The Express.
London, England, 1849-01-01 00:00:00

IRELAND.

DUBLIN, Ditc. 31.
A requisition to the Right Rev. Dr. Delany, from
a krge number of the Rol** Catholics of Cork, has
induced his lordship to &avail, a meeting of his
spiritual subjects fur Tuesday Lext, to cor.sider the
position of toe Pope, and to concert and adopt such
measures as the deprivation of the temporal resources
of the Pontiff would seem to call fur. The extent to
which the Catholic religion prevails in Cork—
the numbers, wealth, and importance of the
body of its professors there, would stem to
point to it as a !king locality in which to originate
a movement such as the position of the spiritual
head of their church on earth, would seem not unna-
turally to call for. The little steps taken upin the sub-
ject in Du'Mn have been a failure. It remains to be
seen whether a similar result will follow thae now
to be taken to Cork. It is understood that a pecu-
niary contribution will form one of the proposi-
tions to ho submitt. d at the intended meeting.
The county of Monaghan has been the tt etre of a
couple of outrages this week, such as unusually
disturb its quietude. One of them was perpretated
on a memberof that much disrel:shed class—tno land
bailiff. In the other case, the object was a Mr.
Kerr, an extensive butter buyer in the local markets.
The object was plunder, but although Mr. Kerr had
over 2601. on his person, the robbers could only
discover 111. They b-at Lim severely.
A new workhouse is about being built at Bere-
haven, Cork.

DIRECT AND INDIRECT TAXA-
TION CONTRASTED.

A LET:TER has been addressed to Mr. (2.4blen by the
secretary of the " National Confederati ,n for an Equit.
abl - Adjustment of National and Local Toxati.m,'
hich, with some few omissions, we now publish.
The principles which the society is formed to carry
cut are, ler, that ell nec.ssasy taxation shall be t goit-
aril), adjusted, and be direct. 2, That capitelis
of income shall be t.e basis of assessment. 3. That
economy and retrenchment in the public expenditure
be enforced.

" It is quite easy to conceive, that if a :ma of the
middle or wurkiug classes were told, and understood, '
that while ureter the indite et system of taxa ion, ho
pays from twenty-five to fify per cent. of hie earnings
to support an extravagant system of government,
while the man of wealth pays not above five percent.,
he would, under a system of direct taxation, pay only
in proportion to his means, the wealthy man doing
precisely the same, to then would require no maim-
far dein eu of instruction to convince him of the justice
and advantage of a system of direst taxation; and
so of the millions who are similarly cireum-
sfanced luke the attempt to increase
the income-tax lost. year as an instance; the
nation was at once up in arm., because it saw at a
glance the magnitude of the contemplated infliction.
The historian's panegyric is the hilosapher'a con-
demnation, and pel•tical economists are but too
often the waypoes which do not point out the right
road. Wheu Alison undertook to record facts, he
was under no necessity to violate common sense in
his illustrations; end when M'Culloch informed us
that we were a heavily-taxed people, we could have
been van d the irony conveyed in his assurance,
' that it was to our advantage we should be so. It is
evident that if direct taxation have no other dis-
advantage attending it than that described by
Alison, and if indirect taxation have no other re
commendation than that which he volunteers in its
favour, then his censure is praise, and his praise
censure. Speakis g of direct taxation, he says,
" Mille the indirect taxes, which are paid without
being felt, or for.otten in the enjoyment of the ob-
jects on which they are laid, it (direct taxation)
brir.gs the bitterness of taxation in undisguised
nakedness to every individual, and produces, in con-
sequence, a degree of discontent and exasperation,
which nothing but the excitement of continual war-
fare, or a Renee of uncontrollable necessity, can in-
duce a nation to bear." From this it would appear
that the morality of the principle of indirect taxa-
tion, or of the amount levied, is secondary to the
question of facility of exaction, while the direct
system is condemned, because a man is made aware
of the precise amount of his obligations while he is
in his sober sense 4! There could nut be a more bitter
satire on the folly of the people who submit, or on the
selfishness of the powers who inflict. How truly he
pourtrays the character of the stimulaies which are
necessary to make taxation popular, and no questions
asked ! But the practice of drugging, with a view to
robbery, is in the category of crime. Discontent end
exasperation would be the consequencee, he says, but
for the excitement of continued warfare. No doubt of
it ; this holds enod of either eysten, when it becomes
oppressive. Wars have been crrried on to substrve
special interests, and the people have now to pay for
them, and so will generations yet unborn; and when
wars cannot be got up, then we have rumours of' wars
and prospects of invaeion, which ere considered the
second best means whereby to keep up the " excite-
ment," so that the army is increased, the navy is in-
creased, and aristocratic necessities are thereby pro-
v:ded for. And then there is the affair of the national
defences, with the supplementary episode of " the
continental complications," all intended to keep up
that very excitement which Mr. Alison so much de-
siderite, that the people may not see " the bitter-
ness of taxation in undisguised nakedness."
But Mr. M'Culloch does not condescend to offer
any each apology for the one or the other system of
taxation. He at once proclaims that our burdens are
a blessing, being calculated, as he facetiously ex-
presses it, to draw out our energies; and, according
to him, the more heavily taxed, the more happy
ought we to be. There can be no limit to our pros-
perity, according to him, so long as a soffieient weight
of taxation is placed on the industry of the country.
Mr. M'Culloch tells us that "even the magnitude
of our rational burdens, which, to a superficial ob-
server, might appear to be a heavy drawback on our
exertions, has really been a means of adding. to their
efficiency. Had they been oppressive, their opera-
tion, no doubt, would have been very different ; bat it
was seen that they might be met by increased exer-
tions, and these have been made; they have, in fact,
operated on the public like an increase of the neces-
sary expenses of his family on a private individual,
and occasioned efforts of industry, economy, and in-
vention that have more than counteevailed their in-
fluence, and which we should lave in vain attempted
to produce by any Issip powerful means." But Mr.
M'Culloch forgot vp state how many who have
started on the meekly. failed by the way, weary and
heart-broken • how many have reached the pnson,
how many the poor-house; how many have died early,
how many have suffered late, or what the sum of
human misery which human ear has never heurd of,
all as the fruits, the bitter fruits, of these same na-
tional burdens of which he seems so much enamour:.
And Porter is found to support the same doctrine.
He rye, speaking of Kee schemes to raise money
by a tax on income, "Indeed it has always excited
dissatisfaction on the part of the public to be called
on for the payment of any tax from which they have

net the power to protect themselves by abstaining
hues the nee of the taxed. eqpimotty, It u. the
consideration which has always made our finance mi-
misters prefer indirect to direst taxation, and which
led, during the progress of a long and expensive war,
to the imposition of duties that weighed with destruc-
tive force upon the springs of industry."
" la the following December an income tax was
imposed, at the rate of ten per antupon all in-
come aoroar.ting to 2001. and upwards, with
diminishing rates upon smaller incomes, down to 601.
per annum, below which rate the tax was not to
apply." In March, 1802, this income tax was re-
pealed, " and, at the same time additional taxes
were imposed on beer, malt, and hops, and a con-
siderable increase was made to the assessed taxes ;
besides which, an addition, under the name of a modi-
fication, was made to the tax on imports and export',
previously known under the name of the convoy
duty."
There is fallacy after fallacy, and too close an adhe-
rence to mere official truth, in this statement of Mr.
Porter's. A tax must be assumed to be necessary
before it is imposed, and it then-fore can be no object
of Parliament to confer the power to avoid the pay-
ment of that tax by abstaining from the use of the
taxed commodity. The converse cf this position we
must hold to be the correct one; so that the resort
to indirect taxation from direct, must have been
suggested by some less scrupulous motive. We
have the solution or the difficulty in the simple fact
that the landed and monied interests of that day
found it of advantage to themselves to throw their
own prover liabilities on the shoulders of every
man,woman, and child in the country, and that—with
the desire to prevent the " bitterness of taxation
being brought in utdisguised nakedness" before the
pzople, was the consideration which induced Pitt
and other minWers after him, to prefer indirect taxa-
tion. The landed and monied interests were their
masters, and they had but the alternative of obedience
or discharge. As will be observed, up to 1802, par-
ties of certain income had to meet the amount covered
by the income-tax ; but they were powerful—they
were the electors,—the landed, the monied, and re-
spectable trading interests, who could, with facility,
tarn out a ministry. They had to be conciliated, and
this was done at the expense of the unenfranchised
millions, who, deemed unworthy of the distinction of
freemen, could yet consume the taxed beer, and could
pay for it ; •ho could consume the taxed articles im-
ported, and could pay for them.
That I believe to be the true reading of Mr. '
Porter's laboured apology for ir.direct taxation, past
and present.
Let me turn to a more grateful task than that of
criticism. Under the operation of the direct system
of taxation, the law-makers and the Government
would be economical for their own sakes. When
they spent they themselves would pay, and pay
largely. To the man of twenty or thirty thousand
pounds a ytar, who may now, if he chooses, pass oil
on a payment of 1,000!. per anntimeto the state, er
less if he has a mind, it is of very trifling moment
if threepence or sixpence be placed on a :pound of
tea ; he votes for it for the sake of supporting the
state, as he says, but he is in the way of receiving
a double advantage from this exercise of his patriot-
ism. 'Thor: is the army, the navy, the church, the
colonies, and not a few commissions at home. He
has a brother, a son, or some other relative, who, of
course, is qualified for either, as the vacancy may
happen to arise; and then, if real danger there be
to the country, he gets his property, which yields
him his 30,0001. a-year, protected and sustained iu
value, at an additional cost of an increase ion his tea
of 3d. or 6.1. per pound ! But that would not cover
the proportion ot increased expense for protecting
his property ; and as ho does not pay for its protec-
tion, ',me other person must; and that other Per-
ron, and the millions in the same station of life, are
the parties who, out of their soauty earnings, chit fly
support the state and its reckless extravagance, in-
dustry paying, in one way or other, little short of
fifty millions, ettoinst the balance of four millions,
or so, paid by real property. Direct taxation would,
by equalising the burthen, place on the shoulders of
each man his proper share, and each man would pay
precisely according to the stake he had in the
country, and would know what the government
cost him. If we want economy, there is the
course to ensure it, and to ensure it effectually
and permattently. Again I must repeat, make
your law makers and rulers pay their just shares of
the public bnrthens, and their own sufferings and
necessiti.3 will make them economical. In their very
selfishness the country will have a guarantee for
protection, and industry a guarantee for the enjoy-
ment of its reward.

Had my limits! permitted, I should have endet-
vourcd to show how the industry of the country
is borne down by the indirect system of taxation,
and how it would be benefited by the adoption of
the direct. but it is the purpose of the Na Tonal
Confederation to enter into a consideration of the
whole 106(.0..
There are a few facts on the surface which can at
once be appreciated. The cost of the necessaries of
life would be rt dnced by the change, not to the ex-
tent of the duty alone, (witness the case of salt,
which bare a 30s. duty, with a selling price of 40..
but wilieh fell when the duty was taken off, rot
to 10s.' b.t to 3s. 6d.,) but from twenty-five to
thirty per cent. beyord, on an average, which is
now added to cover profits on duties and other out-
lay', ocersiontd by tee existing system, so that
a man could live in this country as comfortably on
moderate meats as he could in any other country in
the world, while now his existence is but ono con-
, ticued struggle between state-created poverty and
his desire to maintain a respectable position. Mer-
chants and tradesmen could carry on their present
business on one-half the capital now required, or
do double the business on the same capital.
The salvation of the country from a state of pro.
gressive paurerism, and the laying the founda-
tion for a new order of things which shall convert a
scene of desolation into a field full of promise and
hope, are purposes which the Council of the Con-
federation feel assured will enlist the beat aid and
the warmest sympathies of all leading men, whether
in parliament or out of it, whose highest ambition it
must be to contribute ti the realization of so glorious
a consummation.—l have the honour to be, sir, yourr,
very obediently,
J. M. NiACDONALD., Secretary.
Liverpool, Dec. 28, 1848.

ANNUAL AGRICULTURAL REPORT.
DICEMBIR 1848. _ _ _

The following report is extracted from the Juurnal
of Agriculture of the Highland Society :
The year IBM will effurd a memoiable page in the history
of Europe. While many elation have been distracted by
political convulsions, Britain hes only been visited by
meteorological eccentricities. What the ultimate effect of
those c,mvulrinns may be, produe_d as they have been by the
unbridled passions of men, we cannot anticipate, but the
offsets of atainspherical disturbance, however eccentric, rosy
be estimated, because produced'-by the ree ignised laws of
asters. . .

.
January was cold and dry, indicating a good approaching
seed time. February proved fresh and very wet, interfering
with the spring wheat and bean seed time. March was
drier, though cull wet and fresh, and unfavourable to a good
oat seed. April, still drier, and higher in temperature,
and favourable for the barley seed. May proved
the driest, warmest, and meet beautiful month of
the season; and, indeed, its three weeks of fine
weather constituted the only summer we enjoyed. The
sudden heat and drought after the rain rendered the land
hard to work ; on which account the Swedish turnips by no
means received a favourable seed bed. A severe thunder
storm in the early part of June, broke the spell of the fine
weather, and immediately after, June proved a very
wet and cold month. July, though not so wet or
quite so cold, was equally unseasonable. The rain and
cold increased in August considerably. September
was as dry as January, and the temperature was
about that of August, and allowed a large pert of
the crop to be carried in good order. October, usually a
bright and pleasant month, proved wet, and the fried became
intense for several days in succession. The heat of May
tended powerfully to raise tee average thermometrical terns
perature of the tenon, though the weather was always cold
to the feelirge ; but its character was decided throughout
for extritordmere wetness, the tall being in the ratio to hil-
-1 year of 49 99 inches to 3.5 inches.
Now, ne difficulty exists in indicating the effect of such a
season, at thus characterised, should have upon the crops.
The heavy rains of Februsry rendered the land very wet
from the commencement of the so Bing noon ; and March,
which is usually a dry month, contributed more than tho
average monthly quantity of rain. In these circumst in; es,
spring-wheat, beans, and oats were sown in en uufavoiyably
wet etc e of the ground—quite the opposite of last year.
April was better for the finishing of the oat seed, and the
commencement of the barley seed; while the drought in
May effected the braird of both oats and barley—the former
hiving been attaceed by the gruh, and in the latter the ger-
mination was partially checked in embryo, as was
also the case with some of the Bwediidi turnips, of which
that braitded in the drought MP attack, d by the Ay, and'
ceased the crop, is inlay cases, to be re-sown. The rain of
June, while it brought forward all the brairie, interrupted
the continuants of sowing of the white and later turnips.
Notwithstanding the d,ll cold days of June and July, the
vegetation of all.the earlier crops of grain, and even the tor-

nips—thonah then late, and frequently interrupted is the
singling and hoeing-I,u rapid out lull, Ind secured abuta-
aide. Of La3er.

It was reasonably apprehended that the harvest would be
a late one; but, contrary to all surmises, the wheat was
ready to be cut by the middle of August. This early matu-
rity was no doubt greatly to be merited to the for. iur of the
elaboration of the sap by the beat of May; and the plant
having then been pulsed prematurely forward in that state of
Its growth, same more rapidly into ear and towards matu-
rity than was expected. The swarm:is impaited to the
ground in May, and the retention of the heat in it in eonse-
queue of drainage, tended strongly to rer.th r the wheat of
fine/ quality in the best class of soils ; while the late sewn
spring wheat, and that on coarse sods, proved inferior in
quality. The barley, having been rapioly brought f+rward,
proved good ; and a. Ottll absorb a ?role deal of moisture,
they have also yielded a good crop. The erld sharp air In
October rendered the straw so apparently dry in the stack
to induce many farmers to carry it into the stack yard before
it war entirely won, and heated stacks was the core. quence
in many cases. The weight of grain varies very consirerstily
this season. _

Potatoes, thriving in mohture, have produc,d a large
yield. The dime appeared amongst them again to a couai-
derable extent, but in what proportion we cannot say—a/-
though we hid more difficulty in this than in last ye tr of
procuring a good potato for the tabl... We stopi-ct that the
farmers are less disposed to complain aloud of their loss, from
this crop, than in former years. They most now see that
no drpindance can be placed on the potato as an article of
food, or as an easiipraised prolific crop. Still a great reluct-
ance exists agains. banishing it from the tier's; and sa the
early sorts have escaper!, comparatively, from disease
it is passible that morn attention wily, in tuturo, he
given to them than to the later kinds. Some
farness have already planted early potatoes in the
field with saccess—that is, without disease; and twin;
ready for an early market, the return realised by them his
been coasiderablo. Perhaps the ash-seated kidney is the best
early potato for the fl. hi; and although not a prolific
variety, it will yield a sufficient quantity for all tha purposes
to which the potato should be used by the people for their
own consumptien—namely, as an accompanying or alter-
nating vegetable to more substantial fare. Until the custom
of depending on the piruto as the sole means of subsistence
is abandoned by the work.piople, famine will never cease
from the land.

ti4tu;niiaare en unequal crap, being, in many parts of
the country, mall and bearing little eating, and in other
parts th,y are excellent. The disparity cal be easily ace ,unted
tor. Those who sowed early and ts:aped the He have a goad
crop ; and these who had to rearm or sowed late have one of
small bulbs. The smallness of the bulb+, however, is not a
consequence of the late sowing, for there was plenty of time
for the crop before November to grow to a proter size : it
was occasioned by the dry weather iu the end of S. p+emb.r,
which occasioned a little mildew ; this was followed firm by
cold rain, and then intense frost in October, the very period
in which the turnip bulbs swell to in t:urdy—both ceases
stinting the growth in the best season.
The hay crop was much superior to that of last year. The
moist March promoted the early growth of the grasses, and
the bright weather in May enab:ed much at the hay to he
stacked without a shower. For ilia same re +sons, the pas-
ture was good and continued to grow through the season,
and perhaps the hill pasture was never hotter.
The demand fur abet p, 'n more than fair condition, front
the south, hes been very great. The smthetn counties
were cleared of all their draft stack .17 the tot of September.
The demand may have arisen partly from a weal aftermath,
and partly, we suspect, from tite effects o& the epidemic now
felt, of two or three years since, when severe losses were
sustained in flocks. A new t.:isease amongst sheep, the
smelt-poz, has been impored from abroad ; end no great has
the alarm been created of title disease, that leoislative mea-
sures have been passed, with a view to prevent the circula-
tion of marked cares of disease.

The season in Enrlind has not been so favourable for the
crops as in Scotland; and the consequence has been in-
teriority of quality, end defiverey in quantity of the cereal
crops, especially in the south of England in th, great wheat
districts. The English farmers there are so little act us-
tooted to interruptions in harvest, that who n s bad reason
occurs, they are unskilled in expedients to avoid iti injurious
effects. Barley and rats in the swath, have then a very poJr
chance of escaping irrep.krab.c injury. Oeta being the prat-
civil crop in lrelaud, a chipping season is always tavoureble
to their crowth.
. .

Notwithstanding the acknowledged deficiency in the crop
in England, the price of wheat is moderate, 51.. per qr. The
import duty being only 4s. or ss. per quarter, the Lao im-
portation that has already taken place trom abroad, has out
been bonded h•at entered for home consumption. The im-
portation will DO doubt continue, and, wfoet is remarkable,
the Deltic has not yet been blocked up with ice, and what is
farther remarkable, the cargoes .1 wheat of last year's crop,
after having been detained by embargo, by the Danish go-
vernment, in COM queues of its war with Germany, r
here ranch larger prices than *heir owners would hovo taken
for them had they been allowed to proceed to th• it
destine-
tinn at once—verifying once more the old proverb, " The
colley only drives the hare to its meat."

SUDDEN DEATH OF EARL AUCKLAND.
It is with regret that we announce the sudden death
of Lord Auckland, First Lord of the Admiralty.
On Thursday evening last his lordship left-. Lon-
don, in the enjoyment of perfect health, in
order to join a shooting party at Lord. Ashbnr-
tou's seat in Hampshire. Oa &tardily; accom-
panied by Lord A.hburton and a number of
other gentlemen, Earl Auckland spent the greater
portion of tLe d.y in shooting ; but between three
and four o'clock in the afternoon he was seized with a
fainting tit, and almost immediately tell to the ground
speechless. Assistance was promptly rendered, and
his lordship was carried to Lord Ashburton's house,
whole medical aid was instantly procured. His lord-
ship lingered until seven o'clock this morning, when
he breathed his last.

The deceased earl was born in 1734, and succeeded
his father as baron in 1814. lie was Gdvernor•Gene-
ral of India from 1835 to 1811, and afterwards filled
the offices of President of the Board of Tiede, Master
of the Mint, and First Lord of the Admiralty. liis
brother, the present Bishop of Sodor and Man, and
late Vicar of Battersea, better known by his name of
the lion. and Rev. RThert Eden, and who was born
in 1799, bucceede to the earldom.