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

S • ,1 JANUARY 1, 1849.

v
eciortly hoist the pendant here. Two warrant officers
and 60 extra riggers of this yard are ordered to pro-
ceed to Woolwich by railway to bring her hero for
commission.

The Apollo troop-ship, Commander Rawatorne, goes
to China with a regiment to relieve the 98th.

APPOINTMENTS.
ADMIRALTY, DEC. 30.—William Oliver, to be acting-
boatswain ; Edmund T. Wild, midshipman, to the
Apollo; Hairy Eden, midshipman, to the Victory.
Paymaster and Purser W. 11. Wiseman (1844) will be
appointed to the Centaur.
Wind N.E., moderate breens and dark hazy weather.
PLYMOUTH, DEC. 29.—Some slight damage has been
done to the Breakwater during the late heavy gales.
The brig Arno, Captain Munden, which put in here
-this morning, with loss of bulwarks, bound to London,
reports having left the following British vessels at
Buenos Ayres on the 28th of September, viz., the barque
Graham, Salter; the brig Mary Winch, Harris; the
schooner Rachel, Hammond; the barque Mary Queen of
Scots, Wilcocks; the brig Ituna, Clark; the barque Pro-
mise, Hoseason; and the brigantine Choice, Ozier, for
London; the barque Glencairn, Fowler; the schooner
Sappho, Eustace; the barque Alice Brooks, Jackson; the
brigantine Susanna Collings, Crascombe; and the brig
Thames, Rutherford, for Liverpool; the brig Pacific,
Maclean; the brig Mary Halket, Thompson; and the
brig Lucy Sharp, M'Fee, for Falmouth, for orders; and
the brigantine Merchant, Luke, for Fowey. On the 6th
of November, 25 miles east by north of Pernambuco,
spoke the barque Norval, 34 days, from Newfoundland,
for Pernambuco.

Wind, E.S.E., fine.
WOOLWICH, DEC. 30.—The Arrogant steam-frigate,
46 guns, will be tried next week, and commissioned by
Captain Fitzßoy, recently acting Superintendent of
Woolwich Dockyard. Lieutenant Priest is nominated
for First Lieutenant, and the Rev. Mr. Lang to be
Chaplain.

SPIRIT of the PIiBiIbioURNALS.
PROM THE MORNING PAPERS OP THIS DAY.
TIMES.--Mr. M'Gregor has published his financial
programme, and Mr. M'Gregor, from his previous
studies as a statistician, has a better right to publish
such a document than nine-tenths of the multitude with
whose schemes we shall be shortly inundated. The
public will be the gainers by the discussion of these
amateur budgets. We have no apprehension of the adop-
tion of any such insane plan of financial reform as would
go to shake the credit and imperil the security of the
empire. The argument should bo met broadly and fairly
and with as little vague declamation and visionary prog-
nostications of a dismal futurity as may be. Even from
the enemies of the British constitution, from those who
would cut off all connexion with the past, and reduce
the political and social systems of this country to the
level of others which exist under totally dissimilar con-
ditions from ourselves, useful hints may be drawn. For
example, the moment is not arrived for cutting our colo-
nies adrift, or for handing over the vast empire of
British India to the mercy of a regiment or two of New
Orleans volunteers or Texian sympathizers. Ireland
cannot yet be left ungarrisoned, nor London be aban-
doned to the drunken fury of a gang of such nameless
ruffians as;threatened us with conflagration and pillage
during the course of the last spring and summer. We
may, however, obtain certain advantages from the labours
of those who review, even in a spirit of hostility, every
item of the public expenditure. Mr. M'Gregor sets forth
fairly enough the fact that when very nearly 47,000,0001.
are expended on the payment of the interest of the public
debt, and upon the :army, nary, and ordnance, it is to
this sum alone we can look with any reasonable
prospect of effecting a considerable reduction in the
taxation of the empire. Even so the issue must be
narrowed still more. Mr. M'Gregor distinctly asserts,
and his assertion is entitled to belief, that he at least
has no thought of tampering with the hypothecated
credit of the country. " The failure of that credit
would inflict a penalty upon every one of her Majesty's
subjects far more grievous than the payment even of
our present heavy taxation. In Great Britain it would
be ruinous to those who now employ others, and it
would throw those employed out of work. The ca-
lamity of a stoppage of the payment of the dividends or
the interest of the National Debt would break up every
monetary and commercial engagement in the United
Kingdom; the rights of property, whether in lands or
movables, would no longer be sacred ; Bank Stock,
India Stock, and all other stocks, together with
private banks and private credit, would all be
involved in the general calamity of a national
bankruptcy." Mr. M'Gregor has a Tight, then,
to credit for his assertion that the sacred
principle of public credit, as far as he is concerned, shall
be preserved intact. Where interests of such magni-
tude are at stake, we should not feel inclined to place
implicit confidence in the mere assertions of any man.
Were this phrasing merely ancillary to a revolutionary
proposition it should be discarded at once. Such is not
the case of Mr. M'Gregor. In his opinion not only
must the principle of the payment of the dividends of
the national debt be preserved, but with all his ingenuity
he cannot discover how it is that more than 5,304,0001.
of taxation can be taken off. For this reduction we
must look to the army, navy, and ordnance for
4,250,000!. The reductions the lion. Member for Glas-
gow proposes, without impairing the efficiency of these
branches of the public service, aro—

For 1847.
Tho Naval Expenditure, to £6,500,000 .E 7540,405
Tho Army, to ... ... 6,000,000 8,013,873
The Ordnance, to ... 1,750,000 2,947,869

Z 14,250, 000 £18,2,147
The question, then, upon whic h so much discussi 50on is
likely to arise can be thus narrowed to two very intelli-
gible issues :—What degree of force is it necessary to
maintain for the security of the country ? How can this
force be maintained at the smallest possible expense ?
Upon the answers to these two questions will depend the
solution of the pompous problems of the Financial Asso-
ciations and financial reformers in or out of Parliament.
Good will arise from this discussion in two ways.
In the first place, we shall no doubt effect a saving
of some 4,000,0001. or 5,000,000/. on the total sum
0; 70,000,0001. (we include county-rates, &c.) which is
annually levied from the inhabitants of the British isles.
This, as far as it goes, will be a:good, and a great good.
In the second place, we may at length hope to see en
end of the declamatory stuff of those pothouse orators
who are in the habit of presenting to an admirinc audi-
tory the Duke of Wellington and the Archbishop of
Canterbury as drunk and bloated on the spoils of the
industrious poor. We hare but ono wish, which is, that
all may be made so clear that every man in the three
kingdoms of sane mind may be able to understand the
justification and necessity of every penny that is taken
in the shape of taxation from the pockets of the people.
We have spoken of a positive reduction, and of a
positive point where the reduction can be effected. So
far we heartily go with Mr. M'Gregor, if he can make
out his case. This much, however, is far from giving a
just idea of his entire scheme. Not only would he re-
duce, but he would shift burdens. He would do, by a
coup de baguette, that which no thinking man would
wish to see effected but by degrees, and with the most
extreme circumspection. He would abolish all Customs'
duties but on eight articles, and these, with the exception
of tea and sugar, purely articles of luxury. From this
source he expects to derive 18,500,0001. From the
Excise again, he would hope to receive 11,200,0001.
upon his scheme of reduction. It may not be amiss to
place Mr. M'Gregor's scheme once more before our
readers, that they may judge of its practicability:—
A gross expenditure, including charges
of collection, and all payments now
made in its progress to the Exchequer £52,000,000
To meet which I propose:-
I.—Duzigs OF CUSTOMS. X.
(A) Tobacco 4,000,000
(B) Sugar (at present duties) 5,500,000
(C) Distilled spirits, all kinds ... ... 2,500,000
(D) Wines (at duties adjusted for revenue) 2,000,000
(E) Spices of all kinds ... 100,000
(F) Fruit of all kinds 500,000
(U) Tea' at Is. per lb. ... 3,000,000
(LI) Silk manufacutures, and other articles
of luxury, at an:ad valorem duty, ex-
eluding all raw materials end articles
of food ... 900,000
2.—ExcisE UNDER ONE OFFICE WITH STAMPS.
Spirits and Malt ... £10,000,000}
Licenses • 1,200,000 11,200,000
Stamps, Legacy Duty, and Probates
3.—Post-office, gross revenue ...
4.—Crown Lands (should give more) ...

7,500,000
2,300,000
500,000

Total from ordinary sources ... £41,000,000
s.—Duty of 5 per cent. upon the rents or
profits of all realised property, whether
funded, houses, lands, warehouses, docks,
East India Stock, Bank Stock, and all
stocks and shares whatever bought and
sold in the market, which I estimate at
220,000,000 L sterling par annum

11,000,000

Total estimated revenue to meet esti-
mated expenditure £52,000,000
We are fully prepared to admit the desirability of many,
of the changes proposed. For instance, could the Ex-
chequer bear the strain, no one could for a moment ad-
vocate the policy of maintaining the Excise duty upon
bricks or upon soap. No ono would deem it expedient
to saddle the house property and commercial transactions
of the country with the stamp upon fire and marine
assurances—no one but would be willing to reduce the
tea tax to is. per pound, and to abolish the assessed tax
upon windows to morrow. Even as at present some of
these changes may be politic and expedient; but it,
would seem little short of insanity, with an untried
future before us, and at the very moment the commer-
cial and agricultural interests of the country aro just
falling into the new groove cut for them in 1846, to give
up all hold on the past, and confront a certain expendi-
ture with an uncertain revenue. We dread these neat
cut-and-dry schemes, which strike so neat a balance
upon paper. Fifty-two millions expenditure; per elontc::
fifty-two millions, receipts. What can be more dei ghf
ful ? The office of the Chancellor of the Exchequer
may, amongst others, as well be abolished. The machine
will work of itself. Deficiencies will be unheard-of
things upon the scheme of Mr. M‘Grogor, ifs all goes
It is, however, difficult not to be struck with the ,
fact that this amateur budget mainly rests uppu Customs I

derived from articles of luxury, and upon a property-
tax, which would appear to be somewhat in contradiction
of the returns that have been made to Parliament
hitherto upon the subject. At any rate, however, we
shall be glad to see such inquiries followed up in an
honest and straightforward spirit, and met with open-
ness by the Government. We have not the smallest
desire to pay in the shape of taxes one shilling more
than we can help.
CHRONICLE.—Another amateur financier has en-
tered the field as a competitor of Mr, Cobden. The
laborious and "statistical" Member for Glasgow makes
the Christmas offering of an address of rive columns to
his constituents, and of a cut-and-dried budget to the
Chancellor of the Exchequer. Of the manifesto of the
Anti-Corn-law Leader, which has now undergone the
ordeal of a week's criticism, it will be the estimate of
most competent judges that! materiam superabat
opus. It: was an adroit and able paper, vigorous in
style, telling in effect, and well adapted to make an im-
pression on that large class who are quite unversed in
financial arithmetie. But, under its plausible surface,
there lurked some glaring inaccuracies, and not a few
uncandid suppressions, while the principle upon-which
the reduction of ten millions, the basis of the whole
scheme, was assumed, was too unsound to endure a
moment's argument. A given sum was specified as
sufficient for all the exigencies of the State, not because
it was proved to be so, but merely because it had suf-
ficed in a particular selected year. It was not attempted
to show that that year was one either of average expen-
diture or of efficient service; it is known to have been
the contrary. Moreover, since 1835, the Government
has undertaken, or rather it has had imposed upon it, by
the will of the nation, new functions and new responsi-
bilities. All these are summarily passed over in a
scheme which, disdaining all examination of details, as-
sumes, as a premiss, what should have been proved as a
conclusion, that the expenditure of the country is twenty
per cent, greater than the necessities of the public ser-
vice require. Mr. M'Gregor, on the other hand, is
pre-eminently unskilful in the art of dressing
up a statement. His address is not only very long,
but has the graver fault of being what, on the other aide
of the Atlantic, is expressly termed lengthy. He begins
the subject ab ovo, by informing his Glasgow friends,
with a needless display of erudition, that all civilized
nations have had recourse to the device of taxation.
" Augustus decreed that all the world should be taxed;
and all the world was taxed, and all the world has con-
tinued ever since to be taxed." So much, and a good
deal more, as to taxation in general—at last we come to
the more immediate topic, the real point at issue—taxa-
tion in particular. In stating his vie.vs, as to the na-
tional expenditure, Mr. M'Gregor gives us the result,
we have no doubt, of long and laborious cogitations on
the subject, though, as the items are not specified, we
are unable to pronounce as to the soundness of his data.
llis conclusion, at least, is more modest than Mr.
Cobden's—the total saving which he finds practicable,
upon the gross public expenditure, being about half
the estimate of his rival, viz., 5,304,6141. But in all
those parts of the two plans which relate to the re-
adjustment of taxation, by the remission or substitution
of particular imposts, the Scotch and English financiers
are as wide as the poles asunder. It is, indeed, an edify-
ing proof of the inequality which attaches, more or less,
to all modes of taxation, to observe how each particular
tax in the catalogue has its peculiar demerits in the
eyes of one or other of the numerous tribe of fiscal re-
formers. It must be sport to the Chancellor of the
Exchequer, who has the hard task of vindicating them
all, to observe these financial amateurs practically re-
futing ono another, by fixing, successively, upon each of
the public burdens as the most oppressive and objection-
able in the whole series. For example, Mr. Cobden is
prepared to sacrifice five millions for the sake of
abolishing the malt-tax. Mr. M'Gregor considers malt,
next to spirits, as the least objectionable item in the
Excise. On the other hand, thelMember for Glasgow
denounces, with hearty objurgation, the whole chapter of
the Assessed taxes, as unequal:offensive, and highly ob-
jectionable in principle; while the Member for the West
Biding, with a supposed surplus of ten millions at his
disposal, will not spare a shilling from the receipts from
horses, carriages, and servants; but he is eloquent upon
the iniquity of the probate and legacy duties. The
income-tax, too, Mr. Cobden would preserve,
though he drops some vague allusion to the pro-
priety of remodelling it. Mr. M'Gregor would
throw it completely overboard, and proposes, as a
substitute, an original pet scheme of his own for
raising 11,000,0001 by a direct assessment of five per
cent. upon all descriptions of realised property. Finding
much difficulty, as he tells us, in arranging any satis-
factory scale tor taxing permanent and temporary in-
comes, he has cut the knot by letting off the latter class
altogether. The trading and professional classes would,
certainly, reap an ample indemnity for having paid too
much, under Sir R. Peel's tax, by paying nothing at all
under Mr. Al`Gregor's. We cannot attempt to follow
Mr. M'Gregor through all, the complicated details of his
fiscal exercitations. He is what his countrymen would
call a " painful" writer; but his judgment is much
less conspicuous than hi; industry, and his faculty
of lucid and distinct statement bears even a less
proportion to his prolixity. As for his plan, it ap-
pears to us to he neither better nor worse than those of
a multitude of other ingenious projectors, who have
made finance their hobby, and whose schemes for re-
generating the National Exchequer annually load their
publishers' shelves with untold pamphlets, and the
Chancellor of the Exchequer's paper basket with unap-
preciated suggestion;. For our own part, upon grounds
which we have more than once explained, we entertain
a settled distrust of those self-confident operators who
are ready, at a moment's notice, to take to pieces and re-
construct the whole fabric of our financial system; and,
anxious as we are for a sound and well-advised fiscal re-
form, we feel for that very roason about as little respect
for a " national budget" as sober statesmen entertain for
a paper constitution.

ESPLANADE AT DO VER.
TO THE EDITOR OF THE SUE..
Sllt,—lt has been recently stated in the provincial and
other journals that the high seas caused by the late gales
of wind have done great damage to the esplanade at
Dover, and I fear this is only the beginning of a series
of similar disasters of more than probable occurrence
in that part of the bay, unless prompt and efficacious
measures are taken to prevent further encrorchment.
I have no doubt whatever that the injury has °arisen
from a gradual denudation of the shore of its ordinary
supply of shingle, which has been wasting away ever
since the large masses of chalk, exploded in the forma-
tion of the railway, were deposited at the foot of the
cliff through which the tunnels were pierced, opposing
a formidable barrier to the prevailing easterly drift of
the shingle.
I foresaw the danger to which the esplanade property
would in the course of time be liable, and, in a letter
published in one of the London daily papers,
soon after the great mine was sprung, I warned
the :proprietors and the local authorities of the
certain effect of this barrier, sooner or later; recom-
mended then to watch the beach narrowly; and advised
the construction of numerous short groynes in order to
retain the shingle then in the bay.
Nothing, however, was done, and cause and effect are
now plainly enough to be traced.
How long the chalk deposition may continue to im-
pede the passage of the shingle it is impossible to say,
but, undoubtedly, until an accumulation sufficient to fill
up the angle formed with the line of coast to the west-
ward shall have taken place, when the new alignment
there given to the pebbles becoming a tangent to the
outer point of the barrier, they will drift round it, and
travel on to the eastward, as in time past.
But, meanwhile, mischief has occurred, and the espla-
nade may be entirely swept away, if left unprotected;
for a new feature is growing up, which will quickly
prove to the most sceptical that no further supply of
shingle can ever be wafted to the shore in front of the
town. The western breakwater of the Harbour of Re-
fuge, commenced last year, lies to the west of the old
south pier, and, being connected with the land, inter-
poses a second, and an impassable, barrier, which must
for ever divert the shingle from its natural path, and in-
stead of following the contour of the bay it will travel to
seaward of the Harbour of Refuge, after an accumula-
tion, and disposition similar to what has been before
described, shall have taken place in the angle formed by
the breakwater with the line of coast.
I believe this view of the matter is strictly correct, the
deductions incontrovertible; and, if so, surely it behoves
the corporation of Dover and the owners of esplanade
property to give the whole subject the earliest and most
serious deliberation. I do not know the extent of the
ravages lately made by the sea, and, therefore, can offer
no opinion as to the propriety of now constructing
groynes. It may be too late to do so, and a retaining
wall, or piles and planking may be the only safe resource.
Moreover, these plans may be separately applicable. to
different localities, and the choice must be loft to tper"b.
judgment of an engineer, who can only_cometo a
dent determination after personal inspection, and duly
weighing all the circumstances.
the honour
advice, and energy in following it.—i
Again I counsel promptitude in seetainyge
to be, Sir, your most obedient servan_ us,
S. Wii,l4l'lll/ ;
'soya. —ng.necrs.
Lieutenant -Colonel, late professional
Ramsgate, Jan. 1, 1849

NrbEd:Reel trl al.
I I . .--
- make 13
RIDG-
- - ------z-----_ _
last
buronied, in o month, 3
bOtl murdered
Annu
breldli';enher;w dfit
haorbdensyrt-,
ix° on aar
11.1
cis tEd, LATE
S inquiry,AL SALOP, P ,k
touching[S uAi tTDn annA. ._l,. ri
el )1 3dE_ ci talEirta3Dl IlriGn
of
aged 60 years, who it was alleged
was held yesterday in the Town
death
1 iteeaarbobide and up
andgpeh
appear
daughter raa theicto:nirdwe anrt
afterwards
si 4th
vv?'s confirmatory of
Hall, in this town. The evidence
tloieliepeanritaienu,l,;:vrhsoaalprpearedhyepnudbealistlhleed
prisoner, said, I charged
Richard Evans, the
mlother, and cautioned her not
her with murdering her
in going up the High-street,
,nt %ray, al,n.aystlttai titigintgo
herm e .t,
prisoner's brother_
will be another Severn Hall job " (the
suppose this
at Severn Hall),,,raisss?,id)o Lie lock-up, she said to me, "
was hung for the murder of his wife
andana sahaeaosoanid,as
my " What do you mean by that ?"
The evidence of llpasf;ssi.onn
ton,. passion ; I am very passionate,
is
Stranger,over CI
ofl forgive i vice e
wdirectly."death, was read by liew o
Martin, the surgeons,' and
co
raoll deposed to the cause of
ebner, after which the jury
altuarcniryde.nliiiti_lh92viltioit, of r ruary, on which day they
_ __ i 149