THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE. 



201 



Gross Duty 

 Duty charged. Imports, 1858. received. 



£. 

 Butter, 2s. 6d. and 5a. per cwt. . 387566 cwts. 95489 

 Tallow, la. 6d. and Id. per cwt.. 1225181 cwts. 87665 

 Cheese,2s. 6d. audl3.6d.percwt. 364087 cwts. 44369 

 Egga, 8d. and 4d. the cubic foot, about 134^ millions 22426 

 Oraus^ea and lemons, 8d. p. buah. 983777 bushela 32793 

 Nuts and walnuts, la. per buah. 239352 bushels 1196(5 



Dates 26035 cwta. 7546 



Nutmegs, 5d. and Is. per lb 232834 lbs. 11383 



Paper, various — 10000 



Liquorice paste and juice, lOs. 

 and £1 per cwt 10726 8948 



These, with some few other trifling articles, involve a 

 loss of revenue of probably about i:'4,000,000. The 

 excise duty on paper is to be swept away, at a sacrifice 

 of £1,000,000. The duties to be reduced are— Timber 

 sawn anfi split, and not sawn, from 10s. and 2s., and 

 7s. Cd. and Is. a load, to the uniform rates of 2s. and 

 Is. respectively. The imports in 1858 were 2,185,280 

 loads, and the revenue paid on this was about 

 i£'600,000, but the increased employment in shipbuild- 

 ing and for other constructive purposes will, it is antici- 

 pated, lead to a recovery, and not entail a very great loss. 

 Currants and figs are to be reduced from 15s. 9d. to 

 7s. per cwt. duty, and raisins from 10s. to 7s. per cwt. 

 The imports of these in 1858 were : — Currants and figs, 

 422,577 cwts., paying £823,687 dutv ; and raisins, 

 357,485 cwts., paying ifl29,411. 



It will thus bo seen that the free raw materials are 

 now greatly augmented, and, had the national finances 

 permitted, would probably have been more largely ex- 

 tended. Again, such articles as butter, cheese, eggs, and 

 green and dried fruits are also exempted or reduced, 

 as indeed all articles of food, animaland vegetable, and 

 the materials for manufactures, should be. We should 

 gladly have seen the whole category of duties on spices 

 swept from the Customs-list, so as to embrace mace, 

 ginger, cloves, cassia lignea, cinnamon, and pimento, 

 wliich scarcely yield in all £11,000 revenue; while pep- 

 per, bringing in .£"100,000, might also have been re- 

 mitted. The repeal of the duty on paper, after the first 

 July, removes excise interference from almost the last 

 important manufacture, and unfetters the progress of a 

 very important trade, which has largely advanced 

 notwithstanding fiscal restrictions. In ten years the 

 quantity of paper made was increased 71,000,0001bs., 

 and the total quantity made is close upon 200,000,0001bs, 

 The only check to its larger advance now will be the 

 deficiency of raw material, although straw and every 

 other available fibre have been pressed into service. 

 This reduction involves a loss to the revenue of 

 ^1,000,000; but the remission of the duty effects a 

 saving of £20,000 in the inland revenue department ; 

 while the abolition of the impressed newspaperstamp will 

 also conduce to an economy at Somerset-house. What- 

 ever saving of labour, however, this may make in one 

 way will be more than counterbalanced by the immense 

 inconvenience and trouble it will entail on the trans- 

 mission of such papers as go through the post. 



The duty on hops is to be reduced from 45s. to 14s. 

 the cwt. This is a concession which has long been 

 pressed for, and was requisite, seeing that the cheap 

 introduction of foreign wines and spirits may have 

 some influence on the consumption of malt-liquors. 

 The average quantity of hops that have paid duty an- 

 nually in the last three or four years has been about 

 50,000,000 lbs , and Mr. Gladstone estimates the relief 

 of duty at £105,000. The new duty of l^d. per lb., 

 however, is to be payable on the 1st of January after 

 the charge. The foreign hop-grower is to be ad- 

 mitted into competition ; but on what terms is not 

 stated by Mr. Gladstone. At present the duty on 



foreign hops is £2 5s. the cwt. The imports in 1858, 

 chiefly from Hamburgh, were 16,587 cwts., and the 

 duty received £37,320. 



In connection with this subject we may mention 

 that petitions were presented last session to the Bel- 

 gium Chamber of Representatives from several hop- 

 growing districts — complaining of the disproportion 

 between the trifling duty of 1 franc 30 centimes per 

 100 kilogrammes on foreign hops imported into Bel- 

 gium, and the very heavy duties to which Belgium 

 hops were subject in other countries ; and prfiying that 

 steps might be taken to secure a free trade, or else that 

 retaliatory import duties, equivalent to those afiecting 

 Belgian hops, should be imposed on hops of foreign 

 growth. The Committee to which these petitions were re- 

 ferred showed, by statistical facts, that the petitioners had 

 nothing to fear from foreign competition , reported against 

 any increase of duty, and recommended that efforts 

 should be made to obtain from foreign Governments 

 reciprocal freedom of trade in hops. From the reports 

 of this committee it appears that in the five years 

 ending with 1857, the quantity of hops exported from 

 Belgium amounted to 8,626,954 kilogrammes, against 

 an importation of 5,324,051 kilogrammes, and that 

 the amount of the exports to Great Britain was 

 5,045,253 kilogrammes, against 269,448 kilogrammes 

 of British hops imported into Belgium. In 1858, 

 however, owing to the partial failure of the crop in 

 Belgium, the imports of hops exceeded the exports — 

 1,251,519 kilos, being received, against 700,281 kilos, 

 shipped ; and of these imports the large quantity of 

 868,697 kilogrammes was imported from Great Britain. 

 The malt credit is, like that on hops, to be limited 

 from October next to six weeks instead of twelve 

 weeks. The prohibition against the import of malt is 

 to be removed, and a customs' duty of 3s. per bushel 

 substituted. The quantity of malt made has varied 

 but little of late years in the kingdom, averaging 

 40,000,000 lbs. The removal of the duty on liquorice 

 will be of use to the porter-brewer, who uses it pretty 

 freely, and will probably employ it more extensively at 

 the cheaper rate at which it may be obtained, from the 

 remission of £1 per cwt. duty. 



The new sources of revenue proposed by the Chancel- 

 lor are : — A stamp duty of Id. on contract notes ; of 3d. 

 on dock warrants ; and of Id. on cheques drawn by the 

 payer himself, hitherto exempted ; of Id. upon certi- 

 ficates or copies of registers of births, deaths, and mar- 

 riages ; of 6d. upon transfer notes on mining shares 

 under the cost-book system ; heritable bonds to be 

 charged with stamp duty; agreements, 6d. to Is., ac- 

 cording to length ; building societies are no longer to 

 be exempted from stamp duty ; agreements or leases, 

 2s. 6d. and upwards. There is to be " charged upon 

 chicory or any other vegetable matter applicable to the 

 uses of chicory or coffee, grown in the United King- 

 dom, for every hundred weight, raw or kiln-dried, un- 

 til the 1st of April, 1861, the duty of 3s., and on and 

 after that date, 69." This wording would admit foreign- 

 grown chicory free, as it at present pays no duty, 

 which can scarcely be intended, we should suppose, 

 and would be a gross injustice to the British grower; 

 although the quantity now raised here is small, only 

 about 500 acres being devoted to the culture. The 

 imports of foreign chicory in 1858 reached 127,553 

 cwt. Hence a 3s. duty would yield upwards of 

 £19,000. Surely the foreign-grown and British 

 Should be placed upon the same footing; and when 

 this article was selected as the first upon which to take 

 the vote on Friday night, the preference given to 

 foreign-grown seems somewhat strange. 



The game certificates are to be modified; servants 

 are to pay 27s. 6d., and the charge for the general cer- 



