rest, deter you from the strict path of duty and of patriotism. Cause the laws already in existence to be executed firmly but impartially, alleviate the burdens of the people-retrench the expenditure of the state-concede to the prayers of the people a moderate constitutional reform of the abuses which exist in every department of the state. If you cannot act thus consistently with your own ideas of duty, then my Lord I call upon you as a great and noble-minded man, while it is yet in your power voluntarily to make the sacrifice which every minister ought to make, and must eventually make, when he ceases to possess the confidence and good opinion of the people. The nation demands it at your hands. The interest of the minister must bow to the opinion and yield to the welfare of the people. In one word my Lord retire from your post. Thus indeed may you preserve the empire from impending ruin. Thus too in the esteem and gratitude of your country, and the warm congratulations of an approving conscience, shall you obtain a rich reward, in brilliancy surpassing all which the splendor of your past administration can diffuse around you, in honor and in worth exceeding all which you can ever hope to arrive at by adopting in your practice the principles of Cato; principles alike hostile to liberty, hateful to the people, and pregnant with the greatest danger to the laws and constitution of the

country.

January, 1821.

ON

THE PRESENT

TIMBER AND DEAL

Trade,

AS

REGARDS EUROPE

AND THE

BRITISH AMERICAN COLONIES,

RESTING

ON PLAIN AND UNDENIABLE FACTS.

ORIGINAL.

LONDON:

MY LORD,

HAVING had the honor of addressing your Lordship on the present corn laws, I hope that my apology for intruding again, though on a different subject, will be accepted by your Lordship.

In tendering the annexed Statement, on the present timber and deal trade, for perusal, I have but one view, namely, that this important subject might be considered in all its true bearings, and upon them alone, and not on mere individual assertions, a conclusion come to. In whatever way I might have been formerly interested in that trade, here and abroad, I can assure your Lordship that having no interest whatever in that trade at present, no private motives can be ascribed to me, as to have been influenced one way or other, in drawing up that Statement; and I therefore flatter myself that it will deserve so much more attention, and perhaps be found a proper object of being laid before the committees now investigating that subject.

Knowing the great value of time to your Lordship as well as to all persons connected with Government, I lament the length to which that Statement has grown, and which perhaps may make it less an object for consideration on that account alone, than would otherwise be the case. I must, however, assure your Lordship, that the manifold interests involved in that question, and owing to this language being foreign to me, (for which I trust sufficient allowance will be made) did not enable me to abridge more of what I found necessary to say on that subject. Should it, however, be thought superfluous to have that Statement taken into consideration, or the question on which it treats, be already finally decided, as to the course his Majesty's Government mean to adopt, I humbly beg your Lordship will then have the goodness to direct that that Statement be returned to me at the earliest convenience.

STATEMENT,

&c. &c.

THE question of the timber and deal duties having now been in agitation for a long time, and an official report having gone forth, which recommends what would materially injure some of the nations of the North of Europe, with whom this country is at present on a liberal footing of commercial intercourse, namely, as regards a free and encouraged trade in British manufactured goods and colonial produce; I humbly beg to submit the following Statement for consideration, which my own experience in the wood trade here, and in foreign countries, has enabled me to support by facts, and not by mere loose assertions; and to the correctness of which, I shall be prepared to give the most satisfactory proofs, whenever it should be found requisite to call for them.

Owing to the several heavy duties imposed on European wood, a considerable encouragement has been given to the Canadian people, whereby to enable them to supply this country with that article to the extent they have done of late; and wher Government is now called upon to continue that encouragement to them, or embrace other measures, whereby some of the nations in the North of Europe must become most serious sufferers, and which ultimately would affect England, in her present intercourse with them also, surely it becomes a matter of the first importance, minutely to ascertain whether such encouragement is actually of that benefit to the Canadian people and to this country, as to require the sacrifice of trading with other nations; and whether the other measures proposed, do not chiefly rest on a misconception of the statements made by individuals.

The first view I take upon this subject is to consider

"What good the encouragement has done to the Canadian people, and to this country, with regard to the timber trade from Canada." It appears from the evidence given before the House of Lords last year, that the only benefit derived from the timber trade in Canada, is the labor bestowed upon it in the cutting down, and hauling out the trees, the preparing when made into timber, and the floating down when converting them into deals by saw-mills established for that purpose. It is also stated in evidence, that the tree is worth nothing to the original possessor or land-owner, and that he as readily would set fire to his wood (for the sake of making the land useful), by which mode he might get paid for his trouble in selling the ashes; and that if a set of men called woodcutters, (generally United States men) were not to be found, who undertook for their individual benefit the cutting, preparing, and floating down of the timber, most likely the British settler in the interior, jointly with the merchant at the shipping port, would think of some expedient, so as to make the matter beneficial to both. But as it is at present, and owing to the immense quantity of wood brought forward by these "wood-cutters," (and from whence they introduce it, I shall come to presently) it also appears, that with the exception of the smallest proportion of wood converted into deals at the sundry establishments, the direct shipments of timber from the British possessions in North America do not leave a sufficiency of net proceeds in this country, so as to pay for the putting the timber on board of the ships, and that all previous expense and labor, as well as the original costs of the tree, (if there were any) are a total loss, which loss must be felt somewhere, and falls most likely, nay almost to a certainty, upon a British subject, while the United States man is sure of getting paid for all the previous expense and labor before he parts with the tree or the piece of timber.

That kind of timber which has been held of greater value hitherto, going by the denomination of "pitch pine," or "red pine," appears not to grow at all, or is extremely seldom to be met with, within the boundaries of the British possessions of North America, but is a native of the United States, growing chiefly in the 45th degree of latitude; and thence the conclusion is clearly drawn, why United States men are invariably those that cut and prepare the wood, and float it to the ports of shipment, and why such immense quantities are brought down by them :-for it is not only the pitch and red pine from the United States by which the revenue of this country has hitherto been defrauded, but no doubt the yellow pine contributes also a material share in doing the same; for every piece of that timber is subject to a duty of 31. 8s. per load, whereas it has hitherto been successfully introduced in this country, at a duty of only 2s. 6d. per load,