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GIBRALTAR: ITS ADVANTAGES TO ENGLAND. 



IN these days of reform, when an extensive reduction of our military 

 establishments is inevitable, in the ensuing session of parliament, it is 

 desirable to examine and elucidate the comparative expense, utility, and 

 necessity, of the many warlike dependencies of this country, in various 

 quarters of the globe. 



With this view, we propose to bring under the impartial consideration 

 of our readers, the present immense expense of maintaining that glo- 

 rious, but most unprofitable dependency of the crown of England, the 

 fortress of Gibraltar ; intending to prove, that the abandonment of this 

 celebrated rock, is now the more profitable policy of this country. 



Gibraltar was originally taken from the Spaniards in the reign of 

 Queen Anne, by Sir George Rooke ; and at the period of its thus de- 

 volving to the crown of England, so little importance was attached to 

 its possession, that the parliament of the day refused its thanks to the 

 commander and troops who had been engaged in the very dangerous 

 service of seizing the fortifications. Public opinion has, however, been 

 long reversed, with regard to the utility and value of this conquest; and 

 for many years we have been accustomed, without reflection, to consider 

 Gibraltar as the key of the Mediterranean, and the modern Herculean 

 pillar, upon which is inscribed the ne plus ultra of our military power. 

 Still, to a mind accustomed to look beyond the outside of mere prover- 

 bial expressions, it is not to be comprehended in what light Gibraltar 

 can form the key of the Mediterranean ; for the Straits of Gibraltar, in 

 the narrowest part, are seventeen miles wide ; the opposite fortress of 

 Ceuta is not subject to our power ; and it is absurd to suppose, that 

 the guns of the fortifications can reach a vessel in mid-channel, or effec- 

 tually obstruct the navigation. Shipping, too, may pass the position in 

 the night ; and it is quite apparent that the key of the Mediterranean 

 is an unmeaning expression, as applied to Gibraltar, since no fortification 

 can command a strait seventeen miles wide, and the ships of war which 

 we additionally keep there, form the real keys of this lock of the Medi- 

 terranean. If the Straits of Gibraltar, like the Sound of Elsineur, were 

 not more than a mile and a half wide, then the key of the Mediterranean 

 would appear a term of greater probability; but, in the actual width of 

 the channel, it would not be less preposterous to affirm, that the guns of 

 Dover Castle command the Straits of Calais. 



It is the immense and wasteful expense of holding this barren and 

 unproductive possession, that renders Gibraltar worthy to be first 

 selected for reduction in the present depressed condition of the country 

 at home. Unlike our other colonial dependencies, Gibraltar possesses 

 neither revenue, trade, nor agricultural productions. Cut off from the 

 territories of Spain, even its provisions are conveyed, at an immense 

 expense, from England. It is an isolated and solitary prison for our 

 troops, where native employment never varies for years the gloomy 

 monotony of confinement ; and, for the false, empty, and unsubstantial 



