vague a motion, met it by moving the previous question.

Sir Robert Peel said, the motion must be looked at either in a commercial or a financial point of view. Mr. F. Maule had supposed that Mr. Drummond intended that the House should imply an opinion unfavourable to the commercial policy of late years; but he (Sir R. Peel) believed, if this had been his intention, he would have said so in plain and direct terms; and, more over, such an intention was incompatible with Mr. Drummond's avowed opinions and with the legitimate inferences from the terms of the motion. What that gentleman meant was, that the taxation which remained pressed heavily upon industry, and therefore it was desirable to adopt all practicable economy. He agreed with Mr. Cayley that the merits of our recent commercial policy lay in the answer to the question-Had the social condition of the labouring classes generally been improved thereby? Had their command over the necessaries of life been increased? And so far as a judgment could be formed, we had at least no right to infer that the comforts of even the agricultural classes had been curtailed by the legislation since 1842. In various years, under protection, agricultural distress had been most severely felt, even co-existent with high prices. Mr. Drummond had claimed for the farmer exemption from restrictions; that he might, for example, grow tobacco; but if the foreign duty on that article was maintained, and an Excise duty was imposed upon British tobacco, agriculture would reap but a slender benefit. He had not been able to vote on a former night with Mr. Cobden, because

he thought the principle of bringing the expenditure down to the standard of any particular year was a fallacious one, and he had more confidence in the progressive and reflecting retrenchments of a Government than in the varying and vacillating declarations even of a reformed House of Commons, which had its hot as well as cold fits. How could the House adopt this resolution, which must excite expectations of a large reduction of taxation, immediately after rejecting by large majorities propositions for reducing the army and navy estimates? He believed that there were many taxes, the reduction of which, consistently with good faith and public security, would confer inestimable benefit; and he advised the House to apply itself to economy in every practical form, but not one day to vote large estimates, and the very same day agree to a general resolution justifying the expectation of a large reduction of expenditure, and thereby propagating a delusion.

The motion was supported by many of the leading Members of the agricultural interest, by Mr. Newdegate, Mr. Evelyn, Mr. Stafford, Colonel Sibthorp, Lord John Manners, and Mr. Bennett, who dwelt on the distress prevailing in their several counties among the classes whom they represented.They contended that, notwithstanding the alleged prosperity which was ascribed to free trade, taxation really pressed heavily on the people, and that they had a right to demand relief.

Lord John Russell said the motion was vague and difficult to be understood; he supposed Mr. Drummond meant that there ought to be a large remission of taxation

and a great reduction of the expenditure. The course the Government had taken was the only one whereby a reduction could be safely effected. If we were to maintain good faith, the interest due upon the national debt and other charges on the Consolidated Fund left very little scope for reductions, and having voted the army and navy estimates it could not be supposed that the House meant to reverse those votes. He defended the general policy of the recent commercial measures of the Legislature, in reply to Mr. Stafford, and supported the previous question.

Mr. Bright inferred from the motion, which was milder than that of last year, that Mr. Drummond meant that the reductions of the Government did not go so far as they might or as the necessities of the country required. He (Mr. Bright) was of that opinion, and he thought the House was bound to support it, and not escape from it by voting the previous question. The resolution carried last year had induced the Government to issue a circular to which the country probably owed some reductions, and it might be fairly expected that this resolution which was not hostile to the Government, would have a similar effect. He should, therefore, support the motion.

Mr. Hume derived great satisfaction from the co-operation of the Protectionist party in his endeavours at retrenchment, and insisted that the salary of every public officer, from the Crown to the porter, must be revised and reduced. The establishments would admit of retrenchments, without impairing their efficiency, to the extent of 10,000,000.

Mr. Osborne considered that the motion, if it meant anything, meant a reversal of the policy commenced by Sir R. Peel; that Mr. Drummond wished to make a cat's-paw of Members on his (Mr. Osborne's) side of the House, and he would not be a party to such a compromise.

Mr. Labouchere said the Government were quite sensible of the evil of taxation, and they had given to the country practical evidence, by the reduction of 730,0007. in the estimates of the present year, that they were not neglecting their duty in this matter; it was therefore most ungracious and most unfair to put them in a situation to be taunted with the remark, that what they should hereafter do would be the result of a vote of that House. There was a more serious objection to the motion; it would create an impression out of doors of an unfortunate character, and, in connection with the speeches of the mover and seconder, would lead to a dangerous delusion.

Mr. Muntz supported the motion; but Mr. Brotherton suspected it to be a trap, which he should shun.

Lord Duncan acknowledged that the trap had caught him. He saw nothing objectionable in the motion, but something he was ready to support.

Mr. Drummond having replied, the House divided, when the "previous question" was carried by 190 to 156.

Lord Duncan's motion for a total and immediate repeal of the window tax, though brought forward after the Budget had been introduced, and the financial arrangements of the year determined on, produced a result which startled

the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and no doubt powerfully contributed to influence the policy of the following Session. In his speech on this occasion, which evinced much industry and knowledge of the details of his subject, Lord Duncan reviewed at considerable length all the leading facts and arguments in favour of his motion. When he had brought forward the subject in 1845, he observed, Sir R. Peel had promised to take it into consideration; and in 1848 Lord J. Russell had admitted the force of the arguments against the tax, and regretted that the financial condition of the country at that period did not allow of its repeal. Since then our finances had recovered; the estimates had been greatly reduced; other vexatious burdens had been removed or diminished, and if this tax were not altogether repealed (which would be a great boon to the window-glass trade, now much depressed), it might be so modified as to fall more equally upon the different classes, and exempt houses with less than twelve windows. A window tax was objectionable in principle as well as oppressive in practice; evasions were not difficult, and the stationary amount of the duty, notwithstanding the increase of the population, proved that it was evaded. The tax operated most prejudicially upon the public health, and the evidence taken in the course of sanitary inquiries abounded with denunciations of the window duty as a fruitful source of disease and mortality. He read various testimonies to the injurious effects of this tax upon light and air, which neutralized sanitary reforms; and anticipated the objections to his motion based

upon financial grounds, suggesting that the dispensing with the African squadron, a better administration of the Woods and Forests, and of that portion of the public revenue which did not pass through the Exchequer, would more than indemnify the State for the loss of the window tax.

The motion was seconded by Sir De Lacy Evans, who urged three objections to the tax-its inequality, its partiality, and its injurious effect upon the public health; and recommended, as a substitute, a probate duty upon real property.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer contented himself with superficial objections to the proposition, declining to grapple with the facts and arguments adduced by his opponent. The tax, he contended, was already as lightly pressing on the poor as possible. Out of 3,500,000 houses, it was only paid by 500,000 of the better class of houses; and even in respect of those it was ultimately paid out of the capital of the landlord in a reduction of rent, rather than by the industry of the tenant who primarily paid it. The superiority of the dwellings of the poor in England over those in Ireland, where the tax does not exist, refuted much of the sanitary argument. The exemption of all houses having fewer than twelve windows would cost, not 100,000l. as stated, but 250,000.-the duty now received from such houses. The Government had shown its disposition to forward sanitary measures by removing the brickduty, and it could not afford the loss of the 1,800,000l. it was now asked to forego.

Sir George Pechell recalled the fact, that since 1835 five Chan

cellors of the Exchequer had promised to "consider" this subject, and not one had considered it in the way the public voice required. Mr. Hume said the great point was to reduce taxation, for unless this was done the expenditure would not be reduced. Here was an opportunity to get rid of 1,800,000l. of taxes, which would lead to a corresponding reduction of the estimates. If the tax were to be continued, it might be commuted for a tax on houses.

Lord R. Grosvenor should vote for the repeal of this most pernicious tax, and he thought the refusal of the Government to moderate or mitigate it was a very great loss of character.

Lord Dudley Stuart and Sir Benjamin Hall also addressed the House in favour of the motion. On a division there appearedFor the motion

Against it.

Majority for Govern

ment.

77

80

3

The smallness of the minority was hailed with loud cheers by Lord Duncan's supporters.

In the latter part of the Session Mr. Cayley moved for leave to bring in a Bill to repeal the Malt Tax. He had brought forward this motion, he said, entirely on his own responsibility, without a promise of support from any quarter, being instigated by no other motive than a conscientious conviction that, in the depressed state of agriculture, and the novel circumstances in which it had been placed by our late commercial changes, no measure short of reimposing the old system, or of a modification of that system, of protection, could so conduce to the

well-being of the agriculture of this country as the repeal of this tax, which was not only most oppressive, but most partial and unjust. After so long a continuance of the system of protection, which originated not in any selfish policy on the part of the landed interest, but with our manufacturers, the agriculturists were fairly entitled not merely to justice, but if they required it, to something more. They asked, however, only strict justice, and the repeal of the malt. tax had been expected to follow in the wake of that of the Corn Laws. Mr. Cayley then described some of the vexatious regulations and restrictions, enforced by numerous penalties, to which the manufacture of malt was subjected -an operation of the nicest and most delicate kind, that of carrying on one of the processes of nature by artificial means, which was disturbed by the interference of the Excise. The argument that the tax fell upon the consumer was not admitted in the case of other articles; the answer being that it enhanced the price, and the consumers of malt were not the rich, but the labouring classes, who were attached to the ancient national beverage. If a cottager were allowed to malt for himself, without paying duty, he would save a very large percentage on his beer, and obtain a wholesome beverage. Mr. Cayley showed that the increase of the tax had limited the consumption of malt, and argued that whilst wages always settled down to the price of wheat, which was the ultimate standard, they had no relation to that of the innocent luxuries of the poor man, who was often driven by the want of the beverage at home to those sinks of vice, the beer-houses. He argued

that the repeal of this tax must, as in the cases of tea, coffee, and other articles, greatly increase the consumption of malt, while by detaching the lower classes from the use of spirits, it would diminish drunkenness, the taste for spirits having grown up, as he showed, with the duty on malt. The repeal of the tax, he assumed, would treble the present consumption of malt; this would create a demand for 10,000,000 quarters of barley, stimulating the produce of other grain, and occasioning a corresponding advance of prices, the depression of which was the farmer's present complaint. After enlarging upon the impulse which the repeal would give to various branches of industry, he suggested means by which, he alleged, the void of 4,612,000l., the net amount of the tax, could be repaid to the extent of 3,310,000l., and the deficiency, he thought, would be covered by the productiveness of the revenue.

Mr. Christopher supported the motion, urging that as the agricultural interest of this country was the only unprotected interest, and was exposed now to competition with the whole world, the House should insist upon the application of the same measure of justice to agriculture as had been applied to every other interest in this country. Upon the principle that this tax was paid by the consumer-though it was also borne by the producer-he asked for the co-operation of Free-traders in removing a burden of 100 per cent. upon a product of British industry.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer declined to follow Mr. Cayley through all the various topics which he had discussed, confining

himself to the real topic-the malt tax. After pointing out two mistakes into which, he said, Mr. Christopher had fallen, and replying to some of the preliminary observations of Mr. Cayley, who could scarcely expect support from the Protectionist party, the leaders of which were adverse to the repeal of this tax, he assured that Gentleman that the means he suggested for replacing the malt tax would not produce a fifth of the sum. Sir Charles disputed many of the facts from which Mr. Cayley drew his conclusions. Since the unrestricted importation of foreign corn the manufacture of malt had not diminished, but increased. Though between 1839 and 1849 there had been a falling off in the consumption of malt of about 1,000,000 bushels, the consumption of tea, coffee, and cocoa had largely increased; and, so far from spirits having been substituted for beer, the consumption of spirits had also diminished since 1839. The result, which was by no means unsatisfactory, was, that the consumption of all intoxicating liquors had fallen off, and that of non-intoxicating liquors had increased. The effect of repealing the malt duty, which Mr. Cayley expected would treble the consumption, was shown by the repeal of the war malt and beer duty-nearly equal to the existing malt duty-which had had no effect upon the consumption. Sir Charles adduced the opinions of practical men, that the repeal of the duty would not materially augment consumption, nor benefit the farmer; if then, he asked, no great benefit would arise to either consumer or producer from the repeal of this duty, was it wise to risk so large a revenue

as