s. A tax on armorial bearings is suggested as
one which will not be resented by the rich. A fourth correspondent
advocates a graduated Income Tax, ranging from 6_d._ in the pound on
incomes under L400, up to 5_s._ in the pound on incomes of more than,
L30,000 a year, and estimates the total yield at L62,625,000. The same
writer urges the need of a tax on sinecures and pensions, and finally
begs Pitt for a place for life, devolving on his son.[449]

The Chancellor of the Exchequer therefore had the choice of the direct
attack on the purse or the increase of atmospheric pressure. For the
present he chose the latter method, enhancing the duties on tea, wines,
sugar, spirits, game licences, glass, tobacco, and snuff, besides
raising the "Assessed Taxes" by ten per cent. The produce of some of
these imposts is curious. Hair-powder yielded L197,000; the extra tea
and wine duties L186,000 and L923,000, severally; those on tobacco and
snuff only L40,000. Pitt's procedure in December 1796 was very cautious.
He carefully watched the yield of the new taxes, in order to see whether
the increase of price checked consumption. Finding that this did not
happen in the case of tea and spirits, he further raised the duties on
those commodities; but, on behalf of the poor, he exempted the cheaper
kinds of tea. On the other hand he proposed to check the consumption of
spirits by imposing an extra duty of five pence a gallon along with a
surcharge on distillery licences. Further, as the duties on bricks,
auction sales, sugar, bar iron, oil, wines, and coal had not lessened
consumption, he again increased them. A questionable experiment was an
increase in the postage of letters and parcels, and in the duties on
newspapers, stage coaches, and canal tolls. A new House Duty, levied in
proportion to the number of servants, is open to less objection. On the
whole he expected the new taxes to yield L2,138,000. The total supply
asked for was L27,640,000.

The financial outlook grew darker in the year 1797. At the close of
January came the news of Hoche's expedition to Bantry Bay, which
revealed the possibility of revolutionizing Ireland. On 4th February
Pitt heard of the triumph of Bonaparte at Rivoli. The tidings told
disastrously on markets already in a nervous state. A correspondent of
Pitt attributed the decline to the action of the Bank of England at the
close of 1795, in reducing their discounts. Fox and his friends ascribed
it to the export