I therefore propose, that the king's tables (whatever number of tables, or covers to each, he shall think proper to command) should be classed by the steward of the household, and should be contracted for, according to their rank, by the head or cover ;that the estimate and circumstance of the contract should be carried to the treasury to be approved; and that its faithful and satisfactory performance should be reported there, previous to any payment; that there, and there only, should the payment be made. I propose, that men should be contracted with, only in their proper trade; and that no member of parliament should be capable of such contract. By this plan, almost all the infinite offices under the lord steward may be spared; to the extreme simplification, and to the far better execution, of every one of his functions. The king of Prussia is so served. He is a great and eminent, though, indeed, a very rare instance of the possibility of uniting in a mind of vigour and compass, an attention to minute objects, with the largest views, and the most complicated plans. His tables are served by contract, and by the head. Let me say, that no prince can be ashamed to imitate the king of Prussia; and particularly to learn in his school, when the problem is-"The best manner of reconciling the state of a court with the support of war." Other courts, I understand, have followed him with effect, and to their satisfaction.

The same clue of principle leads us through the labyrinth of the other departments. What, sir, is there in the office of the great wardrobe (which has the care of the king's furniture) that may not be executed by the lord chamberlain himself. He has an honourable appointment; he has time sufficient to attend to the duty; and he has the vice chamberlain to assist him. Why should not he deal also by contract, for all things belonging to this office, and carry his estimates first, and his report of the execution in its proper time, for payment, directly to the board of treasury itself? By a simple operation (containing in

a treble control) the expenses of a department,

which, for naked walls, or walls hung with cobwebs, has in a few years cost the crown 150,000l, may at length hope for regulation. But, sir, the office and its business are at variance. As it stands, it serves, not to furnish the palace with its hangings, but the parliament with its dependent members.

To what end, sir, does the office of removing wardrobe serve at all? Why should a jewel office exist for the sole purpose of taxing the king's gifts of plate? Why should an office of the robes exist, when that of groom of the stole is a sinecure, and that this is a pro, per object of his department?

name.

All these incumbrances, which are themselves nuisances, produce other incumbrances, and other nuisances. For the payment of these useless establishments, there are no less than three useless treasurers; two to hold a purse, and one to play with a stick. The treasurer of the household is a mere The cofferer, and the treasurer of the cham. ber, receive and pay great sums, which it is not at all necessary they should either receive or pay. All the proper officers, servants, and tradesmen, may be enrolled in their several departments, and paid in proper classes and times, with great simplicity and order, at the exchequer, and by direction from the treasury.

For

The board of works, which in the seven years preceding 1777, has cost towards 400,0001.* and, if I recollect rightly, has not cost less in proportion from the beginning of the reign, is under the very same description of all the other ill contrived establishments, and calls for the very same reform. We are to seek for the visible signs of all this expense. all this expense, we do not see a building of the size and importance of a pigeon house. Buckingham house was repaired by a bargain with the publick, for one hundred thousand pounds;—and the small house at Windsor has been, if I mistake not, undertaken since that account was brought before us. The good

* More exactly, 378,6161. 10s. 13d.

works of that board of works, are as carefully concealed, as other good works ought to be. They are perfectly invisible. But though it is the perfection of charity to be concealed, it is, sir, the property and glory of magnificence, to appear, and stand forward to the eye.

The mint, though not a department of the household, has the same vices. It is a great expense to the nation, chiefly for the sake of members of parlia ment. It has its officers of parade and dignity. It has its treasury too. It is a sort of corporate body; and formerly was a body of great importance; as much so, on the then scale of things, and the then order of business, as the bank is at this day. It was the great centre of money transactions, and the remittances for our own and for other nations; until king Charles the First, among other arbitrary projects, dictated by despotick necessity, made them withhold the money that lay there for remittance. That blow (and happily too) the mint never recovered. Now it is no bank-no remittance shop. The mint, sir, is a manufacture, and it is nothing else; and it ought to be undertaken upon the principles of a manufacture; that is, for the best and cheapest execution, by a contract, upon proper securities, and under proper regulations.

The artillery is a far greater object; it is a military concern; but having an affinity and kindred in its defects with the establishments I am now speaking of, I think it is best to speak of it along with them. It is, I conceive, an establishment not well suited to its martial, though exceedingly well calculated for its parliamentary purposes.-Here there is a treasury, as in all the other inferiour departments of government. Here the military is subordinate to the civil, and the naval confounded with the land service. The object indeed is much the same in both. But when the detail is examined, it will be found that they had better be separated. For a reform of this office, I propose to restore things to what (all considerations taken together) is their natural order; to restore them to their just proportion, and to their just distribution.

I propose, in this military concern, to render the civil subordinate to the military; and this will annihilate the greatest part of the expense, and all the influence belonging to the office. I propose to send the military branch to the army, and the naval to the admiralty and I intend to perfect and accomplish the whole detail (where it becomes too minute and complicated for legislature, and requires exact, official, military, and mechanical knowledge) by a commission of competent officers in both departments. I propose to execute by contract, what by contract can be executed, and to bring, as much as possible, all estimates to be previously approved, and finally to be paid by the treasury.

Thus, by following the course of nature, and not the purposes of politicks, or the accumulated patchwork of occasional accomodation, this vast expensive department may be methodized; its service proportioned to its necessities; and its payments subjected to the inspection of the superiour minister of finance; who is to judge of it on the result of the total collective exigencies of the state. This last is a reigning principle through my whole plan; and it is a principle which, I hope, may hereafter be applied to other plans.

By these regulations taken together-besides the three subordinate treasuries in the lesser principalities, five other subordinate treasuries are suppressed. All these arrangements together will be found to relieve the nation from a vast weight of influence, without distressing but rather by forwarding every publick service. When something of this kind is done, then the publick may begin to breathe.. Under other governments, a question of expense is only a question of economy, and it is nothing more; with us, in every question of expense, there is always a mixture of constitutional considerations.

It is, sir, because I wish to keep this business of subordinate treasuries as much as I can together, that I brought the ordnance office before you, though it is properly a military department. For the same

reason I will now trouble you with my thoughts and propositions upon two of the greatest under treasuries; I mean, the office of paymaster of the land forces, or treasurer of the army; and that of the treasurer of the navy. The former of these has long been a great object of publick suspicion and uneasiness. Envy too has had its share in the obloquy which is cast upon this office. But I am sure that it has no share at all in the reflections I shall make upon it, or in the reformations that I shall propose. I do not grudge to the honourable gentleman who at present holds the office, any of the effects of his talents, his merit, or his fortune. He is respectable in all these particulars. I follow the constitution of the office, without persecuting its holder. It is necessary, in all matters of publick complaint, where men frequently feel right and argue wrong, to separate prejudice from reason; and to be very sure, in attempting the redress of a grievance, that we hit upon its real seat, and its true nature. Where there is an abuse in office, the first thing that occurs in heat is to censure the officer. Our natural disposition leads all our inquiries rather to persons than to things. But this prejudice is to be corrected by maturer thinking.

Sir, the profits of the pay office (as an office) are not too great, in my opinion, for its duties, and for the rank of the person who has generally held it. He has been generally a person of the highest rank; that is ́to say, a person of eminence and consideration in this house. The great and the invidious profits of the pay office, are from the bank that is held in it. According to the present course of the office, and according to the present mode of accounting there, this bank must necessarily exist somewhere. Money is a productive thing; and when the usual time of its demand can be tolerably calculated, it may, with prudence, be safely laid out to the profit of the holder. It is on this calculation, that the business of banking proceeds. But no profit can be derived from the use of money, which does not make it the interest of the holder to delay his account. The process of the ex