profit. By exportation of corn, we provide food for other countries, at their colt-By exportation of wool, foreign nations are enabled to provide clothes for themselves and others, at our coft. By the exportation of corn, we enfure domeftic industry, of the most useful kind— By the exportation of wool, we deftroy the very means of industry: Laftly, by the exportation of corn, we increase its growth for the home confumption, and, at the fame time (taking into account the regulations of the import-trade) diminish its home price, upon the whole-By the exportation of wool, we increase its growth for foreign confumption, with a certainty, nay, with a view, of railing its price, at home. So pointed is the oppofition, between thefe two

cafes, one of which is here held out to us as a rule for the other.

The parallel, indeed, between the exportation of corn, and that of a finished manufacture, is fufficiently exact. And the fame arguments may be applied, with nearly equal force, to both cafes. The very fame encouragements too might in fimilar circumftances be as ufefully employed, in the one inftance, as in the other. A fum of public money could not be better expended, than in giving a bounty upon exported woollens, fhould foreigners, by any untoward events on our part, be enabled to underfell us."

This is rather an aukward feafon for pointing out new applications of public money; but whether we can adopt the measure or not, no way affects the propriety of it. Adverfe circumftances abroad, ought to redouble our attention to thofe of an internal nature, especially fuch as are affected by any temporary inconveniences: and among these, what can be inftanced of higher importance than the woollen manufacture? Dr. Forfter, very juftly obferves, If there be any falvation for this country, it must be by the prefervation of its reJources. That is, by keeping the people in permanent ability, to fupport the burthens laid upon them. Every tax will indeed, in fome degree, affect either lands or trade, or, as is generally the cafe, both. But there is a wide difference, between laying an additional burthen upon men's fhoulders, and difabling them from bearing any burthen at all. A tree may be wounded in its branches, without hazard of its life or vigour, but a blow at the root will be mortal, and at once decifive of its fate. The meafure propofed has this dire& aim. It ftrikes at the original fources of all national ability, and, confequently, of all revenue-at induftry-at population-at that confamption, therefore, as well of foreign, as of home, produce, whence a revenue can alone arife."— But more difcuffions of this fubject crowd upon us.

N. Art. 15. Reflections on the prefent Low Price of coarfe Wools, its immediate Čaufes, and its probable Remedies. By Jofiah Tucker, D. D. Dean of Gloucester. 8vo. Is. Cadell. 1782. Dr. Tucker is a bold adventurer; but when he defcends from abstract politics to questions of commercial facts, that is, from the lofty regions of imagination to the plains of common fenfe, he knows the ground better, and is not in fuch peril of wandering till he lofes himself: thus, whatever may be thought of his fpeculations on government, his hints and obfervations on commerce defervedly claim our attention. On this fubject, he attributes the low price of coarse wool to four caufes, which more or lefs all certainly combine to operate against the manufacturers of that important article.

I. An obftruction to the exportation of our coarse cloths, blanketing, rugs, ferges, &c. to foreign countries, particularly to America; owing to the prefent war. On this, however, he does not lay fo much ftrefs as fome may do; he confiders the home confumption as of more confequence than a foreign demand; the latter only draining off the overflowings of the home market.

II. The principal caufe he affirms to be the great and general difufe of coarse woollen goods throughout the kingdom. Females of all ages and conditions, from her grace in the drawing-room, down to the fcullion in her kitchen, hardly ufe any woollens except of the finest texture. Silks, cottons, linens, diverfified under names without number; together with chints and other prohibited articles, are now become almoft the univerfal wear: even the men ufe ten times the cottons and filks they formerly did; and rugs, with other coarse articles, are in a manner banished from all houfes both in town and country! These are certainly notorious facts, that need only to be mentioned to extort confeffion; and prove that pride and oftentation are deaf to all policy, both PRIVATE and public.

If this glaring circumftance, which no individual will pay the leaft regard to, in private ceconomy, needed any illuftration, it cannot be more ftrongly furnished than in the Dean's own words.

But though the existence of the prefent evil may thus be accounted for, the magnitude and extent thereof remain ftill to be confidered. In a nation confifting at least of 7,000,000 of fouls, it is but a very moderate calculation to allow, that 2,oco,oco of these may have abandoned the ufe of woollens in their garments, bedding and furniture, to that degree, as to confume annually five pounds weight per head, at an average, less than their grandfathers and grandmothers were wont to do. Now this feemingly trifling quantity of wool refpecting each individual, amounts in the whole to 10,000,000 of pounds weight! And furely, furely, were ten millions of pounds weight of coarse wool now to be bought up [no,matter on what occafion] there would be no complaint, that this commodity was a drug, and bore no price.'

III. The diminution of cottagers in country villages, a clafs of people without whom it is impoffible for us to fubfift, and yet who have perpetual war made upon them by two forts of relentless ene mies, the parish officers, and the affociation for preferving the game; the one left they should become paupers, and the other left they fhould kill hares and partridges!

IV. While these alarming circumflances tend fo directly to diminifh the confumption of coarfe wool, the quantity of that article has increased, by the breaking up of wafte grounds, draining of marshes, and the culture of turnips and artificial graffes, which enable farmers to enlarge their flocks. The fheep alfo, by having greater plenty of food throughout the year, bear heavier fleeces, both longer and coarfer.

Such, briefly, are the caufes to which the Dean afcribes the diftreffes of the woollen manufuacture; and we apprehend their operation can be no more contested than their existence. We fhall now at tend to the remedies he prefcribes against the malady.

He just hints at a permiffion to export raw wool, fubject to a light duty; and the produce of this duty to be applied in bounties on the

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exportation of coarfe woollens and worsteds of our own manufacture; a regulation which, he obferves, would operate as well to carry off our manufactures as our wool; and while the duty and charges of exporting the wool would enhance the raw material to the foreigner, our own workmen would be rewarded by the premium on the exportation of their labours.

Left, however, fuch a scheme should not be liftened to, he waves it in favour of a bounty on the exportation of coarfe woollens and worsteds to any of the ports within the Baltic, fimilar to that on the exportation of coarfe linens. The peasants in the North of Europe, particularly in the Ukraine, he obferves, ftand in need of warm cloathing during their fevere and long winters, and are not yet arrived at fo great a degree of pride and luxury as to difdain the coarfest of our woollens, did they know where to purchase them at prices not exceeding their abilities. To raife the propofed bounty, the Dean recommends withdrawing one-third of the bounty on the exportation of coarfe linens, and one-third of that for grain; these two articles having been at nurfe for many years, and our coarfe woollen goods now demanding our nursing care. He adds,

The propofal is now laid in full view before the reader. And on the whole of this plan for opening a new market to distant, foreign countries, for the vent of English coarfe woollens, I have but one remark more to make: viz. that the greatest objection against it remains yet to be mentioned: which, however, I ought not to conceal from the unprejudiced reader. It is this,―That as there would be NO COLONIZING in the cafe, there would of course be no charters to be granted,-no fees or perquifites for clerks to receive, no governments, no places or finecures for minifters to beftow, no difputes about privileges, no grievances, no remonstrances, no unalienable rights for patriots to declaim upon,-no hopes of fucceeding to the places of those who should be turned out,-no food for inflammatory paragraphs in news-papers,-no jobs for contractors,and no monopolies for felfish traders and manufacturers :-therefore the fcheme, however feafible in itself, and how much foever calculated for the public good, is in great danger of mifcarrying ;-unless more public virtue fhould be exerted in this case, than has been usual on the like occafions.'

Another remedy is, by raifing up fuch a generation as fhall, by their station in life, be obliged to be clad in garments of coarfe woollen, and to ufe the like materials for bedding and furniture. This the Dean would accomplish, by establishing a police for the creation of cottages, for militia men and their families, on wafte land near turnpike roads, on a new plan, and with new refources. But for the particulars of this establishment, we must refer the Reader to the pamphlet, where they are explained at large. N. Art. 16. The Propriety of allowing a qualified Exportation of Wool difcuffed hiftorically. To which is added an Appendix, containing a Table, which fhews the full Value of the Woollen Goods of every Kind, that were entered for Exportation at the Customhoufe from 1697 to 1780, inclufive, as well as the Prices of Wool in England, during all that Period. 8vo, 2 s. Elmsley. 1782. Whatever might be the value of the hiftorical facts collected by this Writer, were they digefted by other hands, he has not the happy

art

art of exhibiting them in a clear point of view; nor are his remarks closely directed to the principles he labours to establish: fo that he is frequently congratulating himself on difcoveries that the reader does not enjoy with him. At length, in one ill expreffed paragraph, p. 55, where the causes of the low price of wool are enumerated, and where one of them is fplit into two, we discover that Dean Tucker's pamphlet had juft furnished him with his conclufions. On the whole, instead of confidering wool as an article that good policy has dictated to us to retain as much as poffible in our own hands, until our manufacturers have worked it up into goods for confemption, he treats the raw material merely as an article of trade, and complains much of the operation of a monopolizing spirit, in prohibiting its exportation. The expediency of countenancing the ex-' portation of a commodity that affords employment for fuch numbers of our own people, to enable our neighbours to work for themselves (and if they did not want it they would not buy it), is indeed a moft delicate queftion to decide. But how the retention of raw wool, to be worked up before it is fold abroad, can be termed a monopoly, is difficult to conceive! We have ever understood a monopoly to mean a privilege of trade or manufacture enjoyed by one, or by a few, to the exclufion of others, in fome particular country or diftriét. To confine an advantage to a country at large, has hitherto been termed patriotifm; yet if our Author chufes to fubftitute the term monopoly for patriotifm, we fhall difpute the propriety of his choice; for patriotifm is certainly a national felfifhnefs, of which we do not easily diveft ourselves. That this Writer has not got quite the better of this national felfishness, appears from his recommending only a qualified exportation of wool; which is only a qualified freedom of trade, or a qualified monopoly, let him subscribe to which of the expofitions he pleases. Art. 17. Plain Reafons, addreffed to the People of Great Britain, against the intended Petition to Parliament from the Owners and Occupiers of Land in the County of Lincoln, for Leave to export Wool. With fome Remarks on Sir John Dalrymple's Treatife, lately published, in Favour of a general Exportation of Wool. 8vo. Is. Robinfon. 1782.

If any credit is due to the prefent Writer, who dates from Leeds, the alarm raised, of the stagnation of our wool in the hands of the grower, fprings from a mere local and temporary inconvenience. The fact, as he ftates it, is no more than this :-The farmers and other occupiers of land in the county of Lincoln, have, for fome years past, paid great attention to their wool; and had their modes of improvement been directed with as much wisdom, as they had been pursued with diligence, both themselves and their country would have been benefited by them. In too eager pursuit of their prefent intereft, while wool was of ready fale and at a high price, they loft fight of it in time to come, when a change should take place, when the demand for wool fhould be lefs, and the price lower.

They have uniformly endeavoured to increase the length of the woo!, and the weight of the fleece, regardless of its other qualities; and though they have frequently been warned by the dealers and manufacturers, that they were making their wool unfit for the general

manufactures

N.

manufactures of this country; that they would reduce it to fuch a state that they could only hope to vend it at a particular market, and would of confequence be greatly diftreffed if that market fhould fail, they have still perfifted.-In many parts of Lincolnshire, where five, fix, or feven fleeces ufed to make up a todd, it will now be made up of two or three. Their theep are grown very large-their wool long and coarse.

Before the prefent war broke out, goods manufactured from this fort of wool, found a market principally in Spain, and partly in America and Holland. But fince the greateft part of our trade to thefe places has ceased, and there has been lefs demand for goods of this particular fort, the wool from which they were made, has not the ready fale it used to have, and is confequently much decreased in its value.

This is, I apprehend, a fair state of the origin and extent of the prefent grievance; the inconveniences complained of are local and temporary; the mode of redrefs which they feem to wish to adopt, would produce others which are general and permanent.

As there is no general redundancy of wool in the nation, for fhort and fine wool used in making cloth, and alfo fine combing wool, has advanced in price for fome years paft (and thefe two forts comprize much the greateft part of the national stock), we are unwilling to fuppofe the Lincolnshire wool-growers wish to propofe fo defperate an expedient as a general exportation of all forts of wool; but only of that fpecies which they fet forth to be redundant, namely, long coarse wool. The lofs fuffered by the nation from the exportation of fuch wool as our manufacturers are in want of, and are able to work up and vend at four or five times its original value, is too obvious to mention.

In the first place, a permiffion to export long coarfe wool, muft a&t as a general permiffion to export all forts of wool. Long and fhort, coarfe and fine, are relative terms; impartial men, who had no intereft in the cafe to mislead them, would often find themselves at a lofs to decide under which of thefe general defcriptions a particular parcel of wool ought to be ranked. How then fhall a cuftom-house officer determine, which wool the law will call long or short, coarse .or fine?

"This difficulty is much augmented from the confideration, that the execution of a penal ftatute muft in all cafes depend upon its being accurately determined, and that upon oath. What an opportunity would this afford for exporting the most valuable wool in the king. dom, that which our own manufactures have the greatest want of; and what temptation would it caufe for fraud and perjury?

But fecondly, fhort and fine wool would be inclofed in the fleeces of the long and coarse. This, it is to be feared, would become a very general practice, and for the following reafons:

Because the fhorter and finer fort of our wool of which cloth is made, and our fineft combing wool, are more wanted abroad; would confequently be of readier fale, and afford a much higher profit to the exporter than the coarse long wool; for the duty on exportation muft be laid in a determinate fum on every pound of wool exported Hence, though coarse long wool, of small value by the pound, migh

be