On the side of the former, Mr. John S. Lefevre, Mr. Macgregor, and Mr. G. R. Porter, officers of the Board of Trade, and decidedly inclined to the total repeal of the Navigation Laws, were the chief witnesses brought forward to make out a case against the existing system. Of these, the first—a distinguished mathematician as well as a lawyer of sound learning—was eminently fitted to work out, calmly and dispassionately, the intricate points connected with the complex system then prevalent. The other two were strong partisans. Mr. Macgregor, a somewhat superficial person, gave the most off-hand answers to questions, though profoundly ignorant of their tendency, therein committing the most egregious blunders, and urging many inaccuracies about the Reciprocity Treaties, their effect on commerce, and the injury Great Britain had sustained through her ancient Navigation Laws. On the question of the maritime relations between this country and the United States, Mr. Macgregor gave evidence, also, at great length, a considerable portion of which was, however, erroneous as to matters of fact, while many of his conclusions were fallacious. [Sidenote: Mr. G. R. Porter.] Mr. G. R. Porter, Secretary of the Statistical Department, and well known as entertaining the strongest convictions that the Navigation Laws were as injurious to the shipowners themselves as they had been to the nation, was an industrious hard-working man, but he was at the same time committed by many previous publications to the most extreme opinions on Free-trade: of real practical commerce he had no experience. Mr. Porter had, however, studied the whole question with care, and, while enthusiastic in favour of an entire change, and sanguine with regard to the beneficial results to follow from the repeal of these laws, he gave strong and valid reasons for his bold opinions. Their repeal, he showed, would tend, materially, to develop and increase the warehousing system of Great Britain, making it, in fact, a vast depôt for supplying the wants of the people of all nations. Not that the existing laws presented any impediment to warehousing goods, but that facilities would be afforded for making advances on foreign produce by the removal of restrictions. In answer to numerous and varied questions from those members of the Committee who were opposed to his views, he gave a clear and decided opinion that the trade of England had not been benefited in any one of its branches, shipowning included, by the Navigation Laws: and he could not for a moment admit that these laws had operated beneficially even for the “encouragement of a commercial marine.” He rested his arguments on the economical principle that the shipping trade of this country, as a trade, could be conducted on no other principles than those whereby trade, generally, was carried on; he contended that no more ships would be built than it was expected would be required, so as to yield