The Express.
London, England, 1866-05-04 00:00:00

ETIENING, MAY 4, 18_66.

pepper to locomotion is an easy flight for a
financier. The hackney carriage duty, and
the mileage duty are ancient grievances, which
have repeatedly solicited Chancellors of the Ex-
chequer. Mr. GLADSTONE has thoroughly investi-
gated the subject, and has arrived at a very sound
and liberal distinction between the locomotion of
the rich—carriages and horses—and the public
conveyances—omnibuses, flys, and vans—which
serve the wants not only of the middle and lower
middle classes, but of the labouring poor, espe-
cially in large cities and towns, where the growth
of railways has depopulated whole districts, and
compelled working men to live at a
distance from their work, and to spend
half their capital, that is their strength
for work, in walking to or fro early and late. It

is proposed to reduce the mileage duty ou stage
carriages from one penny to one farthing a mile.
The loss on this reduction will be 61,0001. for

the year. The duty on hackney carriages (else-
where than in London) it is proposed to reduce so
as to make it fall comparatively lighter upon the
keeper of one carriage and horse only
than upon the keeper of several; at present
the duty falls heavier in proportion on the
man who can least afford to pay it. The loss on
this reduction will be only 16,0001. for the year.
These reductions, in themselves apparently trivial,
are really, we believe, substantial benefits to large
numbers of people, and out of all proportion to
the loss of revenue.

Before he had reached This point in his state-
ment the CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER had en-
larged, in a most instructive and interesting manner,
on the subject of international commercial trea-
ties ; noting the results of the French treaty,
which has so admirably disappointed the fears of
the protectionists over the water, has set so
beneficial an example to Austria, and enabled us
to complete similar negotiations with Belgium,
Italy,and the Zullverein. He paid a graceful com-
pliment in passing to the diplomatic and otheragents
who had been active in overcoming the difficulties of
the treaty with Austria, and he managed to convey in
the friendliest and pleasantest way advice and com-
fort to certain of our neighbours who have
not yet been persuaded of the reciprocity of
Free Trade. After disposing of his surplus,
Mr. GLADSTONE now approached a subject
which alone might have more than sufficed for
the energy and ambition of any ordinary speaker
—the state of the national debt and our duty to
coming generations, who, if recent speculations
are to be trusted, will be burdened with our
liabilities without our resources to meet them.
Referring to Mr. MILL'S recent memorable speech,
and expressing regret at the absence, from illness,
of the Member for Westminster, Mr. GLADSTONE
called the attention of Parliament to this great and
growing evil of national debts, which is over-
spreading Europe. No language could speak
more eloquently than the simple figures of the
national debts of six European Governments, and
of the United States of America, since their civil
war. Mr. GLADSTONE argues very hopefully and
encouragingly of the power of our American kins-
men to redeem their obligations ; but of the
European States, which are borrowing millions
upon millions to lavish upon military expenditure,
he speaks in tones of the gravest admonition and
reproach, and we trust his words will echo fax and
wide. But what of our own National Debt? It
was larger by a million at the end of the great
war than is popularly supposed ; it was reduced
some sixty millions between 1815 and 1830 ;
some five millions between 1830 and 1840 ; from
1840 to 1854 some thirty-six millions and a-half ;
from 1834 to 1857 it rose again some thirty mil-
lions ; from 1859 to the present year it has again
decreased some twenty-five millions. We now
stand much as we did before the Russian
War. Mr. GLADSTONE makes a startling
calculation of the total amount of the national
debts of the :European States at the close of
the present century. But calculations of this
kind, from their very enormity, are slow to lay
hold of the imaginations of men of business.
Whether Mr. GLADSTONE'S solemn concurrence in
Mr. JEVONS' estimate of the probable exhaustion
of the coal treasures of Great Britain within
three generations from the present time will affect
the public mind more impressively we cannot say.
At any rate, the CHANCELLOR of the ExcuEouEit
proves the sincerity of his own apprehensions
by setting to work this very year to re-
lieve our posterity of some part of the
burden, which he reminds the representatives of
the landed interest must fall upon their descen-
dants whenever England ceases to be the market
and Workshop of the world by the impossibility
of selling her coal in competition with America.
When labour has emigrated in search of work, and
money in search of a market, " you," he says in
effect to the landed gentlemen, " will be left
" alone with your immoveable property, with fallen
" rents and a deserted labour market. "
Is it not already time to provide for the
future ; unless our motto is " Eat, drink, and be
" merry," and the warning of our fate is toprompt
us to despair ? Mr. GLADSTONE proposes to re-
duce the National Debt from thirty-nine to forty
millions within nineteen years by the conversion
of a sum of twenty-four millions standing in a
deposit account of Savings Banks Trustees into
annuities terminable in 1885, and by annual
re-investments of the spare dividends accruing
from the same source, in annuities terminable in
1905.

THE LONDON (CITY) TRAFFIC REGULATION

BILL.

The select committee to whom the London
(City) Traffic Regulation Bill was referred, and who were
instructed " to inquire into the best means of regulating
the traffic of the metropolis," have agreed to the following
special report :
"1. Your committee have heard evidence as to the
general street traffic of the metropolis, and as to the
attempts made to regulate it under several acts of parlia-
ment passed to give to the various authorities in the City,
and in the metropolitan police district, power for this
Purpose•

" 2. Your committee are of opinion that any legislation '
which may be necessary fur the further regulation of the
public traffic within the City of London would be ineffica-
cious and incomplete unless corresponding regulations
were in force in a much larger portion of the metropolis,
and that such!regulationalshould be submitted for the ap-
proval of the Secretary of State by the Commissioner, of
Police for their respective districts.
"3. Entertaining these views, your committee think
that it is not desirable to proceed with the bill referred to
them, which is limited to the regulation of the traffic
within the City of London ; your committee therefore re-
commend that a general measure to correct the present
defects in the law, and to give additional powers to regu-
late traffic in every portion of the metropolis, should be
brought forward by the government."

Mr. Alderman Salomon', on Monday, will sat
The Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if he can
give tie house any information on the prevent untoward
aspect of continental affairs, and if her Majesty's govern.
ment has, either by itself or in accord with France, made
any friendly offers to the governments of Italy and Austria
with a view of soothing existing differences, and averting
from Europe the threatened calamities of war.