March 23, 1907.]
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:
CHÍNA OVERLAND TRADE REPORT.
оn.
191
pound, whereas certain boroughs in England | the Policing of the entire Settlement, but equinoctial gale. We do not attempt to bave to pay 10 or 12 shillings. Of course, for a considerable force of Volunteers well! controvert his estimates of the relative cost there is the obvious difference that these armed and trained for its cxternal defence. ¦ of a ferry and the funnel, n ›r to discuss the rates are exceptional, and only occur in a It has also to keep in order and light and engineering difficulties that stand in the few instances where the classes dependent sewer some eighty miles of roads; provide; way of the proposed scheme. Other eminent on their richer neighbours for their daily for public parks and recreation, as well sustenance have obtained possession of the a Town Band; and in addition to effective asserts, with ponderous gravity, that success
as engileers will do that.
{
But when he franchises. But there is another strictly | sanitary control, it has now undertaken ‘ financial distinction. The Shanghai taxa-; the control of education, foreign and native; | —cannot be guaranteed, we wonder how - presume he means financial success tion is based on rentals actually paid, while, as well as providing the necessary school the English taxation is in all cases founded | buildings.
many scheines he has been connected with Putting one thing with another, of which, in their initial stages, the same on a valuation presumed to represent the and remembering that in all cases the con- thing has not been said." And so on, and so economic value of the premises: the trolling staff has to be provided from home, difference amounts to as much as one fourth, it does not seem reasonable to charge the belaboured the por man 80.
But our contemporary need not have or even one third. Comparing this with Council with undue parsimouv, nor on the one of the great men to whose obiter dicta He is only County Council valuations of London there other side to complain of inefficiency in the gullible public, its are some curious differ- nces as well as like. fact, looking at the amoun' and w de extent | apparatus atrophied, loves to listen with Own thinking Desses. The control of the Shanghai Muni of the duties forecl cipality extends over eight square miles; necessities of the situation; it see us rather
upon it by the 'bate breath. All the e people have 8 me that of the County Council over a hundred ; to be deserving of the highest eulogy for Sir JonN WOLFE BARRY has
AXC to grind. We do not sugest that and twenty. Actually the Shinghai Muni- what under circumstances in any respec ́s
had cipality has not yet opered up for purposes discouraging, and in teeth of the jealous |
retailer to "p ose the chenie, but of taxation quite six. The valuation of the opposition of the Chinese Government and opinions might have been other than they do venture to hint that his County Council for taxation is nearly 45 the local officials, it has succeeded million sterling, that of Shanghai 1 million effecting.
are if Le had teen professionally interested sterling, so that space for
in the undertaking. The shipping people space tbe Shangbai valuation comes to two-thirds of
interested in the Channel”. Tra le the London. Proportionally London is more
naturally not in love with the project, but than 50 per ceut, richer so that the result
to convert the public to their views it would bears out the contention indicated above as
never have done to admit their fear of loss to the high rental taxation of the Shanghai
of business. So they gladly join the chorus Settlement. But the house tax represents
of alarm at a great national danger." anly two-thirds of the amount in Shanghai
The argument that it is disgraceful of raised by direct taxation, for in addition to
Englishmen fi admit disinclination to risk the house tax, the ground on which the
sea-sickness is a rather telling one, in priut, house stands is also taxed, and this tax
but it is very thin. There are other advantages than this immunity, which
brings in more than fifty per rent, of the other. Reduced to the English scale of taxation, then, Shanghai pays in direct taxes some 48. 6d. in the pound, which but a few years ago, before the school boards com. menced to impose a heavy scheme of taxation for educational purposes, would not have been looked upou as especially light. This, however, is not all that the Shanghai resident has to pay for the upkeep of his Municipality, for he has to provide some 60 odd thousauds sterling in the way of licence fees. True, a good part of these are entirely optional, but this can hardly be said of the taxes on locomotion which amount to quite half, and are estimated for the coming year at some £30,000. In fact the only outside aid that comes to the assistance of the Municipal Revenue is the Wharfage dues. These, it is true, amount to some £30,000, or 10 per cent. ofthe entire revenue and are a welcome and useful addition t¡ the ordinary revenue.
|
CHINA HONDS AND THE
CHANNEL TUNNEL.
In
(Daily Press, 20th March.) Of all the very numerous Channel Tunnel arguments, for and against, there is so far not one that touches the real danger to the British public The debater hare over- looked the flood of fiction of
The next
а
we
LL
CRIME AND PUNISHMENT,
are
Invasion" type which is bound to follow home-goers from the Fag East will readily
and keep step with-the boring. This,
think of. we hasten to confess, is somewhat frivolous,
The number of Passengers golag overland from But we do not altogether withdraw the
the Mediterranean offers suggestion that the nuisance will be
some indication of the number that will be serious one, We can only hope that the
glad to continue through the tunnel, if and novelists and romancers and expert Daily
when it is ever constructed. The "entente Mail collaborators will wait before regarding
cardiale " argument, in the other hand, bas the Tunnel as the last word, and watch the
been very much overdine. We development of
this tunnel sheme is a commercial enter. presume aerial possibilities. If airships are as near as the newspapers seem
prise, and those who invest in it will take to think, perhaps this engineering feat
the risk, not Sir Jous WOLFE Barry. under the English Cununel will be allowed Those who don't stand to lose nothing, for to pass as adding comparatively little to
it is surely insulting to the intelligence of the perd of the United Kingdom. The they cannot d-vise means to cops with any the British defence forces to suggest that controversy over the tunnel se eme offers a remarkable illustration of the aridity with
danger threatened at one definite point. which arguments are seized upon to bolster existing prejudices. Contra-arguments fly to these as if impelled by atomic attraction, and predilection finds no more difficulty in picking up pro-statements. To the impartial | Chion's or indifferent mind, neither side has much The entire estimated revenue for the to brag of in the way of convincing coming year amounts to 2,000,000 taels, testimony. The great names that bave which may be counted as £300,000 sterlingbeen enrolled on the list of the scheme's As the entire
population, foreign and opponents afford some amusing reflections. native, is estimated at slightly less then half Eminent soldiers who dread its possibilities a million, this amounts to 12 shillings a seem quite unconscious of the implication head-men, women and children. Of this of their opposition; that they have no faith total some 97 per cent. are Chinese, the in themselves or in the British fighting, greater portion of the lower classes, so that men. Of Sir JoHN WOLFE BARRY's opp it is not easy to see how a higher revenue is tion a contemporary has much to say that available, or can be readily extracted is pertinent. Sir Joux WOLFE BARRY'S without involving heavy individual burdens; emuineuce as an engineer does not reader and this is the main reason why economies hit a high priest of infallibility, as, in all the departments have to be carefully our contemporary believes, many people in studied. In one respect the Municipality the Far East will readily agree. affords favourable contrast to
home HUMPHREY DAY, as eminent an engineer Corporations. Excepting the Electric his day as Sir JOHN WOLFE BARKY Lighting station, for which of course the to-day, poolpoohed the possibility of money has had to be borrowed, the entire using
Puષ ફ an illuminaat. Şir J. indebtedness of the Municipality amounts
WOLFE BARRY's eminence is of course, to but a million and a quarter taels, or seven
too well esta dished to call in queuin ; but and a half mouths' i.come, aut an ample when he deliberate vassers that ' a rail- sinking fund is provided, so that this pr way ferry with the most modern impres portion has of late years
been ments could be installed which would fulfil exceeded. This compares well with c falmost all that a Changi Cudoel twelve and a half years' indebtedness of the provide, we begin to wonder whether Sir London County Council. For the £300,000|J. Wolfe BARRY has ever been at sen, if sterling, the Council provides not only for he has ever crossed the Channel in
a
never
•
Sir
could
an
i
1
16.
(Daily Press, 21st March.) Few competent observers consider that genuine, and few doubt that where it does reform" of her penal code is seem to have been acted upon it has been inaugurated with wrong motives and bad results.
For excesses of sentimentalism, cint, and even injustice, it is usually unnecessary to look further than to a try's crime and its efforts to cope with fairly throw st ues at another.
Few civilized nations in this respect can who have not long abandoned hanging and The British,
transportation for petty offences, have still as much to reform as China has, especially in the way of reaching a proper sense of proportion, making the punishment fit the crime. Ten years' imprisonment for an offence far too much if we consider that the evil doue repugnant to all sane men seeins yet
is sentimental rather than physical; while a few mocths for a man who by violence ruins the whole future of a fellow creature
}
1
14
riduulously in lequate. The punish- ment of thos∙d shon-st tin nciers and others who cauw suffering to hundreds should also be more « Vie libtor teary, is never really a deterrent, if Punishment of either sort,
would seem to be that it should in all cases experienc counts at all; and the ideal
be appropriate and inevitable. Bocom- mendations to mercy, usually the result of
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