Chapter IX: Appendix: Great Precedence Question 287 (8)

The problem remains unsolved how the terror of capital
punishments is to be purified from the abominable accessories
and consequences which Dickens and Thackeray have so vividly and
usefully described. I am not one of those who think that capital
punishments are either unlawful or inexpedient. The passage in
Holy Writ which says that the civil ruler bears the sword to be a
terror to evil-doers, points out with infallible authority both
the lawfulness and the use of the extreme penalty. But still I
must admit that this dreadful prerogative of Sovereignty--the
power of life and death--may be, and is in this country,
exercised in such a way, that one might almost doubt whether the
moral pestilence which it spreads did not counterbalance the
security that it affords to society.

The Committee of the House of Lords on Capital Punishment were
so convinced of the evil effects of the present mode of carrying
into effect capital punishments, that they recommended that
executions should in future take place within the prison, and in
the presence only of official and selected witnesses. But this
opinion does not solve the difficulty. Mr. George Augustus Sala
truly says that private executions would not be tolerated in the
present state of society. Besides, certainly the terror produced
by the sight of death cannot be equalled by the sound of a bell
or the hoisting of a black flag, which the Lords’ Committee
propose; and these forms would soon lose any impressiveness. The
sight of death is, indeed, most awful to human nature:

“---- O sight
Of terror, foul and ugly to behold,
Horrid to think--how horrible to feel!”

The knowledge that a criminal had been put to death would no
doubt be less terrible to the criminal and dangerous population
if they were prevented from seeing the execution. If the plan
of private executions be rejected, what can be done to give a
character to public executions more wholesome than that justly
condemned by the committee?

The cold, business-like formality of a public execution is then
referred to: beyond a glimpse of the chaplain’s surplice there
is nothing to remind the spectators of the awful and sacred
character with which the Christian religion invests death. The
people see a man strangled, and that is all.

Archdeacon Bickersteth evidently felt this when he said before
the Lords’ Committee, “I would suggest that the churches might
be opened.... There might be a service at the time, and perhaps
a prayer for the criminal.” This is a very pregnant hint. At
the execution of three men at Dundalk a few years ago, when the
criminals came on the scaffold, all the people knelt and prayed
for them at the request of the priest. Those who were there
describe the scene as most solemn and honourable to the Irish
character. The prisoners confessed their guilt and declared their
penitence. An account describing a late execution for murder at
Ancona, says that the prisoner knelt on the scaffold and repeated
the Litany, the crowd making the responses. A friend of mine
who was at an execution for murder in Rome, told me that the
thousands of spectators round the scaffold recited the _Miserere_
and _De Profundis_ in a loud voice. How different this is from
“levity, jeering, laughing, hooting, whistling, low jesting, and
indecent ribaldry” described before the Committee! This contrast
surely suggests that the people in England should be better
taught than they are, and that it is by religious influences that
executions can be purified from their abominable and loathsome
effects. The people should be made to feel that they are, so to
speak, attending a death-bed scene of the most frightful and
appalling kind, and not the mere slaughter of a biped without
feathers.

Sir George Bowyer then relates how the problem is solved in Italy, where, in every city is a religious society of laymen, called “the Confraternity of Death,” or of Mercy, whose duty it is to attend criminals before and at their execution:

The exposition of the blessed sacrament for the forty hours’
prayer commences in the churches, and the people attend in
great numbers during the whole day, and even sometimes during
the night. The prisoner is taken to the place of execution
(usually outside the town) in the following manner:--First the
great black cross and banner of the Confraternity is seen slowly
advancing, followed by the members walking two and two in their
black cassocks and their hoods over their faces, with apertures
for their eyes. As they proceed along the streets they recite the
Penitential Psalms aloud. They are followed by the litter for the
dead body, carried by four of their number; and then comes the
convict, assisted by the clergy and brethren. At the scaffold
the Confraternity stand round and continue their devotions until
the prisoner is dead, and then they remove the body in the same
funeral procession.

These facts, it must be admitted, are very suggestive; but, how far such ceremonies are adapted for a Protestant country is extremely questionable.

That experienced judge, Baron Alderson, in his answers given to a Committee of the House of Commons, looked on the deterring effect of punishment, such as it was, as more indispensable than the reforming:--

“It is desirable--I do not know whether it is the duty of the State--to make all criminals better if possible; but I think this object is to be held subservient to that of preventing crime by the example of punishment; and on no other principle that I can perceive is it possible to defend capital punishments, which can hardly be said to have any tendency to make the individual criminals better, though I think they have a strong effect in repressing crime.”

The latest evidence upon the subject is--that in September, 1863, the Association for the Promotion of Social Science, holding its second session at Ghent, discussed at great length the subject of punishment of death. The abolition was finally voted by a great majority. In the course of the debate a member read a list of 167 convicts sentenced to death, of whom 161 had been present at capital executions; and he concluded from this fact, that the witnessing capital punishment is not efficacious in the suppression of crime.

FOOTNOTES:

[5] The Statutes were inscribed in Latin to the time of Edward I. (1272); in Norman-French to about the time of Richard III. (1483); and subsequently in the English language.

[6] Selected and condensed from the _Times_, June 13, 1863.

[7] See _Things not generally Known_, First Series, pp. 120-121. _Popular Errors Explained_, p. 207.

[8] In some cases where parties had been married at Gretna, the marriage used to be repeated, as soon as they returned to England, _in a church_.

[9] In 1815 the number of marriages celebrated at Gretna was stated in Brewster’s _Edinburgh Encyclopædia_, at 65, which produced about 1000_l._ at the rate of fifteen guineas each: Murray, however, charged as low a fee as sixpence each.

[10] For the details of these successful steps for the abolition of the Gretna Green marriages, the writer is indebted to the obliging courtesy of a Correspondent who took an active part in the measure.

[11] This Treasury Minute of July 16, 1861, directs that the superintendents and inspectors of police shall be authorized to receive treasure-trove from the finders, and shall transmit it to the Solicitor of the Treasury, who will ascertain at the Mint the real intrinsic or metallic value of the treasure, and the amount will then be remitted to the finder. Cases will no doubt occur in which rare and valuable coins will be disposed of at a higher price than their bullion value, but they will then find their way into some collection, either public or private, and will not be melted down. It should be generally known that treasure-trove is not claimed peremptorily by the Crown, nor is there any occasion for the finder to sell it to the nearest silversmith under the apprehension that it would have to be given up without compensation.

Measure and Value.

_Numbers descriptive of Distance._

Before the introduction of railways we scarcely possessed any standard by which an idea could be formed of the distances and movements of the planets by comparison with those which exist on the terrestrial globe. Thus, the mean distance of the moon from the earth is about 237,000 miles. A steam-carriage on a railway, proceeding uninterruptedly, at the rate of 25 miles an hour, would run 237,000 miles in 1 year, 4 weeks, and 2 days. This falls within the limits of our conception. We may imagine something analogous to this, supposing a carriage, or rather a succession of carriages, to be kept constantly at work for rather more than two years, and working 12 hours per day. But our powers of imagination fail us in estimating a distance equal to that of the earth from the sun, namely, _ninety-five millions of miles_.[12] Our steam-carriage illustration is here no longer available, since it falls far beyond the boundaries of probability. Proceeding uninterruptedly at twenty-five miles an hour, it would require 433 years to move over a space equal to ninety-five millions of miles.--_Dr. Lardner._

_Precocious Mental Calculation._

A rare exceptional instance of this faculty being cultivated and matured for a highly-useful purpose, is presented in the case of Mr. Bidder, the eminent civil engineer, known in his childhood as “the Calculating Boy.” (See a portrait in the _Boy’s Own Book_.)

George Parkes Bidder, when six years old, used to amuse himself by counting up to 100, then to 1000, then to 1,000,000: by degrees, he accustomed himself to contemplate the relations of high numbers, and used to build up peas, marbles, and shot, into squares, cubes, and other regular figures. He invented processes of his own, distinct from those given in books of arithmetic, and could solve all the usual questions mentally more rapidly than other boys with the aid of pen and paper. When he became eminent as a civil engineer, he was wont to embarrass and baffle the parliamentary counsel on contested railway bills, by confuting their statements of figures almost before the words were out of their mouths. In 1856, he gave to the Institution of Civil Engineers an interesting account of this singular arithmetical faculty--so far, at least, as to show that _memory_ has less to do with it than is generally supposed: the processes are actually worked out _seriatim_, but with a rapidity almost inconceivable. They are accomplished mentally by occupying the mind simultaneously with the double task of _computing_ and _registering_. The first--computing--is executive, or reasoning, and is that portion of the process, which, whilst it is the most active, is not that which causes the greatest strain upon the mind. The result is recorded by the second faculty, registering, which is the real strain upon the mind, and that by which alone the power of Mental Calculation is limited.

Experience has shown that, up to a certain point, the power of registering is as rapid as thought; but the difficulty increases, in a very high ratio, in reference to the number and extent of impressions to be registered, until a point is reached, the registering of which, in the mind and by writing, are exactly balanced. Below that point, mental registration is preferable; above it, that by writing will be as quick, and more certain.

All the rules employed by Mr. Bidder were invented by him, and are only methods of so arranging calculation as to facilitate the power of registration: in fact, he thus arrives at a sort of natural algebra, using actual numbers in the place of symbols. When he first began to deal with numbers (in his 6th year), he had not learned to read, and certainly long after that time he was taught the symbolical numbers from the face of a watch.

A brief outline of Mr. Bidder’s method is given in the _Year-Book of Facts_, 1857, pp. 149-152. The paper, _in extenso_, has been edited and published by Mr. Charles Manby, F.R.S., Honorary Secretary to the Institution of Civil Engineers.

_The Roman Foot._

The late celebrated architect and antiquary, Luigi Canina, made a great number of inquiries as to the length of the ancient Roman foot. He measured very carefully the Antonine and Trajan columns, and found them (exclusive of their pedestals and some pieces let in to repair them) exactly alike. This height, which was known to have been 100 Roman feet, was measured with extreme care by means of rods of wood carefully dried, and found to be exactly 29·635 French mètres. Measuring chains were then constructed of this length, and the Roman miles (_mille passuum_) carefully measured down the Appian Way as far as the twelfth mile, and were found to correspond with the traditional sites of the milestones. The great length of these measurements being such an extensive check, their accuracy was at once accepted by the Roman archæologists as the best authority known. This would make the ancient Roman foot 11·66753 English inches; and the mile 4861·41 English feet; being about one-eleventh less than our English mile of 5280 feet. For rough reckoning the antiquary may deduct one-eleventh from Roman miles to bring them into English; or may add one-tenth to English miles to bring them into Roman; the ratio being 10:11, but inversely. There is a common error in supposing the Roman mile, or _mille passuum_, was 1000 paces, or single steps. This is not the case: the military _passus_ consisted of _two_ steps (_gressus_), or about 5 feet Roman.--_Notes and Queries._

_The Peruvian Quipus._

The well-known contrivance of the Quipus, or method of counting and even recording events by means of cords, was equally ingenious and original. The quipus of the Peruvians were of twisted wool, and consisted of a thick cord, with threads more or less fine, attached to the main part. The smaller lines were covered with knots, either single or double. The size of the quipus varies much, sometimes the main cord being five or six yards long, and at others not more than a foot; the branches rarely exceeding a yard in length, and being sometimes shorter. In the neighbourhood of Lurin, on the coast of Peru, a quipu was found which weighed twelve pounds. The different colours of the threads had different meanings: thus, the red signified a soldier, or war; the yellow gold; the white, silver, or peace, &c. In the system of arithmetic, a single knot signified 10, two single knots 20, a double knot 100, a triple knot 1000, and so on to higher numbers. But not only the colour and mode of combining the knots, but also the laying-up of the strands of the cord, and the distances of the threads apart, were of great importance in reading the quipus. It is probable that in the earliest times this ingenious contrivance was merely used for enumeration, as the shepherd notches the number of his sheep on a stick; but in the course of time the science was so much improved that the initiated were able to knot historical records, laws, and decrees, so that the great events of the empire were transmitted to posterity; and, to some extent, the quipus supplied the place of chronicles and national archives. The registry of tributes, the census of populations, the lists of arms, of soldiers, and of stores, the supplies of maize, clothes, shoes, &c., in the storehouses, were all specified with admirable exactness by the quipus; and in every town of any importance, there was an officer, called the quipu camayoc, to knot and decipher these documents.--_Markham’s Visit to Peru._

_Distances measured._

Many people hear of distances in thousands of yards--a usual measure of artillery distances--and have very little power of reducing them at once to miles. Now, four miles are ten yards for each mile above 7000 yards, whence the following rule: the number of thousands multiplied by 4 and divided by 7 give miles and sevenths for quotient and remainder, with only at the rate of ten yards to a mile in excess. Thus 12,000 yards is 48 7ths of a mile, or 6 miles and 6 7ths of a mile: not 70 yards too great. Again, people measure speed by miles per hour, the mile and the hour being too long for the judgment of distance and time. Take half as much again as the number of miles per hour, and you have the number of feet per second, too great by one in 30. Thus 16 miles an hour is 16 + 8, or 24 feet per second, too much by 24-30ths of a foot.--_Athenæum_, No. 1854.

_Uniformity of Weights and Measures._

A collection of the Weights and Measures of the various countries of the world, made, under the auspices of the International Association, for obtaining a uniform Decimal System of Measures, Weights, and Coins, was among the curiosities of the International Exhibition of 1862. Few persons are perhaps aware of the extraordinary diversities in weights and measures, and in their use, which exist in our own country. The price of com, for instance, will be quoted in at least fifteen different ways in as many different localities; at so much per _cwt._, per _barrel_, per _quarter_, per _bushel_, per _load_, per _bag_, per _weight_, per _boll_, per _coomb_, per _hobbet_, per _winch_, per _windle_, per _strike_, per _measure_, per _stone_. The word _bushel_ is in some places used for a measure, in others for a weight, and this weight is by no means the same in all places. In different English towns the bushel means--168 lbs., 73½ lbs., 62 lbs., 80 lbs., 75 lbs., 72 lbs., 70 lbs., 65 lbs., 64 lbs., 63 lbs., 5 quarters, 144 quarts, 488 lbs., and in Manchester, while a bushel of English wheat is 60 lbs., a bushel of American wheat is 70 lbs. The meaning of a _stone_ is almost equally various. An acre of land expresses seven different quantities. These variations in measurement must be highly inconvenient, and prejudicial to trade; and the labours of the above-named Association are directed to bringing about a uniformity, which seems greatly called for. The metrical system employed in France is that which is advocated. This has been already established in Belgium, Holland, Sardinia, Lombardy, Greece, Spain, Portugal, and many other parts of the world. Great Britain and the American States still adhere to their old systems.

_Trinity High-water Mark._

Trinity High-water Mark is placed in various parts of London, as described in the _Register of Tides in the River Thames_, printed by order of the Honourable Court of Commissioners, of the 26th of October, 1849; and every bench-mark in London is shown in feet and decimals of feet above an oblate spheroidal datum plane, decreasing in radii towards the north pole from the centre of gravity between the parallels of latitude at London and Liverpool, about 2·02 feet, or 24¼ inches, which is evidently worthy of consideration, at a rate of 2 feet to the mile in 40 miles of sewer. The difference at Liverpool is also given in the aforesaid Report; and this may prove of public utility if reported on by the engineer employed in the levelling of the main drainage of London. The Ravensbourne drainage is a specimen of such levelling. The approximate mean water at Liverpool is 12½ feet below the level of Trinity High-Water at London, as described identical with the level of the datum plane of the Ordnance survey of London, which is also 12½ feet below the level of Trinity High-Water mark.

_Origin of Rent._

The want of intelligent workmen, without the concurrence of other causes, might have destroyed the old English predial polity, if that system had not failed through its own nature; having been essentially rude and awkward and uncommercial. Under the Plantagenets, service could in general be reduced to money at the discretion of the lord or the option of the tenant. The service often cost the tenant more than it was worth--he found it cheaper to pay than to work: on the other hand, money must have been at all times welcome to the lord, and he did not at all times require labour. In the course of time agricultural service went out of use altogether, and money was regularly tendered and accepted instead of it: so that the improved rent, as it has been called, now paid by a farmer, appears to be a compound--historically considered--of the ancient mail or gable, and of a great variety of petty charges, which were originally compensations for tributes of corn, malt, poultry, bacon, and eggs--or fines for the non-performance of acts of tillage, carriage, porterage, and the like. The elements of rent were recognised in Scotland longer than in England, because petty charges subsisted in Scotland for some time after they had been abandoned in England. At the beginning of the eighteenth century, David Deans--the tough true-blue Presbyterian farmer--still paid “mail duties, kain, arriage, carriage, dry multure, lock, gowpen, and knaveship, and all the various exactions now commuted for money, and summed up in the emphatic word RENT.”--_Heart of Mid-Lothian_, chap. viii.; _Law Magazine_, N. S., No. 27.

_Curiosities of the Exchequer._

Mr. Foss, in his _Lives of the Judges_, tells us that the Court of Exchequer was anciently sometimes called _Curia Regis ad Scaccarium_; and its name was derived from the table at which it sat, which was “a four-cornered board, about ten feet long and five feet broad, fitted in manner of a table to sit about, on every side whereof is a standing ledge or border, four fingers broad. Upon this board is laid a cloth bought in Easter Term, which is of black colour, rowed with strokes, distant about a foot or span, like a chess-board. On the spaces of this Scaccarium, or chequered cloth, counters were ranged, with denoting marks, for checking the computations.”

In the old Court of Exchequer, at Westminster, before the coronation of King George IV., might be seen the chequered cloth which covered the table of that Court. This table, at which sat the officers of the Court, and the king’s counsel, was ten or twelve feet square, and was covered with a woollen cloth, the groundwork of which was white, with a very dark blue chequered pattern over it; the dark stripes being about three inches wide, leaving between them white squares of about four inches across.

Again, the cover on the table of the Exchequer Court in Dublin is composed of a thick woollen substance made in squares of black and white, resembling a chess-board.

The origin of the word _Scaccarium_ (whence Exchequer) is not certain. Madox, the historical authority upon the subject, considers the most likely derivation to be from _Scaccus_, or _Scaccum_, a chess-board, or the _ludus Scaccarium_, the game of chess. He then refers to the chequered cloth mentioned by Foss; adding, “from the Latin _Scaccarium_ cometh the _French Eschequier_, or _Exchequier_, (_Exchiquer_,) and the English name from the French.”

Mr. G. A. Sala, in a communication to _Notes and Queries_, 3rd S. No. 81, however, traces exchequer to the Italian _Zecca_, treasury or mint; whence, also, he derives the word cheque; remembering that in old time our goldsmiths were Lombards and Venetians.

However this may be, the forms by which accounts were kept in the Exchequer, and receipts given for moneys paid by “the King’s debtors” in those days, when few persons knew how to write and cipher, and “double entry” was unknown, were strictly observed down to a period scarcely thirty years ago. The rude wooden “tallies” that were prepared as quittances for payment, and stowed away in the Exchequer as entries of receipt, were still maintained in their sham employment until finally abolished by an Act passed in 1834. The officials who superintended, or were supposed to superintend, the operation of cutting, delivering, and keeping the tallies were paid by fees on all receipts; and as the national revenue augmented their incomes became enormous. A “Tallier,” or, as the name became latterly, “Teller,” of the Exchequer enjoyed at last an income from his sinecure office of more than 30,000_l._ per annum.

The Tally was a slip of willow-wood, cut to a length proportioned to the magnitude of the pecuniary transaction it was intended to record. Its indications were rendered by notches, which signified various sums, according to their size and shape.[13]

When fabricated the instrument indicated this meaning. A large
notch of an inch and a half in width signified 1000_l._; a
smaller notch, one inch in width, signified 100_l._; one of
half-an-inch signified 20_l._; a notch in the wood slanting to
the right signified 10_l._ (in combination this notch was placed
before the 20_l._ notch); small notches signified 1_l._ each; a
cut sloping to the right signified 10s. (in combination placed
before the 1_l._ marks); slight indentations, or jags, in the
wood signified shillings; strokes with ink on tally signified
pence; a round hole, or dot, signified a halfpenny; a farthing
was written in figures.

When split in two lengthwise across the notches, each section of
the tally, of course, corresponded exactly. One half was then
delivered to the party paying money, as a receipt, and the other
kept by the officers of the department, as a check or record of
the transaction. On neither side was the slightest value attached
to the tally; but down to 1834 no payment could be made into
the Exchequer without summoning the officers of the Tally, who
gravely notched and split the willow wand, and handed over the
Exchequer half to be placed in careful custody. The absurdity
came to an end in that year; but by way of farewell ceremony,
is reported to have burnt down the Parliament Houses; certain
furnace flues having become overheated by burning a lumbering
mass of Exchequer tallies. Nor was the tally the only idle
formality observed when payments were made into the Exchequer.
Centuries ago the Royal moneys were actually received and kept
in that department; but for a long while past the actual cash
has been lodged in the Bank of England, where it is more safely
guarded, and more conveniently administered. Nevertheless, every
sum received on Exchequer account was still nominally brought to
the Exchequer Office; and for that purpose a Bank clerk regularly
attended every day with a bundle of cancelled notes, which were
solemnly counted over and checked, and deposited as a precious
trust in a massive iron chest secured with three keys, each in
the custody of different officers.

The tally in course of time failed to satisfy the payers of money
to Exchequer account, and a written quittance became necessary.
This also in its turn grew obsolete in form and language, but was
in like manner preserved in all its antique unintelligibility
until the Act of 1834.

Such was the “tally” system of olden time, and, undoubtedly, it in some way is involved in the origination of what is known as the “tally shop” system of to-day.

Formerly, in the Exchequer business, the collectors and receivers charged with the receipt of public moneys from the taxpayers were required to find sureties for their honesty. These security bonds were valid only for a year, and, therefore, annually renewed, to the great profit of the law and other officers of the Crown. When each collector had duly settled his account, and paid-in all the proper moneys into the Exchequer, for any year, he received back his bond, signifying a discharge from all further liability, and this was called getting his _quietus_. The practice and the term are now disused, but they evidently constituted the point of _Hamlet’s_ allusion:--

When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin.

_What becomes of the Public Revenue._

Of the seventy millions of the Revenue more than one-third is disposed of by the interest of the National Debt, a charge not liable to any important variation. It was less by 89,412_l._ in 1862 than in the year before. But the difference is very slight on such a sum as 26,142,606_l._ The armed force of the country is the next great channel of expenditure. The Army in 1862 absorbed 15,570,869_l._, an increase of 399,000_l._ over its cost in the previous year. The Navy required 12,598,042_l._ in the same period, or 733,626_l._ less than in 1861. Together they account for more than 28,000,000_l._ of the public expenditure. The naval and military operations in China figure in both years of this return. In 1861 they drew from the Exchequer 3,043,896_l._; and in 1862 a further sum of 1,230,000_l._ The votes or money for fortifications rose suddenly from 50,000_l._ in 1861 to 970,000_l._ in 1862. There are small variations, both of reduction and increase, dispersed through an immense number of items, but when the gross sum they absorb is reckoned up, the difference between one year and another is scarcely worth noting.

_Queen Anne’s Bounty._

The origin of this revenue, which is considered to effect little compared with what might be accomplished under improved management, is as follows. We know that in olden times the Romish Pontiff had the “tenths” of the net annual income of good livings, as well as first-fruits. When the Pope and Henry VIII. quarrelled, and the Papal supremacy was subverted, not only was the supremacy in ecclesiastical affairs transferred from the Pope of Rome to England’s supreme ruler, but also the tenths and first-fruits likewise. At length Queen Anne came to the throne, when (with the consent of her Parliament) she nobly refused to receive what the Church should enjoy, and placed the income under the direction of a Board called “the Governors of Queen Anne’s Bounty.” Their revenue for the improvement of poor livings is considerable, but it might be largely increased. The Pope would have had the real present value, and not that of centuries since; yet, strange to say, while some old benefices have been freed from payment no new rich livings have since been included, and all the old ones are rated according to the absurd scale of assessment made in the time of Henry VIII. To illustrate this the writer compiled the following, some time since:--

+-----------------------+------------+-----------+-------------+
| | | Value in | Value in |
| Benefice. | Diocese. | King’s | Clergy |
| | | Books. | List. |
+-----------------------+------------+-----------+-------------+
| 1. Stanhope | Durham | £67 6 8 | £4848 0 0 |
| 2. Whitchurch | Lichfield | 8 17 0 | 1458 0 0 |
| 3. Halsall | Chester | 24 11 5 | 3500 0 0 |
| 4. Croston | Manchester | 31 11 0 | 1050 0 0 |
| 5. Edgmond | Lichfield | 46 8 0 | 2600 0 0 |
| 6. Houghton-le-Spring | Durham | 124 0 0 | 1600 0 0 |
| 7. Bingham | Lincoln | 44 7 0 | 1503 0 0 |
| | +-----------+-------------+
| | | £347 1 1 | £16,559 0 0 |
+-----------------------+------------+-----------+-------------+

Thus, seven benefices which now pay only 34_l._ as tenths to the fund, would, if rated according to the present net value, furnish 1600_l._ annually. If this were altered, and a graduated scale of taxation upon all valuable livings adopted, we should soon see a more equitable and less objectionable management of ecclesiastical affairs. If all the rich clergy regularly assisted the poor benefices, would not the rich laity do the same?

We quote the above from a communication to the _Times_, 1862. It has been significantly remarked that a Report of the Receipts and Expenditure of the Bounty is desirable.

_Ecclesiastical Fees._

A Return issued in 1863, gives a curious list of Fees payable by members of the sacred profession. The Bishop of Lichfield had to pay 624_l._ on his appointment to that see; the Bishop of Bath and Wells 450_l._ on his translation from Sodor and Man. To this prelate the Attorney-General, or “his office,” presented a demand for nearly 30_l._; the Secretary of State (including stamp), 23_l._; a mysterious impersonality, “the Petty Bag-office,” absorbed 167_l._ When the Bishop had his audience of Her Majesty the homage fees were 94_l._, and the _Court Circular_ charged a guinea for its line and a half of history. The bill winds up with an item of 21_l._ for “passing documents through the various offices.” Bishop Baring’s “homage” on translation from Gloucester to Durham cost him only 21_l._ 6s. 8d. The Bishops of Chester and Lichfield add an item of 11_l._ 2s. and 12_l._ for gloves. The fees on the consecration of a church or churchyard are heavy, but it is noticeable as a rule that the bishops waive the customary payment to themselves.

_Burying Gold and Silver._

The practice of burying treasure in the earth has uniformly prevailed in all countries harassed by intestine commotions, or exposed to foreign invasions. Of sums so deposited a very considerable proportion has been altogether lost; and this has, no doubt, been one of the principal means by which the stock of the precious metals has been kept down to its present level. Every one is aware that, during the Middle Ages, _treasure-trove_, or money dug from the ground, formed no inconsiderable part of the revenues of this and other countries. And though the burying of money has long ceased in Great Britain, such has not been the case with our neighbours. Wakefield tells us that, down to 1812, the practice was common in Ireland; and though much fallen off, it still continues to this day to be occasionally resorted to in that part of the kingdom. It has always prevailed, more or less, in almost every part of the Continent. The anarchy and brigandage that accompanied the Revolution of 1789 made the practice be carried to an extraordinary extent in France; and there, owing to various causes, it still maintains a broad and firm footing. Dupuynode, in 1853, estimated the sum at 40 millions thus rendered sterile. Yet, we doubt whether the burying of treasure be at present as prevalent in France as in many parts of Germany, and in Hungary, Russia, Italy, Spain, and European Turkey. The feeling of insecurity that has prevailed in all these countries, especially since 1848, has given a stimulus to this practice. Of the many millions that were distributed among the countries round the Black Sea, during the late campaigns in that quarter, the greater portion is believed to be as much withdrawn from circulation as if it had never been dug from the mine.

It is impossible, of course, to form any estimate of the sums that are thus annually, as it were, placed in mortmain. They are always greater when wars or revolutionary disturbances are in progress; when their occurrence is anticipated, or but little confidence is placed in the permanence of existing institutions. There can, at all events, be no question that the sums which have been disposed of in the way now stated in the different Continental countries of late years have been enormous--greater, perhaps, than those absorbed by any of the usual channels of expenditure. But the practice has been carried to a greater extent in India, Persia, Turkey in Asia, and other eastern countries, than anywhere in the western world. Despotism and a want of security have always prevailed in these countries. The inhabitants have been, in consequence, accustomed to regard the money they have committed to the earth as their only real wealth, and have availed themselves of every opportunity to place portions of their means beyond the grasp of their avaricious and tyrannical masters. And as many of the hoards so deposited will never be brought to light, the practice has, undoubtedly, been a principal cause of the constant flow of bullion to the East.

Bernier, “that most curious traveller,” as he is called by Gibbon, has some remarks on this subject, in which he calls the empire of the Mogul an abyss of gold and silver, which the people buried to escape the injustice and exactions to which they were exposed. At a later date, Mr. Luke Scrafton refers to the same practice. “In India,” he says, “the Hindoos bury their dead under-ground, often with such secresy as not to trust their own children with the knowledge of it; and it is amazing what they will suffer rather than betray it. When their tyrants have tried all manner of corporal punishments upon them, and that fails, resentment prevailing over the love of life, they frequently rip up their bowels, or poison themselves, and carry the secret to their graves. And the sums lost in this manner in some measure account why the silver of India does not appear to increase, though there are such quantities continually coming into it, and none going out.”

The comparative security that was lately enjoyed by the natives in most parts of India may have done something to lessen this habit, in the countries directly under the Company’s government; but there was in Oude, and many other parts of India, previous to the late insurrection, a good deal of disorder, oppression, and robbery. And since that unfortunate outbreak, insecurity and disorders of all sorts have immeasurably increased, and have proportionally stimulated the practice of hoarding. The rebellion in China led to similar effects; and we have been assured by those who, from experience and observation are well qualified to form an opinion on such a subject, that it may be moderately estimated that in India and China, during the half-dozen years ending with 1857, a sum of not less than 100,000,000_l._ sterling has been consigned to the earth.--_J. R. Macculloch_; _Ency. Brit._, 1859.

Thirty years ago, _hoarding_ coin went on in England to a considerable extent, and greatly augmented the scarcity, and consequently the value, of the precious metals. Even the old practice of _making a stocking_ was by no means given up in rural districts. A writer in the _Quarterly Review_, 1832, states, “We ourselves, but a few days back, personally witnessed an old crone, the wife of a small and apparently poor farmer, in a wild pastoral district, bring no less than three hundred sovereigns in a bag to a neighbouring attorney, to be placed by him in security; her treasure having accumulated till she was afraid to keep it longer at home. Such examples are by no means so rare as may be imagined. The failures of so many country banks in 1825 destroyed the confidence of country-people in the bank-notes of the present banks, and causes their preference for gold. The failure of many attorneys, as well as of country banks, which received and gave interest on deposits, and, (with the exception of the savings’-banks, which are very limited in the amount of the deposits they allow,) the total absence, in the rural districts of England, of any safe and accessible depositaries for the savings of the economical, such as the invaluable Scotch banks, have tended most injuriously to discourage economy; and where that principle was strongly ingrafted, have converted it into a practice of hoarding--have caused it to stagnate in unprofitable masses, which, spread through proper channels, would have stimulated new industry and new accumulations, and added both to the wealth of the owner, and to the general stock.”

_Results of Gold-seeking._

The question as to the probable continuation, increase, or diminution of the Supply of Gold is of the greatest interest; though nothing but the vaguest conjectures can be offered respecting it. Though gold be very generally distributed, it is extremely doubtful whether there be many places in which the deposits are so rich and so extensive as in California and Australia; and even in these the produce is either stationary, or has begun to decline. The myriads of adventurers that are attracted to prolific diggings can hardly fail, in no very lengthened period, to rifle the richest beds. And when this is done--when the excitement caused by the original discovery is worn off, and the great prizes in the gigantic lottery recur only at distant intervals,--then, unless some new and equally promising discoveries should be made, a serious check will be given to the gold-seeking mania. The process of quartz-crushing is believed to produce only moderate profits, and is not of a kind to collect crowds of competitors. The few fortunes that have been realized in California and Australia have not been made by the diggers, but by the merchants and others who have supplied their real or imaginary wants, or bought their gold-dust and nuggets on advantageous terms. Of those engaged on their own account in the search of gold, very few have retired from the pursuit with anything like a real competence. The great majority have hardly realized the wages current in the districts before the deposits were discovered; and the conviction seems to be everywhere gaining ground, that more is to be made by cultivating the surface of the earth than by digging in its bowels, or crushing its rocks.--_J. R. Macculloch_; _Ency. Brit._, 1859.

_What becomes of the Precious Metals?_

The indestructibility of Gold is one of its many characteristics, and some very curious questions arise from the fact. We know that at a very early period of the history of the human race, gold was discovered in very large quantities, and was used for a variety of ornamental and useful purposes. Among the latter may be named its employment as a medium of exchange, not exactly in the form of money, but nearly approaching to it. Pieces of the precious metal were cut into certain lengths and were stamped with figures denoting their weight, and these circulated freely among the buyers and sellers of those remote and primitive times. What was known as a talent of gold weighed, it is supposed, 125 lbs., and Dr. Adam Clarke estimates that the revenue of King Solomon in gold, was equal in value to about 4,683,375_l._ sterling. To some extent this estimate is confirmed by the Bible; for it is stated in the book of Kings that “the weight of gold that came to Solomon in one year, was six hundred and three score and six talents of gold,” without reference to silver, which the same authority states, “was nothing accounted of in the days of Solomon.” According to Calmet, the precious metals expended by the same monarch in building Jerusalem and the Temple, amounted in value to eight hundred millions of pounds sterling, and the questions naturally suggest themselves as to where this enormous amount of material came from, and what has become of it also.

It is sufficient for our purpose to know that the precious metals did actually exist in very large quantities; and there is little doubt that they had been accumulating almost from the period of the creation of man. The early history of the Jews abounds with statements as to the uses to which gold was put. The subsequent conquests of Rome doubtlessly led to its absorption at one time of a very large proportion of the accumulated mineral wealth of the world.

It is also plain that the Romans could not employ the precious metals for domestic purposes, or at least not to any considerable extent. Watches, spoons, and plate were the inventions of much later times. Since it is clear that many hundreds of tons of gold found their way to Rome during its prosperous time, and equally clear that gold is indestructible, we may well inquire, “What has become of the vast treasures?” Was it, after the decline and fall of Rome, distributed among other nations? Were large quantities of the precious metals buried in the earth, which still holds them in its keeping?

Amidst a multitude of suggestive replies there remains the undoubted fact that gold is indestructible. Who shall say, in short, in the presence of the certain knowledge we have, that war, conquest, and spoliation have been the rule among nations for centuries past, that some of the “talents” of King Solomon, are not existing at this moment in the shape of sovereigns, in the pockets of the subjects of Queen Victoria? Or, who will have the hardihood to assert that the very watch-guard, or trinket he or she may wear, is not a _bonâ fide_ part of the treasure forwarded by the Queen of Sheba to Solomon the wise?

The fact seems to be clearly demonstrable that much of the gold and silver spoken of in Scripture and in ancient profane history is in active circulation at this hour amongst the inhabitants of the globe.--_Mechanics’ Magazine._

_Tribute-money._

The coins of the British Prince Cunobelin were not only stamped with the figures of animals, but with the word TASCIO, which signified TASK, TAX, and TRIBUTE. The payment of them into the Exchequer acquitted the subject of duties on merchandise, and was also a commutation of personal services. “I have thought,” says the learned Camden, “that in old time there was a certain sort of money coined on purpose for this use, seeing, in Scripture, it is called _tribute-money_; and I am the more confirmed in this opinion, because, in some of the British pieces, there is the Mint-master stamping the money with TASCIO, which among the Britons meant the tribute-money.”

_The First Lottery._

The first Lottery in England of which we have any account, took place in 1569, the proposals for which were published in 1567 and 1568. It consisted of 10,000 lots of ten shillings each: there were no blanks, and the prizes consisted chiefly of plate. There were then only three lottery-offices in London. The lottery was drawn at the west door of St. Paul’s Cathedral; and the profits were intended for the repair of the havens of the kingdom, and other public works. M. Greillier considers this number of lots much underrated, and raises them to 400,000; and he arrives at that conclusion because the drawing was continued uninterruptedly _both day and night_, between the 11th of January and the 6th of May. The first Lottery for sums of money took place in 1630.

_Coinage of a Sovereign._

The number of operations necessary for the conversion of an ingot of Gold into Sovereigns is greater than most persons are aware of. In the first instance it is melted; in the second it is cast into bars; in the third the bars are rolled; in the fourth they are cut into short lengths; in the fifth they are annealed in copper pans; in the sixth they are flattened into fillets; in the seventh the fillets are adjusted; in the eighth they are punched, and blanks produced; in the ninth the blanks are weighed singly by automaton balances; in the tenth the blanks are marked, or have their edges raised; in the eleventh they are annealed in cast-iron pans; in the twelfth they are blanched in an acid bath; in the thirteenth they are washed in cold water; in the fourteenth they are dried in hot beech-wood saw-dust; in the fifteenth they are muffled; and in the sixteenth stamped on both sides, milled on their edges, and made perfect for circulation! Thus sixteen operations, separate and distinct from each other, have to be performed in the production of sovereigns from an ingot. But the ingot will be after all only partly converted; the perforated “fillets,” amounting in weight to nearly half that of the original ingot, must be returned to the crucible, recast into bars, and these bars passed through the routine processes above enumerated. The fillets resulting from this second crop of sovereigns will again have to be melted, and yet again and again, if the ingot is to be made to yield all its value in coin; and thus the sixteen operations will be multiplied before the last sovereign is obtained from the precious wedge of gold.--_Mechanics’ Magazine._

_Wear and Tear of the Coinage._

It has been discovered by the Mint authorities that the intelligent or intelligible life of coins is much shorter than it was prior to the introduction of the railway system and cheap travelling. People move about now more frequently than they used, and so does money. Whether the former wear out sooner from their greater activity is a problem for social economists, but that the latter does is certain. Towards the close of the last century careful experiments deduced the fact that deterioration among ten-year-old silver coins of the various denominations was as follows:--Crowns, 3½ per cent.; half-crowns, 10 per cent.; shillings, 24½ per cent.; and sixpences, 38 2-10ths per cent. Now, the loss is nearly as follows on coins of the same age:--Crowns, 5 per cent.; half-crowns, 12 per cent.; shillings, 30 per cent.; sixpences, 45 per cent.; and threepences, over fifty per cent. This increase is evidently due to “fast living,” so to speak, and the weakest individuals; or, at any rate, the smallest, suffer most from its consequences. The gold coinage does not deteriorate in anything like the same ratio, and this from obvious causes. It is not subjected to anything like the same course of treatment. It moves in higher and more circumscribed circles, is only a legal tender when of legal weight, and is therefore nursed with more care under the porte-monnaie system. Of copper and bronze moneys, pence and halfpence suffer the most rapid deterioration, farthings being the longest lived of the three denominations. They are all tokens of value merely, and their shortcomings are less noticed, and, indeed, of far less consequence to the public.--_Mechanics’ Magazine._

_Counterfeit Coin._

There is little doubt that the method first employed in the manufacture of money was that of pouring fluid bullion into earthen moulds previously impressed by some rude artist with the device intended to be represented on the coin; and that (as now in some remote localities of Central India) a small cylindrical vessel, forming a smelting-furnace, a pair of tongs, a cutting-tool or file, and a pair of scales, constituted the entire apparatus for a mint. It is not a little singular that the casting process is that resorted to by counterfeiters up to this day. The customary mode adopted for the production of spurious money at present is precisely identical, indeed, with that employed in the manufacture of genuine coin by the monarchs and the _moneyers_--as the fabricators of money were then termed--of the Heptarchy, only that the coiners of to-day use appliances superior to those of the tenth century. A private coiner of the nineteenth century, whether in Birmingham or London, expends very little in the purchase of his plant of machinery. He provides himself with a pennyworth of plaster of Paris, which he converts into a mould; making a genuine coin serve as the medium for impressing the material when in a soft state with the devices--the obverse and reverse. If he cannot steal pint measures from a publican, he will have to invest a portion of his capital in Britannia-metal spoons at a shilling a dozen, and these he will break up and melt in an earthen pipkin, purchasable for another penny. With a tobacco-pipe for a ladle he will take up sufficient of the fused metal to create a florin, say, and this he will pour into the moulds. As soon as these are filled, and the base compound has become solidified, the moulds are separated, and any defects observable in the graining or milling of the edge are made good with a file or some other implement adapted to the nefarious purpose. If, after this, a clever confederate can finish the work by depositing a coat of silver (by galvanic agency), so much the better for the manufacturer, his chance of uttering being thus much enhanced.--_Mechanics’ Magazine._

_Standard Gold._

In 1855, an alteration was made in the quality of gold marked in Goldsmiths’ Hall, it being represented to the President of the Board of Trade that it would be advantageous alike to the manufacturer and the public: instead of there being only two different standards, there are now five--viz., 22, 18, 15, 12, and 9 carats. If, on the purchase of a watch, the cases, instead of having the mark of “18 carat,” the gold of which would be worth 67s. per oz., should be marked only “12 carat,” the gold is worth only 45s. per oz., and the purchaser has been legally robbed of the difference in value, which, supposing the cases to weigh 1 oz. 10 dwts., would be 33s.

When purchasing a gold watch, therefore, see that the cases are marked “18 carat;” if they are not so marked, do not make the purchase.

_Interest of Money._

Among the curiosities of the Exchequer, it may be mentioned that about the year 1857, there were paid into its account the proceeds of a lottery prize, drawn in the reign of George II., but which had remained unclaimed for 102 years. The original amount of the prize was 490_l._, to which in the course of a century there had been added 1499_l._ 8s. for interest. The sum of 1989_l._ 8s. was therefore handed over for the public service; but even now we have no doubt that if the purchaser of the ticket, warned by this announcement of the fact, can come forward and prove his claim, the money will be honourably refunded to him from the Exchequer.

_Interest of Money in India._