THE DEATH-DUTIES.
[TO THE EDITOR OF Tux "SPECTATOR.']
Sin,—Lord Rosebery said on Friday week :—" The Death- duties might very easily in a weak family fall four or five times on the same property in fifty years." In my parish a case in point has occurred to corroborate this assertion. An old lady, aged ninety-three, died. Her estate of four farms, . rental £1,200 a year, descended to a cousin, an old gentleman. Death-duties No. 1. He did not live long, and was succeeded by his sister, an old lady who lived two years. Death-duties No. 2. Her sister, an old lady, succeeded, and only lived one year. Death-duties No. 3. The next successor was a cousin, a clergyman, who died last November, aged seventy-two. Death-duties No. 4. His sister, aged seventy, is the present owner, which will be Death-duties No. 5 at no distant date. To what figure, then, will the gross income of these farms be reduced to this lady's successor P—I am, Sir, &c.,
AN OLD SUBSCRIBER.
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