The Express.
London, England, 1850-03-05 00:00:00

THE FIPRESS, TUESDAY EVENING, MARCH 5, 1850.

more abandoned with impunity than private affiii ■
can be. And the elms amongst us that does not
make full ass of its intelligence and p3wer wilt in-
fallibly be robbed of the legitimate influence attached
to it.

A COLUMN or so of oar paper is every other day
devoted to some account of the " State of Tiede."
Therein the reader may discover what was the price
of corn in Mark-lane on the day previous, and how
cotton had been selling at Liverpool all through the
week preceding. The selling rates of Wasend coals
and crushed sugars are diurnally recorded : the prices
of cloths at Leeds and Huddersfield are hebdomadal's!
marked ; sad the quarterly trade of the Staff wdshire
iron-master forms a subject of interesting information.
We have had °coastal once or twice to exam ne,
under this head, what has been the effect of recant
alterations in British and foreign tariff' upon the
state of our home produce, tortoni nral and mauutac-
tnrirg, and we have invariably found the result
favourable to what is called " the great experi-
ment."

A contemporary parer, of old worshipped by the
whip under the title of the Morning Chronicle, but
now in the LINCOLN and tiLADSTONIAN interest, at d
" waiting for a wind" accordingly, has, since the re-
cent secession of one of its leaders, gone far beyond us
in those inquiries into the "state of trade," and with
results which are by some considered as of a contra-
dictory character. Statistical information, and some
acquaintance with the facts, had led us to believe that
trade thn ughout England was never so good as at
th s moment : the Morning Chronicle has found out.
however, that there are particular articles of com-
merce in which it never was so bad.

The commercial records of our contemporary do not,
indeed, reliant to items of commerce which are usually
considered of the first consequence. His accounts of
the exchanges, of the produce markets, of the progress
of the cotton or linen manufactures, are brief. But
to compensate for this, no paper is so great upon mat-
ters relating to the coffee-stalls and baked potato
trade. 01 the operations of the Bank of Englacd be
I does not rums much knowledge; but, on the other
hand, he has the advantage of constant access'
to the back parlour of the cat's-meat man,
and upon the subject of the mutton pie trade,
he boas.. of being possessed of " the best possible
information." Indeed, upon the latter topic we do
I not know whether Mr. Samuel Weller himself
may cot be the Morning Chronicle's contributor.
That gentleman is stated to have obtained from an
I intelligent London pie merchant all the information
upon the subject, which is to be found in the columns
of the Morning Chronicle. And he certainly had
the merit of conveying to the public in ten striking
lines all the information which we find upon the
subject in two closely-printed pages of our con-
temporary :

" What a number oats you keep, Mr. T4'oolloo 'Sy. I
Ah," says hi, " I do—a good many," says he. " You
must be very fond of eats," saps I. " °Jur people is." says
he, a winking et me; "they au% in season till the wing r
though," says he. " Not in season !" says I. " No," save
be, " unit• is in, eats is oat." " Why, what do you mean ?"
says I. "Mean?" sass he, "why, that I'll never be a party
to the combination o' the butchers to keep up the prier* o'
meat," sass he. " Mr. Weller," says he, squeezes of my
hand very hard, and viaperen in my ear weiy low, " doe's
you mention this here again, bat it's the ee.ionine as does it.
They 're all made o' them noble animala," says be, • rointitig
to a very nice little tabby kitten, "and I seamons 'em for
beat steaks, weal or kidney. 'cordin to the demand; and
more than tl.at," says be, " I an maks a weal a beet-steak.
or a beef-steak a kidney, or any one et them • mutton at •
minute's notice, jun as the market changes and the appetites
wary."

The last accounts of our contemporary with regard
to the comm-rcial affairs of the metropolis bad refe-
rence more especially to those valuable branches of
employment, the " dolls' eye and dolls' heads com
position trades," to the "toy drum and tsmbosri• e
manufactures," and " the detonating cracker busi-
ness." It seems that several of these important
branches are suffering from foreign competition under
the new tariff, and we regret to say, on our concern-
parary'a authority-, that, in the general rage for cheap-
ness, art Is declining in these manufactures.

A description of cheap wooden dolls (says the Morning
Chrome:e) are now made that used to have their noes
cared. Through the demand for cheapness of price, the
now is now but little elevated on the countenance—nothing

to call a eon.

The tariff has had the fatal effect of putting out of
joint the noses of the dolls, as well as of the farmers.
fhe free traders have as much to answer for as poor
Miss Nancy Lake's brother, celebrated by the Smiths
in the new Theatrum Poetarum :
Jack's in the pouts, and this it is,
lie 'Molts tune came to more than his,
So to my (bower he goes,
Takes oat my doll, and, oh my stars,Se pokes her head between the bus,
And melts off half her now.

Sir ROBERT PEEL, according to the Chronicle, hu
melted off half the nose of every doll iu London.
Dolls' noses now are " scaroely elevated above the
countenanoe,"—an elegant way, we presume, of ex-
pressing that they don't turn up at all. his gratify-
ing, however, to find that " the rage for cheapness
has not affected the doll's calves:"

We don't go in for symmetry in the commoner aorta of
dolls' lege, slur indeed for calve' at an to them. Be: the
better ones have nice calves, and Snh•coloured calves too.

The fashionable world will be gratified at this. In
ordif,ary life we sometimes find Prime Ministers with
spindle shank., whilst their stable men have what are
called " the beet of legs." But in doll humanity,
according to the Chronicle, the best calves are very
appropriately confined to the upper circles. The in-
ferior and working classes of the dolly world, "the
commoner sorts," have no " calves" among them.
" There is," says the Morning Chronicle, "a great
falling off in the annual average consumption of
British made dolls." This is not attributable to the
fitness of their noses, but is entirely laid to the score
of the " Tariff." In the " Dolls' eye trade," also. there
is, it seems, a great decline. Eyes are anything but
bright; and bavn't looked op for a long time past.

Common eyes were 12e. the twelve dozen pair, 2
years ego : now they are only foe.

This is owing to competition in the home trade : in
which, it seems, two worthy and highly-respected
friends of the metropolitan commission are the sole
parties employed. These gentlemen have a monopoly
of the trade, and one of them complains of the trick,
of the other, and causes his grievances to be laid
before the publio through the columns of our con-
temporary !

He ;is always forcing his business by underselling us.
Immediately the demand ceases at all, he off, n his eye et •
lower price than in the regular season, and so the prime ham
been falling every year.
Thus it M that the dolls' eye trade is ruined.
The toy, drum, and tambourine makers' misfortunes
are dwelt upon athetieally:
- • -

others, are, in the estimation of our contemporary,
utterly unimportant and inconsequential compared
with its own mays upon the toy gun and trumpet
teals and the detonating cracker basiners. Sir
Itonekr Piles declarations fade into in•ignifcanc
before th r revelations concerting the meat piemen ;
the state of Europe is as nothing compared with the
condition of the lollipop and gingerbread nut trades,
as discumed, very spicily, by "our Metropolitan
Commissioner."
" 7o daily much with xableets mesa and low,
Primo that the mind 111 weak—or makes it to."

We make very few tin drum new: the foreign toys have
affected as se ; and tambourins have oaly a limited sale.
The war time was the time (or drums. I have heard one
maker say that he employed eleven men in the war time.

---
We tram we shall not find that the present state of
the " toy gun and detonaing cracker trades," has
so strong an effect upon our contemporary as it
appears to have upon the mind of some of his patrons,
nor that he is about to blow his "toy trumpet" in
favour of protection.

The toy gun and trumpet trade" suffer, likewise,
from the pew and foreign competition :

I do not make half so many guns as I did before the Wolff,
aid the trumpet trade is quite blown away from me. War
time was the time for my bminror ; them was a demand for
puns then. But the grand thing for the trade was the °pa-
gan' report that Buonaparte was coming ; there was to be
an invasion, and then every child was &moldier. Anything
in the shape of a gun foucd • customer in those days.
Peace and the diminished price of the first neces-
saries of life are no advantages to the "toy gun and
trumpet trades," and therefore the sooner we go to
war and restore the corn law the better fqr the
people. This is the argument the protectionists
deduce from what they nil the "remarkable rcvda-
lions of the Morning Chronicle oonsmissioners." It
is not a bad exemplification of the whole prams-
tion system. To put an additional 10 per cent. into
the pockets of the two dolls' eye makers they would
desire that every toy in England should be tazAl.
To secure their own exorbitant rents, the landlords of
the country would require that every Ergliehmen
ii.oad eat dear bread.
Whether the Morning Chronicle itself purposes •
return to the old system of taxation in the cue of
dolls' eyes and penny trumpets, we do not distinctly
discover. Three days a week, however, since the Ist
of February, our contemporary has invoked in its
lamest type the sympathy and condolence of its
readers and the public at its inability regularly to
continue its revelations concerning the trades in,
ginger pop and oranges. The debates in parliament
have not, it is true, unimportant. A new colo-
nial system hai been diseaved, a new franchise for
Inland has been proposed, in the short month which
has elapsed since the QuEmee commissioners opened
the two houses. Political parties elate have undergone
new combinations, and have &incased new positions
both in and out of doors. But all these
matters, interesting as they may appear to