A happy-go-luckier—or rather we should, perhaps, say, an un- happier-go-lucky—financial
policy it is scarcely possible to con- ceive. If the Zulu War costs less than the Abyssinian, we shall be fortunate indeed. Yet Sir Stafford Northcote evidently hopes to bring it within a third of that amount. And in order to show that he is not really adding to our Debt, he had to take credit for the amount of debt yearly extinguished by the operation of the terminable annuities,—in other words, to treat the year as if it were one of unexampled calamity, instead of merely a year of small expeditions, and of depression for the middle-class. According to his own account, the great consuming classes—the poor—are not yet materially diminishing their consumption ; it is only the easy-going classes who are econo- mising in wine and other luxuries. And yet—with the General Election in view—Sir Stafford Northcote will make no effort to make the proper revenue of the year meet the expenses of the year. It is a Government of little wars, and of big bills, and one that tries to pass on its debts to its successor, if it cannot thereby stave off the necessity of making room for a successor.
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