NATIONAL GALLERY 



NATIONAL GALLERY 



them were known as subsidies, and 

 these gradually replaced the tenths 

 and fifteenths. A subsidy, similar 

 in its incidence to a tenth and fif- 

 teenth, produced about 80,000. 

 In addition, Elizabeth raised money 

 by selling monopolies. 



The question of finance played 

 an important part in bringing on 

 the struggle between king and 

 Parliament. James I revived the 

 almost obsolete aid of feudal 

 times, and involved himself in a 

 serious quarrel with some of his 

 subjects by his efforts to increase 

 the rates of the customs duties by 

 the exercise of his prerogative. 

 Consequently, when Charles I be- 

 came king, the chief of these duties, 

 tonnage and poundage, as they 

 were called, were only granted by 

 Parliament to the new king for one 

 year, not, as to his predecessors, for 

 life. Then followed illegal or un- 

 constitutional or unwise attempts 

 to raise money, and the Civil War. 

 Another step towards the modern 

 system was taken in 1660. Charles 

 II surrendered the right of pur- 

 veyance and 'the feudal dues in 

 return for the grant, estimated at 

 100,000 a year, of an excise duty 

 on beer and other liquors. The idea 

 of the excise had been introduced 

 into England by the parliament- 

 ary leaders to provide funds for 

 carrying on the Civil War. It was 

 estimated that Charles II enjoyed 

 from all sources an income of about 

 1,200,000 a year. The customs 

 duties produced about half that 

 sum, and like his two predecessors 

 he had a revenue from Scotland, 

 but that meant also a correspond- 

 ing source of expense. In 1663 he 

 obtained the revenue of the post 

 office. During his reign a beginning 

 was made with stamp duties and 

 licences of various kinds. 

 Changes after 1688 

 When William and Mary ascend- 

 ed the throne in 1688, an attempt 

 was made to separate their per- 

 sonal expenditure from that of the 

 state proper, but it did not go very 

 far. The hereditary revenues and 

 the excise, estimated to produce 

 700,000 a year, were set aside for 

 the expenditure of the crown, 

 which included the salaries of 

 judges and civil servants. From 

 the other revenues Parliament pro- 

 posed to meet the expenses of the 

 army and navy. During this reign 

 the Tudor subsidy, which had 

 become the assessment, was turned 

 into a land tax, and borrowing be- 

 came an integral part of national 

 finance. In the 18th century in- 

 creasing expenditure was met by 

 extending the area of the excise 

 duties, soap, paper, glass, and salt 

 being among the articles added, 

 while the rates of duty were raised. 



A like process, but on a more ex- 

 tensive scale, was carried out with 

 the customs duties, while stamps 

 and licences did not escape increase 

 In 1760, when George III became 

 king, a new arrangement was made. 

 He received, not the produce of 

 certain taxes, but a guaranteed 

 sum of 800,000 a year. He had 

 other sources of income, and he 

 paid out salaries very much as 

 William III had done. In 1782 the 

 civil list, i.e. the income granted to 

 the sovereign, was further regu- 

 lated ; in 1787 the consolidated 

 fund was established. The tendency 

 of these changes was to reduce the 

 charges on the civil list, and this 

 process, carried further on the 

 accessions of George IV and William 

 IV, was completed on that of 

 Victoria. 



The Work of Pitt 



The reign of George III, how- 

 ever, saw greater changes than 

 these. The industrial revolution 

 made it possible, and the Napoleonic 

 wars made it necessary, to raise far 

 larger sums of money than had 

 hitherto been thought possible. 

 One instrument for this was the 

 income tax imposed by Pitt in 

 1799. It disappeared in 1815, but 

 was reimposed in 1842, since when 

 it has been increasingly used to 

 provide the state with funds. 



As a finance minister, however, 

 Pitt's name is rather associated 

 with the simplification of the 

 customs duties. The reduction in 

 their number was left to Peel, who 

 removed some 1,100 separate duties 

 from the tariff. The death duties, 

 now one of the most fruitful sources 

 of national revenue, may also be 

 attributed to Pitt. In 1796 he in- 

 troduced the legacy duty on per- 

 sonal property. In 1853 it was 

 extended to cover real property, 

 and other changes were soon made, 

 but the modern duties date in 

 principle from 1894, when a gradu- 

 ated scale was introduced. 



Bibliography. Finance and Poli- 

 tics, S. Buxton, 1888 ; History of 

 Taxation and Taxes in England, 

 4 vols., S. Dowell, 2nd ed. 1888 ; 

 Public Finance, C. F. Bastable, 3rd 

 ed. 1903 ; Elements of the Fiscal 



National Gallery, London. Facade from Trafalgar 

 Square ; in the foreground, statue to General Gordon 



Problem, L. G. Chiozza Money, 

 1903 ; The King's Revenue, W. M. 

 J. Williams, 1908 ; British National 

 Finance, J. W. Root, 1909 ; Na- 

 tional and Local Finance, J. W. 

 Grice, 1910 ; Parliament and the 

 Taxpayer, E. H. Davenport, 1918 ; 

 A Financial History of Gt. Britain, 

 1914-18, F. L. McVey, 1919; 

 Primer of National Finance, H. 

 Higgs, 1919 ; English Public Fi- 

 nance, H. E. Fisk, 1920. 



National Gallery. Term usu- 

 ally applied to a collection of pic- 

 tures and statuary belonging to a 

 nation, and maintained and added 

 to by public funds administered by 

 the government. One of the first 

 of such galleries was founded by 

 Napoleon I when he converted 

 the Louvre into a national museum, 

 and deposited in it a collection of 

 works of art from the treasure- 

 houses of Europe. Many Euro- 

 pean galleries were originally the 

 private collections of sovereigns. 



The National Gallery. in London 

 was begun by the purchase by the 

 British government of the Anger- 

 stein collection of pictures in 1824. 

 It was notably extended by the 

 purchase, in 1871, of the Peel Col- 

 lection, and later purchases and 

 gifts have made it one of the 

 most representative collections hi 

 Europe. The pictures are arranged 

 according to schools of painting, 

 and the collection is particularly 

 rich in examples of the Flemish 

 and Dutch schools, Rubens and 

 Rembrandt being represented 

 throughout their career, while 

 there are numerous and character- 

 istic specimens of the work of 

 Teniers, Jan van Eyck, Frans Hals, 

 Ruysdael, Hobbema, and Cuyp. 

 The Florentine, Venetian, and Um- 

 brian schools are represented al- 

 most equally well, among the gems 

 of the collection being masterpieces 

 by Fra Filippo Lippi, Botticelli, 

 and Michelangelo, Titian, Tintor- 

 etto, and Paul Veronese, Piero della 

 Francesca, Perugino, and Raphael. 

 Among the Spaniards Murillo, 

 Velasquez, and Goya, and among 

 the Frenchmen Claude and Poussin 

 are magnificently represented. 

 The British school is displayed 

 from its beginnings, the collection 

 of Turners being 

 especially fine. 

 The existing 

 gallery in Trafal- 

 gar Square was 

 completed and 

 opened in 1838, 

 and reopened after 

 enlargement in 

 1861. It is con- 

 trolled by trustees, 

 and a director. 

 See Art ; Hermit- 

 age ; London, Lou- 

 vre ; Painting; 

 Tate Gallery. 



