ever, the incorporation was not so complete, The field before us is so wide that we or the union so entire, as it should have been. should exceed all pardonable bounds were There still was need, or was thought to be we to attempt to exhaust it. The author's need, of a provincial management, a domestic character as government of Ireland ;—and the old wretched a metaphysical writer, if it parliamentary machinery, though broken up stood only on his celebrated Essay on Beauand disabled for its original work, naturally ty, would entitle him to rank in the highest supplied the materials for its construc- class of mental inquirers. It is needless tion. The men still survived who had long for us to criticise a performance so univerbeen the exclusive channels of communication sally known and appreciated, wherever the with the supreme authority: and though other and wider channels were now opened, the philosophy of mind is cultivated. We are habit of employing the former, aided by the also compelled to pass, without the notice eagerness with which they sought for contin- it deserves, another class of these Essays, ued employment, left with them an undue which, perhaps, form the most entertaining share of its support. Still more unluckily, the part of the collection-we mean those genancient practice of misgovernment had left its eral accounts or abstracts of works of lightusual traces on the character, not only of its er literature, in which his office and object authors, but its victims. Habitual oppression was not so much either to praise or to conhad produced habitual disaffection; and a long course of wrong and contumely, had end-demn, as to cull the beauties, and distil them ed in a desperate indignation, and an eager thirst for revenge. for his readers. Such are the articles on Mrs. Hutchinson's Memoirs, Lady M. W. "The natural and necessary consequences Montague, Madame du Duffand, Pepys, of the Union did not, therefore, immediately Cumberland, and the Novelists. The light, follow its enactment-and are likely indeed to be longer obstructed, and run greater hazard easy, gossiping style in which they are of being fatally intercepted, than in the case of treated, make the reader acquainted with Scotland. Not only is the mutual exaspera- the author, without his attention being distion greater, and the wounds more deeply tracted by the Reviewer's individual specrankled, but the Union itself is more incom-ulations. After the formal introduction is plete, and leaves greater room for complaints over, he lets the author tell his own story, of inequality and unfairness. The numerical but never at such length as to be tedious, strength, too, of the Irish people is far greater, and interposes whenever the spirit of the inand their causes of discontent more uniform, But, although much than they ever were in Scotland; and, above terview begins to flag, all, the temper of the race is infinitely more ea- might be said of these things, and of others, ger, sanguine, and reckless of consequences, our limits compel us to desist. "Mira illis than that of the sober and calculating tribes of dulcedo, mira suavitas, mira hilaritas," and the north. The greatest and most urgent truly may we add, cujus gratiam cumulat hazard, therefore, is that which arises from sanctitas scribentis."* For though we their impatience:-and this unhappily is such, have endeavored, with what accuracy we that unless some early measure of conciliation is adopted, it would no longer be matter of could, to form a calm estimate of the work, surprise to any one, if upon the first occasion we cannot disguise how difficult we find it of a war with any of the great powers of Eu-to assume the critic when there stands berope, or America, the great body of the nation fore us one whom Scotland has so much should rise in final and implacable hostility, reason to honor. It has been his enviable and endeavor to throw off all connexion with, lot, if not to attain all the prizes of ambior dependence on Great Britain, and to erection for which men strive, at least to unite itself into an independent state!" * * * * "One thing we take to be evident, and it is the substance of all that can be said on the subject, that things are fast verging to a crisis, and cannot, in all probability, remain long as they are. The Union, in short, must either be made equal and complete on the part of England-or it will be broken in pieces and thrown in her face by Ireland. That country must either be delivered from the domination of an Orange faction, or we must expect, in spite of all our warnings and remonstrances, to see her seek her own deliverance by the fatal and bloody career to which we have already alluded-and from which we hold it to be the height of guilt and of folly to hesitate about withholding her, by the sacrifice of that miserable faction."—Vol. iv., pp. 140, 141, 145, 146. in himself those qualities which, in many, would have secured them all. A place in the front rank of literature in a most literary age-the highest honor of his profession spontaneously conferred by the members of a bar strong in talent and learning-eloquence among the first of our orators, and wisdom among the wisest, and universal reverence on that judicial seat, which has derived increased celebrity from his demeanor-a youth of enterprise-a manhood of brilliant success-and " honor, love, obedience, troops of friends," encircling his *Plin. Ep. 3. 1. later years-mark him out for veneration | drawn by a single horse, a man leading it; and to every son of that country, whose name he has exalted throughout Europe. We need not speak here of those graces of mind and of character, that have thrown fascination over his society, and made his friendship a privilege. Our rod of office drops from our hand; we remember the warning-we trust not too rashly disregarded "Nec tu divinam Æneida tenta, Sed longe sequere, et vestigia semper adora!" he cuts up the ice to a depth of six inches. The outer blocks are then sawn out, and iron bars are spade, of a wedge form. In dropping them into used in splitting them. These bars are like a the grooves the ice splits off, and a very slight blow is sufficient to separate them; and they split easy or hard, according to the weather in a in comparatively softer weather, it is more ducvery cold day. Ice is very brittle in keen frost; tile and resistible. Platforms, or low tables, are placed near the opening made in the ice, with an iron slide reaching from them into the water; and a man stands on each side with an ice-hook, very much like a boat-hook, but made of steel, with fine sharp points. With these the ice is hooked, with a jerk that throws it on the platform on the sides, which are of the same height. On ICE. We remember to have announced, some a cold day every thing becomes covered with ice, years since, the arrival at Calcutta of a cargo of and the blocks are each sent spinning along, alice from America, subsequently of the increasing though they weigh two cwt., as if they weighed importance of this strange trade. Ice has since only a pound. The slides are large lattice-work been imported to Liverpool, and we have the platforms to allow the ice to drain, and three tons following interesting particulars from the Liver- can thus be easily run in one of them by one pool Standard:-"As we are henceforth to have horse. It is then carried to the ice-houses, disthis cooling luxury regularly supplied to us, and charged upon a platform in front of the doors, its great superiority, both in clearness and thick and hoisted into the building by a horse. Forty ness, over the home article (owing to the precamen and twelve horses will cut and stow away rious nature of our winters and other causes) is 400 tons a day. If the weather be favorable, 100 acknowledged by all who have tried it, a short men are sometimes employed at once; and in notice of its uses, the manner of keeping it, and three weeks the ice-crop, about 200,000 tons, is of cutting and securing it in America, may prove secured. Some winters it is very difficult to seinteresting. Ice has become a great article of excure it, as a rain or thaw may come that will deport in America. Sixty thousand tons are annu- stroy the labor of weeks, and render the ice unfit ally sent from Boston to southern parts, the East for market; and then it may snow and rain upon and West Indies, &c.; and as saw-dust is solely that, before those employed have time to clear it used in packing, a large trade is also carried on in off: and if the latter freezes, the result is snowthat article. The ice-houses near the lakes and ice, which is of no value, and has to be planed ponds, are immense wooden buildings, capable of off. The operation of planing proceeds in nearly holding 10,000 to 20,000 tons each; some of them, the same manner as that of cutting. A plane indeed, cover half an acre of ground. They are gauged to run in the grooves made by the built with double walls, that is, with an inner ker,' and which will shave the ice to a depth of wall all round, two feet from the outer one; and three inches at one cut, is drawn by a horse, until the space between is filled with saw-dust-a nonthe whole piece is regularly planed over. conductor-making a solid wall, impervious to chips are then scraped off. If the ice is not then heat and air, and of 10 feet in thickness. The ma- clear, the work is continued until the pure ice is chines employed for cutting the ice are very beau- reached, and a few nights of hard frost will make tiful, and the work is done by men and horses, in it as thick below-inch for inch-for what has the following manner;-The ice that is intended been taken off above. The ice is transported on to be cut is kept clear of snow, as soon as it is railways. Each ice-house has a branch railway sufficiently thick to bear the weight of the men from the main line; and is conveyed in properly and horses to be employed, which it will do at constructed box-wagons to Boston-a distance six inches; and the snow is kept scraped from it of (as the locality may be) 10 to 18 miles. The until it is thick enough to cut. A piece of ice is tools, machinery, &c., employed, and the build cleared of two acres in extent, which, at a footing the houses, and constructing and keeping up thick, will give about 2,000 tons. By keeping the railroads, &c., are very expensive; yet the the snow off it freezes thicker, as the frost is free-facilities are such, through good management, that ly allowed to penetrate. When the time of cut-ice can be furnished at a very trifling cost per ting arrives, the men commence upon one of pound; and a failure of the ice crop in America these pieces, by getting a straight line through would be a great calamity."-Athenæum. the centre each way. A small hand-plough is pushed along the line, until the groove is about a quarter of an inch in width, and three inches deep, when they commence with the marker'- VICT OIA'S PONIES.-The ponies ridden by her an implement drawn by two horses, which makes Majesty, Prince Albert, and the Princess Royal, two new grooves parallel with the first, 21 inches during their sojourn at Blair Athol, have arrived apart, the gange remaining in the first groove. It at the Royal Mews, Windsor, with the other pois then shifted to the outside groove, and makes nies of her Majesty, having been handsomely two more. The same operation goes on, in par- presented to their royal riders by Lord Glenlyon. allel rectangular lines, until the ice is all marked Five roe deer have also been brought from Scotout into squares of 21 inches. In the mean- land, presents from the same nobleman to his roywhile, the plough is following in these grooves, | al and illustrious visitors.-Court Journal. DECEMBER, 1844. 36 mar The 562 MILL'S ESSAYS ON SOME UNSETTLED QUESTIONS OF POLITICAL ECONOMY. [DEC. MILL'S ESSAYS ON SOME UNSETTLED | effect predicated, are so complex that we can QUESTIONS OF POLITICAL ECONOMY. From the Spectator. THIS able work, with some others of a quality adapted to keeping, was put aside during the pressure of the Parliamentary season. We take the first opportunity to recur to it. scarcely ever ascertain them, or know, even after the event, that is by the imposition of the tax, whether we have been gainers or losers. The practical result therefore is, that no tax should ever be imposed with any such refined objects: but custom-duties on foreign produce should be used as diplomatic weapons, and only relaxed in return for some corresponding degree of freedom of trade with this country, by the nation from which the commodities are exported;" except as regards duties for protection, or on the necessaries of life, or the materials of manufacture imposing them, or taxes for revenue-in which the amount yielded is the first consideration. Of the five essays in the volume, the fifth, "on the Definition of Political Economy, and on the method of Investigation Proper to it," has been previously printed. The other four were written in 1829 and 1830, but retained in manuscript because of the temporary indif--which are always injurious to the country ference of the public to the discussion of abstract questions in political economy. They are now published in consequence of the controversies excited by The Budget of Colonel TORRENS; and the first paper relates to the question at issue between that subtile economist and his opponents; Mr. MILL agreeing in principle with the Colonel. One main object of the work is to "see that no scattered particles of important truth are buried and lost in the ruins of exploded error." "Every prejudice," continues Mr. MILL, "which has long and extensively prevailed among the educated and intelligent, must certainly be borne out by some strong appearance of evidence; and when it is found that the evidence does not prove the conclusion, it is of the highest importance to see what it does prove. If this be thought not worth inquiring into, an error conformable to appear ances is often merely exchanged for an error contrary to appearances; while even if the result be truth, it is paradoxical truth, and will therefore have difficulty in obtaining credence, whilst the false appearances remain." 66 A principal topic of the first article is the notion, which originated in feudal times, that duties levied on commodities imported, were a tax upon the foreigner." Mr. MILL not only considers that this result may really be brought about under certain circumstanceshe even holds it to be possible that a tax on a foreign commodity, or an export-duty on a home manufacture, may not merely be paid by the foreign nation, but may cause a gain beyond the tax to the one, and an equivalent loss to the other country, by the manner in which it may opperate upon prices through an action upon the respective currencies. The main causes by which this singular result is brought about, are the state of the supply and demand, and the exchanges, or rather the economical condition which primarily acts upon the exchanges and permanently influences both currency and prices. The arguments and illustrations are of too abstruse a character to be followed out here; and would not be relished, and scarcely be apprehended, save by the economist, who will doubtless seek them in the volume. However, the scientific conclusion to which the author comes, is, that the peculiar conditions necessary to produce the The second essay, "on the Influence of Consumption on Protection," incidentally discusses the question of the influence of absentees upon the wealth of a country; and decides to a considerable extent against Mr. M'CULLOCH. Part of it rests upon principles involved in the preceding essay, and part upon an examination of the effects of custom upon an individual trader. As we conceive that all which the absentee landlord personally swallows, and all the foreign commodities, such as wines, which his household would absorb at home, may as well be consumed abroad, but that all his other consumption is an absolute loss to the country which he leaves, and a gain to that in which he resides, we are disposed to agree with Mr. MILL in his conclusion; because the case is too complex for any one to settle the precise extent of the injury inflicted by absenteeism. This paper, however, does not strike us as being the happiest example of scientific disquisition. It seems to combine a singular mixture of the largeness of scientific principle and the abstruseness of scientific discussion with the narrowness of practical individual transactions; nor do we fully recognize the truth of some of its propositions. Perhaps, too, the discussion is deficient. In a thorough consideration of the subject of absenteeism, we suspect that the question of productive and unproductive expenditure is a main element. If an unproductive expenditure is a benefit, it seems clearly to follow that absenteeism is evil. an The "Words Productive and Unproductive" form the subject of the third essay, in order to their more accurate definition. After noticing the views of other writers upon the mooted question of what is productive labor and what is unproductive, Mr. MILL puts forth his own; which is more refined and less marked in the distinctions than most of the others. The illustrations and limitations occupy more space than we can afford; but the following passage contains the pith of his theory, and will fully indicate its character. "The end to which all labor and all expenditure are directed, is twofold. Sometimes it is enjoyment immediately; the fulfilment of 1844.] MILL'S ESSAYS ON SOME UNSETTLED QUESTIONS OF POLITICAL ECONOMY. 563 those desires, the gratification of which is wished for on its own account. Whenever labor or expense is not incurred immediately for the sake of enjoyment, and is yet not absolutely wasted, it must be incurred for the purpose of enjoyment indirectly or mediately, by either repairing and perpetuating, or adding to the permanent sources of enjoy ment. "Sources of enjoyment may be accumulated and stored up; enjoyment itself cannot. The wealth of a country consists of the sum total of the permanent sources of enjoyment, whether material or immaterial, contained in it and labor or expenditure which tends to augment or to keep up these permanent sources, should, we conceive, be termed productive. ductively, and Madame Pasta labors and consumes unproductively; for the building is used and worn out, and Madame Pasta performs immediately for the spectators' enjoy. ment, and without leaving, as a consequence of the performance, any permanent result possessing exchangeable value: consequently the epithet unproductive must be equally ap plied to the gradual wearing out of the bricks and mortar, the nightly consumption of the more perishable properties' of the theatre, the labor of Madame Pasta in acting and of the orchestra in playing. But notwithstanding this, the architect who built the theatre was a productive laborer; so were the producers of the perishable articles; so were those who constructed the musical instruments; and so, we must be permitted to add, were those who instructed the musicians, and all persons who, by the instructions which they may have given to Madame Pasta, contributed to the formation of her talent." "Labor which is employed for the purpose of directly affording enjoyment, such as the labor of a performer on a musical instrument, we term unproductive labor. Whatever is consumed by such a performer, we consider Surely, "were considering too curiously as unproductively consumed: the accumulat to consider thus"-introducing finesse rather ed total of the sources of enjoyment which than refinement into philosophy-distinguishthe nation possesses is diminished by the ing after the fashion of the old schoolmen ; amount of what he has consumed; whereas, and that too without a purpose, for, after all if it had been given to him in exchange for the saying, nothing of the doing will be his services in producing food or clothing, the changed. In despite of all the arguments total of the permanent sources of enjoyment and no small portion of casuisty that have in the country, might have been, not diminish-been printed upon the subject, we are still ined, but increased. clined to adhere to the broad, clear, and sen "The performer on the musical instrument, sible definition of ADAM SMITH-that that then, is, so far as respects that act, not a pro-alone is productive labor which "fixes and ductive, but an unproductive laborer. But realizes itself in some particular subject or what shall we say of the workman who made the musical instrument? He, most persons would say, is a productive laborer; and with reason, because the musical instrument is a permanent source of enjoyment, which does not begin and end with the enjoyment, and therefore admits of being accumulated. vendible commodity, which lasts for some time at least after that labor is past." If we are to admit, with Mr. MILL, that a soldier by affording protection, or a public functionary by upholding order, is in part, or with some other economists that he is wholly a productive laborer, because he indirectly contributes to "But the skill of the musician is a perma-production, that is to production by other peonent source of enjoyment, as well as the inple, we may change the nature of any thing strument which he plays upon; and although by its relation to some other thing. Good skill is not a material object, but a quality of roads greaily contribute to locomotion; but an object, viz: of the hands and mind of roads are not locomotion. Credit, (nay, it is the performer, nevertheless skill possesses ex- said railroads by simplifying business,) reduce changeable value-is acquired by labor and the amount of money which would otherwise capital, and is capable of being stored and be necessary to carry on the transactions of a accumulated. Skill, therefore, must be con- country; but credit and railroads are not mosidered as wealth; and the labor and funds ney. Those, however, who wish to see the employed in acquiring skill in any thing tend-examination of the words " productive and ing to the advantage or pleasure of mankind, unproductive," pursued through all their must be considered to be productively employ- ramifications and refinements of representing ed and expended. labor and expenditure, will do well to consult "The skill of a tailor, and the implements Mr. MILL's essay. he employs, contribute in the same way to the * * * The fourth paper treats of "Profits and Inconvenience of him who wears the coat-terest." One of its objects is to show that the namely, a remote way: it is the coat itself rate of interest is not so true a measure of which contributes immediately. The skill of the rate of profit, as is generally supposed,Madame Pasta, and the building and decora- that interest, for example, may rise, and to a tions which aid the effect of her performance, high rate, without any material change in the contribute in the same way to the enjoyment of the audience, namely, an immediate way, without any intermediate instrumentality. The building and decorations are consumed unpro rate of profit; and Mr. MILL seems to think that such was the case during the late war. His principle we believe to be sound: it turns upon the question of demand raising price. done by Mr. MILL; and he sees the reality of The instance we doubt, because the home | outlay of the greater part of the public loans on matters connected with the war, and the monopoly (which Mr. MILL himself refers to in another place) of the foreign markets possessed by the British, produced great activity of industry, and a great demand. RICARDO's theory of wages and profits is also handled, to exhibit a case of exception, where profits might rise without any change in the wages The literary merit of this book consists in or increased productiveness of industry: but its lucid arrangement and its perfect clearness; as the hypothesis assumed is so unlikely as to for though non-economical readers may someseem impossible, the principle seems a barren times be unable to follow the author, that principle. It is this--if a commodity could arises from the abstruseness of the subjects, be produced without any outlay for imple- or from their own deficiency, not his. The ments or materials, all this previous expense scientific value of the essays follows from this might be added to profits, yet wages remain very abstruseness: they are engaged in disthe same. The example given is corn. Strict-cussing essential truths, which, once established, can be clearly enough presented, but whose establishment is a work of exceeding toil and complexity; just as pure gold is plainly visible, though it cannot be detected by the vulgar, in the ore or the process of refining. But perhaps the most striking quality of the work is the love of truth, for its own sake, displayed by the author. This truth may not, as we think, be always attained; but it is always pursued without fear or favor, and, what is perhaps harder, without deference to great authority or learning towards preconceived opinion. BRITISH ANTIQUITIES -A barrow on the top of an eminence called Rolling Hill, not far from Bakewell, Derbyshire, was opened a few days since, and two rude unbaked urns found, containing ashes and fragments of human bones. The account adds: One of the urns was obtained entire, but the other unfortunately fell in pieces on being removed. On proceeding further into the tumulus, three human skeletons were discovered, deposited in separate cells or coffins, formed of oblong stones. ly speaking, however, this might be held a greater productiveness of industry. The fifth essay, on the Definition and Method of Political Economy," is devoted to a defence, or rather to an exposition, of the propriety of proceeding by hypothesis. Upon this point we must confess an inclination to differ with Mr. MILL and the greater part of the modern school. It may be necessary in abstract sciences; but we doubt whether political economy ever can be an abstract science, any more than medicine, politics, war, or any other pursuit which deals with animal or intelligent life or its relations. It is true that the point and line of geometry are hypotheses, since no geometer can produce a line or point that shall fulfil the geometrical definition. But this assumption misrepresents nothing. The nature of the two pursuits is moreover essentially different. Geometry and iis cognate sciences deal only with extension, &c. in astronomy the nature which it contemplates is too remote-in geography too large, or what is practically the same, on too reduced a scale-to regard any thing save lines and the intervening spaces. A similar remark applies to the art of surveying; and in arithmetic numbers alone are considered, not the quality of the units that form the aggregate, as, for example, the character, courage, and discipline of soldiers, are not considered by the arithmetician in working a sum where the number of soldiers happens to form part of the question. These sciences—Lit. Gaz. or arts are abstract, because their nature is A NEW MOTIVE POWER.-The Paris papers so: but we consider it a useless, or it may be mention that a first trial of M. Andrau's new loa mischievous, effort to endeavor to make comotive power, by means of compressed air, that pure which is in its nature mixed, unless was made on Monday, on the Versailles railroad the teacher distinctly tell the pupil what he is (left bank), in the presence of Messrs. Bineau about-unless he tell him, "This is mere hy-and Baude, Commissioners appointed by the Govpothesis: what I am assuming never actually ernment, of the engineers of the railroad, and a exists purely, or if it does it exists so obscure- great number of spectators. Although the locoly that you cannot discover that state of ex-motive was charged upon the low pressure sysistence: I am putting it to you in this hypothetical form, that you may more thoroughly exhaust the subject in every phase possible or impossible, to possess you more clearly with the science, to sharpen your perception, and to lessen your presumption." This, indeed, is One of the skeletons was of great dimensions, evidently the remains of a person of gigantic stature. The position of this skeleton was unusual, it having been placed in the cell or coffin in a sitting posture. A piece of metal resembling silver, and a large antler of a deer, were also found in or near the cell of the large skeleton. This locality is studded with ancient barrows, many of which are unexplored. tem, because there was not a sufficient power to compress the air to a greater extent, the experiment perfectly succeeded. In expending two or three atmospheres, the locomotive ran a quarter of a league with great rapidity and regularity. The trial is to be repeated in the course of the next month.-Athenæum. |