the exports of British produce were thirty-nine and a half millions sterling in value. The population at that time,—no, I won’t speak of the exact figure of the population, because I have not got it for the three kingdoms.[71] In the years 1826 to 1830,—that is, after a medium period of eight-and-twenty years,—the average of our exports for those five years, which had been thirty-nine and a half millions in 1800, was thirty-seven millions. It is fair to admit that in 1800 the currency was somewhat less sound, and therefore I am quite willing to admit that the thirty-seven millions probably meant as much in value as the thirty-nine and a half millions; but substantially, gentlemen, the trade of the country was stationary, practically stationary, under protection. The condition of the people grew, if possible, rather worse than better. The wealth of the country was nearly stationary. But now I show you what protection produced; that it made no addition, it gave no onward movement to the profits of those who are your customers. But on these profits you depend; because, under all circumstances, gentlemen, this I think, nobody will dispute,—a considerable portion of what the Englishman or the Scotchman produces will, some way or other, find its way down his throat. What has been the case, gentlemen, since we cast off the superstition of protection, since we discarded the imposture of protection? I will tell you what happened between 1830, when there were no railways, and 1842, when no change, no important change, had been made as to protection, but when the railway system was in operation, hardly in Scotland, but in England to a very great extent, to a very considerable extent upon the main lines of communication. The exports which in 1830 had been somewhere about £37,000,000, between 1840 and 1842 showed an average amount of £50,000,000. That seems due, gentlemen, to the agency of railways; and I wish you to bear in mind the increasing benefit now derived from that agency, in order that I may not claim any undue credit for freedom of trade. From 1842, gentlemen, onward, the successive stages of free trade began; in 1842, in 1845, in 1846, in 1853, and again in 1860, the large measures were carried which have completely reformed your customs tariff, and reduced it from a taxation of twelve hundred articles to a taxation of, I think, less than twelve. Now, under the system of protection, the export trade of the country, the wealth and the power of the manufacturing and producing classes to purchase your agricultural products, did not increase at all. In the time when railways began to be in operation, but before free trade, the exports of the country increased, as I have shown you, by £13,000,000 in somewhere about thirteen years—that is to say, taking it roughly, at the rate of £1,000,000 a year.