The Sun.
London, England, 1841-03-20 00:00:00

soil in England, because, with a perfectly
free trade, the vast regions of the United States
being open to our people, that monopoly would
be of no more importance than an individual
having exclusive possession of a cabbage garden
at Battersea, while all the rest of England was
open to be appropriated and used by the first
corner. We hold the assumption of the Post,
that land and labbur are cheaper in other coun-
tries than in England, and all the arguments
and fears which grow from it, to be no farther
true than that the people are limited by the
law, not by nature, to that small portion of the
earth which is owned by the English aristo-
cracy, the law-makers, to obtain the food on
which we all live.

Our Contemporary seems to admit that our re-
ference in a former number to the rnanufactur-
idg towns, where the capitalist would employ
more hands if the corn and other fiseel laws
were repealed, is so far an answer to his former
statements; but he says the competition with
the labour of towns is not what he dreads :
It is not the competition of the manufacturing but of
the agricultural labourer that we have in the first instance
to apprehend, and therefore we should look for the evil re-
sults in Kent, and Essex, and Sussex, and Suffolk, and
Surrey. It is the labourers in these and similar districts (4
our country that we are anxious to preserve from the competi-
tion of foreign labour.

Our Contemporary does not suppose that the
peasants of Hungary would flock over to Eng-
land to compete in the cultivation of our soil
with our labourers; he fears that the influx of
their produce would enable our manufacturers to
feed themselves without the help of our agricul-
tural labourers. The wheat brought a thousand
miles would make men dispense with wheat
grown on the spot ! What an idle fear. Has
our Contemporary any idea of cultivation? It
cannot be extended at will, as a clever writer
like the Editor of the Post can fill his columns.
Wheat cannot be spun from the brains of man.
The most fertile country ever yet discovered
yielded only forest trees or a few wild fruits
till it was tilled by man's labour. Wheat
is the produce of much labour and skill.
To procure it instruments must be made,
animals must be reared, the ground must be
cleared and ploughed ; and after all these la-
bours, it requires from six to eleven months, sub-
sequent to the wheat being sown, to come to perfec-
tion. It would be at least nineteen months from
the time of abolishing our Corn-laws before any
great increase of the supply of food could be
obtained.

At present we have a multitude of people in
towns only half fed, who would be immediately
emplayed and fed better were those laws repealed.
The demand for food would increase instantly,
while the supply could not be immediately in-
creased. That demand would undoubtedly stimu-
late the exertions of the agriculturist in distant
Poland and Hungary; but why should it not have
the same effect on the agriculturists of England ?
The value of what the manufacturers produce
gives value to agricultural produce, and the
more our manufacturing produce is increased, the
greater will be the value and the greater the de-
mand for agricultural produce, including that of
England. There would be no diminution what-
ever of employment in Kent by increasing em-
ployment in Lancashire.
The Post does the agriculturists of England a
great injustice when it supposes that they do not
possess advantages in the production of corn
similar to those which our people have over
other countries in the production of manufac-
tures. They do. They are skilful as aericul-
turists, have excellent machinery and imple-
ments, and powerful cattle. Except the Bel-
gians, from whom we cannot get food, as they
consume all they produce, our agriculturists are
the most skilful in the world. They have more
advantages in producing corn than the serfs of
Hungary or the boors of Russia; and on the ad-
mission of the Post, that it would not ask for
Corn-laws if our people had these advantages,
we ask it to become a Corn-law repealer.
The Post is apprehensive that the repeal of
the Corn-laws would injure the home market
for our manufactures, but it does not explain
how. The people would have more food, there
would be more of them, and they woull want
more clothing and more instruments. There is
no reason suppose that a grain of corn less
would be grown in the country, or a head of
cattle less fattened to supply a greater number
of people; but the corn and the cattle of the
acrriculturists constitute the real market for the
manufacturers' produce, and that market would
be extended just in proportion as the supply of
food was increased. We can assure the Post,
henceforth a brother repealer, that the home
market for our manufactures would be much in-
creased by the abolition of the Corn-law.
We are described as labouring under a delu-
sion when we stated that " one labourer is,
by his produce, the market for another."
Yet the Post admits the truth of the statement
if the labourer be employed, but it fears an ac-
cumulation of unemployed labourers from allow-
ing the capitalists of the manufacturing districts
to employ more labourers. Another most
groundless fear! It is quite " enough in our
complicated state of society that we have people
who are capable of supplying each other's
wants," if the Legislature does not interfere to
prevent them; while the Post's supposition that
" Government must supply the means and the
inducements, restrictions here, encouragements
there," is contradicted by all experience. The
interference of Government with trade has been
so often proved to be noxious, that the person
who now advocates it must be destitute of the
most elementary knowledge of the science of
production. By what patent right can the Le-
gislature tell how the different classes of indus-
trious men can obtain the greatest rewards for
their labour ? If it know not that, why should
it restrict some, and encourage others ? Facility
of production depends on division of labour—and

division of labour depends on the number of the
people—for where there is only one person, he
must do everything for himself. Now, the
number of people depends on the quan-
tity of food; and the Government, not being
a producer of food, every interference by
it takes something from the producer, and
appropriates that to non-production which
he would devote to re-production. Every inter-
ference, consequently, of Government with trade,
lessens the quantity of food in the world, lessens
the number of people, lessens the facility of pro-
duction, and decreases the amount of wealth and
the sum of human happiness.
We have made more observations than we in-
tended. We have written a very long article in
reply to two short ones ; but we have the cause
at heart, and thought it due to our Contemporary
not to leave any of his objections, so far as we un-
derstand them, unnoticed and unrefuted. If we
can gain over or silence the Post we shall de-
prive our opponents of an honest, if not a skilful,
advocate.

We have received Madrid Papers of the 10tii
instant. Reports had been circulated that the
would prorogue the Cortes, which
be wholly without foundation. Es-
proveßege to Regency `would
who had been indisposed, had so far
recovered as to attend a Cabinet Council on
the 10th. According to the Cast&llano, Senor
GONZALES, WllO IS now in London, is engaged
in the negotiation of a new loan. Our merchants
ought by this time to have had enough to do
with Spanish 'cans.
t 28
Joint-stock Companies have been formed for
working the mines in Murcia and Andalusia.
On the Bourse the Five per Cents. closed on the
10 that 27 for cash,and a 11-10ths at 60 days.

The Presse and the Commerce are the only
French Journals of Wednesday that support
emocracy of Paris. Their
BB
Bill
o. n
AAlllo
tuhrre 1 Eil: s Report on the Fortifications
other
Papers abuse it. They are
imaginary invasions
mad for walls. There is no longer any use in
telling them that the walls will be the tomb of
fmt
ithi
iiedcaßi
ebsei ve oaolrnueltyisoot
no otfheJuly—that they will be
heatedfor-
d
with
that they think of nothing, and will hear of
nothing, but how to hide themselves from the
phantom legions of the Four Powers. This
mania is so general, that there is no resisting the
policy which it prompts. This was frankly stated
by M. MOUNIER, who observed that, although
lie individually thought the walls useless, yet as
public opinion was so strongly in favour of them,