"To the Queen's Most Excellent Majesty, the humble Address of the undersigned Merchants, Manufacturers, Bankers, Ship-owners and others, of the City of Glasgow.

"We, Your Majesty's Loyal Subjects, approach Your Majesty with feelings of the deepest respect, and with sentiments of unfeigned homage and attachment to Your Majesty's Royal Person and august Family, being firmly persuaded that whatever affects the glory of that mighty Empire, over which Providence has called you to rule, or the interests of Your People, with which that glory is inseparably united, will instantly recommend itself to Your Majesty's gracious attention.

"We humbly, yet earnestly beseech Your Majesty, therefore, to consider the present depressed condition of the Commercial and Manufacturing interests of Great Britain and Ireland, coincident as that depression is with the alarming progressive diminution of our Foreign Trade-the increasing deficiency in the Public Revenue-the exclusion of our Commerce from Countries which have been open from time immemorial to British industry-the unredressed injuries inflicted by Foreign States on our Commerce-by infraction of treaties-by restrictions on our trade, and insults which they have been permitted to offer with impunity, to the National Flag.

"Feeling that, as Sovereign of this Empire, Your Majesty has the first and deepest interest in the public welfare and the national honour, we are assured that Your Majesty will deem these subjects of unspeakable importance, and will condescend to listen to the prayer of Your Subjects, that an immediate inquiry should be instituted into the causes of that rapid declension of prosperity, which we have thus brought under Your Majesty's notice.

"We would respectfully advert to the loss of external respect, which has followed from the system of Diplomacy which has been pursued for a series of years.

"The consequences of that Diplomacy have been to leave us defenceless in every quarter of the World; to compromise the existence of Turkey, as an independent Sovereign Power,

and thereby to destroy the natural barrier to encroachments on the East of Europe-to abandon Circassia, the bulwark of our Indian possessions, to the conquest of Russia-to reduce Persia to the condition of a Russian dependency-to exclude the British Merchant entirely from the coasts of the Black Sea, where a most lucrative trade could be carried on-to enable the Dutch Government to evade the obligations of a treaty (1824), and to impose illegal duties on our exports to Java, whereby many of us have been deeply injured—to tolerate the establishment, in Africa, of a French Colony, an enterprise contrary to a specific treaty-to exclude our Manufactures from the European markets, by a high scale of duties, contrary to existing treaties-to tolerate encroachments on our Fishing Grounds at Newfoundland, and even on the British Coast-to permit the destruction of the ancient nationality of Poland, and the independence of Cracow-to annihilate the British claims on Greece: We pass over the difficulties in which this Country is involved as regards our relations with Spain and Portugal, with the United States of America, with the Empire of Brazil, and the Government of Mexico.

"In bringing these subjects before Your Majesty, we entertain a confident assurance, founded as much on the high character of Your Majesty as on the example of your Royal predecessors, that you will use your power and influence to cause foreign nations to respect those treaties which they have contracted with Great Britain; and that it will be a gratification to Your Majesty to extend Your protection to the Merchants and Ship-owners of your native Country.

"If the power of Britain has declined in the eyes of other nations, and we grieve to add that such is our impression, it can only be attributable to the supineness and ignorance of those whose duty it has been to watch over our external connections.

"We, therefore, under the solemn conviction of our present alarming position, humbly implore Your Majesty to demand and obtain redress for the injuries and insults offered to our Flag; to maintain the rights of British Commerce against any Power which may presume to infringe thereon; and to uphold the national character, by a display of that

vigour and energy which should always distinguish the Councils of this great Nation.

"We have only to express our hope, that Your Majesty will not pass our prayer unheeded, or permit our wrongs to remain unredressed; and, with the most profound feelings of respect and devotion to Your Majesty's Crown and Person, "Glasgow, June 1838." "We shall ever pray."

Such an address, probing the very core of the evil, is worthy of the enlightened citizens of so great a town; it is worthy no less of the clear, strong sense and active practical character always justly attributed to our Scottish brethren. But there is one thing for which it is still more to be admired, and which renders it one of the most important documents of our times, one of the most satisfactory evidences of our progress towards a saner social and political state: it has proved that national interests are not yet lost in sectional and party squabbles, and that both tory, whig and radical can unite in one firm bond, when the honour, name and prosperity of England are compromised by the incompetence or treachery of her rulers. To this address are attached the names of four hundred and fifty-nine firms and individuals, distinguished alike by their practical strong sense, the greatness of their stake in the country, and the party feelings which they have thus abandoned for a national object.

The remarkable movement which has now commenced in the commercial community, and the threatening aspect of our foreign policy and external trade, lead us to remark the extraordinary circumstance of the indifference of the metropolis to questions of such magnitude, and to considerations which have so deeply affected the community of an outport in the north of the island.

The explanation of this phænomenon, and of the general decline of the prosperity of the metropolis, as compared with the outports, is to be found in the absence of all union and of all concert in the mercantile community of London. Our readers, not commercial, are probably ignorant of the fact, and will be astounded to learn it, that in London there is no Chamber of Commerce! It is evident that, without some such municipal or conventional organization, though there

may be tens of thousands of wealthy merchants, a community of merchants cannot be said to exist.

We rejoice to learn that the institution of some such body is now in contemplation; and, looking at the utter worthlessness of the executive Government, the whole community, scarcely less than that portion of it which is engaged in traffic, is interested in the creation of a power, distinct from party, and of a representation of those interests through which we have a national existence, and through the actual degradation of which our national existence is threatened.

END OF NUMBER XIII.

PRINTED BY RICHARD AND JOHN E. TAYLOR,

RED LION COURT, FLEET STREET,

THE

BRITISH AND FOREIGN

REVIEW.

ARTICLE I.

Obozvenie Rossiyskich Vladenii za Kawkazom, v staticheskom, etnagraficheskom, topograficheskom i finansowom otnoszeniach. Proizvedennoye i izdannoye po vysochayshemu soizvoleniu. St. Petersburg, 1836.

A Survey of the Russian Possessions beyond the Caucasus, in statistical, ethnographical, topographical, and financial respects. Composed and published by supreme authority. St. Petersburg, 1836. 4 vols.

THE immense progress which the power of Russia has made during the last fifty years has already attracted the attention of all Europe, and its probable consequences have been canvassed over and over again by many writers in this country, as well as on the continent. Yet we may say, without exaggeration, that the field on which Russia is advancing towards the completion of her gigantic schemes is but little known, although it has been described by travellers of different times and nations. The most important part of the above-mentioned field is certainly the Caucasian Isthmus, i. e. the tract of land comprehended between the Caspian and the Black Seas, the complete possession of which ensures to Russia a paramount influence over the affairs of Turkey and Persia; whilst the undisputed command she exercises over the Caspian establishes her ascendency over the adjacent regions of Central Asia.

The Caucasian Isthmus has been explored by several tra