112 



Selections. 



[NO. 3, NEW SERIES, 



ports in the year 1840, the then value of cotton was 63,000,000 

 dollars: being £12,600,000 Sterling. 



Tobacco, 9 to 10,000,000 dollars ; being £2,000,000 Sterling. 



Hice under 3,000,000 dollars ;* being £400,000 Sterling. 



Of above 2,000,000 bales of American Cotton exported in 1842-3, 

 Britain took nearly 1,500,000 bales ; France below 350,000 bales ; 

 other foreign countries less than 200,000 bales. Of the growth of 

 that year, which was 2,378,000 bales, the American manufacturers 

 consumed 325,000 bales, or nearly as much as was exported to 

 France. Of Tobacco,f Great Britain and the Colonies took one- 

 third in quantity, but nearly one-half in value, in the year 1835 ; 

 so that England may be said to employ three-fourths of the 

 American slaves engaged in planting Cotton and half to a third 

 of those who cultivate Tobacco for export. It becomes therefore, 

 a national obligation on our part, to study every means by which 

 those products may be obtained by fairly paid labour. 



Our supposed dependance on the " Great Staple" of America is 

 thus expressed in the Times, (30th Oct., 1845,) in an article from 

 the Washington Union — of which the following is an extract " The 

 " English experiment in the East has signally failed. It was made 

 " under the most favourable auspices in different parts of India. 

 " It has succeeded in none of them. It was made under the eye 

 " of ten experienced planters from the cotton regions of the United 

 " States with the best American cotton-seed ; b-ut it has failed ! 

 " Nature forbids any serious competition between the cotton of the 

 " East Indies and that of the United States. The Southern portion 

 " of our country stands unrivalled in the production of a staple 

 " which constitutes the basis of the most important manufacture 

 " both in Great Britain and on the continent. Britain would have 

 " attempted to make herself independent of the United States, 

 " throwing her own manufactures into Texas, upon terms that 



* "Exports of United States, produce for 1840"— American Almanac for 1842, 

 page 118-9. 



t Made up from Table of Tobacco Exports, in American Almanac 1838, page 

 125. 



