referred, may convey a competent notion of some of our principal
manufactures. Their general state will be clear from that of our
external and internal commerce, through which they circulate, and of
which they are at once the cause and effect. But the communication of
the several parts of the kingdom with each other and with foreign
countries has always been regarded as one of the most certain tests to
evince the prosperous or adverse state of our trade in all its branches.
Recourse has usually been had to the revenue of the Post-Office with
this view. I shall include the product of the tax which was laid in the
last war, and which will make the evidence more conclusive, if it shall
afford the same inference: I allude to the Post-Horse duty, which shows
the personal intercourse within the kingdom, as the Post-Office shows
the intercourse by letters both within and without. The first of these
standards, then, exhibits an increase, according to my former schemes of
comparison, from an eleventh to a twentieth part of the whole duty.[50]
The Post-Office gives still less consolation to those who are miserable
in proportion as the country feels no misery. From the commencement of
the war to the month of April, 1796, the gross produce had increased by
nearly one sixth of the whole sum which the state now derives from that
fund. I find that the year ending 5th of April, 1793, gave 627,592_l._,
and the year ending at the same quarter in 1796, 750,637_l._, after a
fair deduction having been made for the alteration (which, you know, on
grounds of policy I never approved) in your privilege of franking. I
have seen no formal document subsequent to that period, but I have been
credibly informed there is very good ground to believe that the revenue
of the Post-Office[51] still continues to be regularly and largely upon
the rise.
What is the true inference to be drawn from the annual number of
bankruptcies has been the occasion of much dispute. On one side it has
been confidently urged as a sure symptom of a decaying trade: on the
other side it has been insisted that it is a circumstance attendant upon
a thriving trade; for that the greater is the whole quantity of trade,
the greater of course must be the positive number of failures, while the
aggregate success is still in the same proportion. In truth, the
increase of the number may arise from either of those causes. But all
must agree in one conclusion,--that, if the number diminishes, and at
the same time every other sort of evidence tends to show an augmentation
of trade, there can be no better indication. We have already had very
ample means of gathering that the year 1796 was a very favorable year of
trade, and in that year the number of bankruptcies was at least one
fifth below the usual average. I take this from the declaration of the
Lord Chancellor in the House of Lords.[52] He professed to speak from
the records of Chancery; and he added another very striking fact,--that
on the property actually paid into his court (a very small part, indeed,
of the whole property of the kingdom) there had accrued in that year a
net surplus of eight hundred thousand pounds, which was so much new
capital.
But the real situation of our trade, during the whole of this war,
deserves more minute investigation. I shall begin with that which,
though the least in consequence, makes perhaps the most impression on
our senses, because it meets our eyes in our daily walks: I mean our
retail trade. The exuberant display of wealth in our shops was the sight
which most amazed a learned foreigner of distinction who lately resided
among us: his expression, I remember, was, that "_they seemed to be
bursting with opulence into the streets_." The documents which throw
light on this subject are not many, but they all meet in the same point:
all concur in exhibiting an increase. The most material are the general
licenses[53] which the law requires to be taken out by all dealers in
excisable commodities. These seem to be subject to considerable
fluctuations. They have not been so low in any year of the war as in the
years 1788 and 1789, nor ever so high in peace as in the first year of
the war. I should next state the licenses to dealers in spirits and
wine; but the change in them which took place in 1789 would give an
unfair advantage to my argument. I shall therefore content myself with
remarking, that from the date of that change the spirit licenses kept
nearly the same level till the stoppage of the distilleries in 1795. If
they dropped a little, (and it was but little,) the wine licenses,
during the same time, more than countervailed that loss to the revenue;
and it is remarkable with regard to the latter, that in the year 1796,
which was the lowest in the excise duties on wine itself, as well as in
the quantity imported, more dealers in wine appear to have been licensed
than in any former year, excepting the first year of the war. This fact
may raise some doubt whether the consumption has been lessened so much
as, I believe, is commonly imagined. The only other retail-traders whom
I found so entered as to admit of being selected are tea-dealers and
sellers of gold and silver plate, both of whom seem to have multiplied
very much in proportion to their aggregate number.[54] I have kept apart
one set of licensed sellers, because I am aware that our antagonists may
be inclined to triumph a little, when I name auctioneers and auctions.
They may be disposed to consider it as a sort of trade which thrives by
the distress of others. But if they will look at it a little more
attentively, they will find their gloomy comfort vanish. The public
income from these licenses has risen with very great regularity through
a series of years which all must admit to have been years of prosperity.
It is remarkable, too, that in the year 1793, which was the great year
of bankruptcies, these duties on auctioneers and auctions[55] fell below
the mark of 1791; and in 1796, which year had one fifth less than the
accustomed average of bankruptcies, they mounted at once beyond all
former examples. In concluding this general head, will you permit me, my
dear Sir, to bring to your notice an humble, but industrious and
laborious set of chapmen, against whom the vengeance of your House has
sometimes been levelled, with what policy I need not stay to inquire, as
they have escaped without much injury? The hawkers and peddlers,[56] I
am assured, are still doing well, though, from some new arrangements
respecting them made in 1789, it would be difficult to trace their
proceedings in any satisfactory manner.
When such is the vigor of our traffic in its minutest ramifications, we
may be persuaded that the root and the trunk are sound. When we see the
life-blood of the state circulate so freely through the capillary
vessels of the System, we scarcely need inquire if the heart performs
its functions aright. But let us approach it; let us lay it bare, and
watch the systole and diastole, as it now receives and now pours forth
the vital stream through all the members. The port of London has always
supplied the main evidence of the state of our commerce. I know, that,
amidst all the difficulties and embarrassments of the year 1793, from
causes unconnected with and prior to the war, the tonnage of ships in
the Thames actually rose. But I shall not go through a detail of
official papers on this point. There is evidence, which has appeared
this very session before your House, infinitely more forcible and
impressive to my apprehension than all the journals and ledgers of all
the Inspectors-General from the days of Davenant. It is such as cannot
carry with it any sort of fallacy. It comes, not from one set, but from
many opposite sets of witnesses, who all agree in nothing else:
witnesses of the gravest and most unexceptionable character, and who
confirm what they say, in the surest manner, by their conduct. Two
different bills have been brought in for improving the port of London. I
have it from very good intelligence, that, when the project was first
suggested from necessity, there were no less than eight different plans,
supported by eight different bodies of subscribers. The cost of the
least was estimated at two hundred thousand pounds, and of the most
extensive at twelve hundred thousand. The two between which the contest
now lies substantially agree (as all the others must have done) in the
motives and reasons of the preamble; but I shall confine myself to that
bill which is proposed on the part of the mayor, aldermen, and common
council, because I regard them as the best authority, and their language
in itself is fuller and more precise. I certainly see them complain of
the "great delays, accidents, damages, losses, and extraordinary
expenses, which are almost continually sustained, to the hindrance and
discouragement of commerce, and the great injury of the public revenue."
But what are the causes to which they attribute their complaints? The
first is, "THAT, FROM THE VERY GREAT AND PROGRESSIVE INCREASE OF THE
NUMBER AND SIZE OF SHIPS AND OTHER VESSELS TRADING TO THE PORT OF
LONDON, the river Thames, in and near the said port, is in general so
much crowded with shipping, lighters, and other craft, that the
navigation of a considerable part of the river is thereby rendered
tedious and dangerous; and there is great want of room in the said port
for the safe and convenient mooring of vessels, and constant access to
them." The second is of the same nature. It is the want of regulations
and arrangements, never before found necessary, for expedition and
facility. The third is of another kind, but to the same effect: That the
legal quays are too confined, and there is not sufficient accommodation
for the landing and shipping of cargoes. And the fourth and last is
still different: they describe the avenues to the legal quays (which,
little more than a century since, the great fire of London opened and
dilated beyond the measure of our then circumstances) to be now
"incommodious, and much too narrow for the great concourse of carts and
other carriages usually passing and repassing therein." Thus our trade
has grown too big for the ancient limits of Art and Nature. Our streets,
our lanes, our shores, the river itself, which has so long been our
pride, are impeded and obstructed and choked up by our riches. They are,
like our shops, "bursting with opulence." To these misfortunes, to these
distresses and grievances alone, we are told, it is to be imputed that
still more of our capital has not been pushed into the channel of our
commerce, to roll back in its reflux still more abundant capital, and
fructify the national treasury in its course. Indeed, my dear Sir, when
I have before my eyes this consentient testimony of the corporation of
the city of London, the West India merchants, and all the other
merchants who promoted the other plans, struggling and contending which
of them shall be permitted to lay out their money in consonance with
their testimony, I cannot turn aside to examine what one or two violent
petitions, tumultuously voted by real or pretended liverymen of London,
may have said of the utter destruction and annihilation of trade.
This opens a subject on which every true lover of his country, and, at
this crisis, every friend to the liberties of Europe, and of social
order in every country, must dwell and expatiate with delight. I mean to
wind up all my proofs of our astonishing and almost incredible
prosperity with the valuable information given to the Secret Committee
of the Lords by the Inspector-General. And here I am happy that I can
administer an antidote to all despondence from the same dispensary from
which the first dose of poison was supposed to have come. The report of
that committee is generally believed to have derived much benefit from
the labors of the same noble lord who was said, as the author of the
pamphlet of 1795, to have led the way in teaching us to place all our
hope on that very experiment which he afterwards declared in his place
to have been from the beginning utterly without hope. We have now his
authority to say, that, as far as our resources were concerned, the
experiment was equally without necessity.
"It appears," as the committee has very justly and satisfactorily
observed, "by the accounts of the value of the imports and exports for
the last twenty years, produced by Mr. Irving, Inspector-General of
Imports and Exports, that the demands for cash to be sent abroad"
(which, by the way, including the loan to the Emperor, was nearly one
third less sent to the Continent of Europe than in the Seven Years' War)
... "was greatly compensated by a very large balance of commerce in
favor of this kingdom,--greater than was ever known in any preceding
period. The value of the exports of the last year amounted, according to
the valuation on which the accounts of the Inspector-General are
founded, to 30,424,184_l._, which is more than double what it was in any
year of the American war, and one third more than it was on an average
during the last peace, previous to the year 1792; and though the value
of the imports to this country has during the same period greatly
increased, the excess of the value of the exports above that of the
imports, which constitutes the balance of trade, has augmented even in a
greater proportion." These observations might perhaps be branched out
into other points of view, but I shall leave them to your own active and
ingenious mind. There is another and still more important light in
which, the Inspector-General's information may be seen,--and that is, as
affording a comparison of some circumstances in this war with the
commercial history of all our other wars in the present century.
In all former hostilities, our exports gradually declined in value, and
then (with one single exception) ascended again, till they reached and
passed the level of the preceding peace. But this was a work of time,
sometimes more, sometimes less slow. In Queen Anne's war, which began in
1702, it was an interval of ten years before this was effected. Nine
years only were necessary, in the war of 1739, for the same operation.
The Seven Years' War saw the period much shortened: hostilities began in
1755; and in 1758, the fourth year of the war, the exports mounted above
the peace-mark. There was, however, a distinguishing feature of that
war,--that our tonnage, to the very last moment, was in a state of great
depression, while our commerce was chiefly carried on by foreign
vessels. The American war was darkened with singular and peculiar
adversity. Our exports never came near to their peaceful elevation, and
our tonnage continued, with very little fluctuation, to subside lower
and lower.[57] On the other hand, the present war, with regard to our
commerce, has the white mark of as singular felicity. If, from internal
causes, as well as the consequence of hostilities, the tide ebbed in
1793, it rushed back again with a bore in the following year, and from
that time has continued to swell and run every successive year higher
and higher into all our ports. The value of our exports last year above
the year 1792 (the mere increase of our commerce during the war) is
equal to the average value of all the exports during the wars of William
and Anne.
It has been already pointed out, that our imports have not kept pace
with our exports: of course, on the face of the account, the balance of
trade, both positively and comparatively considered, must have been much
more than ever in our favor. In that early little tract of mine, to
which I have already more than once referred, I made many observations
on the usual method of computing that balance, as well as the usual
objection to it, that the entries at the Custom-House were not always
true. As you probably remember them, I shall not repeat them here. On
the one hand, I am not surprised that the same trite objection is
perpetually renewed by the detractors of our national affluence; and on
the other hand, I am gratified in perceiving that the balance of trade
seems to be now computed in a manner much clearer than it used to be
from those errors which I formerly noticed. The Inspector-General
appears to have made his estimate with every possible guard and caution.
His opinion is entitled to the greatest respect. It was in substance, (I
shall again use the words of the Report, as much better than my own,)
"that the true balance of our trade amounted, on a medium of the four
years preceding January, 1796, to upwards of 6,500,00_l._ per annum,
exclusive of the profits arising from our East and West India trade,
which he estimates at upwards of 4,000,000_l._ per annum, exclusive of
the profits derived from our fisheries." So that, including the
fisheries, and making a moderate allowance for the exceedings, which Mr.
Irving himself supposes, beyond his calculation, without reckoning what
the public creditors themselves pay to themselves, and without taking
one shilling from the stock of the landed interest, our colonies, our
Oriental possessions, our skill and industry, our commerce and
navigation, at the commencement of this year, were pouring a new annual
capital into the kingdom, hardly half a million short of the whole
interest of that tremendous debt from which we are taught to shrink in
dismay, as from an overwhelming and intolerable oppression.
If, then, the real state of this nation is such as I have described,
(and I am only apprehensive that you may think I have taken too much
pains to exclude all doubt on this question,)--if no class is lessened
in its numbers, or in its stock, or in its conveniences, or even its
luxuries,--if they build as many habitations, and as elegant and as
commodious as ever, and furnish them with every chargeable decoration
and every prodigality of ingenious invention that can be thought of by
those who even incumber their necessities with superfluous
accommodation,--if they are as numerously attended,--if their equipages
are as splendid,--if they regale at table with as much or more variety
of plenty than ever,--if they are clad in as expensive and changeful a
diversity, according to their tastes and modes,--if they are not
deterred from the pleasures of the field by the charges which government
has wisely turned from the culture to the sports of the field,--if the
theatres are as rich and as well filled, and greater and at a higher
price than ever,--and (what is more important than all) if it is plain,
from the treasures which are spread over the soil or confided to the
winds and the seas, that there are as many who are indulgent to their
propensities of parsimony as others to their voluptuous desires, and
that the pecuniary capital grows instead of diminishing,--on what ground
are we authorized to say that a nation gambolling in an ocean of
superfluity is undone by want? With what face can we pretend that they
who have not denied any one gratification to any one appetite have a
right to plead poverty in order to famish their virtues and to put their
duties on short allowance? that they are to take the law from an
imperious enemy, and can contribute no longer to the honor of their
king, to the support of the independence of their country, to the
salvation of that Europe which, if it falls, must crush them with its
gigantic ruins? How can they affect to sweat and stagger and groan under
their burdens, to whom the mines of Newfoundland, richer than those of
Mexico and Peru, are now thrown in as a make-weight in the scale of
their exorbitant opulence? What excuse can they have to faint, and
creep, and cringe, and prostrate themselves at the footstool of ambition
and crime, who, during a short, though violent struggle, which they have
never supported with the energy of men, have amassed more to their
annual accumulation than all the well-husbanded capital that enabled
their ancestors, by long and doubtful and obstinate conflicts, to
defend and liberate and vindicate the civilized world? But I do not
accuse the people of England. As to the great majority of the nation,
they have done whatever, in their several ranks and conditions and
descriptions, was required of them by their relative situations in
society: and from those the great mass of mankind cannot depart, without
the subversion of all public order. They look up to that government
which they obey that they may be protected. They ask to be led and
directed by those rulers whom Providence and the laws of their country
have set over them, and under their guidance to walk in the ways of
safety and honor. They have again delegated the greatest trust which
they have to bestow to those faithful representatives who made their
true voice heard against the disturbers and destroyers of Europe. They
suffered, with unapproving acquiescence, solicitations, which they had
in no shape desired, to an unjust and usurping power, whom they had
never provoked, and whose hostile menaces they did not dread. When the
exigencies of the public service could only be met by their voluntary
zeal, they started forth with an ardor which outstripped the wishes of
those who had injured them by doubting whether it might not be necessary
to have recourse to compulsion. They have in all things reposed an
enduring, but not an unreflecting confidence. That confidence demands a
full return, and fixes a responsibility on the ministers entire and
undivided. The people stands acquitted, if the war is not carried on in
a manner suited to its objects. If the public honor is tarnished, if the
public safety suffers any detriment, the ministers, not the people, are
to answer it, and they alone. Its armies, its navies, are given to them
without stint or restriction. Its treasures are poured out at their
feet. Its constancy is ready to second all their efforts. They are not
to fear a responsibility for acts of manly adventure. The responsibility
which they are to dread is lest they should show themselves unequal to
the expectation of a brave people. The more doubtful may be the
constitutional and economical questions upon which they have received so
marked a support, the more loudly they are called upon to support this
great war, for the success of which their country is willing to
supersede considerations of no slight importance. Where I speak of
responsibility, I do not mean to exclude that species of it which the
legal powers of the country have a right finally to exact from those who
abuse a public trust: but high as this is, there is a responsibility
which attaches on them from which the whole legitimate power of the
kingdom cannot absolve them; there is a responsibility to conscience and
to glory, a responsibility to the existing world, and to that posterity
which men of their eminence cannot avoid for glory or for shame,--a
responsibility to a tribunal at which not only ministers, but kings and
parliaments, but even nations themselves, must one day answer.
FOOTNOTES:
[37] The Archduke Charles of Austria.
[38] Dec 27, 1790.
[39] Observations on a Late State of the Nation.
[40] This and the following tables on the same construction are compiled
from the Reports of the Finance Committee in 1791 and 1797, with the
addition of the separate paper laid before the House of Commons, and
ordered to be printed, on the 7th of February, 1792.
BRICKS AND TILES.
Years of Peace. £ | Years of War. £
1787 94,521 | 1793 122,975
1788 96,278 | 1794 106,811
1789 91,773 | 1795 83,804
1790 104,409 | 1796 94,668
------- | ------- Increase to 1790
£386,981 | £408,258 £21,277.
Increase to 1791
1791 £115,382 4 Years to 1791 £407,842 £416.
PLATE.
Years of Peace. £ | Years of War. £
1787 22,707 | 1793 25,920
1788 23,295 | 1794 23,637
1789 22,453 | 1795 25,607
1790 18,433 | 1796 28,513
------- | ------- Increase to 1790
£86,888 | £103,677 £16,789.
Increase to 1791
1791 £31,528 4 Years to 1791 £95,704 £7,973.
GLASS PLATES.
Years of Peace. £ | Years of War. £
1787 ---- | 1793 5,655
1788 5,496 | 1794 5,456
1789 4,686 | 1795 5,839
1790 6,008 | 1796 8,871
------- | -------
£16,190 | £25,821
Increase to 1791
1791 £7,880 4 Years to 1791 £24,070 £1,751.
[41]
GROCERIES.
Years of Peace. £ | Years of War. £
1787 167,389 | 1793 124,655
1788 133,191 | 1794 195,840
1789 142,871 | 1795 208,242
1790 156,311 | 1796 159,826
------- | ------- Increase to 1790
£599,762 | £688,563 £88,081.
Increase to 1791
1791 £236,727 4 Years to 1791 £669,100 £19,463.
TEA.
Years of Peace. £ | Years of War. £
1787 424,144 | 1793 477,644
1788 426,660 | 1794 467,132
1789 539,575 | 1795 507,518
1790 417,736 | 1796 526,307
------- | ------- Increase to 1790
£1,808,115 | £1,978,601 £170,486.
Increase to 1791
1791 £448,709 4 Years to 1791 £1,832,680 £145,921.
The additional duty imposed in 1795 produced in that year 137,656_l._,
and in 1796, 200,107_l._
COFFEE AND COCOA-NUTS.
Years of Peace. £ | Years of War. £
1787 17,006 | 1793 36,846
1788 30,217 | 1794 49,177
1789 34,784 | 1795 27,913
1790 38,647 | 1796 19,711
------- | ------- Increase to 1790
£120,654 | £133,647 £12,993.
Decrease to 1791
1791 £41,194 4 Years to 1791 £144,842 £11,195.
The additional duty of 1795 in that year gave 16,775_l._, and in 1796,
15,319_l._
[42]
SUGAR.
Years of Peace. £ | Years of War. £
1787 1,065,109 | 1793 1,473,139
1788 1,184,458 | 1794 1,392,965
1789 1,905,106 | 1795 1,338,246
1790 1,069,108 | 1796 1,474,899
--------- | --------- Increase to 1790
£4,413,781 | £5,679,249 £1,265,468.
Increase to 1791
1791 £1,044,781 4 Years to 1791 £4,392,725 £1,286,524.