§ The Earl of Riponwould take that opportunity of making some observations in reference to some expressions which were reported to have fallen from a noble Lord in another place on the previous night. He alluded to the subject of the appointment of a noble Lord, a Member of that House, to the office of Comptroller of the Exchequer. The noble Lord 745 had made a remark with regard to the conduct of Lord Althorp, in allusion to a proposition made for the appointment of Mr. Ellis to the situation of the comptrollership. It was obvious that that statement was calculated to do great injury to the public and private character of Mr. Ellis, and he begged leave to state, as a matter of fact, that Lord Althorp did not express the opinion attributed to him. In the year 1833, Lord Althorp said to him, that he concurred with a noble Earl, then at the head of the Government, in thinking that Mr. Ellis's public character, and his situation in the Exchequer, gave him a just claim to the appointment to the office of comptroller, and it so happened that at the moment at which he quitted that noble Lord, he (the Earl of Ripon) wrote a letter to Mr. Ellis, informing him of what had passed, and that these two authorities had distinctly admitted the grounds on which he urged his appointment, and he congratulated him upon his having been tested for the office. He had no reason, certainly, to say one word against the appointment which had taken place, but he could not permit the opportunity to pass, without saying thus much as to the character of Mr. Ellis.
§ Viscount Melbournesaid, that he thought that it was very natural for the noble Earl to say what he had done; and he only rose to state, that in the position which he had held, he was not in the least degree cognizant of what took place.