The Sun.
London, England, 1830-05-14 00:00:00

AUSTRIAN FUNDS.

VIENNA, APRIL 30.—Metalliques, 102 ; Four per
Cents. 971 ; Bank Shares, 1,3421.
MAY I.—Metalliques, 1011; Four per Cents. 971 ;
Bank Shares, 1,338.
MAY 3.—Metalliques, 102 ; Four per Cents. 971 ;
Bank Shares, 1,347.

Letters from Cadiz of the 28th ult. announce
a heavy failure there in the wine trade, and the
general appearance 'of commercial affairs was
most gloomy. Confidence was almost entirely
destroyed. At Gibraltar a similar stagnation
existed. The Austrian Commodore had left
Algesiras with his squadron for the westward.
The proceedings of this naval force had excited
much and just ridicule, for their deeds had not
been such as to raise the European naval character
in the estimation of the Africans. But Austria has
little or no pretensions to rank as a naval power.

By letters from Morocco this morning we learn
that the Moors were making active preparations
to oppose any attempt of invasion on that portion
of the coast of Barbary. At Oran all those
capable of bearing arms had been ordered to
prepare for active service. The women and
children, as well as those past service, had been
sent off to the interior, from which large bodies
of Moors condi:wed to arrive. At Tunis also
similar preparations were making, should the
French attempt that coast. The influx of people
from the interior had caused provisions to rise
in price, and it was expected that unless large
arrivals took place grain would be very dear,
the drought having much injured the crops.
Oils were getting scarce and advancing in price.
The exchange at Tunis was at eleven piastres
le metal de Sousse.

Several European officera are said to be in
,he service of the Emperor of Monocco, and
:o be entrusted with important commands.

It is really marvellous that people will persist
in such preposterous assertions as those made
last night by Earl STAN HOPE, relative to the
Shipping Interest. "If Parliament did not
depart," quoth his Lordship, " from the grin-
" ciples which modern philosophers had so un-

" happily instilled into it, the whole groundwork
" of the British navy would in time be de-
" stroyed," the evidence of the approach of
which distinction consists not in the diminution,
but in the steady increase, year by year, of British
tonnage employed in our foreign trade. We
extracted a statement on Saturday last from the
Sessional Accounts showing this to be the
fact, and the Duke of WELLINGTON, from a
comparison of these with the returns of former
years, proved the gross misrepresentation of truth
which the advocates of the restrictive system are
bold enough to make. But error is usually per-

tinacious,and does not hide its head though it
be put to silence over and over again.
What the Government can and ought to do
for the Shipping Interest is to reduce the taxes
on all articles, and in the building or equipment
of ships. Some little has been done in this
way since the peace, but by no means so much
as the Duke of WELLINGTON is disposed to
take credit for. The duties on timber ought to
be remodelled, so as to equalize European and
North American timber, the former of which, of
however inferior quality, pays 2/. 155., and the
latter only 10s. a load. Sir HENRY PARNELL'S
suggestion of reducing the duty to 1/. 15s. per

load on all kinds of timber, would lower

the cost 11. per load, and indeed a large
reduction appears indispensable to enable our
ship-builders to maintain permanently a successful
competition with nations possessing natural ad-
vantages which, by our heavy taxation, we render
comparatively useless to ourselves, and a means
of raising their industry at the expence of ours.
The Hemp Duty is also a grievous burthen upon
shipping, enhancing, as it does, the price of sails
and cordage to a degree quite inconsistent indeed
with the spirit of laws which admit foreign vessels
on the same footing as our own. The amount
annually arising from the Hemp Duty does not
much exceed 100,0001., while it forms one of
the real drawbacks to the prosperity of our navi-
gation. Again, the coast duty on coals presses
very heavily upon the numerous vessels employed
in the coal trade, besides the hardship of making
people who unfortunately live at a distance from
coal pits, pay a heavy tax in addition to the
freight, from which the dwellers in the coal
countries are exempt. The ship-owners have
been deluded by pseudo-economists from looking
after the redress of their real grievances, while
they beat the air in their anger with a shadow
by which they cannot by possibility have been in-
jured, even if they have not been actually benefited
by the laws they complain of. But so long as they
suffer such things to be said in the name of the
Shipping Interest, as those put forth by Lord
STANHOPE last night, they injure their own in-
terest by drawing away the attention of Govern-
ment and of the public from their real wants.

Sir J. WROTTESLEY last night submitted
his motion to the House for a Select Committee
to inquire into the duties, salaries, and emolu-
ments of the Commissioners of Hackney-
coaches within the bills of mortality, and into
the present state of public carriages, and the
laws affecting them within the same district.
The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER ex-
pressed his satisfaction that the motion had been
made, and stated that the subject had, from
time to time, engaged no inconsiderable share of
his attention. "At present," the Right Hon.
Gentleman observed," no stage-coach could take
up and down on the stones of the metropolis
without being liable to a penalty. This penalty
he intended to repeal in a Clause to a Bill which
was in progress, so that one of the principal re-
strictions would then be removed." We are