Before I run away from this question of Tariffs which will be occupying a good deal of the stage of political and economic polemics for the next few weeks, let me mention the two prize essays published in the Statis i thousand pounds was awarded to Mr. Colmer, a Colonial who advocates British Protectionist duties against foreign countries for the benefit of our Colonists, and the other five hundred pounds to Mr. Ashton, who pleads for imperial commercial arrangements on other bases and pronounces against this country returning to the policy of Protection against foreigners in the interest of our Colonies.
Farrer has been asked to examine these essays, and report to the Cobden Club Committee, and in the course of his report he says of Mr. Colmer's essay that his scheme is "open to all the objectic which have been stated over and over again in the publications of the Club on the subject of Fair Trade that these oblections are not answered in this essay, and that the scheme must be condemned by the Club in toto." Lord Farrer is astonished that a soi-disunt statesman like Lord Lorne and a soi-distant economical journal like the Statist can give any countenance to such proposals."
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.