The wide and complicated question of local government and taxation, probably occupies more public attention at the present time than any other question of home politics. It is my purpose this evening to consider only that portion of the subject which relates to the-government and taxation of municipalities. The government of counties, though equally deserving of attention, and perhaps more urgently requiring the interference of the Legislature, could not be satisfactorily treated of in the same paper with the government of towns, within the limits of time assigned to essayists by the rules of this Society; and moreover my acquaintance with county affairs is not such as to warrant me in attempting to deal with so important a subject.

Read before the Society, 19 January 1875