320 A HISTORY OF THE COLONY OF VICTORIA 



the Government had been unable to find from the days when Mr. 

 Service appointed the Civil Service Board down to the present time. 

 It was an easy matter to strike off a percentage reduction from the 

 pay of good, bad and indifferent alike, and the result could be quickly 

 shown. So, like the rain from heaven, the blow descended upon the 

 just and the unjust alike, because discrimination meant delay, and 

 the country clamoured for " something being done ". 



Fortunately, these trying years of public finance were robbed of 

 some of their terrors by the bounty of Nature, and the harvests of 

 1892-93 were abundant. In the same year a forward movement was 

 shown in the produce of the gold mines, after long years of decrease, 

 and this encouraging feature happily continued until the close of the 

 century. 



On the 28th of August, 1894, the Patterson Ministry was defeated 

 by a majority of four, on a want of confidence motion tabled by 

 Mr. George Turner, who had been Commissioner of Customs and 

 Solicitor-General in the previous administration. The defeat was 

 largely due to the unsatisfactory budget proposals of Mr. Carter, the 

 Treasurer, who, finding that the revenue for the year had fallen 

 850,000 short of his estimates, submitted some very unpalatable 

 forms of increased taxation, chiefly through the Customs. In pro- 

 posing an income tax, estimated to bring in 250,000 a year, he 

 adopted quite an apologetic tone, and explained that personally he 

 thought it desirable to show the English creditors that Victorians 

 "are in earnest, and are not going on accumulating a deficiency, 

 without making provision for its payment ". Nevertheless, his 

 speech seemed to imply that if there was any serious opposition the 

 Government would not press the proposal. Sir James Patterson 

 was not a man to take defeat as a matter of course. He managed 

 to satisfy Lord Hopetoun that the smallness of the majority indi- 

 cated a snatched vote, and that there was no cohesion or unity of 

 purpose in the Opposition that would justify him in looking there for 

 an acceptable administration. The appeal to the country on 20th 

 September elicited an emphatic denial of these contentions, and a 

 condemnation of the ministerial policy and supporters. The rout 

 was almost as complete as in the celebrated Berry campaign against 

 Service in 1880. Eighteen months before, Sir James Patterson had 



