On Wednesday, after Sir Michael Hicks Beach had announced that
he would reduce the tax on maize by half, Mr. Morley dealt with the Corn-tax as a whole. The first part- of his speech was a clever attempt to convict the Chan- cellor of the Exchequer of Protectionist intentions, and to place him in as awkward a position as possible in regard to the Conference of Colonial Premiers. When, however, Mr. Morley had finished with this piece of party strategy, he turned to the general question of a Zollverein, and dealt with it in a most masterly and convincing fashion. Most excellent was the way in which he refuted the absurd allegation that our trade was dwindling, that we were going under commercially, and that we must save ourselves before it was too late. As for saying that our policy is suicidal, that we are losing ground, and so forth, I will only remind the Horse of this single fact, that the total tonnage of ships belonging to Great Britain doubled between 1860 and 1900—from four and a half millions to nine and a quarter Equally sound and good was Mr. Morley's handling of the ridiculous notion that because of an apparent balance of trade against us—it is a purely statistical balance —we are losing one hundred and sixty million sovereigns a year.
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