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to have faved; and if I include, as I think I may be allowed to do, the fum to which the discount upon thofe teas would have amounted, the faving upon the teas of laft fale will be full 200,000l. less than it should have been. As the report holds forth fuch abundant information relative to the saving of the public, and the profit of the tea-dealer, I wonder it did not mention the gain of the company, with which the reporters must have been at least as well acquainted.'

Mr. Twining agrees with the Report as to the probability that at least as much tea was fmuggled as paid duty; but he thinks, that in the claufe immediately fubfequent, the Report has not ftated the fubject fairly. It is there faid, in which cafe only half the kingdom contributed to the former revenue from tea: the whole kingdom contributes to the window tax. The fact is, our author obferves, that not half the kingdom, bnt only half the consumers of tea, contributed to the former revenue from that article; and that nothing like all the kingdom, or all the confumers of tea, contribute to the window tax. He farther remarks, that a very confiderable number of the confumers of tea do not pay any window tax at all, and yet consume thofe fpecies of tea, upon which almost the whole faving (or, at leaft upwards of five-fixths of it) occurs; whilst the remaining part of the former confumers of legaltea, who are, according to the Report, to contribute the fum of three hundred thousand pounds, drink those species of tea from which not even one-fixth of the faving arifes; the rest. of the window tax being made up, not as the Report seems to imply, by all, but by a part only of those who before contributed nothing. Mr. Twining however adds, that though the diftribution of the window tax, and the faving upon tea, do by no means fall in the manner implied by the Report, yet, in his opinion, they fall, in general, as they ought: for that the principal part of the faving is enjoyed by the poor, and the principal part of the tax, on the contrary, falls upon the rich.

Mr. Twining affirms, that he never remembers fresher and better teas, than thofe with which the public may at prefent be fupplied. This affertion, from a perfon of fo much experience in the trade, reflects a very unfavourable prefumption, on the conduct either of the company, or the teadealers, confidering the general complaint, at prefent, of the bad quality of teas. We are forry to find that the company is not exempted from a fhare of this imputation, by continuing to expose bad teas to fale, rather than fubmit to the lofs which would accrue from deftroying them.

When tea is refufed at one fale, fays our author, it is ufually, if not always, put up at fome fubfequent fale; and it

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is then put up fale after fale, till it finds, at length, a pur chafer. I mention this circumstance for two reafons: the first is, that I think the report implies that which is not fact: the other is, that I have long thought this an evil which ought to be corrected. Tea which is damaged, or very bad in quality, ought never to be expofed to fale by the Eaft India company. Indeed any perfon would fuppofe, from the following paffage in the report, that the company never did fell tea of this defcription; for the report fays" perhaps indeed the prize seas (part of which were very bad and damaged) may, to a few dishonest dealers, have afforded a mixture inferior to any tea of the company's importing; but this means of adulteration must be foon exhaufted." I rather think the public will be furprised when I tell them, that the company do put up to fale a great deal of tea which is "very bad and damaged." It often happens that a cheft of this tea is in the fame lot with a cheft or two of better tea; and, in this cafe, the good fells the bad, or that which, in fact, is not of a "merchantable quality." As the company have now confeffed, that fuch tea is made a difhoneft ufe of, and that better tea is adulterated with it, I think they must allow, that it ought never to be put up to fale. It is well known that when this tea does find purchafers, they too frequently offer it to the public under the title of good tea; for if they were to call it bad, they would fell but little of it. Thus are the public deceived; and thus is the fair trader, who asks a higher price for the tea which he calls good, and which actually is fo, materially injured. It is poffible that the prize tea, which has given rise to this obfervation, might be even worse than the worst of the company's tea; but that will not make the company's tea fit to be fold. I am not, however, fo unreasonable as to expect that the company should get no compenfation for their damaged tea: I would wish their trade to be, upon the whole, a trade of profit. For fome of this tea, I believe the company are paid by the owners of their thips; and as to the remainder, the tea which is not damaged fhould pay for that which is. It will be more advantageous to the public to confent to this, than to drink a miferable infufion of decayed and damaged leaves. I would, however, diftinguish between that tea which has accidentally been damaged after the company bought it, and that which, when they bought it, was good for nothing. There is no reason why the public fhould be anfwerable for such injudicious purchases of the company. I am forry to observe, that there is, at prefent, too much occafion for this remark; for, notwithstanding the company have of late imported very fresh and good teas, they have alfo imported, within these few years, and even this year, very bad. The principal part of the Singlo tea, in the prefent fale, to which the dealers have objected, does not appear to have received the leaft injury in its paffage, but to have been abfolutely unfit for ufe when it was bought.

Nor

Nor can fuch purchases be juftified by the company's faying, that their investments could not be completed without them. I cannot allow that any investment is to be completed by the purchase of fuch miferable trash. If the Chinese find that the English fupra-cargoes will buy fuch tea, they will certainly. take care that no large investment should ever be completed without it; but let them perceive that the English will not buy it, and I think they will contrive to produce better.

The company do indeed take the damaged tea out of those chefts which appear to be confiderably injured by falt-water;" and the tea fo taken out is burnt. But this bufinefs is performed by perfons who do it very inaccurately. If they find any tea which is actually wet, or which, from the wet it formerly received, is caked together, that tea is taken out of the cheft; but the remainder which is left in, and which is exposed to fale, has often received fo much injury as to be unfit for ufe. A great deal of tea, which is damaged, mufty, and mouldy, escapes the notice of thofe perfons who are employed in fepa rating the damaged from the faleable tea.-When the teadealers or brokers fee the teas which are to be expofed to fale, they discover thefe bad chefts; but, notwithstanding the tea is indifputably mufty or mouldy, and perhaps worse than a great deal of that which is condemned to be burnt, it is till expofed

to fale.'

Mr. Twining obferves, it may perhaps be thought that he is acting the part of a very unskilful advocate for the teatrade, whilft he is expofing the badnefs of fome.tea. But he thinks the public will never entertain a better opinion of tea, than when they perceive that the perfons who deal in it, and who are the best judges of it, are careful to prevent the fale of any which is unfit for public ufe, The tea-dealers, fays he, have done this, upon the present occasion: and I doubt not but they will continue to do it.' We fincerely wish that this affertion may be well founded; for we should be forry to think, that Mr. Twining had introduced it only with the view to obviate an injurious charge, of his being a very unskilful advocate for the tea-trade.'

Mr. Twining, to prevent all fufpicion of his having intentionally mifreprefented any part of the Report, has annexed a copy of it to his Remarks. We fhall conclude this article with obferving, that amidst the patriotic declarations of the directors on one hand; and, on the other, of the body of tea-dealers, under the name of their zealous and intelligent reprefentative Mr. Twining, we wish to fee the public derive fome more effential benefit, relative to the prices and quality of tea, than can refult from the mutual recrimination of those interested parties. We must however do this fpirited author

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the juftice to acknowlege, that his Remarks have a natural tendency to produce advantageous effects. Of accomplishing this they could not fail, if the directors and the tea-dealers would honeftly and vigorously co-operate in laying the ax to the root of the tree;' we mean not for the purpose of deftroying the tea-plant (for that, we are afraid, would be confidered as a national calamity); but with the view of diminishing the price, and preferving the purity of a beverage become fo much the object of almoft univerfal indulgence.

Obfervations on the Rights and Duty of Juries, in Trials for Libels: together with Remarks on the Origin and Nature of the Law of Libels. By Jofeph Towers, LL.D. 8vo. 2s. 6d. Debrett.

IN

IN trials for libels, whether the jury have a right to judge of the law as well as the fact, is a question which has been much agitated for fome time, and the determination of it, on either fide, feems not likely to afford general fatisfaction. The author of the Obfervations before us efpoufes, with great zeal, the popular doctrine that the jury has fuch a right. In endeavouring to establish this principle, he takes a wide view of the feveral opinions incidentally delivered by judges, and the fentiments maintained by political and legal writers on this fubject. The chief argument in fupport of this doctrine is, what he calls a very ancient, and certainly a very rational idea; namely; that judges, appointed by the king, may have an improper bias on their minds, in caufes between the crown. and the fubject. We fhall readily admit that the jealousy of fuch an influence is not unnatural in a free conftitution; but we may venture to affirm, that the judges being appointed by the king, was a circumstance which could lefs excite fufpicion of undue influence, than that of their being formerly removeable at the royal pleasure. Dr. Towers must know fufficiently well both the change, and the importance of that change, which has of late taken place in the fituation of the judges; and we therefore think that he argues difingenuously, when he affects to reprefent the ancient and prefent times as expofed to equal danger from any biafs on the minds of the judges.

Among the inftances adduced by Dr. Towers, of those who, in trials for libels, have denied the power of the judges to extend to the determination of the point of law, is the case of the famous Lilburne, who addreffed the judges thus:

The jury by law are not only judges of fact, but of law alfo; and you that call yourfelves judges of the law, are no

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more but Norman intruders; and in deed, and in truth, if the jury please, are no more but cyphers, to pronounce their verdict.'

Though we condemn, the feverity of the ftar-chamber court, in the affair of Lilburne, we cannot allow that this cafe has great weight towards confirming our author's" opinion, that the interpofition of the judges, in trials of libel, is actually a ufurpation. Lilburne's invective, that the judges were Norman intruders,' is meant to convey an infinuation, that before the, Norman Conqueft, the trials, in respect to libels, were otherwife determined. But we believe it will be difficult to prove, that before the epoch of the Conqueft, there ever was any trial for a libel in this country. The invention of printing is the period which laid the foundation for this fpecies of offence; and when Dr. Towers alledges that his doctrine is conformable to the practice of juries in times more remote than the middle of the fifteenth century, he afcends to an era where it is impoffible to find either common or statute law upon the subject.

We cannot help being of opinion, that this author difcovers a want of candour in an observation which he makes on Blackstone's Commentaries. The learned author of that work had expreffed himself in the following terms on the subject of libels.

"In a criminal profecution," he fays, "the tendency which all libels have to create animofities, and to difturb the public peace, is the fole confideration of the law. And, therefore, in fuch profecutions, the only facts to be confidered are, first, the making or publishing of the book or writing; and fecondly, whether the matter be criminal: and if both these points are against the defendant, then the offence against the public is complete."

In a later edition of the Commentaries, Mr. juftice Blackstone altered the paffage here cited, and inferted the word points instead of facts. Dr. Towers reprefents this amendment as entirely a political accommodation. It is manifect, he adds, that the original and uncorrupted opinion of Blackstone was, that the criminality of a book or paper, whether it was, or was not, a libel, was a queftion of fact, and not a question of law.' The argument that an original opinion should be best founded, seems not very conformable either to reafon or truth; and with regard to its being uncorrupted, we know too well the clearness of understanding, and the integrity, with which the learned judge was endowed, to fuffer the infinuation to pafs unnoticed, that his opinion was not equally uncorrupted when he made the alteration above mentioned.

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