for the four previous years. The staff of
officers employed in getting up the yearly
chronicles of our trade would suffice to carry
on the entire government of many petty
German states.

Not only legislative reform but science has
brought facilities for trade, the bare mention
of which tend to show its extent. Railways
bring people and goods together, which before
were always separated. A cask of sugar to
get from Glasgow to Carlisle had formerly
to circumnavigate England in a ship; now it
reaches its destination in a few hours by railway.
Merchants living at a distance from
one another corresponded for years and never
once met. Now, the Glasgow, Liverpool, or
United States merchant makes his journeys
to London or to other centres of
trade as often as need arises. The
introduction of the electric telegraph has also
helped to work a great change in the
mode of transacting business. Instead of
the day's operations being as formerly,
entirely carried on upon 'Change, bargains
are struck between Liverpool, London, and
continental firms of many thousand pounds'
value—from morning till evening—through
the agency of electric wires. A ship laden
with coffee from Costa Rica, or sugar from
the Brazils, arrives off some port in the
English Channel consigned to the order of a
London merchant, on account of a firm abroad.
The captain does not come to an anchor
and wait an exchange of posts with London
for his orders: he simply puts his sails aback,
pulls ashore in his boat, sends a few words
by electric telegraph announcing his arrival,
and, by the time he has finished a glass of
grog at his favourite inn, a reply reaches him
from town, to this effect: "The London
market is depressed;—go on to Hamburg."
At the end of an hour, from first stepping
into his boat, he is making all sail for the new
destination.

What would the shade of Edward the
Third say to the entry, inward and
outward, of upwards of twenty thousand ships
at the port of London alone, when, in his day,
the customs receipts amounted to about eight
thousand pounds a year of the coin of that
period ? The encouragement given to trade
by Elizabeth, and the state of peace in which
this country remained from her accession to
the reign of Charles the First, caused the
customs revenue of London, in the last period,
to amount to one hundred and nine thousand
pounds in one year. A century later, it
reached half a million sterling; in the year
eighteen hundred and thirty-seven it amounted
to ten millions and a quarter, being precisely
half of the entire customs revenue of the
United Kingdom. According to the blue
book before us, there were upwards of four
million tons of shipping entered both ways
at the port of London in eighteen hundred
and fifty-three, against one hundred and
eighty thousand in the middle of the last
century. The declared value of the goods
exported from this country in eighteen
hundred and forty-nine was upwards of
sixty-three millions sterling; showing, that
within twenty years, our trade beyond
sea had increased by fifty per cent. Thanks
to free trade, steam, and electricity, we
are now advancing with more rapid strides;
and we have accomplished, in four years,
what had previously required twenty to
bring about. In eighteen hundred and
fifty-three, our exports amounted to nearly
one hundred millions sterling; being an
increase of more than fifty per cent, upon the
trade of eighteen hundred and forty-nine,
and equalling the yearly revenue of the whole
of continental Europe, with the exception of
France.

Of our entire export trade, one-third goes
to the British colonies; and more than another
third is shipped to the United States. In
casting our eyes over the shipments of
eighteen hundred and fifty-three to various
parts of the world, we did not fail to remark
that the British manufactures and produce
exported to the gold colony of Victoria
amounted, within a few thousands, to the
value of the whole of the imports to British
India, viz. seven millions sterling. The
population of the two being respectively two
hundred and fifty thousand and one hundred
and forty millions, it follows that the
proportionate consumption per head was twenty-
eight pounds sterling in Victoria, and one
shilling in British India.

The ratio in which our manufactures are
taken by different places is interesting and
instructive. Thus gold-digging would appear
to be a thirsty occupation and gold-diggers a
jovial community; seeing that one-half of
the wine and beer sent out of this country is
taken by the Australian colonists,—in other
words, if they drink it all in one year, they
will absorb two hundred thousand barrels of
strong beer, and nearly one million and a half
gallons of wine. This is exclusive of spirits,
which were exported to Australia at the rate
of seven gallons for each colonist. The chief
occupations in Australia are those of
shepherds, stock-keepers, and gold-diggers; and
one would imagine that such kind of work,
being none of the cleanest, would create a
demand for the stoutest description of clothing.
Yet it would appear that, sheep are
tended, cattle herded, and gold dug for, in
light evening costume: silks having been
taken to the value of nearly half a
million, and muslins and cambrics to the extent
of a million and a half yards; whilst, of vulgar
fustians, only one hundred and twenty-four
thousand yards were required.

In strange contrast with the steady
progress of our own trade and that of
other European states, is the convulsive
starts of countries without the reach
of Saxon influence. Thus we find
Morocco taking in one year seven hundred