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Leader (1850-1860), 17th November 1860, Edition 2 of 2, Page 6, A SLIGHT REVOKE. rr^HERE aro few things ...

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      How To Diminish Our Annual Expenditure. ...

      state of the national defences , we shall require to lay out £ 11 , 850 , 000 in the course of the next four years , in . addition to the sums required to meet the ordinary expences of Governm ent . It therefore hecomes a matter of the utmost importance to inquire , whether there are any means within our reach , which will enable us to diminish the national expenditure and lighten the heavy burden of taxation . The interest of the public debt absorbs about two-fifths , of the annual revenue ; the expenses of the army and navy . swaHow up other two-fifths ; and the remaining fifth is expended w maintaining the civil government of the country . The first of these sources of expenditure we cannot , of course , reduce : nor can we , in the present threatening state of the political horizon of Europesafely attempt to diminish the second ; while the sums

      , expended in maintaining the civil service of the Home Government cannot be . said to be extravagant , or to admit of any material reduction . But there is one direction in which it appears to us that some change and some retrenchment might safely and easily be effected , and that is , in the expenditure connected with the maintenance and protection of our colonies , and we should like to see the attention of our legislators turned in this direction during the ensuing session of Parliament . The prosperous state of most of our colonies and dependencies ought , ere long , to make them independent of all support from' mother country , or , at least , able and willing to pay for that support which they actually receive ; and it is surely worth while inquiring , whether a considerable reduction might not be effected in the grants

      now made for the salaries of their governors and magistrates , and also in the large sums now voted for their defence , in conformity with the recommendation of the committee on the military defences of the colonies . Our colonies comprise an area of about six millions of square miles , and , exclusive of India , cost us iipwards of £ 4 , 000 , 000 per annum . They now enjoy a very large measure ^ of self-government , are lightly taxed , and , except in the case of British India and Canada , are unencumbered by the pressure of a national debt . Our North American colonies , which are in the most prosperous condition , and which , in 1859 , took £ 3 , 600 , 000 of British and Irish manufactures , annually entail on the national exchequer an expenditure of £ 500 , 000 for fortifications , barracks , regular troopsand naval chargesfor governors and ecclesiastical affairs ,

      , ^ besides a portion of the expense of the packet service and a portion of the expense of the fleet on the North American station . Our West Indian colonies are also very costly ; draining the British Exchequer of upwards of £ 600 , 000 per annum to pay their governors and justices , their ecclesiastical establishments , their troops and fortifications . Our vast possessions in Australia , with an annual income of £ 6 , 000 , 000 , and an expenditure of £ 5 , 000 , 000 , yet cost the mother country half a million per annum ; while our African colonies entail upon us an outlay of no less than a million annually ; and Ceylon , Labuan , and Hong Kong , cost £ 450 , 000 . Lastly , we come to India , the richest and most important of our colonial possessions , with a trade , counting exports and imports , amounting to £ 55 , 000 , 000 , and a revenue of t

      £ 32 , 000 , 000 . Unfortunatel y the expenditure greatly exceeds he revenue , and has been rapidly increasing . The outlay for military purposes has increased from £ 11 , 000 , 000 in 1855 , to £ 19 , 500 , 000 in 1859 ; and the home charges , duringthe same period , have risen from £ 2 , 500 , 000 to £ 6 , 000 , 000 . But it must be remembered that thirtytwo millions of taxes in a population of 170 millions , is an unprecedented light taxation , scarcely amounting to < Ls . per head ; while the taxation in this country is £ 2 2 s . per head , and in Kussia , the most lightly taxed country in Europe , 12 s . per head . It is clear , therefore , that , by a more thorough system of taxation , India might easily be made to defray her own expenses . The colonies of other European nations , although not enjoying that degree of liberty and self-government which we haye wisely accorded to ours , are yet often obliged to pay the whole expenses of their government and defence . To take but one prominent instance— -that of Cuba , tho

      brightest gem in the colonial diadem of Spain . There , although the native planters and merchants aro deprived of all political power and influence , which are the exclusive property of tho Spanish governor and Spanish officials , they are yet obliged to defray the whole expense of the colonial establishment , both civil and military , and to remit , besides , the surplus revenue—generally amounting to upwards of a million annually—to the Spanish treasury . Surely , then , we are not making 1 an unreasonable suggestion when we propose that our own colonies , where the inhabitants enjoy the same privileges and the same freedom as ourselves , and where they aro in , general well able to pay tho expenses of their civil and military government—should be required either to defray the whole of their expenses , or at least to pay tho largest proportion of thorn , and thus relievo tho revenue of the mother country of a heavy expenditure , which it can but ill afford , and which it ought not injustice toi be culled upon to bear .

      J 942 The Saturday Analyst And Leader. [...

      j 942 The Saturday Analyst and Leader . [ Nov . 17 , 1860

      A Slight Revoke. Rr^Here Aro Few Things ...

      A SLIGHT REVOKE . rr ^ HERE aro few things more unpleasant than to bo obliged to JL retract or modify praise—bufc it must sometimes be done for Truth ' s sake . The Neapolitan correspondent of tho Times is , we believo , an Englishman , and can have no motive , that wo aro aware of , to detract from the credit of his countrymen , Yot wo had Bcafcely printed our romurks on tho beneficial effect on Italian feeling 1 towards England , in consequence of the co-ioporation of our countrymen , and on tho bearings of tho co-operation , when wo read , in tho ^ Neapolitan correspondence , to the following' effect , vi « , that the English residents regret , likely to result from tho misconduct of tho English . Volunteer Corps , or of many of its members ,

      that such a corps was ever formed—that some of them are " loafing " or idling about the streets of Naples—that others have been guilty of certain excesses , which the writer declines naming that . the corps is dwindling away , and will , probably , soon cease to exist , its better members enrolling themselves in the several regular Sardinian regiments . That a portion of our countrymen have done us , and will continue to do us honour , there can be little doubt , whilst we most sincerely regret that any should have detracted by their misconduct from the general credit . Unfortunately , in the case of our countrymen , it is always most dangerous to risk anything like praise of a general description . If in firing a salvo in their honour , we in the slightest degree overload our piece * we are sure of a sharp recoil on our shoulder , if we are not fairly knocked over . The liberty which gives a free path to the wise or the brave , makes an arena , too , for Marplots ,

      mountebanks , and vauriens . There is not a good article in our shops of which there is not some cheap and rubbishing imitation ; we cannot have a fine five-act piece , without some farce at the end of it . There is somebody or something to blot our fairest pages . Do we open trade with a new country , as Japan , and congratulate ourselves and our country upon it , " the next news is that a set of English vagabonds are disgracing us in the eyes of our newly-acquired friends by infamous bullying and extortion . The Volunteer movement goes on most honourably und respectably , excepting only that little canine affair ( which , by-the-by , only Englishmen would have blundered into ) . The continent looks On the movement with respectful eyes , when some injudicious youngsters , whose best excuse may be that it is only in their Volunteer capacity that their parents will allow them pocket-money , or trust them in Paris , desire to trot their uniforms on the Boulevards . If we do not fail in principle , we take care to fail in taste , judgment , or discretion .

      Selection—Tails, Toys, Caoutchouc. Ih Wh...

      SELECTION—TAILS , TOYS , CAOUTCHOUC . IH what a flutter is an ordinary man ' s heart , when lie fancies that he is on the point of proving his title to a Peerage All kinds of things—old tombstones ,, for instance , as in the famous Tbacy case , are brought in evidence . With " a strange kind of inverted ambition ; " others are in an ccstacy at the chance of finding , if they leave no stone or stratum unturnedby infinite pains , that they are descended from a molluse , or from that primitive worm that has scrawled or crawled his autograph upon the " Cambriun . " To these the text , "lama worm , and no man , " probably appears to contain a greater mystery of truth than any other in the volume which some of us receive as inspired . We suppose that a good genealogist Avould value his personal skill more than his family pride , and admit , it needs were , a *•/* . per coll . in his lineage , rather than miss a link or make a blunder . It is some reward to find that if we belong

      to a family that has no dignity , we belong to one that has no responsibilities . If we are doomed " Downwards to climb , and backwards to advance , " may we go at last right through the granite on a philosopher ' s back , as Dante did on the old serpent ' s , and passing the centre come up at last to some antipodean heaven , and bo able to exclaim , . , „ " E quindi useitnnio a riveder le stelle . If any reader asks what this has to do with our main subjects , we reply , that we make use of tho popular princip le ) ot " selection , " and that tho link of connection botweon what we is at least oh

      have said and what wo are going- to say , as strong that between a man and a Japan lizard , in its ? supromo devqlopment , or a monkoy . The Rabbis were boforehaud , in ono respect , with Lord Monboddo and the devolopmentarians ; they said that Adam was born with a tail ; also , we believe , that ho was of a green colour , but that is less to our purpose . Whon watching the young of othor oreaturea amusing themselves unweanedly with 1 heir—natural playthings—wo have sometimes been absorbed in rofleotion upon the harder lot of tho human uivoni e whioh has boon loss liberally endowed , and which doponds so muob . on the generosity of others for its instruments ot entertainment . We have boon oven , tempted to think that a toil murht have beon arranged , calculated to servo ail tho purposos ot childhood , and dropping oil ; like that of tho tadpole , at the approach of adolosoeneo , and so , in as small a dtigrou as possible , compromising tho dignity or throwing doubt upon the origin oi man . "What a savinff of expense to unoles and aunts ! ol lniuuc

      quarrels about possession ! of uarontal invontions to proHorve quiet and provido aniuHomont ! what an csoapo for over trom thoso (< tlons / uuitilw , " malicious prowonts from false and protended friends to the infants of norvous parents , suoh as smnii trumpets and drums , and penny ( libs and whistles , utcouy destructive of family comfort . . - ,, But , compared with nature ' s windom , ours is mure toiij . " Necessity is tho mother of invention , " and the toy-uooosfluy has put broad into the mouths of muny poor littlo itngusii , Dutoh , and German children , whaj : is play to us , being vwtua J to thorn . Go to tho Lowthor-aroado ; what ohoapnoatt ! wnai ingenuity ! what splendour ! Could tlxo cannibal himsoll ciohho anything more tempting and gaudy wherewith to bait liw wap » for tho suaoulent but wandering and incautious ohiiaron oi » hostile tribe ? What ondloss purchases for a shilling i A ^ J ' J ; then to the toy-buyers , toy-brokers , and toy-broakors , on wnoin tSe two former depend ; may the playthings of tho junior poition

  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), Nov. 17, 1860, page 6, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_17111860/page/6/