The Sun.
London, England, 1845-11-10 00:00:00

Artt, Am.

LONDON. MONDAY. NOVEMBER 10. 1845.

We hare every reason to fear that there are but small
hopes of. a peaceful settlement of differences between this
country and the United States of America. We pretend to
no superior information on.this important question, but judge
!'rota circumstances and for reasons which may enable any
one, tolerably well-informed, to come to a conclusion.
arrangements have been in progress for some time, and are
now nearly completed, for embodying the militia whenever
it may seem tit for the Privy Council to issue an order to that
effect. This measure,- we are inclined to think, depends
entirely on the result of negotiations now going on, both in
London and Washington, respecting the Oregon territory
and the recent occupation of Texas ; and should it be un-
favourable, a trlal,of strength will be the only retort. The
policy of the Cabinet has led the public, or ought to have led
thetn, to such an alternative. Last session, on the motion of
Sir ROBERT Pref., large sums were voted for increasing the
strength of the navy, building steam-boats, and fortifying
the coasts. The activity exhibited in our dock-
yards since the vote was agreed to, and even before,
shows that there must be some strong cause for
this new rigour and warlike display ; and on looking
at our relations with all the nations of Europe and America,
we find only one against which these preparations can be
directed. England is on the most amicable terms with
France ; their fleets are operating together in the. New World,
their policy with regard to the occupation of Texas is the
same; there is not, in fact, one pint of difference or one
ground of quarrel between them. All the other States of
Europe, we rejoice to say, are either well- inclined towards
Englat9; or are so insignificant with respect to power, that
thee can afford no grounds whatever for these demon-tra-
tions. With America, however, there are serious matters of
dispute, and from the deliberate and official declarations of the
representatives of the awo countries, we can hardly see how
they can be settled amicably. Both TYLER and Vora( have
declared to Congress that they claim the whole of the Oregon
territory, and, not satisfied with that, recommended the repre-
sentatives of the people to lose no time in voting supplies
and adopting measures for putting an end to all doubt on the
question, by establishing stations and forts on the route
across the mountains, and taking possession of the whole
of the Columbia river. Sir RoaEßr PEEL and
the Earl of ABERDEEN were no less explicit in reply
and in their places in Parliament announced that they could
admit no such occupation; that their resolution to resist it
was formed, and that they were prepared to maintain it.
Their brief addressee were loudly cheered by all parties in the
Lords and Commons. They cannot recede, for the nation is with
them, and after such a display of vigour would be denounced
es poltroons and betrayers of the rights of England, if they
should yield one inch of territory either to the diplomatic
skill of Mr. LANE, or the lawless aggressions of a fierce and
unrestrained democracy. But neither nation is disposed to
yield. There are old recollections as well as present quarrels
to foster a hostile feeling. In the wars England has waged
with America she has little to boast of. She was shamefully
defeated in the war of independence; she obtained some
trophies, brilliant we admit, in the war of 1813 and 1814;
but she was sadlv humbled in her encounters with America
on the-Canadian Lakes. The army of Sir GEORGE PREVOST
was uttlerly defeated—he died of shame and in dis-
grace on his voyage home, and a peace was patched
up which reflected little credit on England, exalted
the vanity of the republicans, and made both the naval and
military services of tngland dissatisfied with the result, an
=views for another opportunity of vindicating their honour
and bravery. The &aeries., believe that they ban beat us
43 they have hitherto dome. We, on the other hand, are
confaent dour strength,: see UN'S -no victories to boast of
which can allow us to sheer magnanimous indifference ;
inroads of the sympathisers on the peaceable inhabitanti of
Canada, the deceitful occupation of Texas, and the threatened
eccupatiota of a territory long in undisputed possession of the

. -
North-West Canadian Company, together with threats of
seizing other vast tracts, to which the Americans have no
right whatever—all combine to put this country on her right,
and compel her to fight for every inch of bare rock with'is
much determination as for the most valuable possession. But
there are other circumstances, too, that add to tke difficulties
of the crisis. If Pouc and his Cabinet were inclined to yield
to reason, and settle the dispute on amicable end
honourable terms, they have not the power. They,
in fact, have little or no influence on -the Western
States. These are beyond their reach, yet they
can influence their decisions ; they are resolved
to "go ahead" at all risks, safe alike from the armies and
fleets of England, unrestrained by laws or treaties, or the
usually admitted compacts of civilised nations. They care as
little for the Congress of 'Washington as the Parliament of
London, and will go on in their course until they meet with
a power that can bring them to reason. For men of this
stamp the River Columbia is an acquisition of the first im-
portance, since the trade with China has been thrown open
by the gallant achievements of British soldiers and sailors
They could thus monopolise the whole of the fur trade with
China, and establish commercial relations with the Celestial
Empire, which would render Oregon one of the most thriving
districts on the whole of the western coast. England cannot
stand by with her arms folded, and allow:such an invasion
upon her rights as the expulsion of a hardy and frugal race,
long established at the mouths of the Columbia. But the
neighbouring States, too, are also threatened. California is
already doomed to form a twenty-ninth or thirty-ninth state
of the Union; Mexico will follow, for in that wretched
country there is no pOwer of resistance; and unless England
manfully oppose the very first encroachments, she
may reckon upon the occupation of Cuba and the attempted
conquest of all the British West India islands. Our ol ject is
not to create alarm or to excite a hostile feeling in America;
for we state only facts about which there can be no dispute,
and which are even openly avowed by certain organs of lead-
ing parties in the United States; our object is to put Eng-
land on her guard, to encourage her Government to maintain
her rights, and to remember that no nation ever shamefully
yielded to unjust claims without being compelled to yield
fifty more, or resist at last when the fit opportunity had been
lost, and the strength and insolence of the aggressor were
increased by the acquisition of unlawful wealth. For many
reasons both countries may regret the alternative, but it is
neither consistent with the policy, nor the power, nor the
honour of England to put off the evil day.

The French newspapers, we perceive, are congratulating
their readers on the favourable comparison which exists
between the balance of their " exchanges of manufactured
products with England" for the last year :
" With England our situation with regard t• the exchange of
manufactured products is more favourable. Out of 145 millions
of merchandise which she sells us, 54 are manufactured articles,
of which 114 are consumed here; whilst, out of 144 millions of
our products with which we supply her, 72i millions are articles
of our own manufacturing."

This is, no doubt, a very just source of gratulation to the
statistical critic by whom the results embodied in that article
of the Journal des Debats, from which we are quoting, are
discussed. But it is matter, also, pregnant with grave re-
flection for the English public. For obvious reasons, we are
disposed to attach more importance to the data for the con-
clusions arrived at by the French journalists, than to those
of the Parliamentary return called for by Mr. HASTIE,
M.P., to which we some time ago adverted (Seas. Pap.,
1845, No. 628), entitled " Trade with France." In the
latter, the summary of "'lmports from France," their
official value is stated at 3,687,8781., and the total of
exports to France, official value, is given at 5,284,176/. Now
the difference itt pounds sterling between these two sums
►hould be a very large amount, indeed, in favour of England.
But, according to the Journal des Musts, it is a differenccr
even in francs, less than this sum in our currency. The
question is—what is the cause of this difference? And we
heartily wish that we could set our mercantile community on
diligently investigating the point. They would find
it identified with that deplorable system of mone-
tary legislation which the country has permitted the
Minister to establish, with a degree of infatuation and cre-
dulity scarcely- to be believed, of an intelligent and observant
people, forming the most highly civilized, opulent, and enter-
prising community in the world. What is the reason that
France, Hol'and, Spain, Belgium, Germany, do not take more
of our manufactured goods? The demand and market for
our exports, considered in relation to the wonderfully reduced
prices at which they are, produced—that is natural, or gold-
standard prices—and the diminished rates of the wages paid
for the industrial labour occupied upon them, are fearfully
decreased. It is altogether 4 false principle of calculation to
take the aggregate increase of declared and official value,
and comparing it with the aggregate of any preceding year,
to assume that because this is larger for 1844-45, therefore,
there is an increase of our trading prosperity in the current
year. There are to be taken into the account the increased
Lumber of ports of consignment, the increased extent of
capital embarked in manufacturing establishments, and many
other elements of any fair comparison, and the
result will be that there is an absolute decrease
both as to the bulk of our trade with certain

given countries, once our largest customers, and as to the
general profit upon the whole of our manufacturing opera-
tions. Gold, our readers will perceive, continues still too
fatally to verify our reiterated predictions. The bullion ac•
count of the Bank of England published to-day exhibits a
further decrease. 11,600,000/. is the whole store amount,
over the perhaps 20,000,000/. of gold in circulation, to meet
the floating demands which may be made upon the " con-
vertible " paper issued to represent all the evolutions of
our immense trade ; the preliminary bargains in
the scrip of new railway schemes, the hypothecated
capital ( f which exceeds 600,000,0001. ; the weekly drain for
wages of the enormous establishments in our manufacturing
districts ; for wages of all the workmen and staff of the
great lines of railway on the Continent,which are worked by
British capital ; for salaries, pay, &c., of. all our immense
public services and for our foreign commercial remittances
The price of gold—that is,-the difference between the Actoi
i Parliament or Mint price of the metal—at standard fineness,
and its realisable or market value—is so palpably in favour
of the foreign importer of grain or goods who has balances
to be paid here, that he rejects at once all those of your
manufactures of which lie is not in want as matters of indis-
pensable necessity. He will be paid in English paper—cheque,
bill, or bank-note; he carries it to the Bank of England, and
converts it into gold, and gold being dearer at Hamburgh,
in Paris, at Lubeck, Bremen, &c., " it follows" (to use the
phra-e of our City correspondent) that he makes his market
of it at either of those great European marts. The reaction
on the Bar.k of England is this :—the enhanced value of the
gold in the market above the price at which it is
compelled by Act of Parliament to pay it on de-
mand over its counter, increases in a far greater
and prompter ratio than its raising its rates of discount and
its contraction of its own paper issues can check this ten•
dency to dearness in the gold market, or raise the value of
its own paper in the exchanges. But what is the effect of
all those causes in combination? The raising of the rate of
discount, the diminution of the gold bullion in deposit, and
the contraction of its paper currency, to which the Bank na-
turally and properly resorts as a precautionary means of
alleviating the pressure upon its resources arising from the
scarcity of gold and the convertibility into gold of those paper
issues on demand, aggravate and accelerate the declining
tendencies not of the money and share markets alone, but of
the whole trade of the United Kingdom, and must—inevi-
tably must—if, at even more than the eleventh hour, some
timely and vigorous exercise of the authority of the
SOVEREIGN do not avert the desperate and imminent peril
of the impending catastrophe—result in a ruinous and
overwhelming panic. We deny that for such a panic Me pre-
vailing railway share speculation mania, lamentable though
it may be, will be mainly responsible. The responsibility
will rest on a single head. The disaster will be attributable
to Sir ROBERT Piot, it' he perversely refuse any longer to
procure the issuing of an Order in Council, in the first place
to open the ports. If you relieve the people from their pre-
sent well-grounded apprehensions of a winter.famine, or, at
any rate, fearful privation; you
_will go far to restore confi-
dence and cheerfulness to the public mind. If you would
re-establish that banished cheerfulness, and that shaken con-
fidence, another Order in Council must suspend the •pers-
tion of the Currency Acts of the years 1819, 1826,
and 1844. We defy any 'man to show how the
dangers that threaten us, and that have already cast such a
gloom over the City, can be averted by any means short, in
their virtual effect of these. When Sir ROBERT PEEL com-
menced his career of monetary legislation he assigned the
dangers of " over speculation" as the prime motive of his
fatal officiousness. When he introduced hie complement'llill
of last year, to consummate whatever ruin accident had
theretofore prevented him from achieving, he rested his
case on the necessity for discouraging over-speculation.
What this was, he neither did, nor attempted to define.
It was one of his sublimely vague nothings, on the credit of
which, by a species of technical skill in propounding them, he
has raised for himself a reputation of statesmanship. By
which test will the Premier be content that posterity shall
now try his pretensions? By his sliding-scale of corn duties?
All Europe is at this moment ridiculing its stupendous
failure. By his currency legislation ? He has shown him-
self; on a memorable occasion, incompetent to solve his own
problem, propounded in his own words—" What is a pound ?"
A true statesman, not a Minister of expedients—agreat mind,
not a trimming, cunning one—would come forward at this mo-
ment, and without further coquetting with daily .summoned
and daily-adjourned Cabin et Councils of no conclusions—man-
fully avow the errors of his past views. To recal the past
faultdon
mischiefs they have occasioned is impossible. To repair the
n
nogf hhb:i:soraoriakntw.gt ailetnhh mcho iensns own committed
dwfeourratittihiahoenertmdmoh,ifssitsiihtolitwllmnni heni ilfislumspower,fmyroe md comingiao tbue,yt oa
tbtat hn
S or-
wardStatute.-book.
gb.escaginieb, yboopryeniitnagftrhagroe ports,ents
press-
ing, and extensive of the calamities his counsels have en-
atanidlebdrueapokinngthehikainugndhoampp,yletaihidiimn
,deeper than the unholy wand of Prospero.

Accounts from Madrid of the 30th ult. 'state that the Funds
continued to rise—a singular feature in a country without
credit, and at a time when the public funds in England,
France, and every solvent state, are, on the decline. The
Three per Cents. were officially quoted at 244 for cash, but
out of doors they sold at 25% li. Private operations in the
"zee per Cents. were done at 3b 7i, for cash, and 36
~ br taw; Coupons, 25 for •cash.
The Gazette publishes various regulations for the execu-
tion of the royal decree of Sept. 17, relative to public schools
and universities. The following paragraph relative to the