Taxation as affecting the Agricultural Interest. 417= 151 
nark the mode of levying local taxes in the three divisions of 
he United Kingdom. In England all are charged on and 
ollected from the occupier. In Scotland certain rates such as 
^ountv-rates are levied directly on the landowner ; while others 
uch as Poor and Education-rates are charged in moieties on the 
indlord and the tenant. The latter practice prevails also to 
ome extent in Ireland. 
In Scotland, too, for a much longer period than elsewhere, 
ttempts were made to continue the older liability of personal 
s well as real property to the Poor-rate by assessing " means 
nd substance " as well as land rental to the tax. This practice 
!bere, as elsewhere, encountered many difficulties, but it only 
?gallv ceased seventeen years ago, and over about one-third of 
le rateable area of that country an endeavour is still made to 
litigate the rigid inequality of a rate which, as regards occupiers, 
leasures their ability to pay solely by their rental. This prac- 
ice, which, so far as it goes, is favourable to agriculturists, con- 
ists in the imposition of a graded rather than an equal rate, 
barging the rentals of dwelling-houses, offices, shops, and farms 
t varied scales ; occupiers of land frequently paying only one- 
bird or one-fourth of the poundage rate levied on residential 
•remises. To a minor extent the principle here acknowledged 
5, in the case of special works of a sanitary character, acted on in 
England, where land pays one-fourth of the rate charged upon 
ouses. 
CHAPTEK V. 
Eelative Pressure of Taxation. 
'UCH varieties of systems as those last alluded to are, however, Relative 
.0 more than exceptions to the ordinary rule that local taxes for p"«ssure^of 
he most part fall with uniform directness on +he rentals of perial"taseT'oii 
ertain fixed sorts of property. Among these, lana is necessarily agricultural 
onspicuous, and it thus appears that agriculturists are in conse- "i'^o°^«^- 
[Uence, more largely affected by taxes levied in local areas than 
7 those received into the national exchequer. This is at once 
pparent if the conclusions already reached in this inquiry be 
ecalled to mind, and the several percentages of charge on purely 
gricultural and on upper and middle-class incomes generally be 
ontrasted. Following the general classification of taxes before 
ssorted to, the pressure of the several forms of taxation may be 
lus grouped : — 
2 G 2 
