CO882-(1-2) — Page 173

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So far from having been but "two or three days in the 'Gazette' before it went into Committee," it was gazetted on the 30th October, and did not go into Committee till the 8th November.

Mr. Ackland's idea that it was contrary to the views and wishes of the mercantile body, is still more at variance with the fact, as I myself, before the introduction of the measure, took every prudent opportunity to collect the opinions of the mercantile body on the subject, and amongst others, that of Mr. Ackland himself; and without a single excep- tion, they were unanimous in favour of the abolition of the export duties.

་

Mr. Ackland at a subsequent stage objected to the substitution which was proposed, in the shape of that am aware of, but he never, a land-tax; expressed any opinion unfavourable to the measure itself.

Mr. Ackland's idea that the mercantile body and the unofficial members of the Council were ad- verse to the abolition, is directly contradicted by a still bigher authority, Mr. Saunders, the Collector of Customs, who states that public feeling was directly the reverse of that reported by Mr. Ackland; and this is confirmed by the strong fact that the ordinance to repeal the export duties passed through all its stages in the Legislative Council without a single division.

As to taking the public by surprise, it is out of the question, as the intention of the Government to propose the repeal of the export duties was known ✰ long before the ordinance was introduced, and when printed, the ordinance itself, and the alterations which it proposed had been universally canvassed, and its proposition met with general acclamation.

And the ordinance calling for returns of coffee plantations, with a view to the imposition of a land-lax, had been before the public for some time

"Gazette previous, having been published in the on the 23rd October.

Mr. Ackland says the Chamber of Commerce protested against the removal of the export duties, because they disliked the substitution of this tax upon coffee lands.

But as the Government did not impose that tax, but resorted to impose others to which the Chamber had not signified any repugnance, it follows that

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PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

Reference :-

TTIC.O. 882

سلائسسالسا

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PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

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COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH—NOT TO

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6883

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less weight was to be attached to their opposition. In fact, the only objection which they urged on that ground was considered, and the intention to impose

the land-tax was suspended; so that their wishes were virtually complied with.

And the new taxes which were imposed instead instance any of a land-tax were not objected to in

by the Chamber of Commerce.

Besides, even had a land-tax been carried as pro-

posed at the rate of 3s, an acre, it would not have been an equivalent by 60 per cent. for the amount of duty remitted.

An acre of coffee land will yield on an average 7 to 9 cwt. A hundredweight in 1847 was worth, on an average, 40s. The remission granted, there- fore, was 20 per cent on 181., or 98., whilst the land- tax proposed would have amounted only to 38.

Alleged misrepresentation by Lord Torrington. Mr. Ackland says that he withdrew his opposition to the abolition of the export duties, on Lord Torrington's assurance that it had been introduced under special directions from Earl Grey, contained in "the Report of the Committee on Ceylon Affairs and Revenue," and that he now finds that this was a misconception.

But he might have satisfied himself on that point at the moment, for simultaneously with the first reading of the ordinance, that very report was laid by Lord Torrington on the table of the Council for [See the general information of the members. Minutes Legislative Council, 5th November, 1847.]

Mr. Wodehouse states (4,530) that these des- patches were all generally understood and "fully duscussed;" and

Mr. Saunders, who took a great interest in the discussion, repeats the same (5,883).

Importance of the measure to the Merchants.

In fact the importance to the mercantile interest of the proposed abolition of the export duty is so self-evident, that their alleged opposition to it would be somewhat unintelligible without this explanation of Mr. Ackland's evidence.

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To the European planters it was no inconsiderable encouragement (Ackland, 3,875, 3,378) at a moment when the value of plantation coffee was every month sinking lower and lower in the market (Mr. Ackland, 3,873), and had fallen between January 1846, and November 1847, from 548. per cwt. to 358. per cwt., and with so little prospect of improvement, that it decreased as low as 31s. in November 1848. [This was in each case the price of the lower qualities.]

Lowest Price of Coffee in each of the following

Years:-

Plantation.

Native.

1845

1848

1847 1848

1845 1848

1847

1848

s. d. a. d.

&

da d

•. de

a. d. a. d.

ad

January-

February

March

- 51

54

44

46 6

52 0

38

-

6

April

36

55

May

June

49

July

Aogust

September

•

47 44

October.

45

November

69

December

རྒྱ༦ 「རྒྱུ | བྷཱུ ། བྷཱུ ཎྜུ ཏྠ

1

46

34 6

38

35 0

39

49 6

ཎྜ ཝཿ ཅ ཞེ ཆེ ཝཿ

38 6

*-*-*** ! | * * *;

,,, । , 。 ༅ ། ཕ ནི ། ༄

6

47

41

46

48 46 5

40

43

47 6 38

44 6 37 6

48

46

མྦུ·བྷཱུཏྟཱདྷཏྟཏྟཏྟཎྜཊྛཧྥུ!

82

34

31 6

-

-

41

36 6

29

4]

37 6

28 6

41

36 6

29

39 6 34 6

20 6

37 6 39

47 6

33

26

47

98

Yearly average 45 14 48 2 Lost Price -}}

40 41 33 847 1

43 9

38 8

29 3

Importance to the Natives of the Abolition of the Export Duty on Native Coffee.

But besides the merchants and the Chamber of Commerce were not the only parties interested. There was an infinitely more numerous class who are extensive cultivators of coffee--the natives — who for many years past have exported an average from 10,000,000 lbs. to 12,000,000 lbs. weight of native coffee.

To the natives the importance of this article can acarcely be over-estimated; it is not only their staple