as they can. An elaborate process of what is
called "the higgling of the market" goes on all over the world between
exchanges linked up by telegraph, whose prices vary to a sixteenth
and a thirty-second. We are invited to believe that with all that
subtle process of calculation made from almost minute to minute
throughout the year, the imposition of a duty or demand for L1,000,000
or L2,000,000 for this or that Government, placed suddenly upon the
commodity in question as a tax, makes no difference whatever to the
cost to the consumer; that it is borne either by the buyer or by the
seller, or provided in some magical manner. As a matter of fact, the
seller endeavours to transmit the burden to the purchaser, and the
purchaser places it upon the consumer as opportunity may occur in
relation to the general market situation all over the world.

That is by way of digression, only to show that we believe that a tax
on a commodity is a factor in its price, which I thought was a
tolerably simple proposition. What a dangerous thing it will be, year
after year, to associate the idea of Empire, of our kith and kin
beyond the seas, of these great, young, self-governing Dominions in
which our people at present take so much pride, with an enhancement,
however small, in the price of the necessary commodities of the life
and the industry of Britain! It seems to me that, quite apart from
the Parliamentary difficulty to which I have referred, which I think
would tend to organise and create anti-Colonial sentiment, you would,
by the imposition of duties upon the necessaries of life and of
industry, breed steadily year by year, and accumulate at the end of a
decade a deep feeling of sullen hatred of the Colonies, and of
Colonial affairs among those poorer people in this country to whom Mr.
Lloyd George referred so eloquently yesterday, and whose case, when
stated, appeals to the sympathy of every one round this table. That
would be a great disaster.

But there is another point which occurs to me, and which I would
submit respectfully to the Conference in this connection. Great
fluctuations occur in the price of all commodities which are subject
to climatic influences. We have seen enormous fluctuations in meat and
cereals and in food-stuffs generally from time to time in the world's
markets. Although we buy in the markets of the whole world we observe
how much the price of one year varies from that of another year. These
fluctuations ar