consumer, and I have provided you with a tariff that
will support my argument.'

2. Is it unwise to ' tinker ' with Customs duties ?

Undoubtedly. A tax may be antagonistic to pure
justice and reason, yet have a kind of merit because
people have become used to it, and therefore pay it
without much reluctance. It has always been a pecuhar
trait of the English to pay cheerfully moderate indirect
taxes, and this because such taxes are not brought home



TARIFFS AND SPECULATION 385

with startling effect to the payer's mental consciousness.
' Tinkering ' with Customs taxes, by making slight
additions, irritates the public, for the goods are usually
bought in small quantities at short intervals, and every
purchase of an ounce of tobacco, a dram of spirits, or a
parcel of tea or sugar, reminds the buyer of that which
he would willingly forget. This is especially the case
when the goods have been previously overtaxed, and the
addition actually limits consumption, thus inspiring
annoyance and producing no additional revenue, and also
when the additional duty is so arranged that the consumer
is charged an extra halfpenny on every small purchase,
of which but one farthing goes to the revenue and the
other to the dealer.

Another objectionable product of ' tinkering ' is the
dislocation of trade that ensues. For months prior to
the annual announcement merchants are fretting and
fmning over probabilities. Many an order is delayed,
and many a parcel, purchased on mere speculation,
remains long upon the dealer's hands. But, while specu-
lators are thus occasionally injured, the bulk of the loss
falls upon the consumer. Enterprising firms have been
known to net many thousands of pounds by well-judged
ventures on Budget possibilities. Till within recent
years, it was actually a Customs practice to make special
provision as to staff and hours of attendance, in order to
enable merchants to indulge to the full their mania for
speculation ! It is bad enough for the public to be fleeced
by keen-witted adventurers, but the matter becomes
maddening when the public has to pay overtime to its
own servants, that they may assist the process.

3. Are ad valorem duties preferable to specific ?

Were it possible to infect the mercantile world with
sincerity, and to enrol as customs officers none but con-
spicuously self-sacrificing and efficient persons, an ad
valorem tariff would be eminently preferable. It would
ease the poor, who consume the cheaper articles, and sur-

n. 25



386 VARIOUS TARIFF QUESTIONS

tax the luxuries imported by the rich. Its chief fault
lies in the uncertainties of collection. If we are to believe
the Tariff Reformers, the United Kingdom depends more
upon imports than any other country in the world. A
' reformed ' tariff would not instantly check importation,
and it is not contended, even by the most violent de-
claimer, that a reformed tariff would shut out more than a
portion of foreign articles. Therefore the present customs
men, who have no deep training in the estimation of values,
would be suddenly called upon to check a multitude ol
declarations, or the department would have to employ
many highly-paid ' experts.' (Men of insight and com-
mon sense would probably prefer the ordinary customs
man, whom contact has endowed with a rough knowledge
of merchandise, to the average conceited and pedantic
' expert.') In either case it is conceivable that many
difficulties would arise. Merchants would import goods
and declare them at lower than the actual values, much
delay and many detentions would occur, and be it known
that there are ways of indirectly intimidating overworked
officials. As to the danger of corruption, it is certain
that the customs officers of the United Kingdom are the
most incorruptible in the world, and this is due to —
(i) the competitive test for admission into the lower
grades , (2) permanence of employment ; (3) the absence
of ad tuloycm duties. There could be no blacker history
than that of the British landing-officers of the early part
of the nineteenth century, were it possible, by merely
inspecting records, to gauge the extremities of official
depravity. It is undeniable that, even with the present
staff and under the improved modem methods, a system
of ad valorem duties would produce a plentiful stock of
temptations.

At the same time ad valorem duties would assist towards
one consummation — a consummation which every Tariff
Reformer* avows is next his heart — the shutting out of

* It is to be hoped that the avowal is sincere. The tactics of
some of the noisiest of the Tariff Reformers tend to show that
the end aimed at is an all-round rise in the price of goods.



I



THE DOWDY VICTORIANS 387

some of the ' cheaper and nastier ' foreign goods, the
flimsy and often putrid rubbish which at present is cast
so plentifully upon our shores, to the utter degradation of
many British handicrafts and industries. (Even un-
scrupulous dealing would assist in this, as it did of old,
when the aim of the ordinary merchant was to import
goods of the highest possible value, and enter them at the
lowest rate that the Customs would allow.) Perhaps this
may explain why most of the articles made by our
ancestors were so much more worthy and enduring than
those constructed at present, why paper of 1710 is still
as good as new and ink of the same date as brilliant as
€ver, why ancient furniture is so majestic and substantia]
and ancient cutlery so perfect in material and finish,
and why grandfather's clock ticks so musically and keeps
so firm a grip upon the flying seconds. It might even be
held to explain the continuance during bygone centuries —
due, perhaps, to the self-reliant ' Englishness ' engendered
— of a certain rough idea of picturesque beauty. Why
was it that the early Victorian period teemed with
dowdyism ? Why does a peasant's cottage of a hundred
years back, though steeped in ruin and decay, convey a
certain charm to the artistic eye ? Will age, or ivy, or
sweet natural surroundings, ever thus endow a cottage
of the sixties ? Will the pork-pie hat and crinoline
of the sixties ever be reproduced on canvas, as artists
of the present day reproduce the trappings of the
Georgian era ? It is to be hoped, if we are to have
Tariff Reform, that, if it fails in everything else that it
has promised, it may make us a little more genuinely
English than we have been during the past seventy
years.

4. May Customs duties be adjusted so as to genuinely
foster certain home manufactures ?

Undoubtedly this was done in the past. The English
woollen industry was simply built upon Protection. As
soon as the old export wool duties reached the dignity of a



388 VARIOUS TARIFF QUESTIONS

' Subsidy,' they began to protect the Enghsh cloth manu-
facturer. Enghsh, and later Irish, agriculture suffered
by the system, but the cloth manufacturer, probably the
greatest commercial tyrant that ever existed, prospered
exceedingly. The extent to which the duties acted
protectively towards the manufacturers is shown by their
becoming almost unproductive, years before the exporta-
tion of wool was prohibited, and by the vast increase in
the exportation of English cloth in the latter end of
Elizabeth's reign and the beginning of James I. (Pro-
hibition of the exportation of wool was a device to check
' owling,' which practice was encouraged by the French
and Flemings in their desire to hamper the English cloth
manufacturers.) The high duties on foreign woollens
were also protective. The old ' aliens' duties ' — surtaxes
on goods imported by foreigners — and the extra levies on
goods brought in foreign ships, combined with the
Navigation laws in building up the British merchant navy,
a distinctive kind of protection, of which the third factor
might be existing in a modified form at the present day,
but for the clumsiness of the pedants who drafted the
Acts incidental, and the innate rascality of some of the
administering officials. The preferences given of old
to fish, oil, and blubber of British taking, and the privi-
leges granted to the Newfoundland fisheries, were of
immense benefit to the industries concerned. It is useless
to argue that some of the concerns alluded to prosper now
without protection. Difficulty lies as much in the waj-
of establishing as of maintaining a trade. Certain
industries now followed in the United Kingdom would
not have attained importance but for protection. Of
course, the protective idea was often enforced to the
extent of absurdity, but freaks of that kind occur in con-
nection with every system. Fools occasionally obtain
powers of administration, but that does not utterly
invalidate. It may be repeated that many commercial
enterprises were stimulated and preserved of old by
means of Customs enactments. Whether this was good



OLD AND MODERN PREFERENCES 389

or no for other ventures, or for the pubhc generally, is
outside the present consideration.

Another striking instance of the effect of Protection is
the immense and disproportionate growth of London as a
centre of shipping. It cannot be shown that London
possesses many natural advantages as a port. In the
old days the whole of the East India Company's trade
was confined to London, and the great city was thus
artificially made, not only a hive of British and colonial
traffic, but a vast centre of transhipment. Many other
kinds of valuable goods were only allowed to be imported
into London. As soon as the privileges were abolished
the trade of London began to lose its extraordinary
eminence. It is likely that most of the modern schemes
for the restoration of London's commercial prosperity
may prove abortive, merely because the planners have
not sufticiently borne this in mind.

It may be pointed out that even the modern tariff
contains certain protective items. The surtax on wines
and spirits imported in bottle has doubled the bottling
of wines and spirits in the United Kingdom. A higher
duty is levied on cigars than on tobacco, on manufactured
tobacco than on leaf, on manufactured cocoa and coffee
than on raw. If these were not intended to act pro-
tectively, why were they thus arranged ? It is certain
that they do act in that way.

5. Is there any weight in the objection to a compre-
hensive Customs tariff, that it would multiply officials ?

It is likely that we are already overdone with bureau-
cratism. The average official, after all, is but an average
man, with a few extra limitations and a certain dexterity
in routine. It must not be thought that the customs men
of the present day are worse than other civil servants ;
indeed, there is a kind of maritime freshness in the work
performed by some of them that has a highly redemptive
tendency. As in the days of Adam Smith, they are the
most adaptive of revenue officials. There is little that is



390 VARIOUS TARIFF QUESTIONS

hidebound in their methods. They do not possess that
mechanical hardness that distinguishes the ' inland
revenue men,' nor have they much of the astounding
priggishness that exists here and there in ' the West End
departments.' Yet an army of them would scarcely be a
desirable institution. It cannot be too often repeated
that we have already far too many officials and institu-
tions, far too many smug people who worry the world
from behind desks. It is possible that the genuine
English spirit, the subtle essence which has done every-
thing that has bestowed credit on the national name,
does not traverse extensively the atmosphere of
officialdom. Somehow, we have not done particularly
well since the Germanizing of England set in. One thing
is certain, the effective supervision oi ad valorem trans-
actions could not be achieved by purely clerical means.
The man would have to be ' on the spot ' — to handle the
goods. Much would have to be left to the judgment of
the ' waterside officer,' or things would soon go wrong.
Strong-minded and clever men would be needed in plenty,
to do the actual landing work.

6. Can anything be urged in extenuation of the present
craze for statistics ?

Little. Faith in statistics appears to be but a form of
superstition. It is likely that most of the statistics of
commerce, gathered prior to the last ten years, were quite
incorrect. This statement will not particularly dis-
concert such people as hold that incorrect figures are
better than none ; therefore it may be best not to embellish
the page with many specimens, but to mention casually
that even accredited statements of payments into the
Exchequer frequently differ, now to the extent of a
million or two, then to the tune of seventeen shillings and
sixpence ha'penny ; that some of the old statements of
tonnage, imports, exports, etc., though quoted in Parlia-
mentary speeches and perpetuated in tables, will not
bear common-sense consideration ; that for many, many



OFFICIALS AND STATISTICS 391

years our import trade with various countries was esti-
mated according to ports of shipment instead of places of
production ; that the values furnished often depend on
the whim of a mere office-boy ; that one huge item was
left out of the export return for many years, and when
this was pointed out by a layman the omission was not
by any means immediately rectified ; that — but space is
limited, and there are folk to whom cold fact is un-
comfortable. All old statistics should be dealt with
cautiously. It has been suggested that statistics should
not be collected continuously as now, but at long intervals,
as the Census is taken, and then thoroughly. Accurate
collection is next to impossible when the uncountable
mercantile army is always being pestered for returns, but
if statistics were taken every seven years proper arrange-
ments could be made. It is to be assumed that there
are men in the country who could make interesting and
instructive speeches, and assist in governing the nation,
without long lists of figures in front of them.

7. Would Tariff Reform cause a considerable rise in
the price of commodities ?

Hard to say. To be effective, according to the plea
of its advocates, it should shut out many foreign manu-
factures, and stimulate British production. It appears
likely that in its early stage it would increase prices by
raising the reward of labour. People with fixed incomes
would then suffer. The price of imported raw material
might not be particularly affected, especially such raw
material as foreigners compete to supply us with. The
trade of a nation is much like individual trade. When a
manufacturer is pestered by bagmen who sell raw material,
he is usually able to dictate his own terms, but if many
manufacturers have to resort to one centre of supply the
position is reversed. Broad theories may not with
success be applied to commercial masters.

One circumstance deserves reference — the amazing
insincerity at present displayed in argument. It is not



392 VARIOUS TARIFF QUESTIONS

at all uncommon to hear an ardent ' Reformer ' applaud
his system as a means of obviating unemployment, and
almost in the same breath assert that the unemployed
are unemployable. The mercantile man — and Tariff
Reform is essentially a mercantile idea — is avowedly
opportunistic, and every agitation that he pioneers
should be regarded with profound caution. It is for that
vast body of people who possess fixed incomes to consider
at once whether they are actually willing to pay for a
period more money for certain articles than they have
done in the past. If patriotism will carry them through
the ordeal, no more need be said upon this point. But
they should think deeply upon the matter, and weigh
carefully the ' bagman ' portion of the Tariff Reform
arguments.



The apparently ' blunt ' style of the foregoing remarks
may require explanation. It is due merely to lack of
space, and the consequent necessity of curtness. Be it
understood that the statements are founded upon long
and arduous study of almost every kind of record con-
nected with the older British Customs practice. There
are few branches of research more dry and complicated,
at the same time fuller of pitfalls into which even the
most careful may stumble, than this particular one.
Therefore all idea of being dogmatic must be disclaimed.
The above deductions may be proved to be wrong. Still,
they have been formed cautiously, and should at the
present juncture be found interesting. Above all, the
' prophetic ' position must be disclaimed. The old
records relating to Customs legislation and debate teem
with prophecies, yet it would be difficult to quote one
prophecy in twenty that was fulfilled. Few subjects are
so poorly understood as this of Customs tariffs — this upon
which men argue from mom to dewy eve. Hard is the
task to form a decision upon any of its vital points — at
least, a decision that will stand the test of close thought



WARNINGS AND RESERVATIONS 393

and common sense. This may be because the subject
itself is so repellent to naturally intelligent men, for after
all there is a touch of spoliation in every kind of impost.
This opinion, coming as it does from customs officers,
may seem strange, yet there is something in it. If men
would devote as much mental effort to the reduction of
national expenditure as they do to the creation of taxes,
the world would be all the better for the change.

LIST OF AUTHORITIES.

Revenue legislation : The various Acts quoted in text.

Incidence of duties, etc. : The various Customs handbooks.

Colonial revenue and smuggling : Australia, Tasmania, and New
Zealand, Quebec, Mauritius, Newfoundland and New Brunswick.
St. Kitts, Jamaica, 'Promiscuous,' Cape of Good Hope, and
Nova Scotia Files ; General Letters, 1848.

Departmental regulations : General Letters, 1847, 1848, 1850 ;
General Orders, 1853.

Ships' Registry : Privy Council Letter, 1847.

Commercial reciprocity : General Orders, 1852.

First Importation of Semolina : General Orders, 1852.

Chichester : General Orders, 1852.

Parliamentary proceedings : Hansard, April 21, 1853 (Com-
mons).

British smuggling : General Letters, 1845, 1848, 1849, 1850 ;
General Orders, 1852 ; ' Remarkable Seizures,' 1848, 1849, 1850,
1851, 1852, 1853, 1854, 1855.



CHAPTER IV

CUSTOMS LITERATI : PEACH ; DOYLE ; ALLINGHAM

Peach.

Charles William Peach was born in 1800 at Wansford,
Northamptonshire. It appears that he was appointed
to the Revenue Coastguard in 1824 through the influence
of Lord Westmoreland. After several removals he was
stationed at Gorran Haven, near Mevagissey, Cornwall,
and remained there till 1845, when, at the intercession of
Dr. Buckland, Sir Robert Peel appointed him to the
Customs at Fowey. It is evident that he had been in
the ' Mounted Guard ' during his stay at Gorran Haven,
for the notice of his appointment stands thus in the
Establishment Book : ' Charles Wm. Peach, Mounted
Guard, appointed Searcher, etc., Treasury Warrant
loth February, 1845.' He was removed to Peterhead as
sub-controller in 1849, under Treasury Warrant
i6th November. In 1853, by Treasury Warrant of
27th August, he was made controller at Wick, and
remained in that office at a salary of £150 a year till 1861,
when he was ' retired ' with several other officers, on
account of reductions rendered necessary by the Com-
mercial Treaty with France. The Board's Minute of
August 15, 1861, authorizing this proceeding, gives his
age as sixty, his years of service as thirty-seven and seven-
twelfths, and his retiring allowance as £130 a year.

An idea of his attainments may be best gleaned from
the following extracts from the Athenceum's obituary
notice (No. 3,046, pp. 362, 363) :

394



CHARLES PEACH, OUTDOOR MAN 395

' Peach's taste for collecting was first awakened while
on the coasts of Dorsetshire and Devonshire, where he
soon acquired an intimate knowledge of the marine fauna
of the south of England. His frequent shif tings were
in many respects of considerable advantage to him.
They gave him a wider range for his observations, and
brought him into contact with scientific enthusiasts,
from whom he obtained much useful knowledge and the
loan of books. In return Peach was able to provide
specimens which helped to clear up many points in
natural history. Amongst others he was enabled to
supply the Rev. Mr. Layton, of Catfield, Norfolk, with
the bones required to complete the elephant found in
the well-known " Forest Bed " of Norfolk, which is now
in the British Museum. While at Gorran Haven Peach
began to direct his observations to geological phenomena,
and to cultivate his powers of observation. It was not
long before he detected fossils in rocks previously regarded
as destitute of organic remains. He at this time made
one of the chief discoveries of his life in finding lower
Silurian fossils in the rocks of Cornwall, which before
that time were considered to be azoic. This discovery
was of great value to Sir Henry de la Beche, who was
then engaged on the Government Geological Survey, as
it furnished him with a basis for mapping the rocks of
south-western England.

' The British Association met at Plymouth in 1841,
and to that meeting Peach communicated his first
scientific paper, " On the Organic Remains of Cornwall."
He became a member of the British Association, of the
Devon and Cornwall Natural History Society, and of the
Royal Cornwall Polytechnic Society. In 1843 he fur-
nished to the Polytechnic Society a " Synopsis of the
land and fresh-water shells, starfishes, sea-urchins,
coralines, alcyonites, sponges, and marine algae," which
was printed in the " Transactions " for that year. This
paper bore testimony to his industry, his habits of
observation, and to his excellent self -training. After the



396 CUSTOMS LITERATI

Plymouth meeting most of the eminent geologists and
many of the naturalists who attended it proceeded into
Cornwall. The Polytechnic Society at Falmouth was
the centre of this gathering, and Charles Peach became
their guide to many of the points of geological interest
in the west of Cornwall. Peach thus formed an acquaint-
ance with several men of eminence, which became, by his
genial nature, a lifelong friendship. For many years he
was a regular contributor to each of the three county
societies of Cornwall, and his zeal received in many ways
substantial recognition.

' All this time * this remarkable man never received
more than £75 a year, and £30 for the keep of a horse.
When it is remembered that Peach married in 1829, and
had a family of seven sons and two daughters, it will be
matter of surprise how he was enabled to maintain his
intellectual pursuits amid the struggles of his everyday
life.

' Peach was promoted to Peterhead in 1849, and to
Wick in 1853. Here his duties were onerous ; he had
to measure large quantities of timber imported for the
herring trade, and he was appointed Receiver of Wreck,
which gave him the charge of 180 miles of coast. It was
while on one of these journeys that he made the discovery
of fossils in the altered rocks of the Highlands, which in
Sir Roderick Murchison's hands afforded the key to the
elucidation of the structure of that region.

' Mr. Peach formed a friendship with Robert Dick, and
worked with him in the Old Red Sandstone fossils, and a
living geologist has said of his labours in this field that
Peach has done " more, indeed, than all other geologists
put together." ... It is pleasant to find that he was not
without rewards which were gratifying to so simple-
minded a man, who ever worked for the love of truth.
The Prince Consort presented him with Professor
Macgillivray's " Natural History of Deeside and Braemar."
The Council of the Geological Society of London in 1859

* During his stay at Gorran Haven.



FRANCIS DOYLE, COMMISSIONER 397

awarded him the Wollaston fund for his discoveries in the
rocks of Devonshire and Cornwall. In 1875 the Royal
Society of Edinburgh gave him the Neill prize for excel-
lence in natural history. The Royal Cornwall Polytechnic
Society at two of their annual meetings gave him their
silver medal for the arrangement and collection of zoo-
phytes from the Cornish coast, and a bronze medal for a
collection of algae. Besides the above, Peach received
numerous presents of books from natural history societies,
and some small grants of money to enable him to pursue
his investigations.

' Mr. Peach died in Edinburgh, on the 28th of February,
in the 86th year of his age, respected by a large circle of
scientific friends.'

Doyle.

Sir Francis Hastings Charles Doyle was born at
Tadcaster, Yorkshire, in 1810. He was descended from