Part 7 (2/2)

Now, a these _obstacles_, there is one which we ourselves have placed, and that at no little expense, between Brussels and Paris This consists ofthe frontier, armed to the teeth, whose business it is to place _difficulties_ in the way of the transportation of goods from one country to another These men are called custom-house officers, and their effect is precisely siy roads They retard and put obstacles in the way of transportation, thus contributing to the difference which we have remarked between the price of production and that of consumption; to diminish which difference asto resolve

Here, then, we have found its solution _Let our tariff be diminished_ We will thus have constructed a Northern Railroad which will cost us nothing Nay, in from the first day to save capital

Really, I cannot but ask myself, in surprise, how our brains could have admitted so whimsical a piece of folly, as to induce us to pay many millions to destroy the _natural obstacles_ interposed between France and other nations, only at the same time to pay so many millions more in order to replace them by _artificial obstacles_, which have exactly the same effect; so that the obstacle res go on as before, and the only result of our trouble, is, a double expense

An article of Belgian production is worth at Brussels twenty francs, and, from the expenses of transportation, thirty francs at Paris A similar article of Parisian manufacture costs forty francs What is our course under these circumstances?

First, we iian article, so as to raise its price to a level with that of the Parisian; the govern nu of this duty The article thus pays ten francs for transportation, ten for the tax

This done, we say to ourselves: Transportation between Brussels and Paris is very dear; let us spend two or three millions in railways, and ill reduce it one-half Evidently the result of such a course will be to get the Belgian article at Paris for thirty-five francs, viz:

20 francs--price at Brussels

10 ” duty

5 ” transportation by railroad

-- 35 francs--total, or market price at Paris

Could we not have attained the sa the tariff to five francs? We would then have--

20 francs--price at Brussels

5 ” duty

10 ” transportation on the common road

-- 35 francs--total, or ement would have saved us the 200,000,000 spent upon the railroad, besides the expense saved in custom-house surveillance, which would of course di would become less

But it is answered, the duty is necessary to protect Parisian industry

So be it; but do not then destroy the effect of it by your railroad

For if you persist in your deterian article on a par with the Parisian at forty francs, you must raise the duty to fifteen francs, in order to have:--

20 francs--price at Brussels

15 ” protective duty

5 ” transportation by railroad

-- 40 francs--total, at equalized prices

And I now ask, of what benefit, under these circumstances, is the railroad?

Frankly, is it not hu to the nineteenth century, that it should be destined to transes the exaravely practiced? To be the dupe of another, is bad enough; but to eislation in order to cheat one's self,--to doubly cheat one's self, and that too in a mere mathematical account,--truly this is calculated to lower a little the pride of this _enlightened age_