The Income-Tax. By the Rev. CANON RICHSON.

The author quoted the report of the late Committee of the House of Commons, in which they declined to interfere with the present mode of levying the tax, and described the case of a clergyman deriving £150 from a living in a large parish in Manchester, the extent of which necessitated the employment of two curates. The clergyman gave up the whole of his income towards the payment of his assistants, but both he and they were compelled to pay income-tax, though he did not receive a farthing in the way of personal emolument. Taking therefore into consideration the refusal of the report to recommend any modification of the present Acts for levying and collecting the income-tax; that the number of persons who suffer unjustly from the operation of the present Acts is very large; that there are sufficiently definite objections to their operation in which persons concur, without involving those subjects of discussion wherein there is little immediate prospect of agreement; that the operation of the present Act leads to habitual frauds, injurious to commercial integrity; and, finally, that the efforts of individuals are unequal to the necessary conflict with the prejudices and interests arrayed against such a revision of the Acts as their very terms appear to justify,-he considered that, after so unsatisfactory a result of two committees of the House of Commons as was indicated by the present report, it was useless to expect equitable improvement, unless they who are dissatisfied with the existing anomalies are prepared, for the present, to sink their differences of opinion in respect to an entire modification of the bases of the tax, and to form an extensive association, with the restricted and clearly defined object of promoting the application of the IncomeTax Acts in harmony with their declared objects.

Can Patents be defended on Economical Grounds?

By Professor J. E. T. ROGERS, M.A.

The author contended that patent laws did not stimulate invention; they did not come within the definition of protection to property and the acknowledged duty of the state to maintain intact the labour of individuals; they acted as a hindrance to improvement by being a check on the freedom of beneficial discovery; they were an illogical acknowledgment that the accidental property of discovery was the ground for allowing a sole property. All reasonable advantages were secured by secresy, and were constantly superseded by secresy; and they were a tax in the fullest sense on the consumer.

On the Definition and Incidence of Taxation.

By Professor J. E. T. ROGERS, M.A.

The author gave the following definition of a tax :-"A tax is a contribution imposed by an acknowledged authority on a community, for the purpose of public utility, whether this utility be the discharge of obligations incurred for past services or for the maintenance of present capacities of production, the tax being levied on the ground that the utility procured, service rendered, or functions performed by the administration of this contribution, cannot possibly be procured, rendered, or performed by individuals, or by inferior cooperative agencies, and cannot be so economically discharged by them." The incidence of a tax he indicated to be as follows:-"If a tax be levied on sources of income which are of an elastic character that is, on the services of productive labour, it must be paid by the consumer; and though such an incidence may be inexpedient to the community, it is not unjust to the person who is the channel of the tax. But if it be levied on income which is not elastic, it may be unjust to the person who pays it, as well as inexpedient to the person or persons who represent the consumer."

On some Account of the Manchester Gasworks. By JOHN SHUTTLEWORTH. Manchester was the first place in which the regular and complete application of gas for economical purposes was successfully tested. This was effected under the direction of Mr. William Murdoch, in 1805, at the cotton-mill of Messrs. Phillips and Lee, and had made Manchester a sort of starting-point in all historical notices of the subject. Their townsman, Dr. Henry, was the first to direct attention to the

purification of gas; and, further, the Act 5 George 4, c. 133, which passed in 1824, under which the Commissioners of Police for Manchester were authorized to establish gasworks for lighting the town, was, he believed, the first Act ever granted by Parliament that empowered a municipal body to apply public funds to the carrying on of a manufacturing business for the benefit of the public. Until that Act was obtained, it was an established principle in the legislation of this country not to permit public bodies to become traders. It appeared, then, that in connexion with gas Manchester enjoyed the distinction of being the locality where its practical use on a large scale was first shown, of ranking among its citizens the eminent chemist by whose researches its purification was effected, and of removing the Parliamentary restrictions that prevented municipal bodies from deriving profits for public use from its manufacture. The Commissioners of Police, who managed the affairs of the town under an old Police Act, the 32nd George III., which passed in 1792, began the public use of gas by fixing a single lamp over the door of the then police office in Police-street, at the bottom of King-street. He well remembered the crowds that night after night gathered in front to gaze at it. As the use of gas spread, its superiority to all other light made the public anxious to obtain it for private consumption; and several public meetings were held for the purpose of urging the Commissioners of Police to extend the works so as to supply the general demand. The Commissioners made an appeal to the leypayers at large; and at a meeting held on the 30th of April, 1817, it was resolved:-"That it will be expedient to adopt the proposed mode of lighting the central parts of the town with gas, and, for the purpose of effecting this object, to raise the police rate from 15d. to 18d. in the pound." The gasworks were enlarged, a "Gas Committee" was established; but as the right of the commissioners to sell gas to private consumers was uncertain, it was thought desirable to obtain a special Act of Parliament to legalize what had been done and to give power to continue the works, prescribing the application of the funds derived from them. While the commissioners were preparing their measure, a notice appeared on the 20th September, 1823, from persons entirely unknown in Manchester, and without any previous intimation of their intention, to apply to Parliament for a bill to authorize the establishment of a "Manchester Imperial Joint-stock Oil Gas Company, to light with oil or other gas the town and parish of Manchester." On this notice appearing, measures were taken to oppose the project, and at the same time to promote the previously intended purpose of obtaining a Gas Act for the town. In furtherance of these objects meetings were held in Manchester, Salford, Ardwick, and other townships of the parish. Though the opposition to the Oil Gas Bill was thus formidable, the promoters continued their efforts, and might have succeeded; but in getting up petitions in favour of the bill they had resorted to the grossest fraud in attaching forged and fictitious signatures, and, on these frauds being proved to the committee by the clearest evidence, the committee to which both bills had been referred at once indignantly rejected the Oil Gas Bill and adjourned without making any report, alleging that they dispensed with this customary formality from a motive of mercy to the parties, inasmuch as they could not make a report without bringing the authors of the fraud and contempt to justice. So strong and general was the indignation excited in the House, that on an attempt being made a few days after to revive the committee, the motion was negatived, not in the usual way by a quiet orderly vote, but, as it is stated in the newspaper reports of the time, "by a thunder of Noes." The resentment thus provoked by one party had, perhaps, a reactionary influence in favour of the other; for the defeat of the Oil Gas Bill was speedily followed by the passing of the Manchester Act, thereby practically recognizing the principle that such establishments might be created by public funds and conduc ted by public bodies for the public benefit, and, further, that the object to which gasworks especially are subservient are more likely to be secured by a general establishment conducted under effective public control by a public body than by any private association founded solely for private gain-in short, that such establishments are not only legitimate in principle, but are even the best (because the most certain and convenient) means of effecting those most import ant public improvements which progress and circumstances make necessary in towns, which might not be otherwise effected. The Act unfortunately left the constitution of the body which, under the Act of 1792, governed the town, and from which the gas 1861.

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directors had to be chosen, unaltered. The governing body was not composed of a limited number of persons chosen as representatives, but was constituted of all the inhabitants who paid a rent of £20 a year. Under such a system it was clear that whenever there was a strong collision of opinion on public questions, persons on both sides would qualify in such numbers as utterly to destroy the deliberative character of the public meetings that might be held. In the proceedings, both with respect to gas and other public affairs, that took place for years after the passing of this Act, so great was the excitement that prevailed, that crowds of qualified inhabitants became Commissioners of Police; and for a long period the meetings that were held were characterized by the most disgraceful turbulence and disorder. At one meeting alone, in 1827, no less than 665 persons qualified as commissioners. At these meetings the most extravagant propositions were brought forward, such as, for instance, that gas should be supplied to consumers at cost price. The parties most prominent and offensive in this violent agitation were chiefly the lowest class of shopkeepers and publicans. Then followed an agitation for the sale of the gasworks; but this was eventually suspended by the appointment of the late Mr. Thomas Wroe to the comptrollership of the works. This was quite an epoch in the history of the works. In the first year, Mr. Wroe reduced the price 5 per cent., and raised the production from 88 millions of cubic feet to 96 millions, or 9 per cent., and increased the profits from £10,200 to £13,500, or 34 per cent. In the ten years that Mr. Wroe was connected with the works he reduced the price from 10s. 6d. to 58. 9d., and raised the annual profit from £10,200 to £31,700. The benefit derived by the town from Mr. Wroe's services amounted to an annual sum of £45,416. This was stated in a report of the Finance Committee, bearing date August 22, 1842, which he thought ought to be published for general circulation, as it contained particulars of the services of one who had not yet had justice done to his unparalleled work as a public servant.

For the introduction of the Municipal Corporations Act to Manchester they were indebted to Mr. Alderman Neild, who originated the movement, and was untiring in his exertions until it was accomplished. The Municipal Act, among its many other advantages, gave a security and permanence to the gas establishment which it could not be considered to possess previously. The consequences had been highly important. To the inhabitants it had supplied the best and cheapest light that exists. To the public at large it had contributed regularly funds for widening old and forming new streets to an extent that had afforded needful accommodation for the vast increase of traffic, of population, and merchandize that had grown up among them, and which, without such aid, would probably have been actually prevented by the want of space in the streets and thoroughfares, which was essential to its existence. In both social and political economy, facility of communication and transit was one of the most important elements of national prosperity, and demanded unceasing attention to every available means for securing it. In this respect the Manchester gasworks had been especially useful. Before their establishment it was the standing and universal reproach of Manchester that it was the worst and most inconveniently built town in Europe. It possessed no fund for general improvements, and was so rapidly increasing as to make from day to day the necessity of such a fund more alarmingly apparent. Without the funds derived from the gasworks, the physical necessity of wider and shorter streets would either have put a stop to the growth of the traffic, or have rendered absolutely imperative a resort to large improvement rates, thus not only most injuriously affecting the value of property throughout the town, but also checking and depressing all other interests. Such were the exigencies of the town in this respect, that at a meeting of the Commissioners of Police in 1827, a scheme of necessary improvements to meet the rapidly advancing wants of the community was brought forward, which involved an estimated cost of from one to one and a half million sterling. He thought it was a happy circumstance for Manchester in a threatened necessity of such vital importance to its prosperity, that a fund existed in the profits of the gasworks of sufficient magnitude to equal the demand. That these estimates were not overrated was clear from the fact that, in addition to improvements still in progress and still wanted, the payments from the gas profits for the purposes then contemplated have amounted to more than £700,000, besides debts incurred that were yet owing. In the first year of the establishment of the gasworks the profits amounted to £263 10s. 5d. In

the following seven years they amounted to £20,000, and of this £15,000 to £17,000 was paid towards the erection of the Town Hall. From 1825 to 1839 inclusive (from the date of the first Gas Act to the grant of the charter, a period of 15 years) the profit was nearly £172,000, or an average of £11,500 a year; and from 1840, when he became a member of the Gas Committee, to 1859, when that connexion ceased, a term of 19 years, they amounted to £660,000, or an average of nearly £35,000 a year, or treble that of the preceding 15 years. The price to the consumer during the same period had been reduced from about 16s. to 4s. 6d. (in 1859) per 1000 feet; and but for a resolution of the Town Council in 1851, by which onehalf of the profits was diverted from improvements to relieve the water rate, would certainly have been reduced ten years ago to a medium of 4s. per 1000 feet. According to the last published report of the Gas Committee, to June 24, 1860, the amount of capital in the gasworks was £501,326; gas produced in the year ending June 1860, 779,150,000 cubic feet; rental, £154,658, which was equal to an average charge of about 38. 10d. per 1000 feet. The price of gas within the city is from 3s. 8d. to 4s., or a medium of 3s. 10d. The cost of cannel, £56,177, equal to 1s. 34d. per 1000 feet; cannel consumed, 76,039 tons, which showed a production of 10,240 per ton. By the Gas Committee continuing to attend to the quality of the gas so as to secure the highest purity and illuminating power, and by the council so regulating the price by fixing it at as low as was commensurate with the capital employed and the business done, they might expect not only a continuance, but an augmentation of the benefits of which it had been a certain and important source. On the Altered Condition of the Embroidery Manufacture of Scotland and Ireland since 1857. By JOHN STRANG, LL.D.

The author enlarged upon the advantages of this particular occupation in encou raging artistic skill and taste, and in affording occupation for females at their own homes. He deplored the capricious fickleness of female fashion, which had led to a great decline, and said it was to be hoped that so long as the tasteful designer continued to dream after some new shape or pattern, so long as the unwearied energy of the manufacturer was exerted to create new articles of utility, and the restless activity of the merchant was spent on discovering some new market for their disposal, the future of the muslin embroidery manufacture would ere long become, as heretofore, a pleasing and profitable occupation during the intervals of field labour and domestic duties to at least as great a number as it formerly did of the industrious females of Scotland and Ireland.

On the Comparative Progress of the English and Scottish Population as shown by the Census of 1861. By JOHN STRANG, LL.D.

If some distant and untutored foreigner happened to cast his eye over the map of the world, and were told by some enlightened bystander that within the comparatively small islands of Great Britain and Ireland there resided the elements of a first-rate political power, he would no doubt feel some little surprise at the intelligence, particularly were he, at the same time, informed that within the boundaries of Great Britain itself there was only a surface area of about 57 millions of statute acres. But the foreigner's surprise would be perhaps still greater were he further told that, while the southern portion of the island, called England and Wales, with a surface of little more than 37 millions of acres, had a population (as ascertained by the late census, exclusive of the army and navy, and merchant service abroad) of 20,061,725, the northern portion, called Scotland, with a territorial surface of upwards of 20 millions of acres, contained only 3,061,329 inhabitants. Such, however, are the real facts of the case; and those, like ourselves, who are acquainted with the distinctive physical peculiarities of the two portions of Great Britain will feel little wonder about it. There is, however, a subject connected with this territorial division of England and Scotland, and their d' stinctive populations, which is not so easily understood; we mean the fact, as shown by the census returns of the present century, that there has existed for some considerable time, and particularly of late years, a marked difference in the ratio of the progress of the population within the limits assigned to the northern and southern portions of Great

Britain respectively. By a table before me, it appears that the population of England and Wales has, in the course of sixty years, increased to the extent of 10,905,554, whereas that of Scotland has advanced to the extent of only 1,452,909, exhibiting an increase on the part of England and Wales of 119-1 per cent., and on that of Scotland of only 903 per cent.; and if we merely compare the progress of the population of the two divisions of the island respectively during the last ten years, we find that, while England and Wales show an increase of 12 per cent., Scotland only exhibits an advance of 5·9 (or about 6) per cent. The question then naturally arises, how can this great and important discrepancy between the rates of progress in England and Scotland, particularly as existing between the years 1851 and 1861, be explained? Has it been occasioned by a different birth and death rate ruling in the respective portions of the island? or is it to be found in a larger proportional rate of emigration on the part of the North to that of the South? And if the latter be the case, what may be the probable causes which have led to that higher emigration spirit?

Let us then attempt to discover what has been the actual natural increase of the population in Scotland, as deduced from the excess of births over deaths, since 1851. And here a difficulty meets us on the threshold--the fact that before the 1st of January, 1855, there was no public register of births, deaths, and marriages kept in Scotland; and it is therefore only from the latter period that we can obtain any authentic figures wherewith to deal. During the last six years and a half, the actual increase of the population from the excess of births over deaths amounted to 260,392; and, assuming that the average annual birth and death rates then existing differed but little from those existing during the three and a half years that preceded the passing of the Registration Act for Scotland-which rates were, say, birth-rate 341 per cent., death-rate 2:08 per cent.-then it would follow that during that period of three and a half years preceding 1st January, 1855, the births must have amounted to 346,115, and the deaths to 211,120, showing an excess of births over deaths of 134,995, which, when added to the excess of births over deaths during the last six and a half years, makes a total natural increase of the population in ten years, within the boundaries of Scotland, of 395,387, or at the rate of about 13-6 per cent. It is therefore quite evident that, had Scotland not been subject to the effects of a serious emigration, her population of last census would have amounted to 3,284,129, instead of 3,061,251. If such, therefore, may be taken as a proximate picture of the real natural progress of the population of Scotland, it necessarily follows, considering the immigration from Ireland into the west of Scotland, that the tide of emigrating Scotch to other countries must have been very great, especially during the last ten years, seeing that, in addition to all the Irish immigration (which, however, has not been so large for these four or five years past), there must have gone out from Scotland no fewer than 222,878 persons, being the difference between the natural increase from the excess of births over deaths and the increase as shown by the late census. According to the returns made to the Registrar General by the Government Emigration Board, we find that during the last two years the estimated number of Scotch who have emigrated with the knowledge of the same board has amounted to 183,627, leaving 39,251 which must have left otherwise, either to recruit the army and navy abroad, to push their fortunes in various parts of the globe, unaccounted for by the Emigration Commissioners, or, what is more likely, have gone to swell the population of England.

That the population of England has been greatly increased from immigration will at once appear evident when it is stated that in the ten past years the Englishborn emigrants have amounted to 640,210, the natural increase of her population only exhibits 136,460 more than her ascertained population by the census, showing an unaccounted-for deficiency of 503,740, for which she must have been mainly indebted to Scotland and Ireland. That an emigrating spirit has manifested itself on the part of the Scotch more than the English is certain from the fact that, taking the mean population for the last ten years of each country, we shall find that, had Scotland only emigrated proportionally to England, the Scotch emigrants ought only to have amounted to about 100,000, whereas the numbers stated by the Commissioners are 183,627. If the emigration from Scotland has thus been so disproportionally great, it may be asked from what particular quarter of the country has this spirit chiefly manifested itself? or, in other words, in what division of the country