gentlemen, on being interviewed, said that under the McKinley Tariff it was impossible for them to retain the American trade. America was once their chief market. Now, however, the increase of the duty on the lower grades of silks brought prices to a point at which English firms could not compete with American houses.

The ignorant British workman is apt to think that the migration of capital, accompanied by the unrestricted immigration of foreign paupers, is bad for him. He must be taught to take a more strictly scientific view of the matter, but it will take some time to teach him.

But we are told that the November elections in the United States completely disposed of the McKinley Tariff, of the Republican party, and of the policy of Protection. The whole iniquitous fabric is gone. Free Trade has come, and universal happiness is at hand. One enlightened organ of public opinion rejoiced over "the complete overthrow of Protection," and the

dawn of Free Trade in America." The Spectator was very confident about the "dawn." "The movement for reciprocity in Canada," it declared, "will be squelched at once." Inexperienced persons who have a tendency to believe in newspaper predictions should make a careful note of this brilliant specimen. The movement for reciprocity in Canada was never so strong as it is to-day. The Spectator further informed the public that "Mr. Blaine's South American policy, which aimed at securing the whole trade of the Southern Continent by the differential duties authorized in the Tariff Act, has gone to the winds." So wedded are some writers to their own opinions that they cannot even see the facts. The Spectator had scarcely swept Mr. Blaine and his scheme into outer darkness, before it was nounced in the newspapers that Brazil had concluded a treaty with the United States "for reciprocal commercial relations." Numerous expounders of American politics and ideas are always in the field, but they have the fatal trick of looking at everything through British spectacles. Not for a moment can they lay their prejudices aside. "The dawn of Free Trade in America," was distinctly perceived by Sir Robert Peel over forty years ago. Since that time the tendency has always been in one direction to increase the duties on foreign goods, and to adopt every measure that ingenuity can devise for the purpose

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of hampering English trade. Sometimes this tendency has been allowed to run into the most dangerous extremes, as in the McKinley Tariff Act, and then there has come about a temporary reaction. But whenever an extensive reduction of the tariff has been proposed, the party which has brought it forward has invariably been soundly beaten. To talk of a Free Trade party in the United States is the most ridiculous of delusions. No such party exists. It was my lot to live in that country for nearly ten years, during which I occupied a position which brought me continually into close and confidential communication with the leading men of all parties. I never saw a free-trader through. out the whole of that period. I never heard of one, except in connection with Barnum's Museum. And I recently noticed that one of the ablest and bestinformed Americans now in EnglandColonel New, the Consul General of the United States had been explaining to a newspaper correspondent that precisely the same state of things exists to day. "There is no political party," he said, "in the United States in favor of Free Trade. I will go further than that. I do not believe that, outside of a lunatic asylum, and not considering a few theatrical college professors, you can find a citizen of the United States who is a freetrader." It is obvious, however, that Consul-General New cannot possibly know so much of the United States as an English doctrinaire or the Cobden Club. The truth remains for rational men, who desire to fix their attention on facts and not upon crazy theories, that all parties on the other side of the Atlantic are agreed as to the policy of raising the greater part of the money required for the government of the country by duties on foreign goods. No party has ever proposed to abolish these duties and to adopt the English system of free imports and direct taxation. Any party which did propose it would be annihilated. Mr. Cleveland lost the last presidential election chiefly because he advocated tariff reform, which some people in England call Free Trade. But they would not call it Free Trade if its introduction. were recommended here. They would then describe it, and not unjustly, as an organized and drastic system of Protection. It is astonishing that this fiction of a large Free Trade party in the United States

should still have the power to deceive any section of the English public. A reward might be offered in every State in the Union for a genuine free trader, and not a single man who was not a "crank" would come forward to claim it.

The McKinley Tariff Act was not only an outrageous abuse of the principle on which the Americans base their commercial policy, but the manner in which it was brought into operation was eminently adapted to cause the utmost amount of mischief. It was put into force before any section of business men had time to prepare for it. Everybody was caught with short supplies of the foreign commodities in which he dealt. Orders already accepted could not be carried out. The tradesman in these days does not lay in large stocks, because he knows that the next steamer will enable him to supply himself with all that he requires. But this Act was sprung upon him while the goods he had ordered were still upon the seas. No wonder that in every part of the country irritation and bitter feeling were aroused. But those who assume that the principle of the Act stands condemned, and that it will be relinquished by the American people, are wandering in a fool's Paradise. All Americans are in favor of the principle, though they may be opposed to a scandalous abuse of it. They will not give it up to please England. But what they cannot fail to observe is that their Government raises a good deal more money at the Custom House than it knows what to do with. That is an evil in itself, and it gives rise to other evils, to endless jobbery and corruption in connection with the pension system, and to the demoralization of Congress, to say nothing of the State legislatures. Therefore the demand naturally arises for a tariff for revenue only,' which is the position taken up by the Democratic party. This would not mean anything resembling the free entry into the United States of British or any other foreign goods. It is scarcely too much to say that any attempt to force such a policy as that upon the country would provoke a revolution. Once for all, the United States, in common with all other great nations except England, have decided to raise the money they want, as they express it, "from the foreigner. We might as well expect to see the sun going round the earth as to look for the reversal of this system.

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Mr. Gladstone has had far too much experience of public life to be subject to any delusions so far as trade is concerned, and therefore he has not held out any foolish hopes of Free Trade being adopted by the United States. But in his speech at Dundee he contended that "it is not true that any tariff in any country on earth can interfere seriously with the prosperity of Great Britain or the United Kingdom." Would be, then, refuse to acknowledge that if we had free access to the other markets of the world, our prosperity would not be greater than it is now that, for instance, if there were no duties on our cotton goods in the United States, we should not sell more there than we do to-day? To limit the growth of the commerce of any nation, in any part of the world, is surely an injury to the nation. No, it is not, Mr. Gladstone appears to argue, because if we are driven out of one market it will merely serve to develop our trade with others. If, he says, "there are twenty great markets in the world and a stringent Protection law is passed in one of them, we are injured in that one, perhaps, but we are benefited in the other nineteen. This might be true if the other nineteen were not all bent upon the same policy as the twentieth. But they are. That is our position in the face of the world at this moment. Give us the command of nineteen markets, and then take away the twentieth if you like. At present, the only absolutely free market we have is India, and although that country is proving a formidable rival to us in cotton manufacturing, still the growth of our trade with it affords the most striking example that could be found of the progress we can make when we are unfettered by hostile tariffs. Suppose we had been able to deal on the same terms with all the other nations of the world. Can anybody doubt that it would have been an enormous benefit to this country? To contend, therefore, that foreign tariffs cannot seriously interfere with our prosperity is as great a fallacy as it is to contend that great industries cannot grow under a Protective system.

But one hostile tariff the more is not the only difficulty which threatens us. The United States are making persistent efforts to form a new commercial federation in their own favor, to embrace the whole of the continent on which their destinies have been cast. We laugh at this,

and say that it will come to nothing. That is our self-confident way in most things. The Americans like to see us indulge in it, because they know that while we laugh they can push steadily on. They have it within their power to offer very great advantages to the South American republics and to Canada to induce them to enter into an arrangement by which the productions of the United States shall be taken upon exceptional terms, and England, among other powers, be further handicapped in the race. The South American republics will in due season enter into this arrangement, and we shall find our trade with Brazil, Peru, Honduras, the Argentine Republic, and other countries greatly reduced. The "other nineteen" parts of the world, to which we are to look for compensation for losses sustained in the United States, will not be found in South America. Then how does the matter stand as regards Canada ? No doubt the present Premier, Sir John Macdonald, is opposed to entering into inore intimate relations with the United States than those which at present exist; but, on the other hand, the Liberal party is strongly in favor of accepting the overtures once more made to them. It is idle to deny that the United States can offer immense inducements to the Canadians to join them in a commercial federation. Mr. Erastus Wiman, one of the greatest of Canadian manufacturers, in entertaining the members of the British Iron and Steel Institute at Niagara Falls, on the 24th of last October, expressed the sentiments of tens of thousands of his fellowcitizens when he declared that Canada needed " only the magic touch of freedom and appreciation of the American people to enormously enrich them." Evidently he and his friends have ceased to look to England for help or for advice. No doubt his warnings will be disregarded by too many leaders of public opinion in this country, but it is earnestly to be hoped that they will sink deeply into the minds of the business men and the working classes, whose interests are in such grievous jeopardy. Let us at least listen to what Mr. Wiman has to say, and remember that he is a representative of the Opposition party in Canada, the party which may come into power on this very "platform": "If the Congress of the United States," he said, "should express a willingness to extend to the north an invitation to reciprocal NEW SERIES.-VOL. LIII., No. 2.

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arrangements similar to that which, in their new tariff, they have extended to southern nationalities, the people of Great Britain must not blame Canada if she accepts this first omen of better relations hereafter to exist between the Englishspeaking nations that hold this vast continent in common.' And again, the Hon. W. Laurier, leader of the Opposition in the Dominion House of Commons, speaking on the 8th of October, emphatically asserted his opinion that the "only salvation of Canada was in unrestricted reciprocity with the United States in natural products and manufactured goods. Sir Richard Cartwright, another Liberal member, declared, on the 21st of October, that "the United States was their natural market," and he ridiculed the idea of seeking markets three thousand miles away. Even the Quebec Telegraph, which usually supports Sir J. Macdonald, throws him over on this question, and falls back on "manifest destiny." Trade is what we want, it remarked in October, not twaddle about loyalty to the Crown. If those who believe in annexation only have the courage of their convictions, and speak out as we do, they will hasten the welcome day when we call ourselves citizens of the mighty Republic.' What is the reply of England to such remonstrances and warnings as these? She replies that "Free Trade is the source of wealth and property, and that the nation which refuses to adopt it is lost. Moreover, wrong or right, we never intend to depart from our present attitude on the question. With that, Canada, and any other of our colonies who wish to draw into closer union with us on commercial affairs, will have to be contented.

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Unfortunately the United States are able to bring to bear upon Canada pressure of a more practical kind than can be exerted merely by argument. The Fishery question, in one form or another, is always arising. It is approaching the acute stage as regards Behring Sea. Lord Salisbury has acted with great wisdom and prudence in all the negotiations that have hitherto taken place, but he cannot settle a dispute which one party involved does not wish to have settled. That was the obstacle which stood in the way of Mr. Chamberlain's success some little time ago, as he probably sees much more clearly now than he did then. Here is a weapon which may

always be used against Canada, and we are powerless to prevent it. Sir George Baden-Powell told the citizens of Montreal, on the 20th of October, "that if danger threatened Canada, the last drop of British blood and the last of Great Britain's treasure would be expended in the defence of the Dominion." Assuredly no responsible public man would go about Canada vaporing in this manner, and it is not clear who authorized Sir George Baden-Powell to enter into the contract which he was pleased to announce. It is to be hoped that before any English minister takes it up he will seriously count the cost. The United States are well aware that they are not called upon to indulge in any theatrical clap-trap on the subject. They leave that sort of stuff to members of the House of Commons. But a despatch appeared in the London newspapers a few weeks ago which may have its significance. We are told that the annual report of Mr. Windom, Secretary to the Treasury," will contain a recommendation that the privileges which the Canadian railways enjoy in transporting freight for the United States shall be materially abridged." It was added that Canada would be brought to terms by striking at the system of her railways, especially the trans-continental route. We have also to consider that one of the most extraordinary laws ever enacted by any legislature was passed by the United States Congress in August last. This enactment places it absolutely within the power of one man, the President of the United States, to prohibit the importation of any goods into that country from any nation he may think proper to name. He need give no reasons, no explanation. It is only necessary for him to issue an order some morning that no more cotton goods, no more iron or steel, shall be admitted into any United States ports from England, and no produce of any kind from Canada, and every Federal officer would immediately obey him. As is our way, we make light of this. We decide at once that this is a law which was never intended to be used. Then why was it passed by the most practical people on the face of the earth? Circumstances are conceivable, in connection with the Irish vote and the near approach of a presidential election. or with the fishery dispute as affecting Canada, under which that retaliation law would not long remain a dead letter.

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English merchants who are largely engaged in the export trade to the United States have been made to feel the effects of another piece of legislation in the last session of Congress. The Customs Legislation Act has not attracted such widespread attention as the McKinley Tariff, but it throws new and serious obstacles round the attempts of our manufacturers and traders to get their goods into the United States. It subjects them to heavy penalties for breaches of regulations such as no other nation puts into operation against us. All invoices are required to be made out in the currency of the place from which the importations are made, and these invoices are to be accompanied by an affidavit or declaration from the exporter, made before a United States consul or agent, setting forth that the particulars given are in all respects correct and true.' Where ad valorem duties are levied, the value of every crate, box, or other covering is to be included in the value upon which duty is assessed, so that not even a packing-case shall pass into the United States duty free. The invoice is also to explain "if the merchandise was obtained by purchase,' and to contain a true and full statement of the time when, the place where, the person from whom the same was purchased, and the actual cost thereof and of all charges thereon." A trader whose agent has bought goods in France, or anywhere else, must go before the United States Consul and be prepared to state the name of the person from whom he purchased them, the day of the weeka true and full statement of the time"how much he paid for them, and what discount he received on the transaction. Any one failing to fill up these forms correctly is made punishable by a fine of $5,000 (1,0007), or, if within the jurisdiction of the United States, he may be imprisoned for two years. It is not too much to say that in very many instances the particulars thus exacted could not possibly be obtained by the exporting merchant. And let it be remembered that these ironclad restrictions are imposed upon us by a nation from whom we receive everything they choose to send us-apart, of course, from tobacco and spirits-without impediment of any kind. We bought of the United States last year merchandise to the value of 95,461,4757., most of which came in unfettered by a penny of duty or by obstacles

of any kind. At the same time, all the ingenuity of the Americans is devoted to the work of keeping our goods out of their markets. This is what we call "Free Trade.' Is it any wonder that our merchants and the working classes have the very strongest suspicions that we have not got hold of the real thing after all? If, however, they find themselves harassed by the continual attacks of the United States, they may console themselves with the reflection that we all speak the same language," and that the same blood runs in our veins."

What is the use, however, of blaming the American people? Their main object is to build up the biggest trade in the world, and they will do it, and do it moreover by that very Protection which, as our philosophers tell us, saps the foundations of every industry to which it is applied. Their duty is, not to consider the harm they can inflict upon us, but the good they can do themselves. If, incidentally, a severe blow is inflicted upon England, the vast masses of the people in the United States would sincerely rejoice, although that is a fact which is usually kept out of sight at festive gatherings. It has, however, a significance of its own, which we shall probably understand and appreciate better some day than we do now. Meanwhile, the Americans have beaten us at the iron and steel trades, in which thirty years ago they did next to nothing, and eventually they will pass us in the cotton trade. They are now turning their attention to shipping, in which we are at present supreme. Hitherto they have been prevented from buying ships from other nations, and shipbuilding in their own country has not been a profitable business. The high rate of wages has made the cost of building a ship from 20 to 25 per cent more than in England. But two measures have been submitted to Congress making provision for subsidies to the American builders, and these bills have already passed the Senate, and there can be scarcely any doubt that they will become law during the next session of Congress. Preparations are already being made on the Delaware river, and in other parts of the country, for the revival of shipbuilding. The country," wrote the Philadelphia correspondent of the Times recently, is filled with the idea of placing the American flag again upon all parts of

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the ocean, and sending its ships throughout the world.” That ambition will be realized all the sooner on account of the deadly blows at our own shipping trade which strikes and agitation are continually delivering. We are opening the gates to the enemy. And already we feel the injurious influences of the McKinley Tariff Act. Shipping agents all report a diminution in the quantity of goods sent to the United States. One agent has stated that the difference between this year and last year is at least 50 per cent. The volume of the reduction is chiefly in cotton and woollen goods and upholstery materials." Too many of our own workpeople propose to meet this crisis with renewed strikes and an eight hours' law. No wonder the shrewd Americans believe that their chance has come of stepping into the first place, and putting England into the second.

From their own point of view they are quite right. They say to us, "Why do you not bestir yourselves to meet the altered conditions which meet you on every side? You are slow, and you think you are infallible. Whatever you do must be right. You took up with what you absurdly call Free Trade when you had everything your own way, and you swear you will never give it up. But you will be driven to do so. At present you think you are all right because the volume of your trade does not fall off. Go into Lancashire and Yorkshire and see whether the manufacturers there are not obliged to strain every nerve to keep up this 'volume.' The concerns that pay best are the limited liability companies, which can easily make a call upon the shareholders when things are going wrong, and which can borrow money at a low rate. It is easy enough to pay interest on those loans, but the same rate of interest will not enable private firms to keep on replacing machinery with new, and to sustain the inevitable losses of trade. Under an appearance of great prosperity, many of your great industries are crumbling beneath your feet. You are always quoting your big figures showing increase in quantities. But what about profits? Your manufacturers could unfold a tale on that point. We shall cut you out in all directions in time. We do not adhere to any theory when the facts are manifestly against it. We shall give up Protection when we are ready, but we shall never give up import