The Express.
London, England, 1846-12-17 00:00:00

fte erpreoo.

MAILS.
Tb, overland mails for Gibraltar, Malta, Greece, the lonian blends,
Egypt, Aden, Ceylon, India, Hong-Kong, and China, ria Soutnampton,
will be made up on the evening of the 19th December.
The ovvrlaM closed mails, via Marseilles, to the Mediterranean,
Egypt, Aden, Ceylon, India, Hong Kong, ay., will be made up on the
evening of the 24th December.
'The malls for Vigo. Oporto. Lisbon, Madeira, Cadiz, and Gibraltar, ,
will be made up on the morning of the 28th DecembSr.
The mails for New South Wales, Van Diemen's Land, and New
Zea'and will be made rap on the evening of the Slat December.
'the West India math, including dine for :demioo, Honduras, awl
the llavannah. will he made up on the morning of the 2nd January.
The mails Pot British North America, Bermuda, and the UMtett
States, will be made up on the eveniag of the 4th January.
The mails for the Smells, the River Plate, Monte Video, Pernam-
bum, Bahia, Madeira, and Buenos Ayres, will be dispatched on the
evening of the eth January.

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MGR WATER AT LONDON.BRIDGE.
This DAT. —Morning, 37 min. post 0; Afternoon, 0 min. past I.
To-Monaow—Morning, 22 min. port I; Afternoon, 43 min. past I.

LONDON, THURSDAY, DEC. 17.
THE free-traders of France have begun where
those of England coneladed; the agitation of the
League was a process of self-inettuction its leaders
were learners while they were teachers, and no better
proof can be given of the narrowness of their ori-
ginal views than the title of their first official organ
is Manchester, the rlnti•Bread-tax Circular. Hence
the English struggle for the greater part of its early
was practical rather than intellectual, deriving
stages
aid from literary. skill, and not perfectly sus-
tained by economic science. It was not until the
metropolis became the centre of the agitation, that
Manchester prejudices were thrown aside ; so soon as
the provincial Anti-Corn-law Associat'on became a
National League, the views of its leaders were enlarged
with the sphere of their operations, and as its orators
"thought aloud" in their speeches, the same processes
et thought which enabled them to correct and purify,
while they. developed, their principles, were equally
influential in raising their followers to the same level.
In France the science has taken precedence of the
practice : nearly all the leaders of the free-trade
movement are men honourably distinguished in the
world of letters and science. HORACE SAY is the
most eminent living disciple of ADAM SMITH ;
BIANCHI is the best -historian of political economy;
FREDERIC BASTIAT one of the most acute logicians that
have appeared in modern times; and LEON FArenea
is almost the only Frenchman whose views on the
social, physical, and economic condition of England
are worth the trouble of perusal. The French
League, therefore, already commands the audience
which the English League had to win ; and the duty
of a French CiIIIDEN is that of an interpreter rather
than a discoverer; he starts with a definite creed and
fixed articles of faith.
The difficulties with which the French emancipa-
tors of industry have to contend differ equally in kind
and in magnitude from thorn against which the Eng-
lish League had to contend. So far as the agricul-
turists of France can be brought to think upon the
subject, they see that free trade will be a direct ad-
vantage to them. But the agricultural interest in
France has no unity or organization, and it does not
possess a preponderating influence in the electoral
body. On the contrary, the manufacturers interested
in the maintenance of their several monopolies, are
I well organized, firmly banded together, commanding
great political influence both over the legislature and
the public press.
One of the difficulties of the English leaguers was
the apathy of their adversaries ; so incredible did the
successof their agitation appearto the recognised leaders
of what is called the English agricultural interest, that
they could hardly be induced to offer any resistance.
Long before the Dukes of RICHMOND and BUCK-
INGHAM had organised their rival associa-
tion in New Bond-street, the fight was vir-
tually won. A great part of COBDEN'S suc-
cess with the farmers was owing to his being
the first to treat them as rational beings ; their land.
lords commanded them to believe, he invited them to
reason. This new form of exercising their intelli-
gence had the double charm of novelty and excite-
ment ; and even those farmers who withheld assent
from COBDEN'S matter, were half won over by his

manner.
There is no apathy among the monopolists of
France ; they are as active and vigilant as can well
be imagined, They have pre-occupied all the posi-
tions which the English League found all but unde-
fended. The Due d'HARCOCRT well compares them
to proprietors of hothouses associated to prevent the
importation of foreign fruit. Their central com-
mittee has been in existence since 1842, and the
government has been accustomed to regulate its
tariffs at their dictations. They preponderate in the
councils of the North and of the Lower Seine, the most
wealthy and populous districts of France; they have
their discipliued corps of orators, of lecturers, and of
writers; they will dispute every inch of ground, and
they will forego no prospect of advantage.
It is gratitying to observe that the free-tract...
France do not underrate the difficulties which they
have to encounter. They have taken the field, well
aware that the contest will be arduous and pro-
longed. Their official' journal, Le Libre Echange,
edited be FREDERIC BASTIAT, and contributed to by
the most eminent economists, is conducted with a
calm reliance on principle, and not with the fevered
enthusiasm that leads to attempting success by a con))
de main. A single instance may serve to illustrate
the nature of the benefits which they seek to confer
on their country, and the obstacles which their
patriotic course is impeded.
No monopoly in France is more onerous or more
nationally injurious than that of iron. A travelkr
finds its blighting effects everywhere; in the in-
feriority of the agricultural implements used by the
husbandman; in the clumsy tools of the carpenter;
in the limited use of iron for purposes of construction,
and in the slow progress of railways. The iron
masters of France could never have compelled their
countrymen to submit to the multitudinous dispdvan-
tages and inconveniences arising from these causes it
they stood alone in their monopoly ; but the ironstone of
France not being. as it, England, interstratified with
coal, the manufacturers are obliged to use large
quantities of charcoal in their furnaces, and thus they
have secured the sympathy and support of the pro-1
prietors of forests. Now, as the House of Orleans
dawns the greater proportion of the forests of France,
it is easy to see that "the great charcoal interest" is
a very potent ally to the monopolising iron interest.
The iroumasters of France not being able to pro-
duce sufficient to meet the national wants, and thus
commanding a market in which demand exceeds
supply, it would seem to follow, that they must all
'be assured of large profit' and certain fortunes. No
such thing: monopoly, like a bear, endangers those
whom it hums. Monopoly, indeed, ensures high
prices, but these are far from being identical with
high pr fits. The cost of production has more than
kept pace with the advance of price; many fur-
noses at the present moment are working at such