August i, i8gi.] 
THE TROPICAL AQ«rOWLTl» 18 T, 
135 
whom we dieousscd this matter. He gave hie opinion 
as a praotioal workman that he could use the 
leather, but it must bo carefully tanned and out 
down in tbioknese as soon as it was lifted out 
of the tanning pits. Perhaps this is what is 
done in America, but it is certain that no such 
prooess is known here. It must bo a very costly 
one, and to out down a hide said in your ex- 
tract to be li inch in thickness to a thinness 
which would render it available for working up 
into fancy goods, seems to mo to be a useless 
waste of labour. Even when all was done the 
leather could searotly be as supple or as sound 
as crocodile leather, and it has none of the 
handsome and peculiar marking which makes the 
latter such a favourite. — London Cor, 
the incidence of our road taxation 
There are few of what we may term our fiscal 
arrangements that have called forth more criticism 
from time to time than the relative burden 
imposed by the collection of money for the upkeep 
of our roads. At first sight it appears to be an 
anomaly that the agricultural laborer should 
be called upon to contribute towards this 
in the same degree as his more wealthy fellow 
subjects. But there are few anomalies in the 
matter of taxation the redress of which would 
not produce further anomalies which are impossible 
of being taken into account, or oven of being 
accurately foreseen and provided against. 
It is tbia difficulty no doubt that led to those 
devised this method of upkeeping and 
extending our roads to ignore altogether any scheme 
of assessment such as could alone distribute 
evenly the burden to which we have referred, 
dud to substitute for it a level impost of 
so many days’ labour. Power to commute in 
money was a neoessity of the ease. Had not 
this boon allowed, the existing anomaly — if 
anomaly there really be— would have been intensi- 
fied ; the higher among our social grades would have 
oontributoJ at rales varying from say £1 to £10 p-r 
diem, while the agriouliural laborer would 
have contributed but from 8 pence to 9 pence per 
day. The power to commute the days of labour 
for a fixed rate of money payment became there- 
fore absolute, and unless a sliding scale wi re 
fixed mulcting the planter in so muoh, the native 
proprietor at so muoh, aud so on throughout tl.o 
many varied grades aud ooaupalions, it was noooi- 
sary that the current value of a day's ordina y 
road Ubour should bo aooepted as the standard 
lor everyone whatever his rank or degree in lif i. 
Many among those who have brought this questi'-n 
orward from lime to time have contented them- 
selvoa with drawing a sharp lino of distinotii n 
between natives and Europeans only. They have 
vauoed that the latter should be ameroed to a 
greater extent than the former. They would follow 
the absurd coaoh-fare praotioo still carried out, of 
so much for Europeans, so much leas for Burghers, 
and so much less for natives. This argument 
B a ridiculous one, tor many natives paying road 
tax are really better off in this world’s gear than 
ropuUUon!^* European 
There is a strong feeling in most of the more 
advanced countries of the world that the working 
classes, as the rule, do not contribute their tab 
quota to the taxation which provides for them 
the oomforts and security of civilized Goveriimo it 
m which all share a ike. The dimculty is as to 
_ ow to reach auoii olassos witiiout iuipoalng 
inordinate burdeiffi. It is all very well to attempt 
to tin a boundary lino between rich aud poor 
but it is an acknowledged foot that many of the 
working classes are better off in their degree 
than many who rank higher in the social scale. 
Their burdens are in many respests lighter, and 
from their oiroumstanoea are more easy, relatively, 
to be borne. In a vast number of oases, too, to 
increase the burden of the higher olaescs is to 
place a tax upon the industry or intelligenoe 
which has enabled these to rise in life out of 
the dead level of the mass of the oommunity. 
Now in tbs case of rood upkeep everyone is 
equally benefiled. For if proper attention to our 
roads enables the more wealthy to pass from place to 
plaoe the more readily in pursuit of mere pleasure, 
it equally provides faoilities whereby an enormous 
number— in fact the greater portion of the popu- 
lation — can earn a living. Were it attempUd, 
therefore, to impose a tax tor road upkeep in 
proportion to apparent means, the wealthier would 
be called upon even far more than they do at 
present to pay for a privilege wbioh is shared in 
equally by every member of the oommunity. 
But it should not be forgotten tbit in respeot 
of district roads in planting districts — a series of 
roads by wbioh the Central Province has been 
scored— hall of the original cost, as well as half 
of the cost of nnhesp, is directly imposed on 
the planters. The native agriculturist in the low 
country gets a road to his village or neighbour- 
hood, and through it finds a profitable market for 
bis straw and grain, paying no more than his 
commutation ; while the planter for his district 
road often pays a large sum every year, apart from 
commutation. 
And it must in addition be reoolleoted 
that the contribution made under the road 
ordinance is but a proportion only of the 
outlay required for the efficient maintenanee of 
our highways. Now whenoc is the balance for 
this derived? It is drawn from the general revenue, 
and this we know to be ohisfly raised, not from 
the labour of the olasses who elect to work out 
their apportioned task on the roads rather than 
commute for it by a money payment, but from 
the fruits of the industry of the higher olassos 
among the people. No means, we feel assured, 
could have been better devised to ensure that 
contribution should be made towards a general 
good by those who in other respeots are relatively 
free from taxation than this demand for a oertain 
number of days’ labour from each and all alike. 
It enables those who are poor in cash to bear 
their share of the burden, while it makes it possible 
for those whose day’s labour would bo worth a 
hundred-fold that of the goyiya to escape the 
anomaly that would fall upon them were they 
compelled to the absolute performance of so many 
days of labour on tho roads. Were this not so, 
the anomaly oomplainod of as regards present 
arrangements would be, as we have said, largely 
inoreaeod. All should contribute to a common good, 
and no method suggests itself whereby this oan be 
more fairly enforced than by the present operation 
of our Road Ordinunoe. 
COFFEE PLANTING IN EAST-CENTRAJ. 
AFRICA. 
(By an ex Ceylon Planter.) 
NyassalauJ, Kast-Gontral Africa, 
May 4th, 1891. 
Mails to this part of the world are slow and 
irregular, I got your papers by tits and starts ; the 
last lot just t) hand ia wishing your readers a 
prosperous Now Year I We hope soon to have more 
regular mails. The commander of tho gunboats 
on the shore ie doing his best with the homo 
