stated, that he was anxious to correct a mistake into which he had inadvertently fallen in the debate of last night upon the education question as to a matter of fact. In answer to some observations which had fallen from the hon. and learned Member for Oxford, as to an address which had been presented by the clergy of the diocese of Bath and Wells, he (Sir G. Grey) had stated that that address had been signed by Mr. Denison. He believed at the time—speaking from memory—that that statement was strictly true; but upon looking over the original address this morning, he had found that the name of Mr. Denison was not among the names of those who had signed the address. He felt it due to that rev. gentleman that he should take the earliest opportunity of stating that his name was not appended to the address, and to express his regret that he should have made that mis-statement.

wished to ask the right hon. Gentleman the First Lord of the Admiralty, what steps had been taken in consequence of the vote of the House on the 8th of April last as to the accommodation of assistant surgeons on board ships of war?

said, that in the course of the debate he stated that there was a cabin dedicated to the purposes of study on the part of assistant surgeons. On inquiry it appeared that though the order had been issued by the Admiralty, it had not been carried out to the full extent. It was the intention of the Admiralty to take care that it should be fully carried out. With regard to the cabins for the assistant surgeons, the vote of the House had been attended to, and he had most anxiously looked to see how far it was possible to carry it entirely into effect; but, unfortunately, it happened that they could not by a vote of that House add to the accommodation of a ship, and while it was their anxious wish to give accommodation to all the officers of the service, yet they had two points to be taken into consideration: one was the efficiency of the ship of war, and the other was the interference with the accommodation of the crew. In some ships it would be impossible to give that additional accommodation to the assistant surgeons without interfering with that of the crew: in such cases the Admiralty had directed that accommodation to be given, but in some of the smaller vessels of war it would not be convenient to do so without infringing the two points to which he had just alluded, With regard to the messing in the ward room, it was thought requisite that the assistant surgeons should serve some apprenticeship before they should be admitted to mess in the ward room. Amongst those who were most anxious for the accommodation of the surgeons, such a course was considered extremely important. It was then proposed that they should serve three years before being allowed the advantages of the ward room.

said, in soliciting their attention to the subject of the malt tax, he begged to assure them that he brought it forward entirely on his own responsibility, without any promise of support from any quarter of the House. In no way whatever could it be considered a party question; for his noble Friend at the head of the Government had intimated that he did not consider himself able to dispense with the malt tax; while, on the other hand, a noble Lord occupying a distinguished position in the other House, as head of the Protectionist party, had publicly declared that he could not give his support to a Motion of this kind, which would rob the revenue of so large a sum. He (Mr. Cayley) could, therefore, be influenced by no other motive than a conscientious conviction that, under the depressed state of agriculture, and under the novel circumstances in which it was placed by the late commercial changes, nothing (short of the re-imposition of the old, or a modified system of Protection) could so conduce to the well-being of agriculture, as the repeal of this most oppressive tax. Taxation was never very popular, and still less was it likely to be so when it was oppressive and unequal. Taxation! what was it, after all, but this: that the nation had run up a large score, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who was in the position of paymaster, called upon all parties to pay their "shot," as it was commonly called? Now if half a dozen gentlemen chose to indulge themselves in any entertainment, and, on the bill being called for, only five of them were ready to contribute to its payment, the one who "shirked" would surely not be very graciously looked upon, nor could his companions be expected with a very good grace to start a whip to pay his share. It would be the same in a commercial partnership, or any other joint-stock concern—of which society at large was one. Burdens imposed for the use or protection of all, to be cheerfully borne, must be equally borne. But the complaint against the malt tax was not only that it was so heavy and oppressive, but that it was partial, and imposed on agricultural produce a greater burden than was thrown on any other branch of British industry. By the repeal of the corn laws, British agriculture, after a long period of protection, had been deprived of it. It had been often stated that the corn laws were of late enactment, and dated no farther back than 1815. It was, however, notorious that these laws giving protection up to 48 s. a quarter for wheat, had existed not less than 170 years, and that in 1670 that system began which had expired in last year. It was true that in 1815 a higher protection had been established than theretofore had existed; and that whereas, in 1790, the pivot was a price of 54 s., in 1804 it was 64 s., and in 1815, 80 s. But surely these circumstances showed that British agriculture was entitled, after such a long period of protection, not merely to justice, but (if it were required, which it was not) to something more than justice, and even to a tender consideration at the hands of the Legislature. During the long period of protection, the landed interests were in power, and were not unwilling to extend to other classes the same protection which they required for themselves. Their principle was, "Live and let live." Indeed, the system of protection did not begin with corn, but with the woollen manufacture. Until the seventeenth century it had been the habit of the population of this country to purchase their woollen clothing principally of the Flemings; but, in order to favour our woollen manufacture, prohibitory duties were established against the importation of Flemish woollens, and a prohibition also was established against the export of British wool, which had been previously exported to Flanders. Mr. Porter stated— root sugar and tobacco. Then the hon. Member for Wolverhampton, who had always introduced the question for the repeal of the corn laws until the hon. Member for the West Riding took it out of his hands, and asked the agriculturists if they would consent to the repeal of the corn laws if they had the repeal of the malt tax, which, he said, the country would be anxious to get rid of on those terms. And the hon. Member for the West Riding had intimated a similar opinion in his celebrated budget; and he (Mr. Cayley) hoped, therefore, for these hon. Members' support. There was (said the hon. Member) another name, which, at the present moment, he scarcely knew whether it was not almost indecorous to refer to—he meant the name of that eminent man who had so lately and so inscrutably been withdrawn from their councils. But as he could cite no higher authority than that distinguished name, perhaps the House would permit him to appeal to it. On the same occasion, in 1839, in reply to arguments in favour of a repeal of the corn laws, Sir Robert Peel stated, if they were repealed, he would say, "Let the farmer grow his own tobacco, and manufacture and consume his own malt." And there were other occasions on which that eminent man expressed a similar opinion. Thus, Sir Robert Peel, in 1834, in a discussion on a petition, said— l. in amount, and it was virtually impossible to escape the infliction of them if the excisemen were extreme in a rigorous enforcement of the law. The following were some of the hardships and vexations. The object of the exciseman was to get the largest possible amount of duty. This was obtained in the couch. To obtain this the exciseman obliged the maltster to throw his barley as highly as possibly in three conical heaps into the couch from the cistern, so that as much space should exist as possible between each grain. The gauge was then taken of the cubical contents—taking space and air as well as barley. Much was sometimes said as to the objections against taxes on light, like the window duties. But the malt tax was a tax on air and space. The success of malting often depended in a great degree on the constant changing of the water; but this the excise would not permit more than once. Then, again, malt mixed with unmalted barley would make good beer, but was not allowed, for fear of injuring the revenue. In short, such were the excise regulations, that it was impossible to carry on the manufacture in a sure, scientific, or successful manner. Then, again, such was the insecurity of the trade and the risk of incurring penalties, that no small capitalists could procure the "bondsmen" required by the excise laws as security for the revenue; and the consequence had been that the malt trade had become a great monopoly, as also had the brewing trade—so much so, that there were fewer maltsters now in the country than there were five years ago, and eight out of ten public-houses belonged to brewers. In fact, a brewer could afford to give 100 l. for a house only worth 50 l. on account of the sale of his beer, and enormous were the profits thus made upon the malt. A word or two as to the process. The manufacture of malt was one in which the process of nature was artificially imitated, and therefore was one of great delicacy, in which it was, for instance, of the utmost importance whether the malt were long enough in the "cistern," which it scarcely ever was, for fear of increasing the swell so much as to occasion too high a gauge in the couch, and consequently too heavy a rate of duty. To escape duty, the maltsters steeped the barley too short a time in the cistern, and made up for it by sprinkling on the floor; and the regulations of the excise most materially interfered with and obstructed the process—the delicacy and difficulty of which, indeed, were such that it was obvious no interference should take place—the farmer should be his own maltster. But he could not be so, on account of the heaviness of the tax. Why, however, should the maltster be dealt with differently from any other manufacturer? The farmer should be enabled to use his own malt. In the inspired writings it was said that the labourer should be the first partaker of the fruits of his toil; but in this country the labourer was in a great degree deprived of his national beverage, the fruit of his toil, through the tax on malt. Again, the farmer, but for the duty, would use malt extensively, instead of oil cake. It had been disputed how far this was so, as to dry malt; but he had consulted Dr. Ure on the subject, who had said that the experiments of the excise on the subject proved nothing. However, it was certain that the "wash" from distilleries, or "sweet wort," was far more nutritious than dry barley or dry malt; so much so that, in competitions for cattle prizes, it was usual to forbid the use of it, on account of the expense; and it was most unfair that farmers should be debarred from the use of so valuable an article of food for their cattle, on account of oppressive and partial taxation. In reference to the question as to the amount of saccharine in malt, it was probable that the saccharine in malt was not two-thirds, probably not one-half, developed until it was in the mash tun. In former times, when the duty was not so high, there used to be a malt house attached to every farm house—and so there would again, if this tax were repealed. It was said that the tax was paid by the consumer, as the phrase was. But, if so, how happened it that the cotton manufacturers were so anxious to get rid of the duty on cotton yarn and printed calicoes, which were as much paid by the consumer as that on malt? Such an argument was obviously fallacious, for it was plain that a duty limited the consumption by raising the price. His object in asking for the repeal of this tax was to lower the price of malt and beer, and to increase the consumption of barley, and so raise its price; and this could not be done without displacing wheat and oats, and so raising their price also. The malt tax amounted to cent per cent on the article manufactured. How would the hon. Member for Manchester like an exciseman to walk into his mill any hour of the day, interfere with every process of his manufacture, and tax him besides 100 per cent on the article he made? He (Mr. Cayley) should be sorry to be the exciseman. Many Members said, "Taxes must be paid." Yes, but they should be fairly distributed. And the objection to the malt tax was, that it was so partial and unequal. The House, perhaps, was not aware of the extent of the exemptions enjoyed by manufacturers from duties on articles used in their manufactures. Thus, for example, in the article of soap, they had enjoyed a total, and now enjoyed a partial, exemption. The hon. Member here referred to a statement as to the use of soap for manufactures of woollen, flax, cotton, silk, and linen goods. The amount of allowances in 1849 was on 20,000,000 lbs. Why was this exemption made? According to the opposite argument the duty was paid by the consumer. Aye, but the manufacturers were aware that the full duty would increase the price of their goods, and thereby diminish the consumption of them. Why not apply the same principle, then, to the malt manufacturer? Then, again, as to the duty on paper, as to which there had been great complaints. There had been a good deal said in a leading journal which greatly influenced the councils of the country—the Times —in reference to this Motion, as to the extent to which this duty on paper affected it; although, according to the argument of that journal on the malt tax, the duty should be immaterial to it, being "paid by the consumers," that is, the purchasers of the paper. However, a copy of the Times, with the supplement, weighed four ounces, and the paper tax upon it was one farthing and a quarter. The stamp was only one penny, and thus the total duty on such paper was not three half-pence, that is, less than 25 per cent; whereas the malt tax was 100 per cent. It should be recollected, too, that for the penny so paid on the stamp, the paper was carried free; whereas the farmer had to pay the car- riage of his malt. The tax on the Times was not equal to this privilege, for if it had to go by post according to its weight, it would cost double the tax, and its price would increase, and its consumption lessen in proportion. As regarded the tax on advertisements, it was plain, by the instance of the North British Advertiser, which circulated gratis, that advertisements in spite of taxes paid pretty well. Now, with reference to what the farmers thought of this tax, he held in his hand a letter of Mr. Ellman, of Sussex, who, after referring to the opinions of his father, who lived to a great age, and whose memory went back to the time when cottagers brewed their own beer, stated, as some proof of the very injurious effects of this tax, that the barley grown on his farm, near Lewes, was now nearly unsaleable, and that, in his opinion, nothing could benefit the farmer more than the repeal of this odious impost. [The hon. Member also quoted from a pamphlet written by a captain in the Navy, who was also an excellent practical farmer, to the effect that whereas he could grow seven quarters of barley per acre on his land, for which he got 9 l. 16 s., the Government took 7 l. 4 s. 8 d. ] Yet it was said that this tax was paid by the consumer. But even if it was, were not the agricultural labourers the chief consumers of beer? And yet these were some of the parties whom they boasted of having exempted from the payment of the income tax, though they threw upon them the payment of a ten times heavier burden in this tax upon malt. But there were other ways in which this tax operated injuriously, and among them might be named the fact that farmers had now their labourers much less in their houses than used formerly to be the habit—a circumstance that was very much to be attributed to the excessive duties levied on malt, and the consequent dearness of the beer they would have to give them. In a district where beer was still given to agricultural labourers, it cost the farmer from 1 s. to 1 s. 6 d. an acre merely as a consumer of beer. Before the repeal of the corn laws, a farmer had to send the value of 9 qrs. of barley to make 5 qrs. of malt—although 1 qr. of barley made 1 qr. of malt. Now, it took 11½ qrs. of barley to get 5 qrs. malted. This was monstrous enough. Malt liquor was, and always had been, from the earliest period of the history of this country, the class of drink peculiar to the nation; and such, indeed, was the national taste for that beverage, that it had required all the oppression of Chancellors of the Exchequer and excise officers to limit its consumption. But this tax, which was as much as 100 per cent on production was, as the subjoined statement would show, a tax of some 500 per cent on the poor consumer:— dom, 38,000,000 bushels; duty per bushel, 2 s. 7 d., with 5 per cent added; consumption per head greater in 1730 than in 1849 by 400 per cent. A tax on this simple luxury of the poor was a great disgrace to the Legislature. The two most popular luxuries of the poor, beer and tobacco, were either directly or indirectly taxed from 500 to 700 or 800 per cent. These affected the poor man's comfort more than what was (viz., the corn law) called the tax on the poor man's bread. For call gold the standard of value as much as they pleased, it was not the standard. Wheat, the staff of life, or more correctly, labour, was the standard; gold might be the measure, or silver, as paper was the representative; but the ultimate standard was labour, or the bread corn that sustained the life of that labour which was the creator of all value; and to this standard in the long run wages would always conform. It was not thus with the simple luxuries of the poor. These might be taxed beyond the means of the poor. It was to a great extent so with malt. And this tax had always led the labourers, after their ability, in consequence of the rise in the malt duty, to brew their own beer was put an end to, to resort to the alehouse, and there to spend that money which was required for other things. In proof of this, and as evidence that the cottager used to brew his own beer, he would quote two authorities: one Mr. Ellman, so well known for his spirit as a farmer, and as the son of a father equally distinguished in agricultural pursuits, whose recollections went back to the middle of the last century; the other was the late Duchess of Grafton, from whose manuscripts the extract he would adduce, was given him by his noble Friend, the present Duke. He was quite free to admit, notwithstanding the number of petitions that had been presented on this subject, that the farming public generally was not sufficiently alive to the importance of this question. There was, however, a large class of the most intelligent farmers, especially in the south of England, fully sensible of the serious evils which pressed upon their industry and comforts from this tax. Mr. Ellman writes as follows:— s. to 10 s. 10 d. in 1780, and to 12 s. 10 d. in 1791:— cisely the same thing now? When men who had been labouring all day in the field, or the operatives who had toiled the long day in the factory, were returning home from their hard toil, were they not thus driven, by the very stress of nature, to the beershops, those sinks of vice and nurseries of crime? But with reference to these excise duties generally, he confessed he could not see how any Government could possibly continue them in operation under the present commercial system of this country. He did not see how the agricultural interest could be carried on under all this taxation, of one kind or other, that pressed so heavily upon it. How was it possible they could continue to bear up with all this taxation upon their home industry, and all this foreign competition at the same time? It was not consonant to common sense, or common justice, to persevere in such a system. He entreated the noble Lord at the head of the Government, to take its inconsistency and pressure into his serious consideration. Neither was it consistent, by implication, with Divine injunction, to tax home rather than foreign produce. "Of whom do the kings of the earth take tribute? of their own children, or of strangers? Peter saith unto him, Of strangers. Jesus saith unto him, Then are the children free." Are our children free? Again, as to the effect of these beerhouses upon the country, the other House of Parliament had, during the present Session, appointed a Committee on the subject, and he would advise hon. Gentlemen to read the evidence which had been given before it by Mr. Mayne, the superintendent of the metropolitan, and of Mr. Dowling, of the Liverpool police; also of Captain Macfarlane, Mr. Rotch, and others, as to the manner in which these places harboured crime, and encouraged habits of intemperance among the public. The petitions he had himself presented from Essex against this tax, were signed by ninety-two clergymen; and he might here mention, as further evidence as to the injurious effects of this tax, and of the evil of the labourers being driven to the beershops, that a magistrate of Oxfordshire having put the question to fifteen clergymen in his neighbourhood as to what they considered would be the best mode of putting an end to drunkenness among the labouring population, no fewer than fourteen of the number returned answers to the effect that the most likely mode would be by a repeal of the malt tax. With refer- ence to the arguments which had always been urged against the repeal of this tax, that it would not increase the consumption of malt, he could show by several details respecting the consumption of tea, coffee, and spirits, that their consumption had always increased, in some instances 300, and in others even 800 per cent. On tea the excise duty was reduced, in 1745, from 4 s. to 1 s. per lb., and the consumption rose in the next year from 730,729 lbs. to 2,358,589 lbs., or more than 300 per cent. Between 1782 and 1784 the duty was reduced from 55 l. 15 s. 10 d. per cent to 12½ per cent; and, in 1787, the consumption had risen to 17,047,054 lbs., being an increase of more than 12,000,000 lbs. in five years, or more than 300 per cent. During the war the duties were again increased, and in 1814 the consumption had fallen to 29,224,154 lbs., or what it had been about twenty years before. These sudden rises in the consumption, it must be remembered, took place at a period when the taste for tea was comparatively unknown or uncultivated. Since the war the duties have been still further reduced. The consumption, in 1846, was 22,693,992 lbs.; and, in 1847, 46,324,298 lbs. Mr. Senior, in his Chapter on Taxation, said— d. to 1 s. 1 d. The result was that in 1796 the consumption fell off to 396,953 lbs. There were fluctuations in the duty up to 1804, when the duty was raised and the consumption decreased, so that in 1808 it did not exceed that of 1791. In 1808, however, the excise duty was lowered from 1 s. 1 d. to 3 d. per lb., and the customs duty from 6⅞ d. to 4 d. per lb. The result was, that in 1808 the consumption was 1,069,691 lbs., and 9,251,837 lbs. in 1809; showing an increase in one year after reduction of duties of 800 per cent. In support of his argument, he would read the following passage and table from Porter's Progress of the Nation: —

s. 6 d. per lb., the use of coffee was confined altogether to the rich. The quantity used throughout the kingdom scarcely exceeded on the average one ounce for each inhabitant in the year, and the revenue derived was altogether insignificant. In the interval between 1801 and 1811, the duty was reduced from 1 s. 6 d. to 7 d. per lb., whereupon the consumption rose to 750 per cent. and the revenue derived was increased more than threefold. During the next decennary period, the duty was again advanced to 1 s. per lb., by which means the progressive increase was checked so as to render the consumption actually less in 1821, taking the increased population into account, than it was in 1811. In 1825 the duty was again reduced to one-half the previous amount; and we see that, in 1831, the consumption was consequently increased 14,500,000 l., or nearly 200 per cent. the average consumption of each individual being raised from 8 oz. to 21 oz. per annum, while the revenue was increased by 100,000 l. Again, with reference to spirits, the argument will hold good, namely, that a diminution of duty always increased the consumption. In 1823 the duty on Irish spirits was reduced from 5 s. 6 d. to 2 s. 10 d. the imperial gallon, and the following was an account of the quantities of spirits made in Ireland which had paid the duties of excise for home consumption:— ductions of duty had led to increased consumption, à fortiori, that consumption would be still further increased by the entire repeal of duties on malt; he did not propose a partial repeal, because of the difficulty of getting rid of the brewers' monopoly if any duty remained. With regard to malt itself, they had evidence sufficient to prove that there would be, with a reduction of taxation, an equivalent increased consumption—and that high taxation diminished consumption. In Scotland there was formerly such a taste for "twapenny," that its protection was made part and parcel of the Treaty of Union. But eventually there was a malt tax imposed, and the people felt so strongly on the subject, that the Government dared not put it in force until 1725, twelve years after it was legally laid on; and even then, according to Mr. Ford, in his History of the Malt Law, a work from which he had derived great information, "considerable riots resulted, which were suppressed with great difficulty." In 1822, beer or big was allowed to be malted in Scotland at a duty reduced from 28 s. 10 d. per quarter to 22 s. 8 d., and in 1823 to 14 s. 5 d. The consumption of malt in Scotland rose from 147,776 quarters in 1821, to 490,730 quarters in 1826, being an increase of 300 per cent in the consumption, from a reduction of one-half in the duty on malt. But to return to the causes which drove malt liquor out of consumption in Scotland, and made that a whisky-drinking country instead. At and previous to the beginning of the 18th century, every publican in Scotland—being every man who chose to embark in the trade—brewed his own ale, and the resort to his house depended on the quality of his liquor; which, when thunder or witchcraft did not interpose, was generally excellent. The strong ale was reserved for holidays and the tables of the great; but the twopenny—so called because it was sold at twopence the Scotch pint, equal to nearly two English quarts—was so much esteemed as a national beverage, that it was inserted by name, and guarded by peculiar privileges, in one of the articles of the Union. Another article, however, in the same Act, secured to the Scottish brewery an Exchequer Court; and this, conjoined with the enormously increased malt duties, so lessened the exhilirating qualities of this ancient ale that it has now lost its fame. In its stead a kind of small drink is brewed; but it is destitute of all the qualities so often celebrated in Scottish song, and is scarcely superior to the trash termed table-beer in the workhouses of the metropolis. The result was just the same in Ireland, and it would show why they were a whisky-drinking people; and he might here mention that it is malt that gives its peculiar flavour to whisky: and from the Scotch making theirs almost entirely from malt it is that which has given to the Scotch whisky its far-famed excellence. In 1792, when the tax was 7½ d. per bushel, there were consumed 5,088,976 bushels of malt; and in 1821, when the tax was 3 s. 6 d., it was only 1,783,876 bushels. The difference in consumption in proportion to population was nearly 500 per cent. To take a further illustration of the effects of taxation on the consumption of this article; in 1792, the tax per barrel on malt in Ireland was 2 s. 6 d.; in 1795, it was raised to 3 s. 3d.; in 1796, to 5 s. 3 d.; in 1799, to 6 s.; in 1801, to 6 s. 6 d.; by which time the consumption of malt had decreased from 1,284,378 to 173,900 barrels. Thus the difference in consumption resulting from the increase of taxation was 700 per cent, and even more, if the increase of population were to be estimated. So much for the argument, that taxation had not driven malt out of consumption. There were those in the House who would object to the repeal of the malt tax on the score of morality. He had shown that in Ireland there was in a few years a falling-off in the consumption of beer to the extent of 700 per cent. and in Scotland in a similar ratio. No doubt we were a very moral people whenever it was convenient, but not a moment beyond that point. A few years ago, in a fit of humane impulse, we did away with slavery; now, because we liked cheap sugar, we encouraged it. Again, when the Chinese Government wished to divert its people from the use of the pernicious drug, opium, we went to war to prevent their doing so—our manufacturing interests required it—and the morality of the disciples of Confucius was permitted to triumph over the morality of those who bore the name of the blessed Jesus. He had said nothing of the cotton produced by slavery; to give up that trade would be far too great a sacrifice to the moralists of England, although it was not the less true that they who allowed or sanctioned oppression shared the crime. But, even on the ground of morality, the repeal of this tax ought to be advocated; for the increase of spirits in the last forty-five years in England had been twofold, in Scotland fivefold, and in Ireland sixfold. The reason there was this great difference between England and the other countries arose from the duty on spirits in England trebling in one case, and doubling in the other, the duty in Scotland and Ireland. The statement that malt liquor was superseded by an increased taste for tea, coffee, cocoa, &c., from an increased disinclination to strong drink, was therefore entirely disproved by the increased consumption of ardent spirits coincidently with the increased consumption of tea and coffee. He defied all the ingenuity of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and all the casuistry of the political economists, to show that the falling-off in the consumption of this good, old-fashioned, generous, and wholesome national beverage, resulted from anything else but excessive and oppressive taxation. We had historical evidence of its having been the drink of the country for many hundred years. Eusebius, in his panegyric on Constantine, 1,500 years ago, referred to the fertile corn fields and the drink made of corn, for which Britain was famous. The taste for this national beverage remained as strong as ever, as would be shown if the repeal of the tax allowed the public to get it cheap, and unadulterated by noxious drugs. He apologised for being tedious; but he now wanted to show his right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer what he, the maltster, and the brewer got out of an acre of barley. Hon. Members would be astonished to find what was got out of an acre of barley. He would suppose—and it was not an unreasonable supposition—that an acre of barley produced, on an average, five quarters, and that one quarter of barley produced one quarter of malt; one quarter of good malt produced 961bs. of saccharine matter, and that would make three barrels, or, allowing for waste, 101 gallons of the beer usually sold at 6 d. per quart. For the acre of barley, then, this would give 50 l. 10 s. worth of beer. Supposing the malt was untaxed, that could be produced for 10 l. 14 s., including hops; and thus the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the maltster, and the brewer made nearly 40 l. —39 l. 16 s. —out of each acre of barley, while the landowner only received 25 s., and the tenant, when he got anything at all, seldom more than 15 s. Looking also at the produce of an acre of barley when applied to the manufacture of spirits, the result was much the same oppressive and most exorbitant taxation; indeed, a great part of our fiscal system seemed built on this grossly unjust taxation of barley. Spirits from the raw grain paid a duty of 5 l. per quarter, or 25 l. the acre; and the malt spirits 6 l. per quarter, or 30 l., which sums were absolutely paid for taxes only to the Chancellor of the Exchequer. It had been said that this was a question which merely affected barley lands; but he would show that there was not an acre in the three kingdoms which would not be benefited if this obnoxious tax were abolished. The draft report of the Committee which sat on this subject in 1836, of which the noble Lord at the head of the Government was a Member, recommended that the duty should be reduced one-half; and it founded that recommendation on the assumption that such a reduction would double the consumption. The same assumption was taken by the Commissioners of Excise Inquiry in their fifteenth report. They said— à priori reasoning, that a total reduction of the duty would at least treble the consumption. "Oh! but," said some hon. friends of his, "granting all this increased demand for barley, the county I represent is not a barley district, it wont help me, and nothing but protection will help me." To this he (Mr. Cayley) replied, protection would not only raise the price of wheat and oats, which he supposed was what his hon. friends wanted; but he would show that the repeal of the malt tax would raise wheat and oats quite as much as it would raise barley; and he hoped the Irish and Scotch Members would especially mark that part of his case. The first great demand would be for barley; its price would first rise; but it could not be supplied without taking the place of many million quarters of wheat and oats at present grown in this country. The effect would be to take probably 8,000,000 qrs. of wheat and oats out of the market. Then, wheat and oats would rise in price as much as barley. This would happen as follows. The present consumption of barley for malting was about 5,000,000 qrs., and the repeal of the duty could therefore not be expected to add less than 10,000,000 qrs. more. What a stimulus would this give to the growth of barley! and allowing that there would be brought in 2,000,000 qrs. more than at present of foreign barley, there would be 8,000,000 qrs. more barley required to be grown in the united kingdom, on land now producing wheat and oats. The present growth of wheat and oats being thus reduced, there would be a legitimate increase in price, and thus he contended that the producers of all kinds of grain would be benefited by the repeal of the tax. The displacement in this country of 4 or 5,000,000 qrs. of wheat, and of 3 or 4,000,000 qrs. of oats to make room for 8,000,000 qrs. of barley, for which a new demand would shortly arise, must raise the price of all three grains. Foreign grain did not lower the price merely because it was foreign grain, but because it at present caused an excess of about 4,000,000 qrs. of wheat, and 1,000,000 or 1,500,000 qrs. of barley and of oats; but if we reduced our growth of wheat and oats in the same proportion, then prices might possibly rise to what they were before the repeal of the corn laws. If this ought not to be an argument with protectionists and farmers for the repeal of the malt tax, he did not know what ought. The repeal of this tax was the best lever in their hands. It might, financially, either compel the imposition of moderate import duties to make up the revenue, or the exposure of the gross injustice and partiality of this tax might prove to every one the necessity of some protecting duty by way of compensation; or if no protection could be recovered, the repeal of this oppressive tax would be the best substitute for it. The present system in fact, forced the farmer into an unnatural system, and made him grow wheat twice in the course, instead of only once. It must be always remembered we were as superior to the foreigner in barley as he was to us in wheat. At this time we were complaining of foreign competition, and at the very period when we were most exposed to foreign competition the Government persisted in overtaxing the very article in which we were best able to compete with the foreigner. He would not venture to predict—he was one of those who believed that human beings could not see an inch before their noses—but if there were any certainty at all in experience, then would the advantages he had described seem to be the natural result of the repeal of this tax. He trusted we should hear no more, then, of this being only a barley question. There was no measure short of a repeal of the present commercial system, unless California, or a reform in our monetary system, came quickly to our aid, which could help the British farmer equal to the repeal of this tax. Of what did the farmer complain? Simply of low prices. He did not ask for high prices for the sake of high prices, but to give him reasonable remuneration, and because as those prices diminished, the effects of taxation became more visible. Like some amphibious reptile, which, in the darkness of the night, might commit universal havoc and destruction, and hide himself from view in the day time, in some deep reservoir; as the waters subsided, the hideous reptile would become more and more exposed to view; so, as prices diminished, the monster taxation became more exposed to light, and the ability of the English farmer to bear up against the ravages of that reptile the taxgatherer, became less and less. In considering whether we could compete with the foreign barley grower, the case must be viewed particularly with reference to quality. Our best barley was better than Saale barley (the best foreign barley) by 5 s. to 8 s. a quarter, because weighing from 2 lbs. to 4 lbs. a bushel heavier, and containing from 8 lbs. to 10 lbs. per quarter more saccharine. The last year was a good barley harvest everywhere, and the prices were:—Saale barley, 21 s. 6 d to 23 s. a quarter; Danish barley, 17 s. to 20 s. a quarter; English average barley, 23 s. a quarter; English best barley, 25 s. to 27 s. a quarter. On the authority of Mr. Ford, a gentleman who had been engaged in the trade for many years, he could positively state that not more than 100,000 quarters per annum from Saale would be likely to be brought hither. From the south of France the samples were generally dirty, and the crop was mostly grown by small farmers, who used it themselves. We received none from America, because, either raw or malted, the grain suffered from so long a voyage, either in colour or by acquiring a bad taste or odour, or by chafing, and therefore we need not expect any; and all that were received from the Danish and other ports of the Baltic were inferior to our own average. Under these circumstances, we had not much to fear from foreign competition. It might be said that the present prohibitory duties on foreign malt would be involved in the repeal of this duty. Let it be so. He would encounter that cheerfully if by it he could secure the repeal of this excise duty on the home-made malt. It was not probable we should import foreign malt, when at present, in spite of an insufficient drawback on the duty, we exported beer to every country that did not prohibit it. Malt, besides, had a great tendency to grow slack or soft in a voyage. He had given his best consideration to the question, and he was convinced that so great would be the impetus given to agriculture by repealing this tax, that it seemed, so far as appearances or à priori reasoning could be ever trusted, that it would almost render nugatory the effects of the repeal of the corn laws. Taking into account the difference in the amount of population at both periods, there was a decrease in the consumption of barley in 1849, as compared with the consumption in the year 1700, of no less than 17,500,000 quarters. What could more eloquently demonstrate the injurious effects of the duty on barley than this astounding fact? If the tax were repealed to-morrow, there would be an increase, in the course of a year or two, of no less than 10,000,000 quarters in the annual consumption of malt; nor would the advantage end there. Look at the impetus which would be given not only to the avocations of masons, carpenters, brickmakers, limeburners, slaters, plasterers, labourers, coopers, hoopmakers, glass bottle makers, stavemakers, sack and twine makers, growers of hemp, burners of coke, hop growers, carriers of coke, malt, and beer, pitmen (coals), &c; increased employment to probably at least 100,000 men, and, with their families, sustenance to 500,000 additional people. Of coke alone, 220,000 tons additional would be required. The advantage which would accrue to the hopgrower would be, in itself, so great, as almost to justify the repeal of the tax, even though other arguments in favour of such a proceeding were wanting. The extent of land at present devoted to the growth of hops, was about 43,000 acres; but it would be no exaggerated estimate to calculate that at least 86,000 acres more would be devoted to that purpose if the tax were repealed. If the Chancellor of the Exchequer should ask how the revenue was to be recruited for the loss it would sustain by the abrogation of this tax, he (Mr. Cayley) was not sure that he would give an opinion on the subject, unless he were paid for it; for he had generally observed, that what was got for nothing, was thought to be worth precisely what it had cost; but of this he would assure his right hon. Friend, namely, that if he had as large a fee for producing a budget as himself, he would promise him a most satisfactory one. But, nevertheless, he could assure the right hon. Gentleman, that he did not think that any serious difficulty would be experienced in making the change square with the demands of the revenue. The gross amount received in the year 1849, on account of the malt tax, the quantity taxed being 4,749,000 quarters, was 5,145,702 l. The deductions on account of the expenses of collection, drawbacks, and allowances, amounted to no less a sum than 523,000 l., so that the net revenue realised by the tax could not be estimated at a higher amount than 4,622,702 l. Under all the circumstances of the case, the surplus in the Exchequer this year was estimated at 1,500,000 l. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, in repealing the duty on bricks, and altering the stamp duties, had estimated the expense to the revenue at 750,000 l.; and there then remained a sum of 750,000 l. more, which he proposed to devote to the reduction of the National Debt. Now he (Mr. Cayley) did not mean to interfere with these arrangements, except to suggest that it was very doubtful whether the Stamp Bill would pass. If he should be so fortunate as to carry his present proposition, and to obtain leave to bring in a Bill for the repeal of the malt tax—an occurrence of which he admitted he did not think there was much chance, since the protectionists were not ready to come in, and the financial reformers only voted for financial reform when it was not likely to be carried—he did not mean to propose that the change which he contemplated should take effect under circumstances which would occasion the least interference with the financial arrangements of the present year. The main provision of the Bill he proposed to introduce would be, that one-half of the duty should be remitted on the 5th of April next year, and that the remainder of the tax should be repealed on the same day of October the same year; an arrangement which he trusted would be found to conduce to the convenience of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The surplus in the Exchequer on the 5th April, 1851—even according to the showing of the budget—would probably amount to 1,000,000 l.; but it should be remembered that they had also the best authority for indulging in the anticipation that considerable reductions would be effected in the national expenditure. A perusal of the calculations which, in February last, appeared on this subject in a newspaper edited by a gentleman whose views on economical subjects were supposed to have great weight with the Government—he alluded to the Economist —would appear to favour the opinion that the additional saving to the Exchequer on account of reductions in the expenditure commenced last year, might be estimated at 500,000 l. There would be an increase in the hop duty of at least 500,000 l., and the extra corn duties would produce, probably, according to our experience since the budget, over and above what was there reckoned upon, 310,000 l. If to these sums were added the 1,000,000 l. that would be annually saved by the withdrawal of the African squadron, it would be seen that the deficiency in the revenue which would be occasioned by the repeal of the malt tax would be reduced from 4,622,000 l. to 3,310,000 l.; leaving the actual amount of the deficiency at not more than 1,312,000 l. So small a deficit as that surely ought not to be held forth as an argument against the repeal of a tax so obnoxious and vexatious as this. But if we were to credit the rumours that there was to be an increase in the present quarter' srevenue of 400,000 l. above the same quarter of last year, and that this increase might be expected to be more than maintained throughout the year, it would be found that the deficiency occasioned by the repeal of the tax would not exceed 100,000 l. or 200,000 l., and perhaps that there would be no deficiency at all. If the proposition, therefore, were only to be considered with reference to its bearing on the Exchequer, he should have no hesitation, even on those grounds, in proposing the repeal of this oppressive, and, indeed, he might almost add, this atrocious impost. Not only would the daily enjoy- ments of the healthy and vigorous amongst the poor be enhanced and promoted by such a measure, but the poor lying-in woman would be enabled to taste what was a necessity of her position, the poor decrepit old man would be comforted, and the sickly child would be strengthened and refreshed. He had, he hoped, satisfactorily shown not only how inquisitorial, how vexatious, and how partial and unjust this tax was, but how heavily it oppressed the farmer—how still more grievously it oppressed the poor labouring consumer—how temperance and its high interests would be promoted by its repeal—how the employment of labour and scientific farming would be stimulated by it. He was warned, indeed, by the right hon. Member for Ripon not to press a consideration of agricultural taxation, for fear of the consequences of a thorough investigation. He was not afraid. More agricultural taxation than any other had been reduced since the war, it was true, but only because agriculture bore an undue proportion; more still remained to be reduced, because agriculture was still most unduly taxed. "Farm-houses are exempted from the window-duty," said the right hon. Baronet. Yes! to the extent of 30,000 l. a year. He forgot to add that tradesmen's shop-windows were exempted to the extent of 50,000 l. a year. "Agricultural horses and (I think he added) shepherds' dogs, are relieved from taxation." Yes! but had we ever yet taxed the machinery of the manufacturer? Horses to the farmer were the machinery of his trade. Had we ever taxed the railway whistle, or the factory bell? When we did, they might then boast of the repeal of the tax on shepherds' dogs. There was, therefore, no objection, there could be no real argument, against the repeal of this tax, but that which related to the loss of revenue. But who objected to the repeal of this tax for fear of a deficit? The last Government, which repealed the corn laws, on which repeal this demand is irrefragably founded, the single condition of which change in our policy, was a free and unfettered trade to all? Was a tax of 100 per cent on one important process of industry an unfettered trade? Was 100 per cent tax on the producer free trade? Was 500 per cent tax on the consumer just or free? The present Government, did it object, who, by its own organ at the commencement of the Session, declared that it had lowered agricultural produce, and there- by gained to the country 90,000,000 l. ? Could they set 5,000,000 l. of revenue against a loss they had inflicted on British agriculture of 90,000,000? Could they, who have unlocked our doors to the inroad of the whole world, refuse to unloose the shackles with which our hands were bound, that we might use them in self-defence? He had shown how this 5,000,000 l. of revenue could be dispensed with; but if part of it, or even the whole of it, be imperatively required, who could best afford to pay it?—those who have lost the 90,000,000 l., or those who, according to you, have gained it? Who then objected on the score of deficit? The free-trader, who promised so large an accession of wealth to the country, that, if he be right, the deficiency should be made up in one year by increase of prosperity? And it must not be forgotten that, under the protective system, the amount produced by this tax had been made up in a single year, without an increase of taxation. The financial reformer, did he object on this ground, who is, or was, for a diminution of 10,000,000 l. in the expenditure, whereas the outside deficiency created by the repeal of the malt tax, could be only 2,000,000 l.? Could he discover so effective a means of reduction as not giving the money to be expended? The protectionist, did he object, who knew that if free trade failed, the deficiency could easily be supplied in a manner unfelt by the general consumer through the system he prefers? The Government, no doubt, would plead danger and inconvenience against the repeal of this tax. So did they against the repeal of the corn laws. What did they answer then to them? "Justice to the consumer." So his answer to them now was, "Justice to the consumer and producer both." Of that justice many doubted, and still doubt. Of this justice no man doubted, or could reasonably doubt. Who taught them to be cautious in their legislation in reference to the land? The right hon. Member for Ripon, who, in the language of Mr. Burke, told them, now many years ago, that it was a perilous thing to try experiments upon the farmer." If peril, then, there was in this course, remember it was of their seeking, not ours. It was a simple corollary to their own economical problem. Would they plead public faith? Was no faith, then, to be kept with the land? Was there any man in that House who, either for himself or his constituents, whatever branch of in- dustry he represented, would consent that an analogous amount of taxation should be placed on his own or on their produce? If not, let him, before deciding into which lobby he would go, call to mind that divine rule which taught them to do as they would be done by. Public faith! Who taught them, year by year, by quotations from the speeches of that illustrious statesman, to respect the opinions and reverence the name of Mr. Burke? That eminent man, but yesterday a Member of this House, whose untimely loss they now so much deplored. What did Mr. Burke say on the subject of public faith? "The first creditor of the State is the plough; this original, indefeasible claim supersedes every other demand." But could public credit be really more endangered than through a course of oppressive injustice, by sapping the foundation of that stable and permanent interest, every acre of which, according to Mr. Pitt, was mortgaged to the public creditor? It was, in common fairness to that great interest, that he asked them to repeal this tax. In the name of justice, as well as good faith, he implored them to disregard all the stale pretexts of inconvenience to the public service, of danger to public credit, of peril to the Ministry, those ancient bugbears of Ministerial resistance to every reduction of taxation that was ever yet proposed. Above all, he entreated them to rise superior to the meanness of that maxim, which would teach them to do right only when it was convenient to do it. In the name of the largest body of producers in this kingdom—in the name, too, of the largest body of consumers, he adjured them to redress this crying wrong—to be just and fear not.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That leave be given to bring in a Bill to repeal the Malt Tax."

said, after the able speech of his hon. Friend, and considering it desirable at that period of the Session that the debate should be brought to a close that evening, he should be very brief in his observations in suport of the Motion. On former occasions, notwithstanding that he considered the excise duty on malt grievous and oppressive, still, taking into consideration the protection which agriculture then enjoyed, he had thought it right to oppose the repeal of the tax. But when that Motion was brought forward by a noble Friend of his in 1836 (the Duke of Buckingham), the protec- tion enjoyed by the agricultural interest amounted to something like 50 per cent. At that time the price of barley was 32 s., now it was 22 s. a quarter. Great agricultural distress prevailed then, but it arose not from universal competition with foreign nations, but from excessive production. Circumstances had entirely changed. They had abandoned their former commercial policy, and had left agriculture the only unprotected interest in the country. Under these circumstances he felt justified in calling on the Government to apply the same measure of justice to that interest which they had applied to the other great interests of the coumunity. On what principle of justice could they continue to levy a duty of 100 per cent on the produce of this country, when the produce of other countries was admitted free? On what principle of justice was the English farmer prohibited from growing tobacco, or cultivating beet-root, for the purpose of making sugar? He felt, therefore, that he had now a right to call on those who had been the advocates, of free-trade measures, to carry out their own principles. Above all, he felt entitled to ask the support of the hon. Member for the West Riding, not only by his vote, but by his influence. The hon. Gentleman, on a remarkable occasion, advocated the repeal of the malt tax. He was reported to have said, in a speech delivered by him at Manchester, that he sympathised with the farmers. He would never tolerate a shilling by way of protection on corn, but would co-operate with them in getting rid of that obnoxious tax. "We owe something," he said, "to the farmers, and will repay them in kind." The hon. Gentleman also wrote a letter to the chairman of the Financial Reform Association at Liverpool, in which he said—

"It might be laid down as a rule, that whenever you touched an excise duty at all, it should be totally abolished, because the great objection to such taxes was the interference of the exciseman with the process of production, which would equally apply whether the duty was great or small."—" The farmers were in favour of the repeal, not merely because it would add to the contentment of the peasantry, and relieve the employers from a heavy tax, but because the best agriculturists protested against a duty which denied them the free application of their capital to the fattening of cattle, and restricted the growth of barley. Speaking to an influential deputation of farmers, he told them their national budget would be unavailing unless it included the total repeal of the malt tax, amounting to 4,000,000 l. "

An inquiry had been instituted to ascertain the value of malt as food for cattle; but how was it conducted? By asking influential agriculturists in different parts of the country? No such thing. A case was sent down to one or two chemists, of whom Dr. Thomson, of Glasgow, was one. and with their judgment the Board of Excise rested satisfied. But he held the opinion of such men as Mr. Latimer or Mr. Hudson, of Castle Acre, Norfolk, who had written on the subject, and made themselves acquainted with it by experience, to be worth 500 reports of the Board of Excise and the chemists of Glasgow. But it was argued on the other side that the tax fell principally ou the consumer. This was a curious argument, certainly, to come from the mouths of free-traders, who, with the hon. Member for Westbury, seemed to think that it was of no consequence how much the producers competed with and ruined each other in the race, provided the consumer was benefited. But he denied that the tax fell chiefly on the consumer, and he could not better illustrate this than by quoting the words of the great statesman whose loss they all so deeply deplored. Speaking on the Motion of the hon. Member for Wolverhampton for a repeal of the corn laws, the right hon. Baronet observed, referring to the malt tax—

"I think you raise 8,000,000 l. or 9,000,000 l. a year from the tax on barley. I think the duty is above 8,000,000 l., and in addition you subject the landowner to great difficulties in conducting his operations. You say to him, 'In order to secure this revenue from a single article, we will interfere with the operations of your trade, and subject you to peculiar supervision, interrupt you in the application of your capital, and prevent you from making the most of the barley you have.' I know the answer to this statement will be, that this duty is not a burden peculiar on land—that it is borne by the consumer. Let us try to apply the same sort of reasoning, supposing a tax were proposed to be imposed on the cotton manufacture. Supposing the manufactured articles of cotton were subjected to a duty for the purpose of raising 2,000,000 l. or 3,000,000 l., I apprehend the cotton manufacturers of this country would decidedly object to such an imposition. They would say, 'At the time we are pressing you to take off the duties on raw articles, and while we complain of the duty on foreign raw cotton as a grievous exaction, to propose to raise 2,000,000 l. or 3,000,000 l. by a duty on manufactured cotton, would be an act of folly and insanity, of which no man fitted to serve in office in this country could be guilty.' If I answered them by saying that foreign silks and articles of foreign manufacture, which entered into competition with their goods, would come in more fully if their goods were taxed—that the tax on the goods would fall on the consumer, and that they (the producers) had no reason to complain—would they be satisfied with these observations? and, therefore, though I cannot admit that the malt tax is to the extent to which it has been represented a burden exclusively on land, yet as the removal of the malt tax would give great facility to the operations of those concerned in the malting business, I must say that it is a heavy duty on an article of agricultural produce, which must operate as a disadvantage in the application of capital in that particular direction. For these reasons I have a strong impression, that on the ground of special burdens there is a claim for protection on the part of the land."

He said, that although he could not admit the malt tax to be, to the extent represented, a burden exclusively imposed on land, yet as its removal would give great facilities to those concerned in the malt business, it must operate disadvantageously upon the aggregation of capital employed in that particular direction, and therefore, on the ground of its being a special burden, he thought a claim for protection existed on the part of the land. The House had thought fit now to withdraw this protection, and these taxes were therefore no longer applicable to the present state of things, and in common justice ought to be immediately repealed. When this tax of 20 s. 8 d. was first imposed in 1817, the average price of barley was 49 s. 9 d.; but with the present reduced price of barley, in which there was no prospect of a rise, owing to the increased importation, the duty, instead of being 50 per cent, which was excessive, would be 100 per cent, if the present amount were retained. The only real objection which could be raised to the repeal of the tax was on the ground that the revenue would not bear it; but when he considered the number of taxes pressing heavily on the industry of the country which had been repealed since the war, and that every one had been met by these self-same arguments; when he recollected, despite the warnings of successive Chancellors of the Exchequer, that the public credit remained inviolate, he thought they were entitled, without any desire to impair the public credit, to call on the Government to agree to the Motion of his hon. Friend. The amount of the tax might be urged by the Government as an argument against its repeal; but he thought he was justified, knowing the intolerable distress which prevailed amongst the class on whom it fell, and the refusal of the Government to afford them any relief, on calling on the Government to abolish it, leaving it to the ingenuity of his right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer to find a substitute. Nor would it be the first time his ingenuity had been so taxed, for he re- membered that his right hon. Friend had in a former Session introduced no less than three budgets. For his own part he followed the general views entertained by his lamented noble Friend, Lord George Bentinck, with whom he had had the honour of being in constant and intimate communication. His opinion was, that if the sounder system of financial policy adopted by Mr. Pitt had been followed more, and those of the modern economical school less, no doubt a sufficient revenue would have been found. It was in vain to tell him, after the repeal of 30,000,000 l. of taxes since the war, when this country, with not more than half its present population, bore 70,000,000 l. of taxation without complaint, while it had now only to support about 54,000,000 l., that a substitute could not be found for this tax. He could quote an authority which he knew would be received with respect by his right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer and those Gentlemen on the other side of the House, namely, that of Mr. Fox. Mr. Fox said, on all occasions, that he considered the excise duties intolerable, except from absolute necessity; and in all the debates on the finances of the country he always maintained that the customs duties were preferable to the excise. Speaking with reference to the tobacco duties, Mr. Fox said—

"If there was any man acquainted with the freedom of the constitution, who did not think the excise laws more harsh and oppressive than could be borne? He declared, therefore, that he came down that day, not so much with any great hope of successfully opposing the Bill, as with a view to state his opinions on the subject, and to enter his general protest against a scheme which he completely disapproved. If, in a country where every trade could see its own danger by what happened to another, they did not feel it as a common cause, and join in resistance whenever the excise laws were attempted against any one article of manufacture, they gave but bad symptoms of their hearts or their understandings. If the tobacconist, when he saw the wine merchant taxed, and put under excise laws, stood by and said to himself, 'Let the excise go to the wine merchant so that I am free,' he acted foolishly, and scarcely deserved to be assisted when the case should become his own. The wine merchant, in like manner, might say the same of the tobacconist and of the country gentleman, whereas it was now proved that the oppression of the excise laws would fall upon both. Those who would not assist others, must not expect to be assisted themselves in the hour of danger."

In conclusion, he repeated that so long as the manufacturing interest enjoyed a protection to a certain extent, it would be but common justice to place the agricultural interest on an equality with it. It was for this reason that he had risen to second the Motion of his hon. Friend. The Government had refused to grant protection, and had, therefore, left the agriculturists no choice but to demand as an act of justice the removal of this burden.

said, the House would probably not think it necessary that he should follow his hon. Friend the Member for the North Riding, through the many various topics embraced in his speech, since, if he did so, he should be obliged to occupy so much time as would render it utterly impossible that the debate should close that evening. His hon. Friend had drawn a glowing picture of the blessings that were to be derived by all classes of the community from the repeal of this tax, and he was sorry that he should be obliged to destroy the flattering prospects of this Eldorado. But if he could show the impossibility of any great benefit proceeding either to the consumer or the producer from the repeal of the tax, judging from the experience they had had of former extensive reductions of the duty on malt, he thought he should be fully justified in asking the House to sanction a continuance of the tax. The hon. Gentleman who spoke last, had made two mistakes which it was important to correct. First, he said that whereas manufactures were protected against foreign imports, no protection whatever existed for articles of agricultural produce. His hon. Friend might surely have remembered that in a paper printed this Session, on the Motion of the hon. Member for Montrose, there was a return of the amount of duties levied on imports of foreign agricultural produce and foreign manufactures respectively, and that the amount of duties levied on foreign agricultural produce considerably exceeded that levied on articles of foreign manufacture. His hon Friend's statement on this point, therefore, was not borne out by facts; and his hon. Friend was equally mistaken in supposing that there existed by law any prohibition of the cultivation of beet-root by agriculturists in this country. There was no reason why the agriculturist should not grow beet-root for making sugar, if he found it profitable; and if he did not do so, the fault was not imputable to the law. The hon. Member for the North Riding seemed to think it necessary to justify the agriculturists from the imputation of being actuated by selfish motives in their efforts to maintain protection. He could assure his hon. Friend that he had never imputed selfish motives to hon. Gentlemen who were favourable to agricultural protection. He differed from them on this subject, but he had always given them full credit for believing honestly and conscientiously that the policy they advocated was calculated to produce benefit to the community at large. If he were called upon to name any article, the removal of protection from which had been productive of unmingled good, by benefiting both the producers and the consumers, he should take that of wool, the consumption of which had most materially extended since the removal of the duty on foreign wool in 1844, and with the greatest benefit to the British producers. He did not regard this as a party Motion, because he apprehended that the leaders of hon. Gentlemen opposite were just the last persons who would advocate the repeal of the malt tax. Lord Stanley had declared within the last few months, that if he were to vote now on this question, he would vote as he had always done, whether in Government or Opposition, against the repeal of the malt tax, for which no substitute could be discovered, and the benefit arising from the repeal of which was of a very problematical sort. Again, he could hardly persuade himself that the hon. Member for Buckinghamshire would join in the vote for the removal of this tax, remembering some of that hon. Gentleman's declarations as to the expediency of maintaining a considerable surplus, though it was true that some of the hon. Gentlemen's recent votes on financial questions were rather inconsistent with those professions of opinion. As to the effect of the proposed measure being prospective only, he did not think there could be a more mischievous course to pursue than to announce an intention of reducing the duty on an article of this description in a future year; for when it was known that the duty was to be taken off at a subsequent period, he apprehended that hon. Gentlemen who had crops of barley to dispose of, would find the article remaining on their hands a long while, and only be able ultimately to dispose of it at a very considerable loss. The malt tax produced last year within a few thousands of 5,000,000 l. sterling. The hon. Member for the North Riding talked of the ancient bugbears of national faith, and national establishments, and maintenance of Cabinets. He did not conceive that the sober and reflective portion of the House would consider national faith and national establishments mere bugbear words. As to the displacing of Ministers, he would only advise his hon. Friend, before he displaced him in the Chancellorship of the Exchequer, and proceeded to abolish the malt tax, to be very sure he had got some substitute for it that the House and the country were likely to sanction. The hon. Gentleman seemed to imagine that the falling-off in the consumption of beer was entirely owing to the duty on malt. Now it was certainly true that, if you took a period of 10 years, the consumption of malt was less now than it was 10 years ago; but if you took three periods of 10 years, the result was the other way. The House would find a great mass of information on this subject in the papers laid before the House of Lords on the sale of beer, and from that information he derived these averages of the quantity of malt paying duty in the last three decennial periods:—1821 to 1830, 26,800,000, 1831 to 1840, 34,400,000, and from 1841 to 1849, 31,700,000 bushels. According to the hon. Gentleman, this latter falling-off was owing to the duty; but an inquiry into the quantity of malt paying duty in the three years of unrestricted importation disproved the supposition. The figures were these:—in 1847, 30,200,000; 1848, 31,800,000; 1849, 33,160,000 bushels. The hon. Member, in pointing to the undoubted fact that other liquids had increased in consumption, while beer had fallen off, ascribed this circumstance also to the duty. Here, again, the hon. Gentleman was mistaken. That the other liquids referred to had increased in consumption, while beer had fallen off, was true, but the cause lay mainly in the change of habits and tastes manifest in all classes of the community. Every Gentleman present must, in his own establishment, have found that the beer at one time consumed by his domestics had of late years been in a great measure replaced by tea and coffee. The same was the case with the labourers throughout the country, and a very great blessing it was, for the sake of the public health and morals, that such was the case. If Gentlemen would turn to the tables he had already quoted, they would find to how great an extent this change was operating. He would read from those returns a comparative statement of the consumption of particular articles in the united kingdom in the years 1839 and 1849:—

"Malt, in 1839, 39,930,000 bushels, in 1849, 38,935,000 bushels; tea, in 1839, 35,136,000 lb., in 1849, 50,024,000 lb.; coffee, in 1839, 26,832,000 lb., in 1849, 34,431,000 lb.; cocoa, in 1839, 1,610,000 lb.; in 1849, 3,233,000 lb.; spirits, in 1839, 29,216,000 gallons, in 1849, 28,231,000 gallons, wine, in 1839, 7,238,000 gallons, in 1849, 6,487,000 gallons."

The result of that comparison was that the consumption of all intoxicating liquors had fallen off during the last ten years, whilst the consumption of all liquors not intoxicating had increased to a considerable amount within the same period. He did not think that was an unsatisfactory result. He believed that it had contributed very much to the benefit of the working classes, by removing from them the temptation to use those liquors which they were formerly prone to use to an extent prejudicial to their morals and their health. It was a convincing proof it was not owing to the duties that that result had been obtained, that the rate of the duty on beer was infinitely lower than that levied upon wine or upon tea, which were the great articles that came into competition in consumption. The hon. Gentleman said that if they only took off the duty on malt, they would increase to an almost unlimited extent the consumption of beer; but the consequence was anything but a matter of course. It was certainly the case, that if they looked to tea, coffee, and other articles, a large increased consumption had followed a reduction of the duties on those articles; but he doubted if the same result would follow the reduction of the malt tax. He did not, of course, deny that there had been a large increased consumption of those articles, consequent partly upon the reduction of the duty, and partly upon a change in the habits of the population of this country. But he had a far better criterion of what the reduction of the duty on malt would lead to, because he knew what had been the result of the reduction of the duty on beer. The hon. Gentleman had referred to times long ago; but they had the experience of thirty-five years ago, of what was the effect of the reduction of the duty on war malt and on beer. It appeared from the report of the Lords' Committee on the sale of beer, that taking together the war malt and the beer duty, the total duty on strong beer was equal to 75 s. 2 d. a quarter on malt; and the duty on weaker beer was 60 s. 10 d. a quarter on malt. The duty on beer being repealed, the duty per quarter on malt was 20 s. 8¾ d.; and although there had been a reduction of the strong beer duty of 50 s. per quarter on malt—on weak beer the reduction was 40 s. per quarter on malt—the consumption of beer had not increased. This being the case, was it reasonable to say that any extraordinary increase could arise from a reduction of 21 s. per quarter, when no increase took place from a reduction of 50 s. and 40 s. per quarter? It was not reasonable to think so. If the hon. Gentleman would refer to the evidence of Mr. Barclay, given before the Lords' Committee, he would find that that gentleman stated that there might be by a total repeal of the duty some slight increase in the consumption, and that the whole benefit to the consumer would not be, as the hon. Gentleman supposed, some 500 per cent, but that on a calculation that a quart of porter now cost 3½ d., the total repeal of the malt duty would lead to a reduction of one-halfpenny in the price. The experiment of taking the duty off malt and of putting a duty on malt had both been tried, and the effect following a reduction of the duty was a diminished consumption, and following an increase of duty was an increased consumption. In 1816 the duty per bushel on malt was 4 s. 6 d., and the average consumption for the two preceding years was 25,500,000 bushels. In 1816 the duty was reduced to 2 s. 6 d., and the average consumption of the next two years had fallen off to 22,700,000 bushels. In 1819 the duty was increased from 2 s. 6 d. to 3 s. 7 d., and the average consumption of the next two years—which before was under 23,000,000 bushels—had increased to: 25,000,000 bushels per annum. The hon. Gentleman seemed to think it was monstrous to suppose that the duty was paid by the consumer of malt and beer; but the Committee of the other House appointed to inquire into the burdens on real property, inquired, among other things, into the repeal of the malt tax, and they came to the conclusion that the duty fell as a general tax on the consumers of the article, which he (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) thought was mainly the truth. But, as consumers, they would be equally benefited by the reduction of the duty on any other article of consumption which entered into their daily food or their daily drink. Then came the question whether this was an article on which the reduction of duty would be most beneficial to them as consumers. Lord Stanley was by no means satisfied that the repeal of the duty was the best form of relief to grant to the consumers, in which opinion he (the Chan- cellor of the Exchequer) quite concurred. If he showed a good reason for thinking that there would be no considerably increased demand for malt, even if the duty was taken off, it followed that the amount of benefit to the producers of malt from the repeal of the duty could not be very much. He would again refer to the evidence given before that Committee by Mr. Barclay, who was a most experienced witness, and possessed of great sources of information on this subject. That gentleman gave it distinctly as his opinion that he did not think any great effect would be produced by a total repeal of the malt duty. His hon. Friend had quoted the opinion of Mr. Elman as to the great benefit which would arise to the farmer from a repeal of the duty on malt. When this question was brought before the House during the last Session of Parliament, he (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) had sent to him a Sussex paper containing a report of a meeting in that county in favour of agricultural protection, and at that meeting Mr. Elman came forward and moved a resolution. And what was that resolution? Why—

"That this meeting is of opinion that if foreign barley be allowed to be imported, as at present, at a mere nominal duty of 1 s., the benefit which the British farmer would otherwise derive from a repeal of the malt tax would be principally enjoyed by the foreign grower."

If, therefore, that authority was good for anything, the repeal of the malt duty, according to Mr. Elman, would do little good to the British farmer; and the next Motion of his (the Chancellor of the Exchequer's) hon. Friend would be to restore the duty on barley. He (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) thought he had shown that no great benefit was likely to arise to the consumers in this country from the total repeal of the malt tax; and it was not probable any great benefit could arise to the producer; and if no great benefit was to arise to any interest whatever, and whilst the benefit at best could only be partial and equivocal, he would ask, was it proper or safe to risk so large an amount of revenue as 5,000,000 l. per annum, which would be involved in the repeal of the malt tax? It was perfectly impossible that the national faith could be reposed on the national establishments, if this proposed repeal of 5,000,000 l. of money was carried. The tax in question was a most productive tax; it was mainly paid by the consumer; it was collected rather more cheaply than any other tax in the country; and it imposed as little inconvenience on the trader as could be imposed with regard to the safety of the revenue; and the House would incur great risk and great danger by sacrificing such an amount of revenue. The benefit of the proposed repeal, where benefit would result, would be slight and partial; and he thought, under those circumstaeces, he might safely call on the House to concur with him in resisting the Motion of his hon. Friend the Member for the North Riding.

said, he little thought, when the House remembered the effects produced by the first enactment of the excise laws, that they produced a convulsion scarcely less violent than that which was produced by ship-money—and when they remembered that those laws were continually and repeatedly denounced by Mr. Fox and Mr. Grey in that House during the whole continuance of their opposition—that they should have heard so strong a panegyric pronounced upon them by a Whig Chancellor of the Exchequer. According to him, they seemed to contain every merit that a fiscal machinery could have—facility in collecting the revenue, pressure on nobody, an immense mass of money poured into the Exchequer with little trouble—in short, there seemed not to be a single advantage which those blessed excise laws did not possess. He (Mr. Drummond) did feel so much the impropriety, and he might also add the increasing sense of impropriety, of interfering with the arrangements of the Government, that he should not venture to take the part he was now about to do, without at the same time offering a pledge to the Chancellor of the Exchequer to give him his (Mr. Drummond's) support for any other tax which he pleased to levy. But he (Mr. Drummond) should like to see him muster courage enough to lay a tax upon the Manchester manufacturers. [ Laughter. ] Oh, yes; the Chancellor of the Exchequer was obliged to pay attention to the shakes of heads which he saw there—[ pointing to the benches behind the Treasury Bench ]—but he could afford to despise those of the agricultural classes, to whom this question was a matter of quite as vital importance as the repeal of the corn laws. Now, this question was, he believed, the real test of the honesty with which the repeal of those laws was carried. Was it truly on account of the labouring classes—was it indeed in order to give cheap food to the people, or was it really to get so much cotton manufacture exported? This question brought the House to a test on those points. Now, it had been considered—he did not say argued—but it had been thrown out too much as if this question was connected some way or other with what was called the landed interest. Now, when they looked at the manufacturing interest, there was the merchant who supplied the raw material, the manufacturer who worked it up, and the operative whom it employed. But the interests of those three parties were not at all identical. It was the interest of the merchant to sell his raw material as dear as he could; of the manufacturer to buy it in the cheapest market he could; and it was certainly the interest of the operative to keep his wages as high as he could; and in all those three cases the interests of the parties were wholly different. So it was with the land. If hon. Gentlemen refused to grant this boon because they thought it was a boon to landlords, they were exceedingly mistaken. There were certain persons who, finding this was no boon to the landlords, saw that no good would ensue from the repeal of this tax. He did not advocate it on any such ground whatsoever; he said it was of essential importance to the labouring classes, and it was for their interest he advocated it. In the present circumstances of the country, the only good the House could confer on them was so to cheapen food, that they might be enabled to live for 5 s. a week as they had been enabled to live for 10 s. In no other way could the House do them any good, or benefit the farmer. No diminution of this taxation would do, or no taking off the tax on beer. For the benefit of the farmers and the labourers they ought to take back the labourers into their houses, to feed them there; and the most important article of food would be good wholesome beer. Now, he very much doubted whether half the Gentlemen in that House knew what beer was. The right hon. Baronet had told the House that there had been a great alteration in the tastes of the people, and stated that people would not take beer now as they formerly did, as they preferred tea and coffee. Upon this subject, however, he would refer to the statements of a few of the witnesses, given in the blue book to which the right hon. Baronet the Chancellor of the Exchequer had referred, as to the quality of the article sold as beer. The first witness, who was evidently praising his article, said, "We don't mix it up as many do—as the trade in general do;" the next said, "The beer in the beershops is inferior trash;" a third said, "The beer is generally a muddy, inferior, deleterious article, and cannot afford nourishment to the working man;" a fourth stated, "The owners of the beershops are in the hands of the principal brewers, who supply them with the very worst article;" a fifth informed them, "That the beer made by the owners of beershops is generally bad and intoxicating, and the beer sold in beershops is very indifferent;" again they were told by a sixth, "The beer sold in the beerhouses was worse than that sold in the public-houses"—this witness was a publican. A seventh witness told the Committee, "That if the people could buy their beer as they did their bread and cheese, they could stand a chance of getting it of an improved quality." That was just what he wanted, that the poor man should be able to obtain his beer just as he could get his bread and cheese, without the intermeddling of the Excise in any manner whatever. Another witness said, "The beer is very inferior indeed. I have heard great complaints of the quality of the beer." He thought that these statements would account in some degree for the altered taste to which the right hon. Gentleman had referred. But could they wonder that such an alteration of taste should take place, when a brother brewer of that witness to whom the right hon. Baronet had referred, had published to the world the articles of which beer was made. This gentleman stated in his book that it was not beer that they were drinking, nor anything of the sort. The following were a list of the various ingredients from which he said beer was manufactured, among which were treacle, liquorice, coculus indicus, linseed, ginger, dye, cinnamon, blue vitriol, and many other articles. A friend of his had for some years taken great pains to detect many of the impostures and adulterations carried on in this town, and employed one or two persons at considerable expense in procuring and discovering tests of vegetable solutions, of which they at present knew very little. One of the modes adopted by him was that of evaporating the liquid as far as possible, leaving the residue to be dealt with. Upon one occasion he treated some porter in this manner, and having evaporated the liquid was about to proceed in his analysis with the residue. At first he thought he would taste it; but happening to reflect upon the matter, he thought that that would not do. It happened that his cat was crossing the room at the time, and he gave her a little of the article. How the cat liked it he could not tell, but he knew that in five minutes it was dead. He remembered a short time since, a friend of his, not of course in the county with which he was connected, on one occasion bought some grains of a brewer to feed his pigs upon—various persons also bought some for the same purpose—the pigs were fed upon them, and they all died. Well, now, could they be surprised that the tastes of the people for beer had altered? In fact, except in private houses, there was no such thing as beer to be had. If they chose to buy the "blacking" which was sold in this town, and called beer, they must take the consequences. Uuless they could give the labourer facilities for malting and brewing in his own house, they could do nothing for him. It had been said, however, that this question was merely the effect of impulse. Impulse indeed! He had been labouring for years to get the labourer the privilege of drinking his own beer; ever since he had raised his voice in public matters; and he would continue to do so till his point had been gained. He would have a starling taught to speak, and to say nothing but "beer, beer." He would have an English edition of the Georgics, and he would have in it—

"Beer veniente die beer decidente canebat."

said, he had been engaged as a brewer for the last thirty years, but had not acquired so much information about the manufacture of beer as the hon. Gentleman the Member for West Surrey. If the hon. Gentleman would set up a school for the instruction of brewers, it might become a profitable undertaking. He certainly seemed to know what no brewer in the trade was acquainted with. Were he (Mr. Bass) to stand before the house as the organ of the public brewers of this country, he was sure it would be his duty to endeavour to maintain the present duty upon malt; he was persuaded it would be their interest even to have the duty doubled. He was the last man to advocate any measure which would have the slightest tendency to impair the credit or diminish the resources of the country. He did not think, however, that the repeal of the duty would have that effect. He did not think a substitute was required to the whole extent of the tax. There was a considerable surplus last year, and he was delighted to find that there was a prospect of a surplus this year also. He was quite satisfied that a large sum of money might be saved by a better system of economy and administration than had hitherto obtained. Although a free-trader, still he sympathised with the condition of the agriculturists, who were at present greatly depressed, and he thought it was the duty of the House, by every legitimate means, to help them out of their difficulties. Propositions, with that object in view, had been made last Session, but no great advantage could result from any of them. One proposition would afford relief to the amount of 6 d. or 8 d. an acre on the average of land in cultivation throughout the country. That was a boon not worth contending for, but it was his decided opinion that, if they removed the malt tax, there would be an immediate and certain advantage. In the first place, they had a right to consider the quantity of beer that was consumed by the agricultural population. On tillage land the absolute cost in the duties on malt to the landowner and the farmer amounted to six per cent on the rental of the country. But if the duty were repealed, there must be a considerably increased consumption of barley. The right hon. Baronet the Chancellor of the Exchequer had been treating of cases where there had only been reductions or diminutions of duty; and he was willing to admit that they had not, in all instances, been followed by that increase in the consumption which had been looked for. But were they to try the effect of a total abolition of the malt duty, he was sure it would result in a great increase both in the quantity of barley grown and the quantity consumed; and that that would be followed by a certain advance in the price of barley. He thought that advance would be about 4 s. a quarter, which, calculating the quantity of ground at the rate of five quarters to the acre, would give to the barley grower the advantage of an increased price to the extent of 20 s. per acre on all land under barley cultivation. He did not think that that was a very exaggerated calculation. With respect to the case of the consumer, he had looked with some care to that part of the subject, and he was of opinion that the very least reduction to the consumer would be from thirty to thirty-five per cent. It should be remembered, too, that the trade of the brewers, as now conducted, was in the hands of very large capitalists, and that all restrictions on any trade gave very decided advantages to the capitalists in whose hands it might be. If, then, they were to remove this duty, it would create a great competition—a competition would lead to the advantage of the consumer to the extent to which he had just referred. The hon. Gentleman opposite, the Member for West Surrey, had insisted on the claim of the labouring classes in regard to this question; and he (Mr. Bass) had the greatest pleasure in agreeing with him that it was the duty of that House to give to the labourers of this country a more ready access to their favourite beverage; for he never would believe that, if the consumption of beer were not impeded, they would resort, as they now were obliged to do, to many of those articles that did them no good, and drink quantities of slipslop tea, instead of good wholesome beer. The right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer had said that the consumption of beer had not increased in proportion to the reduction of the duty; but he had not laid before them the results in any case in which there had been a total repeal of the duty. Let him (Mr. Bass) remind the House, however, that when the duty on salt was abolished, the consumption very shortly increased from 2,000,000 to 7,500,000 bushels, and that increase had now mounted up to more than 13,000,000 of bushels. Now he considered it to be quite impossible that somewhat similar results would not arise from a reduction of the duty on malt. He thought, however, that it was the duty of that House to mate the trial, and he was of opinion that substitutes might be found for any loss to the revenue that it might be supposed would accrue to the revenue from such reduction. With respect to the other portion of the proposition of the hon. Member for the North Riding, he agreed with those who thought that this question could not be properly tried without reverting to the total abolition of the duty. But let them, at all events, begin by trying the reduction of one-half of the duty; and he was sure that, looking to the great reductions which had taken place in the price of barley, the great brewers of this country would feel it their duty to concur in the reduction of the tax, though they might not agree to the total repeal of it. If, then, the House should refuse to adopt the Motion then before it, he should feel it to be his duty to submit to it a proposition for the reduction of the malt tax by one- half. They had been taught by the great statesman whose loss they so deeply deplored, that mere loss of a duty was not, necessarily, loss of revenue. This had been evident in the case of the reduction of the duties on brandy, since which the revenue on brandy had increased 20 per cent; and as he was distinctly and clearly of opinion that it was most desirable for the country generally—that it was desirable for the landed interest in its present hour of depression—and that it was desirable with reference to the labouring classes that this duty should be repealed, he should give his vote in favour of the Motion.

said, there was much force in the observations of his hon. Friend as to the mischievous effects produced by the malt tax, especially by giving a monopoly to large capitalists. But the question with him was, whether at that moment he was bound to vote for the total repeal of that tax; whether, after the House had decided what should be the expenditure of the country, he could conscientiously vote for the remission of something like 5,000,000 l. a year. The hon. Member for North Lincolnshire had claimed the vote of the hon. Member for the West Riding, and had read an extract from a letter of his hon. Friend, in which he stated, as it would appear, his opposition to the malt tax, and his willingness to support a Motion for its repeal. But the hon. Gentleman did not read the whole of the statement in question. His hon. Friend had never proposed, irrespective of the reduction of expenditure, and of other financial considerations, an unconditional repeal of the malt tax. His hon. Friend proposed to prepare the way for the repeal of the malt tax, as well as of other taxes pressing on the productive industry of the country, by the only practicable mode through which the object could be effected—namely, a large and bold reduction of expenditure. But, seeing that the House was determined, as it would seem, to maintain the public establishments on a scale quite inconsistent with the large reduction of taxation now proposed, he, for one, could not support the Motion. Hon. Gentlemen opposite must recollect that they had brought these taxes upon themselves by the systematic mode in which they had in times past supported a profuse expenditure on the part of the Government; and nothing but the retracing of their steps, and the putting the establishments on a far more economical footing, could enable the House to deal with this large item of taxation. The hon. Member for West Surrey advised the Chancellor of the Exchequer to screw up his courage to take off the malt tax, and to throw the burden on the Manchester manufacturers. Now he (Mr. M. Gibson) begged that the right hon. Gentleman would do no such thing. He did not want the repeal of the malt tax, and the substitution, for it of some new tax, perhaps equally objectionable; what he wanted was to have the expenditure reduced, so that both the manufacturing and the agricultural interest might be relieved from many of the excise duties which now pressed upon them. Besides, there was such a thing as having a preference with regard to taxes for repeal. He had recently presented himself to the House in the character of a tax repealer, proposing a remission of duty far more moderate in amount than that which was then asked for; and he maintained that it would be better first to repeal the taxes on knowledge rather than those on drink. He admitted that good wholesome beer was a very excellent beverage, but he considered that the spread of knowledge amongst the community was a matter far more pressing and far more important with reference to the welfare of the country. It was his intention again to ask the House to repeal those taxes; and, under such circumstances, he could not vote for the Motion.

was sure that the House would agree with him in returning thanks to the hon. Member for Derby for the very useful information which he had furnished them with. He had evinced a thorough knowledge of the real state of the question, and had shown his extreme honesty in his manly declaration. By the hon. Member's statement, one of the first witnesses of the Chancellor of the Exchequer was put out of court. The hon. Member informed the House that the brewers would willingly consent to double the tax rather than to abolish it. But at the same time he declared that he himself was ready and willing to give up his own interest for the purpose of advancing the interests of the public. By the repeal of the tax, the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer said that if we got rid of this tax we should not increase the consumption; and he quoted the year 1815, when there was a reduction of the duty upon malt, to show that such increase did not take place in the years 1816 or 1817; but that, on the contrary, the consumption of it was dimin- ished. Did, however, the right hon. Gentleman recollect the incidents of those years? Did he recollect, that in 1816 we had a very wet harvest, and the barley was good for nothing? That the year 1817 was a failing crop, and the price of barley rose? The increased price of barley counterbalanced the reduction of the duty? Did he recollect the bad harvest of 1821? Did he recollect the panic of 1825, which threw the whole commercial world into a state of great distress, and the people out of employment? Let the hon. Gentleman take the average of his ten years, or the choice of his two years, and go minutely into the facts, he could not prove that the lowering of the price did not increase consumption. He would ask the right hon. Gentleman if he were prepared to come to this conclusion, that the lowering of the price of any article does not increase the consumption of it? If the right hon. Gentleman held the opinion that no such result would be adduced, then let him defend his free-trade doctrines if he could. Why did the right hon. Gentleman consent to take the duties off so many articles, if he did not think that by so doing the consumption of them would be increased? What will become of his freetrade arguments if he says now that, by lowering the price as much as we pleased, there would be no increase in the consumption of the article? If free trade was well founded, it must be on the principle that by decreasing duties we increased consumption. If it was not so founded, then the right hon. Gentleman could not justify the great injury that he had done to the agricultural interest. Then the right hon. Gentleman said, look to the increase of the consumption of tea: although the duty had not been reduced, while the duty on malt had been reduced, yet there had been no increase of consumption of that article. Did the right hon. Gentleman forget that in 1834 the China trade was thrown open? The effect this had on the price of tea was very great. It induced immense speculations in China, and tea was brought in such quantities into this country that the owners of it could hardly get sale for it except at very low prices. Did the right hon. Gentleman think them so blind or so stupid that they could not see through these arguments? Did the right hon. Gentleman mean to say there was not an immense mass of the working classes of this country that could not get beer because of the high price of malt? For- merly the farmers gave their labourers beer; but they did no such thing now; they got their labour at the lowest price, and, from the necessity of the times, let their men drink at the pump instead of going to the cellar; and if they told him that the House of Commons was justified in allowing that state of things, let them not talk to him of their consideration for the poor. He could not conceive why the Chancellor of the Exchequer should have spoken as he had done, except that he had addressed himself to a thin House, and had calculated upon "a count out." A little had been said of the use of malt for feeding cattle, and reference was made to a report on the subject; but that report did not come from practical men. Instead of practical men they had sent out two theorists, and who, to show that barley and malt were not beneficial in the feeding of cattle, had taken two cows, in the month of June, out of a rich pasture, and tied them up by the neck, and then gave them dry barley and dry malt. If, however, these parties had taken the trouble to go into some milkhouses in this town, and see the condition of the cattle kept there, they would have found, that by giving them a due proportion of grains and other food they gave abundance of milk, and got fat. If the use of grains was so beneficial, what would be the effect of using malt? He presumed that the persons from whom this report emanated were very choice professors, and made great calculations, and were wonderful theorists; but he preferred the opinion of one practical man to the notions of a hundred professors. He would wish now to say one word to the free-traders. The House had heard much from them of the necessity of taking off all excise duties from manufactures. Well, he referred them to the report before quoted, which showed that this tax stopped the manufacturer of malt from making a proper and profitable use of his own barley. They had, by their experiments in Edinburgh, shown that by the use of dry unmalted barley, good beer could be made. In a short time, all beer in that city was made from raw grain; but the Government compelled the brewers to desist. They not only laid a tax upon malt, but compelled the brewers to use it. How could they justify that on the principles of free trade? Why were they, he asked, to have a tax which interfered with the growth of barley? Why not allow a man to use that which was his own commodity in such manner and in such way as was most beneficial to himself? Why prevent him from having the use of the raw material which he grew himself? Upon principle, he said, the free-traders were bound to vote in favour of this Motion. The hon. Member for the North Riding had shown the gross injustice of this case. He had shown that there was no other class upon whom a tax was placed when they used articles of their own growth for the purpose of manufactures. His hon. Friend had made out a case of crying injustice. He had proved that the tax was an incentive to immorality; that through its means the miserable labourer was driven for refuge into the public-houses, and that at last he become a frequenter of them to the injury of his family. He would ask the House to return to the good old times, when the farmer made his beer in his own house, and his men could find comfort in their own cottages. And if they would not take off the whole tax upon malt, at least permit the grower of barley to have the use of it in his own place and for his own benefit free from tax. It had been said, that the farmer can now steep barley; and that steeped barley is as good food for cattle as malt: that is altogether a mistake, as every practical man knew. Nothing is so important in fattening cattle as that they should be regularly fed—this can only be done by having a constant supply of food in a proper state. Steeped barley cannot be kept in that state; it is only by drying the barley that this can be done; and by the excise laws, the duty attached to barley so dried. Before he had a seat in that House, he had regarded the malt tax as a most oppressive and a most unjust tax, as one that could not be justified; and, therefore, one with respect to which he was determined to use all the means in his power to get rid of. The right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Gibson) had insinuated that they who advocated the repeal of this tax were heedless of the public credit. It was rather singular to hear such an intimation coming from the ranks of free trade, from those who had taken off 9,000,000 l. from the customs which the foreigner used to pay. They had taken these taxes off in the customs, whilst they left the excise on. He appealed to the hon. Member for Wakefield, and to every practical man in that House, to bear him out in the statement, that the effect of imposing the duty on foreign corn here was to lower it abroad; and that in most cases it rose in price abroad as they took off the duty here. Thus they had thrown away from 8,000,000 l. to 9,000,000 l.; they had taken this from the customs; they had given so much to foreigners, and they left at the same time an unjust tax on their home produce. He would not longer take up the time of the House in exposing the fallacies of the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer, but would cordially give his assent to the Motion of the hon. Member for the North Riding.

was rejoiced to hear so much valuable information as had that night come from the opposite side of the House; and he was ready to join in the declaration, that to remove not only the tax on malt, but on every article of consumption, was the true way to promote the prosperity of the country. He was sorry, however, that he could not give his vote in favour of the Motion, because they had already agreed to an enormous expenditure, which must be met, and because no substitute had been proposed by which so large a sum as 5,000,000 l., derived from the malt tax, could be made up.

, seeing that in the present deplorable state of agriculture the repeal of the malt tax was a subject of general interest among farmers, could not give a silent vote on that occasion. He should like to hear something said as to the probability or otherwise of a free importation of malt being hereafter permitted from abroad. The farmers generally, he believed, were not aware that malt could not be imported at all; and when it was proposed to repeal the malt tax, he should like to hear a declaration that it would not be followed by an importation of that grain duty free. There was a difficulty in importing barley, as it was apt to be injured on the way; but there would be no difficulty in importing malt; and his belief was, that if, the moment this tax was taken off, the House was to allow malt to come in duty free, the farmers would be undersold to such a degree, that not a grain of barley would be grown in this country but for the pigs and poultry. If allowed to come in duty free from abroad, malt would be sold at 2 s. 6 d. to 3 s. a bushel, and, instead of being beneficial to the farmers, the change would be the reverse. He would be the first to repeal any tax that would relieve the agricultural interest; and his belief was, that in the absence of protection, the best thing would be a relief from local burdens. Taking all circumstances into consideration, he could not vote for the Motion of the hon. Member for the North Riding of Yorkshire.

said, that frequent allusions had been made that night to a memorable discussion on this question some years ago, when a Motion for the repeal of the malt tax was carried. He was one of the majority on that occasion, and if the state of the Exchequer now had been similar to what it was then, he should to-night have given a similar vote. But at the former period there was a considerable surplus at the disposal of the Government, and as they at that time had been taking off many of the taxes which pressed on the trading and manufacturing classes, he thought that the landed interest ought to be relieved of the malt tax. At present there was no such balance in the Exchequer to justify him giving a similar vote to that which he then gave; and he was bound to consider how the deficiency that would be created by a repeal of the malt duty could be supplied. It could only be supplied by a great extension of the property tax, and as that would press upon many small farmers now exempted from it, he was not prepared to inflict a certain burden on them, for any uncertain benefit that might result to them by a repeal of the malt duty. Much had been said as to the condition of the labourer in connexion with this question. He remembered the time when there was no sort of agricultural labourer who did not brew his own beer; but the taxation on malt had put an end to that. That taxation had been caused by the wars in which the country was then engaged; and it ought not to be forgotten that the representatives of the agricultural interest had been the great supporters of that war. There were other taxes which affected the labourer as much as the malt tax, so far as his beer was concerned, and which he thought ought at the earliest opportunity to be repealed—he alluded to the duty on hops. Whenever circumstances were favourable, he should certainly vote for a repeal of the malt duty.

said, that protection and free trade had been spoken of as if opposed to each other; but it appeared to him that the contest was between free trade and fettered trade. It was absurd to talk about free trade in a country where the revenue could not be raised without excise duties. With regard to the malt tax it might be said, that its repeal would not benefit some classes of farmers, especially the dairy farmers; but there was still protection for dairy produce. The climate of this country was adapted for dairy produce rather than for the growth of wheat. Some able writers on agriculture would not place this country in the list of corn-growing countries. If this was the case under a system of free importation, they could only obtain certain prices. It must happen, therefore, if they had not peculiar advantages in the production of an article, those who persisted in producing it, when exposed to the cheap produce in foreign countries, must be brought into a state of difficulty. Under such circumstances, they must reduce the growth of wheat. He was not an advocate for low farming, but was anxious that the land should be as highly cultivated as possible. It had been said if, by improved cultivation, the farmers could produce double the quantity of grain, they would not be worse off with wheat at 30 s. a quarter than when they produced it in the old state of things, and sold it at 60 s. It was clear that they could not obtain double the produce by any improvements, unless under circumstances of peculiar advantage; and even then there must be a large outlay of capital. The advocates of the repeal of the malt tax said, with the repeal of that duty they could profitably produce barley on land where they now grew wheat; and also that they would be enabled to make malt of an inferior kind of barley if the excise restrictions were got rid of. The farmers were themselves very great consumers of malt in making beer for their labourers; and some of them, to his knowledge, expended as much as 60 l. or 70 l. a year in that article. He might be told that it would be better to pay their labourers in money than in kind: this was a practice which had existed for a very long period in many parts of the country, and more particularly in that part with which he was connected; and it would be very difficult to alter the system. If an attempt was made to change the practice, the farmers would find that they were obliged, in harvest time more particularly, to give beer to their labourers, as they had been so long accustomed to receive it. He did not believe that the farmers would go back to the good old system of keeping their labourers in their farm-houses, as such changes of habits had occurred. He knew in his district the agricultural labourers at their meals drank water, or a miserable concoction which they called tea; and their notion of beer appeared to be a jollification in the beershop. He believed the greatest good would result from making beer the constant beverage of the working classes. He would put an end to beershops, and allow beer to be sold in shops, like bread and cheese, but not to be consumed on the premises. Improve the habits and dwellings of the poorer classes, and it would be soon found, when their condition was ameliorated, that you could not make the beer too cheap. For his own part, he did not believe the labouring man could get through his work without beer. In those very able letters which had been published in the Morning Chronicle, on the condition of the labouring classes, it was clearly shown that the labouring classes could not do their work in a satisfactory manner without a proper allowance of beer. The writers of all those letters clearly showed that all these classes required this wholesome beverage. Large numbers of women also required beer as well as the men, and regarded it as almost a necessary of life. He denied that beer was no longer the habitual beverage of this country; for he believed the consumption of pale ale and Guiness's beer was as common now as it ever was. In a daily paper there had been some powerful articles written in favour of a reduction in the price of beer; but he was convinced they would try in vain to reduce the price of beer until they took off the malt tax. It was notorious that the continuance of this tax had created a monopoly in the hands of a small number of brewers; and they were told that such a monopoly made the trade more respectable. According to this view of the subject, a man was not to be regarded as respectable for being a good citizen or a good father and husband, but only if he possessed a certain amount of wealth, and nothing more. The right hon. Baronet the Chancellor of the Exchequer said that he could not spare this amount of revenue. No doubt of that; but this Motion ought not to be considered as a party attack from that (the Opposition) side of the House; for the noble Lord, who was generally recognised as the leader of the Conservative party, expressed himself as being hostile to the repeal of the malt tax, and the present Motion emanated from an independent Member—the representative of the North Riding of Yorkshire—who generally supported the Government. For his own part, he (Mr. Seymer) should never abstain from voting for a Motion in consequence of being told that its success would be injurious to Her Majesty's Ministers; for things should not be in such a condition that they must look every day for a Ministerial crisis. Some friends of his out of doors had said, if they took off the malt tax, the Chancellor of the Exchequer would impose some other taxes on the soil. His reply was, that it would be the duty of that House to see that the Chancellor of the Exchequer did not impose a tax which pressed unjustly and unfairly on the cultivators of the soil. It had been asserted that the adoption of this resolution would be injurious to the public credit. He thought that it was one of the best symptoms in this country that no attempts had been made to injure the public credit; he would never be a party to such a proceeding, and for the purpose of upholding that credit he would support the imposition of any tax which would not unfairly press on the agricultural interest. While he said this, he felt that great savings might he made in the public expenditure. He hoped the House would soon have an opportunity of reconsidering its decision as to the maintenance of the African squadron, with the view of striking off that enormous item in the Navy estimates. The Government might also diminish, without calling for the interference of that House, the salaries of some of the diplomatic officers abroad, who now received exorbitant sums. He was not so absurd as to suppose that by such reductions they could at once afford to give up the amount of revenue received from the malt tax; but much might be done by means of economy, and the remaining deficiency might be made up by the imposition of a tax which was not oppressive and unjust in its character. As he saw the hon. Member for Montrose in his place, he would remind him of an opinion which he delivered in 1834, respecting this tax. The hon. Gentleman then said, "If the malt tax were taken off, the agriculturist must consent to a plan for the free importation of grain." They had now the reverse of that; and he called upon the hon. Member and the other free-traders to vote for this Motion. He believed, by refusing to relieve those classes who were now in such a distressed condition, they were pursuing that course which was most likely to endanger public credit. He did not mean to say that the farmers would refuse to pay taxes, as they were a loyal body, although they might make use of strong language at their meetings, but they would soon be reduced to such a condition that they would be unable to pay taxes.

said, he hoped to be permitted to make a few observations in reply to the hon. Member for Dorsetshire. He could not accept the meaning which that hon. Gentleman attached to the phrase "free-trader," as in connexion with the resolution before the House. He was quite willing to admit, in general terms, that restrictions arose on the consumption of an article by the imposition of an excise duty, as in the case of the malt tax—and so far it was objectionable. The only meaning of free trade was not such as had been described by several hon. Gentlemen opposite, but it was that no duties should be levied for the purposes of protection, and that the produce of all taxes imposed should go to increase the revenue of the country, instead of any portion being allowed to be devoted to the pockets of any class. The hon. Gentleman who spoke last placed the issue in a fair form. He asked the House to repeal the malt tax as a compensation for protection. The question before the House that evening was, whether this duty was a tax on the producer, or a tax on the consumer. He was willing to admit that, so far as there was a restriction on the consumption of the article, it militated against consumption; because there was no doubt that the consumption of malt, as of tea, or any other article, was lessened by the large duty to which it was subject. But, on the other hand, he should be allowed to ask what there was in the article of malt, more than any other exciseable article, that the Government should be called upon to yield up a revenue of five millions annually derived from that single article? Whilst he admitted that the malt tax did act in a manner prejudicial to farmers—as did all taxes, more or less—yet it still could be contended that, with regard to the malt tax, the prejudicial effect on land was not so much as it is in the case of many other articles now subject to high taxes; and for this reason, that at the present moment this country did not supply all the agricultural produce it consumed; and the very fact of this tax being repealed, would only lead to further importations from abroad. It had been argued that the repeal of the malt tax would be beneficial, as more encouragement must follow to the growth of barley, which proved a more profitable crop than wheat. But he could not suppose, as had been alleged by his hon. Friend the Member for the North Riding, that the removal of this tax would tend to an increase in the consumption of barley to the extent of 10,000,000 quarters a year; if it should lead to this result, it was clear that that amount of produce could not be raised in this country. The hon. Gentleman said, that it would be more profitable, after the repeal of the malt tax, for farmers to grow barley instead of wheat. His hon. Friend had proved too much by this admission, for not only was the importation of foreign wheat very large, but last year the quantity of barley imported was not less than a million and a half of quarters. [An Hon. MEMBER: The great portion of that barley was not fit for malt, as it was of such inferior quality.] He admitted this might be the case; but if there was an increased demand for barley, the great portion of it would be imported. The hon. Gentleman who opened the debate, and several hon. Members who succeeded him, compared the malt tax with the tax which formerly existed on cotton prints. It should be remembered that the larger portion of the cotton goods were exported, and a drawback was allowed. The hon. Gentleman also complained that the manufacturer should be allowed a drawback of half the duty which was paid on soap; but he should have recollected when they exported beer, a drawback was allowed to the extent of the duty on the malt and hops used in its production. Hon. Gentlemen opposite said we had lately introduced a new system of policy; the corn laws had been repealed; and, therefore, they came forward under entirely new circumstances to demand the repeal of the malt tax. Now, supposing this principle to be admitted, where were they to stop in its application? The West Indian colonists told us that their sugar trade had been injured by the free-trade system, and they demanded to be treated, with regard to their produce, like an integral part of the empire. [ Cheers. ] Did hon. Gentlemen who cheered see where their principle would land them? It would go to the repeal of the whole of our custom-house duties. [ Cheers. ] Were Gentlemen opposite ready then to give up the customs duties entirely? Why, the hon. Member for North Warwickshire had pointed to an increase of the customs duties alone as the means of making up the deficiency that would be occasioned by the repeal of the malt tax. And what did that amount to? Why, simply that they were going to untax a man's beer in order to retax his bread. If they were to comply with the advices and suggestions of hon. Gentlemen as to the abolition of taxes, he doubted not Her Majesty's Ministers would find themselves before long bereaved of some thirty millions of income. He was prepared to show that the malt tax, though heavy, was by no means so heavy as the taxes imposed on a great many articles equally as essential to the comfort of the working classes. Malt paid 57 per cent on its value, or 100 per cent on the price of raw barley; and, in speaking of the other articles, he spoke of them in the stage in which they reached the consumer. Coffee paid 100 per cent; British spirits, 333 per cent; tea, 200 per cent; and tobacco, as much as 1,200 per cent. Where was the claim of hon. Gentlemen to repeal the taxes on these articles? The hon. Gentleman who opened the debate dwelt much on the great and increased consumption of tea after the duty on it had been diminished; but he begged to ask the hon. Gentleman if a further reduction of the duty on tea, and such like articles, would not be more beneficial to the working classes than a reduction or abolition of the duty on malt? The hon. Gentleman also asserted that the tax was a consumer's tax. He (Mr. Wilson) did not deny that it was peculiarly a consumer's question, and that the House never could be engaged in a better or in a more useful duty than in reducing in every possible way whatever tax pressed heavily on the great mass of consumers in the country. Whilst admitting that, he should also declare that the House could not be charged with indifference as regarded those classes, when it was recollected the amount of taxation that had of late been abolished on various articles of luxury as well as necessity, and when hon. Gentlemen opposite, to their credit, submitted to the weight of a property tax, in order to make good the deficiency that would otherwise have occurred in the revenue of the country, by the repeal of many direct taxes which pressed on the trade and industry of the country. He thought it was impossible to look at such a Motion as the present, made at that period of the Session, without recurring to the words of a great statesman, made on a similar occasion, when he asked "whether they would maintain public honour, or were prepared for a suspension of cash payments and a breach of the national engagements?" ["No, no!"] Gentlemen said "No," but they must either reduce the expenditure five millions, or increase the revenue by some new tax, if they, while persisting in the present proposal, wished to preserve the national honour. They must not consider that the labouring classes of the country were uninterested in the struggle. Some persons asserted that the working classes were merely taxpayers, and had no interest in the maintenance of the public credit. He denied that altogether. No classes were more interested in the maintenance of public faith, than those who lived by trade and industry, because public credit and private confidence were very closely allied. On all these grounds he thought that the House would act injudiciously if it consented to the Motion.

I cannot, Sir, give a silent vote on this important question, more particularly as I have been so pointedly alluded to by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. I cannot discuss the proposition before us to-night—to repeal the malt tax—without taking into consideration the state of the agricultural classes of this country, inasmuch as barley is one of the principal articles of the produce of those classes. I do not suppose that any person here present will deny that the condition of the agricultural classes is one of great depression. I see Gentlemen opposite, of great authority, who have admitted that not only is that condition one of great depression, but that it is a condition of unexpected depression. We on this side of the House were prepared for this result of that legislation which a majority of the House of Commons decided should occur, and therefore great and grievous as it has been, it is not on this side of the House unexpected. But the difference between the two sides on this subject is, that while both agree that the depression is great, it is only on that side where the Government sit, it is acknowledged to be unexpected. Under these circumstances, we have a right to ask from the Government a clear and succinct view of what they think will be the future condition of the agricultural interest. We know that it is one of great distress; we predicted it, and we are prepared to attempt, if we have the opportunity, some remedy; but you denied that that distress would occur, while so great is its reality and its severity that you are obliged to acknowledge it; and almost on the very first day of the Session you attempted to cheer and solace the agricul- tural interest by predicting and promising that it was transient, and would quickly pass away. Early in the Session the same Minister who has addressed us to-night (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) acknowledged frankly that he was surprised at the distress in which the agricultural interests were plunged. He gave it as the opinion of the Cabinet half a year ago that the great depression of prices, while it astonished the Cabinet, was, in their belief, one of momentary character. Recently, on another occasion, we were assured by the same Minister that prices would rally, and that that severity of distress which all acknowledged, would rapidly pass away. Another and another month has elapsed; we are now approaching the end of the Session, and we all acknowledge that, not only does the distress remain, but that its severity is increasing. Of those who represent more peculiarly the agricultural classes in this House, several hon. Members have sought their relief. Early in the Session, I had the honour of proposing a measure of a remedial character to the consideration of the House. Some Gentlemen, no doubt, conscientiously believed that, if carried, it would not have produced the good effects we anticipated; but all must acknowledge that a great party in this House were not of that opinion, and that several who supported the Motion are on the Ministerial benches. At any rate, it was lost only by a bare majority in one of the fullest Houses of this Session. The character of that Motion could not be said to be extravagant, unreasonable, or intemperate; and indeed the Minister who opposed it, did so on the ground that, as a measure of relief, it was too insignificant to meet losses of such a magnitude. At a subsequent period, a Gentleman sitting on the opposite side of the House came forward with an other measure for the remedy of the all-acknowledged agricultural distress. In the one case a practical measure, the object of which was to reduce the peculiar burdens upon agriculture, was proposed, and you rejected it. In the next instance you were asked to agree to a Motion, the acknowledged tendency of which was to impose moderate duties on foreign agricultural produce, and you rejected that by a large majority. All the time, however, the House universally acknowledged the distress of the agricultural classes produced by their own legislation, and the Government expressed its dismay at the continuance of that distress, but announced on every occasion that it was of a temporary, transient, and occasional character. We are now invited to discuss another proposition made again by a Whig Gentleman, the tendency of which is again to relieve the sufferings of those classes; and I cannot consider it upon its mere merits or demerits, but I feel called upon irresistibly to look at it in reference to the condition of the classes whose fortunes it is calculated to influence. After the speech of the hon. Member for Westbury, I must take a general view of our sources of revenue. The revenue of the country is levied in three ways:—1st, by a duty on imports; 2ndly, by a system of inland taxation; and, 3rdly, by a plan of local contribution. There is not a single article of our imports which can come into competition with our home agricultural productions which is not at this moment, generally speaking, admitted duty free. With respect to the second branch, our inland taxation, a great portion, and, I might say, the greater portion, is directly contributed by the land or its productions. With regard to the third branch, our local taxation, the whole of it is raised from the land of its adjuncts. I ask the House if this system can go on much longer? I ask the House, is it possible this system can be much longer endured—whether it will be in the power of those who contribute these great sums much longer to supply them? I ask, how can they be expected to endure the effects of our modern legislation, when its characteristic is by the same machinery to diminish the means while it increases the burdens of those who contribute to the revenue? This cannot long continue, and I must therefore consider this question with reference to your recent legislation and the suffering condition of the agricultural classes. It brings us to this point. This House and the country must decide on the principle by which the revenue in future is to be raised. I am at a loss to understand the reasoning of the hon. Member for Westbury. I think he must have mistaken a cheer to have come from this side of the House instead of from his own, and founded upon it an argument which leads to inferences exactly the reverse of those his side of the House would have wished. The point upon which the people of the united kingdom must speedily decide is, whether the burden of the public taxes shall be raised externally or internally. It is a controverted position whether the foreigner pays any portion of a customs duty; but I hardly think any Gentleman will maintain the thesis that the foreigner pays an excise duty, or any portion of it. I therefore maintain, in considering the financial system of this country, we should adopt, as the principle of all our ameliorations, the reduction of excise, and not of customs. The hon. Member for Westbury illustrated his fallacious argument by drawing an illustration from the condition of the colonies. I did not think in this debate to have to refer to the condition of the colonies; but if I wished for any argument more powerful than another to urge upon the House as an objection to our system of inland taxation, I would adduce them from the condition of our colonies. For, if there be any object which more than another ought to engage the attention of the statesmen of this country, it is the necessity of consolidating our colonial empire. If we wish to maintain our political power, or our commercial wealth, we can only secure those great results by the consolidation of our colonial empire. I will not advert to the political means by which such a consolidation might be maintained. I will not enter into the difficult but important consideration, whether the colonies ought or ought not to be represented in this House—although these are questions which we ought not to discard from our minds—but looking only to the commercial and fiscal part of the subject, I cannot understand by what means in the present day, following the current of our recent legislation, that consolidation can take place unless we can reduce into a fact a phrase which political economists are so fond of using, namely, that our colonies should be placed on the same footing as the counties of England. Now, let me ask the House when this claim has been made on behalf of the colonies, what has been the objection? It has always been met by the plea that it is impossible the colonies can be on the same footing as our English counties, because they do not bear their share of the excise duties. But in attempting the great commercial and fiscal reforms which have gone on for the last six or seven years, if you had directed your attention to the Excise, instead of the Customs, you would have increased the means of the people to provide themselves with articles of consumption, and diminished in an equal de- gree the burdens of the people, while at the same time we should have destroyed the great barrier to that consolidation of our colonial empire; and while we relieved and employed our people, we should have increased the imperial strength of this still, I hope, great empire. With these feelings I cannot allow this question to be decided by arguments urged by the Chancellor of the Exchequer with reference to the state of the revenue. Whatever may be the state of the revenue, the Chancellor of the Exchequer is responsible for that. If the resources of the Exchequer are diminished, the Government alone are answerable for it. I must impress upon the House the dangerous fallacy of the revenue being an index to the national prosperity. The true index of national prosperity is the condition of the people. I can never admit the state of the revenue as an infallible, as the only test, or indeed as the principal test of the prosperity of the country. Nobody, surely, will say in sober seriousness that, because we may reduce the revenue, by taking off a tax producing 4,000,000 l. or 5,000,000 l., that the public credit is in danger. If so, public credit is in a perilous state at this moment. This is not, it is said, a party question. I believe no truer statement was ever made. There is hardly one Member on this side of the House conscious of the opinion I am about to express. But I express it because I could not give a silent vote upon a question of such magnitude, and particularly after the Chancellor of the Exchequer had so particularly referred to me; but I feel that I cannot give this vote without reference to the future. This is a vote which no Gentleman can give without being prepared to state all the circumstances to vindicate the course he is taking, and I wish to put my vote upon a clear and definite footing. If you are prepared to do justice to the land of the united kingdom, then the landed interest will take into consideration what degree of sacrifice it may make for the common good. But when you pursue a course which, according to your own confession, not only grievously injures that great interest, but which you nightly admit to us occasioned you the greatest astonishment—as long as you admit that the interest in this country with which the welfare of millions is connected is in a state of suffering occasioned by laws which you have supported, but the effects of which are exactly the reverse of what you anticipated—as long as this state of affairs continues, and you will offer, or can offer, no relief, although the calamity is one which you admit cannot be exaggerated, then I say you force the Opposition to support measures of relief, in which, if you offered measures of relief, we might not otherwise concur. What is the condition of the greatest interest in this country? It is in a state of suffering unexampled in history. We have before had great agricultural distress, and great manufacturing distress, but never has there been an instance before of a distress of such great magnitude being of so long a continuance, and which, while the Ministry admit its severity, they declare their inability to relieve. Is the Government surprised, then, that, on two occasions, two of their own supporters—two county Members sitting on the Whig benches—should have taken the opportunity of suggesting remedies? They cannot complain of the Opposition supporting the propositions of those Gentlemen. If the Prime Minister had came forward and said, "As this distress—which we acknowledge — is so much greater than we expected, we will take it into our consideration whether we can suggest measures for its relief; but do not cripple us by a hasty and violent decision"—that appeal would have been listened to, I venture to say, with respect and attention. But what is the position in which we are placed? Parliament has now sat for six months. You assert yourselves that you had knowledge of the distress of the agricultural classes. It was amply acknowledged, you say, in the Speech from the Throne. We consider that it was not sufficiently acknowledged in that Speech. But you say that the fact was so important, and so patent, that it was not only acknowledged in the Speech from the Throne, but in a manner intended to exhibit the importance of the fact, and the great sympathy of the Government. Six months have, however, passed—the distress is even aggravated—and the Government have not taken one single step to alleviate that distress. If the Ministry had been formed of Gentlemen of the Manchester school, this conduct would have been consistent—we might have opposed their policy, but we must at least have respected their consistency. The Gentlemen of the Manchester school approve of the legislation which, by universal admission, has produced this distress. ["No, no!"] Well, then, give me some other satisfactory reason for it. You have told us that the circumstances were unexampled, yet you have not denied that the importation of foreign agricultural produce has produced them. Some of you have argued that this unexampled state of things was dependent upon an importation which would not continue; but no one has argued yet that the importation has not produced the result. But if we had to face a real free-trade Ministry, formed by the hon. Member for the West Riding, I could understand the policy pursued by the Government. If we came forward to complain of the depression of those classes which we more particularly represent, they might then have replied, "Yes; but what you call depression we consider prosperity." If we came forward to complain of low prices, they might say that in those low prices they recognised the source of general content. But we face a Ministry who, while they acknowledge our distress and deplore it, refuse us any relief, and answer only with vague assurances that higher prices are coming. And when at the end of the Session we announce that it is impossible for us any longer to keep silence on the subject, they are ready to assure us that if we wait a little longer we shall obtain what we desire, and that which, according to the theory which they support, is a cause of prosperity in the country will cease, and no longer occasion that good fortune which we were assured it would accomplish. We want to know, at the end of the Session, when we are going back to our constituents—we want to know from the lips of the noble Lord at the head of the Government what we are authorised to say to them. We want to be enabled to tell them at what point Her Majesty's Ministers consider that cheapness begins to be a curse. Because if we are enabled to tell them that the Ministry, consistent with the principles upon which they say their Government is founded, acknowledge that cheapness is the only object which any Government of this country ought to attempt to realise—that they are prepared for wheat at 20 s. a quarter—that half-a-crown a bushel for wheat they recognise as an additional evidence of our increasing national prosperity — then our constituents will be able to comprehend their position even if it be a position of despair. But if myself and my hon. Friends are in this awkward and embarrassing position when we meet our suffering constituents, that we have only to tell them we have repeatedly endeavoured to represent their state to the Government; that the Government deplores their position, but is sanguine that that suffering will soon pass away; that it is the opinion of Ministers that more remunerative prices for the investment of capital and the exercise of industry will soon be received; that, under such circumstances, our constituents will be enabled to bear, as they now bear, the whole of the local taxation of the country, with very slight exceptions; to bear, as they now bear, a great portion of the inland taxation of the country; to endure, as they now endure, unrestricted competition with the foreign producer—then I can easily understand that they will feel that we have not been very urgent in our efforts, if we could not succeed in obtaining from such a sympathising Government some efficient measures of assistance. If the Government will not remedy an evil which they acknowledge and lament, with what face can we refuse to remove taxes which have the necessary effect of diminishing the demand for the produce of the sufferers? Are we to tell them that in such questions as this they have no interest? Must not we avail ourselves of every means that afford the slightest chance of a remedy? If we support the Motion of the hon. Member for the North Riding, it will bring the House to its senses; it will then be no longer possible for any Administration to exist, reaping the advantages of a policy to which they do not conscientiously adhere; it will not be possible for a Ministry to exist which is unwilling to compensate those who have suffered from measures which the Government themselves admit have produced consequences to be deprecated. I am convinced that if we support with success the Motion of the hon. Member for the North Riding, the effect will be to bring the House to its senses—that great experiments so fatal to the land will be terminated—and the Government will be obliged to strip from its face that convenient veil which has so long clouded its features. For these reasons, Sir, I shall support the Motion of the hon. Gentleman the Member for the North Riding. It is a Motion which, so far as I have heard, has not, in point of argument, been at all met. Why, if you admit the validity of your principles, this Motion is one of their necessary corollaries. No one can deny the justice of this Motion: all those eminent men on both sides of the House who, for a number of years, have given their opinion on the corn laws, have admitted that the questions of the malt tax and the corn laws were indissolubly united. Well, you have repealed the corn laws, but the malt tax remains. Complete your scheme: fulfil your project. With local taxes enormous in amount, at all times difficult of endurance, with the corn laws abrogated, and a heavy income tax, it is surely worse than unjust that you should still continue the impost the repeal of which, under other circumstances, and at other periods, you admitted was the inevitable consequence of those changes and those inflictions which we have experienced, and which we now endure.

said, that in one part of the speech of the hon. Member for Buckinghamshire he told the House that the question then before them was not a party question, and that he had that night not discussed it as a party man, though the cheers with which that remark was received might naturally have led to an opposite conclusion. Still he accepted the sentiments of the hon. Gentleman as they were stated, and he derived great consolation from that declaration; but there were some of the statements of the hon. Member the influence and tendency of which were not quite free from danger. The hon. Member placed the land apart from and in opposition to all the other interests of the country. ["No, no!"] The hon. Gentleman certainly told the House that if the land received just and fair consideration, the owners and occupiers of the soil would then consider what sacrifices they would make for the community at large. In that statement there was at least some ambiguity. Suppose they were to repeal the sum, nearly amounting to 5,000,000 l., which constituted the malt tax; suppose they were to repeal the rest of the excise, to the extent of 10,000,000 l., and that public credit was shaken to its base, what consolation would any Government have in being able to say that they had followed the advice of hon. Members on the other side of the House? Had those Gentlemen told the House anything about the care that they would take or the means that they possessed for replacing public credit upon a safe foundation? No; what they said was, that when the case of the land was considered in the manner of which they approved, they would then estimate what sacrifices they were prepared to make. He saw, however, with great satisfaction, that the leader of a great party in another place gave an opinion opposed to the present Motion, and said that if he were a Member of the House of Commons he should not vote for a repeal of a tax which produced a revenue of 4,500,000 l. That was the opinion of Lord Stanley—the opinion of the leader of a great party. He said—

"I confess that if I were a Member of the House of Commons, I should be rather inclined to coincide with the latter than the former, and think no officer in opposition would vote for the remission of a duty involving 4,500,000 l. without being provided with some means by which the deficiency might be made good."

For his own part it was satisfactory to him to find that the hon. Gentleman did not represent the sentiments of Lord Stanley, and that Lord Stanley, if he were a Member of this House, would agree with them, and refuse to make a defalcation in the revenue which he did not see the means of making good. It might be all very well to say that this affair of taxation was the business of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who was to receive those taxes; but it was also the business of the inhabitants of this country, who were to pay the taxes to the Chancellor of the Exchequer. When he found the tax, they would have to pay it, and they might suffer from a different impost much more than they did from the malt tax. Remembering that, and remembering, also, the possibility of a defalcation, he did not understand how it would be possible for any Minister to dispense with such a tax without seeing very clearly his way in proposing a substitute for it which would be less injurious than the malt tax was supposed to be to the community at large. At that late hour he should not enter into the particulars which the hon. Member for the North Riding of Yorkshire had given them. There were so many particulars in his speech, that there would not be time to enter into them, but he might observe that for not less than three quarters of a century, namely, from the year 1775 to the present time, the principle of the malt tax had been recognised by Members of that House, and by political economists. No less a man than Adam Smith had said that 26 s. or 27 s. per quarter might be collected from malt more easily and without so much burdening the community as it might be from other articles. Passing by, however, the immediate question of the malt tax, he could not, as he had risen to address the House, avoid taking some notice of the observations which they had heard on sub- jects of larger interest. The hon. Member for Buckinghamshire had told the House that the present policy of the Government had proved destructive to the agricultural interest; and they had also been told that the unexampled distress of that part of the community had taken the Government by surprise. He must say that they had not experienced any surprise whatever: he never supposed that, in the great transition which the country had undergone, suffering could have been altogether avoided. The hon. Member opposite asked, with great appearance of triumph, whether this was a benefit or an evil: on these points, however, he had given opinions frequently upon former occasions when other opportunities of discussing them had been afforded; but, considering all the circumstances of the country, whether living under protection or free trade, he could under no circumstances resist the conclusion that whether prices were high or low, whether they sank or rose, the Government should never seek by the introduction of an Act of Parliament to produce artificial prices. That was a plain proposition. Whether hon. Gentlemen considered that prices were at present not remunerative to the producers of the country, or whether they considered them generally beneficial to the country; whether they considered them one thing or another, the principle of legislation on the subject was a principle perfectly clear, and by which the Government meant to abide. Whether prices remained at their present level, or whether they sank below it, they would not attempt to raise the price of the food of the people of England. And that was his answer to the question of the hon. Gentleman. It was a matter of curious disquisition whether or not prices were, or were not, likely to rise. Gentlemen might discuss, if they pleased, what was likely to be the produce of next harvest. For himself, he would not have the arrogance to predict either on the one subject or the other. He would leave prices to be regulated by the supply of this country and of the world, and he would not interfere with prices, whatever they might happen to be. But how was the prosperity of the agricultural interest consistent with the prosperity of all the great interests which together formed the well-being of this country? It appeared to him that they were perfectly consistent with each other. The ordinary taxes of the country were taxes imposed for the benefit of the State—taxes to enable the State to pay the interest of the very large debt incurred in former years, and the establishments which the House of Commons might think necessary for the service of the year. But there were other taxes of very great amount, some part of which went into the Exchequer, but the greater part of which went into the pockets of particular classes and interests, and which were a very great burden on the people, without yielding any benefit whatever to the Exchequer, or assisting to pay either the debt or the establishments of the country. Some of these taxes were no longer maintained, and their diminution tended to increase the prosperity of the people, and enabled them to bear the taxes which were absolutely necessary. He would instance the case of sugar. The diminution of the revenue from sugar was not very considerable. But if they compared the price of the 200,000 tons of sugar consumed in 1845 with the price of the same quantity consumed in the present year, they would find that the diminution of the price to the consumer in the present year was no less than 5,000,000 l. But the loss to the revenue was not 5,000,000 l., but much less. It was obvious, then, that when such a great diminution of taxation took place, and when the people were enabled to consume articles of necessity at a much less price than before, they had the greater means of consuming excisable articles, and the greater ability to contribute to the revenue of the country. This result was seen that very day in the returns of the revenue, in which they found, that notwithstanding the diminution of taxation that had taken place in excisable articles, the Excise revenue had not only increased, but the general state of the revenue was also increasing and advancing. Another proof of the advantage of the plan which the Government had been pursuing, was the returns of the exports which had lately been laid on the table. He found that while the value of the exports for the month of June, 1849, amounted to 4,355,783 l., the exports for the corresponding month in 1850 amounted to 5,959,949 l., being an increase of no less than 1,604,160 l. on a single month. If, again, he took the first five months of 1849, and compared them with the first five months of 1850, he found that in 1849 the value of the exports was 12,191,973 l., while the value of those of 1850 was 26,027,948 l., being an increase of nearly 5,000,000 l. If, again, they compared those with the exports for the same period of 1848, they would find that the increase was about 8,000,000 l. What did this imply? It implied that great numbers of people were employed at good wages, that they were able to consume the corn of the agriculturists and the sugar of the colonists, and all the various articles which contributed to the Excise, and the other branches of the revenue of the country. It was in vain to tell him that in a country where manufactures were advancing at such a pace, the agricultural interest would be left behind, and must long remain in a state of suffering. The hon. Gentleman the Member for Buckinghamshire represented the landed interest as if, for a long series of years, they had been falling into a state of depression, from which they could never recover. He maintained that the reverse was the case—that in consequence of the increase in the manufactures and commerce of the country, both the owners and the occupiers of the land had been enabled to exchange their products at a much greater value than they formerly did. ["Oh, oh!"] He regretted he had not the tables there to prove it; but would hon. Gentlemen who cried "Oh" be good enough to look at the rent of land, and the returns of the income tax, for the last year, and compare them with the returns for the years 1775 and 1790, and then tell him that the rent of the land, and the returns received from land, had not greatly increased in the course of that time? And what had been the main cause of that increase? The main cause had been the increase of our manufactures, and the prodigious exertions of those who were engaged in the trade and commerce of the country. The hon. Gentleman had asked him for the decision of the Government upon this question. He had said that he did not consider that the Government were really attached to the principles of free trade, and that they had maintained very different doctrines with respect to the effects of free trade. He begged to tell the hon. Gentleman that what the Government maintained was this, that whatever immediate loss or immediate difficulties might be caused to the agricultural interest by the great transition which was taking place in our social laws, that loss and those difficulties would be more than obviated by the general increase in the prosperity of the country, and that to enable the people to obtain their food at the cheapest rate at which it could be procured, and to exchange the products of their industry with foreign nations, would afford the best foundation for the increased prosperity of the land. He believed that it would be an entirely false and injurious policy if, like the hon. Gentleman, they attempted to found that prosperity upon the principle of separating the prosperity of the land from the welfare of the other interests of the conntry. He believed that the welfare of all the great interests of the country were inseparably bound up with each other, and that the welfare of all these great interests was that which the Government had consulted. With these principles, therefore, he asked the House not to consent to the Motion of the hon. Member for the North Riding. The hon. Gentleman the Member for Buckinghamshire had said that they overtaxed land, and that customs duties were almost entirely rejected by them. The fact was, however, that the customs duties amounted to nearer 23,000,000 l. than 22,000,000 l., which, according to his view, was charged upon the consumer, but which, according to the hon. Gentleman's theory, was charged upon the foreigner. What would he have more? Even if they took the income tax and the local taxation of the country, of which so great a portion was charged upon the commercial and manufacturing interests of the country, they would find that there was nothing like the sum raised from those sources that was raised from customs duties. He did hope, then, that the House would, as they had hitherto done, maintain that system of commercial policy they had of late years adopted—that they would not endanger the national credit by taking away at once nearly 5,000,000 l. of taxes—that they would not reject the wise advice of Lord Stanley, who had declared that if he were a Member of that House, he would vote with the Government on this occasion—but that they would save the credit of the country and persevere in that system which he considered wise for all the interests of the country.

, in reply, said he had not wished to rest the question on grounds of protection; he had not asked for agriculture more than strict justice. The noble Lord at the head of the Government had compared this year with 1849 and 1848, which were years of great adversity. Let him compare the three years since the establishment of the free-trade policy with the three years before, and he would then find the balance on the other side. It was true rents had increased since 1775 and 1790—not in consequence of the higher price of produce, but of the greater amount of capital invested. As to the revenue, his idea of supporting the public credit was to consider the interest of the taxpayers. His proposition was to relieve the springs of industry. He sought to relieve the consumer of a tax of 100 per cent in the first instance, and which was actually 500 per cent on the consumers. This was a wheat and an oat question, an Irish as well as an English question, and there was not any part of the country, from John-o'Groat's house to the Land's End, which would not feel the benefit of the repeal of the malt tax. But, then, it was not convenient to repeal it at present. The screw must now be applied. Still, he was satisfied that the time was coming when the tax would and must be repealed.

Question put.

The House divided:—Ayes 123; Noes 247: Majority 124.

The House adjourned at Half after Two o'clock till Monday next.