tax, by checking the growth of capital, and drain-
ing away the funds which should purchase the
produce of their industry.
It was generally supposed at the time that
Ministers would have resigned, upon 33^
Parliament having negatived a pro- Remission o!
posal forming so important a part of ^^^ war Malt
their financial system ; but, instead '^'^â– ''' ^I^'-''^-
of doing so, they equally surprised the House of
Commons and the country, by voluntarily pro-
posing, two days afterward, the entire remission
of the war duty on malt — a tax producing at that
time £2,700,000 a year. The reason assigned
by them for this unlooked-for boon was, that as
the abolition of the income tax would render it in-
dispensable for them to go into the money mar-
ket to meet the exigencies of the year, it was of
little moment whether they borrowed a few mill-
ions more or less ; and, therefore, that it was
deemed advisable to give a material relief to the
agricultural interest, which was laboring under
a severer depression than any other class. There
can be no question that there was much truth in
this observation, although there were not want-
ing shrewd observers, who remarked that the
boon would never have been heard of, if Minis-
ters had not received a shake, and that this show-
ed that the best way to inspire Government with
philanthropic feelings was to make them afraid.
Be this as it may, the remission of the tax was
hailed with delight by the leaders of the agrifiul
tural interest in Parliament ; and being levied on
a beverage which the people in great part pre-
pared lor themselves, there can be no doubt that
it was felt as a relief by the people generally,
contrary to what too often obtains with the re-
' Pari Deb mission of indirect taxes, which onl}'
ixxiii. 458; swell the profits of the dealers in the
Ann. Regist. articles, without lessening their cost
1816,26. to the consumers.'
As the abolition of the property tax, and the
24_ remission of the war duly on raalt,
Reduced esti occasioned a loss to the Exchequer
mates formed of fully £17,000,000 a year, it be-
rnent"^*â„¢' came necessary for Ministers to re-
vise entirely their estimates for the
year, and reduce the expenditure in oportion
to the large defalcation in their resources. This
was accordingly done, and with a success be-
yond the most sanguine expectations of the
country : £3,000,000 was borrowed from the
Bank ; and this, with the issue of Exchequer
bills to the amount of as much more, supplied
the deficiencies of the Exchequer. The reduc-
HISTORY OF EUROPE.
33
tion of the estimates gave rise to warm delates
in both houses of Parliament, which are import-
ant as evincing the ideas then afloat in the coun-
try, and forming the basis on which the whole
pacific expenditure of the nation since that time
has been bunded. The reduction edected wa?
very great, for the expenditure, irrespective of
the debt, was reduced from £0-^,000,000 to
£•25,000,000, and the loan for England and Ire-
land together was only £8,900,000. But the
debates are peculiarly valuable, as evincing the
temper of the. nation on this all-im- i Ann. Reg
portant subiect.' * 1^16, 70.
On the part of the Opposition, it was contended
by Mr. Ponsonby, Mr. Tiernay, and „j
Lord Cavendish — "War is only Ar
borne because it is hoped it may a reduction oi
lead to peace ; and warlike expendi- e?;penditure
1 •» .1 by tlie Opposi
ture, because it may pave the way ,|q„_
for pacific reductions. But, accord-
ing to the system now pursued, ye are to have
the evils and burdens of war witnout the bless-
ings and reductions of peace. When we eon-
* The following Table, exhibiting the national expenditure for 1815 and 1816, as estimated, will show thp hxrs'
redactions effected in all branches of the public expenditure in the latter year:
1815.
Supply.
Army £13,876,757
E-xtraordinaries 23,983,961
Barracks 99,000
Navy 18,644,200
Ordnance 4,431,643
Miscellaneous 3,000,000
£62,135,039
Loans to foreign powers 11,035,247
Permanent Burdens.
Interest of debt Funded, and Sinking
Fund £41,015,527
Do. of Unfunded 3,014,003
Supply.
1810.
Army £9,665,666
Deduct troops in France 1,234,596
£8.431,0:4
Extraordinaries 1,500,000
Commissariat 480,000
Deduct in France 75,000
405,000
178,000
.50,000
Barracks
Stores
Navy 9,434,440
Ordnance 1,882,188
Deduct in France 186,003
1,696,183
Miscellaneous 2,500,000
Indian debt 945,491
£117,199,816 £25,140,186
Permanent. Burdens.
Interest of Funded debt and Sinking
Fund 43,410,059
Interest of E.xcheiiuer Bills 2,196,177
Foreign loans £1,731,139
Ireland 2,581,143
4,312,287
£75,056.';0S
The expenditure for 1616, however, in reality reached £80,185,828, as various articles of outlay exceeded the eell-
mate.— See Ann. Reg. 1816, 70, 71 ; and 1817,^256, 257.
To meet this expenditure, which even in the last of the two years was immense, the following were the receipts tut
the two years :
Ways and Means.
1815.
Ordinary Retienue, nctt.
Customs £9,070,554
Excise M,5y.),()28
Stamps 6,139,585
Land and assessed 7,604,01.0
I'ost-olllce 1,755,898
Lesser resources 189,352
Ordinary and hereditary revenue £45,197,368
Extraordinary.
Customs £2,280,fi34
Excise 6,7,'i7,028
Property-tax 14,978,248
Lottery 304,051
Paid liy Ireland 3,981,783
Irish expenditure 6,107,986
Loans 39,421 ,950
Lesser heads 117,241
1816.
Ordinary Revenue, ne'.t.
Customs £8,169,780
Excise 19,013,630
Stamps 6,184,288
Lund and assessed 7,257,906
PoBt-offli-e 1,059,854
Lesser resources 67,280
Permanent ordinary £12,370,130
Hereditary revenue 105,270
Extraordinary.
Customs £1,007,810
Excise 4,581,637
Property-tax last»yenr 12,039,120
Lottery 234,680
Interest of loans for Ireland 4,558,558
Ireland's share of expenses 1,184,009
Unclaimed dividends 333,.')06
Lesser heads 134,000
Total £119,370,629 Total without loans £60,579,420
Loi'.n, including Ireland S.Oac.SOS
Total £75,511>«>
.''Finance Statement," Ann Reg 1610, 420 ; and 1817, 210.
Vol. I.-C
34
HISTORY OF EUROPE.
[CUAP. II.
sider the enormous nmoiint of our nfttional debt,
aiul tlie oomplcto triumph of our aruis which
wns purchased by it, nothiufj can bo more evi-
diMit than that at no former period were large
reduetions in our peace e^tabll^hment both more
loudly called for, or more safe and practicable,
than at the present moment. What is the value
of our boasted victories, if, after they have been
;;ained, we are oblifjcd to remain armed at all
|H>ints. as before the contest in which they were
achieved commenced? Some reductions, it is
true, have been made, but on a scale by no
means proportioned to the necessities of the
case; and if our financial situation is considered,
it will at once appear that, unless the expendi-
ture is reduced on a very dilTerent scale from
what has hitherto been attempted, the empire
will be involved in inextricable ditTiculties.
" The total sums required to be provided for
the service of the year amount, ac-
Continued. cordMg to I he statement of the Chan-
ccIIot of the Exchequer, to £31,-
0S3,000, of which the establishments of the
country formed upward of £28,000,000. In ad-
dition to this, by the Treat}' of Union, two-sevcn-
leenths of the joint expenditure of the empire
was to be charged to the account of Ireland ;
and such was now the financial situation of that
country, that its finances were not equal even to
the payment of the interest of its debt — so that,
instead of ils contributing any thin
joint expenses of the United Kingdom, Great
Britain would have to advance £997,000 to
make up its deficiencies. Thus the whole sum
we have to provide for the service of the year
is about thirty-two millions and a half. To
meet this sum, the surplus in the hands of the
Chancellor of the Exchequer, according to his
own account, is £12,700,000, leaving a defi-
ciency in the first year of peace of no less than
£19,981,000 ! It would be some consolation if
we could flatter ourselves that this immense de-
ficit was owing to winding up the expense of the
war, and that any considerable reduction of it
could be hoped for if our present establishment
continued in future years. But this was very
far from being the case. When the items of the
expenditure are looked into, it appears that they
are all permanent, arising from the current ex-
penses of the year ; and so far from there being
any prospect of a reduction in future, it is evi-
dent that next year the charges of the nation
must be increased £1,000,000, and that for
ever, to meet the interest of the sum to be bor-
rowed in this verj' year, to meet its excess of
expenditure above income. If that is our con-
dition in time of peace, and with all the security
derived from the greatest triumphs, can any
thing be so deplorable as our financial situa-
tion?
"If the establishment maintained in the dif-
2y ferent parts of the empire at this time
Continued. ^^ compared with what it was in
1792, the difierence is prodigious, and
wholly unaccounted for by any increased neces-
sities of our situation. On the contrary, if there
is any difierence, it .'â– hould be found in the di-
minuhed force now required, from the enhanced
security which our commanding situation and
unparalleled victories have now procured for us.
Nevertheless, Government propose just the re-
Terse ; the establishment they have submitted
to the Honsc is more than double of what it was
in 1792. The two }cars stand thus :
1792.
Men.
Great nritaiu 15,919.
Old Colonies 16,848.
Ireland 16,000.
New Colonies .
1816.
Men.
, 32,000
.27,000
.28,000
.25,000
48,767 112,000
Exclusive of troops in France and India
"If to these forces be added tne troops in
France and India, which are maintained by
their respective countries, and comprise at least
50,000 men. it follows that we have now above
160,000 men in arms in a period of profound
peace, and immediately after the conclusion of
a war which is boasted of as having given us
unexampled security. All that we have gained,
if the statement of Ministers be correct, by a
war which has quadrupled our public debt,
is, that we have incurred a neces- iparl.Deb.
sity of tripling our military establish- xx.xii. 1194,
ment.^i 1202.
On the other hand, it was contended by Lord
Liverpool, Lord Palmerston, and gg.
Lord Castlereagh — " JNluch of the Argument on
embarrassments and difficulties of the other side,
the country during war have always ^^' ^^""ster.s
arisen from our establishment in peace having
been brought to so low an ebb that, on the first
breaking out of hostilities, we were either abso-
lutely powerless, or, if we attempted any thing,
were constantly, for some years, involved in
disaster. This was particularly the case during
the first years of the American and the late war
— on the last of which occasions Mr. Pitt, by
whom the reductions were made, expressed
bitter regret that he had been instrumental in
reducing the establishment, during the previous
peace, to so low an ebb that the fairest oppor-
tunity of bringing the war to an early and suc-
cessful termination was lost. It was to the
liberty we enjoyed that the industry and exertion
which happily distinguished England from many
of the Continental powers were to be ascribed ;
and to these advantages, which a free people
only could possess, we owed all our superiority,
which would not be in the smallest degree af-
fected by the magnitude or diminution of our
peace establishment.
" It is a very easy matter to compare our
peace establishment in 1816 with
what it was in 1792, and to ask, how, contliiueii.
when we have been successful in the
war, an additional and much larger inilitary
force is requisite. Is it not well known — has
it not passed into a maxim in history — that
success only mulli]j!ics the demand for increased
means of defense, by widening the circle from
which hostility may be apprehended ? Our
empire in the colonies has been more than
doubled during the war ; and are we to be told
that, after having been won with so much diffi-
culty, they are not worth preserving, but must
be abandoned, for want of a protective force, to
the first enemy who chooses to grasp them ?
Look around upon the colonies, and say whether
there is any one of them for which a supply of
soldiers has been voted larger than is absolutely
necessary. The fact is notoriously the reverse;
they are all so under-garrisoned that the men
stationed there will be over-worked, and fall
1816.J
HISTORY OF EUROPE.
35
victims to fatigue and the diseases of tropical
climates. Tiie new colonies obtained during
I he war were proposed to be garrisoned by
22,000 men, of whom not more than 15.000
could be reckoned on as effective ; whereas the
afTorrewate m' effective soldiers who marched
out of them, when they were taken, was upward
of 30,000. In some of the old colonies — as
Jamaica and Canada — it was proposed to station
a force considerably larger than had been there
before the war; but that was*because America
had become a considerable military and naval
power, in consequence of the events of its later
years.
'• In regard to the home stations, the number
allotted for Great Britain is 25,000,
Continued being about 7000 more than the quota
of 1792. But is that an excessive
addition, when the increase which during the
war has taken place in our population and re-
sources is considered? The first has increased
a fourth ; the last, if measured by our exports,
imports, and shipping, have more than doubled.
The augmentation of the army at home was by
no means in the same proportion. In proportion
as our colonial force is augmented, the troops
at home, by whom they are to be fed or relieved,
must be increased also. Then if, in addition to
all this, the vast additions made to the armies
of the Continental powers during the war, and
the magnitude of their peace establishments, be
taken into consideration, it must become at once
apparent that not merely our respectability, but
our very existence as an independent nation,
was involved in resisting the reduction now pro-
{)osed. The question at issue is not whether, by
reductions in our establishment, we can get quit
of the income-tax or loans in its stead, for by no
possible reduction can that object be eff"ected.
It is, whether we shall compel the Crown to
abandon all our colonial possessions, fertile
seurces of our commercial wealth, and whether
we should descend from that elevated station
which it had cost us so much labor, blood, and
treasure to attain.
"It is unfair to charge the whole expense
3j of the army being £9,800,000 pro-
Concluded, posed this year, to the account of our
present establishments: £2,000,000
of it is absorbed in pensions to those gallant
men, now .'or the most part retired, who have
borne us through the perils of the contest; £1,-
000,000 is applied to the forces embodied at
present, which will be disbanded in the course
of the year — particularly the regular militia and
foreign corps, which are to be entirely reduced.
Let it be recollected, too, that since the year
1792 the pay of the soldiers had been doubled —
it had been raised from sixpence to a shilling a
day, which added at least a third to the total ex-
pense of our military establishment. If these
things are taken into consideration, it will be
found that the proposed military establishment,
so far from being excessive, is in reality ex-
tremely moderate, and could not be reduced in
.he prese:r,t circumstances o( Europe, the empire,
- Pari Deb ^"^' ^'^® world, without serious de-
xxxiii.843,872; triment to our national character,
nndxxxiv. and the most serious danger to our
19.04, 1210. national independence."^
Notwithstanding the force of these arguments,
and the obvious inexpedience of tot rapidly re-
ducing the national establishments, from the per.
nicious effect which throwing a vast oq
number of idle hands at once upon Establish-
the labor market would have, such ments ulti-
was the strength of the public cry mately voted
for economy, and such the necessities of Govern-
ment after the great resource of the property
tax was withdrawn, that very great reductions
became necessary in the army, against which
the chief complaints were directed. The es-
tablishment was ultimately fixed at 111,756 men,
deducting the foreign corps disbanded in the
course of the year, and the troops in France and
in the East India Company's territories. Includ-
ing them, the number was 196,027.* The
regular militia, 80,000 strong, and about 50,000
of the regular army were disbanded in the course
of the year. For the navy 33,000 men were
voted — a great and immediate reduction from
100,000, who had been voted in the preceding
year. Great part of these copious reductions
did not take effect till the succeeding j'ear, and
so had little effect in lessening the expenditure
of this ; but the disbanding of so large a number
as 200,000 men from the two services, including
the regular militia, however unavoidable, had a
most prejudical effect upon the labor market,
and tended much to augment the suffering
so generally felt by the working classes, from the
diminution of employment, and the i ^.^^^ j^^^^
distressed condition both of theagri- "xxii. 842, 847
cultural and manufacturing i)opula- ^nn. Reg.
tion.i 816,9,10.
Agricultural distress, as might well have been
expected, from the difficulties so 33
generally experienced by that im- Debate's on
portant class of the com.munity who agricultural
were engaged in the cultivation of ^listress.
the soil, holds a very prominent place among thj
subjects of parliamentary discussion in this year.
The debates of course terminated in nothing ef-
fective being done for the relief of the landed
interest ; for the causes of this distress were
either altogether beyond the reach of remedy
on the part of Government, or they arose from
measures connected with the currency, which
the legislature was inclined to render more
stringent rather than the reverse. But they are
not, on that account, the less valuable in a histori-
cal point of view, as tending to indicate the com-
mencement of the operation of those causes of a
general nature which, ere long, had so import-
ant an influence on British prosperity, and came
to exercise so decisive an effect on the legisla-
tion and destinies of the empire.
On the part of the Opposition, it was contend-
ed by Mr. Brougham, Mr. Tierney, and Mr.
Army estimate for 1810
Cost.
Land forces, including
corps intended to be £,
reduced 111,756 4,702,611
Uegitnentsin France. . 34,0.'il 1,234,596
Ilcf;iineiits in India. . . 28,491 900,604
Foreign corps 21,401 370,669
Recruiting Staff. 348 20,835
Deduct in
Franco . ...34,031
Do in India.. 28,401
196,027
62,522
Remains 133,505.
—Pari. Deb .\xxii. 842.
'tth lesper ch.irffos,
£1,234,590
906,004
11,123,571
2,141,190
i'8,9H2,3ti9
n
HISTORY OF EUROPE.
[CUAP. II.
Western — ' It is suiicilliunis to sny n"y thinp
jj on the ftinount niul universality of
ArmimpMi of the distress wliioli exists in the
ihtOpiuvsiiuin country at this time. That, unbap-
011 tlio KuVot. -^^.^ is mutter of notoriety, anil is
universally ndmiiteil. If any donht oonUl exist
npon the subject it would be removed by the peti-
tion presented this very nijjlit I'rom Cambridge-
shire, in whieh it is stated that every single indi-
vidual in a parish in that eounty, with one excep-
tion, has become bankrupt or a pauper, and that
tiuU o.ie. in consequence, has lalicn from a state
of atnuenee to ruin, I'rum the rates all Tailing
upon him. The real point for consideration is, lo
what is this universal and overwhelming distress
owing ? In 1792, the average price of wheat was
47s. a quarter, now (April 9) it is 57s. — almost
twenty per cent higher; yet no complaint of
luin from low prices was heard before the war.
t)n the contrary, such a state of things was
with reason hailed as the greatest possible bless-
ing, as the first fruits of peace and plenty. We
must seek for other causes, therefore, for the
jiresent distress, than in the mere fact of low
prices; and those causes seem to be chiefly the
following :
'•The years 1796 and 1799, it is well known,
were years of very bad harvests, and
Contuiued ^''^J'' ^^ course, raised the price of agri-
cultural produce, and gave a tempo-
rary stimulus to cultivation. This was increased
by the profuse expenditure of the war, which, not
confined to income, lavished in single years the
accumulated hoards of previous generations.
But the great circumstance which tended to raise
prices in a lasting way, was the suspension of
cash payments by the Bank of England. This
gave such a stimulus to that establishment, and
also to all the country banks, that prices not only
rose, but were retained at a high level. The
consequence was, that the banks were encour-
aged to advance money to cultivators from the
certainty of their obtaining a remunerating price
for their produce, and thence a prodigious im-
pulse was given to agriculture in all its branches.
Nor is the effect of the vast increase of our co-
lonial possessions to be overlooked, which has
operated not merely by increasing our exports
and imports, but, in a far more important de-
gree, by promoting enterprise in the cultivation
of our own soil. This appears from the great
amount of riches which was remitted from these
colonial possessions to purchase or improve land
in Great Britain ; and the source from which
that wealth has come may be distinctly traced
in the names of estates and farms, especially in
Scotland, which are in many places taken from
that of places — as Berbice, Surinam, or the like
— in the East or 'West Indies. Lastly, among
the causes which gave so great an impulse to
agriculture during the war, we must assign a
very prominent place to Napoleon's Continental
blockade, which not only gave our cultivators,
during the last seven years of its continuance,
an almost entire monopoly of the home market
for agricultural produce, but, by throwing the
whole foreign commerce of the woild into our
hands, powerfully promoted the prosperity of our
seaport and manufacturing towns, and through
them reacted upon that of the most distant parts
of the country.
"In consequence of this combination of cir-
cumstances, most of w hich were of a casual oi
temporary nature, there has occur-
red in this country what may with- Continued
out impropriety be called an ovcr-tiad-
in^ ill aiiriculliirc, and conse(]uent redundance
of agricultural produce. Jnelosure bills to the
amount of twelve hundred have been pacsed
during the last ten years, and the number of
acres thereby brought into cultivation has been
estimated at two millions Certain it is that,
between the neirly inclosed land and the im-
provement of that which was formerly under
cultivation, at least the produce of two millions
of acres, which may be taken at six millions of
quarters of grain, has been added to the national
supply. But the population of the island has
only increased two millions during the war, and
taking a quarter of grain for the average con-
sumption of each individual, it follows that two
millions of quarters only have been added to the
demand, and six millions to the supply. This
sufficiently explains the glut of agricultural pro-
duce, and consequent fall of prices, and the dis-
tress which now universally prevails among the
cultivators and landed proprietors.
'â– Supposing, as is perhaps the ease, that these
calcufations of political arithmetic are
not altogether to be trusted, we may continued
rely on a much safer testimony, the
evidence of our own senses, to be convinced of
the extraordinary advance which our agricul-
ture has made of late years. The improvements
in most parts of the country have been so great
that the most careless observer must have been
struck by them. Not only have wastes for miles
and miles disappeared, giving place to houses,
fences, and crops ; not only have even the most
inconsiderable commons, the very village greens,
and little stripes of sward by the wayside, been
subjected to division and exclusive ownership,
but the land which formerly grew something haa
been fatigued with labor and loaded with capital
until it yielded much more. The work both of