I wish I could say as much for civil as for religious liberty in this country. The press is more completely muzzled than any cart-dog in London. The latter may open his jaws so far as to growl; but the press is hermetically sealed in this submarine territory. No book can be translated or published without the censor’s license—nay, a hand-bill, announcing the importation of Warren’s blacking or Morrison’s pills, cannot be printed or affixed to a wall, without a license and a stamp! In a conversation with an intelligent Dutchman respecting this restriction on the press, I was completely silenced by the following argument. I believe, said the gentleman, that in your profession, _prevention_ is considered to be better than cure. I assented. Then, said he, I observe in all your newspapers that people are tried, and sometimes severely punished, for publishing libels, although the authors may not believe them to be such at the time of writing them. Now the paternal Government of Holland _prevents_ such misfortunes and evils from happening to its subjects, by examining the document before publication, and thus taking on itself the responsibility, in case it should turn out afterwards to be libellous. There was no answering this argument. The Dutch are the most patient animals that ever lived beneath a yoke, or bowed beneath a load of taxes. Talk of John Bull’s rates and taxes! They are bagatelles compared to those in Holland! Every species of business, from the cobbler to the ship-builder, is taxed after a graduated scale, varying from a few shillings to twenty or thirty pounds annually. Every dwelling, every window, door, fireplace—even the furniture, is taxed according to its value! The taxes on houses are more than a fourth of the rent! The necessaries of life are, in fact, extremely dear, and were it not for the solace of tobacco, gin, and coffee, the poorer classes of Dutchmen would die in their dykes under the pressure of hunger and taxation, notwithstanding their loyalty to KING, and love of VADERLAND! AMSTERDAM.