Commons Sitting of 2 March 1854

MINUTES.
PUBLIC BILLS.—1° Merchant Shipping Acts Repeal; Merchant Shipping.
2° Highways (South Wales); Coasting Trade.

GREAT LONDON DRAINAGE BILL.
Order for Second Reading read.
Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a second time."
MR. W. WILLIAMSsaid, he felt it his duty to oppose this Bill. The measure had been introduced last Session to the House, had been referred by the House to a Select Committee, and, after every fair consideration, had been rejected. He believed that the parties who supported the Bill were little better than a body of speculators, and the mere object of the undertaking they were endeavouring to force upon the House was to make two large sewage drains upon either side of the river Thames. He held in his hand a copy of an opinion of Mr. Stephenson on the subject, who stated distinctly that to do what was contemplated by the promoters of the present Bill would be to commence at the wrong end. The noble Lord the Secretary of State for the Home Department was about to bring before the notice of the House a measure to reorganise the Commission of Sewers, and, under present circumstances, he thought that it would be most impolitic to countenance such a
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scheme as the present. He therefore moved the postponement of the measure.
Amendment proposed—
"To leave out the word 'now,' and at the end of the Question to add the words, 'upon this day six months.' "
MR. WARNERsaid that, at a time when we were threatened with cholera, and when, in all probability, that disease, if it did come, would rage more seriously than ever, he thought the House incurred a very serious responsibility in refusing to hear parties desirous to suggest and carry out improvement in the drainage of the metropolis. He considered that this measure, like all measures of a like importance, ought to have a full and fair inquiry, and he thought that the hon. Member for Lambeth, in offering the opposition to the Bill which he did, was, in fact, doing little less than voting for the introduction of a pestilence which we all ought to be so anxious to ward off.
SIR BENJAMIN HALLsaid, he opposed the Motion for the second reading of the Bill, on the ground, among others, that the parties who now stood forward as desirous of entering into the speculation of the drainage of London, an undertaking which would require an expenditure of 2,000,000 l., had not at the present moment, he understood, 500 l. to commence the works with. As a specimen of the clauses of the Bill, one of them was to have a guarantee of 3l. per cent out of the local rates. He never heard of such a measure, and it would be monstrous to let it pass, There never was such a Bill as the present introduced into Parliament; and at the present time, when the noble Lord the Secretary of State for the Home Department had promised to bring in a Bill for the better management of the sewers, it would be a monstrous thing if that House were to permit a body of speculators to take upon themselves a task which they had no means of carrying out.
MR. DRUMMONDsaid, that it appeared to him there was at least one body of men in the metropolis of considerably more importance in their own eyes than even the House of Commons itself, and that was the select vestry of Marylebone; and although such body did not issue blue books, yet they had put forth a document complaining of this Bill more grandiloquent in its phraseology than even the despatches of potentates and diplomatists

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contained in such books. The matter, however, before the House was simply this—that we had been threatened with cholera for the last seven or eight years, and we had as yet done absolutely nothing to check its advances. The hon. Gentleman who began the opposition to the measure stated that this Bill was rejected by the Select Committee of last Session. That statement required a little explanation. The promoters of this Bill proposed a plan which was admitted by all parties to be the best that had yet been proposed, and the reason that it was not adopted was because each parish in the metropolis could not or would not see a step beyond its own immediate interest, and would not incur the risk of a trifling rate. The select vestry of Marylebone—which had really no more interest in the matter than any other parish in the metropolis—had, as he had previously stated, issued a report upon the subject, denouncing the present scheme as a most unjust invasion of the independence of parishes. The present Bill, although rejected by the Select Committee last year, was not so rejected on the ground of the principle upon which the sewers were proposed to be constructed, but because the promoters sought to obtain a guarantee only in the case of their own dividends not coming up to three per cent. The very company which had formerly opposed the Bill had now adopted its principle. That principle was perfectly intelligible, for, as it was now clear that the Thames was getting dirtier every day, because the more water that was introduced into the dwellings of the poor the more filth was driven into the Thames, this company proposed to make two large tunnels, one on each side of the Thames, to carry off the sewage without letting it go into the river at all. The noble Lord the Home Secretary had, by a coup d'âtat, blown up the Commission of Sewers the other day, and now they were told that he was going to establish a new Commission, somehow or other based on the representative system. But he would ask what single thing had ever been done where that representative system had been tried? Was it not notorious that the people of Newcastle, under that râgime, had never succeeded in washing out one of their own dirty alleys? It was clear that if it were left to the parishes to counteract and thwart one another nothing would ever be done. This guarantee, which was so much talked of, only amounted to three farthings
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in the pound, after all; and because Marylebone would not give even three farthings in the pound, they were going to reject this most sensible proposition for the drainage of the metropolis.
LORD SEYMOURsaid, that that part of the scheme which proposed that there should be two tunnels—one on each side of the river—to carry off the drainage had been fully approved by the Committee which sat last year; but on the second part, which proposed to render the sewage applicable for agricultural purposes, the evidence had totally failed. The only similar case which was brought forward was that of a single prison, where it had only been tried to a limited extent; and it was considered one of the wildest schemes possible to expect to raise money on no other guarantee than that of the probable profit to he made by the conversion of sewage into manure. The only resource left for the promoters in this case, was to endeavour to obtain a guarantee of three per cent upon their expenditure, and to this the Committee were decidedly opposed. But, with respect to the drainage of the different districts of the metropolis, the proposed Bill would be perfectly inoperative, because it did not propose to construct any cross sewers whatever, but left all that to be done by the parishes; and the whole question, therefore, for the House to consider was, whether for the sake of two large drains, one on each side of the river, they would give a guarantee to this company of three per cent for ever. He recommended the House to reject the Bill, and not send it again before a Committee.
SIR JOHN SHELLEYsaid that all the parishes of Westminster concurred with Marylebone in opposing this Bill. This was certainly a very inopportune time to bring it forward, when the Government had a new scheme of their own in contemplation.
LORD DUDLEY STUARTsaid, he must defend the Marylebone vestry from the imputations of the hon. Member for West Surrey, (Mr. Drummond). They opposed the Bill on principle, and, had the guarantee been only one farthing instead of three farthings in the pound, their opposition to it would have been just as strenuous.
MR. BOUVERIEsaid, he thought the House ought to be very slow to reconsider the decision of a Committee before which the same scheme had been fully discussed.

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He would remark, also, that there was no guarantee that the company would actually proceed with the works, and it might turn out that they would only occupy the ground, and prevent other parties from actually carrying out an efficient system of drainage. For these two reasons he should advise the House to reject the Bill.
MR. APSLEY PELLATTsaid, it was really intended to carry out the work, for 35,000 l. had already been deposited as an earnest. He had heard no objection to the Bill from the south side of the river, and, so far as Southwark was concerned, all the inhabitants were extremely desirous of seeing any scheme carried out which would relieve them from the present direful state of things.
VISCOUNT PALMERSTONsaid, that last year he had felt disposed to look favourably on this Bill, because he had thought that, if in the course of the ensuing twelve months the company could really accomplish any portion of the great drainage of the metropolis, it would be desirable that they should be allowed to put their scheme in practice. The Bill then failed, however, in consequence of the objection raised to the guarantee which was demanded by the company, and, in the present state of things, he must confess his opinion differed from that which he had entertained last year. He was about to reorganise the Commission of Sewers, and that Commission had lately matured a plan for the drainage of the metropolis which, upon full consideration, he believed to be a good one, and likely to effect the objects which the scheme now before the House was intended to effect. He thought there would be great advantage in the drainage of the metropolis being effected and managed by one central department in some degree connected with the local authorities. Moreover, if it should be possible to realise that which, according to this Bill, might be realised—namely, the connection of the drainage of the metropolis with some commercial advantages from the transformation of sewage into manure—that also ought to be in the hands of Commissioners, in order that any such profit might be applied for the public benefit, in diminution or relief of the rates raised for the construction of the sewers. He conceived that this Bill had no chance of passing through a Committee with the guarantee clause which it seemed the company still considered it ne-
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cessary to demand, and, therefore, all things considered, so far as he was concerned, he should be disposed to negative the second reading of the Bill.
LORD JOHN MANNERSsaid, he had understood the noble Lord to say that the Commissioners of Sewers had projected a plan, but the public were under the impression that the noble Lord disapproved of the proceedings of the Commissioners of Sewers. Perhaps the noble Lord would explain whether the Commissioners were in a position to carry out their plan.
VISCOUNT PALMERSTONsaid, the Commissioners of Sewers had matured a plan which he, upon full consideration, had thought might probably be adopted for the great arterial drainage of London in parallel lines, or at least in some relation to the course of the Thames, with a view of preventing the sewage of London from falling into the river. The points upon which he had differed from the Commissioners were with regard to the detailed manner of constructing the subordinate drainage. The noble Lord was, doubtless, well aware that there was a controversy going on as to the relative superiority of large sewers with room enough for a man to walk in them, and sewers of a circular form and smaller dimensions. There was no doubt that the last were the cheapest and most economical, and, if that system were found equally advantageous in other respects, it was quite clear that its adoption would save a great deal of expense which would otherwise have to be incurred in draining the whole of the metropolis.
Question, "That the word 'now' stand part of the Question," put, and negatived: Words added.
Main Question, as amended, put, and agreed to.
Bill put off for six months.

ORDNANCE SURVEY OF SCOTLAND— QUESTION.
MR. RICHsaid, he begged to ask the right hon. Chancellor of the Exchequer, whether the Report, dated the 10th July, 1851, of the Select Committee on the Ordnance Survey of Scotland, recommended the abandonment of the six-inch and the adoption of a two-inch to the mile scale, and the Treasury Minute thereon of the 16th December, 1851, had been set aside; and also, whether any steps had recently been taken for authorising a survey of Scotland upon a scale exceeding twenty inches to the mile, and if so, whe-

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ther he would submit to Parliament copies of any correspondence that may have taken place respecting such survey, together with an estimate of its cost?
The CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER: Sir, in answer to the question of the hon. Gentleman, I have to state that the Treasury Minute of the 16th December, 1851, which was itself a departure from former arrangements, was set aside by the Government of Lord Derby, and that upon the formation of the present Government, we found the question of the Ordnance survey of Scotland in a state that appeared to require further consideration. Upon going into the question, it appeared to me that it required a reconsideration as a whole. There was no principle laid down, and no conclusion arrived at, of so distinct and definite a character as could be satisfactory to Parliament, to the Government, or to the country; especially considering the large expenditure of money which it involved. We are under the impression that, while the original scale of one inch to the mile was a scale sufficient for purposes which were national in the strictest sense, the scale of six inches, which was adopted as an extension of the original scale, was not sufficient for purposes of a purely local and departmental character. Neither, as far as we are able to judge, is a scale of twelve inches sufficient for such purposes. We desired, therefore, to come to a conclusion upon the question, what was the best scale to adopt with reference to the survey and the production of a map that should be satisfactory to all parties; but it would have been very difficult to come to a conclusion on that question with the facts as they stood before us, for we had no correct means of ascertaining the cost of the survey. The course, therefore, which has been taken has been this—we have marked out certain particular districts of the country, and those districts are about to be surveyed with a degree of minuteness which will make the survey applicable to the purposes of a map upon any scale that may be desired. We are likewise going to take care that the expenses of the survey in those districts so selected shall be so taken account of as to enable us to judge of what the future expenses of the prosecution of the work will be. Directions have also been given, that whereas the survey up to the present time has been conducted simply by the officers of the Ordnance, working in their ordinary manner, upon their regu-
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lar salary, two other methods shall be tried in the selected districts—one of them, the method of contract, properly so called, by independent parties, and the other the method of piece-work instead of day's wages by the officers of the Ordnance department itself. We believe that when the survey has been completed in these districts in the manner which I have just described, we shall be in a condition to come to a conclusion upon the mode in which it should be prosecuted throughout the country; but the question is a very large one, and it is not too much to say that it is at least possible that before we have done with the whole mass, it will cost the country, not some hundreds of thousands, but some millions of money. Under these circumstances it is obviously proper and right to bring it under the full view and consideration of Parliament. The responsibility is too great for it to be treated merely as a departmental subject, and, perhaps, it would have been desirable that even at an earlier period steps should have been taken for bringing it under the consideration of Parliament. There are other questions of considerable importance besides the question of scale. One of these is whether the scale shall be less or more than that which has hitherto been adopted; another is with respect to the practice of contouring; and the third is whether the expense of the survey is to be defrayed entirely out of the Exchequer, or whether the principle of local contribution is to be called in aid. The principle of local contribution was a part of the original plan, and it is quite plain that if, instead of making the survey sufficient for military and national purposes only, we are to execute it upon a scale for local and even for estate purposes, the principle of local contribution becomes still more just and appropriate than it was before. I have said now, perhaps, as much as can be said at the present stage of the business; but with respect to the second part of the question of the hon. Gentleman (Mr. Rich), whether any steps have been taken for authorising a survey of Scotland upon a scale exceeding twenty inches to the mile, he will understand that particular directions in reference to certain districts have been given to that effect; and with respect to the production of papers, I may state that papers on this subject are in preparation, and shall be submitted to Parliament when in such a state as to enable Parliament to form a judgment upon the whole subject.
COLONEL DUNNEsaid, he wished to ask if he was right in understanding the right hon. Gentleman to have said that the Government of Lord Derby did not decide upon the six-inch scale, and did not order the survey to be pursued upon that scale?
THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER: What I said was, that the Government of Lord Derby deviated from the Treasury Minute of the 16th of December, 1851; which Minute was itself a deviation from former arrangements. The deviation made was this: according to the Minute of the 16th of December, 1851, the order given by the Treasury was, that those counties in Scotland which had been actually commenced on the six-inch scale, should be finished on that scale; but that all the rest of the country should be executed on a one-inch scale. The Government of Lord Derby deviated from that Minute—and I am far from blaming them for having so deviated—to the extent of ordering, in answer to petitions or memorials from certain counties in Scotland, that the six-inch scale should be extended to certain other counties; but no general or definite decision had been taken when we entered upon office.

EMIGRANT SHIPS.
MR. J. O'CONNELLsaid, he rose to move the appointment of a Select Committee to inquire into the recent cases of loss of life on board emigrant ships. He wished the proposed Committee to finish the inquiries of the Committee of 1851 on this subject. Notwithstanding the Act which had been passed for the removal of the evils connected with the emigrant system, they had broken out in some instances with greater virulence than ever. There had been a fearful loss of human life caused by sickness on board passenger vessels. He was not prepared in every instance to vouch for the authenticity of the statements he was about to make, but he had taken them from several newspapers, and he had never seen their accuracy called into question. One statement was to the effect that a number of vessels, averaging from five to seven, which sailed between Liverpool and America last autumn, had the large number of 1,034 deaths on board during the passage, those deaths averaging upon the total number of passengers very nearly 30 per cent. He really thought the fact that within the short period of six weeks or two months so great a loss of life should have occurred, amount-
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ing to so large a number of the passengers as 30 per cent, was alone a fact sufficient to induce that House to institute an inquiry, in order to see if they could not ascertain whether the causes of this loss of life were to be traced to any defect in existing regulations, and, if so, whether some plan might not be devised which would prevent such lamentable occurrences for the future. As it might be said that he ought to have gone to the Government offices for information before bringing a Motion forward for the appointment of a Select Committee, he would at once state that he had done so, and that he had endeavoured to obtain information from every quarter he thought likely to afford it. The result of these inquiries, however, led him to believe that information could only be obtained by calling witnesses before a Committee of that House. Indeed, the Board of Emigration and other departments of Government declared that the regulations at present in force were powerless to ensure a thorough knowledge of the deaths which occurred in vessels going to America, or to take efficient measures of precaution against them. Under such circumstances, it became the imperative duty of that House to devise some means of putting into the hands of Government the power of obtaining a full knowledge of all these matters, and of adopting means to prevent such a fearful loss of life. He would suggest that negotiations should be entered into between the Government of this country and that of America, in order that some well-concerted scheme, some really stringent and efficient superintendence, should be organised, whereby the fullest information might always be procured. In 1851, an inquiry was instituted by a Committee into the condition of emigrant vessels, and he proposed now to touch upon certain matters which had not particularly engaged the attention of that Committee. The emigrants of the poorer classes, when they arrived at Liverpool, were pounced upon by a set of harpies, who, under the pretence of procuring them lodgings and ships, plundered them of money which they could ill spare. The Committee of 1851 had made inquiry into the supply of provisions, and the manner of cooking them; but the labours of the Committee had been inefficient for the purpose of procuring a separation of the sexes, and the due stowage of the cargo, so as to ensure a sufficient amount of space to passengers. He proposed to take up the inquiry where that Committee left off.

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Emigration from Ireland was going on to as great an extent as ever, if not greater. There were larger remittances sent last year for emigration purposes from persons who had emigrated to America to their friends and relatives in Ireland than in any former year, and emigration in the spring would probably go on more than ever. He was informed that no less a sum than between 70,000 l. and 80,000 l. had been remitted to Limerick alone, and that large sums had also been forwarded to Waterford, Dublin, Galway, and other towns for this purpose, and that the total amount exceeded that of any former year. It was therefore important that something should be done to secure the health and safety of passengers by emigrant ships. The cholera had raged fearfully in emigrant ships crossing the Atlantic, and the probability that the cholera would again break out in this country in the summer and autumn was an additional reason for taking precautions against the pestilence again devastating our emigrant ships. One important subject of inquiry ought to be the want of provision for the comfort of the poorer class of emigrants coming across the Channel. Men, women, and children, coming from Irish ports to Liverpool and other places, were often exposed without shelter upon the decks to the beating of the sea in the most stormy weather, and in the depth of winter. This subject was not handled by the Committee of 1851. They admitted its importance, but a Bill was then before Parliament which promised to deal with the subject. However, the provisions for the protection of emigrants were one by one abandoned in the progress of that Bill through Committee, and the 14 & 15 of Vict. chap. 79, contained no provision relative to the transit of the poorer class of emigrants across the Channel. This was the first subject into which the Committee ought to inquire; the second was as to the class of ships taken up for emigrant vessels. They were often vessels which had just brought home a cargo of guano, of hides, or of old rags, and were in an unwholesome and offensive condition, which rendered them totally unfit to convey emigrants. He trusted that steps would be taken in future to prevent such inhuman proceedings. No sufficient care was at present taken to see that emigrant ships were in a fit state. It was necessary that such ships should be well whitewashed below, and that the whitewash should be
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dry before the passengers went on board. Such vessels ought to be examined, not only by a nautical man, but by one of Lloyd's surveyors and a master carpenter, to test their seaworthiness. The next point of inquiry before the Committee should be, whether emigrant vessels should not be chosen out of the same class as Government convict vessels. The Government never took up vessels for the conveyance of convicts unless they belonged to the two first classes, known at Lloyd's as A 1 and Æ. Yet, it was from the classes below these two that the majority of emigrant ships for the poorer classes were taken. The same regulations, too, as to the amount of space for each person which the Government adopted in convict ships ought to be enforced in emigrant ships. It might be said that this was an interference with private enterprise; but surely it was an interference in behalf of human life and health, and that had always been considered by the Legislature sufficient justification. The state of the waterclosets on board the lower class of emigrant ships also required some regulation, for the abominations that took place for the want of this necessary provision could not be described, so cruelly were the feelings of decency of the female passengers outraged. It would be necessary for the Committee to examine witnesses, to see whether the existing regulations in force relative to emigrant ships had been carried out, and particularly whether a larger number of children had not been carried in some of the emigrant ships than was allowed by the Act. The law provided that there should be a space of six feet clear between decks, and that the decks should be laid carefully upon the permanent beams of the ship. These provisions were, he was told, frequently evaded, so as to prevent that cleanliness and due ventilation which it was the object of the Act of Parliament to secure. The American Legislature had passed an Act to provide for some protection to the hatchways, so as to secure to the passengers due access to light and air. In the English emigrant ships the hatchways were flush with the deck, through which the spray and the water, from the washing of the decks, often found its way to the passengers below. In bad weather they were obliged to be closed, or very nearly so, and then the passengers below were deprived of light and ventilation. It would be a question for the Committee to consider whether some kind of booby-hatch

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could not be constructed over the hatchways, so that the side remote from the wind might be kept open. The Committee might call evidence to inquire whether something could not be devised between the cumbrous house erected in American emigrant ships and the hatchways flush with the deck of English vessels. There was a time when a considerable portion of the passage money in the case of vessels going to Sydney, was retained until the safe arrival of the passengers at their destination. It would be matter of consideration whether that provision should not be revived—whether the passage-money should not be paid to the credit of some Government officer in the sea-port town, either entirely or in part, and not handed over until the British consul had reported that the agent who had sent them out, and the captain of the ship, had properly performed their duty. If any loss of life was caused by the misconduct of the charterers or their servants, of course the passage-money would be forfeited, and, if possible, returned to the relatives of the unfortunate sufferers. There were many recent cases of great loss of life on board this description of vessels, which showed the necessity for some revision of the regulations applicable to them. He would quote first the cases which occurred actually in vessels sent out by the Colonial Land Emigration Commissioners.
"The Bourneuf, to Melbourne, 1,495 tons, carried 754 passengers, and out of them eighty-four died. The vessel had bad hospital accommodation, having only two large and eight small beds provided. The Marco Polo, for Australia, a vessel of 1,625 tons, and which was very much cried up, carried 887 passengers—fifty more than she was chartered for—and fifty-two deaths occurred on board. The Wanota, 1,442 tons, also for Australia, had 758 passengers, and there were forty-eight deaths. The watercloset and hospital accommodation was bad; there were also bad suet and bad water. The Ticonderago carried 800 passengers; there were 102 deaths, and she landed 300 sick."
The casualties to vessels sent out by private parties were but too notorious. Then there were the following:—
"The Victoria, from London for New York, 50 deaths on the passage last autumn. The Southampton, ditto, 15 deaths. The Annie Jane, from Liverpool for Quebec, the 9th of September, 1853, 380 passengers; lost on Barra Island on the 25th of September, 1853, 340 drowned. The Staffordshire, for North America, in December, 1853, 180 emigrants drowned, 102 passengers and crew saved. The California, from Sligo, on the 18th of September, 1853, put back leaky, and some of the crew deserted for that reason, and were taken and put in prison. She went to sea again in No-
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vember, and three or four days afterwards foundered. Out of 60 passengers, in two boats, 15 died from exposure. A few days after the Annie Jane sailed, an emigrant ship, 17 days out, put back to Liverpool, with 47 deaths from cholera and the hold full of cases. Hot water was selling on board at 6d. per quart."
Another very important question was, whether it was right to allow passengers to be taken out on more than one deck. In some cases, there was a practice of stowing passengers in cabins hastily constructed on the upper deck; that was a system which he thought ought to be put an end to. In most cases passengers were stowed on what was termed the main deck, but, in some instances, they were stowed on the deck below that again. Those lower decks were very confined, and there was scarcely any chance of proper ventilation. It was a matter of very grave consideration whether that system ought to be allowed any longer, for there was scarcely a single case of vessels carrying out emigrants on two decks—one above the other—in which disease had not broken out and proved fatal. He also thought it desirable that this description of vessels should not sail between the months of October and April, inasmuch as vessels so crowded were by no means adapted to overcome the dangers of the Channel and the passage. On these points a gentleman acquainted with emigration details for the last thirty years, wrote:—
"The greatest amount of mortality always occurs on board of emigrant vessels with passengers on more than one deck. At any rate, at certain seasons of the year the use of a second deck should be entirely forbidden. Passenger ships should not be allowed to attempt the voyage to America during the winter months. The great source of all the neglects and evils is paying the passage-money beforehand. The Legislature ought, at least, to provide that the passage-money of emigrants dying from obvious neglect or ill-treatment, should be refunded."
Another experienced person wrote:—
"One great cause of sickness and death is the permission to carry passengers below the main deck. Only fancy country people coming in from pure air, kept for several days in dirty lodging-houses in Liverpool, and then crowded in a passenger ship, with neither light nor ventilation on the second or lower deck."
And the Colonial Land and Emigration Commissioners themselves said in their Report of 1852, vol. 98 of Accounts and Papers:—
"In every two-decked ship which has yet reached Australia, a mortality has taken place unprecedented during the many years we have been engaged in sending out emigrants."

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Surely, it was the duty of that House to inquire into the matter, and examine competent parties, so as to obtain the materials which would enable them to judge whether it was not absolutely necessary to prohibit vessels from taking emigrants on more than one deck. On a previous occasion it had been urged that the rush of emigration was so great that, if restrictions of that nature were placed on the vessels, it would increase the price of the passage to a degree that would cause great inconvenience, but that reason did not exist to the same extent now. He thought human comfort, human health, and human life had paramount claims, and, however good that reason might have been when economists and theorists considered the great object was to get rid of the Irish population, it did not retain the same force now, when labour was abundant, wages high, and the country needing the services of all who were willing to fight her battles. The Committee ought also to go into the question of what kind of officers should be entrusted with the command of emigrant ships. The last case he should allude to was, that most distressing case of the loss of the Tayleur, and he would ask any one who had read the clear and able Report of Captain Walker upon that subject, whether a case had not been made out for legislative interference. That was a case in which a captain had received his certificate, but was allowed to proceed to sea in a vessel which proved unseaworthy; for it was distinctly proved that the error in her compasses had not been ascertained. It was true that the ship had been swung, but that was two months before she sailed, and not after her cargo was put on board. No account was taken of other disturbing causes, and the proper tables of errors had not been supplied. They had not been twenty-four hours at sea when it was necessary to wear, and, in wearing, the vessel took a full hour coming round and ran four or five miles to leeward. He spoke with diffidence on that point, but he thought a vessel could hardly be called seaworthy which took so much room for that purpose. He recommended the Report of Captain Walker to their serious attention, for it would show them that this large vessel, of nearly 2,000 tons measurement, had only thirty-two able seamen, thirteen ordinary seamen, and six boys, just half the number there ought to have been. The twenty or twenty-two passenger stewards would be only lum-
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bering the deck in bad weather, and would be of no avail whatever. In that Report of Captain Walker, he conceived, there were ample grounds for inquiry into this subject by a Committee, and for legislation by that House. A gentleman who had visited the scene said, that in his judgment the captain had manifested utter incompetency, by the measures he adopted when he found himself close to land. He should have cut away the mizen-mast, to see if she could be brought to, and if that failed, he should have simply hove the sails back upon her, and she would have drifted six miles clear of any land, when she could have been "wore" round with ease. If it were said they were appointing a Committee close upon the heels of the Committee of 1851, his answer was, the Americans were doing the same thing. In the last two years the American Congress had passed three Acts for the better regulation of emigrant vessels, and the masters of our vessels coming from America were obliged to conform to them, and give more accommodation than our law required. Notwithstanding that America had legislated better and oftener than we had, they did not think they had done enough, and had just appointed another Committee, which had addressed circulars to merchants and shipowners throughout the Union, asking for information, in reply to a series of fourteen questions, and for any additional facts within their experience. That House would be only imitating the humanity of the American Legislature, if they appointed a Committee, and gave full scope to this inquiry. He should, therefore, without further observation, and thanking them for their attention, move, in the terms of the notice, for the appointment of a Select Committee.
Motion made, and Question proposed—
"That a Select Committee be appointed to inquire into the recent cases of extensive loss of life aboard Emigrant Ships, whether by sickness, wreck, or other causes; and generally into the sufficiency or otherwise of the existing regulations for the health and protection of Emigrants from the United Kingdom."
MR. FREDERICK PEELsaid, that some of the remarks of the hon. Member for Clonmel might lead to the conclusion that, not only was there some defectiveness in the law relating to passenger ships, but that there had also been some remissness on the part of the officers charged with the administration of

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that law. Now, so far as the administration of the existing law was concerned, he (Mr. Peel) could entertain no objection whatever to any inquiry the House might think proper to institute. He felt confident that, however strict and searching the inquiry might be, it would clearly be shown that those duties which, under the existing Passengers' Act, had devolved upon the Emigration Commissioners, or the emigration agents in different parts of the United Kingdom, had been discharged in the most satisfactory manner, and in a mode which he could confidently say had resulted in ensuring a degree of safety and comfort to the emigrants which only a short time back would have been thought wholly unattainable. The hon. Gentleman had anticipated the principal objection which he had to the adoption of his proposition in the form in which he had presented it to the House: it was that the whole subject of the law relating to passengers had been most fully and very recently inquired into. He referred, of course, to the Committee which had been appointed in the year 1851. That Committee had gone into the whole case—had put a great variety of questions—had laid before the House a Parliamentary Paper of unusual bulk—and had presented a Report containing very valuable suggestions. Now, if nothing had been done in consequence of that Report, it might, perhaps, not have been inexpedient to appoint another Committee with the view of recalling the attention of the House to the recommendations there made; but, in consequence of the investigations of the Committee of 1851, a measure, avowedly based upon their Report, was brought into the House in the Session of 1852, and that measure was passed, and was now the law of the country. That measure re-enacted the greater part of the then existing law with regard to passenger ships, which had been found unobjectionable and perfectly adequate for the purpose for which it was designed, and the Amendments then incorporated in the Passengers' Act were founded in a great measure upon the suggestions of the Committee of 1851, and were undoubted improvements upon the previous law. He would not attempt to enumerate those Amendments specifically, but they provided for such matters as the proper separation of the sexes, the adoption of an improved scale of diet, the issue of provisions in a cooked state, and medical inspection
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on the voyage. Those provisions had as yet been in operation for eighteen months only, and he, therefore, thought that a fair opportunity had scarcely been afforded of judging of their efficiency; but he could say that, so far as they had been tried, they had been found most serviceable, and that the emigrants derived considerable advantage from them. The hon. Member for Clonmel had also anticipated another objection which might be made to his Motion, as to the extent to which Government interference should be carried. It must be admitted that the case of the passenger trade was an exceptional case, which justified the interference of the Government with the private enterprise of shipowners and charterers of vessels, and the principle of that interference was simply to protect the interests of the great bulk of the emigrants from this country—the Irish emigrants—who were so poor and helpless as to be incapable of ensuring the consideration to which they were entitled. He (Mr. Peel) must say, however, that there was a limit beyond which Government interference ought not to be carried, and his own opinion was, that Government interference in this matter had been carried as far as it well could be carried. It appeared to him that, if they were to interfere to a further extent, and to enter into all the points touched upon by the hon. Member for Clonmel, the whole responsibility of emigration would be thrown upon the Government, and the emigrants would be deprived of that protection which they derived from the interest which the private shipowner had in the success of his speculations. The hon. Member for Clonmel had said that the Committee for which he now moved, was intended to be merely supplementary to the Committee of 1851; but he (Mr. Peel) thought that every point alluded to by the hon. Gentleman, with the exception of the removal of emigrants from Ireland to Liverpool, or their port of embarkation, had been inquired into by the Committee of 1851, and the recommendations of that Committee had, as far as possible, been embodied in the Act of Parliament. Some of the recommendations of the hon. Member for Clonmel appeared to him, he confessed, hardly practicable. He (Mr. Peel) understood the hon. Gentleman to propose that no vessels should be employed to carry emigrants but such as would have been taken up by the Government for the purpose of conveying convicts from this coun-

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try. There was, however, scarcely any similarity between the two cases. The convict ships were employed to remove convicts from this country to Australia, and it was obvious that when Europeans were to be conveyed through a tropical climate, a distance of 16,000 or 18,000 miles, they required larger space and better provision for accommodation and ventilation on board ship than emigrants who were only conveyed 2,000 or 3,000 miles across the North Atlantic to America. The hon. Gentleman had also referred to the case of remittances. The Committee of 1851 reported that the remittances were then very large, amounting, he believed, to nearly 1,000,000 l. a year; that they were made through houses of established credit; and that, whatever might have been the malpractices which once existed, the plan had then been, in a great measure, systematised, and that it seldom happened that the friends of intending emigrants from Ireland paid their passage-money to persons who were unable to guarantee such passage. The hon. Member for Clonmel had also made some remarks with regard to the seaworthiness of emigrant ships. He (Mr. Peel) was not aware that any emigrant vessel had left this country in an unseaworthy state. The existing law contained full provisions on that subject. It required an inspection of the vessels by a responsible Government officer, and he believed that inspection was carefully made in the case of every emigrant ship that left this country. The first part of the hon. Gentleman's Motion referred to the extensive loss of life on board of emigrant vessels in the autumn of the last year and the commencement of the present year from shipwreck, disease, and other causes. He (Mr. Peel) thought, however, that the House would be led to an erroneous conclusion if it were to accept, without considerable qualification, the recent disasters at sea as affecting the efficiency of the Passengers' Act. It must be remembered, with respect to the deaths from sickness on board emigrant ships, that last year the cholera existed in this country and on the Continent; that, undoubtedly, many poor persons went on board emigrant ships, carrying with them the seeds of disease, and that such disease was fomented by the crowding together of a number of people in a confined space. What, however, was the course adopted by the Government when they received intelligence of the ravages of disease on
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board emigrant vessels? The Emigration Commissioners at once published a notice, Commissioners at once published a notice, warning persons that they exposed themselves to great risk by embarking on board emigrant ships during the prevalence of the cholera in this country, and advising them to postpone their departure. That notice was circulated very generally throughout Ireland and the Continent, and he believed that it almost entirely put a stop to emigration. So much so he understood from the Emigration Commissioners that, at the time, great difficulty was found in procuring the complement of passengers for some vessels which were then prepared to sail from Liverpool. With respect to the wreck of emigrant ships, it must be borne in mind that during the last autumn the weather in the Atlantic had been unusually rough. Indeed he had been informed that such tempestuous weather had rarely been known in the Atlantic. He had only that morning read a Report from the emigration agent for Canada, in which it was stated that the average duration of the voyage from this country to Canada for many years past had been thirty-nine days, while in 1853 the average duration of the passage had been forty-eight days. This statement, showing that the average duration of the voyage had been increased by nine days during the last year, proved clearly that the weather must have been usually tempestuous and unfavourable. No doubt, in consequence of this, the emigrants had had to endure considerable suffering and privation. The hon. Member for Clonmel had adverted particularly to the loss of the ship Tayleur, and he understood the hon. Gentleman to say that that case showed the necessity of Government interference with regard to the selection of captains to command emigrant vessels. That instance, however, was one in which the captain appeared to be a person who had had great experience in his profession; and he thought, if the hon. Member read the Report of the Government officer, Captain Walker, who had been sent down by the Board of Trade to inquire into the circumstances connected with the loss of the Tayleur, he would see that the loss of that ship was attributable to causes which could hardly be brought within the reach of any legislation. The Report stated that there could be no doubt the loss of the Tayleur was attributable to the variation of the compass, caused by the ship being built of iron; and that, while the captain was apparently steering his vessel

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in a direction which would have taken her safely out of the channel, he was, in consequence of not being aware of the variation of the compass, steering directly upon the coast of Ireland. The great question at issue, however, was this:—Was it really the case that there was a large mortality on board emigrant vessels from this country to all parts of the world, either from wreck, sickness, or any other cause? The Emigration Commissioners had given him a return of the number of passenger emigrants who had left this country during 1852 and 1853, since the new law came into operation; and he thought the House would be surprised to hear what a small proportion of the immense number of emigrants had lost their lives by shipwreck. No less than 792,983 persons left this country in the year 1852–53, and of that number only 510, or 6-100th parts of 1 in every 100, lost their lives by shipwreck. Then, with regard to the general mortality:—he would take, in the first place, the emigration to Australia, which was partly assisted and partly unassisted, the unassisted emigration having sprung up entirely since the passing of the Passengers' Act. In 1852 the mortality on board the Government contract vessels, taken up by the Emigration Commissioners, was undoubtedly considerable, amounting to four per cent; but what was the cause of that large mortality? It was referrible, he conceived, to causes which were quite beyond any legislative provision. The Commissioners, at the request of persons who were acquainted with the Australian Colonies, relaxed the regulation with respect to the number of children conveyed by their vessels; they agreed to take families, including a large number of children, under the belief that such persons would be least likely to resort to the gold diggings; and he had not the slightest doubt that at least three and a half per cent of deaths out of the four per cent consisted of children. There was another cause of mortality which had since been removed. In 1852, the rate of freight being extremely high, it was impossible for the Commissioners to obtain the usual class of vessels; they were therefore compelled to take very large ships with two decks; and the four vessels mentioned by the hon. Member for Clonmel were the double-decked ships chartered by the Commissioners, in which the greatest mortality had occurred. Since that time, however, the Commissioners had discontinued taking
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up vessels with two-passenger decks, and, in consequence of their having ascertained that the mortality on board emigrant ships steadily increased in proportion to the size of the vessels, they had resolved upon not despatching any ship with a larger number than 400 emigrants on board. He was given to understand that the mortality on board Government vessels to Australia in 1853 did not exceed one, or he believed, even half per cent. Then, with regard to emigration to Canada, he found, from the Report of the emigration agent at Quebec, that in 1853 the number of emigrants to Canada was, 36,443, and out of that number only 240 died at sea and in quarantine, the rate of mortality not being much more than half per cent on the whole number. He found, also, that out of this number of emigrants to Canada 14,453 sailed from Irish ports, and in that number there were only forty-three deaths, or not more than a quarter per cent. He would next refer to the United States. In the different ports of our own Colonies emigration agents were appointed, whose duty it was to see that the law relating to passengers was enforced, to afford redress to emigrants who were wronged, or had just cause of complaint, and to punish the captains of vessels who were guilty of any infraction of the law. But the case was different in the United States. They had an excellent law of their own, but it appeared that it was not properly enforced. In New York, for instance, he found that there was no emigration officer. The Custom-House officers were the persons whose duty it was to administer the law, but they had so much to do in their own particular departments, that they could not afford time to attend to any infraction of the law of their own or of this country which might take place on board emigrant vessels. He was, therefore, without any specific information as to the rate of mortality on board emigrant ships proceeding to the United States; but it was incidentally mentioned in the report of the emigration agent in Canada, that it was stated in a New York newspaper that on board twenty-eight emigrant ships, which conveyed 13,752 passengers, there were 1,141 deaths, the rate of mortality being eight per cent. He thought the hon. Member would have acted wisely, if he had not opened up the large question of the passenger law, which had been so fully investigated, and was working so satisfactorily. It was a mistake to suppose that

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that House could by any legislation prevent vessels from going to pieces, or from running upon the rocks—it was equally impossible to prevent occasional errors of judgment, or to ensure good seamanship, under all circumstances, on the part of either master or crew; but if it was thought that an inquiry into the circumstances of those recent disasters to which the hon. Member had alluded was likely to elicit anything which might diminish the chances of their recurrence, and if the hon. Member would consent to limit the terms of his Motion in that way, he should not offer any opposition to it, and should be glad to find it attended with a beneficial result.
MR. LIDDELLsaid, it was not his intention to oppose the Motion, and he would beg to call the attention of the House to the terrible sufferings which were endured by the poor Irish who emigrated to this country, and who were thrown in shoals upon the town (Liverpool) which he had the honour to represent. He hoped, therefore, that the Committee would direct their inquiries to the circumstances under which a great number of Irish peasants were brought over from their own country, and shovelled, so to speak, upon the shores of England, with no earthly means of support but such as they might hope to derive from casual charity. Some two or three years ago this evil prevailed to a most lamentable extent, and while the right hon. Member for Morpeth (Sir G. Grey) held the office of Secretary of State for the Home Department, he (Mr. Liddell) had felt it his duty to bring under the notice of that right hon. Gentleman the extreme inconvenience to which the county of Northumberland was subjected from the introduction of shoals of Irish emigrants in the most miserable state of poverty and destitution. He remembered at that period to have seen the roads in the part of the country where he resided, swarming with poor creatures—men, women, and children—with scarcely as much clothing on them as was necessary for the purposes of decency, unable to speak a single word of the English language, and steeped, to all appearance, in as hopeless barbarism as the aboriginal inhabitants of Australia. He had no objection whatever to the emigration to this country of those hard-working, cheerful, and well-conducted Irish labourers, by whose co-operation, at stated periods of the year, the harvest was gathered in, and works of agricultural im-
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provement were efficiently and expeditiously carried out. On the contrary, he believed that the introduction of that class of Irish was alike advantageous to themselves and to their country; but the poor helpless creatures of whom he had spoken were not of this useful class, and it would be certainly judicious to inquire who paid their passage to this country, and under what circumstances they came here, without the means of doing good either to themselves or others.
MR. HENLEYsaid, he was glad that the Government had perceived the propriety of granting this Committee, but he could not see the wisdom of restricting them in their inquiries. The more information they collected, and the more extensive their inquiries, the better for the public; for, in this age of continual emigration, the question was one of the greatest importance. The hon. Gentleman the Under Secretary for the Colonies had stated that the Emigration Commissioners, guided by experience, had decided not to send out any ship with more than 400 emigrants. This, however, applied solely to the class of assisted emigrants; with the unassisted the Commissioners had no right to interfere, but of these Parliament should take care. He could not concur in the opinion that the statements made by the hon. Gentleman as to the rate of mortality in emigrant ships, were altogether satisfactory. That hon. Gentleman seemed to think that one-half per cent on a voyage to Quebec was not a serious mortality; but it should be remembered that that voyage averaged two months in duration, and hence the mortality per annum would average three per cent, or thirty deaths among 1,000 people. This he considered rather a serious rate of mortality; and it would be well for the Committee to consider whether it might not be practicable to diminish it. But then, when they came to the United States and found a mortality of 8 per cent, or 48 per cent per annum, it did appear to him to be such a state of things as ought to weigh very strongly against restricting the inquiry. He was quite aware that it was impossible to get rid of all the inconveniences or of all the dangers of a sea voyage by legislation; but that was no reason why they should not inquire whether it was possible to mitigate them. The Committee would, of course, inquire into such calamities as the loss of the Tayleur, and endeavour to as-

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certain the cause of them. Captain Walker had given it most distinctly as his opinion that the vessel was under-manned. The emigration agent, on the other hand, had declared in his evidence that she was adequately manned; so that two Government officers were at issue on a point of the deepest interest and importance.
MR. FREDERICK PEEL: The statement in the Report is, that the crew were not in any way implicated in the loss of the vessel.
MR. HENLEY: That might be; the crew might have exerted themselves to the utmost of their power, and yet they might not have been numerically adequate to the duties devolving on them. Captain Walker did not attribute the loss of the ship necessarily to this defect, but he stated most distinctly that the vessel was undermanned. There seemed to have been some gross negligence somewhere, in not taking care that the compasses were properly adjusted. It seemed impossible to avoid the conclusion that the emigration officer had not performed his duty in that important respect. However, the whole calamity was as yet involved in mystery, and the Committee would be usefully employed in making such an inquiry respecting it as might possibly prevent the recurrence of similar disasters.
MR. CARDWELLsaid, he believed he rightly expressed the feelings of his hon. Friend (Mr. Peel) when he said that there was only one object in the limitation to the inquiry that he proposed, namely, that it should be limited to those matters which had not been definitely settled by the former Committee. The Government had no desire to impose unnecessary restrictions on the Committee. They suggested limitations only with a view to prevent the Committee from bestowing its time and labour on such branches of the subject as had already been inquired into by former Committees. The Committee, however, would of course collect as much valuable information as they could, and endeavour to ascertain by what means such disastrous occurrences as the loss of the Tayleur might be averted for the future. There were already before the House two measures which he had introduced a few evenings ago, and which would materially tend to the greater safety of emigrant ships. In addition to those measures, however, he should be most happy to adopt any valuable suggestions that might emanate
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from the Committee. With respect to the Tayleur, nothing could be clearer than Captain Walker's statement, that the loss of that vessel was chiefly to be attributed to an erroneous assumption that the compass before the helmsman was correctly adjusted. Whether the vessel was adequately manned was, of course, a subject of great importance, and one that would come very legitimately within the cognisance of the Committee. It was undoubtedly a matter of the first importance that the soundings should have been taken accurately, and that, in our narrow channel, the lead should be repeatedly heaved. He would pass no opinion on the conduct of Captain Noble, nor attempt to prejudice his case, because on receipt of the Report of Captain Walker, he had requested the Local Marine Board of Liverpool to institute that inquiry into the conduct of Captain Noble which the Act contemplated, and on which depended the withdrawal or the continuance of his certificate. As inquiry was now in the hands of the Local Marine Board, he felt that he should be doing wrong if he now introduced it in the House.
CAPTAIN SCOBELLsaid, he was very much obliged to the hon. Member for Clonmel (Mr. O'Connell) for having brought forward the present subject; and he hoped the Committee would be invested with sufficient powers to sift it thoroughly. It was a matter of considerable importance that the meaning of the term "emigrant ship" should be clearly defined. In all cases of Government contracts, as was very well known, none but first and second class vessels were invariably employed—as, for instance, in the case of convicts. Surely, then, as much ought to be done for emigrants as for convicts, With regard to the loss of the Tayleur, it appeared undoubtedly that the vessel was very insufficiently manned, there being only thirty-two able-bodied seamen on board, whereas the invariable rule in the case of Government vessels was, that there should be four to every 100 tons burden, and the custom of the port of Liverpool was to have but three; but the Tayleur did not seem even to have had three. The reason for this practice was to be found in the fact that the Government never insured, but bore its own losses; while private vessels almost always insured, and, therefore, were anxious to save as much money as possible. In the case of an emigrant ship,

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the Themis, which sailed from Liverpool for Melbourne with 300 passengers on board, the crew consisting principally of Chinese and Lascars scarcely had the ship cleared the land, when the crew was found so inadequate to work the ship, that the captain was obliged to put into port to obtain some British sailors. Parties ought to be employed by Government, to see that in all cases a proper number of efficient seamen were on board, while it would remain for another department to decide whether the captains in each case were fit to discharge their duties. In the case of the Tayleur, a crew was shipped only the evening before the vessel sailed. She put to sea on a Thursday, and on the Saturday she was stranded on the coast of Ireland. Really the whole affair was quite disgraceful to the art of navigation.
MR. MEAGHERsaid, he thought that the Committee, while engaged with the calamities befalling emigrant ships, might with advantage turn their attention to the Government regulations affecting emigrants when on board, and consider whether they were well adapted to the preservation of health, and, what was more important, of morality, which was often endangered by crowding both sexes together on board. He would warn the Committee against being misled by anything which fell from the hon. Member for Liverpool, to inquire into the condition of the deck passengers from Ireland to Liverpool. And when the hon. Under Secretary reminded the House of the law introduced only eighteen months ago, he must say, that it was since that time that most of their calamitous losses of emigrant ships had occurred—a very good reason, he thought, for inquiring into the law as it stood. He found no fault with the Government officers; yet it might be found on inquiry that they were not invested with sufficient power to give effect to the purpose of their appointment. Above all, when so many as 900 human beings were crowded into one vessel, it was surely sufficient reason for inquiring whether accommodation was provided for them, conducive to health and to morality, and for inquiring generally into the whole case. Might it not, also, form a fit subject of inquiry to the Committee, whether an emigration ought not to be confined to vessels with a single deck, and whether temporary decks on deck ought not to be prohibited. He had seen a letter from an emigrant, who had been housed in one of these tem-
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porary erections, complaining not only of the indecency to which they were exposed, but of the bad weather which they could not escape. For his own part, he did not think the months of December, January, and February, the most favourable time of the year for the purposes of emigration to Australia, and that, too, might very properly come under the consideration of the Committee, whether it would be desirable to make any regulation as to the season of the year for embarkation. With these suggestions, he pressed the Motion on the attention of the House, and hoped the hon. Under Secretary would not continue his opposition.
MR. FREDERICK PEELsaid, he thought it would render all further discussion unnecessary if he stated at once that he consented to the nomination of the Committee, but subject to the understanding that its objects should be confined to the points contained in the Motion of the hon. Gentleman (Mr. O'Connell).
MR. BENTINCKsaid, he thought it was a very dangerous principle to lay down that by further legislation they could not guard themselves more effectually from the carelessness of sailors. On the contrary, he believed a great deal might yet be done to check all such negligence and carelessness. In nine out of ten cases of shipwreck he believed the loss of the vessel was attributable either to the insufficiency or inefficiency of the crew, or to the carelessness or ignorance of those in charge of it. All such cases, therefore, ought to be dealt with by legislation. He saw no reason, if the penalties at present enforced in cases of culpable neglect were insufficient, why they should not be increased, and additional means taken to promote the levy of the fines in all cases where loss of life had occurred. He, therefore, would suggest, that it should be an instruction to the Committee to determine whether increased penalties ought not to be imposed on masters guilty of all negligence and carelessness.
MR. FAGANsaid, he must acknowledge that, after the statement just made by the hon. Under Secretary, any remarks from him were almost superfluous. Still, in justice to his constituency, he could not avoid making a few remarks. And in the first place, he wished to point out the remarkable fact, that while on board foreign vessels, American or otherwise, conveying emigrants to the United States or Canada, the mortality was as high as eight per cent,

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it only reached to one per cent in vessels the property of British subjects. Now, this was a point which well deserved the attention of the Committee, and they might consider whether some arrangements could not be made with the Government of the United States to enforce regulations as regarded emigrant ships of that country, and to put those ships on the same footing as our own. It was very well known that nearly two-thirds of the emigrants to Canada and the United States were taken out by American vessels; and it appeared from the statement of the hon. Under Secretary that, according to statistics in his possession relating to last year, the mortality on board those vessels was eight times as much as that in British vessels. It also seemed to him (Mr. Fagan) that, as so large a proportion as three-fourths of the emigrants leaving Liverpool were Irish, arrangements should be made to enable those poor Irish to emigrate from their own shores, either from Cork, Waterford, or Limerick, where depôts might be established for the purpose.
MR. J. O'CONNELL, in reply, said he must disclaim all intention of conveying any imputation on the conduct of the Colonial Emigration Commissioners, his only object being to arm them with such powers as might secure the safety and comfort of emigrants. With regard to the circumstances which had led to the loss of the Tayleur, if he had been aware that an inquiry was now going on into the professional capacity of Captain Noble he should have abstained from commenting upon that part of the subject.
Motion agreed to.

MILITARY SERVICE AND EXPENDITURE.
MR. HUMEsaid, he would, according to notice, beg to call the attention of the House to the Report of the Royal Commissioners for inquiring into the practicability and expediency of consolidating the different departments connected with the civil administration of the Army, who recommended that the greater part of the authority, with reference to the Army, which at present belonged to the Secretaries of State, should, for the future, be vested in the Secretary at War, and that in future he should always be a Member of the Cabinet. The Report to which he called the attention of the House was signed by Lord Howick, Lord Palmerston, Lord John Russell, Sir John Hobhouse, and others, and it was presented to Parlia-
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ment in 1837. The question which he had undertaken to bring before the House was one, in his view, of great importance. It was not a novel question, it was one which he had brought before the House indirectly many years ago, and which he had expected, after the Report of the Commission alluded to in his Resolution, would not have been allowed to remain so long as it had remained without the application of a remedy. At the present moment, perhaps, he should not have interfered, if he had not considered the matter one of the first importance in connection with the military movements which were now going on. It might be all very well that such a complicated system should be allowed to remain as it was in times of peace, but the case was different now; and, in bringing forward this Motion, his object was to strengthen, if possible, the hands of the Government in the administration of the Army, and to enable them to apply the resources of the country in the most direct way, so as to prevent the pecuniary loss which he was prepared to prove had taken place under the existing system. That loss in the various departments of the Army, the Ordnance, and the Commissariat, had been for years past something like 200,000 l. or 300,000 l. annually; but, although the Commissioners of 1837 were unanimous in recommending the change he was about to suggest, their propositions remained unadopted. He hoped it would not be considered that, in pressing his Resolution at the present moment, he had any idea of throwing difficulties in the way of the Government. On the contrary, he had never known any period during the last thirty years when supplies were granted to any Ministry with so little trouble as in the present Session, and he, for one, wished it to be seen abroad that there was no unwillingness, on the part of the House of Commons, to grant supplies, and that the House would cheerfully give to the Government the means by which they might best act, in the present crisis of affairs, for the honour and interest of the country. It was, therefore, with no hostile spirit that he brought forward this Motion, but only with the view of showing the anomalies of the present system, and the importance of remedying those anomalies. His object was to show the impossibility of allowing these matters to remain in their present condition, and he had no hesitation in saying that, if any gentleman connected with a large establish-

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ment acted on the principle on which the business relating to the Army was conducted, he would very soon bring himself to ruin. He wished the House to understand clearly what his meaning was, and what he really proposed to do. He wished to propose to the House that the whole department of the Army, consisting, not only of the Guards and regiments of the line, but of the artillery, engineers, and commissariat, should be brought under the control of one responsible individual, and that the whole charge for the maintenance of the forces should be brought under the consideration of Parliament by one person, and that the Army department should be placed in the same position, with regard to the Estimates, as the Navy. The Admiralty had charge of everything connected with the Navy, and he wished the Army Estimates to be dealt with in a similar manner. He entirely concurred in the Report of the Commission which sat in 1837, that the different branches should be brought into one department, and that that department should be under the control of one person, who should receive the title either of Minister of War or Secretary at War, it mattered little which. Under the existing system, the 8,000,000 l. required for the maintenance of the forces was divided into different parts, and 4,000,000 l. was asked for by one individual, while the remaining 4,000,000 l. was asked for by various others. It appeared to him to be entirely opposed to anything like sound financial principles that one department, which consisted of three different branches, should be placed under the orders of different individuals. The whole expenditure ought to be under the control of one person, who would, of course, be responsible to that House for the manner in which he executed the functions of his office. If a question was put to the Secretary at War, he could only answer on certain points. If more information was required, application must be made to the Treasury or the Ordnance, and it was a very difficult matter to ascertain to which department inquiries ought to be addressed. The present system had thrown great difficulties in the way of checking the Army expenditure. That portion under the control of the Secretary at War was voted one month; another month afterwards the barrack vote was proposed; and then, in the course of another month, came the Commissariat; then, at another period, came the Ordnance. There was no means of obtaining a comprehensive view of the depart-
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ments of the Army. Hon. Members who had read the Report of the Commission of 1837 would have a fair notion of the anomalies and inconsistencies of the present system. That Report was drawn up with considerable ability, and no person, he believed, could read it without being forced into a conviction of the necessity of some change being effected. With regard to the naval department of the service, the orders of the Government were conveyed to the Board of Admiralty, and everything connected with the annual expenditure for the Navy was then under the control of that Board. With regard to the Army, the orders of the Government concerning the employment of troops were communicated to the Commander-in-Chief by a Secretary of State, who was a responsible person, and under whose signature all expenditure was sanctioned; but that Secretary of State was the Secretary for the Colonies, whose attention was more than sufficiently occupied with the business of forty-two colonies. The orders were at the same time communicated to the Master General of the Ordnance, the Ordnance—that was the artillery and engineers—being an entirely distinct branch, under the control of the Board of Ordnance; and it did certainly seem that such an arrangement was liable to be subversive of rapidity and unity of action. It was not so in other countries, and why, he would ask, should it be so in this? The Commander-in-Chief and the Master General of the Ordnance might both be very good men, but he did not see why there should be more than one responsible person. He would call the attention of the House to the real duties performed by the Secretary for the Colonies and the Secretary at War, with regard to the administration of the military establishment of the country. When troops were ordered upon foreign service, it might be imagined that the orders of the Government were communicated by the Secretary at War; but it was not so; they were communicated by the Secretary for the Colonies. The Secretary for the Colonies had, in fact, authority in all matters relating to the Army. He submitted to the Queen the consideration as to the number of the troops to be employed on any service, and made known to the Commander-in-Chief the total number decided upon. In time of war it was his duty to communicate with officers commanding forces in foreign countries, and to convey to them the orders of the Government. All Commissions in the Army were

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practically issued under his authority. The Commander-in-Chief took the orders of the Queen as to appointments or promotions, and then forwarded a memorandum of names to the War Office. The Secretary of War then made two lists of the new commissions, one for regiments serving in India, Ceylon, or in the other Colonies, and another for the remaining regiments, whether in England, Scotland, or Ireland. The first of these lists was transmitted to the Colonial Office, and the latter to the Home Department, and after the commissions had been prepared in those departments they were forwarded to Her Majesty by the Secretary of State for her signature, then they were countersigned by the Secretary of State, and afterwards sent to the Commander-in-Chief. He was utterly unable to perceive what advantage there could be in such a complication, and, when he considered how often immediate action might be necessary, he was convinced that the delay thus occasioned might be productive of great injury to the public service. Another point to which he wished to direct the attention of the House was, the manner in which the troops were supplied with arms; the Commander-in-Chief informed the Secretary at War that arms were required, the Secretary at War then wrote to the Secretary of State for the Colonies, who, after having obtained the authority of the Queen, wrote to the Master General of the Board of Ordnance, and, on the authority of that letter, the arms required were supplied. Four different letters must be written before a single musket could be issued to any one regiment in the service. Why should not the Secretary at War have power to act at once in the matter? Such a method must necessarily be productive of delay; and must, consequently, be injurious to the service. What, on the other hand, were the duties of the Secretary at War? He prepared and submitted to Parliament the Army Estimates; but, in doing so, he prepared them under the orders of the Secretary for the Colonies—in fact, he did little more than was done in India by a kerani, who would copy an English letter perfectly, without understanding a word of the language. The detailed estimates were made out under the orders of the Secretary at War, and by some arrangement with the Commander-in-Chief. The expenditure of the sum granted for the Army was made under a warrant issued by the Secretary at War. The accounts of the regimental pay-
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masters were examined by the War Office. Now, he wished to see the expenditure of every shilling in the War Department brought under some proper check and control. The Secretary at War decided upon all claims as to widows and pensions for the wounded. The Secretary at War, in conjunction with the Commander-in-Chief, with the consent of the Treasury, made from time to time alterations in the rates of pay and allowances. Warrants for payments were prepared by the Secretary at War, and submitted to the Queen. He was required to answer all questions in Parliament connected with the administration of the Army, and could offer such suggestions as he might think fit to the Commander-in-Chief. Now, to make him really efficient, he ought to have the whole of the service under his control. The Secretary at War certainly had some other duty, such as the insertion of military appointments and promotions in the Gazette. He had also to correspond with magistrates respecting any complaints against officers or men. It was his duty also to bring before Parliament the Mutiny Bill, to frame the Articles of War, and to issue routes for the removal of troops. He would now proceed to show some of the anomalies of the present system. There were two sets of regulations—one for the Army under the Commander-in-Chief, the other for that portion of the Army under the Master General of the Ordnance. The latter officer exercised all the powers respecting the artillery and engineers which the Commander-in-Chief exercised with respect to the Army. But then came the civil duties of the office. These were placed under the superintendence of the Board of Ordnance, individual officers composing that Board, each taking and conducting a department. That Board performed for the artillery and engineers all the duties that the War Office did for the Army—made the examination of pay lists and accounts, decided claims of officers for compensation, for loss of horses and baggage, &c., and fixed the amount of passage money. Another anomaly existed with respect to the supply of clothing. In France, Austria, Belgium, and Russia, the supply of clothing was under one management and control. Was that the case in this country? No such thing. The clothing for the engineers was provided by the Ordnance Board; the clothing for the militia was also provided by that Board; and it formerly provided the clothing for the Irish police force. Some of the colonial clothing

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was also supplied by that Board, and greatcoats for the whole Army. But what was the case with regard to the Army clothing? It was supplied by the colonel. Now, he could not conceive on what grounds there were two departments to perform precisely similar duties. It could not be argued that any particular species of education was required for the control of the Ordnance Department, for neither the present nor late Master General of the Ordnance were artillery or engineer officers. The designs for and erections of barracks and all other buildings connected with the Army were under the control of the Ordnance Department. Now, though he admired the talents and abilities of the engineer corps, he did not think that in many respects they followed up all the improvements of the day, and, consequently, the public benefit was not so great as it would be if the buildings were placed under the superintendence of a Minister of War, and, after being publicly advertised, were completed by contract with the best possible specifications. If the Secretary at War, for instance, had the charge of this department, he would first ascertain what accommodation was wanted, and then he would call on engineers to give specifications according to the newest improvements, taking care to have the buildings erected and completed as cheaply as possible. The anomalies arising from the existing division of military departments were numerous, and he had that day been informed, though he could not undertake to say whether correctly or not, that an engineer or artillery officer could not take the command of the line; so that were Sir John Burgoyne the ablest general in Europe, this country could not avail itself of his service, by placing him at the head of an army. If such a rule had existed in France, Bonaparte, who was an artillery officer, and many other able officers who had figured on the Continent, would never have had the command of armies. When a superior officer or general was required for the forces in the Colonies, what occurred? The Secretary of State and the Commander-in-Chief determined upon the officer, and the Secretary at War sometimes did not know officially who was appointed, until the officer applied for his passage money? Why should the Secretary of State do more than announce the vacancy and require an efficient officer? for, surely he could not know better the merits of an officer than the Secretary at War, who had so much
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to do with other applications which made him cognisant of such matters? An army was of very little use without a good commissariat and a proper supply of food; and yet it appeared to him that the supply of food for the Army was conducted in a manner most extraordinarily anomalous. For the Army in England the food was supplied by contract, but in Ireland—though he believed the system was about to be altered—by regimental contracts. The Guards, too, in London, were supplied by regimental contracts, while in the militia the colonels supplied the food as they best could. Why should there be these different modes of supply, and was there any reason why the whole force should not be supplied by contract? He understood that, by a recent arrangement, the Treasury was about to transfer this duty to the Commissariat for Ireland; and then the Commissariat, sitting at the Treasury, would make contracts for Ireland, the Ordnance would make contracts for England, and the Treasury, as usual, would make contracts for the forces abroad. He did not mean to say that every officer engaged did not perform his duty to the best of his power, but these different systems must of necessity occasion mistakes and mismanagement. He was told that it was intended, contrary to the opinion of the Committee of 1851, to introduce the commissariat generally into England, but he trusted he should hear in that House that no such intention existed, for by the evidence of Sir Charles Trevelyan, it appeared that the establishment as then conducted was enormously expensive. The Commissariat should be placed under the control of the Treasury, to be checked, but not conducted, by that department. There was nothing to prevent the supplies of food being consolidated in one department, and the Secretary at War, who was at the present moment the Finance Minister for the Army, would, if invested with the powers he proposed, be the proper person to attend to this matter. Another anomaly was, that the Secretary of State had the bestowal of the Order of the Bath—a distinction chiefly conferred for military services. But what could the Secretary of State know of the merits of officers? Those he could only learn from the Commander-in-Chief or Secretary at War, and the latter would be the proper person to have the granting of it, as he was obliged to know the services of officers, for all promotions, sales of commissions, retirements on half-pay, being

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matters of finance, came under his cognisance. He would now call the attention of the House to the recommendations of the Commission of 1837. That Commission reported:—
"1. That the greater part of the authority with reference to the Army, which at present belongs to the Secretaries of State, should, for the future, be vested in the Secretary at War.
"2. An alteration should be made in the form of the appointment of the Secretary at War:—1. That he should in future be always a member of the Cabinet. 2. That he should be the Minister by whom the advice of the Cabinet, as to the amount of the military establishments, should be laid before the king. 3. That he should be the person to consider and act on all points with the Commander-in-Chief on behalf of the Administration, and to be immediately responsible to Parliament for all the measures of the Government with reference to the Army. 4. That he should assume all the merely formal duties relating to the subject now performed by the Secretaries of State, such as the preparing and countersigning of military commissions and the issuing of orders for the delivery of arms to the troops.
"3. The Secretary of State, to whom the civil administration of our numerous colonies, with all their complicated interests, is entrusted, cannot possibly give the attention to the subject (amount and distribution of the Army) which it requires.
"4. The Secretary at War, by whom the Army Estimates are now moved in the House of Commons, seems to us to be the person to whom the important duty of watching over the whole military administration of the country should properly be committed.
"5. To give him, the Secretary at War, a direct control over those large branches of business relating to the military service of the country, which are now managed by the Board of Ordnance and by the Commissariat Department of the Treasury.
"6. With respect to the Ordnance, we think this might best be accomplished by dividing the civil from the military duties of that department. 1. The latter (the military duties) should be left, as at present, in charge of the Master General, who should exercise the same authority he now has in all matters of discipline, promotion, &c., subject only to the general orders of the Government, to be conveyed to him, as we have already explained, by the Secretary at War instead of by the Secretary of State. 2. He should also retain under his immediate orders the Inspector General of Fortifications, and be charged with the duty of superintending the execution of all military works.
"7. The civil business, on the other hand, should be brought under the more direct control of the Secretary at War, by making the board officers, by whom it is more immediately conducted, subordinate to him instead of the Master General and Board of Ordnance; so that their separate divisions of the business would become branches of the War Office, and the whole expenditure connected therewith would be provided for in the general Army Estimates."
Those recommendations appeared to be of
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vast importance for the purpose of consolidating and bringing under one head these various duties. In the Committee of 1850 Earl Grey, who had been Secretary of State for the Colonies and chairman of the Royal Commission of 1837, in reply to several questions, stated, that so far as respected the inconvenience of the present system, his opinion had not in any way altered, but, on the contrary, was rather confirmed, though, at the same time, he believed that the difficulty of making any alteration was, perhaps, greater than it was at that time supposed. He would read the following extract from Earl Grey's evidence:—
"In consolidating the two branches of the War Office and the office of the Secretary at War, your Lordship contemplated, I think, still retaining the office of the Master General of the Ordnance as a separate department?—That was proposed.
"Leaving the military part of the Ordnance still under the Master General of the Ordnance?—Yes, but making the Secretary at War the person answerable to Parliament for the whole military expenditure as well that of the Ordnance as for the Army.
"In making him responsible to Parliament for the military expenditure, did your Lordship mean that he should regulate the amount of force to be sent to the different colonies?—My notion at that time was that, with regard to the Army, as with regard to the Navy, it requires some one authority which shall manage the whole business, which shall be both responsible to Parliament for the amount of expense, and shall be bound to consider what the most economical mode of providing for the service which is required may be. At present the Admiralty, as you are aware, has complete control over the management of the whole naval service; but the different Secretaries of State, as the organs of the Government, signify the Queen's commands to the Lords of the Admiralty as to the force to be employed for particular purposes and in particular parts of the world. In the same manner it appeared to me that there ought to be some one authority to have a general cognisance of all military affairs; to receive in the same way the orders of the Government from the Secretary of State, but to be responsible to Parliament for the economy and for the efficiency with which the service is conducted."
He thought that what he had adduced to the House showed that the system, as now conducted, was contrary to sound principles of finance, and calculated to throw difficulties in the way of a thorough investigation by Parliament of the military expenditure. He had waited patiently during many years for the necessary reforms to take place. He knew that there were at the present time impediments in the way, but he did hope that when these impediments were removed the requisite changes would be made, so as to prepare in a time of peace for such an emergency as had now

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come upon them. They were now called upon to extend their force, and a Supplementary Estimate to the extent of 80,000 l. was about to be laid before them, which would raise the Army Estimates to between 8,000,000 l. and 9,000,000 l., and, therefore, he thought that, on the score of economy, these changes should be carried into effect as speedily as possible. He asked, fourteen days ago, whether it was the intention of Government to carry out any of these changes, and the answer he received was, "No." That being so, he had no alternative but to propose the Motion which he had brought forward, not in hostility to the Government, but to urge them on to the performance of their duties in a more efficient and economical manner. It was said that this was not the time for these changes. He differed entirely from that opinion, for he thought that no time could be better than the present, when they were called upon so largely to extend the Army. With regard to the word "forthwith," which appeared in his Motion, he was willing to leave that out if any objection were taken to it.
MR. W. WILLIAMSseconded the Motion.
Motion made, and Question proposed—
"That it is the opinion of this House, that, in accordance with the Report of the Commission for inquiring into the practicability and expediency of consolidating the different departments connected with the civil administration of the Army, dated the 21st day of February, 1837, confirmed by Evidence taken before the Committee on the Naval, Military, and Ordnance Expenditure in the years 1848–50, measures should forthwith be taken to consolidate the different branches of the Military Service and Expenditure, and to place the whole under the superintendence and control of one efficient and responsible department."
MR. SIDNEY HERBERT: Mr. Speaker, I certainly agree much more with many of the opinions which my hon. Friend the Member for Montrose has indicated in the course of his speech than with the Motion with which he has concluded. My hon. Friend, I think, differs in some material portions from the Report which he asks us to adopt, and he has stated those grounds of difference with great frankness and in much detail; and I confess with equal frankness that I concur with him in many of the objections to that Report. First of all, let me say what were the circumstances under which the Report of 1837 was made. At that time there is no doubt—and, in fact, it is alluded to in the Report—there had been
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great impediments placed in the way of carrying on the public business, and that differences and controversies had arisen between the different branches of the war department. It was also true—though the evidence on that head was drawn from a remote source—that in 1812 serious differences had arisen between the Commander-in-Chief and the Secretary at War; and I believe that at a later period, though anterior to the sitting of the Commission of 1837, grave differences of opinion and serious controversies had arisen between the Secretary at War and the Commander-in-Chief. At that time there was a great indisposition on the part of the military authorities to adopt improvements and to listen to the advice which came from the War Office; and as the recommendations which Lord Howick, the then Secretary at War, proposed, and which he ultimately carried to a successful issue, were then thwarted, he was led to propose such a charge in the organisation of the system as would be necessary to carry on the plans which he was convinced, and rightly convinced, were necessary for the wellbeing of the Army. Now, it has been my fortune, on more occasions than one, to speak in very high terms, though not more high than they deserved, of the efforts which Lord Howick made to promote the efficiency of the Army. But if controversies existed then to such an extent as to render the appointment of a Commission necessary, see how these difficulties have been got over. We are now, I am glad to say, in an entirely different state of things. In the first place, those very plans in which Lord Howick was opposed, he by his energy and determination succeeded, in spite of the opposition, in carrying into effect. At present, therefore, these grounds of complaint no longer exist. If you look to the proceedings of the last few years, you will find that great changes have from time to time originated at the War Office, and that these changes have ultimately been invariably successful. During the administration of the present Lord Panmure, two of the greatest changes that could be conceived in the condition of the Army were proposed by him and ultimately carried out—that is, the abolition of military service for life, and the substitution instead of a limited service of ten years; and next, the introduction of an examination of officers before receiving their commissions. These changes were vital in their nature; the first altered the whole

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system which had subsisted during the late war and since till the change was made. The military authorities at the time thought that service for life was almost necessary not only for the efficiency, but even for the very existence, of the Army; but, in spite of that opinion, Mr. Fox Maule succeeded in carrying this change, and at the present day there is a complete harmony between the military and civil departments, arising out of more enlightened and extended means on the part of the military authorities; the indisposition to change has entirely disappeared; and as far as the differences and controversies are concerned, there is no longer any ground for change. But my hon. Friend the Member for Montrose says, he thinks the Army ought to be under one head, the same as the Navy. Now, I must remind him that the Navy is not under one head in the same sense in which he proposes that the Army should be under one head. The Navy is, and is by this very Report proposed to be, under two heads—for the personnel is under one department, and the matériel under another department. Everything relating to the artillery, and to the science of projectiles, which is more likely to be understood by men who have devoted their whole time to the investigation of these subjects, than by the officers of the Navy, was, according to the recommendation of the Commission of 1837, to be taken under the charge of the Ordnance Department. But, more than that—when I was Secretary to the Admiralty, applications were coming to us from the Colonial Office constantly, and which we used to think exceedingly inconvenient, to the effect that the political necessities of the country rendered it necessary to send ships and officers to stations where, if regard was had only to the efficiency of the force, they ought not to go. I remember, when an insurrection broke out in the Ionian Islands, the Secretary for the Colonies issued his orders that the Admiralty should send ships from other parts of the Mediterranean for the purpose of putting down the insurrection in those islands. So, when the famine took place in Ireland, ships were sent to Ireland by the orders of the Home Secretary, to furnish a supply of food at the different ports on the Irish coast. Well, then, it is not correct to say that if you were to constitute the Secretary at War a Secretary of State he would be in the same position with the First Lord
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of the Admiralty, because the First Lord of the Admiralty takes his orders from the Secretary of State; while if you created one officer for the whole department, he would take no orders from the Secretary of State, but his office would absorb into itself all the duties connected with the Secretary at War—all the duties performed by the Master General of the Ordnance—all the duties performed by the civil portion of the Ordnance—all the duties connected with the Army now performed by the Treasury and by the Commissariat; and in addition to this vast increase of duties he would have to take on himself the duties now performed by the different Secretaries of State, and would be required to be responsible for the distribution of the whole force throughout the country. Let the House consider, for one moment, the increasing and complicated machinery with which the Secretary at War would be encumbered, if he were required to discharge all these various duties. Let us see if there would be any increase in promptitude by the substitution of this new officer in place of the Secretaries of State and the Commander-in-Chief. How is the Secretary at War to judge whether or not there is an additional force required in any part of England? You may have disturbances in Lancashire; you may have strikes; you may have an uneasy feeling between the men and their masters; you may have Rebecca riots in Wales; you may have an insurrection in Ireland. The Secretary at War could only obtain his information on these points from the Secretary of State for the Home Department. You may say that he is to issue his orders, and that he alone is responsible for them; but in point of fact he is not responsible, for he can only get his information from the Home Secretary, and he must take his word for what is going on. Or suppose that there is a disturbance in some part of our Colonial Empire. The new Secretary of War must then be the mere go-between between the Colonial Secretary and the Commander-in-Chief. In point of fact, the Colonial Secretary would dictate then to the Commander-in-Chief as he does now—the Home Secretary would dictate as he does now; but in place of doing that directly—in place of making his own explanations, and receiving explanations from the Commander-in-Chief as to the difficulty of moving troops, and so coming to a mutual understanding, all this would then have to be filtered and strained from one

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to the other through this new Secretary of State, who would be a third party placed between two parties who had hitherto worked sympathetically with each other, and the result would be that you would infuse difficulty where there is now simplicity, and a cumbrous mode of arriving at an object where there is now directness. My hon. Friend stated with great frankness in what he differed from the Report of the Commissioners, and I think I cannot do better than follow his example and state, with equal frankness, the course which I would follow. I do not say that the present system is a perfect system. Theoretically, no doubt, it has many faults, but practically it works very well—though my conviction is that by certain well-considered changes it may be made practically to work much better. Let me first of all say that, having given my opinion as regards the question of the abolition of the present authority of the Secretaries of State, I would like to fortify it by quoting the opinion of Lord Panmure, who has a great leaning towards the views of my hon. Friend the Member for Montrose, and who, when examined before the very Committee of 1837, whose recommendations my hon. Friend (Mr. Hume) wishes the House to adopt, on being asked the question, "With reference to the maintenance of the public peace at home, is there any Member of the Government more competent to form an opinion upon that point than the Home Secretary?" replied—
"Certainly not; the Home Secretary is the most capable, and he ought to be the person who should advise the Crown with reference to all matters connected with the preservation of the peace of the country. Is not he in constant communication with the lord-lieutenants of counties, and with the magistrates generally?—Certainly. With reference to the aid which may be required from the military branch of the public service, for the maintenance of peace and the support of the civil power, is there any one so immediately responsible as the Home Secretary?—No one can be. Therefore, upon the question of the quantity of military force that will be required in aid of the civil power, is not he the most competent judge?—Whoever may be the party to decide upon what force is to be maintained in the country, he is, and of course must be, guided by the advice of the Home Secretary as to what force should be maintained in the home districts. If there were transferred from the Home Secretary to the Secretary at War, for instance, the duty of judging of the quantity of force to be maintained at home, would not the Secretary at War want that correspondence which takes place with the Home Office, for the guidance of his judgment?—I take it that he would go to the Home Secretary to furnish him with that information to guide his
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judgment upon that point. Then at last it would come to a mere shifting of the responsibility from one Minister to another, but a communication with the Home Office would be necessary to enable the war department to form a judgment with reference to the quantity of the home force that may be required?—A war Minister placed in the position supposed in Mr. Ellice's question, would be informed by the Home Office that so many troops were required in such a district; and then he would distribute those troops as economically as he could upon his own responsibility."
But what then would his responsibility amount to? If he were called upon to answer for his distribution of forces in the country, his answer would be—I was told by the Home Secretary that he required a certain number of men in certain districts, and I furnished them. The Home Secretary is the man who governs the country—he is the man who is responsible—you may call the Secretary at War responsible if you please, but he is a mere go-between between the man who is really and virtually responsible for the peace of the country and the Commander-in-Chief, who provides the troops that are required. I will now state what are my own views on this subject. I do not believe that it would be safe to add very largely to the existing consolidation of the duties of the Ordnance Department. The Ordnance Department has had placed upon it, since 1815, the care of the barrack departments in England, Ireland, Scotland, and the Colonies, and the care of providing fuel and light, both in England and the Colonies, important duties which were formerly discharged by other departments. As far as I have had the opportunity of judging of the working of that department, I think there are certain great objects which we ought constantly to keep in view. If I had the power, by a magician's wand, to rearrange the department without reference to existing circumstances, and especially without reference to the difficulties of the present moment, when it becomes necessary not to change our tools, but to use them, I should say that a change in the interior arrangement of the Ordnance Office would be far more important than any change in the office of the Commander-in-Chief. Now there is a broad line of distinction between the Master General of the Ordnance and the Commander-in-Chief. At present the business of the Commander-in-Chief is very much of the nature of routine. He can make no alteration in the army which carries with it any expense, without the sanction of the Secretary at War. He can promote to a

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vacancy, but that vacancy, so far as it is caused by retirement, can only be created with the consent of the Secretary at War. He can remove no officer to half-pay. Similar duties fall to be discharged by the Master General of the Ordnance, though not to the same extent; but then there is no such check upon him. But the duties of the Master General are ten times more important; they are such that, though they require him to be a military man in a great degree, yet the civil element enters largely into them. The providing of ammunition and the care and maintenance of fortifications both come under the cognisance and await the decision, of the Master General of the Ordnance. His duties, in fact, are of the most complicated nature, and require the advice of men eminent in science, and they often demand a nice judgment to decide. If a fortification be commenced which turns out in the end to be useless, there is great harm done, for it is not merely the waste of time and labour, consumed in erecting the fortification, but that fortification must be maintained, and it will abstract men who might be employed in other and more valuable services. I say, therefore, that, though it does not rank so high, the office of Master General of the Ordnance is of more importance to the State than that of the Commander-in-Chief. I confess that as far as I have seen the working of the War Office in connection with the Horse Guards, I would attribute its great financial success to this fact, that the one office incurs the expense, while the other checks it. My hon. Friend has been pleased to undervalue the duties of the Secretary at War; but I believe that the main reason why the administration of the Army is more economical than that of the Navy is this, that the Secretary at War watches over every step of the Commander-in-Chief, and checks his course whenever it is inconsistent with economy. I think that this check, which is applied by the War Office to the Horse Guards, ought also to be applied by the War Office to the Ordnance. I confess again—but this is my private opinion, and I pledge no Member of the Government to it—that I think a further division might be made, though there would be great difficulties attending the arrangement, which would give the Commander-in-Chief the command of the whole personnel, and the Master General of the Ordnance the direction and control of the matériel, so that the whole
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of the artillery, for instance, as troops, should be under the control of the Commander-in-Chief. But I am aware that that is an opinion not shared in by others, though it is an opinion I have come to from all the means I have had of judging. However, it is a change not so indispensable as that which I mentioned before, which is a sound, and I believe an undisputed opinion—that the check on the army expenditure at the Horse Guards might be applied with advantage to the Ordnance. There are other and minor points to which my hon. Friend alluded, and in which I should hardly think of following him, if I did not wish to state my opinions with equal frankness to his own. He has spoken about a change in the mode of drawing up commissions. The commissions are now drawn up in the Home Office, and I know no reason why they should not be drawn up in the office of the Secretary at War, and countersigned by him, rather than by the Home Secretary. The general process of providing stores was well described in the Report of the Commission of 1837, which stated that, when arms were required by the Commander-in-Chief, he wrote to the Secretary at War, and the Secretary at War wrote to the Home Secretary, and there the thing stopped. Properly speaking, the Home Secretary ought to have taken the Sovereign's pleasure on the subject, and on the Sovereign's signing the warrant the arms would be delivered. But it was known that King George IV. had a very great aversion to the frequent signing of his name, and as he would not sign the warrants, the Home Secretary ceased to send them. The warrants became mere waste paper, and the arms were sent on the authority of the Secretary at War. But when Her Most Gracious Majesty came to the Throne, with that punctuality in business which has always characterised her, and with that desire which she has ever shown to identify herself with everything that relates to the comfort and well-being of the Army, she desired that the warrants might be sent to her for her signature, and they have been sent ever since. My hon. Friend has referred to another matter with regard to the Commissariat. The Commissariat department supplies stores throughout the Colonies; but the Commissariat Commission, over which my noble Friend the Member for Totness (Lord Seymour) presided, recommended several alterations, by which considerable reductions have been effected.

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The result of those alterations has been that we have the services of some reduced officers and officers upon half-pay in the Commissariat, whose assistance is economically used for the purveying of food for the troops, while a fixed stoppage has been substituted for the regulated system of contract. And further, in the expedition which is now proceeding to the East we have found that we have the services of an ample number of able and experienced men, who have effectually organised the Commissariat establishment. But I confess with reference to this branch of the service I never could understand why Commissariat officers, whose business it is to provide food and forage for troops, should act as bankers to the Treasury. That is a practice I cannot understand. I should be glad, therefore, to see the Commissariat put upon another footing in that respect. Suppose the course was taken which I have suggested—that is, that the command of the artillery should be taken from the Ordnance, and put upon the Horse Guards; in other words, that the Commander-in-Chief should have under his control the personnel of the Army, and the Ordnance the matériel. This would be a proper division, and in this sense the Commissariat would serve under the Ordnance; and then would apply the formal check of the Secretary at War as to finance in the same manner as it is applied at the Horse Guards. I now come to the course proposed to be taken immediately, at this particular juncture. My hon. Friend has alluded to the evidence which was given by Lord Grey in 1849. I will also read one or two passages from Lord Grey's evidence, because if Lord Grey thinks there is a time when no alterations should be made à fortiori the present is a moment when, in my opinion at least, it would be dangerous to make such a change as that proposed by my hon. Friend. Lord Grey is asked:—
"Is your Lordship aware that any alteration has been made since that waste of time and paper was pointed out in 1837?—I am not aware that there has been any change made.
"Does your Lordship's recollection enable you to state whether the subject has ever been before the Government of which you have been a Member so long?—I do not think that the subject has ever been taken up lately. After the Report was issued, it was considered in the beginning of the year 1838, and there was an intention of making rather an extensive change, but it was found that there was so much objection entertained to it, I believe throughout the Army and throughout the Ordnance, that the intention was abandoned, and I am not aware that it has ever been revived.
"Were not, in fact, five of the seven Commis-
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sioners in 1837 Cabinet Ministers at the time, and have they not remained so while that Administration was in office?—They are now again Cabinet Ministers; they have been so all the time.
"Is your Lordship's own opinion, as expressed in that Report, in any way altered by anything that has occurred since which leads you to approve of that system being continued?—My opinion is certainly not altered as to the cumbrous and imperfect nature of the existing arrangements. I am not prepared to say that it is impossible to devise a better mode of improving the system than was suggested in this Report. That is a very difficult question.
"Although you retain your opinion as to the cumbrous nature of the present arrangements, you have never, during the interval which has elapsed, thought it sufficiently embarrassing and prejudicial to the public service to render it your duty to bring it before the Cabinet of which you have been a Member?—No, I have not. I believe that in peace the present arrangement, though certainly very imperfect, works tolerably well; and it is always right to have a good deal of consideration for the feeling of the profession; and I believe the profession is very much against any such change as was proposed in the Report."
Such was the evidence of Lord Grey on this subject, and it should be received with all that respect and deference which is due to so eminent and experienced an authority on such matters. I have already explained to the House the opinion which I myself have formed from having paid some attention to this subject during the past year. At any time I think you ought to proceed step by step. The process should be gradual. But at this moment I do not believe you could undertake a more rash experiment than when you are about to enter upon a serious contest, and when you will have the greatest pressure upon your machinery from being engaged in a very hot war. I believe you have a system in operation which practically works well, though there are defects in it which I have endeavoured to point out—defects, however, which may be remedied—and which, in an emergency like the present, will give efficient results. It certainly occurs that in manufactures, for example, there is great power in the division of labour, and that great results are obtained from it; but the question here is, whether the greatest results cannot be obtained rather by combination than division. Well, if colleagues are thoroughly imbued with a strong desire to carry out great objects for the benefit of the public service, they will act just as harmoniously in three different departments as if you had them all concentrated in one. Since I have been in office, for example, it has been the custom for the Master General of the Ordnance, the Inspector

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General of Fortifications, the First Lord of the Admiralty, the Commander-in-Chief, and myself, to meet periodically at the War Office, and go carefully through all the different changes which were being made with regard to our home defences. Whenever we had colonial questions of a like character to consider, we did the same in conjunction with the Colonial Secretary. And so everything has gone on harmoniously, and, I trust, efficiently. Recollect that the Colonial Secretary is, to a great degree, necessarily a War Minister. He certainly governs large colonies which have no garrisons, and which are strictly colonies; but he also governs colonies which are not colonies, but garrisons. Such are Gibraltar, the Ionian Islands, Bermuda, and Mauritius—though the latter is both a colony and a garrison. These places are held for war purposes; but they are governed by the Colonial Secretary, and nobody has yet dreamt of putting them into the hands of the Secretary at War. If you think the Secretary of the Colonies is unable to carry on the duties of a War Minister because he is overworked, you must likewise recollect, that of the three Secretaries of State, the Colonial Secretary is the only one whose work must ultimately become much lighter. The work of the Foreign Secretary is the heaviest of all; and that of the Home Secretary is rapidly accumulating. With respect to the Colonial Secretary, however, the House must remember that in every case where you give responsible government to a colony, you cast that colony, as it were, away; her connection with you exists in an imperial sense, but administratively she is almost entirely cut off, and thus consequently the work for a Colonial Minister becomes lighter. Fifteen or sixteen years ago, I believe, Canada gave more trouble, occupied more time, and inspired more anxiety in the breast of the Colonial Minister, than all the rest of the colonies put together. But I apprehend that at this moment there is no part of our colonial empire which gives so little anxiety, which consumes so little time, and gives so little trouble to the Colonial Minister as Canada. The Cape of Good Hope has been got into the groove of self-government, and the same thing will happen there. The same result will ultimately take place with regard to Australia, Van Diemen's Land, and other colonies. Under such circumstances, I say you must not consider the Colonial Minister unfitted to undertake the
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charge of direct operations in war. As far as we have had experience—and we have had the opportunity of judging for the last few weeks how the existing machinery will work under what may be called very high pressure—we are satisfied it has worked well. The Government, as the House knows, have been engaged in sending out the largest military force that has been sent out of this country for many years. It is a larger British force than that which the Duke of Wellington took with him to Portugal, or than he had with him at Waterloo; and it has been fitted out with greater attention to efficiency and to health than any that ever previously left our shores. This was done in an unprecedented short time; and all who have seen the troops will admit that an army never went forth in a higher state of efficiency both in the personnel and the matériel. We know, therefore, by practical experience, at the present moment, that these different departments can work together harmoniously and efficiently. I confess, then, that, holding the opinions which I have frankly stated to the House, wishing to carry them out, and hoping to see them effected, I should look with great alarm upon the success of a Motion which pledged us instantly to put the whole of this machinery out of gear in order to introduce what I dare say might in some respects be an improvement, but which as a whole can only be regarded as a theoretical proposition. There is another consideration, also, in reference to my hon. Friend's proposed reformations, which ought to be most seriously and gravely reflected upon, and that is, that you can seldom make any very great changes, such as those suggested, in Government offices, suddenly and at once, because, if you do attempt to do so, you run the risk of disturbing that accurate knowledge of routine business which is most important, and can scarcely be overrated. The success of the conduct of a department depends, as the House must be aware, in no slight measure upon an accurate knowledge of routine. We have in every department men who may be called only men of routine. But yet they are men of ability. Their eyes have long been fixed upon particular objects; their duties have trained them to it, they are thoroughly masters of details, and they are consequently of the greatest use in administering the affairs of the department. But change their position, ask them to originate a new routine;

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take them off the rails, do this, and you will soon find the whole establishment in confusion. My right hon. Friend the First Lord of the Admiralty effected the greatest change made in modern times in the organisation of that department; and I have asked him how it was effected. The answer he gave to me was, that it took years of difficulty to get over the changes which he introduced; that it took years of labour before he got things to run in their accustomed course; that it took years of trouble before the men got used to the new machine; and that it would have been totally impossible to have made such a change under the pressure of war. My hon. Friend the Member for Montrose has said, that he has no wish to embarrass the Government; and that the House has consented to vote the supplies, we have asked, cheerfully. I am prepared to acknowledge that. I think the conduct of this House in general, and that of my hon. Friend under existing circumstances, has been most honourable to them. They have most laudably supported the Government in this emergency. But I must confess that if an immediate adoption of the very large change now recommended, and the consequent abolition of three or four existing posts, be forced upon the Government—although the changes were feasible, which I doubt—the efficiency of the public service would be impaired. Having expressed these opinions with entire unreserve, but always bearing in mind that we ought gradually to approach towards a better state of things, I hope my hon. Friend will allow me to ask him not to press this Motion.
LORD SEYMOURsaid, he had listened to the speech of his right hon. Friend the Secretary at War with great pleasure, though it contained some points with which he could not concur. His right hon. Friend had expressed his willingness to consider any suggestions for the improvement of the departments referred to, and to deter unnecessary expenditure. He could not object to the statements by which this assurance was qualified; and when his right hon. Friend added that this was not the right time, though when the right time came he should be prepared to make a change, he (Lord Seymour) heard with no dissatisfaction an argument which had lately been treated with scorn and contempt. He wished, however, to call attention to two or three points on which his right hon. Friend had touched. Circum-
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stances, he said, had very much altered since the Commission of 1837, which had been referred to so often both by his right hon. Friend as well as by the hon. Member for Montrose. In considering this subject, he (Lord Seymour) would refer to these altered circumstances since the military affairs of the country had been put under the Secretary of the Colonies. The Secretary of War was an office created, he believed, about the year 1795; and in the year 1800 the business of the Colonies was transferred to the Secretary of War. But at that time the Secretary of War had little to do as regarded the Colonies, for they did not give the same amount of trouble which they did in later periods. His right hon. Friend hoped that the Colonies would hereafter give less trouble. He trusted this idea might prove correct; but, considering that we had forty-two colonies, with only one Secretary of State to read and answer all the correspondence relating to them, he thought they provided work enough for one man without making him also responsible for the management of a great war. Lord Grey had stated to the Committee of 1849 that, in his opinion—
"it was absolutely impossible for the Colonial Secretary to exercise a constant supervision over the arrangements with regard to the military forces of the country."
But Lord Grey, who had given this opinion, was himself in a favourable position, if any man ever was, for exercising this supervision, for he had previously been Secretary at War, he was familiar with the details of the organisation of the Army; yet when he became Colonial Secretary, he felt he could not, with all his previous knowledge, exercise a proper superintendence over matters connected with the Army. And he (Lord Seymour) would ask whether it was possible that a Secretary of State, who was generally chosen not on account of his military knowledge, but for the sake of his general wisdom and judgment, could be the fittest person to manage and conduct the affairs of war? In the last war the Colonial Secretary had, he believed, an Under Secretary, who was an eminent military man; but at the present moment there was nothing of the kind. Now, he wanted to know whether any assistance was to be afforded to the Colonial Secretary in this respect, so that he might not be at a disadvantage on account of his want of military knowledge? Then, he would ask, how had the present system

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worked? Had it worked well? We had had the Duke of Wellington Prime Minister; Sir George Murray, Colonial Minister; Sir Henry Hardinge, Secretary at War, at the same time; yet Lord Grey stated that, even at that time, with these great military authorities in the Government, the arrangements were so complicated between the different departments connected with the Army, that it was impossible business could go on well. Lord Grey had given some information which proved this statement. He referred, for instance, to several cases in different colonies, which showed the inconvenience of arrangements by which not only purely military matters, but matters affecting the health of the troops, and even their lives, were delayed, and eventually forgotten. In 1836, on the 18th of July, Colonel Nicholls, stationed in Bahama, wrote to the War Office respecting an officer's room in the barracks; it was a most unwholesome place, destructive to health; the officer who occupied it was sick and dying; and he wished for the necessary authority to have it put into a proper condition. One would have expected that such a notice, coming as it did from an officer who then held the position of Lieutenant-Governor, would have met with some consideration; but the letter remained unnoticed for a whole year; disputes going on all the time between the different departments, who referred it from one to another, whether the room should be washed, cleaned, and ventilated. At last, in the following year, another letter was sent, reminding the authorities of that sent in July, 1836, and earnestly calling attention to the inconvenience which the delay had created. Several more letters and explanations passed between the different departments; and at length this small matter, which affected the health of officers serving upon a distant station, was accorded. Another case was also mentioned by Lord Grey. Colonel-Commandant Cockburn wrote to the Treasury about the state of the barracks at Bahama; and in his letter he said that plans had been sent in year after year, and that life after life I had been sacrificed, still no order had been given upon the subject. When gallant officers were writing in this way, and the facts were brought under the notice of the Committee of 1849, it was natural that Parliament should be anxious to know whether any steps had been taken to remedy so discreditable a state of things. There
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were other cases to which he might refer, but in this very correspondence about the barracks the Ordnance referred to the Colonial Secretary; then it appeared the Colonial Secretary could not find the earlier letters, and so the whole thing was stopped, because the earlier letters could not be found. Next, the Ordnance were obliged to ask what was the question. The question was, whether the troops did not want new barracks; but this question had not been answered in 1838. The correspondence on this subject passed through no less than five departments—the Secretary of the Colonies, the Treasury, the Commander-in-Chief, the Secretary at War, and the Master General of the Ordnance—besides through the offices of the civil governor, and the officer commanding in the colony. Very truly was it said by Lord Raglan, then Lord Fitzroy Somerset, in one of his usual business-like letters, that "the multiplicity and complexity of correspondence must always tend to inconvenience and delay." Another and a similar instance occurred with regard to the barracks in Turk's Island. Barracks were much wanted there, and in December, 1838, a letter was written to the Treasury, requesting them to make provision in the Estimates for the erection of the necessary buildings. The letter was referred to the Ordnance, and they said it had been brought under the notice of the Master General, but that, in the absence of instructions from the Colonial Secretary and the Lords of the Treasury, they were unable to issue any order. Consequently, nothing was done. A long correspondence then took place between the Ordnance, the Colonial Secretary, and the Treasury; and then the Ordnance wrote another letter, stating they possessed no information; and at last it was discovered that Turk's Island was not under the Ordnance at all. These were cases which proved that some general control and superintendence were necessary. Such things could not have happened if only his right hon. Friend had been responsible; for he would have taken care that the decisions were given either one way or the other at the earliest moment. A question next arose as to the food of the troops. There had been complaints of illness for nineteen years; the medical department reported the health of the troops, and pointed out various things that might be done in the barracks and elsewhere for the benefit of the troops. The representation came to the War Office

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that it was necessary to substitute fresh meat for salt provisions. This took a long time to effect. There really appeared no end to the correspondence between the Commissioners of Audit, the Treasury, the Ordnance, the Colonial Secretary, and the War Office. At last the change was effected which ought to have been effected nineteen years before, and then, instead of being attended with an increase of expense, as expected, it was found to be absolutely more economical. What his right hon. Friend (Mr. Sidney Herbert) had said that he was ready to do was good so far as it went, but he (Lord Seymour) should have liked the duties connected with the Army, now performed by the Secretary of the Colonies, to be transferred to the office of the Secretary at War, leaving the Secretary of the Colonies to state what force was required in the different colonies, and, of course, empowering him in cases of emergency to communicate directly with the Horse Guards without the interposition of the Secretary at War. He was convinced that there could be no economy until we had some more general superintendence over the administration of the Army. The relief of troops might also be more economically managed under the direction of the Secretary at War, who had the military authorities immediately at hand to consult, than under that of the Colonial Secretary, who, from not being well acquainted with the subject, might give orders which would entail additional expense on the public. He was glad to hear the right hon. Gentleman state that he was in his own mind inclined to divide the Commissariat department; to place, as he (Lord Seymour) understood him, that portion which belonged to the supply of the troops under the Ordnance, keeping the Ordnance under the check of the Secretary at War, and leaving to the Treasury that which might be called the banking department. At the same time, he hoped that the Commissariat officers would not be allowed to contract for the supply of all consumable articles to the troops at borne. He knew that at the Treasury there was a great love for the Commissariat, and it was thought that nothing could be done except by its officers. Sir Charles Trevelyan said that he thought it was but fair to the Commissariat officers that they should have the supply of the troops at Home, on account of their having had so much service abroad; but Lord Fitzroy Somerset had recommended that
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the troops should be supplied on the regimental system. He believed that every Member of the Committee upon this subject was satisfied with the ability of the gentlemen in the office of the Secretary at War, and he should be glad to see them relieve the Colonial Secretary of some of those duties which he could not properly perform. He did not go the whole length of the Report of the Commission upon this subject; but he supposed that Report was well considered, and he should like to hear what were the present opinions of those who signed it. He should especially like to hear whether his noble Friend the Secretary of State for the Home Department (Lord Palmerston), who had had many years' experience in the War Office, retained the opinions which he entertained when he signed the Report of that Commission, and how far he agreed with the opinions which his right hon. Friend the Secretary at War had expressed on this subject. He quite agreed with his right hon. Friend, that this was not a convenient time for remodelling great departments, but he thought that we might now relieve the Secretary of the Colonies, either by transferring some of the duties at present discharged by him to the Secretary at War, or by the appointment of a military secretary to assist him. After the speech of his right hon. Friend the Secretary at War, he thought that it would be impolitic on the part of the hon. Member for Montrose to put the House to the trouble of dividing; and he hoped that, after a little more consideration, the Government would be prepared to go a step further in that consolidation of departments which, as regarded finance, would be satisfactory to that House and the country.
SIR JOHN PAKINGTONsaid, he considered that the hon. Member for Montrose (Mr. Hume) had done a service both to the House and to the country, by calling attention to this question at the present moment; and, though he readily admitted the candid and fair spirit in which the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary at War had met the speech of the hon. Member for Montrose, he must at the same time say he did not think the right hon. Gentleman had been altogether successful in meeting the statements and arguments which the hon. Member for Montrose had urged upon the House. With regard to several of these statements and arguments the right hon. Gentleman had not offered any answer at all.

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Every one must feel that at the present moment public attention would be directed more urgently than ever to the state of the Army, and the manner in which the Army was governed and conducted; and he was afraid all must admit that, great as the efficiency of that Army was, there were several points connected with its government and its management which could not be regarded as satisfactory. The hon. Member for Montrose had adverted tonight to several of these points; among others, to the system by which the army was clothed. There were also other points which from time to time had occasioned a considerable amount of scandal, and nothing that excited public disapprobation could occur without being more or less injurious to the public service. These, however, were not the chief points raised in the speech of the hon. Gentleman (Mr. Hume), but the points specially raised in the speech of the hon. Gentleman were the questions with regard to the parties by whom the Army was managed and governed. He (Sir J. Pakington) thought the Members of the present Government would not find fault with him if he attached weight to and expressed his approval of a document that bore the signatures of "Palmerston" and "John Russell." Their signatures were attached to the Report of the Commission of 1837; but, if he was to judge from the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary at War, those noble Lords were not now disposed to carry out the views they urged in 1837, but were rather disposed to contend that this was not the time for such changes, although, as the noble Lord the Member for Totness (Lord Seymour) remarked, Government had not lately shown themselves very accessible to arguments as to the inopportuneness of the present time for particular and very important measures. And what was the state of things which the two noble Lords he had named disapproved in 1837, but which they appeared to be unwilling to depart from or change now? Could it be contended that the present mode of carrying on the government of the Army was satisfactory, or could conduce to efficiency? We had an Army governed—first of all, by a Secretary of State for the Colonies, as Secretary of War; then, we had the distinct office of Secretary at War; then the distinct office of Commander-in-Chief; and finally, the distinct office of the Board of Ordnance. And what, then, was the in-
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evitable result of having these numerous distinct authorities to carry on that which, he confessed he believed, like any other great public department, would be much better and much more efficiently carried on by one authority. The noble Lord the Member for Totness (Lord Seymour) had made statements upon this subject which he himself (Sir J. Pakington) was enabled to confirm, from the experience he had gained, during the time he had the honour of holding the office of Secretary of State for the Colonies. Upon two occasions, which he now bore in mind, he happened to receive applications of an urgent nature, relating to the health of our troops in the Colonies—in fact, to the effect that our troops in different parts of the world were suffering from sickness and other causes brought on by deficiency of barrack accommodation. He was anxious, of course, to adopt remedial measures as soon as possible, but, on inquiry, he found that, although he was nominally War Minister, he had no power, and he was obliged to refer the matter to another department, which department referred it to another. It appeared that no department was really responsible, and while the various departments were pressing questions upon one another, it was found practically impossible to remedy the evil, perhaps not practically impossible to remedy the evil, but, at any rate, to remedy it with that promptness and despatch which in such a case was highly necessary. The evil was, consequently, obliged to remain for some time unchecked. He quite concurred with what had fallen from the noble Lord (Lord Seymour) upon this subject, and he thought the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary at War, in endeavouring to answer the objections of the hon. Member for Montrose, had only confirmed them and shown their full force. "Very true," the right hon. Gentleman said, "we have these various departments, but they are now acting in perfect harmony together;" but at the same time the right hon. Gentleman admitted that at no distant day, instead of acting harmoniously together, there had been great discord in these several departments. The discord which had occurred at one period might occur again, and he thought the right hon. Gentleman had shown no reason why the harmonious action now existing must be permanent. He (Sir J. Pakington) could not but think that anything like the want of harmonious action when our forces were in the field

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could only he attended with serious injury to the public service. The right hon. Gentleman (Mr. S. Herbert) said no sufficient reason had been urged for creating a Secretary of State for the War Department. Now, the Motion of the hon. Member for Montrose did not, as he (Sir J. Pakington) read and understood it, require the appointment of a Secretary of State for the War Department, but what the right hon. Gentleman himself said showed the necessity of placing that great department under the superintendence and control of one efficient office. That was alone the object sought for by the hon. Member for Montrose, and he (Sir J. Pakington) thought that, when the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary at War had shown that the Queen's commands were conveyed through different Secretaries of State, sometimes the Home Secretary, sometimes the Foreign Secretary, and sometimes the Colonial Secretary, according to the portion of Her Majesty's dominions in which the action of a military force was required, no argument could seriously be brought forward to show that the Secretary for the Colonies should continue in the anomalous and inconvenient position of being Secretary for the War Department. The Secretary to whom the civil administration of our numerous Colonies, with all their complicated interests, was intrusted, could not possibly give that attention to the efficient management and government of the Army, in a time of war, which the importance of the subject demanded. The noble Lord opposite (Lord Seymour) had stated with perfect and unanswerable truth that which he (Sir J. Pakington) could confirm from experience, namely, that the correspondence of the Colonial Department, taking only the colonial duties in it, was already too much by itself, and ought not to be mixed up with duties of a totally different nature. His right hon. Friend (the Secretary at War), when he referred to the business of the Colonial Department, and expressed an opinion that now we bad given free institutions to many of our Colonies, the business of that department would partially diminish, could have but little idea of the amount of correspondence of that office, and he would ask the noble Lord opposite (Lord J. Russell), who had himself held the office of Secretary of State for the Colonies, if he was disposed to confirm the view the Secretary at War appeared disposed to entertain. He believed the right hon. Gentleman would then make the admission that certainly in the day about
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to arrive it would be unwise for the office of Secretary at War to be held by the Colonial Secretary. In a time of peace the Secretary of State for the Colonies might continue to act as Secretary at War, but he confessed that very frequently, during the time he held the office of Colonial Secretary, the thought had crossed his mind, "This may do very well in a time of peace, but, if ever we again encounter the misfortune of war, it will be impossible for the Minister of this department to carry on also the duties of Secretary at War." The House had been told to-night that George IV. was tired of so often signing his name, and he (Sir J. Pakington) thought any man who had held the office of Secretary of State for the Colonies would imbibe the same extreme dislike to so often signing his name, Much of the time of the Colonial Secretary was occupied in signing commissions, in attending to details of the Order of the Bath, and in other matters which would be much better transacted by some other department. In a time of peace it would even be wise to relieve the Colonial Secretary from these vexatious duties; but, in a time of war, he believed it would be impossible for any man to discharge both functions. In a time of war, with armies in the field, the duties of the War Minister must necessarily be greatly increased, and he appealed to the Government whether it would be possible in a time of war for the same individual to discharge the duties of Secretary of State for the Colonies, and also those of chief Minister for the War Department. The House was told that this was not a time for change. In 1837 a Commission reported that a change ought to be made; and why had it not been made then? Why, because it was a time of peace, and because it was then thought that nothing very pressing existed calling for a change. The country was now, however, unhappily involved in war, and still the House were told that a change must not be made, because it would be extremely inconvenient to have a change in a time of war. Thus, at one time because we were at peace, and at another time because we were at war, we were to be told that no change ought to be made. The country would not be satisfied to see a question involving the administration of so important a department—he would not say trifled with—but they would expect, and had a right to expect, that that department should be properly and efficiently conducted. With these

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views, he trusted the Government would seriously consider, if they really thought it would be unwise at this moment to organise a new department, whether some change might not be made, consistent with safety and prudence, that would relieve the Colonial Department of duties that they could not properly discharge, and adopt the suggestion of the noble Lord opposite by the appointment of a Secretary who might transact the war business of the country. In conclusion, he must observe that the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary at War had met the suggestions of the hon. Member (Mr. Hume) in a candid and fair spirit, and he had made the important admission that the present system was clumsy and bad, and ought to be changed. He (Sir J. Pakington), therefore, hoped that the House might trust to the discretion of Her Majesty's Government to make those changes as quickly and as effectively as they prudently could, at the same time adding a hope that the hon. Member for Montrose would not feel himself called upon to press his Motion to a division.
MR. ELLICEsaid, he would also entreat his hon. Friend the Member for Montrose not to divide the House on this question. It did appear, however, that, if the Motion was pressed to a division upon the question whether the military administration of the country should remain on the footing upon which it now was, the Government would be left in a minority. At the same time, there was no concealing the fact that the impression out of doors, as well as the decisions come to in the Reports of every Commission and every Committee that had considered the subject, were, that it was impossible, in a rational country, long to continue a confused and perplexed administration like that the merits of which they were discussing. Take, for example, the department of the Commissariat. It was shown before the Committee to which reference had so often been made in the course of this discussion that civil officers in departments both of the Ordnance and Commissariat were doing almost the same duties in different parts of the world, that a Commissariat officer in Canada, for instance, was doing the duty that Ordnance officers were doing at home. Now, surely one of these departments might be made to carry into execution all the duties of the other. It would appear, however, that the opinions of Sir Charles Trevelyan exerted great influence over all Governments. No
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one had greater respect than he had for the talents and devotion to the public service of Sir Charles Trevelyan; but if the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who appeared to have adopted some of his views, would look into the evidence of Sir Charles Trevelyan before the Committee on Army Expenditure, he would see how ready he was to suggest plenty of business, though it was not always so clear how that business would be discharged. He remembered hearing Mr. Sheridan once say to Mr. Whitbread that he was so fond of labour that he thought, if he had been wrought in a dray belonging to his own establishment in Chiswell Street, he would have been for doing all the work of the dray-horses himself. It was pretty much the same with Sir Charles Trevelyan, who seemed equally fond of work, for he would take not only the Commissariat, but the whole banking business and emigration establishments of the country under the superintendence of the public. He must say, he thought it high time to begin the work of reformation with regard to some of these departments, and he was happy to find that his right hon. Friend the Secretary at War would not be a laggard at the work. It could not be denied, however, that great difficulty was experienced in moving some of our public departments. It was hardly necessary to remind the House of the communication which recently appeared from Mr. Guthrie, the surgeon, in the public press relative to ambulances for the wounded. He stated that he was unable to get any satisfactory result from his communications to the Commander-in-Chief and the Board of Ordnance; but no sooner did Mr. Guthrie state his complaints in the newspapers than the noble Duke at the head of the Colonial Office, with that good feeling and attention to the public service which distinguished him on all occasions, immediately attended to the communication, and issued an order upon the subject. Had it not been for Mr. Guthrie's letter in the public papers, however, the matter would, in all probability, not have been attended to. With regard to the system of clothing by the colonels, the Committee of which he and the hon. Member for Montrose were Members unanimously came to the conclusion that the clothing of the Army should remain as it was; but it did not follow from this that alterations should not from time to time be made in the system. No change in this respect could be determined on,

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however, except by a committee of general officers. All these matters depended on so many parties, that the consequence was a system of administration not to be found in any other country in the world. The right hon. Gentleman the Secretary at War said they wished to interfere with the duties of the three Secretaries of State. That, however, was not correct. No one wished to take from the Secretary of State the duty of providing for what was requisite within his own department. If the Secretary of State for the Home Department wanted troops for the interior service of the country, he ought still to have the power of obtaining those troops from some department competent to supply; and so also with the Colonial Secretary, if he desired to send troops to the Colonies. But what they wanted to see was the appointment of a reponsible department, to which all military authorities should report, and to which the Secretary of State should be able to say, "I want 20,000 men," instead of having to go for these 20,000 men to the Commander-in-Chief, to the Ordnance, the Commissariat, and he knew not how many other quarters. The great expedition just fitting out had been placed under the command of one of the best officers in the country, and not only so, but one of the best men of business in it. There would be no divided authority in that force. The noble Lord who commanded it would have the entire control of the Ordnance, the Commissariat, the paymasters, the doctors, and everything else. This was what ought to be, and what they wanted was, to see the same rule adopted with respect to the administration of all these departments at home.
COLONEL KNOXsaid, he must entreat the Government to take into their serious consideration the recommendations of the Committee some years ago to put the Ordnance under the same department with the war establishment. At present not even a gun could be removed from Woolwich without applications going from one office to another on the subject. He trusted that the right hon. Secretary at War would urge on the Ministry the necessity of bringing under one head the different departments of the Army. He thought it was rather late that, now that they were embarking a great number of troops on foreign service, the Government had not made up their minds as to what arms they should have. He hoped this would be at once decided upon, for uniformity of arms and
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ammunition was the mainstay of an army. If this was not attended to, it would lead to the most disastrous results. He thought also, that the Minié rifle ought to be looked into, as he had been told on good authority, that these rifles required, in connection with the ball and ammunition, a quantity of grease. In a warm climate there would be some difficulty probably on that score, and then, after a few rounds, the weapon would be rendered useless, as without the grease it was impossible to force the ball into the rifle. He threw out this suggestion for the consideration of the Ordnance department, as it was most important that the soldiers should be furnished with efficient arms.
COLONEL MAULEsaid that the soldiers had only been supplied with two sorts of arms, consequently there would only be two descriptions of ammunition. Various experiments had been made at the firing school at Hythe, and he could assure the hon. and gallant Gentleman that the result of these proved that there was not the slightest difficulty in firing or loading the Minié rifle.
LORD JOHN RUSSELL: Sir, I confess that my opinion as to the general evils of the present state of the war department is not very much altered from what it was when the subject was inquired into some time ago. As to the remedy which was then proposed, I have some doubts certainly with regard to a part of the authority which it was suggested should be given to the Secretary at War. I think that other arrangements might, perhaps, be better for the attainment of the object we have in view. At all events, I consider it is very clear from what has happened at various times—with respect more particularly to the Ordnance department, and the difficulty of making arrangements for the health of the troops—that a more efficient and more direct authority is required. My right hon. friend the Secretary at War has stated that he thinks the Ordnance ought to be more connected with the Secretary at War than it now is—that as the Secretary at War checks all the expenditure of the Commander in Chief, so he ought also to check the expenditure of the Ordnance. I believe if this were done, it would not only serve as a check, but the operations of the Ordnance department would be much facilitated and made more effective than they now are. It has been asked why it was that the Report of the Commission of 1837 has not been carried into effect. The reason

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was this: The first consideration of that report came naturally before Lord Melbourne, who was then the head of the Government and he immediately entered into a correspondence with the Duke of Wellington on the subject. The Duke of Wellington wrote two or three letters to Lord Melbourne who found that those letters contained many objections to the Report. They were chiefly objections of a constitutional nature, as relating to the functions of the Secretary at War. His Grace thought that certain things could only be done by the Secretary at War—that he was the proper person to take Her Majesty's pleasure, and to give directions to the Commander-in-Chief. These objections proceeding from so high an authority, and being enforced by able arguments, induced Lord Melbourne to think it better at that time not to take steps to carry out the Report. I quite concurred in Lord Melbourne's opinion, and would not have liked to be a party to enforce the new arrangement against the authority of the Duke of Wellington, who, on this point, entertained very decided objections. With respect to the arrangement now proposed, my right hon. Friend has explained the great difficulty and inconvenience that would arise from attempting to carry into effect a new organisation of the departments at a moment when they are all required to make the utmost exertions in the preparation of the expedition now on its way to the East. But there is one suggestion which has been made in this House that has already been taken into consideration, namely, the suggestion that there should be, and especially in time of war, another Under Secretary of State for the Colonial Department, and that that Under Secretary should be a military Secretary attached to the office of my noble Friend the noble Duke at the head of the War and Colonial departments. That suggestion has been already taken into consideration, and will, I trust, in a very short time be adopted. I believe it is necessary that some arrangement of that kind should be made to enable the noble Duke to carry into effect the preparations in which he has been so busily engaged. My noble Friend, having charge of the War and Colonial departments, has paid the utmost attention to all the arrangements which are necessary at this moment. Instead of its being a great public convenience, I believe it would be a great public inconvenience, if the carrying out of these ar-
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rangements were to be transferred to any other department; but I quite agree with my hon. Friend the hon. Member for Montrose, that better arrangements are required, and I am sure that the hon. Gentleman and the House will feel satisfied after the speech of my right hon. Friend the Secretary at War, that no want of attention will be shown to this subject.
MR. HUMEsaid that, after the statements which had been made to the House on the part of the Government, he would not at present persevere any further with his Motion.
Motion by leave withdrawn.
The House adjourned at a quarter before Twelve o'clock.