COCHINCHINA. 337 
and more varied productions, may be excused when she af- 
fects to despise foreign commerce, and to speak with contempt 
of the nation who depends solely on its support. The 
miseries, the misfortunes, and the devastations, how^ever oc- 
casioned in such a countr}^ may certainly be repaired without 
the aid of foreign commerce. But this is not the case with 
regard to England. We need only cast a glance at the 
articles with which the numerous large and well-stocked shops 
and warehouses in the capital are stored, at the multitudes of 
shipping which frequent our ports, to make it obvious that the 
national industry is more employed, and consequently more 
productive, in manufacturing the raw material of foreign growth 
than in raising such as are congenial with our own climate and 
soil. From Tyburn turnpike or from Hyde Park Corner to 
Whitechapel almost every house is a shop or a -warehouse, 
and two thirds at least of these shops and warehouses are 
stored with articles of foreign growth. Any check, therefore, 
to our commercial prosperity, and to that preponderancy 
which we now enjoy in foreign trade, could not fail to 
be attended with the most injurious consequences to the 
country at large. In fact, having advanced perhaps a little 
too far in this career to retreat with safety, every exertion 
must now be made to hold our own, to give protection and 
permanent security to that commerce which has hitherto en- 
abled us to measure our strength with an enemy as implacable 
as he is powerful. It may be necessary even that the paws of 
the British Lion should 3^et be extended — that they should 
grasp every point which may add to the security of what British 
valour and the industrious and adventurous spirit of the 
X x 
