of land, and who spend that income, and would at once ruin such of them as spend it only upon necessaries.

Some there are who think that the fall in the price of bread, and the increased vend of the exports of the nation, would be an advantage to the people generally, which would make up for the evil and ruin inflicted upon the owners of rents. But the prevailing opinion is, and ought to be, against any legislation which involves the ruin of innocent parties; and it may be taken as one resting-place in these arguments, that all proposals of a law, simply and solely for the free and unlimited importation of corn, will be rejected, because it would be a law for the ruin of a number of the proprietors of land, and of such leaseholders as might be held by their landlords to the terms of their agreements.

But then the question arises, Whether some qualified law of importation, accompanied by enactments for the relief of land from a part of its present burdens, might not at once lower the price of bread, establish a new and valuable branch of foreign trade, and benefit, instead of hurting, the small proprietors of land?

There is, at least, a sufficient likelihood of this, to make some inquiry necessary, before it can be universally pronounced to be impracticable.

A fixed duty on the importation of corn would be a productive source of revenue, and might be so regulated as to cause at first only a moderate importation, and, consequently, a moderate fall in rents. If, then, the whole amount of what was received as duty on the importation of corn was to be made a means for enabling the government to take off an equivalent portion of the burdens upon land-either, for instance, by remitting a portion of the excise duties, or by paying, out of the general revenue, a portion of the sums required for the relief of the poor-it may be questioned, whether rents might not be raised as much by the latter operations as they could be

depressed by the first; and whether, by the same method, the importation of corn might not be gradually augmented by a reduction of the duty on it, and the land be gradually relieved from all its burdens and improved in value; for a large importation of corn would produce a large revenue, even with a low duty.

But then comes another question, Whether such a duty could be as securely reckoned upon for a lasting revenue, as those taxes or rates on the produce of land which would be taken off? A direct tax on corn, payable to the government, would be substituted for the direct tax which is now paid on excisable articles, and the factitious price which is now paid on corn, not to the government, but to the landowners. The fundholders would be placed in a dis-, advantageous position. It would be said that their dividends were paid, partly by that portion of the wages of his labour which the poor man would still have to give for his bread beyond what it would cost him if the whole duty on the importation of corn were taken off; in short, by a bread tax and against a clamour of this sort, it may be doubted whether any duty on the importation of corn could be maintained. It is true, however, that the labourer pays some excise duties now, as well as a high price for bread; but, for the most part, the excise duties have of late years been taken off the absolute necessaries of life, and those upon some of the ordinary comforts of life which still remain, are old and accustomed burdens, and do not present so fair a mark for invective as a productive tax on the importation of bread-corn would; at least, whilst the change was taking place, and before it could be established by habit and usage.

This, after all, is the main point for consideration. A productive duty on the importation of corn might be substituted for the whole, or a part, of the excise, so as at once to lower the price of bread, and increase the value of land, without either increasing or diminishing for the pre

sent the gross amount of the revenue; but if this were done, would the funds be equally secure, or could they by any additional enactments be made secure?

As to the arguments founded upon the remote effects of enabling any country to draw the sustenance of its poorer classes from all parts of the globe, where from time to time it may be most cheaply procured, whereby the country, if it be already a wealthy one, is likely to become so populous as to be no longer capable of raising produce sufficient for the sustenance of its own members, and to assume towards the rest of the world much of the character and relation which a town bears to the rural districts surrounding it, with all the attendant changes in manners and in morals, these reasonings are too refined to be made a ground for doing, or for abstaining from doing, any thing in the way of legislation in popular assemblies. Certain as such consequences may be, they are discernible with certainty only by a few. They cannot be made use of to stem the current of affairs; they are matters of philosophy rather than of politics; they are inevitable if all things tend toward them; and those who are the earliest to foresee them, are most usefully employed in arranging beforehand an accommodation of old interests to new circumstances.

The assertion, that a fall in the price of corn would produce a fall in wages, so that the labourer would be just where he was before, appears at first sight to be a more substantial and palpable argument. But this also resolves itself into a contemplation of futurity. The poor of the next generation would probably be no better off for a repeal of the corn-laws; for, in all circumstances, the human race, apparently, will breed up to the uttermost verge at which existence is tolerable: but it is in vain to deny that the existing mass of labourers would find some present relief in a sudden fall in the price of corn; in an increased facility of manufacture: in a new import trade; and in a corresponding augmentation of exports.

III.

THE HOUSE OF LORDS.

THOSE who are aware how much both our security and our advance in social prosperity depend upon the Upper House of Legislature, must desire, both that its stability should be secured and its efficiency increased.

If the possession of an unencumbered estate in land, of a certain annual value, were established as a necessary condition of taking by descent the different gradations of the peerage, it would go a long way to augment both the influence which the House of Lords derives from property and station, and that portion of its power which rests upon intellectual excellence.

The unseemliness and the offence of a union in the same person of mere rank with poorness and servility would be removed. All who should come into the House of Peers by descent would have wealth and station, and, consequently, independence and influence.

But a still greater effect would be produced from the Crown being thus enabled to admit into the House of Peers more persons distinguished by high personal merit than can now be admitted, without entailing on the country families and races of poor lords. The rank would cease with the life of the newly created peer, unless adequate fortune should be left to descend with the peerage.

It is not likely that such a law as this will be made at

present. It would be mischievous that it should be attempted, otherwise than by the peers themselves.

But the ambition of the baronets to bear an ornament upon their persons, and the large addition to the numbers of that noblesse which was made at the coronation, has suggested a notion that one step towards the desirable innovation in the laws of the peerage might be made very easily in acceding to the harmless wishes of the baronets, if the decoration was to be granted to them by an order of the Crown, which, at the same time, should notify that future creations of baronetcies would be subjected to the condition that the title should not be taken by descent, unless the heir should establish by proof, in some of the offices of the Chancery, his possession of an estate of inheritance in land of a certain annual value.