The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1833-04-23 00:00:00

TUESDAY 'AIOIIXLVG, APRIL 23, 1833.

The Morning Herald of Saturday last informs us
of a most vexatious case illustrative of the impolitic de-
tention of Dutch merchantmen by the British Govern-
ment. The facts are contained in a letter from the
agents to Lloyd's, at Ramsgate, and are as follows:

" The cargo of the Pauline is gradually melting away, and
the vessel is some inches lighter in her draught of water,
clearly showing that the sugar is in a rapid. state of decay,
which this particular kind of sugar is liable to more than any
other. We are of opinion that if this vessetremains here much
longer, her cargo of sugar will release itself."
This would be bad enough even if England and Hol-
land were at war, and the property so deteriorating and
wasting solely belonged to our enemy; but far otherwise
is it in this case, for the Herald continues to inform us
that it is insured by British underwriters who will even-
tually have to bear the loss and make good the damage.
The Pauline was bound from Demerara to Middleburgh,
when she was captured by one of our cruisers and carried
into Ramsgate. To see a Government thus preying
upon its own subjects is one of those curiosities Which
none but Whigs of the most liberal order could have
reconciled to the refined notions of national policy. This
is indeed cutting off the nose to be revenged on the
face.

WITH the exception of Lord Althorp's premature bud-
get, and his English tithe commutation bill, nothing has oc •
curred in the House of Commons since Monday se'nnight
that calls for any comment. Some hundreds of petitions
drawn up, pro forma, against West India slavery, have
been presented, which, if we were to judge of the people
of England as a foreigner would do, and as Mrs. Trollope
judges of the Americans, would force us to the conclusion
that no other subject attracts public attention, from the
Land's-end to the Orkney Islands, than the condition of
our "poor dear oppressed black brethren" in the colonies.
Slavery is one of those conditions in society for which
we have a very strong abhorrence, and which it is desi-
rable to see rooted out; but we are much mistaken if
there be not, in the name of liberty, and under the sanc-
tion of liberality, much more real slavery and op-
pression—much more tryranny and injustice—much
more crime against the first laws of nature—toler-
ated and committed in this country than in all the
slave countries on the face of the earth. It is true
that we must: not justify one evil by another. We
must not mix sand with the sugar which we sell under
the name of free labour sugar, merely because our neigh-
bour is in the habit of doing so daily. This is fraud : it
is robbery and cruelty combined. But on the other hand
we should not, if imbued with a Christian spirit, traverse
sea and land to find ideal objects of commisseration while
the poor chimney sweep weeps under our windows at
home, or a helpless debtor, with a wife and six children
in the parish workhouse, pines in a wretched prison, at
the suit of a merciless creditor, for a debt of fifteen shil-
lings. In such a:case, and there are thousands of such
cases in England, the philanthropy that disports in the
colonies, without looking at home, is spurious charity, if
net barefaced hypocricy, playing a factious game for self-
ish purposes.

THE noble Chancellor of the Exchequer, in terrorem
of the announced motion of Mr. Attwood on the state of
the country, was induced, or rather was compelled, to
bring forward his budget on Friday last, and the public
are now in possession of what the government—the whig
government—the retrenchment ministry—the peace ad-
ministration—intend doing for them in this pleasant year
1833. Lord Althorp, after counting upon his fingers
every penny he could possibly spare, and, as some think,
(among the rest Sir Robert Peel,) a few more pennies
than he can SAFELY spare, has condescended to remit
taxes to the amount of £1,300,000.
But the mode in which this is to be accomplished is in
perfect keeping with all the other finance schemes of the
noble Lord. He has, as usual, entirely lost sight of
what ought to be the first consideration in reducing the
taxes, and which has never for a moment been lost sight
of by those who have within the last few years been con-
stantly imploring relief. He has forgotten that the
working clasSes are those who feel most severely the pres-
sure of taxation, and that any reduction which does not
remove this pressure is a delusion and a mockery of their
sufferings.

In considering, therefore, the most practicable mode of
administering relief, the primary question should be,
what is the taxed commodity in most general use, which
is a universal necessary of life, and in the consumption of
which the working classes bear the largest portion of the
impost ? As far as we have the means of ascertaining, it
is not complained that bread, or beef, or bacon, or even
ale, are unreasonably dear at the present juncture, parti-
cularly when we reflect that the agricultural interest is
suffering extremely from the poor-rates and other national
burdens ; `but it is a proper subject of complaint that tea,
sugar, and coffee, which are indispensable necessaries
among thepoorer classes of the population, are enormously
taxed, not only to the discomfort of the poor, but to the
serious injury of the growers and manufacturers of these
articles.

This being the case, had Lord Althorp been at all de-
sirous to ameliorate the condition of the mechanic and
labourer, he would have remitted some portion of the
duty upon the necessaries of life. But this considera-
tion was not allowed to mar the more speculative and
characteristically absurd propositions of- Lord Althorp's
"financial statement." He has taken off various duties,
-which, up to this hour, we have never heard complained
of as grievances. The people demand cheap- food, and
the noble Lord has abolished the tax upon tiles, just as
if pantiles were pancakes, or an article of daily suste-
nance. He might with equal propriety have reduced the
duty upon spinning tops and Dutch toys. The people
of England complain that they pay an hundred per cent.
more for their tea than is paid by the people of America,
and-Lord Althorp (in order to relieve them) reduces the