CHAPTER V.

LOANS FOR COLONIZATION AND EMIGRATION.

"It is to the emigration of English capital that we have chiefly to look for keeping up a supply of cheap food and cheap materials of clothing proportional to the increase of our population; thus enabling an increasing capital to find employment in the country, without reduction in profit, in producing manufactured articles with which to pay for this supply of raw produce. Thus the exportation of capital is an agent of great efficacy in extending the field of employment for that which remains; and it may be said truly that, up to a certain point, the more capital we send away, the more we shall possess and be able to retain at home."

Principle of Loans applies to other Cases.

J. S. MILL.

It will no doubt be thought that the proposal of a ten-million loan to the farmers is startling enough in itself, without the accompaniment of loans for any other purpose, and that if the former is to have any chance of being listened to, it would be better to let it stand alone. But I have no right to shrink, and I do not shrink, from the consequences of the position here maintained. The main ground on which the propriety of agricultural loans is justified, does warrant a wider application of the same principle. It may from time to time be a most important duty of Government not to enforce, but to encourage and facilitate a better application of capital than that to which private interest, if left wholly to itself, would lead. Mr. Mill, after laying down the old doctrine respecting the increase of capital in which an over production of commodities is treated, as if it were identical with an excess of money capital, says, "The point is fundamental; any difference of opinion on it involves radically different conceptions of political economy, especially in its practical aspect."

I perfectly agree in this, and accept the consequences. Having, therefore, the clearest conviction that Mr. Mill's doctrine, when applied to money-capital, by which the changes in all other capital are regulated, is erroneous-believing no fact to be more certain than the tendency of money-capital to accumulate in excess, until it is temporarily destroyed,-I draw the general practical conclusion, that it may become a legitimate function of the Government, when circumstances present a strong case for interference, to favour the direction of that capital to channels into which unaided private interest would not cause it to flow.

Misdirection of Capital in 1845.

The supposed infallibility of private interest in finding out the best application of new capital, is a conclusion which, within a comparatively recent period, received most conspicuous contradiction. The shopkeeper is no doubt the best judge as to whether it is prudent to lay in another hundred pounds' worth of goods; and the merchant, however liable to err, knows, at least better than any minister of State, how far it is prudent to order sugar from the Brazils, or send cottons to Calcutta; but it is quite untrue that the non-trading classes, who are the chief accumulators of disposable capital, are good judges; or, indeed, that they are not the very worst judges of the safety of the investments by which they are so often tempted. For such persons, who want an income without trouble, there is no safe investment, except government securities, or the bonds and debentures (not shares) of great joint-stock companies. What can they know of the merits of a mining scheme in America or Australia, or of a railway project, whether foreign or domestic? For answer, it is enough to refer to the year 1845. What could be more wild and extravagant than the miscalculations of that year? What more frantic than the waste, the sheer waste of capital which then took place the waste upon surveys which came to nothing and upon bills which were abandoned, or passed and not acted

upon-the waste by transfer to landlords who often mistook such windfalls for the first-fruits of a harvest which was to last for ever, and dissipated them accordingly-the waste by double prices paid for all kinds of materials and services, and which were taken out by nearly the whole class of navigators in intoxicating drinks, or the mere whims and fancies of animal indulgence? Thousands of families are still pinched by the losses of that year, but the loss of capital was the least of the disorders then produced. There was an incredible amount of mis-direction given to the education of the young, from which results more lasting evil. Numbers of young men were during the railway excitement placed suddenly in the possession of high salaries, which produced absurdly false expectations in themselves and in their connections. They contracted habits of expense, of which they soon experienced the bitter fruits. Meanwhile, youths destined for commerce and other professions were hastily converted into engineers; and many of those young men, able and highly educated, are now working, and glad to get work, in various engineering establishments at the wages of mechanics.

It is no extravagant proposition to say, that an intelligent Government, free from speculative passions, might have given a safer direction to that last great outflow of capital, than that which was given by the blind and ignorant impulses under which it actually took place. It does, therefore, seem to me a practical conclusion, abundantly sustained by all that is known of the working of our monetary system, that not only in the particular case of agriculture, but in others likely to present themselves from time to time, it may become advisable for the Government to promote the movement of spare capital into channels into which, of its own accord, it would either not flow at all, or only to a very slight extent.

I will proceed to state two cases in which the Government might borrow capital, and lend it out on unexceptionable security, with immense advantage to all classes. The first is for

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purposes of colonization and emigration, the second for the improvement of towns.

Wakefield and Buller on Colonization.

Upon the general principles of colonization, I could say nothing except what I have learnt from the writings of Mr. GIBBON WAKEFIELD, and the speeches of CHARles Buller. Alas! that name-how can I write it without a thrill of painful recollection? What great hopes, not only for the colonies, but for England, were buried in that untimely grave! Nothing shows more strongly the essential truth of Mr. Carlyle's censures on our legislative and administrative system, than the fact that a man like Charles Buller, with intellect enough for half a Cabinet, should pass through nearly twenty years of public life without ever sitting at a council table. By such a man the office of Judge Advocate could scarcely have been accepted without some feeling of humiliation. For him the opportunity of real work had only begun just before he was called away. Yet it must be acknowledged as characteristic of these latter days," that he with his eminently attractive personal qualities could not wholly escape the enervating influence of that spirit of society which wages such deadly war with all severe and sustained labour. The strong man was condemned, whether he would or no, to hold the distaff, but he sometimes did it with too little reluctance.

Colonization by the English Aristocracy.

But who that has ever read-and, above all, who that heard -that masterly speech on colonization, which for the time merged all party enmities in one common sentiment of admiration, can doubt that its principles might be acted upon with success if only a mind like that which made the speech were appointed with full powers to carry out the plan? Colonization may be one of the lost arts, but if it be so, the loss is in our lethargic and self-indulgent habits, not in our intelligence. No

one can study that speech, or the writings of Mr. Wakefield, from whose mind the materials were drawn, and feel still in the dark as to what it was that made the ancient Greek colonies in Italy and Asia Minor so successful. The Greeks only did from instinct and intuition what Mr. Wakefield has proposed to effect with a reflective perception of the cause, by a most felicitous application of the modern relations of capital and labour. Mr. Carlyle, however, whose thought always penetrates below the economical foundations, is still right in maintaining that the cool cash-payment calculation will not of itself ever do the work of the ancient heroism. But in England the honours at the disposal of the Crown have still power to accomplish much that cannot be accomplished by money. If successful leadership in colonial enterprises came to be regarded as a better title to peerages and blue ribands than such diplomatic exploits as are wont to be performed in the saloons of Berlin and Vienna, there would still be room for hope that the glories of the Ionic cities might be outdone, and that the English aristocracy, now wasting its high culture and still unbroken energies in aimless and unsatisfying pursuits, would yet become the architects of a great colonial civilization, richer and more fruitful in benefit to man than any social achievement of the ancient world. The Canterbury settlement, considered merely as a private effort, must be regarded with admiration and sympathy, in spite of a theological basis too artificial to bear the strain of any severe trial when it comes to clash with material interests. But the success of any such private undertaking, with the old dispersion and disorganization on every side of it, must at best be doubtful. It is somewhat like the attempt to create a Madeira climate for tender lungs in an English locality. Sooner or later the ever vigilant east winds find out weak points, and at length come with full force sweeping through the enclosure.

The application of Mr. Wakefield's principles would require, in the first instance, some advance of money, although the character of the scheme is essentially self-supporting; but it may be