There are other considerations connected with the permanent depreciation of landed property in Great Britain, which are personal to almost every man belonging to the higher and middle classes of society. It has been far too hastily assumed that this is a mere proprietor’s question, or at least one in which the mercantile and professional classes have no direct interest. We propose, towards the conclusion of this article, to examine that matter minutely: in the mean time we shall direct our attention to the official tables of the exports and imports for the last year, which have been thought so favourable to free trade, as almost to justify the celebration of a national jubilee. In 1848, our exports were short of forty-nine millions; this year they exceed fifty-eight. Such is their declared value; and though we must still hold with Sir Robert Peel, that these tables cannot be entirely relied on for accuracy, we shall consider them simply as they are given us. In order to estimate the real advantage which the country has derived from the adoption of free trade, it is necessary to revert to the condition in which we stood _before_ the Corn and Navigation Laws were repealed. No one, who reflects upon the state of the Continent in 1848, can be surprised that our exports have been augmented materially by the restoration of tranquillity. That augmentation has nothing whatever to do with free trade. The question which we must now consider is this—have we been materially benefited, or benefited at all, or the reverse, by the substitution of free trade instead of our former system? In order to ascertain that, we must institute a comparison between our situation anterior to free trade, and that which is now made the ground of Ministerial triumph. We shall, therefore, compare the exports and imports of the year 1845, the last protection year, with those of 1849. The fairness of this comparison will not, we presume, be disputed. And first, as to the exports: