“Take me with you then, papa. Do take me with you,” cried Jack. “The little master had better make sure of what sort of place he would have to go to,” observed Studley. “He might not altogether like a jail.” “A jail!” cried every body. “I mean no more than this,—that the penalty for certain excise offences is 500_l._; and all people are not always ready to pay 500_l._” And Studley went out, now the confirmed enemy of the whole party he left behind. “I am not going to justify that man’s spying and threats,” observed Le Brocq: “but I really do not see why the government should not make a point of its own servants being of its own political opinions; and, as for their not voting at elections, it is a favour done to the people, I conclude, from the consideration that so large a body of persons, supposed to be biassed by their dependence on the government, would often turn the scale in a close contest.” “And where can there be a stronger proof of the badness of the system? Is there no better way of the people paying for government than by their supporting a host of tax-gatherers, who are first compelled to harass their supporters by daily ill offices, and then become the slaves of rulers in proportion as they become hated by the ruled? Let the people of England come forward like men and Christians, asking to have their state-subscription levied in the form of a periodical contribution, rather than wrenched and filched from them after the manner of a theft,— so that the gang of wrenchers and filchers, of whom I am one, may support themselves by a more honest labour, and once more become men in their social rights and their liberty of speech.” “Do you mean to remain in your office till that day?” “If they will let me exercise ordinary freedom of opinion. Yes: while the system exists, it is the duty of those who feel its evils to soften their operation as much as possible. If I resigned to-night, the next best-drilled spy would take my place, and in some lower rank there would be room made for some mischief-loving, shabby-souled tyrant;—for who but such would accept the most hateful of offices with the meanest of salaries? Frightful as is the sum which Englishmen pay for their standing spy-army, the forces are so numerous that the pay of each (considered in connexion with the odium of the office) is not enough to command the services of honest men. But if you had seen the half of what has come before my eyes, you would value the blessing of a tender heart, here and there, among such a tribe as hold the tyranny of the excise in their power; and you would entreat such an one to keep in his place for love of the widow and the fatherless, and the poor, and such as have none to help them.”