The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1846-06-09 00:00:00

1 stringent clauses which would have suited Mr,

Evan

Here they arc

AND W

HEREAS, the erection of warehouses for the re-
„„„,tc. ~,prphnudise uuon the ouays

port of Liverpool, will furnish additional security to mer-
chants, and will remove the opportunities which ric,w exist

for the commission of crime. BE IT TIIEREFORE
ENACTED, that the said trustees shall apply, and they
are hereby directed to apply in next ensuing session of
Parliament, to enable them to build warehouses upon
and around the quays of all the docks made or now being
made in Liverpool aforesaid, belonging to or under the con-

trol of the said trustees. And that the said trustees shall
not proceed with the construction of the Wapping Dock
and Basin, or with the construction of any other dock or
basin by this act authorised to be made to the east of

Kinv,'s Dock, or with the construction or enlargement of

the Salthouse Dock so respectively delineated as aforesaid
on the said plan, and described and comprised in the said
book of reference, or intended so to be delineated, de-
scribed, or comprised, until suchact of Parliament as
last afocesaid shall have been obtained.
AND BE IT FURTHER ENACTED, that no warehouses
shalt be pulled down, removed, or destroyed by the said
trustees, except such as it may be necessary to pull down,
remove, or destroy for the purpose of the intended rail-
way, but for no other purpose whatsoever, until the act
of Parliament for the erection of such warehouses as
aforesaid shall have been obtained by such trustees.

A comparison will show how far the committee
sympathised with this gentleman's policy.
We have already referred to the incongruous al-
liance patched up between Mr. Eyre Evans and the
Birkenhead Dock Commissioners to oppose this
Dock Bill—a bill wh'ch will effect more in the way
of giving facilities to the commerce of Liverpool than
any other Bill ever propounded to Parliament, and
is likely to inflict a most damaging blow to the inte-
rest of the Herculaneum Dock scheme; for with a
dock and warehouses east of the King's Dock, and
at the very mouth of the Railway Tunnel; with a
chain of Railways connecting the whole of the docks
from north to south with each other, and with this
tunnel ; the: undertaking in question must beseriously
injured. It will be seen, from our report, that the
landing accommodation on this side of the river is
left to be provided by the Dock Committee, accord-
ing to their original plan. Since the Commissioners
have placed themselves in the position of rivals to
the Dock Trustees, we can conceive some excuse
for their opposition to this bill ; but for Mr. Evans's
course of proceeding, we cannot find any legitimate
ground. Although he seems to think that the acreage
of the port has always kept pace with the tonnage,
and that, with even the present system of dock
working, instead of the 80 acres of dockage forming
at the north end of the town, 24 acres would meet
every requirement, yet the real facts of the case were
ably stated by the Chairman of the Dock Com-
mittee, at the last Council meeting. It was shown
that, in 1815, the docks and basins of the port
extended ol er 52 acres ; the tonnage was 709,849
tons, or 13,600 tons pet acre. In 1825, there were
71 acres of dock space ; tonnage, 1,233,820, or
17,200 tons per acre. In 1835, the dock room was
99 acres ; the tonnage 1,768,426, or, per acre,
17,800 tons. In 14145, the dock space was 120
acres; and the tonnage was 3,016,531, or 25,000
tons per acre! Our existing docks had to accom-
modate, in 1845, five times the tonnage turned out of
the London docks; and, assuming the port to remain
stationary, and all the new docks, now in progress
and proposed, to be in actual operation, we should
he at the present moment n precisely the same posi-
tion, as to comparative acreage and tonnage, that we
were in 1815, when the Prince's Dock was about to
be constructed !

The value of Mr. Evans's opinion, that the com-
merce of the port is likely to decline, may he judged
of from the following facts. In the session of 1344,
Mr. Evans, when examined before a committee of
parliament, appeared to think that the timber trade
was not likely to increase. The actual consumption
up to the commencement of the preceding year,
1543, had been thirteen millions odd. To that of
1844, however, it incr:ased to fourteen millions
odd ; to that of 1845, to thirty-one millions odd ;
and to the commencement of the present year,
it has risen to 35 millions odd ! With respect to
the general tonnage of this declining (!) port, Mr.
Bramley Moore informs us that, notwithstanding
the increase of last year, amounting to the enor-
mous sum of 383,000 tons, the increase in the pre-
sent year, up to the 2d instant, was the further
amount of 152,509 tons. Such a statement speaks
volumes in favour of the course adopted by the able
Chairman of the Dock Committee and his col-
leagues.

Tho Corn and Customs Bill may now be con-
sidered to be, in effect, carried. We are, as a com-
munity, embarked upon the current of free trade
and competition, with each other and with the
world. It is time, therefore, that we were beginning
to enquire what is the course which we are to pur-
sue, and what the exertions which we have to make
to enable us to sustain ourselves under the coming
struggle. Let us first take the case of the agricul-
turist, for upon him the pressure will first fall.
We shall presume that the promoters of our free
trade policy can now afford to lay aside the delusive
sophistries which they have used in the course
of their advocacy of that policy. They will admit
to the farmer that he will be called upon to sell his
grain for a reduced price. For a time, probably—
in the present state of foreign cultivation, and with
the deficient continental crop of last year—the re-
duction will not be great. For a time the opening
of our markets may raise prices abroad ; but even,
at present, it will not be contended that foreign
prices can rise to the rate of those in British
markets. They will most likely meet midway at
first, with a downward tendency, as the foreign cul-
tivator directs more of his energies towards supply-
ing our demand. The farmer must therefore pre-
pare to reap a profit from his capital and industry
with diminished prices for the produce of his land.
How is this to be done? " Improved cultivation,
more perfect agricultural implements, draining, fenc-
ing, manuring," is the reply which we shall hear.
But all these things imply the possession of ade-
quate capital, of which, perhaps, the farmer is not
in possession. The resource •f those who are un-
happily in this emergency, must, of necessity, be the
landlord, who must assist them, either by direct ad-
vances, or by forbearance in the collection of rent.
But where neither farmer nor landlord have the ne-
cessary capital—where the former is a small holder
only, with small means, living from hand to mouth,
and only a grade or two removed from the condi-
tion of a labourer, and the iatter cannot go a day
beyond the stipulated term for the receipt of the
rent, which is his sole available income, what is to
be done ? The answer is obvious. Such a man
must resign his farm to the agricultural capitalist,
who alone can develop fully the resources of the
land, and withstand the competition to which agri-
cultural industry is exposed. Such small farmers
must become labourers.
But the class above this have also sacrifices to
make; and those sacrifices will not be made with

great alacrity. Personal and household expenses
will have to be diminished. A riding horse or two,
it will be found necessary to dispense with ; music
lessons must be curtailed in quantity, although the
piano-forte may remain in the now modestly fur-
nished parlour; a Yorkshire school, of the Squeers
sort, may become the substitute of the academies at
present resorted to for education by the young
gentleman farmer. The Leger, or the Derby, the
cup at Ascot or at Goodwood, may be run for with-
out the trim white cords, the well polished top-
boots, or the sganking hunter of that young gentle•
man, being seen upon the course. In a word—and
we sly it not in mockery, although some of the
class of whom we speak are not the best specimens
of humanity, whose reducti6n in the social scale to
make a-grievance of—the race of gentlemen farmers
must descend into the condition of practical far-
mers, lay aside guns and dogs, hunters and scarlet.
coats, and look after the more profitable occupation
of improving turnip crops and fattening cattle. To
this class we would recommend the very different
course of action, pursued by our scientific farmers
—by men, even, who although not dependent upon
farming as a business, devote to the improvement of
agriculture an amount of industry and painstaking
which is infinitely creditable to them. We have a
few instances in our own town, of gentlemen who,
although immersed in vast commercial undertakings,
are not ashamed of resorting to cultivation of the
land, nay, even delight in the pursuit, and may, with
justice, pride themselves in the success which at-
tends their efforts and their liberality. We have to
record in our columns, this day, the forward state of
the crops of a gentleman of this town, Mr. Harold
Littledale, whose entire farming manege will chal-
lenge the admiration of the most experienced prac-
tical agriculturist, and whose example it would be
most creditable and profitable, at the same time, for
the race of young country squireens to follow.
A sacrifice, too, of no ordinary magnitude in their
eyes, mush be made by the agricultural capitalists,
and the great landowner himself. We shall: pro-