Commons Sitting of 9 February 1860

TROOPS FOR CHINA.

  RETURN MOVED FOR.
  MR. SEYMOUR FITZGERALDmoved an Address for a Return of the Military Forces of all Arms under orders to proceed, or on their way from this Country, Her Majesty's East Indian Territories, or the Colonies, to China, and similar Return as to the Naval Forces.
  LORD JOHN RUSSELLasked, whether the sanction of the Government to the production of these Returns had been asked and received?
  MR. SEYMOUR FITZGERALDsaid, that the Secretary to the Admiralty had agreed to his portion of the Returns moved for, and he understood from the Secretary to the Treasury that there was no objection to the rest of it.
  LORD JOHN RUSSELL: I must say I think it is entirely without precedent that such a Return should be moved for without the Secretary of State for War being asked whether he had any objection.
  MR. SEYMOUR FITZGERALDsaid, he was quite willing to defer the Returns as to the military forces, so that the Secretary of State for War might be consulted, if it were desired. The Return of the naval forces had been assented to, as he had before stated, by the Secretary to the Admiralty.
  MR. SIDNEY HERBERTsaid, he had no objection to the hon. Member having

  717
  the information he desired; but it was obviously inexpedient to make a public Return of the strength of a hostile expedition. The hon. Gentleman had seen the General Order giving the number of regiments proceeding to China, and he must say he thought it would be very inconvenient to publish the Return asked for.
  Motion negatived.

FIRE-WORK MANUFACTORIES.

  QUESTION.
  MR. JOHN LOCKEsaid, he would beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether his attention has been drawn to the explosion of a Fire-work Manufactory which took place last month in Regent Street, Lambeth Walk, resulting in the death of three persons; and, if so, whether it is the intention of Her Majesty's Government to adopt any measures for the removal of such buildings out of crowded neighbourhoods?
  SIR GEORGE LEWISsaid, that a memorial upon the subject of the explosion to which his hon. and learned Friend referred had been received at the Home Office, and had been referred to the Chief Commissioner of Police for his report, which had not yet been received. With respect to the general question, he would take that opportunity of stating that his attention had been called during the recess to the frequency of accidents arising from the manufacture of gunpowder and of different other explosive substances, and the defective state of the law upon that subject. He had at present under consideration a Bill for the consolidation and amendment of the law relating to the manufacture of those substances, and he hoped before long to be able to bring that measure under the notice of the House.

DEMANDS OF THE ALLIES UPON CHINA.

  QUESTION.
  MR. SEYMOUR FITZGERALDsaid, he wished to ask the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Whether any Convention had been entered into between Her Majesty's Government and the Government of the Emperor of the French with reference to the demands to be made by both Governments on that of China, and with the view of settling the bases of the combined operations of the French and English Forces in that country, and especially with reference to a permanent occupation by either Power of any portion of the Chinese
  718
  Territory; and, if any such Convention has been made, whether Her Majesty's Government have any objection to lay it on the table of the House?
  LORD JOHN RUSSELLwas understood to say that there was an ordinary private Convention which was on the point of being signed, but there was no such general Convention as the hon. Member had indicated.

THE SHIP "ACCRINGTON."

  QUESTION.
  MR ALDERMAN SALOMONSsaid, he would beg to ask Whether Her Majesty's Government has received any information relative to the sickness and mortality on board the ship Accrington, which left Liverpool for India on the 30th of last September, with the wives and families of soldiers; and also as to the reported acts of cruelty and violence committed on board that ship, resulting, as it is alleged, in the murder of the captain and chief officer?
  MR. CHICHESTER FORTESCUEsaid, that some information had been received upon that subject from Her Majesty's consul at Pernambuco, but not all the particulars that were to be desired. It was evidently a most lamentable case. The facts were simply these. When the vessel conveying the families of soldiers to India had arrived at Pernambuco, it was found that a very large mortality had taken place among the children. It was also ascertained that the captain, who was accused by all parties of having been guilty of great tyranny and oppression towards the emigrants, was dead, as well as his chief officer; and there was reason to suspect that these men had been poisoned by the cook or by some other person on board. With respect to the mortality among the children, a full and rigid inquiry must be instituted, and as regarded the deaths of the captain and mate the consul had already set on foot a full inquiry into that subject, as their case involved a charge of murder. He would add one word with regard to this lamentable occurrence on behalf of the Emigration Commissioners. He had to remind the House that the vessel was not one of the ordinary emigration vessels in charge of the Emigration Commissioners. It was a vessel chartered to carry the families of soldiers to India, that duty having been undertaken by the Emigration Commissioners at the request of the War Department. In all other cases the Commissioners exercised a discretion as

  719
  to the selection of the emigrants on board, and they strictly limited the number of children to be conveyed in any particular vessel. But in the present instance they were bound to take the emigrants as they found them, and out of sixty-seven deaths which it was found had occurred when the vessel reached Pernambuco, sixty were those of children under four years of age. He mentioned these facts for the purpose of showing that there was no prima facie appearance of neglect in that case on the part of the Commissioners.

TASMANIA—THE LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL.

  QUESTION.
  COLONEL SYKESsaid, he rose to ask the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies if any and what proceedings have taken place consequent upon the transmission of a Petition to the Queen, signed by more than 5,000 inhabitants of Hobart Town, Tasmania, complaining of an Act passed in great haste by a minority of the Legislative Council, affecting the Constitutional privileges of the Electors.
  MR. CHICHESTER FORTESCUEsaid, that the facts with respect to that Tasmanian Act were as follows:—An Act had been passed to amend the constitution of the Legislative Council of Tasmania; and among other provisions, but not the most important of the whole number, was one which for the future would exclude all the Judges of the Supreme Court from seats in the Legislative Council. The immediate effect of that provision was to exclude from the Council a gentleman of great distinction and influence in the colony, Mr. Justice Home, lately Member for Hobart Town. That exclusion had been very much objected to by the constituents of the learned gentleman, and the petition presented that evening by the right hon. Baronet the Member for Droitwich (Sir J. Pakington), and very numerously signed, proceeded solely from those constituents. The provisions of the Act had nothing in them objectionable, and they probably formed an improvement on the pre-existing law. With respect to the mode in which the law was passed, he had to state that it was passed legally when a quorum of the Legislative Council was sitting; and although passed in a way which we should consider in this country as rather sharp practice, yet the Government thought it was not a case in which Her Majesty should be advised to inter-
  720
  pose her veto, and especially inasmuch as if there were anything substantially unfair in the way in which the law was passed, the constituencies of Tasmania had in their own hands a remedy in the powers which a free constitution gave them.

THE IRISH POOR-LAW COMMISSIONERS.—CASE OF THE REV. PETER DALY.

  QUESTION.
  MR. GREGORYasked the Attorney General for Ireland, Whether the late proceedings in the Court of Queen's Bench, Ireland, on the part of the Poor Law Commissioners, against the Rev. Peter Daly, were instituted under the direction of the Law Officers of the Crown; and, if not, under whose direction; and, also, from what funds the costs given against the Poor Law Commissioners will be defrayed?
  COLONEL FORDEsaid, he also desired to ask the Attorney General for Ireland to answer a similar question as regards the Poor Law Commissioners and the Board of Guardians of the New to wnards Union, as that put to him by the hon. Member for Galway.
  MR. O'BRIENsaid, he would take that opportunity of putting the Question of which he had given notice. He would ask the Attorney General for Ireland, Whether the proceedings by the Poor Law Commissioners against the Guardians of the Clonmel Union were taken under the advice of the Irish Law Officers, and also from what fund the costs awarded against the Commissioners would be defrayed?
  MR. J. D. FITZGERALDsaid, that he had to give substantially the same answer to all the three Questions. The late proceedings in the Court of Queen's Bench, Ireland, on the part of the Poor Law Commissioners against the Rev. Peter Daly, which were intended to oust that gentleman from the chaplaincy of the union, were not instituted under the direction of himself or of his learned Colleague the Solicitor General, nor of the present or of the late Law Officers of the Crown. He presumed that the Commissioners acted on the advice of the standing counsel, an eminent barrister, and that the costs would be paid out of the annual sum of £300 voted in the Estimates for the legal expenses of the Commissioners.

  HIGHLEIGH PREBENDAL SCHOOL.
  MR. FREELANDsaid, that he rose with feelings of pain and regret to submit to the consideration of the House the Motion which

  721
  stood on the notice paper in his name. His object, he said, was to obtain, through the interposition of the authority of the House, and in connection with an important and public educational trust, a statement of facts which he could arrive at through no other channel, or at all events only at the expense of a considerable and altogether indefinite outlay. The Home Secretary had consented to the Motion. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Kilmarnock had given him in writing the grounds of his opposition to it. He was, therefore, obliged to trouble the House with a statement, which should be as short as he could make it, consistently with a due regard to the object which he had in view. The school in question had, he thought, strong claims on public sympathy. The learned Selden had been educated in it. Collins, one of the greatest if not the greatest of our lyric poets, had received in it a portion at least of his education. It was founded by Bishop Storey in 1497, for the gratuitous instruction of scholars from all parts of the diocese. He founded it, he said, Propter ignorantiam sacerdotum et proborum raritatem ministrorum Diocessus Cicestrensis. The diocese, however, no longer deserved the reproach of the truthful and outspoken Prelate. The chief points to be borne in mind were that the school was founded for purposes of gratuitous instruction; that the number of free scholars was not at first limited; that it was limited in 1828 by a statute of Bishop Carr to ten, whom the Dean and Chapter were to nominate. That the burden of teaching was thrown on the prebendary of the prebend of Highleigh for the time being, who as such was master of the school. By the statutes no payments were to be made either by the pupils or their parents. If the master took any presents he was to be twice admonished, then fined £10. If after a third admonition he offended, he was to be deprived of his canonry and prebend. The present master had been master between twenty and thirty years. During that period only three boys had been presented for gratuitous education, as he had ascertained from the chapter clerk, whom the Dean and Chapter had instructed to supply him with the information which he required. He wanted to know what had been the receipts of the prebendary during this period. He wanted to know what the tithe-rent charges, fines and quitrents were. All this, in the case of a public educational
  722
  trust, the public had a right to know. The Charity Commissioners had attempted to deal with this school between 1853 and 1859, though without result; but this shewed that they considered it a public educational trust. In 1854 the House had ordered a somewhat similar return; but the rev. Gentleman answered that it did not come within his power or that of any other person now living to make it. It was, however, within the power or the rev. Gentleman to make the return for which he now asked, and he therefore begged to move for—
  "Returns from the Rev. Thomas Brown, Prebendary of Highleigh, in Chichester, as such, and as Master of the Prebendal School in that city; of date of his appointment; amount of tithe commutation rent-charges in Sidlesham, Ferring, and elsewhere; of annual value of prebendal residence; amount of fines since appointment; of rents or other emoluments."
  Of the number of Boys presented to the School by the Dean and Chapter since the said Prebendary's appointment. Of the number of Scholars on the Foundation who have received a gratuitous Education in each year; of the highest number at any one time; and of the usual numbers on an average. And, of the names of any Scholars on the Foundation at present.

COMMERCIAL TREATIES WITH FRANCE.

  QUESTION.
  MR. LIDDELLasked the President of the Board of Trade whether any Commercial Treaty or Treaties (other than that recently ratified) are in force between this country and France; and, if so, whether there is any objection to lay copies of the same on the Table, with the dates at which they were entered into?
  MR. MILNER GIBSONsaid, he had to state in reply to the hon. Gentleman that there was a treaty, or rather a convention, in force between England and France relating to commerce and navigation, and bearing the date of January, 1826. It related almost exclusively to the direct trade, and under its provisions each nation agreed to place the ships of the other on the same footing as national vessels. But there could be no necessity for placing that-treaty upon the table of the House, as it was already published in Hertzlet's Collected Treaties, a copy of which would be found in the library of the House. He might add that there was also a French decree of the year 1854, consequent upon the repeal of the English navigation laws, which made certain relaxations in favour of our vessels engaged in the indirect trade.

NEWSPAPERS TO AUSTRALIA.

  QUESTION.
  LORD ALFRED CHURCHILLasked the Secretary to the Treasury, Whether the Government have re considered their plan for levying upon Newspapers to Australia an extra penny to meet the cost of transit through Egypt, and, if so, what course they propose to adopt; and whether, in any contemplated alteration, it would take effect previous to the departure of the Australian Mail on the 12th instant?
  MR. LAINGsaid, he had had an opportunity of communicating upon that subject with gentlemen connected with the Australian colonies, and he had reason to believe that the inhabitants of those colonies would prefer paying their share of the extra charge for the transmission of newspapers through Egypt rather than that charge should be met by levying an additional penny upon the postage of those newspapers. Under these circumstances, the imposition of the additional penny had been withdrawn, and would not be again enforced if the Australian colonies would consent to defray their portion of the cost of transit.

  ARMS OF THE TROOPS IN THE CHINESE EXPEDITION.—QUESTION.
  MR. O'BRIENasked the Secretary of State for War, Whether it is correct that the Troops forming the Expedition to be sent from India to China are to be armed with the smooth bore instead of the rifled musket?
  MR. SIDNEY HERBERTsaid, that all the troops despatched from this country to China would be armed with the Enfield rifle, and all the battalions of European troops which went from India would be similarly armed. But, as he understood the General Order published in India to which the hon. Gentleman no doubt referred, the case was as follows. The Native Indian troops, almost without exception, had not hitherto been armed with the rifle. They were furnished with a weapon of a smaller and lighter construction and having a smooth bore, and the intention of the Indian Government was, no doubt, to arm all the Native troops with the same description of weapon.

VOLUNTEER RIFLE CORPS.

  QUESTION.
  MR. HOPWOODsaid, he would beg to ask the Secretary of State for War if he will explain the reason for the long delay
  724
  in issuing Commissions to Officers in the Volunteer Rifle Corps.
  LORD HOTHAMsaid, he had that morning received a letter stating that a considerable impediment was thrown in the way of the enrolment of Volunteers by the delay in issuing commissions to officers.
  MAJOR SIBTHORPsaid, he would take that opportunity of asking the Secretary of State for War whether officers who had been elected by Volunteer corps, and approved of by the Lords-Lieutenant of counties, but who had not received their commissions from the War Office, would be allowed to attend Her Majesty's levee on the 7th of March.
  MR. SIDNEY HERBERTsaid, he would answer the last Question first. Her Majesty had arranged that she would receive at the Levee to be held on the 7th of March all those officers who had been recommended to Lords-Lieutenant and approved by Lords-Lieutenant, and whose names upon transmission had been approved by the Queen, without waiting for the commissions to be published in the Gazette. With respect to the other Question, as to the tardiness of issuing commissions to officers, he regretted that there should be any such complaint; hut it must be recollected that before the services of a company could be accepted and before the officers could be nominated, the Government required certain preliminaries to be observed. There must be the requisite number of volunteers to form a company. There must also be a practising ground selected and approved by a competent officer, and a storehouse with a person to take care of it, approved by the Lord Lieutenant. It was not always possible to get all these things done off- hand. The correspondence, too, on the subject of Volunteers was not direct, but had to pass through a third channel. Some allowance must also be made for the enormous increase of business which the volunteer movement had cast on the War Office. When he first went into office there were about 20 papers a week on this subject on which it was necessary to give a decision, while the number of papers received last week was 620—the number disposed of 621, and the number of letters written 467. There had never been such an enormous amount of business undertaken for the first time and conducted with so little complaint as this connected with the Volunteer Department, which he had intrusted to Lord De Grey, and he was very glad to have this opportunity of stat-

  725
  ing the opinion he had formed of the tact, punctuality and courtesy with which the noble Lord had conducted this portion of the business of the War Office.

  STEAM-BOAT ACCOMMODATION AT HOLYHEAD.—QUESTION.
  LORD JOHN BROWNEsaid, he rose to ask the Chief Secretary for Ireland what provision is being made at Holyhead for the accommodation of the large Steamers which will commence running to and from Kingstown in June next; and whether it is true, as reported, that the recent extension of the old Pier has been found quite useless for that purpose, in consequence of its being too much exposed.
  MR. CARDWELLreplied, that as to the extension of the old pier so far from its being useless the boats now regularly ran to it. It was true, that it was exposed to points NNE., but during the whole of the late tempestuous season the railway-boat had only been prevented using it three times. The noble Lord, the Secretary of the Admiralty, had under his consideration at the present moment what new alterations were necessary.

  POST-OFFICE ARRANGEMENTS.—EDINBURGH.—QUESTION.
  SIR JAMES FERGUSSONsaid, he rose to ask the Secretary to the Treasury, Whether it is intended to proceed with the new General Post Office in Edinburgh, for which land has been purchased and plans decided on; or whether there is any intention of departing from the recommendations of a Committee of this House, which sat in 1854, in favour of keeping up separate Post Office Establishments in Edinburgh and Dublin?
  MR. LAINGstated that the Post Office had recently had very heavy demands made upon it for the erection of new buildings in several of the principal towns of the country. Steps had been taken to ascertain whether in some cases an extension of the existing buildings would not suffice; and that had been found to be the case in Manchester and Liverpool. The Post Office authorities had been led to believe that by a small alteration of the establishment at Edinburgh it might be possible to continue the Post Office in the present building. It was true a site had been actually purchased from the town council at a cost of £60,000; therefore its abandonment would involve the necessity of applying to Par-
  726
  liament for an Act for the purpose. But he thought the House would not object to such a measure if it could be shown to be otherwise desirable, and to have the effect of saving £50,000 or £60,000. The inquiry was in progress, and in due course the parties interested in Edinburgh would be called upon to state their case. There had certainly never been any intention of departing from the recommendation of the Committee of 1854, that separate Post Office establishments should be kept up at Edinburgh as well as Dublin. The only suggestion was to withdraw one branch, the accountant's, from Edinburgh; but upon that point no decision would be come to without giving the parties interested a full opportunity of stating their views.

MR. GLADSTONE AND THE BUDGET.

  QUESTION.
  LORD HENRY LENNOXsaid, he would beg to inquire of the noble Lord at the head of Her Majesty's Government whether the right hon. the Chancellor of the Exchequer is sufficiently recovered from his recent illness to enable him to proceed with his financial statement tomorrow, and, if not, whether the Government will lay on the Table the Treaty of Commerce with France?
  VISCOUNT PALMERSTON: I saw my right hon. Friend a very short time ago, and I cannot undertake positively to say that he will be well enough to go through his statement to-morrow evening. I expect to receive a communication from his medical attendant in the course of the evening which will enable me to speak with more certainty. If he should not have recovered his strength of voice sufficiently to enable him to go through that which must necessarily be a long statement, I am persuaded the House will indulgently give him until Monday; for it would be unsatisfactory to the House as well as to him, if, not having entirely recovered his strength, he were to find himself, in the middle of a long statement, unable to go on. My noble Friend the Secretary for Foreign Affairs will, at all events, to-morrow lay on the Table the recent Convention with France.

PREVENTION OF BRIBERY.

  LEAVE.
  SIR FITZROY KELLYsaid, that in asking permission of the House to intro-

  727
  duce a Bill for the prevention of bribery, it was not his intention to enter into any lengthened discussion on the subject. Since he had placed his notice on the paper, the question had been brought before them by the hon. Member for Marylebone (Mr. Edwin James); and the hon. Member for Nottingham (Mr. Mellor) had also given notice of a Motion on the subject; besides which, the noble Lord the First Minister of the Crown had intimated that the subject was under the consideration of the Government, and that it was not unlikely that a Government measure would be introduced. In addition to all this, the noble Lord the Member for London had informed the House that it was his intention, on the 20th inst., to introduce his long promised and long expected, if not much-desired, measure of Parliamentary Reform. Under those circumstances, he (Sir FitzRoy Kelly) felt that his duty was limited to a short and concise statement of the objects of his Bill; he should then ask leave to lay it upon the table. He would at once say that it was not his intention to move the second reading of his Bill until after the Reform Bill of the noble Lord had been considered, and until they knew what measure, if any, the Government had it in contemplation to propose for the repression of bribery; but be could hardly believe it possible, after the recent disclosures at Wakefield and Gloucester, that this Session would be allowed to pass away without some measure on this subject being brought forward under the direct sanction of Her Majesty's Government. After that, he should, if necessary, proceed to bring this Bill before the House. He might say at once that it differed to some extent, but not greatly, from the provisions originally introduced in the Corrupt Practices Bill of 1854. His first object was to compel the candidate to pay all monies to be expended for election purposes, and under his own control, through the hands of a public officer, and thus to render it certain that unless that public officer should himself be a party to bribery, it would be impossible for bribery to occur. His second object was to make the offence of bribery disgraceful—one which no man could commit and afterwards hold up his head in society, and such as no gentleman, or any one aspiring to be a Member of that House, could contemplate without fear and shame. His third and last, but not least difficult object, would be to provide, if possible, some legislative means to render it probable, if
  728
  not certain, that when bribery had been committed it should be followed by prosecution and punishment. With respect to the first of these objects, it might be secured if the money first found its way into the hands of the election auditor, for then he thought it might fairly be said that bribery would be almost impossible. It was true that no man, however much he might disclaim any resort to corrupt influences, could in all cases prevent money being improperly spent; but inasmuch as an oath or declaration equivalent to an oath must be made under this Bill by the candidate, that he would pay no money for election purposes except through a specified public officer, it became impossible without perjury that money should be passed, as it was now from the candidate through various channels to persons by whom it is at last applied to corrupt purposes. He could not conceive that any gentleman really desiring that such money should be applied legitimately, would hesitate to make this declaration. The evidence recently laid before the House proved that the money expended in elections was often paid by the candidates into the hands of parties unknown in the locality, who went down from London, and appeared in the town under assumed names. By them the money was paid to others, through whom at length it reached the hands of the electors; and thus the system of corruption was carried out. Now, if the candidates, and all to whose bands the money should come, were made liable to all the penalties of perjury, unless it were paid to the election auditors, it was impossible to suppose but that they would apply it accordingly, and the bribery would thus be prevented. A series of clauses was inserted in this Bill, enacting that every candidate should make a declaration, with all the solemnity of an oath, that he had not paid, and never would pay, directly or indirectly, any money for election purposes except to the election officer. But it had been said that effectually to prevent bribery it was necessary to turn against it the current of public opinion, and to make it a disgraceful offence of which any man would be ashamed. How could this be more effectually done, then, by rendering it impossible for the candidate to be a party to bribery without at the same time being guilty of perjury? Bribery, he was afraid, might have been treated with indifference or lenity; but no one has any sympathy with perjury, and if this Bill should become

  729
  law, and a candidate were to violate the oath to be taken, public condemnation would be directed against him, and he would be disgraced in the eyes of society. The Bill, in addition to the penalties of perjury, provided that any candidate violating this solemn declaration, and paying or sanctioning any application of money, except through the election auditor, in addition to all other penalties should be incapable of sitting in that House, or of holding office under the Crown, or any municipal office in the kingdom. Other provisions of the Bill would facilitate the prosecution and punishment of offenders; but there was also a, proviso in the Bill calculated to meet the numerous applications of money to corrupt purposes which were made without the sanction of the candidate, but where the money passed from or through some relative or friend, or the member of some political club, to prevent money being so devoted to any hut lawful purposes, there was a clause which made it a misdemeanour in any one whomsoever to pay or apply any money for the purposes of an election except through the auditor. At present it often happened that when bribery is to be resorted to some one unknown to the candidate advances the necessary funds; and after the return, and when the time for petitioning is past, the Member is told that an advance has been made on his behalf, which it would be well for him to discharge, and many Gentlemen felt bound in honour to pay such advances. But if the candidate made oath that he never would pay any money except through the election auditor, he would at once be furnished with a decisive answer, and the result would be that these zealous friends would not advance their money, and the bribery would not be committed. He thought the adoption of these clauses would have a great effect in deterring persons from resorting to corrupt practices at elections. He might be told that it would be possible to evade the provision of the Bill which he had just sketched out by means of false accounts rendered by the agents, and indeed it could not be denied that such evasions had occurred under the existing law. He had therefore endeavoured to provide against the recurrence of such a state of things by giving power to the election auditors to scrutinize every item of expense, and to disallow all that should appear illegal or colourable. The next question to be considered related to the election auditors themselves.
  730
  The Corrupt Practices Act of 1854 had the effect of telling candidates that they ought to pay money through the election auditor, but no adequate penalty was imposed for any breach of the provision. A proviso similar to the one he now sought to introduce had been endeavoured to he inserted in that Act, and was supported by the leading Members on both sides of the House, but was defeated by a narrow majority; so that while the payment of money, except through the auditor, was forbidden, no punishment was annexed. He sought to provide that those persons who now acted as revising barristers should he the election auditors. He was aware that great difference of opinion existed on the question, which that was not the time for entering upon, but he hoped it would be considered in Committee upon that or some similar bill; but certainly the officers who were selected to perform the duties of election auditors should be persons whose character, ability, and experience would entitle them to general respect. He thought the election auditors ought to have the power of making a minute and specific investigation into the items composing the accounts; it would be the duty of these officers to make these inquiries; and then he thought it would he impossible that money passing through their hands should be improperly applied. The only remaining point was, perhaps, the most difficult; and that was, the means of ensuring the prosecution and punishment of offenders against the law. At present, though bribery may have been extensive and notorious, many causes conduce to prevent prosecution. He would particularly instance the case of elections where bribery had been committed on both sides, and where persons on either side were afraid to prosecute those whom they knew to be guilty, owing to fear of retaliation. It was not likely that private individuals would undertake the work of prosecution. What he proposed by this Bill was that the election auditor, whom he would assume to be a barrister, or some one acquainted with judicial proceedings, should within a certain time after the election, if he thought fit, institute an investigation—supposing that he had reason to think that bribery or corrupt practices had been resorted to—and that he should have the power to hold a court to which he might summon the candidates, their committees, friends, and par-tizans—in short, any witnesses whose evidence he might deem likely to be of import-

  731
  ance to the object in view:—and that he should prosecute the inquiry by oath or otherwise, and if the result should be such as to afford reasonable grounds for suspicion that bribery to a great extent had prevailed in a particular borough, he might make a special report of the facts to the Attorney General, and should further be obliged to report that he had made such report to the Speaker of the House of Commons. Under these circumstances it would be difficult to find a case in which an election auditor would not have the means of ascertaining whether bribery had been committed, and of all the particulars relating to the offence. By means of this court of inquiry the most extensive information could be obtained on the subject, and all that should come under its cognisance must be reported to the Attorney General, who, either with or without the instruction of that House, would be competent to prosecute the offending parties. If during the progress of this Bill—supposing he would be permitted to lay it on the table—any better means could be devised to secure the detection and punishment of offenders, no man would more rejoice than he would at the adoption by the House of such means in preference to his own. He had, then, only to ask the leave of the House to introduce his Bill, and to intreat the attention of hon. Members to the important subject of which it treats, with a view to render the measure as effectual as possible for its object. The hon. and learned Member concluded by moving for leave to bring in a Bill for the Prevention of Bribery, and to amend "The Corrupt Practices Prevention Act (1854)."
  SIR FRANCIS GOLDSMIDsaid, that having given much attention to the subject, the result of his consideration was to lead him to the conclusion that neither the Bill of the hon. and learned Member for Nottingham (Mr. Mellor), nor that of the hon. and learned Member for East Suffolk (Sir FitzRoy Kelly), was calculated to effect the object they all had in view. On the other hand, he thought that there were means by which that object could be reached, to a great extent, which both Bills overlooked. He would not now discuss the Bill of the hon. and learned Gentleman at any length, but he would take the liberty of making one or two observations in relation to the subject generally. It appeared to him that any attempt to check an offence against the public interests by so severe a punishment as was proposed would in effect
  732
  be bringing them back to the state of I things that existed half a century ago, when the criminal legislation of the country was marked by a character of great severity, but which for the last forty years had given way to much more humane and enlightened views. He must own he feared that the punishment provided by this Bill, as well as by the other Bill to which he had referred, went beyond public opinion. The public was aware that, he would not say at present, but he believed at a time not very remote, a large number of Members of that House owed their seats to that practice which the hon. and learned Gentleman now proposed to punish so severely; and he therefore doubted whether public opinion would support the hon. Gentleman in his endeavour to inflict for the crime in question a punishment which would permanently disgrace a man or affect his future standing in society. He felt that if the hon. and learned Gentleman did succeed in his object, without at the same time providing means by which even in corrupt boroughs a man might be returned without corruption, the effect would be to deter gentlemen from coming forward to prosecute, or to assist in the prosecution of, the offending parties. It might also have this effect, that corrupt boroughs might be represented by persons who in no respect deserved the character of gentlemen. If they wished to prevent men entering that House by means of bribery, they must provide the means of entering it without corruption, even as the representative of a constituency of which a portion was corrupt. He would merely state, that it appeared to him that the provision which would be more effective than any other would be this—to provide that whenever a successful candidate was unseated on the score of bribery, the opposing candidate, after he had established his case, without any recriminatory case being made out against him, should obtain the vacant seat without the necessity of a new election, The great difficulty under the present state of the law was to induce the unsuccessful candidate to prosecute the offending party, inasmuch as in the event of his success in ousting the sitting Member he would be further than ever from the object he sought in petitioning, because he would be compelled to go again before the same constituency, after he had made himself unpopular in their eyes by exposing their corruption, and his chance of being returned would consequently be much di-

  733
  minished. This state of the law operated as a great discouragement to petitions. He believed that those best acquainted with the subject were convinced that in the immense majority of cases in which bribery was committed no petitions were presented against them; and it was well known that although every general election was followed by a great number of petitions, the number in which they were effectively followed up was small. He attributed that state of things to the defective state of the law in this respect. It was that which he believed gave the greatest encouragement to bribery. The plan he would suggest—a plan which was not then for the first time submitted to the House, but which had never been fully considered—would enable them to give the honest candidate a mode by which he might enter Parliament as the Member for even a corrupt borough, without having participated in any corruption. He was aware that that was not the time for proposing any such measure; but unless he saw it taken up by a more competent Member he should feel it his duty, upon a future occasion, to state more fully the principles upon which he believed that any measure to be effective in putting down bribery should be based.
  MR. EDWIN JAMESfelt that, in order to have some well-digested scheme of legislation on this important subject, it would be extremely desirable that the various measures which had been or might be laid on the table, should undergo some scrutiny and investigation before a Committee. Some parts of this Bill were perfectly impracticable, and he trusted would be reviewed by his hon. and learned Friend before the second reading. One objection he ventured to urge was this,—it took for its basis the Corrupt Practices at Elections Act, and sought to amend the system as respects the appointment of the election auditor. Immediately after 1854, when this machinery first came into force, it proved to be an entire failure. It had no operation at all, because, there being no time fixed upon when accounts were to be furnished, and the auditor was to make his report, it often happened that election petitions came on for trial without any report being made by the election auditor. It did appear to him to be a great mistake to make election auditors of revising barristers. The revising barrister of a district was to be the election auditor of the borough. A candidate could not move
  734
  without a revising barrister at his elbow; and inasmuch as frequently several elections in the same district were held simultaneously, his hon. and learned Friend would almost require to make his revising barristers ubiquitous. A revising barrister would have several boroughs in his district, and there must necessarily be a much larger number of revising barristers appointed. Then—what appeared to him a most extraordinary proposition—these revising barristers were to be constituted into a Court of Inquisition, with power to summon persons before them, and if they did not appear, these young gentlemen might issue their warrant to run to all parts of the country—England, Scotland, and Ireland, and he supposed to commit them if they refused to answer any question put to them. This would be an apotheosis for those young gentlemen who were to act as grand inquisitors in order to ascertain whether an offence had been committed against any of the provisions of this Bill. His hon. and learned Friend could hardly be serious in sanctioning a system of machinery of this kind. It would be absolutely necessary, if these points were not corrected before the second reading, that the Bill should be referred to a Select Committee.
  MR. CROSSthought the House ought to provide some protection for the candidate to prevent him being entrapped into bribery by the acts of his agents, for all of which he was now responsible. He believed that there would be much less bribery both in towns and counties, if paid canvassers, messengers, and other paid agents could be got rid of. The only plan was to allow Members to incur certain limited expenses for these purposes. Boroughs, for example, were at present divided into certain polling districts by the municipal authorities; candidates might be allowed to engage a Committee-room and a certain staff in each polling district, proportioned to the number of electors or the area of the district. So many messengers and paid agents might be permitted, and the employment of any greater number should be strictly prohibited. He believed that if the House adopted such a provision, and if they declared that all paid agents thus employed should be restricted from voting, they would do more to prevent bribery than had ever yet been done.
  MR. DENMANremarked that it was perhaps premature to discuss the provisions of this Bill; but he thought there was a

  735
  view of the matter which it was highly important the House should take, and that was this, that though there had been a great deal of useless legislation there had also been some useful legislation on this subject. He thought the House was deeply indebted to the hon. and learned Gentleman for bringing in this Bill, and also to all the other Gentlemen who had prepared independent measures on the same subject. He did not see that any harm was done by bringing forward separate measures for the prevention of bribery, nor could he see any good reason for abstaining from legislation on the subject from time to time in order to await the time when they could consider the subject as a whole and pass a complete measure. His hon. and learned Friend the Member for Marylebone (Mr. E. James) was of opinion that all Bills connected with this subject should be submitted to a Select Committee, and considered together. He (Mr. Denman) thought that an inexpedient mode of proceeding, as tending to unnecessary delay, and not promising so great a security for the punishment and prevention of all the various phases of this detestable offence, as would be given by assisting the independent efforts of individual Members, each endeavouring to meet one or more of those phases, by several remedies. He believed that every Bill on the subject laid upon the table of the House had some good in it and that the several provisions of those Bills were not inconsistent with each other. Let the House strike rapidly and in earnest at the offence of bribery wherever they could find it, and then eventually it would be put clown. With that view he hoped the House would allow this Bill to be brought in, and give their best assistance to carry through all the provisions in it which were most efficient.
  MR. MALINSsaid, that he, for one, would give his cordial assent to any measure calculated to put down bribery at elections. He would, however, make one suggestion in regard to the inconvenience arising from employing paid messengers and clerks. As soon as the poorer class of voters could be brought to believe that the possession of the franchise was not to be made a pecuniary advantage to them, directly or indirectly, this system of bribery would be abolished, and the moral condition of the people would be improved. That desirable state of things was, however, hopeless of attainment, unless professional men were determined to refuse
  736
  fees from candidates for their services. Those gentlemen would shrink from horror at being charged with bribery; nevertheless, by accepting of professional fees from the candidates, and then giving them their votes and services at the elections, they were really committing that offence against which they exclaimed so loudly. If a man in a humble station of life took a sum of money for his vote, it was called a bribe; and however much professional men might attempt to disguise that fact from themselves, if they received retainers, as they called them, for their services at elections, those payments could not be viewed otherwise than as remuneration for the exercise of their own franchise, and for exercising their influence in behalf of the party who feed them. Those gentlemen might call this money retainers, but he called it bribery. He took that opportunity of making these observations, because he was proud of the profession to which he belonged, and of the respectable body of men with whom he associated. He was anxious that they should look the truth in the face, and that they should not allow themselves to be deceived any longer. The habit was such an inveterate one with those gentlemen, that it would not allow them to see the truth. Those fees at elections were nothing more nor less than an indirect mode of taking a bribe. They had before them the Report of the Gloucester Election Commission. Though he objected at the time to the appointment of that Commission, he was bound now to admit that the Report they had presented was a most able document. It unravelled the system of bribery, and placed in such a glaring light the practice of professional men being employed at elections, and taking retainers to give their services and use their influence for particular candidates, that the fact could not be misunderstood. He mentioned this practice for the benefit of the profession, and he did hope that those gentlemen would from that moment perfectly understand it was the opinion of the House that such conduct was deserving of censure; and that, if they wished to exercise their franchise, they should do so as free-born Englishmen, and should set an example to the voters, by showing that they would not make the possession of the franchise the means of bringing them any pecuniary advantage. He trusted it would be provided in the Bill, that if a voter should be employed at elections, he was from that circumstance to be deprived of the power of exercising his vote.
  MR. CLAYsaid, that the difficulty of the subject might be measured by the variety of the suggestions offered. He attached great value to a solemn and most positive declaration by the candidate of his non-participation in any corrupt practices. Many Members obtained seats, who, at the declaration of the poll, sincerely believed they were elected by the unanimous feeling of their constituents, but whoso election cost them thousands, where they believed it would be covered by hundreds. After the election, however, the Member was told by his agents that such and such expenses had been incurred in his behalf, and that he was bound in honour to pay them. Now, he would exact from every candidate a declaration, when he came to the table, that neither before nor after the election, and neither directly nor indirectly would he pay, or become responsible, for any expenses that were not legal expenses, or that had not been brought before the election auditor. If this were done, the business of the election auditor, which was now a farce, would become a useful reality. He might be told that the honourable man would have no chance under such a system, and that the dishonourable man would make the declaration. He did not believe that any hon. Member would take such a declaration, and then break it. If he did, he would commit an infamous offence, for which a man would be blackballed at his club, and excluded from the society of gentlemen. By means of such a declaration alone would bribery, in his opinion, be put down.
  Leave given.
  Bill ordered to be brought in by Sir FITZROY KELLY and Mr. CAVENDISH BEN-TINCK.

FINANCES OF INDIA.

  COMMITTEE MOVED FOR.
  MR. VANSITTARTrose, pursuant to notice, to move the appointment of a Select Committee to inquire into the following questions connected with the Finances of India:—

  "1. Whether, having due regard to all vested rights, it is practicable to introduce a new Civil Service upon a cheaper footing.

  "2. Whether it is not desirable to abolish the Legislative Council at Calcutta, and the Supreme Councils of Bengal, Madras, and Bombay, and substitute for them a Legislative Council for each Presidency.

  "3. Whether it is not advisable to amalgamate the Supreme and Sudder Courts.

  "4. Whether, with reference to the fact of India forming a portion of the British Empire, it is not expedient to put a stop to the existing system of
  738
  raising loans at the present high rates of interest."

  The hon. Member assured the House that he was fully impressed with the gravity of the step he was taking; but such was the importance which the state of our Indian finances had assumed, that he thought it very desirable that the House should come to some decided expression of opinion on the subject. He ought to mention that he placed the Resolutions to which he invited attention on the Notice Paper towards the end of last Session, and at a time when the greatest apprehension prevailed in the public mind, among the mercantile community, in the circles of private society, and in the press. At that period were heard such alarming expressions as these:—"We must give up India, or we must restore the greater portion of our possessions to the Native Princes, or we must give back the government of the country to its former rulers—the late East India Company." And deprecating then, as he did now, such timid counsels, he was anxious to press forward this discussion, but the lateness of the Session and the thinness of the House induced him to withdraw his Motion. He did not regret having done so, as it had enabled him to submit his Resolutions in a modified shape, and bad given time for much feverish excitement and unnecessary panic to subside. The House would observe that the Resolutions had reference entirely to the civil administration and the financial condition of India, and that he had studiously avoided all allusion to military and other questions. He believed that now that the mutiny had been effectually crushed, and that Her Majesty's benevolent sway was recognized from one end of India to the other, it was our bounden duty to face our financial difficulties boldly and manfully, and introduce such economical reforms and salutary regulations as were imperatively called for in reference to the altered circumstances of the case. The first Resolution referred to the Civil Service. He had already, in the course of the discussions which had taken place in that House, declared his opinion that it would be very unjust to meddle with the salaries of the present incumbents; but, at the same time, he thought that an inquiry as to the practicability of introducing a new Civil Service upon a cheaper footing might be attended with good results. It would throw impartial light upon the subject, disclose the real facts of the case, and give the civilian

  739
  a more settled position in future by setting at rest those sweeping accusations which had of late years been urged against that distinguished service. That any great reduction of expenditure under that head would be proposed by the Committee which he sought to have appointed was very problematical, for the impoliey of underpaying our officials in that trying climate was pretty generally acknowledged, and such a measure would produce great discontent, discontent would produce listlessness, and listlessness would produce indifference. Any considerable reduction of salaries would sweep away the entire surplus available for accumulating a small competency to enable the civilian to revisit his native country. That would, indeed, be a poor compensation for the sacrifices entailed by a man passing the best years of his life in a remote district, cut off from the charms of civilized society. So keenly was this already felt, that he ventured to say that if any great reduction of salaries were made there would not he found fifty men in the Civil Service who, if they could recommence life with their present experience, would not deliberately prefer a clerkship in any of our Government offices in London to the life of comparative ease in India. Already candidates for the medical service were not to be obtained, and the number of competitors for the Civil Service decreased every year, although it was far easier to procure a nomination to compete for that service than one to compete for a clerkship in the Government offices in London, or for a tide waiter ship in the provincial towns. The Committee, however, would have the advantage of referring to several important documents and ably written minutes, which had been compiled by a high authority in India, who was deputed to inquire into the subject by the late East India Company. With regard to the second Resolution, the abolition of the Legislative Council of Calcutta as at present constructed and of the Supreme Councils would be hailed with great satisfaction. These Councils had signally failed to produce any practical advantage, and since the creation of the Legislative Council of Calcutta in 1853, no one exactly knew what were the peculiar duties of the members of the Supreme Council beyond drawing very high salaries. The Committee would, therefore, inquire into the expediency of abolishing these Councils, and whether the Lieutenant-Governors of Bengal, Madras, and Bombay might not be
  740
  advautageously assisted with a separate Legislative Council, to be composed one-half of officials residing at the Presidency towns, and the other half of non-officials. He bad not included the Government of the North-West and the Punjab in this arrangement, because the European community was very small in those provinces. It could not be doubted that some such reorganization and infusion of fresh intelligence was greatly needed. The whole of the evidence taken before the Colonization Committee proved that fact, and, with the permission of the House, he would read some brief extracts from the evidence of two or three witnesses. He would begin by quoting Mr. Waller, because that gentleman was a solicitor of the Supreme Court, and afterwards an advocate at the bar of the Sudder Dewanny and Nizamut Adawlut at Calcutta. These Courts were supposed to be rather jealous of each other. The Judges of the Supreme Court were appointed by the Crown from eminent barristers in this country, and the Judges of the Sudder from the covenanted civilians; and, as Mr. Waller did not appear to have got much out of either of the courts, his evidence was probably the more reliable and candid. Mr. Waller said:—
  "The Supreme and other local Councils are wholly useless and enormously expensive, and the chief secretaries and the heads of departments may well supply their places. That the present Legislative Council of Calcutta possess neither the confidence of the Europeans nor of the natives. That there ought to be a certain number of ex officio members receiving no other salary than that of their respective substantive appointments, and there should be as many non-official as official members, composed equally of Englishmen and native Christians, and of Natives who are not Christians. That the Government of each Presidency should have the power of putting a veto to, or suspending the operation of, any law passed by the Council, pending a reference to the Home Government. That the official members ought merely to receive the pay of their substantive appointments, the non-official members to receive nothing, and that it should be left to the Governors of the Presidencies to determine the selection of these non-officials and Natives for appointments in the Legislative Council."
  He advocates strongly—
  "The creation of a Legislative Council for each Presidency, and that each Presidency should enact its own laws. Such a measure would give the Legislature a larger amount of experience and information than it has at present, would eventuate a great benefit to the country, and would do away with that political antagonism between the governors and the governed which exists at present; but we can hardly do so so long as we have but one Legislative Council, for how are we to introduce people resident at Madras into the Legislative Council located at Calcutta?"

  741
  The Rev. Mr. Mullens, of the Calcutta Missionary Conference, gave some valuable evidence, and, speaking of the Legislative Council, he says:—
  "We have no good tribunal before which we can really bring forward the various evils which we consider to exist in the country. The present Legislative Council is by no means so open as we should like; all the members are officials, appointed by the Government, and they are so far irresponsible, except to the Government itself; and it is very hard to get a case fully taken up in the Legislative Council, and discussed on every side. In Ceylon the planters have a Council in which they have the highest confidence, and in which some of their own merchants are engaged. The Ceylon Council is composed partly from officials and partly from different sections of the country,—one or two planters, one or two merchants, and one or two natives, so that all classes are represented. A Council like that in Calcutta would be a great help to having these questions thoroughly discussed."
  Mr. M'Nair, an indigo planter, complained in his evidence that—
  "The European community in India have no mercantile or agricultural representative in the Legislative Council; that it is entirely composed of Government servants, and nearly every law brought forward by them is to strengthen the hands of Government, or to impose some new restriction upon the already over-restricted European settlers; "and he thinks" it would be advantageous if the Governor-General were instructed to select six non-official members from the mercantile and agricultural community, and that this plan is adopted in Ceylon and Hong Kong, and has worked well for the prosperity of those countries."
  Again, several important meetings had been held at Calcutta and Bombay, at which the lamentable ignorance displayed by the Legislative Council in regard to financial matters was denounced. How, indeed, could public confidence be placed in men who could frame a measure in which especial care was taken to exempt themselves from taxation which they wished to extend to all other classes but themselves? So clumsily contrived, too, were the provisions of the measure, that while it fell with peculiar seventy on petty traders struggling to gain a miserable pittance, and whose net profits amounted to only sixty-six rupees, or £6 12 s. per annum, the opulent Muharjuns and Bunnyahs—the money-lenders, bill-brokers, and bill-discounters of India, whose usurious practices exceed all belief, even surpassing those of their brother craftsmen in this country—were allowed, comparatively speaking, to escape scot-free. If the second question, therefore, were to be carried in the affirma-
  742
  tive, a very considerable saving of expense would be effected. We should obtain that happy mixture in the Legislative Councils by which the over-zeal of one party would be judiciously checked by the other, and we should gradually pave the way for enabling the Natives to take a more active part in the government of the country, while, at the same time, they should be held responsible for the income and the expenditure, without coming to England for assistance; for, depend upon it, India could be made to pay her own expenses, and, were the French or Russians masters of the country, they would quickly devise the means of effecting that desirable object. The same argument applied in a great measure to the next Resolution, because the majority of the witnesses before the Colonization Committee advocated the expediency of amalgamating the Supreme and Sudder Courts. Now that India had become a part of Her Majesty's dominions, what could be the object of maintaining two separate appellate tribunals at the Presidency towns? All that the Europeans objected to was, to be tried in criminal cases by a Native. If therefore the Judges of the Supreme Court were to be associated with a corresponding number of Judges of the Sudder Court, this objection would be still respected, and we should again have a happy mixture of sound and able English lawyers, and practical and intelligent covenanted civilians, carefully selected from our Zillah or provincial courts. Another great saving of expense would be effected by this reform, which would only be carrying out the recommendation contained in the Report of the Colonization Committee, namely:—
  "The judicial system of India will never be placed on a sound and practical basis till all the Courts are organized into one harmonious whole, and until, by an amalgamation of the Supreme and Sudder Courts, the highest and most learned tribunals of the land shall be Courts of Appeal to the whole country, administering law under the same procedure."
  It was unnecessary to dwell at any length on the fourth and concluding Resolution, as it opened up the question of an Imperial guarantee, which had been so frequently discussed in that House, and which, from its importance, would of itself be a fit subject to refer to a Select Committee. It appeared to him that the principle by which our Indian Ministers at home were guided in raising loans could not he sound. A few months ago the right hon. Baronet

  743
  the Secretary of State for India required £5,000,000. He invited tenders, limiting the price at 97, bearing interest at 5 per cent. Seven and a half millions were immediately subscribed for, and in a few weeks the stock jumped up from 97 to 105. Now, it could not be doubted that a 3¼ per cent stock, under an Imperial guarantee, would have been just as easily raised, and on so small a sum as £5,000,000 something like £87,500 a year have been saved to the revenues of India. He was aware that this course would be objected to in many quarters on the ground of the risk and liability. Well, then, why not subject all future loans raised for India to a reduction of say 1 per cent, to be put aside as a sinking fund towards the redemption of the loan? That arrangement would involve no risk, but, on the contrary, it would ensure every provident precaution for the future. That more loans would be asked for India was beyond a doubt. The right hon. Baronet the Secretary of State for India told the House so in August last, expressing a hope that he would not require more than £6,000,000. Meanwhile the Indian debt by the 1st of May of this year will have reached £96,000,000. To meet these difficulties a few extra taxes had been imposed, and from that questionable tax—the salt-tax—which had been increased 20 per cent, the greatest source of revenue was expected to be derived. All at present was in a state of uncertainty. The Legislative Council was waiting for the right Hon. Mr. Wilson; that right Hon. Gentleman was seeking an interview with Lord Canning, who had started on a long itinerant tour, in which he appeared to be disposing of Principalities with a lavish hand, and Mr. Wilson hoped to catch him at Lahore, distant upwards of 1,000 miles from Calcutta. Under these icumstances it was necessary that something should be done, for the present principle of raising loans was operating as unfavourably to India as it was favourably to the gentlemen of Capel Court. He had now brought the subject of his Resolutions under the notice of the House. He had endeavoured to do so briefly, and perhaps on that account he had executed his task imperfectly. It was probable he should be told that as a right hon. Gentleman of distinguished ability had been so recently deputed to India to inquire into its finances, it would be premature to grant a Committee which might embarrass his proceedings. All he could say
  744
  in reply was, that such a result was, very far from his wish and intention, and he begged to assure the House that in applying for this Committee he was actuated only by a sense of public duty. He was anxious, most anxious, that the House of Commons should give an assurance to the public, both at home and in India, of its earnest desire to co-operate with that right hon. Gentleman in promoting those measures of economy and simplification which were so essential to the prosperity of our Indian possessions; and he was sanguine enough to believe that by carrying into effect the measures which he had shadowed forth our financial difficulties would soon disappear, and that our Indian empire, with its dense population and vast resources of undeveloped wealth—founded as it had been by the indomitable spirit of a Clive, and matured and consolidated by the lofty genius of a Wellesley,—would endure as an imperishable memorial of England's greatness, wisdom and glory.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That a Select Committee be appointed to inquire, &c."
  SIR CHARLES WOOD: I hope before I sit down to satisfy even my hon. Friend who has moved these Resolutions that no advantage will be derived from the appointment of a Select Committee. I am grateful, however, to him for bringing these questions before the House, because, varied as they certainly are in their nature, I fully admit that they are most important in relation to the Administration of India, and well worthy the consideration of every hon. Member of this House. I am also glad that they should have been brought forward by a former Member of the Indian Civil Service, as it cannot be supposed that he is inimical to the claims of those members of that service who have to perform most responsible duties in a distant clime. With regard to the first question, it is not one which has at any time escaped the attention of the Indian Government. In the Committee of 1853 it was shown that already the number of civil servants had considerably increased, while the amount of salaries had diminished, and when we look at the higher class who receive large salaries, we find that those receiving upwards of £3,000 a year have diminished one half in the last twenty years. It is therefore, unjust to preceding Governments to suppose that they have been unmindful of obtaining efficient servants at as cheap a rate as is consistent with the

  745
  due performance of the duties required of them. But there may be some classes of officers whose salaries are too high, and probably others whose number may be reduced. In 1854, when I was President of the Board of Control, I desired the Board of Directors to send a despatch calling upon the local Government in India to revise the salaries of all the civil servants. The consequence was that Mr. Ricketts, now a Member of Council, was appointed specially to consider the subject, and he reported very fully to the Indian Government. That Report was revised by the Indian Government, and their report sent home and printed at the close of last Session. That Report proposed considerable reductions throughout in the salaries of the civil servants. I have received the strongest remonstrances, not only on the part of many of the civil servants, but also on the part of the Government of Madras, against carrying out those recommendations. As soon as the Indian Council met after the recess I appointed a Committee of the most experienced Members, some civil and some not civil servants, to go through with the greatest care the various recommendations both of Mr. Ricketts and the Indian Government, to consider the objections urged against them, and to report fully upon the subject. They have for two months been prosecuting that inquiry, and when it is concluded, the whole subject will be taken into consideration by myself and the Council of India, and it may perhaps be necssary to introduce a Bill upon the subject. I agree with the hon. Gentleman that, considering the responsibility and the amount of labour imposed upon them, in a climate not particularly favourable to European constitutions, the civil servants, as a body, are not overpaid; and, knowing that there is an apprehension abroad among the civil servants that they may be subjected to a sweeping reduction, I am glad to avail myself of this opportunity of stating publicly that the Home Government is not of opinion that a reduction of such a character ought to be made. No doubt, some saving may be made by abolishing certain offices and reducing others here and there, but I do not think that anything like a sweeping reduction is called for or would be right. I am afraid, however, that any saving which could possibly be effected from this source cannot afford great relief to the finances of India, since there are many places now in which for the proper
  746
  administration of the country a larger staff of civil servants both European and native is necessary, and all the savings which you might effect in the way I have pointed out ought to be applied to this purpose. It is perfectly true, as the hon. Gentleman has observed, that there is not the temptation to go out to India now as in former times. The medical service and the civil service have lately been thrown open to competition, and yet in the medical service we have had more vacancies than applications; and it was only the other day that I saw a letter from a young man who had got a civil appointment by competition telling his friends that he was so much disappointed that he should be glad to exchange India for the most moderate clerkship at home. That being the case, I do not think it would be right to hold out any anticipation of a large reduction being effected in this way. If you look at the salaries paid by railway companies out there to their employés, you will find that they are quite as large and sometimes larger than those paid by the Government to their servants, notwithstanding the far greater responsibility and labours thrown on the latter. As much inquiry has been made and is going on as can be made into this subject, and I do not see, therefore, what benefit can be derived from the appointment of a Committee. With regard to the second point the hon. Member has brought under our notice, the abolition of the Supreme Councils of Bengal, Madras, and Bombay, I am not prepared to say that they may not come under the class in which reduction might properly be made. The hon. Gentleman seems to think that the Executive Council at Calcutta has nothing to do, but still they have all to do which they had before the creation of the Legislative Council by the Bill of 1854. I do not wish to give a positive opinion on the subject, but I entertain serious doubts whether it is advantageous for the interests of India to keep up the Executive Council in its present form. The theory of the Government of India is that it is the Government of the Governor-General in Council. All the papers connected with the administration go to every member of the Council, and, vast as the business is, they endeavour to discharge their duties fully and completely—the consequence of which is inordinate delay; and to such an extent has this gone that they have been obliged, of their own authority, to divide the less important business among

  747
  the different members, so that it may he disposed of without the necessity of coming before the whole Council. Besides this, a great deal of business is necessarily despatched by the Secretaries of the different departments, so that it is no uncommon remark, in the junior Presidencies, "It is of no use to send such a thing before the Supreme Council, because Mr. Secretary So and so is known to be opposed to it." A good deal of dissatisfaction had arisen from this cause, for persons in authority naturally objected to being overruled by an official of inferior rank to themselves. It seems to me very desirable that the Council in its present state should be put an end to, and that officers of higher rank than the present Secretaries should be put at the head of each department, and should he made responsible to the Governor General for the transaction of the business in that department. Upon important occasions the Governor General might summon all of them together in a sort of cabinet council. I have been in communication with Earl Canning on the subject all the autumn, and he very much concurs in these views. The papers have been submitted to a Special Committee of the Council, and they are considering whether the alteration ought to he made, and, if so, in what manner. When Mr. Wilson went out it was with the understanding that if this alteration were carried out he would be prepared to take charge of the Finance Department; and when Sir Henry Frere was appointed I impressed upon him also that if the change Were made he must be prepared to take charge of such department as the Governor General might think fit. In this way a saving will be effected, and you will have the further advantage of being able to obtain men from all parts of India, instead of from the province of Bengal merely, as is generally the case with the Supreme Council now. If, however, this plan is adopted, it will only be right to raise the salaries of the Secretaries, not indeed to those of members of Council, but so as to make the situation objects of ambition to men of the greatest talents and most experience. It will be necessary to come to Parliament for powers to carry out the Measure, if on consideration it be thought advisable. The same observations applies to the Councils in the minor Presidencies. I believe that if secretaries were appointed there in the same way to transact the business a great saving might be effected, and the business would be done in less time. The next
  748
  question is the Legislative Council. What has taken place with regard to this Council is a warning against precipitate action, even where all the authorities are unanimous in its favour. Any hon. Gentleman who sat on the Committee of 1853 will remember that all the witnesses examined before it were in favour of the creation of Legislative Council; and it was in deference to that unanimous opinion that I introduced a clause into the Bill creating it. But I must admit that it has not answered my expectations or the expectations of those who originally suggested it. At the same time it is not exactly what I intended. It was obvious that the Execu-tive Council of Bengal was not the best body to legislate for the whole of India, as it did not possess the requisite knowledge of the other portions of the country to enable it to do so; but it was hoped that with the assistance of those who were conversant with the requirements of Madras and the North-Western Provinces, and with the addition of two Judges of the Supreme Court, who would add to the general stock their knowledge of English law, a working Committee would be constituted which might elaborate the laws and improve the legislation of India. I am afraid that in their desire too closely to imitate the House of Commons they have lost sight of more important objects, and they certainly have not succeeded in gaining the general confidence of the public, though in some of the objections that have been urged there may be a little exaggeration, and possibly they have been to some extent over-stated. The question of framing a legislative body of any kind for India is a very difficult one; for, though it is of course desirable to introduce into it persons who are unconnected with the Civil Service, it is not easy to see how they can become acquainted with and advocate before the Council the interests and wishes of the great mass of the Natives of India. If we introduce an English merchant or indigo planter, a native-born merchant or learned Brahmin, into the Legislative Council of Calcutta, how is is it to be supposed that he will adequately represent the interests of the landowners of the North-Western Provinces, being as ignorant of the requirements of nine-tenths of the population as the members of this assembly must necessarily be? If it were possible to suppose that we could be called on to frame a similar council here in Loudon, does any one suppose that a city merchant would

  749
  fairly represent the agricultural population of Devonshire or Yorkshire, of Perthshire or the county of Cork? If any person will fairly consider the diversities of race and language, of occupation and interests, which exist throughout the different parts of India, I think he will agree with me that it is nearly impossible to construct upon any conceivable plan a Legislative Council in Calcutta which shall afford a fair representation of the whole of India. I myself believe that the civil servants of the Crown who live in the Provinces, and are necessarily brought into daily contact with the Natives in various capacities, whether as collectors, judges, or magistrates, are in general persons much fitter to be intrusted with the administration of the general interests of India than individuals who happen merely to be residents in or near Calcutta. Of course the difficulty diminishes in proportion as the area is lessened; the facility of procuring in each province persons who may be supposed to be practically acquainted with its interests is greater; and therefore I will not say that parties, who may not be in the service of the Government, are to be excluded from the Legislative Council; but if such a change is to be admitted, I am inclined to think that a Separate Council for each Presidency will be the preferable course. But I do maintain—although it may appear rather an unconstitutional principle—that the difficulties in the way of the formation of a good Legislative Council for India render it almost an impossibility, and that practically the legislation for the whole of our Indian territories must be left almost entirely and uncontrolledly in the hands of the Governor. The difficulty may be illustrated by a reference to the important subject of the manner in which a new tax should be imposed; and here I must say that the hon. Gentleman was a little unjust to the members of the Civil Service, when speaking of what has recently occurred; because it was never their intention to exempt themselves from taxation; but their view was to introduce a Licensing Bill on trades and professions, and to tax themselves in some other way. This tax, opposed as it may seem to our notions, is not only a feasible but a popular way of raising money in India. Sir R. Montgomery has actually raised a very considerable sum in the North-West provinces in this way; but in Calcutta and in Bengal, where there are numbers of English residents, an income-tax is much
  750
  more suited to their notions, and indeed is much more applicable to fundholders, officeholders, and large proprietors of land; but if this tax were applied to the ryots of Madras, not a soul from one end of the Presidency to the other would come under its operation. I think that a moderate license duty, imposed according to the feelings and habits of the Natives, is one of the least unpopular taxes that can be levied on an Oriental people. A series of mistakes appear to have been made about this Licensing Bill, which render it very doubtful whether it will be passed at all; and we have not yet heard what proceedings have been taken since the Legislative Council reassembled. But, in one shape or mother, additional taxation is required; and I hope that, having regard to the circumstances of the different provinces—for I do not think it necessary that one uniform tax should prevail throughout India—a sufficient revenue may be raised, so that, by bringing our expenditure within reasonable limits, we may be able to look forward to a period of prosperity. A great difficulty with which it has been necessary to contend, has arisen from the centralising policy which was heretofore adopted: formerly everything was taken away from the subordinate Governments and concentrated at Calcutta, and the consequence was, that great discouragement was thus cast on the minor Governments, while from the enormous pressure thrown upon the Supreme Legislative Council, and partly, also, from the defects in its constitution, results of a most unsatisfactory kind ensued. We have, to a certain extent, endeavoured to relieve the Central Government, by putting greater power into the hands of the subordinate Government. We have removed the superintendence of Baroda to Bombay, and that of Mysore to Madras. We have also taken measures to bring Singapore under the jurisdiction of the Colonial Office, and we have also intrusted the subordinate Government with greater authority in respect to the execution of public works. But the House must remember that the point on which all these provincial Governments claim greater liberty of action is precisely that point in which the supervision and control of the central legislative authority is most necessary and beneficial—I allude to the expenditure of the public funds. If the different Provinces all contributed rateably to the necessities of India, it would be only fair that they should deal with the surplus revenue as they pleased; but such, unfortunately, is far from being the

  751
  case; and if some check were not exercised by the Supreme Government, the finances of the country would soon fall into irretrievable disorder. I quite agree with my hon. Friend as to the direction in which we ought to proceed, still preserving to the Central Government a general and central control. The next question is, whether it is not advisable to amalgamate the Supreme and Sudder Courts. On that point I entirely go along with my hon. Friend. I came to that conclusion as long ago as 1853, and I introduced a measure for the purpose of amalgamating those courts in 1854. But the government of Calcutta found it impossible to carry it into effect; and in 1860 what I proposed in 1854 is still undone. There is, however, a prospect of the question being settled. The plan for the amalgamation has received the support of the Judges of both Courts in Madras; they state that the scheme is not only possible, but desirable. The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court at Calcutta is favourable to it. We have again directed the attention of the Supreme Government to the subject; and I hope before the end of the Session it will be my duty to introduce a Bill to carry the amalgamation into effect. I believe it will be a most valuable measure; I have no doubt that the combination of the legal knowledge of the English Judges; and the local knowledge of the Sudder Judges will form a better court of appeal, and furnish a better example to all the other Courts throughout India than any one now existing. Probably, also, it will be a measure of economy, as it may enable the Government to reduce the number of Judges. I hardly know whether I need follow my hon. Friend through the question of Imperial guarantees for Indian loans; the subject has been thoroughly discussed. The loan that has been made has been very successful, and the credit of India in England stands high; that has reacted on India itself, where Indian credit is now higher than it was six months ago; and I sincerely trust that before the end of this year I shall be able to make a statement of the financial condition of India, that will be more favourable than the statement of last year. The three subjects which were referred to by the hon. Member—the Civil Service, the Supreme and Sudder Courts, and the question of the Legislative Council—are now under consideration by three different Committees of the Indian Council; and I hope before long to lay before the House such measures as may become necessary for car-
  752
  rying out the decisions which may ultimately be adopted. Under these circumstances I do not see what advantage would be gained by referring them for investigation to a Committee.
  MR. H. BAILLIEsaid, he was not surprised that the hon. Member for Windsor (Mr. W. Vansittart), taking as he did a deep interest in the prosperity of India, should have brought this subject under the consideration of the House, and proposed a Committee of Inquiry into it. He was happy to hear that the right hon. Secretary of State for India was able to take so cheerful a view of the future prospects of Indian finance; but he did not believe that an unprejudiced person who had paid attention to the subject could come to any other conclusion than that the present state of the Indian Administration was very little creditable to the Government of this country. What were the facts? Possessed of one of the finest regions of the world, renowned from the most remote antiquity for its wealth and civilization, and containing a numerous and industrious population—possessed of all these advantages, its Government, nevertheless was practically in a state of insolvency. It had for many years past lived from hand to mouth, upon the proceeds of its ancient reputation; and the very credit on which it then subsisted would ere this have failed were it not for a general belief prevailing in the public mind, and fostered, he regretted to say, by statesmen in that House, that sooner or later the Imperial Government must take on itself the responsibility of Indian debts. He did not wish to take an exaggerated view of the difficulties of the Indian Government, he only echoed the opinions of higher and greater authorities. Sir H. Frere, late Commissioner in Scinde, and now a Member of the Legislative Council, in his Report on the re-organization of the Indian army, described the Government as being in the condition of an insolvent Irish landlord before the Incumbered Estates Bill was passed. It was impossible to be in a much worse condition than that. Such had been the result of the administration of Indian affairs from the financial point of view; but what had it been with regard to the condition of the people? A vast portion of the finest land in India—estimated by some as much as one-sixth, which previously to the establishment of the English Government was in the highest state of cultivation, had

  753
  since become a desert waste. That was an answer to what they so often heard of the great advantages the Natives of India had derived from their just and civilizing administration. He did not assert that all this fertile land was thrown out of cultivation in consequence of English misgovernment alone. Many large tracts were thrown out of cultivation in consequence of the anarchy and confusion that followed the dissolution of the Empire of Delhi; hut England had done nothing to reclaim then), nothing to remedy the evil the Indian Government had much contributed to produce. It might be said this was the result of past administration; that they had now established a new form of Government for India, and that now our Government was firmly established, the administration would be better. We had, indeed, a new form of Government. But it was a new Government only in name; the same men still sat in the same places, discharging the same routine duties, and carrying out the same principles. He would not say of them what had been said of some potentates, that "they had learned nothing and forgot nothing;" if they had done nothing else they had been very successful in raising loans for the Governor General in this country, for which duty their long practice under the Court of Directors rendered them eminently qualified. While speaking of the Indian Council, he might he permitted to notice the changes which had been effected of late in the management of their business by the Secretary of State for India. Those changes had, he believed, been most judicious, for previously the system had been to send all the despatches to the Committees of the Council before they were submitted to the Secretary of State. The result of that system had been, that the Secretary of State for India had been left in ignorance of the views and opinions of the able men who presided over the several departments of his office, and could only see through the eyes of the Council, which, if the former state of things continued to exist, would practically possess the functions of an executive, instead of being that consultative body which the Legislature intended. So far, therefore, he regarded the change to which he referred as one which was calculated to operate beneficially. He should next proceed to advert to the finances of India, and the means which had been resorted to with the object of removing the difficulties by which
  754
  that question was beset. A gentleman had been appointed to proceed from this country to India upon that important mission, but he must take the liberty of stating that he thought a mistake had been committed at the very outset in connection with that appointment, in constituting Mr. Wilson a Member of Council. He entertained that opinion because Mr. Wilson, in that capacity, would have to wade through the enormous mass of business which came before the Council—a duty the discharge of which was quite sufficient to take up all the time at his disposal to the exclusion of financial subjects. Now, if Mr. Wilson had been appointed a Special Commissioner, with full powers to deal with questions of finance, then indeed he might have devoted himself altogether to their solution; but one of the reasons which were given for not having done so was that it would have been found impossible to give him a salary of £8,000 a year unless he had been nominated a Member of Council. But be that as it might, he should like to know with what powers beyond those of an ordinary Member of Council, Mr. Wilson was to be entrusted. Was he authorized to deal with the great military establishments of India, or was his attention to be exclusively directed to questions of finance? If the latter were the case, then might the Government as well have appointed an extraordinary Chancellor of the Exchequer in this country to draw up a scheme for the payment of the national debt. In expressing that opinion, he however by no means meant to depreciate the abilities of the Gentleman in question, but simply acted upon the belief that the great Indian difficulty was not strictly one of a purely financial character, or one which could be solved by any fiscal measures, however well devised. That difficulty, he should maintain, arose from the system of administration which had of late years been pursued in India—a system which was hateful as well to the great body of its people as to the native chiefs and nobility, and which rendered it necessary that the Government of the country should be carried on by means of large military establishments which were out of all proportion to the revenue and finances of the country. Now, the statesmen who had founded our Indian empire, and those by whom it had up to the time of the Marquess of Wellesley been governed, had invariably laid down the principle, that its administration ought to be conducted by means of the native chiefs

  755
  and nobles, and, entertaining that view, they had done everything in their power to conciliate those native chiefs, and to associate them as far as possible in the Government. That system, however, had of late years undergone a change. The native chiefs and nobles had been treated with the utmost contempt, and their existence, so far as the administration of affairs was concerned, had been completely ignored. A centralized system of Government, emanating from Calcutta, had been adopted, a system which had proved so odious to the inhabitants of India that he believed it had been one of the chief causes of the rebellion which had broken out in the North-Western Provinces. The question of administration, indeed, was one of so much importance that he should advert to a single example as illustrative of the view which he was endeavouring to impress upon the attention of the House. The example which he should take was that, he believed, which was most favourable to the present system of Government in India—he alluded to the case of the Punjab, which he had heard it so frequently said had been admirably governed by Sir J. Lawrence, who seemed to be regarded by some as the beau ideal of administrators, and whose system, it was said, ought to be adopted in every part of our Indian Empire. Now, he for one was perfectly ready to bear testimony to the great abilities which Sir J. Lawrence possessed, as well as to the energy and vigour with which he had stemmed the tide of rebellion. The exhibition of those qualities, however, was altogether a different thing from the system of administration which he had established in the Punjab, the wisdom of which he (Mr. Baillie) was very much disposed to doubt, for the reasons which he was about to state to the House. Hon. Members were probably aware that when Sir J. Lawrence had first been sent to the Punjab, it was a newly conquered country, and the Government required to be reorganized. He had gone there in the capacity of assistant to his brother Sir H. Lawrence, who at the time filled the office of Chief Commissioner. It had, however, soon after been discovered that the views and opinions of the two brothers, as to the mode in which the government of the Province should be conducted, essentially differed. Indeed, so great had been the difference between them on the subject, that he had reason to believe both had addressed letters to the Marquess of Dalhousie, requesting that
  756
  either one or the other of them might be removed. The views which Sir H. Lawrence entertained as to the mode in which the Punjab should be governed were those to which he (Mr. Baillie) had already alluded as characterizing the administration of our earlier Indian statesmen. He desired that all the native nobility should be confirmed in the possession of their estates, and that they should be associated with the Government in the administration of affairs. The views of Sir J. Lawrence, on the contrary, were that we should carry out in the Punjab that system which had been adopted in the North-Western Provinces—that was to say, that the talookdars, or native nobility, should be called upon to produce written titles to their estates, and in those cases in which they should fail to produce them that the estates should be confiscated, with the view of replenishing an exhausted exchequer, leaving to the proprietors of those estates only a life interest or some sort of right of curtailed occupation. Those respective views had been submitted to the Marquess of Dalhousie, and the result had been that he had decided in favour of the policy of Sir J. Lawrence, which might be described generally as of that centralizing character which prevailed in the North-Western Provinces. Sir H. Lawrence had, in consequence, been sent to Lucknow, while his brother had been installed in the Punjab, with full power to carry into execution the views and opinions which he entertained. Now, it appeared from the evidence of Mr. Mangles, who had been examined before the Committee on the Colonization of India, that the confiscation of property in the Punjab had been carried on to a greater extent than in any other portion of that country. The results of the system had, he might add, soon manifested themselves, inasmuch as the Government had received from Sir J. Lawrence constant requisitions to be supplied with fresh troops, and regiment after regiment had to be marched up to his assistance. So far, indeed, had that state of things proceeded, that the Indian Government had found it expedient to consider whether it was possible to carry out the system the adoption of which Sir J. Lawrence had recommended in consequence of the extraordinary expense which its maintenance entailed. The question, however, had been argued in the Indian Council upon the principle that the Punjab formed part of the Bengal Presidency; that they were compelled to main-

  757
  tain in that Presidency a certain number of troops, and that it was immaterial in what particular districts those troops happened to be quartered. For it was supposed by those who seemed to have been very ignorant of the state of native feeling that there was no necessity for the presence of British troops either in Lower Bengal or in Central India, or in the North-West Provinces, and the scheme founded upon that notable argument had accordingly been carried into effect. Regiments had been marched from every part of Bengal to the Punjab, and their places supplied by Native troops. The consequence had been that when the mutiny broke out it had been discovered that while Sir John Lawrence had a force of 13,000 soldiers in the Punjab there were only 1,300 European troops to he found between Delhi and Calcutta—a distance of more than 1,000 miles. Could any one doubt that this policy in the Punjab was the cause of the success that attended the first outbreak of the rebellion, and of its earliest and most disastrous consequences? He did not say that the rebellion would not have occurred under any circumstances; but he said that if the troops had been left in their accustomed stations,—if there had been a single regiment at Cawnpore, the horrible massacre would never have taken place there, and if a single regiment had been at Delhi that arsenal would never have fallen into the hands of the rebels; and it was only the fortunate arrival of the British troops on the sudden termination of the war in Persia that restored the prestige of our arms. Such was the immediate result of the system of government he had described in the Punjab; and what was the result as regards our present position in India? That was the important point to which he wished to called the attention of the House. He would offer no opinion of his own, but adduced that of far more competent witnesses—Sir John Lawrence himself, Brigadier General Chamberlain, and Colonel Herbert Edwardes. These three distinguished officers were appointed a commission to report on the organization of the Indian army, and one of the first questions put to them by the Governor General was this:—What should be the number of European troops for the permanent occupation of the Punjab, and what should be their ordinary distribution? Their answer was that 22,600 European troops were necessary. Then, as to the number of Native troops to be maintained there, they reported that
  758
  there should be a force of 52,364 men. Why, the whole of Her Majesty's forces in India previous to the rebellion amounted to only 22,000, and now we had the astounding fact from these officers that 22,600 European troops were necessary for the government of the Punjab alone—the very last of our Indian conquests and a very insignificent portion of our empire. He would offer no comment on this statement, but leave it to be pondered by the House and the country. It was evident, however, that we were governing India just as the Austrians governed Lombardy, contrary to the wishes of the people, by the force of our battalions and bayonets. That was a system which would never last, and the people of England would soon find that even the honour and glory of governing India would be too costly a luxury if it was only to be obtained upon such terms. He thought he had shown that our great Indian difficulty was not to be solved by sending out an economist to deal with the financial part of the question. With regard to the Indian debt, he thought the right hon. Gentleman had not expressed himself very clearly. There seemed to be a feeling abroad, which he believed prevailed to some extent on the Stock Exchange, that sooner or later the Government would take on itself the responsibility of the Indian debt. If such an intention existed, he thought it should be done at once. But if, as he hoped, that House would never consent to put the burden, at least of the past debt of India, whatever might be done as to the future debt, on the shoulders of the people, he did think it very desirable that the Government should make an explicit declaration, so that the question might be settled, and those who embarked their money in Indian securities might know that while they got a larger percentage they must put up with an inferior security. There was another subject far more serious to which he wished to call attention—the necessity under which we were now becoming liable to maintain little short of 100,000 European troops locked up in India. Was it possible—he did not say in time of war, but in time of peace—to provide such a force, and also to provide for the wants of our other colonies, keeping also an army in this country sufficient to give security to the people that their hearths should not be invaded, and that in time of war we might be able to maintain, as of old, the honour of England? There could not be a doubt

  759
  that the uneasiness which had prevailed in this country for some time past at the great military preparations in France arose in a considerable degree from a knowledge of this fact, that we had 100,000 trained soldiers to keep in India, while we had nothing but second battalions and embodied militia for the defence of our own shores. If these 100,000 men had been in the south of England, we might have laughed at all the preparations of France. Was it possible to provide and maintain such a number of men for India? Only last year the Minister for War came down to the House and told them that it was of no use to vote more men for the army, as the Government could not raise the number voted last year. That was a degrading and humiliating statement—that they had not been able to raise the number of men that Parliament deemed necessary for the country; and he trusted they would not have a similar statement on any other occasion. What he wanted to see was action on the part of the Government. He looked for action, but found it nowhere. In India there was the same old routine system going on, just as if there had been no great rebellion. In England, too, routine was still prevalent. Take the case of the militia—every one knew for the last five years that our militia system had broken down. If they wanted to call out the militia for defence, instead of 150,000 men Government could not bring 50,000 under arms. Last Session the hon. Member for Birmingham (Mr. Bright) made a very able and important speech with reference to India, in which he stated that the Government of India was too unwieldy—that such was the enormous mass of business which came before the Governor-General that it was impossible any man could get through it, and the result was that despatches remained unanswered, not for weeks, but for months and years. They had a remarkable example of this in regard to the Principality of Dhar. A despatch was received from India while a noble Friend of his was at the Board of Control, stating that the Governor General had dethroned the Rajah and confiscated his territory. It was deemed necessary to reverse the decision of the Governor-General, and order him to restore those territories, and despatches were forwarded to that effect. During the twelve months his noble Friend remained in office no answer of any kind was returned to those despatches; but he was informed that lately—in fact, just
  760
  within two years—the answer was received, that answer being that the Governor-General did not think it wise to execute the orders which had been given to him. That circumstance would give a notion of the autocratic powers assumed by the Governor-General of India. The hon. Member for Birmingham also suggested that each Presidency should have its own administration. He thought that the great difficulty which stood in the way—namely, the financial part of the question, might be got over. The question had been discussed by many able civilians, and among them by Mr. G. Campbell, who had written a pamphlet on the financial state of India. Mr. Campbell said that the Government would never succeed in remodelling the finances of India until they established that localization of finance which was so much wanted there. Local finance at present was a thing unknown, whereas every district ought to be bound to regulate its expenditure in some degree by its receipts. Sir Henry Frere said that the late alterations in the Government of India might confer upon the Governor-General the autocratic power he required, but that India must be centralized by persons, and not by departments, if the Government wished to avoid general bankruptcy and ruin. He believed that if a different system of Government were adopted in India they might dispense with one-half the European troops whom it was now necessary to maintain there. Sir J. Lawrence recommended that not less than 22,600 European troops should be maintained in the Punjab, and the Government could not do better than follow Sir John's advice, for if they allowed the European troops in the Punjab to be too much weakened they might have another rebellion. Let the Government bear in mind that upon the solution of this important question, not only the honour and character but also the safety of the country were involved. He would recommend his hon. Friend not to press his Motion.
  COLONEL SYKESobserved that great misapprehension existed as to the state of the finances of India. A table which he had before him, and which was compiled from official papers on the table of the House, showed that in 1800 the debt of India was £14,125,000, the interest being at £12, £10, £9, and £8 per cent. The revenue of India at that period was only £10,485,000, and the interest of the debt was £1,429,000, the pressure of the debt was therefore upwards of 13½ per cent upon

  761
  the revenue. The amount of the debt increased year by year in consequence of successive wars, but by numerous financial operations the pressure of the interest had been reduced, until in 1857, though the debt was £60,000,000, the interest had a pressure of only 7·13 per cent instead of 13·65 in the year 1800, and this was owing to the rates of interest having fallen from a range between £12 and £8 per cent to 4 per cent, and in 1857 a loan of £500,000 was even raised at 3½ per cent. The revenue of the country, in fact, had gone on increasing in a greater ratio than the pressure of the debt, having risen from £10,485,000 in 1800, to £33,303,000 in April 1857. There were, in 1857, 50,000 European troops in India—the charges of the civil and military establishments were no doubt very high—but in spite of that the revenues were sufficient to cover every possible charge in India and in England, to lay out £2,000,000 on extraordinary public works, and to leave a balance of £82,432. And yet an opinion was abroad at the time and was even expressed in the House of Commons that India was bankrupt! Fifty thousand European troops were sufficient to take Delhi, to take Lucknow, and to break the neck of the mutiny—50,000 troops were sufficient to hold their own against the rebellion of the whole Bengal army,—universal insurrection in Oude, and partial revolts of Native chiefs, until reinforcements arrived from Europe. If 50,000 troops were sufficient to hold India when all the Native Princes were capable of resisting us—and many were doing so—surely, now, when there was not a Native Prince capable of standing before a brigade, and not a fortress to besiege, we did not require 100,000 European soldiers in India. We need not fear the people. They had been pretty generally disarmed—that was an act which he regretted; as it was undignified, and he would almost venture to designate it, cowardly, but such was the case; and we could not, therefore, require more than 50,000 men now. The mutiny had occasioned a very large outlay, and the debt had risen from £60,000,000 in 1857 to £98,000,000 in 1859–60, but still the pressure of the interest did not amount to what it was in 1807, when India was less wealthy. It then amounted to 15·67 per cent on the revenue; it was even now only 13·54 per cent. What reason was there, then, to despair? What reason was there for seeking to increase the re-
  762
  venue of India by the mischievous and impolitic means lately proposed? The people of India could only consume a certain amount of our manufactures—chiefly cottons and cotton twist—woollens and hardware, beer, spirits, stationery, &c, were of no use to them. But we required every year an increasing quantity of their produce—indigo, sugar, oil seeds, dyes, &c.—and the result is that we have to pay yearly several millions in silver to them as a balance of trade. He could not conceive then a greater financial blunder than placing a duty of 20 per cent on English manufactures, the consumption of which ought to be encouraged in India. As regarded the licensing tax, his right hon. Friend (Sir C. Wood) was mistaken in supposing that an impost of that nature had been common in India in past times; men were born to their trades and fixed in them by caste and were not licensed. There had been the moturpha, a small tax on shopkeepers and trades, but it did not resemble the licensing tax, and this was proved by the great dissatisfaction which that tax had created among the Natives. Moreover, there was no absolute necessity for imposing such a burden on the people of India. All that was required to be done was to tide over the deficiency occasioned by the mutiny by loans, and that object had been already partially accomplished by the people of England having invested their money in Indian securities, without an Imperial guarantee. The Indian loans were now at a premium in the English market. The guarantee question had been practically settled, and his right hon. Friend could now obtain any amount of money that he required on favourable terms. He would recommend him to do so, and reserve any increase of taxation in India to the time when it was absolutely necessary. Let the European force be reduced to 50,000 or 60,000 men, and there would be an abundance of money for public works. He approved the plan of giving a Council to each of the Presidencies in which the chiefs and great landowners of the interior should be represented; but a Calcutta Baboo, or Native merchant at Madias or Bombay, would be out of place in such a Council. If his hon. Friend divided the House for a Committee, he should certainly divide with him. There was an extraordinary amount of ignorance in this country with regard to the people of India, and he should rejoice in anything which tended to present the Natives in their true light.
  COLONEL HERBERTremarked, that he was glad to hear that it was not the intention of Her Majesty's Government to make any large and sweeping reductions in the salaries of the civil servants of India. Generally speaking, those salaries were not, in his opinion, too high to maintain the responsibility and the honourable position of the service. He was also rejoiced to hear it was the intention to give more extensive powers to the governors of the minor Presidencies. It was a great detriment to the interests of the service to have those constant references from the minor Presidencies to the supreme Government of Calcutta. He had heard with surprise the remark of the hon. Member for Inverness-shire (Mr. Baillie), that India had for ages been celebrated for its civilization. India bad been celebrated for barbaric splendour; but he did not believe that in this country, at all events, gorgeous palaces and splendid trappings were regarded as marks of civilization. All the principal monuments of India were raised to gratify the taste or vanity of despotic monarchs. The chief roads were roads from one palace to another; the chief towns were towns built by successive rulers to perpetuate a name. There were palaces built by Mogul Emperors, the cost of which was so fabulously great that the hon. Member for Lambeth would be appalled if it were proposed to spend one tithe of the amount on a palace in this country. He (Colonel Herbert) was not prepared to admit that such things were proofs of civilization. It had been customary to abuse those who had governed India during the last hundred years, and to compare their acts and monuments with those of the Native rulers. It would be found on examination that the Government of the East India Company had made great progress in recent years in useful and beneficial works. It was previously engaged in great wars, which were in most instances thrust upon it—wars for the very existence of British rule in India; and because its exchequer was emptied by wars, which, though they had been called aggressive, were in nine cases out of ten purely defensive, and because, in consequence of that state of things, it could not carry on the works that it desired, it had been held up to scorn and obloquy. The hon. Member for Inverness-shire said that if they did not take care India would become a millstone round their neck. He should like to know when England ever paid one farthing on account of India. As much as six or seven
  764
  millions came from India to this country for the purchase of stores and the payment to salaries and pensions. The balances were thus far entirely on the side of England, and there was no other of our colonies which could show similar results. Therefore there was no ground for speaking of India as if she were likely to be a millstone round the neck of this country. The general conclusion which he had drawn from what he had seen and learned in India was most favourable to the administration of their countrymen in that country during the last hundred years. When he said this he could not be charged with being too partial to the East India Company, for although he belonged to a family that owed much to India, it could not be said of it that it owed much to the East India Company.
  MR. KINNAIRDsaid, he hoped the hon. Member for Windsor would withdraw his Motion, although they were much indebted to him for the interest of this debate and for much valuable information extracted from the Government and other speakers. He rose, however, principally to express his deep regret at what had fallen from the hon. Member for Inverness-shire (Mr. Baillie), who, when the Government of the Punjab was not necessarily in question, had thought fit to introduce the differences that had existed between Sir John and Sir Henry Lawrence, and unjustly to attack Sir John Lawrence, for whom they must all entertain the highest admiration. There was this consolation, that the country would know that the attack was as undeserved as it was ungenerous. If the hon. Gentleman would bring the matter in due form before the House, he was sure that the answers of those in authority and of private Members would disprove the statements which the hon. Gentleman bad hazarded. The hon. Gentleman would lead them to suppose that India was saved simply by the bravery of the English troops, when he ought to have known that the capture of Delhi was as much owing to the influence of Sir John Lawrence with the Native chiefs as to the courage of our troops.
  MR. W. EWARTsaid, he also must express his regret at the allusions made to Sir John Lawrence. He concurred, however, in one statement only of the hon. Member for Inverness-shire, that the time was near when the oxcessive number of the army might be diminished, and India pacified by the good administration of just laws and the courteous deportment of

  765
  British subjects. He rejoiced that the Secretary of State for India was favourable to the decentralization of authority, and he hoped by that course, and by the infusion of non-official members in the Legislative Councils, great improvements would be effected. He wished to know whether the licensing system was to be modified or abandoned.
  MR. T. G. BARINGsaid, that the Bill which was first introduced by the Government in India was a Bill for licensing trades and professions. It was afterwards changed into an Income-tax Bill. The Legislative Council then adjourned, and they had not yet re-considered it. Her Majesty's Government could not, therefore, be aware of the precise position in which the matter stood. It was the income tax, and not the licence tax which had created most opposition in India, as a reference to meetings in Bombay and elsewhere would show. In the Punjab, for example, the licensing system had been introduced with success and without any opposition on the part of the people. He thought that after the discussion which had taken place the hon. Gentleman would probably not divide, and that the House would be satisfied of the intention of Her Majesty's Government to relieve the Supreme Government of that minute control over the local Governments of India which had hitherto been exercised. The effect would be to give the local Governments more power and more responsibility; and, so far from expecting extravagance to follow the exercise of power and responsibility he was convinced more inquiry would be made into every branch of expenditure. He cordially concurred with the hon. Member for Perth (Mr. Kinnaird) in regretting that the hon, Member for lnvernessshire (Mr. Baillie) should have introduced a reference to the administration in the Punjab, and more especially an attack on a most distinguished man—Sir John Lawrence. The statement of the hon. Member was that the policy in the Punjab caused the insurrection, and he inferred that Sir John Lawrence was responsible for the disposition of the troops at the time of the mutiny. Sir John Lawrence was no more responsible for the disposition of the troops at Delhi and Cawnpore than the hon. Member himself. Delhi and Cawnpore were not in his jurisdiction, and if any one were to blame for there being no more troops at those places at the time of the insurrection it was certainly not Sir John Lawrence.
  766
  However humbly connected he might be with Indian affairs, he felt it incumbent on him to say that if there was one man more than another who deserved—not thanks, for the thanks of Parliament had been given, hut honour, it was Sir John Lawrence. Instead of the policy in the Punjab being the cause of the insurrection it was the policy of Sir John Lawrence which more perhaps than any other cause was the means, under God, of saving India in those critical times. It was owing to the loyalty of the people of the Punjab and the affection and cordial assistance of the neighbouring Native Princes that Sir John Lawrence was able so to strengthen the force before Delhi as to give success to the British arms. He was sure there was no Gentleman in the House except the hon. Member who would have coupled the name of Sir John Lawrence with the insurrection not only without one word of praise but with a censure which was not in the slightest degree deserved. The hon. Gentleman referred to the India Act of last year in a manner which, considering the vote he gave, and the position which he filled when that Act passed was extraordinary; and he also attacked, in very wide terms, the conduct of our countrymen in India. The hon. Gentleman had been completely answered by the hon. and gallant Member for Ludlow (Colonel P. Herbert), and he would only add that, in his opinion, the hon. Gentleman would have done well to have listened with more attention to a speech delivered last year by the noble Lord the late Secretary of State, under whom he served, as he would then have probably avoided statements which there was no evidence to support.
  MR. DANBY SEYMOURsaid, it certainly was an extraordinary proceeding for the Legislative Council even to entertain a finance Bill containing such exceptions as those referred to by the hon. Member who moved the Resolution. The Secretary of State for India indeed had stated that it was not true that in the first Licensing Bill the Indian Council had exempted themselves and the officials of Calcutta. The fact was, however, asserted in the Petition recently presented to that House from the merchants and other Europeans in Calcutta. The right hon. Gentleman had also said that the licensing tax was only the continuation of an old impost to which the people of India were accustomed, and which they extremely liked. Certainly the hon. and gallant Member for Aberdeen

  767
  (Colonel Sykes) and other Indian authorities had never heard of such a Native impost. The right hon. Baronet must have confounded this tax with the moturpha, which was wholly distinct from a licensing system, and affected a different class of the population. The petitioners to whom he had referred said they wanted an equitable income tax—not a licensing system, and they stated that at the time their Petition was despatched from Calcutta that obnoxious system was still being adhered to. Their Petition was presented within the last fortnight or three weeks. The Secretary of State, in answer to questions put to him in that House as to whether or not the Licensing Bill had been abandoned, had said that he knew nothing about the matter. No doubt the details of measures for India should be settled by the authorities in India; but when the welfare of a great Empire was concerned, the principles of such measures ought to undergo the statesmanlike supervision of the Home Government. The Legislative Council of India, composed as it was of a few officials who thought it their duty to follow the dictation of the Governor General and the Governors of the Presidencies, was of no earthly use. He hoped, therefore, that the right hon. Gentleman would soon be in a position to give them more details regarding the licensing question which was creating such a ferment in India; but if the next Indian mail did not bring intelligence of something satisfactory having been done upon the subject, he should feel it necessary to bring it before the House.
  MR. TORRENSsaid, he could state, not only from the Petition referred to but also from his own experience in India, that the people of that country bitterly complained of the measures taken in respect of the licensing system. The landholders and the agricultural interest in India contributed largely to the public revenue, while the merchants and traders had hitherto been allowed to escape scotfree. Any feasible plan for bringing the latter class under its fair burden of taxation should have his hearty concurrence.
  MR. VANSITTARTreplied: His acknowledgments were due to the hon. Member for Poole for correcting the Secretary of State for India's statement in regard to Mr. Harrington's having exempted himself and the other officials from the Licensing Bill. There could be no doubt that in the first Bill, brought in on the 12th August, the Government officials were ex-
  768
  empted, though it was quite true they were included in the second. He would not now, however, pursue that matter any further. His object had been completely gained by the manner in which his Resolution had been ventilated in that House—more especially as the right hon. Baronet had given an assurance that the subjects to which the Motion referred were under the consideration of separate Committees in India, and had also held out the prospect of early legislation as the result of the labours of those Committees. It would be extremely ungracious therefore on his part to press the House to a division, and he would ask leave to withdraw his Motion.
  SIR CHARLES WOODexplained: What he had said was, not that the first Licensing Bill included the holders of Government offices, but that Mr. Harrington, in the speech which he subsequently made in the Council, stated that although that measure did not include official salaries, it was intended in another way to bring them under taxation.
  Motion, by leave, withdrawn.

FRIDAY ADJOURNMENTS.

  RESOLUTION MOVED FOR.
  MR. STEUARTsaid, he rose to move the following Resolution with respect to the Motion for Adjournment on Fridays. It was not his wish, he observed, to infringe on the liberty of debate, but to introduce more regularity than at present existed on the Motion for Adjournment on Friday, and to obviate the objection raised by the right hon. Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Bouverie) as to the desultory nature of the conversations that then took place. As the House were aware, they sometimes were compelled to travel from India to a question, perhaps, of county rates in Ireland, and then back to India again. Last Friday, for example, there were fourteen questions on the adjournment. The first was put to the Secretary for War, relative to officers of the Land Transport Corps; then came one relative to the shrubbery in Hyde-park, followed by others on a great variety of subjects; and the thirteenth question was again one addressed to the Secretary for War with regard to Militia regiments. There were important questions put to the Foreign Secretary, and several of great interest were addressed to the Secretary for India, These were all mixed together, and hon. Members were sometimes in a state of uncertainty as to the time when they should put

  769
  them. The Resolution he proposed would obviate much of this inconvenience, while it would not interfere with the privilege of the Members.
  Motion made, and Question proposed,—
  "That it would tend to the regularity of Debate, on the Motion for Adjournment on Fridays, if the Clerk were instructed to place in their order on the paper, one after another, all questions to be addressed to each particular Member of the Government."
  MR. DISRAELI: I had supposed, Sir, that some noble Lord or right hon. Gentleman, in some manner responsible for the conduct of the business of this House, would have risen to favour us with his opinion on this matter. I have not given the Motion of my hon. Friend all that consideration which, perhaps, it deserves. I have been obliged to form my opinion of it from his few observations, and while you, Sir, were giving it to us from the Chair; but it appears to me that this House ought not to adopt it. I have always supported the privilege enjoyed by hon. Members on Friday of bringing under the consideration of the House all questions of pressing and general interest, and I think it is for the public advantage not to subject that privilege to those general regulations which are so convenient for the management of our ordinary discussions. But I have always understood that a grave objection to the continuance of that indulgence was, that the inquiries made on Friday evenings were assuming the form of debates; and I have always thought that they should not take that form—that they should not interfere with the business of the evening. The proposal of my hon. Friend is, however, that they should become debates; for should you, Sir, by an artificial contrivance put them amongst the business of the House, we should have a number of debates arranged in which hon. Members might all deliver their opinions. The argument for my hon. Friend's Resolution is, that the arrangement which he proposes would tend to the regularity of debate; but I am entirely averse to the inquiries addressed to Government taking the shape of formal discussion, which the Resolution of my hon. Friend would pave the way for. We have on Friday evenings a sort of conversazione, which it is for the public advantage should be tolerated; but we should be very cautious not to allow it to deviate from that character. The Resolution of my hon. Friend would aggravate all those objections which may be fairly urged against the privilege which I have always advocated. I would, there-
  770
  fore, call on the House to pause before they adopt a course which, if adopted, would lead to still greater inconvenience than that now felt, and which would still further strengthen those objections, which are not at present by any means devoid of weight, against the enjoyment of that indulgence which is now conceded to hon. Members on Friday evenings.
  SIR GEORGE LEWIS: I am glad the right hon. Gentleman has prevented this question being formally put from the Chair, and has interposed the observations with which he has just favoured us. I should have risen immediately after the hon. Gentleman, had it not been for the feeling that it might be considered, perhaps, somewhat invidious for a member of the Government to speak on the subject before any other hon. Gentleman had had an opportunity of offering his remarks, on account of the impression—a mistaken one—which appears to prevail that the members of the Government have a sort of personal interest in shortening the Friday evening's debate and dedicating the whole of that evening to Government business, strictly so called. I have already expressed my opinion that members of the Government are the last persons who have an interest in increasing the number of hours dedicated to Government business. The right hon. Gentleman has correctly stated the object of this Motion to be to systematize the debate on the adjournment of the House. At present the notices are taken in the order in which they are put down, and if we are to maintain and extend the miscellaneous debate of Friday evening, I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman's Motion would not make it somewhat more intelligible; but it would certainly tend to produce the result pointed out by the right hon. Gentleman—a disposition to convert every knot of questions, whether on India or any other subject—into a little debate. So far it would violate the present understanding that the questions put should be as much as possible in the nature of interrogatories to the Government, and gradually the night on which Orders of the Day are by courtesy supposed to have precedence of notices of Motion would be converted into a night on which notices of Motion have precedence of Orders of the Day. My disposition is to vote with the right hon. Gentleman against this classification of notices. The present system, irregular as it is, tends to prevent abuse of the privilege, and if the hon. Member goes to a

  771
  division, I shall certainly vote against him.
  MR. A. STEUARTsaid, of course, after such an expression of opinion, he should not attempt to divide the House upon the Question; but he desired it should be understood that his object in moving the Resolution was not that attributed to him by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Buckinghamshire (Mr. Disraeli), and he did not see how putting two questions together could possibly render it likely that they would change their character of interrogatory and assume that of debate.
  Motion, by leave, withdrawn.

  GLOUCESTER CITY AND WAKEFIELD ELECTIONS.—LEAVE.
  MR. T. DUNCOMBEsaid, that in moving for leave to bring in a Bill to provide that at the next elections for the boroughs of Wakefield and Gloucester the votes of the electors might be taken by ballot, he would commence by presenting a petition from the Ballot Society, and another signed by 700 electors of Gloucester, in favour of the Motion. He was authorized to say that if the House agreed to the second reading of the Bill the signature of 1,000 out of the 1,500 electors of Gloucester would be procured to a similar petition. His object in making this Motion was to endeavour to convince the House, as he himself was convinced, that secret voting was the only remedy for the corruption which had been shown to exist at the various elections. To such an extent had that corruption been carried at the two places to which his Bill referred, that last year that House thought proper to address Her Majesty, praying Her to issue Commissions to inquire into the corrupt practices supposed to prevail in these two boroughs. The Commissions had been appointed, had inquired, and had presented their Reports. In 1854 similar Commissions were appointed for the boroughs of Canterbury, Hull, Cambridge, Maldon, and Barnstaple. In 1854 he pursued the same course as that which he was now pursuing—he had moved that the issuing of the writs for those places be deferred until provision had been made enabling the electors to give their votes by ballot. The Motion, however, was rejected. What was the consequence? Why, that nothing was done. The Commissioners for Canterbury reported that "corrupt practices had prevailed there at the last election and at previous elec-
  772
  tions"—and one gentleman said the only way he could account for it was that Can terbury was a cathedral city. In the case of Cambridge the Commissioners reported that" bribery, treating, and other corrupt practices had systematically prevailed for a long period "in that borough. This was accounted for by another gentleman by the fact that Cambridge was a university town, where there were a number of young gentlemen being brought up for the Church. The Commissioners for Hull reported that "systematic corruption had uniformly prevailed at all elections for the borough of Hull, to which our attention has been directed." At Maldon they reported that "corrupt practices in various forms had prevailed," "that open and direct bribery was practised at the last election in a greater degree than at any previous election," "that the bribe was taken openly by all and unquestioned, and this shamelessness was in some cases increased by the electors so bribed being witnesses before the Commission as to their own bribery, and perjuring themselves." It appeared that the bribery was principally carried on among the poorer classes; "but," said the Commissioners, "the corruption did not lie so much with the lower classes as with their superiors by whom it was initiated." Again it was said "corrupt practices" at Barnstaple "prevailed extensively, 205 out out of 362 electors receiving bribes." But in that case the parties were not confined' to the lower class, many of them being most respectable, as far as their position in the town was concerned, tradesmen, and those men, the Commissioners said, "attempted to deny on oath the fact of their electoral corruption, apparently for the purpose of preserving their position in the eyes of their fellow-tradesmen and hiding their own shame." And yet those boroughs were still allowed to return Members, and those Reports to lie upon the table, nothing being done to cure such a state of things. Here were two more Reports—was the same course now to be pursued with regard to them? When he last made his Motion in 1854, what was called the "Corrupt Practices Prevention Act" had just passed, and the noble Lord the Member for the City (Lord John Russell), who seemed very proud of it, said "Let us grant the writs and see what this Act will do." It had been tried, and had it proved successful? Barnstaple, one of the boroughs in which delinquency from time immemorial had been established, was again about to be

  773
  tried, notwithstanding the Corrupt Practices Prevention Act. But the noble Lord, he thought, must admit that the reason which he had given on the last occasion was undoubtedly had; and he hoped he would inform the House as to the nature of the remedy which he had now in store for Gloucester and Wakefield. Two Commissions had been issued last year and had made their Report; that of the Gloucester Commission extended over thirty-three pages, and that which had made inquiry into Wakefield consisted only of three pages, but these were very much to the point, and reflected great credit on the Commissioners by whom it had been drawn up. In the Gloucester case it was reported that bribery had been practised in that borough from time immemorial, and that with regard to all the accounts of expenses which went before the auditor, they were a mere farce, "the auditor and the agent only existed to deceive and delude the Legislature and the public." The Commissioners also stated that in 1816 Colonel Webb spent £27,000, and in 1818 Admiral Berkeley spent £16,000 in contesting elections at Gloucester; but it was to be observed that elections at that time were capable of being protracted for eight days. £3,000 a day was still about the rate of expenditure. A Reform Club was formed in that city, and on the retirement of Admiral Berkely they came up to London to look for a candidate. Mr. Price was one of the members who was chosen, and Mr. Monk was the other. The orders given by the city of Gloucester on that occasion were that the candidate, whoever he was, must be an advocate of the Ballot This, he thought, proved that the electors generally were in favour of vote by Ballot. [Laughter] Hon. Members who laughed might think that an evidence that the voters liked corruption, but that they were actuated by a desire to prevent corruption would be proved by a petition which was to be presented to the House, signed by 1,000 out of 1,500 electors of the borough, declaring that the Ballot was the only means of putting an end to the corruption which prevailed. He had received a letter from one of the inhabitants in forwarding the petition to him, in which it was staled that,—
  "If two or three days further had been allowed, we might have strengthened our case. We are not inherently corrupt; the Conservatives are in a large minority, and if, for the sake of carrying their candidate, they will resort, as they do, to extensive bribery, the Liberals consider themselves
  774
  morally justified in slightly resorting to the same practices, and this is the true solution of our present unfortunate position."
  He had also received a letter from Mr. Monk, one of the candidates, in which he said:—
  "I am convinced in my own mind that if the votes bad been taken by ballot at the late election myself and my colleague would at this moment be the representatives of that city, instead of the victims of hypocrisy on the one side and of misplaced confidence on the other. I will not offer any remarks further than by stating that the result of my experience at the last election leads me to the conclusion that no amount of vigilance on the part of the candidate can prevent bribery, but that the best safeguard that can be devised against it is the Ballot. By getting in the thin end of the wedge in the cases of Gloucester and Wakefield, I believe you will do more for it than would be accomplished by ten years of agitation, and most heartily do I wish you success."
  Then what said the Commissioners? It appeared that Sir Robert Carden was the Conservative candidate. He knew nothing at all about corruption, bribery, or anything of that sort. It was true that through his means St. Albans had been disfranchised, and that at a former election he had spent a very large sum of money at Gloucester, and had succeeded in gaining his election. But, as was stated by the Commissioners,—
  "Experience upon a nature so unsuspicious as Sir R. Garden's was wholly thrown away. He had been a candidate for St. Albans, the constituency of which he stigmatized as the most base and depraved probably in the whole of England, and was there made, as he told us, 'the victim of the hypocrisy of other people;' but the knowledge which he had acquired at St. Albans was, in his judgment, applicable only to St. Albans. The knowledge that St. Albans was venal afforded, he said, no reason why he should suppose that Gloucester was venal, nor did his experience of the corruption of St. Albans suggest the necessity or the propriety of making any inquiries as to the character of the expenditure at his election."
  The Report went on to say that Sir R. Carden denied all knowledge of the expenses of his election in 1857 as distinguished from the expense of the petitions, though he admitted having seen the election auditor's account, which represented his expenditure as £610 12 s. 1d.,—the fact being that it exceeded £1,700. Mr. Lovegrove, his agent, when questioned upon the matter, stated that Sir R. Carden did inquire how much had been expended upon the election, and how much upon the petitions in 1857; that he supplied him with the information, and that Sir R. Carden, of whom Mr. Lovegrove said, "He is a man of business, and I should

  775
  say 'understood figures as well as any man in England"—had the opportunity of seeing the subjoined account, which Mr. Lovegrove produced on the occasion of its final settlement in August, 1857. After this very candid evidence, given by a gentleman who, as ex-Lord Mayor and a member of the Stock-Exchange, must be supposed to know something of figures, the Commissioners still gave him a certificate of indemnity; but in summing up they found that W. P. Price and Charles J. Monk were not privy to or cognizant of the corrupt practices which they declared had prevailed extensively at the election of 1859. With regard to Sir R. Carden they were altogether silent. Finally, they reported that "corrupt practices have for a long period prevailed at contested elections for Members to serve in Parliament for the city of Gloucester." What was the remedy which was proposed for this state of things by the Government, or by hon. Gentlemen on the opposite side of the House? The proposals which they had yet heard were confined to making the Corrupt Practices Act more stringent. One hon. and learned Gentleman, the Member for Nottingham (Mr. Mellor) proposed to make bribery a misdemeanour, punishable with imprisonment and hard labour; and another hon. and learned Gentleman (Sir F. Kelly) proposed that if this were insufficient the sentence should be changed to penal servitude. The case of Wakefield likewise went to show that some step on the part of the Legislature was imperatively called for. The freemen, to the extent of some 300 or 400, had been greatly blamed in the Gloucester report—he strongly suspected that the freemen were very often made the scapegoats for the iniquities of other persons; but in the case of Wakefield there could be no such allegation, that borough having been called into existence by the Reform Act of 1832. The Commissioners stated that at the last election Mr. Leatham, the Liberal candidate, spent at least £3,900, of which only £478 passed through the auditor's account, and the rest was disbursed in illegal payments; that Mr. Leatham provided the money with the intention that part of it at least should be employed in bribery and corruption, and that at least between £1,800 and £1,900 was expended in bribery. They found that Mr. Charles-worth, the Conservative candidate, spent £4,150, of which only £652 passed through the auditor's hands, and that £1,600 at least
  776
  was expended in bribery. They also stated that Mr. Charlesworth having provided the fund out of which the bribery, in fact, was afterwards carried on in his behalf, designedly abstained up to the election from inquiring as to the manner in which that fund was being employed, having before the election the means of knowing and good grounds to suspect the manner of its disposal. The Commissioners added that ninety-eight persons were guilty of bribery in respect of the votes of other persons, that eighty-six persons were guilty of bribery in respect of their own votes, and that twelve others were guilty of bribery not on side only, but on both. He thought those twelve men were very likely the most honest men of all. One of the agents gave it as his opinion that with the Ballot, bribery at Wakefield would cease. The Commissioners, however, found that it was generally anticipated by the partizans on both sides, for some time before the election, that recourse would be had to bribery by their respective opponents; and they added—
  "That the fact that bribery was being carried on on both sides was before the election a matter of common notoriety throughout the borough, and excited but a scanty measure of disapprobation even on the parts of those who did not actually join in the work of corruption."
  That was the state of moral feeling at Wakefield just before the election; and he (Mr. Duncombe) wished to know, when it was stated that the fact that bribery was being committed on both sides "excited but a scanty measure of disapprobation" among the upper and middle classes of the inhabitants, how it could be any matter of surprise that the humbler orders should have accepted bribes. The Commissioners found, lastly—
  "Having regard to the length of time before the election at which the preparations for the work of corruption were commenced, to the large proportion (142 out of 866) of the whole constituency engaged in corrupt practices and guilty of bribery, to the number of persons (including fifty-six, themselves electors) who voluntarily joined in the work of offering and giving bribes, to the zeal and skill they exhibited, to the readiness with which their services were received and their acts adopted, to the open way in which bribery was carried on by the canvassers and discussed among all classes, and to the manner in which the voters received and bargained with the canvassers on both sides,—that large numbers of the electors were then not for the first time engaged in the like operations of gross corruption."
  Wakefield was a borough that was called into existence under the Reform Act. The

  777
  House would probably think, with him, that the electors had made up for lost time in not being sooner admitted to the exercise of the franchise, and that in the matter of corruption they were more than a match for some of the older constituencies. He wanted to know what was the remedy of the House for such a state of things. Were they going to make the Corrupt Practices Act more stringent, when they found that, in places such as Wakefield, open and notorious bribery "excited even among the upper and middle classes of the inhabitants but a scanty measure of disapprobation." He submitted that the House ought to have recourse to a measure such as he was now asking for leave to introduce. They might limit its operation to one, two, or three elections; but let them at all events make the experiment. If it failed, they would be only just where they were. But if it succeeded, they would have the satisfaction of knowing that they had checked, if not altogether crushed, that system of bribery and intimidation which was a disgrace to our representative system.
  Motion made, and Question proposed,—
  "That leave be given to bring in a Bill to make provision that, at the Election of Members to serve in Parliament for the City of Gloucester and Borough of Wakefield, the Electors thereof give their Votes by way of Ballot."
  SIR GEORGE LEWIS: A short time ago I had occasion to ask the House to agree to a Motion for not issuing writs to these two boroughs of Gloucester and Wakefield without seven days' notice being previously given. That Motion was agreed to by the House, and the effect of it was that the writs for those two boroughs were to be suspended without due notice was given of the intention to move that they be issued. Upon that Motion some debate ensued. The hon. Gentleman the Member for Birmingham (Mr. Bright) addressed himself generally to the corrupt practices reported to have taken place in those boroughs and expressed an opinion that it would be desirable to punish the electors there with the suspension of their electoral privilege for a certain number of years, or at all events for a single Parliament. I did not express any opinion on that proposal; but the hon. Gentleman the Member for Fins-bury now makes a Motion which in its tendency is diametrically opposed to the suggestion then made. His Motion contemplates the immediate issue of these writs.
  778
  It assumes that the provisional measure taken by the House should not be acted on; that the writs should be issued; that when the elections take place an exceptional mode of voting should be introduced in those two boroughs, and that the votes should be taken secretly, and by way of Ballot. I am not prepared immediately—even if I were favourable to the general plan of voting by Ballot—to give my vote in favour of this narrow and exceptional measure. If the system of secret voting be good, why is it to be applied as a penal measure to those two boroughs exclusively? By the Motion before the House it is distinctly applied as a measure of punishment. ["No, no!"] I will not quarrel about the word "punishment;" but what is the effect of the Motion? It was proposed a short time ago to visit those two boroughs with suspension of the electoral privilege. The hon. Gentleman says, "Don't do that, but apply to them as an exception—not as a general measure, or leading to a general measure—vote by Ballot." If that be not a punishment, it is at all events a visitation upon them. There is great difficulty in distinguishing between this and a penal measure. But if the measure of vote by Ballot is good let it be applied simultaneously all over the country. If, on the other hand, it is to be regarded as something exceptional and penal, do not apply it at once to those two boroughs. Let them be the subjects of a more deliberate investigation, and let us consider whether some other means may not be found of subjecting them to penal consequences. Further, if we consider it as a local and limited remedy, instead of a punishment, is secret voting, even in the view of its more strenuous advocates, fitted for this particular mode of electoral corruption? I have always understood that the particular electoral vice to which the Ballot has been applied, and for which it is now propounded as a remedy, is not bribery but intimidation. [Cries of "Both!"] If the voter could effectually maintain his secret—a point about which I confess I entertain the greatest doubt—the system might lay claim to the merits ascribed to it by its advocates; but we know in that country where the system of voting by ballot has been in operation for the longest time—where it has had the widest trial, and where the institutions and character of the people most resemble that of the people of this country—I mean the United States—has not led to the practical preservation of the secret of the voter. It

  779
  has often been the subject of discussion in this House, and I repeat, that the testimony of all whose opinions and statements are worthy of any consideration, and who have described the state of things in America, has concurred and does concur in affirming that the mode of voting in that country is not a system of secrecy. I defy any Member of this House to produce any valid testimony in contradiction of that position. No doubt the Ballot may get rid of some of the incidents of our system; it may get rid of our poll; it may get rid of the authentic register of votes; but it does not preserve the secrecy of the voter. If it does not do this, can it be contended, with any plausibility, that it will render bribery impossible, or even difficult? We know that in the United States, notwithstanding their larger constituencies, bribery does prevail to a considerable extent, How far the Ballot would be an effectual preventive against intimidation, by far the most plausible and solid ground on which it can be defended is a question we are not now called on to discuss. Intimidation is not reported as one of the prevalent vices at the Wakefield and Gloucester elections. The evil pointed out by the reports of the Commissions was bribery, and I cannot understand, nor did I collect from the speech of the hon Member for Finsbury, how the Ballot would furnish any effectual remedy for bribery. It might, on the contrary, be argued with considerable plausibility that secret voting would render bribery not more difficult, while it would insure impunity to the persons by whom it was committed. But without going into the general question, I think this experiment is inexpedient. If the Ballot is a preservative against bribery and intimidation, are you justified in stopping at two boroughs. If, on the other hand, you wish to deal in an exceptional manner with them and inflict some penalty for their abuse of their electoral privileges as you have done on Sudbury and other places, the success of the present Motion will preclude us hereafter from any proper consideration of the subject, and anticipate the decision the House might come to on this difficult question. I shall give my vote for these reasons against the Motion.
  MR. FRANK CROSSLEYsaid, when the Ballot was proposed as a general measure the right hon. Gentleman had uniformly opposed it. Now they had proposed to limit it to the two worst boroughs among the cases that had come before them; the
  780
  right hon. Gentleman opposed that Motion also, and said, Do not try it on those two bad boroughs alone; apply it generally. But if the right hon. Gentleman had so little faith in the Ballot, why not let them try it in this small way, and see if it would not answer? The right hon. Gentleman was illogical in his argument. If the Ballot were tried on a small scale and did not answer, it would be a stronger argument against applying it generally. There was a Gentleman, a Member of that House, Mr. Childers, who had himself been elected by ballot in Australia, who had filled the office of Chancellor of the Exchequer in Victoria, and who could tell the right hon. Gentleman that it was possible to vote by Ballot with perfect secrecy; and, if a scrutiny should be demanded, it could be shown how every man had voted. ["Oh!"] He could assure those who received this statement with some degree of incredulity that till a scrutiny took place the Ballot vote was quite secret; if a scrutiny was required the secrecy was at an end, and it was known how every man had voted. If hon. Gentlemen were in earnest in condemning bribery and intimidation, they could have no objection to vote with the hon. Member for Finsbury.
  MR. A. MILLSsaid, the perusal of the evidence given before the Wakefield and Gloucester Commissions had convinced him that they would not be justified in trying this experiment. The impression he had derived from their Reports differed widely from that of the hon. Member for Finsbury. The conclusion he drew from the evidence was this, that as long as there were Gentlemen ambitious of becoming Members of Parliament, and yet contented to represent nothing but strong beer and bank notes, no possible law, enactment, or machinery that could be devised by the House of Commons would prevent bribery and corruption at elections. No fact disclosed by the Reports of the Commissions appeared to shake this conclusion. So long as public opinion sanctioned the present system, all attempts to stop bribery would be utterly futile. The only remedy then was in a more elevated state of public feeling. The hon. Member for Finsbury, Mr. T. Duncombe, asked them to try the Ballot in these boroughs as an experiment, but the experiment had been tried; not long ago there was a contested election for the borough of Reigate. There were four or five Liberal candidates, and it was agreed that they should submit their claims to a

  781
  sort of preliminary Ballot of the electors of their party. They did so, and one of the candidates who was rejected by it afterwards published an address to the electors, in which he distinctly stated that irregular and improper means had been resorted to to influence the result and secure the election. The Ballot had been for twenty-four years propounded to Parliament, and had been the subject of eighteen or twenty divisions in the House. It was now sought to apply it in a homoeopathic form—he did not know whether as a remedy or a penalty, but professedly for the purpose of trying whether it would succeed on a large scale. They knew that it had been tried in other countries. The Ballot had produced an iron despotism in France, and had not put an end to intimidation and bribery in the United States. He had been informed by a noble Lord not then in the House (Viscount Bury) that while in America a member of Congress had shown him his poll-book, a large octavo volume, containing the names of 25,000 electors, with a statement of how each man had voted during a period of ten years, and who had remained neutral. That was the system which it was proposed to introduce in this country. With respect to intimidation, public opinion had already wrought a vast change for the better since the days when Mr. Grote first brought this question under the notice of Parliament. In the face of an enlightened public opinion, it now required more courage to intimidate than to resist intimidation. He could only say that if any one would point out to him any country in the world where the system of the Ballot had acted as a preventive of bribery and intimidation he would support it, but until then he should continue to believe that the best remedy for these evils was to be found in a more elevated condition of public opinion.
  MR. ROUPELLsaid, that as one who was present at the Reigate case referred to by the hon. Gentleman who last spoke, he must contend that what then took place merely tended to show that the right system was not tried in the first instance. The Ballot meant secret voting, and anything by which secret voting was not assured was not the Ballot. The first experiment made at Reigate was to send a card to each elector with the names of-all the candidates inscribed thereon, leaving the elector to strike out all but his chosen candidate. But the consequence was, the weakest candidate bought up most of the tickets.
  782
  That was not the Ballot, it was ticket-voting, quite a different thing. A better system was then adopted, that which had been successful in Australia. A card was given to the voter as he entered an outer room, and he wrote upon it the name of the candidate he wished to vote for. [An hon. MEMBER: "Which everybody saw him do."] He was endeavouring to inform the House from what he had himself witnessed, and he could state that this second experiment, wherein the voting was secret, perfectly succeeded, and all the candidates expressed themselves satisfied with the result.
  MR. BENTINCKsaid, it appeared to him that those hon. Members who were strongly opposed to the Ballot must have been highly gratified by the arguments they had heard adduced that evening in favour of the measure. The hon. Gentleman the Member for Finsbury (Mr. T. Duncombe) said that the House must wish to screen bribery and corruption if it did not adopt his proposal. But he (Mr. Bentinck) contended that the adoption of the hon. Member's Motion would be really screening bribery and corruption. The hon. Member said his plan would prevent a repetition of the late bribery and perjury. It might, indeed, prevent perjury, because there would be no means of detecting the bribery. The hon. Member for Finsbury also said that the electors of Gloucester and Wakefield were in favour of the Ballot. Of course they were. They had been proved to be guilty of the grossest venality and corruption, and as a penalty the new writs had been suspended; but the hon. Member wished to give them a period of ten years' uninterrupted enjoyment of their favourite amusement at the expense of any candidates that might offer themselves. Then, the hon. Member said, if his plan succeeded, it would prove the success of the Ballot. It would be sure to succeed, for once the Ballot system was applied to Wakefield and Gloucester the bribery could be carried on without detection! The right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for the Homo Department was wrong in saying that the hon. Member for Finsbury wished to inflict punishment upon those venal electors. On the contrary, it was a reward which he would bestow upon them. Upon a former occasion he (Mr. Bentinck) had stated, when the Ballot had been brought under the consideration of the House by the hon. Gentleman the Member for Bristol (Mr. H. Berkeley) that

  783
  the result of the adoption of the Motion would be to prevent the detection of bribery, and he had suggested that the Bill of the hon. Gentleman should be called "a Bill to prevent the detection of bribery." He had never heard any advocate of the Ballot grapple with this question—how they were to detect or prevent bribery under the system of the Ballot, He wished also to call the attention of the House to the high authority of the noble Lord the Secretary for Foreign Affairs, whom he was sorry not to see in his place on the present occasion. That noble Lord followed him in the debate to which he alluded, and, as he found him reported in Hansard, he said he was convinced the argument of the hon. Member for West Norfolk was correct, that under the Ballot candidates would be found to offer £1,000 or £2,000 for their election, without inquiring how it was spent, and that thus more corruption would exist than before. That was the opinion expressed by the noble Lord on that occasion, and he only regretted that he was not present to add his powerful voice in favour of the same view now. But he (Mr. Bentinck) would like to ask whether the House, as at present constituted, was in a condition to take up this question with clean hands? He would like to ask whether there was more guilt in a poor and ignorant man who took £5 for his vote, or in some great and distinguished Statesman, who, abandoning all his former principles, acquired by gross acts of political tergiversation and political profligacy a place in the direction of the affairs of the country with a salary of £5,000 a year. [Cries of "Name."] Name! Why, their name was legion. It appeared to him the poor man only added a unit to swell the majority at a contested election, but that the distinguished public character to whom he had adverted, and who was guilty of the acts he had named, deceived and betrayed millions of his fellow-citizens who, by their confidence in his integrity and the principles he professed had elevated him to the position in which he was enabled to betray them. Was such a man as this fit to sit in judgment on the poor and ignorant fellow who accepted £5 for his vote? Why, it seemed to him very much as if a tiger that had destroyed human life, and ravaged flocks and herds, were to sit in judgment on the predatory habits of a mouse. But is long as the tigers were allowed to rang with impunity, it seemed to him that the mice must be let alone. He would offer
  784
  one other suggestion. The hon. Member for Finsbury was fond of trying experiments. He brought forward this measure avowedly by way of experiment, which, if it succeeded, was to be more widely extended. Now, he would suggest to the hon. Member whether it would not be better to try the experiment upon themselves at first; and he would venture to suggest to the hon. Gentleman that he should bring in a Motion which he (Mr. Bentinck) would be happy to support, that they should test the advantages of vote by Ballot in that House by taking a division by Ballot whether it would be advisable this year to deal with the question of Reform. He thought that would be a very fair way of testing the experiment, and he believed the results of it would somewhat startle the hon. Member for Birmingham and his friends. The proposal of the hon. Gentleman (Mr. Duncombe) was so monstrous that the House could not entertain it, for it would, in fact, confer a reward, where the wish was to inflict a punishment.
  MR. BONHAM-CARTERsaid, he would not have troubled the House on this occasion, but for the circumstance that, in the year 1853, he had himself made a similar proposition to the House. He did not think the measure had been fairly characterized by the hon. Gentleman who had just sat down. For himself, he considered the proposition wise, just, and temperate. For years they had had a series of beliefs, convictions, and speculations upon this subject, and in the present Session six or seven different ways for dealing with the evil complained of had been proposed. Every hon. Member had his own idea as to the best mode of curing the evil. Some proposed to do so by declarations, some by penal enactments, some by the general adoption of the Ballot, and some by the moderate measure now before the House; but all seemed anxious to find means by which they might set themselves right not only before this country, but before the eyes of Europe. As to the Home Secretary's argument upon the result of the Ballot in America, the voting there was entirely devoid of secrecy, and they could draw no analogy between that which was an open act and that which his hon. Friend (Mr. Duncombe) was trying to render a secret one. The Home Secretary had not once alluded to the successful operation of the Ballot in our own colony of Australia, He was sorry

  785
  to find that an hon. Member who was elected by the Ballot in Australia, was not present to give the testimony of his experience to the House; but he (Mr. Bonham-Carter) had had an opportunity of speaking the other day with a gentleman who lately held office in Australia—who was, in the first instance, an opponent of the Ballot, but who told him that its influence was very great in preserving order and quiet on the day of election. And this was no small matter. They all knew that it was about half-past three in the afternoon of the polling days that the Blue Lions and the Green Lambs congregated together, and watched when the poll was running close. But by the Ballot they could not tell how the poll was going, and there would, therefore, be no temptation to hold back their votes for the chance of disposing of them at the last minute for, perhaps, £40 or £50 a piece. Then it was said that the Ballot would prevent the detection of bribery. But that was a mistake. It was not necessary to know how a man voted in order to convict the briber, for even under the present system men were found to vote both ways; and it was the corrupt offer that constituted the crime, not the vote in consequence of the offer. Then it was argued that this measure must either be a reward or a punishment. He held that it was neither, but a remedy; and in considering the remedy proposed, the House ought not to forget the number of those electors who gave their votes honestly and fairly, and who sincerely regretted the existence of this corruption. Parliament should lose no opportunity of preventing the corrupt minority from overriding the opinions of the honest majority, and should put every difficulty in the way of their receiving bribes. He did not believe that the Ballot was a panacea for every possible evil that existed; but it would be of use in restraining both intimidation and bribery, and the House would do wisely and safely in giving leave to introduce this Bill. He wished it to be tried as an experiment, and he believed that if it had been tried in 1853, the question would not be under discussion now.
  VISCOUNT PALMERSTON: I wish to state, in a very few words, the reasons why I shall not be able to vote for the Motion of my hon. Friend. I have always opposed the Ballot on general principles. Upon former occasions I have stated at sufficient length the grounds upon which I think that, instead of being an improve-
  786
  ment in our electoral system, it would, on the contrary, tend to demoralize and to degrade our national character in the performance of important constitutional functions. I cannot, therefore, agree with my hon. Friend, in applying as a remedy that which I think is in itself an evil. We know very well that a poison administered in very small doses sometimes cures disease, but I do not think this kind of application will be at all adapted to the evil which my hon. Friend wishes to correct. And if I were disposed to acquiesce in any plausible proposal for the partial and local application of that to which upon general grounds I objected, any such disposition would be removed by the candour or the indiscretion of my hon. Friend, who, in reading that valuable communication received by him from one of the candidates at the last election, said that, if he could only now introduce the thin end of the wedge, it would do more to forward the cause of the Ballot generally than ten years of incessant agitation. That forms a perfectly good reason why my hon. Friend, who is a sincere advocate of the Ballot, should recommend the Motion which he has made to-night; but he will admit that it forms an equally good reason why I, entertaining different opinions on the general principle, should resist his Motion. Again, with regard to the effect which this measure would be calculated to have in the prevention of bribery, I must say that in my opinion there is another circumstance which my hon. Friend mentioned which shows that, so far from correcting the evil of which he complains, the operation of this Bill would be to generalize it. My hon. Friend, in the course of his speech, read an extract from the report of the Commissioners, which stated tha teight electors had been bribed by both sides. [Several hon. MEMBERS: Twelve]. Well, that makes my case so much the stronger, for if under a system of open voting, which compels every elector to declare for whom he desires that his vote should be recorded, men are found who are bribed by both the opposing candidates, you would, under a system of secret voting, have 100 electors who would be so bribed. In fact, all those electors who were disposed to take bribes would present themselves to each of the opposing candidates at an election, or communicate with each by means of an agent, would accept of a bribe from each, and would have no difficulty, at the same time, in promising to vote for both. After the

  787
  election was over the same men would go to the successful candidate and make a merit of having given the vote for which they were paid. Now, in the case of open voting, the bad faith of those twelve electors to whom my hon. Friend alluded, became notorious, and thus far a check was imposed upon others—their number might be 1,2000—who, if a system of secret voting were established, would be quite ready to accept bribes from both parties. I shall not now enter into the general question of the merits or demerits of voting in secret; but, as the subject of the mode of voting in America has been alluded to in the course of the discussion, I may be permitted to observe that, frequently as the expediency of adopting the Ballot has in former years been pressed upon the consideration of the House of Commons, upon the ground of its existence in America, the example of America in this respect has not of late been very particularly relied upon by the supporters of the measure. The truth is, it has been discovered that the system which prevails in America of voting by Ballot is not secret voting, and the advocates of the Ballot have thrown overboard that system, and call upon us to establish in this country one of a different character. I am, however, prepared to maintain that you cannot establish here a system of secret voting unless you make a man liable to a penalty who discloses the way in which he happens to have voted. Any such proposal, therefore, as that which my hon. Friend has made, in order to be effectual, must not be simply permissive, and would, therefore, deserve to be characterized—as my right hon. Friend the Secretary for the Home Department has justly said—as a penal measure. It is, at all events, perfectly clear that if a vote given in secret may—and, as a matter of course, does—become matter of general notoriety, the arguments in favour of secret voting at once fall to the ground, and that in resorting to the Ballot you are only taking a roundabout way of perpetuating that publicity which now exists. For these reasons I feel it to be my duty to oppose the Motion under the consideration of the House.
  MR. CHILDERS:* Sir, I have been in the course of this debate so pointedly appealed to by the hon. Member for Winchester (Mr. Bonham-Carter), and by my hon. Friend the Member for the West Riding (Mr. Crossley), that I cannot refuse, even at this late hour, to give the
  788
  House some information relative to the nature and working of the Ballot in Australia. At the same time I must throw myself upon the indulgence of hon. Members, not only because I now for the first time address them, but because until within the last half hour I had no idea that I should be called upon to do so. I trust that I shall receive that generous forbearance which, under similar circumstances, has been so often granted; and I anticipate it the more confidently because in the few remarks which I intend to make I shall confine myself to facts within my own personal experience.
  Ever since the first concession of representative institutions to Australia, vote by Ballot had been one of the measures of reform, agitated in the Colonies and their Legislatures. It was not, however, until the eve of the introduction of what is called "Responsible" or Parliamentary Government, that it met with general advocacy. About that time public attention was directed to the corrupt practices which there, as in this country, too frequently attended Parliamentary elections. The prevailing evil was not so much intimidation as bribery. In a comparatively new country, without a landed aristocracy, and with greater facilities for personal independence than are found among our poorer voters, intimidation was, as might be expected, comparatively rare. Indeed, the only undue influence which was feared to any extent came rather from below than from above. But bribery and treating, in the vulgar forms in which we know them, were rife in the town constituencies; and to check them and at the same time to reduce the excitement and expense of contested elections, the Ballot was proposed. The first colony that took up the question was Victoria, and as I was at the time a Member of the Legislative Council, I think the House will permit me to give some details as to its introduction and machinery in that colony.
  The Ballot was not in Victoria as in England exclusively advocated by the popular or liberal party, and opposed by conservatives. On the contrary, some of its most strenuous advocates sat on the conservative side of the house, and unquestionably its most formidable opponents were the leaders of the extreme democratic party. And to this, I think, much of its success is due. For not being a party measure, its details were honestly discussed and settled by the ablest men

  789
  in the house; and if it is not perfect in its operation, at any rate it is consistent and simple. But before I explain to you, Sir, what it is, I will tell you what it is not In the first place it is not the American Ballot. There is, I think, no greater popular delusion than that the Ballot in America has generally had for either its object or its result secrecy in voting. It was really established not for secrecy but for speed. With frequent elections, not only to the Legislatures, but to offices of all kinds; with almost if not quite universal suffrage; and without those means which we in an older country have for fairly proportioning the number of booths to voters, oral voting was impracticable, and it became absolutely necessary to devise a more expeditious machinery. This was called Ballot; and, although in a few States, and within the last few years, secret, as distinguished from open, Ballot has been proposed and even put in practice, these are only exceptions, and the change is not, so far as I can learn, likely to be generally adopted. This open or American Ballot then, as giving no protection to the voter, was not established in Victoria.
  Nor, Sir, on the other hand, did any of those systems, which Mr. Grote used to offer for the consideration of this House, meet with favour in Australia. For they all appeared to us open to the objection, that they would afford encouragement to personation and to the recording, without remedy, of bad votes. I believe that no plan had ever been proposed in this country which admitted of a scrutiny on petition before an Election Committee. The vote once given, however bad it might be, the mischief was done; and whether the voter were convicted of personation or bribery, or for any other cause were proved incapable to elect, as there was no means of ascertaining how his vote was cast, so it could not be struck off. We felt, Sir, that with an extended suffrage, and consequently increased facilities for personation, under whatever system we might establish, the evil would be greatly aggravated under the Ballot in its usual form; and we, therefore, by a very large majority, decided to reject that form.
  But we did introduce a machinery obnoxious to neither of the evils to which I have alluded. And I will now describe it to the House: premising that in every other respect, as to the registration of voters, as to nominations, the regulation of expenses and petitions, elections in Aus-
  790
  tralia are conducted almost exactly on the English model. After the nomination, the returning officer sends to a public officer—I think the Clerk of the Peace—a requisition for a number of voting papers equal to that of voters on the roll. On the face of each paper is printed a list of the candidates, with instructions to the voter to strike off those for whom he does not poll; and on the back the returning officer signs his name. When the elector comes up to vote, and after the usual questions have been put to him, the returning officer writes at the back of a voting paper the number of the elector on the roll, and hands it to him. The voter takes the paper to a table, not overlooked by the poll clerks or the public, and after erasing the necessary number of names, folds it, brings it back, and drops it into the ballot box in front of the returning officer. At the close of the poll the box is opened, and the voting papers are, in the presence of the scrutineers, unfolded by the returning officer, placed on their backs so that the numbers cannot be seen, and the result is recorded. They are then sealed up in a separate packet, and sent to the clerk of the Parliaments with the return, and with two other packets containing respectively the unused and informal papers; and until an Election Committee orders the seals to be broken, every vote is protected by the most complete secrecy. Even then no vote is ascertained, unless the voter's name he included in the scrutiny list as objected to. I think, Sir, that my hon. Friend the Member for the West Riding most correctly described this process as one combining perfect secrecy with a simple means of testing any vote, in the event of a scrutiny.
  And what, Sir, has been the result? That I conceive to be the real question, and indeed the only one which would justify my addressing you this evening. Why, by the common consent of almost every public man who has seen its working, the Ballot has been thoroughly successful. It came into operation in the year 1856, when I was myself elected under its provisions. I cannot speak to the number of elections in other Colonies; but in Victoria I understand that about 200 have taken place since that time. They have been distinguished by the almost entire absence of those practices which were previously so prevalent. I believe that in only two cases have petitions been presented, complaining of illegal returns. Not that it is more difficult to proceed on petition there than here, for as I have ex-

  791
  plained, the voter can always be connected with his vote before an Election Committee, and in other respects the proceedings are identical with ours in England. In one of these cases the member was accused of treating, and he was unseated. In the other, I think, some two or three voters were bribed; and this also was proved without difficulty. There was also at the last general election a complaint of intimidation; and this undoubtedly existed, and arose from the notorious and deep-seated religious animosity in a rural district between the Roman Catholics and Presbyterians, which no system of voting could have concealed or suppressed. But, as a whole, elections have been conducted with a regularity and quiet altogether unknown before; and this in a population far more excitable, and during the agitation of questions far more exciting, than you have in this country.
  I admit, Sir, that the Ballot has its weak points. I have no wish to conceal from the House what I have myself observed to its disadvantage, and I will state them to you candidly. It is unfavourable to candidates against whom local or private prejudices exist, prejudices which, with open voting, would he often concealed; and it unquestionably works better in a constituency represented by one than by more members. In the latter case, as the state of the poll is not known through the day, decided partizans of individual candidates are induced to plump rather than to vote for the whole list of their own party, when it is expected that the contest will be close; although with open voting they might have no reason, and indeed would be ashamed, to do so. I remember that at the first election for the city of Melbourne under the Ballot, although there were ten candidates and five members to be returned, the average number of votes given by each elector was barely over two. By this defect less prominent men are frequently placed at a disadvantage when standing with leaders, although their party may have a small majority on the roll; an inconvenience easily cured by subdividing the electoral districts and giving to none more than one, or at most two, members. But on the other band, and for precisely the same reason, the Ballot altogether puts a stop to what I will call afternoon bribery. I allude to what many borough Members, who have had the misfortune of being engaged in a close contest, must know well,—the temptation to bribe arising from organizations of corrupt electors, who at two, three, or
  792
  half-past three o'clock in the afternoon, offer themselves to the best bidder at prices which rise as the poll approaches its close, This the Ballot manifestly intends to stop; for as the state of the poll cannot be known through the day, a vote is as valuable at half-past eight in the morning as at half-past three in the afternoon; and in practice it has been found, that by thus removing all the food for excitement, and by reducing the value of unpolled votes, bribery, on the day of polling, at least, becomes useless and obsolete. In this respect the success of the Ballot in Australia is unquestioned by its most determined opponents.
  I trust, Sir, that I have now shown you that the Ballot is not so impracticable as the hon. Member opposite confidently informed us; but I would, in conclusion, venture to allude to the special case under discussion. I take it that the constituencies of Gloucester and Wakefield have, in fact, committed political suicide. Like many instances, which will at once occur to you, of men highly distinguished in politics or science, whose better principles have been momentarily overthrown by some morbid over-excitement, these two boroughs have been brought down, by a small and corrupt minority in their bodies corporate, to the disgrace and the political death which has now justly overtaken them. They lie, as it were, on our dissecting table; and it is for us to deal with them as we think fit. Whether or not the Ballot be un-English and degrading, so far at any rate as their interests are concerned, we need not determine. But if, as I have endeavoured to show, the Ballot may be and has-been carried out in a British community, and by the side of British institutions, not only without mischief, but with the most perfect success; if the evils which were predicted of it have been unknown, and the good which it was designed to bring about has been accomplished; then I say it becomes our duty, in the interest of society and of our constitution, to test by experiment, under our own eyes, this problem in political science, which cannot in any other way be satisfactorily solved. When the advocates of the Ballot, instead of demanding it for universal adoption, generously offer to abide by the result of its trial on such constituencies as Gloucester and Wakefield, it is, I will not say unjust, but impolitic in its opponents to decline the experiment. For my part, I hope the House will agree to give practical appli-

  793
  cation to a principle which is dear, not only to the greater part of those who sit on this side, but to the majority of the people; and I shall therefore give the Motion of the hon. Member for Finsbury my most cordial support.
  SIR JOHN SHELLEYappealed to the Government, after the speech they had just heard, showing the entire success of the ballot in Australia, to withdraw their opposition to a Motion which was supported by the Liberal party in that House. Everything said by the Home Secretary had been contradicted by what had fallen from the hon. Member for Pontefract (Mr. Childers).
  MR. T. DUNCOMBEreplied, he was sure the House felt exceedingly indebted to the hon. Member for Pontefract for the very able and interesting statement he had made in reference to the Ballot, and he personally begged to thank him for the valuable support he had given to his Motion. With regard to the argument of the noble Lord at the head of the Government, he had only to say that he put this forward as an experiment, and nothing else. He wanted the experiment to be tried, and he used the expression of one of the candidates for Gloucester when he said that he wanted to get in the thin edge of the wedge, hoping that he would soon be able to drive it home. Great measures were not carried in a day. They must proceed by slow degrees. It was thus they carried Jewish emancipation. It was by taking Baron Rothschild from behind the bar and placing him in one of their Committees and to meet the Peers in conference that they were enabled to convince all rational men that the contest was at an end, and the result was, they had now four hon. and distinguished Members of the Jewish persuasion representing in that House large and important constituencies, while the British constitution and the Established Church, which it was said would perish the day a Jew took his seat, stood exactly where they were; and so it would be with their representative system after the Ballot was introduced. Its effect would be equally harmless.
  Question put.
  The House divided:—Ayes 118; Noes 149: Majority 31.

  List of the AYES.

  Adam, W. P.

  Baines, E.

  Alcock, T.

  Bass, M. T.

  Atherton, W.

  Baxter, W. E.

  794

  Bazley, T.

  MacEvoy, E.

  Beale, S.

  Marjoribanks, D. C.

  Bellew, R. M.

  Marshall, W.

  Biddulph, Col.

  Martin, P. W.

  Biggs, J.

  Mellor, J.

  Black, A.

  Merry, J.

  Bonham-Carter, J.

  Mitchell, T. A.

  Brocklehurst, J.

  Monson, hon. W. J.

  Buller, Sir A. W.

  Morris, D.

  Campbell, hon. W. F.

  Napier, Sir C.

  Childers, H. C. E.

  Noble, J. W.

  Clay, J.

  Norris, J. T.

  Clifford, C. C.

  North, F.

  Clive, G.

  O'Brien, P.

  Collier, R. P.

  Osborne, R. B.

  Craufurd, E. H. J.

  Paget, C.

  Crawford, R. W.

  Paxton, Sir J.

  Crook, J.

  Pease, H.

  Crossley, F.

  Peto, Sir S. M.

  Dalglish, R.

  Pilkington, J.

  Davey, R.

  Pollard-Urquhart, W.

  Deasy, R.

  Redmond, J. E.

  Douglas, Sir C.

  Robertson, D.

  Duke, Sir J.

  Roebuck, J. A.

  Ellice, E. (St. Andrews).

  Rothschild, Baron L. de

  Esmonde, J.

  Rothschild, Baron M. de

  Ewin, H. E. C.

  Roupell, W.

  Ferguson, Col.

  Russell, A.

  FitzGerald.rt. hn. J.D.

  St. Aubyn, J.

  Foley, Henry W.

  Salomons, Mr. Ald.

  Forster, C.

  Salt, T.

  Freeland, H.W.

  Scholefield, W.

  Gavin, Major

  Scott, Sir W.

  Gibson, rt. hon. T. M.

  Scully, V.

  Gifford, Earl

  Seymour, Sir M.

  Goldsmid, Sir F. H.

  Seymour, W. D.

  Gower, hon. F. L.

  Shelley, Sir J. V.

  Hadfield, G.

  Smith, J. B.

  Hankey, T.

  Smith, Augustus

  Hanmer, Sir J.

  Stansfeld, J.

  Hennessy, J. P.

  Sullivan, M.

  Ingram, H.

  Sykes, Col. W. H.

  Jackson, W.

  Talbot, C. R. M.

  James, E.

  Tite, W.

  Kershaw, J.

  Tollemache, hon. F. J.

  Kinglake, A. W.

  Trelawny, Sir J. S.

  Kinglake, J. A.

  Villiers, rt. hn. C. P.

  Kinnaird. hon. A. F.

  Vivian, H. H.

  KnatchbullHugessen, E.

  Watkins, Col. L.

  Laing, S.

  Westhead, J. P. B.

  Langston, J. H.

  Whalley, G. H.

  Lanigan, J.

  Wickham, H. W.

  Laslett, W.

  Williams, W.

  Lawson, W.

  Wyld, J.

  Leatham, E. A.

  Lindsay, W. S.

  TELLERS.

  Locke, John

  Duncombe, T.

  M'Cann, J.

  Ayrton, A. S.

  List of the NOES.

  Archdall, Capt, M.

  Browne, Lord J. T.

  Baillie, H. J.

  Bruce, Major C.

  Baring, T.

  Burghley, Lord

  Barrow, W. H.

  Carnac, Sir J. R.

  Bathurst, A. A.

  Cartwright, Col.

  Beecroft, G. S.

  Cave, S.

  Bentinck, G. W. P.

  Cavendish, Lord G.

  Bentinck, G. C.

  Cecil, Lord R.

  Blackburn, P.

  Clinton, Lord R.

  Botfield, B.

  Close, M. C.

  Bridges, Sir B. W.

  Codrington, Sir W.

  Brooks, R.

  Cole, hon. Col.

  795

  Collins, T.

  Mackie, J.

  Denman, hon. G.

  Martin, J.

  Dickson, Col.

  Matheson, A.

  Disraeli, rt. hon. B.

  Miller, T. J.

  Du Cane, C.

  Montagu, Lord R.

  Duncombe, hon. W. E.

  Morgan, O.

  Dunne, Col.

  Mowbray, rt. hon. J. R.

  Edwards, Major

  Mure, D.

  Elmley, Visct.

  Naas, Lord

  Elphinstone, Sir J. D.

  Northcote, Sir S. H.

  Estcourt, rt. hn.T.H.S.

  Packe, G. H.

  Ferguson, Sir R. A.

  Pakington, rt. hon.Sir J.

  Filmer, Sir E

  Palk, L.

  Finlay, A. S.

  Palmerston, Visct.

  Forde, Col.

  Papillon, P. O.

  Forster, Sir G.

  Parker, Major W.

  Foster, W. O.

  Patten, Col. W.

  Gard, R. S.

  Paull, H.

  Garnett, W. J.

  Peacocke, G. M. W.

  Gaskell, J. M.

  Philipps, J. H.

  George, J.

  Powys, P. L.

  Gladstone, C.

  Puller, C. W. G.

  Goff, T. W.

  Quinn, P.

  Gordon, C. W.

  Repton, G. W. J.

  Gore, J. R. O.

  Ridley, Sir M. W.

  Gray, Capt.

  Rogers, J. J.

  Grogan, Sir E.

  Sclater-Booth, G.

  Haliburton, T. C.

  Selwyn, C. J.

  Hardy, G.

  Seymer, H. K.

  Hartopp, E. B.

  Shirley, E. P.

  Henley, rt. hon. J. W.

  Sibthorp, Major

  Herbert, Col. P.

  Smith, Montagu

  Hervey, Lord A.

  Smith, Abel

  Hood, Sir A. A.

  Smith, S. G.

  Hope, G. W.

  Smollett, P. B.

  Hopwood, J. T.

  Spooner, R.

  Horsfall, T. B.

  Stanhope, J. B.

  Hotham, Lord

  Steuart, A.

  Howard, hon. C. W. G.

  Stewart, Sir M. R. S.

  Howes, E.

  Sturt, H. G.

  Hume, W. W. F.

  Taylor, Col.

  Hunt, G. W.

  Tempest, Lord A. V.

  Jermyn, Earl

  Thompson, H. S.

  Johnstone, hon. H. B.

  Thynne, Lord E.

  Jolliffe, rt. hon. Sir W. G. H.

  Thynne, Lord H.

  Tollemache, J.

  Kekewich, S. T

  Torrens, R.

  Kelly, Sir F.

  Trefusis, hon. C. H. R.

  Kendall, N.

  Valletort, Visct.

  King, J. K.

  Vance, J.

  Knatchbull, W. F.

  Vandeleur, Col.

  Knox, Col.

  Vansittart, W.

  Lacon, Sir E.

  Vernon, L. V.

  Leeke, Sir H.

  Walker, J. R.

  Lefroy, A.

  Walsh, Sir J.

  Legh, W. J.

  Watlington, J. W. P.

  Leighton, Sir B.

  Winnington, Sir T. E.

  Lewis, rt. hon. Sir G. C.

  Wise, J. A.

  Liddell, hon. H. G.

  Wood, rt. hon. Sir C.

  Longfield, R.

  Wyndham, hon. H.

  Lopes, Sir M.

  Wynn, Col.

  Lovaine, Lord

  Lyall, G.

  TELLERS.

  Lygon, hon. F.

  Mills, A.

  Macaulay, K.

  Gurdon, B.

  THE FINANCIAL STATEMENT.
  VISCOUNT PALMERSTONsaid, that perhaps it would be convenient that he should inform the House that he had that evening received a communication from his
  796
  right hon. Friend, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who stated that he felt perfectly competent to be in his place tomorrow and make his financial statement.

CONVEYANCE OF VOTERS, &c.

  LEAVE.
  MR. COLLIERsaid, he rose to move for leave to bring in a Bill to prohibit the payment of the expenses of conveying voters to the poll, and to facilitate polling at elections. The provisions of the Bill he proposed to introduce were the same as those of the measure he had brought in last Session, and as that Bill had been read a second time in the last Parliament by a large majority, it was not necessary for him to make a long statement to the House. The state of the law on the subject was that it was lawful to convey a voter to the poll, but it was bribery if money was given for his conveyance. This state of things was clearly absurd, and it was clear that they must either make the payment of these travelling expenses, including the conveyance of voters to the poll, absolutely legal or illegal. He trusted the House would permit him to introduce the Bill and to proceed with it at no distant period. He believed it would have a tendency to insure the purity of elections, or, at all events, do away with some clear and manifest evils of which everybody complained.
  MR. COLLINSsaid, he did not rise to oppose the introduction of the Bill, but to deny the statement of the hon. and learned Gentleman that the payment to voters themselves of the expense of their conveyance to the poll was bribery under the Corrupt Practices Act. The Huddersfield Committee decided last Session that such payment, though it might be a misdemeanour, was not bribery within the meaning of the statute. He should oppose the second reading of the Bill.
  MR. PEASEsaid, that to prohibit candidates in counties from conveying voters to the poll would practically disfranchise many poor electors in outlying districts. He hoped, therefore, that the Bill would be narrowly watched by county Members.
  MR. JOHN LOCKEremarked, that whatever the decision of the Huddersfield Committee might have been, the Courts at Westminster had declared that to pay the voters themselves the expense of their conveyance to the poll was bribery.
  MR. DARBY GRIFFITHSsaid, he had

  797
  a great respect for the Courts at Westminster, but their decisions could not affect what was the end and object of bribery—a seat in that House The decision of the Huddersfield Committee on the contrary. was one of a practical character, and, therefore, entitled to considerable weight.
  LORD JOHN BROWNEexpressed the hope that candidates in counties would not be prevented from conveying voters to the poll.
  MR. BOOTHsuggested that some provision should be made for multiplying polling places.
  MR. COLLIERstated that a clause to that effect formed part of the Bill.
  MR. LIDDELLsaid, that this was the third measure for reform of the representation in one shape or another that had been introduced that evening by private Members; and he doubted whether, seeing that the Government were about to introduce a general measure of Parliamentary Reform, the former exercised a wise discretion in bringing forward Bills dealing with small parts of the subject.
  Leave given.
  Bill to prohibit the payment of the Expenses of conveying Voters to the Poll, and to facilitate polling at Elections, ordered to be brought in by Mr. COLLIER, Mr. MELLOR, and Mr. BAINES.

SPIRITS (IRELAND) ACT AMENDMENT BILL.

  SECOND READING.
  Order for Second Reading.read.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a second time."
  Notice taken, that Forty Members were not present; House counted; and Forty Members not being present,
  House adjourned at a quarter after Twelve.