REVENUE  AND  EXPENDITURE  103
ago,  the  average  retail  price  so  fixed  was  50  cash  a  catty  *  ;
as  the  corresponding  price  in  Hunan  was  36  cash,  and  as
those  were  the  prices  before  the  increase  in  taxation  to  meet
the  Boxer  indemnities,  this  price  of  5°  cash  may  be  accepted
as  a  fair  average.  Converting  at  the  same  rates,  the  producer’s ­
  cost  of  Tls.1,130  for  the  quantity,  3,75°  piculs,
under  one  license,  is  increased  to  Tls.12,545  as  Ü ie  P r i ce
to  the  consumer,  the  difference  being  Tls.11,415  i  if
Tls.1,415  be  allowed  for  cost  of  transport  and  legitimate
profit,  the  remaining  Tls.10,000  (Tls.2.67  a  picul)  is  paid
by  the  people  as  tax,  regular  or  irregular,  open  or  covert.
The  consumption  of  salt  in  the  Empire  can  only  be
guessed.  A  hundred  years  ago  the  official  “  blue-books  ”  of
China  put  it  at  20,000,000  piculs,  and  this  was  stated  to
be  less  than  the  amount  fifty  years  previously  ;  twenty
years  ago  a  Vice-President  of  the  Board  of  Revenue  put
it  at  28,000,000  piculs.  The  300,000,000  of  the  people
of  India  consumed  24,300,000  piculs  of  salt  in  1904,  and
it  would  seem  a  fair  assumption  to  put  the  consumption
of  the  400,000,000  of  the  people  of  China  at  the  same
figure.  On  this  basis,  and  calculating  at  the  rates  for
eastern  Hupeh,  the  people  of  China  pay  Tls.81,000,000
for  their  salt,  of  which  sum  Tls.64,000,000  and  more  is
taxation  in  one  form  or  another,  and  Tls.39,000,000  is
taxation  according  to  regularly  published  tariffs  of  charges  ;
the  collection  reported  to  the  Imperial  Government  is
Tls.13,050,000.1  In  India,  in  1904,  the  people  paid  88,000,000
rupees,  of  which  76,000,000  rupees  was  taxation  actually
credited  to  the  government.
5.  Miscellaneous
Some  new  taxes  are  included  under  this  heading,  but
the  greater  part  are  old  ;  whether  new  or  old,  they  are
covered  by  much  obscurity.  Many  of  them  are  of  local
*  A  well-informed  writer  in  the  China  Mail,  Hongkong,  1885,
gives  the  retail  price  of  salt  at  Hankow  as  64  cash  a  catty.
t  “  China  ;  Past  and  Present.”