Sir Stafford Northcote expounded his Budget on Thurs- day night,
with too much prolixity indeed, and with a certain tendency to blander as to arithmetical detail .which re- minded one more of the results .of Mr. Lowe's defective vision than of any other Chancellor- of the Exchequer we remember, but with,great candour, great clearness in stating arguments and principles, anct not a little touch of caustic humour now and then. As to the year. just. concluded, Mr. Lowe had estimated its Expenditure, including the Alabama indemnity, at £75,071,000. In fact it had amounted to 11,156,000 in excess of that esti- mate, an excess of which £800,000 represented the total cost of the Ashantee War during last year, on the econo- mical administration of which Sir Stafford complimented Lord Cardwell. The Revenue of the past year had been estimated by Mr. Lowe at £73,762,000, and had actually yielded 177,335,657, showing a nominal excess of £3,573,657; but of this a part is only nominal, being due to the Post-Office irregularities, so that the real excess of the revenue of the year over the estimate was only £2,773,657. Of this excess, £736,000 had been due to Customs, and no less than £1,425,000 was due to Excise. Of the Customs' excess, again, more than half, 1450,000 was due to the importation of spirits, and of the excess in Excise a still larger sum was also due to spirits. On the whole, then, even after paying the supplementary estimates, the Alabama indemnity, and the Ashantee war, there was a good surplus of last year's revenue over its expenditure to go towards the extinction of Debt.
