allegation on which the whole hypothesis | ployed. In the practical effect of this prinwas founded, was that moral obligations ciple there could be no choice between had induced us to exclude slavery from our cutting off all trade with Russia and the colonies, and that therefore in the view of United States, and admitting to our ports the West Indian planters it followed we the slave-grown sugar of Cuba and Brazil. should exclude the products of slave labour If we were to exclude ourselves from comfrom the shores of the mother country. mercial intercourse with nations because But looking back to the history of the they differed in institutions, he apprehendworld, it would be impossible to deny that ed that all our boasted prophecies of the there had been any nation, which in the effects of commerce going hand in hand course of its rise from barbarianism to with religion and civilisation in the world civilisation, had not passed through a con- would be in vain. The great practidition of things, wherein a great mass of cal question to be considered was, first her population were exposed to slavery. It of all, the allegation that free labour was would therefore be unjust to say, that be- dearer than slave labour. Now, to esticause in a certain state of civilisation mate the exact value of labour was an slavery was improper, we should not hold exceedingly difficult thing. As an illustra any intercourse with countries which un- tion of this he would instance what had der other circumstances were compelled to taken place on the Birmingham and Glouadmit the continuance of such a state of cester railroad. On that railroad a short society. No nation had ever reached liberty time ago the locomotive power had cost and civilisation, in which the lower classes 2s. 10d. a mile, and yet within two years had not for years existed in a state equiva- the cost was reduced to 10d. This showlent to slavery; and he need not go very ed how great was the saving which might far back for the time in which the people be. effected by a change of arrangements. of this country were in a very different He held in his hand a letter from Trinidad state from that in which they now were, denying that the cost of labour was any and when their moral sentiments had ex- dearer now than it was during the last centended subsequently to the colonies. He tury, and stating that the cost of particular was not at all prepared to say, that because operations was merely what it would have the relation between employer and em- been during the existence of slavery. In ployed was that of master and slave, we the last number of the Mauritius Mail he should brand it as injustice and oppres- found an article which warned the planters sion, however willing he was to admit that of Bourbon that as soon as civilisation had sufficiently advanced, it was the duty of every country to increase the liberty of her people as far as possible, and to put an end to slavery. Those conscientious gentlemen who had appealed to the House to preclude slavegrown sugar from our markets, would, he supposed, object to slave labour in any form, and would oppose it equally in Cuba or Brazil, in Russia or in the United States. The principle of the question, if it were worth anything, should make no distinction with respect to the country in which slavery was tolerated. or the articles which slave labour produced.. If then it were laid down that we should exclude the slave-grown sugar of the Brazils, it would be necessary to contend that the productions of Russia, where the relations between serf and master were those of perfect slavery, should be excluded also. Equally incumbent on the supporters of this argument would it be to refuse to admit the productions of Egypt, for in no other country did there exist a more degrading connexion between the employer and em -" as long as slavery existed among them there could be no progress, no liberal institution, no good government, no security for life and property." With respect to Mauritius, he found that whatever might have been the distress existing in that country, they had nothing to complain of from free labour. In 1832 there were employed in the field, separate and distinct from the other slaves, 32,000 persons, the production of sugar being larger than in any previous year, and amounting to 24,000 tons, or at the rate of three-fourths of a ton per head. Last year the production was 65,000 tons, considerably more than double what it was in 1832. By the census of last year, he found that the largest number of labourers now employed in agriculture amounted to 60,000, not quite double the number of 1832, so that it was to be inferred that they last year produced, upon the average, upwards of one ton per head; whereas, under the slave-labour system of 1832, the production was three-fourths of a ton per head. With respect to Porto Rico, the sugar produced eastward of the Cape of noble Lord (Lord G. Bentinck) did not seem to place much confidence in the statements of Colonel Flinter; but he could only say he had found, on the whole, that that writer's statements were perfectly correct with respect to the proportion of the slave to the free population. Colonel Flinter stated, that in the chief part of the island cultivation was carried on by free labourers; that there were 275 sugar estates, and 148 coffee estates, being but 423 in all (out of the whole 19,000) cultivated by slaves. The free coloured population was 280,000, whilst the slaves were only 50,000, being but ten per cent on the entire population of 500,000. It appeared, therefore, that Colonel Flinter's statements were quite borne | out by the census taken two years ago. But, perhaps, the most conclusive evidence with respect to the greater economy of free labour was to be found in the progress of sugar cultivation in the East during the last twenty years. Java, now one of the most considerable markets for the supply of Europe, barely produced as much sugar twenty years ago as its inhabitants consumed. The whole exported produce of that island in 1826 did not exceed 23,000 cwts., or 1,000 tons. Since 1826, under a system of open competition with the slave labour of Cuba, Brazil, and Surinam, the production of Java had in-ginal seats of sugar culture. Whether it creased from 1,000 to 75,000 tons last year. We had not in the whole world the example of so rapid an increase in the production of sugar; and his belief was, as far as he could judge from the information he had received from Dutch ministers who had resided in Java, as well as from other sources, that the inhabitants of that island were as free as almost any population in the world. Again, by the Chinese settlers at Singapore and Penang, sugar was produced at a lower rate than in any other region. On the continent of Europe, again, the present production of sugar was equal to two-thirds of the whole production of the West India islands twenty years ago. It certainly was not less than 100,000 tons; and in beet-root sugar the difference in price from Cuba sugar was 2s. a cwt. only. The cultivation of beet-root sugar was rapidly extending on the Continent. This was a new species of competition which the West Indians had to contend with, but one over which the House had no control. Beet-root was becoming a new branch of agriculture in Europe, and an important element in the rotation of crops. In 1826 the whole amount of was to be the fate of sugar, as had been the case with indigo, to be produced entirely by free labour, it was impossible for him to say; but had you adhered to slave labour, it seemed to him that, as infallibly as the cultivation of indigo had moved from the west to the east, so would the cultivation of sugar have gone to the east. If the House should comply with the demands of the West Indians, he asked if they would be any better off than they were now? Would they not still have to sustain the competition of Java, Manilla, and other countries? The House had no power to grant relief in this respect. Under the provisions of the new law regulating the admission of refined sugars, we had opened our market at once to the whole of the beet-root sugar produced in France, Belgium, and different parts of the Continent. In every one of those countries there was a drawback on refined sugar exported, acting by way of bounty, equivalent to the protective duty imposed in the first instance. So that, unless we altered the whole of our commercial relations with the continental countries, it was quite impossible to exclude from our mar ket the produce of European beet-root su- it was a natural desire, and he had no gar. Again, we had decided that refined doubt a very proper one; but he could not sugar, like flour, was a manufactured arti- resist the consequences of both such syscle, to be admitted without reference to tems. He also found in six years that the country where it was grown; so that Porto Rico had constructed 47 regular under our treaty with Holland it would be bridges, 132 wooden ones, and 400 miles impossible to prevent the Dutch from im- of railroad. He had the authority of Sir porting the sugars of Cuba and Brazil, re- Robert Schomberg for stating that there fining them in Holland, and selling them was no less than 800 miles of railroad in here as the manufactured produce of that Cuba, while there were only 1,200 in all country. There were no means, there- the British colonies. It was impossible to fore, of giving protection by excluding deny that railroads were a great means of slave-labour sugar from this country. It economising labour. He remembered some was a most satisfactory announcement eight or nine years ago when a proposition from the right hon. Gentleman the Chan- was made to make a railroad in Jamaica, cellor of the Exchequer that the Govern- the gentleman who proposed it canvassed ment, while they were determined to ad- all the parties, merchants and settlers in here to the Bill of 1846, intended to do the island, who ought to have been interjustice to the West India colonies, by re-ested in its construction; they all admitted moving every species of restriction which the immense advantages which such an could be repealed with propriety. There undertaking would confer upon the colony, were also many other questions which might with propriety be entertained by the Committee. He believed that if the West India colonies were to be saved, it must be by a social change in the relative position of these islands. He believed that the Government, in dealing with the question of labour there, had committed a great error. He believed that the social constitution of the West India colonies was detrimental and inapt. Let the House compare those under the British crown with Cuba and Porto Rico: there was a material difference between the social position of the inhabitants. He found that in Porto Rico, forty per cent of the population were white people, seventy per cent were white and free people; and taking the two islands together they had only thirty-two per cent of slaves upon the whole population. In the British colonies only seven and a half were whites, and ninety-two were blacks. Was that, he would ask, a division likely to promote the interests of those colonies, or the efforts of civilisation? In Cuba, English and Spanish families had settled, whose descendants from generation to generation succeeded to their estates and plantations; and who, if they made a great deal of money, spent it where they made it. A very different state of things existed in the British colonies, which it appeared to him were only looked upon as places for making fortunes. Gentlemen went out there, made money, and in order to make the rest of their days comfortable, came home and spent it. He very much preferred the latter to the former course; With but not a shilling did they subscribe to the land. had not escaped the attention of the then | if wages were reduced by 25 per cent, Government. Lord Glenelg, in 1836, in a there would be hope. Well, what was the despatch, laid down the principle as result? That would be best known by broadly and clearly as any person could extracts which he would read with great wish; but not a single answer was made pleasure to the House, and which hon. to it, nor was the matter subsequently Members would listen to with equal plea. alluded to by his Lordship. He found sure, because they showed how readily that in Cuba and Porto Rico one of the the suggestions of the hon. Gentleman had chief means which had been taken to been complied with. These extracts were reclaim them was by stringent regulations from two numbers of the Royal Gazette against vagrancy and squatting; and all of George Town, in Guiana :persons were held vagrants who had no visible means of obtaining a livelihood; and convince us that we have neither been for years "Some slight consideration, however, will that was a very fair test; it was the test pursuing a phantom, nor have little to hope from in civilised and cultivated society, and he the present measure of the Home Government. did not see why they should apply a more In the last three years we have received the largest lax code to the colonies. With regard to accessions to our population which we have ever obtained since the emancipation. It is estimated the immigration of labour, he had no objec- that since 1844 not less than 30,000 labourers tion whatever; he thought that the plant- have been introduced into the colony. It is quite ers were entitled to obtain labour where true that the exorbitant rates of agricultural they could, and how they could, so long wages, which prevailed in 1844, prevail now; and as they did not transgress the law of the that in these three years a vast number of the peasantry have withdrawn entirely from the But although he was in favour of coasts, and settled upon their own freeholds up free immigration, he very much doubted the rivers and creeks in the paradise of the inte whether immigration would confer any pre- rior. These may or may not be lamentable facts. sent benefit. He found that in Barbadoes But it is equally true that, as compared with 1843 or 1844, the sugar crop of 1847 has remarkthere were 734 persons to the square mile; ably increased, and that every colonist of observain Jamaica there were 88 to the square tion and experience attributes this increase solely, mile; and in Trinidad 29 persons to the under Providence, to the importation of Coolie square mile; and in Trinidad squatting and Portuguese labourers effected in the interim. was an evil proportioned to the population. 35,000 hogsheads; the sugar crop of 1847 will be The sugar crop of 1843 and 1844 was about He believed that an improvement in the about 50,000 hogsheads. When three years ago vagrancy law would confer a greater prac- the authorities conceded to us Coolie immigratical benefit than any immigration. By tion, every cane field almost in the colony was a the last accounts from the island they could not be obtained for love or money to take a wilderness of weeds; labourers in many places would perceive that the distress which exhoe or shovel in their hands; the arrogance of isted last year was beginning to produce a the native peasant was intolerable: the depennew and a better state of feeling between dence of the planter upon him humiliating and the employer and the employed. He al- disastrous in the extreme. The colony, which deluded with great pleasure to a letter from is in a crisis just now, but will have, in all probapends wholly upon its sugar cultivation, not only British Guiana, written by the hon. Mem- bility, crisis after crisis to go through till the ber for Leominster (Mr. Barkly). The Sugar Bill shall have fully developed itself, and letter to which he alluded did honour to the sugar of the British West Indies enjoys no fathe mind of the hon. Gentleman who wrote, your whatever in the markets of the mother country. We entertain some hope that things will, in and showed that he, at least, had taken a the end, go right, from a fact which has come unclear and decisive view of the only mode der our observation within the last fortnight, and by which the present difficulties were to which proves, to our mind at least, that the popu be met. The hon. Gentleman stated, that lation can and will bend and accommodate themto hope for protection was in vain that ask no more in order to fight the battle of freeFor our part, we would he had voted for a repeal of the corn laws, labour with slave-labour produce. It was clearly and he could not hope for protection to enough demonstrated to the people that sugar sugar. But he said that the difficulties was not, at the old rate of wages, paying the might be in some degree met by efforts to re-planter: and the alternative was, in many disduce the cost of production. The hon. Gen-tricts, submitted to the peasantry, either of not tleman stated that the expenses of an estate were fairly divisible into three heads: first, the cost of supplies; next, the salaries of clerks and overseers; and the third, the wages of labour. All should bear their proportion of reduction and economy, and selves to circumstances. working at all, or of working for wages reduced at the rate of 25 per cent. With wonderful smoothness and placidity, all things considered, the people have agreed within the last few days, in the finest and most extensive sugar district of the colony the Arabian coast of Essequibo—to accept the reduced rate; and the same thing we learn has happened on the east coast of Demerara. This great change has been effected without any stated that no system of protection could strike, without any sulkiness, without any maniserve the interests of our colonies; that festation of ill-feeling; and shows, on the part of the free peasant of this province, a degree of manthe growth of other kinds of sugar, besides ageableness which surpasses, we are inclined to our own colonial sugar, was so great that think, any degree of submission which coercive he was only surprised our colonies had discipline can produce in Cuba or elsewhere. existed so long. To what the hon. Gen This trait-which we own has taken us by sur-tleman thought all this must ultimately prise-in the character of our free labourers, though it has diminished their wages 25 per cent, has raised our opinion of the prospects of the colony at least fifty." This was a most satisfactory statement, coming from the colonies, and he did not think that they had any right to despair. In the Mauritius things were bad indeed. It was proved that the Colonial Government alone cost the colony 6l. per ton on the sugar raised. With such an outlay as that, it was hard for them to compete with such islands as Cuba and Porto Rico. These were all legitimate questions for the Government to entertain. He was confident that they already entertained them; and, therefore, he was confident that they saw their way through a great deal of mist. The Chancellor had stated that he had no intention of altering the law of 1846; but he did hope that the noble Lord the Member for King's Lynn would not be induced to withdraw his Motion. come, he had not been able to gather from his speech. The hon. Gentleman said that he believed that the colonies were to go through crisis after crisis; but he did not conclude by stating what was to be the final result. The hon. Gentleman, however, stated that a great competition had within recent years risen up between our colonial produce and a variety of freegrown sugars in different parts of the globe. The hon. Gentleman had told the House to look at the beet-root manufacture. No one could doubt that the manufacture of beet-root sugar had risen to a great extent; but the chief gist of the question seemed to be-were the producers of these sugars in the same position as the producers of sugar in our own colonies? Were they fettered in obtaining a supply of labour, and had there been that great social revolution among them which had taken from them the means of producing sugar? The hon. Gentleman the Member for Westbury said that he was glad that the right hon. Baronet the Chancellor of the Exchequer had held out no hope to the West Indies. He MR. T. BARING said, that of all the painful descriptions which this debate had called forth of the present state and future prospects of the West India colonies, he thought there had been nothing more pain-(Mr. T. Baring) was sorry that the right ful for the House to have heard than that part of the speech of the hon. Gentleman who had just spoken, in which he figured the present condition of our own colonies, and contrasted it with the flourishing condition of Cuba and Porto Rico. Nothing, in his opinion, could be more disheartening than when the hon. Gentleman pointed to Cuba, and said, “See what slavery has done!" and then pointed to the British West India colonies, and said, "Behold the result of freedom!" The hon. Gentleman stated that he was not exactly aware how many hundred miles of railway had been completed in Cuba; but he was well aware that, after the utmost possible effort had been made to finish one short railway in Demerara, only twelve or fifteen miles had been formed. The hon. Gentleman also stated that he had examined a ship that was going out to Cuba, fitted up with iron tanks for sugar making, but that no such advantages were available to the merchants of Great Britain; no such improvements could they send to their own possessions. Finally, the hon. Gentleman hon. Gentleman could not give them assistance; but, if it was to be said, that nothing could or would be done for them, it was far better to say so at once; and, abandoning the vacillating policy which had hitherto prevailed, to declare that it was the opinion of the people of England that they ought not to give up slave-grown sugar. When the colonies were taunted with loss of capital and improvident expenditure, it was to the hopes which the legislation of this country had held out that must be attributed the blame of the losses which had been incurred. The right hon. Gentleman said, that he did not wish to hold out any hopes; and he (Mr. T. Baring) confessed that he thought it better for the Government openly to state the resolution to which they had come; but, when the right hon. Gentleman went on to say that it was not the Bill of 1846 which had produced the fall in sugar, which had only partaken in the fall of other commodities, he must contend, although he did not deny that sugar must partake of the effects of a monetary pressure, that the real question |