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 CORRESPONDENCE 
 
 BETWEEN 
 
 SIR LOUIS MALLET, C.B 
 
 AND 
 
 MR. DAVID MACIVER, M.R
 
 \Extracted from the British Empire Newspaper, 
 August 9, 1879.] 
 
 The following correspondence has passed between Sir Louis Mallet, 
 C.B., and Mr. David Maclver, M.P., in respect to Mr. Maclver's recent 
 speech in the House of Commons, on Mr. Chaplin's motion for a 
 Royal Commission, challenging the accuracy of Sir Louis Mallet's 
 figures in his recent pamphlet on " Reciprocity." 
 
 SIR LOUIS MALLET TO MR. D. MACIVER. 
 
 Sir L. Mallet presents his compliments to Mr. Maclver, and with refer- 
 ence to his reported remarks in the House of Commons, begs to enclose a 
 note on the subject of the discrepancies between certain figures given in 
 his letter on *' Reciprocity," and those with which they are compared in 
 the British Empire newspaper. 
 
 India Ofllice, July 15, 1879. 
 
 Manufactured and Half-manufactured Articles. 
 Imports into the United Kingdom, 1877. 
 
 Sir Louis Mallet's figures (taken from the Statistical Abstract for the 
 United Kingdom, 25th number) give the value of the imports under the 
 above head as ohout forty-nine millions. Mr. Maclver, on the other hand, 
 gives their value as nearly sixty-five millions. The discrepancy may be 
 accounted for as follows : 
 
 I. Mr. Maclver includes in his list the following articles which are 
 included by Sir Louis Mallet under the head " Articles for Consumption," 
 viz. : 
 
 Oil-seed cake ;f i,457,003 
 
 Sugar (refined and candied) ...... 5,794,232
 
 Reciprocity: n. {Fv. rrriprorUr.) 
 
 Keciprocal obligation or right; equal mutual rights 
 or benefits to be yielded or enjoyed. 
 
 ' The commissioners offered to negoeiate a treaty on 
 principles of reciprocity.' 
 &c. &c. 
 
 Imi'kuiai. JjiCTiuxAiiy, \ oi. 2, p;ige ,>i'.). 
 
 Published by Blackik & Son, Edinburgh and London. 
 
 Edition 1856.
 
 NATIONAL PROTECTION 
 
 COMMONLY CALLED 
 
 "RECIPROCITY" 
 
 STATED FROM VARIOUS POINTS OF VIEW 
 
 BEING 
 
 REPLIES TO 
 SIR LOUIS MALLET'S CHALLENGE 
 
 IN A LETTER ADDRESSED BY HIM TO 
 
 THOMAS BAZLEY POTTER, M.P. 
 
 AS CHAIRMAN OF THE COBDEN CLUB 
 
 RcpT-intcd from the British Empire Nauspaper of yd May 1879 
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 Pnface By the Editor 
 
 From the ^'' Mantifadiired Goods^^ Point of Vinv .... ,, Veritas 
 
 ,, '■^ Producer and Consumer''^ Point of Vino . . . ,, Aois 
 
 ,, *^ General International Trading'" Point of Vieia ,, Vigilans 
 
 ,, "Agricultural" Point of Vie7c> ,, Plus SoLis PLUS VnVE 
 
 ,, "Lal>02tr" Point of Vieiu , FoRTis IN Arduis 
 
 PUBLISHED BY J. ^^^ BURROWS 
 
 AT THE OFFICE OF THE BKITISIf EMPIRE NEWSPAPER 
 
 47 FLEET STREET, LONDON, E.C. 
 
 1879 
 
 Price Sixpence
 
 NATIONAL LEAFLETS. 
 
 Price One lliilfpeimy each, or, for distribution, \is. per Thousand. 
 
 No. 1. FREE TRADE CRAZE. 
 
 Reprinted from the Monetary Gazette, Jan. 25. 
 
 No. 2. MR. BRIGHT'S LOGIC. 
 
 Reprinted from the Monetary Gazette, Feb. 22. 
 
 No. 3. MAN TO MAN. 
 
 Reprinted from the Monetary Gazette, Mar. 8. 
 
 No. 4. WHERE IS THE OVER-PRODUCTION ? 
 
 Reprinted from the IMonetary Gazette, Mar. 15. 
 
 No. 5. WHERE MAY WE LOOK FOR COMMERCIAL TREATIES? 
 
 Reprinted from the Monetary Gazette, Mar. 29. 
 
 No. 6. THE LABOUR QUESTION. 
 
 Reprinted from the Monetary Gazette, April 12. 
 
 No. 7. FREE TRADE FALLACIES : a Dialogue. 
 
 Reprinted from the British Emtire, May 3. 
 
 No. 8. ENGLAND TO THE RESCUE. 
 
 Reprinted from the British Empire, May 10. 
 
 No. 9. W^ITHOUT MEMORY OR LOGIC. 
 
 Reprinted from the British Emiire, jMay 10. 
 
 No. 10. THE PUBLIC GOOD. 
 
 Reprinted from the British Emfirk, May 17. 
 
 No. II. A W^ARNING. 
 
 Reprinted from the British Empire, May 17. 
 
 No. 12. A LIBERAL REMEDY. 
 
 Reprinted from tlie British Emi'IRE, May 24. 
 
 No. 13. BRITISH INTERESTS. 
 
 Reprinted from the British Em tike, June 7. 
 
 No. 14. JOHN BRIGHT AND JOHN BULL. 
 
 Reprinted from the British Emi'IRE, June 7 
 
 Assorted Parcels of the above may be had for distribution by the 100 or the 1,000. Per 100, 1.1. 6rf.; 
 per 1,000, I2S., free by post to any part of tJic Kingdom. 
 
 Published by J. W. BURROWS, at the Office of the British Empire Newspaper, 
 47 Fleet Street, London, E.C.
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 The Cobden Club has again held its annual festival, and its 
 mennbers have enjoyed their undoubted privilege of once more 
 reasserting their " immortal " principles, reaffirming their infallible 
 dogmas, and congratulating each other that, in the midst of the 
 surrounding gloom, and in the presence of the determined hostility 
 of the rest of the world, they are the sole possessors of the true 
 economical faith. 
 
 The speakers at the annual dinner of the " Club " have been 
 this year somewhat persistent in pointing out that the fiscal policy 
 in their charge is even yet only on its trial— -a period of thirty 
 years or thereabouts being so little in the history of man. Their 
 greatest apostle, however, has recently declared that, in this country, 
 at least, the question was " settled " in 1 846 — so that when doctors 
 disagree, who shall decide ? But " settled," or only on its trial, the 
 subject has too absorbing an interest to be lightly dismissed as 
 beyond the range of discussion. 
 
 In republishing the following papers, written in reply to Sir Louis 
 Mallet's letter to the Chairman of the "Club" — in which it was 
 suggested a prize should be offered by the Cobden Club for the best 
 statement of the " Reciprocity " case — we have nothing to add than 
 that, though originally published on May 3, no serious rejoinder 
 has as yet been attempted, either by Sir Louis Mallet, or any 
 representative, or any advocate of the system generally known as, 
 but most erroneously called, Free Trade. 
 
 Editor "British Empire" Newsp.vper. 
 
 June 24, 1879.
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 The theoretical ideas contained in tlie term "free trade," which latter has, by 
 the force of various exceptional causes, secured for many years an immense 
 hold on the popular mind in Great Britain, are sufficiently captivating, on 
 the surface, to afford some excuse to the unthinking masses who take their 
 opinions at second hand, and join heartily in the most plausible cry of the 
 liour. For this reason a pamphlet issued lately by the Cobden Club, from 
 the pen of Sir Louis Mallet, and purporting to inquire into the question of 
 reciprocity, has been received with the profound deference generally paid 
 to " inspired '"' writings. It is not too much to say that at the present day 
 Englishmen accept their teachings on economics in much the same man- 
 ner as the majority of mankind accept the doctrines of their several reli- 
 gions — without incjuiry, and frequently without even knowing, or caring to 
 know, the basis of tlieir faith. lliere is an orthodoxy in ever)'thing 
 that the popular mind does not readily grasp as well as in creeds, and the 
 fashion of the day has ruled that on the question of political economy 
 the name of Cobden before all — and then that of Mill, or of Bright, 
 or of Gladstone — most appeals to the average Englishman's senses. For 
 this reason anything and everything that emanates from such a source — 
 and probably in a tenfold degree all that comes out with the imprimatur of 
 the Cobden Club and its semi-blasphemous, superficial, and utterly 
 inefficient motto — is swallowed whole without cavil or question. For no 
 other reason can it be conceived possible that so weak a pamphlet as that 
 to which we have referred should have been accepted without protest, or 
 even as quietly as it has been. Probably the chief condemnation of its 
 internal feebleness is to be found in the fact that it has not created any 
 great sensation, which, coming from such a source, would have naturally 
 followed had it been a masterly production. In point of fact it bears all 
 the evidence of having been only hastily thrown together and somewhat 
 carelessly compiled, Sir Louis apparently having in his mind all the time that 
 he was only grappling with* (to use his own tarms) a " man of straw." Had Sir 
 Louis waited till this week he might have employed a happier phrase thrown 
 him by the Prime Minister, and might have said instead that on seeking for 
 his antagonist he always found him a "phantom." He would have found 
 that word admirably suited to his purpose, though perhaps he would scarcely 
 have used it in the sense in which it was employed by Lord Beaconsfield. 
 But since Sir Louis feels this difficulty, and because we cannot admit that 
 Lord Bateman's " Plea for Limited Protection or Reciprocity " — which Sir 
 Louis appears to regard as the representative of what he calls the 
 '• modern reciprocitarian " — is at all calculated to remove it, any more 
 than his lordship's speech of last Tuesdayf in the House of Lords is likely 
 to do so, we have endeavoured to supply the deficiency by papers written 
 !"rom the various points of view of each writer. 
 
 Reciprocity, says an eminent authority, is " dead," and its ghost only 
 survives to lure us on in " phantom " fashion. Reciprocity is " dead " — the 
 
 * May 3, 1879, t April 29, 1879. "^ -^
 
 S/J^ LOUIS MALLETS CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 5 
 
 first Minister of the Crown has said — because ow legislators have nothing 
 left ivherewith to reciprocate. We have long ago given up the arms with 
 which we could fight — all our big guns and nearly all our small arms — 
 and are without the means even to show our teeth. Such, in point of fact, 
 is the first conclusion from the statesman's point of view. Not in a hurry, 
 but after long and patient thought, the country, captivated by brilliant 
 rhetoric and seduced by no less brilliant promises of untold prosperity in 
 the future, decided to reverse all its old fiscal system, and to embark on a 
 new sea. Hence it is no business of the Government, no matter what 
 party to which it belongs, much less of the House of Lords, to interfere 
 with that which the nation has willed, until the country again shows plainly 
 that it desires another reversal of our fiscal policy. Nor would we 
 wish, nor venture to suggest, that aught even now should be done in haste. 
 But it is another question entirely whether the matter is not to be fairly 
 discussed, and the people to be told the plain truth as to the principles of 
 that which is known — or, rather, believed to be known — by the term reci- 
 procity. From that point of view it is not " dead," but certainly lives in 
 the heads and hearts of many. We may say, however, at once, that be- 
 tween the faint creed professed by Lord Bateman — who has posed as a 
 prominent man, if not a leader on the question — and the more decided 
 views of others, there are many stages. We are not sure, indeed, whether 
 Lord Derby* was not right in the main when he described reciprocity as 
 *' protection in a fancy dress." The term was intended as a sneer, of 
 course, and as such the delicate mind of Lord Bateman evidently shrank 
 from the application in his speech on Tuesday lastt in the House of Lords. 
 But we do not hesitate to declare that the protection of home land and labour 
 — of the productive consumer rather than of the unproductive consumer — 
 is the first article of the creed of him whom Sir Louis Mallet terms 
 the "modern reciprocitarian." The word "reciprocity" itself is, indeed, 
 poor in expression, compared with the policy its most earnest and hardest- 
 thinking adherents advocate. It has probably been widely accepted for 
 the very reason that impelled Lord Bateman in so many words to repudiate 
 the veiy mention of the word " protection." 
 
 The " modern reciprocitarian " then, as we have said, aims at protection 
 to British land and labour — but differs from that which popular prejudice 
 somewhat unfairly ascribes to old " protectionism," in that he does not claim 
 to protect the interest of any special class, but to legislate for that of the 
 community at large, and not to leave all commercial action free as 
 the air- any more than society dares to leave the actions of 
 individuals free and unfettered. The " modern reciprocitarian," for 
 instance — to put a hypothetical case — would dismiss the sugar trade ques- 
 tion to the four winds, were it not typical of almost every trade and colling in 
 the kingdom. The interest of 30,000 families — who are represented in the 
 sugar-refining community — would rank as nothing, comjiared with any 
 .advantages that could be shown likely to result to 30 millions of people, by 
 sweeping the 30,000 families away or driving them elsewhere. The 
 " modern reciprocitarian " would impose no duties for the mere sake of 
 levying duties ; but, since taxes must be raised somewhere and somehow, 
 would impose them in such manner that home interests should be thereby 
 protected, that home land and labour might receive a greater demand for 
 its products, and thereby better enable the nation to bear the burden of 
 taxation. There are, naturally enough, " reciprocitarians " and " reciproci- 
 
 * His lordship also quoted this phrase second-hand. f April 29, 1879.
 
 6 5//? LOUIS MALLETS CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 
 
 tarians." Some are only " dissatisfied free traders," who profess to advocate 
 a universal free trade much in the same fashion as the ultra-dissatisfied 
 members of the Cobden Club talk : for even in that sanctum there are 
 dissentients. Others, again, are litde else than what is known by the term 
 "rank protectionists," who do not believe in •' unrestricted competition " in any 
 shape, not even if two nations mutually agree to open their ports to each other. 
 It were indeed impossible to be otherwise, since as long as human nature 
 exists there must ever be degrees of opinion. For this reason, therefore, 
 possibly, Sir Louis Mallet has found himself, as he says in the first lines of his 
 pamphlet, confronted with the " insuperable difficulty " that, 
 ' In spite of much reading and a very sincere desire to understand the objects 
 and arguments of the advocates of this new (.?) commercial policy, I have 
 entirely failed in finding any statement of their case." 
 
 We have therefore endeavoured to supply Sir Louis, in a measure, with 
 that which he so sincerely desires. In the following pages he will find 
 that though every writer more or less treats the subject as a whole, each 
 paper has some special point of view from which he regards the question. 
 For instance, " Veritas " in the first paper has directed his attention mainly 
 to the question of manufactured goods and of luxuries. The tone of 
 " Agis' " mind, in the second paper, appeals more directly to the question 
 of the producer and consumer, and to examine which interests should 
 be primarily regarded. " Vigilans," in the third paper, makes a special 
 feature of our international trade generally. " Plus Solis plus Vitae," in the 
 fourth paper, looks upon the matter from an agriculturist's point of view. And 
 " Fortis in Arduis," in the fifth paper, grapples boldly with the Avhole labour 
 question. One point, however, Sa- Louis Mallet may possibly search for 
 without finding — he may complain that no practical measure is formulated. 
 Sir Louis, however, must remember that it is easier to pull down and 
 destro)"- — as in the case of the introduction of a free trade policy in the 
 days of the Anti-Corn League — than to build up and consolidate a system 
 which must be formulated by practical statesmen, when once the country 
 accepts the principle. When the " dead" has arisen again — as it will when 
 the film from men's eyes is removed, and they see the delusions by which 
 they have been so long ensnared — then will come the hour for such details. In 
 the meanwhile it is our part to rouse all those wlio are willing to think, to 
 a conception of the dangers ahead, and to that " impending shipwreck "— 
 to use the Duke of Rutland's appropriate term — which will inevitably come 
 upon us as a nation if we do not alter our ways. 
 
 While thanking the writers of the following pages for the readiness 
 with which they have responded to our request, let us add that not one of 
 them is " interested " in a business capacity personally with the special 
 features from which he views the question. " Veritas " has nothing to do, 
 to the best of our belief, with the trade of manufactured goods. "Agis" — 
 though a worker in one way — is what would be called a non-productive 
 consumer, against whose iiu mediate interests he argues. " Vigilans " is not 
 a trader, although he occupies a position enabling him to understand even 
 the details of our international commerce. " Plus Solis plus Vitse" is not an 
 agriculturist ; and " Fortis in Arduis" is not in his own person a type of the 
 working classes. Therefore the mind of neither is tinged by any personal 
 interest whatever — a reproach which is frequently and groundlessly 
 brought against the " modern reciprocitarian," to attempt to throw 
 discredit on his motives. 
 
 The Editor " British Empirk " Newspaper.
 
 S/J? LOUIS MALLET'S CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 
 
 FROM THE ''MANUFACTURED GOODS'' 
 POINT OF VIEW. 
 
 Sir Louis Mallet's pamphlet certainly is a most remarkable production. 
 The author cannot be congratulated upon his good taste, for some para- 
 graphs in the pamphlet are almost bordering on profanity. Expressions 
 such as " In thanking God, then, that he is not as other men, or even as 
 this foreigner, the British Pharisee must not be allowed to deceive himself 
 by a phrase ; " and, " Can it be that while the hands are Esau's hands, the 
 voice is the voice of Jacob, inviting us in the name of reciprocity to barter 
 our free trade birthright for a mess of protectionist pottage ? " are not very 
 creditable to a writer who really has some standing, and a reputation to 
 lose ; but we have more to do with Sir L. Mallet's accuracy than his good 
 taste, and we think it will be found that he is as wanting in one as in the 
 other. 
 
 One of the first things that Sir L. Mallet assails is the word " recipro- 
 city," which he informs us is totally inapplicable to the policy which has 
 been so long advocated in these columns. 
 
 We perfectly agree with him that " tlie essence of all trade is and must 
 be ' reciprocity,' " but we decidedly demur to the statement which follows 
 it, that " every transaction of commerce, by which one man voluntarily 
 sells his produce or property to another, is an act of 7'eciprocity, a?id is com- 
 plete in itself.'' The essence of reciprocity in the treatment of either nations 
 or individuals, is that both parties should be treated alike, and if one gets 
 all the kicks, and the other all the half-pence, the treatment can hardly be 
 called reciprocal, even if an engagement had previously been entered into 
 to that effect. 
 
 The statement also that " the more nearly the tariffs of foreign countries 
 approach to the limits of prohibition, the more will the British producer be 
 protected in his own market," is so ludicrously incorrect that it seems im- 
 possible that the learned writer can have intended to make it in that form. 
 Does he really mean to affirm that if the French tariff is so increased as to 
 absolutely exclude our manufactures, while her own are imported here free, 
 that it would tend to "protect the British producer in his own market' ? 
 We imported from France jQ^x millions worth of manufactured goods in 
 the year 1877, each and all of which competed with precisely the same goods 
 manufactured here, while owing to the high import duties in France we 
 only sent under f[^\o millions worth there. Does Sir L. Mallet really mean 
 that if the latter were excluded from France it would give greater protection 
 to the English producer ? While on this point, we may notice that in the 
 appendix to the j^amphlet there is a list of " Imports of manufactures into 
 England, 1877," in which it is stated that only ^16,060,400 were imported 
 from France. We will refer our readers to the table issued in our number 
 of January 4 last. That table was compiled with the greatest care from 
 the Board of Trade returns, and it showed that ^21,240,462 of manufac-
 
 8 S//^ LOUIS MALLETS CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 
 
 tares were imported from France in 1877. So much for Sir L. Mallet's 
 accuracy on that point ! 
 
 It is rather amusing to find our learned author quoting from Mill's 
 Principles of Political Economy that " things are only in their permanent 
 state when the exports and imports exactly pay for each other." With a 
 total of imports of ^^394,419,682, and a total of exports of ;^i 98,893,065, 
 he must have felt that, according to his own quotation, our trade was very 
 far from a position of " stable equilibrium," but he tries to get out of the 
 difficulty by stating that in recent years the imports of gold and silver 
 bullion into the United Kingdom have exceeded the exports — the average 
 annual excess in the last five years being, according to Sir Louis, nearly 5 
 millions per annum. Now, although his figures are in this instance per- 
 fectly correct, yet we think it would have been fairer if he had mentioned 
 that in the year 1877 the balance was the other way, and that we exported 
 two millions and a half more bullion than we imported, but no one really 
 knows better than Sir Louis that bullion transactions are no real test of 
 financial position in the present day. Where Sir Louis makes a mistake is 
 in confounding the import of foreign goods that we do not manufacture 
 here with those which we do manufacture here. VV^e want as much of 
 the former as we can get, and as little of the latter, and in that sense 
 the words that he puts in the mouths of the advocates of recipro- 
 city, viz., that they say "Our policy is to induce foreign countries 
 to take more of our goods, and give us less of theirs in return" (p. 12 of 
 the pamphlet), are perfectly correct. Such a doctrine, Sir Louis tells us, 
 " is not likely to be very popular either with the producing or with the 
 consuming classes of this country." We think he is considerably mistaken 
 on this point. To the producing classes it is a matter of most vital im- 
 portance to prevent the yearly increasing importation of foreign manu- 
 factured goods, which enter into direct competition with their own 
 productions in the home market. Sir Louis, like many other writers of 
 his way of thinking, tries to make out that the amount of foreign manu- 
 factured goods imported into this country is far below what it really is. 
 We shall come to this point soon, and shall show how utterly wrong his 
 figures are, and we only now wish to point out that to those producing 
 classes a policy which prevents foreign competition in their own market 
 must be an advantageous one, and that they are not such fools as to be 
 made to believe, even on the authority of so distinguished a man as Sir 
 Louis Mallet, C.B., "that every Englishman who sells or buys in a foreign 
 country, whatever be the tariff' of that country or of his own, is already in 
 the possession of complete reciprocity." Moreover, let it be well remembered 
 that those producing classes are now far more numerous than they were 
 in years gone by. PZngland, whether the change be for better or worse, 
 has ceased to be what she used to be, viz. " an agricultural country." 
 Out of a total population of 26,072,284 in England, Scotland, and Wales 
 at the last census, 5,105,998, or very nearly one-fifth of the whole, were 
 engaged in manufacturing pursuits or trades, such as mining, dependent 
 upon them. We do not for one instant mean to depreciate the importance 
 of the agricultural interest in this country, and we hope to show hereafter 
 how completely that interest ought to be bound up with those of the 
 manufacturing classes in this matter. But it is important to show that 
 numerically the manufacturing classes vastly preponderate, for those 
 engaged in agriculture now are only one-fourteenth of the population. 
 Moreover, besides those actually engaged in manufacturing pursuits as 
 mentioned above, there are a vast number of shopkeepers, etc. in our manufac-
 
 S/Ji LOUIS MALLET'S CHALLENGE ANSWEI^ED. 
 
 turing towns who are as dependent on the welfare of our staple trades as 
 the very workmen themselves, and that when they are once made to under- 
 stand how ruinous our present commercial policy is to those trades, they 
 will probably be willing enough to forego the small advantage they get as 
 " consumers " in buying cheap foreign goods. Those " consumers " them- 
 selves, too, are becoming alive to the fact that they do not gain all they 
 think they do by the cheapness of these goods. The British housewife 
 has already found out that it takes two lumps of beet sugar to sweeten a 
 cup of tea as much as one lump of cane sugar would do, and that the 
 ruination of our English loaf sugar trade has been anything but beneficial 
 to her pocket. 
 
 We now come to the most important part of Sir Louis's pamphlet, viz., 
 where he tries to show that the real injury to the manufacturing classes of 
 this country caused by foreign competition is so small that it would not be 
 worth while laying import duties upon it. 
 
 He puts the values of our imports in 1877 of ''manufactured and half- 
 manufactured goods" at ^49,089,241. We give below a list carefully 
 compiled from the Board of Trade returns for that year, and for the 
 accuracy of which we can vouch. It amounts, as will be seen, to as nearly 
 as possible half as much again as the amount stated by Sir Louis ; and 
 upon this we will merely remark that a gentleman who is so little to be 
 trusted in his figures is not very worthy of trust in the deductions that he 
 draws from them. 
 
 List of articles imported in the year iSj'j into this country dutyfree. 
 
 Beads of glass . , 
 
 Candles .... 
 
 Caoutchouc manufactures 
 
 Chemical manufactures and products . 
 
 China and porcelain ware 
 
 Clocks .... 
 
 Cordage and twine 
 
 Cork, manufactured 
 
 Cotton yarn .... 
 
 Cotton manufactures . 
 
 Drugs, unenumerated . 
 
 Embroidery and needlework . 
 
 Flowers, artificial 
 
 Glass of all kinds 
 
 Hair, manufactures of . 
 
 Hats and bonnets of felt 
 
 ,, ,, of straw 
 
 Hides, tanned, tawed, curried, or dressed 
 Jute yarn .... 
 
 Lace ..... 
 Leather manufactures — boots and shoes 
 ,, ,, gloves 
 
 ,, ,, unenumerated . 
 
 Linen yarn .... 
 
 ,, manufactures 
 Metals — Copper, unwrought and part wrought 
 
 Iron in bars, unwrought 
 
 Steel, unwrought 
 
 Iron and steel, wrought or manufactured 
 
 Lead, pig and sheet . 
 
 Tin, in blocks, ingots, bars, or slabs 
 Musical instruments 
 Oil, seed .... 
 
 Oil, chemical, essential, and perfumed 
 
 A2 
 
 Value. 
 ;^66,26o 
 430,511 
 
 1,484,794 
 
 1,056,466 
 
 279,888 
 513.387 
 
 542,048 
 
 491,503 
 379,801 
 
 1,764,802 
 
 481,501 
 
 84, 609 
 
 588,828 
 
 1,908,167 
 
 116,510 
 
 103,588 
 
 79,925 
 2,953,722 
 
 37,959 
 521,384 
 348,786 
 
 1,518,557 
 379,005 
 285,942 
 289,459 
 
 2,888,371 
 
 977,971 
 
 70,687 
 
 1,537,063 
 
 2,016,803 
 
 961,398 
 
 615,702 
 
 569,967 
 
 237,484
 
 lO 
 
 .S-/A' LOUIS MALLETS CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 
 
 Oil seed cake .... 
 
 Painter's colours .... 
 
 Paper of all kinds (except hangings) . 
 
 Paper hangings .... 
 
 Silk, manufactures .... 
 
 Skins and furs, dressed, and manufactures therefrom 
 
 Sugar, refined and candy 
 
 Toys ...... 
 
 Watches ..... 
 
 Wood — house frames, fittings, and joiners' work 
 
 Woollen manufactures 
 
 W^oollen yarn ..... 
 
 Goods, unenumerated — wrt;////^<r^«n'i/, vide page 63 
 of Trade Returns .... 
 
 Grand Total 
 
 Board 
 
 1,457,003 
 
 759,552 
 
 1,220,500 
 
 62,95s 
 
 12,860,988 
 
 1,366,324 
 
 5,794,232 
 
 444,829 
 
 504,164 
 
 120,524 
 
 5,235,948 
 
 1,753,718 
 
 5,748,653 
 
 ^63, 9 1 2, 238 
 
 Some exception may be taken to my including " Tin in blocks, ingots, 
 bars, or slabs " in the above return, as it may be said that such articles can 
 hardly be considered as " half manufactured goods " ; but it must be re- 
 membered that tin is found in large quantities in Cornwall, and that a very 
 large population has been almost reduced to destitution by foreign com- 
 petion in the tin trade, vast quantities being now imported which have gone 
 through the first process of manufacture. Moreover, there is just as much 
 reason to include them as there is to include pig iron, which has gone 
 through a similar stage of preliminary manufacture. 
 
 So far, then, from having to deal only with an eighth part of our import 
 trade, as stated by Sir Louis, we should have to deal with a sixth of it if we 
 returned to import duties on manufactures. When Sir Louis comes to 
 examine the " sources of our supplies " he is equally, or even more grossly, 
 inaccurate. He deliberately states that the value of the manufactures which 
 we import from the United States " is less than £,2millio}is sterling, of which 
 more than half consists of tanned and curried hides." Let us see what the 
 real facts are, which the following table will show : 
 
 Table of Manufactured Goods Imported from the 
 
 Clocks 
 
 Chemical manufactures 
 
 *Cotton manufactures 
 
 Drugs . 
 
 Furniture 
 
 (ilass manufactures 
 
 Hides, tanned . 
 
 House frames, &c. 
 
 Iron manufactures 
 
 Linen manufactures 
 
 Leather manufactures 
 
 Muskets , . 
 
 Oil-seed cake . 
 
 Painters' colours 
 
 Sugar, refined . 
 
 Toys . 
 
 Woollen manufactures 
 
 Total 
 
 including boots and shoes) 
 
 United States in 1877. 
 
 . ^107,780 
 
 
 37,074 
 
 
 400,000 
 
 
 33,591 
 
 
 77,064 
 
 
 4,393 
 
 
 1,090,811 
 
 
 37,493 
 
 
 200,000 
 
 
 5,162 
 
 
 30,499 
 
 
 6,199 
 
 
 1,051,843 
 
 
 15,081 
 
 
 425,150 
 
 
 13.813 
 
 
 23,568 
 
 
 ;^3,559,S2i 
 
 * The above figures, with the exception of " Cotton manufactures," are taken from 
 the Board of Trade Returns. For some unaccountable reason, "Cotton manufactures"' 
 are not there mentioned among imports from the United States, but we have it on the 
 authority of U.S. returns that 2,008,348 dols. were cxi^orted to Great Britain during 
 1877.
 
 S/J^ LOUIS MALLETS CHALLENGE ANSWERED. ii 
 
 So much for Sir Louis's accuracy, his timo milUons having grown to more 
 X^x'a.'o. three and a half m^S!i\ox\%. But to this amount may fairly be added 
 the following articles of partially manufactured goods, viz. : 
 
 Copper, unwrought and part wrought .... ;^27,326 
 
 Lead, pig or sheet ...... 12,663 
 
 Oil, turpentine ....... 320,834 
 
 Oil, chemical ....... 43)364 
 
 Total ..... .;^404,i87 
 
 which will bring the total up to nearly ;^4 millions without including " un- 
 enumerated articles of manufactured goods," which would probably amount 
 to at least half a million more. So much for Sir Louis's accuracy on this 
 point, and with it falls his absurd argument that because we could not touch 
 the United States, therefore we should have no right to place an import 
 duty on Frencli manufactures. 
 
 But the most extraordinary misstatement on Sir Louis's part is contained 
 at p, 22 of his pamphlet. He there says that '■'■the importations of manufac- 
 tured goods from France do not greatly exceed the amount of the British exports." 
 Now, the real facts are as stated in our issue of January 4 last, that while 
 the imports from France were 07'er twenty millions, the exports to France 
 were under ten millions. 
 
 We leave it to our readers to say whether a writer who makes such 
 statements is worthy of any credence at all. Sir Louis commences his 
 pamphlet by saying that, " whenever I approached my adversary, I found 
 him to be a man of straw," and that no " programme of practical measures 
 which will stand the test of serious discussion " has ever been put forward 
 by the advocates of reciprocity. We will answer him by saying that in 
 the first place our policy would be to place an import duty on the manu- 
 factured goods of all countries that refused to allow our manufactures to 
 be imported free. We have already shown that in the year 1877 the 
 amount of goods imported on which such a duty could be levied was 
 sixty-four and a half millions. We would not propose to make this duty 
 prohibitory, but would place it sufficiently high to prevent any possibility 
 of unfair competition in the home market. 
 
 We should also endeavour to form a national Zollvcrein between Great 
 Britain and all her vast colonies and dependencies. To do this we should 
 be prepared to place a small import duty on United States corn and other 
 food produce, in order to divert that supply from the United States, that 
 refuses to take our manufactures in exchange, to Canada and our other 
 colonies who joined this Zollverein and consented to take them//%'. 
 
 We have shown how we would treat the manufactures of countries that 
 refuse us reciprocity. We should treat all alike, so that there would be no 
 excuse for statements like those of Sir Louis, that we were retaliating on a 
 country which only taxes our imports 20 per cent, or less, while we left 
 untouched a country like the United Slates, which taxes them double. 
 
 But although at the present moment the greatest need of change in our 
 commercial policy is caused by the distress amongst our manufacturing 
 population, still it must not be forgotten that there is also a cry, and a well- 
 founded one, from our agricultural classes. It is becommg more and more 
 impossible for our high-priced English land to compete with the virgin soil 
 of the United States. Those agricultural classes, as has been already stated, 
 are numerically but a small proportion of the whole population, but the 
 owners of the land have immense power in the country, and it is useless to 
 think that they will ever concede to the manufacturing classes the recipro-
 
 12 67A' LOUIS MALLETS C/IALLEiYGE ANSWERED. 
 
 city for which they ask, unless at the same time something is done for the 
 agricultural classes in return, and both classes must work hand in hand 
 together. 
 
 In consenting to a small import duty on food, the working classes will 
 remember that cheap bread is of no use to those who are out of work, and 
 have nothing to buy it with. 
 
 We are quite aware of the use which our adversaries made in former 
 years of the " cheap loaf cry," and doubtless will make again, but it is of 
 the utmost importance, apart from any other consideration, that the 
 Empire should be self-supporting^ and if a very trifling advantage were 
 once given to Canada over the United States, we should soon be just as 
 cheaply supplied from the former as we now are from the latter, so that 
 the injury to that important individual, the British consumer, will be but 
 temporary. 
 
 Veritas.
 
 SIJ^ LOUIS MALLET'S CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 
 
 FROM THE ''PRODUCER v. CONSUMER" 
 POINT OF VIEJV. 
 
 You have asked me to make a few observations on a recent pamphlet 
 which, however insignificant in itself, is supposed to have a certain weight 
 because it is printed for the Cobden Club, and printed at their request. 
 It is, I must say, frankly, a somewhat flimsy and unsubstantial production ; 
 but, considering the materials Sir Louis Mallet had to deal with, and the 
 weight of economical error under which he labours, I do not know that he 
 could be expected to have done much better, A man who starts from the 
 assumption that two and two make five cannot arrive at any very useful 
 conclusions. I am not imputing any special ignorance to Sir Louis Mallet. 
 He only shares and endorses the fundamental error of his teachers — Mr. 
 Ricardo, Mr. McCulloch, M. Jean Baptiste Say, Mr. Bright, and Mr. 
 Cobden — that true wisdom is shown in buying in the cheapest and selling 
 in the dearest market. Now, setting aside for the moment the question 
 of the true interests of the community, which are practically ignored by the 
 whole of this free trade school, and considering the interests of individuals 
 only, it is absolutely and even ludicrously false that it is always best to buy in 
 the cheapest and sell in the dearest market. I will tell Sir Louis Mallet 
 what is true, though I have considerable doubt whether his mind will not 
 be too deeply clouded by prejudice to be able to profit by the lesson. It 
 is not always wise then to buy in the cheapest and sell in the dearest 
 market, for that is often the height of folly (as I shall hope to con- 
 vince Sir Louis and even the Cobden Club), but it is wise to buy in 
 the best market— which may often be the dearest nominally — where you 
 can obtain the best and soundest goods ; and to sell in the surest 
 market, where you are likely to carry on a lasting and a profitable trade. 
 As soon as this higher truth is stated the fallacy of the old formula 
 will become patent, it is to be hoped, to every capacity. The thing to be 
 considered in business is lasting, not immediate, profit. The mere consi- 
 deration of immediate money gains is secondary. Suppose a man 
 could engage in two branches of business, one bringing only lo and the 
 other 20 per cent, but that the former of these occupations were healthful, 
 and the latter injurious to human life, and likely to shorten it. AVhich 
 business would pay best ? I am endeavouring to make my illustrations as 
 simple as I can, that even the Cobden Club may be able to follow me. 
 A man's health and strength are his main capital. Any undue waste of 
 these would be equivalent to a most heavy money loss. It would involve 
 the probable surrender of the whole bulk of a man's capital in order to 
 obtain a higher interest for the moment. Now apply this to a country or 
 community. If it be true, even of an individual (as it is) that momentary 
 gain means often permanent loss, that it is often most unwise to buy in the 
 cheapest and sell in the dearest market, how for more true is this of a 
 country or a nation ! The bodily, mental and moral health, strength, and
 
 14 S/J^ LOUIS MALLET'S CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 
 
 wealth of the whole population of the country are its chief capital. Now 
 imagine what the wisdom of a system of political economy must be which 
 puts this entirely on one side as a matter of no account, and assumes as 
 its primary axiom that true economy has nothing to do with communities 
 but only with individual gains and losses ! I repeat that the health 
 and strength of the population are the chief source of wealth to the land, 
 and these depend on two things, first the power of healthful production, 
 and secondly the obtaining of a reasonable profit for produce. If, by 
 whatever means, the prices of the goods produced fall below a profitable 
 or paying standard, the business must come to an end, and the population 
 must starve or emigrate. 
 
 The underlying assumption in the minds of '• free traders " is that plenty 
 and consequent cheapness are absolutely good under all circumstances, 
 and this is what they mean when they tell us that the State has nothing 
 to do with the producer as such, but has only to consider the con- 
 sumer's interests, because all producers are consumers. Here economical 
 errors multiply so thick and so fast that it is hard to know which to 
 reprobate first. But let us go to the chief assumption that plenty must 
 be always a benefit. Now, as this world is constituted, plenty is only 
 a benefit when it is the result of healthful energ)-. Conceive the trees to 
 bear loaves of bread, and the rivers to run with wine and milk — or let us 
 say with milk only, not to tread upon the corns of teetotallers — would that 
 be a benefit to society? We have all heard of the bread-fruit tree ot 
 Polynesia ! Are we prepared to accept Tahiti, as it was, as our ideal ? 
 As plain matter of fact, is it not certain that too great luxuriance on 
 the part of the productive unaided powers of nature is highly prejudicial 
 to the interests of humanity ? Can I not make it clear to Sir Louis 
 Mallet and the Cobden Club that the primary sentence on man is also his 
 highest blessing ? " In the sweat of thy brOAv thou shalt eat bread." But 
 if this be so, it follows that healthful labour is the primary source to man 
 of all wealth, and that sound political economy must interest itself primarily 
 in the well-being of labour, or in other words of the producer. \\'hat 
 shall, what must we say then of a system of political economy grounded 
 on the unhappy absurdity that the State has only, or mainly, to do with 
 consumers, when ninety-nine out of every hundred can only consume on 
 the condition of producing first ? 
 
 Labour in all its forms was the first source of propert}' ; labour 
 took possession of the soil and tilled it, and thereby became a landowner. 
 Then labour in the shape of higher mental energy organised division and 
 cultivation of the soil. The seeming curse of partial sterility or stubborn- 
 ness on the part of nature was the highest blessing in disguise. Industry, 
 zeal, activity, self-control, manly virtue in all its forms, became needful to 
 attain the wished-for goal. In so complex a matter as human society, 
 various influences have to be allowed for ; the paternal developing into 
 patriarchal authority, the headspring of the monarchical and hereditary 
 principle, and also physical strength and courage and military daring, the 
 power to resist and to attack ; and above all energ)-, physical and mental — 
 but chiefly mental energy in cultivation and production on a large scale, 
 raising one man above his fellows and enabling him to become a practical 
 capitalist. Now, in a highly complicated state of society, the result of a 
 long-lasting and ever-widening civilisation, we have landholders, tenants, 
 and labourers, master manufacturers and workmen, all the vast body of 
 those who are engaged in commercial undertakings of every kind, all wlio 
 contribute directly to the health and wealth of the community, lawyers.
 
 SIR LOUIS MALLETS CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 15 
 
 divines, physicians, soldiers, sailors, all the guardians of society, and all 
 these are in a true sense producers. Fundholders, as suc/i, are not, because 
 they consume without producing. The money which they have lent to 
 the State or elsewhere, however, produces, for money breeds money, 
 so that they are not useless ; but it is manifest that their welfare is not to be 
 preferred to that of the direct producer. Now it should be almost un- 
 necessary to say that the first condition of all production is profit. There 
 must be a market, and a sale at a reasonable rate. Is it not clear that the 
 wealth of a State must depend in the long run on the amount and value of 
 its produce, which is the expression of the healthful energy of its popula- 
 tion ? Plenty is admirable, if it be the result of labour ; if it comes in any 
 other way it is a delusion and a snare. What satisfaction could it 
 be to us to have corn selling at 10s. or ^s. a quarter in our markets, 
 and cattle at an equally low rate, if the land were thrown out of cultiva- 
 tion, if all our landlords were ruined, and our agricultural classes driven 
 from the land ? Or, supposing, for argument's sake, that we could obtain 
 foreign manufactured goods, the result of underpaid labour, at so low a 
 rate that we could only compete with foreigners, if at all, on the condition of 
 reducing our manufacturing workmen to the state of helots, would money 
 cheapness be any equivalent to the nation for the ruin of its manufacturing 
 population ? But, if this be granted, it is apparent that cheapness is not an 
 absolute good, and that it is a fundamental error to seek to constitute the 
 world's well-being on a ground-work of unrestricted competition or " free 
 trade." It is far better that I should have to put forth my best energies 
 in one shape or other than that I should be fed by others as a helpless 
 infant on the choicest luxuries. Clearly in the long run cheapness at the 
 expense of native labour would mean actual ruin. The great body of the 
 population would have, as I have said, to starve or emigrate, and we 
 should have lost life itself, national existence, for the sake of momentary 
 money gains. 
 
 Now when these first principles are settled, and not before, we can 
 approach the question of reciprocity. Sir Louis Mallet and the Cobden 
 Club conceive that they are settled in the interest of cheapness. They 
 cHng to the old transparent fallacies, first that it is best for the individual to 
 buy in the cheapest and sell in the dearest market, instead of selling in the 
 best and buying in the surest — (by-the-bye, did not Sir Louis offer a con- 
 siderable sum to anyone who should disprove this worn-out fallacy?) ; and 
 secondly, that the State should only consider the interests of consumers, 
 and aim at money cheapness and plenty, no matter at what cost. 'Of 
 course, if this were so, if cheapness were the only thing to be considered, 
 the cheapness of the moment, then indeed reciprocity would be absolute 
 nonsense, for doubtless the levying a tax on foreign produce must have a 
 tendency to raise prices finally. If all we had to aim at was the obtaining 
 of goods at a low money-rate, we should be only spiting ourselves, as Sir 
 Louis tells us, if we retaliated on France or Germany, or the United States 
 of America, by taxing their exports because they taxed ours. But if, on 
 the contrary, the cherished axioms of free traders are altogether mis- 
 chievous and foolish errors, errors of the worst kind, however specious and 
 fair-seeming, then reciprocity becomes a matter of bounden duty and of the 
 plainest common sense. 
 
 Now I am not greatly concerned, I must own, to defend the 
 language of Lord Bateman on the subject of free and unrestricted com- 
 merce or exchanges, for I have shown it to be founded on a fallacy, that 
 the interests of the productive classes should not be considered primarily.
 
 i6 Sl/y! LOUIS MALLETS CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 
 
 which they always ought to be. But the truth is that the most vigorous minds 
 of the last generation have been deceived in England, and as far as I 
 know, in England alone, by the sophistries of Messrs. Ricardo, McCulloch, 
 etc. Some notion of the logical value of Mr. Ricardo's speculations may 
 be gained from the simple fact that he considers rent to be the profit 
 which remains over and above, if any (on the basis of supply and demand 
 as ruling prices), after the actual cultivators, tenant and labourer, have 
 reaped their profit. The truth is, that in every civilised country, land has 
 an intrinsic value like gold or money, variable indeed, but always real. As 
 money must always bear interest, so land will always bear rent. If I lend 
 a hundred pounds to a man he has to pay me interest for it at so much, 
 quite independent of the question whether he derives a personal profit 
 from the use of my money. So if I let him a farm he has to pay me rent 
 for the use of my land, wholly apart from the question of his profit. 
 Rent is the equivalent for the use of land, as the payment of interest is 
 the equivalent for the use of money. But even this primary and most 
 obvious truth is a mystery to Mr. Ricardo ; indeed, he practically denies 
 it, and involves the whole subject in smoke. 
 
 But to resume, the world is governed by words, at least too often. 
 Free trade and unrestricted intercourse among nations sound very fine. 
 What they mean is ruin in the long run to all producers, that is, to the 
 whole country. For a country's wealth, I repeat, does not depend on 
 immediate money cheapness, but on the development of all the energies of 
 the nation. 
 
 It is needless to say that all foreign countries see this fact, and so do 
 all our greatest colonies. They have not, indeed, found the Columbus's 
 egg of the matter, the axiom that all true wealth and health must be 
 grounded on the well-being of labour. But they are like Molifere's •" bour- 
 geois gentillioiiune" who had talked prose all his life without knowing it. 
 They have acted on a common-sense theory, though they have not ex- 
 pounded it. It has been expounded, indeed, by Sismondi, Alison, and others, 
 but the business of a true national league must now be to carry home 
 sound theory to the hearts and heads of all reasonable men, the very 
 Cobden Club included. For, after all, Sir Louis Mallet and his friends 
 cannot wish to injure their country. Let us beware of imputing the errors 
 of Messrs. Bright, Cobden, Fawcett, &c., to self-interest. No, they have 
 been honestly persuaded that immediate cheapness was the best goal, that 
 we had nothing to do but to consult the momentary seeming interest of 
 the consumer, and always to buy in the cheapest and sell in the dearest 
 market. Is it unreasonable to hope that a clearer light may dawn on them 
 yet? As Shakespeare has said : 
 
 "Good reasons must, perforce, give way to better." 
 
 Let them reconsider the starting-point. Should we not aim at the 
 increase and consolidation of national wealth and health? Competition, 
 doubtless, has its great uses within due hmits. It awakens and stirs \\\i 
 energy in agriculture and manufactures alike, and to this extent it is good, 
 nay, necessary. But there is a limit. The profit of healthful labour is the 
 first essential, and on that tlie good of the commonwealth and greatness of 
 the empire must be grounded. I say nothing of the imperial or colonial 
 question now. There will be time enough for that. I am only anxious to 
 show that the securing the rights and interests of native labour is the first 
 condition of well-being for any community. Reciprocity follows as a 
 matter of course, as far as the interests of native labour allow. This is a
 
 SIR LOUIS MALLETS CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 17 
 
 matter of practical arrangement between statesmen and governments, 
 grounded on the plainest common sense. But again and again I say the 
 foundation on which the well-being and greatness of every country and 
 empire must be reared is the healthful occupation of labour, and all 
 cheapness at the expense of this involves a fearful loss of money and of 
 money's-worth to the whole country, first of all to the productive classes, 
 but finally to the consumers also, because whether we see it or no, we 
 are all one body, socially and politically members one of another, and must 
 ultimately stand or fall together. 
 
 I beg to subscribe myself, Mr. Editor, by the name of a warrior of old, 
 who did his country some service, but scarcely reaped his due — I mean 
 
 Agis. 
 
 A3
 
 i8 S/R LOUIS MALLETS CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 
 
 FROM THE ''GENERAL INTERNATIONAL 
 TRADING'' POINT OF VIEW. 
 
 An opinion is rapidly extending itself throughout the country that, ni 
 view of the melancholy condition of our trade as contrasted with that of 
 America and certain European nations, and in consequence of the daily 
 increasing displacement of British industry by the growing importation of 
 foreign produce and manufactures, some inherent defect exists in our com- 
 mercial relationship with the world, some grand change is needful to 
 resuscitate British commerce and reinvigorate the market for British 
 labour. In no frantic haste, in no mere sentiment, from no feeling of 
 jealousy or ill-will, men in vast numbers are becoming convinced that 
 foreign countries are and have been for years getting much the best of us 
 in the general trade in which we are engaged with them. Trade returns 
 and practical experience, in the form of departed profits and increasing 
 losses, are to them forcible proofs that a reversal of pre-existing inter- 
 national economy has set in, and that advantages we once enjoyed have 
 been insidiously transferred to commercially hostile communities. 
 
 It is borne in mind that England has for twenty years fought, with free 
 ports, a world armed with almost prohibitive tariffs. The establishment 
 of such a condition of things, thoroughly voluntary as it was, had for its 
 raison d'etre implicit faith in the soundness of the economical doctrines 
 by which we were guided, and hopes that foreign countries, converted to 
 our views, would hasten to adopt them, and divest themselves of those 
 garments of pure protection to which they had so long been accustomed. 
 
 No such prospect, however, opens up, and capitalist, manufacturer, 
 and labourer, alike yearn for that element in international commerce Avhich 
 in all matters — political and social — is deemed essential to the well-being 
 of communities. That element is " Reciprocity," a common understand- 
 ing for mutual benefit based on the enlightened principles of political 
 econemy which alone forms the distinguishing mark between the barbarism 
 of mere barter and the improved polity of really civilised commerce. Such 
 a response was the reward Sir Robert Peel looked for in releasing, in 
 opposition to the country party of the day, so large an amount of foreign 
 jjroduce from the high tariffs prevalent. Similar hopes buoyed up Mr. 
 Cobden in renewing and extending in i860 the action of his great prede- 
 cessor. " Reciprocal instrument " was the explanatory and defensive term 
 given to the French Treaty by Mr. Gladstone, and it is no doubtful state- 
 ment to assert that the whole of the free trade action of this country since 
 1846 has been, as respects the foreigner and his commercial legislation, 
 purely experimental. 
 
 Thirty-three years, a complete generation of time, finds us still single- 
 handed in the contest, our monopoly of manufacture non-existent, and a 
 teeming and closely-packed population, whose constant employment is a 
 necessity not to be trilled with. Self-preservation is our first law, and the
 
 S/J^ LOUIS MALLET'S CHAI^LENGE ANSWERED. 19 
 
 only alternative to a re-imposition of duties sufficient to divert home capital 
 to home uses is the yielding to us that condition on which our faith in 
 treaties was ever based, viz., mutual advantage, mutual benefit, or, in one 
 graphic expression, " Reciprocity." 
 
 Sir Louis Mallet, in his letter to Mr. T. B. Potter, M.P., designed to 
 bring ridicule and contempt on those who advocate the application of this 
 great principle, presents us with a document whose every page, whilst 
 bristling with inconsistencies, contains within itself, at the same time, the 
 most thorough vindication of his opponent's arguments. 
 
 What is reciprocity, and how will they apply it ? is the question pro- 
 pounded. On the very title-page is the motto of the Cobden League, 
 " Free trade, peace, goodwill among nations." What is this but a prayer 
 for " reciprocity "? The disagreement between Sir Louis and those who differ 
 from him being that whilst he must be held to assume that the appeal is 
 realised, they, on the contrary, assert that practical everyday life displays the 
 one-sided character of international trade, and demands the fulfilment of 
 the condition which was undoubtedly in the mind's eye of those who 
 launched free trade upon a world, as it, appears ill-prepared to understand 
 or ajjpreciate its economical value. 
 
 What is reciprocity? "The essence of all trade is and must be reci- 
 procity," says Sir Louis. He speaks elsewhere too of a school of econo- 
 mists who "by discouraging and discrediting all attempts to obtain 
 * reciprocity ' of free trade, and by ignoring the incontestable truth that 
 you cannot have free trade without reciprocity, &c., &c." So that 
 " reciprocity," even in the opinion of Sir Louis Mallet, and we must sup- 
 pose of the Cobden Club, is admitted to be a real force, and its advocates 
 therefore are not fairly liable to the abuse which doctrinaires of the Stuart 
 Mill following are so accustomed to fling at them. 
 
 We have, therefore, Sir Louis Mallet with us thoroughly, though it 
 may be somewhat in spite of himself, as to the value of the doctrine which 
 the advocates of reciprocity seek to insist upon as the rem desideratum 
 in international trade. Our difference, then, is mainly in the admission as 
 to the extent to which that doctrine already applies, and as to its further 
 application. 
 
 Sir Louis thinks a " one-sided free trade better than no free trade at 
 all." We reply, "Free trade" implies, and was intended by its autJiors to 
 involve, reciprocity. No half measures could be called free trade. 
 Nothing can be lialf free. A man with one hand shackled to one leg is 
 bodily half free, but precisely and morally he is the complete slave. The 
 trade between two countries may be, fiscally speaking, half free, but inas- 
 much as the manufactures of one are protected by a duty imposed on them 
 by the other, there is no complete freedom of trade, but an utter absence 
 real reciprocity. " If one tariff is bad, two must be worse," adds Sir 
 Louis. Not so, if the interests of our producers are first considered, for 
 the imposition of duties on foreign products to any extent would, in pro- 
 portion, throw money now spent abroad into home channels, encouraging 
 home labour and production. 
 
 In the examples of the ^' barique^' of wine, it is overlooked that on 
 the basis of argument there employed, the English producer and consumer 
 pay the whole '• damage " of duty. They get less wine for their manufac- 
 tures exported, and they pay the duty on that wine when' imported, whilst 
 the foreign Government, having the benefit of the extreme duty on the L;inca- 
 shire cloth, the individual importer of the cloth is the better in the bargain, 
 fiscally, by the proportion of that duty, which saves him taxation of another 
 kind.
 
 20 S/Ji LOUIS MALLETS CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 
 
 Following up this question of the effects of non-reciprocity, and seeking 
 to show the result to a country indulging in the levying of high tariffs, Sir 
 Louis says " that to whatever extent it closes its ports on foreign commo- 
 dities, it prevents foreign countries from importing its own." We need only 
 point to the proportions of our trade with America, the highest tariff maker 
 of the world, to fix an irremovable negative on such a statement. 
 
 The United States declined to take more of our commodities last year 
 than ^15 millions. That did not prevent them shipping to us the enor- 
 mous amount of ^^90 millions of produce, &c. In 1872 the proportions 
 were — imports, ;^54,66o,ooo, exports ^45,900,000. A proportion of 11 
 to 9 in a total of ^^loo millions as against, under increased tariffs, the pre- 
 sent proportion of 18 to 3 in a total of ^^105 millions, almost an identical 
 volume. Is it thus, then, that we are to realise the assertion " That the 
 more foreign tariffs approach to the limits of prohibition, the more ^vill the 
 British producer be ' protected ' in his own market " ? Does Sir Louis really 
 think English producers are the better off for selling to the United States 
 ;^i5 millions rather than JQ46 millions? Is this argument consistent with 
 the reminder to that " school of English Chauvinism " which has frustrated 
 the designs of Sir Robert Peel, that they, " in admitting foreign products 
 free, do not take care of our imports." If all foreign imports were free, 
 would that fact further assist in the operation of " protecting " our 
 home producer? 
 
 But this argimient is again illustrated at p. 17, by the assumed reply 
 of the Frenchman or American upon the fact that we tax wine and tobacco. 
 Remit those duties, says Sir Louis, and the foreigner would reply, " Now, 
 since you enable me to pay you for your goods in tobacco and wine 
 — the only coin which I have to offer — the more you take of those the 
 more shall I be able to take from you in exchange." The facts in refutation 
 of this line of argument are that, in face of an inunense increase in the 
 importation by us of these very articles, the relations of trade between us 
 and France and America have assumed the proportions above referred to, 
 viz., of 6 to I in the case of the United States, and of 3 to i nearly in the 
 case of France. 
 
 Then, again, in dealing with the mode of action which Sir Louis assumes 
 would be that favoured by his opponents, he implies that retaliation would 
 be our policy. Nowhere has this been proclaimed, nowhere has it been 
 proposed " to apply to each foreign country a tariff of duties which would 
 correspond as nearly as might be with that which it enforces against us." 
 We should offer terms with any or all nations on the ground of reciprocity, 
 which will of course imply a readjustment of tariffs, in fact, the practical 
 performance of those conditions which were undoubtedly present to the 
 minds of the framers of free trade policy and commercial treaties. 
 And, in default of reciprocal inclinations, we should doubtless apply 
 tariffs not necessarily retaliatory or "corresponding," but sufficient 
 to give our home labour its fair share of employment by a pro rata 
 discouragement of that great mass of foreign imports which is 
 yearly growing upon us. Sir Louis does allow us to contemplate 
 "a moderately protective tariff, say 10 per cent, upon all foreign manu- 
 factures." There he is probably nearer the mark as to the intentions and 
 policy of reciprocity advocates. But he says " this cannot be intended, 
 for it would be a simple return to a policy which we have already tried, and 
 which we have abandoned step by step from a bitter experience of its 
 results." Indeed, where were the "disastrous results?" Take our trade returns 
 for the period of years from 1850 to i860, and it will be found that
 
 SIR LOUIS MALLETS CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 21 
 
 they progressed surely and safely, whilst gradually, and that the severe 
 commercial crises only supervened upon the introduction of the stimulants 
 which, wisely or unwisely, it was deemed well to apply from i860 
 downwards. Large figures may, indeed, be pointed to as the outcome ot 
 such experiments as the Frencla Treaty and the " Limited Liability" Acts, 
 but in all references to trade by those who have been responsible for its 
 present condition no mention is ever made of the bad side of those 
 experiments which, gradually accumulating, have in the main contributed 
 to the awkward dilemma in which we now find ourselves of being com- 
 pelled to admit that free trade so-called has not that element in it which it 
 was intended should have been present, at all events within a reasonable 
 period, after our generous and confiding treatment of the whole com- 
 mercial universe, and that therefore we have not free trade but only the 
 spurious form of it, the contingent remainder having never been realised. 
 From 1863 to 1877 we have abolished on balance ^^26,500,000 of taxes, ot 
 which customs stand for ^14 millions. 
 
 Foreign imports have in consequence grown from ^164 millions to 
 ^304 millions, or very nearly 100 per cent. To what extent has this been 
 reciprocated by the demand for our products ? In 1863 they were 
 ^142 millions, in 1877 ;Ci']6 millions, the growth having been a little 
 more than 25 per cent. ; the falling off since 1872 has been ^73 millions, 
 almost entirely due to the reduction in value and quantity of home manu- 
 factures. 
 
 Finally, Sir Louis dissects our imports from 1877 into raw, manufac- 
 tured, and food, a very proper classification • and, assuming that it would 
 be only on manufactures we should impose duties, proceeds to show that 
 our trade with individual' countries in this respect is so small, with the 
 exception of France, that it would be hardly worth while to incur, for 
 the sake of the protection afforded, the possible retaliation of foreign 
 countries. But surely this is a question of principle, not of expediency. 
 We expected reciprocity ; we have not got the least approach to it. 
 Foreign countries act on the policy of self-preservation. They take what 
 they want of us, and nothing by way of compliment to our free trade 
 system. Did we impose reasonable duties on their manufactures, or even 
 still more moderate duties on some of their raw materials, would there be 
 reason to expect " retaliatory " action pure and simple ? Will they deny 
 themselves coal, iron, and machinery, and so arrest that course of home 
 manufacture which they have diligently followed for some years past ? As 
 it is, they are taxing less of our purely manufactured articles, but we, on 
 the contrary, on account of our free ports, are continuously increasing 
 an import of their products and manufactures, to the detriment 
 of our home labour and trade, and with the inevitable result of leaving 
 ■ourselves more and more dependent on the foreigner for the very articles, 
 the production of which we have in past years been renowned for. 
 
 The issue between Sir Louis Mallet and his confreres of the modern 
 ])olitical economist school, and those whom he designates as utterers of 
 the " blind cry for reciprocity," is a very simple one. 
 
 He and his friends pat the consumer on the back, and bid him con- 
 tinue to invest his income by preference in foreign products and manu- 
 factures. " They are c/ieap, cheaper than you can make them at home, 
 therefore buy them without regard to the incidence of such trade on home 
 labour." 
 
 We put home labour in the fore-front of our cause. We deem it 
 essential that the great army of our producers should be well employed.
 
 22 6-/A' LOUIS MALLETS CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 
 
 We, too, advocate cheapness, but we insist that cheapness for the con- 
 sumer in juxtaposition with idleness for the producer means, at no distant 
 day, simple national ruin. We are now, as a nation, working inter- 
 nationally at a tension such as we never yet encountered. We have 
 wheat at 40^'., a price confessedly unremunerative to the grower. The 
 British consumers, 34 millions, would benefit to the full, //the very cause of 
 this low price of corn was not at the bottom of the contemporary stag- 
 nation, and in many cases, extinction of our home trade. Sir Louis Mallet 
 condemns the policy of " masterly inactivity " as applied in the past to 
 our commercial system, and this admission was confirmed by the Prime 
 Minister in his speech on the reciprocity debate last Tuesday in his decided 
 expression of opinion that England had missed her opportunity for recipro- 
 city in the wholesale remission of import duties. " Masterly inactivity " 
 has nearly worked havoc with our foreign policy, and it is the clear opinion 
 of the advocates of reciprocity that this policy must be terminated in our 
 commercial as in our foreign administration of affairs. Sir Louis Mallet 
 and his friends would stand quietly by and view the logical realisation of 
 their policy in the complete annihilation of our exports, whereas we would, 
 whilst there is time, endeavour to arrest this continuous growth in the dis- 
 proportion of our trade with the world. Their experiment has had a long 
 trial. It has admittedly failed. Our alternative should be met with 
 something more reasonable and practical than open contempt. In a far 
 different spirit the country is preparing to consider it. 
 
 ViGILANS.
 
 S/Ii LOUIS MALLET'S CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 23 
 
 FROM THE ^'AGRICULTURAL'' POINT OF 
 
 VIEW. 
 
 " The Cobden Club is a failure," said one of its members on the afternoon 
 of Monday, April 28 last, adding, "we were established to consolidate and 
 extend the principles of free trade throughout the world, and our attempt 
 to do so is unsuccessful." Such was the voluntary comment made as the 
 above-named pamphlet came casually under notice, and this admission at 
 once suggested the query, " Is not the pamphlet, issued by the Club, also 
 equally a failure in its arguments and facts ? " 
 
 I shall attempt to show that such is really the case, so far as Sir Louis 
 Mallet deals with those matters with which I am best acquainted — the 
 supply and price of bread-food. 
 
 The old scarecrow of " dear bread " is brought out of the curiosity 
 lumber shop of the past to do duty once again, and frighten away discus- 
 sions on the plain merits of the question. Those who have leanings to, or 
 might be persuaded to support, a revenue duty on corn are startled at once 
 on being told that such a measure would heavily touch all consumers' 
 pockets, that such a duty would become " prohibitive," and, as a result, 
 bread would be dear, very dear. Is this the truth ? I say roundly it is 
 not so. I say that the most experienced corn merchants in Mark Lane 
 and throughout the country would also reply that such a statement is not, 
 in their judgment, a true one. So far I am not here discussing the desira- 
 bility of imposing, or of not imposing, a duty on corn (that subject shall be 
 presently treated), I am simply dealing with the Bridge-head of defence of 
 Sir Louis Mallet and other free-traders, when they say, "a duty on corn 
 would make bread dear." To demolish this first point of defence is the 
 object of this reply, as to fortify it appears to have been the chief care ot 
 Sir Louis in his latter-day pamphlet. 
 
 Too much sti"ess cannot be laid on this point of the general question, 
 because when once Giant Dear-Bread shall be slain, the course will be 
 left clear for statesmen to consider freely the expediency of taxing food- 
 imports for revenue, quite apart from the consideration of taxing them 
 with the object of protecting the British farmer and landlord. Perhaps 
 the first useful illustration of taxed imports being not, tJiereforc, dear, is 
 derived from the article of tea, which, although furnishing the revenue with 
 a most substantial and regular income, remains one of the cheapest articles 
 of domestic consumption. This instance is all the more remarkable as the 
 sources of supply of the exotic herb are relatively very restricted in com- 
 parison with the world-wide sources of wheat supply, and to which I now 
 draw attention. 
 
 Those who run may read and understand that relatively any or all 
 Revenue imposts on such an article as wheat are very insignificant in com-
 
 24 S//^ LOUIS MALLETS CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 
 
 parison with its production, and transport, and commercial charges. They 
 are but as the halter is to the horse. 
 
 In regard to foreign wheat, transit remains (and was more so in the 
 past) the one ruling charge that determines whether wheat shall be dear or 
 cheap in England. Transit may now be considered as permanently reduced 
 to a scale that renders it unlikely in the future that wheat Avill be ever again 
 above a general level of cheapliess, and I submit — 
 
 1. Untaxed \\\\t2i\. under transit charges of only a few years ago might 
 
 be represented as 20, whilst 
 
 2. Heavily taxed wheat, with Californian freights, under 50^-., and 
 
 Indian freights under 30^'. per ton, may be placed at 15. 
 This one cause of cheapness of transit demolishes a hundred petty argu- 
 ments and hindrances that once might be considered as objections to the 
 taxation of bread-food ; for what was at one time of great importance to the 
 consumer is now quite unimportant. Moreover, the ease and lessened expense 
 of transit has stimulated an extra production of quite 20 million quarters of 
 wheat in the world (not forgetting the increment of population) in the last 
 twenty years, and thus a surplus is grown to be kicked about the markets, and 
 make " dear bread " in all ordinary seasons well nigh impossible, and I re- 
 peat that the free trader who sets up the scarecrow of dearness to frighten 
 consumers either does not know his subject or wilfully misrepresents pro- 
 babilities. 
 
 The statistics of past and present wheat supply are things so generally 
 known that I need not encumber this column with them, and will only 
 refer to one undoubted fact that through the voj exceptional deficiency of 
 the harvest in France last year, a surplus production of ten million quarters 
 in the United States has been absorbed in Europe, over and beyond the 
 ample supplies sent to the United Kingdom. 
 
 Coming to another consideration, that of permanent cheapness, I am but 
 repeating the recently expressed opinion of an American statistician, and 
 which I heartily endorse, that there can be no counterweight to wheat 
 prices being subject to inflation in England, so effectual and regular, as the 
 regular cultivation of four million acres of wheat by the British farmer ! Now 
 the apologists for one-sided free trade use recondite arguments, and 
 would knock down opponents with lumping figures. All free traders 
 should be Senior Wranglers to talk as they do. " The question is a mathe- 
 matical, not an economical one " — " The policy is a mathematical policy," 
 are common phrases ; yet without going further than a plain rule-of-three 
 sum, let us ask these free trade mathematicians and all the " plain folk " 
 of our agricultural counties — " How will the consumer escape taxa- 
 tion if matters proceed as at present they are proceeding?" We 
 must suppose our Budgets will remain at about their present level. 
 Who are to supply the ways and means? The landlord's property 
 in the soil is computed at ^2,000 millions, and of the farmer 
 at ;!^40o millions. Here are totals that, without a change in aftairs, 
 must be reckoned as bearing reduced rentals of 30 per cent. — so much 
 less Income tax ! Then the coincident reductions of fanners' assessments 
 to local and poor rates will make a void in balance sheets that will require 
 to be filled up from other sources. Thus, in both cases the taxes, 
 rates, &c., borne by landlords and farmers will have to be shifted to 
 the stronger shoulders of other tax and ratepayers — consumers amongst 
 them. 
 
 Is this a better system than keeping the landlord and farmer in a posi- 
 tion to pay taxes in their present i)roportion ? The burden on the back of
 
 SIJ^ LOUIS MALLETS CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 25 
 
 John Bull will remain much the same whatever plan be adopted, but it 
 should be strapped on his shoulders to bear equally on his strength, on 
 his arms and legs and body — the right arm of commerce should not be 
 free and the left arm of agriculture bound fast to his side.* 
 
 One of the plain questions to be answered is, are the four million acres 
 of wheat land in England to go out of cultivation, or is the revision of 
 revenue so to be made that the British farmer can be induced to cultiv-ate 
 Avheat and produce about half of the country's requirements ? In former 
 times, before this country had negotiated thirty-eight treaties of commerce 
 with other countries, the farmer stood alone ; now at his side are ranked 
 commerce and labour, and a national instinct that the foreigner is 
 favoured. This combination of interests and sentiment may, I believe, 
 be backed against the array of mathematical figures and argimients 
 employed by the out-and-out believers in free trade. To me free trade 
 means slavery to an idea rather than the outcome of legitimate reasoning. 
 Has the world advanced so as to double the assessments of Income Tax, 
 more than triple the deposits per head in our Savings Banks, to reduce 
 the percentage of pauperism, because of its having worked on one-sided 
 free trade principles? The answer is, that countries whose idea is 
 protection, and not free trade, have advanced in the same or in larger 
 proportion ! Thus the swarm of flies that, on the wheel of progress, claim 
 to give motion to the chariot, must all be brushed away. A trjie 
 principle in political economy lasts for centuries, but free trade cannot 
 yet count its half century, and is already challenged as a principle essen- 
 tially unsound, because impossible. 
 
 To judge from the action of other countries the verdict has been given, 
 and of English free traders it may be said. 
 
 Their dreamings and schemings, their ruling and schooling 
 
 The world does but call them as Free Trade in fooling ; 
 
 They're witless and fitless, the world will not take them, 
 
 So England may freely, if sadly, forsake them : 
 
 Until all the nations a Round Robin signing 
 
 Take up with the Free Trade of England's designing. 
 
 Doubtless to carry out a grand idea England has made noble efforts, but 
 free trade has still to be regarded apparently as much an impossibility as 
 is the conversion of the idea of universal equality into a fact. If Eng- 
 land has loosened the chains of foreign trade, it has imposed fetters on 
 its home trade since it has handicapped the British farmer and 
 manufacturer, and then started them in a race against the unweighted 
 foreigner. 
 
 Is the above a common belief, or is it not ? 
 
 Sir Louis Mallet states that " Every Englishman who sells or buys in a 
 foreign country, whatever be the tariff of that country or the tariff of his 
 own, is already in the possession of complete reciprocity." 
 
 I confess that I do not understand Reciprocity as thus defined, and 
 wonder no longer that the meaning of the word puzzles a Prime Minister 
 as well as a plain farmer. 
 
 But to revert to my chief object of controverting the head and front of 
 Sir Louis Mallet's offending, where he asks (and so implies). Will " the 
 people of England ever again submit to corn laws or sugar duties, and 
 return to their sjnall loaf and dear grocery 'i" I claim the right to state 
 
 * Vigilans employs a similar illustration on another phase of the question. Neither 
 writer saw the other's paper before it was published, nor had any communication passed 
 between them.— [Editor.]
 
 26 5/A' LOUIS MALLETS CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 
 
 that, any moderate import duties that might be imposed on foreign pro- 
 duce or manufactures, whilst it would be sufficient to enable the British 
 landowner, the British farmer, and the British manufacturer, and the British 
 labourer to maintain a rightful position in the world, would not enhance 
 the value of bread-food to the masses of the people who consume it to any 
 appreciable extent — even to any cpiotable difference in the price of their daily 
 loaf, and I base this belief on a personal knowledge that the present pro- 
 ductive resources of the world have been so generally utilised by the 
 facilities of steam transport, on water and land, during the past thirty years, 
 that areas, in our colonies, in the empire of India, in the Dominion of 
 Canada, and in other countries, have been brought under cultivation in a 
 proportion, relatively to consumption from increased population, that would 
 sanction any English statesman imposing a duty on grain (without the 
 chance of the cost of bread-food being thereby materially raised), should 
 other circumstances international or national, make a revision of the 
 revenue desirable. 
 
 " Plus Solis Plus Vit^."
 
 SIJi LOUIS MALLETS CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 27 
 
 FROM THE ''LABOUR'' POINT OF VIEW. 
 
 •" Free Trade, Peace, Goodwill among Nations," has for many years 
 past been a very taking cry in this country. Thanks to this rallying cry 
 having been coupled with promises of " free bread " and " free breakfasts," 
 its inventors, styling themselves Liberals, succeeded in securing more than 
 their fair share of public support. They were placed in office and handed 
 the reins of government six years after the repeal of the Corn Laws, or in 
 the year 1852, their supporters desiring to give their "free trade" policy 
 a fair trial ; and in 1853, Mr. Gladstone being then Chancellor of the 
 Exchequer, the first sweeping abolition and reduction of "import duties " 
 took place. The gold discoveries which had just previously been made in 
 California and Australia flooded the British market in the five subsequent 
 years with over 130 millions of bullion, and infused new life and vigour 
 into our previously languishing home industries, and the consequent 
 prosperity was, as a matter of course, attributed by our rulers and their 
 supporters to the working of their novel fiscal policy. Free trade was 
 declared to be an unparalleled success. The vote of the year 1846 was 
 generally assumed to have " settled " the future fiscal policy of Great 
 Britain ; and those who remained unconverted were regarded as " heretics," 
 " lunatics," and " simpletons," with whom it was worse than useless to 
 argue, as it was thought that their conversion from " old and exploded 
 doctrines " could neither benefit the cause nor strengthen the party. Re- 
 garded with disdain as numerically too weak to retard the development of 
 the free trade policy, they were left to their natural fate, the belief of the 
 Liberals being in " the survival of the fittest," and who more fit to have 
 dominion and to survive all opposition than " the chosen of the people " ? 
 Such, in brief, was the origin of what you will allow me to style " the free 
 trade craze." 
 
 In this sublunary planet, however, " all is not gold that glitters ; " and 
 the history of the past, together with the inexorable logic of facts, are 
 proofs sufficient to all rational beings that to jump at conclusions is the 
 greatest mistake a man, in whatever station of life he may be, can commit. 
 The consequences attending hasty action have, as a rule, to be repented in 
 sorrow and bitterness of heart by the individual ; but when a nation has to 
 repent of its past actions, the distress is enormously increased, and can 
 hardly be over-estimated. Committed in haste to a delusive policy, it 
 seldom has the power of repenting at leisure, owing to the disturbances 
 which arise amidst its vast and complex organisation when the reaction 
 sets in ; and the demoralisation of the population takes place. But it is 
 not too much to assert that a vast number of individuals are scattered 
 broadcast over the country, who have ever maintained that the logical 
 sequence of " the settlement of 1846" could be nothing less than Socialism, 
 and the dismemberment of the British Empire. 
 
 The predicted reaction set in about June 1873. The exchange value of
 
 28 SIR LOUIS MALLETS CUALI^ENGE ANSWERED. 
 
 tlie products of British labour fell some 50 per cent, in three short months, 
 and has continued faUing ever since. Hundreds of thousands of British 
 workmen have been thrown out of employment, and have been forced to 
 seek assistance from the relief funds raised to alleviate their distress. At 
 no time in the history of friendly societies have the funds of our trades' 
 unions been in such a deplorable condition as they are at this moment. 
 It is positively asserted by those who ought to know what the circum- 
 stances of these societies really are, that were the books of every existing 
 trades' union honestly, carefully, and strictly audited, not one would be 
 found able to meet its liabilities. Under such a state of things it is not to 
 be wondered at that our working classes should turn their eyes longingly 
 towards the land, and murmur at its uncultivated state. They do not 
 understand the cause of its lying idle. Their leaders point to its unproduc- 
 tiveness, and already murmur in their ears the fallacy, " Had each unem- 
 ployed hand only two acres of that land, he could raise sufficient produce 
 to support himself and family throughout the year." The poor are little 
 apt to reason. The idea takes root. They never consider that capital 
 is required to make the land produce ; nor do they give heed to the fact 
 that, while their crops are growing they would starve unless they had 
 sufficient capital to support them during the interval which must neces- 
 sarily elapse between sowing and reaping. The only thing the poor man 
 can understand is that he has no work to do ; that he earns no wages ; 
 that he is starving. He sees that there is plenty throughout the land, and 
 he naturally exclaims, " Why should all those good things exist, and yet I 
 be forced to die from sheer want of the mere necessaries of life ! " 
 
 The "people's men," who brought about "the settlement of 1846," 
 know full well that this feeling is daily gaining strength throughout the 
 country. To admit that their past policy is the cause of the depression 
 and distress, and of the land being thrown out of cultivation, would be 
 more than we ought to expect from human nature — it would mean the 
 downfall of the Liberal party. But the Liberals do not intend to allow 
 their party to be extinguished if they can help it. They got into power on 
 a popular cry, and intend, the "last one failing, to start a new cry to regain 
 the reins of government. Any cry will do. The Extension of the Fran- 
 chise ! Amendment of the Land Laws ! Abolition of the Law of Entail ! 
 One or all of these will serve their purpose. They have already openly 
 commenced to agitate for the " extension of the franchise." The other 
 questions are being silently diffiised among the masses by their emissaries, 
 those paid delegates of the working classes who form the Workmen's 
 Parliamentary Committee, and these, in return for their services, hope one 
 and all to be returned to Parliament at no very distant date through the 
 support of those men whose cause they are now advocating. The Liberals 
 of England, however, know better than to let their present slaves find a 
 seat within the portals of St. Stephen's if they can help it. They promise 
 anything and everything ; but they do nothing. They use the working 
 classes as their tools, through the trade delegates. In that lies the secret 
 of the success of the Liberal party. Workmen listen to workmen, but they 
 turn a deaf ear to their superiors. The most extravagant theory pro- 
 pounded by a workman is accepted, au grand scriei/x, by his class ; while 
 the most simple truism, emanating from a gentleman, is looked at with 
 suspicion. Hence, the working classes have always believed in "Free 
 Trade," not because it emanated from Richard Cobden, John Bright, or 
 AVilliam Ewart Gladstone, but because the theory of " buy in the cheapest 
 market " was preached to them by their own delegates, in the pay and
 
 S/Ji LOUIS MALLETS CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 29 
 
 at the expense of the Anti-Corn ]^a\v League and other Liberal 
 associations. 
 
 Suddenly, these delegates found themselves confronted by a new cry. 
 It was that of " reciprocity." They reported faithfully to their employers 
 that this cry was making headway among the worlcing classes. They 
 could not explain what it meant, but it seemed a taking cry, promising 
 labour to the unemployed. What ! prefer labour to " free bread " and 
 " free breakfasts ! " Surely there must be a mistake ? True, the promise 
 of free food has not been fulfilled. But what of that ? Had not the 
 " people's men " made the promise, and ought that not to be sufficient ? 
 Might it not yet be secured if only some patience be exercised ? And as 
 for the " reciprocity cry," what on earth does it mean ? Did the men 
 want to be led back to protection and starvation, such as existed in the 
 land prior to "the settlement of the year 1846?" No, surely not ! it 
 must be a mistake. There could be no real agitation on foot to upset 
 free trade and " the settlement of 1846." If so, who were its promoters? 
 who the leaders? They must be members of the hated Tory party. 
 They must come from among the bloated aristocracy. Therefore they 
 must belong to the old category of " heretics," " lunatics," and " simple- 
 tons," who were deemed crushed out of existence in the past. Strange 
 they should have risen, as it were, from the dead. Nevertheless, they 
 must now be put down, be they men of substance or men of straw ; and 
 the Cobden Club has chosen its president, Sir Louis Mallett, C.B., to 
 assail the foe, with what result we shall now proceed to discuss. 
 
 " In spite of much reading," writes Sir Louis Mallet, " and a very 
 sincere desire to understand the objects and arguments of the advocates 
 of this new policy, I have entirely failed in finding any statement of their 
 case, or any programme of practical measures which will stand the test of 
 serious discussion. So that whenever I approached my adversary I found 
 him to be a man of straw." 
 
 Having no one to attack, the logical conclusion would be that Sir Louis 
 Mallet would have been unable to cross swords with that which he says does 
 not exist. Strange to say, however, he finds a man, not exactly of straw, 
 in the person of Lord Bateman, who happens to have written a pamphlet 
 e. I titled A Plea foi- Limited Fi-oiection or for Reciprocity^ z\\6. Sir Louis 
 Mallet, therefore, straightway imposes upon himself the task of demolishing 
 Lord Bateman's Plea for Reciprocity, contenting himself with quoting a very 
 short paragraph from his lordship's somewhat weak pamphlet. This quota- 
 tion ends with the statement that " it cannot be denied that the sting of 
 * want of reciprocity ' has from the first checkmated our philanthropic 
 efforts, and obliged us now to confess, after thirty years of trial, that in 
 practice our free trade is at best but one-sided ; and that, while we are 
 oi)ening our ports to the commerce and manufactures of the world free and 
 unrestricted, other countries, without conferring upon us any reciprocal 
 benefit, are takmg advantage, without scruple, of our magnanimous, but 
 disastrous (because one-sided) liberality." 
 
 To this Sir Louis Mallet replies, " No one would, I presume, deny that 
 the system under which British trade is now carried on is not one of free 
 trade, nor that a comj)lete system of free trade is better than a one-sided 
 free trade ; but if, as is alleged, protection is only sought for the sake of 
 reciprocity, it is impossible to understand why a one-sided free trade should 
 not be better than no free trade at all." 
 
 Can free traders bring forward no better argument than this defence 
 of their one-sided policy ? Surely the president of the Cobden Club ought
 
 30 S//^ LOUIS MALLETS CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 
 
 to know better than to place such an argument before reasoning, thinking 
 beings. How on earth can a " one-sided trade " be free ? The difficulty I 
 experience is to deal with such crass ignorance as that which presumes to 
 assume that any sane man would maintain such views. Sir Louis Mallet 
 admits that no sucli thing as free trade has ever existed in this country, 
 and then naively acknowledges his inability to comprehend that a one- 
 sided bargain must be unfair to one or the other of the parties to the trans- 
 action ! He then dogmatically asserts that " the mutual relaxation of 
 restrictions is a mutual advantage." Of course it is, but where do we find 
 such " reciprocity " in existence between any two nations ? Sir Louis 
 Mallet endeavours to demonstrate that a one-sided relaxation of restrictions 
 is a mutual relaxation of restrictions. But nowhere do we find restrictions 
 reciprocally relaxed. On the contrary, all foreign countries vie with each 
 other in maintaining old and in imposing additional restrictions on the 
 products of British labour, so as to prevent those products finding a sale in 
 foreign markets. This necessarily restrains our production, and prevents 
 our exporting commodities in sufficient quantities to pay for those we 
 import. At the same time, foreign Governments are increasing the sub- 
 sidies or bounties they grant to their own producers with the avowed, or at 
 times concealed, object of enabling them to find a ready sale for the pro- 
 ducts of their labour on the British market. This must necessarily further 
 curtail the demand for the products of British labour. No complaint would 
 be raised if for every ton of foreign commodities sold in our home market 
 for home consumption, an equal quantity of commodities, the product of 
 British labour, could be exported and sold in foreign markets for foreign 
 consumption. All we desire to do is to equalise and stimulate the healthy 
 consumption of the products of labour — British and foreign ; but if any 
 favour is to be shown, we say favour British labour, and let the foreigner 
 look after himself As things now stand, the products of British labour 
 are being curtailed on all sides by unfair foreign competition in the home, 
 and by restrictions, amounting to prohibition in many instances, in the 
 foreign markets ; and the natural result of burning the candle at both ends 
 in this manner is to lessen the general demand for — and consequently to 
 impoverish — British labour, the people, and the country. 
 
 Nevertheless, in the face of these facts, Sir Louis Mallet, altogether 
 ignoring the effect of the foreign bounty system, has the temerity to assert 
 " that the more nearly the tariffs of foreign countries approach to the limits- 
 of prohibition, the more will the British producer be protected in his own 
 market," and that, in consequence, reciprocators " must rejoice at every 
 new restriction placed upon British trade abroad, as necessarily involving 
 increased protection to British trade at home." 
 
 From whom do such fallacies emanate ? On whose authority are they 
 now propounded ? The apostles of free trade never preached such foolish 
 doctrines. Thus, for example : — 
 
 Ricardo says that " in speaking of commodities, of their exchange value, 
 and the laws which regulate their relative prices, we mean always such 
 commodities only as can be increased in quantity by the exertion of human 
 industry, and on the production of which competition operates without re- 
 straint." 
 
 Adam Smith assures us that " it must sometimes be a matter of delibe- 
 ration how far it is proper to continue the free importation of certain foreign 
 goods, when some foreign nations restrain by high duties the importation 
 of some of our manufactures in their country. This case naturally dictates
 
 S/R LOUIS MALLErS CHALLENGE AXSIVERED. 31 
 
 retaliation, and that we should impose the like duties upon some or all of 
 their maniifactufes coming into our country." 
 
 McCiilloch asserts that " all commerce, whether carried on by indivi- 
 duals of the same or of different countries, is founded on a fair principle of 
 reciprocity." 
 
 But I forgot. Have not Mr. Foster, Mr. Lowe, and Mr. Courtney only 
 recently disowned all such authorities in the House of Commons, when 
 assuring the country that their views of political economy were their own, 
 and consequently — infallible ? 
 
 To use the words of Sir Louis Mallet, " some apology appears to be 
 necessary " therefore, for thus reproducing statements of doctrine which I 
 always tliought had been thoroughly understood and accepted by free trade 
 economists, but there would appear to be a widespread belief among 
 certain classes of our countrymen that it matters little by how 
 great an amount our imports exceed our exports in value. These never 
 consider that, in the words of McCulloch, " should we import ten or twenty 
 millions worth of foreign commodities this year more than we imported 
 last yea*-, it is undeniably certain we shall, have to export ten or twenty 
 millions worth more of our peculiar products to pay them." This tindcni- 
 ably certain fact never enters into the head of the one-sided free trader, who 
 thinks only of " buying in the cheapest market," that is to say, of self- 
 interest instead of the national good — forgetting that ^self-interested is only 
 u temporary, while a national is a permanent benefit. And from this cause 
 Sir Louis Mallet commits the same error that all free traders have fallen 
 into regarding the balance of trade. Both he and his party forget that 
 McCuUoch's dictum — " \\\ whatever degree, therefore, an unrestricted foreign 
 trade might lead us to receive commodities from other countries, in the same 
 degree it would render those countries customers for our commodities ; 
 would promote our manufactures and extend our trade " — has been folsified 
 by the stratagems adopted by foreign Governments to force us to import 
 their goods while excluding the products of British labour from their own 
 markets. This foreign policy was recently grapliically illustrated by M. 
 Pouyer-Quertier, when he said, " VVe want the Enghsh consumer to 
 accustom himself to use the products of French industries, but we do not 
 want our consumers to accustom themselves to the use of British com- 
 modities." That is to say, the foreigner is willing to accept English money, 
 but he declines to receive the products of British labour in exchange for 
 the products of his own labour, exported for the use of the British con- 
 sumer. Here Sir Louis Mallet commits the usual fault, common 
 to all free traders who think they see a benefit in purchasing " chea]) " 
 foreign goods. Having quoted from John Stuart Mill, he admits, 
 with Mr. Mill, that a country which wants more imports than 
 its exports will pay for has to pay the diffe7-ence in money, and that, by this 
 transmission of the precious metals, the (juantity of the currency will 
 diminish in such a country, and increase in the countries in which it 
 trades. But, urges Sir Louis Mallet, no money leaves England, nor are any 
 of the precious ?netals sent abroad, as ought to be the case had we to pay J or 
 the excess value of our imports ozier our exports in coin. On the contrary, 
 says Sir Louis, " as a matter of fact, the imports of gold and silver bullion 
 into the United Kingdom have in recent years exceeded the exports. In 
 1878 the excess amounted to nearly ^6 millions sterling, and the average 
 annual excess in the last five years has been nearly jQk, millions." Hence, 
 argues Sir Louis, we are actually paying for an immense value of imports 
 by means of a lesser value of exports, "and, if foreign countries are content
 
 32 ^7A' LOUIS MALLET'S CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 
 
 to accept j£^o worth of British goods in exchange for jQ()o wortli of their 
 own, are we to complain of their generosity?" Most assuredly not, Sir 
 Louis, did they do so. 
 
 It is quite true that reciprocators, or tlie advocates of reciprocity, do 
 complain that the foreigner, taking advantage of our one-sided fiscal 
 policy, is restraining more and more our production, and is at the same 
 time forcing us to pay him, not in commodities, but in cash. The error 
 ■nto which Sir Louis Mallet has fallen is this — that to pay in cash he 
 assumes that money or bullion must be exported. He commits this error 
 because he forgets that there exist institutions called banks and stock 
 exchanges. The British bankers receive the money wherewith to pay for 
 the imported commodities. But they do not export that money. The 
 banker employs a stockbroker, and by carefully watching the foreign stock 
 exchanges, purchases such stocks in the British Stock Exchanges as are 
 best adapted to his purpose — that of making a small profit on each trans- 
 action — and the stocks, bonds, or securities thus purchased in the British 
 Stock Exchanges are remitted abroad, and are sold on the foreign 
 stock exchanges. The purchase money is then divided between those who 
 have any claim upon it. In this manner overp^i4o millions worth of stock 
 and bonds and various other quoted securities are annually changing hands, 
 that is to say, are being surrendered by their original British holders for 
 commodities used, enjoyed and destroyed, and are being accumulated by 
 the foreign producers of those commodities, or by the capitalists directly or 
 indirectly connected with their production. Since the year 1858, over 
 ;^i,3oo millions ot securities originally held by British subjects have passed 
 from this cause into the hands of the foreigner, and it is not to be wondered 
 at, therefore, that the interest originally receivable by this country on its 
 foreign loans is each year becoming smaller, and the amount received from 
 abroad and payable in England beautifully less. Soon, very soon indeed, 
 no interest will have to be paid in this country, should we persist in 
 adhering to our one-sided simpleton's fiscal policy. 
 
 If it is beneficial to the nation or to the individuals forming our popu- 
 lation to buy in the cheapest market— that is to say, should there be any 
 saving effected in buying cheap foreign commodities simply because they 
 are offered cheaper than their natural cost of production to the British 
 producer— then the British consumer should, were such the case, derive 
 great and lasting benefit from purchasing all the commodities he requires 
 from the foreigner, provided he secured them for less exchange value than 
 from the British producer. The nation ought equally to benefit by this 
 transaction if it really benefits the individual — and — home production 7vould 
 be a mistake. ^Ve should need neither factories nor workmen. And yet, 
 strange to say, Sir Louis Mallet assures us " that without imports there can 
 be no exports, and without exports there can be no imports." Truly, I 
 cannot understand the logic of these free traders, it is so curiously self- 
 contradictory and selfish ; it is such a curious mixture of facts and fallacies, 
 half-truths and untruths. 
 
 Unfortunately for the arguments brought forward by Sir Louis Mallet, 
 it is the home industries of the country which foster and build up the 
 wealth of the nation, and not the "buy in the cheapest market" theorv'. 
 British commodities must be exported in equal value to that of the foreign 
 commodities imported. No foreign country gives us ^90 worth of its 
 goods for ^50 worth of our goods, as can be seen by referring to the Board 
 of Trade Returns, where the values set down are equivalent \alues in British 
 currency. British commodities are the products of British labour. The
 
 .SYA' LOUIS MALLET'S CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 33 
 
 products of labour saved and accumulated instead of being used, enjoyed, 
 and destroyed, constitute capital. If, therefore, we are forced, through a 
 one-sided policy, to use and destroy the surplus production of the foreigner, 
 it stands to reason that the accumulation of wealth — the saving — is effected 
 in foreign countries and not in England. Consequently, in proportion as 
 foreign countries increase in wealth, Great Britain will be impoverished, 
 unless she can induce foreign nations to take payment in commodities the 
 prodiuts of British labour. Yov the last thirty- three years we have been 
 attempting to persuade foreign nations that they are entirely wrong in ad- 
 hering to their policies of protecting labour, and that we are adopting the 
 only wise course possible in our free trade, peace, good-will among nations 
 policy, which forces labour to shift for itself, by altogether shifting out ot 
 the country ; but, so far from having succeeded in convincing our neigh- 
 bours that we derive any benefit from a policy wliich allows the yearly 
 balance of trade to steadily increase against us, but in their favour, or 
 that they are thereby placed at a great disadvantage and are ruining their 
 own consumers, we find that all foreign Governments are now bent on 
 raising their protective tariffs, as if to give the death-blow to British 
 industry, and they one and all, even to our own colonies and dependencies, 
 steadfastly refuse to listen to the voice of the Brummagem Charmer, charm 
 he never so wisely. They see through the British Pharisee who thanks 
 God daily that he is not as other men, and who would have foreign 
 nations open their ports free to his wares that he may be enabled to 
 flood their markets with his goods, and crush their own native industries, 
 while pretending, under the guise of free trade, to offer them free com- 
 petition ! No wonder then that the astute foreigner replies laconically, 
 '' Pas si bete!'' 
 
 Sir Louis Mallet also points exultingly to the prosperity of this country 
 during the years immediately following the repeal of the Corn Laws ; but 
 he omits to take into consideration the effect of the gold discoveries of 
 that period, the development of our railway system, then only just com- 
 pleted, and of the wars in America and Europe which soon followed. 
 These causes combined to flood the British market with export orders in 
 no manner connected with our fiscal policy, and, therefore, unnecessary to 
 be further discussed. Sir Louis Mallet omits, however, to mention that, 
 although from the above causes England did increase her trade, France 
 and other protectionist countries increased their trades in a greater pro- 
 portion in the same space of time, and notwithstanding the wars of 
 invasion or rebellion they were called upon to undergo. Consequently, 
 since foreign countries, notwithstanding those drawbacks, have done 
 better under their protectionist regime than England has under her one- 
 sided fiscal policy, misnamed free trade, and in the face of her great 
 natural advantages, it necessarily follows, as a logical sequence, that this 
 one-sided commercial ])olicy of ours has caused this country to descend in 
 the scale of prosperity in comparison with the ascent made by our rivals, 
 and this is, I maintain, good and sufiicient reason for the English people 
 to question the soundness of the policy embodied in "the settlement of 
 1846." 
 
 What is reciprocity ? Such is the question asked by those interested 
 in maintaining the settlement they made in their own interests but at the 
 expense of the interests of the nation. To crush the nx)vement embodied 
 in the word these men assume false premises, and then prove to their own 
 satisfaction that the policy of the movement is absurd. But such conclusions 
 and arguments are easily overthrown from tlie moment the premises on
 
 34 S//^ LOUIS JMLLET'S CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 
 
 wliich they are based are shown to be false. In their narrow-mindedness 
 free traders assume thnt the pohcy of reciprocity is to tax corn and raw 
 materials "right away," as our "kin beyond sea" would say. Surely they 
 can give us the credit of appreciating the merit of cheap food and raw 
 material at their full value. They allow we have sufficient wisdom not to 
 merely advocate taxing the paltry ^50 millions worth of manufactured 
 goods now sold yearly on our markets as the best means of relieving the 
 existing distress, and of infusing new life and vigour into our home indus- 
 tries. And they then pretend to be unable to understand what can really 
 be meant by the policy of reciprocity, or to see its utility if only such an 
 inadequate remedy is proposed. Most free traders start in their argu- 
 ments against reciprocity with the old cry of " What ! tax the poor man's 
 loaf?" and pose once more as the champions of the working classes. 
 No doubt this is clever fencing. It raises a taking hustings cry, and 
 its promoters know full well that the poor are not very prone to reason 
 before gulping it down. Indeed, the poor are more apt to forget that 
 •cheap goods manufactured at home are a blessing, only because the poor have 
 been employed to produce those commodities, and have earned in return the 
 means of purchasing " the loaf" be it cheap or dear. But the poor invariably 
 forget that, when the cheap goods sold in our markets have been produced 
 'by foreign labour in a foreign country, the presence of those goods in our 
 market is, to the poor, a curse, unless foreign nations have reciprocated the 
 advantages we have conferred upon them by allowing their goods to enter 
 our markets free of duty, and in return have admitted the products of 
 British labour on reciprocal terms into their markets. But when, as is at 
 present the case, this mutual interchange of the products of labour does 
 not take place, then the products of foreign labour displace the products 
 of our native labour. The poor are deprived in consequence of their em- 
 ployment. This prevents their earning wages. They have, consequently, 
 been robbed of their birthright — labour. And without labour the poor 
 are deprived of the means of purchasing the " cheap loaf" The more 
 prohibitive the foreign tariffs, the less the volume of our exports, and, con- 
 sequently, the less labour is there for the poor. Hence, Sir Louis Mallet 
 is decidedly wrong in asserting it to be a fundamental truth, placed " in a 
 way which leaves no door open for dispute or discussion," and on. luhich he 
 makes the value of the ivhole of his arguments depend, " that the more nearly 
 the tariffs of foreign countries approach to the limits of prohibition, the 
 more will the British producer be protected in his own market." I can 
 only say that, if this is the accepted method of the Liberal party of im- 
 proving the poor, one or both will soon be improved out of existence, and 
 for the sake of the national welfare I do hope the working classes will not 
 be the " improved " in this case. What is reciprocity ? As a matter of fact it 
 means " tax for tax, freedom for freedom, and — as a result— English money 
 spent amongst Englishmen." Free traders assert that the working classes 
 must work " longer hours " to bring about a revival of trade. Why " longer 
 hours " ? Is it to produce more commodities that no one will purchase ? IVe 
 say " tax foreign goods " as a first step towards securing a revival 
 of trade ; so that the question for the working classes to decide amongst 
 themselves is, " Which of the two policies will they support ?" ''■Longer 
 hours, say 72^ week" or " a tax on the products of foreign labour now allowed 
 to compete untaxed in British markets against the heavily-taxed products of 
 British labour." 
 
 There is, however, much more in the policy of reciprocity than is taken 
 into consideration by the philosophy of its opponents. It is not what
 
 SIJ^ LOUIS MALLET'S CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 35 
 
 Sir Louis Mallet has striven hard to make it appear to be — a means of 
 increasing the cost of the necessaries of life. Did reciprocity increase the 
 price of food, it would cause a reciprocal increase of wages to take place. 
 That, however, would confer no benefit on the workman. What reciprocity- 
 aims at accomplishing is the creation of a permanent and lasting demand 
 for British labour ; at securing for labour a fair day's pay for a fair day's 
 work without increasing the hours of labour ; at securing for the country 
 a natural and constant supply of cheap food and raw material ; and at 
 putting an end to all existing one-sided commercial treaties, so as to 
 restore to the country its liberty of action. 
 
 Having accomplished this last object, the supporters of the policy of reci- 
 procity aim at substituting an Imperial for the Liberal vestryman's policy, 
 which would isolate England from the rest of the world, sever her from her 
 colonies, and leave her to die hke a poisoned rat that has taken to its hole, 
 uncared for by the world. Instead, reciprocity would strengthen the bonds 
 of union between England and her colonies ; restore peace to Ireland, and 
 found an Imperial trade federation, which should make the British Empire 
 self-supporting and self-subsisting — totally independent of foreign supplies. 
 Over whatever soil the British flag is unfurled to the breeze, that should be 
 recognised not only as British soil — it should be England ! Be it the 
 British Isles or Australia or the Cape or Canada or India, it is 
 all England ! EngHsh soil tilled by English hands in most cases, and in 
 all cases dependent on English arms for protection against foreign 
 aggression. " Horn and corn " raised by British hands from British soil in 
 all parts of the world will supply England with cheap food in abundance, 
 and English money will then be spent amongst Englishmen in the repro- 
 duction of those commodities now supplied to us by aliens. Then the 
 foreigner can be excluded from our markets unless he consents to deal 
 fairly with us. We ask him for no favour, and most assuredly will show 
 him none. If anyone is to be favoured, let it be our own flesh and blood, 
 for we can now dispense with foreign goods, since there is nothing the 
 foreigner produces but what can be obtained, of better quality and at a 
 less cost in one or the other of our colonies— that is to say, within the 
 British Empire — and in this manner reciprocity aims at securing to our 
 working classes that which they sold to the Liberals for a mess of pottage 
 — the birthright of our people and the cause of England's greatness — 
 Labour. 
 
 It must not be forgotten that every member of the community willing 
 to work has, at the least, a right to food and clothing enough to 
 support life. If, by a vicious policy, he is robbed of his labour, both food 
 and clothing must be supplied to him gratis at the cost of the taxpayer. It 
 is by no means the wealthy only who are specially concerned in this ques- 
 tion. The interests of all who, in their diff"erent degrees, desire to work 
 truly and fairly together are identical. All alike depend on profits, or, 
 more strictly speaking, on the ample reproduction of capital consumed. 
 We must never forget the fact that a nation, just as much as an individual, 
 is bound to give value, in one form or another, for all it receives. Our 
 wealth and capital rest entirely on the maintenance of our vast and com- 
 plex organisation of productive labour, which may, and by every obligation 
 of our duty to our children and descendants, must, be improved to the 
 utmost, but which cannot be destroyed or intermitted without the ruin of 
 the whole fabric. The capital of the country, if not used in the direct or 
 indirect employment of British labour, will sooner or later disappear in 
 paying for the products of foreign labour used, enjoyed, and destroyed
 
 36 S/f! LOr/S MALLET'S CHALLENGE ANSWERED. 
 
 by the Bright-Gladstone ideal consumer. We are all consumers ; hut we 
 are all dependent for our means of consuming on tlie right application of 
 reproductive labour. The Gladstone school, however, has cleverly divided 
 consumers into two classes, whose interests for the time being are diame- 
 trically opposed. We have to face pfodiicers of British goods on the one 
 hand, and distributors of foreign commodities on the other. The latter 
 owe their incomes to the assistance they receive from the foreign bounty 
 system in enabling them to dispose of the products of foreign labour to 
 the British consumer, who, by rights, and by every consideration of his 
 duty as a citizen, ought to purchase the products of British labour. 
 British producers, unable, in consequence of this one-sided and unfair dis- 
 tribution of the products of labour, to find a sale for their commodities, are 
 forced to give up the unequal contest, and in this manner our vast and 
 complex system of production is at present intermitted, and Avill soon be 
 destroyed for the benefit of the distributors of foreign commodities, unless 
 the one-sided fiscal policy of the past be shortly made to give way to 
 sounder j^rinciples of political economy. The wealthy and the employed 
 derive little or no benefit from the foreign bounties. The bounty only 
 secures the purchase of the foreign goods by the distributor, Avho, in conse- 
 quence, refuses to purchase the products of British labour, being unable to 
 distribute both, owing to the oipacity of consumers for consumption being 
 limited ; and in this manner British factories are forced to discharge their 
 workmen and close their doors, and the British farmer is obliged to 
 leave his land fallow. Workmen are thus reduced to see their families 
 starve in the midst of plenty. The markets are literally crammed 
 with cheap foreign goods, but they are of no use to those who, 
 thrown out of employment, earn no wages, and consequently cannot pur- 
 chase, and, as yet, dare not steal them. Hence the question workmen 
 have now to answer is a simple one. The Liberals say, " Alter the Factory 
 Act and work longer hours ! " Which shall it be ? Longer hours, or 
 reciprocity — meaning protection to British land and labour — and fair play ? 
 Workmen, please reply ! 
 
 FoRTis IN Arduis. 
 
 LONDON : PRINTED BV 
 
 SPOTTISWOODE AND CO., NEW-STREET SQIAKE 
 
 AND TARLIAMENT STREET
 
 3 
 
 2. The following articles, given by Mr. Maclver as manufactures or 
 half-manufactvues, are not entered separately in the Statistical Abstract, and 
 were, therefore, included by Sir Louis Mallet under the separate head of 
 " Articles Unenumerated," viz, : 
 
 Beads of glass ;,C66,26o 
 
 Caoutchouc manufactures .... ... 86,676 
 
 China and porcelain ware 279,888 
 
 Cordage and twine 542,048 
 
 Cork, manufactured 49i>503 
 
 Cotton yam 379>8oi 
 
 Embroidery and needlework ...... 84,609 
 
 Hats and bonnets 183,513 
 
 Jute yarn 37>959 
 
 Lace 521,384 
 
 Leather boots and shoes 348,786 
 
 Leather unenumerated ....... 3 79, 005 
 
 Linen yarn and manufactures 575,401 
 
 Musical instruments 615,702 
 
 Painters' colours 759,552 
 
 Paper 684,631 
 
 Toys 444,829 
 
 House frames, &c. 120,524 
 
 Manufactured goods (unenumerated) 5' 748, 65 3 
 
 Imports from the United States. 
 
 Sir Louis Mallet gives the value of our manufactured and half- 
 manufactured imports from the United States as about two millions : the 
 British Empire gives them as about three and a half millions. 
 
 Sir Louis Mallet's figures are taken from the annual statement of the 
 Trade of the United Kingdom with Foreign Countries and British Posses- 
 sions for the year 1877, p. 206. 
 
 The British Empire gives the following articles, which do not appear 
 in that statement, viz. : 
 
 Chemical manufactures ....... £2iT^'^7A 
 
 Cotton ,, 400,000 
 
 Glass ,, 4,393 
 
 Linen ,, . . . . . . . 5,162 
 
 Leather ,, 30,499 
 
 Muskets 6,199 
 
 Painters' colours . . . . . . . .15,081 
 
 Toys 13,813 
 
 House frames, &c. ........ 37,493 
 
 Also the British Empire includes in its list of American manufac- 
 tures or half- manufactures imported the two following articles, which have 
 throughout been treated by Sir Louis Mallet as " Articles for Consump- 
 tion," viz. : 
 
 Oil-seed cake £^,OS\,^Al> 
 
 Sugar (refined) ........ 425,150
 
 MR. DAVID MACIVER TO SIR LOUIS MALLET. 
 
 Mr. Maclver begs to thank Sir Louis Mallet for explaining the discre- 
 pancy between the figures given in his letter on " Reciprocity " and those 
 quoted by Mr. Maclver in the House of Commons. 
 
 Sir Louis Mallet's note, however, does not indicate that the " Cobden 
 Club " is taking any steps to correct the mistake which Mr. Maclver 
 pointed out. 
 
 The " Cobden Club " has printed, and is circulating, Sir Louis Mallet's 
 letter on " Reciprocity " in a form which conveys the impression that when 
 Sir Louis Mallet gave the value of our "imports of manufactured and 
 half-manufactured goods," he intended to include the whole of such 
 imports. 
 
 Mr. Maclver readily admits that Sir Louis Mallet treated part of these 
 imports as " articles of consumption," and another part as " articles unenu- 
 merated " ; but, most unfortunately. Sir Louis Mallet omitted to mention 
 that the articles so treated were in reality manufactures. 
 
 ' Mr. Maclver, therefore, having waited, as he thinks, a sufficient length 
 of time without hearing from the " Cobden Club," and believing that Sir 
 Louis Mallet's letter on "Reciprocity" is still being circulated unaccom- 
 panied by the explanation which he is now good enough to furnish, 
 considers himself entirely justified in sending this correspondence to the 
 press. 
 
 House of Commons : August 6, 1879.
 
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