The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1848-10-24 00:00:00

CONSERVATIVE UNION.

(From the John Bull.)
Abro,' nnd at home we are getting daily into difficulty
and da:,er. Our colonies murmur, our revenue dimi-
nishes, and boasted prosperity grows dim ' • Ministers,
wickedly rt y elling in the havoc occa9ioned by treachery
and folly, pi.,ye themselves no better than the convicted
felons whom we eject from our shores. Religion herself
looks pale and sickly in the midst of the universal discou-
ragement.

Does this state of things preach no lesson, and suggest
no policy ? We think it does. We do not ask the hon.
gentlemen who voted against Protection to be reconver-
ted, and to become again Protectionists. We do not call
upon Protectionists who, manfully and bravely, have
fought the battle to the last, to eat their words, to deny
their faith, and to become free-traders. But since free-
trade has, against our will, become the law of the land,
we would earnestly recommend both parties to forget that
such a term as " Protection" ever existed, and, as en-
lightened, conscientious men, taking things as they find
them, to set about such a thorough reconstruction of our
whole commercial policy as may satisfy all the lawful de-
mands of native labour, and, at the same time, all the
pressinc, exigencies of the national exchequer. We have
no doubt whatever, that the people of England would
willingly consent, even at the present moment, to a mo-
derate duty upon foreign manufactured goods for the pur-
poses of revenue, for the maintenance of the national cre-
dit, and for the advantage of the whole community: and
more than this, we have now, at all events, no hope or
chance of getting.

_ .
The free-traders themselves must, ere long, demand
such a reconstruction, if they be not altogether inclined to
accept it now. Granting the principle of free trade as
enunciated by our economical quacks to be without a
flaw, its application has been so wild and aimless, so tho-
roughly independent of all rule and system, that whole-
sale ruin must speedily be the inevitable consequence of a
dogged persistance in our present course. We call upon
Conservatives, then, to reconstruct the commercial edifice,
and to do that which the present wretched Government
has no strength to achieve. We implore both sides to
forget old animosities, and to obliterate, if possible, the
marks of past collision ; to rounite upon well-understood
and accurately-defined principles,—for the sake of the
mighty and many interests of the empire,—for the sake of
the nation's faith, as well as of its material prosperity,—

in the name of the Queen they love, and the GOD whom
they adore !

THE COLONIES OF CAPE OF GOOD HOPE

AND CANADA

These colonies are the remaining ones to be embraced
in our summary of the minutes of the Colonization Com-
mittee. As regards the Cape, it appears that the average
annual emmigration to that colony during the last six
years has not exceeded 398 people. Its temperate climate,
and its being nearer to England than the Australian colo-
nies, would at first sight lead to the supposition of its
proving more attractive, but the western or older division
is interspersed with vast desert tracts, while its popula-
tion is chiefly Dutch ; and the eastern division, of which
Algoa Bay is the port, and which was settled by the Eng-
lish emigrants about 28 years ago, (a scheme which was
attended by many failures, and on which £50,000 of the
public money was expended). has the drawback of possess-
ing no navigable river, added to the inconvenience suffered
from the neighbourhood of the Caffres. In point of cli-
mate and soil there is nothing to complain of, but wood is
not considered to be abundant, and the port is not good,
idthough it might be made so by a breakwater, which has

been talked about. Up to the commencement of the
Caffre war, however, the settlers in this division had in a
ereat degree surmounted all their_ difficulties. The white

population is 3:3.146, and the black, who are very orderly,
though not industrious, 37,075, making a total of 70,221.
Its revenue has for several years been in excess of its
ex-
penditure.
Its live stock is valued at two millions ster-
ling, there are 35,000 acres of land under cultivation,
chiefly wheat, oats, and barley, and the annual produce of
the settlement is valued at £269,000. Sheep farming is
the principal pursuit, as requiring less labour than tillage.
This part of the colony is divided into six districts, and

about an equal distance inland. The distance from Gra-
ham's Town, its capital, to Cape Town, the capital of the
western district, is nearly 700 miles, and an overland mail
twice a week conveys the post in about five days. From

Yort Elizabeth, which is about 94 miles from Graham's
Town, over had roads, there is a steamer to Cape Town
that performs the distance in about three days. The co-

lonisisare desirous of promoting inomigration, but whatis

wanted is a continuous rather than a large supply of really
useful English labourers. The sum expended on immi-
gration from surplus revenue was, in 1844, £5OO ;in 1845,

£285 ; and in 1846, £5885. In 1847 the authorities
thorised the Commissioners to proceed with emigration,

0,000 for the purpose, but the apprehensions
entertained among the labouring classes in England as to
the dangers of the Caffre war put a stop to it. In the old
or western colony the immense grants originally made of
Crown land have had an injurious effect. In freeholds

lately sold the price has been about 2s. per acre, and this
is now the Government upset price for country lands. In

•
this division there is generally an abundance of water.
The wheat grown in some of its districts is said to be the
finest in the world. A great road in course of construc-
tion from Cape Town to the eastern frontier by convict
labour is likely to promote, in a high degree, the im-
provement of the territory.

The colony of Natal is about 1,200 miles from the Cape
settlement, and 600 from Algoa-bay. It is a country
abounding with wood and water, having a very fertile soil
and a most delightful climate, although not so salubrious
as Cape Colony proper. Its only want is a safe and com-
modious harbour, and it is hoped that this may be gained.
There is no road from Algoa-bay to Natal, but Sir Harry
Smith has it in view to create one, although the difficul-
ties are very great. There are, however, good natural
roads for horses and ox-waggons, and before the war there
was a reg

~,„
liar postal communication carried on by native
runners to Graham's Town, As yet there has been no
regular exploration of the Natal district. The whole area
has been estimated by the Surveyor-General at upwards of
13,000 square miles. The district seems capable of grow-
ing every useful product, and, above all, it is believed
auailable for the growth of cotton, which, unlike the Ame-
rican cotton, is not an annual, but a perennial. Some
specimens, grown experimentally in a garden, and sent to
the manufacturing districts in England, have been well re-
ported upon, and Lord Grey has instracted the local autho•
rities to give every facilities for its cultivation. Indigo is
found as an indigenous plant. Fine crops of wheat are
said to have been grown ; but the abundance of water and
a luxuriant grass, which covers a large part of the district,
render it especially favourable for pasturage. The amount
of European population is not known. The early Dutch
emigrants hold large grants, which. it is apprehended, may
prove an obstruction. Most of the new settlers, how-
ever, have bought their land from the Dutch at very low
prices. The settlement was originally formed about 11
years back by an emigration of Dutch boors from the
eastern districts, but it was not recognized by the Home
Government until 1845. It is at present governed by a
Lieutenant-Governor, who holds under the Governor of
the Cape, and about 500 troops constitute its military
establishment. For the year ending January 5, 1846, its
imports were £32,000, and its exports £lO,OOO.

A SOLDIER.—There he is—a hundred thousandth part
of a great thing called an army. A great thing wonder-
fully organized—most ingeniously devised; a very impos-
ing, a very costly thing, made up of very varied materials,
but, most homogeneous as a whole. It is hard to say
what it does not contain. Nothing so hard, nothing so
soft • nothing so full, nothing so empty ; nothing so gay,
nothing so mournful, as not to be a part of it. Light
plumes and heavy ordnance; the empty drum anl the
well-charged shell: the gay music, and the mournful
funeral-pall—there are all sorts of contrasts and contra-
rieties in it, but how complete a thing is it as a whole !
Look at the intricacy of its Machinery—the wonderful ad-
hesiveness of its parts—the unity and integrity of it.
Dispersed though it be in a fragmentary state over the
whole surface of the globe, there are chains and wires,
which take no account of space, keeping it together as
surely and irrefragably as though it were a compact mass.
Within this mighty circle, there is nothing so majestic—
nothing so insignificant, as not to be brought into imme-
diate contact with each other. The minutest component
of that great fact—the British army, has an intimate affi-
nity and is a matter of immediate concernment to the
greatest and most glorious of the realities, who give a dig-
nity and a radiance to the whole. There is a link which
unites the small child who tinkles the triangle with the
mighty warrior who conquers nations and overturns dy-
nasties, and revolutionises the world. The voice of that
small hero of the triangle may make itself heard by the
great hero of history •, and not so insignificant is the child
—being an atom of that great comprehensive army—but
that his injuries will be resented and redressed by the ve-
teran of a hundred fights, and. a hundred orders.—North
British Review,
THE MEANS OF DESTROYING SNAILS.—I determined
to undertake the analysis of the small gray snail, (Limax
agrestis,) so frequently found in gardens and in the fields,
and which has this year done so much damage to all kinds
of cultivation. hoping that such an investigation might
lead to the discovery of a means of preventing the too
great increase of these creatures. My attention was es-
pecially directed to the glutinous matter which they con_
tinually secrete, and which serves to attach their bodies
to their surfaces over which they pass. I endeavoured to
find out in what way lime, which has long been recom_
ended to cultivators as a means of destroying snails,
acted upon them ; and I have ascertained that lime-
water, diluted with three times its bulk of water, was
sufficient for their destruction. Water, scarcely rendered
alkaline by the addition of potash, killed them still more
quickly, causing a large quantity of slime to be thrown
out. Solutions of the metallic salts, when added to this
slimy matter, produce an abundant coagulated mass; that
which is produced by the action of nitrate of copper dis-
solves in an excess of potash, and produces a violet-
coloured liquor. Of all the poisons which I have tried
on snails, there is none which has appeared to exert so
deleterious an influence as the alkalies. If a drop of
caustic ammonia, or of caustic potash, be added to a
quart of rain-water, an alkaline solution will be formed
of such little strength that it scarcely affects delicate test-
paper, and causes no impression on the organs of taste ;
if, however, we place some snails in this solution, they
soon die, whilst other snails, placed in rain-water alone,
escape out of the vessel in which they are placed. It
would appear difficult to find more energetic poisons for
snails than those I have indicated ; I therefore think that
a weak solution of caustic potash or soda, or, what would
be still more economical, the refuse lyes which have
served for the washing of linen, diluted water, to which
a small quantity of quicalime has been added, will enable
us to attain the object we have in view more readily and
certainly than by the use of lime alone in the state of
powder, as this is speedily converted into a carbonate of
lime by the action of the air, and thus loses its poisonous
influence on the snails.—M. Bruconnot, in the Florisi,