the Custom-house returns, we shall find that we shipped to the continent of Europe, in value, about 21,000,000l.;-to our West India islands, 9,000,000l.;to America, chiefly the United States, 16,000,ocol.;-to Africa, 1,300,000l.;-to India, China, and other parts of Asia, 3,200,000l. We conclude these extracts by a statement of our registered ships, and of the men and boys employed to navigate them: England Year 1805. Ships. 14,700 Our colonies in North America and the West Indies Scotland Ireland Men and boys. 117,668 15,467 2581 15,160 5070 4347 Isles of Man, Guernsey, and Jersey 589 It is satisfactory to find, on a comparison of different years, that, notwithstanding all the evils of war, our mercantile navy has been rather on the increase. The number of men and boys employed in 1806 was 156,021;-in 1807, it was 157,875;-in 1808, it was 157,105;-in 1809, it was 160,598; and in 1810, it was 164,195. A considerable part of these must be allowed to have been foreign seamen : but, when to the native seamen in our merchant-ships we add the 140,000 seamen and marines serving in the royal navy, we cannot help thinking that we somewhat over-rated the danger of being outstripped in naval strength by Bonaparte and his allies. II. The pamphlet intitled A Review of the Controversy,' &c. gives a different representation of the subject from that of Mr. Johnstone's speech. It is a clear and well arranged publication, but our limits prevent us from doing more than making a very brief abstract of its several sections. One of the first topics of discussion is the state of our exchanges in 1800 and 1801. The drain of bullion at that time is here ascribed, as it was repeatedly by us, to the imports of foreign corn and the pressure of continental subsidies. The author of this pamphlet cites the early opinions of several bullionists, such as Mr. Horner and Mr. Henry Thornton, and is amused with the contrast which they form with the later doctrines of Mr. Huskisson or Mr. Giddy. In denying the coincidence between the rise of specie and the rise of the articles of life, the writer has our full concurrence: but we cannot help remarking that he is singularly unfortunate in the table by which (p. 30.) he undertakes to prove the truth of his argument. The articles selected by him are by no means necessaries of life, and, being chiefly 5 foreign foreign products, they are liable to fluctuate in price from a variety of political causes. His next topic is the statement given, in the Bullion-report, of the comparative amount of our exports and imports; a branch of the subject in which, he truly remarks, the triumph is on the side of Mr. Bosanquet and the other practical men. He questions the accuracy or the comparison instituted in the Bullion-report between the case of the Bank of Ireland in 1804, and the present situation of the Bank of England; and he exposes the error of the committee, in reasoning on the condition of the Bank of England in 1696 as a parallel case. Had that precedent been fully stated, it would have tended, he says, by exhibiting a derangement of exchange from magnitude of foreign expenditure, to have confirmed the reasoning of the mercantile opponents of the committee. Of the remainder of the pamphlet, the most striking feature is a bold eulogium on the Bank-suspension-act, not merely as a temporary expedient, but as a measure of permanent policy. It has had the effect, says the author, of preventing us from being under the necessity of concluding peace, as in former ages, on the pressure of financial difficulties. The fortunate issue of the war is likely to increase the number of the adherents to this opinion, and we will not attempt to interrupt the general cordiality by reflections on the magnitude of our past sacrifices. It will belong to the historian, after the lapse of years has calmed the agitation of parties, to form a deliberate estimate of the political effects of the Bank-restriction-act; and to examine whether the overthrow of Bonaparte has been produced by events in any way connected with that measure. With regard to the pamphlet under review, the chief faults are a too decided leaning to one side of the question, and a prolixity of style, which, in a dry discussion like the Bullionquestion, ought most especially to be avoided. III. The Lack of Gold' is a more serious discussion of the subject than the quaintness of the title appears to imply. The author, like the writer whom we have just reviewed, embraces the side of the Bank, and defends it with much ability: but he confines his investigation to the time subsequent to the passing of Lord Stanhope's bill in July 1811, the effect of which was to give the last blow to the existence of gold in our currency. Under these circumstances, he labours hard to prove the position that paper is almost as good a circulating medium as coin. The value of both, he says, is conventional; though in gold the check on augmentation is greater, yet its value is by no means permanent; and, if we analyse our present situation, we shall find that it is not our paper but our REV. JUNE, 1814. N gold gold that has undergone a change of value. Paper remains as before with regard to home-transactions: but, the balance of payments having become greatly unfavourable to us in late years, gold has acquired the premium attached in all such cases to bills of exchange. The author next combats the suspicion of the stability of our country-banks, and maintains that they possess the same claim to confidence now, when their reserve-funds are in Bank of England notes, as formerly when they were in specie. It follows from his reasoning that it would be altogether unadvisable to compel the resumption of cash-payments, or materially to limit our paper-issues, until the balance of payments shall cease to be considerably against us. Decided, however, as the writer is on the side of the Bank, he by no means adopts the current prejudice in favour of the prohibition of exporting our coin, the traffic in which he would render as free as that of any thing else. He concludes his pamphlet by some observations on the general state of the country, which we should gladly have exchanged for a continuance of his remarks on the Bullion-question; since he has said enough on that topic to shew that his research had been much more effectual than that of many who have written on it. To his arguments, our chief objection is that he carries his conclusions too far; and to his language, that in the midst of well constructed periods it is somewhat deficient in perspicuity. Had a treatise from the pen of this author, of greater length and plainer style than the present, been published in the early part of the discussion, it could not have failed to attract considerable attention. IV. Mr. Parnell's Speech. - Mr. Parnell became known to the public several years ago as a writer on the state of the Bank of Ireland in 1804. (See Rev. Vol. xlviii., N. S., p. 399.) In the Bullion-question, he took a decided part in favour of the Report, and animadverted on the evidence of the mercantile witnesses as proceeding from a quarter which was wholly barren of general views. Moreover, he adds, the command of money is so paramount a consideration in the eye of the merchant, as to render him the zealous advocate of a papersystem, or of whatever promises to accomplish his object. we mark the fluctuations in the value of money at different epochs, we shall find, says Mr. P., that the fall which has occurred in our days is the only great fall for nearly a century and a half. From 1657 to 1700, the average price of wheat was 21. 11s. per quarter; and, during the whole of the last century, with the exception of the last seven years, it was on an average below that rate: but since 1793 the price of wheat has risen remarkably, and the average of twenty years would If carry carry it to nearly 41. per quarter. An increase in the price of corn having also been experienced throughout the Continent, to what, says Mr. Parnell, can this be owing except to the great addition made, in the present day, to the currency of the world by the adoption of paper-money? The substitution of paper for coin in England must alone have thrown many millions of gold into circulation; and we are told that the bank-paper of Paris amounts to four millions, while that of Austria is not short of eight. Sweden, Denmark, Russia, and Portugal, have each their paper-currency; which, though depreciated like the Austrian, serves to supply to a certain extent the place of coin, and, in course, to lower the value of the latter. From these various considerations, Mr. Parnell assumes that too much stress had been laid on the computed influence of our taxes and deficient harvests on the general price of commodities. Taxes, he observes, (p. 11.) operate only on the articles specifically taxed, and the enhancement of corn is likewise of partial effect. If this should seem plausible, yet, when closely scrutinized, we shall find in Mr. P. an additional example of the prevalent habit of overstraining arguments, and looking too much to one side of the question. No doubt, the adoption of paper-currency in the present age has tended to depreciate money but the extent of that adoption has been much smaller in other countries than in our own. No doubt, likewise, the enhancement of corn affects chiefly the wages of labour: but how few commodities are independent of the fluctuations in the rate of labour? Again, if he would prove the effect of taxation to be partial, let Mr. Parnell discover and point out any article which is not subject, directly or indirectly, to its operation. In other divisions of the subject, our ideas approximate somewhat more to those of Mr. Parnell. His observations on exchange (p. 41.) would be intitled to notice at length, had not the question been already fully before our readers. He thinks, with Lord Liverpool, that an excess in our paper-currency had begun to exist before the stoppage in 1797; and he dates this unfortunate circumstance from the permission granted to the Bank of England to issue notes so low as 51. This, it must be confessed, was a trespass on Dr. Smith's well known limit of Iol. for notes in London, and 51. in the country. Mr. P. does not, however, agree with Mr. Huskisson, that the recurrence of bank-stoppages is to be anticipated; since, in a country possessed of so much industry and capital as England may boast, it would be most extraordinary if we could not so manage our circulating medium as to provide against such disreputable and pernicious suspensions. Neither does he hold, with Mr. Horner, that the Bank of England, constituted as it is, has been an institution of great public benefit; since a larger share of advantage might (in his opinion) have been obtained had the banking-business been left free, as in Scotland. He omits, however, to mention the particular manner in which the exclusive privilege of the Bank of England has been most hurtful; we mean, in preventing the association of more than six names in any English banking-house; or, in other words, in precluding the country-part of England from the benefit of chartered banks. To what other cause are we to ascribe the endless multiplication of petty banks in small towns; and those examples of insolvency, unfortunately too frequent among bankers, which form one of the chief evils in the extensive diffusion of papercurrency? The case of the Bank of Ireland in 1804 has given rise to much argument; the Bullionists maintaining that it was indicative of depreciation, which their opponents are equally resolute in denying. On this topic, Mr. Parnell's opinion is intitled to considerable attention. At the time of the suspension of the cash-payments of the Bank of Ireland in 1797, its notes in circulation amounted to 600,cool., and the exchange with England was generally in favour of Ireland: but, the obligation to pay in cash having been removed, the Bank of Ireland extended its circulation so rapidly as to raise it in 1804 to 3,000,000l., being five times its former amount. Country banks having gone on in the same hopeful ratio, it can excite little surprize to find that the exchange rose to 10 per cent. against Ireland. A parliamentary-committee having investigated this irregularity, and recommended a reduction of the quantity of bank-paper, the application of that remedy had the desired effect, and the exchange was re-established: but, say the opponents of the Bullion-committee, the circulation of the Bank of Ireland is again raised to three millions, and the course of exchange with England is not deranged. True, replies Mr. Parnell, but this pro- . ceeds from the depreciation of English currency. Were the present English currency equal to coin, or were it only equal to the value of Bank of England paper in 1804, we should soon see the rate of exchange turn against Ireland. If we look at the rate of foreign exchanges, we find that they are now nearly twenty per cent. against Ireland, while guineas bear a premium of more than fifteen per cent. It is said, adds Mr. P., that to alter our present system would be incompatible with the public safety: but do those who made this remark mean to assert that no danger will attend the continuance of that system? Is it a system beneficial to our commerce, and safe for our finances? We must not extend our abstract of this honourable gentleman's speech: but enough has been cited to satisfy our readers that, though |