The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1849-02-20 00:00:00

TO CORRESPONDENTS.

There is no doubt considerable truth in the pointed rebuke of
"A Sufferer," who, after noticing the immense business done
on 'Change, the good attendance at the four theatres, the
balls and concerts almost every day of the week, and the
large collections for the charities, asks how it is that trades-
men's bills remain unpaid in so many instances. He says
that lie cannot collect .E 5, and considers that the public
should be just before they are generous.
"WEEKLY PURCHASER."—We cannot find any authentic data
to determine the question of our correspondent, as to the
respective tonnages of the ports of London and Liverpool.
All that we take cognizance of in this port is the tonnage of
vessels entering our docks from foreign ports. Coasting ves-
sels, as paying no dock dues, are not noted. It is the same
in London, where the coasting trade is almost exclusively
accommodated in the river. The tonnage from foreign ports
to Liverpool last year, we believe, exceeded that of London.
The entire tonnage, foreign and coastwise, entering the
Thames, would no doubt exceed the entire tonnage entering
the Mersey.

Elie Rtherpool &tanbarb.

TUESDAY MORNII

VG, FEB. 20, 1849

THE Government measure for the abolition of
England's naval supremacy is at length before the

public ; and we must confess that its framers have
shewn themselves perfect masters of their business.
There is no hesitation evinced; no half-way work.
The bill is trenchant and sweeping enough, and
will do its work; will strike at the very heart of
England a blow, which will be felt and deplored,
long after its infatuated or dishonest authors have
been visited with the contempt of their fellow-
countrymen and the world. _ _

The- objects and operation of the bill may be
regarded as threefold. In the first place, upon the
plea that the population of our Canadian posses-
sions experience a difficulty in carrying on their
commerce with the far west of America, under the
restrictions to which they are subjected by our
navigation laws, the whole of the carrying trade of
our colonies in every quarter of the globe is to be
thrown open to the foreign shipowner. By doing
this, we are told, we shall be conferring incalcula-
ble advatages on the colonist, and—strangest result
of all !—the abrogation of this last link of a con-
nexion, which it has been the studied object of all
our recent policy to break, is to "unite our colonies
by the ties of interest and affection to the mother
country." Why, the only ground upon which the
demand for this concession is made by some of our
colonial dependencies, is that the mother country
has ceased to treat them as colonies; that she no
longer fosters and encourages their industry; that
the idea of any tie of interest or affection remaining
betwixt us and themselves is a cruel mockery.
The second branch of the bill is the uncon-
ditional surrender of those provisions of the
navigation laws, by which we have at present
secured to us what is called the long voyage trade,
a most valuable feature of which privilege was
its tendency to make Great Britain the principal
depot for the produce of distant countries. In
admitting the foreigner to a participation in this
trade, we not only give up the most profitable source
of employment for our commercial marine, but
strike a blow against interests which are at present
congratulating themselves upon their complete se-
curity. What, for instance, is to prevent a large
portion of the Foreign and Colonial produce, at
present deposited in the warehouses of London,
Liverpool, Bristol, and other British ports, from
ig a location more central for re-export, or for
continental, or even for home, consumption, in
Hamburg, Marseilles, or elsewhere ?
That some slight modification of this portion of
the existing laws may be required we have never
denied. On the contrary, we have advocated such
an alteration as that proposed in the draft of a
Bill prepared by Mr. Henry Cleaver Chapman,
which we are glad to find has met with the unquali-
fied approval of the Liverpool Shipowners' Asso-
ciation. The following is the clause to which we

"11. And be it enacted, That Goods may be imported
into the United Kingdom, and to all British Possessions,
to be used therein, not only in British Ships, but also in
ships of any such Foreign Country of which the Goods
are the Produce, or in ships of any such Foreign Coun-
try from which the Goods are last imported ; Provided
lly granted by any
;h Goods solely in

always similar privileges
such other Country, otherwise any

British ship

Such a clause we contend would satisfy every prac-
tical man, not absolutely bent upon the destruc-
tion of the commercial marine of his country, and
would be in accordance with strict justice to all
parties. Nothing can be more certain than that
concessions made by us ought to be met with re-
ciprocal concessions by the foreigner, except the
fact that unless we stipulate for such a return, as
the coedit

l Lion,

t will be

id

A new feature of the present measure is the pro-
posal to throw open, to a certain extent, the coag:
ing trade of Great Britain.
___MtV .TfiiT ale- pre-
House thatthr ednibin-ing a foreign and a coasting
Voyage, apply equally to foreign and British ship-
ping, and were created with a view, mainly, as far
as the latter is concerned, to protect the revenue,
Mr. Labouchere thus announces his new proposal:

" I intend, then, to propose that all vessel% whether
English or foreign, sailing from a British port, grid bound
to a foreign port, shall be allowed to touch at any inter-
mediate ports in the United Kingdom ; not to carry car-
goes from port to port, .but to clear out for a foreign voy-
age. I have been in communication with the officers of
the Board of Customs upon this point, and I have satis-
fied myself that it can be done consistently with the
safety of the revenue, provided one restriction be imposed
—I mean that this permission shall not be allowed to ves-
sels of less than 100 tons burden. The reason for this is,
that apprehensions were entertained that an English ves-
sel might acquire facilities for smuggling by having high
duty goods on board ostensibly for a foreign voyage, but
in reality intended to be smuggled into a British port by
uniting a British voyage with a foreign. Ido not think
this facility will to any extent be taken advantage of. My
own opinion is that-the light dues and the various other
charges to which the coasting trade is subject would pre-
vent both English and foreign merchants from conducting
a coasting trade under these circumstances. Still, for the
reasons I have stated, I think it advisable to give the faci-
lities to the extent I have mentioned, and I am of opinion

hall altogether meet the
an (Mr. Gladstone),
I obtain from America

dopting this course w
_ ent of the right hon. gentler
and it will enable us to asl

iat which, considering the liberal manner on which we
.e disposed to trade with her, it is but just that our mer,

,pants should recei'

The only inducement held out to us for adopting
s vital and ruinous change is a vague promise of
the American Charge d'Affaires, Mr. Bancroft, that
he United States will reciprocate with us. So far
t country is concerned we might possibly
some advantage from this portion of the
cheine. But as a return for the whole of the sur-
render, which we are called upon to make, of our
colonial and long voyage trade, the mere privilege
of landing a portion of our cargoes at New York, and
filling up there with good s for New Orleans, or Phila-
delphia, is a perfect mockery. So far as Europe is
cerned, the concession will he without the pos-
-ty of any reciprocal advantages being derived,
ist be most ruinous in its results. The
of the

as th

shinninff of

weden and o

per countrie

is may come, say to Newcastle or Sunderland,
with Baltic produce, and having discharged the
bulk of it, retaining only a few packages in order
to comply with the letter of the act, take in coals
for the London market, and afterwards compete
there with the British shipowner for a foreign out-
ward cargo. What the result must be of such a
measure to the shipowners and maritime population
of the Tyne and Wear, and to the coasting trade
generally, we need scarcely state.

But how has Mr. Labouchere been able to get
ever the difficulty, to obviate which was the object
for which the original restriction, applicable to both
British and foreign ships, against combining a fo-
reign with a coasting voyage, was imposed ? How
will he be able to protect the revenue from serious
loss by smuggling ? He does not tell us; but
says that the consideration which he has given to
the subject has assured him that it is practicable ;
and that he has been in communication with the
officers of the Board of Customs on the subject.
We know not what may he the impressions of
London Customs' Officers, or even of the very
wise board itself ; but we can assure him that
experienced custom-house officers here maintain
a very different opinion, and are convinced
smuggling upon a most extensive scale
jould be carried on under this provision of
the Dill, with scarcely a chance of detection, unless,
indeed, the country is to be saddled with a whole
army of additional custom-house officials, and the
same strictness of search extended to the coasting
trade which is now exercised over our foreign trade.
But, of course, neither the interests of the revenue,
nor any other consideration, can he permitted to
stand in the way of the carrying out of the pet prin-
ciples of free trade.

Thus far the measure is directed principally
against the shipowner and the seaman; but here it
was scarcely in the nature of Whig legislation to
atop. The trades.connected with the building and
rigging of our commercial marine must also be en-

gulphed. Mr. Labouchere proposes that "a British
merchant is to be allowed to register a foreign Bri-

tish ship—that is, a ship built -abroad by a'British
merchant—as a British ship ;" and he adds, with
the utmost coolness, " this is proposed in order to
break up the monopoly which at present exists in
shipbuilding." In other, and plainer words, the
free traders want cheap foreign labour to add to
their catalogue of other cheap articles. The ship-
wrights, the blockmakers, and other trades con-
nected with shipbuilding, are to turn their hands
to other employments, if they can find them, or
turn their faces towards the union workhouse.
These classes, however, he says, notwithstanding
the breaking up of what he calls "their monopoly,"
have " nothing whatever to fear from this proposed
alteration of the law." Nothing, of course, except
the certainty that for every foreign vessel to be pur-
chased, a British vessel will cease to be wanted and
to be built; nothing but the certainty that, to ena-
ble our builders to compete with the foreign buil-
der, he must enable the over-taxed British carpen-
ter to exist upon the pittance which provides black
bread, greens, and fish oil or tallow for the Russian
and the Swede ! Mr. Labouchere has even the
hardihood to attempt to prove his position. He
endeavours to show us that, in the trade of ship-
building, we possess some advantages over the
American builder. But he omits altogether the
fact, proved beyond a possibility of dispute by the
evidence given before the packed committee on the
navigation laws, that the countries on the shores of
the Baltic can furnish a good vessel, completely
fitted for sea, for a sum, per ton, which will not
cover the cost of the hull of a very second-rate
British ship. Admitting, however, that, from their
superiority of construction and timber, a few first-
class British vessels may continue to be built, there
can be little doubt that the foreigner will have a
vast harvest before him, in the demand for the class
of vessels suitable for our immense coasting trade,
the building of which we thus resign into his hands.
We shall not enter upon the consideration of the
subsidiary measures, which are to follow this inroad
upon the principles of a system which has mainly
contributed to secure the maritime greatness of this
country. We have said enough already to show
that nothing but its utter prostration, and the ruin
of all classes connected with it, will satisfy the fac-
tion now at the head of affairs. Our duty is now
to ask of these classes, to ask of all loyal men, who
love their country, and can estimate alike the
sources of its past growth in power and prosperity—
are they prepared to fall without a struggle ? We
are aware that there is at present existing a sad
lethargy in the public mind, a hopelessness of the
success of any effort to stem the tide which is set-
ting towards ruin and revolution, a distrust in
leaders and in statesmen, nay, almost a despairing
conviction that God himself has ceased to watch
over and care for the destinies of this land. These
feelings must be thrown aside. Now, upon this
very measure there is the ground for an effective
stand. We are not all deserted. We are not,
either, without the instrumentalities for effecting a
triumphant issue of the struggle. A House of
Commons, elected under the influence of a delusion,
which no longer sways the intelligent mass of the
community, may be deaf alike to remonstrance.
warning, or reproof. But, " thank God ! we have
a House of Lords." The phalanx led on in that
house by the indomitable champion of constitu-
tional liberty, Lord Stanley, is strong enough to
defeat this mischievous and suicidal measure ; and,
we say it advisedly, they will do it if they are pro-
perly supported by public opinion out of doors. Let
the merchants and shipowners of Liverpool resolve
to imitate the excellent example set them by the
inhabitants of Toxteth-park ; let them make their
opinions known by the voice of a town's meeting,
and their opinions must have weight, if not with
the present House of Commons, at all events with
the right-hearted and chivalrous peers of England.
We would even go the length of the advice given
by one of the speakers, Mr. H. C. Chapman, to
the Toxteth meeting, and urge upon the throne
that a measure so vital as the repeal of the naviga-
tion laws ought not to he decided without an ap-
peal to the constituencies. Republican France has
just repudiated the opinions of an assembly elected
under the influence of mob dictation and mad
excitement, and we have an equal right to ask that
our fate stall not be decided by a House of Com-
mons similarly elected, under the influence of folly,
delusion, and unconstitutional fraud.

WE informed our readers last week of some im-
portant facts, connected with the resumption of the
Dock Works at"Birkenhead, which we have reason
to believe have been rpsciypiegtiai In
tisf.ArtifghiCorthe Mersey : indeed, we may say,
by a large portion of the community on both sides
of the river; for it can have been no satisfaction to
any party to contemplate the dreary wreck, which
has for a long time been presented in a locality, of
which such large anticipations of public usefulness
were entertained, and the sacrifice of property and
the ruin to many individuals which the stoppage of
these works has occasioned. It is with pleasure, there-
fore, that we are enabled to confirm our previous
report, and even to add some encouraging particu-
lars. In the first place, however, as they are not
very generally known, it may be well to explain
more in detail than we were previously able to do
what are the precise works, upon which the new
trustees are about to expend the money raised
under the provisions of their act.
It will be remembered that the original plan em-
braced the formation of the great low-water basin,
the outer walls of which are partly completed ; and
that this basin was to be connected with the great
inner float and other works by a gut, and scoured
by means of an expensive system of subaqueous
force. The formation of the Egerton and Morpeth
Docks was a deviation from the original plan; and
upon these, and the uncompleted walling, the funds
at the disposal of the trustees were exhausted. It
is proposed to leave the outer basin and its suba-
queous sluices for the present untouched; and to
take measures first, by the formation of a temporary
dam, from a point near the western gut of the Eger-
ton Dock to the nearest point on the Seacombe side
of the pool, to pen up the waters in the great inner
float, and thus to render it at once available for
wharfs, timber yards, and other purposes as origin-
ally intended. The entrance to the float will be
from the Woodside Basin through the Morpeth and
Egerton Docks, the gates of which are to be
deepened to afford water and space for vessels of
the largest burthen. These works, of practical and
immediate usefulness, the trustees have found that
they can execute within the means at their disposal,
economically applied; and they confidently expect
that, when they are completed, they will he put in
possession of an income sufficient not only to pay
the interest of the preferential bonds, but also to
spare something towards the payment of the arrears
due to the original bondholders. A sensible relief
will also be afforded by this judicious course to the
owners of frontage and other lands, Pn the margin
of the pool, which have recently been unsaleable,
except at ruinous sacrifices. Indeed, we learn that
several applications to purchase have been made
during the past week.

It is not itt all contemplated that the works will
for any length of time be stopped here. The entire
scheme will ultimately, but cautiously, be carried
out; and the outlay required for the construction
of the temporary dam will not by any means be
lost, but, on the contrary, afford important facilities
for the construction of the apparatus for scouring,
the gates, &c., which were originally to be placed
'at the main entrance from the outer basin, for
which coffer dams must otherwise have been put
down. A few more unimportant works will, we
believe, be required, and are in course of being put
into operation. On Thursday last, a force of about
150 excavators and others were at work ; and this
week the number will be largely increased.
From the great stake in the undertaking held by
the gentlemen who represent in the trust the
original bondholders, there is now, happily, the
utmost certainty that every department of the works
will be most faithfully and
i watchfully superin-
tended; and that no collateral interest will be per-
mitted to sway them in the execution of their duties.
The docks will be regarded as purely an investment,
not, as in times past, subsidiary to building or land
speculations. To ensure a strict surveillance on
the spot, on Wednesday last an adjourned general
meeting of the trustees was held, at which a gen-
tleman of Liverpool, unconnected personally with
any leading interests on either side of the water,
although intimately conversant with the general
bearings and requirements of the business of the
port, and of known high character and experience
in public works, was elected to supply the place of
one of the trustees of the bondholders who had
resigned; and from our personal knowledge of the
gentleman in question, we feel confident that his

presence on the board is a circumstance for all
interested in the success of the work to congratu-
late themselves upon.
There is one consideration, connected with this
changed state of things, which affords subject for
deep reflection. For the interests of Birkenhead
any change for the better—any progress of a work
upon whose successful completion their prosperity
so largely depends—must be advantageous. But
it seems certain now that, if ever the idea of again
attaching the property at Wallasey Pool to the
Dock Estate of Liverpool was seriously entertained,
the opportunity of so doing upon the same favour-
able terms as were at one time within our reach has
gone by. It is quite possible that the opportunity
thus lost may become to Liverpool interests a sub-
ject for regret. There is no necessity, it is true,
thatthe two estates should be worked in antagonism
to each other. They may, however, be so conducted.

THE boast of the Whig-Radical party, when out
of office, has for years been the superior efficacy of
their policy in tranquillizing Ireland, and producing
in that distracted country social and industrial re-
generation. Out of office, they bad been in the
habit of denouncing, as insulting and oppressive,
every measure not framed in accordance with their
pattern of the hour. But, in office, they have in-
variably slunk from the performance of their most
emphatic promises ; and adopted either the same
policy, which they condemned when advocated by
their opponents, or some unintelligible and time-
serving policy of their own, which only seemed to
aggravate the evil it was designed to cure. What,
thus far, are the Irish measures of her Majesty's
present Whig Government ? We have had an-
nounced only the continuance of the Habeas Cor-
pus Suspension Act and a miserable dole of £50,000
for the relief of Irish distress; a dole which will be
exhausted in a week—an atom of food held to the
lips of a famishing man—an offering just sufficient
to provoke the leech-like craving of Irish indolence
and habitual beggary.

Yet when was the condition of this unhappy
country more full of practical difficulty; when did
it more require the active remedial efforts of sound
and firm statesmanship ? It is not merely factious
and mendacious agitation which is now convulsing
her, but the total uprooting of the framework of
society, the prostration of every branch of industry,
the total dependence of a large portion of her peo-
ple upon the eleemosynary aid of the British Go-
vernment to put food into the mouths of that
portion at least who are not preparing to throw
themselves for support upon the resources to be
found in distant lands. The loss of the potato crop
has done its work ; the cessation of cultivation of
the soil throughout a large portion of the country,
and the impossibility of an agricultural population
carrying on their operations upon a vicious system,
and with only the rudest appliances, will do the
rest. In another season, with such legislation as
we are thus far promised, Ireland will present to
British statesmanship a difficulty absolutely in-
surmountable.
We have but two prospects before us, the result
of our present imbecile policy towards that coun-
try. We must keep the bulk of the people of
Ireland, or allow them to eat up the property of
the soil. A large number of her Poor-law Unions
are at present in a state of hopeless insolvency;
and the rates in others are with difficulty endured.
Every where the spectacle presents itself of those,
who have the means left within their reach, desert-
ing the sinking vessel; rushing from the cry of
suffering, which they can no longer relieve, and
from an abyss in which they feel themselves rapidly
sinking. To stay at home is to starve, to be re-
duced to pauperism, or to live upon the accumu-
lated industry of their neighbours. To adventure
themselves, without capital, and with their present
habits, in any other land is only to flee from a
known to an unknown evil. To England, at all
events, their nearest and accustomed refuge, they
can only come to beg, to fill our prisons, or to
drive our own industrious population to pauperism
and the Workhouse. Certainly, if there was ever
a state of things which imperatively called for a
government possessed of fertility of resources, of
indomitable courage and energy, and of practical
knowledge, of firmness to resist alike the clamour
of habitual mendicancy and the flippant dictation
of ignorant quacks and selfish demagogues, it is
to be found in the condition of Ireland at the
present moment.
We must—the times imperatively call for it—have
a government capable of grappling with the great
social problem which Ireland presents, and resolved
to tuy.,,the caustic, if healing salve will not suffice,
great empire, If, in the. prieea +jr4qAd,PAl
the House of Commons and the present dislocation
of parties, such a government cannot be found; if,
amongst the representatives of Ireland herself,
there is scarcely to be found a member returned
for any other qualification than his adhesion or
his opposition to Repeal; and amongst those of
England the question of the condition of Ireland
has been regarded as one of importance by the
consituences; we must now in our cooler and
more collected moments, take measures to impress
upon her Majesty's advisers, or, if necessary, upon
the Sovereign herself, the absolute necessity of our
being permitted the privilege of returning a House
of Commons more accurately representing the
changed convictions and opinions of her people.
To .every human being in this empire—to the
capitalist, the merchant, the shopkeeper, and the
working man—the prompt solution of the Irish
problem is a matter of almost life and death
interest. We must neither suffer that country to
become a social pandemonium, nor our own to be
inundated by its disease, its filthiness and its

beggary.

WHEN our Manchester friends get up a case for
fussy interference, it would add much to the in-
fluence of their exertions if they would endeavour
to he correct in their facts. During the past week,
we observe, they have been getting up a little steam
to oppose the bill now before Parliament for the
rating of the Liverpool Dock Estate; and if the
deputation, which has proceeded to London for
this purpose, have gone with their case as stated
by the Guardian of Saturday last, they will impose
most egregiously upon the credulity of those
honourable members whom they may favour with
their communications.
The Guardian says, one effect of this bill, if it
passes, will be to compel the Dock Trustees to
raise their dock dues. We can assure our
contemporary that no such effect is at all likely to
occur; that, in fact, notwithstanding a reduction
of forty per cent. in those dues last year, our dock
receipts showed a surplus over expenditure of
£35,000; and that during the eight months which
have elapsed of the present year, there has accrued
a further surplus of £15,000, which is expected to
be increased to £25,000, making a total of £60,000
surnlus over current exnenditure. Instead, there-
fore, of any raising d the dues, there is every
probability that the Estate can not only contribute
its fair proportion to those local burthens, which it
assits in creating, but even afford, although already
the cheapest port in the empire, a further reduction.
Our contemporary is a little magnificent as to
the importance to be attached to his own locality;
and a little oblivious, at the same tia.le, of his
political economy. lie says, "We believe we do
not overstate the matter when we estimate the
amount of the Liverpool dock dues paid by this
city and the surrounding manufacturing district,
at little, if at all, less than three-fourths of the
entire revenue arising from that source." If our
contemporary means that dock dues, or any other
charges, upon imports, or upon the vessels bring-
ing them, form a portion of the price to be paid
for them, he is so far right; but the Manchester
manufacturer no more pays those charges out of
his own pocket than the original importer. Po-
litical economy teaches that the consumer, whether
home or foreign, is the ultimate paymaster.
We shall not attempt to argue with our con-
temporary the question as to the justice of the
measure. Perhaps if he was a Liverpool rate-
payer, and had to pay for shipping back to their
miserable homes the shoals of Irish paupers, which
the manfacturing districts periodically throw upon
our streets to starve, or beg, or plunder, he would
not object to the commerce of the entire kingdom—
for that is the real object sought to be taxed—being
made to contribute the same share towards the
local burthens, as it would be liable to do if the
docks and quays, a large portion of which has been
abstracted from the rateable area of the parish,
were in thy; hands of private individuals. It should
be remembered that the Doek Estate of Liverpool
is the on'ty similar property in, the kingdom which
is not
*rated to the local burthens. If our Matt-
chelte7: friends were consistent in their opposition.