The Sun.
London, England, 1865-02-15 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

TIMES.—The publication of the National Income
and Expenditure for the year ending on the 31st of
December last enables us to predict with some cer-
tainty what will be our position at the close of the
financial year. The accounts are made up for nine
months out of the twelve, and half of the remain-
ing three has passed away without producing any
interruption of our continued prosperity. No cloud
is in the heavens, and, though the horizon is not
free from threatening symptoms, we may without
imprudence hope that a hearty desire for peace may
continue to preserve us from war. If no untoward
event shall happen in the meanwhile, Mr. Gladstone
will be able to meet the House of Commons in April
with as good tidings as those he brought last year.
The Parliamentary account of the public income is
not drawn up in a very convenient form, inas-
much as it gives us only the gross income for the
year 1864. No separation is made between the
three months before Mr. Gladstone's financial
statement and the nine months which succeed it. In
order to ascertain the effect of the alterations in our
financial system made in April last, we must have
recourse to previous Returns, and it is not until after
many tedious operations of addition and subtrac-
tion that we discover the truths which the pub-
lished accounts hide rather than reveal. It may be
remembered that after reducing the sugar duties,
taking a penny off the income tax, and making an
alteration in the fire insurance duty, Mr. Glad-
stone's estimate of the income of the current year
was £67,128,000, and his final estimate of the ex-
penditure was £67,073,000. The surplus of £55,000
was smaller than that which he originally designed,
and indeed his first balance was much too narrow,
considering the extent of our expenditure and the
chances to which we are always subject. But fortune
has favoured the boldness of the Chancellor of
the Exchequer, and it now seems not improbable
that the anticipated surplus of £55,000 will be
converted into an actual surplus of at least two
millions. The loss of revenue in the year 1864-5,
arising from the reductions made last April, was
estimated at £2,332,000, and as compared with the
revenue of 1863-4 a small additional diminution
was anticipated in consequence of reductions made
in the previous Budget which did not fully take effect
last year. But the gros revenue in the three quar-
ters which ended on the 31st of December scarcely
shows any falling off in the receipts. The revenue
in the quarter ended on the 30th June, 1864, was
£18,274,200, against £18,490,204 in the correspond-
ing quarter of 1863 . the revenue in the quarter
ended on the 30th dept. was £14,792,490, against
£14,411,504 ; and the revenue in the quarter ended
Dec. 31 was £18,069,595, against £18,318,166.
The total revenue in the three quarters from the Ist
April to the end of 1864 was £51,136,285, and the
total revenue in the same nine months of 1863 was
no more than £51,219,874. The whole loss of revenue
in the nine months was, therefore, only £83,589,
while the estimated relief to the taxpayers was nearly
two millions. The first loss through the reduction of
the sugar duties was calculated at £1,719,000 ; but
through the increase of consumption it was hoped
that the actual loss in the year would be no more
than £1,330,000. How much has actually been lost
on these duties we are as yet unable to say, but the
total receipt from the customs during the three
quarters of the year only fell from £17,699,000 to
£17,002,000, which would give a diminution of
£930,000 for the whole of the twelvemonth. The
property tax shows a reduction nearly correspondino-
with the estimate, but all the other sources of the
revenue have proved more productive than they were
last year. The Excise brought into the Exchequer
in the nine months of 1864 the sum of £14,216,000,
against £13,080,000; the stamp returns rose from
£6,878,000 to £7,029,000 ; the assessed taxes show
an increase of £43,000; and the Post-office revenue
is £3,095,000, against £2,845,000. - If the receipts
of the current quarter prove equally satisfactory—
and we may prudently anticipate so much, seeing
that we are recovering from the commercial depres-
sion of October and November—the total income of
the financial year will be about £70,000,000, and
may probably slightly exceed that sum. The expendi-
ture of the year was estimated at £67,073,000, and
though the New Zealand war has probably increased
the military expenditure, we may hope that the total
has been 4.0t1e exceeded. These figures will show a
realised surplus of three millions, and financial re-
formers are at liberty to add to this any saving
which may be effected in the coming 12 months by
a reduction of exrenditure. A- possible surplus of
three millions will naturally attract a cloud of
claimants. The tenant farmers are on the alert, the
county members support their prayers for the reduc-
tion of the Malt Duty, and Mr. Sheridan has placed
his annual motion in the Parliamentary notices, call-
ing on the House of Commons to pledge itself once
more to the abolition of the Fire Insurance Duty.
It must, however, be remembered that a part of the
surplus is already given away. The penny taken
off the Income Tax last April involves a diminution
of next year's income to the extent of £43,000, and
the reduction actually made in the duty on fire in-
surance on stock will create a further loss of
£63,000. It may be assumed, therefore, that half
a million of the apparent surplus is gone, and the
Chancellor of the Exchequer will only have the
balance to distribute. Last year Mr. Gladstone
looked forward to a further reduction of the Income
Tax by a penny, .and though it would be unsafe to
his being now of the same opinion, he may still
think such an operation desirable. For some rea-
sons not very easily perceived, he spoke of a five-
penny Income Tax as eminently satisfactory. We
venture to think that the propriety of this further
reduction ought not to be too hastily assumed. A
direct tax must always be maintained, if only to
preserve the equity of our financial system, and
though it .would be easy to point to the unequal
pressure of the Income Tax, its abolition would be
productive of still greater injustice. A tax of six-
pence in the pound is for many reasons convenient,
and a survey of the comparative taxation of the
country will perhaps lead to the conclusion that it
should be kept at that rate. There are other ele-
ments in our system of direct taxation which afford
ample scope for revision. Among the Assessed
Taxes, for instance, there are many items which
it would be difficulti to defend except on the
plea of the direst financial necessity. A tax
on hair powder and the magnificent per-
sonages who wear it may find some advocates ;
but why the very useful and laborious class which
ministers to our wants in the production of vege-
tables and flowers should be placed in the same cate-
gory would tax even Mr. Gladstone's ingenuity to
explain. Then, again, comes the case of Fire In-
surances. Mr. Gladstone has always consistently
opposed the abolition of the Fire Insurance Duty,
and in making the small remission of last year he
strangely chose those cases where the pressure of the
tax was least felt. The House of Commons has
twice, and perhaps oftener, voted for the abolition
of this duty, and whether the inherent impolicy of
the tax or the effect which it has in increasing the
cost of insurance be considered the vote is amply
justified. If the reduction of one-half the duty
granted last Aprilin the case of insurances on stocks
in trade be extended to all fire insurances, the loss
to the Revenue would be £750,000, and it is not
probable that a greater reduction will be made,
while any proposal of a smaller concession would be
disrespectful to the House of Commons. There
would, however, remain a large surplus to be the
prize of contending claimants.
POST.—If the court-martial which has just termi-
nated at Portsmouth on Captain Campbell and the
officers and the crew of her Majesty's late ship
Bombay has failed to account for the fire so mys-
terious in its origin, and so uncontrollable in its
violence, by which she was destroyed, it has been
the means of adding to the records of British naval
heroism one of its brightest pages. While, there-
fore, we have to deplore the loss of a fine ship and
of eighty-nine lives, we have to congratulate our-
selves on the evidence with which this melancholy
episode has furnished us, that the spirit which ani-
mates the English sailor of the present day has not
deteriorated, but that, should occasion arise, we shall
find the traditional bulwark of the empire manned
as it was of old, and that whether " the wooden
walls of Old England" be changed into iron ones or
not, the character of the defenders remains the same.
It is difficult, in reading the proceedings of the
Portsmouth court-martial, to realise to its full ex-
tent a catastrophe so sudden and so appalling as
that which overtook the officers and crew of the
Bombay on the afternoon of the 14th of last Decem-
ber. Suddenly, and without a moment's notice,
while the men were at lower-deck quarters, the
glare of fire was observed by two men stationed next
the door of the handing room of the after magazine,
coming apparently from the very bottom of the
ship, and revealing itself, without the smallest
warning of smoke or the smell of it, in a burst of
flame. They instantly rushed to report it, one first
going straight to the fire-bell and giving the alarm ;
and here we have the first evidence of the perfect
order which reigned on board the ship, and the ad-
mirable discipline of the men. We have it on the
evidence- of the commander that within less than five
minutes from the moment the fire was reported all
the hose were playing upon it, and the water rush-
ing in upon the orlop deck through the sea cocks,
which were promptly opened. The only effect of ab-
solutely flooding the ship fore and aft was to add to
the fire a smoke so dense and urgent that those
working at the fire hose dropped down insensible,
and had to be dragged out of the smoke by men
who imperilled their lives by saving their comrades.
The fire in a few moments forced all those engaged
in extinguishing it to the upper deck, where all the
men were still working as obediently to orders as if
they did not expect every second to be blown into
the air. It would seem that Captain Campbell and

Watts, the master, were standing
sy able immediately abovethe after magazine 'w
it :eported to be on fire. That the impulse ,°'
Mr. Watt" instead of being to jump overboar",
should 130 remain exactly where he was, and look
at his watch, as nearly as
NIA the view of noting the moment
he was 111),-
of coolness is only an illustration of the sort
*,,h,:'ch seems to have characterised al
single officet,• from the captain to the smallest rail'
shipman whd*C7i.f, overboard at last with nothing
on, and lais watch in his mouth, in which condition
he swam about for antour before he was pickedp:"th.-1-
While the men were vah..lY endeavouring tocionsl
guish the fire, Captain Ca, Was a'
and promptly ordered out thein
the boats ; this
-npbell most judi
trying moment for the crew,
for it showed there
the hopelessness of the case ; yet so far from
being any rush to the boats as the ~v were lowerea,„
not a man entered them except the crows belongni
to them and the sick who were handekl into theinisl,
and yet they were only just got out in time, asur';it
proved by the fact of the launch being ac tually b
while hanging in the slings, and the men .41° Weof
in her being so blinded by the smoke that some
them jumped out of her on the wrong side, b,Y.,;:athise
take, down the main hatchway, and perished cut
flames. By this time the ship was absolutely'
tie
into two parts by the fire, which blazed UP the
mainmast, feeding upon the sails; and fusingwere
wire rigging; the greater part of the crew .a,,fe
driven forward, and Captain Campbell 11°171 'der
those who were within reach of his voice the order
to strip and jump overboard. Many had beellwaist
tually driven into the water already from the
of the ship, and were now holding on t° rpltle
spars, and hammocks, which those on the for he-
were he;
were throwing over to them. At last the hetwaaa
cameinsupportableheretoo. Every-thing that "„, to
skill and ingenuity could devise had been &:01,
save the ship : the 'masts were tottering overl.l,st.
hundred pound shells Gn the lower deck were h'iitie
ing beneath their feet, the explosion of the rooagvola 'a
became every mordent more imminent, and Ca mot
Campbell, Commander Wilson, and the sins the
of officers and men who, totthe,ship tows
last, were now gathered in her taws,' let theintOut
down into the water by ropes, and either stru,,es,
for boats, or, unable to swim, clung on to,r„%ad
Meantime, many of the marines, and these
burst of
been driven out of the ship by the first.; the
flame on deck, were drowned, either becansfough
ropes to which they were clinging were burnt tin toe
above, or because, in the crowd of men at on,iepr
in the water, some must have been pulled anr fact
the others. We are thus able to account for ta to
that all the officersbut one were saved ; theY
era gOod
the ship to the very last, and most of them WZaer
swimmers. While some were forced in the liven
described over the bows, a smaller number, which
aft, at last got down into the launCh, in t
Messrs. Watts and Carr in the most galia_li,„ or,
hung on to the ship, picking off the clinglnjae to
and managed by the sheer force of diselF',,lh
overcome that dread of the explosion w":",,,ide"
unnaturally haunted the men who already' C.'s:o no
the boat. Sub-Lieutenant Mandeville.,:%,` clef
sooner picked out of the water than, wit" s'reCfr
of volunteers, he pushed back to the blazing t; es,
in the jolly-boat no less than three different
other
each time discharging part of his cargo in— osios
boats and going back for more ; on oneieo. fore-
narrowly escaping being crushed by the fall'itacier
mast, and taking off men who were clingiltks age°
bows, where shells were bursting, shotted glO.
into
going off, melted lead was pouring upon thnfiev. to lt.et
the gammoning of the bowsprit, causing ttildere
go their hold and thus lose their lives ' Wilot
chain cables, as the anchors fell, ran white
sea,
of the hawse holes and hissing into the ror
th
where, as he describes in his evidence, he St° the
hundred-pound gun fall through all deck: cive
bottom of the ship. It is difficult to en; '
situation more appalling than that of the Tei-ys
sur-
unable to swim, were clinging under the or as
rounded by 'such eights and sounds as thrive
an
act more heroic than that of Mr. Mandie ;, three
his boat's crew of volunteers, who pulle":+11 01(
times to their rescue. While we regard Av an
timent of natural pride these deeds of daring rs,
self-devotion on the part of our own sewe
should be wanting in common gratitude thrilled,
not express those feelings which have been ,"`,ltblie
not only in the naval service, but the Britis,"srupo
generally, by the noble conduct of our aThe.sriu be
this occasion. We trust that some steps
nets
taken to mark our acknowledgment Of the
~cts
sympathy shown, not only in words, but in "nssare
generosity and unselfishness, which lye can `",sl tile;
Admiral Chargman and the, officers and craw o 1
013
Astree have not been-thrown airaY_;llP°sunla° bace
whom they were bestowed.-.A4s-AVn
these that the alliances of great
based. They will offer a firmer foundation h"- !Do•
lasting friendship than all the protocols re-
most skilful diplomacy could frame, and fina-",",hat-
fuse to be undermined by any Foreign-oflice
nations shoalror
soorer.