Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 67, No. 416, June 1850

Sussex. – Messrs W. Rigden, A. Denman, S. H. Bigg, Edward Wyatt.

East Grinsted. – Messrs George Head, Wm. Turner, John Rose, John Mills, John Payne.

WARWICKSHIRE, NORTH.

Rugby and Dunchurch Branch. – Messrs H. Townsend, John Perkins.

Sutton Coldfield. – The Hon. E. S. Jervis, W. M. Jervis, Esq., Rev. W. K. B. Bedford, Messrs R. Fowler, R. Fowler, jun., Bodington, Sadler, Osborne, Buggins.

Coleshill. – Messrs Cook, Gilbert, H. Thornley, John York, and Dr Davies.

WARWICKSHIRE, SOUTH.

Warwickshire. – Messrs Edward Greaves, C. M. Caldecott, Luke Pearman, J. H. Walker, W. W. Bromfield, R. Hemming, S. Umbers, B. Sedgeley, John Moore, H. Brown.

WILTSHIRE, NORTH.

Messrs G. Brown, W. Ferris, J. A. Williams, R. Strange, J. Wilkes, E. L. Rumbold, L. Waldron.

WILTSHIRE, SOUTH.

Salisbury Branch. – Messrs Stephen Mills, F. King, George Burtt, Leonard Maton, B. Pinnegar, – Lush.

WORCESTERSHIRE, WEST.

Worcestershire Branch. – The Hon. and Rev. W. C. Talbot, F. Woodward, Esq., Richard Gardner.

YORKSHIRE, NORTH RIDING.

Knaresborough. – Mr T. Collins, jun., of Scotton.

Easingwold. – Mr Charles Harland.

YORKSHIRE, EAST RIDING.

East Riding. – Mr John Almack.

Malton. – E. Cayley, Esq.

Holderness. – Messrs Josh. Stickney and G. C. Francis.

Pocklington. – Cross.

YORKSHIRE, WEST RIDING.

Boroughbridge Branch. – Wm. Josh. Coltman, Esq.

SCOTLAND.

Scottish Protective Association. – Sir J. Drummond, Bart., Professor Aytoun, Professor Low, Dr Gardner, Messrs Geo. Makgill, Jno. Dickson, Jno. Dudgeon, J. Murdoch, J. Shand, Blackwood, Garland, Hugh Watson, Cheyne, Steuart of Auchlunkart.

East Lothian. – Sir Jno. Hall, Bart. of Dunglass, Messrs R. Scot Skirving and Aitchison, of Alderston.

Aberdeenshire. – Dr Garden.

IRELAND.

County Down. – The Marquis of Downshire.

The noble Chairman rose and said – Gentlemen, it will not be necessary for me upon the present occasion to trespass but a few moments upon your attention, because I am happy to say that there are gentlemen much more able to discuss the question upon which we are met here to-day than the individual who now stands before you – more able, I say; but there is no man in the United Kingdom who is more deeply impressed than I am with the conviction that, if this country is to continue to be great and free, moderate import duties must be imposed (loud cheers.) Though some persons have called free trade a "great experiment," and wish us to wait and see what the result of that "experiment" is to be, I tell them fairly now, that that experiment has been tried – that it has failed – and that common sense always said it would fail (great cheering.) But during the trial of this "great experiment," have they calculated the amount of hazard which they are incurring? Are they aware of the mass of landowners and tenant-farmers of England who must be cast away if this experiment is not immediately put an end to? (loud cheers.) We are met here to-day to receive deputations from different parts of the country, and it has been thought advisable to convene this meeting, because doubts have been expressed in Parliament, whether distress was universal or not. We are met to-day to hear from the tenant-farmers from various parts of the country the prospects of their localities (hear, hear.) Gentlemen, I fear those prospects are bad indeed. But still I will say before you that which I stated in Parliament – that I have the greatest confidence in the good feeling of the people of England (cheers.) I believe that the tenant-farmers will follow the advice which I have ventured to give them, and persevere (hear, hear.) They know the justice of their cause. Let you, all of you, when you return home, tell your neighbours to persevere; and depend upon it, justice will, sooner or later, be done to you (loud cheers.) I will not now detain you longer than to say I hope that the expressions which may be made use of here to-day will be to show that, ill used as we are, we are still loyal to our Sovereign, and firmly attached to the constitution of our country (tremendous cheering.)

Mr T. W. BOOKER, Ex-High-Sheriff of Glamorganshire, of Velindra House, near Cardiff, was then called upon by the noble chairman, and amidst great applause stepped forward to propose the first resolution – "That the difficulty and intolerable distress pervading the agricultural and other great interests of the country, and the state of deprivation and suffering to which large masses of the industrial population are reduced, are, in the opinion of this meeting, fraught with consequences the most disastrous to the public welfare, and if not speedily remedied must prove fatal to the maintenance of public credit, will endanger the public peace, and may even place in peril the safety of the state." – Mr Booker spoke as follows: My lord duke, my lords, and gentlemen, – It is, I do most unfeignedly assure you, with the deepest diffidence, if not with the deepest reluctance, that I stand before you thus early in the proceedings of this most eventful day; for, gentlemen, I came here under the sincere hope that I might be allowed to listen to others instead of myself occupying your time. But there are times, and this is an occasion, when I feel that it would ill become any man to shrink from the discharge of a public duty which those with whom he has an identity of feeling and a community of interest will and wish should devolve upon him. Humble, therefore, though my name may be, yet I will, without further apology, proceed at once to the objects which have called us together. (Cheers.) At this time of day, and on this occasion, I need not, I think, enter upon any lengthened argument, nor need I adduce any elaborate statements of statistical facts, to prove that the condition of Great Britain and Ireland and her dependencies is, to say the least, most unsatisfactory. (Hear, hear.) Your own experience will tell you that. Therefore to save your time, and with a knowledge of those who will have to follow me, I will assume three propositions. First of all, I will assume that the agricultural interest is immeasurably the most important interest of the state. (Hear.) Secondly, I will assume that that interest is in a state of alarming and greatly increasing depression. (Hear, hear.) And, thirdly, I will assume that that depression is occasioned and aggravated by the adoption and continuance in that altered policy of the country which now prevails. (Cheers.) I presume that my two first propositions will be conceded to me everywhere; and as to the third, here at least I presume we are unanimous, that the difficulties, the dangers, the distresses, and the disasters that now accompany us are attributable to that vile, suicidal policy falsely called free trade. (Cheers.) Having gone thus far, and having arrived at this point, it will not be of much advantage to you that I should dwell long upon the nature and extent of the distress which now accompanies you, and now environs you. That I will leave to others of those intelligent practical men who, in such multitudinous numbers, have left their homes and have come here to tell, in this central heart of England, their feelings upon the distresses and dangers that have overtaken them. But I will just glance at what is the prevailing symptom of the distress of the present day. And, strange as it may appear, the prevailing symptom is cheapness – cheapness of all the necessaries and conveniences of life – cheapness of the bountiful gifts of Providence, the productions of the earth – cheapness of the works of man, the produce of his skill and labour. And how is it that this cheapness, which augurs plenty and abundance, should not be accompanied with its usual, nay, its invariable concomitants – ease, enjoyment, safety, and repose? (Cheers.) There must be something fundamentally wrong in a state which produces such startling results. It was the opinion of one whose opinion, and whose memory too, ought to be an object of veneration with every Free-trader, as unquestionably they are of respect, from the sterling, amiable, pains-taking qualities of the man – I allude to the late Mr Huskisson – it was his opinion, and he delivered it in his place in the House of Commons so long ago as the year 1815 – it was his opinion that nothing could be more delusive than the proposition that cheapness in the price of provisions is always a benefit. On the contrary, cheapness, without a demand for labour, is a symptom of distress. (Cheers.) The French, he adds, in his day, had cheapness without capital, and that was a proof in them of progressive decay. But this all-pervading state of cheapness is so ably glanced at and set forth in a document which I hold in my hand, and which has been transmitted to me since my arrival in town, that I cannot forbear quoting some passages from it. It is the Address of the Metropolitan Trades' Delegates to their fellow-countrymen, on the interests and the present position of the labouring classes of the empire; and if there can be words of solemn warning and import, they are contained in this most extraordinary document. It commences: —

"Fellow-Countrymen, – There is not recorded an era in the history of our country, nor, indeed, in the history of all nations, when the great subject of the natural and social rights of those who live by means of their labour was required to be so thoughtfully considered, so clearly explained, and so zealously and faithfully supported, as the present era."

It afterwards goes on to treat the question of cheapness thus: —

"We have it announced to us that it is under the operation of unregulated, stimulated, and universal competition, we are henceforth to live.

"Cheapness is proclaimed to be the one great and desirable attainment. But the cheapness that is attained under this system is not the result of fair and distributory abundance – being mainly acquired by diminishing the enjoyments, or the consumption, of those by whose labour productions are derived, and by that economy of labour by which, in so many instances, the labourer is cast off altogether from employment, because a cheaper, that is, a less consuming instrument than his body, is invented and applied. The labour of the working man thus becomes a superfluous commodity in the market, so that he must either be an outcast altogether from society, or else find some way of doing more work for less of materials of consumption; and even then, if he should succeed in this course of realising cheapness, he becomes instrumental in bringing many others of his fellow-labourers down to the same degraded level to which he is reduced. (Loud cheers.)

"Bad and appalling, however, as is the existing condition of so many whose only means of supporting themselves and their families is the exercise of their daily labour, yet we maintain that the prospect before us is still more dark and gloomy. We declare to you our conviction that a far greater degree of suffering and of destitution impends over the labouring class and their families, both of this and of all other nations, unless the falseness of the free or competitive system be thoroughly penetrated, clearly exposed, and a course of general commerce, very different from that emanating from the free system, be entered upon." (Great cheers.) In this manner do these practical men, who are practically groaning under the evils of this altered system, dispose of the question of cheapness. The men whose signatures are appended to that document, have done me the honour also of communicating with me since I have been in town, and of stating to me what their intentions and objects are. They write me on the 4th of May inst. that "The delegates have a desire to collect all the statistics in their power showing the decline in the employment of the people, and also showing the gradual falling-off of wages since the introduction of free-trade measures to their respective trades; and also the condition of those trades which have not been directly interfered with by foreign imports, but which the delegates have reason to believe are indirectly affected by the displaced hands, from other industrial branches, continually forcing themselves into the above-mentioned trades – this is the reason they have appealed to all who are friends to native industry for assistance." But, gentlemen, it is said that free trade has not yet had fair play. Most fortunately I am indebted to the kindness and courtesy of a member of parliament, a personal friend of my own, the invaluable member for Falmouth, Mr Gwyn, for the returns of trade and navigation up to the close of last month, which only appeared and were placed in my hands last night. I have gone through these documents with all the business habits that I am capable of; and I come to this conclusion and result, the truth of which I defy any Free-trader to controvert. (Cheers.) The flourishing state of the cotton trade is boasted of. Why, these documents prove to you that the export of cotton goods has increased 10 per cent, but the consumption of cotton altogether has decreased 20 per cent. (Loud cheers.) And what does this show? That there is a decrease in the consumption of cotton of 30 per cent. What! free trade not had fair play! Why, our colonies have had free trade for the last twenty years. For the last ten years they have had the blessing of free and unrestricted trade, and let me appeal to any colonist, what is the universal language which defies even contradiction – We are ruined! (loud cheers.) Our own British possessions get their supplies cheaper from the United States than they can from Great Britain or our North American colonies. They expend the property of their own colonies, and of ours too, which they get there, in fostering the trade of our rivals to the destruction and exclusion of their own. Free trade not had fair play! Why, what have been its effects in Ireland? (hear, hear.) In the year 1844 or 1845, there were of acres cultivated in wheat in Ireland, 1,059,620; but in 1847, the blessed year that followed the consummation of free trade, the number was reduced to 743,871, and in 1848 it was still further reduced to 565,746, thus showing a decrease in three years of the palmy days of free trade of no less than 500,000 acres of wheat, equal to the production of 2,100,000 quarters, and in value, at what ought to be the price of wheat, upwards of six millions sterling. (Shouts of "hear, hear.") This shows with a vengeance that capital is flowing from the banks of the Shannon to the shores of the Vistula (hear, hear.) Free trade not had fair play! What will you, farmers, your wives and daughters, say to this? In the year 1833, the export of salt butter from Ireland was 25,000 tons, in value L.3,000,000 sterling, and it would take 260,000 cows to produce that quantity of butter. Now, let the Free-traders tell us what has been the export of salt butter from Ireland during the last year (hear, hear.) Ireland has broken up her old pastures, and has sown wheat upon them; and yet with all that forced and ruinous cultivation, the foreigner beats her out-and-out. But it is only a waste of time to go through the extent and the nature of the distress which afflicts you. I will no longer dilate upon it. I will leave its effects upon England to those admirable men whose public spirit and whose private wrongs have brought them here. And I will at once ask, what is to be the remedy? You will answer me with one acclaim, There can be but one, and that is a return to the policy of protection to native industry (cheers.) And how is this remedy to be attained? Why, by a cordial union of all classes whose labour has been invaded, and the produce of whose skill, enterprise, and industry has been excluded by that vile policy which has supplanted us in our own markets. I presume, and I say it with all respect and deep humility, that you can have no remaining hope from the present parliament (cheers), nor from the present advisers of the Crown (tremendous cheering.) But we have a constitutional sovereign, who well knows that her own peace and happiness depend upon the welfare and prosperity of her people. She well knows that upon that peace and prosperity, not only her own happiness, but the security of her throne (cheers,) and the stability of the monarchy that she administers, all alike depend (cheers.) Let us carry to the foot of the throne the wishes of her faithful people. Let us tell her of the distress and difficulties that are overtaking the industrious cultivators of the soil of the empire which she benignly governs. (Loud cries of "hear.") Let us tell her of the dangers and disasters that environ the hard-working, industrious occupiers of the territorial domains of the ancient nobility and gentry of her land (hear, hear.) Let us tell her, as the noble duke said, that, although oppressed, we are still faithful – still uncompromising – still unswerving – still unseduceable – still loyal and true to her; and I will stake my life on it, that she will be compassionate and true to us (hear, hear.) The humble individual who now addresses you is no proud aristocrat – he is no lordly possessor of wide-spread territorial domains; but he has obtained his fortune by the active pursuits of commercial industry (hear, hear.) He affords daily employment to hundreds, and thousands are dependent for their daily bread on his care and success (hear, hear.) I hope, therefore, that I speak with a due sense of the responsibility of my words and actions; and I desire – and, with God's blessing, I shall use every energy and talent that my Maker has endowed me with (loud cheers) – I desire, and with God's help, I shall endeavour to transmit to my children's children unimpaired those laws and liberties, those customs and institutions, which have afforded me protection during my own career of successful toil (cheers.) You will take one word of counsel from me. You, the owners and industrious occupiers of the soil, will, I hope, from this vast assembly hurl back with proud defiance that gross threat, that, if success should attend your exertions for a restoration of protection, the foundations of property would be shaken to their centre (hear, hear.) Such is the language used by Free-traders in fustian, in words as well as in merchandise (hear, hear.) Ay, forsooth, by the apostle of peace, who would have the manly quarrels of nations, as well as of individuals, settled by palaver and humbug, instead of musketry and gunpowder (great cheering.) Hurl back, I say, that defiance, and let your answer reach the ears of all who dare to obstruct the exercise of free discussion, and the results of free discussion in this hitherto free and prosperous land (hear.) But, in the struggle that must of necessity ensue before we can obtain the gracious accession of our beloved Sovereign to the prayers of her people, it may and will happen that our friends who, amidst treachery and desertion unparalleled (hear, hear,) had stood firm and faithful to their principles and professions, may be inconvenienced, and that their seats in the legislature may be jeopardised by the miscellaneous onslaught of our ministerial and jacobinical opponents (hear, hear.) But this must not, this shall not, be; for these men must be protected at the hustings (hear, hear.) When I look at this vast, this magnificent assemblage – when I consider whom and what it represents – I cannot for a moment doubt that there are, in the ranks of the protectionists of England, Ireland, Wales, and Scotland, a thousand men who will put down their hundred pounds a-piece to form a fund against all aggressors (hear, hear.) For myself, I shall at once avow that I will be one, either of a thousand to put down my hundred pounds (hear, hear,) or, if need be, I will be one of a hundred to put down my thousand pounds (loud cheers,) for this national, this necessary object. And then having done our duty, and having among our hereditary legislators a Richmond (cheers,) a Stanhope (hear,) a Stanley (cheers,) an Eglinton, a Talbot, a Downshire, a Malmesbury, a Beaufort, and a host of others, who will forgive me if I now fail to name them; and a Disraeli (great cheering followed the mention of Mr Disraeli's name,) a Granby (hear, hear,) a Manners (hear, hear,) a Beresford, a Stuart, a Newdegate, and many more such whom we will send to aid them in the House of Commons, let us commit our cause, the cause of peace and plenty, the cause of truth and justice (cheers,) the sacred cause of protection to native industry and capital (hear, hear) – let us commend that cause to our Sovereign, to our country, and to our God (loud cheers.) My lords and gentlemen, I must apologise for the undue length at which I have addressed you. I thank you most cordially for the kindness and the enthusiasm with which you have listened to me, and I now beg to propose the resolution with which I have the honour to be intrusted.

The honourable gentleman sat down amidst the most deafening cheers.

Mr W. CHOULER, South Muskham, Newark, Notts, in rising to second the resolution, said he should not waste their time by offering any apologies for his unfitness to address them upon that occasion. He had come forward to state facts, and he should at once proceed to discharge that duty to the best of his ability. He should first of all advert to the state of the labourers in his own immediate neighbourhood. He could state that the wages of those labourers had of late been reduced nominally from 12s. to 10s., and in some parts of the county to 9s. a-week; while the real reduction was much greater, because, in consequence of the depressed condition of their employers, they had been deprived of that piece-work by which they had formerly earned a further sum of 1s. or 2s. a-week. Since he had come to London he had received a statement of the condition of the labourers in a part of Leicestershire which adjoined South Nottinghamshire, and from that statement he found that during the winter there had been many unemployed labourers in that district; and that latterly, even at the approach of the spring-time, eight of those labourers had been going about begging. They had not asked, however, for alms, but for employment, by which they could have obtained an honest livelihood for themselves and their families. (Hear, hear.) Now, he appealed to every one whom he was addressing, whether a cultivator of the soil could be placed in a more heartrending situation than when he found himself unable to afford employment to an honest and industrious, but necessitous labourer? But, feeling dissatisfied with things at home, he had taken some trouble to ascertain how the labourers are situated in other districts with which he had no immediate connexion. As a matter of course, he had thought that the place in which he might expect to find perfection was the estate of Sir Robert Peel. (Loud cries of "hear, hear," jeers, and laughter.) He had read the document issued some time since by Sir Robert Peel to his tenantry, and through his tenantry to the country at large; and from the wording of that document he had been led to suppose that in the parish of Kingsbury, the property of Sir Robert Peel, the labourers were fully employed, well housed, and well fed. But he would tell them what he had seen there only a few days ago. The parish of Kingsbury was an extensive one, and the farms there were large, for that part of the country, as they varied from 300 to 400 acres. But instead of the labourers in Kingsbury being lodged in comfortable cottages, he found scarcely any labourers' cottages upon the estate. There were no small holdings, no cottage allotments in the parish; and he had been told that the labourers employed in it resided at a distance of two or three miles from the place. The fact was, that for some years a system had been carried on in that parish for reducing the number of its agricultural labourers, (hear, hear,) and removing the poor off the property. He confessed he only wondered that the "Times Commissioner" had not been down there (hear, and laughter,) to tell the tenantry how much of the physical force of the labourer was lost by living so far from his work. But he had found worse than that. He had found that English labourers were being gradually displaced by low-priced Irish labourers. He had found that the tenants of Sir Robert Peel had been employing during the winter, is well as during the summer, six or eight Irish labourers each, to whom they paid little or no money wages. (Cries of "shame.") Now he should not have thought much about that if he had found that the Irish labourers were prospering, as they are British subjects; but he had seen them in a very wretched condition, to which the English labourers also were being rapidly reduced. The Irish there have no house to live in, no bed to lie on, or fire to go to, but lay on straw in an outhouse; therefore this system has this tendency, – to depress the English labourer to the Irish or Continental level, without elevating the other. He would pass, however, from the parish of Kingsbury to a district represented by another lion of the day. (A laugh.) They would recollect that Mr C. Villiers, the member for Wolverhampton, had stated at the commencement of the session that there had been L.91,000,000 a-year saved to the country by the fall in prices which had followed the adoption of the free-trade policy. Now it had occurred to him that the constituents of Mr Villiers must have obtained a pretty good share of that sum. But he had found that in Wolverhampton the poor-rates had been gradually increasing during the last eight or ten years. It appeared that, during the twelve months ending in March 1842, the poor-rates in the union of Wolverhampton had not amounted to half the sum which they had reached during the twelve months ending in March 1850. It further appeared that in the year ending March 25, 1849, they had amounted to only L.10,007, while in the year ending March 25, 1850, they had amounted to L.11,625. He had mentioned these facts for the purpose of showing that the people of Wolverhampton had derived no advantage from the supposed saving of L.91,000,000 a-year effected by the adoption of a free-trade policy. But he said, without fear of contradiction, that no such saving had been made. He admitted that that sum had been lost to one class in this country (hear, hear,) but he denied that it had been gained by any other. (Cheers and laughter.) Lord John Russell said last Friday night week, that if Mr Henley brought forward a direct motion in favour of protection, he should be prepared to show that the great mass of the people were in possession of as great comforts as they ever had been. Now this was three months after the country had been said to have been the gainer of L.91,000,000 a-year, and yet all that Lord John Russell could say was that the people were in "as good" a position as ever they were. He would admit, if necessary, that this sum had been lost to one class, but it had not been gained by another. He should not be so much dissatisfied if the farmers had lost it, if only some other class had gained it. But the farmers had lost it and no one in this country had gained it. (Cheers.) Two-thirds of the people of this country were engaged in agricultural pursuits, and could any policy, he would ask, be more suicidal than to deprive them of L.91,000,000 a-year, without conferring any benefit on the remaining one-third of the population? (Hear, hear.) He had no hesitation in saying that the agriculturists, as a body, had never been in a worse position than that in which they were at present placed. He felt convinced that, if the existing prices for agricultural produce were to continue much longer, the tenant-farmers would be wholly unable to afford full employment to labourers; great efforts had been made last winter to employ the labourers; and when parliament met we were told, because we had employed them, that there was no distress. But if the class of able-bodied labourers were offered no alternative but to perish from destitution or to enter the workhouse, he had no hesitation in saying that this country would soon be reduced to a state which he should be most sorry to witness. Already the agricultural labourers talked of combinations; and although the farmers might be able to stem the torrent by affording them employment until the termination of the harvest, he could not help anticipating the most serious perils after that period. The labourers did not blame the farmers for their condition, for they were well aware that the farmers had not the means for affording them employment; and under those circumstances, could it be expected that the farmers would mount their horses for the purpose of opposing the just demands of their humbler fellow-countrymen? (Hear, hear.) If a man was willing and able to work in this country, he had a right to have the means of living in comfort in it. (Hear, hear.) Mr Cobden had said what he would do if a system of protection were re-established, and what would then become of the landlords. But I will say openly and publicly, that if the landlords will stick to us, we will stick to them. (Loud and enthusiastic cheers.) But I will go further than that – I have not yet quite finished the subject. We own nine-tenths of the horses of the kingdom, and we have the men to ride upon them. (Vociferous cheering.) And we go further still: we will support the Crown as well as the landlords. (Cheers.) Her Majesty need not fear, if she turn her back upon the towns, that she will not be supported. Protected ourselves, we will protect her against all assailants. (Loud cheers.) Mr Chouler then proceeded to say that, in his opinion, it matters not what prices were, provided all interests were placed upon the same footing. But if one interest were reduced below another, if employment were lessened whilst taxation was kept up, if more money left the country than came into it, the result must be beggary. (Cries of "Hear," and "Now for the rents.") He would come to that directly; but first stop a bit. (Laughter.) He had not quite done yet, (cheers;) but would mention to them the case of a tenant-farmer who had applied to him for advice as to what he should do under his present circumstances. This gentleman occupied three farms, had a large family, and employed a good deal of capital. The ages of his children varied from 24 to 9. He stated that his wheat wanted hoeing, and that he had no money to do it with; that he intended to have placed his family on the farms, but that if he were to do so they could not live. What could he do with them? Some of them were too old to be put to trades, and then, if he were to take out his capital, all his dead stock would go almost for nothing. He (Mr Chouler) knew he could not do anything for him. The man was a good cultivator, in good circumstances, and that was the case of hundreds and thousands of tenant-farmers. (Hear, hear.) Rent had been alluded to by some one just now. He had always regarded rent as a private bargain between two individuals. He did not come there to find fault with either his own landlord or the landlord class generally, because, as a class, he had seen them act as the very best friends of the people. But he did think that in this particular movement, latterly, they had left it almost entirely not only to the tenants to do the work – that he should not care anything about; but to defray all the expenses. (Cheers and laughter.) Now, if the tenant-farmer could not cultivate his land properly, his labourers and himself would get worse off, and he would be in a worse position to pay his rent, his tithes, and his taxes; and if no tithes and rent were paid, how are the clergy and aristocracy to pay their taxes and servants? (Cheers.) With regard to taxes, he would ask, was there a class of men in any other country who produced an article that was taxed from 75 to 100 per cent, before they could use it themselves? for that was the case with the malt-tax in this country at the present moment. (Cheers.) Sir Robert Peel had told them that the food of the labouring man should be free from taxation; but what was the fact? Why, he held in his hand a list of no less than 15 articles, all of which were eatables or drinkables, and necessaries to the poor man, which had to pay taxes at this moment. They were – butter, cheese, cocoa, coffee, corn and meal, eggs, fruits, hams, rice, spices, spirits, sugar, refined ditto, molasses, and tea; and they produced a revenue to the country of L.13,677,795. And yet this "wiseacre" had said that the food of the working man should be free from taxation. In addition to that, there were the articles of tobacco and snuff, which produced upwards of L.4,000,000 more. (Hear.) And was not tobacco a necessity of the working man? (Hear, hear.) Well, that brought the amount up to L.18,000,000 sterling, or more than one-third of the whole of the general taxation of the country, raised upon articles of food. (Laughter and cheers.) With regard to the malt tax, he thought that no impost was more unjust, because there was not a great quantity of malt liquor consumed by the higher classes, the greater portion being consumed by the working classes; and, with the exception of one or two cyder counties, malt liquor, in one shape or other, was the universal beverage of the labourers. But beer must be taxed, forsooth! That was not the food of the people! (Hear.) There is only one other point (continued Mr Chouler) upon which I will make an observation, and that is with reference to the great "Exhibition" of 1851. (Oh, oh! groans and hisses.) I have heard of many curious things in my lifetime; but there is one thing which I have always regarded as visionary, or as never having had an existence – but it has actually been realised in this 19th century, and in this great city – ay, in this year of grace 1850 – a "mare's" (mayor's) nest has been discovered. (Roars of laughter.) Yes; and in this "mayor's nest" was "the Prince," and what does "the Prince" say? Now I beg that it may be distinctly understood that I mean no disrespect to my Sovereign or the Prince; but I came here to speak the truth, and I have spoken it fearlessly, and the truth I will know before I go home. The Prince says that, when you get the productions of all countries and nations before you, you have only to choose which is the cheapest and the best. Well, if you are to do that, is it not to show you that you have the opportunity of buying them? (Hear, hear.) A little umbrage has been taken at this exhibition as savouring somewhat of free-trade, and the royal commissioners have told us that they do not intend that the articles shall be sold, but that they shall be merely shown. But do you believe that the foreigner will bring his produce across the Channel or the Atlantic, and take it back again without receiving English money for it? Now, I want to know who does speak the truth? (Cries of "the Prince.") I suppose the Prince does. (Shouts of "no.") Well, well, have it as you like. (Roars of laughter.) I am come here as a delegate from the part of the country in which I reside. I came to seek the truth, and I will know it and declare it. I ask, is the foreign corn that will be imported into England in the year 1851, to come in and be looked at without being sold? (Loud cheers.) What will the foreigner say? Why, he will say "I care nothing about your 'looks,' give me your money" (Cheers and laughter.) That is what he will say. It is my duty then to ascertain whether or not it is intended still to encourage the sending out of the country money which it would be better to circulate at home. And I hope I am not exceeding my functions as a delegate in asking that question. Now you have heard my opinions upon this subject, and the concluding remarks I shall make are these: that without an alteration this country will be so shaken – after harvest, mind you, as there will be a good deal of work until then, not before – that I am perfectly confident it will be totally impossible to preserve the public peace. (Loud cheers.) I am not surprised at untruths coming from the royal commission, considering whom that commission is composed of, when I find Peel and Cobden amongst them. (Groans and hisses.) There is one name amongst them, however, which I am always in the habit of speaking of with respect and honour, and that is the name of Lord Stanley. (Cheers.) How far he will come out from among these royal commissioners without harm (bravo, loud cheers, and laughter,) from such a den of – you must supply the rest – I do not know, but I have confidence in the man. (Loud cheers, and great laughter.)

The resolution was put from the chair, and carried unanimously.

Mr EDWARD BALL, Burwell, Cambridgeshire, then moved the next resolution: – "That the indifference with which the just complaints of the people have been received by the House of Commons, its disinclination to adopt any measures for removing or alleviating the existing distress; and the want of sympathy it has exhibited for the sufferings of the people, have produced a widely-diffused feeling of disappointment, discontent, and distrust, which is fast undermining their reliance on the justice and wisdom of Parliament, the best security for loyalty to the Throne, and for the maintenance of the invaluable institutions of the country." The attendance of the noble duke this day, observed Mr Ball, imposes a fresh debt of gratitude upon us, and realises the hope we entertain, that whenever there is a grand field day he will be found in his right position – at the head of the troops. As our great commander, it is obligatory upon us that we should observe his orders, and one of those orders is, that we should express ourselves temperately and with moderation. (Hear, hear.) But I am sure that, from his experience of the field of conflict, he knows that sometimes the ardour and zeal of the British troops carry them somewhat beyond the exact line marked out by their leader and chief. (Cheers.) And if we should be found upon this occasion to advance a little beyond that strict line of propriety which he has chalked out for us, his kindness will excuse it when he knows that it is out of the fulness of our hearts, and the deep distress in which we are plunged, that we are assembled to-day to make our representations and complaints. (Cheers.) Coming, then, to the resolution which I have to propose, I ask is the allegation contained in it true? For if the thing stated in it be not true, it is useless for us to use it as an argument in justification of our assembling here to-day. Is it true? (Cries of "Yes; it is true.") Is it true that the House of Commons has shown great disregard to our petitions? (Cheers.) Is it true that it has rushed on heedless of the entreaties of the whole body of agriculturists, and passed a measure which it was elected for the very end and purpose of preventing? This (proceeded Mr Ball) constituted the bitterness of their grief, that when Lord John Russell's commercial measures of 1841 were defeated, a new parliament was called, and the voice of the nation proclaimed through that parliament against free trade – that the great mass of the constituencies rallied around the banner of protection – that they raised such a number of men to represent them in the House of Commons, that Lord J. Russell was obliged to throw up the reins of government into the hands of Sir Robert Peel, who took the leadership of the House of Commons with a good majority of 100, who were thought truly and honourably to represent the agricultural interest, and ready to protect their cause. (Cheers.) Then he wanted to know if the complaint in the resolution was not just when they saw that very house, which was congregated for the express purpose of maintaining protection, unhesitatingly strike that protection down, defeat all their objects, blast all their hopes, and prove untrue and unfaithful to the great constituencies of the empire. (Loud cheers.) I say, exclaimed Mr Ball, that we will never cease to represent that it was not by fair and legitimate means that we were beaten (cheers;) but that it was by the unfair, the foul play, the treacherous betrayal of those who had headed us to lead us on to victory, but who conducted the enemy into the camp, introduced the foe into the citadel, and destroyed all our hopes and prospects. (Loud cheers.) That being true, what is the language of the Free-trader upon the occasion? He sees a consequence that he never anticipated. He sees the result which we pointed out, and which he disbelieved. He finds that prices are as ruinous as we stated that they would be, and that free trade is as great a hindrance to the welfare of agriculture as we always reported that it would be. And now how does he shelter himself? Instead of coming forward, and honestly saying we have failed – it was only an experiment, which was forced upon us, and having made an error we will endeavour to correct it – he says that it is an exceptional case; that it is not the legitimate consequence, but that there are some particular circumstances which make the principles of free trade press with unusual severity just now. (Hear, and oh.) Now, look at the reasoning of this. If the foreigner, when he had no hope of such a market being opened to him, could for the last two years send in a supply of nearly twenty-two million quarters of various descriptions of corn, and if he could do that out of his surplus produce, what will he do now that he has the market entirely open to him – when he has got our capital to improve his cultivation, and when he knows that he may produce and send an unlimited quantity into our markets? (Hear.) I want to know how it is that, with an express declaration of the principles of the people upon the question of free trade, the landlords in the House of Lords and in the House of Commons, contrary to their own creed and in opposition to their own judgment, swerved from all that they had promised us, and threw up to those who were more impassioned and boisterous than themselves all that protection which they were bound in honour and in interest to uphold? (Loud cheers.) I feel that it is painful to speak of the landlords of this kingdom in the presence of so many of that aristocracy who shed a lustre upon their order, and whose presence here shows us how much they respond to our own principles. (Cheers.) We can never forget that those laurels which adorn the brow of the noble duke who presides over us were won in the most terrible and hard-fought encounters that ever brought glory, honour, and renown to the British arms, and that the noble duke has, from the period that he turned his sword into a ploughshare, ever stood true to the best interests of agriculture – (loud cheers) – has ever stood true to the declarations which he has made; and under all changes, and in the midst of the vapourings of his opponents, has been steadfast, untarnished, and unsullied, and now comes before us with renewed glory and increased claims upon our gratitude and support. (Loud cheers.) We cannot forget that the noble lord on his right – the Earl Stanhope – (great cheering) – whom it has been my privilege for five-and-twenty years to follow in the paths of philanthropy – who has come to the evening of a long and a useful life, in which he has shown sympathy to the poor, and has had the best interests of his fellow-men at heart – that he comes here, too, for the purpose of giving his powerful support to the great principles to which he and we are alike devoted. (Loud cheers.) They had also several other noble and honourable gentlemen present. They all knew the undaunted courage with which the Marquis of Downshire had fought for their right. They knew that the gentlemen around him were noble exceptions to that great defalcation which had been committed by so large a portion of the aristocracy. (Cheers.) Therefore, he (Mr Ball) could not discharge what he considered to be his duty now, without pointing them out as exceptions to the statement he was about to make – that they had fallen, not by Cobden's – that they had fallen, not by the League's tricks – that they had fallen, not by the treachery of Peel; but because their landlords – the aristocracy – those who should have upheld them – had swerved from their duty in the houses of Parliament. (Cheers.) We had the power – we had the majority – we had the voice of the country, not loud, but strong and firm, and ready to manifest itself when the moment for action came; but they were faint-hearted, they failed in the hour of need, and sacrificed us to the discordant elements of demagogueism and free-tradeism. (Uproarious cheering.) Moreover, they have contrived to take the full tale from the poverty and the debilitated circumstances of a struggling tenantry. (Loud cheers.) Let me put this simple case to you. I take the free-trade landlord, and I take the tenant-farmer. They are in partnership, are engaged in the same pursuit, and have a joint interest in the same property. A is the landlord, B the tenant-farmer. A comes to B and says, "We must make an experiment upon this land. We must introduce certain fresh modes of cultivation. We must change our plan; and if we do so-and-so you will farm better, my rent will be more secure, and we shall be altogether in more favourable circumstances than before." B, the tenant, says, "No, it is too frightful an experiment. No, it may involve me in ruin. No, you risk nothing – I risk all." (Great cheering.) But A is the richer man – A has the greater power, and he insists upon the experiment being made, in spite of the tears and protestations of the tenant. In the legislature A assents that the experiment shall be made. Thus he sweeps away and brings down to ruin the tenant who, in his wretchedness, looks up to the landlord for relief; and I do say that, according to the immutable principles of justice, and on the ground of what is due from man to man, the landlord, who is a party to the passing of free-trade measures, is bound to sustain and uphold his tenant, and reimburse his losses. (Vehement cheers.) I want to know, also, if I have L.5000, L.10,000, or L.20,000, placed in the funds, and a similar sum invested in the land, both of them being sustained and supported by the law – I want to know if the land be to pay the interest of the national debt, whether it is fair and just to take away the income out of which the interest of the national debt is to be paid, and what right or justice there is in demanding the full payment of the national debt? (Loud cheers.) If the fundholder has looked on and encouraged the movement which was made to bring us to ruin, I want to know with what propriety or consistency he can ask to gather out of our ruined means the wealth which, under other circumstances, we would gladly and cheerfully pay him? (Cheers.) But we are told that our landlords cannot now reverse this policy – that they have gone too far to recede – and Cobden, in that celebrated speech of his, which he made at the close of last year in Leeds, said "Only let the agriculturist come forward and put on one shilling in the shape of corn duty, and I will create such a tumult as shall shake the kingdom to its centre." (Laughter.) Most deliberately and dispassionately my answer to that is – The sooner the better! (Tremendous cheering; the whole of the vast assemblage rising to their feet, and waving their hat and hands.) I say that we have a conscience, that we have a superintending Providence, that we have laws violated, that we have all these things which will sustain and give endurance to us in any conflict that may approach; and that, therefore, we may laugh at all threatenings, and set them at defiance. (Loud cheering.) But what have the tenant-farmers to fear at the approach of discord? Can you be worse off? (No, no.) Can any alteration damage you? (Renewed cries of "no no.") All is lost! Persevere in your free-trade laws, and there is no concealing the fact that, as a class, we are swept away. (Hear.) Persevere in those laws, our homes will be taken from us. Persevere in those laws, our wives will be without protection. Persevere in those laws, our children will become paupers. (Cheers.) Will you then tell me, when laws have been enacted that reduce me to that position, that I, a broken-hearted man, passing into poverty and my family degraded, that I shall fear the threats of a demagogue? (Much cheering.) My answer for the whole body of the tenantry of the country is this – that we are disposed to risk all, brave all, dare all! (vociferous cheering, again and again repeated;) and that we are prepared, come what will, and cost what it may, at the hour of our country's peril, for our homes, our wives, and our families, to take those terrible steps which are the most frightful for a good and peaceable man to imagine, but which necessity and unjust treatment hurry us on and bring us to the contemplation of. (Vehement plaudits.) The most abominable part of it is this, however. If it had been a calamity brought on in the Providence of God – by the failure of the seasons, or by something which was above legislative control, we would have humbly bowed to it. But here comes the scourge – we fell through the cowardice and faint-heartedness of him whom we considered to be the greatest of modern statesmen; and when the history of the age that is passing has been recorded, it will tell us that at the same period there was in Italy a man (Count Rossi) who had been appointed minister of the Pope; that he was the witness of a rising tumult and a coming desolation; and that on the very morning of his death he was told not to go to the Senate, for if he did so there would be danger attending him. His reply was, "I have taken office – and when I did that, I took not only its honours and emoluments, but its duties and its dangers." He went to the Senate, and perished upon the steps of the Forum. But our statesman (Sir Robert Peel) saw the approach of the storm, quailed at the tempest, bowed down to the lowering cloud, dishonoured the country, brought infamy upon his own name, and poverty upon the people. (Great cheering.)

Mr J. ALLIN WILLIAMS, of Wiltshire, seconded the resolution. He stood before them that day as a Wiltshire farmer, second to none in the kingdom in his loyalty and attachment to the throne and his love of the constitution of old England. (Cheers.) Moreover, he stood before them deputed by the farmers of the county of Wilts, for the purpose of protesting against the treatment to which the occupiers of the soil of Great Britain, as a class, had been subjected by the measures of her Majesty's Ministers and by the House of Commons. (Cheers.) He wished he could think that those measures and their consequences had been properly considered and contemplated by their framers before they were brought forward. Despite the remonstrances of the defenders of the agricultural interest in the House of Commons, and of the noble duke in the chair, and of other noblemen in the Upper House of the Legislature, her Majesty's Ministers persisted in those measures which must ultimately reduce the tenantry of England to beggary. (Hear, hear.) An individual, whom he would not name, as his name appeared to grate upon the ears of every honest farmer in this country – (cheers) – but whom it was impossible to forget, as he had laid down maxims which they felt obliged to take up and consider – a few years ago that individual laid down, as a rule, that the British farmer could not grow wheat in this kingdom under 56s. per quarter. (Hear, hear.) And upon the faith of that statement many of the men that he saw before him, himself included, had entered into agreements with their landlords for the purpose of occupying their estates for a certain period of years. (Hear, hear.) He himself had taken a lease for 14 years. What, then, must be the condition of the farmers of those estates when they were obliged to sell wheat at 36s. per quarter? The consequence was, that all, or the greater part of those who were similarly situated with himself, must be ruined. Upon the same figures was also based the Tithe Commutation Act; and by that act, which, as they too well knew, was ruled by a septennial clause, last year, when they were selling their wheat at the price of two guineas per quarter, they were compelled to pay after the rate of 54s. 10d. per quarter as the tithe of their produce; and this year, when they were selling their wheat at from 36s. to 40s. per quarter, they had to pay upon an average of 53s. (Hear, hear.) It was on that account that he came there to proclaim that her Majesty's Ministers had done the farmers a great piece of injustice, and that they had in fact emptied the pockets of the British farmers by their legislation. If there had been a necessity for the late Free-trade measures, (and he denied that there was any such necessity,) he contended that every portion of the community ought to have been made to bear a fair share of the burdens which had been placed upon the agriculturists. But what was the fact? He maintained that the industrious classes, the producers, alone were made to feel the burden, and that property and capital were wholly exempt. (Hear, hear.) The Free-traders, when proposing their ruinous measures, appear to have made a grand discovery, and assert, that we have no right to tax the food of the people. But did it ever enter their brains that on the wheat produced by the British farmer he paid a large tax in the shape of the superior wages paid to the labourers as compared with those of the labourers of the foreigner, to meet the taxes that are imposed on them upon the necessaries of life? That in fact the proportion of labour in a quarter of wheat (which he would assert to be two-thirds) was taxed to the enormous extent of 33 per cent? (Hear, hear, hear.) Again, was not the wheat produced by the British farmer taxed by the poor rates, the highway rates, &c.? and the heavy rents which he paid as compared with the foreign farmer, (such rents as were not heard of in any other country in the world,) was it not on account of the heavy taxes the landlords had to pay? If these things never entered the brains of her Majesty's Ministers, they were no men of business. (Hear, hear.) If they did enter into their brains, then their conduct was most knavish, most scandalous; for thereby they compelled the farmers of England to compete on most unequal terms with the foreigner. (Hear, hear.) The aristocracy of this country, he regretted to say, had not as a body done their duty in this matter. (Hear, hear.) Had the farmers of England had the aristocracy and the clergy of the country with them, they might easily have resisted the iniquitous measures of the Free-traders, and they would not have been in their present deplorable condition. (Cheers.) But now let them look for a remedy. Let them from that day call forth those men who had hitherto been blind and apathetic as regarded their own best interests, as well as those of their own immediate dependents. Let them call upon the landed gentry and the clergy throughout the country to do their duty. (Hear, hear.) He thought he might say with confidence, if they responded to that call, that the agricultural interest had nothing to fear. If nothing else would rouse the aristocracy of the country to a proper attention to their vital interests, as well as those of their common country, surely the insolent language of Mr Cobden at Leeds was enough to rouse them from their lethargy. But if they still refused to do their duty, he would call upon them, in the language of Milton, to

"Awake! arise! or be for ever fallen."

(Cheers.) He knew that time was pressing on, and that he must be brief. He would therefore conclude by again protesting against the treatment they had received, and most heartily seconding the resolution which had been proposed to them by Mr Ball. But he could not resume his seat before he had conjured them to send Whig principles to the winds. (Laughter and cheers.) His belief was, that Dr Samuel Johnson never made so happy a hit in his definition of those principles, as when he said that the devil was the first Whig. (Great laughter and cheers.)

The resolution was then put and unanimously carried.

Professor AYTOUN, of Edinburgh then came forward, amidst loud cheering, to propose the following resolution: – "That this meeting attributes the depression and distress of the agricultural, colonial, shipping, and other interests to the rash and impolitic changes in the laws which had long regulated the importation of foreign productions; that it is of opinion that those laws were based on the most just principles, and dictated by the soundest policy; that, under their salutary influence, the British nation had attained an unexampled state of prosperity, and a proud pre-eminence in the scale of nations; and that if their object and spirit in fostering and protecting native industry be finally abandoned, many of the most important interests of the state will be sacrificed, and the national prosperity and greatness be ruinously impaired." The learned Professor proceeded as follows: – Gentlemen, I have been desired, perhaps, rather than requested, on the part of the Scottish Protective Association, (hear, hear,) to attend this meeting, and to move one of the resolutions. I most sincerely wish that the task had been confided to abler hands than mine; but all of us have a distinct duty to perform; and those of my countrymen who act with me feel that, on such an occasion as this, it would be wrong and faint-hearted if Scotland, which is so deeply interested in the grand question of protection to native industry, were to hang back, and refuse to come forward to testify to you and to the tenantry of England that our zeal in this cause is as great, our feeling as decided, our determination as strong as your own. (Cheers.) I cannot offer to you the testimony of a practical agriculturist, but, perhaps, I may be allowed to say that I do not consider this is a meeting entirely of agriculturists. (Hear, hear.) Every man in this nation, from the lowest to the highest, has, I conceive, a distinct stake in this question. Every man, whatever be his occupation or his calling, is entitled to come forward here and declare his opinion upon those measures which have been thrust on the nation by an act of perfidy and treachery, to find a parallel for which we shall search the pages of history in vain. (Hear, hear.) I do not exaggerate our case when I say that Scotland is, if possible, more interested than England in the maintenance or the restoration of protection to native industry. Far later in point of time were our fields broken up, our moors reclaimed, our morasses drained; and the prosperity of Scotland, great as it has been, can hardly be reckoned as of older date than the last seventy years. Glasgow, the largest city of Scotland, the second city of the United Kingdom, rose to its present high wealth and distinction by its colonial connexion within a comparatively recent period. Our counties and our towns are alike interested in this matter. The "transition state" of suffering which our opponents now affect to have foreseen as the inevitable result of their measures – though they took especial care to conceal that revelation from every human eye – is more than beginning to make itself felt in the latter: in the former, it is evident and undenied, and already, I am sorry to say, in our remote Highland districts the work of desolation has begun. They may call it peace if they please; it is not peace, alas! it is solitude. (Hear, hear.) Now, there are certain things you have imported from Scotland for which perhaps you may not thank us very much, and one of those things is a certain race called Political Economists. (Hear, hear, and laughter.) I do not, however, wish to include among the number the father of political economy, Adam Smith, now in his grave three-quarters of a century, who wrote at a time and under circumstances very different from those in which we are at present placed. I observe that Mr Cobden is going about the country with the works, as he says, of Adam Smith in his hands, and favouring the public with his comments on those works; but I hope those comments will be taken by the public, as I take them, at their true value – estimating the quality of the text at a different ratio from the perverted interpretations of the expounder. There is another Scottish Political Economist, Mr M'Culloch, who has written a great deal on the subject of the corn trade, and who has been hitherto, during his long life, a decided enemy to all restrictive duties; but who, I believe, is now discovering at the last hour, that he has been going too fast in his views, and that the total withdrawal of protection is not likely to do all the good which he had at one time anticipated from it. Then, there is another gentleman, who is an ornament to the present House of Commons – the illustrious Mr Macgregor, (roars of laughter,) the gifted and infallible seer, who won the suffrages of a benighted city by telling its electors from the hustings that the nation was to increase in wealth, under the free-trade system, at the rate of precisely L.2,000,000 a-week. (Hear, hear, and laughter.) That was to be the national gain; a gain in which we were all to participate the moment the corn laws were swept away. Mr Macgregor also told the people of Glasgow that in this matter he was the political tutor of Sir R. Peel, (hear, hear, and laughter;) that he, the two million a-week man, was the individual who laid down that grand plan under which we are all at present suffering. If that be true, all I shall remark is this, that surely never did any pupil select so singular a master. Under these circumstances, I must admit that, however we may be entitled to appear here as a deputation, one gift which we have sent you from Scotland, in the shape of political economists, is a gift for which you cannot be very thankful. This is, I may add, an age in which men have been more befooled by figures than by anything else which we can mention. (Hear) Half a century ago, when any extraordinary account appeared in the newspapers, it used to be said that it must be true because it was to be found in print. Now, that delusion seems to have passed away; the charm of infallibility is broken, and people do not at present suppose that the press has got any particular exemption from error. But a delusion quite as great, and even more baneful, still prevails with respect to figures. There are men seated in their closets, with blue-books before them, casting up long columns of accounts, and making out statements which they call statistics, which are to form the invariable rules by which mankind is to be governed, and by which the commerce of this country is to be regulated; and it is by putting their noxious dogmas into effect that this country has of late been exposed to so much suffering. The system is older even than the days of Adam Smith; for about a century ago there went forth from Edinburgh a man of the name of John Law, the founder of the famous Mississippi scheme – a scheme for enriching men by foreign trade and for conferring on them fortunes at once, while it did away with native industry. History has its cycles, and we have again arrived at a period when quackery and imposture have usurped the place of sound common-sense, of wise policy, and I fear not to add, of truthful and Christian legislation. (Great cheering.) I know well that it is not my part to dwell long upon topics with which others are better acquainted, but if you will allow me, I shall make a few observations with regard to the present state of agricultural industry in Scotland. We have of late years been much flattered by commendations of our system of farming in that country. Whenever any of the farmers of England were supposed not to be quite up to the mark, it used to be said by Sir Robert Peel and his friends, that those farmers had only to imitate the example of the men of the same class in the Lothians. But in the beginning of this year, after a fair trial had been given to the so-called experiment of free trade, the farmers of the Lothians came forward, and testified by the leading members of their body that they were losing under the present system, and that their industry, skill, energy, and frugality were employed in vain so long as that incubus weighed upon them. (Hear, hear.) What followed? Why, the note was immediately changed, and it was said that those men were not farming high enough! That discovery was made by a gentleman who now appears to be Sir Robert Peel's great authority upon the subject – a certain Mr Caird. (Hear, hear, and laughter.) Now that gentleman, although a farmer, does not happen to be able to say that he ever made anything himself by farming. But he is acquainted with another individual, who is the factor on an estate of a very liberal landlord, who lets him have land for a merely nominal rent. That individual is at present in possession of a fine peat-moss, exceedingly well fitted for growing potatoes; and, as there has been less rot this year in his potatoes than in those of the greater portion of other farmers, he had derived from them a considerable profit. That is the farmer whose example is now recommended by Mr Caird as the grand panacea for all the evils under which the agricultural class is suffering. (Hear, hear.) So you see, gentlemen, in what you are to put your trust – peat-moss and potatoes! (Great laughter.) These are the twin resources with which you are to meet unlimited importations of grain! Pity, for the sake of Ireland, where both articles are abundant, that the discovery was made so late! I believe, indeed I know, you have something of the same sort here. Mr Mechi – (hear, hear, and laughter) – a gentleman whose razors are of undeniable excellence – has been attempting to show the farmers of England how to shave close (a laugh;) and the unclean spirit of free trade, finding no other place of refuge, has at last flown into the herd of Mr Huxtable's swine. (Immense cheering.) But I must say a few words with regard to the poorer districts – with regard to the Highlands of Scotland. The misery prevailing in many of those districts, more especially in the west and in the islands, did not proceed solely from the repeal of the corn laws; for it was also in a great measure owing to the noxious tariffs of Sir R. Peel, which admitted provisions duty-free into this country. It appears – indeed I believe it is an uncontradicted fact – that the British fleet is now victualled by foreign product. (Cries of "Shame.") I hold in my hand a letter from a banker in the town of Oban in Argyleshire, stating that emigration is now taking place to a very considerable extent there, that most of those who can scrape a few pounds together are taking their passage to America, and that shortly the landlords will be left with no class of people on their lands save the reckless, the improvident, and the idle. Free trade is now rapidly driving from the Highlands their most industrious inhabitants; and I believe that unless we compel the Government to retrace their steps, a large portion of Scotland will soon be brought back to the condition in which she was placed at the time when the Heritable Jurisdictions were repealed, and when the country was in a half savage state. (Hear.) I say that Scotland is now rapidly assuming the place which Ireland has hitherto occupied. A deluge of Irish labourers is already flowing over to us, and forcing down wages all over the country. I believe that, if this fatal experiment should be allowed to go on for another year, the cry from Scotland, and especially from her remoter districts, will become overpowering and appalling. We have seen the recent revelations made by the public press with regard to the state of the poor in this country. Everybody, I believe, has read in the graphic letters in the Morning Chronicle upon that subject, tales of the most appalling distress, flowing from excessive competition in every branch of industry. But that competition must necessarily be increased by that crowding into the towns from the country, which I know is now taking place in Scotland, of labourers who would emigrate if they had the means of doing so. I observe that it has been proposed, in a pamphlet recently published by an eccentric writer, that the surplus population of our towns should be marched out in industrial regiments, and sent to till the bogs and reclaim the hill sides. Such schemes are utterly visionary; and they are founded upon a shallow and perverted view of the social grievances against which we emphatically protest. Why, it is the want of occupation in the country just now which is doing the whole of the mischief, and which is creating that mass of pauperism which we all deplore. (Hear, hear.) It would seem, indeed, as if the present Ministers and the Free-traders would wish to realise no better picture of Great Britain than this —

"Wasted fields and crowded cities,
Swarming streets and desert downs;
All the light of life concentred
In the focus of the towns."

The Free-traders tell us that they are at present as determined as ever on persisting in their experiment; but they talk incoherently about some future measure of relief, which, if we will consent to be quiet, they may possibly, out of their great bounty, vouchsafe to the victims of their policy. Now, let us see in what position we are placed. For the first time probably in the memory of man, the Whig Chancellor of the Exchequer has a surplus; but he does not well know what to do with it; and he thinks that perhaps the best way of employing a portion of it is to give the manufacturers another bonus by taking the duty off bricks; but he calls that a boon to the agriculturists. (Hear.) Why, in a single factory stalk there are more bricks than would build cottages for a whole parish! Let us see, however, how that surplus has been occasioned. That surplus would be a deficit, and a large deficit, were it not for the property and income tax laid on by Sir R. Peel – (hear, hear) – under a promise as solemn as ever flowed from the lips of man, that it was to be but temporary in its operation. But that tax has never been removed, and never will be removed, unless this country shall speak with more determination upon the subject than it has hitherto done. How does that tax work on you farmers? (Cheers.) You are charged to the income-tax in proportion to the amount of your rents, so that you do not pay it out of your profits. Now, I say that the continuance of that tax on the farmers, after the legislature has deprived them of the profits of their business, is a crying iniquity. (Hear, hear, and cries of "We will no longer pay it.") I suppose you will not pay it because you cannot pay it; that is, no doubt, the reason. But let us see what argument is advanced in favour of the continuance of Free Trade. What tangible ground have they for telling us that we are still bound to persevere? There is none; there cannot be any argument advanced in its favour. The experiment was adopted, we are told, with a view to stimulate exports, and to give the manufacturers of this country more extended markets for their produce. Well, but last year the amount of these exports had not reached the amount of the year 1845 – the last year of Protection. (Immense cheering.) So then, even the exporting manufacturers have been disappointed. As to the home trade, we all know, and the manufacturers themselves know to their cost, in what a wretched position that is placed. But when the Free-traders were asked why they had adopted the Free-trade policy or why they continued it, they replied that it was because if they had not done so there would have been a revolution in this country. (Hear, and laughter.) That is, indeed, the most precious reason I have ever heard assigned for any course of policy. What does that say for the loyalty of the individuals for whom the change has been made? (Loud cries of "Hear, hear.") But you are known to be loyal, and you therefore the class selected to be sacrificed to buy up the loyalty of the towns. (Enormous cheering.) Test this argument of theirs in any way you will, and I defy you to arrive at any other conclusion. Is it not enough to make one sick to see such legislation going on? But it is not confined to Great Britain alone: we have it in Canada also at this moment. There the Government is buying up the rebels, compensating those who rose in arms against this country, and spreading disaffection among the loyal people of that colony, who were ready to lay down their lives in defence of the Queen and the Constitution. But I fear I have already detained you longer than I ought to have done. We are here simply to tell you, that in this great national struggle, for a principle which is scarce less vital to us than our liberties, our co-operation, according to the measure of our ability, shall be cordially and unreservedly given. (Loud cheering.) This is not England's battle only: it is ours as well; and therefore are we here to-day. It is matter for regret that the tenantry in Scotland have not oftener had opportunities of meeting their brethren in the south, and, indeed, that the agriculturists of the country generally cannot, from obvious reasons, be brought into contact with each other as frequently as would be desirable. But this I will say, that I believe the feelings among the yeomanry and the tenantry in both countries are the same; and that those two classes who, in days long gone by, met in hostile conflict, are now united in their determination to have the infamous measures which are over-riding us all repealed; and when the red cross of St George and the silver cross of St Andrew are blended indissolubly together, I fear no Cobdens – I fear no opposing force: I fear neither the machinations of the intriguer, nor the empty bluster of the demagogue. (Loud and long-continued cheers.) I despise their threats, as I know that their hearts are cowardly; and I tell them that their insolent challenge has been taken up, in a manner which they fear to answer, by the true men and the valiant spirits of Britain; and in the justice of the cause we repose our faith in its issue. (Loud and vociferous cheering.)