The Sun.
London, England, 1851-12-12 00:00:00

France, by Belgium, or by Germany in matters
where we have shown ourselves, as a community,
such proficients. All we mean to assert is this—
that whereas with ourselves we have been enabled
to dedicate the whole of our capabilities to the
advancement of the interests of civilization, our
continental brethren have only been enabled
to travel in a similar direction through the number-
less impediments of a social and political character
thrown in their way by a series of tremendous revo-
lutions. That they have, notwithstanding all these
obstructions, advanced as far as they have, is a marvel
honourable to their resolution and perseverance.
But, necessarily, they have been prevented,
to a considerable extent, from proceeding as
far as they would otherwise have done, if
they had, like ourselves, possessed the advantages of
uninterrupted tranquillity. The facts here referred
to are notorious to all intelligent observers in both
hemispheres ; and the late Industrial Exhibition
seemed to be the crowning event of their celebration.
It was suggestive and significant enough that that
Exhibition of the results of the toil and ingenuity of
the human race was held in the capital not of France
of Austria, of Russia, of Italy, of Turkey, or of China,
but of Great Britain. Accustomed as we are to
arrogate to ourselves a certain political pre-eminence
as being the conservators and custodians of a truly
representative and liberal form of government, we
have yet greater reason to claim a position of un-
questionable superiority, as the nation in which are
preserved and cultivated all those arts and sciences
most essential to the development of the interests of
civilization. For this reason, therefore, we say thit
the Great Industrial Exhibition was appropriately
held in London, as the metropolis of the land in which
the cause of industry is most cared for by the popu-
lation.
We should find some difficulty, even if we re-
stricted ourselves to panegyric, in exaggerating the
merits of the remarkable lecture delivered on
Wednesday evening before the Society of
Arts by Professor OWEN—his discourse elu-
cidating with extraordinary skill the importance
of one of the most interesting class of objects contri-
buted to the Industrial Exhibition. The Professor
commenced by observing that for the raw materials
derived from the animal and vegetable kingdoms,
mankind owed more to the power and operation of
nature than to the inventions and appliances of art. A
memorable reflection, which he might have still fur-
ther enforced by the assertion that the vast majority
of those same inventions and appliances of art were
originally suggested by that power and operation of
nature. Beginning with the raw materials derived
from the animal kingdom, Professor OWEN explained
the peculiarities of those employed in textile fabrics
and clothing. Here it was that at the very outset he
instanced the peculiarities of wool as affording a proof
of the correctness of his previous observations—wool,
that peculiar combination of hair, in consequence of
the interlacing or interlocking of its fibres, being cha-
racterized by smoothness, softness, and a singular
laminated or imbricated surface, on which depended its
felting properties. Having described with exceeding
minuteness and lucidity the exact nature and mode of its
formation, the learned Lecturer commented upon the
extraordinary varieties of wool from all parts of the
globe contributed to the Great Exhibition—wool
from the east in China, the mountains of Thibet, and
the plains of Tartary ; from the west in the United
States ; from the south in the C pe of Good Hope
and Tasmania ; from the north in Iceland and Scan-
dinavia. Later on, Professor OWEN enumerated the
other among the more remarkable raw materials con-
tributed to the Great Exhibition—the hair of deer, of
goats, and of camels from India and Persia, the hair
of rabbits from Spain, and the samples of bristles
from Russia. After recounting several of the more
peculiar uses of whalebone, the Lecturer,spoke at large
upon the value of silk as a raw material supplied by
a seemingly insignificant insect, and yet one fabri-
cating some of the most inestimable products for tex-
tile fabrics—particularising, as the most precious of
all the various kinds of silk, that produced by the
larvae of a species of moth called the bornbyx mori,
so called from its feeding on the leaves of the mul-
berry. Such were among the many interesting mat-
ters treated of by Professor OWEN in his remarkable
lecture—a lecture which nobly carried out the views
of the illustrious Prince who originated the series
now in course of delivery at the Society of Arts.
That series, we are satisfied, must tend very greatly
to forward the cause which the Exhibition itself was
projected to promote—the cause of the industry of
he human race and of the general interests of civi•
zation.

The entertainment recently given by the American
Chamber of Commerce at Liverpool to the Hon.
It. J. WALKE2, has been emulated by the great city
of Manchester. The merchants and leading com-
mercial gentlemen of that proud emporium of indus-
try have thus, in a marked and honourable manner,
testified their appreciation of his successful exertions
to obtain from the Legislature of the United States a
reduction of the prohibitive tariff on our manufac-
tures ; a happy measure of reform, which occurred
almost simultaneously with our own repeal of the
corn-laws. The opinions expressed on the occasion
of the banquet at Manchester on Tuesday evening last,
in favour of unfettered commerce, were mark-worthy
from the weight and experience of the speakers. Be-
sides the honoured guest, the names of such men as
COBDEN, BRIGHT, MILNER GIBSON, and RATHBONE,
lent a veritable importance to the gathering of free-
trade champions who were assembled under the pre-
sidency of Mr. BAZLET. Mr. 'WALKER, developed his
views with his usual felicity, lucidity, and soundness.
Ile supported them by an interesting and cogent array
of statistical facts, and whatever falls from this dis-
tinguished statesman is eminently worthy of atten-
tion, if it were but from his repeated aspirations—

aspirations bearing the impress of genuine sincerity.

for a cordial and perpetual connexion of amity be-
tween the kindred countries of England and the United
States. Justly believing that commerce is pre-emi-
nently the friend of peace, Mr. WALKER enunciates
his conviction that by the joint action of the two
countries in the repeal of our corn-laws, and in the ,
reduction, the very great simultaneous reduction of 1
American duties, more was done by those two single
acts to cement and perpetuate the friendly relations of
England and America than by all the preceding Acts
of Parliament and the statutes of the Congress of the
United States. The absurdity of the allegation that
the tariff of 1846 is really a Protectionist tariff, was
happily shown up by the hon. speaker, who, ley the
use of a few figures, demonstrated that the measure
in question was a fundamental change. He called
attention to several items as taxed under the respec-
tive systems in the years 1844 and 1846, from a con-
sideration of which it is manifest that the average of
those duties, embracing most of the great
necessities of life exported from England to
America, was 88 per cent. under the tariff of 1842,
and 26 per cent. under the tariff of 1846. " For the
first time," said Mr. WALKER, referring to the latter
measure, " for the first time in the history of our Go-
vernment the ground was then assumed that itwas un-
i uAt,.impolitic, and unconstitutional to impose any pro.
t ct tre
duty
that we could justly and properly impose
no
a exceptrdu
evyei,ueian
fortai td. Whenrevenue, a
youndim bear in mind thatposenodulybeyond
from the organization of our Government under our
te
constitution of
1788, down to ecenaber, 1845, no
abandonment Ana er American Sec roefta; y
protective had ever
duties,
dared
ithite
must,tt
aoriff als proposeitthti thehn 1
n,
be conceded that the change
made by a single step
was great and important. Underi
stood, there was scarcely an article manufactured of
cotton that the manufacturers of this day could have
exported to the United States. With duties ranging
from 41 to 70 per cent. they would soon have become
—in fact they were becoming—absolutely prohibitory.
Now the export is nearly quadrupled. These are
some of the results, ts I have noted them from the
statistical tables of the United States, of what has
been the effect produced in that country by our re-
duced tariff. Our exports the last year of the tariff of
1842 were 113,488,516 dolls. ; in 1851, under the tariff
of 1846, they were 195,898,650 dolls. Our revenue
the last year of the tariff of 1842 was 26,712,000 dolls.:
the last year, under the tariff of 1846, it was
50,000,000 dolls. Thus, while we have reduced our
dutiesi
already
nmutual is nearly doubled."
this
exports
enormousra
atioonud
by one single step, our
revenue
I
n the imports a similar ex-
traordinary augmentation is apparent. In the cotton
. trade a vast increase between the two countries has I