EMERSON TENNENT ' S BELGIUM.

Ma. TENNENT'S work is a proof of the utility of some definite object to a traveller. Although passing through a country which of late years has been constantly described by tourists, besides guide-books, he has imparted matter, solidity, and variety to his Belgium, by the force of having a pursuit, which impelled attention to reality and constantly took him amongst men and affairs. This not only gave an earnestness and activity to his immediate in- quiries, but infused a similar spirit into his mere sight-seeing :

just as we see stirring men of business continue stirring even in their recreations, and carry their faculty of " looking sharp " into places of amusement. Had Mr. TENNENT gone to Belgium merely as a tourist, he would most probably have gone direct to lords, and they would have taken him to balls or courts.

The object of Mr. TENNENT'S Continental tour was to inquire into the actual state of the manufactures of Belgium' especially of the cotton-trade, which certain witnesses before the Committee on the Copyright of Designs had declared to be in a very flourish- ing condition and able to compete with England. Every thing connected with manufacturing industry, from the growth of flax to the making of machinery, was therefore a specific matter of inves- tigation to Mr. TENNENT. But these things did not wholly engross his attention. Gifted with a taste in art, and acquainted with the history of the Low Countries, he examined the public and private buildings which the burgesses of Flanders have left behind them as standing evidences of their wealth and taste, and felt an interest beyond their architectural merits, in recalling the characteristics of the age which produced them, or the events with which they were connected. The collections of art formed by the wealthy Flemings of a later day also attracted his attention, as well as the appear- ances of nature, the change which agriculture imparts to a country, and the character of the agriculture itself, together with those so- cial characteristics which a person like Mr. TENNENT, travelling with public objects, was well situated to observe.

He also has many political remarks, on the Belgian Revolution,

the separation from Holland, the" partie prete," and other mat- ters, that add no particular attraction to the volume; partly be- cause they seem out of place, partly because the remarks are baseless or exaggerated, but chiefly because they are evidently written in compliance with a party theory. In his dedication to Lord STANLEY, and throughout the volume, Mr. TENNENT asserts, though by a forced analogy, that the Belgiap patriots resemble the Irish Repealers ; and his aim, obvious and therefore useless, is to hold up the Belgians as an example to the Irish. In the pursuit of an independent status' they have sacrificed, says Mr. TENNENT, the markets of Holland and of all her colonies, and are reduced to great manufacturing distress; the Catholic priests, who united with the Ultra-Liberals to accomplish the Revolution, no sooner attained their end than they threw over their allies, and now rule them with a rod of iron ; whilst the much-coveted inde- pendence has cost very dear in the shape of taxes, has dissatisfied everybody, and gives small promise of being permanent. This is possible enough ; nor is it so much to the view that we object, as to the tone of the view. For example, the manufac- turers of Belgium are said to be in distress, and very probably are, and much of this distress may have arisen from Os sepa- ration. But the population of Holland is considerably less than that of Belgium, and, with the markets of her few barbarous and backward colonies, could not cause a greater demand than Belgium possesses in herself: yet Mr. TENNENT says, the "simile of a tub for a whale is no actval exaggeration to represent the incompatibi- lity of his Leviathan establishments [Mr. COCKERELL'S manufac- tories] to the puny resources of the new and independent king- dom, within which they were suddenly walled up by the Revolution of 1830. The gross of green spectacles which Moses brought home from the fair were not more utterly disproportionate to the wants of the family of the Vicar of Wakefield." Truth itself has at first a hard struggle with interest and prejudice but rheto- rical exaggeration injures the cause it would advance; for its oppo- nents are hardened in unbelief, and the indifferent, detecting the partial untruth, argue thence the falsehood of the whole. In a critical point of view, the merit of Belgium is considerable. Mr. TENNENT writes like a literary gentleman: clear, rapid, and off-hand, his style is rather the result of good teaching than of self- training, and is more distinctive of a class than of the individual. Without being profound, or distinguished for any great degree of acumen, his opinions are decided, and decidedly expressed upon all matters great and small, as if his judgment came by intuition. We note this fact not as a fault in Mr. TENNENT, for his former publi- cations show him to possess literary ability, and his remarks be- speak taste and reflection ; but in despite of all this, his knowledge smacks of the royal road.

The qualifications we speak of shine most in description, or dilettante criticism, remarks on society, and what the French call rapports :

(" We've not so good a word, but have the thing,

In that complete perfection which insures"

the getting-up of speeches upon matters of which the orator knows little, having facts found him and opinions suggested.) And it is chiefly of such things that Belgium consists. Take as an example the description of Bruges; ; a town which thousands pass through weekly in the season, but amongst all the descriptions we have read none approach to Mr. TENNENT'S picture.

BRUGES.

The air and general appearance of Bruges, on entering it by the railroad, which passes direct into the centre of the town, cannot fail to arrest the inte- rest and attention of a stranger. It is unlike any place that one has been ac- customed to before, and is certainly the most perfect specimen of a town of the middle ages on this side the Rhine. Its houses have not been rebuilt in mo- dern times ; and with their ample fronts, vast arched entrances and sculptured ornaments, and fantastic gables, are all in keeping with our stately impressions of its feudal counts and affluent but turbulent burghers.

Instead of the narrow dingy passages which occur in cities of similar anti- quity and renown, there is an air peculiarly gay and imposing in the broad and cheerful streets of Bruges; its streets enlivened by long lines of lindens and Oriental plane-trees, and traversed by canals, not sluggish and stagnant, but flowing with an active current through the city. Upon these the wealthier

_ - mansions open to the rear ; a little ornamented " pleasance" separating them from the river, laid out in angular walks and ornamented with evergreens clipped en gueruille, and here and there a statue or an antique vase. The squares maintain the same character of dignity and gravity, overshadowed with ." old ancestral trees," and flanked by their municipal halls and towers—the monuments of a time when Bruges was the Tyre of 'Western Europe, and her Counts and citizens combined the enterprise and wealth of the merchant with the fiery bearing of the soldier. These edifices, too, exhibit in their style something of the sturdy pride of their founders ; presenting less of ornament and decoration than of domineering height and massive solidity, and striking the vieiter rather by their strength than their elegance. On the whole, Bruges reminded me strongly of Pisa, and some of the towns of Northern Italy, whose history and decline are singularly similar to its own. The air of its edifices and buildings is the same, and there is around it a similar appearance of de- sertion rather than decay ; though in Bruges the retirement and solitude which was till recently its characteristic, has been much invaded by the concourse of strangers whom the railroad brings hourly to visit it.

The following may also be quoted as a favourable specimen of characteristic description, thoroughly Flemish in its features.

VIEW FROM " LES HALLES," BRUGES.

The view from this tower is really surprising, owing to the vast level plain in which it stands, and which stretches to the horizon without an undulation npon every side : the view is only limited by the ability of the eye to embrace it ; and the sight is bewildered with the infinity of villages, towers, forests, canals, and rivers, which it presents ; taking in at one vast glance the German Ocean, the distant lines of Holland, the towers of Ghent, and to the South the remote frontier of France. Its views, like almost every thing else in the Ne- therlands, are peculiar to itself; and in the repose and richness of cultivated beauty have not a parallel in any country of Europe.

A FACT FROM THE LACE—TRADE.

The exquisitely fine thread which is made in Hainault and Brabant, for the purpose of being worked into lace, has occasionally attained a value almost in- credible. A thousand to fifteen hundred francs is no unusual price for it by the pound; but some has actually been spun by hand of so exquisite a texture as to be sold at the rate of ten thousand francs, or upwards of 400L, for a single pound weight. Schools have been established to teach both the netting of the lace and drawing of designs by which to work it ; and the trade at the present moment is stated to be in a more flourishing condition than it has been ever known before, even in the most palmy days of the Netherlands.

TABLE D'HÔTE AND REFLECTIONS THEREON.

We dined at an excellent table-d'hbte at the Hotel de Commerce ; the only inconvenience being the early hour, two o'clock : but this, and even earlier hours for dinner, we became not only reconciled to, but almost to prefer, before leaving Germany. To the prevalence of these tables-d'hôte in every town and village of the Continent, must no doubt be ascribed much of that social feeling and easy carriage which characterize the people of almost every country in Europe except our own. Being frequented by persons of all ranks, they lead to an assimilation of manners and of taste, which must be conducive to general refinement ; and by an interchange of opinions and a diffusion of intelligence during the two or three hours of daily intercourse, they must contribute to a diffusion of information and a better understandiog between all classes.

In England, with our present sectional ideas and well-defined grades, their introduction would be impossible; or if attempted, would only serve to make more distinct and compact the divisions into which society is parcelled out. Atte yet how desirable would it be that some successful expedient could be dis- ...covered to produce a more frequent intercourse between these numerous castes, and to soften down these Hindoo prejudices, which are an unquestionable source of insecurity and weakness in England. It is to this that in a great degree is to be ascribed the virulence of political jealousies and the intense hatred of political parties. So long as wealth is constituted the great standard which is to adjust conventional precedence, affluence and intelligence must form one exclusive race, of whose feelings, habits, objects, and desires, poverty and ignorance, as they can know nothing, may be easily persuaded to believe them hostile and destructive to their own ; and even mediocrity of rank, as it stands aloof from either, will continue to look with alarm and jealousy upon both.

Were it practicable by any salutary expedient to enable the humble and laborious to perceive for themselves that the enjoyments and habits of the rich are not necessarily antagonist to their own, it would at once paralyze the strength of the demagogue and the incendiary. Religious bigotry and political malignity, like sulphur and nitre, are explosive only when combined with the charcoal of ignorance.

Excepting the lace and the paper trades—the latter prospering by the piracy of French and English books—the most flourishing manufacture is that of machinery ; the history of which should be a beacon to the advocates of restriction. Great Britain, as is well known, prohibited, and still prohibits the exportation of machinery ; and many persons who professed free trade doctrines considered this as a wise exception. What has been the consequence ? English artisans, English capital, and English tools were exported, (for to have prohibited tools, as Mr. TENNENT seems to think should have been done, would have destroyed our iron and hard- ware trades at home, and stopped cultivation in our colonies,) and instead of diverting foreigners from manufactures, we have forced their attention to them, and thrown the business of supplying them with machinery into the hands of a rival. Hear Mr. TENNENT on the fact- " The refusal of Great Britain to concede the whole question, has at all times excited an intense feeling on the Continent; and the Belgians themselves are amongst the loudest in denouncing this 'jealous and narrow-minded policy of England '; forgetful that they themselves in 1814 adopted identically the same course, and prohibited under pain of fine and imprisonment the exit of their own machinery or artisans, such as they were. Even now, the value of that which England conceded is forgotten in the importance attached to that which she still withholds, and even the appearance ot mystery connected with the prohibition increases its importance in imagination and whets the appetite to obtain it. A whimsical illustration of their ideas upon the subject occurs in the work of M. Briavionne; who gravely asserts, that the manufacturers of Lancashire, impatient to participate in the cares of the Government upon this point, have submitted to a voluntary tax sufficient to organize a perpetual guard, which surrounds Manchester night and day to prevent the exit of ma- chinery.' "However, it is notorious that notwithstanding these sleepless precautions, and in spite of every prohibition, machinery of every description is at the pre- sent moment smuggled into Belgium, and.every other state that requires it ; not, perhaps, in such quantities as to serve for the fitting up of extensive facto- ries, but so as to afford a model of every improvement and every new invention for the instant adoption and imitation' of the Continental engineers and me- chanicians. Thus provided and thus encouraged, speculating upon capital sup- plied lavishly by their Government, and equipped with the most valuable Eng- lish tools, inspected by English artisans, and working i by English models, the Belgians have now far outstripped all the rest of Europe n the manufacture of machines of every description ; and in all but the cost of construction, and that beauty of finish which matured skill can alone achieve, they at present bid fair to rival England herself in her peculiar and hitherto undisputed domain. " The establishment of the Phcenix is one of those which have sprung up, thus stimulated and thus encouraged. It was originally erected by an indivi- dual proprietor, M. Huytens Kerremans, in 1821, and attained much of its reputation under the management of an Englishman named Bell; so much so, that at the period of the Revolution in 1830, it employed upwards of two hun- dred and twenty workmen daily. In 1836, on the death of the proprietor, it passed into the hands of a joint-stock company, by whom it has been enlarged to more than thrice its previous extent, at an expense of upwards of one mil- lion of francs. It is at present conducted by Mr. Windsor, a gentleman from Leeds, and is certainly the most admirably-arranged establishment of the kind I have ever seen, those of England not excepted."

Let us turn from manufactures to a picture of

FLEMISH AGRICULTURE.

The entire surface of the country between Ghent and Courtrai is one un- broken plain, which though less rich and luxuriant than the alluvial soils ot Holland and of England, exhibits in all directions the most astonishing evi• dence of that superiority in agricultural science for which the Flemings are renowned over Europe. The natural reluctance of their thin and sandy soil has been overcome by dint of the most untiring labour ; an attention to manuring, which approaches to the ridiculous in its details; and above all, by a system of rotation the most profoundly calculated and the most eminently successful.

The general aspect of a Flemish farm ; the absence of hedge-rows, or where they are to be found, their elaborate training and intertexture, so as to pre- sent merely a narrow vegetating surface of some two or three feet high, and twice as many inches in thickness ; the minute division of their fields into squares, all bearing different crops, but performing the same circle of rotation, and the total disappearance of all weeds or plants other than those sought to be raised ; all these show the practical and laborious experience by which they have reduced their science to its present system, and the indomitable industry by which, almost inch by inch, these vast and arid plains have been converted from blowing sands into blooming gardens. Here draining and irrigation are each seen in their highest perfection, owing to the frequent intersection of canals; whilst the same circumstance, affording the best facilities for the trans- port of manure, has been one of the most active promoters of farming improve- rnent.

To fix the flying sands of Belgium, the main and permanent expedient has been the application of manures. The preparation and care of this important ingredient has been, in Flanders, reduced to an actual trade; and barges innu- merable are in constant transit on the canals, conveying it from its depots and manufactories in the villages and towns to the rural districts, where it is to be applied. Servants, as a perquisite, are allowed a price for all the materials ser- viceable for preparing it which they can collect in the house and farm-yards, and the value of which often amounts to as much as their nominal wages. Pits and a tank, called a smoor-hoop, or smothering heap, are attached to every farm, and tended with a systematic care that bespeaks the importance of their contents. Into these every fermentable fluid is discharged, and mixed with the refuse of vegetables : the rape-cake which remains after expressing the oil, wood-ashes, Beepers' waste, grains from distilleries, weeds from the drains, and in abort, every other convertible article collected in the establishment; and often, in addition, plants such as broom are sown in the lands, expressly for the purpose of being ploughed in when green to increase their fertility, or to be cat for fermentation in the smoor-hoop. This latter is constructed with bricks, like a tan-pit, and covered with cement to avoid escape or filtration; and its contents, at the larger establishments, are sold to the farmers at from three to five francs a hogshead, in proportion to the quality.

BUSINESS IN BELGIUM.

In Ghent business has always been conducted, not only upon an extended scale but upon the most solid and steady basis : bank accommodation and dis- counts are unknown, in fact, in Belgium ; and a bill, if drawn at all, is as age- neral rule held over to maturity, and collected by the drawer. This may in a great degree account for the trifling balances which suffice to produce a sus- pension of business. In an annual document, published officially I presume, I perceive that although the number of failures in Ghent for the year 1839 amounted to twenty, the amount of their united deficiencies did not exceed 198,000 francs

There are many other subjects demanding attention in this able work ; but we must restrict ourselves to a topic which will shortly force itself upon the public attention—prison discipline.

THE MATSON DE FORCE OF GHENT.

We this morning accompanied Count d'Hane to visit the celebrated prison of Ghent, the muison de force, which received the applause of Howard himself, and has been the model for most of the improved penitentiaries of Europe. It was erected in 1774, under the auspices of Maria Theresa, whilst the Spanish Netherlands were still attached to the house of Austria ; and for its present state of completion and perfected system, it is indebted to the care and muni- ficence of the late King William the First of Holland. It at present encloses upwards of 1,100 prisoners, divided and classified into various occupations ac- cording to the nature of their crimes and the term of their punishment. Of these, two hundred were condemned to perpetual labour, and one to solitary confinement for life, the remainder for temporary periods. In Ghent there has not been more than three capital executions since the year 1824; and as Belgium has no colonies to which to transport her secondary offenders, they are condemned to imprisonment in all its forms in proportion to the atrocity of their crimes. Labour enters into the system in all its modifications ; and as the ra- tions of food supplied to the prisoners are so calculated as to be barely adequate to sustain life, they are thus compelled by the produce of their own hands to contribute to their own support. According to the na- ture of their offences the proportion of their earnings which they receive is more or less liberal. They are separated into three clasees—lst, the condemn is aux travaux forces, who receive but three-tenths of their own gains' 2d, the condamnes d la reclusion, who receive four-tenths ; and 3d, the co ndatnnes correct ionellement, who receive one-half. The amount of these wages may be seen to be but small, when the sum paid for making seven pair of sabots, or seven hours' labour, is but one penny. Of the sum allotted to him, the criminal receives but one-half immediately, with which he is allowed to buy bread, coffee, and some other articles at a canteen established within the prison, under strict regulations; and the other moiety is deposited for his benefit in the savings bank of the gaol, to be paid to him with interest on his enlargement. A prisoner, notwithstanding his small wages, may, after seven years' confinement, have amassed one hundred and twenty francs exclusive of interest. The labour of the prison consists, in the first place, of all the domestic work of the establishment, its cleansing, painting, and repairs, its cooking, and the manufacture of every article worn by the inmates; and secondly, of yarn-spin- ning, weaving and making shirts for the little navy of Belgium, and drawers for the soldiers, together with other similar articles suited for public sale. Pri- soners who have learned no trade are permitted to make their choice, and are taught one. The cleanliness of every corner is really incredible ; and such are its effects upon the health of the inmates, that the deaths, on an average, do not exceed, annually, one in a hundred. After paying all its expenses of every description, the profit of the labour done in the prison leaves a surplus to the Government annually, to an amount which I do not precisely remember, but which is something considerable.