himfelt, can be neither debtor to, nor creditor of the public, except as far as he may be refponfible for his clerks. On paffing his accounts, the bill indorfed, or requifition of the navy board, is both his authority and voucher for his draft. The draft indorsed is the voucher for the Bank to prove their payment. If these accounts agree (and they ought frequently to be compared together) it is highly probable that they are both right..

The only remaining fource of delay, in the accounts of the treafurer of the navy, that has come under our obfervation, is the neceffity, arifing from the prefent courfe of the Exchequer, that these accounts fhould pafs through the office of the auditors of the impreft. Public accounts ought certainly to be fully and accurately examined fomewhere. The officer entrusted with public money fhould give an account what he has done with it; and the public have a right to the fatisfaction of knowing that their mone has been applied to the purposes for which they gave it.

The treasurer of the navy is an officer merely minifterial: he nei ther receives nor pays in confequence of any judgment of his own, but as he is directed, or according to lifts prepared for him, and rules prefcribed him; and therefore to pals his accounts, is no more than to fee that he has an authority, and a correct voucher, for every payment he claims to be allowed.

We learn from the information of George Marth, efq. one of the commiffioners of the navy; and from Jonas Hanway, efq. one of the commiffioners of the victualling; and from Mr. Nathan Crow, chief clerk to the commiffioners of fick and hurt, that the commitioners of each office are entrusted with the power of mak1783.

ing all contracts, whether for the purchase of stores or materials, or for the performance of services in their feveral departments; that certain officers are appointed or officially bound to fuperintend the execution of the contracts; and no payment is directed to be made but upon the certificate or teftimony, in fome fhape or other, of these officers that the contraces have been executed to the amount of the de mand with honefty and fidelity, and according to the terms and conditions of the engagement. Certain officers of these boards, in their refpective departments, compare the bills with the terms of the contracts, and examine the computa tions and caftings. The commiffioners, relying upon their accuracy. and fidelity, aflign the bill fo examined upon the treasurer for payment. The treafurer, before he tranfmits his account or ledger to the auditors of the impreft, fends the feveral parts of it to different branches of the navy, victualling, and fick and hurt offices, with the vouchers: the officers, whose bafinefs it is, in thefe departmen ́s, compare the articles in the ledger with their correfpondent vouchers, and with the entries in their books of office; this examination war rant the fubfcription of the commiffioners of the navy to the ledger entries. The auditor compares the abftract with the particular items that compote it; he recafts and recomputes the compound articles, and makes fome alteration in the arrangement of others.

From this flate of the progrefs of thefe accounts, it feems to us that the accounts of the trea❜urer of the navy are in fact not auditel by the auditor of the impreft, but by the commiflioners of the navy.

To the commitlioners of the fe. (0) veral

veral boards is committed the important truft of making and deciding upon the execution of all contracts. They are the fole judges of the reasonableness of the terms, and of the fidelity with which they are fulfilled; they direct the payments or fums to be advanced on account, confequent to the complete or part performance of the contracts. Hence they are the ultimate judges of the ground and confideration of every payment. These powers must be entrusted fomewhere without appeal; and where, to all appearance, fo properly as with the prefiding officers of the feveral boards, fubject to the fuperintending eye of parliament.

Of this material branch of an audit, the auditor of the imprefts has no cognizance. From the nature and conftitution of his office, he is not competent to examine in to the grounds of these payments; or, if he could examine, can he be qualified to decide upon the propriety of them? Neither does he fee any vouchers (except for the few extra payments :) he relies upon the teftimony of the commiffioners of the navy (a teftimony he is bound not to call in queftion) that they exist, and warrant the entries: he does no more, in fact, than what has been previoufly, and to all appearance fufficiently done to his hands in the navy-office, except the difpofing of certain articles in different order; which, as far as it is useful, may easily be ado ted in the office of the treafurer; where they are now profiting by his example in the arrangement of the infupers. Errors may cer tainly escape the navy and other of ficers. The auditor difcovered an error in the account of the year 1750, of a double charge of eighty feven pounds ten filings; and,

extend the chain of re-examination to any given length, the poffibility of error must exist in the last link. The auditor himfelf is not perfect: errors in his accounts have been difcovered in the pipe-office, and corrected by him.

Since, then, the accounts of the treasurer of the navy are, in effect, paffed, and with fufficient care and accuracy, in the offices to which they feverally relate, and the most important parts of the examination are intrufted to thofe officers without control, it seems reasonable to fuppofe the computations and caftings, generally the bufinefs of clerks in office, may, with equal fafety, be finally committed to the fame decifion.

We are therefore of opinion, that auditing the accounts of the treafurer of the navy, in the office of the auditors of the impreft, is unneceffary, and may be difpenfed. with; that the proceedings of that office upon the accounts of the treafurers now before them should cease, and the materials relative thereto be returned to the office of the treasurer, and that the auditors fhould be relieved and discharged from all attention to them for the future.

Paffing public accounts without the intervention of the auditors of the impreft, is no novelty in the Exchequer. Thomas Rumley, efq. deputy auditor of the excife, informed us of the manner in which the accounts of the duties under the management of the commiffioners of excife are paffed. Thefe commiffioners are all jointly accountable for the fums received and paid by them on account of the excite, and other duties committed to their truit: they do not paf, their accounts in the office of the auditors of the impreft, but in that of the

auditor

auditor of the excife; an office inftituted for that fpecial purpose. The accounts they pafs every year, are fixteen cafh accounts, and feventeen general accounts. All except the malt are made up to the 5th of July. Each cafh account contains the account of the weekly receipts and payments of the commiffioners themselves only, relative to one or more duties. It is made out by the accountant general in whofe department thofe duties are. After examination, it is fworn to by all the commiffioners, before the curfitor baron of the Exchequer, about the May following; after which, it is delivered to the auditor of excife, with all the vouchers: he examines them, and reduces the account into the official form of the Exchequer he makes out two parts, one on parchment, the other on paper, as is done in the office of the auditors of the impreft.

Befides thefe cafh accounts, the general accounts are likewife made up every year by the accountants general to the fame period. These general accounts are more comprehenfive than the cafh accounts. They contain all the receipts and payments of each particular duty by every collector throughout the kingdom, and at the office in London: they are figned by the refpective ac countants general, and delivered to the auditor with the vouchers. He examines and reduces them into the like official forms, and makes out fimilar parts of them. They are not fworn to by any one. Both the cafh and general accounts are figned by the deputy auditor of excife, declared every year, ufually in June or July, before the chancellor of the Exchequer, and figned by him and two lords of the treafury; after which, the auditor delivers the parts on parchment to the king's

remembrancer, and retains the declarations in his own office. The total charge upon the commiffioners of excife for the year 1778, was feven millions four hundred feventy-nine thousand fix hundred and thirteen pounds; the total difcharge was five millions fix hundred fiftyfix thoufand eight hundred twentynine pounds,

We find likewife, from the examination of Mr. James Roulands, first clerk in the office of James Weft, efq. one of the auditors of the land revenue, that the accounts of the receivers general of the land tax, window tax, and of feveral other duties, are not paffed in the office of the auditors of the impreft, but in the office where he is em ployed.

Since, then, the courfe of the Exchequer does not render it abfolutely neceffary that all public accounts fhould be paffed in the office of the auditors of the imprest, we fee no reason why the navy ac counts may not proceed in the like train with thofe of the excise. Of thefe duties the commiffioners themfelves are the accountants"; and therefore a diftinct office is appointed for the paffing them; but in the navy, the treaturer being the accountant, and neither appointed by, nor fubject to the commiffioners, his accounts may, without danger of collufion, be completely, as they are now in by far the most material part, paffed by the commiffioners of the navy; they may be reduced into the Exchequer form in the treaturer's office, adopting from the auditor his arrangement of the articles, and may be paffed through the Exchequer offices.

All these public accounts, in whatever office paffed, are drawn up in the official form of the Ex(02)

chequer

chequer; and after declaration, the part on parchment paffs through the three feveral cices of the king's remembrancer, the lord treafurers's remembrancer, and the pipe. We endeavoured to learn, from the officers employed in thefe departments, to what purpofe thefe accounts were pafied through fo many offices.

Adam Martin, efq. the first clerk in the office of the king's remembrancer, and John Perrot, efq. first fecondary in the office of the lord treasurer's remembrancer, and Mr. Peter Sykes, deputy to the first tecondary in the pipe-office, informs us, that a state or abstract of every public account, after it is paffed, is inrolled in thefe offices, and in the two first the infupers are inrolled verbatim; but in the laft, the grofs fum only, fet infuper, is entered upon the roll without the names, unlefs where there are but few of them. This inrollment is the record of the account in each office and in the othce of the king's remembrancer, warrants the procefs that iffues against the ac countant, whether it be the ordinary process of diftringas ad computandum, or the fpecial procefs of capias ad computandum, or any protels for recovering a debt due to the crown. No general procefs can iffue from this office, unlets founded on matter of record in the office; but, in the two other offices, the inrollment feems to be of no ufe; no proce's flues from either of them, in confequence of, or grounded on that record. The long writ, which is the procefs that iffues out of the office of the lord treasurer's remembrancer, is grounded upon the nichil record tranfmitted to them from the pipe-office,

On the roll of foreign accounts in the pipe ofce, which contains the abstracts of all the public ac

1

counts, no process whatever iffues. The words, either "Quictus eft," or "He is quit," are written at the bottom of every abstract upon the roll, and a copy is delivered to the accountant, which is his quietus.

Public accounts, or abstracts of them, ought to be inrolled, and the records of them preferved in fome office, or other: but inrolling them in three different branches of an office, feems to be more than is neceflary. In that of the king's remembrancer it is neceffary, as the ground for the procefs; and that inrollment anfwers all the purpoles of a record; it may be con fulted for information, or it may be produced, if wanted, in evidence. The other two seem utterly ufelefs, and may, therefore, be difpenfed with, and the fees faved to the public. The fees paid to the pipe for the quietus upon Mr. Grenville's account for the year 1759, were eighty-one pounds ten fhillings. The account itfelf being lodged in this office, a very short abitract, with the quietus fubfcribed, may be delivered to the accountant as his final difcharge.

An account in the Exchequer form is in English, but contains fome Latin terms. The imprestroll is all written in an abridgement of the Latin language. The fums in both are expreffed in characters that are, in general, corruptions of the old text, and are in ufe no where, that we can find, but in the Echequer; characters very liable to mistakes, inconvenient and troublefome even to the officers them felves: the fums fo expreffed cannot be caft up. Most of the ac counts in the Exchequer are made up twice; firft in common figures, that they may be added together; and then turned into Latin, and the fums entered in the Exchequer figures: and that the high numbers