HC Deb 06 July 1863 vol 172 cc254-69
MR. AYRTON

rose to move, that in the opinion of this House, the purchase money of land at Kensington should be applied by the Commissioners of the Great Exhibition of 1851 towards discharging the liabilities of the Commission, and that the Commission should be determined, and the property now held by the Commission be vested in Her Majesty's Commissioners of Works, subject to any interests now existing therein and to any charges thereon. The hon. Member said, that although no doubt the subject had lost some of its interest owing to its not having been brought forward on a previous occasion, yet in consequence of the purchase which had been sanctioned by the House, it had become necessary to go further, and to inquire into the nature of that body of Commissioners from whom the land at South Kensington had recently been purchased, and to take into its own hands the whole question in reference both to the land bought and to that remaining in their possession. That Commission was of a very peculiar character. He need scarcely remind the House that the Exhibition of 1851 was carried on by virtue of a Royal Commission issued to His Royal Highness the late Prince Consort and twenty-four other Commissioners. That body was authorized to take whatever measures might be necessary for the purpose of carrying out the Exhibition, to receive subscriptions and to apply them to that end; but the Commission contained no ulterior provision. On the contrary, it provided, that after the close of the Exhibition, the powers and functions of the Commissioners should cease. Every one would remember that the Exhibition was an immense success—that it resulted in a surplus of £181,000, therefore no sooner had the Exhibition closed than the question arose as to what was to be done with that large sum of money. The Commissioners had issued a notification, that whatever subscriptions they might receive from the public, the subscribers would have no control over them, but that the money would be at the absolute disposal of the Commis- sioners themselves for purposes strictly in connection with the ends of the Exhibition. The consequence was, that at the close of the Exhibition, the Commissioners found themselves in possession of a fund with which they had no power to deal. They reported that fact to the Crown, with their opinion that no measures could be so strictly in accordance with the ends of the Exhibition as those which might increase the means of industrial education and extend the influence of science and art upon productive industry; soon after a new Commission was issued, giving the Commissioners power to devise a plan for the disposal of the surplus money in accordance with the expectations held out to the public and to carry it into effect. The Commission conferred powers, among others, to buy and sell land. The fund was thus declared to be entirely a public one, derived from public sources, and intended for the benefit of the whole community. Some of the large towns which had subscribed towards it put forward claims to participate in it, and they proposed that institutions for the promotion of science and art should be established in all the chief seats of industry. The Commissioners rejected these applications, on the ground that the contributions were collected on the distinct understanding that those who gave them were to have no further control over the fund. The Commissioners at length came to the conclusion that the only course they could consistently take was to frame some great scheme to be carried out in the metropolis for the promotion of science and art. What that scheme was to be the Commissioners did not exactly state, but they strongly deprecated the frittering away of the money on small detached objects, and recommended that it should be devoted to one grand comprehensive plan. They further suggested that they could do nothing until they were in possession of land for the purpose, and they proposed to acquire a considerable estate in the suburbs as a preliminary measure, and they invoked the aid of the Government. Her Majesty, in consequence, at the opening of the Session of Christmas 1852 said, in Her Gracious Speech from the Throne— The advancement of the fine arts and practical science will be readily recognised by you as worthy of the attention of a great and enlightened nation. I have directed that a comprehensive scheme shall be laid before you, having in view the promotion of that object, in carrying out which I invite your co-operation. The subject, therefore, now assumed a national aspect, and the House voted £177,500 to enable the Government to join with the Commissioners in purchasing a large extent of land at South Kensington, which was to be the foundation of future action between the Commissioners and the State, to carry into effect Her Majesty's recommendation. Thus assisted, the Commissioners proceeded to acquire the land; but as some of the proprietors refused to sell, and some of the occupiers to quit, and they could not enforce the negotiations by their own authority, they had to come to Parliament for compulsory powers. These were granted, and under these powers the Commissioners obtained possession of about eighty-six acres, at the price of £355,000. With this joint purchase of the land began the partnership between the State and the Commissioners for the advancement of science and art. The partnership was to be further strengthened by the Government being represented at the Board by four officials—the First Lord of the Treasury, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the Chief Commissioner of Works, and the President of the Board of Trade, That implied that the Government were always to be in a safe minority of one to five. That arrangement endured for two or three years. The land was laid out; about four acres were converted into roads, and a compact estate of eighty acres or upwards remained in the hands of the Commissioners. Some parts were let on building leases, hut, on the whole, very little annual profit was derived from the investment. At length, the partnership was found so irksome that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Bucks, when Chancellor of the Exchequer, announced his intention to dissolve it. It had been proposed that all the great departments of science and art should be gradually concentrated at South Kensington, but none of the great institutions of London could be persuaded to transfer themselves to Kensington. Public opinion pronounced against the plan in the case of the National Gallery; the rich and independent institutions rebelled against the proposition, and the poor and dependent societies entreated the Government that they should on no account be removed to such an inconvenient suburb. The dissolution of the partnership between the State and the Commissioners, though involving great sacrifices, was therefore hailed with delight. When the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Bucks came down to the House and announced that the National Gallery was to remain where it was, and that the partnership between the Government and the Commissioners had better be dissolved, the announcement was received with great cheering. It might have been expected, that in parting company the State and the Commissioners would have followed the usual course when joint owners of a great estate desire to separate and have partitioned the land equally between them; but no such arrangement was proposed. The State got twelve acres valued at £60,000 and £120,000 in money; the rest of the estate, worth between £300,000 and £400,000, was left in possession of the Commissioners. For interest alone, the State lost about £20,000; it paid for its twelve acres more than they originally cost, but they had acquired no absolute title to the land; they were only allowed to occupy it so long as they should devote it to purposes of science and art; and the moment they diverted it from those purposes their former partners, the Commissioners, would be entitled to take possession of the twelve acres on refunding the £60,000, and they would also be entitled to all the buildings on the land, paying nothing in return. The State, therefore, had paid more than the land cost, and yet was not the owner of it. He thought that that was a most extraordinary relation for the public to be placed in towards a private body of Commissioners. The rest of the land was left in the possession of the Royal Commissioners. What had the Commissioners done since the dissolution of their partnership with the State to further the great ends of science and art? Before that dissolution they had erected an iron shed, and gathered together a number of miscellaneous objects—nothing more. They had not made a single step in advance since, but they had laid down a grand theory. A distinguished statesman used to say that a man with a theory was something intermediate between an animal under the dominion of an instinct, and a rational being. He could not pretend to decide to which category the Commissioners belonged; but they had a grand theory, that science and art were to be advanced by one comprehensive institution. It was somewhat remarkable that in all their Reports, when referring to this compendious institution, they never failed to add, "This plan will be developed according to the aid we receive from the public." That meant that the Commissioners could not carry out any scheme unless they practically became partners with the Government. One thing they had, undoubtedly, accomplished. With a view, he presumed, to promote science and art, they had provided an ornamental garden for the amusement of the upper classes at Kensington. They had given no fewer than twenty-two acres of their land in order to promote, not the science of horticulture, which could not be carried out at Kensington, but the art of amusing those who delighted in Saturday promenades and exhibitions of fruits and flowers. Not only bad they bestowed twenty-two acres upon a private subscription society rent free, but they had spent out of a national fund for the promotion of science and art, £50,000 for an arcade—the only condition being, that after all the expenses of the Horticultural Society, including its garden at Chiswick, were paid, a very limited portion of the surplus income should be given to them by way of recompense. Now, the English taste in gardening had gradually predominated over the whole of Europe, and one might naturally have anticipated that something great would be clone at Kensington. Quite the contrary. Under the name of science and art we had got a garden in which there was neither science, nor art, nor nature. People quitted it with the impression that they had been visiting the cemetery at Kensal Green, and great doubts were felt whether a place so revolting to English taste and feeling could be sustained. The Commissioners lad entreated the School of Music to come to Kensington, but the school begged to be excused, and as a substitute a band had been added to the other attractions of the Garden, but it had failed to draw the people away from Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens. The Commissioners had per-formed one other feat in the interest of science and art—they had established a Department of Domestic Economy, which was carried on in the place appropriately called the Brompton Boilers, where lectures were given upon food, teaching fat people how they might get lean, and lean people how they might get fat. But the Commissioners had resolved that the national taste should be further cultivated, if not in gardening, at least in one other respect. They had made arrangements to build one of the finest cafés in London, and to set up a great department of eating and drinking in connection with science and art. They relied upon the attractions of beer, cheap wine, and gin-sling. They intended to enlighten the people in all the science of adulteration, and to promote the art of drinking—it might be in moderation or it might be in excess. The grand central point and sine quâ non of the whole scheme was to be this great tavern, from which the visitor should never be able to escape; they might lose sight of other features of the exhibition, but of this never. He had no doubt that the Dilkusian party had already a new Cadogan in view who would draw a splendid income upon the refreshments supplied to rich and poor. What the tavern was to cost they did not exactly know; but twenty-two and a half acres were given for nothing and a grant of £50,000 for a stucco garden, to a society which had the right of excluding from it every one but its own members. That was the mode in which the Commissioners were disposing of a fund derived from the whole kingdom, which was confessedly national and which was to be devoted to national purposes. Then came the transactions connected with the International Exhibition. All the proceedings relating to that Exhibition were pervaded by a spirit of over-reaching and chicanery, so excessive as, he was happy to think, to have ultimately defeated its own object. Instead of being frank and open, they were entirely of a hole-and-corner character. In place of the beautiful creation of the native genius of the country which men saw spring up as if by enchantment in 1851, and which all admired, they had that extraordinary combination of brick galleries, iron and glass domes, with clerestory wooden naves painted after the fashion of an immodest casino, which had been so generally condemned. But, fortunately, the building and all its details had been disposed of, he trusted for ever, by the decisive Vote of the other night. The House had agreed to purchase the site for £120,000, and his Motion accepted that decision. But they had bought the land with a direct responsibility to this Royal Commission, that it should be appropriated to the purposes of science and art. Now, he had some doubt whether a legal question could not be raised, that, by the law of England it was not in the power of the Commissioners to attach conditions to the future use of the land which nobody had a right to enforce. On either side of the House sat Gentlemen who were well acquainted with the law, who could advise the Government whether it was a good condition, that this land, which was public property, should not be dealt with for any public purpose except that which the Commissioners prescribed—namely, for science and art. But there was another condition. However much the House, in establishing collections and galleries, might desire to refine the minds of the people, all those collections and galleries must be inextricably associated with the tavern and drinking-house of the Commissioners. Whatever might be the nature or the cost of public buildings erected on the land, the Commissioners stipulated that there must be free access between every building and the national gin palace. The partnership between the Commissioners and the public was again forced upon them by these conditions. And this brought him to the operative part of his Motion. There was but one remedy for that state of things. They had not been able to disentangle themselves from the Commissioners, and they never could do so as long as the Commission existed; and therefore the only way of getting rid of the partnership was by getting rid of the Commission altogether. Without doing that, they could not hope to see the end of those embarrassing and circumventing intrigues which had been witnessed in the present Session. The proceedings of Thursday last, however tumultuous they might be thought, did honour and credit to the House of Commons. For when the House found that there had been circumventing intrigues to mystify and ensnare them, it was high time that hon. Members expressed themselves in terms of such indignant disgust that there might be no attempt to repeat such practices. He claimed the whole of the property in the possession of the Commissioners as essentially national—as property with which the House was entitled to deal in common with the other estates of the realm, as guardians of the public interest. A constitutional question might have been raised whether the Crown had a right to dispose of the fund at all in favour of the Commissioners without the intervention of Parliament. But, while they had that illustrious Prince among them, who took a great interest in the subject—who had devoted his whole life to the study of science and art—who possessed most eminent powers of administration—who associated himself with men eminent in science and art, and had the benefit of their judgment—and while the control had not yet fallen into the hands of certain honorary associates, and mainly into those of the Dilkusian party, it might not have been worth while to raise such a constitutional question. The late Prince Consort could be trusted when he acted on his own judgment, and he might have accomplished some grand design; but, like all Princes, he was sometimes the victim of the mere parasites and intriguers, from whom it was the great misfortune of Royalty it could not always escape. But the case was now altered. He knew of no circumstance now existing which should withdraw this great national fund from the legitimate control of Parliament. He knew no reason why any persons should dictate to the elected guardians of the public interest how they should act in regard to science and art. He had always gone rather to extreme lengths in vindicating the rights of private property. But where property was in the hands of a mere Commission or corporation, without any local object, without any personal interest, without any ulterior right of ownership, where the property was acquired from the public and dedicated to the public at large, Parliament had a clear right to intervene and legislate for the public interest. ["Hear, hear!"] He was glad to learn that doctrine was admitted on the Treasury bench. The question of expediency then only remained. He ventured to say, that if this property were administered with judgment, as a whole, it would supply all the requirements of science and art for a century to come. The House must not be misled by a very remarkable Return which had been produced in relation to this Motion. When he recollected the circumstances under which this Return had been made—how it had been resisted as an intrusion into the private acts of the Commissioners—it appeared as if it had been prepared to give to the House as little information as possible; and its tendency certainly was to mislead the casual reader. He had desired to know what was the financial condition of the Commission, and the Return stated the total annual income at about £5,900, besides such rents as the Horticultural Society may pay, which he might explain as nothing. The total annual liabilities of the Commission were stated at £8,700. Thus it was made to appear at the first glance that his Motion would only impose a charge on the public to meet a deficit. The true state of affairs would never occur to any one cursorily perusing this Return. This was the conclusion of a partnership in which the country was entitled to an equal share of the property. They had now agreed to pay £120,000 for some of the land. The Commissioners, who now imposed the condition that the land should be applied to the purposes of science and art, had themselves, of their own authority, let land on building leases. The value of the ground rents was about £162,000. Then there were fifteen acres unbuilt on, valued, according to the Commissioners' own standard, at £225,000. Their assets would amount to £507,000. There was besides the reversion of the twenty-two acres, absolutely at the end of sixty years, which the Horticultural Society now held, and there was also the great tavern, which had cost a great deal of money. These were their assets. Their liabilities were £120,000, borrowed from Greenwich Hospital, and £50,000; an annuity to Messrs. Kelk and Lucas to be redeemed for £17,000. The total liabilities of the Commission therefore were £187,000; their assets being £507,000. He called on them to wipe away all this complication, which had arisen from the terms put on them by those who presumed to be their patrons and protectors in the disposal of this property. They were told that the Treasury were about to create a Department for the purpose of grappling with this question, and that that Department Would be responsible to Parliament. He had no objection to vesting in a Government Department the disposal of these funds under Parliamentary supervision, so as to evoke the hearty co-operation of all men in this country conspicuous for their attainments in art and science, and he hoped they might thereby obtain some guarantee that the buildings erected on the ground purchased should themselves be models of art and schools of design for the country at large. As the necessary complement, then, of this work, he called on them to hand over the whole of this property to that Department of the Treasury. They did not set up as arbiters of taste, but these great public affairs should be conducted so as to subserve the purposes of all the high science and real art of the country, and not the mere hole-and-corner interests of second, third, and fourth-rate men. He wished to get rid of the excrescence of the Commission, which was no longer justified now it had lost its great ornament and head, which had really no- thing to do, and which had accomplished nothing during its existence.

Amendment proposed, To leave out from the word "That" to the end of the Question, in order to add the words "in the opinion of this House, the purchase money of the land at Kensington should be applied by 'The Commissioners of the Great Exhibition of 1851,' towards discharging the liabilities of the Commission; and that the Commission should be determined, and the property now held by the Commission be vested in the Crown, subject to any interests now existing therein, and to any charges thereon,"—(Mr. Ayrton,) —instead thereof.

MR. LOWE

said, he would, in the first place, state what was the exact legal position at this moment of the Commissioners for the Exhibition of 1851. The hon. and learned Gentleman had correctly stated that in 1850 Her Majesty had issued a Commission for the purposes of that Exhibition. In the same year, and therefore before the Exhibition of 1851, Her Majesty issued a charter to the Commission, and in December 1851 she issued a second charter to the Commission, the object being to give them a more extended field of action. These charters were recognised by an Act of Parliament passed in 1854, by which extended powers beyond those contained in the charters were further imparted to them. After the Exhibition accounts of 1851 were wound up, the Commission came into the possession of £187,000, the surplus which remained after defraying the expenses of that Exhibition; and the greater part of that sum, with £177,500 advanced by the Government with the sanction of Parliament, was applied towards the purchase of the Kensington Gore Estate. The Government and the Commissioners were therefore partners in respect of that transaction. That continued till 1859, when this joint ownership of the land was put an end to. The Government took the large piece of land, valued at cost price at £60,000, on which the Kensington Museum now stood, and they received from the Commissioners £120,000, which they raised by a mortgage on the remainder of the land. From that time the partnership between the Government and the Commissioners was dissolved, and the Commissioners assumed the same position as any other corporate body for trust purposes. They held their funds for the purposes of promoting science and art; and they were liable for any malversation or misappropriation of their funds—which they had derived partly from a fortunate land speculation, and partly from the success of the Exhibition of 1851—like the trustees of any hospital founded by private charity, to proceedings in Chancery. The Commissioners having repaid the public money which had been advanced, were strictly in the position which he had described. Of course, there were means by which the charter could be revoked. If it were shown that Her Majesty had been deceived, or that false representations had been made when the charter was granted, it could be revoked by a writ of scire facias: or, if it could be shown that the Commissioners had abused their powers, it could be re-remedied by writ of quo warranto. Those were the means known to the law by which the charter could be determined; except that there was a provision in the charter itself, by which, on its being certified by three Commissioners that the objects of the charter had been satisfied and accomplished, the charter itself might then come to an end. The proposition of the hon. and learned Member for the Tower Hamlets was, that the House of Commons should by a Resolution—not put an end to the Commission, for that it was not in their power to do, but declare that the Commission ought to be put an end to. The point for the House to decide was whether it was desirable to pick out one from among the vast number of corporations that existed in this country, and declare that this corporation, having no public money, and no other privileges than Her Majesty had been pleased to bestow, and no other duties than were contained in the charter or added to by the Act of Parliament, ought to be put an end to at once. Of course, the House was aware that this corporation was formed of some of the most distinguished persons in the country, and that up to the period of his decease it was presided over by his Royal Highness the Prince Consort. So far, therefore, as regarded the mere personal qualifications of the Commission, it came before them with every claim to respectful consideration, with every claim to have its acts weighed dispassionately, with every claim not to have harsh and disparaging terms applied to those acts, unless they were clearly deserved. Before the hon. and learned Gentleman permitted himself to apply the word "chicanery" to such a body, presided over by such a person, be should at least have informed himself what were the duties of the Commissioners, how they were distinguished from other similar bodies, and he should have been able to place his finger on some act, established by clear and irrefragable evidence, in respect of which such a term might have been justifiably employed. He should have no difficulty in showing that this was not the case with regard to this Commission, when he reminded the House what the facts really were. The Commissioners of 1851 were not the managers of the Exhibition of 1862; and it was no proof of "chicanery" on the part of the former even if any disreputable or discreditable conduct could be established against the Commissioners of 1862—which no one believed. No act, good or bad, of the Commissioners of 1862 could affect the Commissioners of 1851, as they were distinct bodies. Before the hon. and learned Gentleman came down to the House and dealt in such terms with the honour of men highly respected in the country, he was bound at least to make himself acquainted with such an obvious fact as the one which he had just mentioned. He could not pretend to follow the hon. and learned Gentleman through the disquisition he had given them; but the main offences alleged against the corporation were two—first, that they had built a tavern; that having considered it desirable that an attempt should be made to form gardens for the exhibition of plants and the recreation of the public at South Kensington, and thinking it also right and proper that they should have Exhibitions such as that which took place last year, they had devoted part of their money and a portion of their land to providing refreshment rooms. If it had been shown that the purpose for which these refreshment rooms had been provided had been abused, that anything improper or disreputable had gone on there, there might have been some ground for accusation; but he wanted to know what fault there could have been in providing proper recreation for the public after the fatigue of going through the Exhibition last year. Persons came from a long distance to the Exhibition, many of them had no time to spare, having to return to the country the same day, and he thought it would have been a strong ground of complaint against the managers if no provision had beer, made for their refreshment; and how their having done so could be made a ground for Parliamentary interference he could not conceive. The other ground of offence in the corporation seemed to be, that their property amounted to more than £300,000 when all encumbrances were paid off. He believed the Commissioners must plead guilty to that fact—that having started with £180,000, the surplus of the Exhibition of 1851, and having so managed that they had sold land to the Government, on which the South Kensington Museum was built, for £60,000, which was worth £120,000 at the time, and was now worth £150,000; having also sold land to the Government for £120,000 which was worth £260,000 or £270,000; that having provided for the country funds for the promotion of Science and Art to the amount of £200,000—having done all this, they were still in possession of property worth, after all encumbrances were met, about £300,000, over and above a reversionary interest in the Horticultural Gardens, which might, if the Gardens failed, place them in possession of twenty-two acres of valuable land; and if the Gardens succeeded, would yield between £2,000 and £3,000 a year, and a contingent share of the profits. Such was the balance-sheet; and considering what they started with, this was a most astounding and wonderful result. Fortune had favoured them, it was true; but still the Commissioners could truly point to it as an instance of success in ten years unparalleled in the boldest and best-conducted commercial enterprises. This success they have been able to achieve without wrong to any one, without any one act inconsistent with their charter—and this success is now made a reason why Parliament should be asked to interfere by so violent and unheard-of a method as an Act of Parliament to put an end to the corporation that has achieved it. The hon. and learned Gentleman said, that whereas the corporation had power to sell or to let their land on building leases, when they sold land to the Government, they sold it charged with the condition that it should be employed for the promotion of science and art; whereas they had sold or let land to other parties not charged with any such condition. The thing was perfectly explicable. By the charter they had the power to sell the land freed from the trust on which they themselves held it, but in that case the trusts attached to the money they received for the land; or they might sell the land charged with the trusts. The Commissioners exercised this option—where it was deemed more convenient to charge the money they charged the money, and where it was more convenient to charge the land they had charged the land, in accordance with those Parliamentary powers. It would take him an immense time to follow the hon. and learned Gentleman through the many mistakes and misrepresentations in which, from his very superficial acquaintance with the subject, the hon. and learned Gentleman had become involved, and he did not propose to detain the House at that length. But he would merely say that there were concerned in this matter the Society of Arts, which was really the body that originated and managed the late Exhibition of 1862 by means of trustees, of whose existence the hon. and learned Gentleman seemed ignorant, and the Horticultural Society, with which the Commissioners had entered into a sort of partnership, the effect of which would be to reserve to the public, in that which would become a very crowded part of the metropolis, twenty-two acres of land free from building; the Department of Science and Art, at South Kensington, which had nothing to do with the Exhibition of 1862, the Horticultural Gardens, the tavern as the hon. and learned Member called it, or any one of those transactions, and which was only introduced to prejudice the case because the hon. and learned Member believed it to be an unpopular department; and lastly, there were the Commissioners of 1851 themselves. He had shown the House what the Commissioners had done, and upon what grounds they firmly believed themselves entitled to public confidence. But even if the hon. and learned Gentleman could have established some of the many charges which he had so loosely flung about, surely the House would not consent to so unprecedented a step as the introduction of an Act—which must be the next step if this Resolution were carried—to put an end to this corporation, without the slightest proof of misconduct or malversation on their part, but merely on the allegation that the money in their hands devoted to matters of taste had not been spent in the most judicious manner. This done, the money was to be confiscated for the use of the public. It was no longer to be devoted to purposes of science and art, but was to be carried to general purposes. That was the proposal of the hon. and learned Gentleman, and there was not a word to show that the trust was to remain impressed with the object for which it was created. He doubted whether a Commission comprising such names as Michael Angelo and Raphael would be able to satisfy the criticism of the House in such matters; and this pro- posal was, that as this charitable corporation—charitable, that was, in the sense in which the word was employed in the Court of Chancery—had not satisfied the taste of the hon. Gentleman and his constituents, it should be dissolved, and the large funds which by good judgment and good management it had accumulated, and by which it had been able to secure great advantage to the public, and which it held as a trust for the purposes of science and art, should be diverted altogether from the purposes of science and art, and, in fact, appropriated for the general use of the public.

MR. HENRY SEYMOUR

said, the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Lowe) had asked why the Commission should be dissolved. Now, he would ask why it should be continued? and be did not think that any reason had been offered for its continuance. This money was really public money, for it consisted of the shillings and sixpences of the visitors to the Exhibition of 1851; and the land was land which had been forcibly taken under the powers of an Act conferred by the Legislature. Neither was the corporation strictly a private one. The fact that the land was first obtained by a local Act, the proprietors being obliged to part with it, and that four official trustees still continued to serve in the Commission, brought the whole subject under the public eye, and seemed to give Parliament a certain control. He wanted to know upon what ground the corporation was to continue to be kept up, and for what interest the land was held by the Commissioners; and unless he obtained a satisfactory explanation on these points, he should vote with the hon. and learned Member for the Tower Hamlets. It was useless to disguise the fact, that the Commissioners had not given satisfaction to the public in the appropriation of the property in their hands. The Commissioners had sold portions of the land, or let it out to the Horticultural Society, and he believed that the only ground which they now held was that on which the refreshment rooms stood, so that this, and their reversion to the Horticultural Gardens, constituted their sole remaining interest in the land.

MR. LOWE

said, the Commissioners were in possession of land, besides the buildings, to the extent of fifteen acres—four acres in front of the Horticultural Gardens, and the land upon which the annexes stood.

MR. HENRY SEYMOUR

Then they had fifteen acres of good building land, besides some assets. He thought that after fifteen years had elapsed, and nothing had been done for science and art during all that time, except the formation of the Horticultural Gardens, the right hon. Gentleman was bound to tell the House what this corporation intended to do, and why it should be maintained. Evidently the Commissioners had made a good building speculation, but they had done nothing for science and art.

MR. T. BARING

said, that he was a Commissioner, of both the Exhibitions, 1851 and 1862, and was ashamed of no transaction he had been engaged in in either capacity, for he believed that both those Commissions had tended to the public benefit. He was at a loss to understand how the shillings and sixpences given for admission to a sight or show could be called public money, or how it could be argued that by a Vote of this House this money could be abstracted from the recipients to whom it belonged, because the House disapproved of the proceedings of the Commission. He denied that Parliament had a right to touch either the funds in their hands or to annul their charter. It was not the fault of the Commissioners of 1851 if, as his hon. Friend said, they had done nothing for the last fifteen years. They had been ready to apply the land to public purposes—they had refrained from letting it or selling it—and if they had done nothing, the fault lay mainly with the House, who had exhibited a feeling against availing itself of the land for the specific purposes to which only it could be applied. The charges made against the Commissioners had not been substantiated, and he trusted that the House would not interfere with the rights of corporations, or the management of money which had been applied most beneficially and profitably. Perhaps, in the course of time, the question might arise whether this Commission had not so fulfilled its office that it should cease to exist, or its duties might be devolved to other parties; but to say that this should now be done by an arbitrary Resolution of this House was a monstrous proposition, and he trusted that the House would not accede to it.

Question put, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."

The House divided:—Ayes 165; Noes 42: Majority 123.

Question again proposed, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair."