a desire of adhering to principles of remuneration, so far as they can be applied to the army, some regard must also be paid to other parts of the community, and to those especially, who, from the necessary increase of our force, are obliged to supply the vast expence with diminished means. And it must never be forgotten, that every man taken from labour and civil employment is a double privation to the country, inasmuch as his maintenance must be drawn out of that general stock, from the supply of which, at the same time, his exertions are withheld. It is, however, a consolatory reflection, to know that the great increase of national wealth has amply tended to alleviate the evil here complained of; and, taking them collectively, the officers in our army are certainly better able now to sustain the expence attending it, than at any former period of our history." We are surprized to hear the assertion that officers are better able now, than at any former period of our history, to sus tain the expence attending military employ. It is dangerous to the public service that officers should principally be drawn from the richer classes of society, because it seldom happens that the young rich are exposed to those hardy exercises and severe privations, which form the best preparation for military life. The pay, therefore, ought always to secure a sufficient competition from among the secondary classes of the community. The French army, which is the best in Europe, has certainly not drawn the mass of its officers from the polished, but often enervated, families of exalted life. The Roman discipline declined in proportion as it grew genteel to hold a commission. The barbarians triumphed by conferring on the sturdy qualities of strength and daring these commanding situations, which culture aspires to reserve for college-tacticians. It is well to read Xenophon and Polybius, but it is possible to be a general without being a Hutchinson. ART. LXXV. Remarks on Sir R. Wilson's Enquiry, &c. By a BRITISH YEOMAN Svo. pp. 39. SIR Robert Wilson's Enquiry is too important for the merry tone in which it is here treated. It may be rational to say: Confide in your navy; the French cannot effect anywhere] a landing in sufficient force to be formidable: but it cannot be rational to say, Confide in your volunteers, as at present disciplined and officered; they will beat an equal force of Frenchmen. This Yorkshire gentleman assures us, from personal observation, that the volunteer system does not injure the recruiting service. To his personal observation we can only oppose our own: it respects a neighbourhood where allowances are made to the privates for coming to muster. These weekly pensions, and the gratuitous uniforms, evidently satisfy the boyish ambition of shop-lads and journeymen, who would else have been parading in the regulars. As we teach whist to prevent gambling among our children and dependents, so we encourage volunteering to prevent enlisting. The best method of facilitating the recruiting service, is to shorten all contracts of apprenticeship, and to confer on four or five years of servitude the municipal privileges of seven. This writer complains of the number of male shopkeepers: they might no doubt be compelled to take out a costly licences but we doubt if any sensible effect would be produced by the measure, these many shopkeepers being all necessary during. the busy hours. This Yorkshire yeoman is very indig nant at the critique of sir Robert Wilson on the battle of Zama; a critique naturally convincing, and corroborated by the highest classical authorities. What is more probable than that artisans should have been hastily drilled, when Carthage was in danger; and that artisans, hastily and sparingly drilled, should be the least efficient part of the public force? Will the Yorkshire weavers, when compelled to take up" shafts for shuttles dipt in gore," shew themselves superior to the regular regiments of Highlanders? Surely the expectation would be preposterous. The chief use of the volunteer system is to familiarize playing with gunpow der, and to render tolerable to the numerous classes a labour which gentlemen have eagerly incurred, whenever the hour shall arrive for unaffected alarm, and for the compulsory imposition of an omnipresent military despotism. ART. LXXVI. The Justice and Policy of a War with Spain demonstrated. 8vo. pp. 46. "The ship Mary, from London to Legborn, with a cargo amounting to 30,000l. sailed in May 1802, and having encountered very tremendous weather, which rendered her so leaky as to make repairs necessary, entered the port of Ferrol; when she had remined there a few days, the master wished to clear out, but he was prevented, and afterwards the ship and cargo were confiscated; the reason for which proceeding was stated to be, that the treaty of Amiens had rendered all prior treaties with England of no force. The privateers which France sends out to commit depredations on our commerce, are, it is true, commissioned and armed in her own barbours; but no sooner are a few men got on board, than they usually il to a Spanish port, where they complete their crews, and proceed to sea. Besides, these ships are allowed to have shelter in the ports, and often capture our vessels within the limits of Spain, and sometimes even in her very harbours; while, in all cases, the prizes they take are sure of condemnation and sale in her maritime towns; and even her prisons have been made receptacles for British sailors." After this the author passes on to consider the policy of the war. Is the honour of the British nation thus to be dragged through the mire by holding out such flimsy pretences as our most valid grounds of war? It ought in the It ought in the next place to be proved, that these maritime injuries, having been notified and remonstrated against by our ambassador at Madrid, were neither redressed nor desisted from. They hence constitute only a ground of diplomatic correspon dence. At the end of the pamphlet occurs another argument for the seizure and detention of the Spanish frigates, which we will also extract. "The detention of the Spanish ships stands justified on the principles laid down by Buddaus, which are inserted by Barbeyrac, in his note on the 13th sect. of the sixth chapter of the eighth book of Pufendorff. The claim, says that eminent civilian, on account of which recourse is had to reprisals, ought to be very clear, and the matter in dispute of great consequence: for it would be no less imprudent than unjust to charge a foreign magistrate with connivance, or a malicious refusal to do justice in an affair that is obscure, dubions, or of no importance, or without having decisive proofs of the bad faith of the sovereign to whom application has been inade, or before every me thod has been used to obtain justize by gentle means, as for instance, by having fair compensation made. "The moment the peace was signed, the royal treasury of Madrid became a debtor to the merchants of this country; from that time to the present hour government has been using the gentle means above recom mended: as to what the effect has been, let British creditors answer. In these circumstances, what was the line of conduct to be pursued by Great Britain? When a griev ance is complained of, which admits neither of excuse nor palliation, is negotiation to last for ever? Have we not gone lengths in forbearance which the weakness of the other party can alone justify?" The policy of a war with Spain depends at present on its justice; because our main object being to restrict the encroachments of French ambition, by means of a confederation of the still independent European states, the prospect of such co-operation, whether military or diplomatic, (the latter would apparently suffice) must depend on conciliating the good-will of such states, through the public opinion of their politicians, and by the most pointed attention to. their common interests. Every thing, therefore, which infringes on our cosmepolitical duty is really impatriotic. We are invoking aid on grounds of international obligation, by which it is not less important that we, than that the French should be compelled to abide. Independently of what may be called the moral impolicy of a war with Spain, it has gross and obvious geographical impolicy. The French by the seizure of Hanover rendered it probable that Westphalia would become the seat of war. The deliverance of Holland is our own main interest in the contest, because the northern aggrandisement of France is alone dangerous to us. Both parties therefore tend to concentrate their antagonism in that arena. Now the necessity of attacking or defending Spain or Portugal, is to us a far more remote and inconve nient diversion than to the French. It is a difficulty created in our own wrong. We shall have to send troops to Lisbon, when we ought to send them to Bremen. ART. LXXVII. A brief Appeal to the Honour and Conscience of the Nation upon the Ncessity of an immediate Restitution of the Spanish Plate-Ship. By the Author of Curser Remarks. 8vo. pp. 39. THIS striking appeal is worthy of the author of Why do we go to War? It is claimed by the author of Cursory Remarks: it recalls certain paragraphs in the Morning Chronicle, which the public are taught to ascribe to Mr. Metheun. Whoever the author may be, he possesses a high-toned purity of moral sentiment, a pathetic vehemence of expression, a force of argument, and a sincerity of manner, formed in the principled school of the Demostheneses and Foxes, not in the sophistical academies of the Ciceros and Burkes. We shall take no extracts from a work, which ought not only to be read entire, but to be purchased for preservation; yet, notwithstanding our deference of admiration for the author, we shall make some critical remarks on the points in discus sion. We admit entirely that to have detached so small a naval force as rendered any resistance of the part of the Spanish commander essential to the honour of his flag, was a high crime against humanity; which marks the ministry as guided by inconsiderate, improvident, ignorant men, who are not aware of the probable consequences of their actions. But the act of detention is not without apology, although the manner is. During the antijacobin war, the Spanish court sequestered all the British debts in that country, and received their amount into the public treasury from the Spanish merchants. At the peace it was agreed that this sequestered property should not be confiscated, but restored to the rightful owner, the British creditor. The process of defining and ascertaining the British claims has been gone through; but whenever the Spanish treasury has been in cash, and desirous of issuing these payments, Bonaparte has found means to levy his tribute in preference, and the British creditor has repeatedly been put off. Procrastination, when the date of payment has been agreed, is understood, throughout the mercantile world, to be symptomatic of insolvency; and to justify the attachment, as lawyers call it, of the debtor's property, in whatever bands it can be met with. Analogous to the process of attach ment in private life, is the process of re prisal here recurred to: and, however confidently this appealer appeals to i importable library of the law of nation we are decidedly of opinion that it is a recognized process; and that the seize.e of the plate-ships was an orderly pursu redress. Martens, the Gottingen professor, pu' lished his Précis du Droit des Gens, whi he was a subject of our own king During the conferences of Rastadt, . writings were appealed to as an auti rity, both by the French and the German negotiators. He unites therefore in an unusual degree the general sur frage of diplomatic men. A few ex tracts will satisfy our readers, that he admits the right of self-compensation, when regular satisfaction is withheld. "255. Représailes. Mais lorsqu'une nation a manqué à ses obligations par faites en blessant nos droits primitifs, ou ceux que nous avons acquis par occupa tion, ou par des conventions expresses, on to cites, le droit des gens nous autorise à l forcer de nous donner la satisfaction qui nous est due, et à cette fin nous perme de manquer de notre côté à des obliga tions d'ailleurs parfaites, en usant de re présailles* soit par le refus de satisfaire à ce qui lui est dû de notre part, sou pañ des violences. "257. Des griefs qui autorisent représailles. Chaque état étant autorist à protéger ses sujets contre les lésion des étrangers, et d'un autre côté toute état étant résponsable s'il manque à sca obligation d'administrer aux étranger une justice aussi prompte et aussi impat tiale qu'a ses propres sujets, ce ne sont pas les lésions seules qui ont immédiate ment et primitivement lieu de nation nation, mais celles même qui ont t commises par les sujets de l'autre, qui peuvent autoriser à des représailles lorsqu'il conste que la satisfaction de mandée à l'état a été ou refusée, au trai née en longueur d'une manière indue. "§ 259. Le genre le plus nsité det représailles c'est la saisie de personnes, a de biens, recontrés, soit dans notre tert toire, ou en pleine mer, soit dans la terri toire de la puissance contre laquelle un use de ce moyen. Lyuker de jure represaliarum. If the newest authorities acknowledged living hostile diplomatists do not safy the appealer, he may look backrder. The opinion of Vattel, that risal may not be decreed in favour of hird power, implies the right in one's case. Barbeyrac, in his notes on nkershock (c. xxii. s. 5.) Puffendorf .v. c. xi. s. 5.) and Grotius (lib. iii. plainly support this right of reten, and self-indemnification. It is the me to be confided in, as it is confirmed the spirit of the civil law. Now the of nations, fundamentally and in its gin, was a string of inferences from analogy of the civil or Roman law: ich was formerly accepted throughEurope. The modern variations of law of nations have chiefly resulted the application of local, domestic principles of legislation to international policy. If the plan of reasoning here advanced be acceded to, it will follow, that the captors of the Spanish plate-ships have no right to an atom of their prize; but are to be rewarded on the same principle as police-officers who execute an attachment. It will follow, that the merchants, who have made good their claims upon the Spanish government, have a right to, bring actions in the court of Admiralty (or whatever other jurisdiction undertakes the guardianship of this trust-money) for their proportionate shares of the deposit. It will follow, that the governmental property of Spain must at once, and without deduction, be distributed, as far as it will go, among such claimant merchants. And it will follow, that the private property of Spanish individuals, found on board these plateships, may legitimately be sequestered by the British government, subject to an eventual distribution, analogous to what the Spanish government may hereafter make of the private British property sequestered in Spain. This bestowal will in our opinion be no less honourable to British justice, and be less disgraceful to the executive power, than the restitution proposed with an eloquence so generous by the author of the appeal. 7. LXXVIII. Reflections on the Commerce of the Mediterranean. By JOHN JACKSON, Esq. F. S. A. 8vo. pp. 220. THIS book deserves praise; but adnot of analysis. It is a collection facts of detail, concerning the comercial and statistical condition of the editerranean sea-ports, especially the sore southern and barbarous. It will read with advantage by the manufacrer, the merchant, and the statist. As specimen of the rational and specific pirit of remark which pervades these intractive pages, the following section may suffice: avoid all these misfortunes and expences, it will be necessary to raise the cargo with that sort of dunnage that will not give way. It may be taken for a general rule amongst all sorts of shipping, the higher the centre of gravity is raised, the ship will be easier in all her motions at sea. On the economy of loading a ship with heavy goods for a foreign voyage. "In shipping brimstone, barilla, and all her heavy cargoes, there is one very material point which should be always carefully attended to; that is, the manner of stowing the ship's cargo, which is sometimes shamefully neglected. The ship is then very uneasy at sea, when the wear and tear in the sis, and in her standing and running rigping, are almost incredible, and very often endanger the ship and all her crew. To "This great and general principle, in which all shipping are very materially interested, is not so universally understood nor practised as it ought to be. The most material part will be to point out the most advantageous method of stowing so large a proportion of a ship's hold as may be necessary for the dunnage of these heavy cargoes. The present custom is to cut a large quantity of brushwood and faggots, and spread them in the ship's hold, which soon fills up a large space: the brimstone is then laid upon it, and as the weight increases, it is pressed down the more, till it sinks lower than could be at first imagined. When the cargo is on board, it is too late to be altered, and the ship will be very uneasy at sea: and it is not an uncommon thing for a ship to return into port to take out a great deal of her cargo, be fore she can proceed upon her voyage. There are many instances where the ship's dunnage for a cargo of barilla or brimstone has not been properly attended to, that after loading upon the coast, the ship has been so very burthensome to herself, that they have even found the greatest difficulty to get into port. By this sort of dunnage the most experienced anasters of ships are often deceived, besides, by the ship's returning into port to take out part of her cargo, they lose a great deal of freight, and are put to an immense expence, which might all have been avoided, had the cargo been properly stowed, and the ship might have carried it with the greatest ease. Palermo, Messina, and all the principal ports, there are generally plenty of good oak pipestaves to be purchased very reasonably; they will always allow a handsome freight to the ships, and are always in demand in England: dunnage of this kind cannot shrink much, and it will always keep the ship's hold clean. By dunnaging the ship with brushwood, the leaves soon decay through the dampness of the ship, and rot the ship's ceiling; and the small particles of barilla or brimstone, falling down amongst it, are generally lost; the barilla is lost inevitably. In Should there be any want of oak staves, which is not very probable, there is always plenty of wood, which at first costs but very little, and is of some use in this country. Cork-wood is always in great abundance, and would be very useful amongst our turnors and block-makers. "In shipping cargoes of brimstone, barilla, and other articles upon the coast, there should always be a person on the part of the ship, to attend the scales, &c. who is well acquainted with the language, which, if properly attended to, including loss and waste, the ship will deliver in England-one ton for every 13 Sicilian cantar. The exports from Sicily, exclusive of the articles already mentioned, are silk, wine, brandy, tarter, raisins, figs, currants, sweet almonds, bitter almonds, small nuts, pistacheos, lemons, oranges, lemon juice, essence of lemon, essence of bergamot, marble, salt, soap, manna, cantharides, shumac, liquorice paste, linseed, linseed oil, olive oil, locusts, rags, goat and kid skins, rabbit skins, rabbit wool, anchovies, tunny fish, wheat, barley, beans, kidney-beans, callavances, argols, &c. &c. "Imports into Sicily-Baccaleo, tanned bullocks' hides, tanned calf skins, tin in sheets and bars, bar iron, plate iron, lead in pigs and sheets, pepper, pimento, spices sorts, sugars of all sorts, indigo, coch herrings, dye woods of all sorts, pile Manchester goods, hardware, earthen copper, coffee, cocoa, pitch and tar, silk cotton hose, rum, alum, copperas, i linens. "The imports into the island of Sie very considerable; they have very few n factories of their own, and they must, in sequence, import very largely, partic wearing apparel, and the consumption some articles is very great; there is one great advantage to the merchant, bes to get return cargoes for any numb shipping, and he may frequently bart: goods for his ship's return cargoes, to vantage." In addition to the articles here e merated, it would surely be possible obtain from Sicily citrate of lime. great use is now made in our cotton nufactures of the concrete citric a It is prepared by squeezing lem flinging lime or chalk into the expre juice, pouring off the mucilage, and taching, by means of the sulphuric a this lime or chalk from the citric a with which it has become united. waste which lemons incur from de during importation, and the injury w lemon-juice incurs from fermentation adulteration, render these articles expensive to our chemists: but if lime or chalk were to be saturated Sicily with the acid of lemon, and forwarded to our manufacturers, it co hardly suffer any damage. The s quent delicate process of separating chalk from the citric acid cannot we trusted to the coarse superintendance the foreign merchant. Whithersoever we wish to send g it is important thence to contrive art of importation: else our ships inc loss of back-freight; and the exch between the two countries tends to a which is continually opposing fresh stacles to our supplying that market longer. Exportation and import are equally profitable; and the tea they approach equality, the strong their tendency to progressive increase ART. LXXIX. A concise Statement of the Question regarding the Abolition of the Su Trade. 8vo. pp. 103. THIS pamphlet deserves perusal; for it condenses in an instructive and convincing form the facts and arguments long since scattered over the whole surface of British society by the friends to the abolition of the sl trade; and it collects from scarce a foreign sources many additional parti lars. The following summary of the arg |