§ MR. MILNER GIBSONsaid, he wished to put to the noble Lord at the head of the Government a question of great commercial importance. It was generally understood that a Conference had been lately sitting at Copenhagen, but which had not as yet been concluded, with reference to the abolition of the Sound Dues. He had heard from common report that, at the last sitting of the Conference, which took place on the 2nd of February, the Danish Government communicated a definite plan for the abolition of those dues, which had been considered acceptable, and referred to the several Governments taking part in that Conference for their approbation; and that it was at the present moment under the consideration of Her Majesty's Government. If that were the case, he thought that the present was the proper moment, before Government decided one way or the other upon it, to revert to a subject which he had brought under the notice of the House in 1839. He alluded to the toll charged by the Danish Government on goods carried by the road from Hamburg 181 to Lubeck. That was then a new duty, and was levied for the protection of the Sound Dues, as the road between those two cities having been improved, the trade between the North Sea and the Baltic was beginning to be carried out. Under those circumstances he first called the attention of the British Government to the subject; and the noble Lord opposite, who was then Foreign Secretary, remonstrated against the impost, and threatened the Danish Government with retaliation. That toll was still levied; and if they were now about to do away with the Sound Dues, and establish perfect commercial freedom between the two seas, it would be incomplete if they did not include in it the abolition of the transit dues between Hamburg and Lubeck. He did not, of course, wish that the noble Lord should tell the House what the plan proposed by the Danish Government was. The question he would put was simply this—that as the proposals of Denmark were now under the consideration of Her Majesty's Government, whether they had directed their attention to the removal of the transit dues charged in Holstein and Lauenberg?
§ VISCOUNT PALMERSTONsaid, that the right hon. Gentleman was quite right in saying that communications were going on between the Danish Government and other Governments concerning the trade to the Baltic, on the subject of a commutation of the Sound Dues. Of course his right hon. Friend could not expect him at present to enter into any details of the arrangement, or to state what they were. No communication had been made to the Danish Government on the subject of the tolls adverted to by his right hon. Friend. When attention was drawn to the subject in 1839, representations were made to the Danish Government, and the toll was to a certain degree lowered. What passed at that time showed that Government might consider itself entitled, if a proper occasion occurred, to make representations to the Danish Government on the subject.