The second circumstance which tended to produce the prosperity from 1842 to 1845, was the glorious successes which, in the first of these years, succeeded to the Affghanistaun disasters. We all recollect the throb of exultation which beat in the breast of the nation when the astonishing news arrived, in November 1842, that a single Delhi Gazette had announced the second capture of Cabul, in the centre of Asia, and the dictating a glorious peace to the Celestial Empire, under the walls of Nankin. Not only was our Indian empire secured for a long period, by those astonishing triumphs, but its strength was demonstrated in a way of all others the best calculated to insure confidence in its future prosperity. The effect of this upon our manufacturing and commercial prosperity was great and immediate. Confidence revived from so marvellous a proof of the resources and spirit of the nation, which had so speedily risen superior to so terrible a disaster. Speculation was renewed on a great scale, from the sanguine ideas entertained of the boundless markets opened for our manufactures in the centre of Asia, and in the Chinese dominions. Sir Robert Peel is entitled to great credit for the glorious turn thus given to our Eastern affairs, and the gleam of sunshine which they threw upon the affairs of the nation; for his fortitude, when the previous disastrous news arrived, was mainly instrumental in producing it. But free-trade principles, and the tariff of 1842, had no more to do with it than they had with the affairs of the moon.