the century, which, I think, appears by authentic accounts to have amounted to 10,000 or 12,000 tons. Much of this, however, is a little premature at present; but I mention what occurs, wishing to have your opinion beforehand on every point where I can. If no general standard can be found such as I have referred to, the duties must be fixed separately on each article. The proposed principle, I conceive, would be to establish such moderate duties on each as will be advantageous to the revenue, and not too much check the importation. And, even in this way, the detail on the few articles to be specified will not, I hope, be long. I trust, indeed, that a short time (if there occurs no unexpected difficulty) will bring this great work to a prosperous issue.

"Believe me, my dear Sir,

"Sincerely and faithfully yours,

"W. PITT."

The premier, however, had many difficulties. The following letter is from Mr. George Rose, whose hair, the editor remarks, seems to have stood on end at the idea of opening the silk trade :

"Mr. George Rose to Mr. Eden.

"Great George-street, Wednesday, May 31st, 4 p.m.

'My dear Sir,

"I think I have as little political cowardice as should belong to any one in any situation in the smallest degree responsible, but I tremble at the very mention of a repeal of our manufactured silk laws. I verily believe the prohibition even of that article is unwise; at the same time I consider an attempt to make an alteration respecting it as the most dangerous that can be thought of. Consider the situation of Spitalfields, where there are more than 40,000 weavers and other workmen, in the capital itself. Recollect the consequences when the Duke of Bedford made a less alarming experiment. I am persuaded that the very people who have held the language you mention, would now avow that to their fellow manufacturers. The condition, too, that they would annex to the measure is a serious one. You will see by the accounts herewith sent, that the revenue arising from raw silk is more than £200,000 a-year.

*

"You will, I trust, be satisfied upon the whole with the dispatch you will receive herewith; it lays the foundation of a treaty on the surest footing which circumstances will admit. We have carried our wine measure so far most triumphantly; we shall go through the committee to-day with little opposition, and have the debate upon the report, which I hope will not be later than Friday, but of that we cannot

be sure.

"The cambric business cannot be arranged till next session; it would be parting with too much out of our hands.

"I am, &c., &c.,

"GEORGE ROSE."

The question of the introduction of French ribands then, as now, gave rise to the most opposite conjectures. Lord Carmarthen writes:

* Alluding to a riot of the Spitalfields weavers.

" (Private.)

"Whitehall, August 25th, 1786.

“. . . . Quant aux rubans, nous ne brillons pas de ce côté là. A shorter and more direct negative was never given than by a meeting of those concerned in the riband manufacture to the general question of opening the trade of that manufacture. Anything short of absolute prohibition seems, in the eyes of these gentlemen, to involve them, and of course the country, in immediate ruin and destruction. So much for Spitalfields; for the two gentlemen (Wilson and Venning, if I remember right) who were previously examined, appeared infinitely more reasonable (though not very sanguine in their expectations of a beneficial intercourse in that article) before they had consulted their commettans.

And Mr. Pitt :

" (Private.)

'Downing-street, September 4.

"My dear Sir,-We have been working hard to expedite your dispatch, and I have scarce a moment left for a private letter. In the main, I trust you find everything satisfactory, and I doubt not you will be able to reconcile the French Court on the two or three points on which we cannot give way. The ribands and modes are of this description, and the rate of duty on the linens cannot be lowered beyond our former offer. In the glass, I hope and believe we shall be able to comply. The interval necessary before the reduction of the wine duty should take place will be very speedily ascertained; both these particulars will be sent to you by another messenger, who will probably reach you before all the points in the present dispatch are exhausted; and you shall have, at the same time, an account about the British-made wines. In the meantime, it is enough to say that the duty on them was raised last session, and is much higher in proportion to foreign wine than formerly. I will not enter further, at present, on the subject of my former private letter, except only to repeat my sincere desire at all times to keep in view whatever you feel material, either for your credit or satisfaction, in any arrangements that may be in question. On the other points, I will write again very speedily. I foresee that, at all events, it will be impossible for your presence here not to be very material when the Treaty comes to be discussed in Parliament. I write, as you see, in the utmost haste."

Lord Sheffield thought all the advantages of the treaty were on our side :

"... The treaty seems very much of the same kind as the American and the Irish, viz., the reciprocity is all on one side; for I have not discovered, since I received your letter this morning, a single advantage the French have gained. Observe, however, that I only know extracts from two articles, viz., 6th and 7th. You say they contain the material points respecting the duties and general principle of the business. I should be most afraid the French would quarrel with them when they find our manufactures filling their warehouses. I hear they consider the treaty as an experiment for two years, and are much. * Probably the uncle of the Bishop of Calcutta, to whom, in youth, he was apprenticed. See Bateman's Life.

pleased with it. If it is all of a piece with the articles you have communicated, the French, for once at least, are taken in, and exhibit themselves very ignorant and foolish.

"I could write an excellent pamphlet on the French side of the question against the treaty. On the first blush of the business, I almost wish the advantages were more equal. You say France will be advantaged on the article Cambrics - positive nonsense; and I think I convinced some of the Glasgow people that the importation of cambric will not be considerably increased. France already had the supply of this country for the cambrics she is likely to supply. I gave you some notes on that subject before you went, I believe; at least I sent some to Glasgow to conciliate. In point of revenue Britain will be benefited as far as the amount of the duty on an article before prohibited." . . .

We quote these as curious historical records. In the present state of our Coventry weavers, it is scarcely wise, and certainly ungracious, to boast too much of the advantages to ourselves of some points in the late commercial treaty. Still we are hopeful. Whatever tends to bind two great nations in commercial intercourse has made out a strong primâ facie case to every lover of his country and of mankind.

But darker days were coming. The commercial treaty was framed on our side with the pen in one hand and the sword in the other. The attitude of France was menacing; explanations were demanded and received; but eyes less keen than those of Mr. Pitt and his colleagues discerned frightful dangers at no great distance. We almost tremble for the future as we trace the parallel between those times and these; the same jealousies, the same fair promises, the same mutual distrust! In November, 1787, France and England, as appears from a letter of Lord Carmarthen's, gave mutual explanations on the subject of their respective navies; each promising to disarm. "You will inform M. de Montmorin that directions are given by the Admiralty for paying off, with as much expedition as possible, the ships and seamen which will not be wanted for the peace establishment. I enclose to you a state of the naval force of the country at home as it stood in the beginning of the present year, which you will deliver to the French ministers whenever they are ready (which I take for granted will be immediately) to furnish you in like manner with the state of that of France at the same period.* You will also be instructed, in a short time, to enter into a further explanation with the *The vast power of the French navy Ships of the line, forty-six ships 74 guns. at that period will, we think, surprise most of our readers. We make the following summary from a list procured by Mr. Eden for Mr. Pitt. It is dated the 18th October, 1787 :

Ships of the line..... six ships 110 guns. 80

seven

""

five

64

one three

60

50

On the stocks at Toulon : Ville de Paris, 118 guns, and one 74. At Brest, two 74.

Frigates.... one ship 44 guns.

French ministers on the subject of the naval force to be kept up in other parts of the world; and you will inform me of any ideas which they may in the meantime suggest on this subject." But however diplomatists might endeavour to cajole each other, pamphleteers and ladies threw out significant hints. Mirabeau, so terrible in the Tribune, soon afterwards gave vent to the national hatred of England, as a pamphleteer, Mr. Eden reports to Mr. Pitt: "I sent to Mr. Rose a very singular pamphlet of Mirabeau's. We sent it a week ago to the office, and you probably have seen it; if not, it is well worth your perusal, because, though it contains little, there are some strong and remarkable expressions in it, and though he speaks impertinences of England, he does justice to your coup de maître (referring to the commercial treaty). Perfidious Albion was then as now a theme on which Parisian ladies were eloquent. The ambassador had invited M. de Montmorin to dinner :

"M. de Montmorin hinted to me yesterday, whether, in the present undecided state of things, it would be proper for him to come; he said that his own feelings held such objections in great disregard, but that the temper of others was more sensitive. And in the evening, when Mrs. Eden and I went to Madame de Polignac's, the ladies made war upon our whole nation with considerable violence. The queen was present, and was too polite to seem to hear it, but was exceedingly silent and reserved. Madame de Polignac told me she could not give it to me here, but that she would write a letter to Spain, to state all the perfidy of England towards a nation that wished to be in friendship with her. I could only desire her to recollect (personally) that 'les petites brouilleries sont presque toujours suivies des plus étroites amitiés." If you had been twenty months in France you would think these female politics are not immaterial. I am anxious to know whether M. de Montmorin will come."

There was a sick man, too, in those days-for our historical parallel is not exhausted,—and he dwelt, as now, at Constantinople. The gentler sex do not seem to have treated him with the consideration which poetry and experience, happily agreeing for once, would have taught us to expect. This may be explained in part by the fact that Russia was then governed by a woman's hand.

"Here, again, female politics enter for something. . . . The empress of Russia (Catherine), as far as I can learn, wishes to avoid the war with the Turks, and to rest upon their returning to the terms of the last peace. The emperor (of Germany) hesitates about it, and is Frigates. five ships 28 guns. fifty 26

one ship 24

Corvettes.. ten ships 20

In this memorandum, which is printed in the Appendix, the name of each ship is given, and the station at which she lay. At the close of the war this magnificent fleet was annihilated. We believe only one ship of the line remained to France.

much impressed by a famous expression of M. de Vergennes, Une partition de l'empire Ottoman n'est pas difficile, mais je ne vois pas la compensation pour Constantinople." "

It is with a feeling of relief we turn from these intrigues to a few letters of Mr. Wilberforce. Pascal tells us there are three kinds of greatness: wealth or station, intellect, and virtue. He might have added, that while the world is fulsome in its admiration of the first and second, it overlooks the last. Wilberforce was a great man; but his greatness was of the neglected kind. We who view him as an historical personage, or whose recollections go back no further than the time when he was an agreeable and benevolent old man, seem to have agreed that, as an orator and statesman, or even as a man of letters, he has been over-praised. But his moral influence, in the most stormy times, has never been called in question; and it ought to be conceded, in order to account for this, that in whatever degree we subtract from the popular estimate of his mental prowess, in the same proportion we exalt his moral grandeur. It is a fine sight for moralists, and a noble study for young and ardent politicians. Wilberforce, at the bursting out of the French revolution, the personal friend of Pitt, the vigorous supporter of his administration, never diverted from the one grand purpose of his life. Amidst all other conflicts, battling still for Africa. Despising, or affecting to despise, nothing that concerned his country's honour; yet true, as the needle to the pole, to the sable down-trod negro. How earnestly he worked in the face of discouragements which few would have encountered, may be seen incidentally from the correspondence of which we transcribe a part :

"London, 5th Jan., 1788.

"My dear Sir, I earnestly wish that your representation of the barbarity and impolicy of the slave trade may excite its due impression on the minds of M. de Montmorin and his coadjutors. Your expectations of success do not seem very sanguine; but look back to the other negociations that you have conducted, and ask yourself, if you could have preconceived the result of them would be so favourable as it actually turned out. As to the proposition you throw out, at the close of your memorial, for a suspension of the trade, I cannot say that it strikes either Mr. Pitt or myself in a very eligible point of view. Taking the question generally, the inconveniences attendant on the change we propose will be felt most sensibly at first, whilst the compensating benefits are of more slow and silent growth. This holds true both as applied to Africa and the West Indies, as well as to every country engaged in the trade. After the expiration, then, of the term of suspension, the utter abolition would be attempted under the most unfavourable circumstances possible; add to which, we must expect that the flame which is kindled will gradually die away, and the public attention be attracted by some new object. Many of the reasons which I am persuaded will have suggested themselves to your