f paper might end
in a more serious war; for now remonstrance met remonstrance, and
memorial was opposed to memorial. The wise Britons thought it more
reasonable that the poor, wasted, decrepit revenue of the principality
should die a natural than a violent death. In truth, Sir, the attempt
was no less an affront upon the understanding of that respectable people
than it was an attack on their property. They chose rather that their
ancient, moss-grown castles should moulder into decay, under the silent
touches of time, and the slow formality of an oblivious and drowsy
exchequer, than that they should be battered down all at once by the
lively efforts of a pensioned engineer. As it is the fortune of the
noble lord to whom the auspices of this campaign belonged frequently to
provoke resistance, so it is his rule and nature to yield to that
resistance _in all cases whatsoever_. He was true to himself on this
occasion. He submitted with spirit to the spirited remonstrances of the
Welsh. Mr. Probert gave up his adventure, and keeps his pension; and so
ends "the famous history of the revenue adventures of the bold Baron
North and the good Knight Probert upon the mountains of Venodotia."

In such a state is the exchequer of Wales at present, that, upon the
report of the Treasury itself, its _little_ revenue is _greatly_
diminished; and we see, by the whole of this strange transaction, that
an attempt to improve it produces resistance, the resistance produces
submission, and the whole ends in pension.[34]

It is nearly the same with the revenues of the Duchy of Lancaster. To do
nothing with them is extinction; to improve them is oppression. Indeed,
the whole of the estates which support these minor principalities is
made up, not of revenues, and rents, and profitable fines, but of
claims, of pretensions, of vexations, of litigations. They are
exchequers of unfrequent receipt and constant charge: a system of
finances not fit for an economist who would be rich, not fit for a
prince who would govern his subjects with equity and justice.

It is not only between prince and subject that these mock jurisdictions
and mimic revenues produce great mischief. They excite among the people
a spirit of informing and delating, a spirit of supplanting and
undermining one another: so that many, in such circumstances, conceive
it advantageous to them rather to continue subject to vexation
themselves than to give up the means and chance of vexing