§ SIR JAMES ELPHINSTONEsaid, he wished to ask the Secretary to the Admiralty, If there is any truth in the report now current, that a sum of money, stated to amount to £2,000, has been paid as compensation under a late Act to a person who had been previously discharged from the service for misconduct; and, if so, will he state the date and cause of said clerk's dismissal, and the date and amount of payment of the commutation referred to?
§ MR. BAXTERSir, I regret to say it is true that, owing to a very strange mistake in the pension branch of the Admiralty, a person who had been discharged from the service by the Duke of Somer- 1090 set in October, 1861, received on the 13th of June, 1870, a sum of £2,233 9s. as the commutation of a supposed pension, no such pension having ever been granted. The Treasury and Admiralty have instituted a thorough investigation into the circumstances of this most extraordinary case.