The quarterly account of the state of the Revenue, up
to the 5th of January 1833, exhibits a decrease, as compared with the corresponding quarter of last year, of 29,473/. But the increase on the whole year amounts to 546,169/. The finances of the country, therefore, are on the whole in a prosperous condition. There is an actual surplus of income over expenditure, for the year ending 10th October 1832, of 467,391/. Os. 7d.; and the Commissioners of the Sinking Fund have applied one-fourth of that sum, or 116,847/. 17s. 4d., to the reduction of the National Debt; which debt, our readers are aware, is upwards of 800,000,000/. This seems something like removing a mountain of sand one grain at a. time.
It is mentioned in some of the papers as a singular fact, that while the receipts from the Customs have increased during the last quarter, those from the Excise have fallen off, notwithstanding the General Election, which has heretofore usually occasioned an augmented consumption of exciseable articles, especially gin. But the Elections, it should be remembered, only occupied two- instead of fourteen days this year • and men of the most capacious swallow cannot do the work of fourteen days in two. Besides, excitement being the chief thing wanted, it was abundantly sup- plied during the two days ; and as the spirits had no time to flag, so they needed little extra stimulus to keep them up to the electioneer- ing point. But perhaps, after all, the real solution of the difficulty lies in the fact, that the duty on what was consumed in the latter end of last year add the few first days of this could scarcely have been collected and paid into the Treasury by the 5th instant. We hope to see the Excise receipts Unproved next quarter ; for we are very certain, that at Liverpool, Norwich, Bristol, Hertford, Stain - ford, and other places, the Conservative purses were nearly emptied in supplying liquor to their hired bludgeon-men and pequred drunkards.
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