But towards finding this vent for our indigent and unemployed population at home, in the colonies, it is indispensable that the colonies should be preserved to the British crown; and from the effects of free-trade, it is very doubtful whether this will long be the case. Every body knows that the West Indies have been utterly ruined by the act of 1846: estates are valueless, and the planting of canes is rapidly ceasing. We know of an estate which, within fifteen years, was sold for £38,000, which was knocked down within these few weeks for £20! To give an idea of the feelings which the unexampled injustice to which they have been subjected have excited in these once noble and loyal islands, we subjoin an extract from the _Jamaica Despatch_ of April 7:-- "The affairs of Jamaica have now arrived at that desperate crisis that there is, we believe, not one man in the colony whose dependence rests solely on property invested within it, that would not, could his single voice effect the change, pronounce at once for adhesion to any other government than that which has beggared him. Loyalty is, at best, but a sentiment dependent for stability upon circumstances. We love our country so long as, and because we think, our country protects our lives, our liberties, and our properties. We are patriots whilst the government of our country secures to us those possessions which our industry has earned for us, and which the written constitution has guaranteed us. All human experience shows this limit to the most exalted spirit of loyalty and patriotism. True it is we have not the power of Canada. We are as unable as we are unwilling to change our lot by force; but let England beware lest passive alienation of every sentiment that can attach us to her as a nation do not prove even more dangerous to her colonial power than any active spirit of disaffection could be. This magnificent colony has, indeed, been sinfully and treasonably sacrificed. _The property of the Queen's subjects has been confiscated without offence on their part_; whilst, in a political point of view, each day renders the colony less and less valuable to the Crown as a national dependency. All commerce between Jamaica and the mother country must speedily cease. Of exports there can be none. Ministers--the fatal Whig Government, which has proved to be the evil genius of the West Indies whenever destiny has placed it in the ascendant--have pronounced the final doom of West Indian cultivation. After August next, when the present crops shall have been taken off, _five estates in six must of necessity cease to become sugar producers_."--_Jamaica Despatch_, April 7.