Sir,--It is precisely thirty years since I was called to the Bar, and
several of my contemporaries have already been elevated to the Bench,
while Sir John Simon, who is considerably my junior, is in the receipt
of a salary probably double that drawn by an ordinary Judge. My earnings
for the last ten years have exempted me from income-tax, but this is but
a poor consolation when I consider that were it not for the caprice of
fortune I should probably be returning £400 or £500 a year to the
Exchequer in super-tax. But not only have I been badly treated in regard
to mental equipment; I have been further handicapped by hereditary
conscientious objection to pay any bills. An annuity of £500 a year, or
only one-tenth of the salary of a Judge, is the minimum that my
self-respect will allow me to accept in payment of the State's
long-standing debt to
Yours faithfully,
William Weir.
The Cruelty of Competition.
Sir,--I confidently appeal for your support in the application for a
grant which I am forwarding to the Prime Minister. My son, aged 14, has
failed to win an entrance scholarship at Winchester and Charterhouse,
not from any fault of his own, but simply owing to the unfair
competition of other candidates more liberally endowed with brains. At a
modest estimate I calculate that the extra drain on my resources for the
next eight years in consequence of this undeserved hardship will amount
to at least £600, which I can ill afford owing to unfortunate
speculations in Patagonian ruby mines--another example of that bad luck
which, in the noble words of the Chancellor Of the Exchequer, it is the
privilege of the prosperous to remedy.