'Tis true that, as they were formerly conducted, the system was fraught with some evil. Insurances were allowed upon the fate of numbers through protracted drawings; and, as the insurances could be effected for very small sums, those who could ill afford loss, imbibed a spirit of gambling, which the legislature, very wisely, most effectually prevented, by adopting, in the year 1809, the present improved mode of deciding the whole lottery in one day. As the present conducted, the lottery is a voluntary tax, contributed to only by those who can afford it, and collected without trouble or expense; one by which many branches of the revenue are considerably aided, and by means of which hundreds of persons find employment. The wisdom of those, who at this time resign the income produced by it, adds to the number of the unemployed, may, as I have observed in a former address, surely be questioned. Mr. Pitt, whose ability on matters of financial arrangements few will question, and whose morality was proverbial, would not, I am bold to say, have yielded to the outcry against a tax, the continuing of which would have enabled him to let the labourer drink his humble beverage at a reduced price, or the industrious artisan to pursue his occupation by a cheaper light. But we live in other times--in the age of improvement! To stake patrimonal estates at hazard or _écarté_, in the purlieus of St. James's, is merely amusement, but to purchase a ticket in the lottery, by which a man may gain an estate at a trifling risk, is--immoral! Nay, within a few hours of the time I write, were not many of our nobility and senators, some of whom, I dare say, voted against lotteries, assembled, betting thousands upon a horse race? In saying so much, it may be thought that I am somewhat presumptuous, or that I take a partial view of the case. It is, however, my honest opinion, abstracted from personal considerations, that the measure of abolishing lotteries is an unwise one, and, as such, I give it to that public, of which I have been, for many years, the highly favoured servant, and for whose patronage, though lotteries cease, my gratitude will ever continue." We will close our studies on this subject with a copy of an epitaph written in remembrance of these old-time institutions. It is as follows:--