The Sun. — London, England, 1850-06-01 00:00:00

•••••• ••••••••..... 'te li H tp u , t 'ssY with the en. Gentleman on the division 11141',h 111.1 at questio n , found that the Emperor f ro~ti carefull y watching over the interests of Nit; su ltiects, had said in his speech from the throne, he turn hez would adopt ix eisures for su . pp )1% , d iii tierieuts,eith labour, the want of whi h ch l a v ve 1 4,, I , I s Ibre asing." Now, to what labour could h Ilin g?clearly to slave labyur, e and to ar• It appeared that in the year 184 r there had 147,44P0rted into the Brazils 73,000 slaves, and that . 44°1:lunation had since that time been constantly ir e ) : s uit ;,g; and yet it was not sufficient to meet the o d e. tielT r slave lahotar in that country. The same m itii4CileY prevailed in the United States which pr.T lei;sib England upon that subjsct ; and the question with ttshrentries seemed to be, not whether slaveryshoul I 4 0 0 1 1 , 11 not exist, but how it could be turned to the most ltat t t s ii-l e account. Nothing could be more inconsis tilse l ab the whole policy of her Majesty's Government eat, p h *t. question. He found, that notwithstanding . tipa-4tlY attempts to suppress the slave trade, they ltin-rlsented to enter into communications and to ex eni,te presents with the King of Dahomey, who was &rieengaged in the capture and the sale o h f . I gepoet eaY, that petty sovereign carried on flet T . eihkacticeg by mixes of as army of 8.000 women; . 'the: ha ving at one time applied to the represent e ativ , e ) s . ket;trajesty for 2,000 caps for the use . of iho N s ow w ho (11s, et demand had been complied with. t f the Be et felt curious to know what was the nature itt im - cps so supplied, and whether or not they we tiit -e u ior defeisive military purposes? Ile . foun( tis re a . n ether of these barbarian kings decorated his war- Ittigh i j i t he cast-off wigs of gentlemen of the bar—(A els - is is larld he (Mr. G. Berkeley) should be glTadresto key bNlether the gentlemen sitting on the drat be ether had supplied any portion of those . hea . cl , - G ' 8 ? It 'N I would certainly appear as if her Majesty s tR the Tit had no very earnest desire of supp-ess- - 81 " e trade, while they exchanged presents eitrimartuirians who derived their revenues from t a 'le traffi c to tt C. Our West India colonies did not fear . ?rads_ Petition of' any foreign country which raised its Jtct, d " by free labour. But that to which they . b .. i tbs tl , w as the admission into our markets of slave ttlis t ,. Pr ?duce. Ile would tell them that if they should tton r ' e go on mu c h l onger as th e y went on at pree tols,jar colo nial empire would be lost.—(Hear.) Th 1 4 :1a . e4 ta iba , !uie , instances were almost ripe for revol t; , kted t a ny of the colonies the people wished they be• ,kind is .° a ny other country rather than to England. , it t issi ; a s Much injustice in their mode of trea . ting . the d '"ol e d /s • Berbice, for instance, they had maintained 71 . , - ,,titeh law, and had compelled the colonists to Loss% `ue Maintenance of canals and roads which .. they . 6,Nli se B „ ed • He was glad to find that some intimation ‘, 4 1, e - ," k ebren of an intention to relieve them from that ; 44 he said they ought to have been long ago t e- h lotli it. Her Majesty's Government had l pizaro 'lolloeu the same course towards our West cr ud o l ui. llit,t-ta Which the • had pursued towards . the a„ri of N, k i t , ° l this country. They had deprived them d t‘,its•-tt:s had ruined their labour market—an ti l ;er (tte a e r, haeatrer)ag T ai hei t r man, and man against miss policy had cast a gloom I . h tte n r , it extended; and their law-making had, like s ' l , 4l' ' sts ' e s of old, stained everything that it touched. ed ,ILSON said the Hon. Baronet who had b . `q j s ,lue dis and the Hon. Gentleman who do e w u n sa h l° ad placed the issue of the debate 1 "„ t t a e - ,7 (1 grounds. They said that the British colo slithe'pe cot indisposed to compete with free labour 5', 4 3 s _,; e • The only thing to which they objected was 40 s • 'z 'Pelled h toeomp l e t te wa w s ith the produce of slave just two years since the Hear ,t tts hef e e ar t .) he House. The discussion which then w °r a? . preceded by a long and important lis s ,'Y int ?El rod ° the position of the British colonies and the OM • " a cing countries of the world; and . his Hon. isa.s4.lll order to justify himself for bringing s _t o h w e o q t u h e a s- t k i k, lard again at this time, ought to have h to two ears of experience he had some .1 ! (1 r (1 811 °W why the policy then adhered to by the ti.b'f.tertlioeothadnot scc - eeded, and why these colonies threatened with more danger than they were at th.the e piseri l would b necessary for him shortly to refer Tice taken before the Committee in 1548, to . 1 suet tons as to what would be the result of Zrke ~D4ronaent policy, and then to shot! how far 'l.bppl'redietions had been fulfilled. It was impossible I , 6 \ 4raell this as exclusively a West Indian question. rllikrlii ri 'ar.) It was impossible to exclude the large it l ttlt al P ly rD is U ctog countries in the East Indies, exporting I_94s t 0 .000 tons, and producing four times that e'lti'„ a s c ,d the Mauritius, exporting 68,000 tons; and "eSser s t go . still furthe; . east, and include those new na me As which were r k a o psdl becoming sugar•growing a y rapid glance at the pro liitleolts .toeerwould k t , t , %"T on t h great take of the British empire— P- tius, and the West Indies. With te 44 t e a lte t ,: s t3 de t yl e o9 lVi t a h u e r y t had before them Mr. Anstru foreeiedu.Y.eXtensive planter, Mr. Christian, and others tAll t with the island, by whom they were distinctly si' l . e ti tr t ll l , l they did not retrace their steps with regard Ott "e, and raise the duty on coffee from 2d. to L kt. w e 's than three years the island would be a barren ;hat had the result? The importation .s,"2 4, O ff Po , ,, t he.lsa d ssin b g ee o ti f the measure from 20,000,0001bs to 49uuulhs. in the next year, and in the following 1 ' r ely tooo,ooolbs , being thus doubled instead of ts,:tr,'oihilated; and they were now told by Cey k l'as's eb ants that protection had become a dead • I t i l l 4ls;', ‘ entirely unimportint because, notwith 10q,napetition, they had ' managed so far to es"ool,.;_neteir cultivation and the qusntity supplied to , that now the importation from the British s t ; z eeeded the entire consumption of this country, ' :rs th Plus remained for exportation to the continent, Vs 4l . ;cr wer had to contend with the ma , kets of the sh s told the quantity would he k i k N o Is Year the were Th , - Let it not be supposed that this t wa .e s a o r, wi b n e 4_ Vt i t , 14 prices ranging during the presen IN ' t in have been the result of the prices ) of the 411 1114 Year, when they were the lowest ever known. 4 tl 'r a j loriNlori n ee to the East Indies, they had before them k;t 4 most able directors and officers of the East { (4 ' 1)4.1 1r, and amongst others Mr. Tucker,_ Mr... a I 14-4711411 d Colonel Sykes, who . stated that unless lath 4, 1 1 44 s ugar it would be impossible for us to find a on ° or manufactures there, and the whole evi th:istmil the su bj e et was mos t discouraging. Mr. a very e m i nen t m e rchant, told them that if I:sl(t‘i si i/ ills rt "- not a prot ec ti ve d u ty of 103. per cwt. the I- itk r ttst ss ns slim from the East Indies would fall in il ts t'iSs t Year from 60,000 to 40,000 tons ; and that 4i n ( bth e u 'r four years the importation would cease Van 1% . , They had also witnesses from Mad e r a % top parse in the same strain. Well, two y 1 00 1 ) t o "; and instead of the production . falling from I tt 'abi ' O ,OOO tons, it was a great consolation to him I si b i ti tt .t° aay that the imports had steadily increased l i pesth P r esent time, and during the last year were any preceding year. They were also well tof r iviOs o q t. ' in the present year there would be 75.000 Etto ? . ll s. He next came to the Mauritius. That li b ,' ue time when this evidence was given pre tply Picture of gloom, perhaps unequalled in the s e t) i i t , i t he British 'colonies. All the British mar , very few exceplioas, hod become bankrupt, Vis`a.aonnected with the trade of the Mauritius 1 1: 1 • 4 t4 3 . _ t4 te of insolvency. They we're told by Mr. (tlh' t tu ensinent merchant, that withou t a duty of ilti k t i ,ths" it Zalnst foreign sugar, it would be imoss e il:le . i'll-ii,etlitiVatioll could be maintained; and it h was i th'44 cultivator in the island must e ruined. ti l 'rZ a t t b t he same effect was . given by Mr. ...Hunter, ttc~r c ultivator of estates in the island, by Sir G. teihrti t „ ii ., c rl Mr. Chapman. It was powerful notsurp m ris p i r n e g ss t io h n at ; i st `-'lee should have made a i 4th the result ?In the three years pre -114; period of 1846, when slave-grown sugar was 1 44'. kale- th e production was 34,000 tons; but in the years, including last year, the average ItT' ;, ii t ' i lwaS 50,000 tons; and this year, it was confi ttse'%Vcilinted that the production would be not less l ii7el ° tons. Next came the West Indies. The trilinselicinortation for the three years preceding the c ilit's; bll of slave-grown sugar from the West India ltle Is„ a ' 12 7,000 tons per annum, while the average 115 ,1 1 1,.. t1i ree years was 148,000 tons; and the impor ki'''oo D ii ; the present year would probably be from om b-140,000 tons. After sitting upon the C - b et e• to which h © had re -13. e Welch the evidence as as • from 1)) alti. given , and after deriving information dis. TA t o to which he had access, he was not ,lf,"tlih'ilestion the distress and suffering which s had be h e West Indian and all the sugar c t ot t o h n i i n e g . to tlit-tqr.) But it was a totally different 1 1 ' 11 :-„t Slid say that it was to be cured arisen. ro ;t:L' .. I ,el l believed the distress to have the. withdrawal of protection, but from the t tff iix'Jttetti of years gone by, by which property had t'.„ *t he' 1 1 tted in some instances and burdened in t s' a g . e r af weight of which had been thrown on the t t'laZilait s h!„, o , l proprietors. They had before them the 't l fr aletober for South Cheshire, who had just 7 4 .1, ‘ al -bl . a visit to his own property in the West h ki tt ,ec ti i t said that he had been told that r e s lii:; tl Y happy in having one of the best manage . 4t 91 to When he went there, however, his tl hew he h *ever received anything from the l' e - ", s e eoransone a st agricultural implements we.reehi. 14, moused, and the manure was often . carried t it'slits: e° , to Place by handsful. He insisted on vs,: all shii and what was the result ? By the ,44t111),t th e the Hen. Gentleman he had seen the account, 24k r ,'lestilt of one year ' s experiment, which showed he 3 ;0061. out of 9,000/.—(Hear, hear.) T hey' t jo y . t4;a; f ort eea told that the cry of "cheap sugar" 'iv e ,„ lit the result of their legislation, i w n a a slio o rt . i4 s th tisZ l , he to throw our own lands entirely out f Il:s a nd When that was achteved rices would thZul t itted that a very large increa p se had taken Prolof ghat slave - growing countries, bat the chief pos te fee ceetirred between 1828 and 1840, when the jlelte de . ' lave labour was practically excluded. is "'lied that a greater increase lqi 111 )4 attlhate countries than in our own ha colonies. ,rorta Rico, in the three years preceding est - ' iini ng the year 1845, when . the crops sr as sbsY„" by a hurricane, the entire roduc• 's t ,„ 1 t - u,OOO tons, while during the P three last in Tis`ttbl'esltatClounted to i 300,000 tons. In Brazil, t p hs (Mo n t re Precedir's 1846, the average production e Itt tbbB, and i n the three last years 1 08 , 000 he British West Indies in the three years Is ik , t lB4 6 the amount was 127,000 tons, and in the h c'i t les 6 _33 e ars 1 48,000 tons ; in the Mauritius, e L l s„ . I ' l % l " 4 „'° o o tons, and of sir 50,000 tons; in the ' th." q4 s i "ei.ore 184 ' 6, 64,000 tons, after 72,000 tons. bhp _g the quantities shipped. From the whole ieej,,hu Possessions the average quantity for three 0 ton s, 1836 was 225,900 tons; after that period, tist b l ) s. 4 " u ; or rather more; thus showing an increase ( e Tit: ; Porto Ri co o f 20 per cent.; in Brazil of 11 !te.‘,l,l:4, a tt x ti in the British possessions of 20 per cent. N-Lob, -r*) But there was another important consi l'es. •Flom 1 810 to 1840 the consumption of sugar I sear al • ti le bkf alm ost stationary; at all events , .. for about E a's 45 th e r e D 1844 there had been no visible increase. titt l . first alteration in the sugar duties took 141846 w change glse took pliwo in the law. THE SUN, LONDON, SATURDAY EVENING, JUNE 1, 1850. the repeal of the navigation-laws had rendered the re vival of distinctions of that kind more difficult.—(Hear, hear.) Besides, the present Government did not enforce the observance of the treaties with Brazil and Spain. Under these circumstances he saw no mode in which the object of the Honourable Member for Essex could be carried out but by making an alteration in the sugar duties, and for a time re-enacting protective duties to some extent; and at all events, for a given number of years, of arresting the descending scale.—(Hear, hear.) He could not at present specify the exact amount, but he intended to propose that the differential duty should net be lower than the differential duty which at pre sent existed between colonial and foreign sugar.—(Hear hear.) He could not look forward without dread to the equalisation of the duties in 1854. The Hon. Member fir Westbury protested against holding out to the world the wild example or alteration of our policy. But had not our policy with regard to the sugar duties been frequently altered before ?—(Hear, hear.) The Government, in 1848, found it necessary to make an alteration, under which the colonies now enjoyed a protection of 3s. 6d. per cwt. more than they would have done under the Act of 1846, and under which an equali sation would not take place till 1854, when the duties would be equalled at 10s. instead of 143. And he be lieved that before 1854 the Government would find the pressure of distress so great in the colonies that they mutt give way to another alteration.—(Hear, hear.) He admitted to a certain extent that the experts from the co lonies had not fallen off in quantity; but, nevertheless, the state of those colonies was most disastrous, and they could not go on in their present condition. The subject at issue was, whether it was possible for the West India colonies to compete with the slave countries producing su,gar. The Honourable Member for Westbury had adverted to the continued imports from the East Indies. Now a great deal of sugar was grown in the East Indies for the consumption of that country, which was consumed there, and any surplus might find its way to England. It was now being brought here under the protection of 1848, and it was a most noto rious fact that the importation from the East Indies was now carried on at a loss of several pounds per ton. With regard to the Mauritius, the condition of that colony was somewhat p ecu liar. It had the advantages of obtaining a supply of coolies, and also the benefit of the increased protection of the Act of 1848. The reports from the Mauritius and the East Indies were, therefore, accounted for.—(Hear, hear.) He would now proceed to consider the state of the West India colonies.' He admitted that since the year 1848 there had been a considerable fall in the wages paid to the labourers in the West India colo nies, varying from 30 to 50 pet' cent. In Trinidad the reduction was 40 per cent., and in Jamaica 30 per cent. These circumstances were undoubtedly favour able to the British grower. He also admitted that the importation of sugar from the West India colonies had coasiderab'y increased in 1848 and 1849, as compared with former years. But notwithstandin g these large importations the colonies were in a distressed and ruinous condition. When the Hon. Gentleman talked of the increased consumption of British sugar as com pareil with foreign, he had to remind him that there was ‘an immense import of British sugar in 1847 un disposed of in that year. That state of things was now reversed. In the last three months the amount of foreign sugar entered for home consumption in this country, instead of being 90,000 cwt., as in the similar period of last year, was 180,000 cwt.—exactly double, while the import of British sugar for the last three months was 19,800 cwt. against 22,900 cwt. in the corresponding three months of last year.—(Hear, hear.) The Hon. Member for Westbury had omitted to allude to a most important point—the prices of sugar.—(Hear, hear.) The Hon. Member had told them of the quantity, but had said nothing of the price which the unfortunate British colonist had received for ft. In 1846 the Gazette average of muscovado, without duty, was 345. 5d.; in 1847, 28s. 3d.; in 1848, 235. 8d; in 1849, 255. 4d.; and the average of ten weeks in 1850 was 245. lid. per cwt. —a lower price than that at the time they were debating the Bill of 1848. But it would be easy to show that im ports might be large and pat profits small, or even no thing at all. Lord Harris, writing in the summer of 1848, admitted that the crop had increased, but stated that it would not be difficult to show that since 1838, not only had there been no profit, but, on the contrary, a loss of British capital to the amount of at least a million.— (Hear.) According to the statement of Lord Harris, of 193 estates, 17 might be considered as giving a profit— as many just holding their ground—and that the rest had been cultivated at a 10-s. Governor Barkly also gave evidence of the loss sustained by the planters of Guiana from a depreciation of the value of produce. These statements were conclusive proof that though the amount of produce might be large, the diminution of price more than counterbalanced it. The Hon. Member for West bury had adverted to the quantity of rum imported, but again he made no mention of a fall in its price.—(Hear.) Since 1848 there had been a fall of little less than a third in the price of rum, a most important item, as every one knew, in the returns from a sugar estate. The Hon. Member had referred to the large importations of sugar from the West Indies as a proof of their prosperity, and seemed to deny that any material increase had taken place in the importation of slave-grown sugar. Mr. WILSON had spoken of the quantity of slave grown sugar taken for home consumption with free labour sugar. He had never alluded to the quantity im ported, because it was often imported for the purpose of being re•expoTted to the continent. Sir J. PAIiINGTON felt that this was a point, never theless, which required their attention. In 1831 the West Indian colonies exported 205,000 tons of sugar; in 1848 the quantity had diminished to 139,000 tons; in 1849 it was 142,000 tons, and he believed the amount this year would not exceed 112,000 tons.— (Hear, hear.) Meantime in five years, from 1831, Cuba exported 84,000 tons; and in the four year, from 1346 to 1849, the amount bad increased to 176,000 tons.—(Hear, bear.) Brazil exported from 1842 to 1845 on the average 69,000 tons; from 1846 to 1849 the figures were reversed, the average export . being near 96,000 tons.—(Hear, bear.) Now, with regard to the condition of our colonies nothing could be more deplora ble. He might refer in proof ot this to the able pam phlet which the Hon. Member for Lynn had published on this subject within these few days. Writing cf what he had witnessed in British Guiana, the Hon. Member said he was prepared for desolation, but not for the scenes of ruin which he witnessed—that the whole road which he traversed was lined with ruined houses and mills.—(Hear. hear.) Governor Bsrkly held similar language. What more deplorable than such a state of things? Again, be would refer to the pamphlet of the Hon. Member for Lynn. The Hon. Member gave an ac count of ten estates in British Guiana which had been sold at diff,rent periods, from 1835 to 1844, at an aggre gate of 155,0001., but which, when sold again, during the last three years, had only realised 17,000/,—(Hear.) Again, referring to the pamphlet, he found the Hon. Member stating that passing through the parish of St. Ann's, Jamaica, he was informed of an estate of 800 acres without incumbrance, that was in the market fin 601., and that meeting his informant some three weeks later, was told that he had actually become the purchaser at the stipulated price.—(Hear.) But there was another point to be considered—the dreadful effect of such a stilt( of things on the Creole population of the:West Indies. H, feared that if they persisted in their present policy every hope of improving the social and religious condi tion of the negro population was at an end, and that they would lapse into barbarism.—(Hear.) The Right Hon. Gentleman the Secretary at War had lately pre sided over a meeting of the Wesleyan Missionary So ciety, at which reference was made to the deplorable state of the West Indian population. Lord Grey, in his dispatch to Governor Barkly, also alluded to the state of the negro population, and admitted that instead of ad vancing in civilization they had retrograded.—(Hear.) The opinion of Dr. Lushington, given before the Com mittee, was that the Act of 1846 had greatly stimulated the slave trade. He would also quote the opinion ot the Right Hon. Gentleman the Member for Oxford in favour of his proposition, where that Right Hon. Gen tleman had said that he wished to maintain the charac ter for sincerity which this country possessed amongst foreign nations, and therefore he should not have passed the Sugar Bill of 1846. He could even refer, in support of his proposition, to a speech of the Noble Lord at the head ot the Government, wherein it had been admitted freely that the colonies had been placed at a disadvan tage by the measures of the Government of which the Noble Lord was the head. He was sorry to say that he believed the Noble L ord had done mere to stimulate erin;hich ho had used, that they had passed b s y o n a c n o g n i a d ge t t h b a e n s a l n av y e otberper trade, the Act of 1846, and were prepared to defend its policy. —(Hear.) If they sincerely wished to pat down the slave trade, they should carry out their policy with single ness of purpose and steadiness of design, with sincerity and modesty, or they could not expect any blessing of Heaven to attend the policy of this country so long as with one hand they lavished their money in keeping up the appearance of a squadron on the coast of Africa, whilst with the other they were inviting and giving every encouragement to the practice of slavery.—(Hear.) They could not expect any such blessing whilst with one hand they drew the sword to put an end to 'slavery, and with the other did everything to encourage it.—(Loud cheers from the Protectionist benches.) That policy must be reversed —(Cheers)—and he hoped some day to see this country acting in a manner which should not invovle suspicion of its honour—in a manner which wou ld not involve suspicion of its sincerity—in a manner which would exhibit this nation to the world as one, not guided merely by motives of gain—(Cheers)— which would show to the world that we could not be led solely by pecuniary considerations, but that we were determined, at any cost, to put an end to slavery and the slave trade. —(The Hon. Gentleman resumed his seat amidst loud cheers from the Protectionist benches.) The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER said the ob jects of the Hon. Gentleman who had just spoken, and of the Hon. Gentleman (Sir E. Buxton) whose motion he sup ported, were as different as well could be conceived. The Hon. Gentleman (Sir E. Buxton) had stated he brought forward his motion as a great question of principle, and no one who knew the Hon. Gentleman could doubt he had brought it forward as no party motion, or was influenced by anything but his attachment to the principle of destroying in every way slavery and the slave trade. His motion, how ever, came far short of the principles be avowed. On what principle would he draw a distinction between the produce of Brazil and Carolina? The Hon. Baronet emphatically said that the man who bought slave-grown sugar was as guilty as the man who bought a slave.—(Hear, hear,) That might be so, but how could the Hon. Baronet draw a dis tinction between slave-grown sugar, slave-grown cotton, and slave-grown coffee ? (Hear, hear.) He was afraid the Hon. Baronet did not altogether abstain from the use of slave grown coffee. According to the principle he had laid down, was not he guilty of the blood of the slave?—(Hear, hear.) The Hon. Gentleman opposite (Sir J. Pakington) supported the motion on far different grounds, and, aware of the impos sibility of making a distinction, would pat all foreign sugar, free and slave-grown, on precisely the same footing with respect to duty. Did the Hon. Gentleman opposite propose to extend the principles of his policy to the Mauritius sugar? Did he mean to protect free-labour sugar grown i n any of our possessions, or did he confine himself to the West Indies ; or did he propose a protection to all British colonial sugar as opposed to all foreign sugar ? The Hon. Member for Dorset shire would exclude all foreign sugar; and there, at least, it must be admitted that he was consistent with himself; but the opposite plan had no standing whatever-it had no prin ciple to rest upon. It appeared to him that many of the Hon. Members who supported the motion desired protection to all colonial sugar. Now, he was not prepared for that, and he hoped that the House was not prepared for it either. In the course of the present discussion an observation had been justly enough made that the question before them was one of details and statistics, and though he might to some extent trouble the House with some of that species of evidence, yet he would not unduly trespass upon them. In the first place, he desired to call their attention to the fact that for the fif teen years ending in 1844 the importation of sugar from the West Indies had been under 200,000 tons; in 1848 and 1849 it rose to 206,000 tons, and it now amounted to 300,000 tons per annum. That improvement might be reckoned amongst the earliest changes consequent upon the abolition of slavery. But the first effect of the present motion, if it were carried, would be not what its Hon. Mover might expect-its first effect would not be to discourage slavery at all. But the true way to look at the question before the House was to consider the effect of the present state of free labour and of open competition, and this he thought might be best seen by the average rate of consumption of sugar per head per annum in this country. In the year 1840 the average consumption was 151 b.; in 1841-2-3-4, it was 171 b.; in 1845, 201 b.; in 1846, 211 b..; in 1847, 231 b. ; in 1848 and 9,241 b. He pre sumed that no one would for a moment doubt that that was a great benefit to the people of this country, that it was a great advantage to them to be enabled to raise their con sumption of sugar from 151 b. to upwards of 201 b. But the question beyond this was one of great importance. Let Hon. Members look to the effect of this change upon the West Indies themselves. A proposition, however, like that then before them was one to which he would not consent ; for his impression was, that one more unfortunate for the West Indies could not be devised. He admitted the distress which prevailed in the colonies, and no one could be more ready to afford relief than he should be, but the colonies having sub mitted to the Act of 1848-having admitted that Act as a final settlement-having made unusual exertions to main tain and promote their own interests under its operation or with its aid, whatever might be their condition in other respects, there could be no doubt of this fact, that sugar, the produce of the West Indies, of the East Indies, and of the Mauritius, had greatly increased within the last two years. That fact was before the House, and was beyond all possibility of dispute. If Hon. Members would refer to the returns of 1848 and 1849, they would find that in Antigua, Barbadoes, Jamaica, St. Vincent's, and Trinidad, there had been a steady and manifest increase of prodaction and expor tation. Thus 2,794,000 cwts. had advanced to 2,840,000 cwts. and the export from Guiana for the first quarter of the year 1849 was 7,920 hogsheads; while, in the corresponding pe riod of 1850, it was 9,336 hogsheads, showing an increase of 1,416; and an increase not perhaps always precisely similar in amount, but pretty nearly so, might be found to have oc curred in all our possessions where sugar was prcduced ; yet the reverse of all that had been predieted ; it had been pre dicted that Ceylon would be a desert, that the Mauritius would be a desert-and yet those prophecies so confidently made and so implicitly relied upon, had been falsified within the short space of two years. The Hon. Member for Lynn, in his statement, certainly did not omit the West Indies, and he, comparing periods of three years, gave statements, the result of which showed an increase of production and of exportation from 127,000 tons to 148,000 tons, the in , crease being in the three years subsequent to the Act of 1846, as compared with the three years preceding that measure. But, further to show the insufficient ground on which the motion of the Honourable Baronet rested, heshouldc nrt all im th p ea a t t t in e n ofntion sugar of from th Honourable Members ev ie t s o the average t fiTvehey d 'e e a t rs ails en w d e in re g a l s B f l o 4 iln a w nd :_ t A h n e tig fi n v a e , years s ending g lB t 4 h 9 e . five years ending 1844, 177,727 cwt. ; five years ending 1849, 180,737 cwt. ; Barbadoes, ending 1844, 290,873 cwt. ; ending 1849, 402,987 cwt. ; Trinidad, ending 1844, 282,000 cwt. ; ending 1849, 385,000 cwt. ; St. Kitt's, ending 1844, 89,00 cwt. ; ending 1849, 107,030 cwt. ; St. Lucia, ending 1844, 55,000 cwt. ; ending 1849, 70,000 cwt. •, Guiana, ending 1844, 522,000 cwt. ; ending 1849, 572,000 cwt. ; Jamaica, ending, 1844, 602,000 cwt. ; ending 1849, 665,000 cwt. ; Mauritius, ending 1844, 591,000 cwt. ; ending 1849, 907,000 cwt. ; aggregate of all colonies, including the East Indies, five years ending 1844, 3,925,000 cwt. ; endiug 1849, 5,072,000 cwt. The next point to which he should solicit the attention of the House was the comparative ope ration of slavery and freedom-the productiveness of free labour as compared with slave labour, and he should take the six years ending in 1834 for the purpose of comparing them with the six years ending in 1849, the quantities being, in cwts. : - Antigua, 1834, 175,000 ; 1849, 188,000 ; increase, 12,000. Barbadoes, 1834, 343,000 ; 1849, 390,000 ; increase 47,000. Trinidad, 1834, 310,000 ; 1849, 366,000 ; increase, 56,000. The question was what might be done by means of free labour, and that question was one which he conceived those statements fully answered. It was scarcely necessary for him to go over the ground that his Hon. Friend the Member for Westbury had already traversed, but as the House was now more full than when his Hon. Friend addressed them, he would say it had been clearly shown by him that the consumption of colonial sugar had increased, while the consumption of foreign sugar had fallen off. He should now trouble the House with only a few more details, for the purpose of :contrasting the effects of slavery with freedom, as shown in the consumption of sugar. Thus it was in 1846-47 :-Colonial, 227,000 tons; slave grown, 61,000 tons; 1847-48, colonial, 242,000 tons; slave grown, 39,000 tons; 1848-49. colonial, 251,000 tons, slave grown, 48,000 tons; 1849-50, colonial, 282,000 tons; slave 4rown' 36,000 tons. The years ending July 5, and the two months of this :year, were estimated at the same rate as the 10 months. The average importation from the West Indies 1844-5-6, was 127,000 tons; 1847-8.9,148,000. Those facts appeared to him to be well worthy of the attention of the House, and his belief was it would always be found that slave-labour was inferior to free labour. He agreed with the Honourable Member for Montrose, that protection would not save the West Indies, but increased cheap ness of production would, and the duty of the Legislature was to afford the colonies every facility for aug menting the means of cheapness. Now, reference had been made to the Dutch colony of Surinam, and there, it was not unworthy of observation, the proprietors of sugar estates were beginning to think that free labour was more profitable and advantageous in all respects than that of slavery. Suri nam was on the verge of our possessions, and appeared to be likely very soon to follow our example. They and others were about to discover that the way to cheapen sugar was to Abolish slavery. The Honourable Member for Lynn had quoted a passage from the dispatch of the Lieutenant-Go vernor of Barbadoes, and now he should take the liberty of reading a few additional words from that dispatch, because. though the writer had been represented by the Hon. Mem ber as holding that free labour was less productive than slave labour, yet the following portion of the dispatch would show that an exception was made in the case of Barbadoes:- " How long that time should be your Lordship will un derstand that I cannot say. If there be no protection, the cultivation of sugar will be given up further in Grenada, and it will dwindle in all the Windward Islands, excepting Barbadoes." With that passage in the hands of the Hon. Member, how could he say that the expe riment of free labour had failed in Barbadoes? He also held in his hand another paper, with a quotation from which he should trouble the House; it appeared in the Times, in the month of December last. It was in the following words :- " Labour was abundant and cheap, and the Trinidadian says, that field-work was never so cheaply performed in the island as at the present day, not even when slavery was at its zenith." Such facts could not be got over, and they clearly proved that wherever slavery existed production could not be cheap. At the same time, the Government were not prepared to adopt the plan of buying slaves in Africa for the purpose of setting them free in the West Indies, but they were prepared to grant any facilities short of that which was only another mode of slavery. The only means similar to that which had succeeded was when the expense was incurred of importi ng lib era t e d Africans. ! During the last three years there had been a gradual increase in the num ber of liberated Africans imported into the West Indies. In 1847 the number was 1,07 ; in 1848, 3,148 ; in 1819, 4,762. It was also right the House should remember that it present there were not unsatisfactory accounts from many of the colonies. He was far from saying that distress did not prevail in the West Indian colonies, but in Trinidad he found, from a dispatch of Lord Harris, dated February 23, 1850, that the revenue, the exports, and the imports, had all increased during the last year. In Guiana the import duties, which amounted to 23,191 dollars for January, 1846, were, in January, 1847, 22,506; 1848, 27,685; and 1849, 46,195 dollars. His Hon. Friend (Sir E. Buxton) had brought for ward his motion with a view of discouraging the slave trade, and in his hands it had no reference to protection. But these were not the grounds upon which the motion had been sup ported by Hon. Gentlemen opposite, who had advocated pro tective duties against the admission of all foreign sugar whatever. But he hoped that the House would take into its consideration not only the interest of the planter but the interest of the consumer at home. Looking to what was going on in the West Indies, in the exertions which were being made, and successfally made, to cheapen the production in the colonies and to adopt a better cultivation of the lands, he trusted that they would not, by acceding to this motion. check the active spirit of enterprise that was going on, or induce . the hope that by a return to protection they would be giving any encouragement to free-labour over slave-labour sugar. Mr. GLADSTONE said, that the Honourable Gentleman the Member for Essex, in a motion for which his name, in dependently of his character, was a perfect guarantee, had invited the House to resume the consideration of a question the difficulties of which increased upon them at every step they took. In 1848, when this question was last opened, they had before them the question, not whether they would maintain the settlement of 1846-lbecause that its authors themselves proposed to abandon; but whether they should introduce a fixed system of protection, giving uniformity of condition, and time for the resources of the colonies to de velops themselves under the new system; or whether they should adopt the scale proposed by the Government, which provided a progressive descent in the different duties, a descent at first very slight, and which was not yet ex , perienced, but which would in another year be a rapid one-(Hear, hear),-and from which they might expect not only a continuance of the present pressure, but a very greatly increased pressure.-(Hear, hear.) In 1848 he (Mr. Gladstone) with many other Gentlemen on that (the Oppo sition) side of the House, who felt themselves bound upon other points to support the application of the principle of freedom to the regulation of our commercial system, voted against the proposal of the Government and in favour of a proposition to extend a larger measure of protection to the West Indies. That vote he felt bound to repeat on the pre sent occasion. -(Cheers.) The words of the motion of the Hon. Gentleman might have afforded him the means of escape had he felt inclined to avail himself of them, i because the motion placed in the same category t he whole of the British possessions, to some of which, i they stood But commend an extension or augmentation of protection. di alone, he (Mr. Gladstone) should not he P the case really before the House was that of the West Indies -(Cheers)-and he would admit thatinproposingu and the present peculiar circumstances of those colonies, repared to re commend I tend it also to other portions of the empire w lac no such peculiar claims.-(Hear, hear.) The case of the West before them now as in 1848, only with the danger Indies was , the suffering aggravated. The grounds of justice temporarily, to extend protection to them,. they would ex tend it same, and the grounds of policy were clearer and , broader than ever. T he House ; must recollect the c r isis h h which the West Indies had passed. They were not now complaining merel y and sufferin g m erely , but through ground down absolutely to the ground and reduced to total ruin by the Legislature of this country.-(Cheers.) They had begun with emancipation, a great and vital change in the constitution of West Indian society, and if it had been conducted with no more tenderness and wisdom than some of our more recent changes it would have precipitated the West Indian colonists at once into ruin. But happily a wiser spirit, and one more in accordance with justice, presided over that act; and Lord Stanley , as t h e organ of Lord Grey's Go vernment, with great energy a nd wisdom contrived so to temper and adjust the details, that while he satisfied the majority of the House , he by a s in gular felicity gained the confidence of the planters themselves. Within the last few days, and even within the last few hours, they had seen that the perfect talents and statesmanship of that Noble Lord had descended upon his son, who had that night addressed them. —(Loud cheers.) It was true—and happy it was for philan thropy that such was the fact—that the emancipation of the negroes in the West Indies was not immediate. He ad• mated, also, that those philanthropists who had recommended the abolition of slavery were not responsible for the ruin of these colonies.—(Hear, hear.) But what did Parliament do? The Government of Lord Melbourne sent out instruc tions for the postponement of all the preparatory legislation which was necessary for the new state upon which they were about to enter. They obliged the colonies to postpone every act of precaution and legislation which might tit them for the new state of things. In 1837 a Committee of the House of Commons recognised the Emancipation Act as containing a solemn contract of apprenticeship until 1840, and they stated in their report that nothing could be so disastrous as to shake the public confidence with regard to the sanctity of that con tract. In 1838, by a hasty and injudicious vote of the House, they compelled the West India colonies to give up the re mainder of that apprenticeship which the House had gua ranteed to them.—(Hear, hear.) They were thus not only deprived of the pecuniary benefit of the two years' appren ticeship, but the Government having desired them to post pone all preparation, they were compelled to plunge into the new state into which they had been forced by public opinion in this country. With regard to the question of labour, he could not join in any censures relative to the present proceedings of the Government. The supply of labour for the %Vest Indies was a far more difficult subject than the Hon. Member for Montrose supposed. The Go vernment, he believed, were desirous to give such facilities as they safely could to increase the supply of labour. But he spoke now of the state of public sentiment in this country; and he said there was a period when, by seizing the oppor tunity, the House might have prod uce d• the most important consequences by the introduction into the colonies of tree labour from abroad. Had they chosen to give facilities at the time for the moderate introduction of labour into the islands, much of the evil would have been avoided, but they had refused to do this. Willi such jealousy was every pro ceeding of the West Indians—every effort of laudable enter prise on the part of some of the planters to increase the means of labour watched at home—so hostile a construction was placed on every act of the colonists, that the Govern ment did not venture to give the slightest facilities for the introduction of labour; but, on the contrary, precaution af ter precaution, regulation after regulation, was interposed to create an artificial scarcity of supply.—(Hear.) For that ar tificial scarcity of labour the public opinion of the time, and the representatives of that public opinion, were responsible. (Hear, hear.) After the breach of contract of apprentice. ship, after the artificial scarcity of labour, came the Act of 1846; and, as to that, he disputed and denied, not the figures, but the inferences of the Right Hon. Gentleman op posite. The Right Hon. Gentleman cited the three years since 1846 as indicating the effects of that Act upon the pro ducing power of the West Indies. Did the Right Hon. Gen tleman really believe his own argument? Had the Right Hon. Gentleman so little studied the nature of cultivation in the West Indies, or anywhere else, as seriously to believe that the exports from the West Indies in 1847 were the mea sure of the effects of an Act passed in 1846 ?—(Hear, hear.) Was their no other fact in our legislation—a fact happily of a different character—which, concurring with favourable seasons, might be connected with the increase of crops in the West Indies ? Had there not been an Act of. 1845 as well as an Act of 1846 —an Act .reducing the duty on our colonial sugar from about 245. to 145., and to which, and not to the Act of 1846, the inferences of the Right Hon. Gentleman were referable? But for the check of the Act of 1846, in 1848 the Act of 1845 would have been in full operation, whereas the Act of 1846, so far from developing itself in 1847, had not until after 1848 come into full operation. What, in the Committee of 1848, said the resolutions pro posed by the President of the Board of Control—whose absence from so deplorable a cause was a source of grief as deep as unaffected to the whole House?—(Hear, hear.) Distinctly this, that the distress of the West Indians was markedly traceable to the restrictions imposed by public opinion, in its anxiety to carry out the Act of Emancipa tion, upon the supply of labour to our West Indian colonies. —(Hear, hear.) No mere formal regard to consistency would induce him to repeal his vote of 1848, could he agree with the Right Hon. Gentleman in the belief that the West Indies were rallying from the stroke they had received, and that the present was an injudicious proposition, calculated to retard returning prosperity.—(Hear, hear.) He would freely concede thus much to the Right Hon. Gentleman, that protection would be no permancat cure for the evils of the West Indies.—(Hear.) He fully bore in mind the admis sion of the Right Hon. Member for Tamworth, an admission of course carrying the greatest weight, that the case of the West Indies was fairly to be treated as an exception from the ordinary category of free-trade principles ; this was an admission so often made that he need not now dwell upon it, and, could it be shown that the permanent restora tion of protection, or its permanent maintenance, or its permanent increase, would operate as a cure for the evils of the West Indies, he should be prepared to give his vote in accordance with that principle—(Hear, hear) — but he would ask the House to consider well what would be the operation of protection as a permanent instruffent of re lief in the state of our West Indian colonies? Suppose you were to increase considerably the rate of protective duty. When the intelligence of that increase reached the West Indies it would reach not the planter only, but also the labourer, and so act on the rate of wages quite as much as on production.—(Hear, hear.) What was the competition with the West Indian? Not that of the foreign slaveholder only, but that of the Mauritius planter and that of the East In dian planter, both of whom had plenty of labour at their command, and for both of whom protection would operate with undivided effect as against the West Indian, with whom its effect would be divided and broken up.—(Hear, hear.) What he was prepared to vote for was that the scale of descending duties should be arrested.— (Hear, hear.) The British capitalist who was to be invited to invest his money in production in the West Indies ought to have some fixity of scale held out to him, and not be subjected to an incessant change of differential duties, so that he could never know, from year to year, in what position he stood.—(Hear, hear.) He did not say the House should pledge itselfjndefinitely on this point, but he certainly considered that for such a term as the House should think reasonable the scale of differential duties should be fixed for the West Indies.—(Hear, hear.) He would not refer merely to the.decrease in the exports of the great staple of the West Indies. That decrease was not the less enor mous, that it suited the purpose of some reasoners to pass over the differences between one colony and another.— ( Hear, hear.) The Right Hon. Gentleman, for example, triumphantly cited Barbadoes in proof of the good results of free trade—Barbadoes, where there was plenty of labour, and not an inch of spare ground. Yes; it was quite true that the production of Barbadoes had been positively stimulated since emancipation. In the four years preceding emancipa ion the production of Antigua and Barbadoes was 26,900 tons of sugar on the average, while iu the three last years the average had increased to 31,300 tons. But look at Jamaica; in the years 1831 to 18.34, the average production of Jamaica was 67,000 tons, of British Guiana 43,000, or together 110,000 tuts ; whereas, in 1847-9, notwithstanding the liberality of the Legislature in reducing the duty on colonial sugar to 14s, the exporta tion from these two colonies did not exceed 65,500 tons, a reduction of 45,500 tons, or more than 40 per cent. on the whole preduction.—(Hear, hear.) This was not a ques tion merely affecting the planters; no, it was a question affecting the whole negro population f our West Indian colonies—( Hear, hear)—and he affirmed with sorrow that those indications which the Hon. Member for Lynn had given in a recent publication of the decaying condition of all that we should wish to see flourishing in our West Indian population were but too true, and but too truly the effect of the legislation of that House.—(Hear, hear.) Not only by the reduction of prices, but by giving an artificial command of the market to the negro race, they had done all in their power to deaden and discourage labour itself, and to stay the progress of the negro's permanent civilization and pro sperity.—(Hear. hear.) During the years of emancipation the cry was—" True. the exports from the colonies, on which the planters depend, have undergone some decrease, but do not, in your regard for the planter, forget the great mass of the West Indian population, or the increase of those imports into the colonies which tend to the greater comfort of the negro." How stood the case now? That the amount of these imports, the stated tests of the negroes' comforts, had fallen below the point even of the days of slavery.—(Hear, hear.) In the last four years of slavery the exports from this country to the West Indies were in value 2,575,000 L ; in the four years of apprenticeship, from 1833 to 1838, they rose to 3,450,0001. ; from 1843 to 1846, after the abandonment of apprenticeship, they fell to 2,657,0001. ; in 1847, the year Honourable Gentlemen were so fond of quoting, they had still further fallen to 2,279,0001; while in 1848, the last year for which we had returns, those exports, which in the years of slavery were 2,500,0001., in the years of apprenticeship nearly 4,000,0001., had fallen to 1,500,000/.—(Hear ° hear.) That most important, most significant, an d mos t disastrous fact indicated that there was a necessity for their considering what further measures were required for the relief of the West India colonies —(Hear, hear.) To what measures, then, did he point for permanent relief to the We't Indies? In 1848 they had indulged the hope that great things would be done towards cheapening production in these colonies, and numerous were the modes laid down by which that object might be attained. In many places it was to be effected by drainage of lands; in many, by a system of irrigation; in others, by the improvement of roads and by aiding in the formation of railways; and in British Guiana speculation turned much upon the means by which it was hoped to keep out the sea from large portions of that colony. A Commit tee of that House laid down in its report the principle, that Government were to take on themselves the responsibility of looking to the circumstances of particular colonies, and making grants of money that might be made available by the planters themselves. Instead of all this, however, what had been done? Nothing whatever. The p lat not eted improvements had not been made; Government assumed that responsibility . which was anticipated, themselves in the but had thrown it upon the Colonial Legislature, but very imperfect midst of financial embarrassment, and the colonies they legislated organs for numerous purposes of for; so that while the West Indians were told that protection was no remedy for the evils under which they laboured, and that other measures than protection would be tried for their benefit, those other measures had never been attempted, and they were in precisely the sam e condition that they occupied two years a hear.) They had not taken the work hand which two years ago had been promised. In the c olonies they were red u ci n g the expenses of their own Gove rnmen ts, and in that they had received no encourage ment.—( Hear, hear.) In the case of British Guiana, on the con trary, the report of the Committee showed plainly that the influence of the Government had not been used in the direction in which it should have been directed.—(Hear, hear.) As to the condition of the planters, he begged the House to recollect that the possibility of their rain was sot disproved by circumstan ces w hi c h might seem to give colour to such an idea, because where there had been a vast expenditure, and where by legislative measures the floating capital of the planters had been re duced to nothing, it followed of course that new parties would come in, encouraged and attracted by the advantage of obtaining a large amount of fixed capital at a nominal price— (Hear, hear)—and, putting in their own fresh capital for the cultivation of the soil, that would be a temporary stimulus given to the property. ( Hear, hear.) This was not an ar bitrary representation, but was one borne out by the testi. mony of Governor Light, who in a dispatch stated that one of the finest estates in British Guiana—and this was a sample of the rest—had been sold during the time of slavery for SO,OOO/. or 100,000/. [he spoke from memory as to the figures] ; during the apprenticeship, for 30,000/. or 40,000/. ; and in 1848 ; for 2,000/. (Hear, hear.) q, - verrior Light proceeded in language not more quaint than full of meaning and instruction, to say that the purchaser having acquired all the buildings, works, machinery, &c., on the estate for 2,000/., had wha , t , he termed " a noble chance of escaping ruin. (Cheers, and Laughter.) This was what matters ha _ come to him in the wreck and dilapidation of a once powerful class—there was left for some fortunate purchasershe a noble chance of escaping ruin. —(Hear, hear.) T repeated, had strong claims on the indulgence of planters, that House, whiph had been in fact the cause and instrutent of their e r difficulties ; but he did not make his ppeal the H manly on their account. He would ask them to give the planters such a form of fixed protection as would serve them till the remedial measures meant to be introduced were car.. ried into effect, and which would give confidence to the and avail himself of this " n o bl e chance of escaping nix British capitalist to come " • e (Hear, hear.) But he asked this chiefly on behalf o f the ne g ro p o p ulation, who wore now losing the advance they once made under happier aus pices. Let the House consider all the bygone circumstances connected with the emancipation of this race, let it consider the eulogies by Dr. Channiug and other eminent men in foreign countries in reference to what had been done on be half of the negro. Those eulogies were founded on the fact that they bad in their West India colonies a happy and pros perous population, who had been saved from the lash and all the horrors of slavery; and was the House willing to lose the bright title of having achieved these things in their be half ?—(Hear.) Was it not painful to think that there was a gradual slipping from the hands of the negro population of the comforts of civilisation, and a less disposition to ask theta, and to cultivate the rational and spiritual part of their being, by following after the benefits of religious education ? ( Hear.) For his part he should be sorry to share in that re sponsibility. On their behalf, as well as from some consi deration for an ill-used class, forming the proprietary inte rest in the West Indies, he hoped the House of Commons would support the motion of the Bel. Baronet.—(Hear, hear.) He would always regret that they had chosen to break through the distinction so well maintained by the Right Hon. Gentleman the Member for Tamworth, relative to slave grown auger. For that distinction he was always prepared to contend, and he lamented that a great political crisis in the country should have wrung from any those reluctant votes that had produced a change so disastrous in its con sequences and so injurious to the high character of Great Britain as that effected in the Act of 1 846.--illear.) He admitted the difficulties under which they now stood; but never certainly was greater industry shown by any party than was shown by the Noble Lord and his friends in effect ing the change of that distinction to which Parliament had formerly given its sanction. He hoped the House would not reject the appeal that had been made to them—whether they considered it in the light of an appeal from a suffering class, or an appeal urged in behalf of a population once happy and prosperous, and advancing in a career of social improvement, but now, under the legislation of that House, losing the ground they had gained, and sinking gradually back towards the inferior, if not degraded condition from which they were rescued by philanthropy and benevolence. Viscount PALMERSTON—It has seldom fallen to my lot to witness a debate conducted on the one side with more curious inconsistencies and with a greater series of contras dictions.—(Hear, hear.) My Hon. Friend who introduced this motion proposed it on the ground of humanity, and as a mode of getting rid of the slave trade; but scarcely had his arguments fallen on our ears when the debate took another turn, and from that time his motion has been chiefly sup ported on the ground of protection, a principle which I be lieve my Hon. Friend had not himself intended to advocate. —(Hear, hear.) Almost the only example of consistency which we have witnessed in the course of this debate, is that consistency of talent and ability which have been displayed by the Hon. Member who has for the first time spoken on this question, and who has proved himself to be the consis tent representative of that father whom we have so often heard with admiration within these walls. The Right Hon. Gentleman who has just sat down has, I think, crowned the example of inconsistency in this debate.—(Hear, hear.) Whether the limited scope of my capacity or the ambiguous arguments of the Right Hon. Gentleman be the cause, I am now quite at a loss to know what he means to do and on what side be intends to vote.—(Laughter and Hear, hear.) He declared himself, as I understood him, ready to support the motion of my Hon. Friend, that motion being a perma nent declaration that it is impolitic and unjust to expose the free-grown sugar of our colonies and possessions abroad to unrestricted competition with the sugar of foreign slave trading countries. But the Right Hon. Gentleman has not, as I understand him, as yet so entirely thrown off the princi ples of free trade, of which he was once an able advocate, and in support of which he has often rushed into the van at periods of great difficulty, and given his most honourable support.—( Hear.) The Right Hon. Gentleman did not, as I understand him, abandon that doctrine, or accept the doctrine of protection. All he asks for is a limited period of protec tion to give time for those remedial measures for the colo nies for which he is anxious. But if that is his only object, if he does not wish for the permanent re-establish.. ment of the principles of protection, then I ask on what principle of consistency can he vote for a resolution which is permanent in its object, and which does not give a limited but a permanent period for the continuance of protection to our colonies? (Hear, hear.) I certainly shall not vote for the motion of my Hon. Friend.—(Laughter.) lam not either for limited or permanent protection. lam convinced that protection has done no good to the West Indies, and will do no good. (Hear, hear.) Now, it was under a sys tem of protection that the West Indies have been in former times in a state of continued distress and rain ; and it is not by recurring to that system that we can restore them to that prosperity which I trust they are still destined to attain. It is by those remedial measures which the Right Hon. Gen tleman alluded to—by a better system of cultivation—. (Ironical cries of " Hear, hear")—and by that stimulus which competition affords that we may hope to see them ex tricated from the difficulties under which they complain.— (Hear.) Now, how my Hon. Friend thinks that this excla sion of slave-grown sugar would put an end to the slave trade I really cannot for a moment imagine. I cannot see how such a measure would operate in the way he wishes to put an end to that traffic. Has my Honourable Friend en tered into the proportion of free-grown sugar introduced into this country for home consumption as compared with slave grown sugar? He would have seen, had he done so, that for the year 1849, the proportions were five and a half mil lions of cwts. of free-labour sugar to half nmillion of cwts. of slave-grown sugar.—(Hear, hear.) It is, in fact, not the competition of slave-grown sugar which is ruining the West Indian planters, but it is the annually increasing competition of free-labour sugar from other parts of the world—(Hear)-- and if my Honourable Friend is prepared to give to the West Indies that protection which he thinks is essential to restore them to prosperity, it must be done not by confining the restriction to the slave-grown sugar of Brazil and Cuba, but by extending to them the full protection which they enjoyed informer times against free-labour sugar, t'proposition whi c h I am sure my Honourable Fri en d would not advocate, and a proposition which I am sure this House would never en tertain.—(Hear, hear.) It has been often urged that we had only to exclude the slave-grown sugar from the market of this country, and to draw an equal quantity of free-labour sugar from the market of the world, in order to afford the protection desired; but this would be only creating a vacuum which would be at once filled up by the slave-labour sugar of Cuba and the Brazils.— (Hear, hear.) The slave-owners in those countries would laugh at your precautions, and would know that there were still markets enough open to them to induce them to go on cultivating sugar and increas ine: the number of their slaves as before.—( Hear, hear.) But if any man c mild doubt that the attempt must be perfectly fatile, I think those who heard the speech of my Hon. Friend the Member for Westbury, and attended to the manner' in which he demonstrated that the recent changes in our navi gation-laws have added an insurmountable obstacle to the carrying out of any such arrangement, must have every shadow of a doubt removed. It is not measures of this kind for excluding sugar of one kind, and laying heavier duties on the produce of this country or that, by which we can extir pate the slave trade—the object which I know my Hon. Friend has most at heart. No doubt many Hon. Gentlemen have protested against the African squadron, and against our maintaining a maritime police as being insufficient to effect the suppression of the slave-trade. But I have never maintained that that alone was sufficient to put the slave trade down, though I have always contended that without this maritime police other measures would be fruitless.— ( Hear, bear.) The House may rest assured that other mea sures for this object are in progress, and that we are, by trea ties with native chiefs in Africa, and by other exertions on the other aide of the Atlantic, pursuing measures which, I trust, if properly continued, in the course of the next year will enable us to entertain better hopes that the slave-trade will be, if not extinguished, at least very considerably dimi nished. Now what is the state of the slave-trade at the pre sent moment? There are now in Africa 1,500 miles-north of the line entirely free from the slave-trade—of the entire 2,000 miles north of the line there are now only about 420 in which the slave-trade at all exists; and I trust the measures now in operation may lead to the extirpation of the slave trade from that remaining portion north of the line. I this very day received a dispatch from one of the Commis saries at Sierra Leone, stating that during the quarter which had just expired, he can assert that not a single ship had left that place with slaves.. There are 12,000 miles south of the line where the slave trade exists; and one-half of that territory belongs to the Portuguese dominions, where better methods are at command on the coast for the suppression of the traffic with Brazil. And I hold it to be by no means that chimerical expectation which gentlemen who sat in Committee have chosen to term it, that the combination o f all the measures now being adopted may tend at no distant perm • d to accomplish that end. And I must say that no object—l speak not now of those higher considerations which the hie h 1h Rightth think Honourable,nevernevertheless lee eGentleman influencee adverted a nation to, and like the British in matters of this kind—but independently of these higher considerations, taking even the most narrow views of temporal interests, I must say that nothing can be accomplished that would tend more to further e e r x ci t a i r l p i a n t t i e o r n e s o o t A t n h d e p l o a 7 e ef i t t r y . d o e f . this iso c p o a u r n t t r y of than the th the entire globe offers more scope for the commercial coast onlnle of Africa.rcialenterpris iv e o e f h t a h v i e s country than the interior and th a demand for the things which she produces, and she stands in want of the goods that we can supply. In many other parts of the world, where there is a larger population to con sume what we can export, there is a want of commodities to offer in return. Our trade with China has been limited to a certain degree by a want of the commodities to exchange for our products. But in Africa commodities for barter abound; there is hardly anything of value which cannot be found' there to offer in exchange for the goods that we can supply. Cotton might be grown on the western coast in infinite quantity and of the best quality. And, recollecting how precarious is the source of supply which we now derive from the United States of America recollecting how the growing manufactures of America herself are now annually absorbing more and more of the co tt on which sheprod produces—and recollecting what a vast amount of our own - population de pend upon the manufactures from that raw material for daily bread, it becomes a matter of the most extreme im portance that we should seek out other sources of supply. —(Hear, hear.) Palm oil, an article also of great value and much used, is found in abundance in that country, there are also coffee, ivory, gold, i n f ac t, h ar dl y an ything of value and utility might not be produced or found in Africa, and might not be received in return for our own exports. I say, therefore, it is an object of great national importance, that by an end being put to the slave trade, we should be enabled to enter into commercial intercourse with the vast Hon.fit to population of that region.—(Divide.) I will not follow the Right Hon. Gentleman into all those details connected with o en ur te W r. West Indian eonfine possessions into sin to to which be Friend. I contend that it is notamethed avail in putting down the traffic, against its of the tsfort purpose it whichtacan h t the of an y avail motionaz ohhtieonofmy thought lwevouellldedienldcotnoteinnddtieht a atw g it r h ea o tt ut te n v ry om o p n li t s h h e in eo g West Indiana a delusive hop e I country, and would hold out to the which might induce t r y o s a p n e d ri tyyr• principle, eainpde therefore, them to relax their energies, and prevent hose other measures by which alone them from adopting they can recover theirs of l I object on every ground, both Honourable Friend. It is • ffl expediency n p c men cient to the motion of spy of humanity for which he b • ' rings it forward, for the purposest station the would tend to re-instate principle of protection in and it Our commer c i a l relations —a principle, I maint a i n, of fatal and inimical to the prosperity r of every commun ity to whose affairs it Ina y be appli e d . _ k ear, hea a nd cries of "Div i d e. ") , Sir E. N. BUXTON briefly replied. He would not detain the House at that late hour with any lengthened remarks. l i e f e lt very grateful to the Government generally for the measures it had adopted to suppress the slave trade, and es• pecially to the Noble Lord who spoke last, for the manner in which he had at all times directed his efforts to securing that object. But he must urge his motion on the adoption of the House, simply on the ground that while on the one hand we sent out a fleet to the coast of Africa to put down that nefarious traffic, we encouraged it on the other hand by the admission of slave-grown produce. The House then divided. The numbers were— For the motion *** 234 Against it ..* *** 275 Majority against ..• • ••• --41 - -*eft A lost. '1 he motion wis therefore los.. On the motion of the LORD AD VOCATE, the order for the Committee of the Public Health (Scotland) Bill was dis charged. The Court of Session (Scotland) Bill was read a third time and passed. What bed been the history of the sugar trade during the last five years? It had risen steadily, but still very ra pidly, to no less than 300,000, en increase of 50 per cent. lie had reason to believe that the introduction of slave-grown sugar had not given great encouragement to that mode of production, because the price at the Hsvannah of sugar during the three ears preceding the change in the law was 23s Id. a cwt., and in the three succeeding years e2s. 4d. They might be told, perhaps, that the great increase in the consumption of sugar since 1846 was owing to their availing themselves of shave-grown sugar ell over the world; but the fact was, that the production ef British free-labour sugar had increased, while that of slave-grown sugar had ma terially diminished. At the conclusion of the first year after the change in the law, the consumption of this country was 289,0001. tins, which was made up of 227,000 tons of f, ee labour colonial produce, and 61,000 t ins slave-labour sugar. In 1848, the consumption of tree labour sugar increased from 227.000 to 243,000 tons, while slave-labour sugar decreased from 61,000 to 39,000 ton-. In 1849, the consumption of the whole country woe 301,000 tons, of which 253,000 were Bri tish free-labour, and 48,000 slave-labour sugar. What was the case this year? The accounts for the 10 months warranted him in assuming that the consumption would be 318,000 tons, of which he might take 282,000 as Bri tise, and 36,000 the produce of slave labour.—(Hear, an) But sugar was not the only thing in which these colonies were interested. Molasses tend rum must also be taken into the account. He would take 31bs. of molasses to represent 11b. of sugaa In this article the increase of consumption had been from 207,000 tons in 1844, to 317,000 during the last year. Of rum, the quantity imported from the British possessions in I the three years preceding 1846 was 3,095,000 pitons, ; and in the three last years 5,080,000 gallons. Tne lion. Gentleman who last addressed the House placed tne 1 whole issue upon the possibility of our confining our competition to free-labour countries, to the exclusion of slave-labour. Now, it appeared that in the three years preceding 1846 the quantity. was 354,000 tons, and in the three years following that period 263,000 tons. At 1 the present moment the entire quantity of sugar produced was 1,227,000 tons, of which 530,000 tons were the pro duce of slave labour, and 697,000 tons the produce of free labour. It was unnecessary for him now to repeat I the arguments based on the difficulties which would be created by the admission of refined sugar, and the de mands of Holland and the United States to the privileges of the most favoured nations. In addition to this they had the additional difficulty caused by the changes which had taken place in their legislation since the ad , mission of slave labour and the repeal of the navigation laws. But he maintained that every attempt to return 1 to protection would be the greatest injury they could inflict on the colonies. Suppose at the present mo ment they had it in their power to give the West Indies protection, what would the effect be? They were told that Trinidad was able to grow enough of sugar for the whole consumption of this country—that British Guiana could do the same if it could only ob tain a supply of labour—that the production of the , Mauritius was likely to be much more than at present. IThen from the East Indies they had had a most valuable return of the produce of the last two years, and showing the extent of land under cultivation, the extent of ground `under palm trees and date trees for the production of sugar; and the quintities there indicated amazed and astonished him, much as he knew of the extent of the resources of their East Indian possessions. In all these places they were on the eve, with the slightest en couragement, of having a surplus production. Notwith standing it had been asserted, and he believed truly, that the West Indies were in a state of great distress—not withstanding all that, they were increasing the amount of production so rapidly in the West Indies, that long bee fore the expiration of the Act of 1846—long before 1854—they would find themselves in the same position with regard to sugar as they were at present with re gard to coffee, and that protection had worn itself out. It would merely by a year or two anticipate the ordi nary course of events. On behalf of the British colonies themselves, was that a desirable result? They only now required 10 per cent. of additional pro duction in their own colonies to have enough for their entire consumption. He had shown that the predictions that were made before the Committee of 1846 were not fallacious—he had shown that, instead of becoming more and more dependent enslave labour, the production of their own colonies, in place of being lessened, had been gra dually and considerably increased. If the House agreed to the motion they would have all the slave-holding countries looking up—they would be proclaiming the fail ure of their own experiment, and it would be holding out to them an encouragement and an inducement to the continuance of slave labour. They would be telling the world that with the largest market and the greatest com merce of any nation they were unable to support the principle of free labour—that at that late period it had become necessary for them to retrace their steps, and for the sake of their colonies to go back to protec tion. On every account, therefore, he felt himself justified in opposing the motion; and he hoped the House would bo of the same opinion, and reject the motion.—(Cheers.) Mr. S I'ANLEY said—Sir, I have more than one reason for asking the indulgence of the House. I have never addressed it before—l shall not now address it long—l have been personally referred to in the course of the debate, and I have some personal knowledge of the countries whose condition we are now discussing.—(Hear and cheers.) And further, I may say that I have not in my hand one single statistical table—(Hear, hear)—that I shall quote no figures, and that I shall detain the House by no calculations—(Hear, hear.) I shall con fine myself to a reply to those lion. Gentlemen who have preceded me in the debate, and to those I shall re ply as briefly as it is in my power. Before I enter upon the details of the question itself; I may be permitted to express my astonishment, and which, I believe, has been felt in common with myself by many Hea Members on this side of the House, when the Honourable Member who immediately preceded' me in the debate toll us that it was something strange that the consider ation of this question, which had teen fully discussed two years since, should have again been brought forward, and that an appeal should be again made to the House to reverse its de cision. Why, Sir, the period is not very far remote when it was the practice of that party professing the policy of which the Hon. Gentleman is so warm a sup porter, year after year and session after session, to ask the House to reverse its former decisions—(Hear) — when it was their practice to bring forward motions, not with a view to their being carried, but with a view to the effect which they would produce, not in that House, but rather with a view to the effect which they would and actually did produce elsewhere.—(Hear, hear.) Sr, I admit that this does not alter the case so far as we are concerned ; but I was still more sur prised when I heard the lion. Gentleman, not ten minutes after that expression of opinion, admit—nay, assert, that in consequence of certain changes that had taken place in the policy of the country, an entire change had taken place in all the features of the e,tse.—(Hear, bear.) Sir, although I was not in Parliament when this question was brought forward in 1848, still I have some recollection of the debates that took place on that occasion ; and, if my memory does not deceive me, I find that the overwhelming majority by which this change was effected, acid against which we are now told it is hopeless to struggle, was, in a House numbering between 400 and 500 Members, a majority of just 15.—(Hear, and cheers.) Sir, I must also be permitted to offer one remark upon the reply which the lion. Gentleman made to the argument em ployed by the lion. Baronet who brought forward the motion. That motiou was founded exclusively upon the existence of great distress in the West Indies; and the lion. Gentleman replied by a careful and elaborate cafe culation, showing that the import of sugar had increased net in the West but in the East Indies.—(Loud cries of " Hear.") Something has, I believe, been said about the protective system by the Hon. Gentleman, but, long as the debate has continued, I am nevertheless the first Member on this side of the House who has taken part in it. and, in reference to certain remarks made by the Hon. Baronet who brought forward the motion, I wish dis tinctly and emphatically to corroborate the statement he has made, and to say that this is not a protection ques tion, and that I do not intend to deal with it as anon.— (Hear, hear.) Taking that view of the case, I feel that I am supported by very high authorities who have been often appealed to in this House—by Mr. Deacon Hume, and by many of the most eminent of those who brought forward or supported the new financial move ment—by Lord Brougham, and by the Right Reverend Prelate the Bishop of Oxford, who voted against the Act of 1846, although they were in favour of the mea sure for putting an end to agricultural protection. lam further supported by a very powerful authority in this House, the Right Hon. Baronet the Member for Tam worth, for although his vote was given in favour of the Act of 1846, he at the same time admitted that sugar was not to be placed in the general catlory with other articles of' agricultural produce.—(Hear, hear.) It al.- pears to me, then, that as regards the West Indian colo nies the case is very simple. One of two alternatives the House must adopt—either it must declare that free labour can compete with slave labour, or it must at once and openly confess that emancipation has failed (Hear, hear)—that it was useless to abolish slavery— that the 20,000.0001. given as compensation to the plan ters, and the 80,000,0001. indirectly paid away, have all been sacrificed, and are as much lost as if they had been thrown into the sea.—(hear and cheers.) With regard to the impossibility of free-labour sugar compet ing with the produce of slave labour, it would be difficult to argue the question fully in a brief compass, but I shall just refer to one authority, which must be admitted to be one of considerable weight. I take the authority of Colonel Reid, who at the time this dispatch was wriiten, May, 1848, was Lieutenant-Governor of the is land of Berbadoes :—" Oa the future prospects of the planter I shall say but little, since this subject has been publicly inquired into in England. I shall confine my self to recording an opinion I already gave in general terms on the 26th February, 1848, supported by the in formation which I have collected and transmitted, that the cost of making sugar from free labour is greatly be yond the cost of making it by slave labour—that sugar cultivation cannot yet withstand competition on equal terms with slave labour, and that free - dom requires to be nursed with protection." Honour able Gentlemen will probably consider for a moment from what part of the world that declaration comes. It is from Berhadoes—from an island in the West Indies, in which, if the question of free labour could be any where fairly tried, it could be tried there. In that island the population was far denser than in either England or Ireland, and it was estimated to be as dense as in China. The wages of agricultural labour range from 6d. to Bd. per day, the land is all highly cultivated, there is no waste land, and therefore there is no possibility of squatting. The negro must be employed as a labourer or he must starve.—(Hear.) Is not that as fair a trial of free labour as it is possible to have? and yet the an swer to all that is, that there it has failed.—(Hear, hear.) Compared with Jamaica, Trinidad, and British Guiana, the population of Barbadoes is considerably more dense; and, on the other hod, speaking of the area —the area rf Guiana is very much larger, and accord ing to the calculation of Sir Robert Schomburgk, while the one contains a population of 130,000, Guiana, according to the same computation, should contain a po pulation of 50,000,000. At all events this much is cer tain, that British Guiana contains an area of 100,000 square miles; its soil is the most fertile in the world, and, being everywhere accessible, is Particularly adapted to the cultivation of the cane; yet, notwith standing all this, the population of Guiana is not half that of Barbadoes.—(hear.) I need not use many words in explaining what has been the result of the removal of protection in the West Indian colonies. The labourers are now become very few, and it is impossible to get these to work. Even if additional labourers could be procured, it is one hundred chances to one that they may not become labourers on the sugar estates. They find no difficulty in buying land for themselves, and if they do not choose to buy land they have nothing to do but a-cend the rivers for DO or 100 miles, or make their way into the beck woods and forests, and settle wherever they ploese.—(Hear.) But it was said that the draw back to the prosperity of the West Indies would cease if a sufficient supply of immigrant labour could be pro cured. I beg leave to doubt the truth of that. I doubt if you could ever obtain immigrant labour as cheap as that of the negroes, and you can only do it by re ducing the condition of the immigrants to that of the slaves.—(Hear, hear.) Sir, I fer one, do not think that desirable.—(Cheers.) I do not think tho English Government would do that ; but whether they would or not, I believe it to be utterly impossible.--(Hear, hear.) The wages of immigrant labour can never fall below the present price, but they may rise very much higher. Even if the whole African coast were thrown open to the West Indies, and that you obtained for them an abundant supply of labourers, still you will not obtain an abundant supply of cheap labour.—(Hear, hear.) Let the House for one moment consider the expense of introducing a supply of immigrant labour. The colonies had the alternative of bringing them from India, a dis tance of 3,000 miles, from the other side of the globe. You have by law provided, and I do not complain of it —you have, by the existing law provided that the planter is bound at the end of a certain period to provide the labourer a passage back again to his own country. The expense of that passage back and forward can hardly be less than 71. or 81., and in the interval he has to pay him wages, and besides this, to provide him with every single thing that may be considered necessary. He has to pay him wages during the time he employs him, and he is then, at the end of a cer tain period, obliged to send him back again. I am firmly convinced, then, that aided or unaided by immigration alone, these colonies will never be able to compete with slave labour.—(Hear, hear.) lam aware that some per sons have placed much confidence upon the ultimate effects of the blockade by the African squadron. Now, in the first place, it is not difficult to prove—in fact, there has been already abundant proof—that the African squadron has not effectually answered its purpose. I cannot think that it is reasonable to expect that with the present system of tariff any amount of armed force that it is in the power of the world to employ will suc ceed in putting down a traffic in which one successful voyage will pay for five failures.—(Cheers.) The House will bear in mind the continental blockade which was enforced by Napoleon—he endeavoured to blockade the Continent, and to prevent that free intercourse which the necessities of these countries rendered neeessary. We know by the experience of history that there never was a greater failure than that continental blockade.—(Cheers.) I do not think that that trade was more remunerative than the African slave trade, and I do not think that the blockade of the coast of Africa was more strictly maintained than that continental blockade.—(Hear, hear.) Sir, I have only one point more to advert to, and I must call upon the House to consider well what they are doing in the vote they are about to give. As regards our colonial empire I know something of its vast importance, and I know also some thing of its feeling; and I tell you now, that from Ca nada to Jamaica, from the St. Lawrence to Essequibo, there is in the minds of all thinking men but one predo minant all-pervading feeling—a feeling, call it un-Eog lish if you will, but you cannot call it unnatural—a feeling of growing disbelief in the attachment and of distrust in the policy of the mother country.—(Loud cheers.) Ido not say that feeling is well founded, but these men believe that their claims have been neglected and their interests sacrificed to no real or imaginable considerations of policy—(Hear, hear)--and have not the West Indies good cause to complain?—(Hear, hear.) Look back at their early history; it was England made them a penal colony—it was England that forced slavery upon them, and they adopted that system at her repeated instigation. By force England took it away from them, without giving them any compensation for injury thus inflicted.—(o6, and cries of "Hear, hear.") I am merely pointing out the inconsistency of England in this matter, and the additional injustice of now re proaching the West Indies with having resorted to slave labour. On the last crowning stroke of all—the passing of the Emancipation Act of 1834, the colonies were, indeed, compensated with a sum, which, however high for England to give, was absolutely nothing for the %Vest Indies to receive. —(Hear.) Let the House con sider for one minute how the case stands. It was dis tinctly stated by the Government which passed the Emancipation Act, that the planters in the West Indies were to be compensated; but it was impossible to suppose that the Government meant that the compensation should be only half. There were persons in this country who said that the West Indies had no right to hold slaves, and were not entitled to compensation. But compensation was awarded—Commissioners were sent out to value the slave property, and they returned the value at 43,000,0001. sterling. As compensation for the slaves, a sum of 17,000,0001. was paid down, being some thing like forty per cent., while all the capital invested in buildings, machinery, improvements in land, fixtures which were in their nature absolutely irremoveable, lost half its value when the Act was passed, and for all that no compensation was given.—(Loud cheers) Ido not dispute the right of the House to ruin our colonies by their course of commercial legislation.—(Hear, hear.) But let there be no half-measures—let their be no under-- baud work, let them at once, openly, avowedly, and in the face of the world, proclaim what they mean to do. C ill the slave trade a humane and profitable traffic—de signate slavery, as it has been termed in some of the states of South America, as " a glorious institution handed down to us from our forefathers"—apologise to Cuba and to Brazil for all the injury the African squa dron has inflicted upon their traffic—allow them to carry on unmolested their laudable pursuit, and without in terruption let them continue their trade with the coast of Africa, with which you will assure them you will never interfere again; but do not mock with your syme pathy those whom your policy tends to ruin, and do not stand forward to the world at one and the same time as the supporters of liberal institutions at home, and the abettors and supporters of slavery and the slave trade abroad.— (Loud cheering.) Mr. HU rr complimented the Hen. Gentlemen who had just sat down upon the able and effective speech which he had delivered. At the same time he must give his vote against the motion of the Hon. Baronet. As re garded the question of the sugar duties he must observe that their consideration had been forced upon the pre sent Government under circumstances of pressing and extraordinary difficulty. It was impossible upon any just commercial principles to refuse to apply to sugar the same commercial policy that was applied to all other articles. The introduction of slave-labour sugar had been opposed on the ground of humanity, but he be lieved that argument untenable. It was impossible to keep out slave-grown sugar after the parsing of the Act of 1845. The only question for the Honse to deli berate upon was under what circumstances and on what terms they would undertook the great and important change in their policy. Some distinctions of a very tine nature bad been set up relative to the difference be tween dealing in slave grown sugar and slave-grown cotton and tobacco, all the productions of Cuba. Now, there could not be two standards of right and wrong. If it was not permissible to deal in any of the produc tions of slave-labour, let it be so stated, ar.d let all the productions of all the slave-owningcountries in the world, including not only sugar, but cotton and tobacco, the copper of Cuba, and the gold of Brazil.—(Hear, hear.) But if such a policy as that was impeachable, what be came of the principle ? It had been said that the sugar law stimulated the slave trade. But did not the copper law stimulate the slave trade ? and did not the cotton trade stimulate the worse than slave trade carried on by Carolina and Louisiana?—(Hear, hear.) Although Hon. Gentlemen opposite said this was not a question of pro tection, ho was afraid it would be so regarded by large numbers of these who intended to support the motion of the Hon. Member for South Essex, although the Hon. Member felt very little sympathy with their views. He admitted that the treatment which the West Indies had received was a treatment of which they had a right to complain—(Cheers)—and if they were not entitled to compensation for the injury which they had received, they were deserving of every consideration.—(Hear, hear.) But there was one concession which could not be made. We could not agree to the abandonment of a great national policy—a policy which he believed to be beneficial in itself, and cf the highest possible value to every portion of this empire—a policy which had been established by years of conflict and labour, and by some of the most serious personal sacrifices ever made by public men in this country.—(Hear, hear.) Sir J. PAKINGTON said he approached the subject with undiminished sympathy for the sufferings inflicted on our colonies, and with undiminished indignation at the extent of the discredit which was thrown upon the national character by the policy of the Legislature of late years and by that pursued by the present Govern ment.—(Cheers.) He wished to give his most decided and cordial support to the motion of the floe. Member for South Essex; but he fit it right to indicate the course which be should feel it his duty to take in the event of the motion being carried, as he hoped and trusted it would be. If it should be rejected it would le another result of the unhappy state of parties to which legislation had so long tended; because he was certain eat if Hon. Members were to vote solely on their own opinions, without reference to the state of party, the legislation of late years would be generally condemned by a decided majority.—(Cheers.) Ho would now state the course which he intended to take in the event of the motion being carried. Should that be the case, he would take the earliest opportunity of moving for a Committee of the whole House to reconsider the sugar duties of 1848.—(Hear, hear.) The motion now under con sideration carne before the House in an incomplete y po a l n iti abstract to exposetractre the sugar o solutiotdeclaf ourring it sh to b ' e u l r t iju w s a t s er a m ndi e m l o o own n s c l a o v l e o - n t i r e a s d t i o n g a o n mp d e t d i i t d i o n n o w t , p ith r t o h c e e ed sugar to say in what manner injustice was to be prevented. He therefore had thought it necessary to give notice of an amendment.—(Hear, hear.) The present Government, following a precedent not uncommon, had rather ham pered themselves by some hasty declaration, and had pledged themselves so strongly to the favoured nation clause, that it was impossible for them to maintain the distinction which had been drawn between foreign free sugar and foreign slave-grown sugar. In addition to that