The Express.
London, England, 1848-11-16 00:00:00

THE EXPRESS, THURSDAY EVENING, NOVEMBER 16, .1848.

HAY.—SuITTIVIIILD, Two ritArck.—Metare.Coopet
sad Davis report • very bear 7 trade. sad prices as follows:
Prim I7os. to Ma I Room .46% eh I Mall.. 34, to 118.
WNW ..... to Ott. Glover ... des to MP.

CATrim-Excrza, Nov. 15.-This, in order of
tints, was our Orsat Market, but d not in Loy e
now speci drial
ven
de-
gree deemed that character. Thdis fat Bullocks
rn are not of the fine coder and as to amount there was this
ISOTOWS mon then enough', which sold at prices making
quotations 441. 6.1 to 30s. per cwt., or from to 91. per
more. Halation' Calves were seine, and fetched from 6d. to
61d. Pa lb. Foe Mt Sheep the quotation must be stated at
from 6d. to rather over 64d. per lb.
Bostronn, Nov. 15.-The trod* for all kinds of stock
&host the same as last week. Bl cf, 3s. to 3s. Mutton,
3s. 6d. to 4s. 6d. Laub, at. Bd. to O. 61. Veal, 31. 4(1. to
4s. Pork, 3s. Bd. to 4s. 6d.
SOUTHALL, Nov. 16.-Our trade was slack, and the quali-
ties of things being generally interior the prices wootback
a little from tort week. Besf made from 21. 4d. to 4e.
Mattes, 3s. &I. to Su Veal, 3a. Gd. to 4s. Q. Pork, 3e. 4d.
to 4s. 6d., per Men of Blba., sinking the offal.
Per yesterday' i weeprksis see iad pays.

statement of what the Berlin revolution and its Na-
tional Assembly had done for farmers and for la-
bourers.
The Globe might there have learned that although
an ordonnance of 1807 decreed the Prussian peasant
personally free from serfdom, nevertheless most of the
oppressive feudal burthens and inequalities actually
continued to subsist. The Prussian peasant was
still subject to the same corree that made
the Frenchmen of 1789 rebel. He was still
forced to grind his oorn at the lord's mill; nay, to
yoke his hoaxes to the lord's plough, and sometimes
to his carriage. While feudal burdens thus hung
heavy on the peasant, he was at the same time made
to bear a weght of taxation from which his lord was
exempt.
The National Assembly of Berlin did away with
this. We quote our own article of Oct. 24, in order
to instruct our contemporary in facts and dates
Oa the 21st of July a bill (greet:-entieart) for aboashiag
.11 ...mptions Irtga the lend tax was presented by cinal
"" •
wimp* to the assembly ;on the 20th `..)•0 lame month a
bill (secompanied by an explanatory report) had been pews
seated by ministers for the abolition of all such feudal
burdens as could be equitably abuli•hed without compensa-
tion ; end 'stain on the 21st a committee of the assembly
reported, rseommending a general law for the equitable
adjustment of the claims of over-lords and their peasanta.
The boons conferred upon the peasantry of Austria
by NI unfortunate Diet are too well known to be
disputed even by the Globe. It admits them.
There is one more act which was pawed by both
the assemblies of Berlin and Vienna, and we leave the
farmers and agricultural labourers of England to
judge whether these recent revolutions have worked
good for Germany or not.
That act was the abolition of the game laws
We counselled those writers, who are champions
exclusively of the class of landed proprietors, not to
stir the question of foreign revolutions, or of the good
and ill accruing from them. The Globe most unwisely
would nut follow this counsel. It has got its answer.
And the agricultural readers of the Express have
'-teed some extra information.

WE drew the attention of our readers a few days
ago to the very general discontent occasioned in Ca-
nada by the postponement of the repeal of the navi-
gation laws. In so doing, we adverted, as the grounds
on which this discontent rested, to the virtual supe-
riority which the pressure of these laws upon the St.
Lawrence gave to the American over the Canadian
exporter, and more particularly to the ruin with
which their continuance was fraught to the carrying
trade of Canada. We also explained what
that trade was, both in its present deve-
lopment and its prospective advantages. We
now propose to inquire how far the Canadians
are right in regarding the navigation laws as injuri-
ous to it, and how far their convictions are well
founded, that, with these laws repr sled, they could suc-
cessfully compete with their neighbours for the carry-
ing trade of the north-west.
The only rival which Canada has in this respect to
fear, is the state of New York. The competition be-
tween them is, which of the two can offer to the
fertile regions bordering on the lakes the greater faci-
lities for reaching the ocean, and, consequently, foreign
markets, with their produce, and also for conveying
to them from the seaboard the productions of their
foreign customers in exchange for their exports.
It cannot be denied that the route by the St.
Lawrence, from the lakes to the ocean, is longer than
that by New York. But once in the open sea, a
vessel bound from Quebec is much nearer Liverpool
than one first entering_ the open sea on her way to
that port from New York. The one has to emerge
from the Gulf of St. Lawrence at Cape Breton, the
other has to pass very close to the strait there leading
into the Gulf, on her way to Liverpool. Far inland
though Quebec be, it is not at a greater distance from
Liverpool than New York. It is quite true that a
vessel may make Cape Race, the 'oath-eastern point
of Newfoundland, sooner from New York than from
Quebec ; but, to counterbalance the loss of time which
may be experienced in the lower part of the river,
the Canadians can show a great gun of time over the
New Yorkers between the lakes and tide-water.
To make the Canada route from the far west to tide-
watersuperior to that through New York, it was ne-
cessary to enable the exporter by it both to gain time
and to save expense. This the Canadians have done,
their channel of communication between the interior
and tide water being superior in both these respects
to that through New York. But it is at tide water
that their difficulties commence ; whereas it is at
tide water that the obstacles in the way of their com-
petitors end. What they have gained between the
lakes and Quebec they more than lose be-
tween that port and Liverpool. What boots
it to the Canadian that he can bring a parcel
of flour or a bushel of wheat in a shorter time
and at a less cost from Lake Erie to Quebec, than the
American can from Lake Erie to New York, if the
price of transporting it from Quebec to Liverpool be
so much higher than that for conveying it from New
York to Liverpool as to deprive him of all the advan-
tages which he secured by the inland transportation ?
It is the cost on the whole voyage that decides the
channel by which produce shall be sent, and on
the whole voyage the American has, at this moment,
the advantage over the Canadian. It is chiefly
to the navigation laws that he is indebted
for that advantage. But once let the British ship-
owner be competed with in the St. Lawrence, and
freights between its ports and Liverpool will fall to
an extent which will secure to the Canadian all the
advantages at which he aimed by his expensive im-
provement of the channel of the St. Lawrence.
How fax the Canadian has the advantage over the
American, between the lakes and tide water, ma
the
y be
gathered from the following comparison between
two routes. From what has already been said of the
position of the lakes, and of the regions contiguous
to them, it will have been seen that, down aa
far as the lower end of Lake Erie, these great
bodies of water are a common highway
of Lake
to the
Canadian and the American. It is at the foot
Erie that the competition between them commences,
the one offering the St. Lawrence as. the means of
further transport, and the other the Erie Canal. The
advantages offered by the rival routes will be best
appreciated by tracing the progress of a cargo pro-
ceeding to tide-water by each.
Let us suppose, then, that two large screw-pro-
pellers, of from 300 to 400 tons burden. each, have
descended, laden with flour, from Detroit or any of
the ports on Lake Michigan or Lake Huron. One cargo
is destined for New York, the other for Montreal or
Quebec. Until they reach the foot of Lake Erie they
pursue, as already intimated, a common course. Here,
however,they separate—the one to proceed by the Erie
canal, the other by the route of the St. Lawton.. Let
us first follow that proceeding by the Erie canal. That
csnal, although recently greatly enlarged, is still a
boat canal, the boats which navigate it averaging
from 80 to 100 tons burden. The cargo . has conse-
quently te be transhipped at Buffalo, ocemioning con-
siderable expense and no little delay. After it is
transferred front the schooner, or screw-propeller, to
the canal boats, it enters upon a tedious canal naviga-
tion, which it will take, under the most
favourable circumstances, at least seven dajm
to accomplish, the canal being nearly 400 miles in
length, and the lockage in many places being exceed-
ingly heavy. On reaching the other end of the canal
et Albany, on the Hudson, another tranteshipment has
to be made, occasioning further expense and delay, the
flour having to be conveyed from Albany to New
York in barges, towed by steam-tugs. It takes
another day at least to descend the river, and once at
New York still another trans-shipment awaits it,
making, from the time at which it reached Buffalo, at
the Lake Erie end of the canal, no less than three
trans-shipments. The time occupied in all this, in-
cluding that spent in navigating the canal, is never
less than eleven days, and the expense at which& bare
eel of flour could be thus conveyed to New York, in
1846, was 2s. 7d. sterling.
Let trace
us now return to Lake Erie, and the other
cargo down the St. Lawrence. It has already been
aid that the canals designed to overcome the obstacles
in the way of the St. Laurence route, are ship maids.
peoeee&ng. thereicee, through the Welland Canal,
from Lake Erie to Lake Ontario, it is not necessary
to break bulk, as must be done at Buffalo.
The propeller, which descended the Lakes, passes
through the canal, to descend Lake Ontario to
Kingston, front which point it can proceed,
shooting the vapid' or using the other canals, to
Montreal, taking only three days or three
and a half at the farthest, in accomplishing the
distance from Lake Erie to that city. At Montreal
the cargo is at tide-water, but it may be conveyed by
the same means to Quebec, 180 miles farther down
the river, in another day, making the time from Lake
Eris to Quebec four and a half days. And all this