§ SIR BENJAMIN HALLsaid, he had been requested by a right rev. Prelate to make a statement that would prevent the possibility of any misapprehension taking place in the public mind with respect to what had passed on the preceding day. The noble Lord the Member for Woodstock (the Marquess of Blandford) having moved the second reading of the Episcopal and Capitular Revenues Bill, he (Sir. B. Hall), after making one or two suggestions to the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for the Home Department, said—
There was also another point to which he wished to direct attention, and that was with regard to the management and control of cathedral establishments. They were all governed by cer- 395 tain statutes, which were passed for their management at the time of their foundation; and in almost every one of them it was provided that the bishop should take an oath that he would preserve those foundation statutes inviolable. One of these statutes was, that the bishop should hold at least a triennial visitation of his cathedral. It would be very difficult to show an instance where that statute had been carried out, although the bishop was bound by a solemn oath to perform it. Take the case of a cathedral which had lately been brought before the notice of the public—he alluded to the Cathedral of Rochester. Now, the bishop was bound by the statute to make a visitation of that cathedral once every three years. He had been informed that the bishop had never per-performed that visitation."—[3 Hansard, cxxii. 337–8.1In consequence of that statement the Bishop of Rochester had done him the honour to call upon him, and to direct his attention to the report. The right rev. Prelate had admitted that he was right in his statements as to the non-visitation of the cathedral, which he admitted should have been done if he had acted according to the statutes, hut he said it had been the custom not to do so, and that he had acted according to custom. There was reason to hope that the visitation of the cathedral would he made in future; hut up to the present time the fact was, that the right rev. Prelate had visited the diocese, but he (Sir B. Hall) was right in stating that he had not visited the cathedral, although he was under a solemn obligation to do so.