Ir seems indicative of some great change in the nature of the English people that they should in these latter days huve been disposed to renounce that self-confidence which as hitherto stood them in such good stead. The remark of an alien and an enemy of former days, that "these English never know when they are beaten," could Lardly be applied at the present moment, when we seo them ready to retire from every position and give up'every advantage, rather than run the risk of an encounter. It is noticeable that this feeling is by no means confined to the field of polities, but is to be found fully developed in mercantile and industrial quarters, and that the fear of being supplanted has established a partial paralysis not only in the cabinet of the Minister, but in the counting house of the Merchant, and even in the cottage of the Artisan. We see it here in the eries which from time to time meet us of trade passing from foreign into Chinese bands; and our brethren in the South more especially tell us of our approaching extinction. Yet calmly considered, there is little reason for the ery. It is certainly no loss to us that native trade should prosper; and even on the narrowest grounds of self-interest there would be good deal to congratulate ourselves on could we really be able to say that Chinese trade was progressing. In England, the same ery of the com. petition of foreign countries meets our ears, The scarcity of labour in the United States has led to. the production of labour-saving machines, while in England many of the old, ponderous, and, comparatively speaking, rade methods of manufacture have survived, The Exhibition at Phila. adelphia and more recently.that at Paris have shown that for the moment Eog-Jand has remained stationary. We should have expected that, finding such to be the case, manufacturers would at once have set to to amend what was defective and take advantage of the many points in which Great Britain was really ahead of the States. Doubt. less some have done so, and already signs of improvement are to be noticed. The general feeling, to judge from newspaper articles and election speeches, is, however, one of depression;—British manufacturers have been beaten, and British industry must decay. A feeling of irritation is to be noticed, too, in many quarters. The American artisan is set up, not asa pattern for imitation, but object of enmity; and an idea of some sort of injury done to the British workman seems apparent amongst those who make appeals on account of his dia-tress. More curious still, this unreason. ing out-break of feeling has associated itself with a half-suppressed ory for a return to protection, as if that would be panacea for evils whose main-spring is the want of free intercourse, Trae, in some sense the perfection of some of the. American labour-saving machines is to be traced to protective tariffs, but in a manner very different from what those who urge their reimposition would desire. Protection tariffs in fact, so increased the price of the ordinary necessaries of life, and in consequence so raised the price of Inbour, that it became impossible to continue in the old grooves; and, as necessity is the mother of invention, machines were introduced to ret industry possible. Certain engineers in England thirty years ago used to be acoused of picking out difficult routes for their railways in order to show their skill at surmounting obstructions, The result was satisfactory in one way, namely in showing their ability,- but hardly so to the shareholders, who, for many long years waited, but in vain, for dividend. Oar would-be protectionists would weight the wheels of their machines in order to encourage invention, and this seems tobe the spirit of the day. True, the natives of those happy islands in the Pacific, where Nature supplies all their needs without the necessity of labour, have fallen behind their follows in less favourable climates, where man hes to earn his bread by the sweat of his brow; but we can
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.