nearly the same
proportion as is the number of the officials on the two boards--namely,
622 in Ireland and in Scotland 467, and this, too, in spite of the fact
that further statistics show, namely, that there are five convicted
criminals in Scotland for every three in Ireland.

These are a few facts which show the value of the case for the present
state of affairs, based on the assumption that over-taxation is balanced
by profligate expenditure. The maintenance--to take only one point--of a
police force about half the size of the United States army, when at the
present time white gloves--the symbol of a crimeless charge--are being
given to the judges on every circuit, is a state of affairs which is
intolerable, while the small proportion which in the returns Ireland is
shown to bear of the Imperial contribution is the result of the
inclusion of the Viceregal and Civil Service charges, not, as should be
the case, in the Imperial account, but in the separate Irish account.

As an instance showing how exorbitant exactions defeat their own end by
diminishing, and not raising, the available revenue, it should be noted
that in 1853 an income tax of 7d. in the pound raised L200,000 more than
did an income tax of 8d. in the pound at the date of the Royal
Commission. Of the remedies which are suggested, the alteration of the
Fiscal system, by making abatements in the Irish Excise and Customs, is
not likely to be attempted. Reduction of expenditure, liberating money
which may be made to serve a useful purpose, is obviously the first
step, but any scheme of allocation of large sums for Irish development,
without full and proper financial control, will undoubtedly fail to meet
the case. The multiplication of irresponsible boards must be stopped,
and to what extent anything, save economies in expenditure, can be
effected without far larger changes remains a moot point. Of one thing,
at any rate, one may be certain--the present Liberal Government when in
Opposition joined forces with the Irish members in driving home the
tremendous admissions of the Royal Commissioners, and it is impossible
to think that, now they are in power, they will repudiate their
obligations, the more so as the present Chancellor of the Exchequer last
year announced the intention of the Government to see how far it is
possible to adjust the financial relations between the two kingdoms on a
fairer basis.

Sir Hercules Langrishe, the friend and correspondent o