Notes on North America, Agricultural, Social, and Economical. By James F. W. Johnston, M.A., F.R.SS.L. and E., &c. Two Vols. post 8vo. William Blackwood & Sons.

Professor Johnston had three objects in view in his visit to the New World. His high reputation as an agricultural chemist had induced the Agricultural Society of New York to request him to give a course of lectures at Albany upon the connection of chemical and geological science with that of the cultivation of land. He had also been commissioned by the Government of New Brunswick to examine and report on the agricultural capabilities of that province. And besides these public duties, he was impelled by a strong desire to study the actual position of the art of husbandry in the fertile regions of the West, and the influence which its progress is likely to exert upon British agriculture.

Our shrewd brother Jonathan, however brilliant his achievements have been in other arts, has not hitherto earned any great reputation as a scientific farmer. Nature has been so bountiful to him, that, with "fresh fields and pastures new" ever before him, he has hitherto had no need to resort to the toilsome processes and anxious expedients—"curis acuens mortalia corda"—of our Old World systems of agriculture. On the newer lands of the Union, at least, the rotations followed, the waste of manures, and the general contempt of all method and economy, are such as would break the heart of a Haddingtonshire "grieve," and in a couple of seasons convert his trim acres into a howling wilderness. What would our respected friend Mr Caird say to a course of cropping like the following, which, though given by Professor Johnston as a specimen of New Brunswick farming, is the usual method followed on most of the new soils of North America?—

"He cuts down the wood and burns it, then takes a crop of potatoes, followed by one of wheat, with grass seeds. Nine successive crops of hay follow in as many years; after which the stumps are taken up, the land is ploughed, a crop of wheat is taken; it is then manured for the first time, or limed, and laid down again for a similar succession of crops of hay. This treatment is hard enough; but the unskilful man, after burning and spreading the ashes, takes two or three more crops of grain, leaves it to sow itself with grass, then cuts hay as long as it bears a crop which is worth cutting—after all which he either stumps and ploughs it, or leaves it to run again into the wilderness state."—(Johnston, vol. i. p. 104.)

Such a system seems, at first sight, to argue a barbarous ignorance of the very first elements of agriculture; and yet, as Professor Johnston remarks, "we English farmers and teachers of agricultural science, with all our skill, should probably, in the same circumstances, do just the same, so long as land was plenty, labour scarce and dear, and markets few and distant." Let no one suppose that our wide-awake kinsman does not know perfectly well what he is about. His apparently rude agricultural practice is regulated by a maxim which some of our Mechists at home would do well to bear in mind—that high farming is bad farming if it is not remunerative. He knows that to manure his land would be to insure the lodging and destruction of his crops, and he therefore leaves his straw to wither in the fields, and lives on in blessed ignorance of the virtues and cost of guano. To plough deep furrows in a virgin soil, saturated with organic matter, would be an idle waste of labour; and the primitive Triptolemus of Michigan scatters the seed upon the surface—or, raising a little mould on the point of a hoe, drops in a few grains of maize, covers them over, and heeds them no more till the golden pyramids are ripe for the knife. The first three crops, thus easily obtained, generally repay to the settler in the wilderness the expense of felling the timber, burning, and cultivating. If he then abandon it, he is at least no loser; but for eight or ten years the soil will still continue to produce crops of natural hay; and then, having extracted from it all that its spontaneous fertility will yield, he sells his possession for what it may bring, and moves off westward to repeat the same exhaustive process on a fresh portion of the forest, leaving to his successor the task of reinvigorating the severely tested powers of the soil by rest and restoratives.

This locust-like progress of the American settler—ever on the move to new lands, and leaving comparative barrenness in his track—must evidently place the case of America beyond the sphere of those ordinary laws of political economy which are applicable in European countries; and Professor Johnston seems to consider the fact of the incessant exhaustion and abandonment of lands as the chief key to a right understanding of the peculiar economical position of the United States. The owner of land in the older and more populous States, who has not learnt to apply a restorative system of culture, derives little benefit from the comparative advantage of situation, while the inhabitants of the towns and villages around him are fed with the surplus spontaneous produce of the far off clearings in Ohio or Missouri. But these in their turn become worn out—and as cultivation travels on westward, the chief centres of agricultural production are gradually receding farther and farther from the chief centres of population and consumption; and this increasing distance, and consequent cost of transport, is every year enhancing the price of grain in the busy and crowded marts of the West—ever filling up with the incessant stream of immigration from Europe. Such is Mr Johnston's view of the present normal condition of the Union in regard to the sustenance of her people; and he makes it the ground-work, as we shall presently see, of certain rather doubtful inferences, of some importance in their bearing on the agriculture of this country. One consequence, however, of any material increase in the price of food in the Eastern States of the Union is very obvious—the proprietor of land in these districts will gradually be enabled to apply, with profit to his exhausted soil, the artificial aids and costlier system of culture followed in Britain. Already this result is apparent in Professor Johnston's account of the energetic spirit of agricultural improvement which is rapidly spreading over most of the New England States. In the keen, restless, and enterprising New Englander, our Old Country farmers will undoubtedly find a more formidable competitor, for the honour of the first place in agricultural advancement, than any they have yet met on this side of the Atlantic. We have seen this year what his invention can produce in mechanical contrivances for economising the labour of the field; and, that he is not indifferent to the aids which science can afford him, is sufficiently proved by the occasion of that visit to America of which Professor Johnston has here given so pleasant and instructive a record. The invitation was not more creditable to the character of the Professor, than to the discernment of the zealous and patriotic men who thus showed how correctly they apprehend the true method of improving their fine country. His engagement was fulfilled during the sitting of the State Legislature at Albany in January 1850, when the hall of the Assembly was given up to him as a lecture-room; the leading members of the Assembly and of the State Agricultural Society were among his auditors, and the greatest public interest was evinced in the important subjects of his prelections.

It is apparent, from many passages of the Notes, that the author has listened too confidingly to the flattering tale—the "canor mulcendas natus ad aures" of the syren of Free Trade. He seems to be gifted with a strong natural faith, and a patriotic confidence in what British enterprise, and especially British agriculture, can achieve in the way of surmounting difficulties. It is not perhaps to be wondered at that one, whose professional pursuits naturally lead him to place a high value upon the aids which science has in store for the agriculturist, should encourage the farmer to think lightly of his present difficulties, and keep up his spirits with the hope of some paulo-post-future prosperity. It must be allowed that the farmer, poor fellow, has not wanted abundance of kind friends to comfort him in his adversity. Generally, however, their consolations—like those of the sympathetic Mrs Gamp—have been rather indefinite—vague moralisings upon his calamity, as if it were some inevitable stroke of Providence, to be bowed to in silent resignation, and hazy anticipations of good luck awaiting him. Others, again—who have professed the greatest friendship for him, and, like the Knight of Netherby, have come down to hearten up the broken-down man by imparting to him some plan of theirs, as sheep-pasturage or the like, for setting him on his legs again—are mentally taking an inventory of his remaining chattels, and calculating when to send the sheriff's officer. But Professor Johnston belongs to neither of these classes of comforters. His opinion, we know, is at least disinterested, and he brings it before us in the shape of a distinct proposition—viz., that the wheat-exporting capabilities of the United States are not so great as have generally been supposed, and that, as they must diminish rather than increase in future, the prospect of competition with American produce need cause no alarm to the British farmer.

This opinion, coming from such an authority, claims a deliberate examination; and the more so that, in the dearth of other gratulatory topics, it has been eagerly laid hold of by the Edinburgh Review, the Economist, and other Free-Trade organs, and vaunted as a complete proof that protective duties are quite unnecessary.

The reasons which Professor Johnston assigns for believing that the present wheat-exporting powers of the United States have been exaggerated, may be passed over with very little comment. The Board of Trade returns leave no room for doubt as to the quantity that has actually reached this country, and it is therefore unnecessary for us to follow him through his hypothetical estimate of the exportable grain, grounded on what they ought to have had to spare for us. We may remark, however, that the data on which his calculations proceed are far from satisfactory. He shows that all the wheat produced in the United States, as given in the estimates of the Patent Office, is inadequate to afford the eight bushels which in England we reckon to be requisite for the annual supply of each inhabitant—the population of the Union being about twenty-one millions, and the produce of wheat one hundred and twenty-seven millions of bushels. He does not overlook altogether the fact that wheat is not in America, as it is with us, almost the sole cereal food of the people; and he admits that a considerable allowance must be made for the consumption of Indian corn instead of wheat. But how much?—That is the question. The compilers of the State Papers at Washington estimate that Indian corn, buckwheat, and other grain, form so large a proportion of the food of the people, that they require only three bushels of wheat per head; and no doubt they have good grounds for this calculation. Professor Johnston, however, without indicating any reason whatever for his assumption, has set down the consumption of each individual at five bushels per annum; and thus, by a stroke of his pen, he reduces the average exportable surplus of the Union to only three millions of quarters.

As to what may be expected in future—Professor Johnston anticipates the gradual diminution of the supply, from the circumstance, already adverted to, of the progressive exhaustion of the newer lands of the Union, and the rapid increase of population in the old. If several of the Western States, he argues, have even already ceased to raise enough wheat for the supply of their present inhabitants, and are compelled to draw largely on the produce of the remote States of Illinois, Ohio, &c.—and if the productive power of these new lands is annually becoming less, the virgin soils more distant, and the transport of subsistence more difficult—if this is the state of matters now, what will it be in 1860, when immigration and natural increase will probably have raised the population of the Union to some thirty-four millions? "It is very safe," he concludes, "to say that in 1860 their wheat-exporting capability will have become so small as to give our British farmers very little cause for apprehension." It may perchance occur to these gentlemen, that the consolation Professor Johnston here offers them is not very cheering after all; and as long as they see the provision stores in every market town piled up with the interloping flour barrels of New York, and their own waggons returning home with their loads unsold, it is not to be wondered at if they are not greatly exhilarated with the prospect of what may possibly happen nine years hence. And slender as is the hope deferred here held out to them, it rests, we fear, on very questionable grounds.

Professor Johnston's opinion is founded on two suppositions: 1st, That the exhaustion of the Western States, on which he dwells so much, is proceeding so rapidly as already to affect the markets of the eastern districts; 2d, That these older districts will be unable to increase the quantity of produce raised within their own boundaries, without so adding to its cost as to prevent its being profitably exported.

As to the first supposition, it may be conceded that, in the course of time, a period must necessarily come when the spontaneous fertility of the newer-settled States will cease to yield grain with the same bountiful abundance it has done hitherto. But, when may that period be expected to arrive?—to what extent has exhaustion already taken place?—and what is the rate of its progress? For a reply, we have only to point to that vast territory, bounded by the lakes on the north and Ohio on the south, comprising the five States of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin—a territory eight times the size of England and Wales, with a population about equal to that of Scotland, containing 180,000,000 acres of arable land, a large portion of which is of surprising fertility—and ask whether it is possible to believe that it has already reached the turning point of its wheat-productiveness,[1] or can by any possibility do so for centuries to come? Why, the extent of land advertised in these five States for sale, (which forms only a fraction of what still remains in the hands of government,) is greater by a fourth than the whole area of England; and of the territory that has been actually sold, it is estimated that five-sevenths is still unreclaimed from the wilderness. Then look at the means of transport provided for conveying the overflowing abundance of those rich alluvial regions to the markets of the East, by way of the two great outlets—the lakes on the north, and the Mississippi on the south. The cost of such transport is no doubt considerable; the conveyance of a quarter of wheat from the centre of Illinois to Boston, by New Orleans, averages about 16s. 6d. But, nevertheless, so trifling is the original cost of production, that immense quantities of corn do annually reach the eastern seaboard by this route, a considerable portion of which is re-shipped to Liverpool, and sold there at prices greatly below its cost of production in this country. The annexed table[2] shows the remarkable fact, that, of the whole quantity of grain exported from the United States in the five years 1842-6, twelve-thirteenths of the wheat, about one-half of the flour, and a large proportion of the Indian corn, came from the two ports of New York and Philadelphia alone. Now, as we know that these large supplies were not grown within the confines of the Eastern States, and must have been brought from the westward, the inference is obvious that the two causes insisted on by Professor Johnston—the distance of the virgin soils, and the expense of transport—are as yet inoperative; or at least that they have not prevented the transmission of grain to the east in such vast quantities, as not only to meet the wants of all the population of that part of the Union, but to afford an average surplus for exportation to other countries equivalent to the annual maintenance of a million and a half of men. We need only mention one other fact, which seems in itself a sufficient refutation of the theory Professor Johnston has taken up. The causes which he thinks are so soon to dry up the supplies now derived from the West are of no recent or sudden emergence. The process of exhaustion on the new lands, and the rapid population of the old, has been going on for many years. If, then, these causes are so influential as he imagines, their effects should at least be apparent in a gradual increase of the prices of bread-stuffs in the Eastern States. Now, no such effect is to be found. On the contrary, we find that, during the last twenty years, the price of wheat, as well as of maize, in the chief marts of the east, has been steadily diminishing, instead of increasing. We extract from the returns published by the Board of Trade the annexed comparison[3] of the prices of wheat flour at New York, during two periods, from which it appears that, in the very State where the results of Professor Johnston's hypothesis ought to have been most manifest, the experience of twenty years shows a reduction of price instead of an enhancement, notwithstanding that the latter period in the comparison embraces the years of the potato failure. An examination of similar returns from Baltimore and New Orleans establishes the same fact, namely, that the tendency of prices for twenty years past is not upwards, but downwards—a fact quite irreconcilable with the supposed rapid exhaustion of the wheat soils of the interior.

It is much to be regretted that Professor Johnston was unable to extend his tour to these granary States of the West. It would have been satisfactory to have had from him an estimate of their capabilities founded on actual survey and personal observation, instead of indirect inference. We are quite ready to admit, that many of the accounts of those regions which have reached us, drawn up to suit the purposes of speculators in land, are of very dubious authenticity, and, like the stage-coach in which Mr Dickens travelled to Buffalo, have "a pretty loud smell of varnish." But, on the other hand, we cannot discredit the official data supplied by the State papers—without at least stronger grounds than those inferences from general geological structure which Professor Johnston has adduced to disprove the alleged fertility of the State of Michigan. There can, of course, be no more valuable criterion of the natural agricultural value of a country than is afforded by its geology—provided the survey be sufficiently extensive and accurate. But it is difficult to follow those enthusiasts in the science, whom we occasionally find drawing the most startling deductions from very narrow data—and prophesying the future history of the territory, and even the character of its inhabitants, from a glance at the bowels of the earth, as the Roman augur foretold the fate of empires from the entrails of his chickens.

We find, for example, a writer of high standing in America accounting for a remarkable diminution in the amount of bastardy in Pennsylvania, some thirty years ago, by the fact—that the settlers at that time had got off the cold clays and on to the limestone! A Scottish geologist, with more apparent reason perhaps, has founded an argument for an extensive emigration of the Highlanders on the prevalence of the primitive rocks in the north and west of Scotland. It is only from a complete and systematic survey that we can venture to predicate anything with certainty of the future agricultural powers of a country; and, in the absence of such trustworthy data, we must be content to estimate the future wheat-productiveness of Michigan, as well as of the other States we have named along with it, from what we know of their present fertility, and of the vast extent that is still uncleared.

As to New York and the other old-settled States of the Union, which we are told do not now produce enough for their own consumption, are we to take it for granted that they are always to continue stationary, and to make no effort to keep pace with the growing demands of an increasing population? Professor Johnston, we observe in one passage, has qualified his opinion as to the prospective dearth of grain by this curious condition—"Provided no change takes place in their agricultural system." But what shadow of a reason can be given for supposing it will not take place? The area of New York State is only one-twelfth less than that of England, and is, at least, no way inferior as to climate or quality of soil. As far as material means go, it is quite capable of maintaining, under an improved culture, at least four times its present population of three millions. The only question is as to the will and ability of her people to develop these means; and on this point Professor Johnston's own work is full of multiplied proofs of the zealous and intelligent spirit of improvement which is extending rapidly all over the North-Eastern States. We find the central government of the Confederation occupied in organising the plan of an Agricultural Bureau on a scale worthy of a great and enlightened nation—a work that contrasts in a very marked way with the studious neglect which such subjects meet with from the government of this country.[4] We find the several State legislatures anxiously encouraging every species of improvement—that of New York, in particular, devoting large grants to the support of exhibitions; preparing to found an Agricultural College; distributing widely and gratuitously the annual public reports on the state of agriculture; and, finally, sending to Europe for a celebrated chemist to assist in maturing their plans, and sitting—senators and great officers of state—at the feet of a British Gamaliel, laying down the law to them on the true principles of the all-important science of agriculture. Nor are the owners of the land asleep. It is a strong indication of their growing desire for information, that seven or eight agricultural periodicals are published in the State of New York alone. Professor Johnston found no less than fifty copies of such papers taken regularly in a small town in Connecticut of some two thousand inhabitants; and he had occasion to observe, in his intercourse with the farmers of New York, their general acquaintance with the geology of their country, and its relation to the management of their lands. Their implement-makers, who had already taught us the use of the horse-rake, the cradle-scythe, and the improved churn, have recently outstripped us by the invention, or at least the great improvement, of the reaping-machine, the advantages of which are so appreciated in the country of its origin that at Chicago 1500 of M'Cormick's machines were ordered in one year. In short, the proverbial energy, perseverance, and sagacity that distinguish our Yankee friends, seem now to be all directed towards effecting a change of system in the management of land; and the true question is, not whether the hitherto laggard progress of American agriculture is to be quickened in future, but whether we shall be able to keep pace with it.

But then Professor Johnston tells us that improvement is expensive, and that every process for reviving the dormant powers of the soil, and preserving their activity, must necessarily be attended with an addition to the price of the produce, which will thus prevent its coming into competition with that of England. This view rests upon a fallacy, which we are sure the author must have drawn from his reading in political economy, and not from his experience as an agriculturist. It is an off-shoot from the rent-theory, (the pestilent root of so much error and confusion,) which, however, we shall not notice at present, further than by affirming, in direct contradiction to it, that improvements do not necessarily, nor generally, involve an increase of price. Even those which require the greatest outlay—even a complete system of arterial drainage all over the State of New York, instead of adding to the cost of wheat, may very probably reduce it, as it has certainly done in this country. But most of the improvements readily available in the Eastern States involve scarcely any expenditure at all. The most obvious and effectual is to save and apply the manure, which is now wasted or thrown away; and when that proves insufficient, abundant supplies of mineral manures are easily procurable. On the exhausted wheat-lands of Virginia, a single dressing of lime or marl generally doubles the first crop. Deposits of gypsum, and of the valuable mineral phosphate of lime, seem to be abundant both in New York and New Jersey. Again, in the former State, where the common practice is to plough to a depth of not more than four inches, the simple expedient of putting in the plough a few inches deeper would of itself add one-half to the return of wheat over a very large district.

On the whole, so far from seeing any reason to anticipate, with Professor Johnston, a material reduction in the quantity of our wheat imports from the States, we look rather to see it increased; and, at all events, we have no hesitation in saying, that to encourage our English farmers to expect a cessation of competition from that quarter is to deceive them with very groundless hopes.

We have already dwelt at considerable length on this topic, both because of the prominent place it occupies in Professor Johnston's volumes, and of the notice which his speculations upon it have attracted in this country.

It has been mentioned that a large proportion—probably not less than one-half—of the cereal food consumed in the States consists of maize and buckwheat. Mr Johnston always alludes to this fact, as if the use of these grains were a matter of compulsion—as if the Americans resorted to them from being unable to afford wheaten bread. Now, according to the information we have from other sources, the truth is just the reverse of this. We are told that in the Eastern and Central States, as well as on the West frontier and among the slave population, the various preparations of Indian corn are becoming more relished every year; and that the extension of its cultivation is to be attributed, not to the failure of the wheat crops, but to a growing preference for it as an article of food. In a less degree the use both of oats and buckwheat seems to be spreading in the States, as well as in our own colonies of New Brunswick and Canada East; and one can scarcely wonder at the taste for the latter grain, after reading the appetising descriptions our author gives of the crisp hot cakes, with their savoury adjuncts of maple-honey, which so often formed his breakfast during his wanderings. The general use of these three kinds of grain—maize, oats, and buckwheat—has somehow come to be considered by political economists as indicative of a low degree of social advancement. And yet we know that, in the countries suited to their growth, a given area of ground cultivated with any of them will return a greater quantity of nutritious food, at a smaller expense and with less risk of failure, than if it were cropped with wheat. We are told that the great objection to them is, that their culture is too easy. Professor Johnston touches upon this notion in some remarks he makes on the disadvantage of buckwheat as a staple article of food. The objections to it, he tells us, consist in the ease with which it can be raised, the rapidity of its growth, and the small quantity of seed it requires: it induces, he says, like the potato, an indolent, slovenly, and exhausting culture; and "it is the prelude of evil, when a kind of food that requires little exertion to obtain it becomes the staple support of a people."[5] It may be noticed in passing, that, in point of fact, the results alleged are at least not universal; for, in regard to this very grain, we find its cultivation prevalent in some of the best-managed districts of the hard-working, provident, and intelligent Belgians. But taking the axiom as it stands, we cannot help suspecting that there is some fallacy lurking at the bottom of it. Misled by what we have observed of the Irishman and his potato diet, we have confounded the cum hoc with the propter hoc, and come to regard an easily-raised food as the cause of that indolence of which it is only the frequent indication. It were otherwise a most inexplicable contrariety between the physical and the moral laws which govern this world, that in every country there should be a penalty of social wretchedness and degradation attached to the use of that particular food which its climate and soil are best suited to produce. Can it be supposed that the blessings of nature are only a moral snare for us, and that, while she has given to the American the maize plant—oats to the Scotch Highlander—rice to the Hindoo—the banana to the inhabitant of Brazil—a regard for their social well-being requires each of them to renounce these gifts, and to spend their labour in extorting from the unwilling soil some less congenial kind of subsistence? Virgil has warned the husbandman—

But it were surely a dire aggravation of the difficulties of his task if his most plentiful harvest were also the most injurious to his advancement and true happiness. We cannot now, however, examine the grounds of a doctrine so paradoxical, and have adverted to it only to remark that it seems destined to meet with a most direct practical refutation in North America, where we find the habitual use of what we choose to consider the coarser grains associated with the highest intelligence and the most rapid development of social progress. There can be no doubt that the nature of the food generally used in any nation must exert an important influence on its prosperity; but it is difficult to understand how that prosperity should be promoted by the universal use of that variety which costs most labour. At all events, it is certainly a subject of very interesting inquiry, in reference to the increasing consumption among ourselves of wheat—the dearest and most precarious species of grain, much of it imported from other countries—and its gradual abandonment in North America, what effect these opposite courses may have on the future destinies of the two great branches of the Anglo-Saxon race.

Leaving this as a problem for political economists, let us now follow him in his visit to the British side of the St Lawrence. His brief three weeks' survey of the Canadas did not, of course, enable him to form any very intimate acquaintance with the condition of these provinces; and he prudently abstains from pronouncing any judgment upon the vexed topics of Canadian politics. His presence at the great exhibition, at Kingston, of the Agricultural Society of Upper Canada, gave him a good opportunity of estimating the progress that has been made in practical agriculture. The stock, as well as the implements, there brought forward in competition for the various premiums, amounting in all to £1000, gave most satisfactory indications of improvement; while the large attendance, and the interest taken in the proceedings, sufficiently showed that the inhabitants of the Upper Province are now awake to the necessity of agricultural improvement as the main source of their future prosperity. In a country where eighty per cent of the whole population are directly engaged in the cultivation of the soil, the land interest is, or ought to be, predominant. But the bitter animosity of political parties, and the abortive attempts of government to soothe and reconcile them, have hitherto stood much in the way of any combined effort towards the encouragement of improved cultivation. The art of husbandry is not likely to thrive in a country where every man is bent on proving himself a Cincinnatus. Of late, however, public spirit has shown symptoms of taking a more wholesome direction; and, notwithstanding occasional ministerial crises and political explosions, which we on this side the water are sometimes puzzled to understand, all parties in the province seem now fully aware that the development of the vast resources of their fertile soil is the only road to permanent prosperity. The encouragement of local competitions, the provision for systematic instruction in agriculture in the colleges—which Professor Johnston tells us is in progress—and the introduction of elementary lessons in the art as a regular branch of common school learning, are all steps in the right direction. It is precisely in such a community as that of Canada that the last-mentioned kind of instruction is really of essential benefit. From the last census of Upper Canada, it appears that there are sixty thousand owners of land in the province, and only ten thousand labourers without land. The great majority of the boys in the ordinary schools will become proprietors, and, at the same time, cultivators; and, in such circumstances, it is of the utmost importance that the youth should acquire betimes a competent knowledge of the principles on which his future practice is, or ought to be, founded—such knowledge as will, at least, enable him to, shake off the traditional prejudices and slovenly habits which his father may have imported with him from Harris or the County Kerry.

The querulous and depreciatory tone which our Canadian fellow-subjects are apt to employ in speaking of their country, and its prospects, is remarked by Professor Johnston as contrasting oddly with the unqualified adulation of everything—from the national constitution to the navy button—which one constantly hears from his republican neighbour. One consequence of this habit is, the existence of a prevalent but very mistaken notion that, in the march of social advancement, Canada has been completely distanced by the United States. Professor Johnston has been at some pains to demonstrate, and we think most successfully, that this impression is entirely erroneous. Indeed, if we only recollect the history of Canada for the last fifteen years—the disunion of her own people, and the reckless commercial experiments to which she has been subjected by the home government, the rapid strides in improvement—of the Upper Province especially—are almost marvellous. As a corroboration of what Professor Johnston has said on the subject, we have thrown together in the subjoined table, collected from the Government returns, some of the most striking and decisive evidences of the recent progress of Upper Canada. In certain particulars, no doubt, she is outstripped by some of those districts of the States to which from time to time extraordinary migrations of their unsettled and nomadic population have been directed. But putting such exceptional cases out of view, the inhabitants of Canada need fear no comparison with the Union in all the chief elements of national advancement.

PROGRESS OF UPPER CANADA,—1837-47.

In looking at the great sources of wealth possessed by these provinces, our attention is at once arrested by the growing importance of the St Lawrence as an outlet to the produce, not only of the Canadas, but of a vast area of the States territory. With the exception, perhaps, of the Mississippi, no river in the world opens up so grand a highway for the industry of man as the St Lawrence, with the chain of vast lakes and innumerable rivers that unite with it in the two thousand miles of its majestic progress to the ocean. Never was there an enterprise more worthy of a great nation than that of surmounting the obstacles to its navigation, and completing the channels of connection with its tributary waters; and nobly have the people of Canada executed it. Taking into account the infancy of their country, and the amount of its population and revenue, it is not too much to say, with Mr Johnston, that their exertions to secure water-communication have been greater than those of any part of the Union, or any country of Europe. The improvements on the St Lawrence itself, and the canals connected with it, have already cost the colony two millions and a quarter sterling, in addition to the expenditure of £800,000 by the home government on the construction of the Rideau Canal. The results of this liberal but judicious outlay are already showing themselves, not only by the rapidly-increasing Canadian traffic on the St Lawrence, but by its drawing into it, year after year, a larger share of the commerce of the States. That the influx of trade from the south must ere long vastly exceed its present amount, is evident from a consideration of the gigantic projects already completed, or in course of construction, for effecting an access between the lakes and the fertile regions of Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, &c., already spoken of, and thus saving the longer and costlier transit by the Mississippi. One of the Reports of the State of New York thus speaks of them:—

"Three great canals, (one of them longer than the Erie Canal,) embracing in their aggregate length about one thousand miles, are to connect the Ohio with Lake Erie; while another deep and capacious channel, excavated for nearly thirty miles through solid rock, unites Lake Michigan with the navigable waters of the Illinois. In addition to these broad avenues of trade, they are constructing lines of railroads not less than fifteen hundred miles in extent, in order to reach with more case and speed the lakes through which they seek a conveyance to the seaboard. The circumstance, moreover, is particularly important, that the public works of each of these great communities are arranged on a harmonious plan, each having a main line, supported and enriched by lateral and tributary branches, thereby bringing the industry of their people into prompt and profitable action; while the systems themselves are again united, on a grander scale, with Lake Erie as its common centre."

The various streams of the trade from the interior being thus collected in the lakes—which form, as it were, the heart of the system—there are two great channels for its redistribution and dispersion through the markets of the world. These are the St Lawrence, and the Erie Canal with the Hudson; and the vital question as regards the prosperity of Canada is, by which of these outlets will the concentrated traffic of the lakes find its way to the ocean? Mr Johnston has devoted considerable attention to this subject, and assigns two good reasons for believing that the St Lawrence is destined immensely to increase the share which it has already secured. In the first place, the American artery is already surcharged and choked up;—notwithstanding all the efforts that have been made to expedite the traffic on the Erie Canal, it has been found wholly inadequate to accommodate the immense trade pouring in from the west; and, secondly, the route of the St Lawrence, besides being the more expeditious, is now found to be the cheaper one. In a document issued by the Executive Council of Upper Canada, it is mentioned that the Great Ohio Railway Company, having occasion to import about 11,000 tons of railway iron from England, made special inquiries as to the relative cost of transport by the St Lawrence and New York routes, the result of which was the preference of the former, the saving on the inland transport alone being 11,000 dollars. There seems good reason to expect that a considerable portion of the Mississippi trade may be diverted into the Canadian channel; but putting this out of view altogether, it is certain that the navigation of this glorious river is every year becoming of greater importance to the United States, as well as to Britain: let us hope that it is destined ever to bear on its broad breast the blessings of peace and mutual prosperity to both nations.

After a rapid glance at Lower Canada, Professor Johnston crossed the St Lawrence, in order to complete the survey of New Brunswick, which, before leaving England, he had been commissioned to make for the Government of the colony. We have had no opportunity of seeing the official Report, in which he has published the detailed results of his observations; but the valuable information collected in these volumes has strongly confirmed our previous impression, that the resources and importance of this fine colony have never yet been sufficiently appreciated at home. With an area as nearly as possible equal to that of Scotland, it possesses a much larger surface available for agriculture. The climate is healthy and invigorating; it is traversed by numerous navigable rivers; its rocks contain considerable mineral wealth; and the fisheries on its coasts are inexhaustible. Imperfectly developed as its resources are, the trade from the two ports of St John's and St Andrew's alone, exceeds that of the whole of the three adjoining States of the Union—Maine, Vermont, and New Hampshire—although its inhabitants do not number one-sixth of the population of these States. As to the fertility of the soil, Professor Johnston, by a comparison of authentic returns, shows that the productive power of the land already cultivated in the province considerably exceeds the averages of New York, of Ohio, and of Upper Canada—countries which have hitherto been considered more favoured both in soil and climate. By classifying the soils in the several districts, he has estimated that the available land, after deducting a reserve for fuel, is capable of maintaining in abundance a population of 4,200,000; while its present number little exceeds 200,000. In all the course of his travels, he met with but a few rare instances in which the agricultural settlers did not express their contentment with their circumstances; and although it seems still questionable whether farming on a large scale, by the employment of hired labour, can be made remunerative, the universal opinion of the experienced persons he consulted testified that, with ordinary prudence and industry, the poorest settler, who confines his attention to the clearing and cultivation of land, is sure of attaining a comfortable independence.

The question naturally occurs—How is it that, with all these natural advantages and encouragements to colonisation, and with its proximity to our shores, so very small a proportion—not more than one in sixty or seventy of the emigrants from Great Britain—make New Brunswick their destination? Professor Johnston, while he maintains that, taking population into account, New Brunswick is in this respect no worse off than Canada, adverts to several causes of a special nature which may have retarded its settlement. But the truth is, that the question above started leads us directly to another of far greater compass and importance—What is the reason that all our colonies taken together absorb so small a proportion of our emigrants compared with the United States? What is the nature of the inducements that annually impel so large a number of our countrymen to forfeit the character of British subjects, and prefer a domicile among those who are aliens in laws, interests, and system of government?

We hardly know how to venture upon anything connected with the ominous subject of emigration, at a moment when the crowds leaving our shores, at the rate of nearly a thousand every day, are such as to startle the most apathetic observer, and shake the faith of the most dogmatic economist in the truth of his speculations. This is not the place to inquire what strangely compulsive cause it may be that has all at once swelled the ordinary stream of emigration into a headlong torrent.[6] Mayhap it is neither distant, nor doubtful, nor unforetold. But whatever it may be, there stands the fact—which we can neither undo, nor, for aught that can be seen at present, prevent its annual recurrence in future, or say how and when the waves are to be stayed. "When the Exe runs up the streets of Tiverton," says a certain noble prophet—whose vaticinations, however, have not been very felicitous hitherto—"then, and not till then, may we expect to see the reversal of the free-import system;" and then, and not till then, we take leave to add, may we hope to see the ebbing of that tide of British capital and British strength which is now flowing strongly and steadily into the bay of New York.

Proportion of British Emigration to the Colonies and to the United States, 1846-50 inclusive.

The accompanying abstract, from the returns of the Emigration Commissioners, exhibits two most remarkable results:—1st, The proportion of emigration to British America and other destinations is gradually falling off; 2d, That to the United States is steadily and rapidly increasing, so that they now receive four out of every five emigrants who leave our shores. Is this distribution to be regarded as a matter of indifference in a political point of view? Are we to understand that it is no concern to us who remain behind, whether the labour and capital of those who leave us shall go to fill up the vacuum of our own colonial empire, or to carry new accessions of wealth and power to those in whose prosperity (to put the matter mildly) we have only a secondary interest? This question the consistent Free-Trader is bound to answer unhesitatingly in the affirmative. In his cosmopolitan philosophy, the interests of one country are no more to be considered than those of any other. The theory of absolute freedom of exchange expunges altogether the idea of nationalism, and regards man, not as a member of this or that community, but as the denizen of a great universal republic. Local and historical associations—ties of kindred and of birth—are only so many obstructions in the way of human progress; and an Englishman is nothing more than the subject of certain animal wants and instincts, the gratification of which he must be left to seek wherever he finds the materials most abundant. Such is Free Trade in its true scope and ultimate tendency. What shall be said, then, of the consistency or sincerity of those pseudo-apostles of the doctrine, who, having been the most active in promoting that nibbling and piecemeal legislation which they choose to call freedom of trade—who have been loudest in proclaiming a universal commercial fraternity, and in denouncing colonies as a wasteful encumbrance—are now the first to take alarm at the natural and inevitable result of their own measures, and to call out for a better regulation of emigration; in other words, for legislative interference with the free action of those of our countrymen who, being thrust out of employment in the land of their birth, are so literally following out the great maxim of buying in the cheapest market and selling in the dearest?

The text is a tempting one, but we must refrain from wandering further from the subject with which we started—namely, the inducements which lead so many of our emigrants to select the United States as their future home. One of the prevalent causes has been very well stated by Professor Johnston—that which we may call the capillary attraction of former emigration:—

"A letter from a connection or acquaintance determines the choice of a place to go to, and, without further inquiry, the emigrant starts. Thus for a while, emigration to a given point, once begun, goes on progressively by a sort of innate force. Those who go before urge those who follow by hasty and inaccurate representations; so that, the more numerous the settlers from a particular district, the more numerous also the invitations for others to follow, till the fever of emigration subsides. In other words, in proportion as the home-born settlers in one of these countries increases, will the number of home-born emigrants to that country increase—but for a time only, if the place have real disadvantages."—(Vol. ii, p. 204.)

It is vain to shut our eyes to the fact that the government of the United States offers to the emigrant many real, substantial, and peculiar advantages. The first and most important aid that can be given to the intending settler is a complete and accurate survey of the country; and this has been accomplished by the States government at great expense, but in so perfect a manner that a purchaser has no difficulty in at once pointing out, on the official plan, any lot he may have selected in the most remote corner of the wilderness. The next point of importance to him is simplicity of conveyance and security of title; and so effectual and satisfactory is the American system that litigation in original land-titles is almost unknown. Then as to the weighty consideration of price—which perhaps ought to have been first mentioned—the uniform and very low rate in the States of 5s. 3d. an acre saves infinite trouble, disputation, and jealousy. Such are some of the temptations held out to the intending purchaser of land; and it must be confessed that, in each particular, they present a striking contrast to the difficulties he has to meet in some of the British colonies—the arbitrary changes of system, the vexatious delays, and the comparatively exorbitant charges—which must appear to the settler as if they had been contrived on purpose to discourage him. When we add to these the prospects of ready employment in the States held out to other classes of emigrants, and the stringent laws lately made for their protection, both on the passage and on their arrival, we cannot be at a loss to see that the direction which emigration has lately taken is not the result of chance or caprice, but of a deliberate comparison of advantages, which the most ignorant can easily understand and appreciate.

The main object of Professor Johnston's visit being of a scientific character, his remarks on the general topics of manners and politics occur only incidentally; but it is impossible for any traveller to keep clear of such subjects in writing of a country, the peculiarities of which are pressed upon his notice at every hour of the day, and at every corner of the street. Rabelais tells us of a certain island, explored by the mighty Pantagruel, whose inhabitants lived wholly upon wind—that is, being interpreted, on flattery; and the visitor of the States who finds himself, as it were, pinned to the wall, and compelled to yield up his admiration at discretion, may be sometimes tempted to believe that he has made a similar discovery, and that the flatulent diet of compliment is somehow congenial to an American appetite. Professor Johnston seems to have had his candour or his eulogistic powers sometimes severely tested, if we may guess from his quiet hint, that "it is unpleasant to a stranger to be always called on to admire and praise what he sees in a foreign country; and it is a part of the perversity of human nature to withhold, upon urgent request, what, if unasked, would have been freely and spontaneously given." He is of course prepared for the reception which any work, aiming at mere impartiality, is sure to meet with among Transatlantic critics; and it will, therefore, not surprise him to find that the above peccant sentence has been already pounced upon by them as proving malice prepense, and as affording a significant key to all his observations on the institutions of the States.

The following extract explains the origin of two of those euphonious party designations in which our neighbours delight, and which may perchance have puzzled some of our readers:—

"In England, to be a democrat still implies a position at the very front of the movement party, and a desire to hasten forward political changes, irrespective of season or expediency. But among the American democrats there is a Conservative and a Radical party. The former, who desire to restrain 'the amazing violence of the popular spirit,' are nicknamed by their democratic adversaries the 'Old Hunkers;' the latter, who profess to have in their hearts 'sworn eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man,' are stigmatised as 'Barnburners.' The New York Tribune, in reference to the origin of the names themselves, says that the name 'Hunkers' was intended to indicate that those on whom it was conferred had an appetite for a large 'hunk' of the spoils; though we never could discover that they were peculiar in that. On the other hand, the 'Barnburners' were so named in allusion to the story of an old Dutchman who relieved himself of rats by burning his barns, which they infested, just like exterminating all banks and corporations, to root out the abuses connected therewith."—(Vol. i. p. 218.)

Equally mysterious is the term "log-rolling," though the thing itself is not altogether unknown in legislatures nearer home.

"When the trees are felled and trimmed, rolling the logs to the rivers or streams down which they are to be floated, as soon as the spring freshets set in, remains to be done. This being the hardest work of all, the men of several camps will unite, giving their conjoined strength to the first party on Monday, to the second on Tuesday, and so on. A like system in parliamentary matters is called 'log-rolling.' You and your friends help me in my railroad bill, and I and my friends help you with your bank charter; or sometimes the Whigs and Democrats, when nearly balanced, will get up a party log-rolling, agreeing that the one shall be allowed to carry through a certain measure without much opposition, provided a similar concession is granted to the other."—(Vol. ii. p. 297.)

The Notes convey to us the strong impression that Professor Johnston's visit to the West has operated as a wholesome corrective of a certain tendency in his political opinions. He seems to have left home with a warm admiration of American institutions generally, which, like Slender's love, "it pleased heaven to diminish on further acquaintance." At all events, he could not avoid being struck with some of the many perplexities and anomalies that result from referring everything directly to the popular voice. In England, whatever dissensions may arise about the enactment of law, all are agreed in a sensitive jealousy as to the purity of its administration. The most rampant Radical among us looks upon justice as far too sacred a thing to be hazarded in the rude chance-medley of popular election. The keenest partisan feels that, in the lofty and unswerving integrity of our judges, he possesses a substantial security and blessing, for the loss of which no place, power, or parliamentary triumph, could compensate. To one accustomed to regard with veneration the dignified independence of the judicial office in Great Britain, nothing will appear more harshly repugnant to sound policy than the system, lately introduced into some of the New England States, of appointing all judges, high and low, by the votes of the electors of the district over which they are to preside, and for a limited term of years.

"It was deservedly considered a great triumph when the appointment of judges for life liberated the English bench from the influence of the Crown, and when public opinion became strong enough to enforce the selection of the most learned in the law for the highest judicial offices. Now, passing over the objection which some will strongly urge, that the popular electors are not the best judges of the qualifications of those who aspire to the bench, and that the most popular legal demagogue may expect to obtain from them the highest legal appointment, it may be reasonably asked whether popular influence in seasons of excitement, and on questions of great moment, may not bias the minds of judges whose appointment is in the hands of the people?—whether the fear of a coming election may not deter them from unpopular decisions? The influence of a popular majority may here as profoundly pollute the fountains of justice as the influence of the Crown ever did among us at home."—(Vol. i. p. 150.)

At first sight, it seems quite unaccountable that an enlightened people should ever have devised or sanctioned a system which so obviously exposes the bench to the risk of corruption; and one is at a loss to reconcile a reverence for the law with an ordinance that subjects her minister to the ordeal of canvassing and cajoling all and sundry—perhaps the very men who may next day be in the dock before him. But the root of the anomaly is not hard to find. Into the purest of republics ambition and cupidity—the love of office and the love of dollars—will force their way. But then, under that form of constition, situations of trust and emolument are necessarily few in comparison to the number of candidates for them. The offices in the civil departments of the United States governments are not numerous. The navy employs altogether some five hundred officers above the rank of midshipman—exactly the number of our post-captains; and the whole army of the Confederation, rank and file, musicians and artificers included, is very little over ten thousand men. There is little temptation to enter the medical profession, in which learning and experience go for nothing, and a Brodie is precisely on a level with a "Doctor Bokanky;"—nor the Church, in which the pastor is hired by the twelvemonth, and is thought handsomely paid with a wage of £100 a-year. What field, then, remains for the aspiring spirit but the law?—and what wonder if the sixteen thousand attorneys, who, we are told, find a living in the States, and take a leading part in the management of all public business, should vote "the higher honours of the profession" far too few to be retained as perpetual incumbencies? Hence has sprung the device of popular election to, and rotation in, the sweets of office, which, by "passing it round," and giving everyone a chance, is designed to render it as generally available as possible. The constitution of the judiciary is not uniform, but varies in almost every different state. In New York, the Judges of Appeals, as well as those of the Supreme and Circuit Courts, are elected by the people at large, and for a term of eight years, each leaving office in rotation. In New Jersey they are appointed for six years by the governor and senate; in Vermont, annually by the legislature. In Connecticut nearly the same system prevails as that in Vermont; while in Massachusetts the judges retain office "during good behaviour." The salaries are not less various, in some States the remuneration of judges of supreme courts being £500 a-year, which is about the highest rate; and in others so low as £180. There are no retiring allowances in any case; and as they are thus liable to be thrown out of office at an uncertain period, or compelled to vacate it after a short term of years, it can scarcely be expected that such remuneration will secure the highest grade of legal acquirements, either for the bench itself, or for the inferior offices of attorney-generalships and chief-clerkships, which are all held by the same lax tenure of popular favour. Even if the system has "worked well," as it is said to have done by American writers, during the four or five years it has been in operation in New York—even if it be true that the lawyers of the Empire State have, by avoiding the snares thrown in their way, given proof individually of the probity of Cato, and of a constancy worthy of Socrates, we still say that the State does wrong in putting their virtues to such a test. Mr Johnston supplies us with an example of the temptation it holds out to a dangerous pliancy of principle. Most of our readers must be aware of the existence of an active and noisy party in the States, who, under the name of "Anti-renters," are seeking to free themselves from payment of certain reserved rents, or feu-duties, as they would be termed in Scotland, which form the stipulated condition of land tenure in a certain district.

"The question has caused much excitement and considerable disturbance in the State. It has been agitated in the legislature and in the courts of law, and the supposed opinion in regard to it of candidates for legal appointments, is said to have formed an element which weighed with many in determining which candidate they would support. During the last canvass for the office of attorney-general, I met with the following advertisement in the public journals of the State:—

"'I have repeatedly been applied to by individuals to know my opinions with regard to the manorial titles, and what course I intend to pursue, if elected, in relation to suits commenced, and to be commenced, under the joint resolution of the Senate and Assembly. I have uniformly replied to these inquiries, that I regard the manor titles as a public curse which ought not to exist in a free government, and that if they can be broken up and invalidated by law, it will give me great pleasure; and I shall prosecute the pending suits with as much vigour and industry as I possess, and will commence others, if, on examination, I shall be satisfied there is the least chance of success. I regard these prosecutions as a matter of public duty, and, in this instance, duty squares with my inclination and wishes.

'L. S. CHATFIELD.'

"Mr Chatfield," adds Professor Johnston, "is now attorney-general; and I was informed that the known opinions of certain of the old judges on this exciting question was one of the understood reasons why they were not re-elected by popular suffrage, when, according to the new constitution, their term of office had expired."—(Vol. ii. p. 291.)

Here, then, we see the highest law officer of the State openly "bidding" for office—truckling to faction—and indecently condescending to enact the part of a "soft-sawderer." That term, we presume, is the proper American equivalent for the stinging soubriquet with which Persius stigmatises some Chatfield—some supple attorney-general of his day—

When persons of the highest official position scruple not thus undisguisedly to trim their course according to the "popularis aura," one can scarcely help suspecting a want of firmness of principle and genuine independence among the classes below them. De Tocqueville's observations have taught us to doubt whether the tree of liberty that grows under the shadow of a tyrant majority can ever attain a healthy stability, however vigorous it may appear externally. No one questions that the Americans enjoy, under their institutions, very many of the blessings of a liberal and cheaply-administered government. You have perfect liberty of speech and action, so far as the government is concerned. The avowal of one's opinion is not followed, as in Italy, or in the rival republic of France, by a hint that your passport is ready, or by the polite attendance on you, wherever you go, of a mysterious gentleman in black; but you feel yourself, nevertheless, perpetually "en surveillance," and constrained either to sail with the stream, or to adopt a reserve and reticence which, to an Englishman, is almost as irksome as the knowledge that there is a spy sitting at the same dinner-table with him.

The spirit of Professor Johnston's strictures on such anomalies will, of course, insure his being set down by his democratic friends in America as an unmitigated "old hunker;" and he certainly shows no great liking for practical republicanism. But to find fault with our neighbours' arrangements, and to be contented with our own, are two very different things; and, accordingly, our author takes many opportunities, as he goes along, of showing that he is quite aware of the innumerable rents in our own old battered tea-kettle of a constitution, and of the infinite tinkering it will take to make it hold water.

We should have held him unworthy of the character of a true Briton if he had omitted the occasion of a grumble at our system of taxation, though, of course, we differ with him entirely in the view he takes of the evil. After an elaborate comparison of the taxation in the United States with that of Great Britain, he sums up all with the following somewhat sententious apophthegm:—

"The great contrast between the two sections of the Anglo-Saxon race on the opposite sides of the Atlantic is this—On the one side the masses rule and property pays; on the other side property rules and the masses pay."—(Vol. ii. 254.)

The sentence sounds remarkably terse and epigrammatic. Most of such brilliant and highly-condensed crystals of wisdom, however, will be found on analysis to contain, along with some exaggerated truth, a considerable residuum of nonsense; and this specimen before us, we apprehend, forms no exception. Even if the fact so broadly asserted were indisputable, we should still be inclined to doubt, after what the author has himself told us, whether the "rule of the masses" is always an unmixed blessing to a community. He has seen enough of it to know at least that the preponderance of popular sway is not incompatible with much social restraint—with prejudice and narrow-mindedness—with what he considers a false commercial principle—with a disregard of public faith, and of the rights of other nations; and lastly, with a contempt of the rights of humanity itself, and a legalised traffic in our fellow men. But, if we understand him rightly, he does not so much defend the abstract excellence of the democratic principle as advocate a nearer approach, on our part, to the American model of taxation. In the States, he says, property pays—in England the masses pay;—that is, if we strip the proposition of its antithetical obscurity, the owners of property pay less here than they do in America—not only absolutely less, but less in proportion to the whole amount of taxation. The calculations on which he founds this assertion are too long and involved to be quoted at length, but we will endeavour to abridge them so as to enable the reader to judge of their accuracy.

The taxes in the United States are of three classes: 1st,—the national taxes, amounting to about six millions a-year, which are raised chiefly by customs duties on imports; 2d,—the state taxes; 3d,—the local taxes, for the service of the several counties, cities, and townships. These two last classes are levied chiefly in the form of an equal rate assessed upon the estimated value of all property, real and personal.

In order to compare the incidence of the public burdens upon property in the two countries, Professor Johnston selects the case of New York State, in which the total taxable property (personal as well as real) in 1849 was 666,000,000 of dollars, and the amount of rates levied for state and local taxes 5,500,000 dollars, or about ⁴/₅ per cent on the gross valuation. Turning then to Great Britain, (excluding Ireland,) he sets down the fee simple value of the real property alone in estates above £150 a-year, as rated to the income-tax, at £2,382,000,000.

"Four-fifths of a per cent (the rate levied in New York) on this sum would realise £19,000,000 sterling; and were all property, real and personal, in this island below £150 a-year, and the amount of property in Ireland rated in a similar way, and fairly collected, our entire revenue of £50,000,000 would probably be obtained as the revenue of the State of New York now is, by this one property tax only."—(Vol. ii. p. 257.)

And he thus concludes that, as regards the absolute amount of taxation, property in Britain escapes for a smaller payment than that in America.

Now, it must be remarked, on this branch of the comparison, that before we can form any opinion as to its soundness, it is essential that we should know on what principles the valuation of property is conducted in New York. The whole question depends upon this. If the system of valuation is different in the two countries, there are no materials on which to build a conclusion. We know what discrepancies may arise out of the mode of valuation, from the fact that, while the annual value of all real property in England and Wales was assessed for the poor-rate, in 1841, at about £62,500,000, a portion of it only—that over £150 a-year—was valued two years afterwards, for the income-tax, at nearly £86,000,000. We observe that Professor Johnston has arrived at the amount of real property in Britain, by assuming the fee-simple value to be twenty-seven years' purchase of the income. But in New York, he tells us, the value of income is calculated at only sixteen and a half years' purchase. The terms of the comparison are, therefore, manifestly faulty. And mark how this affects the result. The real income of Great Britain, capitalised at sixteen and a half years' purchase, would amount to only £1,447,000,000, and, if taxed at the same rate as in New York, would yield, instead of £19,000,000 only, £11,500,000, which, as it happens, is three millions less than it actually pays, as may be plainly seen from the undernoted statement:—

DIRECT AND LOCAL TAXATION OF REAL PROPERTY IN GREAT BRITAIN.

Note.—The first six items are taken from the Report of the House of Lords on burdens affecting land, and some of them are below the present amounts. The items affecting Scotland are obviously defective.

To this extent at least, then, we are justified in correcting Professor Johnston's calculations, and in affirming with certainty that the owner of real property in Britain surrenders a larger portion of his wealth for the public service than in New York, or any other State of the Union. Whether the same can be said of the British owner of personal property is another question, which we shall come to by-and-by.

So much for the absolute comparison. But then Professor Johnston aims also at proving, that while the rich man is better off here, the poor man is worse—that the "masses" (i. e., we presume, those who are dependent on the wages of labour) pay a larger share of the public burdens than the same "masses" do in America. And this, he thinks, is demonstrated by the fact, that the customs duties of America amount to only a dollar a-head of the whole population, whereas in Great Britain they are three dollars—three times heavier. Now, we venture to affirm that, as a contrast between the position of the labouring man on this side of the Atlantic, and that of his brother on the other, this statement is quite a nest of fallacies. In the first place, it proceeds on the assumption (a very common but erroneous one among our Free-Trade authorities) that it is the labouring class who pay the bulk of the taxes drawn in the shape of customs. As this error, however, may be held to affect both sides of the comparison equally, we have next to notice that, admitting it to be the case, the fact of the customs being three dollars a-head in this country, and only one in the States, only shows that the English labourer pays absolutely more than the Yankee, which no one ever doubted. It amounts only to this—that in an old country which has to uphold numerous public institutions unknown in America, and with a public debt to provide for of some £800,000,000 sterling, the burden of this, as well as of all other branches of taxation, is heavier than in the youthful republic, with a national debt of only £13,000,000. In order to draw a fair parallel between the cases as regards the poorer classes of both countries, we must put the question in a different way, and inquire, what proportion does the amount of customs (assumed as representing the poor man's share of taxation) bear to the whole public burdens in the two countries respectively? The contrasted account would then show the matter in a very different aspect from that in which Professor Johnston has represented it, and would stand thus:—

Even if we were to throw into the scale a large portion of the excise duties levied in Britain, which Professor Johnston may be entitled to claim as a peculiar burden on "the masses"—at least as much as the customs—it would still be apparent, that, if such payments are to be taken as a fair criterion, the people's burdens are not relatively heavier here than in America. We shall only add further on this subject, that while many of the less opulent class of our fellow-citizens have undoubted real grievances to complain of, and while writers, with worse intentions than Professor Johnston, are ever ready to exaggerate them, and to foster discontent, it becomes one of his high character to guard against allowing a somewhat undisciplined taste for statistics to betray him into rash general allegations, calculated to produce error and irritation.

The parallel he has drawn, however, is very instructive on one point, although he has failed to notice it. He has taken some pains to prove that, tried by the American standard, our poor men pay too much, and our owners of real property too little, in both which conclusions we have shown his grounds to be fallacious; but he takes no notice of a far more obvious anomaly, the glaring injustice of which is every day attracting more public comment—the comparative immunity of the owners of personal property in this country. The local taxation of the States, it has been seen, is levied by an equal assessment on property of all kinds; and although, from the character of a great part of the country, the real property much exceeds the movable in amount, the rate upon both is a uniform one. No description of possessions is favoured with an invidious exemption. We will take the assessment of one State as an example, and copy the following "Items of the valuation of the taxable property for the State of Iowa, according to the assessor's returns for 1849." They are as follows:—

"Acres of land—Improvements on land—Town lots and improvements—Capital employed in merchandise—Mills, manufactories, distilleries, carding machines and tan-yards, with the stock employed—Horses, cattle, sheep, &c.—Pleasure carriages, watches, pianofortes—Capital stocks and profits in any company incorporated or unincorporated—Property in boats and vessels—Gold and silver coin, and bank-notes in actual possession—Claims for money, or other consideration—Annuities—Amount of notes, mortgages, &c. All other personal property over 100 dollars."

All these descriptions of property contribute alike, dollar for dollar, towards the expenses of the State, which—be it remarked—embrace not only the general charges for interest of debt, and for the support of the legislative, executive, and judiciary departments, but include also payments for prisons, asylums, the militia, the public roads, and several other branches of expenditure, which in this country are saddled either upon real property or upon the land alone. Let any one look at the items of the above list printed in italics, and say what portion of such wealth passes through the national exchequer, or goes to uphold the public institutions, of Great Britain. The whole annual incomes above £50 a-year in Great Britain are estimated, on the best attainable data,[9] to amount to upwards of £352,000,000 sterling, of which the taxed real income is £86,000,000, or one-fourth part only. Is there any one with a conscience so elastic as to maintain that the owners of the other three-fourths contribute fairly to the support of the State, in proportion to the revenue they enjoy under its protection? From the investigations of Mr Smee, to whom we have referred, it appears that while the number of those who pay the direct taxes is about five hundred thousand, there are upwards of one million eight hundred thousand persons in Great Britain enjoying incomes of above £50 a-year, who do not contribute one farthing to them. What is this but a system of iniquitous exemption of the one class, and of virtual confiscation as to the other? But the whole subject occupies far too prominent a place in the public mind to be treated thus incidentally. For the present then we leave it, thoroughly persuaded that, under a form of government which acknowledges no distinctions between classes and interests, so shameless a violation of the plainest principles of equity cannot long be permitted to continue, and cordially joining in the wish that no object of less momentous interest—no schemes of impracticable retrenchment—no wily bait of extended suffrage—no flourishing of the old red rag of reform, may be suffered to distract the attention of the public, from the one great paramount practical reform—a readjustment of Taxation.

We owe an apology to Professor Johnston for having deviated somewhat from the ordinary course of a review. His work has already been so much and so flatteringly noticed, that to have limited ourselves to mere abridgment and quotation from the Notes would have led us over the same ground that has been already exhausted by other critics. We have therefore preferred discussing some of the questions of greatest public interest which his observations have suggested; and if, on some of these, we have been led to dissent from his opinions, we have done so in no unfriendly spirit, which indeed would have been impossible in judging of an author whose own views are always expressed with perfect candour and moderation. There can be no doubt that, under the unpretending title which he has chosen to adopt, he has contrived to bring together a larger mass of varied and valuable information on the present condition of North America than is to be found in any work yet published.