CHAPTER VI. COMMERCIAL AND ECONOMIC PROGRESS, 1821-1831. Comparative Productive Forces, Great Britain and France.-Treaties of Commerce.-Financial Operations.-Savings Banks.-Increase of Population. --Progress of Science.-Progress of Trade. EUROPE now entered into a new era of peace and industry. It was, indeed, needful to repair the waste of war, and the leading states gave themselves in earnest to the arduous task. What forces could they command, what instruments were at their disposal for such a purpose? M. Dupin, in his elaborate work on the Productive and Commercial Forces of France,' estimated these forces as regards France and Great Britain in a careful and conspicuous manner. Taking the population of both countries as a basis, he reduced the entire number of men, women, and children employed in agriculture and industry to the standard of efficient adult human. forces. He added to them a similar equivalent from the number of horses and cattle so employed. He ascertained and estimated the extent of the industrial forces in use, such as mills and hydraulic machines, and the power of steam and wind used in navigation, and brought out the important economic fact that in 1826 France possessed forces equivalent to 48,814,500 men, and the United Kingdom forces equivalent to 60,206,0001 men. Comparing, moreover, 1780 with 1826, M. Dupin calculated that in France these forces increased at the rate of 217,090 adult men per annum, and in the United Kingdom at the rate of 628,000 adult men per annum. The statistics of human labour, and of other forces applied to agriculture and industry, are not so perfect as to enable us to estimate with any precision their gradual progress in this and other countries; but here lies the secret of the relative advancement or retrogression of different states, and in any history of commerce careful notice must be taken of all that tends to advance or retard the development of those forces whereby man works on nature. If the broad acres of old England have become more luxurious and productive, if her mineral stores have become a source of perennial wealth, if her cities are full of people and her manufacturing industry has become the wonder of all nations, it is because English labour has been intelligent and persevering; it is because, not content with the amplest use of human forces, England has availed herself to the utmost of whatever natural force science and art have provided for subjugating Nature and rendering her plastic and obedient to our will. The population of the United Kingdom in the ten years from 1821 to 1831 increased as follows: : Within the ten years the population of London and eleven other principal towns increased as follows: Not much development was manifested in any branch of native industry during this period, and the activity of trade, confined to imports, was mainly owing to a speculative demand, which sprung up from exceptional rumours respecting certain places of production. With France, trade continued unimportant. At the Restoration some attempts were made to diminish the duties on importation, and to remove some prohibition; but the manufacturers had learned to enjoy the monopoly conceded to them, and they resisted vigorously every effort to modify the same. In their petitions to the state they asserted that they had an exclusive right to supply the wants of the French people, and the Government was too weak to oppose their pretensions. A convention of commerce and navigation was concluded between England and France in 1826 by Canning and Huskisson and the Prince de Polignac, which abolished all discriminating duties of tonnage, harbour, lighthouse, pilotage, and other shipping dues. With Prussia, also, a convention of commerce was concluded in 1824. With Holland, too, a general treaty respecting territory and commerce in the East Indies was signed at London on March 17, 1824. And with the United States trade was increasing, notwithstanding the discouraging influences of a protective tariff and great disturbances of credit. Not content with the protective tariff of 1816, the United States Congress, listening to the complaints of manufacturers, imposed taxes which increased from twenty to thirty per cent. the value of all the cotton, woollen, and linen manufactures, iron and other metals, worn or used by the citizens of the United States. The duties levied under this tariff were on cotton 42 per cent., on woollen goods 54 per cent., on bar iron 95 per cent., and on other articles of manufacture in proportion. There was, moreover, an enormous number of bankruptcies in the States. The paper currency was much depreciated, and a policy was pursued with regard to both commerce and banking which was not well calculated to encourage commercial enterprise. Several South American States were then rising to independence and importance. Venezuela constituted herself a republic in 1821, Central America became an independent republic in 1821, and Hayti was recognised as an independent state in 1825, just as Brazil and Mexico had been so recognised in 1810. Whatever improvement in the position of trade occurred at this time in the United Kingdom was due to the diminution of the burdens of taxation, and the gradual liberation of many industries from the trammels of the excise. In 1822 the malt duties were considerably reduced, as well as the duties on hides and skins. In 1823 the salt duty was reduced from 158. to 28. per bushel; and in 1825 the 28. duty was also abolished. In 1825 the duty on manufactured glass was repealed, and a small duty of 3d. per lb. imposed on the fluxed materials. In 1826 a considerable reduction was made in the duty on British spirits, and the duty on printed silks was repealed. And in 1830 all duties on hides and skins, and the duties on licenses to tanners and curriers, were repealed. The stamp duties were also reduced; and the obnoxious duties on houses and windows, on carriages and horses, were repealed. Financial operations of considerable magnitude were made in connection with the national debt. In 1822, 150,000,000l. of 5 per cent. stock was reduced to 4 per cent. In 1824, 76,000,000l. of old 4 per cents. was reduced to 3 per cent.; and in 1830, 153,000,000l. of 4 per cent. was converted into a 3 per cent. stock. In every direction efforts were made to lighten the burdens of industry, and to open new outlets for trade and navigation. Then, too, savings banks, the first of which had been introduced as far back as 1804 at Tottenham, were first recognised by law. In 1817, a fund, called the fund for the banks for savings, was opened with the national debt commissioners, into which all savings banks' deposits were to be placed. In 1826 and 1828 the Legislature found it necessary to check the abuse of such banks, and in order to give greater security to depositors it prescribed that the rules of such banks should be submitted to a barrister appointed by the national debt commissioners, and also made it obligatory that the money deposited in savings banks should be invested in the Bank of England in the name of the national debt commissioners.3 In the ten years 1821-30 substantial progress was made in art, science, and industry. In 1820 the Royal Astronomical Society was founded, which obtained its charter in 1830. The Geological Society, which was founded in 1807, obtained its charter in 1826, and the Royal Zoological Society was also founded in 1826. It was in 1822 that the first steamer, the Comet,' was launched, and that the Syrius' steam packet sailed from London to New York, completing her voyage in seventeen days, and she was followed by the Great Western,' which left Bristol for New York, and made the passage in fifteen days. 6 2 57 Geo. III. c. 120. 6 3 3 & 4 Wm. IV. c. 14. The following facts show the progress of commerce during the ten years from 1820 to 1830 :— Russia, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Iceland, Heligoland. 2,201 United States. France, Portugal with Azores, Madeira, &c., and Spain with Gibraltar and Canaries. "British West Indies, with British Guiana and Honduras. • British India, Ceylon, and Singapore. 9 19 32 | | ༅g། ། -a& 1 |