The Sun.
London, England, 1852-09-20 00:00:00

indeed, that there is not left amongst them any more
vitality of hatred than can be found in the roe of a
shotten herring. The reconstruction of the glass
edifice at Sydenham is, therefore, being effected with-
out the revival of any of those sinister hints or sneers
of depreciation to which the public, two or three
seasons back, were so accustomed. There is, probably,
not to be found in the three kingdoms an individual
bold enough to jeer at the schemes of the Crystal
Palace Company as impracticable or extravagant—
always excepting, of course, our dear friend Colonel
SIBTHORP. Yet those schemes are of a magnitude
and of an apparent complication so remarkable that,
four or five and twenty months ago, they might have
been reasonably viewed by the generality as more
suitable for the dreams of a visionary than for the
prospectus of a commercial association. The truth is
that, in 1851, so many seeming miracles were ac-
complished by the ingenuity of Sir JOSEPH PAXTON,
by the industry of Sir CHARLES Fox, and by the
zeal of Sir RICHARD MAYNE, that people have
almost abandoned the old-fashioned custom
of betraying, or, indeed, of possessing, emotions of
astonishment. If matters go on in this way much
longer the organ of " wonder" may be quietly sponged
out of the chart of Phrenology. It is the fashion, by
the way, of the new generation to be prepared against
any surprise whatever. Insomuch that the petit
maitre of our day—ennuyee, blasé, " used up,' or
" what you will"—like pleasant Sir CHARLES COLD.
STREAM, or rather that is to say, in other words, like
find
be
our delightful CHARLES MATHEWS, thecharacte_
incomparablercan
namesake and impersonator of that
pry even into the flaming abyss
" nothing in it." Neither can othis self-possession Vesuvius,
altogether incomprehensible in an age when marvels
are rendered mere matters of everyday occurrence to
our children. There was a drama produced on the
stage of Covent-garden some time back, which had
the
servantsgoodfort in th
fortune toe
pbreesetw oo twice
of played by her MA-
JESTY'Sof
her
MAJESTY. It
was from the hand of the veteran LEIGH HUNT, and
was called " A Legend of Florence." In this drama
we remember one Fuevio DA RIYA is made to speak
as follows—his remarks being uttered in the age o
LEo X., and in one of the streets of old Florence :
whathis dao should
goo
" The wild man's dream,
Or what he might have dreamt, when at his wildest,
Ahn,
dto the civilized man, his common place :
sors
e, not reverencesti
still
intn
alourselves,alter."
As,
in time
Ine
a c o
" Till chariots run some twenty miles an hour ?"
suggest, his companion, derisively. " Ay," says DA
RIVA, " thirty or or y f t. "
" Oh! oh! Without horses?
Say, without horses."
" Well, to oblige you,—yes"
" And sailing boats without a sail! Ah! ha!
Well, glory be to poetry and to poets!
Their cookery is no mincing! Ah! ha! ha!
They certainly, while they'ra about it, do
Cut and carve world's oat with their golden swords
To which poor Alexander's was a pumpkin."
Not merely, however, have the dreams thus humour-
ously imagined been long since realized by the fiery
dragon of the steam-engine, carrying us upon the
seas without a sail, and upon land thirty or
forty miles an hour without horses—but in a
thousand other particulars the phantasies
of the day-dreamers of old have become,
indeed, our daily commonplace. When. our
portraits are taken by the sunbeam, when we can
talk a thousand miles apart with flashes of lightning,
when we can grow coffee from a transparent solution,
and read with our elbows by clairvoyance, and dis-
cover planets not with the accidental sweep of a teles-
cope, but with the precision of an algebraic calcula-
tion,—it is scarcely possible that there should be much
room left for the simple emotions of surprise or
amazement. The wonderful achievements of 1851
seem to have set the finishing seal to this self-collected
complacency. By the beginning of that memorable
year we had seen a palace sprout from the greensward
of Hyde-park as magically as the famous structure
built in a single night by the genie of the ring for
Prince ALADDIN ; and a palace that contained more
gorgeous curiosities than were ever conjectured to be
possible by the imaginative young lady who told the Sul-
tan Caliph the stories of the Arabian Nights' Entertain-
ments. The rapidity with which the Crystal Palace
of the Exhibition was constructed, under the auspices
of Fox and PAXTON, was such, in truth, that the
public are now prepared for " anything" in re-
ference to the labour of its reconstruction
amongst the rural scenery of Sydenham. When
we hear, therefore, that the foundations are al-
ready hastening towards their completion, the in-
telligence comes to us as a mere matter of course.
We are not at all astonished at the catalogue of
the materials employed—the hundreds of bracings,
the thousands of girders, the millions of railings, the
miles of gutters, the acres of glass, and the moun-
tains of sashbars. We feel no amazement at the news
that the gardens are already being marked out for
future cultivation. It sounds to us simple enough to
be told that OWEN JONES and DIGBY WYATT are tra-
velling here and there into the remotest corners of the
European Continent, to collect ideas of novel decora-
tion and embellishment. Dr. LATHAM has of course
undertaken the management of the ethnological de-
partment. Professor ANSTED has of course accepted
the office of arranging the geological illustrations.
We shall only be surprised if FARADAY does not bot-
tle up some of the electric belt of Saturn in a Leyden
Jar for the shelves of the Crystal Palace Laboratory,
and if OWEN does not add to the zoological treasures
of the establishment an infant Mastodon or a sucking
Pleisiosaurus.

Some of the guessers at intelligence announced a
week or ten days ago, that Mr. DISRAELI had pre-
pared his Budget, submitted it to his colleagues, re-
ceived their unanimous consent to all its propositions,
and was quite ready to make his financial statement
as early in November as was practicable, consistent
with the swearing in of the new Parliament, the pass-
ing of the Standing Orders (which, by the way,
ought to be carefully revised, inasmuch as they often
override Statutes of the Realm), and the disposal of
the routine business following the election of Speaker,
the delivery of the tell-nothing document called "The
Speech from the Throne," and the mock discussions
on the Address " which, as usual, is merely an echo
f the Royal Speech." Now, we very much doubt
the
truth of this circumstantial assertion. It is ex-

eheiswtede
trernely _ _...
probable that Mr. DISRAELI, as Chan-
llor ofo ut h
iExchequer, has applied himself, with
the manyi dnidfelt
Honourable
of National Finance ;
y and ability, to master
for the
Ro: to ourable Gentleman is deter-
mined, we
preanta
earn his salary, and to
fulfil the expectations '
of
hills friends and followers. It
is probable, also, that henedeaasysoketched the rough plan of
unulrikto be at once popular
resedvterally, up
a budget which will
that be may even
and productive. It is not
consult some li
....s co..eaguesely
,ecouratpleted his
on the
leading points which have occu;
cal and tangible ; but that he ha: him as practi-
budget, and has got it in his pocket
with the Cabinet "approved" endorsed UpPlinfid-drY'
pears as unlikely as that Colonel simni_ it, ap-
"" should
become Chairman of the Crystal Palace Company
' or
that GEORGE FREDERICK YOUNG should speak corn_
won sense ; or that Major BERESFORD should walk
down " the shady side of Pall-mall," arm-in-arm
with his correspondent, FRAIL, the Shrewsbury bar-
ber; or that JOHN O'CONNELL should come over
for the express purpose of dying on the floor
of the House;" or that Vice-Chancellor STUART
;hould support " Chancery Reform ," or that Row-
LAND HILL should propose a return to dear postage ;
or that Brother JONATHAN should cease to grasp and
brag; or that Punch should ridicule Whig absurdi-
ties; or that JOHN BRIGHT should suddenly become
the Parliamentary mirror of politeness and gentle
courtesy ; or that, in short, any other very unlikely
And unexpected event should suddenly occur

" To overcome us, like a summer cloud."
On the contrary, we think that Mr. DISRAELI has
Yet some weeks of hard labour to undergo, before he
can have his budget into anything at all approaching
what tailors call " ship-shape." The laws of taxa-
tion' now existing, are altogether wrong in principle,
and they cannot be maintained much longer in their
present shape. There is the Income and Property-
tax, to commence with, which every one (except
i Government officials, who dislike the anticipated trouble
of a change in the system), admits to be unjust,
oppressive, and unequal. This we have shown b 0
often (and we venture to say) so forcibly, that we
not
I waste words upon the subject here. All
this impost cannot remain as it is. If a
man have 5001. a year, derived from professional
inde emdit that

labour; if another have 5001. a year, accruing to him
from rents of houses ; if a third have a like 500/.
a year, from landed property, surely their cases very
widely differ. The professional man's income, which
would stop altogether, or be greatly reduced, from ill
health, competition, or other casualties, is worth a
very small rate of purchase : it is not worth two years'
purchase, under such personal contingencies, but we
shall take it at 1,0001. The property in houses and
other buildings, on leases with various terms to run,
is worth about fifteen years' purchase, or 7,500/.
The landed property, yielding the like income, is
worth thirty years' purchase, or 15,0001. But, under
the present tax, all these are made to pay the same
141. lls. Bd. This is the first point which Mr.
Dls-
RAELI will have to adjust. If the actual value of each
income were taken, and subject to the usual rate of
interest, the professional man would pay 21. 18s. 4d.,
01.
nollloBos. /.,,d. on his 7,
interest 0f520,0007. ; 0/. :antd the hehouse-owner,
21/. 17s. 6d. on his 15,000/. Thus the man with
personal and uncertain income would raise ill. 13s.
4d.; the house-owner would pay 3/. Ps. lid. less
than he does now; and the landed proprietor, with a
fixed and certain income, would very properly be
called upon to pay 71. ss. 10d. more than he pays at
the
eesinene tytq.uaßliysuch equalized and adjusted payments
and unfairness of this tax would be
removed. The richest would proportionably make
the greatest payments, as they ought to do I
In any revision of our system of taxation, the pro-
bate and legacy duties must be equalized, and on the
same principle (of making these duties fall heaviest on
the wealthiest) which we would apply to the income and
property-tax. Nearly twenty years ago the thought-
ful mind of WILLIAM COBBETT applied itself, in and
out of Parliament, to reform the crying evil of this
system. In those days it was considered vastly un-
genteel to challenge the principle of our taxation, and
besides this, COBBETT, who was a giant with his pen
or in the lecture•room, was dwarfed in the Senate.
To spite him, to render his work useless, and to please
Lord ALTHORP (an honest breeder of cattle and
sheep, but very little of a statesman), his motion was
rejected. It was a good motion, for all that, and
would meet with a different reception now. The
probate and legacy duties are very unequal. They
cannot be avoided and must be paid. Most of the
property bequeathed by will is rated to these duties,
and if a man leave no will, the probate duty is made
some fifty per cent. more than if he had. The evil is
that, having been imposed by law-makers who them-
selves are great owners of real property, the duties
are graduated so that real property is excluded from
their operation ! So much for class legislation.
Thus, if A possess a landed estate worth 50,0001.,

and B leave behind him 50,000/. in money, and both
leave this real and personal property to C, be will
have to pay neither probate nor legacy duty upon the
real property (the landed estate), but he must pay
750/. probate duty, and 5,0001. legacy duty, on
the personalty (the money), and this indepen-
dent of the proctor's charges and of the court
fees, including those that make up the
14,000/. a year of the Mammoth Pluralist, the Reve•
rend JOHN .11rloonE, Registrar of the Prerogative
Court of Canterbury—as son of a defunct Arch-
bishop ! If C had been a child or other descendant
of B, he should pay 5001. legacy duty ; if he had
been a brother, or brother's descendant, he should
pay 1,5001. legacy duty; if a brother of B's father
or mother, or the child of such, the legacy
duty would be 2,500/. , if a stage further
in the relationship, C should pay 3,0004
—in each case paying the 7501. as probate
duty, which would be increased to 1,125/. of the
personal property passed without a will. Here, then,
is heavy taxation on the succession to personal pro-

perty, which it may be generally presumed a man's
industry or ability makes, and a total exemption for
real property, which he inherits, as one of the "fruges
cons-tnere natl." The heavy taxation falls on the
industrious—the light taxation on the aristocracy and
landed interest. Nay, so far as the personal
. .

estate can be applied to pay debts and
incumbrances on the real, it is not taxed, and
thus a great amount of even the personalty of the
aristocracy and landowners wholly escapes probate
and legacy duty.
Now, the CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER, if he
means to equalize taxation (as he has promised) must
either abolish these duties—which he cannot afford to

do—or subject all property, real as well as personal,
to their payment. If he honestly attempt this—and
he may fail, through the power of class legislation—
he will do more to establish an honourable reputation
than if be had delivered a score of eloquent orations.
Will his landed•interest colleagues let him attempt
this act of financial justice ?

Judging by the number of cases for trial at the
late assizes, amounting, with those of concealing
birth, to no less than twenty-six, infanticide must
have increased to an extent unparalleled hitherto in
this country. Though the convictions were com-
paratively few, yet it is painful to feel pretty sure
that this is due, for , the most part, either to the
merely legal imperfection of the evidence, or to the
reluctance of juries to be instrumental in the inflic-
tion of capital punishment. The judges who tried
these twenty-six cases, if giving us their own view
of the verdicts of acquittal, would doubtless express
their fears that most of the unhappy mothers had been
guilty of the crime imputed to them. What can be
done in such a state of the question ? It is clear that
a crime of this magnitude cannot be tolerated in a
civilized and Christianized state ; it is clear also
that juries, feeling as most men feel when called upon
to give a verdict involving the life of a fellow-
creature, will lay hold of every flaw and loophole in
evidence as a pretext for acquittal ; and such defects
can generally be readily found by a clever counsel,
interrogating a humane surgeon or other witnesses.
Indeed, it may well be questioned by a juryman of
scrupulous conscience whether he ought to convict
with the remotest chance of error, when he thereby
inflicts a punishment precluding the possibility of
rectifying his awful mistake, should he make one. It
is by no means easy to compensate for imprisonment or
banishment, suffered through an erroneous verdict;
but for death, suffered through a juror's error, there
is, of course, no remedy. By no means unfrequently
(considering the agonizing painfulness of the case) it
has been found, but too late, that innocent persons
have died by the hands of the hangman. It scarcely
admits of a doubt that numerous executions of the
guiltless took place when a wilful Sovereign and the
Bank of England were inexorable in hanging for
forgery. Juries cannot, therefore, be expected to
relinquish their strong desire to acquit, if possible, in
capital cases. We have, indeed, heard it remarked
that infanticide, like suicide, is a case almost beyond
the reach of law ; that a mother's love to her off•
spring is so strong, that nothing but partial insanity
could nerve her arm to destroy it. That a kind of
delirious frenzy, generated by the awful social
punishment inevitable on her fall, and in part to be
endured by her offspring also, if she spare it, renders
her a scarcely accountable agent. We have indeed
heard this very statement from the lips of a most in-
telligent surgeon. It is not one, however, on which
we think a legislator can act, except in the way of
.moderating the penalty. Without wishing, therefore,
vi Ili 0
ltahteinlne aos
f theholiest t to extenuateies instincts the
of
of son a
tu monstrousre,a
sthe a
ought
ty venture murder of the innocent who had just become suscep-
tible of maternal love and help, by the hands of its own
muothhter, to we
inflict
nearly always
yet I),
the
the sternest same punishment
ask whether law
g
as for the
murder of an adult.
Much might be said, no doubt,
most helpless
state
on the claims of a human being in its
ofmurdered law.
Yetthe
murdered
under
circumstances in which he is as helpless as an
infant itself. And here, after all (without
on
adult is ne
offering a word in defence of a most irrational and
wicked practice), is the undeniable difference between
killing in a duel and real murder. But further, the
mother, in murdering her child, has feelings to oier_
come which are unknown to the duellist and the mur-
derer. The latter have to surmount only the or-

dinary aversion of human beings to injure one ano-
ther ; and the most terrible penalty the law can inflict
is unquestionably deserved, to say the least, by the
man who takes from another the one thing which men

value above all else ; for " all that a man bath will he
give for his life ;" and as the penalty is deserved, so,
if expedient, it is justifiable to inflict it, as a needful
counterpoise to the promptings of revenge or thirst
for gold. How different with the mother ! Except in