stone to stay the execution two hours. By the The dearth by a visitation of Providence diminished, agency of the electric telegraph the communication while the speculative madness wasted, our rewas received in Maidstone with the usual rapidity; sources; and that "burning of the candle at both and the execution was for a time stayed. It seems ends" exhibits its natural results in straitened means. that the under-secretary of state had been in con- If we look to particulars, the account for the year ference with a gentleman who had interested him- is not so very bad; there is an increase on all the self in the case, and a reexamination of the evi- great branches of ordinary revenue, amounting in dence was humanely determined on; pending the the aggregate to £673,000; the striking exception consultation, the under-secretary ordered the tem- is the excise, which shows a decrease of £160,000; porary respite. Shortly after the transmission of but the great apparent decrease on the year is mainly the order deferring the execution for two hours, a attributable to the falling off in the receipt of messenger from the home office conveyed to the "China-money" and other casual items. railway the secretary of state's order that the law was to take its course, and that the culprit was to be at once executed. As we have heard it stated, Mr. Macgregor, chairman of the South-Eastern Railway, happened to be at the terminus when this order arrived. The telegraph clerk hesitated in sending such a message without instructions; and the propriety of transmitting it was accordingly submitted to Mr. Macgregor. The messenger from the home office could not be certain that the order for Hutchings' execution was signed by the home secretary, although it bore his name; and Mr. Macgregor, with great judgment and humanity, instantly decided that it was not a sufficient authority on such a momentous matter. The account for the quarter is dark indeed. Taking the particular season, the country is in a much worse position than it was at this time last year: all the great branches of the revenue exhibit decrease, with small exceptions under the heads of taxes and post-office; the gross increase under every head is only £18,667. On the other hand, there is a decrease in customs, (£374,000,) excise, (£641,000,) stamps, (£66,000,) and property-tax, (£53,000 ;) the gross decrease being £1,525,000. No doubt, the receipts of the customs in the third quarter of 1846 were unduly swelled by receipts for corn-duties, now in abeyance; the affluence of the stamp revenue was an unhealthy excess; and the apparent abundance of the property-tax was unsound: but even with those deductions, the fact remains, that the diminished and wasted resources of the country, a bad harvest in the previous year, and disturbed commerce, are telling on the revenue at a most serious rate. "It now became the duty of Mr. James Walter, the chief superintendent of the South-Eastern Railway, to see the home secretary on the subject of the message: Mr. Walter proceeded to Downing street, and stated to Sir Denis le Marchant, the under-secretary of state, that the railway com- Will it stop here? The prospect is not cheering. pany, in being required to deal with such a matter The present deficiency belongs to a stage before as a man's execution, must have the signature of the recent storm in the commercial world could have the order affixed in the presence of their responsible had time to operate greatly upon the public receipts; officer; that the second telegraphic message was short time is the order of the day in the manufacin fact a death-warrant, and that Mr. Walter must turing districts; in railway matters, heated specuhave undoubted evidence of its correctness. On lation is succeeded by icy stagnation: diminished Mr. Walter drawing the attention of the secretary exports must be accompanied by diminished imports of state to the fact that the transmission of such a deficiency in customs; wages will continue low message was, in effect, to make him the sheriff, -deficiency in excise; incomes will be lower, the conduct of the railway company, in requiring sometimes imaginary-deficiency in income-tax; unquestionable evidence and authority, was warmly even a healthy reaction in railway affairs must tend approved. The proper signature was affixed in to induce a deficiency of revenue under the head of Mr. Walter's presence; and the telegraph then stamps. To these pinching straits add, that the conveyed to the sad criminal news that the suspen- Irish subsidies will probably be renewed; and that sion of the awful sentence was only temporary. the French government is going to take from the Hutchings was executed soon after it reached Maid- general money-market its long-threatened loan, in instalments at the rate of £400,000 a month for the next two years. It does not seem probable that Lord John Russell's administration will be able to boast the happy ornament of rich revenue-tables.Spectator 16 Oct. stone. "An extraordinary sensation was created in Maidstone. It was generally believed that the man would not be hanged. The sheriff delayed the execution the full time of two hours, and did not get the second mandate, ordering the execution, until after the expiration of the time. This was in consequence of the wires being engaged in transmitting a message from the sheriff to the home office, so that the secretary of state's order could not pass through until the sheriff's conversation had ended. We believe this is the first instance of the employment of the electric telegraph on such a service." THE revenue accounts for the year and quarter ended on the 10th of October are alarming decrease on the year of above a million, on the October quarter of above a million and a half! This was to be expected: the famine in Ireland and the overtrading in England, with all the consequent dislocation, fiscal and commercial, could not happen and not mark the formidable effects of scarcity and imprudence in the aggregate accounts of the nation. OMNIBUSES have appeared in Turkey; a regular course of them has been established between Constantinople and Adrianople, by an Armenian company. These carriages carry twelve passengers inside, two out, and are drawn by six horses. The journey occupies thirty-two hours; and the fare is 130 piastres. THE joint Stratford and London committees have reported, that they have paid 3,8231. for Shakthat the subscriptions fall short of that amount by speare's house and the adjoining property; and 1,4007.; leaving the committee liable. GRACE AGUILAR, the authoress of many popular works in favor of the Jews, urging their claims to free and equal civil and religious rights throughout the civilized world, died on the 10th September, at Frankfort, in her thirty-second year. RAILWAY INTELLIGENCE.-Such is the pressure or two. About eighty sugar properties are thrown for money among some of even the largest and up, not paying the expenses of cultivation, and wealthiest railway companies, that, in addition to everything on them gone to ruin. Before the their offers of five per cent. for money advanced on emancipation, the export of sugar was about 200,their debentures, they contemplate allowing a bonus 000 hogsheads; last year it amounted to little more on fares paid in advance by passengers. Thus, a than thirty thousand. The negroes are very loyal person going by the twelve o'clock train will be and humble in their deportment and pretensions, allowed a handsome drawback if he takes out his but very indolent; and being able to maintain ticket at eight o'clock, for the company gets the themselves with little work, sufficient labor cannot play of his money during four hours, which in the be had. The coffee properties (which are in the present state of things will be found a most desira- mountains) are doing somewhat better; but bad is ble accommodation. It is expected that some of the best. All the white inhabitants able to leave the leading lines will speedily put forth an announce- the island have gone away."-Charleston Mercury. ment that "interest at the rate of five per cent. per hour will henceforth be allowed on all fares paid in advance on sums not exceeding fifty shillings ;" and preference tickets will be issued, with a corner seat guaranteed, to the twenty first passengers by each train who shall have paid up the whole sum upon their fares a quarter of an hour previous to starting. -Punch. NEW BOOKS AND REPRINTS. Evangeline, a Tale of Acadie. By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. We can only acknowledge the receipt of this welcome book now, but shall hereafter find opportunity of introducing it to our readers. Published by Messrs. Ticknor & Co., Boston. Messrs. Harper & Brothers have published CamISLAND OF JAMAICA.-The following is an ex-paign Sketches of the War with Mexico. tract of a letter from a gentleman who inherited a landed estate in the island of Jamaica, the slaves attached to the same having been emancipated under the act of Parliament. Encouraged by the British and American abolition reports on the successful progress of the emancipation policy, and hoping that he could revive his abandoned sugar estate with free black labor, he recently visited Jamaica, and on his return gave the result in the extract furnished. "The condition of property in Jamaica is as low, ás regards value and production, as can well be imagined, yet the people there think they have not yet reached the lowest point, and will not for a year By Capt. W. S. Henry. The officers of the army, and other reporters, have drawn from the life and given us many vivid and picturesque scenes in Mexico. This is not a sufficient reason for the war, but it may be called "one of its advantages." And yet not so, dear friend, if it create a love of war. Also-The Life of Henry the Fourth, King of France and Navarre, by G. P. R. James; and No 31 of the excellent and beautiful Pictorial History of England. Chambers' Miscellany pours out its attractive numbers, through the press of Messrs. Gould, Kendall & Lincoln. SCRAPS.-Punch on the Money Market, 343 & 363-Death of Mr. R. B. Peake, 360- The LIVING AGE is published every Saturday, by | twenty dollars, or two dollars each for separate volumes. E. LITTELL & Co., at No. 165 Tremont St., BOSTON. Any numbers may be had at 12 cents. Price 12 cents a number, or six dollars a year in advance. Remittances for any period will be thankfully received and promptly attended to. To insure regularity in mailing the work, remittances and orders should be addressed to the office of publication as above. Twenty dollars will pay for 4 copies for a year. COMPLETE SETS to the end of 1846, making eleven large volumes, are for sale, neatly bound in cloth, for AGENCIES. The publishers are desirous of making arrangements in all parts of North America, for increasing the circulation of this work-and for doing this a liberal commission will be allowed to gentlemen who will interest themselves in the business. But it must be understood that in all cases payment in advance is expected. The price of the work is so low that we cannot afford to incur either risk or expense in the collection of debts. LITTELL'S LIVING AGE.-No. 185.-27 NOVEMBER, 1847. THESE Volumes contain by far the most valuable store of facts which has ever been collected respecting the commercial and social history of the New Continent. It requires, indeed, some courage even to glance over the enormous mass of details, which these 3000 closely printed pages present to the eye. But a very brief examination dispels any doubt as to the serviceable and practical character of the work. Mr. Macgregor is so thoroughly conversant with the art of dealing with statistical figures, and long habit has rendered him such a master of arrangement, that an inquirer even moderately familiar with such studies will find himself easily enabled to turn to the particular pigeon-hole in which the materials he is in search of are deposited. The first volume embraces a general sketch of the history of discovery in the New Continent; its more recent political annals; the separate history and geography of British America, Brazil, and Spanish America; and the statistics of the two latter coun tries, together with those of Hayti and the foreign West Indies. In the second volume, Mr. Macgregor returns to the statistics of the United Sates of North America; and this is by far the most complete part of the work, as the subject is more important, and the materials more trustworthy. a near relation, the late Sir Alexander Mackenzie, to the Arctic shores, and afterwards across the broadest part of America to the Pacific. The more I study the progress of the European settlements in America, the more thoroughly am I convinced of an infallible truth, that the history of navigation and commerce is the history of civilization." To enthusiasm of this order the history of American progress affords the most ample nourishment. The visions and speculations of the people of a new country are almost wholly of a material order. Wrestlers against nature, conquerors of the wilderness, their chief attention is concentrated on a struggle which, among inhabitants of the Old World like ourselves, is long ago over, and forgotten; and excites only the interest of romance. We have become settled in our present condition. There are many among us-nay, most of us, in some mood, have shared the feeling who could be content to remain stationary, and to be neither more numerous, nor wealthier, nor more advanced in our command over nature, than we are at present, provided only the rest of the world Our could gain no advantage by slipping past us. cherished dreams are generally of other conquests and glories than these, and are not easily kindled by statistics; but statistics constitute the favorite excitement of the imagination of most Americans, and of Mr. Macgregor no less. He evidently enjoys himself amidst the long array of figures, which prove the rapidity of past advance, and illustrate the laws of future development. We do not understand on what principle the A very large part of his first volume, however, British dominions in America are left out, or rather contains matter more attractive to ordinary readtreated of in part only; a sketch of their history ers, being composed of extracts and summaries of and geography being given, while the statistics modern travels, after the fashion of Pinkerton and both of British North America and the West other compilers; and here Mr. Macgregor has Indies are wholly omitted. Perhaps Mr. Mac-drawn very largely on American stores with which we were previously unacquainted. This is gregor was of opinion that these regions, forming part of the British empire, would be more properly particularly the case in relation to Mexico, the old "Internal Provinces," so long unvisited, but now opened by the commercial and military enterprise of the Anglo-Americans-California, Oregon, and the interior of Brazil. Many of the sources from which he has derived this part of his collections are almost inaccessible to English readers in general. included in compilations treating of our own domestic affairs. Perhaps he intended at some future period to supply the omission. If otherwise, we cannot but regret it; not only on account of the peculiar interest which those parts of America possess for the British reader, but also because Mr. Macgregor is personally familiar with them. He illustrated their condition some years ago in his "British America," of which the statistical part is already antiquated, from the rapid changes which the subject-matter has undergone. As to the Spanish-American republics, Mr. Macgregor appears to have been perplexed between the necessity of making his work as complete as possible, and the extremely worthless character of the materials with which in their case he has had to deal. We place very little reliance on "The enthusiasm," says Mr. Macgregor," which his political arithmetic respecting these regions, accompanied me in my youth to the British settle-which, feebly disclosed to us in the personal narments in America, was first inspired by the writingsratives of a few occasional visitors from Europe of Robertson, Charlevoix, and Raynal-by poring over Hakluyt and Purchas, and the more recent and the United States, are sinking, for the most collections of voyages and travels; and an ambition, part, back into the darkness which concealed them entertained on perusing with delight the travels of from the eyes of the civilized world during the 25 century before their emancipation; and are left as In 1785, Mr. Adams, then the United States it were aside in the rapid movement of the rest of minister at the Court of St. James', proposed to Christendom. As to these, the statistician has to place the navigation and trade between the dominelicit his results from a multitude of old, ill-ar-ions of Great Britain and all the territories of the ranged, and contradictory authorities; and it is not United States upon a basis of complete reciprocity. altogether to be wondered at, if, with that propen- The proposal was not only rejected, but “he was sity, which certainly belongs to his class, and from given to understand that no other would be enwhich Mr. Macgregor is not wholly free-to pre-tertained." Mr. Adams, accordingly, advised his fer collecting to analyzing-to fling down cart-countrymen (in a letter to the foreign secretary, loads of figures on the desk, and trust to chance Mr. Jay) :-" You may depend upon it, the comfor the arrangement-his tables are often not only merce of America will have no relief at present; inaccurate, but sometimes inconsistent in their de-nor, in my opinion, ever, until the United States tails.* These portions of the work, however, will be consulted more as matters of curiosity than utility; except the commercial returns from the various ports of South America, which appear to rest, for the most part, on better authority, and to be compiled with great labor from sources generally unattainable. shall have generally passed navigation acts. If this measure is not adopted, we shall be derided; and, the more we suffer, the more will our calamities be laughed at. My most earnest exhortations to the states, then, are, and ought to be, to lose no time in passing such acts." their first tariff-innocent, indeed, in comparison with its successors, but the commencement of a series of legislation most mischievous to the people of both countries. Advice to adopt a measure of retaliation, so As matters of political interest, the chapters justly provoked, however questionable its real relating to the United Sates constitute the main policy might be, could hardly fail of being received value of the work. Mr. Macgregor is well known with favor. The difficulties which the then conin this country as the laborious and steady cham-stitution of the United States interposed in the way pion of the cause of free trade. He has had a of unity of commercial legislation, prevented Mr. share, and no trifling one, in directing the move-Adams' suggestion from being acted on for a few ment of the last few years. To many minds, his years. But, in 1789, on the adoption of the new figures have brought stronger conviction than all federal constitution, congress passed a navigation the eloquence enlisted on the same side, both in law, which has since led to reciprocity treaties and out of parliament. And now that the battle between us and them. Unfortunately, pursuing is won, (or nearly won) in his own country, there the same policy, they enacted in the same year is no more glorious victory left to be achieved, than that which must ultimately be won, over the party prejudices and class-interests which still govern the commercial legislation of the great republic. That legislation may not be worse than what still prevails in many European countries; but it stands in more striking contrast with the character and the other institutions of a people so shrewd and far-sighted in all matters concerning their interests. Nor has it arisen, as in less enlightened states, from the successful intrigues, or the arbitrary exercise of power, of a protected class of monopolists. Nothing is more clear, to any one who has studied the history summed up in Mr. Macgregor's pages, than that the "American system" of protection arose from political and not from commercial motives. We are ourselves the fathers of it. It began in a desire of just, but impolitic retaliation on England. Once implanted in the state according to the uniform history of such evil growths-it struck its roots too deeply in popular feeling to be eradicated, so long as the close balance of parties, and the difficulty of conducting the government, might render it an object with statesmen to bid for the votes of a protected class, strong in united self-interest rather than numbers. *E. g. Lima, at vol. i., p. 955, is made to contain 54,096 inhabitants, with an average of 2350 deaths annually, At p. 956 it is stated to have a population not exceeding 45,000, with 3500 interments in the year; a mortality at which even Mr. Chadwick would stand aghast. We are ashamed to notice such trifles in a work of this magnitude, but we might have multiplied instances; and the hint may direct attention in some future revision. It is therefore but too true, as Mr. Macgregor shows, that "the American government, at the outset of its independent existence, would have agreed to commence and maintain an intercourse which would have enabled England to enjoy every possible advantage which could be derived from the United States, if they had remained colonies; and all those advantages, without either the perplexity or expense of governing them. The advances made with respect to such wise policy by the United States, were unhappily rejected." The first consequence of our selfish and sulky policy was a famine in the West Indies; of which Bryan Edwards gives the details with just indignation-the slaves, and poorer class of the free inhabitants, being deprived of their old supplies of food from the revolted colonies. The ultimate results were embargoes and restrictions; the almost civil war of 1812-15; the war of tariffs, which has continued ever since, though now happily onesided only; and the crippling of our commerce with those who possess almost a monopoly of one article of the first necessity to us, and great advantages in the production of others. Once commenced and set on foot, the "American system" of protecting domestic manufactures was far too tempting a delusion-flattering the prejudices of many, harmonizing with the honest but mistaken theories of some, and serving the interests of an acute few-not to enlist on its side 66 whom a dollar paid by way of a salary to a priest, or civil list to a king, appears an oppression to be resisted to the last drop of blood-are content to disburse for the benefit of their Yankee brethren, a tribute which, in all probability, would defray the civil expenditure of half a dozen small European monarchies-nay, they have pressed and compelled the modest and reluctant Yankees to accept it! a large party, and become a great political bond of became converts to its doctrines; and no wonunion. Mr. Hamilton, a great name in America der. To them the benefit was immediate, at the -though we could never exactly ascertain the expense of all their fellow-citizens; the loss conbasis on which his reputation is founded-pre- tingent and ultimate only. We find, on analyzing sented to congress his elaborated "Report on the tables of Mr. Macgregor, that the six states of Manufactures" in 1791: a species of essay, em- New England, containing one eighth of the popubodying the favorite principles of the protection lation of the whole republic, produces two thirds theory. But the breaking up of old political par- of its cotton fabrics, three fifths of its woollens, ties which followed the French Revolution, and nearly half its leathers, and other articles in almost the subsequent war with England, adjourned the the same proportion. The single state of Massaexecution of his recommendations until the year chusetts owns one sixth of the manufacturing cap1816, when an avowedly protective tariff was for ital of the nation. As far, therefore, as protection the first time established. It is a curious fact, can confer benefit on the producers of the monopthat this bill and that of 1824 were carried against olized articles, they, and they alone, have reaped the will of the New England States. In 1816, it. The remaining eighteen millions of the proudnearly two thirds of the New England members est and most irritable nation upon earth-men to voted for a reduction on the proposed duties on cotton manufactures; while out of 43 members from New York, New Jersey, and Pennyslvania, who voted on the question, nine only were in favor of it." In 1820, a very able speech indeed, in favor of free-trade, was delivered at Faneuil Hall. Neither Say nor Ricardo could have uttered sentiments more to the purpose; and the doctrines of these abstruse philosophers were clothed in plain, home-thrusting, popular oratory, of the best order. How much those worthy descendants of the "For his part, ," the orator declared," he believed, pilgrim fathers have gained by the advantages thus that, however derided, the principle of leaving such forced upon them, we may by-and-by endeavor to things very much to their own course, in a country estimate. In the mean time, the burden has been like ours, was the only true policy; and that we usually borne by the tributary states with that could no more improve the order, and habit, and stolid patience, or rather that exulting and selfcomposition of society, by an artificial balancing of applauding self-denial, with which large bodies of trades and occupations, than we could improve the mankind are in the habit of offering up their connatural atmosphere, by means of the condensers tributions to the cunning few. But this has not and rarefiers of the chemists." The speaker was been uniformly the case. In the year 1828-32, Daniel Webster. Since that time, unhappily, the Union was in greater danger of disruption than falsehood has made its converts as well as truth. at any period before or since, from the nullification But the orator was on the popular side; for prin- movement of South Carolina, in which Georgia, ciples of freedom as yet commanded a majority and even Virginia, very nearly participated. among those whom Webster then addressed. On cannot be wondered at that the southern planters, the introduction of the tariff of 1824, the votes of amidst their exhausted fields and decaying ports,* the New England States were fifteen for, and and suffering severely under the competition of the twenty-three against it: while those of the states newer soils of Louisiana and the Mississippi, felt of New York, Pennyslvania, New Jersey, Ken- aggrieved by the pressure of duties, which at once tucky, and Ohio, stood seventy-eight for, and only narrowed the market for their commodities, and nine against. And in the discussions on the tariff increased their cost of production. The report of of 1828, the same proportion still continued. the Carolinian committee, to inquire into the While, therefore, that portion of the American power of the judicial government, declared "all people which alone possessed much manufacturing legislation for the protection of domestic manufacindustry, and which has always evinced the great-tures to be unconstitutional, as being in favor of a est aptitude for commercial pursuits, continued local interest, and that congress had no power to hostile to restrictions which could by no possibility do good to any but themselves-while they, the only parties who could derive a share of profit from monopoly, continued to repudiate it-it was literally carried through by the votes of the farmers and planters of the central states, whose predilection for the "American system" was simply suicidal!-a curious proof, among many others in the history of commercial legislation, how often mere ignorance, or mere party spirit, has done the mischief ordinarily attributed to self-interest. It legislate, except upon subjects of general interest" -a difficult proposition to answer on political principles, whatever reply American jurists may be able to make to it. The movement failed, however, as it deserved to fail, because, with an unfortunate perversity, the people of South Carolina chose to include in the same proscription, as unconstitutional,“ all legislation for the purpose of meliorating the condition of the free colored and *The exports of South Carolina have remained stationOnce started, however, in the cause of protec-ary for the last thirty years. Charleston, its capital, is the only large American town of which the population tion against their will, the New Englanders soon diminished between 1830 and 1840. |