The Express.
London, England, 1851-07-07 00:00:00

shaspened and shortened transit, have alike tended to
make the notion of a brother or a son, choos-
kg a farm in America, in preference to one in
Lincolnshire or the Lothians, an affair simply of
prudence and convenience, in which no element of a
sentimental kind has any longer a real or instinctive
place. And as for mercantile iurruits—a young min1
of activity and self-dependent spirit would almost
feel ashamed of objecting to adopt an eligible open-
ing in an approved line of business on the ground
that the counting-house happened to be in Broadway
instead of Mincing-lane.
I What will follow? This great good, amongst
others—that the stagnant weight of unemployed popu-
lation in these insulated realms is never likely again to
accumulate suddenly to the dangerous amount
which there was sometimes cause to apprehend that,
from unforeseen revulsions in industry or foreign trade,
it might have done. A natural vent is now so tho-
roughly opened, and so certain to grow wider and
clearer every day, that the overflow will pass off
whenever a moderate degree of pressure recurs. Po-
pulation, skill, and capital, also, will no longer wait
in consternation till they are half spent with watch-
ing and fear. The way is ready. 'they will silently
shift their quarters when the competition or depres-
sion here becomes uncomfortable. Every family has
already friends or acquaintances who have gone be-
' fore them over sea. Socially our insulation as a
people is proved, by the census of 1831, to be at an
end.
What the countervailing consequences of this
mighty change in our national condition may be, we
do not pause here to inquire. To say that there are
none, would be simply to feign that we are blind—
to pronounce dogmatically that we are as yet able to
estimate fully their nature or extent, would be to
play the coxcomb in political philosophy. It is
enough to feel thoughtfully alive to the duty of ob-
serving carefully this new do elopment of the destiny
of the Anglo-Saxon race. and to rejoice at the positive
mitigation of buffering and privation for all classes
which the bridt.ting of the ocean seems to
insure. For the labourer; the threat of starvation or
the workhouse need no more sound in his cam as an
inexorable and probable reality ;—for the youth of
decent education and intelligent ambition, there
need no more be hung the dismal spectacle of dis-
heartened companions and parents utterly at fault
fir a chance of occupation to eawk for their sons. To
the inventive and speculative man of limited means,
there need no more seem to be an insurmountable
jail wall barring all his efforts and designs. What
is equally note-worthy for those who are likely
to tarry to the cud of their days in the land
of their birth, there is no mare the sad and
demoralizing cause for apprehension that we
are glowing too numerous as a people, and that
industrially we are in danger of a specks of uncon-
GRsed ilism. The gates of this debasing
jealousy are fairly taken off their hinges and have
been Hung into the unfathomable sea.
Practically the evidence of this great good is
already beginning to be appreciable. The returns of
the Board of Trade for the tivemonthsendingJune 3,
la:it, show a value of exports amounting to 27,K65,731/.
against 26,027,915 t. in IsbiO. and 21,191,9731. in
1849. It will hardly be disputed that the rate
of improved production here set forth far exceeds
the rate of increase in population. But this
is not ull. The quarterly returns of the revenue
show that notwithstanding large reductions on
sugar, timber, and coffee, the diminution of the
customs receipts at the treasury are hardly worth
notice,—do not in fact amount to 100,090'. The
meaning of this striking fact is plain. There has
been a steadily increasing consumption of the mime
necessaries and chief luxuries of life, which almost
compensates the exchequer for the taxes it has re-
linquished. But as the ratio of population has by no
means kept vice with this augmented consumption,
it follows that the change has been absolutely
realised by the community individually and collec-
tively.

FRANCE.
PARIS, SyrunnAT Esincimo.
To-morrow the President willprocced to Beauvais,
_
to he pre.cnt at the inauguration of the statue of
Jeanne Hachette, the heroine who defended the city

- ,
against the siege of (•hnrhw the Bold of Burgundy.
The club of the Rue des Pyramides resumed last
night the adjourned debate on the revision of the
constitution. Several members, distinguished by
their Bonapartist real. declared that the petition
movement had been perfectly sivontancous and natu-
ral, while others inveighed vehemently against the
unworthy mann•uvnes which had been put in opera-
tion to scrape together these signatures, which
amount to übout 1,200,000. The debate was again

adjourned.
M. Dufaure made in the debate of yesterday a
very able reply to the arguments of M. Dupont de
Bu-sae against farming out the Mediterranean packet
service to a company. lie said, since 1#435 the govern-
ment had undertaken to work the line of steamers in
the Mediterranean. Bouts took the mail and pas-
sengers, the service had been performed in the most
irreproachable manner; but after 1815 the transport
of merchandise had been added, rind hardly had the
state undertaken this fresh service than it sustained
severe losses. During the five last years the transport
of goods has producd for the first year 20,500 E,
for the second 400,000 E, for the third 407,000 f.,

for the fourth 500,0001., for the lifth
475,00nf. While the French steamers in the Levant
made so little progress, let them observe what was
passing upon other points of the Mediterranean.
Neither the English nor the Austrian government
charged Ciemselves with these operations of trans-
port; they had been contented with encouraging
the companies —they had appealed to private in-
dustry. M. Dufaure then described the progress of
the Austrian Lloyd's and of the l'eninsular and
Oriental companies. It was said that in encouraging
steam they were destroying the shipping in-
terest, but the sailing vessels of Austria had
increased precisely in the proportion of her
steamers. The Peninsular and Oriental, not eon-
tent with carrying off from them the transport of
llndian goads, was now depriving them of the Indian
mail, which seemed, however, the natural prize of
the French railroad. It had decided some time ago
on building two iron boats of SOO-horse power, that
would arrive at Alexandria in nine days from Eng-
land.
Fortunately, the English admiralty prevented
the construction of these vessels. The new Pacha of
Egypt was said to be completely identified with
English interests. He had permitted the establish-
ment of a steamer, of 100-horse power, upon the Nile,
between Alexandria and Cairo, and a railway be-
tween Cairo and Suez. The company hail persuaded
the I'acha to employ Mr. Stephenson to present
a plan for a railway between Cairo and Suez, and
had at its last meeting voted thanks to the new
viceroy. Thus what diplomacy had failed to obtain,
had beim gained by an Industrial company. M. Du-
fame then proceeded to depict the deplorable state of
French commerce, and its inferiority to that of the
other powers, in Greece, Turkey, and Egypt. It was
evident that the working of the Mediterranean
steamers would be very ill-placed in the hands of the
state, and that the wholly commercial character of
this service was not suited to officers of the navy.
He then gave his entire approbation to the stipu-
lations of the contract. The company would
have to buy the steamers of the state for
about four millions of francs ; it would
take three steamers belonging to the Rostan Com-
pany fur 1,201t,000fr., the government steamers
neeaed a reparation amounting to 1,200,000 fr. The
company was then obliged to build, within a certain
time, five new steamers, which would cost five mil-
lions. That would make eleven millions and a half.
Independently of this, there were the stores and
working fund—the latter would be twelve millions.
The steamers bought by the company would be ap-
praised. The subvention was three millions a year,
which would be employed in the service of the
steamers. The capital engaged is twelve millions.
He counted the interest of the capital at five
per cent., the insurance at five per cent., and
the liquidation and depreciation at eight per
cent. The company would, therefore, have
to find eighteen per cent. upon the protits
of the working, that is, their first profits ought to be
1,900,000 f. Meantime what were the returns of the
undertaking? The average expense of the last
rear had been four millions and a half; adding
1,000,000 f., he obtained 6,400,0001. How could the
company hope to realise this sum? The receipts
during the last years had been by the post in 1847,
410,0001. ; in 18121, 396,000 f.; in 1849, 961,000 f.;
in 18:4, 723,000 t; but they must remember that the
postage of letters belonged to the state. The average