The Sun.
London, England, 1869-01-21 00:00:00

STATISTICAL SOCIETY.

The usual monthly meeting of this society was held on
Tuesday, at 12, St. James's-square, Colonel Sykes, M.P.,
in the chair. Amonst those present were Mr. Lowe,
Chancellor of the Exehequer ; Mr. Childers, First Lord
of the Admiralty; Mr. V. Harcourt, M.P., Dr. Farr, _
Dr. Guy, Dr. Clark, Mr. W. Newmarch, Mr. F. Preedy,
Mr. S. Brown, president of the Institute of Actuaries,
and others.

A letter was read from Mr. W. E. Gladstone, the
president of the society; stating that an engagement at
ITawarden prevented his attendance that evening, and
that he much regretted his inability to be present.
Mr. P. DUDLEY BAXTER read a paper on the taxation
and capital of the United Kingdom. He first considered
the resources and territories of the United Kingdom. The
United Kingdom, he said, was so populous and wealthy
because she was the metropolis of a vast commerce ; and
our existence as a wealthy nation depended upon our pre-
eminence. Whatever might he thecost of maintaining that
pre-ern in en ce,it mustbe cheerf ull ypaid, as the truest national
economy. The lecturer then dealt with -the principles of
taxation, quoting Adam Smith, Jeremy Bentham, and
.T. S. Mill. He modified Adam Smith's rules as follows:-
1. Expenditure on bare necessaries should be exempt from
taxation. 2. Expenditure on bad habits may be heavily
taxed. 3. On the rest of his income every man ought to
he taxed in an equal percentage. 4. Taxes ought to be
certain and uniform—not arbitrary and unequal. 5. Every
tax ought to he levied at the time end in the manner most
convenient to the contributor. 6. Every tax ought to take
out of the pockets of the people as little as possible beyond
its produce to the Treasury. Such a system might produce
in the three examples above mentioned something like
the following results, assuming that the taxpayers were
men of moderate indulgence in the luxuries of their
stations :—A wealthy man with £lO,OOO a year would pay
21,000; a professional man or tradesman with £soo' a
year, £45 ; and a workman with 270 a year, £5. The
diminution in favour of the temperate part of the community
would under this system be paid by an increased taxation
on the bad habits of the intemperate. The lecturer then
contended that direct taxation by one tax was impracticable,
and that a system of taxes was necessary. He examined
the various methods of taxation, giving a slight sketch of
their history, and proposed the following classification
1. Taxes on income and capital. 2. Licences or taxes on
trades and professions. 3. Taxes on consumption of food
and stimulants. 4. Rates on occupation and tolls. On
the subject of taxation on individuals and classes, as the
basis of his calculations he took a family of four, and
three such families from the great classes of the nation—
the upper, the middle, and the manual labour class.
The family with £lO,OOO a year income paid in taxes on
income, capital, and miscellaneous, -£738 ; the family
with £5OO a-year, 226 10s. ; and the family with 270 a-year,
nothing. The same families in taxes on food and stimulants
paid £6l 35.. £lO 16s. 6:1., and £3 7s. 10d. ; and in local
rates and tolls they would pay 2162, £l5 10s., and £1 12s.
it thus followed that the at tual distribution of taxation in
the United Kinedoin upon men of temperate habits was
not very dissimilar to that already mentioned earlier in
the le-einre, viz., the wealthy- man with £lO,OOO a year
raid £960 ; the man with .E5OO a-year, £52; and the work-
man with £7O a year, £5. But besides this portion of the
taxes, which provided for temperate indulgence in alcoholic
drinks, there was a residue of taxation—more than
£lo,Co),ooo—derived from these drinks sufficient to supply
fifteen additional gallons of beer and nearly two-thirds of
a gallon of proof spirits per head to 22,000,000 persons.
The lecturer concluded by observing that the taxes in
direct action did not appear to be inequitable to the
working man, and by stating a variety of questions to be
considered in a future paper.
The CHAIRMAN spewed by statistics how much during
the last fifteen years Mr. Gladstone's policy had done to
diminish the taxation of the country, and thus to increase
the comfort of the poorer classes.
Mr. NEWMARCH pointed out the anomaly of real pro.
perty paying no succession duty.
Mr. ELLIOTT held that the incidence of taxation on those
who were called poor was very light indeed, and that most
of such people could reduce their consumption by one-half,
and be the better for it. •

Dr. GUY agreed with the last speaker, remarking that
the poor were the most luxurious feeders under the sun.
They denied themselves no gratification which the money
they happened to have at the moment in their pockets
would procure them, never looking forward to the
future.

Mr. V. HARCOURT, M.P., questioned the accuracy of
some of Mr, Baxter's statistics relative to the expenditure
of a family with an income of £lO,OOO a year ; and remarked
that if they were amended the difference between 9A per
cent. and the 101 per cent. paid by the middle-class fimily
would rapidly disappear.
Mr. GLOVER thought the poor man shared in a less
degree in the benefits of government than the rich man
and that therefore he ought to pay less in taxes.
Mr. DILKE, Dr. FARR, and Dr. CAMPS continued the
discussion.
Mr. BAXTER, in reply, said he was of opinion that the
poor man was more heavily taxed at the rate of 7 per cent.
than the rich man. There were two ways of carrying out
what Bentham wished : the first was, to exempt all with
an income less than £5O a year, which was not practicable
without direct taxation ; and the second was, to assess the
poor man at a lower scale.
A vote of thanks was accorded to Mr. Baxter for ibis
caner.

THE WORST KIND OF EDUCATION—TO be brought
up by a policeman.—Judy.

THE " SEA SERPENT."—The Portland (Maine)
Advertiser gives the following description of an extraor-
dinary creature killed near Eastport, October Bth. It is
part fish and part beast, over 30 feet in length, and girths
21 feet, having one enormous dorsal fin, two side belly
fins, and a broad, shark-11e tail. About one-third of its
length from its tail, in connection with small fins, it has
two huge legs terminating in web feet. Its mouth makes
a line of five or six feet in length, the whole extent of
which is set with innumerable small teeth, resembling in
size and shape the kernel of a species of sharp-pointed pop
corn. It has a series of gills which overlap each other
like thl flouncesonce the style of ladies' dresses. His im-
mense body, estimated to have weighed, when captured,
about eleven tons, has no framework of bones, its
most solid portions consisting of cartilage iuca-
tablo
tougt, fk
e ptrbeasetrvoatfiont.he letlepshkainnts
andis drabrilncoeeraonsd.
There is no record of the species, and to none is
it a greater wonder than to naturalists whose attention
is being drawn to it. Among others who have had an op-
pl
no
sr ttui
tnuittey, ooff seeingwasbf
nit
gi
tsoln'r, owl ebsos ofrs Bassi ryde, t ouf
tit ha
be
ISmithsoniaplacen
t
in the known list of the animal kingdom. When first
trt fired
t,
dis-
covered it was swimming along leisurely, and when put-
w]. ed tookie-w
tiotahtee r
but none took effect until the g
spike, whichun was ded w
stomach containedlanntad;ka.ndNuwmaserocaups
sued someor 120 feet
above
bstruek just above
nothing
gbnt
vegetable
eetaloas w
mainble fore
raattleirnt.w ith a smallhTliehhe
leads to the conclusion that it subsisted upon vegetables
on the bottom of the ocean and shore. From Portland it
will be taken to Saco, to be exhibited for a few days.
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