The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1846-02-17 00:00:00

LOCAL BILLS.

Petitions complaining of non-compliance with the
standing orders have been presented and referred to the
Select committee on Petitions in the following cases:—
Birkenhead, Lancashire, and Cheshire Junction Rail-
way.
Birkenhead and Holyhead Junction Railway.
Birkenhead, Lancashire, and Cheshire Junction Rail-
way (two petitions).
Birkenhead and Llangollen Railway.
Chester and Manchester Direct Railway (three pe-
titions).
Liverpool and Bury Railway.
Liverpool and Leeds Direct Railway.
Liverpool Paving. Sewering, and Watering.
Liverpool Sanatory regulations.
Liverpool Improvement.
Manchester, Bolton, and Bury Canal Navigation and
Railway Extensions.
Toxteth Park Improvement.
Tient Valley Midland and Grand Junction Railway.
West Lancashire Railway.
Northumberland and Lancashire Junction Railway.
The following petitions for Bills have been severally re-
ported, and Bills ordered to be bromht in :
Manchester, Buxton, :Matlock, and Midland Junction
Railway.
Mold Junction Railway. '
Liverpool, Manchester, and Newcastle-upon-Tyne
Junction Railway.
St. Helen's Canal and Railway.
Liverpool Docks.
Ellesmere and Chester Canal.
The Blackburn, Chorley, and Liverpool Railway.
Liverpool, Ormskirk, and Preston Railway.
Manchester, Sheffield, and Midland Junction Railway.
Bills read a first time, and ordered to be read a
second :
Grand Junction Railway—Huyton and Aston ; Huy..
ton, Prescot, and St. Helen's ; Warrington and Park-
side ; Showhill and Portobello, and Edgehill and Huy-
ton branches.
North Union Railway Bill—For vesting in the Grand
Junction Railway Company, and the Manchester and
Leeds Railway Company, the North Union Railway, and
all the works, property, and effects appertaining thereto.
Lancaster and Carlisle Railway, (Extension to Caledo-
nian Railway), and Lancaster and Preston Junction Rail-
way Amalgamation Bill.
The Committee have dispensed with compliance with
certain standing orders in the Liverpool, Manchester, and
Newcastle Junction Railway. Since which the bill has
been read a first time, and ordcred to be read a second
time.

The subject of this evening's lecture at St. Andrew's
Church is " The Communion of Saints."
Private letters from Calcutta to the 23d of December
have been received. They contain the important fact
that the government had sent round a circular, stating
that their advances on hypothecated goods have for the
present ceased. The exchange is expected to advance
considerably upon this circumstance.

SPEECH OF J. BRAMLEY-MOORE,
CHAIRMAN OF THE DOCK COMMITTEE,
ON THE SUBJECT OF DOCK EXTENSION.

In campliance with a requisition addressed to the Dock
COlDwiLtee, signed by 76 influential firms, urging that the
able speech of their Chairman, on Monday, the 19th ul-
timo, and " the valuable statistics contained therein (evi-
dently collected with great care and research) are deserv-
ing of preservation in a more lasting form than they can
possibly be in the pages of a newspaper," and requesting
that it should be printed in a more permanent shape, we
observe that a neat pamphlet, containing the speech in
question, corrected by the Chairman from the report in
the Standard, with some additional matter, has just been
published, with a map of the new docks So valuable a
document, or one so interesting to the town, and so cre-
ditable to its author, has not for some time past issued
from our local press.
Amongst the additional matter of a statistical character
introduced is a table of the number of vessels employed
in the timber trade in Liverpool, which exhibits some
surprising results. The following is the table on which
Mr. Moore makes one or two remarks, and we have ap-
pended a few additional observations :

BRITISH AMERICA. BALTIC.
Year. Vessels. Tonnage. Vessels. Tonnaoe
1838 305 160,415. 72.... 22.788
1839....
1840 230 133,400 . 48.... 1-1,000
18 11 .... 318...... 174,948 .
1842 165 91,179........ 33.... 11,239
1843 311.. 154,518 61.... 17,253
1844. .. 369 189,414 51.... 14 ,141
1845..
Thus you see (says Mr. Moore) that in 18-14, when the
timber trade was said to have commenced its decline,
there were then 418 vessels, of 202,471 tons ; and in 1845,
the enormous number of 566 vessels, of 273,646 tons.
Now, this alone will shew the importance of the timber
trade, and how inadequately that trade has been accom-
modated in Liverpool. There has been an extraordinary
increase in several descriptions of timber. I will jest
notice the Mahogany trade, to which attention was di-
rected, and particular accommodation afforded, some
four or five years ago, by the Dock Committee. The
number of logs imported since 1838 is as follows :
In 1838...... .10,918 logs, 1 In 1842........ 7,789 logs,
1839... ..... 11.441 „ 1843........ 8,760 „

1840..• 7.214„
1811 6,600 ~

1844.... .... 16..248
1845 ..28,840 „

I will now give you, for the last four or five years, the
increase for all descriptions of timber in pieces and feet.
I will take you back to 1838:
In 1838 15,000,000 I In 1810 11,000,000
1839...... 16,000,000 1841..
Mr. Rathbone asked whether these were pieces?
Mr. Moore.—They are pieces and feet, by string or
sale measure. In callipers they would be about fifteen
per cent. more :

In 1842 9,000,000 I In 1844...... 24,000,000
1843..

~The most extraordinary increase exhibited in the first
table is that in Baltic timber, from 51 vessels, 14,144 ton-
nage, in 1844, to 113 vessels, 33,792 tonnage, or an in-
crease in one year, in the article of Baltic timber alone, of
19,648 tons, in 1845 ; and it is a fact worthy of remark,
as showing the great increase of the consuming power of
the country, that the price of Baltic timber, notwith-
standing the increased importations, was higher in 1845
than in the previous year. In the same period. the in-
crease of tonnage employed in the British American
timber trade amounted to 50,440 tons. In the entire
timber trade, therefore, we have an increase in 1845, over
that of the previous year, of about 70,000 tons, which is
considerably above three times the increase of the tonnage
of all kinds employed in the port of Bristol for the same
years, such total increase being only 21,076 tons. We
believe that this evidence of prosperity appeared so im-
portant to the Government that an application was made
from the Treasury for information confirmatory of the
correctness of the statement conveying it.

Another important item introduced in this pamphlet,
and which the chairman of the Dock Committee had not
received at the time of delivering his speech, is the export
of salt for the year 1845, which amounted to 472,146 tons,
against 429,131 in 1844, showing an increase of 43,015
tons on the year.

PETITION OF THE LIVERPOOL BRAZILIAN
ASSOCIATION FOR A RELAXATION OF THE
PROHIBITORY DUTIES LEVIED UPON BRA-
ZILIAN SUGAR.

A petition has just been presented to the House of
Commons by this body. signed by their chairman, Mr.
J. Bramley Moore, praying to have their case considered
in the arrangements making for the reduction of i nport
duties. The petitioners represent, in strong terms, the
injury which they sustain by the prohibitory duties upon
Brazilian sugar, and the retaliatory spirit which that coun-
try has adopted towards them. They urge their right to
a share in the ameliorations taking place in our commercial
code, and the advantages which would be emferred upon
the agricultural and other classes from whom protection
is being withdrawn, by cheapening the article of sugar, the
consumption of which has decreased since 1511 from 26
pounds per head to 16 pounds in 1841. The question of
Brazilian being the produce of slave labour they consider
ought no longer to be mooted, now that we import
largely so many other articles similarly produced, and
that the West India planters themsefves import the same
sugar for consumption, in order that they may have the
whole of their own crop available for the markets of this
country. They urge it also on account of vast accession
of trade which it would bring to the manufacturer, to
whom Brazil has been a large customer, and the advantage
which an increase of trade with that country will afford
to the shipping interest, and conclude by praying for the
impartation henceforth into this country of Brazilian
sugar upon the same terms as any other foreign sugar.