§ MR. BANKESsaid, the noble Lord the Secretary for Foreign Affairs, would, per- 1355 haps, be so good as to answer the question he had put on the previous day.
§ VISCOUNT PALMERSTONI have had a communication from Her Majesty's Minister at Madrid, enclosing copies of two decrees issued on the 16th November—the one altering the mode of levying the duty on woollen goods, which alteration tends in some degree to increase the duty; the other decree simply increases the duty upon goods which are composed partly of cotton, prohibiting them in all cases in which the cotton exceeds one-third of the aggregate of the material, and stating that in other cases where the cotton does not exceed one-third, the duty shall be levied according to the material which predominates in the manufacture. Her Majesty's Minister at Madrid stated, in a communication with the Spanish Government, the reasons why he thought those decrees at variance with the principle of commercial relaxation which had been expressed on the part of that Government. I hope that the operation of those decrees will be postponed to a later period, in order to give parties interested time to make their arrangements.