The Express.
London, England, 1850-04-02 00:00:00

site envois.

orroongo KULL
TM alai be nabob, be Imes, sad BOOM ATM, wiU
Ite snide up ea be swag. et Assil 4.
TM Raft tor Brae Verb Maria sad the Ilaited
limes be mode up ca the ',Wesel bleil
TM mob lot Lisboa, Iris, end iilMYlarMC be nab
ago ea April 7.
TM mils viA MrMol.s, re Use Nediterreams,
Onion. ledis, ReatLest& as 4 Mil be male aptilt
'waft e/ April S.
TM West labs Nobs. eadadba Beromla, Haysasal.
Noma, Hoydens, New OMNI% aal Mesdek lasladias
limo kir Medeire, at. Jaarde•illbsemes. X.w Gnash,
ead Pam 10 be model. OA APG 17.
The mils ter Ciamissz, Naha, diresse, be teaks Limb,
11= Ceyks, ledis, sad Mak fierabeweas, mill
up is be messias el Mat la.

MOT WATTS AT WINDOW WUTITS
TWA w.—Swaing. It Ws. WfwessAa. h. Ow
TToosarT-1/Awiss

LONDON, TUESDAY, APRIL 2.

Tem probability that the quirter's revises, as can-
pared with that of the corresponding period of last
year, will show a diminution in the net receipts
ender the head of customs doliee, has caused more
emotion swop certain people than the facts of the
ewe appear in any degree to call for. On the one
band, there ere gloomy looks and solemn words of
explanation end regret, as if the result which
has marred was not long since foremen,
and calculated on as the necessary conse-
quence of lowered and abandoned taxes upon three
of the chief articles imported for home consumption.
On the other hand equal exultation is as unreason-
ably expressed at the presumptive proof thusfurnished
of the decay of commerce under the influenre of free
trade • as if any inference was to be drawn from the
circumstance of a diminished revenue accreting from
corn, timber, and sugar, on all of which we have
agreed to forego the principal part of our fiscal
exactions.
Confessedly the revenue for the financial year end-
ing sth April, 1850, will be found to have exceeded
very considerably that of the year ending sth April,
1849; although on the commodities we have named the
state has imposed lighter burdens than at any period
during the last 30 years. In every branch cave that
in which these large remissions have taken place,
there has been a steadily progressive increase; and
the proceeds, coupled with certain retrenchments in
the general expenditure of the country, present the
surplus, sanguinely estimated at 2,000,0001., but
which in reality may be taken in round numbers at
1,500,000/., about the disposal of which so much has
recently been said.
On the whole, therefore, we have sound and in-
telligible ground for congratulation, that the first
year in which anything resembling an approach to
emancipated commerce has been fairly tried, the
financial renounce of the empire instead of tempora-
rily suffering, have been more than compensated by
the augmented consumption of necessaries and luxuries
paying moderate duties for the defalcation caused by
the abandonment of the more onerous ones. But inas-
much as this course of abandonment was accomplished
by suceeesiee steps, and was only completed towards
the end of the expiring financial year, it follows
almost of necessity that the income derivable from
foreign or coicenial produce, most be less during the
last three months than it was during the correspond-
ing period of last year. We want no subtle ex-
planation where there is in fact no mystery;
and we fear no mischievous use being
made of facts and figures, whose simplicity
may well defy greater powers of mystification than
those which disconsolate protectionism has at its
command. But even were it otherwise we should
wholly object to the species of economic casuistry in
which some of oar contemporaries are wont to indulge,
and which under the colourless form of financial
analysis, covers political views and objects which
are felt to be too peppiest for frank and open
advocacy.
A weekly journal whom peculiar function is pro-
hesedly to furnish the public with an accurate resume
et ever thing. relative to trade and taxation, affects
despoadsnry jest now because the net receipts of the
customs foe the quarter are somewhat lower, as we
have said, than those of the fist three months of
1849; and regardless of the advantage which its
teas of reluctant admission may he turned to, by the
poke-saseaseAs advocates of commercial reaction, it
to recount a curious assortment of account-
cutlass, all of them connected with that pe-
E:as
• view of foreign politics which it insidiously
endeavours to sustain. The republican party has
shown a determination not to be jockeyed back into
monarchy; the petty sovereigns of Germany have
refit ed to keep the promises they gave their people
to concert with Preemie the constitutional means of
securing something like a federal unity ; stave all,
the Pope still delays his return to Rome ; all which,
exclaims our contemporary, shows an ens. teed state
of political feeling on the Continent, and all which
prevents British industry from working, British mer-
chants from trading, and the &kith means front
flourishing as it would otherwise do,
Now we do not mean to deny that such convulsions
as those of 1848 had on effect upon commercial specu-
lation and employment in this country. Neither do
we think it necessary to theorise upon the possible
effect which changes of like moment might produce
upon our industrial affairs, were they to ooeor
again. But we contend that a more mis-
ehieeens delusion cannot be conceived than that
of supposing that the ordinary fluctuations of
German, French, or Italian politics are to be watched
as the weather-glasses of our financial state. A
violent revolution comes but seldom, and it comes
suddenly. Public credit is for the moment parslysed,
and public thought spell-bound for the time by en-
rionty, hops, and fear. Then things resume their
ordinary po.itioo. The intriguers gather con-
• and begin to spin their webs anew.
The corrupters steal forth ono. more and bribe
paltry princes, and still more paltry journalists, to
get up terrors and alarms and pleas for reaction, all
which are duly chronicled in certain pages, and re-
tailed in certain cliques in this country, whom preju-
dices against popular power render them a ready prey
to the knavish imposture. But to pretend that the
entire sum of logitimitist perfidy and plotting,
whether east of the Rhine or west of the Rhine,
north of the Alps or south of the Alpe, is regarded
by the great =twos amongst whom it is tolerated as
of more Importance than buying and selling, making
end consuming what their daily wants require, is sheet
absurdity. Whilst the attempt to pi reuade our
commercial dames that the reason Sir CHARLIS
WOOD has not a greater balance in hand is because
Pius IX. still tarries at Gaeta, or the Erfurt paint.
neat is still short of delegates from Hanover, or 111.
CAltwoT has been returned to the French National
Assembly—would be one of the most pernicioth
endeavours to disseminate error that we have ever
heard of, if it were not one of the most transparent

Moo".
There are, indeed, questions of foreign policy that
nearly touch our mercantile, and, therefore, our finan-
cial fortunes ; but they are not those which the anti-
liberal party in parliament or in the press are most
given to talk about. In the main our material inte-
rests are thorn u&y in harmony with our moral
sympathies. Alutism, however cloaked or
excused, is injurious to as as a manufacturing
people, because it is repressive of the desire for popu-
lar improvement and interchange, which would make
its vassal., were they emancipated, valuable customers
of ours. The wood of the many everywhere is one
and the same ; but unhappily there is too much of a
smiler identity between the advocates of oligarchic
male In every part of the world.

THE great secret of commercial success in England
is, assuredly, facility. Enterprise does much for us;
Ist marries wouM be without opportunity, if there'
Vary no aseraamodstion. Capital and wealth are
rendered doubly available by commercial confidence;
sad merlons losses are hourly prevented by the readi-
sem with which advances are obtained upon every
deneription of motility and guarantee.
Nothing in the commercial world of England is
permitted to lie idle. No sooner does a man accumu-
late capital than lie makes it available as the repre-
sentative of value. Whatever shape it may assume,
convertible imenediatalli or col) at a distant date, *P•
portunity is opsu-to bi.os of making it subservient to
the readied purposes. Whether it is dock, or bills of
exchange, shares, or bills of lading, title deeds or
dock warrants, that he posaysee, he hu only to walk
into the counting-boas of the nearest banker or bill
broker to whom he is known, to receive polite atten-
tion and advances of snowy, at the current rates of

the day, proportionable to hit requirements and to
the wain of the democrat, he proposes to Aspeeit.
It has been of great r.dvastme to the banking
and commercial comarr.airy of Beirsad that ft barn
been possible to accomplish these operatioae without
any istereentin of t'Ail law. There are few =au of
lite in oar contry with which oar Ryden of law or
wades does sot ra Rime slaps iatermeddle. But,
ha ly fir migraine, this system et banking sam-
modstiea
bas been maptuutively free. Only is iso-
lated sad erelosptional intances has it bees considered
accessary by beakers to obtain from their customers
additiosal guarantees ether than the deposit of their
esonritise, sad a reseal authorised= to convert
them is **event of sea-redemption.
Who proposes to meddle or iaterfere with
arrangements eo deeply important to British sem-
mace, and to the capitalists of oar sentry
The CIANCZLLOIL of the EICHIQOIII : the brit-
sental representative of the morretary inmost of
Britain. In the new bill for altering the sbmplaw.,
several most important alterations will be hawk iseply
affecting the question of deposits by way of secant,
with bankers. In order that the case may be made
clear, we will print is fall the clans under the head
of " Mortgagee," to which we specially refer, marking
in italics all the nem conditions now for the first time
iatrodoesd. The dams impoms the a valorem duty
as follows: _ _

" Also say agremneet, sientrose, bead, or other writing
wilateemer, moompanted with a deposit of a title deed
or this deeds, or Meer instrument or writing, relating
to any property, matter or Ming, for malting a man-
gy% walla& or say seek osorrity or tionversam as
aforesaid, of any lands, Mato, or peeperty comprised le rash
tide died sr deed*, uselnweent or writing, or for pledging
say sash deed, isistrunamt or writing, leeda, estate, or pro-
perty, moiler or thew, in Ms or /gouty, se a security, or
whamby any sunk deed, instrument, or writiv, leads,
estate, property, neater, or thing, shall be made or shall be
or become cloned or affected as • security in law or equity."
On these are to be levied the ad valorem mortgage
duty.
Now, it will not require much consideration to
arrive at the conclusion that here is a most important
alteration in the stamp laws, and one that must neon-
eerily involve endless difficulty,dispute,and litigation.
Reed the clause without the words la italics, and it
will be seen in an instant that the act has heretofore
limited the mortgage stamp to " agreements accom-
panying deposits of title deeds for making a
mortgage, wedset, security, or conveyance of
any lands, estate, or property, comprised in
such title deeds." But under the new stamp
law, the increased mortgage stamp must be
affixed net only to all agreements of the nature just
recited, but also to "all oiler writings whatmerer
accompanying a deposit (not only) of title deeds (but
of any) other instrunwut or writing relating to any
property, matter or thing !^" That tie effect of
this will be to bring under the operation of the clause
all writings accompanying Mork, shares, dock war-
rants, &c., deposited with bankers as security for
advances, there cannot be a moment's doubt. And if this
law passes, no banker in justice to himself or to his other
customers will henceforward be justified in accepting
deposit even of the best security for an advance
without having their authority to convert it, written
upon paper, bearing a ramp proportioned to the
considerution.
Let us glance at one or two of the eases which
this alteration will affect : cases by no means the
most important, but which present themselvt 3 imme-
diately as illustrative.
Loans upon the deposit of railway or other shares,
&c, are managed thus, even when there is a
transfer : The transfer is executed to the lender
(say a banker). in consideration of a " nominal
sum ." and a memorandum is signed that such
transfer is intended to secure a certain amount,'
say, three-fourths of the value of the shares;
and that in certain events the lender shall be at
liberty to sell the sharie to repay himself his loan,
interest, &c. At present, this memorandum does not
bear a stamp. Hereafter, it will be subject to an ad
valorem dnty.
Bills of lading at present, pus from hand to hand
simply by endorsement. They are frequently the
subject of deposit, as they give the holders the right
to the cargo to which they refer. The memorandum
setting out the object of the deposit, abd the amount
it secures, does not at present bear a stamp : under the
new law it will be invalid without it.
Jewels and plate are not unfrequently deposited
with a memorandum stating the object and the cir-
cumstances under which their sale may be allowed.
This memorandum most henoeforward bear an ad
~lures stamp on the amount advanced, or there can
be no legal conversion of any of the plate.
Deposits of this sort, it must be borce in mind, are
made chiefly to avoid the delay and expense of an
actual transfer where the property is susceptible of
transfer by deed, or to avoid the lees consequent upon
immediate conversion where it can only be parted
' with by sale. These arrangements are therefore not
loaly valuable for commercial purposes ; they are also
provident in their character; and to levy a heavy tax
upon them is to tax the man who is seeking to borrow
to the best advantage.
Advances of this nature are usually made to parties
who are in some credit. 531310 bankers and others
may therefore be disposed conveniently to argue that
this new law will be of little compa-
rative consequence, inasmuch u their relations
with their customers will enable them to evade it.
At the present time there is little doubt that the duty
which ought to be taken on agreements accompanying
the deposit of title deeds is evaded largely. Parties
argue that if the worst comes to the worst, they can
get the agreement stamped after execution, by paying
the 101. penalty. But let no one flatter himself that
this can be the case henceforward. The CusecuLon
of the Exenzeivita proposes another new clause to
hit evaders. It is as follows:
Provided, that if the some be stumped at any time after
the elocution thereof by say party, it shall take tied as a
charge or security for or in respect of any sum to which the
stamp duty so impressed thereon alter such execution shall
relate, only from ilte day on whisk it Mali be so atantped,
end not before.

The effect of this will be, that no interest whatever
will be recoverable in respect of any advance so long
as the agreement remains =stamped. And not only
this, but cases are very likely to occur in which the
principal and interest may be het together; as for
example where a deposit is made to obtain a loan for
a limited period, and that period expires without the
memorandum being duly stamped. No banker or money
dealer will be justified, under this new law, in advancing
moneyon the best security, except the deposit is accom-
panied with an agreement bearing an ad volorens stamp
of 10s. per cent., or 51. for every 1,0001. advanced. In
justice to themselves and to their customers, bankers
mast insist as naturally upon a stamp
being impressed en these agreements as they
now do in the eases of bills or notes.
One point more remains to be adverted to. It is a
common practice with first alms merchants in London
to take a running credit with their bankers upon the
security of stock, Bro., placed in deposit, —such credit
being often to a very large amount, and being drawn
upon as circumstances may require. Under the exist-
ing law a 25/. stamp covers the agreement accompany-
ing the deposit of the stock, &c., whatever is the
amount to be secured. The new law, however, has
this proviso :
It the total moots of the money mewed or to bs
ultimately recoverable. shell be uacertala, and without say
hunt, that the same shall be available es a security or
charge for such amount only of loamy or stock as tAs ad
warrens deity will extend to cover.

A stamp of 251. will only cover an advance of 5,00 W.
A running credit of 60,0001. would require in future
a stamp of 2501., and so on in proportion. We point
this out for the benefit of bankers who, if Sir Queue
WOOD'S MGM* bermes law, mast look to their
stamps as well as to their securities.

FATAL ACCIDENT ON THE MEZSZT.—We regret
to aaeounce the death of Mr. Lowndes, judge of the Lim-
ped County Court, by an unfortaaate casualty which im-
mured on Sunday night en the river. Shortly after 10
o'sloek, as the &womb' steamer neared the larding-stage to
lead tier passengers, a gentleman was observed to step to
the gangway, imaginiag, apparently, that the usual
ber was stretched across the gap in the bulwark. A person
plaint hastened forward to arrest the gentleman's progress,
bat too late. Another individual, almost at the same me-
meat, sprang forward, with the intention of jumping over-
board alter the unfortunate gentleman, who was then being
mated away by the incoming tide. The same person above
alluded to grasped his coat to prevent this attempt, and for a
few seconds succeeded in restratniag him, bat at length the
cloth tore awain Ida hands, and Mr. Lowades' eon plunged
Into the river In • Wave but, unhappily, futile attempt to
eve We father's LW. lateen anxiety prevailed ea board
midst the darkness, but boats immediately put off from
the leading•Map,and, after setae time, succeeded in *k-
ing up the eon. Mr. Lowades, sat. we regret to say, was
lest; and, so far es we can mortal:4 his body has sot yet
beat leoevered. Kr. Lowed" jos. was teamed to the
reteita.y. Iwo .c, end toesivod every Walks.

roe 1 Ter Aoouunt.
Wan. I,oll•ll2s—PiGiCrtiotot:

. 55 50 35 IS
. 90 20 90 0
• •• le Pt
• 0

SPAIN.