The soundness of the position taken up by the Opposition last year in
regard to the national finances, has this year been fully established by
the admissions and procedure of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. It may
seem remarkable that the Chancellor of the Exchequer should preface his
financial statement by referring to a resolution of the House, which was
adopted at the instance of the Opposition,—that he should avowedly base
his present Budget upon that resolution. But Mr Gladstone is a Minister
of consummate Parliamentary tact, who avails himself of every plea which
best serves his purpose for the time; and, as we shall see in the
sequel, he had a special reason for thus seeking to cover with the
authority of Parliament a Budget which is not quite so accordant with
the resolution of the House as he desires it to be thought. The
resolution, which was adopted at the instance of the Opposition, and
upon which the Chancellor of the Exchequer professedly bases his present
Budget, insisted upon the necessity of reducing the national
expenditure. It was urged upon the Government that the financial
administration of the three previous years had been such as to trench
deeply upon the extraordinary resources of the country, and that, while
ostensibly adding to the military strength of the country, we were
really diminishing our power by exhausting the sources by which the
expenses of war and national defence could be sustained. It was pointed
out that during these years we had not only abolished, and put out of
reach, several important taxes for the remission of which there was no
urgent necessity, but that, in order to do so, we had actually incurred
a considerable deficit. Of late years not only the leaders of the
Opposition, but some of the highest financial authorities on the
Ministerial side of the House—including Lord Overstone, Lord Monteagle,
and Earl Grey—had denounced as most impolitic the hand-to-mouth system
pursued by Mr Gladstone, and had urged the necessity of framing the
estimates with a view to obtaining a substantial yearly surplus. These
were the considerations which led the House of Commons last summer to
adopt the resolution to which the Chancellor of the Exchequer now
appeals in justification of his Budget; and they must not be forgotten
when examining how far the financial programme of the present year is in
accordance with that resolution.
A new critic now takes the field against Mr Gladstone, and adds his
protest to those which have already been made by the other leading
financial authorities. In a new edition of his work on Taxation, that
veteran Liberal and political economist, Mr M’Culloch, severely
criticises the recent financial policy of the Government, and endorses
with his high and obviously impartial authority the opinions by which
that policy has been so often combated by the Conservatives. To all the
special features of Gladstonian finance Mr M’Culloch is opposed. He is
strongly in favour of the maintenance of a good yearly surplus, as an
indispensable feature of a prudent system of finance; he condemns as
most impolitic that narrowing of the area of taxation which Mr Gladstone
extols as a “simplification of the tariff;” and he moreover objects, in
the strongest terms, to the manner in which that principle of
“simplification” has been applied.
It is not surprising that the voice of protest should thus be raised
from all quarters against the principles of Mr Gladstone’s finance. To
begin with, he has been a most prodigal financier, and cares not a jot
for the future. At a time when the charges on the National Debt were
reduced by the falling-in of the terminable annuities, to the extent of
two millions a-year—when there was an unexpected repayment of a portion
of the Spanish loan, and other windfalls—and when he found a surplus of
considerable amount left to him by his predecessors in office,—then
surely, if ever, the country had a right to expect from the Chancellor
of the Exchequer a succession of good annual balance-sheets. If the
policy of maintaining a substantial surplus is not carried out under
these favourable circumstances, the fault must lie with the
administrator of the national finances. Yet, so far has Mr Gladstone
been from adhering to the old and sound maxim of financial policy, that
he has not only given us no surplus, but has recklessly incurred us a
deficit, of which he now makes no mention. Had this bad condition of the
finances been incurred in consequence of an exceptional increase of the
national expenditure which could only be met by the imposition of new
taxes, it might have been excusable. But there was no such difficulty:
the revenue was sufficient, if let alone, to have more than kept pace
with the expenditure. The peculiar culpability of Mr Gladstone as a
financial Minister—the pernicious feature of his system which called
forth the eloquent denunciation of Lord Overstone, and the emphatic
protest of Earl Grey and Lord Monteagle, and of the ablest financial
journal of the Liberal party, the ‘Economist’—is, that during this
period of so-called exceptional expenditure he has deliberately thrown
away the means which were at his disposal for meeting it. He has
abolished taxes against which there was no peculiar ground of complaint,
and he has reduced others in order to cheapen certain commodities for
which there was no general demand.
This financial system of Mr Gladstone is, unfortunately, not a mere
thing of the past. Its consequences weigh upon us now, and there is no
sign of his abandoning it. It is a novel system—novel even to himself;
but he adheres to it with an obstinacy which threatens to embarrass us
in the future not less than in the past. A grave question must be at
stake when the greatest financial authorities of the Liberal party come
forward prominently to side with the Conservatives in opposing and
denouncing the policy of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. They feel
strongly that the recent hand-to-mouth system of Mr Gladstone will not
do, and that in times of emergency it would entail grave disaster upon
the national fortunes. “Great nations—such, for example, as England and
France,” says Mr M’Culloch, “with colonies and dependencies in all parts
of the world, and with jealous and powerful neighbours, must expect to
be every now and then involved in difficulties; and on that account they
should have a considerable surplus revenue—_i. e._, a considerable
surplus after defraying the cost of their usual establishments,” And he
adds—“Had the affair in regard to the Trent led, as it was not unlikely
to do, to a war with the United States, it would have found us in an
awkward situation—without any surplus revenue, with discredited customs
and excise duties, and nothing to fall back upon but an increase of the
Income-tax and loans.” We regret to say that the calamity from which we
so narrowly escaped two years ago, cannot be regarded as unlikely of
occurrence now; and there are also elements of strife sufficiently
formidable on our own side of the Atlantic to engage the thoughts of our
statesmen, and to invest with peculiar interest the at all times
momentous subject of the national finances. When we hear so old a
Liberal and so practised a political economist as Mr M’Culloch echoing
Lord Castlereagh, and charging the country in the very words of the Tory
statesman, with an “ignorant impatience of taxation,” we cannot but be
confirmed in the views which we have repeatedly expressed in regard to
the policy of the present Chancellor of the Exchequer; and the country
at large will do well to reconsider that policy and the principle upon
which it is based.
On one occasion in 1857, when the late Sir G. C. Lewis—whose death is a
loss alike to the country and to the Ministry—referred to an opinion of
one who had as good a knowledge of the practical working of taxation as
any man either before or since, Mr Gladstone exclaimed with the utmost
contempt—“He goes back to Arthur Young, sir: old Arthur Young he takes
for his authority!” And when, in his own recent Budget speech, Mr
Gladstone, with all the ingenuity of rhetoric, was calling upon the
House to stand amazed at the rapid increase in the [nominal?] income of
the country (one-fifth during eight years), which he claimed as the
result of his policy,—and Sir J. Packington quietly suggested that it is
Australia and the new gold mines that have caused the difference,—Mr
Gladstone rejoined, “Australia! Oh no: the right honourable gentleman is
lost in the depths of heresy on that point.” This overbearing
presumption is natural to Mr Gladstone, who finds it a convenient way of
summarily evading difficulties which are more easily scoffed at than
answered. But we take leave to think that there are few intelligent men
in this country who, for width of view and soundness of judgment, would
not have preferred the late Sir George Lewis to his more eloquent and
ingenious colleague. And for ourselves we entertain no doubt that Sir J.
Pakington was perfectly correct in his suggestion, and that the great
increase alike in the income of this country, and in certain branches of
the expenditure, is in part attributable to the rise in the monetary
value of property and labour in consequence of the new markets for our
goods in Australia, and the great addition to the stock of gold.[9] Mr
Gladstone would probably treat Mr M’Culloch in the same contemptuous
fashion,—especially as Mr M’Culloch’s opinions and arguments, if
correct, totally demolish the “system” which Mr Gladstone of late years,
and in contradiction to his former self, has been labouring to
establish. But we shall give the public an opportunity of judging
whether Mr M’Culloch’s opinions are not as well founded as they are
harmonious with those of the Conservative party.
Mr M’Culloch maintains that it is more than doubtful whether any
remission of taxation should take place unless the revenue exceed the
ordinary expenditure by some 5 or 10 per cent of its amount. In other
words, he considers that, with an expenditure equal to that of the
United Kingdom, the estimates should always be so framed as to have a
conjectural balance of four or five millions. Mr Gladstone rarely aims
at having a surplus of even a tenth of that amount; and sometimes
£80,000 or less seems to him enough to meet the chapter of accidents,
and sustain the moral power and financial credit of the country! The
following passage, which appears in the new edition of Mr M’Culloch’s
work, seems to have been written expressly in reference to the financial
administration of the present Chancellor of the Exchequer:—
“In countries under free or constitutional governments the reduction
or repeal of taxes is frequently proposed in the view of courting
popularity, or of favourably influencing public opinion. And the
desire to grasp an immediate advantage, to be relieved of a burden,
without caring for the ultimate consequences of its extinction, is so
extremely prevalent, that such projects, though often very
undeserving, seldom fail to procure a less or greater share of the
public sympathy for those by whom they are put forth. Statesmen,
however, and those intrusted with the duties of government, should
take a less circumscribed view of such matters, and are bound to
inquire into the real character of the measures that come before them,
and to weigh and consider their more remote as well as their proximate
results. Their duty is to oppose, not to pander to the selfish and
unfounded prejudices of the public.... The real questions are, can the
tax be spared; and, if not, can it be replaced by a less inconvenient
or injurious tax? If it can neither be spared nor replaced by another
that is less objectionable, its repeal would be as futile, as
inexpedient, and as unadvised a measure as can well be imagined.”
Mr Gladstone, in his desire for popularity, has carried the practice
thus emphatically condemned by Mr M’Culloch to a most dangerous extreme.
He totally disregards the sound principle of ending every year with a
surplus, in order to meet sudden and unforeseen contingencies, and he
lavishes every spare pound upon the reduction of taxation. Moreover, in
making these reductions, he has adopted a practice which, although he
presents it under the attractive guise of a “simplification of the
tariff,” is paving the way for a serious popular agitation against some
of the indispensable elements of our fiscal system. Sir Robert Peel, it
is true, simplified the tariff; but he did so more wisely and prudently.
It was not merely for the sake of simplicity that he reduced the list of
taxed commodities, but because many of the taxes at that time vexed
trade without appreciably swelling the revenue. Previous to his
administration, our customs tariff comprised above a thousand articles,
many of which were insignificant, and all but unproductive to the State.
But Mr Gladstone has carried out the same practice on a very different
principle. The tariff, as left by Sir Robert Peel, embraced above four
hundred items; now it is restricted to about forty. Indeed, this branch
of our revenue at present is raised almost entirely from sugar, tea,
tobacco, spirits, wine, beer, corn, coffee, currants and raisins,
timber, and pepper. This is objectionable in many respects. In the first
place, it renders our revenue liable to be much more seriously affected
by the fluctuations of trade and the condition of the masses of the
people, than under the old system; and by concentrating taxation upon a
few commodities, it makes the fiscal pressure more obvious and more
felt, and furnishes proportionately greater scope for popular agitation.
“When the public attention is fixed exclusively on a few leading and
indeed necessary articles,” says Mr M’Culloch, “it is all but certain
that the duties on them, even should they be moderate, will come to be
looked upon as being, in no ordinary degree, objectionable and
oppressive. But were a great variety of articles, suitable for the
consumption of all classes, subject to duties, there would be but little
probability of the public attention being concentrated on a few only.”
And what are the few commodities which now furnish the principal part of
our revenue? As we have seen, precisely those which are consumed in
greatest quantity by the bulk of the people. There is no real inequality
in the distribution of our taxation; for the Income-Tax, the
Succession-Duties, &c., do not fall at all upon the lower classes, and
have been framed so as to keep the balance of taxation equal between the
rich and the poor. But we fear this fact will not be fairly considered
by the masses, who, under the influence of demagogues like Mr Bright,
are too prone to think themselves unjustly dealt with. Two months ago we
pointed out this feature of Mr Gladstone’s financial policy, as one
eminently provocative of agitation against some branches of our revenue
which it is indispensable to preserve. Mr M’Culloch holds a similar
opinion. He says—
“When such duties apply to all kinds of things [the raw materials of
industry and the prime articles of food being excepted], it is seen
that they must affect, in one way or other, every class, and, indeed,
every individual, and being merged in and forming a part of the price
of the articles on which they are charged, they attract little or no
attention. But such will not be the case with us in time to come.
Consumption duties have ceased to be general, and are now (1862)
unfortunately restricted to a few leading articles, comprising some of
the principal necessaries and luxuries of the labouring poor. So
striking and momentous a change cannot fail to rouse the public
attention; and will, it is to be feared, give rise to a belief that it
is essentially partial and unfair. And such belief will be better
founded than it is at all desirable it should be; for, while we admit
various luxuries of the rich and the great, including the most
_recherché_ wines, at very low duties, and many more, comprising,
among others, the finest laces, velvets, porcelain, tablecloths,
carpets, silks, gloves, ornamental furniture, bronzes, and so forth,
free of all charge, we lay heavy duties on the tea and sugar, which
are indispensable to the labouring poor, and heavier still on the
tobacco, the spirits, and the beer which constitute their luxuries. Is
it to be supposed that such a policy should be considered by the bulk
of the people as other than unfair and offensive?”
It is a most important principle of judicious finance that the incidence
of taxation should be as little felt as possible, and also that it
should not only be fair, but be seen to be fair. We believe that the
present taxation of this country falls very equally on all classes; but,
unfortunately, under Mr Gladstone’s “reforms,” it has assumed an
appearance of gross inequality. We have largely increased the spirit
duties, and we have kept up the taxes on malt and beer, yet we have
greatly reduced the duties on wine. Moreover, we have made the reduction
of the duties on wines in such a way that the finest wines pay no more
than the cheap wines. Several articles of luxury have likewise, under
the operation of the French treaty, disappeared from the tariff, and
their absence, though of no great importance as affecting the revenue,
gives a handle to demagogues who desire to excite the masses against the
taxation of the country. The “Financial Reform Association,” and the
Radical party in general, could have no better ally than Mr Gladstone;
and the chief result of his “popular” Budgets will inevitably be to
render our whole system of taxation extremely unpopular.
Mr Gladstone’s new Budget is less ingenious, less experimental, less
obviously hazardous, than those which have preceded it. The balance is,
in appearance at least, kept even between direct and indirect taxation:
and the twopence off the income-tax, and the fivepence off the duties on
tea, reduce these taxes to the level at which they stood prior to the
Russian war. The modification of the Income-tax upon incomes between
£100 and £200 a-year is an improvement. Mr Gladstone has also done well
in admitting a past error of his, by abolishing the small charges on
certain operations, of trade which he imposed in 1860, but which have
been found exceedingly vexatious to commerce. Nor can any objection be
taken to the change which he proposes to make on the taxation of
railways, by which the tax on the passenger traffic is reduced from 5 to
3½ per cent, while the exemption at present enjoyed by parliamentary and
excursion trains is abolished. His proposal to levy the Income-tax upon
the revenues of corporations which are expended in charity, and on the
income of endowed charities, is more open to question; and so are some
of his other minor proposals; but the interests affected are not
sufficiently powerful to offer much opposition to the Government.
The main facts of Mr Gladstone’s financial statement are briefly as
follows. Warned by the strong expression of opinion on the part of the
House in favour of a reduction of expenditure, the Government resolved
to anticipate farther opposition by curtailing the estimates which the
House had so reluctantly voted, and last year spent about £800,000 less
than they had taken power to do. In respect to the Revenue, Mr
Gladstone’s estimates were singularly at fault. As on previous
occasions, his estimate of the Excise greatly exceeded the actual
return, which this year has fallen short of his estimate by more than a
million sterling. But the Income-tax yielded nearly half a million more
than he calculated, and so have the Customs; and the total produce of
the national taxes has been so favourable as to leave a surplus of about
£400,000 above the estimate, and an excess of £1,300,000 above the
expenditure. The revenue of the past year amounted to £70,603,000, the
expenditure was £69,302,000: surplus £1,301,000. If the taxes were to
remain on the same footing this year, they would yield (according to Mr
Gladstone) £71,490,000; and he proposes some trifling new taxes
amounting to £133,000: together equal to £71,623,000. And as the
estimated expenditure for the ensuing year is only £67,749,000
(£1,553,000 less than last year’s), the surplus at the end of the
ensuing year, if the taxes were kept at their present rate, would be
£3,874,000. But the proposed reductions of taxation, chiefly on the
Income-tax and Tea-duties, will cause a loss of revenue in the ensuing
year to the extent of £3,343,000; so that the actual surplus, as
estimated by Mr Gladstone, will be £531,000. The Budget stands thus:
REVENUE.
Customs, £22,737,000
Excise, 17,658,000
Stamps, 9,000,000
Taxes, 3,160,000
Income-tax, 8,675,000
Post Office, 3,800,000
Crown Lands, 300,000
Miscellaneous, 2,950,000
———————————
£68,280,000
EXPENDITURE.
Debt, £26,333,000
Consolidated Fund, 1,940,000
Army, 15,060,000
Navy, 10,730,000
Collection, 4,721,000
Miscellaneous, 8,965,000
———————————
£67,749,000
Surplus, £531,000.
The surplus which Mr Gladstone thus reckons upon this year is far below
the amount which our best financiers consider requisite for the
maintenance of a sound system of finance. It is true, and we attach
great weight to the consideration, that the present depressed state of
an important branch of national industry renders it desirable that the
taxation of the country should be reduced as low as possible. But this
argument, unhappily, cuts two ways. For the same depression of trade,
which calls for a minimum of taxation this year, to at least a similar
extent places in jeopardy the surplus which the Chancellor of the
Exchequer reckons upon. In his estimate of the produce of the excise,
especially, we believe that he commits his usual mistake of being too
sanguine. But the really hazardous feature of his Budget consists in
this: That only a part of the proposed reductions of taxation will take
effect during the ensuing year; and, therefore, the estimates which
suffice for the financial year, upon which we have entered, will be
inadequate for the year following. The reductions of taxation which will
take place before April next will, as we have said, amount to
£3,343,000; but the total yearly loss of revenue consequent upon the
reductions proposed by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, is £4,242,000;
so that if they took entire effect during the present year, instead of a
surplus of £531,000, there would be a deficit of £368,000. But of the
loss on the Income-tax, £850,000 will only fall on the following year
(1864–5), and £49,000 of loss from the abolition of some petty taxes
will likewise be passed on to next year. Thus we obtain a surplus of
£531,000 for the present financial year only by passing on to next year
a loss of £900,000. If the finances had been in a thoroughly good
condition, and if the state of the country promised to be prosperous,
and our relations with other Powers peaceful, the heavy legacy of loss
for the year 1864–5 might be contemplated with less alarm; for the
experience of late years shows that, in ordinary times, the
productiveness of the revenue tends to augment at the rate of £700,000
a-year. But this is not the case. And, moreover, as Mr Gladstone’s
estimate of the miscellaneous receipts for the present year embrace half
a million sterling of the China indemnity money—a payment which will not
take place again—the deficit which we are preparing for the year 1864–5,
is an exceedingly formidable one = £1,400,000.
This is the weak point of Mr Gladstone’s Budget. Suppose his
expectations are fully realised—suppose he have a surplus at the end of
this year of half a million, and that the productiveness of the taxes
increase next year to the extent of £700,000 (which is not
likely),—there would nevertheless be a deficit in the year 1864–5 of
£200,000. Such a result, the most favourable that can be expected,
cannot be regarded with indifference. But this is not all. Is it not a
fact that the balances in the Exchequer in March last year were
£2,684,000 less than they were in 1860, when Mr Gladstone began his
present financial administration? And as he does not take any account of
that deficit in his new Budget, the deficit remains unprovided for, and
of course renders his present financial programme doubly hazardous. It
was only by the help of the two and a half millions abstracted from the
Exchequer balances, and also by creating new Debt to the extent of
£461,000, that he escaped bankruptcy during the two first years of his
financial administration: and if he had been a Minister of ordinary
prudence, he would have felt bound to replace those sums before he
proceeded to make further reductions of taxation. But he is determined
to produce popular Budgets, however dear a price the country may have to
pay for them in the long run. He justifies anew the censure which Mr
M’Culloch has passed upon such a system of finance. He makes the show of
a surplus for the ensuing year, only by ignoring nearly three millions
of deficit which he has accumulated in past years, and by preparing a
new deficit for the year 1864–5.
Every proposal to reduce taxation is sure to be popular,—we are equally
sure that the present reductions are exceedingly dangerous. It is one
thing to cut down expenditure—and this, we conceive, was what the
Conservatives last year urged upon the Government: it is quite another
thing to dispense with a real surplus, to resign ourselves to a past
deficit, and prepare for ourselves a new one. The errors of Mr
Gladstone’s previous Budgets now begin to weigh heavy upon the national
fortunes. The abandonment of the paper-duties has rendered our present
financial position one of no ordinary embarrassment. Had these duties
still been in operation, the present reductions of taxation, so
desirable in themselves, and so repeatedly called for by the
Conservative party, could have been effected without any risk. As it is,
we think the financial position of the country eminently unsatisfactory
and unsafe. Not only must we experience a deficit in the year 1864–5,
but we are totally unprepared for any untoward contingencies in the
present year. The peace of Europe (if peace it may be called) is
obviously insecure; hostilities seem impending between this country and
Japan; and our relations with the Federal States of North America are
such as, unhappily, and from no fault of ours, to render the occurrence
of war between the two countries a contingency which cannot entirely be
overlooked. But if any exceptional expenditure be forced upon us, how
are we to meet it? Under Mr Gladstone’s management, the taxation of the
country has been so concentrated upon a few articles of universal
consumption, and the duty upon some of those commodities (such as
spirits) has been so obviously carried to the highest possible point,
that to increase the revenue from its present sources would be extremely
difficult and unpopular. We cannot reimpose the old duties on wines,
silks, gloves, and other articles embraced in the French treaty, for in
respect to these we have sold our freedom of taxation to a foreign
power. The paper duties are irretrievably abandoned; for, however
impolitic may have been the abolition of those duties in times like the
present, their reimposition would be a great hardship and injustice to
the manufacturers who have made new arrangements in accordance with the
abolition. A few months hence the same will be the case with the
Tea-duties. _A large increase of the Income-tax_, and an issue of
Exchequer bonds, are the only means by which we can hope to make head
against an emergency. The surplus is merely nominal—the balances in the
Exchequer cannot be further reduced,—and even the issue of Exchequer
bonds can be resorted to only to a small extent, in consequence of Mr
Gladstone’s repeated postponement of paying off, as they fell due, the
amounts already in circulation. Over the term of Mr Gladstone’s present
financial administration, as over his previous one, the country will yet
have to write the words, so damnatory of the reputation of a statesman,
_Improvidus futuri_. In the present aspect of affairs, we begin to think
anew of his Budgets before the Crimean War; and we can only hope that
the year 1864 will not be like 1854, and that the country will not find
itself again in straits and embarrassments like those which proved
wellnigh overwhelming ten years ago.
_Printed by William Blackwood & Sons, Edinburgh._
-----
Footnote 1:
‘Prehistoric Man; Researches into the Origin of Civilisation in the
Old and the New World.’ By Daniel Wilson, LL. D., Professor of History
and English Literature in University College, Toronto; Author of the
‘Archæology and Prehistoric Annals of Scotland,’ &c. Macmillan & Co.,
Cambridge.
Footnote 2:
There is one instance of a fragment of human bone found in company
with these flints, but we have heard doubts thrown on the nature of
this fragment.
Footnote 3:
‘The Life of General Sir Howard Douglas, Bart, G.C.B., G.C.M.G.,
F.R.S., D.C.L. From his Notes, Conversations, and Correspondence.’ By
S. W. Fullom. John Murray, London.
Footnote 4:
Fact.
Footnote 5:
Heldreich (author of ‘An Essay on the Useful Plants of Greece’) finds
it in a single oak forest in Elis.
Footnote 6:
According to the prevalent opinion: the high authority of Decandolle
is the other way; he believes it indigenous in the South of Europe
generally; but the contrary evidence is very strong.
Footnote 7:
It was noted as something semi-prodigious that a palm-tree took root
at Rome, in the temple of Jupiter, on the Capitol, during the war with
Perseus; and another in the pavement of Augustus’s house on the
Palatine.—Ampère, ‘L’Histoire Romaine à Rome.’
Footnote 8:
Diplomatic Correspondence, 1861, 1862. Washington.
Footnote 9:
The _Times_ itself takes this view. After stating that “no one doubts
that Australia, like India, China, and other countries, has
contributed to the prosperity of our trade by developing its own
resources, pastoral, metallic, or otherwise,” it makes this important
admission: “It is also true that Australia and California, by
increasing enormously the quantity of gold in the world, have
diminished its value; so that, _even if the wealth of the country had
not increased, its amount, as represented in gold_ [_i. e._ its value
in money] _would certainly have been larger_.” This alteration in the
value of money since 1853 is the main explanation of the fact which
seems to Mr Gladstone “so strange as to be almost incredible,” but
which he coolly attributes to “the legislation of Parliament setting
free the industry and intelligence of the British people.” This, he
says, is “the real and new cause that has been in operation,” and
which has so marvellously increased the wealth of the country 20 per
cent in eight years! But if this were the case, surely he need not cut
his estimates so fine. A nation that has grown so enormously rich in a
few years’ time could well afford to keep a good balance at its
banker’s—_i. e._, in the Exchequer.
------------------------------------------------------------------------