Statistics of Van Diemen’s Land. 
447 
such a manufacture is abandoned the better. Nor is any entitled 
to complain of the rigid application of this rule, or justified in 
calling for public support except upon the conditions specified; 
for if, on the one hand, the low rate of interest, the immense 
accumulation of capital, the low price of labour, and the perfection 
of machinery, secure such advantages to the English manufac¬ 
turer as apparently to defy competition,—and successfully so, of 
course, in very many British staples; on the other hand, they are 
counterbalanced by heavy shipping and other expenses, together 
with frequently the previous cost of import of the raw material, 
from which the colonial manufacturer is exempted. The interest 
of the consumer must be paramount to every other consideration ; 
and his only shield against excessive prices is the keenness of 
competition. Every extra shilling taken from the purchaser of 
an article is so much misspent; he has so much less to circulate 
in other ways, and it becomes a general loss. 
While it is the interest of the producer to narrow competition, 
it i3 the interest of the consumer to enlarge it; and the advantage 
of consumers is clearly the advantage of the country at large : for 
every man is a consumer, even the producers themselves, who, 
though they may be desirous of preventing competition in their 
several walks, must yet wish for it in all other species of com¬ 
merce. It is by free and open competition alone that extravagant 
prices and exorbitant profits are restrained, and that the public 
are supplied with commodities as cheap as the producer can 
afford to sell them. 
The reciprocal interests of all are best consulted by rigid 
attention to this rule. Independently of the value of our trade to 
the mother country,—which is only a fair exchange for the faci¬ 
lities afforded to us for our exports,—our commercial interests 
benefit by the imports, which, under the restrictions suggested, 
are an essential function to the progress of a community, besides 
adding largely to the sum of its comforts. Occupation is thus 
afforded for a colonial marine; and numerous incidental sources 
of employment spring out of the various branches of trade 
concerned. 
2 E 
VOL. in. NO. VI. 
