writings must endear him to every liberal-minded man, and had, he prefumed, been read by every member of that House; if not, he would recommend them to their notice. The work, he faid, had been admirably tranflated; and he hoped the number of the page he was about to quote would not deter fuch gentlemen, as had not perufed them, from reading the book: The print was large, and the book foon gone through. In page 452 the words he alluded to would be found.

The question was put, and the resolution read a second

time.

Mr. Sheridan faid he would not go into any farther argument upon the fubject that day, but would move a string of refolutions upon the state of the revenue on Wednesday next. In the mean time, as an honourable gentleman oppofite to him had on the preceding day faid, in exprefs terms, that the four and a half per cent. fund drawn from the Leeward Islands, was the private money of His Majesty; and as he was fatisfied the fund was granted for public purposes, he wifhed the Houfe to be informed how the produce of that fund, and its application stood, and therefore he begged leave to move, "That an humble addrefs be prefented to "His Majesty, that there be laid before this House an ac"count of the four and a half per cent. duties paid out of His Majefty's Leeward Islands, for the last three years, "with the charges thereupon."

The motion being made and feconded,

Mr. Rofe declared he had no objection to repeat his words -the Leeward-Ifland fund had been granted for especial purposes, but thofe Gentlemen who had been present the preceding day, would recollect, that he had then faid, that it was competent for that Houfe to call for an account of the application of the produce as often as it was thought proper. The furplus, however, was certainly a matter of little importance, being from its nature precarious, as it depended on the goodness or badnefs of the crops in the WeftIndia Iflands. For fome few years together, perhaps, there would be a fmall furplus, and the year following a very great deficiency, fo that upon the whole the real average furplus was a mere trifle.

Mr. Fox maintained that the Leeward-lfland fund had been voted for public purposes exprefsly, and that it was as much at the difpofal of that Houfe as any other public money what foever.

Mr. Dempfier faid, it was only neceffary to turn to the vote itself to prove that the four and a half per cent. fund had been voted for public purpofes, which purposes were to

defray

defray certain specific annuities, and to support the civil vernment of the islands.

Mr. Sheridan's motion was put and agreed to.

go,

He afterwards moved, "For a correct plan of the civil "eftablishment and payments drawn in claffes, and ar"ranging by estimate the expence of each clafs, and of each "office in each clafs, in manner directed by an act of the "21ft of his present Majefty."

This was alfo agreed to: Mr. Sheridan having confented to leave out the word correct, at the inftance of the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

Mr. Pulteney defired to call the attention of the Houfe to Mr. Pale the cafe of an unfortunate but meritorious defcription of teney. perfons, who had been hardly dealt with laft year. The perfons in question were the hawkers and pedlers; for the relief of whom he fhould move for leave to bring in a bill to explain and amend the act of the laft fellion, but there was no occafion for any debate upon it then, as he only wished to bring in the bill, to have it printed, that every body concerned might fee it, and not to take any farther ftep refpecting it, till after the holidays, by which time every gentleman would have had an opportunity of examining it himfelf, and confulting his conftituents concerning the fubject. The preventing hawkers and pedlers from entering towns, at certain particular times, and fubjecting them to punishment if they did, was a very great oppreffion, and the more especially, as no crime had been imputed to them. The act had been enforced only in the counties of Norfolk and Kent, and, he believed, in the county of Cornwall, and it was almost univerfally complained of. He mentioned fome of the regulations which he meant to put into his bill, and among others, one was, that every hawker and pedler fhould bring with him a certificate of his good beha viour, to be prefented to the officer who made out the license, annually; and another was, that in order to prevent hawkers and pedlers from fmuggling foreign goods, every hawker and pedler, once convicted of having been guilty of fmuggling, fhould be for ever incapable of obtaining another license. Mr. Pulteney concluded with moving for leave to bring in "A bill to explain and amend fo much of the act re"fpecting the hawkers and pedlers as reftrains them from "expofing to fale goods in market towns, and as enables "juftices of the peace of any county to prohibit such "hawkers and pedlers from vending their goods within the "fame, and to farther regulating their trade."

Mr. Chancellor Pitt declared he would not at prefent Mr. Chart object to the bill; but he defired to put in his claim on be- cellor Pitt. half of the fhopkeepers, who certainly ought to be confidered

Mr. Rolle.

Mr. Sheri

Mr. Chan

as deeply interested in it. The reftrictions had been laid upon the hawkers and pedlers by way of a compensation to the ihopkeepers, who had been fubjected to a burden by the late tax, and thofe reftrictions ought not to be repealed without confidering that by fo doing the compenfation would be done away.

Mr. Rolle faid, as time was to be given for every perfon concerned to examine the bill, there was no occafion for him to go into the fubject then, he rofe merely, therefore, to affure the honourable gentleman who made the motion, that the act of the laft feffion had been enforced in the. county of Devon, as well as in the counties of Norfolk, Kent, and Cornwall.

Mr Sheridan remarked that it was the first time that the Houte had heard the right honourable gentleman confefs that the hop tax was a burden on the hopkeepers. It had been repeatedly argued by different gentlemen that the tax was a burden on the hopkeeper, but the right honourable gentleman had always contended that it was the confumer and not the fhopkeeper who bore it. If it was, as the right honourable gentleman had now confeffed, a burden on the hopkeeper, it ought to be repealed; and if the confumer paid it, the hawkers and pedlers were hardly dealt with to be facrificed for no purpofe whatever. The right honourable gentleman had, by his late modification of the ihop tax, relieved all the country fhopkeepers excepting a few, indeed, who dwelt in large towns. His confenting to relieve the hawkers and pedlers would therefore aggravate the injuftice done to the thopkeepers of the metropolis, on whofe fhoulders the onus of the burden now almoft exclufively refied.

Mr. Chancellor Pitt anfwered that, confidering the hoor Fat nourable gentleman's eagerness to catch at inadvertent expreffions, it would have been miraculous indeed if one unguarded word could have efcaped his farcafins. He had, he confefled, ufed the word burden; and fo the tax upon the thopkeepers would certainly have been, had the hawkers and pedlers been left upon their old footing, and enabled to meet them on fo unfair a competition as that must be, between perfons paying a tax, and perfons wholly exempted from it.

Mr Ald.

Mr. Alderman Hammett exprefled a hope that, next year Hammett. the right honourable gentleman would listen to a motion for leave to bring in a bill to repeal the fhop tax altogether. Mr. Manham defired it might be remembered, that it was not the fhopkeepers merely who withed for the ad of the last year refpecting hawkers and pedlers, but the whole country had called for it.

Mr. Mar

them.

Mr.

Mr. Fox declared that he always thought the fhop tax, Mr. Fox. and the reftrictions on hawkers and pedlers, bad measures. He wifhed, therefore, fincerely to fee them both repealed. The right honourable gentleman's calling the fhop tax a burden on the fhopkeepers was not, as he had pretended it to be, the mere flip of a word, but a fair confeffion of the truth. If the fhop tax was to be continued, an equal tax ought undoubtedly to be impofed on hawkers and pedlers, for as the cafe ftood at prefent, the latter had an abundant advantage over the former.

Mr. Alderman Sawbridge faid, the preventing hawkers Mr. Ald. and pedlers from coming to London, was an additional in- Sawbridge. jury to his conftituents, as they took off remnants and goods not very faleable in the fhops of the metropolis, and fold them in the adjacent villages.

Leave was given to bring in the bill.

The order of the day for the fecond reading of the bill for the establishment of a fund to be inalienably applied to the paying off the national debt, having been read, Mr. Chancellor Pitt moved, "That the bill be then read a fecond

time."

Mr. Huffey remarked, that no man was more heartily Mr. Huffey a wellwifher to the appropriating a part of the finking fund invariably to the diminution of the national debt than he was; the principle he highly approved, and fincerely wished it could be effectually put in execution, but he feared it would not be practicable immediately. Mr. Huffey proceeded to affign his reafons for entertaining thofe fcruples on this point, and founded a variety of arguments on the statements of the different heads of public expenditure, contained in the Report of the Committee, to whom the feveral papers relative to the public income and expenditure had been referred: he mentioned the navy, the army, and another head of the expenditure, which had been voted this year, as amounting to infinitely more than appeared in the table of expenditure to be found in the Report opposed to the receipt of the prefent year, and reafoned for fome time on the effential difference which they made upon the whole. He declared he had felt great fatisfaction the other day when the right honourable gentleman took notice of this, and had faid, though there might upon the four years be an excefs on the expenditure equal to three millions, yet he had no doubt of money's coming into his hands fufficiently early to answer that demand. But upon recollection, the receipt of that money was uncertain; it might not fall in, and in that cafe there would not be any furplus this year. He entered very fully into the fuppofed fources of additional receipt, enumerating the Eaft-India Company's

debt,

Sir Grey

Cooper.

debt, the unclaimed dividends at the Bank, and the fale of foreft lands. The fecond, he obferved (the unclaimed dividends) could not be applied to the public fervice without a fecurity to the public creditor, that the money fhould be forthcoming when properly called for, nor ought it to be touched without a diligent fearch after the owner of the dividend. Mr. Huffey examined and difcuffed the propofed mode of paying off the debt, and pointed out the inconveniencies to which it was liable from the quantity of Exchequer bills which were at this time unfunded; declaring, that if great care was not taken, the refult would be, that the Public would buy dear and fell cheap by their traffic in the funds, an operation which would go a great way towards defeating the purpofe of the plan. Mr. Huffey conciuded his fpeech with repeating, that he was a thorough friend to the idea of applying a portion of the finking fund to the diminution of the debt, but had his doubts how far it was poffible to begin to carry the propofed plan into effect this year.

Sir Grey Cooper faid, that as he had declared in a former debate, that he approved of the principle of the bill, to establifh an efficient finking fund for the reduction of the public debt, it might feem fomewhat inconfiftent with fuch a declaration, that he fhould give his opinion against the queftion of this bill being read a fecond time; but the ground of this opinion was, that we were not now in a state of preparation to begin our operations upon this great plan. He ftated, that the Report, which was the bafis of the bill, ought to be confidered as an account folemnly rendered to the reprefentatives of the People, of the real income of the nation, and of the expenditure neceffary for its defence and fecurity; and it was of the highest importance, both with refpect to its prefent object, and to its effects and confequences, that fuch a statement fhould be as correct and accurate, and as free from errors, as the nature of fuch accounts, confifting of a vast variety of heads and articles, would admit. He did not mean to fuggeft, that the Committe had intended to deceive the Houfe, but they might poffibly have mifled them; he did not accufe them of fallacy, but he thought he might of error. He then stated what he conceived to be an error of fome importance: in the two accounts of the neat produce of the taxes, credit was taken in what, if affumed as an average of the probable future produce of the revenue, was a receipt of the fum of 82,000l. in one account, and of 41,000l. in the other, under the article tea, 1745. This duty was repealed at Michaelmas, 1784, and in the eftimate of the future produce of the revenue, the whole amount of the tax on inha