by no means a perfect one, had this effect, that a supply of 500000_l._ was equal to 1_s._ in the pound of the value of the estates given in. And, according to this enhanced valuation, from the year 1693 to the present, a period of above seventy years, the land tax has continued an annual charge upon the subject; above half the time at 4_s._ in the pound, sometimes at 3_s_, sometimes at 2_s_, twice[q] at 1_s_, but without any total intermission. The medium has been 3_s._ 3_d._ in the pound, being equivalent to twenty three antient subsidies, and amounting annually to more than a million and an half of money. The method of raising it is by charging a particular sum upon each county, according to the valuation given in, _A.D._ 1692: and this sum is assessed and raised upon individuals (their personal estates, as well as real, being liable thereto) by commissioners appointed in the act, being the principal landholders of the county, and their officers. [Footnote n: 29 Nov. 4 Mar. 1642.] [Footnote o: One of these bills of assessment, in 1656, is preserved in Scobell's collection, 400.] [Footnote p: Com. Journ. 26 Jun. 9 Dec. 1678.] [Footnote q: in the years 1732 and 1733.] II. THE other annual tax is the malt tax; which is a sum of 750000_l_, raised every year by parliament, ever since 1697, by a duty of 6_d._ in the bushel on malt, and a proportionable sum on certain liquors, such as cyder and perry, which might otherwise prevent the consumption of malt. This is under the management of the commissioners of the excise; and is indeed itself no other than an annual excise, the nature of which species of taxation I shall presently explain: only premising at present, that in the year 1760 an additional perpetual excise of 3_d._ _per_ bushel was laid upon malt; and in 1763 a proportionable excise was laid upon cyder and perry. THE perpetual taxes are,