Weekly national intelligencer. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1841-1869, 1857-03-28
REPORT ON COMMERCIAL RELATIONS.

Messrs ED1roRs: Although the article in your journal
Saturday such evident marks of personal spite
entirely defeat its object in throwing dscred on
the report on the commercial relations recently issued
from the Department of State still it should not be
mitted to pass altogether unnotced by those who have
examined and commended the work, among whom, from
the repeated favorable notices in your columns, have
seemed to be yourselves Indeed it is quite clear that
your correspondent is not as complimentary he might
be to the Integencer which paper he found the
statements crcised selected too, out of all others IN
the volume and published valuable and "insruc-
tive to the many journals by which your article
has been approvingly copied.
To expect that quarto volume of $50 pages, embrace
ing commercial facts almost numberess and more than
thousand tabular statements derived from more than
hundred authorities, in five six different languages,
respecting the of the whole world, should be
free from errors is simply absurd But when In addl-
ton to all this it is considered that this heavy quarto
before me- constitutes, as stated in e Introductory
letter. only onefourh part of the entire work. and that
all this prepared for the press in little more than one
year. and chiefly by two gentlemenhe superintendent
of the report and his assstan-we should rather be
amazed at their unexampled industry than disposed
generously and unfairly eriticse the result Indeed
the statement of the superintendent of the work in sub
hitting it to the public should certainly disarm all by
percrticism:
sIn work so comprehensive and complicated, he
says "some have doubtless occurred but could it
have been committed organized and practised bu
of commercial statistics, 1.-THE statistical office In
the State Department not created until long after
this report had been transmitted to Congress- promptly
supplied by consular agents with all requisite materials
from abroad, similar report demanded from
the persons who have been employed the herewith
presented fewer would unquestionaby be detect
ed the execution of the work being, at the time,
attended with less labor and expense"
And again he says:
ssTo familiar with commercial statistics it is
necessary suggest that in work comprehensive
the present. involving facts and figures almost without
number, derived from authorities numerous and often
conflicting, in various languages errors nowithstand
ing the most unsleepng vigilance and the most tosome
scrutiny, unavoidable"
Such the unassuming terms with which the gentle
under whose supervision this volume was prepared
submits it to the public The language of the able Su-
perntenden of the last Census who has been subjected
to similar abuse in sending out his work to the world
clearly expresses the difficulties nseparable from the
preparation of statistical works that shall be pardoned
for laying it before you:
have labored assiduously night and day, denying
neither labor palms, with the single purpose of work
ing out in the shortest tme the least expense and in
the most reliable and satisfactory manner from multtu
dnous and often confused materials document of which
the country might not be ashamed. | am not hardy
enough to suppose that have been avoided for
that would be. to infer than human agency at
work in the arrangement of ten fifteen millions of f.
CURES collected and combined into tables by the labors
of many different persons during several years. the
thousandh part of which it possible for per-
sonally to examine can say however, that every agen
has been set at work guard against detect these
errors and that he who will assert whatever his expe
rience that, under the circumstances, he could
have done materially better, has only to undertake the
charge of Office of the kind for couple of weeks with
computer and copyist at his elbow suggesting diff
eues doubts and printer clamorous for copy and for
proof to make early and generous recantaions of the
error
From the criticism of your correspondent one would
suppose that the subjects of agriculture population pau
perism education, and finance in France discussed
at length in the report that they entered vitality into its
substance and occupied consderabespace whereas keE
only introduced coateraly and in few brief gene
raj sentences occupying less than page The surprise
expressed by him. however that the subject Of the inter-
nal condition of France should be at all referred in
considering her commercial relations with the United
States might would suppose, have been quietsd by
glance at the remarks by which that subject is intro
duced into the report, which follows
The prospects of future commerce with France de-
pend upon variety of facts The facts bear
ing upon the subject in the United States be found
1
Those respecting the French Empire may be briefly
med up in suggestive rather than an elaborate form
France proper which alone reference is now had lies
between &c.
The first criticism of your correspondent is upon the
general statement in the report that France
is cuvable" PARABLE and, despite all his sophstry it
be conceded that the assertion is about as nearly
exact as can be arrived at.
Macgregor, in his :" Recapituation of the Official
Returns of the Physical and Agricultural Surface of
France" gives the of France, in hec-
tares.. 81 100 296
Arabic lands, hectares. ............25, $50, ISL
Under divers cultivation ............ 951 1874
- &c, 511 O75
Deducting arabic lands we have hectares 26 249 221
which is nearly the half of 81 296 as could well
be expected In general statement introduced in
suggestive rather than elaborate FORM
Your critic next pounces upon the assertion that the
adult population of France from 1841 to 1851 increased
'sneary OOO" and that like increase would max,
upon careful estimate based upon official figures
correct considering that "nearly 20OO OOO' means les
than that number, and "fuly 3d. 600 900" might vel
indicate soul or two more, that your correspondent
remarks seem to me unworthy of further notice
The same is true of his remark upon the expression
working classes paupers, $685., 000'-an expires
sion undoubtedly copied from the authority relied
for the fact and which every person quite an lido
would comprehend meaning the working classes AM
me, in minute classification designed for specif
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