The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1840-02-14 00:00:00

COLONIAL INTELLIGENCE.

NEWFOUNDLAND.
(From the Newfoundland Times of Jan. 15.)
The following is a transcript of the address from the mem-
bers of her Majesty's Council, in answer to his Excellency's
speech at the opening of the present session of the legislature :
To His Excellency Henry Prescott, Esq., Companion of the
Most. Honourable Military Order of the Bath, Governor
and Commander-in-Chief in and otter the Island of New-
foundland and it. Dependencies, iFfie.;
May it please your Excellency,—We, her Majesty's most
dutiful and loyal subjects the Council of Newfoundland, beg.
leave to approach your Excellency to express our humble
thanks for your gracious speech at the opening of the presc.ut
session of the legislature.
We have heard from your Excellency with much s,tiscae-
tion that the Geological Surveyor has laid before your Excel-
lency an interesting report of the progress he has nicaie in
his important labours, which we shall feel gratified in receiv-
ing whenever your Excellency may be enabled to transmit
the same to us, in fulfilment of your Excellency's exprssed
intentions.
We beg to assure your Excellency that the subject of the
alienation of Crown Lands shall receive our most careful at-
tention and serious consideration as soon as the documents
to which your Excellency has made reference shall be laid
before us. ..
The subject of roads, in common with all other matters
incident to the welfare of the colony, rill, we beg to assure
your Excellency, on all occasions, claim our earnest consi-
deration.

To this address His Excellency was pleased to return the
Following answer :7

Mr. President, and Hon. Gentlemen of the Council,
I thank you for this address, which, in the assurance it
contains of your intention to take into consideration all mat-
ters incident to the welfare of the colony, has given me much
gratification.
Government House, 11th January, 1840.

THE COLONIES.
Unfavourable winds have kept us bare of news from the
colonies this week ; hut the more important branches of
colonial policy can now obtain a fair share of public regard
without the stimulus of fresh arrivals. Every body must
have observed a considerable change in this respect. Till
within the last three or four years, to procure attention to
the affairs of the British colonial empire, from any numerous
body of persons, was extremely difficult. Merchants, whose
commerce lay in that line, of course took care to obtain such
information as their operations required ; but the people
generally regarded colonial subjects with ignorant indifference.
Their ignorance'of the value—nay, even of the geographical
position—of many great provinces and dependencies of this
country, was indeed disgraceful. We question even now,
whether many, who pass for well informed, do not fancy
Demerara, for instance, to be an island ; and within the last
fortnight a writer in a leading newspaper of the metropolis
alluded to St. Christopher as one of the most important of
the West India coloiiies. However. the days of this igno-
rance are passing away ; and it is no slight symptom of im-
provement that the landowners and farmers in the Irish
county of Galway could assemble to hear an exposition of
the new principle of colonization, and set an excellent exam-
ple to the proud inhabitants of bublin and Belfast, by com-
mencing subscriptions to an emigration fund, as the surest
means of diminishing pauperism. One of the most useful
and practical provisions of the Irish poor-law, is that which
enables the rate-payers to levy a tax for the purpose of con-
veying emigrants to countries where the demand for labour
insures good wages, and places it in every man's power to
earn a comfortable subsistence. The lead which Galway has
taken cannot be too speedily followed in other counties of
Ireland.—Colonial Gazette.
COLONIES AND EMIGRATION,
We have seen, and the world has seen with wonder, the
astonishing rapidity with which the ancient British colonies
in North America have advanced in their career of prosperity,
since the day on which they renounced allegiance to Eng-
land. No one believes that, had they remained in subjec-
tion to the mother country, the same magnificent results
would have been obtained ; nor have we seen in any of our
other possessions, though many local advantages full equal,
indeed superior, to those of North America—that those ad-
vantages have turned to account to an extent that can, in the
most distant manner, he compared with the unparalleled de-
velopement of the United States. Some enthusiasts may
attribute these effects to the magic influence of democratic
institutions; but highly as we esteem the advantages of
popular government, we are not prepared to look to it as a
panacea for every social evil. The history of the Spanish
colonies affords striking proof that independence alone does
not secure prosperity ; while the improvement that has taken
place in the still independent island of Cuba, shows that
even a very imperfect system of government at home does
not preclude the possibility of an enlightened s stem of ad-
ministration in a distant colony. It ought to be our study,
then, to trace the causes that have led to the advancement of
the United States since the period of their independence,
and to study whether the same causes cannot be put into
operation in onr resnalnint colonies, without awaiting-their
separation from the mother country.
The causes to which we are disposed to attribute the chief
share in the prosperity of the United States are the total ab-
sence of restraint upon domestic industry, and an admirably
arranged system of emigration to the waste lands of the in-
terior—a system that could scarcely be improved, as far as
the interest of the whites is concerned. But are these causes
of a nature not to admit their application to British colo-
nies? Is there a rational ground that can be adduced why
the trade of Jamaica with foreign countries should be placed
on a less liberal footing than that of Ireland? or why the
sugar of the former would not be admitted into the markets
of England with as little restraint as the oats and butter of
the latter? If Jamaica is, as we maintain it to be, an inte-
gral portion of the British empire, there can be no reason
why the produce of Jamaica should not be admitted into
Middlesex and Surrey upon the same terms as the produce of
Yorkshire or Munster; and if it is just that the merchant of
Hull or Dublin be allowed to import his wines from Bor-
deaux, and export his fabrics to hamburg, without being
compelled to the circuitous route of London, there can be no
rational ground for refusing the same Acility to the merchant
of Kingston. Instead of such a system, however, we
have established one founded on principles diametri-
cally opposed to those of a free intercourse. From a
selfish dread lest foreign nations should in any way parti-
cipate in the commerce of our distant possessions, we
have almost wholly excluded foreigners from an inter-
course with our colonies ; and we have compelled those
colonies not only to bring their produce exclusively into the
home market, lint also to purchase from the mother country
alone whatever European commodities may be necessary to
the supply of their real or imaginary wants. To confine them
thus to one market, both as sellers and purchasers, is to set
artificial limits to their powers of production, and to force
them, in many instances, to buy their supplies at a higher
price and of a worse quality than if placed on the same foot-
ing as Ireland and Scotland. In the last-named country
would manufacturing industry ever have attained its present
importance, if the same principle had been put in force by
which we have been guided in the administration of the more
distant portions of our empire? If we wish the prosperity of
our colonies to equal that of the United States, we must
study to imitate the system of America; and we may rely
upon it that when the same causes are brought into play, the
same effects will not be slow in manifesting themselves.
If we consent to place the colonial trade on the same foot-
ing as the coasting trade, a new system of taxation, we are
aware, must be adopted; for if the sugar, coffee, cotton, and
wines, of our colonies are admitted freely into the mother
country, a substitute must be found for the revenue now
raised on these articles. A large proportion of the deficiency,
however, which would arise, would be cheerfully borne by
the colonies themselves ; and by throwing open the colonial
trade to foreign nations, a new source of revenue, and of no
insignificant amount, would be created in the duties paid on
foreign goods imported into the colonies. In the mother
country also, it may fairly be expected, the stimulus that
would be given to the shipping and manufacturing interests
would render every other branch of the revenue much more
productive that it now is ; while the low price at which all
descriptions of colonial produce would be sold to the con-
sumer would not only stimulate trade, by an almost incalcu-
lable increase in the consumption, but reconcile the people at
the same time, to the imposition of such taxes as might be
found necessary for the maintenance of public faith.
Speculations of so vast a compass may seem visionary to
many, but there is no part of them of which the execution is
not practicable ; and if once realized, far from leading to
financial embarrassment, they would ensure a developement
of national greatness, and an increase of revenue, inuneasur.
ably beyond anything that the most sanguine can anticipate
from a perseverance in the present system.
The plan of commercial reform, which wehave here hastily
sketched, would necessitate many other changes. As we
should have to look to the colonies for no inconsiderable por-
tionverwnomueldnt ,halNi,keeltyot oh
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of
ntyhe;
of the national revenue, it would follow that a system of
inhabitants,gceoof men, with English blood in their veins, would
fi
on
rt enron a r
al
long submit to taxation imposed ulion them, either directly
or indirectly, by the Colonial Office in Downing-street. A.
system of domestic legislation, consequently, wholly inde-
pendent, as long as it acted upon certain fixed constitutional
principles, would become the inalienable right of each Bri-
tish colony, as soon as it contained a population sufficiently
large to enter on the exercise of self-government. Each co-
lony, then, in the administration of all interests of a purely
domestic character, would become as independent of the mo-
ther country as the several States of America are of the fe-
deral congress sitting at Washington ; and the Imperial Par-•
liament would cease to be cognizant of all matters except
such as concerned the general welfare of the whole British
nation, in and out of Europe.
Whether a system so simple and just will ever be adopted
by Great Britain towards her colonies, may fairly be doubted ;
but of this we are well assured, that without some great mo-
dification of the present oppressive, impolitic, and restrictive
plan of government, there is not on: of our colonies which,
when it teels itself sufficiently strong to do so, will not hasten to
sever the bond that unites it to the mother country.—Monthly
Chronicle.

QUEEN ELIZABETH AT HATFIELI).-ICI a goodly chamber
well hung with costly arras that was in the Palace of Hatfield,
there sat a lady of a very commendable aspect, though it
wore an expression somewhat serious withal. She was young—
that is to say nigh unto five-and-twenty years of age—and
looked to be of a fair stature. The hair of a light red tint,
whereof the greater part was concealed under a small caul of
gold thread, was combed up from the forehead, showing a
right delicate complexion and a brow of a famous thoughtful-
ness. Her dress was a close-vested robe of a sober colour,
and without ornament that had anything noticeable about it
save its extreme simplicity ; indeed, in her whole attiring,
seemly though it was, there was evidence of a wonderful
modesty in the wearer, and a marvellous freedom from that
common vanity of the sex that delighteth in the wearing of
gaudy apparel. She sat in a cushioned arin-chair of oak,
close upon the hearth, seemingly as if gazing upon the log
that was burning on the fire-dogs, for it was on the 17th of
November—holding in her lap what looked to be a missal or
other work of the like kind, used by Catholics in their devo-
tions • and she wore a rosary round bet; neck, to which there
was affixed an ivory cross. This was no other than the Lady
Elizabeth, at that time residing' in 'a sort of 'honourable
durance, at the royal palace of Hatfield, by command of her
sister Queen Mary.—The Piyche, a new pest:la:Al.