was for the colonies to follow that course which would prove that they were entitled to it. He desired that their lordships would look at the nature of the measures directed in the instructions contained in the order in council which had been sent out to the West Indies, and to say whether any possible evil could result to the colonies from adopting those measures. It was possible that some irritation might, from misunderstanding, take place; but that could not excuse the course which had been pursued by the colonies. He agreed with his noble and learned friend, that the measures of amelioration which ought to be adopted with respect to the slave-population could be most advantageously carried into effect by the colonial legislatures themselves. But if they persisted in refusing to attend to the recommendation which had been given them, it would be the duty of parliament to interfere. The best way for the colonies would doubtless be, to render all interference on the part of the mother country unnecessary. With that view he would urge upon them, as the best thing which could be done for their own safety and prosperity, that they should set about the work of legislation with a real, anxious, and sincere desire to improve the condition of their slave-population. Let them adopt this course, and he was sure they would have nothing to fear from other countries, and would never have reason to complain of the mother country. He trusted, however, that whatever regulations the colonial assemblies might think

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fit to carry into effect would be adopted in the spirit of peace and conciliation, and that the government would not be placed in the unfortunate situation of being obliged to resort to measures to enforce the course which had been recommended.
Lord Suffieldvindicated the abolitionists from the charges which had been thrown out against them. At none of the meetings which he had attended had any thing like precipitation in giving liberty to the slave been suggested. On the contrary, the greatest caution had been always recommended. As to the object of the petition, he must observe, that West-India property had always been distressed, and would continue so to be, until compulsory labour was done away with, and free labour introduced.
Lord Redesdaleadmitted the advantages of free labour, but the difficulty was how to introduce it.
The Lord Chancellorsaid, he regarded it as most fortunate for the country, that the language which had from first to last been held on this question in parliament, had always been recommendatory of a gradual abolition, to be brought about by precautionary and prudent measures. He must, however, beg leave to doubt, whether the same opinion pervaded the whole body of the abolitionists; for he believed, if the noble lord would examine the greater number of the petitions which had been presented to the House on this subject, he would find that they contained an express prayer for the immediate emancipation of the negroes.
The Marquis of Lansdownsaid, he could not agree with the noble and learned lord, that the greater part of the petitions relative to negro slavery prayed for immediate emancipation. Every petition which he had been called upon to present, was of a different description; for he had not failed to look at each, with reference to that particular point, before he presented it; and, if in any one petition he had found a prayer for an object so pregnant with mischief to the negro-population, as well as to the planters, he should certainly have expressed his dissent from it. He was now about to present a petition which, like others which he had before submitted to their lordships, contained a declaration, that the petitioners approved of the resolutions adopted by the House of Commons in 1823, and wished to see the principle of those resolutions carried into effect: and to that extent he fully concurred with the
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petitioners. In adverting to what had fallen from the learned lord opposite, he must observe, that the petition to which their lordships' attention had been called, as it prayed for the improvement of West-India property, was one which ought to have been addressed to the colonial legislatures. He knew of no other parties to whom the petitioners could with so much propriety address themselves; for those legislative bodies had it in their power to improve the property of the colonists, and prevented that improvement by their refusal to ameliorate the condition of the slaves. An opportunity had been afforded them of retracing their steps; which it was to be hoped they would seize. Their policy ought to be, to raise the negro to that state which was consistent with the progress of knowledge, and the general improvement of the world, and not to leave him in a condition which formed a state of society never before existing in any country, and which could not fail to be attended with the effect of depreciating the property of the colonists. What was most necessary to be done was, to call upon the colonists to consider well the perilous condition in which they were placed, and from which they could only be rescued by adopting the course which had been recommended to them, and following the example held up to their imitation. This consideration, he trusted, would induce the colonial assemblies to fulfil those expectations which their imprudent conduct had so often disappointed-With regard to the measures for emancipation, there could be but one sentiment, which was, that they ought to be gradual, and of a nature calculated to ensure that moral improvement, by which alone the negroes could be fitted for the enjoyment of freedom. He concluded by presenting a petition, praying for the abolition of slavery.
Ordered to lie on the table.