TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE Italic text is denoted by _underscores_. Many Footnotes have two or more anchors. Some minor changes are noted at the end of the book. THE BRITISH JUGERNATH. FREE TRADE! FAIR TRADE!! RECIPROCITY!!! RETALIATION!!!! A gruesome huge misshapen monster void of sight.--_Virgil._ BY G. L. M. LONDON: E. & F. N. SPON, 125, STRAND. 1885. _Price Sixpence._ LONDON: PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING CROSS. Dedicated TO SIR EDWARD SULLIVAN, BART., IN ACKNOWLEDGMENT OF THE MANY VALUABLE HINTS THE AUTHOR HAS DERIVED FROM HIS “BUBBLES.” PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. The following squib was written in 1883, with the intention of drawing attention to the serious danger into which we are rapidly drifting, through the suicidal policy of our rulers. Since it was written the evils indicated therein have greatly increased in intensity. The interests of the producers having been completely sacrificed to those of the consumers; the results of such a policy are becoming painfully apparent, in the increasing number of the unemployed, consequent on _unlimited foreign competition_. Working men who are unable to obtain employment can no longer be persuaded, either by the plausible statistics of Mr. Giffen, or by the peevish denunciations of Mr. Bright, that, thanks to Free Trade, they are better off than they were ever before. Cheap food is of little avail if the means of purchasing it be not forthcoming. The cry for _fair_ trade is waxing stronger and stronger. I have endeavoured to show that a light tax on foreign wheat, would, without any appreciable increase in the cost of food, probably enrich England and its dependencies to the extent of about £60,000,000 annually; whilst at present a large portion of this is employed in furnishing the sinews of war which will probably be used against us. G. L. M. _March 30th, 1885._ INDEX.