THE ESTIMATES.
TEE Army and Navy Estimates, which have just appeared, pos- sess a greater interest than usual, from the proposals that have been brought forward to put the defences of the country on a safer footing ; the outcry by which those proposals have been met ; and the national pressure that must be felt with the present excess of expenditure over income. As regards increase in the Army and Navy, the outcry seems to have been premature, whatever the Ordnance may turn out to be presently.* The ad- ditions beyond the amount of last year are not very great, and have little or no bearing upon the Duke' of Wellington's sug- gestions. The "grand totals" demanded for both services consist of several divisions ; some of which have no more to do with future war than has a Gravesend steamer or an annuity from the Funds. Official practice includes in the Estimates, and classes under the title of " Non-effective," all half-pay, pensions for "good service" or to retired veterans, as well as the superannuations or retiring allowances of clerks and so forth, who have been engaged in any civil department connected with the management of either force. The Effective also includes some divisions that either do not vary with additions to the warlike arm at all, or in any pro- portionate degree. The Scientific branch of the Navy, and the General Register and Record Office of Seamen, amounting this year to a gross 90,0001., are of the first class—for science would probably be allowed to shift for itself in a time of war. The Ad- miralty Office is of the latter kind; where some increase may take place, but not much. The Navy Estimates also have an ac- count for expenses " Not Naval"; consisting of three divisions,— the transportation of convicts; 2. the Post-office Packet ser- vice; 3. the transport of troops and stores, which, though a war- like expenditure, has nothing to do with the defence of the coun- * In his Budget speech last night, we perceive, Lord Jobe Russell estimated the increase on the Ordnance at 246,0001.
try. These and analogous matters should always be borne in mind when such subjects are not exhibited in their details, but servilely copied in gross, with all the obscurity of official jargon, and commented upon by persons knowing nothing about the busi- ness ; otherwise conclusions may be come to which are not only false bu. absurd, or indeed impossible.
With this explanatory proem we exhibit a comparative sum- mary of the Estimates for the last and present years.
NAN r. 1848. 1847. INCREASE.
Effective Service ; including Marines as well as Sailors; the Scientitic and Civil Departments
and the Dockyards, &c Services not Naval ; including 181,0001. to be voted for conveyance of troops
Non-effective Service 164,734 138,557 Total of increase £303,291
It will be seen that there is an addition of 164,7341. to be voted for the Navy this year, and an increase on the Army of 138,5571. (though only 43,612/. additional will have to be voted) ; forming a total of 303,000/. Not much of it, however, is an addition to war- like preparation. The Crown nominally pays the Queen's troops serving in India, and for certain depots at home ; but the East India Company finds the money : the Company employed more by about five thousand men last year than she will employ this year; which makes a saving to her of 168,000/., and more than accounts for the present increase—whatever may be done with the troops hereafter. In the Navy there is an increase of nearly 33,000/. on the Scientific branch alone ; of which 30,0001. is for the Arctic Expeditions in search of Sir John Franklin. There is also an increase of 129,0001. under the head of " New Works, Improvements, and Repairs." The form of this account does not enable the inquirer to institute comparisons between the particular expenditures for the past and the present year. But " Barracks " at Woolwich and Portsmouth is the most direct war- like expenditure; " New iron roofs," steam factories, and dock repairs or improvements, are the heaviest items in a gross total of
688,0001.
Because we cut away the ground from the misconceptions of ignorance or the mystifications of fraud, it must not be sup- posed that we think these expenditures might not be lessened without lessening efficiency. Before some blazing orators of the year 1848 were heard, or even heard of, we applied ourselves to the details of these expenditures, without any assistance from mouthing patriots. But they will not labour at all, and we laboured in vain. The first item that meets us in the "Detail of the Charge of the Regimental Establishments of her Majesty's Land Forces at Home and Abroad, for 365 days," is a very old friend with his old face. The Household Cavalry (the two regi- ments of Life Guards and the Blues) stand as rank as ever in military wastefulness and aristocratical favouritism. The imme- diate efficiency of a cavalry regiment must, of course, depend upon its number of horses, since he only is a cavalry soldier who can be mounted. All the above-named regiments have 274 horses each, and 32 officers ; being, within a small fraction, at the rate of one officer to every eighth mounted man. If we add the 53 noncommissioned officers, trumpeters, and drummers, to the 32 officers, there will be found one looker-on, overseer, or musical performer, to every three-and-a-quarter men. If we take the whole strength of the soldiers, (351 rank and file,) we do not then rise to four-and-a-half privates to an officer, noncommissioned officer, drummer, or trumpeter. Yet the Anti-Defence oracles in Par- liament quietly voted these and analogous abuses for years, and made no stir upon the increased estimates they now clamour about.
Turn to another item. It is nearly sixteen years since we called attention to the Deadweight system, and exhibited its work- ings in detail, especially in the Civil service. In 1837 we again and more elaborately entered into the whole subject of pensions ; displaying (as far as the official accounts would allow us) the comparative charge for work and pension in every branch of the public service. The particulars may be seen in the Spectator of that year; the conclusion landed us in the astounding fact, that in an expenditure of fourteen millions, eight millions were for work and six for pension. The encouragement we received for our labour of that class was not of a kind to induce us to con- tinue in it, or to recur to it. Public assistance we had none. We do not remember one single speech of any one'Member of Parliament upon the subject, and systematic attention to it we are sure there was not. The Whig Ministry did indeed patch up a kind of bill—in furtherance, by the by, of a Treasury minute of the Wellington Government—byWhich some deduction from the salaries of newly-appointed officers was to be applied towards paying retiring allowances. How this works, may be judged of by a fact in the documents before us : the amount of what is called " Superannuations" in the Army Estimate is 39,0481.; to which the act of William the Fourth contributes the magnificent sum of 732/. 5s. 7d. I
Total of Navy Am.
Effective Service ; including Civil Depart-
ments, &c
Non-effective Total of Army £ £ 5,346,280 5,111,224 998,284 1,084,959 1,362,046 1,365,693 £7,726,610 7,561,876 4,366,750 4,182.051 2,139,1385 2,175,227 £6,495,835 6,357,278 £
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