The Sun.
London, England, 1834-10-06 00:00:00

of January, 1835, and end the Ist of January, 1838, not to
allow any additional young officers to join the service, or,
for every three mates reduced from the list by promotion
or relinquishment of the profession, to enter one first-class
or college volunteer. When it is considered the number of
highly respectable and intelligent young officers now unpro-
vided with ships, putting out of sight the distant hope of
promotion, his Lordship cannot but consider the suggestion
to be most advisable. There are some midshipmen in this
port who have passed for lieutenants seven or eight years,
verging on to thirty years of age, and, from present appear-
ances, may arrive at forty before they gain the step. If his
Lordship would but adopt the plan proposed for three years,
and promote according to seniority, or otherwise, if a special
case should occur, he would be conferring a boon upon the
parents and guardians of a great numbers of most able and
enterprising young officers.
The case of the late Lieut. Henry Lister Maw, of the
President (whose dismissal from the service was mentioned
in our last paper), was a somewhat parallel instance of in-
advertency when in command, attended with the same pro-
fessional consequences of lapsed responsibility to that. of the
late Lieut. H. M'Cleverty. The offence upon which the
sentence of the Court was founded was to the effect that,
during the middle watch of the morning of the 13th of
August, of which Lieut. Maw had charge, two of the
smugglers placed on board the President had lowered a
boat from the ship, and succeeded in effecting their escape,
unperceived, to the shore, Lieut. Maw being at the time
absent from the deck, in direct violation of the standing
orders of the ship. The court-martial (of which Commo-
dore Sir Thos. Ussher, Pyramus, was President) was re-
luctantly ordered by the commko,der-in,Chief, at the de-
sire of Lieut. Maw himself; who, trot considerihg himself
responsible, persisted in requiring it, notwithstanding the
earnest dissuasion of his friends ; hence the dismissal of an
officer of distinction from the service (he is the author of an
interesting volume of " Travels in South America"), and
another warning to officers on ordinary duty, whose zeal
needs no spurring when raised by unavoidable causes, and
the exigencies of the service.

PLYMOUTH' Oct. 2.—Orders have very unexpectedly
been received for the Malabar, 74, Captain Sir W. A.
Montague, to remove the stores which she had taken on
board for Lisbon into the Stag, and to sail immediately
(she will go to-morrow morning) to join the squadron in
the Mediterranean, whither the Revenge, 78, Captain Wm.
Elliott, C. 8., has already proceeded from the Tagus. The
Malabar has only been two months in commission (since
July 25,) and is completely and efficiently manned, and but
two of the crew who had entered have deserted during the
whole outfit. Sailed, the Stag, 46, Captain N. Lockyer,
C. 8., for Lisbon ; Champion, 18, Commander Hon. A.
Duncombe, for St. John's, Newfoundland, with the new
Governor, Captain H. Prescott, C.B. ; and the Wolf, 18,
Com. E. Stanley, for the East Indies. The Malabar,
Champion, and Wolf went out of harbour at the same
time, which, combined with the Malabar's sudden destina-
tion, revived our national feelings of " Olden time."
The Dublin was paid off yesterday, and the Rover
to-day. The latter returned to England a second time
during her two years' run, to be docked, having previously
touchd the ground, when, though her damages were com-
paratively trifling, orders were given to pay her off into
ordinary. Two of the crew of the Dublin, and one of the
marines, received medals and gratuities from the Lords of
the. Admiralty for length of servitude and good conduct for
a series of years, namely, Clement Wennet, Ab., a medal
and gratuity of Si., with a pension of 161. per annum ;
George Duckham, Ab., a medal and gratuity of 151., with
a pension of 231. 12s. per annum ; James Pittard, marine, a
medal and gratuity of .5/., his pension to be regulated from
head-quarters. The Talbot, 29, Captain Pennell, is nearly
ready to receive Sir Graham Eden Hamond's flag. The
annual survey of the ships in ordinary (under Captain R.
Thomas) will take place next week.—Came in several ships
bound up Channel, having the wind fresh from the E.S.E.,
among them the Eden and British Merchant, from Jamaica;
Avon and Achilles, from Quebec. Sailed the Symmetry,
Stevens, for the Mauritius and Ceylon.

STATE OF TRADE.

(From the Leeds Intelligencer.)

STATE AND PROSPECTS OF THE WOOLLEN TRADE.—
Our public markets have suffered more fluctuation during
the last few weeks than they had done for some time pre-
viously, yet the amount of business done has, upon the
whole, been rather large ; and the demand, considering the
advanced period of the season, continues lively. The goods
most in request are low and middle qualities, principally
for the supply of foreign markets. The indisposition of the
merchants to speculate upon the continuance of the high
prices of English wool renders it a matter of extreme dif-
ficulty for the manufacturer to carry on his operations with
any profit, or even without loss. The disproportion be-
tween the prices of English and foreign wools may be stated
at near 6d. per lb. ; hence a cloth made of each sort, to
cost within 6d. per yard of each other, would exhibit a dif-
ference in value of full Is. 6d. per yard. Notwithstanding
this advantage, however, in favour of foreign wools, it is
remarkable that the superfine cloth trade of the town has
by no means participated in the improvement which has been
experienced
in lower goods, but remains in pretty nearly
the same depressed state to which the general stagnation
at the beginning of the year reduced it. Th con-
tinued suspension of the demand for the American market
may, no doubt, partly account for this state of things,
but there is ground to imagine that another cause, of a
more permanent character, is operating, the effect of which,
however inconvenient for the time, may ultimately prove
any thing but detrimental to the interests of this very im-
portant branch of our industry. When the improved sys-
tem of manufacturing superfines was introduced from the
West of England to this part of the country, something
less than twenty years ago, it might have been well had our
manufacturers imitated also the West of England mode of
conducting their sales, by cultivating a more direct connec-
tion with the consumers, keeping up their standard of quality,
and depending for remunerating prices upon the confidence
which undeviating perseverence would have attached to their
names as the known manufacturers of such goods. But in an
evil hour they suffered their trade to fall into the hands of a
few overgrown monopolizing London houses, who for years
were in the habit of visiting our market every week or two,
purchasing all before them, and who thus establish them-
selves as middlemen between the manufacturer and the con-
sumer. It is essential to the complete success of such a
scheme as this that a purchaser should think he supplies him-
self better from the middleman than he could at the fountain
head—from the manufacturer himself. How this is effected
may be matter of mystery to such purchaser, but it is no
mystery elsewhere. The manufacturer, after all, must play
into the hands of the middleman by sacrificing the intrinsic
properties of their goods for the sake of a low price, and
labouring to give to an inferior quality the showy but delu-
sive appearance of a better one. This view of the matter
will account for the low estimation into which Yorkshire
cloths again generally fell a few years after they had made
a fresh start under the fairest auspices. It will explain why
the finest descriptions of wool have uniformly found their
way to the West of England, and why some of the most
respectable country mercers, even in the town of Leeds
itself, thought it essential to their character to boast that
they did not keep Yorkshire clothes. The agents of these
London houses in the meantime established an entire con-
troul over the market, and gave themselves airs befitting
their assumed importance. Each one held his levee every
morning whilst sipping his coffee at his inn. His usher of
the black rod displayed a bootjack ; his Lord in waiting was
a spruce flunky with a white napkin under his arm, and, if
the whole mortifying truth must be told, he was attended by
a train of bowing applicants, lining the passage and waiting
his turn of audience. This may appear a strange, a degrading
part of the duty of a merchant as the character and standing
of a merchant used to be considered, and certainly no one
of the old school would submit to the indignity in person ;
he might, however, select a fitting tool from the primeval
regions of the gigs and dubbing boards, and compen-
sate him for the performance of the congenial dirty work
by a share in the profit. Such a state of things, however,
cannot last for ever : the pitcher may go often to the well and
be broken at last ; l'inganno felice may be practised for a
long time, under one specious pretext or another, and be
found out after all. The wearer buys a splendid-looking
article at a low price, and thinks he has a bargain, but a
month's wear and a shower of rain show him that he has a
mere dishclout about his shoulders. The reign of the
great London buyers is passing, if not passed ; their opera-
tions have been on the wane for some time. We are in a
state of transition, it is to be hoped, from an unsound to a
sound system. Such a transition requires time to develope
itself, and is generally productive of temporary inconveni-
ence, and it is a fact, as well corroborative of this view of
the matter as consolatory for future prospects, that the
largest stocks of superfine cloths now held are in the hands
of our best manufacturers. They have but to persevere in
producing a really good and durable article, upon which
they dare stake their reputation, and success is certain. An
attempt was made three or four years ago to introduce our
clothes into continental markets, to compete with the ma-
nufactures of Belgium and Prussia, but it failed ; every dis-