The Express.
London, England, 1849-12-24 00:00:00

THE FXPRESS. MONDAY BY
•

Undone.
The day is at hand when the English farmer must
use, that he bas been misled and betrayed by his very
champion ; and that he can never recover, until he
leans to trust himself, and unlearns to trust the
mountebanks of protection.
Hence, we agree with most people in inking
ward with with much anxiety to the par au
and popular events of the coming year. the
objects dour anxiety are not, however, the semi as
those generally entertained. It is not ao much the
triumph of the protectionists that we look to, as
the utter disruption and annihilation of the agricultu-
ral party, and the breaking off of the farmer to some
other party standard and political worship, from that'
which has ruined and beirocked him.
A great and idle cry tag been raised during last year
against those Parliamentary and Financial Reform
Associations which have been making such progress
througheat the kingdom. We published a very able
reporthom the chief of them associations on Saturday,
temperate toe as it was able, and a more calm and
emignehensive expression of civic wants and molests
aim nal& not be found.
" Oir ale didlealties," aye the author of the report,
"enthral, int. In Imam to demenstrate to the assess of
the people that the safkege we pespesid wee the rely attain-
able msesare of reform to be weeded he the mast ; sad,
saoadly, in producing a the minds of the middle claw
the i=1"19•10". iLllllft OringTai that it is lactenbent
ea them to strive for timely limees user we may kereater
aware order, prnmee peprty, end avoid national octave-
slam la neither ragesi, so far as we hem pose, have we
Idled ; and that the woks he retire action, whisk has
bee. effiond airs% of society apes the
lois which we km sot been fruitier, may be pr-
emised in the and salve roar:maim which animates
me. sad the meow ankrasise now mutating the other
aime"
Wait till the farmers take up the question of re-
form, with the agricultural labourers at their back,
and neither their ideas nor their vocabulary will be
found so moderate as this. It cannot be long ere the
farmers find out the humbug of protection—above all,
the humbug of what the protectionists promise them.
Of what use to them, for example, would be a five
shilling duty P How would such a pinching of the
bellies of the whole nation set their accoents right P
With the old system of rents, and yearly tenancy,and
cultivation, and taxation, five shillings a quarter
wield do nothing for them ; no, nor eight shillings.
And yet is there a protectionist in the wide world of
England that dart for a wont extend his sanguine
hopes further P Well might Lord Finwmum ask
at Huntingdon what the farmers would substitute for
the present law, and yet receive no answer. We
have read his lordship's speech with much pleasure,
and only regret that he is so @gnomish as to moat the
championship of what he chooses to call class
llid he expect the corn laws to be repealed by
an impartial weighing of arguments on either aide P
Or does he hope free trade to be defended by flatter-
ing the farmers? Is it not better for all and each to
speak the truth from their own point of view P His
lordship is in the happy position of a landlord who
SW hope for the fanner without surtaxing the
mercantile interest. The present exigencies of the
asejority of the landed interest render it impossible
for their opponents to take the same position towards
them
If we consider humbug number two—the taking ce
the half of local rates i—who does not know that to
throw poor and county expendiore on the Consoli-
dated Fund would merely swamp the revenue, compel
a sweeping income tax, and leave at the same time
the half of than rates left to local taxation, to swell
by lax management to the amount that the whole has
been P
A jealous feeling of the foreign producer may for
the moment blind the farmer to the empty-headed-
ness of the party that promises these things. But
his confidence cannot last. And when he does awaken,
we shall have a movement for financial and parlia-
mentary reform, compared with which all such move-
ments hitherto have been child's play. We there-
fore do not wonder at the eagerness and ac-
tivity of the protectionists at present. They
are like men playing their lam stake ;
and threatened not merely with the loss of what they
stake, but of the power of gambling any users in the
political thimble-rig of party patronage and plow
The more, indeed, we see of these etrugglesbetween
the landlords and their defenders en cue side and the
industrious classes on the other, the mere we foresee
that it will become, not a mere combat of politico-
economic principles, but an electoral struggle—
s collision of popular and of aristocratic interests—
of which the latter are as favoured by the present
working of the constitution as the former are power-
ful in numbers. integrity, and right. We cannot,
therefore, but look upon the Parliamentary and Finan-
cial Reform Association as amongst the foremost
strongholds for defending the popular interests of the
country, not only against public corruption and ex-
penditure, but also against landlord protection.

Ma. COBDIN has jest told the manufacturers at
Bedford some tales about floancial and economical
reform. " You want," be says, " a reduction in the
public expenditure; you want to remove the duties I
wpm tea and upon soap, and that most odious tax on
imowledge—the Excise duty upon paper." We propels
• Seim to-day, and hereafter, what is the operation of
ti st most odious tax ;" a tax so odious that in pro-
Crto its &menet there is none equal to it. It is a
rahich amounts to 50 per mat upon the sewage
4 rise of the article on which it is levied :—but the
unseat is nothing.
'his infamy of this tax consists in the multitude of
posse who are injuriously affected by it. Authors,
pabildmes, artists, newspaper proprietors, printers,
mistimes, type-founders, copperplate and litho-
. printers, card.makers, paper-stainers, paper-
U., are alt directly injured by this duty.
OW it idiots in s item, po Woo-

sidthehle, elle& The pa
mood te manattir eni. errata&
maddaiste, smiths, carlisat"l, 4'67 • 40,1 .
wire-wagions, wool • ,
~I. and
Gaudin the em awe • , ''' , al r ••
ear
these are hr freil:21111 " ..
late which the
Wes& itself. With the rs
pert ' P
kerP'
ma hes extensive dealiep :it will haps ear-
geime thessrporessee to Isere that with thtt-itaa-
thesis" manallesterer his !ewe= are ne
taxarly
s ad
se- i
eztataihe. Formerly the of . „ .
they wife abed op, were of no raise except we
moats.. gheenines Win thee ' discovered
=1 sloth and whit*, they the
available tor the aisaufsotore of a paper,
whisk *the the eh.apases of the raw material,
as he sold at ea ezesediegly low price. Teak of the
golden drains of the Alchemists, what were they to
this process of paper making, by which the vibetesed
Hest waddles materials ore converted into such as
=Lapatasesee as paper,—the mansfectare to
. world is indebted fur its informable, the
itutrumeat ythlek may be said to be to the mind of
alma that whisk the mashies is to his mother web?
Up te 1886 the duty upon pacer was taken accord-
fag to geality. It voted on different dew iptices,
from 23 at 60 per cent upon the finest to 160 or 200
per that. upon the coarsest I A duty so oppressive
led to frauds which no vigilance was able to check,
and which no penalties, however heavy, could prevent.
At this time there was an Excise restriction on the
paper-trade so extraordinary that perhaps it was un-
equalled. The Excise insisted that all third class or
wrapping paper should be made of a particular mate-
rial, and that material, of all other., was tarred rope
If this third clam paper was made of oey other mate-
rial whatever, it was subjected to an additional duty
of 14e. per owl. What in the world, it
will be asked, could be the object of so
absurd and monstrous a restriction? Its inten-
tion was to force upon the manufacturer the
old stores of the government dockyards, and especially
their worn-out cable* ! But inasmuch as, after the
war, rope cables were in a great measure superseded
by chain gables, the real effect was to force the public
to pay au increased price for an inferior article, with-
out patting a single fraction into the pockets of the
government
Nor was this the only effect of this astounding re-
gulation. In sorting rag for the manufacture of the
time papers a large quantity is necessarily thrown
aside in consequence of its inferior quality. This de-
scription of rag makes the best coarse wrapping
paper. Bat, u its use was not permitted in the
manufacture, it was necessarily lost altogether, and,
in proportion to the quantity so lost, the value of
the superior rag was enhanced. Thus, the restriction
to tarred rope had the effect of increasing the price of
the finer papers as well as of the coarser, without,
as we observed before, adding a sliver to the revenue.
But at length this restriction was removed. The
price of " tarred rope" having become excessive
whilst the riper-makers were resTicted to its use,
they naturally exerted themselves to torn it to more
profitable account. By new appliances they were
able to produce from this coarse material a quality
of paper equal to that which fell under the higher
rate of duty. By this application of skill and science
the differential duty became nugatory, fur the higher
qualities of paper were only paying the lowest rate of
duty. Then, and not till then, the Excise opened
their eyes. The injury previously inflicted on the
paper-maker had been nothing, but now that he had
outwitted them, they discovered that be was very
mach oppressed by beiug restricted to manufacture
from" tarred rope,' so they came down to Parliament
with a measure fur his benefit, for which the Chair-
man of Inland Revenue sus now that the paper-
maker ought to be extremely gratefaL Under
the new regulations passed by Parliament in
1836, the tarred rope restriction, and some others
equally absurd, were removed, and the duty upon
paper was equalised without reference to quality.
The manufacturer thenceforward was permitted to
use any materials he pleased, and as the same
rate of duty was levied upon all descrip-
tions of paper, one great and fertile source
of fraud upon the revenue was removed.
As it is with all other Excise duties, so with the
duty upon paper,—it falls upon those least able to bear
its pre. The duty is now a uniform duty of
three halfpence per lb., levied entirely by weight,
without any reference to quality. Tea duty, there-
fore, fare upon the coarser paper, which is the heaviest
in weight and at the same time the lowest in price.
IThis. paper is principally used in commerce for
I packing pupate,. its consumption is relatively
far pester than is the consumption of paper used
for writing purposes. Or late years also, in conse-
quence of the new postal arrangementsof Great Britain
the thinner writing papers have oats into very
greatly increased consumrioo. On these the duty
is so small as to be scarcely appreciable ; whilst on
the coarse brown papers used in trade it is so con-
siderable as to amount to 75 per tent upon their
vales. The duties are estimated to fall in the follow-
ing unequal proportions : 1
Oa thin foreign correspondence paper .... i per met.
On printing paper
Oa vaillbawd, as. 661 OP
Oa brown wrapping paper 74 „
Thus this tax presses heavily where it can least be
borne, and touches lightly where it might well be
rested. This is injury the second ; and one of great
importance. The mode of levying this tax, al-
though improved, is still most obnoxious. It
is levied with a multiplicity of detail known
only in the department of the Excise. The
duty is taken upon every single ream : and
every single ream has to be weighed and stamped,
I it=and made up, and labelled, and endorsed, and
, and entered, in a particular and special man-
Ma; and if there is the slightest infraction of the Ex-
etas regulations as to any one of these particulars and
details, the board is immediately down upon the manu-
facturer for a penalty.
In all the departments of machinery there is per-
haps no implement more beautiful, more wonderfut, or
mere perfect, than the machine into which a creamy
bid pulp flows at one end with unerring precis' on,
Imolai from it at the other in the shape of en endless
gado pest 7—dried, polished, cut round all the edges,
sal vened completely fit for use. Yet even in this
maim combining as it does all that intelligence and
shill sea seemingly apply to such a purpose, there
the a thousand minutia which afford scope for those
sanddiary improvements and corrections which the
modem eye and brain of man is for ever suggesting
la all that is material and mundane. It is not long
ego that Mr. DICIUKBON, of Hertfordshire, one of our
meat intelligent mechanists and most extensive paper-
maims, appiMi air-pumps to the paper machine, by
the maim of which he produced a partial vacuum
aahr a pardon of the wire gauze on width the peer
pap ensolidates. By this contrivance the speagy
I ealistease is prepared instantaneously for its first
falbalkal pressure, and a serious difficulty is
obviated in the working of the machine. An-
odise improvement, made by the same person, was the
laying together of two webs of paper, each made by
a separate process, in such a way as to render them
. This paper is used in coppm,plate '
reiral;l4,land its introduction has put ato stop to
the importation of a species cf French paper, which
was formerly used in considerable quantities by
copper-plate engravers. A third invention of Mr.
DICLISSON was to embody coloured threads in the
fabric of paper, such as those which are to be met
with in postage envelopes and Exehequer bills.
Now, all these and other ingenious improve-'
meats necessarily re qu're some degree et
secrecy experimenting, with a view to bring them
to perfection, and to ensure to the inventor
the reward of his ingenuity. Bat the Excise system
opposes a hindrance to this. The Excise offline
and surveyor are entitled to enter and inspect
every part of every mill, under any chime-
stances and at any time that they think right. They
are able to watch every proceeding and to call every
manufacturer to account. The slightest attempt
at mystery only excites their suspicions and makes
them more obnoxiously inquisitive. The result is
evident. No attempt at secresy can be successful. The
Itheisemsa may report at one paper-mill everything
that be sees at another, detailing the progress d every
tell, the difficulties encountered and overcome, sad
the (Imre, of perfection which has been WAN&
The =Moaner feels that he has a spy on his every'
ant; that he is under an "evil eye;" and that
his every action is watched by the Ewa*, cot, which
Bee ready to pounce upon and gess him. It is only
men with the perseverance and fortitude of Mr.
Dwane= who oould succeed in the fun of such
biehause. Ninety-nine manufacturers out of every

bridged may be—es they are--daunted by snob
ties....
I ildr ui4odtherric:7'anteTsci"l7lre 441.2fipi1:
a psculi ,suite Ole motive the ions
nestioas.
Talbotyge. The 'pemlactiort or4eraoh al
rittptirsahe a pee* extent la neve' room.
=Lathe Deese at the piper mill when the
hooking at tte &at."( the room in which
this Meadaetwma was -411110.11-111 his_ex=
meats, found Abe key teramlogt diloo
within is eontedea andpeetosidisa la she of
'distswaryot .2MIO-Insirrilallft-WArrera
essOureble isipse:sielegilshstass home
is his Castle l'r 11 nod ilmWnelsoiht. &the free
Brim ! Enter the dogmas sad test its value and
veracity ! CTOIS4CLAMite the " Free Britqa " uto
all that he is doing : stop his mill : impede his mann-
failure : threaten " a @mare" of his premises and " a
report far penties:stalk oftheArroarne-Glinsaa.:
wind np 'with an allusion to the Star Chamber
Court of "Exchequer;" sad then p forth and
report to the nearest rival in the trade all that you
have heard and seen in the mill which you have 1,1_,r
and receive from him, if he is equally dishwww4 with
yourself, your reward for informing him of all that
his competitors are doing!