, it
would not prevent those frauds against which it was said to be provided:
that from the examination of the commissioners of the customs, it
appeared that those frauds did not exceed forty thousand pounds per
annum, and might in a great measure be abolished, by a due execution of
the laws in being; consequently this scheme was unnecessary, would
be ineffectual in augmenting the revenue, destructive to trade, and
dangerous to the liberties of the subject, as it tended to promote a
general excise, which was in all countries considered as a grievous
oppression. They suggested that it would produce an additional swarm
of excise officers and warehouse-keepers, appointed and paid by the
treasury, so as to multiply the dependents on the crown, and enable it
still further to influence the freedom of elections: that the traders
would become slaves to excisemen and warehouse-keepers, as they would be
debarred all access to their commodities, except at certain hours, when
attended by those officers: that the merchant, for every quantity of
tobacco he could sell, would be obliged to make a journey, or send
a messenger to the office for a permit, which could not be obtained
without trouble, expense, and delay: and that should a law be enacted in
consequence of this motion, it would in all probability be some time or
other used as a precedent for introducing excise laws into every branch
of the revenue; in which case the liberty of Great Britain would be no
more. In the course of this debate, sir Robert Walpole took notice of
the multitudes which had beset all the approaches to the house. He said
it would be an easy task for a designing seditious person to raise a
tumult and disorder among them: that gentlemen might give them what name
they should think fit, and affirm they were come as humble suppliants;
but he knew whom the law called sturdy beggars: and those who brought
them to that place could not be certain but that they might behave in
the same manner. This insinuation was resented by sir John Barnard, who
observed that merchants of character had a right to come down to the
court of requests, and lobby of the house of commons, in order to
solicit their friends and acquaintance against any scheme or project
which they might think prejudicial to their commerce: that when he came
into the house, he saw none but such as deserved the appellation of
sturdy beggars as little as the honourable gentleman himself, or any
gentleman wha