The Finance Bill (Committee stage) was under discussion in the
House of Commons on Tuesday and Wednesday and Thursday. The chief subject debated was the proposal made by the Government that the Treasury should have the power to exempt from the Death-duties pictures and other objects of national, scientific, and historical interest,—of course only while these objects remain unsold. Ultimately the clause was carried by a majority of 104 (178 to 74). We believe it will be endorsed by the nation, which, though it wants to tax all forms of property equally, and to tax the rich man more- highly than the poor, does not want to see the old historical collections in the "show-places of the county" broken up and destroyed. It is considered, indeed, an act of piety not to part with the pictures of one's ancestors. But if a man is unlucky enough to have had his great-grandmother painted by Gainsborough, his great-aunt by Romney, and his grandfather, "as a child," by Reynolds, it may cost him (in Death-duties) more than he can afford, to keep the pictures in the family. Anything which at all relieves this grievance, and yet makes the millionaire pay fairly on his Raphaels and Correggios, is welcome.
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