The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1848-10-03 00:00:00

OUR SUPPLIES OF FOOD

The subjoined extracts Irom letters received from vari-
ous parts of England and Ireland, with reference to the
crops generally available 'for human food, will be read
with interest at the present time. They show that, al-
though the grain crops are pretty well got in, they are in
many cases damaged, and in others deficient ; and that
nothing at all cheering can be reported with respect to
the Potatoes. It is anticipated that our supplies of Oats
from Ireland this season will be good, but tlmt only a
small quantity of Wheat may be expected thence. To
meet this, our imports from abroad are daily increasing.

Newcastle-on-Tyne, Sept. 30.—Since Sunday we have
had almost constant rain, and ES a large breadth of grain
is still abroad, we fear the quality will be much deterio-
rated by the untoward change. According to our inqui-
ries to-day, it would appear there is a good deal•of Wheat
still out in the remote districts, as well as Barley, whilst
of other grain the great bulk is vet in the fields.

.Peterborough, 30th Sept.—We have had a good supply
of Wheat ; the condition of the greater part is bad, from
the incessant rain we have had all the week ; the supply
of Barley, Beans, and Oats is upon the increase.

Great Waltham, near Chelmsford, Sept. 29.—During
the months of June and July I quite hoped to be able to
report an average crop of Wheat, and the quality pro-
mised to he very fine as harvest approached ; but as
thrashing has proceeded there is universal disappointment
as to the yield, and throughout this county (Essex) there
is a deficiency of 14 bushels per acre compared with the
crop of 1847, which we reckon to have been 1 qr. per acre
over an average. From the long exposure to the damp
and unfavourable weather, the quality is below our anti-
cipations. The colour is generally good—not much is
sprouted—but the average weight is not more than 601%.
per bushel. The crop of Barley will, it is feared, be a
little deficient in quantity, but the quality generally much
better than could be expected after such unfavourable
weather. It has been secured in good order, and the
greater proportion will be of very useful malting quality.
Oats are not a heavy crop, but secured in good condition.
Potatoes are very bad—worse than in 1846. In many
cases of the early sorts not more than 1-10th are sound,
while of the later kinds fully I-3rd are already diseased.
Turnips will he generally good.
Wisbech, 30th Sept.—We have had an incessant rain
now for two days, which has caused the samples of Wheat
to come in in very had condition.

Waterford, 30M Sept.—We had some rain in the be-
ginning of this week, but the wind having changed to
east, it has since been fine, and rather cold, with occa-
sional frosts at night. The harvest is now, we may say,
all secured, consequently the state of the weather is of
much less importance. People here have almost ceased
to talk of the Potato disease ; it is now so universally ad-
mitted to he only a matter of time, when they shall entirely
cease to be fit for human food, already they are relatively
much dearer than either Indian Meal, or coarse Flour.
Limerick, Sept. 30.—Wheat comes forward more
plentifully from the farmers, and the condition and qua-
lity show some improvement.
Cork, Sept. 30.—We have received two letters under
this date, which, as far as regards the native grain pro-
duce, are contradictory. There, is nothing favourable
from this quarter respecting Potatoes : the disease still
goes on steadily, and each day they get more objectiona-
ble for human food.

Belfast, Sept. 28.—The grain harvest is now so far ga-
thered as enables me to speak with something approaching
to certainty of the result. In Wheat the breadth sown
was fully an average, and in some districts the quality and
yield will be as good as usual, whilst in others both will
be so deficient that I do not over-state the general estimate
of the crop as being one-third below an average. Barley
will be a full average and of superior quality, whilst the
breadth of Oats is admitted to have been much larger than
usual, and the yield and quality being unusually good, it
is not saying too much that the surplus of Oats will com-
pensate for the deficiency in Wheat.—The breadth of
ground under Potatoes was large, and, up to a certain
period, was most promising; but, as it came up to that
period (earlier or later in the season, according to the time
of planting), symptoms of disease showed themselves, more
virulent in some districts than in others, but in all suffi-
ciently so to excite great alarm, and the result has been
the premature raising and consuming of a large portion of
the crop ; this is still going on, and, with the disease, will
reduce the quantity by fully a third (some say a half) ;
still, from the breadth planted, there is now more of them
available for human food than we had during the entire of
last season, and this calculation places out of account the
quantity consumed since the disease made its appearance.

MR. DUNCAN'S SECOND LECTURE ON THE
CURRENCY.

On Tuesday evening Mr. Duncan gave his second lec-
ture on the effect of our Monetary Laws in producing
periodical panics and suffering of the commercial and
working classes ; and notwithstanding the disadvantage
of a wet evening we were glad to observe a numerous and
attentive audience present. In the opening portion of
his remarks the Lecturer gave a lucid history of the pro-
ceedings which followed the suspension by Pitt of the
restrictions of 1797, by which the country was enabled to
meet, without the aid of paper money, the immense ex-
penses of the war with France; and proceeded to shew
that the act of 1819, restoring cash payments was not
understood by its author, and was foisted by a juggle
upon I'arttament and the country. He chewed that
Leonard, Horsier, Mr. Huskisson, and others had acted
inconsistently upon the question. He then proceeded to
shew, in opposition to the fallacies of the bullionists, that
gold depreciated as well as paper, and that Peel's pound,
said to be invariable, had depreciated last year ; and yet
this was the solid rock on which the mercantile interests
of this great country depended ! In 1797, had the sus-
pension of cash payments not taken place, the Bank of
England would have been bankrupt, and it was equally
certain that if Lord John RussAl and Sir Charles Wood
had not written their celebrated letter in October last the
Bank of England would have been bankrupt again.
There were failures in Liverpool and in London. Take
the house of Reid, Irving, and Co., who had failed !
Why, if they had only got an act of Parliament extended
to them in the same manner as the Bank of England had
acts of Parliament extended to it, they would not have
failed. Manufacturers and tradesmen were driven into
a corner by the present false system ; but directly the
Corporation, in which the government had a sort of
quasi partnership, were affected, then the laws, by which
all other tradesmen were crushed, were suspended and
declared bad. (Applause.) He then reverted to the end
of the war, and to the dreadful suffering of the nation
after the declaration of peace, in consequence of the re-
sumption of cash payments. He quoted from Sir James
Graham's work on " Corn and Currency," to show that
the first effect of the peace was to prostrate the whole of
the large amounts realised by the merchants and traders
during the war. After having referred to the language
used in the House of Commons by Mr. Prosperity Robin-
son, and to the recantations uttered by Ricardo and Hor-
ner on the subject of the currency, he alluded to Sir Ro-
bert Peel—a man, he said, who had never yet originated
any public measure—who had not given any evidence of
possessing a creative mind—but who had given extraordi-
nary instances of tergiversation on the emancipation ques-
tion and the corn laws. He also quoted from a speech of
Lord Ashburton, a gentleLnan, he'said, of creative mind,
who had looked into the future and could see no end to
the pressure so long as we adhered to bullionism. (Ap-
plause.) Mr. Gilbart, the manager of the London and
Westminster Bank, bothered Sir Robert Peel dreadfully,
and he wanted him to retract ; but he stuck manfully to
his text. He was asked, " Are you of opinion that a
suspension of cash payments would be necessarily the
consequence of a war ?" His reply was, " Necessarily
is a strong term : but I think it would he the best
measure, and I should certainly adopt it." A ques-
tion was then asked him about securing the convert-
ability of the note; and he answered, " In a time of
war I would stop payment at once, because it would
be better to do so before the gold went than afterwards."
This was Mr. Gilbart's defence against invasion. But
the country was now in a state of invasion, not of the
French or any other nation ; but an invasion of paupe-
rism. If they found their poor-rates rising £7,000,000 a
year—be dare say it would next year be £B,ooo,ooo—and
progressively increasing, they might safely say that pau-
perism was a state of. war. It was a war of the hungry
and the needy against those who possessed property ; and
it became a question whether they were taking a wise
course to preserve that property. They would not suffer
the people to be self-sustaining, and the consequence was,
that they forced them to become thieves and spoliators.
After referring to some other points, Mr. Duncan pro-
ceeded to the bill of 1844. At the end of twenty-five
years' experience, Peel had fairly admitted that the bill of
1819 was a decided failure. If not, why did he introduce
the bill of 1844 ? In that bill he began by asking the
question, " What is a pound ?" And he answered it by
saying, "A pound is a certain quantity of metal, of defi-
nite weight and fineness; and the obligation to pay a
pound is an obligation to pay 123 grains of gold, neither
more nor less." Now they found that the weight of the
pound had been constantly varying. In the time of
William the Conqueror the pound was 12 ounces, or 576
grains; under Edward the Third it varied from 437 to
384 grains : in the reign of Henry the Eighth it was 213
and subsequently 192 grains ; in Elizabeth's time it was
172 grains, in Charles ll's, 129 grains ; a very clear proof,
indeed, that the pound, "according to law, to immemo-
rial usage, to the ancient monetary policy of the empire,"
had always been " a definite weight of definite fineness !"
If the pound had been thus reduced, there was no reason
why we should not reduce it still more, to sixty, fifty,
forty, or even to a single grain. He mentioned this as an
instance either of his gross historical ignorance or of his
still more disgraceful conduct in palming a falsehood
upon the people. But in the very speech in which
he gave this definition he violated the whole of his
principles Mr. Duncan here explained the provi-
sions of the bill of 1844. Thirty-one millions of notes
were allowed to be issued by the bankers in different
parts of the kingdom, without being based on gold.
If they went beyond that they must find the metallic basis.
But what, then, became of his doctrine that the obligation
to pay a pound was an obligation to pay 123 grains of
gold ? Thus, they found, he just carried the principle as
far as it served his purpose, and involved the whole com-
munity in misery, simply and solely because he trifled
with the truth. The lecturer next reviewed Mr. Jones
Lloyd's theory of a natural cycle of prosperity and adver-
y sity, upon which he made some caustic remarks, touch-

in conclusion, upon the operation of the new poor
law, which was enacted, he said, for the purpose of keep-
ing up the bullionist system. Contrasting the condition
of the labouring classes in England with that of the slaves
in the West Indies, he said that in this country we abso-
lutely forbid the working man to live. Skilled labourers,

sober, industrious, steady men, attached to their families,
with every moral inducement to work, and willing to
work, could not get it. They went to th.;ir employer, who
said, " I am very sorry, but prices are so low we cannot