the income-tax. It told of distress caused to the farmers in all degrees, from an irritating diminution of profits down to causing utter ruin, as in the case of an honest farmer-an example of a common case-who was thus reduced, in spite of the most strenuous efforts, from being a capitalist, down, by mournful degrees, to the station of a labourer at 108. a week. It told of oppression on the part of sporting magistrates, and of unlimited opportunity for such oppression. It told of fearful demoralisation in town as well as country, from the transactions connected with the sale of game. It told of the rousing of social and political discontents, in places where the hungering poor saw how much human food was devoured by hares and birds, and who felt how irreconcilable were the interests of the peasantry and the magistracy in regard to game. There was no need that it should tell of murders; for the newspapers of the day made known that part of the horror of the case. In January 1844, a gamekeeper of Lord Grantley's, the father of seven children, was found murdered by poachers. In March, a man named Lowther had a double certificate fine upon him, and thought, in his difficulty, of taking some of Lord Normanby's pheasants, wherewith to pay his fine. Being met, he shot Lord Normanby's keeper; and being tried, he was found guilty of murder. But these, and all lesser cases of injury, were unhappily of too common an order to produce much effect on the public mind. The event of the year, in regard to game catastrophes, was one which found its way to the hearts, and troubled the minds, even of some parliamentary sportsmen. The Earl of Stradbroke was well known as a strict game-preserver; and his conspicuous advocacy of all stringent game-law provisions in the House of Lords prevented any mistake about his views. We find him, in June of this year, urging amendments on the bill for the preservation of game by night-provisions for making more stringent a law already intolerably oppressive; and in August, the kingdom was shocked by the news that two of Lord Stradbroke's gamekeepers had committed suicide, on two successive days. From the evidence on the inquest it appeared that the poachers had done much mischief in the preserves, and that Easy, the first suicide, fell into despon

dency, on hearing that Lord Stradbroke was coming down for the 1st of September. On the eve of that day, he shot himself through the mouth. The superintendent keeper, Cucksey, was supposed to take alarm lest he should be discovered to have removed pheasants' eggs from Easy's portion of the preserves, to make a better appearance in his own; and he shot himself the next day. Some little difference of tone is to be observed among legislators after this occurrence; a somewhat less stern assertion that the game was theirs, and that they would do what they chose with their own; a somewhat less virulent denunciation of the peasantry for helping themselves to wild creatures which they can never be made to regard as property, and for yielding to a temptation too strong for flesh and blood. For some time past, it had been rumoured that the home secretary was looking closely into the commitments for poaching offences, all over the country, to ascertain their legality; and some persons even ventured to anticipate a proposal from the government for the complete revision of the game-laws. In August, we find Lord Lilford saying in the Upper House that much observation had been occasioned by the home secretary having required from the governor of Northampton jail a return of summary_convictions under the Game Act in that county; and Lord Lilford inquired of Lord Wharncliffe whether it was intended to cast any imputation on the magistrates of the shire. The reply was, that every county had been visited with the same requisition because it was known to government that great irregularities had occurred in the management of such cases. The evidence of the under-secretary for the home department, before Mr. Bright's committee in the next spring, disclosed such abundant reason for this inquiry that we do not wonder at hearing of no more resentment on behalf of magistrates. So many of the mere commitments were illegal that the home secretary made a jail-delivery of game offenders, extensive enough to render it prudent for the magistrates and their champions to drop the subject. Whenever the administration of justice in rural districts becomes a subject for legislation, as municipal reform has been in our time, the evidence of Mr. S. March Phillips, under-secretary for the home depart

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ment, before Mr. Bright's game-law committee, will suffice to show what that administration was up to 1845.

In the same August which brought the subject of the game-laws so often before the public, the Morning Herald announced that ministers were fully aware of the pernicious operation of the game-laws, and were contemplating a complete revision and large modification of them. It declared that the home secretary had kept a vigilant eye on the rural magistracy, ever since his entrance upon office, and had investigated every case of alleged severity; and it intimated that another session would hardly pass without a change of system. The next session brought about no change; nor has any subsequent session, except that hares are now deprived of some of the protection of sacred game. But public opinion has effected something of what legislation should long ago have done. Several noblemen and gentlemen-and in the first rank of these, the Duke of Bedford-have thrown open their preserves; and many more have given permission to their tenants to destroy hares and rabbits to any amount they please. A strong feeling of disgust at battue-shooting is spreading through all ranks, till we may hope it must reach the highest; and when battue-shooting comes to an end, the overthrow of the game-law tyranny is nigh. The genuine game-law system, derived from feudal times, and endeared to the aristocracy by feudal associations, was destroyed by the act which legalised the sale of game. The sport, thus degenerated into preserving game for battue-shooting, cannot long hold its ground against the indignities which now beset it, the wrongs of a suffering peasantry, and the spirit of agricultural improvement. Already our sportsmen are finding their way to the wilds of Norway and other countries, in pursuit of a truer sport than any that can now be procured at home. The Scotch moors also will be open for a long time to come. With these sporting-fields elsewhere, and the example of such landlords as the Duke of Bedford at hand, we may hope that the gentry who uphold in parliament a game-law which must make every statesman blush, will grow ashamed of insisting on their privilege and amusement, at the expense of ruin to the farmers, and corruption among the peasantry.

Between 1833 and 1844, there were 41 inquests on slain gamekeepers; and in 26 of these cases, verdicts of wilful murder were returned. In some of the rural counties, nearly half of the total commitments to jail were game cases; and the maintenance of the families of poachers, and the necessary enlargements of the jails, and employment of a numerous police, were heavy burdens to the occupiers of land—already much injured by the partial destruction of their crops. The convictions in England and Wales for breach of the game-laws for the year 1843 alone were 4529. It is computed that the expenditure occasioned by the game-laws, independent of the waste of food, amounts to more than that of the poor-law system. Within the last fifty years,' says our calm and judicialminded expositor of the Political Dictionary, game has been preserved to an excess which was previously unknown. Most of the laws relating to game which have been passed within this period have been to enable game preservers to indulge in this taste; and to visit with greater severity those who are tempted by the abundance of game to become poachers. The accumulation of game in preserves, watched and guarded by numerous keepers, has led to changes in the mode of sporting. The sportsman of the old school was contented with a little spoil, but found enjoyment in healthful recreation and exercise, and was aided by the sagacity of his dogs. In the modern system of battueshooting, the woods and plantations are beaten by men and boys; attendants load the sportsmen's guns, and the game is driven within reach of gun-shot, and many hundred heads of game are slaughtered in a few hours. The true sportsman would as soon think of spoiling a poultry-yard. . The effect of protecting game by oppressive laws is, perhaps, more injurious to the morals of the rural population than any other single cause. gentry of England are distinguished by many good qualities; but the manner in which many of them uphold their amusements at the cost of filling the jails with their poor neighbours, who acquire those habits which lead to the ruin of themselves and their families, is a blot on their character which has yet to be wiped off.' We must leave it to a future historian to assign the date of its obliteration.

The

CHAPTER XI.

Financial Statements of 1843, 1844-Sugar-duties-Mr. Miles's Motion -Crisis of Parties-Reduction of the 3 per Cents.-Bank Act of 1844-Railway Extension-Railway Legislation-Delivery of Plans -Gauge Question-Poor-law Amendments-Post-office Espionage -Alien Act.

THE financial statement for 1843 was looked for with some dread by all parties. It could not be otherwise than unfavourable. The long distress was not yet over; the income-tax could have yielded nothing yet; and the prodigious reduction of import-duties consequent on the alteration of the tariff must have operated immediately, and presented its worst aspect first.

On the 8th of May, Mr. Goulburn made his statement. Under some heads, there had been disappointment. Others indicated an improvement in manufactures and in the condition of the people. The deficiency was about £2,000,000; but the income-tax was certain to be more productive than had been supposed. The net revenue from it was likely to be about £5,100,000. On the whole, a small deficiency was left; but it was so evident that the worst was over with the customs, and that the produce of that department must increase as the benefits of a free-trade were experienced, that the surplus of a future time might be confidently reckoned on to pay up the present small deficiency. Two heavy charges of unusual characterfor opium compensation, and to reimburse the East India Company for the Chinese war-might be paid out of the Chinese money to come in hereafter; but meantime, the sums must be advanced. No remission of taxation could be looked for under these circumstances; and the most vehement objectors to the income-tax had now nothing to say when asked what we should have done without it. The deficiency was owing chiefly to a falling off in the wine, spirits, and malt duties, from causes which could not have been anticipated—the expiration of the Methuen