m to
imagine that manufactories of bills existed specially abroad, and that
people could draw with as much nonchalance from Paris or from Hamburg,
upon Jack Nokes and Tom Styles at Amsterdam or Frankfort, as here Lord
Huntingtower accepted for his dear friend the Colonel values uncared
for, or as folks familiarly talk of valuing an Aldgate pump when an
accommodation bill is in question. May we venture to hint to the member
for commercial Sunderland, the _ex_ for Northumberland, that the
functions of "exchange brokers" extend no further than to ask A if he
has any bills to sell, and B if he is a buyer; whereupon he has only
further to learn what rate the one will purchase and the other sell at;
that knotty point arranged, the bargain is concluded, and he receives
his very small percentage. The operations are carried on every day, more
or less, but on Tuesdays and Fridays, being especially "post days" on
London 'Change, where Lord Howick any day may be initiated in the
mystery, if not punctilious about being unceremoniously elbowed and
jostled about.

In the principle of protection, we hold Russia to be perfectly in her
right and her interest; in the abuse of it, she damages herself.
Prohibition is not protection; restrictive duties equal to absolute
prohibition, like the 85 per cent prohibitory tax, formerly levied here
on Indian cotton fabrics, in favour of Lancashire, are not protection in
the legitimate sense. The late Emperor Alexander hit the true nail of
principle on the head when, in 1819, he reformed the Russian tariff on
the calculation of imposts ranging from fifteen to forty per cent. We
are, nevertheless, bound to say, that, even as protection is understood
in its exaggerated sense by the Autocrat, the system has worked well for
Russia, as indeed we have shown. She has accumulated wealth by that
system; she has secured by it the possession of a large proportion of
those precious metals, which are indispensable no less as the medium of
foreign exchanges and balances, than as the means by which, above all
other means, the operations of industry, and the employment of labour,
are facilitated at home. How would industry progress, and wages be
dispensed, if the master manufacturer could offer payment of wages only
in yards or pieces of cloth, the iron-master in ore, or the
land-proprietor in oxen, sheep, corn, hay, or cabbages? In respect of
commercial balances, that of Great Britain against Russia is liquidated