er.

In this manner these virtuous men concluded the peace; and their practice is only consonant to their theory.

Many things more might be observed on this curious head of our author's speculations. But, taking leave of what the writer says in his serious part, if he be serious in any part, I shall only just point out a piece of his pleasantry. No man, I believe, ever denied that the time for making peace is that in which the best terms may be obtained. But what that time is, together with the use that has been made of it, we are to judge by seeing whether terms adequate to our advantages, and to our necessities, have been actually obtained. -Here is the pinch of the question, and to which the author ought to have set his shoulders in earnest. Instead of doing this, he slips out of the harness by a jest; and sneeringly tells us, that, to determine this point, we must know the secrets of the French and Spanish cabinets, and that parliament was pleased to approve the treaty of peace without calling for the correspondence concerning it. How just this sarcasm on that parliament may be, I say not; but how becoming in the author, I leave it to his friends to determine.

Having thus gone through the questions of war and peace, the author proceeds to state our debt, and the interest which it carried, at the time of the treaty, with the unfairness and inaccuracy, however, which distinguish all his assertions, and all his calculations. To detect every fallacy, and rectify every mistake, would be endless. It will be enough to point out a few of them, in order to shew how unsafe it is to place any thing like an implicit trust in such a writer.

The interest of debt contracted during the war is stated by the author at £.2,614,892. The particulars appear in pages 14 and 15. Among them is stated the unfunded debt, £.9,975,017, supposed to carry interest on a medium at 3

* Something however has transpired in the quarrels among those concerned in that transaction. It seems the good Genius of Britain so much vaunted by our author, did his duty nobly. Whilst we were gaining such advantages, the court of France was astonished at our concessions. "J'ai apporté à Versailles, il est vrai, les ratifications du Roi d'Angleterre à votre grand étonnement, et à celui de bien d'autres. Je dois cela au bontés du Roi d'Angleterre, à celles de Milord Bute, à Mons. le Comte de Viry, à Mons. le Duc de Nivernois, et en fin à mon sçavoir faire." Lettres, &c. du Chev. D'Eon, p. 51.

per cent. which amounts to £.299,250. We are referred to the Considerations on the Trade and Finances of the Kingdom, p. 22, for the particulars of that unfunded debt. Turn to the work, and to the place referred to by the author himself, if you have a mind to see a clear detection of a capital fallacy of this article in his account. You will there see that this un

funded debt consists of the nine following articles: the remaining subsidy to the duke of Brunswick; the remaining dedommagement to the Landgrave of Hesse; the German demands; the army and ordnance extraordinaries; the deficiencies of grants and funds; Mr. Touchet's claim; the debts due to Nova Scotia and Barbadoes; Exchequer bills; and Navy debt. The extreme fallacy of this state cannot escape any reader who will be at the pains to compare the interest money, with which he affirms us to have been loaded, in his State of the Nation, with the items of the principal debt to which he refers in his Considerations. The reader must observe, that of this long list of nine articles, only two, the exchequer bills, and part of the navy debt, carried any interest at all. The first amounted to . 1,800,000; and this undoubtedly carried interest. The whole navy debt indeed amounted to £. 4,576,915; but of this only a part carried interest. The author of the Considerations, &c. labours to prove this very point in p. 18; and Mr. G. has always defended himself upon the same ground, for the insufficient provision he made for the discharge of that debt. The reader may see their own authority for it.*

* «The navy bills are not due till six months after they have been issued; six months also of the seamen's wages by act of parliament must be, and in consequence of the rules prescribed by that act, twelve months wages generally, and often much more are retained; and there has been besides at all times a large arrear of pay, which, though kept in the account could never be claimed, the persons to whom it was due having left neither assignees nor representatives. The precise amount of such sums cannot be ascertained; but they can hardly be reckoned less than 13 or 14 hundred thousand pounds. On 31st Dec. 1754, when the navy debt was reduced nearly as low as it could be, it still amounted to 1,296,567. 18s. 11 3-4d consisting chiefly of articles which could not then be discharged; such articles will be larger now, in proportion to the increase of the establishment; and an allowance must always be made for them in judging of the state of the navy debt, though they are not distinguishable in the account. In pro

Mr. G. did in fact provide no more than £. 2,150,000 for the discharge of these bills in two years. It is much to be wished that these gentlemen would lay their heads together, that they would consider well this matter, and agree upon something. For when the scanty provision made for the unfunded debt is to be vindicated, then we are told it is a very small part of that debt which carries interest. But when the publick is to be represented in a miserable condition, and the consequences of the late war to be laid before us in dreadful colours, then we are to be told that the unfunded debt is within a trifle of ten millions, and so large a portion of it carries interest that we must not compute less than 3 per cent. upon the whole.

In the year 1764, parliament voted £. 650,000 towards the discharge of the navy debt. This sum could not be applied solely to the discharge of bills carrying interest; because part of the debt due on seamen's wages must have been paid, and some bills carried no interest at all. Notwithstanding this, we find by an account of the journals of the house of commons, in the following session, that the navy debt carrying interest was, on the 31st of December, 1764, no more than £. 1,687,442. I am sure therefore that I admit too much when I admit the navy debt carrying interest, after the creation of the navy annuities in the year 1763, to have been . 2,200,000. Add the exchequer bills; and the whole unfunded debt carrying interest will be four millions instead of ten; and the annual interest paid for it at 4 per cent. will be . 160,000 instead of £.299,250. An errour of no small magnitude, and which could not have been owing to inadvertency.

The misrepresentation of the increase of the peace establishment is still more extraordinary than that of the interest of the unfunded debt. The increase is great undoubtedly. However, the author finds no fault with it, and urges it only as a matter of argument to support the strange chim

viding for that which is payable, the principal object of the legislature is always to discharge the bills, for they are the greatest article; they bear an interest of 4 per cent.; and, when the quantity of them is large, they are a heavy incumbrance upon all money transactions."

erical proposals he is to make us in the close of his work for the increase of revenue. The greater he made that establishment, the stronger he expected to stand in argument: but, whatever he expected or proposed, he should have stated the matter fairly. He tells us that this establishment is near £. 1,500,000 more than it was in 1752, 1753, and other years of peace. This he has done in his usual manner, by assertion, without troubling himself either with proof or probability. For he has not given us any state of the peace establishment in the years 1753 and 1754, the time which he means to compare with the present. As I am obliged to force him to that precision, from which he always flies as from his most dangerous enemy, I have been at the trouble to search the journals in the period between the two last wars and I find that the peace establishment, consisting of the navy, the ordnance, and the several incidental expenses, amounted to £. 2,346,594. Now is this writer wild enough to imagine, that the peace establishment of 1764 and the subsequent years, made up from the same articles, is £.3,800,000 and upwards? His assertion however goes to this. But I must take the liberty of correcting him in this gross mistake, and from an authority he cannot refuse, from his favourite work, and standing authority, the Considerations. We find there, p. 43*, the peace establishment of 1764 and 1765 stated at .3,609,700. This is near two hundred thousand pounds less than that given in The State

of the Nation. But even from this, in order to render the articles which compose the peace establishment in the two periods correspondent (for otherwise they cannot be compared), we must deduct first, his articles of the deficiency of land and malt, which amount to £. 300,000. They certainly are no part of the establishment; nor are they included in that sum, which I have stated above for the establishment in the time of the former peace. If they were proper to be stated at all, they ought to be stated in both accounts. We must also deduct the deficiencies of funds, £. 202,400. These deficiencies are the difference between the interest charged on the publick for monies borrowed, and the produce of the taxes laid for the discharge of that interest. Annual provision is indeed to be made for them by parliament: but in the inquiry before us, which is only what charge is brought on the publick by interest paid or to be paid for money borrowed, the utmost that the author should do, is to bring into the account the full interest for all that money. This he has done in p. 15; and he repeats it in p. 18, the very page I am now examining, £. 2,614,892. To comprehend afterwards in the peace establishment the deficiency of the fund created for payment of that interest, would be laying twice. to the account of the war part of the same sum. Suppose ten millions borrowed at 4 per cent. and the fund for payment of the interest to produce no more than . 200,000. The whole annual charge on the publick is . 400,000. It can be no more. But to charge the interest in one part of the account, and then the deficiency in the other, would be charging £.600,000. The deficiency of funds must therefore be also deducted from the peace establishment in the Considerations; and then the peace establishment in that author will be reduced to the same articles with those included in the sum I have already mentioned for the peace establishment before the last war, in the year 1753, and 1754.