Star.
London, England, 1821-09-21 00:00:00

OUR COLONIAL SYSTEM.

The following article appears in the Quebec Gazette
of the 9th of August :
" TRADE AND THE CORN LAWS.
de We understand that it is intended by the inhabi-
tants of different parts of this province to petition his
Majesty and both Houses of Parliament on the sub-
ject of the existing Regulations affecting the Trade
of this country.
" It is well known that it is trade that enables one
individual to apply himself exclusively to any one
branch of industry, and yet by the means of an ex-
change of that part of its produce which he does not
require for his own use, to supply himself with all
that is necessary, useful, or comfortable in life.
" It is thus that trade or exchange of commodities
between individuals of the same country is indispen-
sable to individual enjoyment and general prosperity.
Trade, between different countries, operates among
communities in the same way as among individuals
of the same country—vivifies the industry, and in-
creases the wealth and comfort of the individuals of

which each is composed.
The power of regulating the trade of the Colo-
nies, which belongs to the British Parliament, is, in
fact a power over the fortunes, the industry, and the
prosperity of every individual in the Colonies. It is a
magic wand, at whose motions our limbs may be
dried up, and our prosperity. vanish like a shadow.
" This power belongs to Great Britain, and we
would be the last to question anything that is esta-
blished by law. Neither have we heretofore had any
reason to complain of its exercise or its effects.
" Peace, after twenty-five years war, public
debts, taxes, and paper systems, have occasioned
great changes in the state of trade all over the world,
and particularly in every past of the British domi-
nion.. There has been an universal derangement in
the money prices of everything. creating innumer-
able loses and difficulties in effecting the exchange
of the commodities of one country against those of
another, and consequent inconveniences and distresses
in all. Changes of existing laws have been effected
to meet this state of things in Great •Britain and Ire-
land. The Colonies have, however, been lost sight.of
altogether; or, if any Legislative Acts have been made,
nominally affecting them, the change has been to their

disadvantage.
" Lumber made up about one half of their exports,
or, in other words, they were supplied with one half
of the foreign goods which they required in exchange
for their lumber. An alteration has been made by the
Act of the 28th May last,which must greatly diminish
this trade, if not destroy it altogether. ‘Vheat,orother
agricultural produce, made up a great proportion of
the remainder of our exports, or articles to be given in
exchange for European goods. The state of trade to
which see have alluded, and which has produced such
a fall in the price of grain, has, in consequence of the
regulations of the lla itish Pai liament, excluded our
agricultural produce altogether from a market. The
granaries of our far mers, and the stores of our mer-
chants, are now loaded with wheat, and no price what-
ever can be obtained forthis article,which is of a perish-
able nature, and diminishing in intrinsic value daily :
while a great number of the farmers, having been so
imprudent as to get into debt, calculating on the usual
price for their grain, are in danger of seeing their
lands, their houses, their cattle, implements, and fur-
niture, altogether devoured in the Courts of Law, or
sold for not one half their usual value.
If this state of things were solely the result of
natural causes, or of our own acts, it would be silly
and useless to petition ; but, partially at least, it is
owing to the operation of British Statutes.
" These Statutes restrain us from trying to obtain
a market, and making our purchases all over the
world ; they restrain foreigners from coming here to
purchase or sell, should they be so inclined ; they
oblige us to have our goods carried solely. in British
ships. In short, they establish a monopoly of our
trade in favour of Great Britain : they oblige us to
buy and sell there ; and then, by the operation of the
Corn Laws, they enact, in effect, that we shall not
buy or sell at all. It is not the monopoly to which
we object; we adhere to the doctrine and language
of the Act of Parliament, which declares that " the
power of regulating the trade of the Colonies is essen-
tial to the general welfare of the British Empire." It
is the partial interdiction of all trade, by the opera-
tion of the Corn Laws, of which we complain. Fo-
reigners have no right to complain, because Great
Britain exercises no general controul over their trade;
and every nation of right makes such regulations as
it thinks proper with respect to the admission of fo-
reign goods and foreign produce within its own ter-
ritory. This right, common to all, leaves them upon
a parity, with means of retaliation and defence. But
we have no such right, we are British subjects, and
must submit to the regulations of the British Parlia-
ment. We have no defence, no means of protection,
but in the wisdom and equity of the British Govern-.
ment, to which we have a right to appeal, as British
subjects obedient and true.
While our surplus wheat, beyond what is re-
quires' for our own consumption, is lying, as we have
stated, in our granaries and stores, without the possi-
bility of obtaining any price, the same article is sell-
ing at New York at a dollar a bushel. In countries
chiefly agricultural, it is the export price that fixes
the home price. Were the same markets open to
our merchants as to those of New York, wheat at
Quebec ought to bring as much as at New York.
" The British Parliament, in the existing Corn
Law, made a distinction between the British colonies
and foreign countries, by admitting our wheat for
consumption at 675. sterling per quarter, while fo-
reign is excluded at /30s. This distinction, by the late
fall of price, which is likely to be permanent, is now
of no avail; so that, in point of fact, we are excluded
with foreigners, without the advantages which they
enjoy from the absence of the commercial restrictions
imposed on us by the British Statutes.
In the present state of the agriculturists in Great
Britain, we should be loth to ask anything which
would increase their burthens or diminish their profits.
We have reason to believe that the average of our
surplus grain, and our exports of the last twenty years,
even if the whole were to go to Great Britain, will
be found not to amount to two days' consumption of
the people of that country, a quantity which, even if
it were admitted on the same tooting as the produce
of our fellow-subjects at home, while it would be im-
portant to us, would scarcely be felt in the market there.
" Quebec, Anna 7, 1521.7 •

LONDON.

FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, IS2I.
MeTrultw.--lieliday at the Bask.

At a Court of the Proprietors of the Bank of Eng-
land, held yesterday, the proceedings of which will
be found in another part of our Paper, the subject of
the forgery of Bank notes was brought under dis-
cussion; when the CHAIRMAN announced, that the
result of all their boasted labours for the last two
years is an Entire Failure. If the object aimed at has
been to discover how an inimitable Bank note may
be made, nobody can be surprised at this want of
success; but it would be casting an unmerited re-
proach on the state to which the Arts have arrived
in this country, to suppose for a moment that there
could possibly be a failure in discovering a form of
note a hundred times more difficult to imitate than the
present. The want is not absolutely of a perfect note,
or one that should present no temptation to forgery,
but what other nations enjoy, and our own provincial
towns have long possessed—a better note than that
of the Bank of England ; one that shall not seduce
so many to the crime of forgery. Such a note the
Bank Directors have it easily in their power to pro-
cure; and they incur a serious culpability by every
hour's delay in lessening that extreme temptation to
crime which makes the forgery of Bank Notes more
prolific of victims than any other crime inthe calendar.
Another subject of interest brought into discussion
at this Meeting was, the Metallic Currency. It will
yield satisfaction to see an assurance from the high
authority of the Chairman, that the issue of specie is
not confined to the payment of £1 and £2 notes, but
that a holder of notes of any magnitude has only to
take them to the Bank, and to get the full amount
of them in the current coin of the realm. This is,
undoubtedly, a subject of rejoicing.

Yesterday both Houses of Parliament met, pur-
suant to prorogation from the 12th of July, when
they were further prorogued to Thursday, the 29th
of November. It is understood that another proro-
gation will take place. Parliament is, therefore, not
`expected to meet for the dispatch of business, in the