To colonial account, as per Mr Cobden, of active force,— L.3,000,000

Add colonial proportion of half-pay, pensions, &c., as per id., three-fourths of L.1,000,000 750,000 ————— L.3,750,000

Deduct military and other stations, falsely called colonial, as per former account,— L.1,550,000

Deduct again charges for the Chinese war, exact amount unknown, deceptively included in colonial account—say for only 250,000 ————- 1,800,000 —————

Approximate, but still surcharged proportion of army estimates for colonial service, on Mr Cobden's absurd basis of three-fourths, L.1,950,000

This is a woful falling off from Mr Cobden's wholesale colonial invoice of four and a half millions sterling! It amounts to a discount or rebate upon his statistical ware of L.2,550,000, or say, not far short of sixty per cent. Had the Leaguer been in the habit of dealing cotton wares to his customers, so damaged in texture or colours as are his wares political and economical, we are inclined to conceit, that he would long since have arrived at the finiquito de todas cuentas.

We now come to his naval cost of colonies, with a margin for ordnance as well. On this head, Mr Cobden remarks, with much sagacity—and, for once, Mr Cobden states one fact in which we may agree with him:—"But the colonies had no ships to form a navy. The mother country had to send them ships to guard their territories, which were not paid for by the colonies, but out of the taxation of this country. The navy estimates for this year amounted to L.6,322,000. He had no means of ascertaining what proportion of this large amount was required for their colonies; but a very large proportion of it was taken for the navy in their colonies. The ordnance estimate was L.1,849,142, a large share of which was required for their colonial expenditure. The House would find, that from the lowest estimate, from L.5,000,000 to L.6,000,000 out of the taxes of this country were required for maintaining their colonial army and navy." True it is, the colonies have no ships of war; true, the navy expenses count for the gigantic sum stated—in the estimates at least, and estimates seldom fall short, however budgets may; true, also, that ordnance is the heavy item represented. And we also are without the means for any, not to say accurate, but fair approximative estimate of the proportion of this expenditure which may be incurred for, and duly chargeable against the colonies. In the case of the army, as we have shown, the possession and facilities of reference to documents, enabled us to resolve Mr Cobden's bill of totals, in one line, into the elements of which composed, to classify the items under distinct heads, and so to detect the errors, and redress the balance of his own account. The authorities, of official origin mostly, to which we had recourse, were equally open to Cobden, had he been actuated by an anxious desire to arrive at the truth, earnest in his enquiries after the means of information, laborious in his investigations, and, beyond all, with honesty of purpose resolved nothing to withhold, nor aught to set down in malice, as the result of his researches. Unfortunately, the navy is not a stationary body, as the army may be said to be; squadrons are not fixtures like corps in garrison; here to-day and gone to morrow. The naval strength on the various stations, never permanent, escapes calculation, as the due apportionment of expenditure between each, and again of the quotas corresponding to the colonies or to foreign commerce alone, defies any approach to accurate analysis. But we have at least common observation and common sense to satisfy us that but a small proportion of the naval outlay can be justly laid to colonial account, because so unimportant a proportion of the naval armament afloat, can be required for colonial service or defence. We have, assuredly, a certain number of gun-boats and schooners on the Canadian lakes, which are purely for colonial purposes; and we may have some half-a-dozen vessels of war prowling about the St Lawrence and the British American waters, which may range under the colonial category. Wherever else our eyes be cast, it would be difficult to find one colony, east or west, which can be said to need, or gratuitously to be favoured with, a naval force for protection. We have a naval station at Halifax chargeable colonially. We have also a naval station, with headquarters at Jamaica, but certainly that forms no part of a colonial appendage. The whole of the force on that station is employed either in cruizing after slavers, and assisting to put down the slave trade, or it is hovering about the shores of the Spanish Main and the Gulf of Mexico, for the protection of British foreign commerce, for redressing the wrongs to British subjects and interests in Colombia, Guatemala, Mexico, Cuba, or Hayti, or for conveying foreign specie and bullion from those countries for the behoof of British merchants at home. We have a naval station at the Cape of Good Hope, with the maintenance of which, that colony, Australia, New Zealand, &c., may be partly debited. And we have a naval station in India, the expense of which, so far as required for that great colonial empire, is, we believe, borne entirely by India herself. But by far the largest proportion of the expense is incurred, as the great bulk of the force is destined, for the protection of foreign commerce in the Indian and Chinese seas.

If we are to seek where the British navy is really to be found and heard of in masses, we have only to voyage to Brazil, where whole squadrons divide their occupations betwixt coursing slavers and waiting upon foreign commerce. Further south, we find the River Plate blocked up with British war ships, watching over the interests of British commerce, and interposing betwixt the lives and properties of thousands of British subjects, and the unslaked thirst of the daggers of Rosas and his sanguinary Mas-horcas, that AEgis flag before which the most fearless and ferocious have quailed, and quail yet. So also, rounding Cape Horn, traversing the vast waters of the Great Pacific, the British ensign may ever be met, and swarming, too, on those west and northwestern coasts of Spanish America, where, as from Bolivia to California, war and anarchy eternal seem to reign. Assuredly, no colonial interests, and as little do political combinations, carry to those far off regions, and there keep, such large detachments of the British fleet. Nearer home we need not signalize the Mediterranean and Levant, where British navies range as if hereditary owners of those seas nor the western coasts of Spain, along which duly cruise our men-of-war, keeping watch and ward; certainly in neither one case nor the other for colonial objects.

From this sweep over the seas, it may readily be gathered how comparatively insignificant the proportion in which the British colonies are amenable for the cost of the British navy; and, on the contrary, how large the cost incurred for the guardianship of the foreign commerce of Great Britain. In the absence of those authentic data which would warrant the construction of approximate estimates, we are willing, however, as before, to accept the basis of Mr Cobden's—not calculations, but—rough guesses; and as the colonial share of army, navy, and ordnance estimates altogether, he taxes in "from five to six millions," of which four and a half millions, according to a previous statement of his, were for the army alone, we arrive at the simple fact, that the navy and ordnance are rated rather widely at a cost ranging from half a million to one million and a half sterling per annum. The mean term of this would be three quarters of a million; but truth may afford to be liberal, and so we throw in the other quarter, and debit the colonies with one million sterling for naval service, which, so far as isolated sections of the great body political, they can hardly be said, with exceptions noted before, either to receive or need. We have before, and we believe conclusively, disposed of Mr Cobden's colonial army estimates; and now we arrive at the total burden, under the weight of which the empire staggers on colonial account.

Army charge, L.1,950,000, but say L.2,000,000 Navy and Ordnance, 1,000,000 ————— Total to Colonial debit, L.3,000,000

Mr Cobden enumerates a variety of expenditure against the colonies besides, under the head of civil establishments, public works, and grants for educational and religious purposes. We need not—there is no occasion to discuss these minutiae with him; we prefer to make him a bargain at once, and so we throw in, against these civil contingencies for the colonies, the whole lump of the estimates for the diplomatic and consular service, Dr Bowring's commissionerships inclusive; all the charges for civil government, education, religion, public works, &c., besides of those stations, such as Gibraltar, Malta, the Ionian Isles, Singapore, Penang, &c., occupied altogether, or chiefly, for the purposes of foreign commerce, partially from political views, but assuredly not at all with reference to colonial objects. If he be not content with this bargain of a set-off, we are quite ready to call over the account with him at any time, crediting him not more liberally than justly besides, with all the prodigal waste imposed upon the country by the colonial imposture facetiously styled the "self-supporting system," in his smart exposure of which our sympathies are all with him, zealous advocates though we be of colonization, of colonization on a national scale moreover, and therefore on a national and commensurate scale of expenditure; which, however, can only be undertaken by the government when the fiat of financial insolvency which, with the Exchequer bill fraud, was the last legacy of Mr Spring Rice and Lord Monteagle, shall be superseded, and the Treasury rehabilitated, and then only by slow degrees, but sure. An individual may, perchance, thrive upon an imposture, a government never; the late Ministry are the living evidence of the truth. We can comprehend "self-supporting colonization" in the individual sense of the pioneers and backwoodsmen of the United States; in the "squatting" upon wild lands in Canada and the West Indies; in the settlement of isolated adventurers among the savages of New Zealand; but the "self-supporting" settlement of communities, or, as more fancifully expressed, of "society in frame," is just as sound in principle, and as possible in practice, as would be the calculation of the Canadian shipwright, who should nail together a mass of boards and logs as a leviathan lumber ship for the transport of timber, on the calculation that at the end of the voyage it would be rated A1 at Lloyd's, or grow into the solid power and capacity of a first-rate Indiaman, or man-of-war. We all know that such timber floaters went to wreck in the first gale on our coasts; the crews, indeed, did not always perish, they were only tossed about at the mercy of the winds and waves with the wooden lumber which would not sink, so long as hunger and helplessness did not disable hands and limbs from holding fast. And just so with the "self-supporting system of colonization."

Having ascertained, upon bases laid down by Mr Cobden himself, but without adopting his slashing unproved totals, the extent to which colonial trade is criminally accessory to the financial burdens of the United Kingdom, (not, by the way, of the empire of which they form a component part,) it behoves us now to establish the proportion in which we are taxed for foreign trade, for there is clearly more than one vulture preying upon the vitals of this unhappy land.

We established, in our September number, an army cost of about L.1,200,000 against foreign trade for Gibraltar, Malta, the Ionian Islands, Singapore, Penang, &c. We may add, as a very low valuation, in the absence of accounts, L.250,000 more for the war with China. Of the estimates for the navy, L.6,322,000, and ordnance, L.1,849,000—total, L.8,175,000;—we are fully entitled to charge about three-eighths to foreign commerce, or say L.3,000,000. The numerous and extensive naval stations kept up for the protection of our foreign commerce exclusively, together with the Mediterranean, Levant, and Spanish coast naval expenditure, to no inconsiderable extent for the same object, will sufficiently justify this estimate. We have apportioned one million of the naval and ordnance estimates for colonial purposes; one million more may be safely placed to the account of the slave trade; the remainder, L.3,175,000, is certainly an ample allowance for home naval stations, Channel fleet, if there be any, Mediterranean and other naval armaments, so far as for political objects only. We remain, therefore, for foreign trade with—

Garrisons, Gibraltar, &c., and reliefs at home, L.1,200,000 War with China, 250,000 Navy and Ordnance, 3,000,000 —————- Total cost of foreign trade, L.4,450,000 Id. colonial, as before stated, 3,000,000 —————- Excess foreign, L.1,450,000

This excess might justly be swelled to at least half a million more by a surcharge of army expenditure in China; of navy expenditure on foreign stations, that for China is not taken into account at all; and in respect of various other items of smaller consideration, separately, although in the aggregate of consideration, the account might still more be aggravated. There would be some difficulty, it must be allowed, in clearly disinvolving them from masses of general statements, although for an approximate valuation it might not amount to an impossibility; we prefer, however, to leave Mr Cobden in possession of all the advantages we cannot make a clear title to. The advantages, indeed, are of dubious title, and something of the same kind as the entry into a house of which the owner cannot be found, or of which he cannot lay his hands on the title-deeds.

We have now disposed of the preposterous exaggerations of the anti-colonial school, so far as that school can be said to be represented by Mr Alderman Cobden, under the head of colonial cost to the metropolitan state. We have reduced his amount of that cost to its fair approximate proportions, item by item, of gross charge, so far as we are enabled by those parliamentary or colonial documents, possessing the character of official or quasi-official origin. We have necessarily followed up this portion of our vindication of the colonies from unjust aspersions by a concurrent enquiry into the cost at which our foreign trade is carried on, in the national sense of the military, naval, and other establishments required and kept up for its protection and encouragement. And, finally, we have struck the balance between the two, the results of which are already before the public.

There remains one other essential part of the duty we have undertaken to fulfill. It is true that it did not suit the purposes of Mr Cobden to enter himself into any investigation of the comparative profitableness of foreign and colonial commerce, nor did he, doubtless, desire to provoke such an investigation on the part of others. With the cunning of a prejudiced partizan, he was content to skim superficially the large economical question he had not scrupled to raise from the depths of discomfiture and oblivion, in which abandoned by the colonial detractors, his predecessors, who had tried their art to conjure "spirits from the vasty deep," which would not come when they did "call for them." With gross numerical proportions apparently in his favour, but well-grounded convictions that more might be discovered than met the eye, or squared with the desire, should the component elements of those proportions be respectively submitted to the process of dissection, he preferred to leave the tale half told, the subject less than half discussed, rather than challenge the certain exposure of the fallacious assumptions on which he had reconstructed a seemingly plausible, but really shallow dogma. A foreign export trade of thirty-five millions he wished the world to believe must represent, proportionally, a larger amount of profit, than sixteen millions of colonial export trade; that the difference, in fact, would be as thirty-five to sixteen, and so, according to his Cockerian rule of calculation, it should be. But, it is said and agreed, that two and two do not always make four, as in the present case will be verified. We may, indeed, place the matter beyond dispute, by a homely illustration level to every man's capacity. For example, a Manchester banker, dealing in money, shall turn over in discounts and accounts-current, with a capital of L.100,000, the sum of one million sterling per annum. As he charges interest in current-account at the rate of 5 per cent, so he allows the same. His profit, therefore, quoad the interest on current-accounts and balances in hand, is nil; but for the trouble of managing accounts and for discounts, his charge is five shillings per L.100. In lending out his capital, he realises five per cent more upon that. But the return upon capital embarked, say, in the cotton manufacture, is calculated, at the least, at an average of fifteen per cent. What, then, are the relative profit returns upon the same sum-total of operations for the banker and manufacturer?

Manufacturer's Balance Sheet. On Capital. Operations, L.1,000,000 Capital, L.100,000 Profit, 15 per cent, L.15,000

Banker's Balance Sheet. Operations, L.1,000,000 Profit thereon, 5s. per L.100, L.2500 Capital, 100,000 Interest thereon, 5 per cent, 5000 Return on Capital, ——— 7,500 ———— Excess manufacturing profit, L.7500

That is, double the amount, or, as rateably may be said, 100 per cent greater profit for the manufacturer than the banker. Now, what is true of banking and commerce, may be—often is, true of one description of commerce, as compared with another.

It is not meant to be inferred, however, that applied to colonial trade, as compared with foreign trade, the analogy holds good to all the extent; but that it does in degree, there can be no doubt, and we are prepared to show. It will, we know, be urged, that there can be no two sale prices for the same commodity in the same market, a dictum we are not disposed to impugn; but we shall not so readily subscribe to the doctrine, that the prices in the home and colonial markets are absolutely controlled and equalized by those of the foreign market. This is a rule absolute, not founded in truth, but contradicted by every day's experience. It would be equally correct to assert, that the lower rates of labour in the European foreign market, or the higher rates in the North American, controlled and equalized in the one sense, and in the other opposing, the rates in this country, than which no assertion could be more irreconcilable with fact. Prices and labour rates elsewhere, exercise an influence doubtless, and would have more in the absence of other conditions and counteracting influences, partly arising from natural, partly from artificially created causes. Prices, in privileged home and colonial markets, cannot generally fall to the same level as in foreign neutral markets, or, as in foreign protected markets, where the rates of labour are low. Keen as is the competition in the privileged home and colonial trade among the domestic and entitled manufacturers themselves, it will hardly be denied that larger as well as more steady profits are realized from those trades than from the foreign and fluctuating trade, exposed, as in most cases the latter is, to high fiscal, restrictive, and capricious burdens. These, pro tanto, shut out competition with the protected foreign producer, unless the importer consent to be cut down to such a modicum of price or profit, as shall barely, or not at all, return the simple interest of capital laid out. Such is the position of foreign, in comparison with home trade.

The foreign glut, in such case, reacts upon the privileged home and colonial markets, no doubt affecting prices in some degree, and if not always the rates of labour, at all events the sufficiency of employment, which is scarcely less an evil. But the reaction presses with nothing like the severity, which in a similar case, and to the same extent only, would follow from a glut in the home privileged markets. The cause must be sought in the general rule, that the inferior qualities of merchandise and manufactures are for the most part the objects of exportation only. Consequently, in case of a glut, or want of demand abroad, as such are not suited by quality for home taste and consumption, the superabundance of accumulated and unsaleable stock, with the depression of prices consequent, affects comparatively in a slight degree only the value and vent of the wares prepared expressly for home consumption. But a different and more modified action takes place in case of over-production of the latter, or upon a failure of demand, arising from whatever cause. For, being then pressed upon the foreign market, the superior quality of the goods commands a decided preference at once, and that preference ensures comparatively higher rates of price in the midst of the piled up packages of warehouse sweepings and goods, made, like Peter's razors, for special sale abroad, which are vainly offered at prime or any cost. These and other specialties escape, and not unaccountably, the view and the calculation of the speculative economist, who is so often astounded to find how a principle, or a theory, of unquestionable truth abstractedly, and apparently of general application, comes practically to be controlled by circumstances beyond his appreciation, or even to be negatived altogether. An example or two in illustration, may render the question more clearly to the economical reader; although taken from the cotton trade, they are not the less true, generally, of all other branches of home manufacturing industry. As we shall have to mention names, a period long past is purposely selected; but although the parties, so far as commercial pursuits, may be considered as no longer in existence, yet they cannot fail to be well remembered. The former firm of Phillips and Lee of Manchester, were extensive spinners of cotton yarn for exportation, and extensive purchasers of other cotton yarns for exportation also; but for home manufacture they never could produce a quality of yarn equally saleable in the home market with other yarn of the same counts, and nominally classed of the same quality. The principal reason was, that they spun with machinery solely adapted for a particular trade, and the production of quantity was more an object than first-rate quality; to these ends their machinery was suited, and to have produced a first-rate article, extensive and expensive alterations in that machinery would have been required. Mr Lee himself, the managing partner, was an ingenious and theoretically scientific man, and often experimentalizing, but in general practically with little success. When, therefore, the export trade in yarns fell off, as, in some years during the war and the continental system of Bonaparte, we believe it was almost entirely suspended, the yarns so described of this firm, and of any others the same, could find no vent—abroad no opening—at home not suited for the consumption. As the firm were extremely wealthy the accumulation of stock was, however, of small inconvenience; time was no object, the Continent was not always sealed. With the great spinner Arkwright the case was entirely different; at home as abroad his yarn products were always first in demand; his qualities unequalled; his prices far above all others of even the first order; his machinery of the most finished construction. If, perchance, home demand flagged, the export never failed to compensate in a great degree.

So with all other subdivisions of the same or other manufactures, more or less. And this may explain the seeming phenomenon why; when the foreign trade has been so prostrate as we have seen it during the last three years, the home trade did not cease to be almost as prosperous as before. Political economy would arbitrarily insist that, repelled from the foreign market, or suffering from a cessation of foreign demand, the manufacturer for exportation had only to direct his attention, carry his stocks to, and hasten to swell competition and find relief in, the home market. In products requiring little skill, such as common calicoes, such efforts might, to some extent, be successful; but there the invasion ends. In all the departments requiring greater skill, more perfect machinery, more taste, and the peculiar arts of finish which long practice alone can give, the old accustomed manufacturer for the home trade remains without a rival, still prospering in the midst of depression around, and whilst secure against intrusion in his own special monopoly of home supply, commanding also a superiority in foreign markets for his surplus wares, in the event of stagnation in home consumption, over the less finished and reputed products of his less-skilled brethren of the craft.

In the enquiry into the advantages relatively of foreign and colonial export trade, it is not pretended literally to build upon the premises here established; the analogy would not always be strictly in point, but the fact resulting of the greater gainfulness of one description of trade over another is incontestable, and in the national sense perhaps much more than the individual. We shall take it for granted that British and Irish products and manufactures enjoy a preference on import into the colonies, over imports from foreign countries, of at least five per cent, resulting from differential duties in favour of the parent state: it may be more, and we believe it will be found more; but such is the preference. This profit must be all to the account of the British exporter; for it is not received by the colonial custom-house, and whatever the reduction of prices by excess of competition, it is clear prices would be still more deranged by the introduction of another element of competition in more cheaply produced foreign products at only equal rates of duty. Take, for examples, Saxon hose, French silks, American domestics, but more especially all sorts of foreign made up wares, clothes, &c. Quoad the foreigner, the preferential duties make two prices therefore, by the very fact of which he is barred out. We shall now proceed to assess the mercantile profits respectively upon the sums-total of foreign and colonial trade by the correct standard; and then we shall endeavour to arrive at a rough but approximate estimate of the value respectively of foreign and colonial export trade in respect of the descriptions of commodities exported from this country, classified as finished or partly finished, in cases where the raw material is wholly or partially of foreign origin, and measured accordingly by the amount of profit on capital, and profit in the shape of wages, which each leave respectively in the country. It will be understood that no more than a rough estimate of leading points is pretended; the calculation, article by article, would involve a labour of months perhaps, and the results in detail fill the pages of Maga for a year, and after all remain incomplete from the inaccessibility or non-existence of some of the necessary materials. There are, however, certain landmarks by which we may steer to something like general conclusions.

The profits on exports, as on all other trade, exceptional cases apart, which cannot impeach the general rule, are measured to a great extent by the distance of the country to which the exports take place, and therefore the length of period, besides the extra risk, before which capital can be replaced and profits realized. Within the compass of a two months' distance from England, we may include the Gulf of Mexico west, the Baltic and White Seas north, the Black Sea south-east, the west coast of Africa to the Gulf of Guinea, and the east coast of South America to Rio Janeiro. We come thus to the limits within which the smaller profits only are realized; and all beyond will range under the head of larger returns. It is not necessary to determine the exact amount of the profit in each case, the essential point being the ratio of one towards the other. An average return in round numbers of seven and a half per cent many, therefore, be taken for the export commerce carried on within the narrower circle, and of twenty per cent for the voyages a long cours, say those to and round the two Capes of Good Hope and Horn. It is making a large allowance to say that each shipment to Holland, France, or even the United States, for example, realizes seven and a half per cent clear profit, or that the aggregate of the exports cited yields at that rate. Twenty per cent on exports to China and the East Indies, in view of the more than double distance, and increase of risk attendant, does not seem proportionally liable to the same appearance of exaggeration. Under favourable circumstances returns cannot be looked for in less than a year on the average, and then the greater distance the greater the risk of all kinds. Classifying the exports upon this legitimate system, we find that, in round numbers, not very far from eight-ninths of the total amount of foreign trade exports come under the denomination of the shorter voyage. Thus of these total exports of thirty-five millions, less than four millions belong to the far off traffic. The account will, therefore, stand thus:—

Foreign trade profit of 7-1/2 per cent on L.31,000,000 L.2,325,000 Do. 20 do. 4,000,000 800,000 —————— Total mercantile profit, L.3,125,000

The quantities colonial would range thus:—

Colonial trade profit, long voyage, of 20 per cent on L.8,820,000 L.1,764,000 Colonial trade profit, short voyage, of 7-1/2 per cent on L.7,180,000 538,000 —————— Total colonial profit, L.2,302,000

Truth, like time, is a great leveller—a fact of which no living man has had proof and reproof administered to him more frequently and severely that Mr Cobden himself. As culprits, however, harden in heart with each repetition of crime, until from petty larceny, the initiating offence, they ascend unscrupulously to the perpetration of felony without benefit of clergy; so he, with effrontery only the more deeply burnt in, and conscience the more callous from each conviction, will still lie on, so long as lungs are left, and vulgar listeners can be found in the scum of town populations. How grandiloquent was Mr Cobden with his "new facts," brand new, as he solemnly assured the House of Commons, which was not convulsed with irrepressible derision on the announcement! How swelled he, "big with the fate" of corn and colony, as the mighty secret burst from his labouring breast, "that the whole amount of their trade in 1840 was, exports, L.51,000,000; out of that L.16,000,000 was (were) exported to the colonies, including the East Indies; but not one-third went to the colonies. Take away L.6,000,000 of the export trade that went to the East Indies, and they had L.10,000,000 of exports," &c. Oh! rare Cocker; 10 not the third of 16; "take away" one leg and there will only be the other to stand upon. Cut off, in like manner, the twenty-one millions of exports to Europe, and what becomes of the foreign trade? "An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth," is the old lex talionis, and we have no objection to part with a limb on our side on the reciprocal condition that he shall be amputated of another. We engage to wage air battle with him on the stumps which are left, he with his fourteen millions of foreign against our ten millions of colonial trade, like two razees of first and second rates cut down. Before next he adventures into conflict again—better had he so bethought him before his colonial debut in the House last June—would it not be the part of wisdom to take counsel with his dear friend and neighbour Mr Samuel Brookes, the well-known opulent calico-printer, manufacturer, and exporting merchant of Manchester, who proved, some three or four years ago, as clearly as figures—made up, like the restaurateur's pain, at discretion—can prove any thing, that the larger the foreign trade he carried on, the greater were his losses, in various instances cited of hundreds per cent; from whence, seeing how rotund and robust grows the worthy alderman, deplorable balance-sheets notwithstanding, which would prostrate the Bank of England like the Bank of Manchester, it should result that he, like another Themistocles, might exclaim to his family, clad in purple and fine linen, "My children, had we not been ruined, we should have been undone!"

But revenons a nos moutons. According to Mr Cobden's new facts, borrowed from Porter's Tables, so far as the figures, the superior importance and profit of foreign trade should be measured by the gross quantities, and be, say, as 35 to 16. We have shown that the relation of profit really stands as 31 to 23, starting from the same basis of total amounts as himself. The total profit upon a foreign trade of thirty-five millions, to place it on an equal rateable footing with colonial, should be, not three millions and an eighth, but upwards of five millions, or the colonial trade of sixteen millions, if no more gainful than foreign, should be, not L.2,300,000, but about one million less. And here the question naturally recurs, assuming the principle of Mr Cobden to be correct—as so, for his satisfaction, it has been reasoned hitherto—at what rate of charge nationally are these profits, colonial and foreign, purchased? Fortunately the materials for the estimates are already in hand, and here they are:

Colonial trade—cost in Army, Navy, Ordnance, &c., L.3,000,000 Colonial trade—profit to exporters, 2,302,000 —————

Deficit—loss to the country, L.698,000 Foreign trade—cost in Army, Navy, Ordnance, &c., L.4,500,000 Foreign trade exporting profit, 3,125,000 ————— Deficit—loss to the country, L.1,375,000

As nearly, therefore, as may be, foreign trade costs the country twice as much as colonial. Such are the conclusions, the rough but approximately accurate conclusions, to which the new facts of Mr Cobden and the old hobby of Joseph Hume, mounted by the new philosopher, have led; and the public exposition of which has been provoked by his ignorance or malevolence, or both. In order to gain less than 9 per cent average upon a foreign trade of thirty-five millions, the country is saddled, for the benefit of Messrs Brookes and Cobden, inter alios, with a cost of nearly 13 per cent upon the same amount; whilst the cost of colonial trade is about 18-3/4 per cent on the total of sixteen millions, but the profit nearly fifteen per cent. In the account of colonial profit, be it observed, moreover, no account is here taken of the supplementary advantage derived from the differential duties against foreign imports.

In the national point of view, the profitableness of the foreign export trade, as compared with colonial, would seem more dubious still, when the values left and distributed among the producing classes are taken into calculation. Of the total foreign exports of thirty-five millions, considerably above one-fifth—say, to the value of nearly seven and a half millions sterling—were exported in the shape of cotton, linen, and woollen yarns in 1840, the year selected by Mr Cobden, of which, in cotton yarn alone, to the value of nearly 6,200,000. According to Burn's Commercial Glance for 1842, the average price of cotton-yarn so exported, exceeds by some 50 per cent the average price of the cotton from which made. Applying the same rule to linen yarn as made from foreign imported flax, and to woollen yarn as partly, at least, from foreign wool, we come to a gross sum of about L.3,750,000 left in the country, as values representing the wages of labour, and the profits of manufacturing capital in respect of yarn. The quantity of yarn, on the contrary, exported colonially, does not reach to one-sixteenth of the total colonial exports. In order to manifest the immense superiority nationally of a colonial export trade in finished products, over a foreign trade in quasi raw materials, we need only take the article of "apparel." Of the total value of wearing apparel exported in 1840, say for L.1,208,000, the colonial trade alone absorbed the best part of one million. Now, it may be estimated with tolerable certainty, that the average amount, over and above the cost of the raw material, of the values expended upon and left in the country, in the shape of wages and profits, upon this description of finished product, does not fall short of the rate of 500 per cent. So that apparel to the total value of one million would leave behind an expenditure of labour, and a realization of profits, substantially existing and circulating among the community, over and above the cost of raw material, of about L.800,000, upon a basis of raw material values of about L.160,000. Assuming for a moment, that yarns were equally improved and prolific in the multiplication of values, the seven millions and a half of foreign exports should represent a value proportionally of forty-five millions sterling. The colonial exports comprise a variety of similar finished and made-up articles, to the extent of probably about four millions sterling, to which the same rate of home values, so swelled by labour and profits, will apply.

It remains only to add, that the foreign export trade gave employment in 1840—the date fixed by Mr Cobden, but to which, in some few instances, it has been impossible to adhere for want of necessary documents, as he himself experienced—to 10,970 British vessels, of 1,797,000 aggregate tonnage outwards, repeated voyages inclusive, for the verification of the number of which we are without any returns, those made to Parliament by the public offices bearing the simple advertence on their face, with official nonchalance, that "there are no materials in this office by which the number of the crews of steam and sailing vessels respectively (including their repeated voyages) can be shown." And yet a "statistical department" has now been, for some years, founded as part of the Board of Trade, whose pretensions to the accomplishment of great works have hitherto been found considerably to transcend both the merit and the quantity of its performances. The proportion of foreign vessels sharing in the same export traffic in 1840, was little inferior to that of the British. Thus, 10,440 foreign vessels, of 1,488,888 tonnage, divided the foreign export trade with 10,970 British vessels. The returns for 1840 give 6663 as the number of British vessels, and 1,495,957 as the aggregate tonnage, carrying on the export trade with the colonies; thus it will be seen that the exportation of thirty-five millions of pounds' worth of British produce and manufactures to foreign countries, employed only about 300,000 tons of British shipping more than the export to the colonies of sixteen millions of pounds' worth of products, or say, less than one half. Proportions kept according to values exported respectively, foreign trade should have occupied about 3,250,000 tons of British shipping, against the colonial employment of 1,496,000 tons.

Nor is this all the difference, large as it is, in favour of colonial over foreign trade, with respect to the employment of shipping. For it may be taken for granted that, in fact, so far as the amount of tonnage, repeated voyages not included, the colonial does actually employ a much larger quantity relatively than foreign trade. It may be fairly assumed that, on the average, the shipping in foreign trade make one and a half voyages outwards—that is, outwards and inwards together, three voyages in the year; for, upon a rough estimate, it would appear that not one-tenth of this shipping was occupied in mercantile enterprise beyond the limits of that narrower circle before assigned, ad within which repeated voyages of twice and thrice in the year, and frequently more often, are not practicable only but habitually performed. Taking one-tenth as representing the one voyage and return in the year of the more distant traffic, and one and a half outward sailings for the other nine tenths of tonnage, we arrive at the approximative fact, that the foreign trade does in reality employ no more (repeated voyages allowed for as before stated) than the aggregate tonnage of 1,258,000, instead of the 1,797,000 gross tonnage as apparent. Applying the same rule, we find that the long or one year's colonial voyage traffic is equal to something less than two-ninths of the whole tonnage employed in the colonial trade, and that, assuming one and a half voyages per annum for the remainder trafficking with the colonies nearer home, the result will be, that the colonial traffic absorbs an aggregate of 1,113,000 actual tonnage, exclusive of repeated voyages of the same shipping. Here, for the satisfaction of colonial maligners, like Mr Cobden, we place the shipping results for foreign and colonial traffic respectively.

The registered tonnage of the 13,927 British vessels above fifty tons burden, stood, on the 31st of December 1841, (the returns for 1840 or 1839, we do not chance to have,)

Tons. At 2,578,862 Of which foreign trade, in the export of products and manufactures to the value of thirty-five millions sterling, absorbed 1,258,000

Colonial trade in the transport of sixteen millions only of values, 1,113,000

Considering the greater mass of values transported, the foreign trade should have employed, to have kept its relative shipping proportion and importance with colonial trade, above 2,400,000

We are, however, entirely satisfied, and it would admit of easy proof, were time and space equally at our disposal for the elaborate development of details, not only that the colonial trade gives occupation to an equal, but to a larger proportion of registered British shipping than the foreign trade. But we have been obliged to limit ourselves to the consideration of such facts as are most readily accessible, so as to enable the general reader to test at once the approximative fidelity of the vindication we present, and the falsehood, scarcely glozed over with a coating of plausibility, of the vague generalities strung together as a case against the colonies by Mr Cobden and the anti-colonial faction. We have, moreover, to request the reader to observe, that we have proceeded all along on the basis of the wild assumptions of Mr Cobden's own self created and unexplained calculations; that by his own figures we have tried and convicted his own conclusions of monstrous exaggeration, and ignorant, if not wilful, deception. The three fourths charge of army expenditure upon the colonies, is a mere mischievous fabrication of his own brain. In ordinary circumstances the colonial charge would not enter for more than half that amount; and even with the extraordinary expenditure rendered necessary by Gosford and Durham misrule in Canada, the colonial charge is not equal to the amount so wantonly asserted. We have likewise not insisted with sufficient force, and at suitable length of evidence, upon the fact of the infinitely greater values proportionally left in the country, in the shape of the wages of labour, and the profits upon capital, by colonial than by foreign trade. It would not, however, be too much to assume, and indeed the proposition is almost self-evident, that whereas about 150 per cent may be taken as the average improved value of the products absorbed by the foreign trade, over and above the first cost of the raw material from which fabricated, where such material is of foreign origin, the similarly improved excess of values absorbed by the colonial trade, would not average less than from 250 to 300 per cent. Other occasions may arise, hereafter, more convenient than the present, for throwing these truths into broader relief; we are content, indeed, now to leave Mr Cobden to chew the cud of reflection upon his own colonial blunders and misrepresentations.

Here, therefore, we stay our hand; we have redeemed our pledge; we have more than proved our case. Various laborious researches into the real values of colonial and foreign exported commodities, have amply satisfied our mind, as they would those of any impartial person capable of investigation into special facts, of the superior comparative value, in the mercantile and manufacturing, or individual sense, as well, more specially, as in the economical and social, or national sense, of colonial over foreign trade. Do we therefore seek to disparage foreign trade? Far from it: our anxious desire is to see it prosper and progress daily and yearly, fully impressed with the conviction that it is, as it long has been, one of the sheet-anchors of the noble vessel of the State, by the aid of which it has swung securely in, and weathered bravely, many a hurricane—and holding fast to which, the gallant ship is again repairing the damage of the late long night of tempest. But we deprecate these invidious attacks and comparisons by which malice and ignorance would depreciate one great interest, for the selfish notion of unduly elevating another; as if both could not equally prosper without coming into collision; nay, as if each could not contribute to the welfare of the other, and, in combined result, advance the glory and prosperity of the common country.

We have not deemed it proper, to mix up with the special argument of this article those political, moral, and social considerations of gravest import, as connected with the possession, the government, and the improvement of colonial dependencies, which constitute a question apart, the happy solution of which is of the highest public concernment; and separately, therefore, may be left for treatment. But in the economical view, we may take credit for having cleared the ground and prepared the way for its discussion to no inconsiderable extent. Nor have we thought it fitting to nix up the debate on differential duties in favour of the colonies with the other objects which have engaged our labour. We are as little disposed as any free trader to view differential duties in excess, with favour and approval. The candid admission of Mr Deacon Hume on that head, that in reference to the late Slave colonies the question of those duties is "taken entirely out of the category of free trade," should set that debate at rest for the present, at all events.

* * * * *



A SPECULATION ON THE SENSES.

How can that which is a purely subjective affection—in other words, which is dependent upon us as a mere modification of our sentient nature—acquire, nevertheless, such a distinct objective reality, as shall compel us to acknowledge it as an independent creation, the permanent existence of which, is beyond the control of all that we can either do or think? Such is the form to which all the questions of speculation my be ultimately reduced. And all the solutions which have hitherto been propounded as answers to the problem, may be generalized into these two: either consciousness is able to transcend, or go beyond itself; or else the whole pomp, and pageantry, and magnificence, which we miscall the external universe, are nothing but our mental phantasmagoria, nothing but states of our poor, finite, subjective selves.

But it has been asked again and again, in reference to these two solutions, can a man overstep the limits of himself—of his own consciousness? If he can, then says the querist, the reality of the external world is indeed guaranteed; but what an insoluble, inextricable contradiction is here: that a man should overstep the limits of the very nature which is his, just because he cannot overstep it! And if he cannot, then says the same querist, then is the external universe an empty name—a mere unmeaning sound; and our most inveterate convictions are all dissipated like dreams.

Astute reasoner! the dilemma is very just, and is very formidable; and upon the one or other of its horns, has been transfixed every adventurer that has hitherto gone forth on the knight-errantry of speculation. Every man who lays claim to a direct knowledge of something different from himself, perishes impaled on the contradiction involved in the assumption, that consciousness can transcend itself: and every man who disclaims such knowledge, expires in the vacuum of idealism, where nothing grows but the dependent and transitory productions of a delusive and constantly shifting consciousness.

But is there no other way in which the question can be resolved? We think that there is. In the following demonstration, we think that we can vindicate the objective reality of things—(a vindication which, we would remark by the way is of no value whatever, in so far as that objective reality is concerned, but only as being instrumental to the ascertainment of the laws which regulate the whole process of sensation;)—we think that we can accomplish this, without, on the one hand, forcing consciousness to overstep itself, and on the other hand, without reducing that reality to the delusive impressions of an understanding born but to deceive. Whatever the defects of our proposed demonstration may be, we flatter ourselves that the dilemma just noticed as so fatal to every other solution, will be utterly powerless when brought to bear against it: and we conceive, that the point of a third alternative must be sharpened by the controversialist who would bring us to the dust. It is a new argument, and will require a new answer. We moreover pledge ourselves, that abstruse as the subject is, both the question, and our attempted solution of it, shall be presented to the reader in such a shape as shall compel him to understand them.

Our pioneer shall be a very plain and palpable illustration. Let A be a circle, containing within it X Y Z.



X Y and Z lie within the circle; and the question is, by what art or artifice—we might almost say by what sorcery—can they be transplanted out of it, without at the same time being made to overpass the limits of the sphere? There are just four conceivable answers to this question—answers illustrative of three great schools of philosophy, and of a fourth which is now fighting for existence.

1. One man will meet the difficulty boldly, and say—"X Y and Z certainly lie within the circle, but I believe they lie without it. How this should be, I know not. I merely state what I conceive to be the fact. The modus operandi is beyond my comprehension." This man's answer is contradictory, and will never do.

2. Another man will deny the possibility of the transference—"X Y and Z," he will say, "are generated within the circle in obedience to its own laws. They form part and parcel of the sphere; and every endeavour to regard them as endowed with an extrinsic existence, must end in the discomfiture of him who makes the attempt." This man declines giving any answer to the problem. We ask him how X Y and can be projected beyond the circle without transgressing its limits; and he answers that they never are, and never can be so projected.

3. A third man will postulate as the cause of X Y Z a transcendent X Y Z—that is, a cause lying external to the sphere; and by referring the former to the latter, he will obtain for X Y X, not certainly a real externality, which is the thing wanted, but a quasi-externality, with which, as the best that is to be had, he will in all probability rest contented. "X Y and Z," he will say, "are projected, as it were, out of the circle." This answer leaves the question as much unsolved as ever. Or,

4. A fourth man (and we beg the reader's attention to this man's answer, for it forms the fulcrum or cardinal point on which our whole demonstration turns)—a fourth man will say, "If the circle could only be brought within itself, so—



then the difficulty would disappear—the problem would be completely solved. X Y Z must now of necessity fall as extrinsic to the circle A; and this, too, (which is the material part of the solution,) without the limits of the circle A being overstepped."

Perhaps this may appear very like quibbling; perhaps it may be regarded as a very absurd solution—a very shallow evasion of the difficulty. Nevertheless, shallow or quibbling as it may seem, we venture to predict, that when the breath of life shall have been breathed into the bones of the above dead illustration, this last answer will be found to afford a most exact picture and explanation of the matter we have to deal with. Let our illustration, then, stand forth as a living process. The large circle A we shall call our whole sphere of sense, in so far as it deals with objective existence—and X Y Z shall be certain sensations of colour, figure, weight, hardness, and so forth, comprehended within it. The question then is—how can these sensations, without being ejected from the sphere of sense within which they lie, assume the status and the character of real independent existences? How can they be objects, and yet remain sensations?

Nothing will be lost on the score of distinctness, if we retrace, in the living sense, the footprints we have already trod in explicating the inanimate illustration. Neither will any harm be done, should we employ very much the same phraseology. We answer, then, that here, too, there are just four conceivable ways in which this question can be met.

1. The man of common sense, (so called,) who aspires to be somewhat of a philosopher, will face the question boldly, and will say, "I feel that colour and hardness, for instance, lie entirely within the sphere of sense, and are mere modifications of my subjective nature. At the same time, feel that colour and hardness constitute a real object, which exists out of the sphere of sense, independently of me and all my modifications. How this should be, I know not; I merely state the fact as I imagine myself to find it. The modus is beyond my comprehension." This man belongs to the school of Natural Realists. If he merely affirmed or postulated a miracle in what he uttered, we should have little to say against him, (for the whole process of sensation is indeed miraculous.) But he postulates more than a miracle; he postulates a contradiction, in the very contemplation of which our reason is unhinged.

2. Another man will deny that our sensations ever transcend the sphere of sense, or attain a real objective existence. "Colour, hardness, figure, and so forth," he will say, "are generated within the sphere of sense, in obedience to its own original laws. They form integral parts of the sphere; and he who endeavours to construe them to his own mind as embodied in extrinsic independent existences, must for ever be foiled in the attempt." This man declines giving any answer to the problem. We ask, how can our sensations be embodied in distinct permanent realities? And he replies, that they never are and never can be so embodied. This man is an Idealist—or as we would term him, (to distinguish him from another species about to be mentioned, of the same genus,) an Acosmical idealist; that is, an Idealist who absolutely denies the existence of an independent material world.

3. A third man will postulate as the cause of our sensations of hardness, colour, &c., a transcendent something, of which he knows nothing, except that he feigns and fables it as lying external to the sphere of sense: and then, by referring our sensations to this unknown cause, he will obtain for them, not certainly the externality desiderated, but a quasi-externality, which he palms off upon himself and us as the best that can be supplied. This man is Cosmothetical Idealist: that is, an Idealist who postulates an external universe as the unknown cause of certain modifications we are conscious of within ourselves, and which, according to his view, we never really get beyond. This species of speculator is the commonest, but he is the least trustworthy of any; and his fallacies are all the more dangerous by reason of the air of plausibility with which they are invested. From first to last, he represents us as the dupes of our own perfidious nature. By some inexplicable process of association, he refers certain known effects to certain unknown causes; and would thus explain to us how these effects (our sensations) come to assume, as it were, the character of external objects. But we know not "as it were." Away with such shuffling phraseology. There is nothing either of reference, or of inference, or of quasi-truthfulness in our apprehension of the material universe. It is ours with a certainty which laughs to scorn all the deductions of logic, and all the props of hypothesis. What we wish to know is, how our subjective affections can be, not as it were, but in God's truth, and in the strict, literal, earnest, and unambiguous sense of the words, real independent, objective existences. This is what the cosmothetical idealist never can explain, and never attempts to explain.

4. We now come to the answer which the reader, who has followed us thus far, will be prepared to find us putting forward as by far the most important of any, and as containing in fact the very kernel of the solution. A fourth man will say—"If the whole sphere of sense could only be withdrawn inwards—could be made to fall somewhere within itself—then the whole difficulty would disappear, and the problem would be solved at once. The sensations which existed previous to this retraction or withdrawal, would then, of necessity, fall without the sphere of sense, ( see our second diagram;) and in doing so, they would necessarily assume a totally different aspect from that of sensations. They would be real independent objects: and (what is the important part of the demonstration) they would acquire this status without overstepping by a hair's-breadth the primary limits of the sphere. Were such phraseology allowable, we should say that the sphere has understepped itself, and in doing so, has left its former contents high and dry, and stamped with all the marks which can characterize objective existences."

Now the reader will please to remark, that we are very far from desiring him to accept this last solution at our bidding. Our method, we trust, is any thing but dogmatical. We merely say, that if this can be shown to be the case, then the demonstration which we are in the course of unfolding, will hardly fail to recommend itself to his acceptance. Whether or not it is the case, can only be established by an appeal to our experience.

We ask, then—does experience inform us, or does she not, that the sphere of sense falls within, and very considerably within, itself? But here it will be asked—what meaning do we attach to the expression, that sense falls within its own sphere? These words, then, we must first of all explain. Every thing which is apprehended as a sensation—such as colour, figure, hardness, and so forth—falls within the sentient sphere. To be a sensation, and to fall within the sphere of sense, are identical and convertible terms. When, therefore, it is asked—does the sphere of sense ever fall within itself? this is equivalent to asking—do the senses themselves ever become sensations? Is that which apprehends sensations ever itself apprehended as a sensation? Can the senses he seized on within the limits of the very circle which they prescribe? If they cannot, then it must be admitted that the sphere of sense never falls within itself, and consequently that an objective reality—i.e. a reality extrinsic to that sphere—can never be predicated or secured for any part of its contents. But we conceive that only one rational answer can be returned to this question. Does not experience teach us, that much if not the whole of our sentient nature becomes itself in turn a series of sensations? Does not the sight—that power which contains the whole visible space, and embraces distances which no astronomer can compute—does it not abjure its high prerogative, and take rank within the sphere of sense—itself a sensation—when revealed to us in the solid atom we call the eye? Here it is the touch which brings the sight within, and very far within, the sphere of vision. But somewhat less directly, and by the aid of the imagination, the sight operates the same introtraction (pardon the coinage) upon itself. It ebbs inwards, so to speak, from all the contents that were given in what may be called its primary sphere. It represents itself, in its organ, as a minute visual sensation, out of, and beyond which, are left lying the great range of all its other sensations. By imagining the sight as a sensation of colour, we diminish it to a speck within the sphere of its own sensations; and as we now regard the sense as for ever enclosed within this small embrasure, all the other sensations which were its, previous to our discovery of the organ, and which are its still, are built up into a world of objective existence, necessarily external to the sight, and altogether out of its control. All sensations of colour are necessarily out of one another. Surely, then, when the sight is subsumed under the category of colour—as it unquestionably is whenever we think of the eye—surely all other colours must, of necessity, assume a position external to it; and what more is wanting to constitute that real objective universe of light and glory in which our hearts rejoice?

We can, perhaps, make this matter still plainer by reverting to our old illustration. Our first exposition of the question was designed to exhibit a general view of the case, through the medium of a dead symbolical figure. This proved nothing, though we imagine that it illustrated much. Our second exposition exhibited the illustration in its application to the living sphere of sensation in general; and this proved little. But we conceive that therein was foreshadowed a certain procedure, which, if it can be shown from experience to be the actual procedure of sensation in detail, will prove all that we are desirous of establishing. We now, then, descend to a more systematic exposition of the process which (so far as our experience goes, and we beg to refer the reader to his own) seems to be involved in the operation of seeing. We dwell chiefly upon the sense of sight, because it is mainly through its ministrations that a real objective universe is given to us. Let the circle A be the whole circuit of vision. We may begin by calling it the eye, the retina, or what we will. Let it be provided with the ordinary complement of sensations—the colours X Y Z. Now, we admit that these sensations cannot be extruded beyond the periphery of vision; and yet we maintain that, unless they be made to fall on the outside of that periphery, they cannot become real objects. How is this difficulty—this contradiction—to be overcome? Nature overcomes it, by a contrivance as simple as it is beautiful. In the operation of seeing, admitting the canvass or background of our picture to be a retina, or what we will, with a multiplicity of colours depicted upon it, we maintain that we cannot stop here, and that we never do stop here. We invariably go on (such is the inevitable law of our nature) to complete the picture—that is to say, we fill in our own eye as a colour within the very picture which our eye contains—we fill it in as a sensation within the other sensations which occupy the rest of the field; and in doing so, we of necessity, by the same law, turn these sensations out of the eye; and they thus, by the same necessity, assume the rank of independent objective existences. We describe the circumference infinitely within the circumference; and hence all that lies on the outside of the intaken circle comes before us stamped with the impress of real objective truth. We fill in the eye greatly within the sphere of light, (or within the eye itself; if we insist on calling the primary sphere by this name,) and the eye thus filled in is the only eye we know any thing at all about, either from the experience of sight or of touch. How this operation is accomplished, is a subject of but secondary moment; whether it be brought about by the touch, by the eye itself, or by the imagination, is a question which might admit of much discussion; but it is one of very subordinate interest. The fact is the main thing—the fact that the operation is accomplished in one way or another—the fact that the sense comes before itself (if not directly, yet virtually) as one of its own sensations—that is the principal point to be attended to; and we apprehend that this fact is now placed beyond the reach of controversy.

To put the case in another light. The following considerations may serve to remove certain untoward difficulties in metaphysics and optics, which beset the path, not only of the uninitiated, but even of the professors of these sciences.

We are assured by optical metaphysicians, or metaphysical opticians, that, in the operations of vision, we never get beyond the eye itself, or the representations that are depicted therein. We see nothing, they tell us, but what is delineated within the eye. Now, the way in which a plain man should meet this statement, is this—he should ask the metaphysician what eye he refers to. Do you allude, sir, to an eye which belongs to my visible body, and forms a small part of the same; or do you allude to an eye which does not belong to my visible body, and which constitutes no portion thereof? If the metaphysician should say, that he refers to an eye of the latter description, then the plain man's answer should be—that he has no experience of any such eye—that he cannot conceive it—that he knows nothing at all about it—and that the only eye which he ever thinks or speaks of, is the eye appertaining to, and situated within, the phenomenon which he calls his visible body. Is this, then, the eye which the metaphysician refers to, and which he tells us we never get beyond? If it be—why, then, the very admission that this eye is a part of the visible body, (and what else can we conceive the eye to be?) proves that we must get beyond it. Even supposing that the whole operation were transacted within the eye, and that the visible body were nowhere but within the eye, still the eye which we invariably and inevitably fill in as belonging to the visible body, (and no other eye is ever thought of or spoken of by us,)—this eye, we say, must necessarily exclude the visible body, and all other visible things, from its sphere. Or, can the eye (always conceived of as a visible thing among other visible things) again contain the very phenomenon (i.e. the visible body) within which it is itself contained? Surely no one will maintain a position of such unparalleled absurdity as that.

The science of optics, in so far as it maintains, according to certain physiological principles, that in the operation of seeing we never get beyond the representations within the eye, is founded on the assumption, that the visible body has no visible eye belonging to it. Whereas we maintain, that the only eye that we have—the only eye we can form any conception of, is the visible eye that belongs to the visible body, as a part does to a whole; whether this eye be originally revealed to us by the touch, by the sight, by the reason, or by the imagination. We maintain, that to affirm we never get beyond this eye in the exercise of vision, is equivalent to asserting, that a part is larger than the whole, of which it is only a part—is equivalent to asserting, that Y, which is contained between X and Z, is nevertheless of larger compass than X and Z, and comprehends them both. The fallacy we conceive to be this, that the visible body can be contained within the eye, without the eye of the visible body also being contained therein. But this is a procedure, which no law, either of thought or imagination, will tolerate. If we turn the visible body, and all visible things, into the eye, we must turn the eye of the visible body also into the eye; a process which, of course, again turns the visible body, and all visible things, out of the eye. And thus the procedure eternally defeats itself. Thus the very law which appears to annihilate, or render impossible, the objective existence of visible things, as creations independent of the eye—this very law, when carried into effect with a thorough-going consistency, vindicates and establishes that objective existence, with a logical force, an iron necessity, which no physiological paradox can countervail.

We have now probably said enough to convince the attentive reader, that the sense of sight, when brought under its own notice as a sensation, either directly, or through the ministry of the touch or of the imagination, (as it is when revealed to us in its organ,) falls very far—falls almost infinitely within its own sphere. Sight, revealing itself as a sense, spreads over a span commensurate with the diameter of the whole visible space; sight, revealing itself as a Sensation, dwindles to a speck of almost unappreciable insignificance, when compared with the other phenomena which fall within the visual ken. This speck is the organ, and the organ is the sentient circumference drawn inwards, far within itself, according to a law which (however unconscious we may be of its operation) presides over every act and exercise of vision—a law which, while it contracts the sentient sphere, throws, at the same time, into necessary objectivity every phenomenon that falls external to the diminished circle. This is the law in virtue of which subjective visual sensations are real visible objects. The moment the sight becomes one of its own sensations, it is restricted, in a peculiar manner, to that particular sensation. It now falls, as we have said, within its own sphere. Now, nothing more was wanting to make the other visual sensations real independent existences; for, qua sensations, they are all originally independent of each other, and the sense itself being now a sensation, they must now also be independent of it.

We now pass on to the consideration of the sense of touch.

Here precisely the same process is gone through which was observed to take place in the case of vision. The same law manifests itself here, and the same inevitable consequence follows, namely—that sensations are things—that subjective affections are objective realities. The sensation of hardness (softness, be it observed, is only an inferior degree of hardness, and therefore the latter word is the proper generic term to be employed)—the sensation of hardness forms the contents of this sense. Hardness, we will say, is originally a purely subjective affection. The question, then, is, how can this affection, without being thrust forth into a fictitious, transcendent, and incomprehensible universe, assume, nevertheless, a distinct objective reality, and be (not as it were, but in language of the most unequivocating truth) a permanent existence altogether independent of the sense? We answer, that this can take place only provided the sense of touch can be brought under our notice as itself hard. If this can be shown to take place, then as all sensations which are presented to us in space necessarily exclude one another, are reciprocally out of each other, all other instances of hardness must of necessity fall as extrinsic to that particular hardness which the sense reveals to us as its own; and, consequently, all these other instances of hardness will start into being, as things endowed with a permanent and independent substance.

Now, what is the verdict of experience on the subject? The direct and unequivocal verdict of experience is, that the touch reveals itself to us as one of its own sensations. In the finger-points more particularly, and generally all over the surface of the body, the touch manifests itself not only as that which apprehends hardness, but as that which is itself hard. The sense of touch vested in one of its own sensations (our tangible bodies namely) is the sense of touch brought within its own sphere. It comes before itself as one sensation of hardness. Consequently all its other sensations of hardness are necessarily excluded from this particular hardness; and, falling beyond it, they are by the same consequence built up into a world of objective reality, of permanent substance, altogether independent of the sense, self-betrayed as a sensation of hardness.

But here it may be asked, If the senses are thus reduced to the rank of sensations, if they come under our observation as themselves sensations, must we not regard them but as parts of the subjective sphere; and though the other portions of the sphere may be extrinsic to these sensations, still must not the contents of the sphere, taken as a whole, be considered as entirely subjective, i.e. as merely ours, and consequently must not real objective existence be still as far beyond our grasp as ever? We answer. No, by no means. Such a query implies a total oversight of all that experience proves to be the fact with regard to this matter. It implies that the senses have not been reduced to the rank of sensations—that they have not been brought under our cognizance as themselves sensations, and that they have yet to be brought there. It implies that vision has not been revealed to us as a sensation of colour in the phenomenon the eye—and that touch has not been revealed to us as a sensation of hardness in the phenomenon the finger. It implies, in short, that it is not the sense itself which has been revealed to us, in the one case as coloured, and in the other case as hard, but that it is something else which has been thus revealed to us. But it may still be asked, How do we know that we are not deceiving ourselves? How can it be proved that it is the senses, and not something else, which have come before us under the guise of certain sensations? That these sensations are the senses themselves, and nothing but the senses, may be proved in the following manner.

We bring the matter to the test of actual experiment. We make certain experiments, seriatim, upon each of the items that lie within the sentient sphere, and we note the effect which each experiment has upon that portion of the contents which is not meddled with. In the exercise of vision, for example, we remove a book, and no change is produced in our perception of a house; a cloud disappears, yet our apprehension of the sea and the mountains, and all other visible things, is the same as ever. We continue our experiments, until our test happens to be applied to one particular phenomenon, which lies, if not directly, yet virtually, within the sphere of vision. We remove or veil this small visual phenomenon, and a totally different effect is produced from those that took place when any of the other visual phenomena were removed or veiled. The whole landscape is obliterated. We restore this phenomenon—the whole landscape reappears: we adjust this phenomenon differently—the whole landscape becomes differently adjusted. From these experiments we find, that this phenomenon is by no means an ordinary sensation, but that it differs from all other sensations in this, that it is the sense itself appearing in the form of a sensation. These experiments prove that it is the sense itself, and nothing else, which reveals itself to us in the particular phenomenon the eye. If experience informed us that the particular adjustment of some other visual phenomenon (a book, for instance) were essential to our apprehension of all the other phenomena, we should, in the same way, be compelled to regard this book as our sense of sight manifested in one of its own sensations. The book would be to us what the eye now is: it would be our bodily organ: and no a priori reason can be shown why this might not have been the case. All that we can say is, that such is not the finding of experience. Experience points out the eye, and the eye alone, as the visual sensation essential to our apprehension of all our other sensations of vision, and we come at last to regard this sensation as the sense itself. Inveterate association leads us to regard the eye, not merely as the organ, but actually as the sense of vision. We find from experience how much depends upon its possession, and we lay claim to it as a part of ourselves, with an emphasis that will not be gainsaid.

An interesting enough subject of speculation would be, an enquiry into the gradual steps by which each man is led to appropriate his own body. No man's body is given him absolutely, indefeasibly, and at once, ex dono Dei. It is no unearned hereditary patrimony. It is held by no a priori title on the part of the possessor. The credentials by which its tenure is secured to him, are purely of an a posteriori character; and a certain course of experience must be gone through before the body can become his. The man acquires it, as he does originally all other property, in a certain formal and legalized manner. Originally, and in the strict legal as well as metaphysical idea of them, all bodies, living as well as dead, human no less than brute, are mere waifs—the property of the first finder. But the law, founding on sound metaphysical principles, very properly makes a distinction here between two kinds of finding. To entitle a person to claim a human body as his own, it is not enough that he should find it in the same way in which he finds his other sensations, namely, as impressions which interfere not with the manifestations of each other. This is not enough, even though, in the case supposed, the person should be the first finder. A subsequent finder would have the preference, if able to show that the particular sensations manifested as this human body were essential to his apprehension of all his other sensations whatsoever. It is this latter species of finding—the finding, namely, of certain sensations as the essential condition on which the apprehension of all other sensations depends; it is this finding alone which gives each man a paramount and indisputable title to that "treasure trove" which he calls his own body. Now, it is only after going through a considerable course of experience and experiment, that we can ascertain what the particular sensations are upon which all our other sensations are dependent. And therefore were we not right in saying, that a man's body is not given to him directly and at once, but that he takes a certain time, and must go through a certain process, to acquire it?

The conclusion which we would deduce from the whole of the foregoing remarks is, that the great law of living[21] sensation, the rationale of sensation as a living process, is this, that the senses are not merely presentative—i.e. they not only bring sensations before us, but that they are self-presentative—i.e. they, moreover, bring themselves before us as sensations. But for this law we should never get beyond our mere subjective modifications; but in virtue of it we necessarily get beyond them; for the results of the law are, 1st, that we, the subject, restrict ourselves to, or identify ourselves with, the senses, not as displayed in their primary sphere, (the large circle A,) but as falling within their own ken as sensations, in their secondary sphere, (the small circle A.) This smaller sphere is our own bodily frame; and does not each individual look upon himself as vested in his own bodily frame? And 2ndly, it is a necessary consequence of this investment or restriction, that every sensation which lies beyond the sphere of the senses, viewed as sensations, (i.e. which lies beyond the body,) must be, in the most unequivocal sense of the words, a real independent object. If the reader wants a name to characterise this system, he may call it the system of Absolute or Thorough-going presentationism.

[21] We say living, because every attempt hitherto made to explain sensation, has been founded on certain appearances manifested in the dead subject. By inspecting a dead carcass we shall never discover the principle of vision. Yet, though there is no seeing in a dead eye, or in a camera obscura, optics deal exclusively with such inanimate materials; and hence the student who studies them will do well to remember, that optics are the science of vision, with the fact of vision left entirely out of the consideration.

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ON THE BEST MEANS OF ESTABLISHING A COMMERCIAL INTERCOURSE BETWEEN THE ATLANTIC AND PACIFIC OCEANS.

To shorten the navigation between the eastern and western divisions of our globe, either by discovering a north-west passage into the Pacific, or opening a route across the American continent, with European philosophers and statesmen has for centuries been a favourite project, and yet in only one way has it been attempted. Large sums of money were successively voted and expended, in endeavouring to penetrate through the Arctic sea; and such is the persevering enterprise of our mariners, that in all likelihood this gigantic task eventually will be accomplished: but, even if it should, it is questionable whether a navigable opening in that direction would prove beneficial to commerce. The floating ice with which those high latitudes are encumbered; the intricacy of the navigation; the cold and tempestuous weather generally prevailing there, and the difficulty of obtaining aid, in cases of shipwreck, must continue to deter the ordinary navigator from following that track.

Enquiry, therefore, naturally turns to the several points on the middle part of the American continent, where, with the aid of art, it is supposed that a communication across may be effected. These are five in number, and the facilities for the undertaking which each affords, have been discussed by a few modern travellers, commencing with Humboldt. On a close investigation into the subject, it will, however, appear evident, that although the cutting of a canal on some point or order, may be within the compass of human exertion, still the undertaking would require an enormous outlay of capital, besides many years to accomplish it; and even if it should be completed, the result could never answer the expectations formed upon this subject in Europe. On all the points proposed, and more especially in reference to the long lines, the difficulty of rendering rivers navigable, which in the winter are swelled into impetuous torrents; the want of population along the greater part of the distances to be cut; the differences of elevation; and, above all, the shallowness of the water on all the extremities of the cuts projected, thus only affording admission to small vessels, are among the impediments which, for the time being at least, appear almost insuperable.

Without entering further into the obstacles which present themselves to the formation of a canal along any one of the lines alluded to, I shall at once come to the conclusion, that for all the practical purposes of commercial intercourse which the physical circumstances of the country allow, a railroad is preferable, and may be constructed at infinitely less expense. This position once established, the question next to be asked is, which is the most eligible spot for the work proposed? On a careful examination of the relative merits of the several lines pointed out, that of the isthmus of Panama unquestionably appears to be the most eligible. From its central position, and the short distance intervening between the two oceans, it seems, indeed, to be providentially destined to become the connecting link between the eastern and western worlds; and hence its being made a thoroughfare for all nations, must be a subject of the utmost importance to those engaged in commerce.

Some of our most eminent public writers of the day, anticipating the advantages likely to result from the emancipation of Spanish America, considered the opening of a passage across that isthmus as one of the mightiest events which could present itself to the enterprise of man; and it is well known, that during Mr Pitt's administration projects on this subject were submitted to him—some of them even attempting to show the feasibility of cutting a canal across, sufficiently deep and wide to admit vessels of the largest class. Report says, that the minister frequently spoke in rapturous terms on the supposed facilities of this grand project; and it is believed, that the sanguine hopes of its realization had great weight with him when forming his plans for the independence of the southern division of the New World. The same idea prevailed in Europe for the greater part of the last century; but yet no survey was instituted—no steps taken to obtain correct data on the subject. Humboldt revived it; and yet this great and beneficial scheme again remained neglected, and, to all appearance, forgotten. At length the possession of the Marquesas islands by the French, brought the topic into public notice, when, towards the close of last April, and while submitting the project of a law to the Chamber of Deputies for a grant of money to cover the expenses of a government establishment in the new settlements, Admiral Roussin expressed himself thus:—"The advantages of our new establishments, incontestable as they are even at present, will assume a far greater importance hereafter. They will become of great value, should a plan which, at the present moment, fixes the attention of all maritime nations, be realized, namely, to open, through the isthmus of Panama, a passage between Europe and the Pacific, instead of going round by Cape Horn. When this great event, alike interesting to all naval powers, shall have been effected, the Society and Marquesas islands, by being brought so much nearer to France, will take a prominent place among the most important stations of the world. The facility of this communication will necessarily give a new activity to the navigation of the Pacific ocean; since this way will be, if not the shortest to the Indian and Chinese seas, certainly the safest, and, in a commercial point of view, unquestionably the most important."

In his speech in support of the grant, M. Gaizot, in the sitting of the 10th inst., asserted that the project of piercing the isthmus of Panama was not a chimerical one, and proceeded to read a letter from Professor Humbolt, dated Angust 1842, in which that learned gentleman observed, that "it was twenty-five years since a project for a communication between the two oceans, either by the isthmus of Panama, the lake of Nicaragua, or by the isthmus of Capica, had been proposed and topographically discussed; and yet nothing had been yet commenced." The French minister also read extracts from a paper addressed to the Academy of Sciences, by an American gentleman named Warren, advocating the practicability of a canal, by means of the rivers Vinotinto, Beverardino, and Farren, after which he enthusiastically exclaimed, that should this great work ever be accomplished—and in his own mind he had no doubt that some day or other it would—then the value of Oceana would be greatly increased, and France would have many reasons to congratulate herself on the possession of them. This has thus become one of the most popular topics in France, where the views of the minister are no longer concealed, and in England are we slumbering upon it? Certainly we have as great an interest in the accomplishment of the grand design as the French, and possibly possess more correct information on the subject than they do. Why, then, is it withheld from the public? What are our government doing?

To supply this deficiency, as far as his means allow, is the object of the writer of these pages; and in order to show the degree of credit to which his remarks may be entitled, and his reasons for differing from the French as regards the means by which the great desideratum is to be achieved, he will briefly state, that in early life he left Europe under the prevailing impression that the opening of a canal across the isthmus of Panama was practicable; but while in the West Indies, some doubts on the subject having arisen in his mind, he determined to visit the spot, which he did at his own expense, and at some personal risk—the Spaniards being still in possession of the country. With this view he ascended the river Chagre to Cruces, and thence proceeded by land to Panama, where he stopped a fortnight. In that time he made several excursions into the interior, and had a fair opportunity of hearing the sentiments of intelligent natives; but, although he then came to the conclusion that a canal of large dimensions was impracticable, he saw the possibility of opening a railroad, with which, in his opinion, European nations ought to be satisfied, at least for the present. Why he assumed this position, a description of the locality will best explain.

The river Chagre, which falls into the Atlantic, is the nearest transitable point to Panama, but unfortunately the harbour does not admit vessels drawing more than twelve feet water.[22] There the traveller embarks in a bonjo, (a flat-bottomed boat,) or in a canoe, made of the trunk of a cedar-tree, grown on the banks to an enormous size. The velocity of the downward current is equal to three miles an hour, and greater towards the source. The ascent is consequently tedious; often the rowers are compelled to pole the boat along, a task, under a burning sun, which could only be performed by negroes. In the upper part of the stream the navigation is obstructed by shallows, so much so as to render the operation of unloading unavoidable. Large trunks of trees, washed down by the rains, and sometimes embedded in the sands, also occasionally choke up the channel, impediments which preclude the possibility of a steam power being used beyond a certain distance up. No boat can ascend higher than Cruces, a village in a direct line not more than twenty-two miles from Chagre harbour; but owing to the sinuosities of the river, the distance to be performed along it is nearly double. To stem the current requires from three to eight days, according to the season, whereas the descent does not take more than from eight to twelve hours.

From Cruces to Panama the distance is five leagues, over a broken and hilly country. The town is situated at the head of the gulf, on a neck of land washed by the waters of the Pacific; but the port is only accessible to flat-bottomed boats, owing to which it is called Las Piraguas. The harbour, or rather the roadstead, is formed by a cluster of small islands lying about six miles from the shore, under the shelter of which vessels find safe anchorage. The tides rise high, and, falling in the same proportion, the sloping coast is left dry to a considerable distance out—a circumstance which precludes the possibility of forming an outlet in front of Panama. The obstacles above enumerated at once convinced the writer that a ship canal in this direction was impracticable. The Spanish plan was to make the Chagre navigable a considerable distance up, by removing the shallows and deepening the channel; but owing to the great inclination in the descent, and the immense volumes of water rushing down in winter, the task would be a most herculean one; and, even if accomplished, this part of the route could only serve for small craft. A canal over five leagues of hilly ground would still remain to be cut.

Although the plan, so long and so fondly cherished in Europe, and now revived in France, must, for the reasons here assigned, be abandoned, on this account we ought not to be deterred from availing ourselves of such facilities as the locality affords. The geographical position of the isthmus of Panama is too interesting to be any longer disregarded. "When the Spanish discoverers first overcame the range of mountains which divide the western from the Atlantic shores of South America," said a distinguished statesman,[23] "they stood fixed in silent admiration, gazing on the vast expanse of the Southern ocean which lay stretched before them in boundless prospect. They adored—even those hardened and sanguinary adventurers adored—the gracious providence of Heaven, which, after lapse of so many centuries had opened to mankind so wonderful a field of untried and unimagined enterprize." The very same point of land where, in 1515, the Spaniards first beheld the Pacific, is the spot formed by nature for the realization of those advantages which their cautious policy caused them to overlook. The Creator seems to have intended it for general use—as the highway of nations; and yet, after a period of more than three centuries, scarcely has the solitude which envelopes this interesting strip of land been broken. Is Europe or America to blame for this?

[22] This is the first impediment to an oceanic canal, and one equally felt on the other proposed lines. Captain Sir Edward Belcher, when recently surveying the western coasts of America, availed himself of the opportunity to explore the Estero Real, a river on the Pacific side, which he did by ascending it to the distance of thirty miles from its mouth, but he found that it only admits a vessel drawing ten feet water. That intelligent officer considered this an advantageous line for a canal, which by lake navigation, he concluded might be connected with San Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, and extended to the Atlantic; but the distance is immense, the country thinly inhabited, and besides unhealthy, and, after all, it could only serve for boats.

[23] Lord Grenville in his speech on Indian affairs, April 9, 1813.

In the present state of our trade, and the increasing competition which we are likely to experience, unquestionably it would be advisable for British subjects to exert themselves in securing a free passage across the isthmus above-named. It is not, however, to be imagined that this is a new project in our history. Towards the close of the seventeenth century, one was formed in Scotland for the establishment of a national company to trade with the Indies through the Pacific, which became so popular that most of the royal burghs subscribed to it. The scheme originated with William Patterson, a Scotchman, of a bold and enterprizing character, who, in early life, is supposed to have been a Bucanier, and to have traversed several sections of South America. At all events, he seems to have been acquainted with the views of Captain, afterwards Sir Henry Morgan, who, in 1670, took and burned Panama.