392 VEGETABJ,E SUBSTANCES. 



This cheapness was a natural and healthy state of 

 things, which would be sure to provoke the meddling 

 propensities of that class of rulers who can never 

 believe that the interests of trade can take care of 

 themselves. Immediately after the peace, sugar 

 from the French, English, and American colonies 

 was permitted to enter France at the same rate of 

 duty. In a few months, however, it was found that 

 the sugars from the English colonies were driving 

 the sugars of Martinique, Guadaloupe, and Bourbon 

 out of the market. The Colonies must be protected; 

 so a protecting duty of twenty francs the 100 kilo- 

 grammes* was imposed upon all sugars of foreign 

 origin. In 1816 the duty on foreign raw sugar was 

 increased to forty-five francs; in 1820 to seventy- five 

 francs, and in 1822 to ninety-five francs, the 100 kilo- 

 grammes. The law of 1816 was the first bounty to 

 the beet-root sugar manufacturers, and they accord- 

 ingly once more began to be active. But when the 

 duty of 1822 upon foreign sugar amounted to a pro- 

 hibition, their prosperity was certain. They were 

 enabled to tax the consumer to the amount of the 

 prohibition. The beet-root sugar pays no duty what- 

 ever. In 1829 there were 101 manufactories of this 

 sugar in employment, which produced five million kilo- 

 grammes in the year, or about one-sixteenth part of 

 the whole consumption of sugar in France. That 

 the people of France are the sufferers by this miser- 

 able policy is sufficiently evident, from the fact that 

 their average yearly consumption does not exceed four 

 pounds of sugar per head: in the United Kingdom it 

 is twenty pounds per head. 



Upon the national advantage of that commercial 

 policy which has given rise to the manufacture of 

 beet-root sugar in France, and which may probably 



* A kilogramme is equivalent to 21bs, 2 oz. 4 dr. 16 gr. 

 English avoirdupois. 



