de la grandeur de toutes les autres. L'Europe s'élevera sans que pour cela l'Angleterre s'abaisse, et les hommes clairvoyans de tous les pays auront peine à comprendre comment il put jamais exister un temps, où l'on pensait que la richesse des uns entraînait nécessairement l'appauvrissement des autres.”*

In stating the substance of Mr. Smith's argument for the freedom of trade, I took notice of an exception to his general rule, which he himself has admitted, where a particular sort of industry is necessary for the defence of the state. It is upon this ground that he expresses his approbation of the monopoly of the trade with Great Britain, which has been secured to our sailors and shipping by the Act of Navigation. On the same ground, I also observed, that a plea had been lately rested for a relaxation of this abstract principle of Political Economy, in favour of the particular employment of capital and industry, which has for its object the supply of native oak for the purposes of our naval demand; [supra, p. 25, seq.,] and I expressed my doubts how far this plea would be found, upon examination, to be tenable. As it is a question which was much agitated some years ago, and is in itself of considerable importance, a few remarks in support of that opinion, which I have already hinted, as most agreeable to my own sentiments, cannot be considered as a digression altogether foreign to our present employment.

The leading positions to which I wish to direct your attention, cannot be better stated than in the words of the Reports drawn up by the Commissioners, some years ago, appointed to inquire into the state of the woods, forests, &c., of the Crown. Of these Reports, a series from 1787 to 1793, has been submitted to the Legislature, and certainly contains some very interesting information on the present subject of inquiry. The Commissioners were Sir Charles Middleton, (now Lord Barham,) Mr. Call, and Mr. Fordyce, the first and last of whom are now members of a board established for superintending the civil affairs of the navy, which has resumed the inquiry that had previously been prosecuted by the Commissioners.

The passage which I am first to quote, is from the Eleventh * [Ibid. pp. 348, 349, orig. edit.]

Report; and I do this with great pleasure, as it appears to state one of the strongest cases in which a departure from general principle would seem, on a superficial view, to be not only expedient, but absolutely necessary." From the answers we have received from each county," say the Commissioners, "it will be found that there has been, within memory, a great decrease of oak timber, of all sizes, in every part of England; but that great naval timber has decreased more than any other; and timber in hedgerows, which is the most valuable for naval uses, in a still greater proportion than timber growing in woods; that the stock of great timber is now so much, and so generally diminished, in most countries, that they will not be able to continue to furnish so large a supply as they have done of late years; that foreign fir timber is now much more used than formerly, particularly in house building; that the price of underwood has risen, notwithstanding the more general use of coal for fuel; and that in some countries it is not uncommon to fell the oak trees when young, not suffering them to stand so long as to be of use to the navy, for fear of their overshading and destroying the underwood: that notwithstanding the advance in the price of timber, tillage is gradually extended, and the quantity of wood-land lessened; and that the plantations which are now made, are more generally for ornament than use, and of quick growing trees, in preference to oak for the navy."

In a former Report, [the Third,] the scarcity of great timber had been accounted for on a principle somewhat more general and refined, and which, though the Commissioners, perhaps, lay too great stress upon it, must, I think, be allowed to be not altogether destitute of solidity. After stating it as a fact ascertained by experience, that the addition in the demand for naval timber does not produce. a proportional supply, they observe that the reason is obvious. 66 An oak must grow an hundred years or more before it comes to maturity; but the profits arising from tillage or pasture are more certain and immediate, and perhaps as great; it cannot, therefore, be expected, that many private individuals will lay out money on the expec

tation of advantages which they themselves can have no chance to enjoy; commerce and industry seek for, and are supported by, speedy returns of gain, however small; and the more generally the commercial spirit shall prevail in this country, the less probability there is that planting of woods for the advantage of posterity will be preferred to the immediate profits of agriculture.”

In reply to this observation, a late writer, Sir Frederick Morton Eden, denies completely the general principle, that an article will not be cultivated because it requires a hundred years to bring it to perfection. "Acorns and wheat will, in general, be sown with the same view; namely, that the capital employed in their culture shall be replaced with an adequate profit. It is not necessary, either in trade or agriculture, that the returns should be annual. In many instances, several years must pass away before any return, and that uncertain in amount, can be expected. In the cultivation of underwood and hop-poles, from ten to twenty years must elapse before any crop can be obtained. Many cases of enclosing, draining, and manuring, might be pointed out, in which a still longer period will be necessary to reproduce the capital invested with an adequate profit. If, when timber is twenty years old, the owner finds, that by letting it stand twenty years longer, or, in other words, by re-investing its value in growing timber, he can at the end of the term obtain an adequate profit, he has a sufficient inducement to let his trees grow; and on the same principle, the owner of trees eighty years old will let them stand till they are one hundred years old. But the price of great timber is too low, compared with the price of other home products, to produce cultivation."*

I have seldom met with a more illogical piece of reasoning than what I have just quoted from this very accurate writer. The proposition to be proved is, that an article will not be the less cultivated that it requires a hundred years to bring it to maturity. To prove this, the author remarks, that on the same

[Address on the Maritime Rights of Great Britain, Part III. p. 92, seq. second edition.]

principle on which a proprietor who found timber twenty years old on his estate, has a sufficient inducement to let it grow twenty years longer; by the prospect of additional gain at the end of that period, one who has trees of eighty years standing will be disposed to let them remain a hundred. The justness of this observation cannot be disputed; but still the question remains, What inducement has a person to plant acorns at present, the returns arising from which will not be produced for a hundred years? There is, surely, a very distant analogy between this and the sowing of wheat and other grain. Nor can it well be affirmed, that both are done with the same views. On the contrary, I may venture to assert, that, with the exception of a few individuals, whose family pride interests them in the greatness of their children's grandchildren, and, I am afraid, I may add, of the fewer still whose conduct is influenced by remote views of public utility, pecuniary profits, not to be reaped for a century to come, present too faint an object for the imagination to deserve a place among the ordinary motives of human action.

Abstracting altogether, however, from this consideration, I perfectly agree with the author in thinking, that the established price of great timber is too low, compared with that of the other productions of industry, to indemnify a proprietor for the expensive and tedious process of cultivation,-a proposition sufficiently proved by the acknowledged fact, that foreign countries, notwithstanding the high import duties, which almost amount to a premium in favour of the home growers, are enabled to enter into a successful competition with the timber growers of Great Britain. I differ from him only in thinking, that an increase in the price would operate with any influence as an additional motive to the cultivation. The commissioners of the land revenue seem plainly to be of the same opinion with that which I have just stated, from the means they propose to secure the future supply of timber. Their suggestion is, that such parts of the royal domains as would, on an adjustment of the various rights claimed in them, be allotted to the Crown, and which they compute at sixty or seventy thousand acres,

should be enclosed and planted, on the presumption that the land so enclosed would, after one hundred years, produce an annual supply of fifty thousand square loads of timber. The demand for timber for the national and private shipping at present, I may observe, is computed to exceed seventy thousand square loads a year.

The authors of this plan are all too well informed men not to have perceived how widely it deviates from the most indubitable and important principles of Political Economy; and that, in proposing to direct forcibly a proportion of the national capital to the production of an article which can be imported cheaper from abroad, it violates principles, of which Mr. Smith is allowed to have established the wisdom with demonstrative evidence. In recommending, too, a forest system, which would have the effect to continue, for an immense number of years, a large proportion of the land of the country in a comparatively unproductive state, it aims a blow at the agricultural resources of the country, which, according to the general opinion, it ought now to be the leading object of our policy to extend ; while the idea of managing this great experimental farm by the officers of the Crown, is reprobated by the experience of all ages and nations, with respect to the administration and improvement of royal domains.

Notwithstanding of these considerations, however, if it could be proved that the plan would be likely to accomplish its object, and still more if it could be established, that no other plan would be equally efficacious for securing the national safety and independence, undoubtedly, these general principles ought to give way, in the mind of every prudent statesmen, to what Mr. Smith himself has accounted an object of higher value. But that the plan is not more unsound in principle, when considered in connexion with the other parts of our political arrangements, than it is nugatory in point of efficiency, even for the accomplishment of its specific object, a moment's attention will satisfy even the most superficial inquirer. On this head, the following observations of Sir Frederick Morton Eden appear to me to be quite decisive:"Such a plan, it is obvious, is not calculated to