AUSTRIAN EMPIRE. 



263 



as we ooserved before, no advantage whatever is i 

 derived ; but the patent of nobility, besides free- 

 ing an estate from the extra taxes, exempts the 

 family from the military conscription. 



The excise is also a highly important branch of 

 revenue, and embraces, Istly, all manufactories of 

 beer, wine, and spirits, liqueurs, malt, &c. ; 2dly, 

 provisions of all kinds carried into the metropolis 

 and provincial capitals for consumption ; 3dly, it is 

 paid by all innkeepers, butchers, &c. in the country 

 on the provisions they offer for sale. 



The customs' duties were until lately rated so 

 high, that the revenue arising from imported goods 

 could not possibly cover the expense of the fron- 

 tier guards and custom-house officials, while those 

 articles which the country cannot produce in suffi- 

 cient quantity, and of a quality to compete in 

 some degree with foreign productions, are supplied 

 in abundance by means of one of the most daring 

 and extended systems of smuggling that was ever 

 formed. The chief seat of this contraband trade 

 is said to be the Lombard- Venetian provinces, and 

 it is related as a fact that the seal of the Milan 

 custom-house was some time back for a long period 

 in the hands of the smugglers, who had substituted 

 a forged one in its place. But the cordon of fron- 

 tier guards is destined also to protect another 

 branch of the revenue the imperial monopolies. 

 These consist chiefly of tobacco and salt. 



Tobacco is an article indispensable to the com- 

 fort of a German or Sclavonian, is monopolized by 

 the government in all the provinces except Hun- 

 gary. There are several manufactories against 

 which might be urged the same objection that we 

 started when speaking of the industry of the em- 

 pire, for they are conducted by agents on account 

 of the government, naturally at a much greater 

 expense than could be done by individuals working 

 on their own account. Even in so trifling a mat- 

 ter as the preparation of this plant for smoking, 

 the cautious spirit of the government is discer- 

 nible ; for, in order to secure a constant supply of 

 the usual qualities, tobacco of a superior flavour is 

 never sold ; but an equalizing mixture is applied, 

 which reduces the best to the ordinary level, and 

 the public is never allowed to enjoy a superior 

 article, lest an unfavourable season should reduce 

 the quality of the stock and cause dissatisfaction. 

 As the consumption is immense, and that which is 

 bought raw is sold at 2s. per Ib. the sum it brings 

 to the treasury must be large. 



The wealth of the Austrian states in salt is 

 every where betrayed by the names of countries 

 and towns; Salzburg, Gallicia, Hall, Hallstadt, 

 Hallein, are all named from salt. 



Some years back the entire production of mine- 

 ral salt was calculated at 3,188,081 cwt., of boiled 

 salt 2,117,370 cwt, of sea salt 550,000 cwt., con- 

 sequently together 5,885,451 cwt., the greater part 

 of which was consumed in the country, part ex- 

 ported, and part applied to salting sea fish. 



The salt mines and pans are managed, like the 

 tob;icco manufactories, by civilians, for the profit 

 of government, and, like the former, must be 

 costly. But these and the other mines in different 

 provinces occupy a great number of hands, and 

 p;itronage, as we have already seen, has also its 

 worth. The mines of Hungary alone occupy 3,300 

 hands. The following table gives an idea of the 

 importance of mining speculations in Austria, but 

 inuch of the produce here reckoned is on private 

 account. 



Florins 43,859,353 



The produce of the gold, mines of Transylvania 

 is reckoned at from 2000 to 2500 marks, and oc- 

 'casionally 3400 mks. (100 m. cwt.) Those of 

 Hungary are stated to yield 2000 mks. or 10 cwt. 

 The Austrian provinces (Salzburg) yield 60 90 

 mks. Hungary and Transylvania produce about 

 92,000 marks or 460 cwt. of silver ; Bohemia 8,870 

 mks. ; Styria, Carinthia, and Gallicia 2000 marks. 

 Rich as this gain may appear, it gives in reality 

 but a faint idea of the inexhaustible wealth of the 

 different mountain chains which traverse the Aus- 

 trian empire, the mines in which would suffice to 

 supply all Europe if their management were left to 

 the exertions of private individuals. The wretched 

 state of the roads in the most productive mining 

 countries of Hungary and Illyria, and the neglected 

 condition of the rivers, which ought to afford every 

 facility for inland transport, not only render it 

 scarcely worth while to work many of the less 

 valuable metals, but subject these districts oc- 

 casionally to all the inconveniences of scarcity, 

 while other parts of the same province are literally 

 oppressed with the abundance of the crops. 



The crown lands are another and very extensive 

 source of revenue; but we are as little able to 

 state the income they produce, as to give the amount 

 which any one of the taxes annually yields. A 

 mere allusion, however, to these domains suggests 

 a very important question connected with the year 

 1811, that terrible epoch for the nation, which 

 shook the public credit to its foundation. The 

 measure of depreciating the current coin (p one- 

 fifth of its value by an order of council, which 

 threw the trading and industrial classes into indes- 

 cribable misery, while the landed proprietors re- 

 mained untouched, was one of those wanton, in- 

 considerate acts of oppression, which may be 

 explained, but cannot be palliated by supposing the 

 most complete ignorance of all the principles of 

 political economy on the part of those who origi- 

 nated, as well as those who suffered, such a mea- 

 sure. The utmost that could be gained by such a 

 step was the relieving the government from a part 

 of the public debt, and the defrauding the contrac- 

 tors, with whom at the moment negociations were 

 pending. The debt could not at that moment have 

 been a subject of such inextricable difficulty, while 

 the latter gain must at all times have been far too 

 paltry, independently of the moral effects of the 

 measure, for any government to look upon it as an 

 advantage worth obtaining by such means. So great 

 was the panic occasioned by this step, that in a few 



