44 STRONG DRINK AND TOBACCO SMOKE. 



o\\'n which is not much iufluencecl by the general price, 

 as no hops are ever, or very rarely indeed, introduced to 

 supply a deficiency of the Worcester crop should that 

 fail. The hop affords scope for the speculator in two 

 ways : first, the hop itself ; secondly, the hop duty. The 

 last is the subject of betting to a very large amount 

 annually. 



" The old duty on hops is 10s. Qd. per cent. ; the new 

 duty, imposed in 1802, is 125. 7d., making with the 

 fractions 23s. id. ; in 1805, 4,9. 9>d. per cw^t. was reduced, 

 so that the actual duty paid is 18s. 8c?. per cw^t. In 

 betting on the duty the old duty is always understood, 

 and so generally adopted is this mode of expressing the 

 probability of a crop by the betted duty, that the common 

 question is, ' AVhat is the duty laid at ? ' and as the duty 

 falls the price of hops of course rises, and vice versa. 

 This duty is, however, too much guided by a few men in 

 the Borough, who frequently rise and fall it to answer 

 their own purposes ; yet, as the day of joicking ap- 

 proaches, the near correspondence of the betted duty and 

 the old duty actually paid is truly surprising. In the 

 year 1802, on the 14th of May, the old duty was laid at 

 £100,000 ; the fly, however, appearing pretty plentifully 

 towards the end of the month, it sunk to £80,000 ; the 

 fly increased, and by the end of June the duty had gone 

 down to £60,000; by the end of July to £30,000 ; hy 

 the end of August to £22,000, and by the end of 

 December to £14,000 ; the duty actually paid this year 

 was £15,403 10s. 5f/. 



