1 AUGUST 1868, Page 2

Mr. Laing followed Sir Stafford Northcote with a proposal to

raise 20,000,000/. for public works, and strike that item out of the regular budgets. That is a sound proposal as a matter of account, but we will just warn Sir Stafford of one result his critic seems to forget. The Indian Exchequer would then have an apparent surplus, and an apparent surplus will infallibly be spent mainly on establishments of which it will be impossible subse- quently to get rid. The Indian Services would spend the revenues of the world if they could get them, and do it philanthropically, too.