The Press.
London, England, 1857-05-30 00:00:00

LONDON, SATURDAY, MAY 30, 1857.

Wa must acknowledge, that we have been
perfectly amazed at the revelations in Lord
MALmEsauftv's exposure of the astounding
extravagance of our Civil expenditure. We
read the Noble Earl's speech with the
attention due to hts rank and consideration
as a practical statesman ; but it is only
when we have the returns actually in our
hands that we can fully estimate the value
attaching to Lord MALMESBURY'S most impor-
tant statement. The astonishment we feel
pervades every rank of society. The middle
classes have the Noble Lord's speech by
heart, and there is reason to believe that the
patriotic ten-pounders, who exult in " Sir Ben-
jamin the Magnificent" having at last got a
title, are beeinning to frown and get sulky at
finding what Sir BENJAMIN'S most particular
friends have been doing with the public money
during the last ten years.
Nothing, however, shows the effect of Lord
MALMESBURY'S speech more strongly than the
tone taken by Lord JOHN RUSSELL in his speech
on Monday night. The Noble Lord talked of
" the frightful increase in the Civil expendi-
" ture of late years." Whenever Lord JOHN
RUSSELL sees a rising cause, the Noble Lord
at once makes a desperate plunge to get the
management of it, and talk out its exciting
generalities. Whether it be " Reform " or
"Justice to Ireland " on one side, or " Papal
Aggression" on the other, so that it be stimu-
lating and popular, Lord J RUSSELL will always
try to get hold of and extract '• popularity "
from the question. It has been said that " Lord
"JOHN RUSSELL is always landing at Torbay to
" deliver some ideal Englishman from a griev•
" ante." But to us the Noble Member for
London seems as if he were always rushing to a
platform to say something sharp or striking,
in order to carry off the honours of the struggle
from those who had borne the heat of the day.
In the present instance the Noble Lord did
not say a word about " frightful expenditure "
until after the facts of Lord MAL3teseenv's
speech had been fermenting in the public mind
for ten days ! Lord JOHN RUSSELL also forgot
to ask himself who was in office during the
last ten years? The Tory party had a few
months of power, and the friends of " Reform "
and " Progress" held power during the period
of this "frightful increase of the Civil expen-
diture." It is not the first time that Lord
JOHN RUSSELL, in trying to snatch a first posi-
tion for himself, in presence of the public eye,
has deeply committed his friends. His testi•
mony, however, in the case so powerfully made
by Lord MALMESBURY we are willing to accept.
He is " Queen's evidence " upon the " jobbery
of Liberalism."

Waiving these points, we shall at once pro-
ceed to illustrate some of the positions taken
up by Lord MALMESBURY. Last week we
showed the extraordinary expenditure on the
royal parks, and we quoted returns to prove
that when the Conservatives were in office

the expenditure was less than while the
Liberals were in power. We shall now go
through the tables seriatim The returns made
in obedience to the order of the House of
Lords of 16th February confess to the follow-
ing figures. " Civil Services, usually termed
Miscellaneous " :-
1846 X3,482,486
18)6 6,7.24,2,50

That is to say, on the last ten years, as ad-
mitted by the returns (p. 3), there has been
an increase in the Civil expenditure to the
enormous sum of 3,241,764/. ! _

And yet gentlemen. with faces quite inno-
cent of " the jabbery of Liberalism " (though
several of their supporters and constituents
have not their hands clean from this excessive
expenditure), attempt to say that Lord
NIALMESBURY took an exaggerated viow of the
case. They hold debate, forsooth, on the
question whether the eldest Royal child of the
most illustrious daughter of the House of
Brunswick ought to receive a moderate mar-
riage dowry of 40,0001, and 8,0001. a year, and
they have sac by complacently while in the
last ten years the increase in the Miscellaneous
Estimates has reached THREE MILLIONS AND A
QUARTER!

Let us now see how this prodigious outlay
has been incurred. Turning to " Class 2 "
(pp. 4,5), under the head of " Salaries, &c.,
Public Department," we come to the modest
item of " Stationery," which has progressed at
a pace by no means corroborative of its name.
In fact, one might surmise that some " fast "
officials must have rule over the manage-
ment of those innocent little " &c., &c." In
1846, the charges for " Stationery " reached
249,0701., and in 1856 they rose to 458,2751.,
being an increase of 209,1991.
But we may be told to " recollect the war."
We do so, and we reply that the whole charges
of stationery to be debited to the country are
not included in this table of " Miscellaneous
Estimates." We answer; besides, that it is
utterly impossible that an army in the Crimea
and a fleet in the Baltic could possibly have
augmented the demand for public stationery
to the enormous rate of eighty-four per cent. on
whathad been paid in 1846. Let it be recollected
that officers and men of both services, and
their correspondents at home, paid for their
own postage, and for their own private sta-
tionery. How is it possible that such an enor-
mous increase of eighty-four per cent. could
have legitimately occurred in the public
stationery merely upon the official correspon-
dence of the war? The other departments of
the State consumed rather less stationery
during the war than at other periods. The
orders, counter-orders, and replies, could never
honestly have mounted up to such a sum as is
charged in this account.
A quarter of a century has not elapsed since
in this department of " Public Stationery "
there were considerable frauds, and we must
say that we should like to see a more particular
account of these prodigious " &c., &c.," which
figure in this return. The positive increase
is set down here, but we must add that the
relative increase is still greater. Has not there
been a great falling off in the quality and style
of the stationery used in the public depart.
ments ? So far as our own observation goes,
we should say that the quality
,of the paper
used in expediting Her Majesty & Service has
decidedly become inferior, and our opinion
on the matter is confirmed by other ob-
servers. It is worthy of notice, also, that the

We now proceed to the "third class," tabu-
lated under " Law and Justice," and our
readers may prepare to be amazed. In 1838
the country was charged under this head with
the sum of 591,9141, and the charges mounted
in 1850 to the enormous sum of 2,257 083/. !
In round numbers, since 1838, there has been
an increase of nearly a million and three quarters
of money in this one department ! We know how
troublesome lung rows of statistics are to the
eye. and we shall put the matter as simply as
we can before our readers. We shall take two
dates, and contrast the expenditures under
this head. We shall first take 1816, the year
when the Conservative party left °thee, and
the last year :