18 DECEMBER 1915, Page 15

PAYMENTS TO MINISTERS AND OTHERS.

[To rna Enact OF Tan " SPECTATOR."' Srie—You might have reinforced your convincing article on the salary of Cabinet Ministers by recalling the scandal caused by the poverty of ex-Lord Chancellor Erskine (1810-23), though he had a pension of £4,000 a year. As to payment of members of the Commons, the recently found Aristotelian treatise tolls us (o. 29) that after the great reverse in Sicily the Athenians resolved that " during the war all political offices should be unpaid "—except those of the chief Ministera—I am, Sir, &o., H. 0,