sheriff court, and minor objections to the indictment can be wholly or in part disposed of there. Borough magistrates and justices of the peace have jurisdiction in petty cases occurring within the burgh or county, and in a number of minor offences under various statutes.

IRELAND.

In Ireland persons charged with crime are first brought before the petty sessions court, which must consist of at least two ordinary justices of the peace, one of whom may be a stipendiary-commonly called a resident magistrate. Then if the charge be trifling it may be disposed of, the prisoner, if convicted, having a right of appeal to the quarter sessions or recorder's court (according as it is in a borough or in the county), provided he is fined more than twenty shillings or sentenced to a longer imprisonment than one month (Petty Sessions Act, sec. 24). If the charge be of a more serious character it must either be dismissed or sent for trial to the quarter sessions or recorder's court, or to the assizes, as in England. There is this difference, however, between quarter sessions in Ireland and in England: in England they are presided over by an unpaid chairman, who need not be a lawyer and who is elected by his fellow justices of the peace for the county; while in Ireland they are presided over by a paid official, who must be a barrister, whose decision on points of law binds the court, who is appointed by the Crown, and who is also judge of the civil bill court of the county, which corresponds to the English county court. The assizes are presided over by one of the common law judges of the High Court of Justice. In the quarter sessions, recorder's court, and assizes the trial is by jury in all cases save appeals from petty sessions. Under the Crimes Act witnesses and persons suspected of crime may be interrogated before a secret court of inquiry; but admissions then made are not evidence against the persons making them. Prisoners may be convicted before two resident magistrates specially appointed to hear cases under the Crimes Act, and in cases where the sentence exceeds a month, convicted persons have a right of appeal to the county chairman at quarter sessions.

The number of criminal offenders committed for trial and convicted, in each of the three kingdoms, was as follows in five years:

The following table shows the strength of the police force in England and Wales, Scotland and Laland·

There is a Poor Law, under a variety of statutes, applicable to the Three Kingdoms, by which paupers, under certain conditions, are to be relieved in their own houses or lodged in workhouses or poor-houses built for the purpose. The law is administered by the Local Government Board, through Boards of Guardians elected for the purpose. England and Wales, including the Metropolis and the municipal boroughs, are divided into 650 poor law unions, for each of which there is elected a Board of Guardians. In some cases the union consists of only one parish; in others several are included according to popula. tion. In urban districts and in the Metropolis guardians are separately elected, but in rural districts the rural district councillors act as guardians for the parishes they represent on the district conneil. Guardians are elected on the same popular franchise as district councillors. In every civil parish overseers are appointed whose duty it is to make and collect the poor rate. districts, which include boroughs, the local authority raise and collect rates for local government purposes, but in rural districts and rural parishes the funds for this purpose are, as a general rule, taken from the poor-rate.

In urban

The following table shows the total amount expended in relief of the poor for the last five years (ended March 25 for England and Ireland, and May 15 for Scotland). For Scotland, the amount includes expenditure on buildings, but not from loans :

The number of paupers, exclusive of vagrants, in receipt of relief in the several unions and parishes of England and Wales was as follows on January 1 of the last five years :

The number of vagrants relieved on January 1, 1904, was 15,634. The number of registered paupers and their dependents, exclusive of casual poor, who were in receipt of relief in parishes of Scotland on January 15 of the last five years, is shown in the subjoined table :--

The subjoined table gives the number of indoor and outdoor paupers, and those-in blind and deaf and dumb asylums--in receipt of relief in unions in Ireland at the close of the first week in January in cach of the last five years:

Included in the number of indoor paupers are casuals, who numbered 695 in January 1904.

Finance.

I. REVENUE AND EXPENDITURE.

The following tables show the total amounts of the estimated and actual Imperial revenue and expenditure of the United Kingdom for the years ended March 31, 1880, 1890, 1900, and the three years ended March 31, 1904 ;

The following table (derived from the two preceding) shows the differences (surplus or deficit) between revenue and expenditure in 1880, 1890, and the last four years:

1

The Imperial revenue collected in 1903-04 amounted to 151,249,0787., but of this 9,811,5797. was payable to Local Taxation accounts, and 92,3177. to the Isle of Man, therefore the amount payable to the Exchequer, as detailed in the following table, was 141,345,1827., derived mainly from taxation (under the first seven heads of the following table), which in 1903-04 produced 119,036,4607., or 84 per cent. of the whole. The remainder is subdivided into five heads as below (viii.-xii.)

1 That is, revenue actually paid into the Exchequer between April 1, 1903, and March 31, 1904.

2 Including increase to tea duty, 2,000,0001.; and increase to tobacco duty 350,0001. The original estimate of 36,450,000l. was subsequently reduced by modifications in the increased tobacco duty, &c.

3 On property of persons dying after August 1, 1894. On property of persons dying before August 2, 1894. 5 Including 2,000,000l. for increase of 1d. in the £.