"Acres of land—Improvements on land—Town lots and improvements—Capital employed in merchandise—Mills, manufactories, distilleries, carding machines and tan-yards, with the stock employed—Horses, cattle, sheep, &c.—Pleasure carriages, watches, pianofortes—Capital stocks and profits in any company incorporated or unincorporated—Property in boats and vessels—Gold and silver coin, and bank-notes in actual possession—Claims for money, or other consideration—Annuities—Amount of notes, mortgages, &c. All other personal property over 100 dollars."
All these descriptions of property contribute alike, dollar for dollar, towards the expenses of the State, which—be it remarked—embrace not only the general charges for interest of debt, and for the support of the legislative, executive, and judiciary departments, but include also payments for prisons, asylums, the militia, the public roads, and several other branches of expenditure, which in this country are saddled either upon real property or upon the land alone. Let any one look at the items of the above list printed in italics, and say what portion of such wealth passes through the national exchequer, or goes to uphold the public institutions, of Great Britain. The whole annual incomes above £50 a-year in Great Britain are estimated, on the best attainable data,[9] to amount to upwards of £352,000,000 sterling, of which the taxed real income is £86,000,000, or one-fourth part only. Is there any one with a conscience so elastic as to maintain that the owners of the other three-fourths contribute fairly to the support of the State, in proportion to the revenue they enjoy under its protection? From the investigations of Mr Smee, to whom we have referred, it appears that while the number of those who pay the direct taxes is about five hundred thousand, there are upwards of one million eight hundred thousand persons in Great Britain enjoying incomes of above £50 a-year, who do not contribute one farthing to them. What is this but a system of iniquitous exemption of the one class, and of virtual confiscation as to the other? But the whole subject occupies far too prominent a place in the public mind to be treated thus incidentally. For the present then we leave it, thoroughly persuaded that, under a form of government which acknowledges no distinctions between classes and interests, so shameless a violation of the plainest principles of equity cannot long be permitted to continue, and cordially joining in the wish that no object of less momentous interest—no schemes of impracticable retrenchment—no wily bait of extended suffrage—no flourishing of the old red rag of reform, may be suffered to distract the attention of the public, from the one great paramount practical reform—a readjustment of Taxation.
We owe an apology to Professor Johnston for having deviated somewhat from the ordinary course of a review. His work has already been so much and so flatteringly noticed, that to have limited ourselves to mere abridgment and quotation from the Notes would have led us over the same ground that has been already exhausted by other critics. We have therefore preferred discussing some of the questions of greatest public interest which his observations have suggested; and if, on some of these, we have been led to dissent from his opinions, we have done so in no unfriendly spirit, which indeed would have been impossible in judging of an author whose own views are always expressed with perfect candour and moderation. There can be no doubt that, under the unpretending title which he has chosen to adopt, he has contrived to bring together a larger mass of varied and valuable information on the present condition of North America than is to be found in any work yet published.
THE ANSAYRII.
The Ansayrii (or Assassins;) with Travels in the Further East. By the Hon. Frederic Walpole, R.N., Author of Four Years in the Pacific. London: Bentley, 1851.
Hail to the bright East, with all its mysteries, its mighty past, its pregnant future, its inexhaustible sources of airiest amusement and most solemn interest! We welcome with pleasure the original and truly Oriental book before us. It harmonises rather with the poetic than the historic character of Eastern lands; but in its wild and dreamy narrative there are to be found vivid and faithful pictures, such as those that lighted up the charmed reveries of DeQuincey. For the present we will lay aside the critic's task: we will postpone all such considerations, and invite the reader to accompany us in a rapid tour over the varied regions which Mr Walpole has recalled to our memory and imagination. Let us turn for a little from the "world that is too much with us," and, ranging away from chilly mists and gloomy skies, sun our fancy in the lands where Paradise was planted.
Egypt and Palestine appear familiar to us all; they are of common interest to the whole Christian world—classic lands to every old villager who can read his Bible, as well as to the profound scholar. In them, sacred and profane history are so intimately blended that the latter assumes almost the authenticity of the former. Herodotus and his followers have actually a people still in the flesh (if flesh the mummy may be called) to refer to: subterranean Egypt is still inhabited by the undecayed bodies of the very men who associated with the Israelites, and forms that were beautiful and loved three thousand years ago. Imperishable as their old inhabitants, their temples and their monuments still stand above them, and will there remain unparalleled, until their long-buried architects shall rise again.
Passing on to Palestine, we find, memories and associations still stronger and more striking; for here nature is invested with the sentiment that in Egypt is awakened by art. Palestine belongs not to time only, but to eternity; with which, by types and illustrations, its earthly history is so beautifully blended and aggrandised. Its literature is inspired truth, its annals are prophecies fulfilled, and the very face of the land itself vindicates the beauty it once wore, through all the sorrow and desolation that have fallen on it since. Owing to the metaphorical style of Oriental composition, every object in nature was used to illustrate or impress by its analogy; and hence not only the holy mountains, the sacred rivers, and the battle plains have memories for us, but the very "hyssop on the wall," the blasted fig-tree, the cedar, the "high rock in the thirsty land;" every vale, and hill, and lake, and city, is consecrated by some association with the men who spoke the words of God—with the time that witnessed His presence in the flesh.