specified time for the purpose of granting licences; those peculiarly interested in the liquor trade were disqualified. The licence contained various provisions for regulating the conduct of the house and maintaining order, but closing was only required during the hours of divine service on Sunday. Applicants for new licences and for the transfer of old ones (granted at a special sessions of the justices) were required to give notice to the local authorities and to post up notices at the parish church and on the house concerned. _Excise Licences._--It will be convenient at this point to explain the relation between that part of the licensing system which is concerned with the conduct of the traffic and lies in the jurisdiction of the justices and that part which has to do with taxation or revenue. The former is the earlier and more important branch of legislative interference; we have traced its history from 1495 down to 1828. Its object from the beginning was the maintenance of public order and good conduct, which were impaired by the misuse of public-houses; and all the successive enactments were directed to that end. They were attempts to suppress or moderate the evils arising from the traffic by regulating it. The excise licensing system has nothing to do with public order or the conduct of the traffic; its object is simply to obtain revenue, and for a long time the two systems were quite independent. But time and change gradually brought them into contact and eventually they came to form two aspects of one unified system. Licensing for revenue was first introduced in 1660 at the same time as duties on the manufacture of beer and spirits: but it was of an irregular character and was only applied to wine, which was not then under the jurisdiction of the justices at all (see above). In 1710 a small annual tax was imposed on the retailers of beer and ale and collected by means of a stamp on the justices' licence. In 1728 an annual excise licence of £20 was imposed on retailers of spirits, and in 1736 this was raised to £50 (see above). The object of these particular imposts, however, was rather to check the sale, as previously explained, than to secure revenue. In 1756 the previous tax on the retail sale of wine for consumption on the premises was changed to an annual excise licence, which was in the next year extended to "made wines" and "sweets" (British wines). Similar licences, in place of the previous stamps, were temporarily required for beer and ale between 1725 and 1742 and permanently imposed in 1808. Thus the system of annual excise licences became gradually applied to all kinds of liquor. In 1825 the laws relating to them were consolidated and brought into direct relation with the other licensing laws. It was enacted that excise licences for the retail of liquor should only be granted to persons holding a justices' licence or--to use the more correct term--certificate. The actual permission to sell was obtained on