'"

There was another class of immigrants who were found more useful,
the Portuguese, from Madeira. They were highly prized by the Demerara
planters; but even among them the mortality was very considerable.

FOREIGN RELATIONS.

In the East the only hostile acts required from the British government,
during the year 1848, was the suppression of Chinese piracy. During
the year, also, the Rif pirates gave trouble on the shores of northern
Africa. Employment was also given to British cruisers in various other
parts of the world in the suppression of piracy and the protection of
British commerce.

THE UNITED STATES.

The measures of Sir Robert Peel's late government in the disputes which
arose between England and the United States, whatever their demerits,
had the effect of preserving peace between the two countries, which,
during the tumults of continental Europe, the disturbances in Ireland,
and the agitations in England during 1848, was of the utmost consequence
to Great Britain. The discovery of gold in California, although an
American event, exercised much influence upon the commerce and monetary
affairs of the British Isles, and tended still more to draw the bonds of
amity close between the two great British nations.

SPAIN: DIPLOMATIC DISAGREEMENT WITH THAT COUNTRY; DISMISSION OF THE
ENGLISH AMBASSADOR.

Spain, ever fruitful of internal discord, was not less so in 1848. The
history of the court was one of scandal, and of the government one of
weakness, fickleness, and incapacity. The year 1847 closed by a change
of ministry, when the infamous Narvaez was in the ascendant, and his
creatures were gathered around him in the guise of a cabinet. The
queen-mother, it was declared, had been married in December, 1833, to
her paramour, Munoz, within three months of the decease of the king her
husband, and this was kept secret for fifteen years from the Spanish
people, until, under the auspices of the new government of Narvaez, it
was at last brought to light, for purposes at once venal and revolting.
This disclosure incensed the Spanish people, and revived the hopes of
both the republican and Carlist parties. The corrupt practices of Senor
Salamanca also coming before the public, disgusted the nation with
its public men. As will be seen on another page, France effected a new
revolution in February. Louis Philipp was dethroned, and the republic
was once more proclaimed. From the immediate contiguity of