that a surplus revenue may be expected in the present year of about 2,000,000l.

"That in the revenue so estimated, is included a sum exceeding 5,000,000l. derived from the tax upon income, respecting which an inquiry has been directed to be made by a Committee of this House, on the result of whose labours may depend the future renewal or modification of that important impost.

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That, in this provisional state of the financial arrangements of the country, it appears to this House to be most consistent with a due regard to the maintenance of public credit and the exigencies of the public service, not to make any material sacrifice of public income in effecting such changes as may be deemed advisable in other branches of taxation."

Mr. Disraeli commenced his speech on the 30th of June by observing, that before the close of the session it was important that the House and the country should clearly understand the true state of the finances; but he defied any man to tell his constituents what the facts really were; whether there was a surplus or not; whether the sources of our revenue were permanent or fleeting; and therefore he had thought it his duty to ask the House to enter upon this discussion. At the beginning of the session, the House were congratulated on the advantage of having a financial statement when they met early in February-a financial statement, however, which either in its details, or even in its principles, was not completed at the end of June. There was to be a surplus of about 2,000,000l.; but that surplus was assumed on the expectation that

the House would renew the expiring tax upon income, not merely for three years, but until certain results were obtained which the most sanguine could not expect to be accomplished easily or soon. Considerable controversy had often taken place as to the intentions of the eminent Minister who first reintroduced the tax upon property and income into our modern financial system; considerable doubt as to the actual intentions of Sir Robert Peel-whether, in fact, it was his intention originally that the tax on income should be a temporary tax, or whether that was only a parliamentary pretence on which he introduced a permanent feature into our financial system. The very fact that Sir Robert Peel established his tax on income on so narrow a basis, and that he established exemptions on so considerable a scale, convinced him that in his use of that impost he had no other than a temporary object. But the case was the very opposite with the present Ministry.

"I may be told," said Mr.

Disraeli, "that there was no acknowledgment on the part of the Government that in their financial contemplation the Income Tax was to be a perpetual tax; but I speak in the memory of gentlemen on both sides of the House when I recall to their recollection the long catalogue of financial achievements which the Chancellor of the Exchequer indulged in, which he enumerated to an amazed audience, and the completion of which alone was indicated by him as the term when this country could be freed from the impost. I have great confidence in the vitality of the existing Government. (A laugh.) The many escapes they have bad, the disasters

they have encountered, the crises they have baffled, all indicate the position, that if they are not immortal, they have at least most enduring qualities; and therefore, with regard to the noble Lord and his colleagues, I fully recognise their claims to the post they occupy. But, sanguine as may be their own views of the term of their administration, I do not think that even the Chancellor of the Exchequer could have contemplated his tenure of office to be such as that it would be his for tune to achieve those objects the accomplishment of which he had laid down as the only condition of terminating the tax on income. I may fairly conclude, therefore, that the tax, as now framed, is to be a permanent feature of the financial system of Her Majesty's ministers." Upon the surplus assumed on the continuance of a tax, false, dangerous, and pernicious, as every direct impost which is large, but not of general application, must necessarily be, the Chancellor of the Exchequer had based three measures of importance, and some others of minor interest. Of the Window Duties it might be said, that if it were advisable to revise them it would have been better to simply and completely repeal them. But they did not remit the Window Tax: the Chancellor of the Exchequer, wanting the moral courage -rather the financial courage-to do that, took out of the armoury of a financial Minister one of the most inestimable weapons, and used it for the most futile and meanest purposes. He proposed an imperfect remission-a commutation; and thus he wasted that great resource which was offered by a House Tax on a most limited,

and, comparatively speaking, contemptible result. The reduction of the Timber Duty was said by Sir Charles Wood to be due to the builders of ships in this country. But the interests of that body would have been more properly consulted by allowing them to use the raw materials which they required, in bond, and without payment of the duties. By that means, you would put them in fair competition with the foreigner who brought his ship duty-free into this country,, while the Englishman built his ship subject to a variety of duties. The other propositions of the Budget need not be again dwelt on. "The items," observed the hon. Member, “are familiar to the House. Whatever were their value, it is unnecessary for me to calculate them, because no sooner were they offered than they were withdrawn." (Loud cheers.)

Touching on the subject of agricultural distress, and noting the obligation which lay on Ministers to attempt some relief for that distress which they professed to commiserate, Mr. Disraeli again called on them to make the effort: but in doing so, he did not suggest that they should retract their surrender of the Window Tax-that complete remission of the Window Duties, which he considered a realized result, and which no Government could disturb. Yet if this tax had been retained, and if that agricultural burden-the portion of the Poor Law rate not subject to the control of the ratepayers nor to local administration-had been taken off, it would have been an exemplification of sympathy towards the farmers, that would have gone far to allay that asperity, to soften that animosity, and to terminate those emulations between the rival

interests of the country, which were so much to be deprecated, and the encouragement of which Mr. Disraeli believed had endangered, and was endangering, the very institutions of the State.

Passing in review other financial propositions made during the session, he came to Mr. Hume's motion for a limitation of the Income Tax for one year; and with this vote, he observed, the basis of the Ministers' fairy fabrics gave way, and from that moment the financial condition of the country became a precarious one. What then was the prudent course which under these circumstances should be pursued? The fund from which the proposed remissions were to be made, practically no longer existed; all agreed that the Income Tax, as at present framed, would not be renewed by the House of Commons, and it was a prevailing opinion that none of its odious features could be removed. How then was a deficiency of 5,000,000l. to be met? There were only two modes -by reducing expenditure, or by increasing taxation. Sufficient relief could not be obtained from the former source unless our military armaments were reduced, and this no Minister would dare to propose. Taxation, then, must be increased, and what could be more impolitic, under such circumstances, than to take off 2,000,000 taxes? He and his friends were prepared to support the Ministry in a total repeal of the Window Duty, but they called upon them to transform the House Tax into a complete commutation; and as to the Timber Duty, he hoped they would not persist in their impolitic proposition, but would permit the British shipbuilder to build his ships in bond. Mr.

of

Disraeli concluded by expressing. in a highly-wrought peroration, his conviction that Parliament and the Government were determined to support public credit, and that therefore he submitted these resolutions to the House.

His

The Chancellor of the Exchequer declared that he felt quite unable to extract any practical proposition from Mr. Disraeli's two hours' speech, except the concluding suggestion that it should be allowed to build ships in bond. motion said, repeal no taxes: but his speech said, repeal the Window Tax unconditionally; and then, after the surplus was thus disposed of, his speech concluded with reflections on the necessity of upholding public credit, couched in high-flown language about the empire of the Caesars with its triple crown, the mines of Golconda, pillared palanquins, and other things having as little to do with the question. These poetic fancies were very pleasing, but the House would have better liked to hear the arguments in support of this motion against repealing taxes. Sir Charles felt that he would be justified in dismissing the speech at once, and calling on the House to negative the resolutions; but he would correct some misstatements. The surplus for this year was not uncertain: it was estimated at 1,900,000l., and that was the estimate of it still: it did not depend on the Income Tax, and was uninfluenced by the resolution on Mr. Hume's motion. It was not true that the Government had contemplated the tax as permanent; or that they had said that it ought to continue till the long catalogue of taxes enumerated by Mr. Disraeli were repealed; what he proposed was, the repeal of taxes that impe