New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1852-05-24

offered the fact that the present consump-
ton of foreign commodities is greater than
it was last year or in previous years. Thus
of coffee, the increase in the quantity con-
sumed in the year ending April, 1852, over
that of the one ending April, 1851, was
3,445,O0O pounds, and the whole credit for
this is given to the reduction of import
duties. 1t is well known, however, that
coffee has greatly fallen, and we have now
before US in The Economist, of London, a
comparative view of the prices of that
article in bond, showing that the same
quantity which sold in London in March,
1851, for ASS. Cd. will now command only
3Ss. cd. The consumption of the year was
about fifty-three millions of pounds against
fifty millions in the previous one, giving
an increase of sir per cent. to be set of
against a diminution of price averaging
probably ten or taOelre per cent. Thus the
large quantity is purchased with less OF
the products of British labor than before
had been given for the smaller one,-and
this it is that constitutes British prosperity,
although how it is to give prosperity to
those who raise the coffee we are quite
unable to see. Diminution of import du-
ties is held out to the agriculturists of the
for m Grant
Britain monopoly of the manufacturing
machinery of the world, and yet the prices
they obtain fall instead of rising with the
extension of the system called free trade.
Again, during the last six years" said
the speaker, "the consumption of sugar has
increased by $4,000 tuns, being really 80
per cent. upon the consumption of the year
1886" and this statement was received
with cheers, as an admission of the advan-
tages that had resulted from the reduction
of duties. And yet, when we come to ex-
anime into the facts, we find that the
amount paid to the sugar. grower for the
large quantity was less than that paid for
the small one, the price on the plantation
having fallen more than the consumption
has increased. The planter is told, "raise
sugar and we will find market for it," and
a market is made; but how is it made (!
Simply by giving every Englishman three
pounds of it where before they were allowed
two and quarter, and paying the planter
for the three pounds as much as he had be-
fore for the two! The import of 1851 was
100000 cwt. against 7,613,00O in 1852,
being an increase of 413,OOO cwt., and the
effect of this increased importation is shown
by The Economist to have been a fall of
price from 3ss. to 28s. in the single year.
Under such circumstances the consumers
of sugar may well be prosperous, but what
becomes of the producers
We find no reference in the speech to any
increase in the consumption of tea, but The
Economist gives it at 100000 pounds In
the fiscal year 1851 against 53,100,00O in
1850, being about five per cent. increase,
to set off against diminution of the price
in bond of from lid. to 3d., or thirty per
cent. And thus we see that the Chinese
producers of tea, like the East and West
Indian producers of coffee and sugar, con-
tribute largely to the prosperity" of Eng
land.
The consumption of timber has also
largely increased, and this again was given
by the speakcS in evidence of the advaa-
tage resulting from a reduction of import
duties, totally suppressing the fact that the
effect upon the timber producers had been
large reduction of prices. But recently
The Times (London) furnished its readers
with an article showing the advantage Of
free trade in enabling the people of Eng
land to obtain timber from the producers
at less prices than they had ever paid be-
fore. We have here the secret of British
prosperity, which consists in stimulating
competition for the production of ell the
things the people of Britain need to buy,
and destroying competition for the produc-
ton of all they desire to sell. The larger
the quantity sent to her market, the larger
are the charges for freights, storages and
commissions, and the lower the prices.
The effect of this is to give to the farmers
and planters of the world less for large
crops than for small ones; and the less
they get the larger is the consumption Of
Britain, the greater the prosperity of the
British people, and the larger the British
revenue, 'chich always .aourishes chen the
agriealturists Of the ,eorld are being ru-