The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1882-12-05 00:00:00

Poet ern* exprtg.

R, DECEMBER sth, 1.882.

A novel and ingenious system of defrauding
the Revenue has, we understand, just been
disclosed, and one which will, doubtless, either
induce the Revenue to take stringent measures
or, maybe, to reconsider their recent beneficial
arrangement of assimilating the postage and
receipt stamps. The cheat was made public by
• gentleman, who, on entering a shop where •
large business is done (not in Dorsetahire), and '
paying his bill, was asked by the shopman
whether he would take a receipt stamp. As the
amount was above forty shillings, he replied,
of course, it would require a stamp, whereupon
the assistant handed him the receipted bill
with a loose undefaced stamp. This would not
do for the honourable customer. " Put it on
the bill and obliterate it," said he. The
ahopman was taken back at such unusual
morality, and he attired the stamp most
reluctantly, remarking " We never put them on,
our customers always prefer to take them." This
is the mixius opf raniii, but it can scarcely be
called the tradesman's fraud, so much as the
customer's. The former pays his stamp in
accordance with the requirements of the Act,
but instead of paying it to the Revenue he
gives it to the customer, who uses it for his
next letter. How this is to be met is • puzzle.

The Madagascar Committee has had an inter-
view with Lord Granville at the Foreign Office to
remonstrate on the subject of the French pro-
posals to annex the whole north:rn sea-board
of the island. There is a growing feeling that
France must be checked by some one ; but
who is to bell the cat 1 We think it wildly
improbable that the United States will interfere
on a question so remotely connected with
American interests, since there are nos American
stations there, while her commercial relations
with the island are quite insignificant Is all
probability the alarm is exaggerated. It is
forgotten that Frewe has more than once
attempted to form settlements on the Island,
but in every case has been repelled by the
unhealthiness of the sea-oosst district, and It is
probable that she will fail again for the same
roman.

Kr. Biggar's breach of promise case which
should have bees heard thbi week or last, has
been postponed until the next sittings. The
friends of the parties, and especially those of
the defendant, are =dolls to compromise the
matter in the interval. But the member for
Cavan holds out against any surrender, and is
wholly indifferent to the general ridicule in
which the hearing of the came must involve
him.

Some of the city companies are wise in their
cederation. When they come to be disestab.
and disendowed there will be lis.tle or
nothing left for the public to appropriate.
Some of the guilds are constantly increasing in
wealth. Every member pays his entrance feik
amounting from £lOO to £3OO, "sad takes it
out" in dinners which he is generally paid for
eating, and social advantages, such as they are.
The surplus capital of such companies either
lies at the bank or is invested in costly build.
ings or squandered in sumptuous festivities.
But the Stationers' Company—membership of
which, by the way is still strictly limited to
persons who are engaged in printing, or
publishing, or bookselling— do not accumulate
wealth. They divide their plunder every year.
As an investment nothing could be more satis-
factory than "taking shires " in this company.
They never pay less than 15 per cent., to say
nothing of dinners and excursions up the river
and the benefits of citizenship.