The Sun.
London, England, 1841-10-13 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER-13, 1841.

CO":14-FIRC1 PTO' s e'v

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‘r-sfe need not e.ek C.,011.1 eau aotieaseis
now pending between Holland and the Prussian
Commercial League for a striking illustration of the
feeling which pervades the Continent upon the sub-
ject of commercial relations. Financial considera-
tions induced the Governments of the Prussian
League to encourage the importation of colonial
sugar at a moderate duty, in preference to protecting
the home manufacture of sugar from beetroot ; and
it was resolved to contract treaties with the maritime
Powers upon this basis, which should appear to con-
tain a concession made to those states. Holland,
however, which was likely to derive the greatest
benefit from the change, refused to look upon the
measure as a concession, it being evidently dictated
by necessity, and would grant no reduction of duty
upon German wares experts:l to her colonies. It is
highly probable that upon examination it was found
that the German manufacturers actually had nothing
to export which could compete with the manufactures
of Great Britain ; and Holland was and is bound
by the treaty of 18.25 to grant no concessions to
other nations which she does not extend to Eng-
land. It wenn perhaps be going too far to ascribe
the assignment of these motives as an excuse for her
refusal to a positive feeling of hostility on the
part of Holland to ourselves, although the useless
angry altercation kept up for some time by Lord
Palmerston with the Dutch Government was likely
enough to engender such a feeling. A simpler mo-
tive is nearer home in the desire of the Dutch to en-
courage their own manufactures, to which end no
pains have been spared to induce manufacturers to
emigrate from Belgium, and thus to render the
commercial system of Holland, which was previously
complicated enough, s till more perplexed and intricate.
The German manufacturers, blind to the impossibility
of exporting to foreign markets with advantage,
while they were unable to supply the quanti-
ties required at home at sufficiently moderwe
prices to exclude foreign competitors, immediately
raised an outcry against their Governments for
having betray a f their interests by concluding the
treaties in quest' on. Untsil with the sugar refiners,
who htd more reeson to comalairy, because the duty
on refined sugar was reduced in a greater prepor-
tion than th it upon raw swear, they finally coin-
p,led the Prussian G .vernment to announce to the
Dutch that she treaty would expire with the filet
year, a clause allewing such a declaration to be
in ede basing been inserted in the treaty. A report
was, however, circulated that' the low duty was to
be retained in the tariff of the Prussian League,
which was revised last year, but has not as yet been
made public ; aed this perhaps accounts for the si-
lence with which the Dutch received the notifica-
tion, and for the rapid progress mare in the nego-
tiations for the acceadon of the Grand Duchy
of Luxembourg to the Prussian League. This last
treaty was drawn up and even signed by the Pleni-
potentiaries appointed to conclude it, when on a sudden
the King of Holland reused to ratify it, and estab-
lished a commission for the purpose of making further
inquiries into the commercial interests of the Grand
Duchy. The reason assigned for this sudden change is
the report, which has recently bean spread, that
on the expiration of the treaty of 1840, differential
duties will be imposed upon colonial wares imported
through the Hanseatic harbours and those im-
ported through Holland ; but, whatever the cause
was, the refusal of 'the King to ratify the
treaty has excited much bad blood in Germany, and
a portion of the press has recessed its exhortations to
dictate compliance by force to a Power whose re-
sources do not seem to entitle it to be treated with
ordicary courtesy. In the meantime Holland finds
itself obliged to show a disposition to accede to the
commercial systems of France and Belgium, and
would find no full indemnity in the French market
for the loss of the direct trade with Germany ; of the
indirect trade through the Hanseatic port she of coulee
could not be deprived.
Looking upon this situation of affairs abstractedly
from British interests, it would appear a just punish-
ment to the States of the Prussian League for the iso-
lating tendency of their policy, if Holland acceded to
the French Belgian system. The Prussian tariff,
which appeared originally with an especial bad grace
just at the moment when the other nations of Eu-
rope were awakening to a cease of the good
policy of relaxing commercial restrictions, and
emanating from a state which had some preten-
sions to influence as a cultivator of intelligence,
may be said to have retarded the mutual under-
standing between the leading Powers of Europe
a full quarter of a century. The accession
of Holland to tile French Belgian system would
in a great measure neutralise the effect of a
commercial union between France and Belgium
alone. It would then be a treaty of reconciliation
between Holland and Belgium on a footing of mutual
independence, which would be cemented by the ad-
vantages which both derived from France, while it
would contribute to make the former Powers once
more politically independent of their restless neigh-
bour. If Prussia is jealous of such an union, let her
adopt a powerful remedy, which she has at all times
in her hands, and by moderating her tariff annul tlse
exclusive advantages which these lands proposed to
grant to each other. As commercial relations hare
now obtained an unusual weir lit in the political system,
isolation in commerce is the; surest way to induce a
loss of influence, and the most dangerous discovery
which a country cad make is, that its neighbours can
do without it.

Whither at a moment when such important qu,s-
tions are once more set afloat, an approximation on
the part of Great Britain to Holland would not also
be both practicable and desirable, is a question de-
serving of a more detailed inquiry. Materials have
berm furnished in an article in the last number
of the British and Foreign Review, which afford a
comprehensive view of C:e European sugar market,
with its consumption, and the fluctuations in price
which have taken place fur the last ten years. Toe
ohject of the writer is to show that the low price of
Java sugar is partly to be ascribed to the forcing
system of importation, and also induced, both by the
necessities of the Dutch Government, and the false
potion of the Dutch Trading Company towards the
Government. The remedy suggested in the abstrac-
tion of a large quantity of sugar from the continen-
tal market by a reduction of the differential duty in
England—a concession which might Le made in
exchange for a free admission of our manufactures
into the rising colonies of Holland, which have a
p opulation not much inferior in numbers to the
thaited States. Such an abstraction it is con-
tended would raise the average price on the Con-
tinent to a figure which would be injurious
reiCter to our East or West India producers,
as is proved by the average prices of former yea-a,
nhile a step of the kind would give an impulse to
t-ade which must be productive of extensive and
highly beneficial results. It is known that an influ-
e Itial party in Holland is very desirous of being
emancipated from the yoke of the Company as it at
present stands, and the subject will be mooted in the
next, if not in the present, session of the States-General.
But the subject is import tat enough to be separately
considered ; here it is enough to show how anxiously
t ie continental States cling to any petty advantage
f om which they cannot be bought off, and how far
t fey are removed from large and enlightened notions of
ee trade.