Years. 1822 * 1823 SHIPS THAT ENTERED THE HARBOURS OF BRITISH. Ships. 3230 3031 1824 3132 1825 3989 1826 3495 1827 4012 1828 4084 1829 4108 1830 3910 1831 4140 Years. Ships. 1822 696 • 1823 779 1824 776 1825 1175 1826 724 1827 984 1828 866 1829 889 1830 906 1831 989 Tons. 603,167 611,411 607,106 BRITISH. 789,565 675,026 769,102 767,212 784,070 744,229 780,988 Years. Ships. * 1823 1825 1826 1827 1828 1829 1830 1831 Tonnage. 139,728 154,058 142,615 228,204 131,924 191,734 1554 1531 1387 1442 1652 1487 1655 1862 Thus, while the British vessels annually entering the port of London have only increased, since 1822, from 3230 to 4140, that is, a third, and their tonnage from 611,00 to 780,000, or a sixth; the foreign vessels annually entering have increased from 597 to 1557, or nearly tripled, while their tounage has increased from 106,000 to 269,000, or twice and a half. 157,686 166,209 166,263 189,388 BRITISH. 2. HULL. Tonnage. 1263 261,137 1459 296,710 327,198 315,115 299,037 306,369 340,644 326,311 368,268 413,928 Ships. 597 865 1643 1743 1586 1534 1303 1300 1268 1567 3. LIVERPOOL. Ships. 106 205 510 1000 854 801 676 603 550 725 Foreign. Tons. 106,099 161,705 264,098 302,122 Ships. 699 798 702 863 680 810 660 811 1055 978 215,254 221,008 195,929 215,605 Thus, while the British shipping entering the port of Hull has increased, since 1822, from 696 to 989, or a third nearly, and the tonnage from 139,000 to 189,000, or about the same; the foreign ships have increased from 106 to 725, or multiplied nearly SEVENFOLD, and their tonnage swelled from 14,000 to 73,000, or nearly sixFOLD. 207,500 269,159 FOREIGN. Tonnage. 26,355 58,603 100,773 70,137 72,386 60,283 58,854 51,015 73,547 FOREIGN. Tonnage. 174,607 199,688 174,503 222,187 181,907 231,863 179,514 210,713 272,463 265,037 to foretell what, in a given time, must be the result of such a progress. But this is not all. From the table quoted below, it appears that the vessels belonging to the United Kingdom have actually declined in the ten years since the reciprocity system began; that the decline in shipping belonging to the European trade has been very considerable; and that it is the great increase of vessels for the Colonial trade, where the reciprocity system is not yet applied, which alone has prevented the decay over the whole empire from being still more alarming; and this lamentable result has taken place, at the very time when our exports and imports have increased so immensely, that if they had been carried on as heretofore mainly in British bottoms, our shipping should have increased a half during the same time! Ships. 1821 21,969 1823 21,042 2,302,867 2,411,611 1826 20,968 2,193,300 1830 19,174 1831 19,450 2,201,592 1832 19,681 1826 1827 British islands have increased fully a half, while their shipping has actually declined! The immense difference must have been carried out and in from the empire somehow ; and if we turn to the column exhibiting the growth of foreign tonnage entering the British harbours during the same time, we find that it has more than doubled, having risen from 433,000 tons to 896,000 tons annually. This is a most lamentable result. From this it appears that the increase of our exports and imports, so far from adding to, is actually diminishing our strength; that it is carried on in foreign bottoms; and that while the vast increase of our manufactured exports has not added one ton or vessel to the British naval strength, it is augmenting that of our enemies in a most fearful progression; at a rate greater than the British shipping increased even during the most prosperous period of the war.‡ VESSELS BELONGING TO THE BRITISH EMPIRE. COLONIES. EUROPE. 'Tons. 2,449,629 2,355,853 Ships. Tons. 3,384 204,564 3,404 203,641 3,500 203,893 3,579 214,875 3,675 279,362 4,449 324,891 4,547 330,227 356,208 Exports. Imports. L.49,343,051 1822 39,401,264 52,770,416 * 1823 34,591,263 51,733,461 1824 36,141,339 58,218,633 1825 42,661,054 55,618,327 36,069,999 50,401,292 43,467,747 61,082,695 1828 43,396,527 61,957,805 1829 42,311,648 66,072,163 1830 44,815,397 69,028,423 1831 48,161,661 70,820,066 Ships. 25,036 24,642 24,542 24,776 24,280 24,625 23,199 24,095 23,453 23,721 24,242 24,655 British Shipping. 2,560,203 2,519,044 2,506,769 2,559,587 2,553,682 2,635,644 2,460,500 2,517,000 2,531,819 2,581,964 2,617,638 TOTAL. Tons. 2,560,203 2,519,044 2,506,769 2,559,587 2,553,682 2,635,644 2,460,500 2,518,191 2,517,000 2,531,819 2,581,964 2,617,638 Foreign Shipping. Outward. Tons. 433,329 383,784 457,542 563,571 746,707 905,520 695,440 767,821 608,118 730,250 758,368 896,051 From 1792 to 1800, under the unparalleled stimulus of the war, the British tonnage increased only from 1,540,000, tons to 1,905,000, or a little more than a fourth; but the foreign shipping, in a similar period, under the fostering hand of the reciprocity system, has increased from 433,000 tons to 896,000, or more than doubled. The command of the ocean, and the monopoly of the trade of the world, could only do a quarter as much for our own navy in eight years of war, as the reciprocity system has done for our enemies in eight years of peace. British. Foreign Years. 159,418 1821 28,411 140,776 1822 73,853 156,054 1823 63,606 165,609 153,475 1824 44,994 1825 38,943 1826 47,711 151,765 196,863 1827 73,204 217,535 1828 80,158 138,174 1829 61,343 162,327 1830 65,130 214, 166 1831 91,787 229,869 VOL. XXXV, NO. CCXXI. 37,956 48,325 48,666 43,069 58,243 59,734 63,131 71,911 65,498 63,566 72,895 Now, here is a progress which reminds us of the prosperous days of the British Empire. Here are various branches of trade carried on with our own colonies, and, of course, entirely in British vessels, in which the growth of our mercantile navy has been really prodigious. In twelve years the tonnage employed in the trade to New Holland has multiplied TENFOLD: in the same time, that employed in the Canada trade, has risen from 340,000 to 500,000 tons, or nearly a fifth of the whole trade of the Empire. This is the state of our Colonial trade; growing rapidly and steadily in every quarter except the West In AMERICA. course with foreign states, and all the countries to which the reciprocity system applies; and that the deficiency has been solely made up by the vast increase of the colonial trade, which hitherto fortunately has been preserved entire from the modern system. A few returns will at once demonstrate this important fact. East Indies. Tons. 70,348 41,588 The following table exhibits the growth of our colonial shipping and tonnage from 1820 to 1831. PRUSSIA. Canada. Tons. 343,377 337,446 356,448 401,669 427,832 British. Tons. 87,451 79,590 102,847 81,202 94,664 189,214 119,060 150,718 489,844 472,588 359,793 400,841 431,901 452,397 480,236 504,211 dies-a portion of the British empire, in which it has actually fallen off; the insane and oppressive policy so long pursued by our Government towards those splendid Colonies, having more than counterbalanced all the richest gifts of nature, -a virgin soil, a tropical sun, luxuriant vegetation, and scenery of almost fabulous beauty. 133,753 125,918 102,758 83,908 Contrast this striking and gratifying result with the working of the reciprocity system in the three countries which Mr Huskisson specified, as affording the inductive cause of the change of system, viz. America, Prussia, and the Netherlands : West Indies. Tons. 240,510 245,321 232,426 233,790 244,971 232,357 243,448 243,721 272,800 263,338 253,872 249,079 229,117 Foreign. Tons. 60,450 37,720 58,270 86,013 151,621 182,752 120,589 109,184 99,195 127,861 139,646 140,532 Thus, it appears, that the reciprocity system, introduced, as Mr Huskisson stated, under the threat of retaliatory measures from Prussia, has had the effect of diminishing the British tonnage employed in the trade with that country, from 87,000 tons annually to 83,000, and of increasing the Prussian from 60,000 in 1820, to 140,000 in 1831. The Netherlands exhibited the same result till 1830; the British shipping having only increased during that time from 70,000 tons to 117,000, that is, somewhat more than a half; whereas the foreign had increased from 43,000 to 97,000, or more than doubled. Since the Revolution of 1830, almost the whole trade of the Netherlands has fallen into the hands of the British; a memorable instance of the insanity of manufacturing demagogues in urging on the adoption † 1810 1811 1812 Colonies. 248 275 209 243 342 536 588 529 464 416 367 376 This Table is highly instructive as to the working of the reciprocity system. It thence appears, that while the imports of the empire have increased, since 1820, a half, and the exports have risen in the same proportion, the ships annually built now are only a sixth greater in the British islands than at the commencement of that period, and, in fact, they are hardly so numerous at this time as they were twenty years ago, when our foreign trade was little more than half its present amount. This result is the more instructive as to L.30,171,000 69,028,000 70,820,000 76,071,000 the operation of the reciprocity system, because the ships built in the colonies during the same period have fully kept pace with the growth of our foreign trade, the quantity annually built in those distant possessions having increased from about 250 to 375, or just a half. If the ships built at home had kept pace with our foreign commerce, and not been depressed by some peculiar cause, instead of the quantity annually built being now 750, it would have been 1100. We shall only add, that the num The reciprocity was begun in 1820, by a separate regulation for America. See Mr Huskisson's Speech, June 6, 1823. Hansard, ix. 796. Exports. Ships Built. 870 760 Imports. L.45,616,000 42,646,000 27,840,000 |