the widely separated subjects of the Czar, great misconception has prevailed relative to the actual force which Russia could measure with the forces of other states. The facts brought together by Mr Macgregor tend very much to quiet apprehensions on this score. Even admitting that Russia is a power whose policy is peculiarly aggressive, and that her movements, therefore, require to be vigilantly watched by other governments, still the exaggerated notions which have been formed of her greatness appear to be founded rather upon the principle of omne ignotum pro magnifico, than upon any accurate knowledge of the real state of her available resources.

The Russian tariff has long been highly restrictive, and its character was not altered by the modifications which took place in the year 1841. The list of prohibitions is very extensiveincluding various descriptions of cotton, silk, and woollen manufactures, iron, cutlery, and hardware, and numerous other articles which, under a moderate tariff, would be supplied by England in exchange for raw produce. At present, our exports to Russia amount to only half the value exported from the United Kingdom to Holland alone, and to only about one-fourth of our exports to Germany. The value of British exports to Russia in 1838 (a fair average year,) was £1,663,342-of which £1,236,584 consisted of cotton-twist, leaving a balance of only £426,758 for all other articles; whilst the exports from Russia to the United Kingdom in 1837, were £6,977,396-being no less than seven-twelfths of the entire Russian exports to all parts of the world. It thus appears that Englishmen, for their own wants and interests, are the largest purchasers of Russian produce, notwithstanding her prohibitory tariff; and that if, on account of that tariff, Britain were to impose retaliating duties against Russia, the British consumer would be the person most injured by such a proceeding. Our treaty with Russia, signed in January 1843, has secured reciprocity to British shipping, and has placed British commerce upon the footing of the most favoured nation, furnishing the condition of similar equivalents. These concessions, however, did not mitigate the prohibitory character of the tariff, which our author thus describes :

* Since the recent change in the Russian Finance Ministry, a more liberal disposition has been manifested; and there is reason to hope that several of the prohibitions in the tariff-among others, the prohibition of British printed cottons-will be abolished. We must, however, reciprocate by admitting Russian tallow as a raw material, duty free.

Russia may be said to prohibit the importation of every material like those which can be drawn, by the labour of her serfs, from her mines and forests, and of every foreign manufactured article, in order that the labour of those serfs, with the aid of machinery either imported or made in the country, and directed by skilful foreign artizans, shall be made to produce articles either similar to, or that may be substituted for, those of foreign manufacture. We readily admit that this prohibitive system, so generally injurious to the empire, may be very profitable to the nobles at Moscow, and elsewhere, who are the proprietors of the cheaply and coarsely fed and clad serfs.

Russia, for the purpose of supplying and carrying on her manufactures, permits the importation of mathematical, optical, astronomical, and agricultural instruments; newly-invented machinery, and models of machines, mules, and all the materials enumerated hereafter in Table I. of the tariff, required in the arts.

'Cotton twist, still required by her, sheep's wool, and several other articles not enumerated, are admitted at small nominal duties.

A recent relaxation of the rigidity of her commercial legislation has been generally promulgated as a return to liberal trading principles; but on examining the prohibitions abolished, we discover that they are either of no great importance, or that the duties substituted are so high as to preclude any profitable legitimate importation into Russia of manufactured goods.'-(Sect. XII. chap. 7.)

Notwithstanding that for many years it has been the settled policy of Russia to create home manufactures, her manufacturing industry is still very unimportant for a population of sixty millions; and is far in arrear of that of France, Germany, and the Austrian empire. The smuggler pursues his trade across the frontier in spite of ukases, preventive forts, and an army of revenue officers; and will of course continue to do so whilst foreign manufacturers can produce better and cheaper articles than those made within the prohibitory cordon. It ought not, however, to be supposed, that the Russian manufactures have made no progress at all. On the contrary, it appears that her factories, which twenty years ago could not produce sufficient cloth for the use of her army, are now able not only to do this, but to export considerable quantities of cloth to the markets of Central Asia and China.

The state of agriculture in Russia is peculiarly interesting, as affecting the result which might be anticipated from a modification or repeal of the British corn-laws. not apologize for extracting the following passages from Mr We therefore need Macgregor's account of the agriculture of the vast plain of the Wolga:

'TAMBOFF, or TAMBOV.-The area of this province is estimated by some Russian authorities at 21,000 square miles, and by Kortsakoff at

nearly 25,000 square miles, and the population 1,422,000. The surface is generally a vast flat plain. In some parts undulations occur, and, towards the north, sandy, boggy forest, and marshy lands; a great proportion of the province is covered with fir and other trees. The Steppe, towards the east, has no wood of consequence, and the black mouldy soil is generally fertile. As not only the productive powers, but the actual produce of this province, have been held forth as alone sufficient to overwhelm all Europe with corn, and, at the same time, ruin, if admitted at a low duty, the farmers of England, we shall detail at some length the information we have collected.

It has been declared officially, and it has been repeated and reprinted frequently, for the purpose of showing the danger of allowing the importation of foreign corn, that the province of Tamboff alone yielded 39,000,000 quarters. Now, if we take M. Kortsakoff's statement of the area the greatest given by any one-say at 15,689,200 English acres, 39,000,000 quarters would be about twenty bushels per acre; that is, supposing the province of Tamboff were one great corn-field, without any part of it occupied by towns, buildings of any kind-roads, forests, swamps, heaths, marshes, pine barrens, or waters. The facts, however,

are, that the soils, the seasons, the weather, and the crops, according to the official accounts of this, as has been described, the most fertile province of Russia, are all remarkably variable, and that great scarcities of grain for food has frequently occurred. Of the annual produce of corn, we have for different periods the following official statements, or rather estimates:-In 1802, 9,294,827 chetwerts, or rather more than 6,000,000 quarters. In 1821, only 5,223,796 chetwerts. In 1833, the crop was stated as abundant, and 800,000 chetwerts, or 560,000 quarters, were exported to Moscow and St Petersburg. We then have an account of 10,000,000 chetwerts being the produce of an ordinary crop, and 17,000,000 chet werts that of a good harvest. Finally, a consular account is transmitted to England, stating that the province of Tamboff produces 39,000,000 quarters of corn, and the word corn is at once translated into the word wheat.

The greater portion of the corn produced in Tamboff, as well as in all Russia, is not wheat, but rye. Some little wheat, however, is grown in Tamboff-from 21,000 to 35,000 quarters. Oats, and buckwheat, a black poor grain, which grows on sandy soils, constitute, next to rye, the principal grains grown. Hemp is cultivated to an important extent. The cattle pastured and fattened for Moscow and St Petersburg are numerous, but are chiefly driven into Tamboff, for pasturage, from the steppes of South-Eastern Russia, and even from the Caucasus. The horses, excepting those belonging to the nobility, are wretchedly inferior. There are about 1,140,000 sheep, and 700,000 swine in the province.

The more recent exaggerations respecting Tamboff are contained in a work entitled Materials for a Statistical Account of the Russian Empire, published at St Petersburg in 1839, in the Russian language, by Imperial permission.

The following extracts from that work were translated at St Petersburg from the Russian :

Now, it is equally evident that the above statement is also greatly exaggerated. In the first place, the extent of land under cultivation is stated above to be 4,000,000 to 4,500,000 of deciatines. M. Kortsakoff, who allows a greater surface to the province than any other writer, estimates the whole extent, including water, marshes, forests, meadow and pasture, &c., at 5,913,222 deciatines; and the arable land at 2,226,177 deciatines.

The above account of 4,500,000 deciatines being solely under corn culture, is a palpable exaggeration; for if the forests, marshes, and waters alone were deducted from the largest estimate of the area of Tamboff, the remaining part would not exceed 4,500,000 deciatines ; and M. Kortsakoff allows about 1,500,000 for pastures and meadows; so that, taking the highest estimate, there could not have been more than 3,000,000 deciatines left for arable cultivation, and from this quantity must be deducted the spaces occupied by towns, roads, &c. Allowing, as a mere basis of valuation, that 3,000,000 deciatines of Tamboff were one vast corn-field, without any deduction for separations between inclosures, or any space left for other divisions, paths, &c., and deducting the one-third left fallow, according to the above statement, then the extreme quantity left for sowing would be 2,000,000 deciatines, or 5,400,000 acres. The produce, at the lowest quantity given above, 11,410,000 quarters 183 bushels per acre. Taking the highest quantity, 17,220,000 quarters, the produce would be about 25 bushels per acre. All the accounts of the produce of corn in the province of Tamboff, must therefore, to those who will examine the foregoing statements, prove to have been the most extraordinary exaggerations that could have been used, for the purpose of misleading the statesmen and terrifying the landlords and farmers of other countries. After a careful examination of all the statements, and all the information which we have been able to procure, we feel convinced that the province of Tamboff, instead of producing 39,000,000 quarters of corn, or the quantity since diminished to 17,220,000 quarters, and in the worst seasons to 11,400,000 quarters, has never, during the most plentiful harvest, yielded above 10,000,000 quarters of all kinds of grain.'-(Sect. XII. chap. 25.)

Of all the European states, there is none upon which nature has bestowed more of the elements of wealth and power than Spain. Her fine climate and soil-her great mineral riches-and her numerous rivers and seaports-place her far above the average of other nations in respect to natural advantages; yet doubts can hardly fail to arise as to whether those advantages are in reality such, when we see Holland, destitute of the greater part of them, ascribing the industry and enterprise of her sons to the very barrenness of her soil. Indeed, national superiority is found to depend far more upon the race of men than on the country which they inhabit.

Restrictive commercial legislation, and financial abuses, have

reduced Spain to an almost unparalleled state of degradation and impoverishment. The character and effects of her insane legislation are well described by Mr Macgregor :

The commercial legislation of Spain has been, and continues to be, one of the most pernicious and restrictive of all the systems of trading exclusion. While that most despotic of governments possessed an empire in America to interchange commodities with, her code of trading laws was, comparatively speaking, not altogether so ruinous to her finances and credit as it has, generally with other measures, proved since that period disastrous to her general interests, and so discreditable to her national dignity and moral character, during the last thirty years. From the time the Inquisition, and other tyrannical inventions of the Court and Church, drove the industrious Moors from Spain, human ingenuity, absolutism, and power, could not possibly have contrived and enforced measures more efficiently calculated to retard the improvement and prosperity of the kingdom, than those of the Government, coupled with the authority of the Church.

Spain occupies a surface nearly one half greater than all the British Isles, with a soil capable of yielding nearly double the value of agricultural produce. Spain is eleven times as large as Holland; the latter has no minerals, little land for other purposes than for grazing and for buildings no timber-and a climate the character of which is humid, and for a part of the year severely cold. If Spain and Holland were left to themselves in the event of a warlike contention, which of the nations would be the most likely to overcome the other? At present, opinion would decide in favour of Holland.

The example of these two nations is an elucidation of the power or weakness of countries, in consequence of the wisdom and industry, or the folly and negligence of man, in opposition to natural advantages or obstructions. Holland has thriven and attained power under a system of commercial freedom. Spain has sunk to the lowest point of European degradation under the most restrictive and prohibitive customs' laws.

The proud system of Spanish legislation was based on possessing and securing within herself all kinds of luxury, wealth, and power. First, by prohibiting the entrance of commodities from any country except her colonial empire; and secondly, by forcing the latter to consume no manufactured articles except those of Spain, with the specious view that all the precious metals would necessarily be sent to the mother-country, where they would be forced to remain if no foreign commodities were admitted. But, in defiance of this system, the precious metals were drained off to foreign countries, both from her colonies and from Spain, nearly as rapidly as they were robbed from the natives of Mexico and Peru, or drawn from the mines by the millions of American and African slaves who have been exterminated under the cruel labour to which they were doomed.

'British colonists had no sooner settled in North America, than they commenced a very lucrative contraband trade to the Spanish settlements in Cuba and South America. It soon became a trade of prodigious