increased taxation to meet these would be unnecessary, and the income tax would only be 1_s._ 3_d._ in the pound. This was a postponement, not a release. Mr. Holt (L.) abandoned an amendment in the sense of the dissentients' protest, but objected both to the huge expenditure on armaments and to the excess of the actual over the estimated cost of recent social reforms. Members themselves, he thought, were in fault for pressing for more expenditure. It was increasing more rapidly than income, and a decline in trade was at hand. He and his friends did not object to the character of the new taxation; direct taxation was preferable to indirect; but it would be impossible to pass the Finance Bill as it stood and the Revenue Bill by August 6, as required by the Provisional Collection of Taxes Act. It invited obstruction, which would be met by the guillotine closure. He and his friends, therefore, would cordially support the revised programme of the Government. Mr. Long (U., _Strand_) congratulated the dissentient Liberals on their success. The great Budget was crumbling already. But was there any law left in the House? Income tax was being collected at a rate for which there was no Parliamentary authority; what would be done where it had been already collected "at the source"? Would the Irish proposal (to increase the "transferred sum") be abandoned as well as the English? The Unionists had thought of moving to adjourn the debate, but had preferred to state their case for further information at once. Every one wanted social reform, but were they not really burdening the weak? The Treasury had become a spending instead of a supervising department, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer one of the most powerful causes of public expenditure. In every department of public expenditure there was an enormous increase, due either to hasty legislation or to want of control by the Minister whose duty it was to exercise control. Employment on estates was diminishing, and the increase in the death duties imposed unequal burdens. He was unable to understand what the rating proposals were. By thus changing their plan the Government had insulted the House. Later the Chancellor of the Exchequer explained that only some 50,000_l._ had been collected in regard to the 1_d._ of income tax now dropped, and the banks would adjust the matter on the next dividend payment. Some Budgets had been altered while before the Commons, _e.g._ the wheel and van tax in 1890.