The Sun.
London, England, 1859-01-15 00:00:00

concerns.

Among the blue books that have recently ap-
peared, in anticipation of the approaching session,
there is one entitled to some passing consideration,
from its remarkable significance. This is no other
than a volume of some three hundred pages, com-
prising within it statistical tables in reference to
the 'commercial relations, in 1856, between the
United Kingdom and all its gigantic and scattered
possessions—dependencies distributed far and wide
over both hemispheres—territories in Europe, Asia,
Africa, both the Americas, and Australasia. A
tour of this description is equivalent to a plummet
sounding the deeps and the shallows of the relative
value of, the different parts of the British Empire.
It is tantamount, in another sense, to a gauge of
the deli:lents of its wealth and industry. Hence,
while turning the leaves of this blue book,
it is as though we were feeling the pulse
of the mercantile enterprise of the community.
The peculiar significance of the extraordinary facts
and figures here compacted together in a tabular
form will be at once appreciated by a brief enume-
ration of some among the more remarkable " tot-
tles" particularised. Glancing, for instance, at the
record given in this blue book of the total exports
from, and imports into, the several colonies of Great
Britain during 1856, we find that Hindostan alone
exported £23,639,435, and imported £25,244,782—
England absorbing of those exports £10,305,539,
and contributing to those imports £14,668,312.
Canada, again, or rather the two Canadas, im-
ported in 1856, £9,806,487, and exported
£7,210,579. New South Wales imported in the
same year £5,460,971, and exported £3,430,880.
Victoria imported, wonderful to relate, £14,962,269,
and exported £15,489,760 ! Tasmania imported
£1,442,106, and exported £1,207,802.

West Australia importing nearly £122,938, and ex-
porting no more than £44,740. New Zealand im-
ported in 1856, £710,868, and exported £318,433.
Reverting to the East Indies, we find Ceylon
marked in 1856 as importing £2,714,568, and ex-
porting £1,663,612. Turning, on the other hand,
to the West Indies, we find Jamaica in the same in-
terval importin g £961,886, and exporting £935,060.
Barbadoes is marked as having of imports £841,254,
and of exports £97l,o2B—Trinidad, of imports,
£664,474, and exports £s74,767—Honduras im-
ports to the value of £254,994, with exports
to the value of £446,649. The Mauritius
•
absorbed in 1856 imports to the tune of £2,133,085,
and yielded exports to the aggregate value of
£1,804,123. The Cape of Good Hope imported to
the extent of £1,512,269, and exported to the
amount of £1,240,625. Malta—the small and rocky
group of the Maltese islands, exceeding both in
imports and exports—the former amounting, in
1856, to a total of £2,724,999, the latter to a total
of £1,838,449. Nothing whatever is said, rather
unaccountably, of the exports and imports of Hong
Kong, the statistics with which were, perhaps, be-
coming confused by the threatening of the Chinese
war, happily so soon afterwards and so very satis-
factorily to be brought to a final termination. Two of
our possessions in the Eastern hemisphere:yet remain
to be particularised. We have drawn attention to
the exports and imports of each during 1856, until
the close of the preceding• catalogue, because we
cannot help regarding them as items of especial in-
terest and value at the present moment—of an in-
terest and value, indeed, wholly disproportioned to
their relative magnitude, or rather, it should be
said, insignificance. Labuan—the province which
the First Minister of the Crown threatens to cut
adrift from us—showed in 1856 imports to the
value of £33,916, and exports to the extent of
£20,080. The lonian Islands—the inhabitants of
which evidence such an eagerness to be severed
from the British Protectorate, and to be added to
the kingdom of Greece Proper—importing in 1856,
£1,187,123, and exporting to the total value of
£1,118,747. A blue book replete with informa-
tion of this important character could not make a
more timely appearance. It serves to throw a
broad flood of light upon many difficult problems
connected with our Colonial Empile, not the less
welcome at this moment in reference to the Bor-
nese colony and the Septinsular Protectorate.
Conspicuous among the future divisions to be spe-
cified in a sequel volume will doubtless be one
never dreamt of in 1856, nor yet in 1857, being,
in fact, the creation wholly of 1858—to wit,
British Columbia.

COURT CIRCULAR.

WINDSOR, JAN. 14.

Her Majesty's dinner party yesterday included the Mar-
quia of Lansdowne, the Earl and Countess of Shelburne'
and Mr. A. Paget ; also the Earl and Countess Stanhope
and the Earl of Warwick, who arrived on a visit in the
afternoon. Colonel the Hon. Sir Charles and Lady Phipps
had the honour of being invited.
The Queen, with Princess Alice and Prince Arthur,
walked in the Home Park this morning, and visited her
Royal Highness the Duchess of Kent at Frogmore.
His Royal Highness the Prince Consort went out shoot-
ing, accompanied by Prince Edward of Saxe-Weimar and
the Earl of Warwick.

Mr. A. Paget left Windsor in the forenoon.
Viscountess Jocelyn has succeeded the Countess of
Gainiborough as Lady in Waiting to her Majesty.

The Governor of the Bank of England and the Deputy-
Governor had an interview with the Chancellor of the
Exchequer on Thursday, at his official residence in Down-
ing-street.