Punch (45.1863)

December 26 1863.]

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

257

EQUALITY BEFORE THE TAX-GATHERER.

CHRISTMAS DAY IN THE WOEKHOUSES.

ookey Walker, or
somebody else, has
written an article in
the Saturday Review,
extolling the finan-
cial measures of Mr
Gladstone, eulo-
gising the blessed
Income-Tax, and
containing the sub-
joined passage rela-
tive to that popular
impost:—

“ If the ignorant agi- i
tation against equal tax-
ation had not been
silenced or suspended in
1853, it would have been
impossible to raise the
vast sums which were
afterwards levied by
direct taxation for the
purposes of the Russian
War.”

The Income-Tax
amounts nearly to
the completeness of
what the Saturday
Reviewer means by
equal taxation, but
not quite. If that
gentleman had a
marriageable daugh-
ter to dispose of, he
would, of course, out
of two men equally
worthy of her in all

other respects, and in receipt of equal incomes, but one of them deriving his
income from fixed property, and the other from personal > xi rtions, very much rather
assign her to the former. Considering the ability of a man entitled to a stated
income to bear the expense of matrimony vastly greater than that of a man merely
earning so much a-year, he would nevertheless have their respective incomes
taxed precisely alike. Regarding one as a far richer man than the other, he is for
imposing exactly the same weight of taxation on both.

This is undeniably a sort of equal taxation as far as it goes, for it exacts from
one person a sum numerically equal to that which it levies on another who is
indefinitely better off. It thus certainly makes a tolerable approach to the arith-
metical equality of taxation against which people are so ignorant and unreasonable
as to clamour. But the perlection of that equality would be absolute equality:
sameness not relative to circumstances at all; so much a-head. In short, the
height of that equal taxation which the Saturday Reviewer applauds, would be one
uniform Poll-Tax. When the income ceases the Income-Tax ceases—can any-
thing be more just? One thing. If the Poll-Tax exceeded the whole amount
of a man’s property, the excess could not be seized, and his taxation would stop
altogether. That would be juster.

Ha ! ’tis merry Christmas Day,

0 ! be joyful once a-year.

When, attired in workhouse grey.

We shall taste of beef and beer,
Justice now suspends her rod,

Mercy, from her ample store.

Shall regale the rogues in quod,

Give us, even, something more.

Pauper, banish from thy breast
Envy, with despair and grief,

Thou shalt be well nigh as blest
In thy diet as the thief.

Slice of meat from off the round,
Wedge of fat plum-pudding—there,
With a pint of porter crowned,

Lo thy good old English fare !

’Tis as if a day of grace

Shone upon the realms of woe
And the wretched, for a space.

Rested in the depths below.
Comfort, for a while at least.

Gleams behind the workhouse door;
Christian England makes one feast,
Just at Christmas, for the Poor.

FARMER BRIGHT AND LUKE THE LABOURER.

How widely our opinions range
When int’rest crafty calls for change,

How charity some kindly nurse
By levies on a neighbour’s purse,

While tribulation’s touching tone
Can’t squeeze a stiver from their own,

Rehearse, 0 moralising Muse,

That lectures on dissolving views.

As Farmer Bright one summer day
With cob unkempt drove on his way.

Pleased to behold those golden acres
By grain enriched, like M_ark Lane Quakers.

A crooked Boor in rustic guise

Whose snow-white frock was virtue’s prize,

(Thus modest worth on rustic sward
Doth ever meet its due reward.)

Uncovered his Boeotian brow
And made a reverential bow.

As with a peasant’s grin he said,

“ Fearmer ! will he give un a bed ?

This week oi hav’n’t arn’d two groats
So want to snooze among them Woats.”

“ Been drinking beer ? ” cried Farmer B.,

“ Those oats, thou dolt, belong to me 1 ”

THE CRUISE OF A PIRATE.

Well! We have beheld the prize pigs at the Mangel Worzels’ Exhibition
at Islington, but the cheek of some people beats anything we have seen there.
There is a Pirate vessel called the Alabama—you may call her a Floating Blockade,
if you are on the Confederate side—and she goes about the waters picking up all
the merchant vessels that are undefended, and modestly keeping out of the way of
anything that is a match for her. She is a Pirate, however, for she does not take
her helpless “prizes” into a Court, but plunders tLem and burns them. We there-
fore hope that one of Uncle Sam’s vessels will get within range of her, and we are
the more spiteful against her, because her captain, one Semmes, is not a splendid
Corsair, like Conrad, or a Demon with good intentions, like the Red Rover; but
an ugly man, who is very uncouth in his manners, and very churlish towards ladies
who may happen to be his prisoners. Now this is behaviour uncommonly unworthy
of a pirate “half savage, half soft,” in whom a young lady of well regulated mind
can take an interest. However, his officers do not seem ashamed of themselves,
and one of them has written an account of the Alabama's cruise, from her escape
from Liverpool to her arrival at the Cape, and if anybody would like to read a
dashing account of her doings, and how she went about sweeping the sea of Federal
vessels, he may get the story from Messrs. Lee & Nightingale, of Liverpool,
who have sent it to Mr. Runch, who begs in return to say, in every sense of
the phrase, “ Captain Semmes be hanged.”

“ A coorse oi knows it,” Luke replied,

“ So doan’t expect to be denied,

For thee’s been telling simple folk
That we as bears the hardest yoke
Should aril have Woats to give un ease,

So my pitch shall be here, Zur, please.”

“ Friend Luke,” was Farmer Bright’s response*
“ What brains thou ’st gotten in thy sconce!

To practise and to preach are things
Distinct, as Presidents from Kings.

At my poor oats, why envious stop.

Lord Lump there has a finer crop.

Let not a step or two distress thee,

Lie down on Lump’s, and Morpheus bless thee.”

Cobden’s Penny Luminary.

Considering the sort of journalism to which Mr. Cobden
confines his studies, we cannot wonder that he occasionally
makes a false step. What else is to be expected of a - man
who goes by A/ar-light., which is worse than moonshine ?

Why is Nadar the greatest man of the present day ?
one who has taken the rise out of a “ Giant.”

Because he is the

only

Note on a New Book — What to do with ihe Cold
Mutton /’—Eat it.