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per cent. flings himself back upon his chintz bed, which has paid 22 per cent.—and expires in the arms of an apothecary who has paid a licence of a hundred pounds for the privilege of putting him to death. His whole property is then immediately taxed from 2 to 10 per cen'. Besides the probate, large fees are demanded for burying him in the chancel; his virtues are handed down to posterity on taxed marble; and he is then gathered to his fathers to be taxed no more. In addition to all this, the habit of deal

of the revenue derived from loans, 222 | schoolboy whips his taxed top-the parts out of 247 of the American re- beardless youth manages his taxed horse, venue have been derived from fo- with a taxed bridle, on a taxed road: reign commerce. In the mind of any and the dying Englishman, pouring his sensible American, this consideration medicine, which has paid 7 per cent., onght to prevail over the few splendid into a spoon that has paid 15 actions of their half dozen frigates, which must, in a continued war, have been, with all their bravery and ac tivity, swept from the face of the ocean by the superior force and equal bravery the English. It would be the height of madness in America to run into another naval war with this country if it could be averted by any other means than a sacrifice of proper dignity and character. They have, comparatively, no land revenue; and, in spite of the Franklin and Guerrière, though lined with cedar and mounted with brassing with large sums will make the cannon, they must soon be reduced to the same state which has been described by Dr. Seybert, and from which they were so opportunely extricated by the treaty of Ghent. David Porter and Stephen Decatur are very brave men; but they will prove an unspeakable misfortune to their country, if they inflame Jonathan into a love of naval glory, and inspire him with any other love of war than that which is founded apon a determination not to submit to serious insult and injury.

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We can inform Jonathan what are the inevitable consequences of being too foud of glory;-TAXES upon every article which enters into the mouth, or eaters the back, or is placed under the font-tares upon every thing which it is pleasant to see, hear, feel, smell, or taste -azes upon warmth, light, and locotaxes on every thing on earth, and the waters under the earth. -on thing that comes from abroad, or is grown at home taxes on the raw aterial-taxes on every fresh value that is added to it by the industry of un-taxes on the sauce which pampers n's appetite, and the drug that restores him to health on the ermine which decorates the judge, and the rope which hangs the criminal on the poor 's salt, and the rich man's spiceon the brass nails of the coffin, and the ribands of the bride· at bed or board, couchant or levant, we must pay.

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Government avaricious and profuse; and the system itself will infallibly generate the base vermin of spies and informers, and a still more pestilent race of political tools and retainers of the meanest and most odious description; while the prodigious patronage which the collecting of this splendid revenue will throw into the hands of Government, will invest it with so vast an influence, and hold out such means and temptations to corruption, as all the virtue and public spirit, even of republicans, will be unable to resist.

Every wise Jonathan should remember this, when he sees the rabble huzzaing at the heels of the truly respectable Decatur, or inflaming the vanity of that still more popular leader, whose justification has lowered the character of his Government with all the civilised nations of the world.

Debt.-America owed 42 millions of dollars after the revolutionary war; in 1790, 79 millions; in 1803, 70 millions; and in the beginning of January, 1812, the public debt was diminished to 45 millions of dollars. After the last war with England, it had risen to 123 millions; and so it stood on the 1st of January, 1816. The total amount carried to the credit of the commissioners of the sinking fund, on the 31st of December, 1816, was about 34 millions of dollars.

Such is the land of Jonathan-and

thus has it been governed. In his of any civilised and educated people. honest endeavours to better his situa- During the thirty or forty years of tion, and in his manly purpose of their independence, they have done ab resisting injury and insult, we most solutely nothing for the Sciences, for cordially sympathise. We hope he the Arts, for Literature, or even for the will always continue to watch and sus- statesman-like studies of Politics or pect his Government as he now does Political Economy. Confining our— remembering, that it is the constant selves to our own country, and to the tendency of those entrusted with power, period that has elapsed since they had to conceive that they enjoy it by their an independent existence, we would own merits, and for their own use, and ask, Where are their Foxes, their not by delegation, and for the benefit Burkes, their Sheridans, their Windof others. Thus far we are the friends hams, their Horners, their Wilberforces? and admirers of Jonathan. But he where their Arkwrights, their Watts, must not grow vain and ambitious; or their Davys? — their Robertsons, allow himself to be dazzled by that Blairs, Smiths, Stewarts, Paleys, and galaxy of epithets by which his ora- Malthuses? - their Porsons, Parrs, tors and newspaper scribblers endea- Burneys, or Blomfields ?-their Scotts, vour to persuade their supporters that Rogers's, Campbells, Byrons, Moores, they are the greatest, the most refined, or Crabbes ?-their Siddons, Kembles, the most enlightened, and the most Keans, or O'Neils ?-- their Wilkies, moral people upon earth. The effect Lawrences, Chantrys?—or their paralof this is unspeakably ludicrous on lels to the hundred other names that have this side of the Atlantic-and, even on spread themselves over the world from the other, we should imagine, must be our little island in the course of the last rather humiliating to the reasonable thirty years, and blest or delighted part of the population. The Ameri- mankind by their works, inventions, or cans are a brave, industrious, and acute examples? In so far as we know, people; but they have hitherto given there is no such parallel to be produced no indications of genius, and made no from the whole annals of this selfapproaches to the heroic, either in their adulating race. In the four quarters morality or character. They are but of the globe, who reads an American a recent offset indeed from England; book? or goes to an American play? and should make it their chief boast, or looks at an American picture or for many generations to come, that statue? What does the world yet owe they are sprung from the same race to American physicians or surgeons? with Bacon and Shakspeare and New- What new substances have their che Considering their numbers, in-mists discovered? or what old ones have they analysed? What new constellations have been discovered by the telescopes of Americans? What have they done in the mathematics? Who drinks out of American glasses? or

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deed, and the favourable circumstances in which they have been placed, they have yet done marvellously little to assert the honour of such a descent, or to show that their English blood has been exalted or refined by their repub-eats from American plates? or wears lican training and institutions. Their Franklins and Washingtons, and all the other sages and heroes of their revolution, were born and bred subjects of the King of England-and not among the freest or most valued of his subjects. And, since the period of their separation, a far greater proportion of their statesmen and artists and political writers have been foreigners, than ever occurred before in the history

American coats or gowns ? or sleeps in American blankets? Finally, under which of the old tyrannical govern ments of Europe is every sixth man a slave, whom his fellow-creatures may buy and sell and torture?

When these questions are fairly and favourably answered, their laudatory epithets may be allowed: but till that can be done, we would seriously advise them to keep clear of superlatives.

1. Safe Method for rendering Income arising from Personal Property available to the Poor-Laws. Lorgman & Co. 1819. 2. Summary Review of the Report and Evidence relative to the Poor-Laws. By

8. W. Nicol. York.

& Essay on the Practicability of modifying

the Poor-Laws. Sherwood. 1819.

4 Considerations on the Poor-Laws. By

John Davison, A. M. Oxford.

OCR readers, we fear, will require some apology for being asked to look at any thing upon the Poor-Laws. No subject, we admit, can be more disagreeable, or more trite. But, unfortunately, it is the most important of all the important subjects which the distressed state of the country is now crowding upon our notice.

POOR-LAWS. (E. REVIEW, 1820) | fathers and mothers they are commanded to obey and honour, and are to be brought up in virtue by the churchwardens. And this is gravely intended as a corrective of the PoorLaws; as if (to pass over the many other objections which might be made to it) it would not set mankind populating faster than carpenters and bricklayers could cover in their children, or separate twigs to be bound into rods for their flagellation. An extension of the Poor-Laws to personal property is also talked of. We should be very glad to see any species of property exempted from these laws, but have no wish that any which is now exempted should be subjected to their influence. The case would infallibly be like that of the Income-tax, -the more easily the tax was raised, the more profligate A pamphlet on the Poor-Laws gene- would be the expenditure. It is prorally contains some little piece of fa-posed also that alehouses should be vourite nonsense, by which we are diminished, and that the children of gravely told this enormous evil may be the poor should be catechised publicly perfectly cured. The first gentleman in the church,—both very respectable recommends little gardens; the second and proper suggestions, but of themcows; the third a village shop; the selves hardly strong enough for the fourth a spade; the fifth Dr. Bell, and evil. We have every wish that the so forth. Every man rushes to the poor should accustom themselves to press with his small morsel of imbe-habits of sobriety; but we cannot help cility; and is not easy till he sees his reflecting, sometimes, that an alehouse impertinence stitched in blue covers. is the only place where a poor tired In this list of absurdities, we must creature, haunted with every species of not forget the project of supporting wretchedness, can purchase three or the poor from national funds, or, in four times a year three pennyworth of other words, of immediately doubling ale, a liquor upon which wine-drinking the expenditure, and introducing every moralists are always extremely severe. possible abuse into the administration We must not forget, among other of it. Then there are worthy men, nostrums, the eulogy of small farmswho call upon gentlemen of fortune in other words, of small capital, and and education to become overseers profound ignorance in the arts of agrimeaning, we suppose, that the present culture; and the evil is also thought Overseers are to perform the higher to be curable by periodical contribuduties of men of fortune. Then Merit tions from men who have nothing, and is set up as the test of relief; and their can earn nothing without charity. To worships are to enter into a long ex- one of these plans, and perhaps the amination of the life and character of most plausible, Mr. Nicol has stated, each applicant, assisted, as they doubt-in the following passage, objections less would be, by candid overseers, and that are applicable to almost all the neighbours divested of every feeling of malice and partiality. The children are next to be taken from their parents, and lodged in immense pedagogueries of several acres each, where they are to be carefully secluded from those

rest.

"The district school would no doubt be magistrates and country gentlemen would well superintended and well regulated; be its visitors. The more excellent the establishment, the greater the mischief;

Nothing in this world is created in | each district, before they are transmitted vain lions, tigers, conquerors, have to the Secretary of State: - they are their use. Ambitious monarchs, who then laid before Congress by the President. Under this Act three census, or enumerations of the people, have been already laid before Congress-for the years 1790, 1800, and 1810. Ia the year 1790, the population of America was 3,921,326 persons, of whom 697,697 were slaves. In 1800, the

are the curse of civilised nations, are the civilisers of savage people. With a number of little independent hordes, civilisation is impossible. They must have a common interest before there can be peace; and be directed by one will before there can be order. When mankind are prevented from daily quar-numbers were 5.319,762, of which relling and fighting, they first begin to improve; and all this, we are afraid, is only to be accomplished, in the first instance, by some great conqueror. We sympathise, therefore, with the victories of the King of Ashantee-and feel ourselves, for the first time, in love with military glory. The ex-Emperor of the French would, at Coomassie, Dagwumba, or Inta, be an eminent benefactor to the human race.

AMERICA. (E. Review, 1820.)

Statistical Annals of the United States of America. By Adam Seybert. 4to. Philadelphia. 1818.

896,849 were slaves. In 1810, the numbers were 7.239,903, of whom 1,191,364 were slaves; so that at the rate at which free population has proceeded between 1790 and 1810, it doubles itself, in the United States, in a very little more than 22 years. The slave population, according to its rate of proceeding in the same time, would be doubled in about 26 years. The increase of the slave population in this statement is owing to the importation of negroes between 1800 and 1808, especially in 1806 and 1807, from the expected prohibition against importation. The number of slaves was also increased by the acquisitions of territory in Louisiana, where they constituted nearly half the population. From 1801 to 1811, the inhabitants of Great Britain acquired an augmentation of

THIS is a book of character and authority; but it is a very large book; and therefore we think we shall do an ac-14 per cent; the Americans, within the ceptable service to our readers, by pre- same period, were augmented 36 per senting them with a short epitome of cent. its contents, observing the same order which has been chosen by the author. The whole, we conceive, will form a pretty complete picture of America, and teach us how to appreciate that country, either as a powerful enemy or a profitable friend. The first subject with which Mr. Seybert begins, is the Population of the United States.

Population.-As representatives and direct taxes are apportioned among the different States in proportion to their numbers, it is provided for in the American Constitution, that there shall be an actual enumeration of the people every ten years. It is the duty of the marshals in each State to number the inhabitants of their respective districts: and a correct copy of the lists, containing the names of the persons returned, must be set up in a public place within

Emigration seems to be of very little importance to the United States. In the year 1817, by far the most considerable year of emigration, there arrived in ten of the principal ports of America, from the Old World, 22.000 persons as passengers. The number of emigrants, from 1790 to 1810, is not supposed to have exceeded 6000 per annum. None of the separate States have beer. retrograde during these three enumerations, though some have been nearly stationary. The most remarkable increase is that of New York, which bas risen from 340,120 in the year 1790, to 959,049 in the year 1810. The emigration from the Eastern to the Western States is calculated at 60,000 persons per annum. In all the American enuinerations, the males uniformly predominate in the proportion of about 100

to 92. We are better off in Great | ing 1804, were consecutively, in milBritain and Ireland,-where the women lions of dollars, 16, 17, 13.

were to the men, by the census of 1811, as 110 to 100. The density of population in the United States is less than 4 persons to a square mile; that of Holland in 1803, was 275 to the square mile; that of England and Wales, 169. So that the fifteen provinces which formed the Union in 1810, would contain, if they were as thickly peopled as Holland, 135 millions of souls.

Imports. In 1791, the imports of the United States were 19 millions; on an average of three consecutive years, ending 1804 inclusive, they were 68 millions; in 1806-7, they were 138 millions; and in 1815, 133 millions of dollars. The annual value of the imports, on an average of three years ending 1804, was 75 millions, of which the dominions of Great Britain furnished nearly one half. On an average of three years ending in 1804, America imported from Great Britain to the amount of about 36 millions, and returned goods to the amount of about 23 millions. Certainly these are countries that have some better employment for their time and energy than cutting each other's throats, and may meet for more profitable purposes. The American imports from the dominions of Great Britain, before the great American war, amounted to about 3 millions sterling; soon after the war, to the same. From 1805 to 1811, both inclusive, the average annual exportation of Great Britain to all parts of the world, in real value, was about 43 millions sterling, of which one fifth, or nearly 9 millions, was sent to America.

The next head is that of Trade, and Commerce. In 1790, the exports of the United States were above 19 millions of dollars; in 1791, above 20 millions; in 1792, 26 millions; in 1793, 33 millions of dollars. Prior to 1795, there was no discrimination, in the American Treasury accounts, between the exportation of domestic, and the re-exportation of foreign articles. In 1795, the aggregate value of the merchandise exported was 67 millions of dollars, of which the foreign produce re-exported was 26 millions. In 1800, the total value of exports was 94 milLions; in 1805, 101 millions; and in 1808, when they arrived at their maximum, 108 millions of dollars. In the year 1809, from the effects of the French and English Orders in Council, the exports fell to 52 millions of dollars; in 1810, to 66 millions; in 1811, to 61 millions. In the first year of the war with England, to 38 millions; in the second to 27; in the year 1814, when peace was made, to 6 millions. So that the exports of the republic in six years, had tumbled down from 108 to 5 millions of dollars after the peace, in the years 1815-16-17, the exports rose to 52. 81, 87 millions of dollars. In 1817, the exportation of cotton was 85 millions pounds. In 1815, the sugar made on the banks of the Missisippi was 10 millions pounds. In 1792, when the wheat trade was at the maximum, a million and a half of bushels Lands. All public lands are surwere exported. The proportions of veyed before they are offered for sale; the exports to Great Britain, Spain, and divided into townships of six miles France, Holland, and Portugal, on an square, which are subdivided into thirtyaverage of ten years ending 1812, are six sections of one mile square, contain27, 16, 13, 12, and 7; the actual ing each 640 acres. The following value of exports to the dominions of lands are excepted from the sales. Great Britain, in the three years end-One thirty-sixth part of the lands, or a

Tonnage and Navigation. — Before the revolutionary war, the American tonnage, whether owned by British or American subjects, was about 127,000 tons; immediately after that war, 108,000. In 1789, it had amounted to 437,733 tons, of which 279,000 was American property. In 1790, the total was 605,825, of which 354,000 was American. In 1816, the tonnage, all American, was 1,300,000. On an average of three years, from 1810 to 1812, both inclusive, the registered tonnage of the British empire was 2,459,000; or little more than double the American.

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