Page:History of merchant shipping and ancient commerce (Volume 1).djvu/255

 their property had been assessed." From the nature of this tax, it may be inferred that it was arbitrary in its distribution, while, from the rigorous mode of its collection, it could hardly fail to be both unequal and oppressive in its operation. The income tax of our own time has been frequently denounced for its inquisitorial character and the irregularity of the burden imposed on different sections of the people; and if it be difficult now to ascertain, in various branches of trade, the actual amount of a trader's gains, it must have been far more so in ancient days, when the precarious profits of art or labour were capable of only a discretionary valuation.

It is certain, however, that laws pressing heavily on the merchant were now greatly modified in favour of those who followed maritime pursuits—a remarkable fact, as contrasted with the former legislation of Rome and the contempt in which seafaring persons had been previously held. The emperors Valentinian, Theodosius, and Arcadius exempted the ship-owners and the sailors who navigated their vessels, from the payment of taxes, on the ground that the merchant was enriched by foreign trade, while the mariners had all the trouble and risk. The fifth title of the thirteenth book of the Theodosian code referred exclusively to their interests; while the ninth law under that head, enacted by the emperors Constans and Julian, further shelters them from personal injuries and protects them "from all costs of violent proceedings, as well as extortions, ordinary and extraordinary." Nearly two hundred years afterwards the Emperor Justinian considered it politic to