rise in price of £333 6s. 8d. per cent. were offered for the front land.

It should also be mentioned that the British Goverument have aided by loans those merchants who have funds which they cannot realize; £2,000,000 have been advanced on approved securities through the medium of the Bank of England; and the confidence is now (Jan. 6, 1811, the date of the letter from England giving this information) general, that no more failures will take place of Houses which are ultimately competent to fulfil their engagements. In 1793, £5,000,000 of exchequer-bills were thus loaned by government; the failures now therefore are not so great as in 1793.

Indeed it might have been inferred a priori, that the French decrees could not ruin Britain; seeing that they have no power to diminish her naval ascendency, to subdue the spirit, to slacken the industry, or to subvert the freedom of her people. And in the natural order of things, it amounts nearly to an absolute impossibility that these decrees shall be effectual, even to the extent of annihilating all commer- · cial intercourse between England and Continental Europe. Buonaparte orders more than a hundred millions of people on the European Continent to forego all the benefits of foreign commerce; and in consequence to endure the daily and hourly privations of many of the prime necessaries of life, and of many conveniencies and comforts which long habit has converted into necessaries. A very great proportion of those families in Continental Europe, who used before the stoppage of all external trade to live in affluence and luxury, are now reduced to the same rude and homely fare with that of the peasantry in ordinary times; and the vast body of the people are ground down to an inexpressible state of penury and wretchedness. Now there is nothing in all this that is calculated to rouse the national pride, or to fan the

martial fire of the inhabitants of the European Continent. But the constant pressure of privation and inconvenience pervading all their individual and social habits, penetrating into and destroying the inmost recesses of their domestic comfort, haunting their ta,bles and their beds, and casting a face of universal cheerlessness and gloom over all the pursuits of themselves and of their families, can only sharpen and deepen the most deadly and unrelenting hatred against the sole author of all their misery; against the individual who wantonly sacrifices all their comfort and happiness in the prosecution of his selfish, hopeless, impracticable project of destroying Britain. The inference therefore is, that the inveterate habits of the people of Continental Europe will so far elude the utmost vigilance of Buonaparte and his army of custom-house officers, and his tariffs and burning decrees, as to enable them to import British manufactures in considerable quantities; until the day of reaction shall burst asunder the fetters of anti-commercial bondage, by shaking the empire of France to the very centre of its foundations. For other details respecting the war against trade by France and the nations associated with her for the ruin of Britain, see "Hints," pp. 617-642.

If then Buonaparte's anti-commercial decrees cannot destroy Britain, by what means is he to work out her perdition? By fighting? Of the hopelessness of that experiment he has received ample testimony, written in very legible and permanent characters, within the last five years, at Maida, at Vimeira, at Corunna, at Oporto, at Talavera, and at Busaco, where he has had the mortification of finding that his boasted invincible French armies, cannot stand in battle against an inferior number of British troops. It is indeed the peculiar characteristic of the people of Britain, that their spirit and courage rise in proportion as dangers and difficulties thicken around

them; and they have nothing to fear from the combined violence of the whole world directed against them, if they only remain true to themselves, and resolutely persevere in upholding their national rights and honor, against all the assaults of fraud and force. Besides, the insular situation of Britain renders it peculiarly difficult for a foreign enemy to accomplish her subjugation. It is not quite so easy for Buonaparte to pour his myriads of armed slaves into the British isles, as into Spain, Holland, or Germany. Admiral Lord Bridport used to say, "that the French might invade England as soon as they pleased, but that they should not come by water." The French have for some years past been perpetually endeavoring to invade the little island of Sicily, and have always been frustrated in their attempts by the British fleet which commands the bay; although they are masters of all the opposite coast, can command any number of troops for the expedition, and have a very short run by water to encounter. The miserable failure of Murat, King of Naples, in the loss of his flotilla of gun-boats, and the defeat of his troops in their attempt to invade Sicily, in the autumn of 1810, are well known, and serve as an useful practical comment upon the effects to be expected from a French invasion of England. Britain is all-powerful at sea, and can annoy France, can insult her coasts, can prevent the resuscitation of her commerce, and thus cripple her finances and resources. In return for all which effective kindness, France threatens England with invasion. But how is a squadron of flat-bottomed boats to elude the vigilance of the British fleet, and land an army large enough to produce any serious effect on Britain?

But suppose they were landed; an English army, well appointed and of most undaunted valor, would soon destroy any hostile force that could be discmbarked. No doubt, much evil short of absolute sub

jugation, might be inflicted on a country by an invading army; more particularly in Britain, which is very ill-calculated to become the scene of military operations; owing to its vast wealth, its crowded population, its multitudes of traders and mechanics, its public debt and paper currency, its commercial credit, and all the various factitious qualities of a most nice and complicated system of society. But the question now before us is, will Buonaparte ultimately conquer and enslave Britain? Now, no one who has had an opportunity of examining the resources, physical, moral, and intellectual, of the French and British empires, can for a single moment hesitate to assert, that Napoleon, even if he could succeed in combining all Continental Europe against England, and in shutting her out from all the foreign markets in the world, that even then it would be more easy for him to turn aside the waters of the ocean, than to subdue the high spirit of the mistress of the deep. And if he even succeed in making good his landing on that Queen of Isles, "that precious stone set in the silver sea," he will find that the tide of hostile invasion will be rolled back upon him and upon his slaves, by the living rampart of British bodies; every day will be a day of battle; every inch of ground will be floated in the blood of his bravest followers; and the subjugation of Albion will only be purchased by the slaughter of all her children.

Mr. Walsh, who so confidently announces the speedy, the entire, the lasting subjugation of all the European Continent to the arms of France, as confidently decides upon the impracticability of conquering England. He says, in " Letter," &c. pp. 243-245, "Whatever may be the fate of the Continent, the British cannot fall. The character of the population of England, the abundance of her pecuniary resources, and eminently her navy, the great buttress of her strength, preclude almost the possi

bility of her overthrow. The danger of invasion, if not altogether illusory, is extremely doubtful and remote. If the Continent is to be overcome, it is better that the delusion of hope should be at once dispelled from the minds of the British. They will then reserve for a more successful cause, the blood and treasure which they fruitlessly expend in operations abroad. Their attention will be wholly directed to their own defence, for which their means are abundantly sufficient; and to the development of those means. They may be cast down for the moment; but it should be remembered that the dejection of a great nation never leads to nerveless dispair. The prospect of imminent danger tends rather to unite the virtue, and to cement the strength, than to imbitter the factions of a free and magnanimous people."

În considering the probable effects of an invasion of England by France, and of the ultimate issue of the present contest, great stress ought to be laid on the vast addition of national strength and power, which Scotland has given to the British empire, since the political union of the two crowns has been ripened into a moral union of the two nations. The Scottish have distinguished themselves in arts and arms through a long series of ages; patient of toil, and prodigal of life, their industry, enterprise, valor, genius and intelligence, have added incalculably to the permanent strength, honor, and character of the United Kingdom. And we have every reason to expect, that in a few years the Union of Ireland with Great Britain will produce the same beneficial results in a still greater degree; in as much as her capacities of soil, climate, agriculture, commerce and population far exceed those of Scotland. When the Rose, the Shamrock, and the Thistle, shall indeed be all bound together on one stem, the Genius of Britain may look abroad throughout the earth, as Lord of