The Sun.
London, England, 1851-02-18 00:00:00

35,000/. raised upon all seeds. The present duty was ss.
upon foreign seeds, and 2s. 6d. upon colonial seeds ; he pro-
posed to reduce the whole to.a uniform rate of ls. per cwt.,
which would involve a loss to the revenue of
30,0001. Many propositions had been made to
cast what were called the local burdens on
land on the Consolidated Fund. Such a change would pro-
duce a social revolution, by the removal of all the checks of
local administration ; it was to the magistrates, the guardians,
and the local boards, that the peace and safety of the country
were owing, and if they transferred the payment of their
burdens to the Government, they must also transfer the
management ; but there was one portion of these changes
which he thought might be taken upon the general
revenue, and that was a portion of the charge for the
expenses of pauper lunatics. He proposed to leave the
conduct of pauper lunatic asylums as it was at present,
but to take upon the Consolidated Fund a portion of the
maintenance of pauper lunatics, taking upon the :Govern-
ment a larger portion of the expense of county lunatic asylums
than of those paupers confined in private asylums,so as to reduce
the expense of the maintainance of these unfortunate persons
to about the average expense of the maintenance of an ordi-
nary pauper; he proposed to take a charge of 150,0001. under
this head for the United Kingdom. These were the
proposals which he should in due time submit to
the House. In the month of July there
would he a reduction of duty on sugar of 330,0001., and
that added to the reductions which would be proposed would
be a gain to the community of 1,522,000/., but the loss:to the
revenue he estimated at only 1,130,0001. The charge for
the transfer of local rates was 150,0004 making a total loss
to the revenue of 1,280,0004 leaving a surplus for future
years at 612,0001., the actual loss for the
next year being only 150,00(V., being for next
year a surplus of 962,0001., of other years of 612,0001.
He could not but expect that this Budget would in many
quarters create disappointment, but he did not think it con-
sistent to relieve, as he had been urged to do, the
owners of land to a greater extent than he had proposed.
Last year he had relieved them by a reduction of
the stamp duty on deeds, and by the removal of the duty on
bricks, and this year he reduced the duty on timber which
they employed in the erection of farm buildings, and reduced
the duty on seeds. He did not know that there was any other
point on which he need trouble the House, and the resolution
he should propose was for the renewal of the income-tax and
of the stamp-duties in Ireland for three years, and he
was prepared, if the House wished it, to postpone the discus-
sion to another opportunity.—(Hear, hear.)
The resolutions having been proposed from the Chair,
Mr. HERRIES rose, and after complimenting the Chan-
cellor of the Exchequer upon the ability of his elaborate
statement, claimed from the Government ample time for the
country to consider the important point whether or not the
income-tax should be continued. He hoped they would
not be asked to come to a decision that night, and he thought
the House ought to have until Friday next to consider the
matter.

Lord JOHN RUSSELL consented to the postponement of the
further consideration of the resoletion until Friday.
Mr. HumE objected to the apportionment of any part of
the surplus to the reduction of the debt; it should all have
been appropriated to the reduction of taxation. He ap-
proved of the removal of the window duties, but not of the
imposition of the house tax.
Lord DUNCAN considered that the proposition to impose a
house tax would create great dissatisfaction.
Sir JOHN TYRELL did not object to the adulteration of
coffee with chicory, but he thought that adulteration with
other substances should be prohibited.
Mr. W. WinuAms objected to a house tax, and would
prefer seeing any deficiency supplied by the extension of the
probate and legacy duty to real property.
Mr. Alderman SIDNEY objected to a house tax, and would
oppose the renewal of the income-tax, unless a difference
wire made between incomes derived from trades and profes-
sions and those derived from invested property.
Mr. SLANET proposed to relieve the landowners by
granting the facilities for raising money on mortgage.
Mr. IIODGES and Mr. FREwEN advocated a repeal of the
duty on hops.
Mr. ALCOCK, Sir W. JOLLIFFE, Mr. FEWDEGATE, and Mr.
F. FRENCH expressed their disapproval of the statement of
the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
Mr. BANKES approved of the repeal of the window duties,
but reserved his opinion upon the other portions of the
Budget.
Mr. MITCHELL approved of the reduction in the timber
duties.

Mr. MuNTz vrould oppose the renewal of the income-tax.
It was the most objectionable of all taxes.
In reply to Sir B. HALL and Lord DUDLEY STUART, the
CHAscEELoa of the EXCHEQUER said he did not intend to
extend the house tax to Ireland.

The Committee was likewise addressed by Colonel SIB-
THORP, Mr. W. BROWN, Mr. SANDAP,S, Mr. HOPE, Mr.
HENLEY, and Captain HARES, when the House resumed.
Mr. HAWES moved the second reading of the Passengers'
Act Amendment Bill, the objects of which he explained.
The Bill was read a second time, after some remarks
from Mr. S. HERBERT and Mr. HENLEY.

Mr. ANSTEY obtained leave to bring in a Bill for establish-
in municipal councils in counties ; Sir W. Somsavar.2 a
Bill to amend the laws relating to the valuation of rateable
property in Ireland; and Major BLACKALL, a Bill to extend
the remedies provided by the Renewable Leaseholds Conver-
sion Act.

The House adjourned at a Quarter to Twelve o'clock.

Parturiunt mantes, nascitur ridiculus mus. Never
before has so ridiculous an abortion been ushered
in with such magnificent pretensions. Never have
the reasonable expectations of the people been so
deeply and bitterly disappointed as by the " PRECIOTJS
BUDGET 's
-the inestimable boon (!)—which the
Chancellor of the Exchequer has just bestowed upon
the oppressed and suffering taxpayers of the United
Kingdom. If Sir CHARLES WOOD had to struggle
against a deficiency—the ordinary condition of the
Whig regime in financial matters—some al-
lowances might be made. Without a sur-
plus fund to be disposed of, he could scarcely be
expected to sanction any of those great fiscal experi-
ments, by which considerable relief would be

afforded to the industrial classes, without any cor

responding diminution of revenue ; but, unfortu-
nately for his own fame and reputation as a states-
man, he has had handsome balances in 1850, and
1851, after providing for every liability and every
necessary expenditure, and in the allocation of
balances he has contrived to overthrow his own cha-
racter for competency and political integrity.
The "Brick-dust Budget" of 1650 was bad enough.
Much could not be alleged in its favour, and we
candidly confess that we believed that it would have
been utterly impossible to have produced a more im-
politic or more unstatesmanlike plan than last year's
financial bantling of the Right Hon. Gentleman.
But we must acknowledge our mistake. "Facilis de-
-Icensus averni." Our sagacious Minister of Finance
has travelled more rapidly on the downward track
than we could have ventured to anticipate. He
has attained railroad speed during his decline,
and his fall cannot long be averted.
Nemo repeate fuit turpissimus. A man must have been
some time in office, and had his mind gradually har-
dened by the influences of that demoralising situation,
to render such an offence against public policy and
public honesty possible. Sir CHARLES WOOD has
contrived to disappoint the reasonable anticipations of
all classes throughout the length and breadth of the
land, and to heap a load of obloquy upon the
Ministers whose misfortune it is to have
him as a colleague, perfectly unprecedented at
any former period of English history. We have had
honest blunderers presiding over the financial destinies
of the British nation. We have also had clever
rogues (of course we allude only to the public cha-
racters, and do not invade the sacred precincts of
private life); but it was reserved for the present
Cabinet to place at the head of the most important
and
.most arduous department one who was at the
same time an incompetent blunderer and a
political rogue.
We now tell Lord JOHN RUSSELL earnestly and
emphatically, and we say it more in sorrow
than in anger, that Sir CHARLES WOOD is the
evil genius of his Government, and that if he does not
forthwith shake off the incubus, if he does not find a
more popular, a more competent, and a more sagacious
Chancellor of the Exchequer, he must be prepared to re-
linquish office, and make way for others who may not
be so obstinate on such a point. Far better, say we,
that the Protectionists should come into power, and
that the Whigs should be placed in the position
where they have ever shown themselves to be most
consistent and most useful—viz., in opposition, than
that the nation should be longer oppressed by the
inequitable and impolitic, the dishonest and unwise
mismanagement of the national finances, that has
signalised the administration of Sir CHARLES WOOD at
the Exchequer. A combined and vigorous exer-
tion must therefore be made to remove him
from office. Even if the entire Ministry be
shaken in the attempt, it is a matter of but little con-
sequence in comparison to the evils that must follow
from a continuance of Sir CHARLES WOOD as the
English Minister of Finance. The Whig Ministers
are, however, made of squeesrable materials, they have
repeatedly yielded to " the pressure from without,"
when sufficiently forcible. The "voice of public opinion"
has penetrated even into the deepest recesses of Down-
ing-street, and has been responded to, more especially
on fiscal questions. Scarcely a session has passed
since the Peel ministry were removed from office, that
the Premier has not been compelled to step forward,
as the Deus en nzachial, to save his Government from
the gross and palpable errors of his Minister of Fi-
nance. Let.him do so once more, and let him, at the
same time, get rid of the incorrigible blockhead who
has imposed upon him the painful necessity, and has
brought so much disrepute and reproach on the entire
Government.

We must, however, allude to the contemplated
changes which will be found set forth in extenso in
our Parliamentary Summary. Sir CHARLES WOOD
calculates, or asserts that he calculates, that he suall
have a surplus of 1,892,0001. for the ensuing year.
It is a portion, and a very discreditable portion, of
hii system of tactics to make his estimates very much
below the actual probability. This will be found to