to eftablish, either for Irifh confumption or foreign export, those manufactures in which Britain excels Ireland; neither will it attract it to that manufacture in which Ireland underfells Great Britain, namely, the linen; for though that • manufactory has been free and profperous in Ireland for thefe ninety years, and has afforded many great fortunes to the industrious who have engaged in it, yet hardly < any British capital has fettled in it."

Permit me, Sir, to examine fhortly how these different points are made out.

• Iron and pottery,' it is faid, depend so totally on plenty and cheapness of fuel, that they exift only in the coal < countries, and have never known, even in England, to ‹ make what can be called a fettlement at any distance from

a plentiful colliery. In the pottery too, the flint and clay < which are so abundant in England, have not been found in any quantity in Ireland, and in fact there is not a fingle < pottery in Ireland. It is felf-evident, therefore, that these • manufactures never can travel from the country which has coal, to that which has it not from Britain to Ireland; and the fame facility of fuel must give to Britain • a decided preference in all manufactures where steam en<gines cheapen the price of labour. Woollens, though < established for centuries in Yorkshire, have never travelled in any direction ten miles from the coal country, and they are manufactured there to fuch advantage over Ireland, that England fupplies her to the value of near 600, oocl. a year, though burdened with an import duty

• Mr. Fofter's Speech, p. 75.

‹ of

' of more than 8 per cent. And as to cottons, machinery < being more used in this manufactory than in the others, ⚫ the Irish cannot, even on the eastern coaft oppofite the < British collieries, make cotton twist within at least 20 per

cent. as cheap as Britain can fupply them. In Britain, during the continuance of Arkwright's patent, this fabric " was fubject to a heavy charge on that account; but though fuch exclufive privilege did not exift in Ireland, no English money was ever employed to fit up his machinery. there a'.

You will perceive how much ftrefs is laid in this enumeration of difficulties on the circumftance of fuel. But let us not take it for granted, either that cheapnefs of fuel is fo indifpenfable a requifite to cheapnefs of manufacture, even in the inftances in queftion, as that it may not be compenfated for by other circumftances; or that abundance of coal is a benefit which nature has fo abfolutely denied to Ireland as feems in this part of the argument to have been affumed.

Take the case of iron: I am informed that fome of the articles made of that metal which require the greatest confumption of coals, for example anchors, are manufactured in this metropolis, where fuel is, I believe, dearer than in almost any other part of the kingdom. Labour is alfo dearer here than in moft of the other fea-port towns, to which those anchors are to be fent, Yet other circumstances having occafioned the employment of the capital, and the cultivation of the skill neceffary for that business in this place, it seems that it can be carried on, on the whole, to more advantage here than where both coals and labour are much

a Mr. Fofter's Speech, p. 68, 69, 70, 72, 73,

cheaper.

cheaper. The importance of the cheapness of fuel to the manufacturing of other commodities made of iron, is much over-rated; it is certainly a very material circumstance in regard to coarfer articles; but it will be found, by confulting the proper documents, that four-fifths of the goods made of iron, which are annually exported from Great Britain to Ireland and other parts of the world, consist of goods in the manufacture of which the price of coals has hardly any perceptible effect: the principal value of those goods is derived from the fkill and labour of the artisan; but labour is alfo dearer in the places where they are made, chiefly Birmingham and Sheffield, than in most parts of the world. The only advantage therefore Great Britain poffeffes as to fuch articles arifes from the fuperior skill, expertnefs, and celerity of the workman. But with the en-couragement which a new state of things would hold out to the Irish manufacturers, is it to be doubted that they will attain to an equality in those respects with those of this country* ?

The statement as to the woollen goods made in Great Britain, would lead an inattentive person to to suppose that this manufacture was almost entirely confined to York

a I am informed that the city of Liege affords a striking example of the fmall relative importance of cheapness of fuel and labour, to the fuccefs of the most valuable manufactures in iron. That city had been for many ages noted for those manufactures; coals may be dug almost at the very gates of the town, and at a very trifling expenfe, as the veins are to be found within a few feet of the furface, and there is hardly any part of the continent where provifions are cheaper and more abundant; yet Birmingham and Sheffield now underfell Liege in thofe very manufactures for which he had been long fo famous, with the exception of a very few articles, at the rate of not less than from 15 to 25 per cent.

fhire.

That county, or rather a circuit within that county of not more than ten miles every way, is called its

old and great fettlement*.' But the fact is, that the trade there, though certainly very extenfive, is confined chiefly to the coarser kind of cloths, while the principal feat of the manufactory of fine cloths, as well as of the light and fancy woollen goods, is in a part of England where coals are much dearer than in a great many parts of Ireland, namely, at Bradford, Trowbridge, and Chippenham.

The real cafe as to the Irish woollen trade, is, that Ireland works up all the wool fhe produces, though she now only exports to the value of about 12,500l. yearly, instead of 110,207. her export of that article a century ago, and the receives from this country to the annual amount of 580,723. This is no longer owing to the reftrictive condition of a compact long ago at an end; nor does it appear that the goods of this material which fhe does make, are dearer or neceffarily fo than thofe fhe imports from hence, the quality of each being confidered;-we are told the true reafon; it is, that agriculture and the linen • manufactures are found to give better profit in land than " fheep afforded+; a reafon which, no doubt, as to that manufacture will continue to operate, whatever may become of the present duties upon it in its tranfit either from Ireland to this country, or from hence to Ireland.

In the cotton business I understand the confumption of coals is, comparatively speaking, very inconfiderable. Fuel is not more abundant now in England than it was five-and

Mr. Fofter's Speech, p. 69.

b Ibid. p. 72.

twenty

twenty years ago; yet during that period the quantity of cotton wool manufactured in Great Britain has increased from three to near thirty millions of pounds. The importation of the raw material is alike open to Ireland; that country abounds in weavers; and I am told the workman who is in the practice of weaving linen is capable, with little or no previous inftruction or practice, of becoming an expert weaver of plain cottons. What then is the real cause of her paying to this country more than 100,000l. a year for cotton goods manufactured here? what but the want of that capital which alone excites the industry and attention, and thereby improves the skill of the workman, furnishes the means of dividing labour, which diminishes its coft beyond any difference, a difference in the amount of wages and expense of living can ever occafion, and enables the opulent trader to give long credit, fupport accidental loffes, and thrive under a much smaller profit than is requifite to others less fortunate in that refpe&t, who might attempt to become his rivals.

But, does Great Britain poffefs fuch advantages over Ireland in refpect of fuel as has been supposed?

Many coal-mines exift and are worked in Ireland, and I believe in many parts of it the veins are rich and extenfive. Mr. Evans, engineer to the Grand Canal, in his evidence laid before the Irish House of Commons in 1783, as quoted two years afterwards at the bar of this House, faid, That the Kilkenny collieries, if properly work

ed, were capable of producing 300, 000 tons of culm yearly that this might be carried by the canal

• Mr. Fofter's Speech, p. 88, Beaufort's Memoir, p, 27.

⚫ and