Commons Sitting of 27 May 1870

MINUTES.
NEW WRIT ISSUED—For Leicester County (Southern Division), v. Viscount CurZon, now Earl Howe.
SELECT COMMITTEE—Report—Thames Navigation [No. 258].
PUBLIC BILLS—Second Reading—Vaccination Act (1867) Amendment [126].
Committee—Burials (re-comm.) [123]—R.P.

RESIGNATION OF CLERICAL DIGNITARIES.

  QUESTION.
  SIR MASSEY LOPESsaid, he would beg to ask the First Lord of the Treasury, Whether he does not consider that the provisions of the Bishops' Resignation Bill of last Session might not with great advantage be extended to the other dignitaries, as well as to the Beneficed Clergy of the Established Church generally, who either from infirmity or other physical disability are unable effectively to discharge their duties?
  MR. GLADSTONE: In answer, Sir, to the hon. Baronet, I have to say that I think it would not be possible to extend the Bill of last Session, which was intended for Bishops only, to other dignitaries and clergy of the Established Church, because their case, from the nature of the patronage to be exercised, and especially from its marketable character, offers considerable difficulties that do not occur in the case of Bishops. Therefore, I think a measure on the subject would require a great deal of care in the framing of it. But certainly, as far as my opinion goes, I agree with

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  what appears to be indicated in the Question of the hon. Baronet, and I think that a Bill to provide, under proper conditions, for the retirement of beneficed clergy and dignitaries unable effectively to discharge their duties would be of great advantage to the Church.

CANADA—THE FENIAN CONSPIRACY.

  QUESTION.
  MR. WHALLEYsaid, he wished to ask the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies, with reference to the Fenian raid on Canada, Whether the Government have in their possession, and if so, are prepared to consent to the publication of any documents or written information calculated to throw light upon the origin and nature of the Fenian conspiracy, either in the United Kingdom, in the Colonies, or in America, and especially as to any purpose or design other than that of an Independent Republic in Ireland; and, whether the Government are informed of any connection between this Canadian raid and the recent Fenian demonstration in support of the Red River Rebellion?
  MR. MONSELL,in reply, said, he must beg to point out that the first part of the Question ought to have been addressed to the Secretary of State for the Home Department. His right hon. Friend, however, had authorized him to state that Her Majesty's Government were not in possession of any information on the subject which they thought it for the public interest to lay before the House. As to the second branch of the Question, he begged to inform the hon. Gentleman that the Government had no information of the existence of any connection between the Fenian raid and the Red River rebellion.

WATER SUPPLY IN THE METROPOLIS.

  QUESTION.
  MR. WHALLEYsaid, he would beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to the recommendation of the Royal Commissioners, that the supply of Water in the metropolis should be on the system of constant instead of intermittent supply, Whether it is the intention of the Government to adopt any and what measures, with a view to giving effect to such recommendation?
  MR. BRUCEsaid, in reply, that the recommendation of the Royal Commissioners went much further than the mere question of an intermittent or constant supply of water. They proposed that the task of supplying water should be transferred from the private companies to a central body, and that every householder should be obliged to take water on condition of being supplied constantly. Now, in order to give effect to the recommendations of the Commission it seemed necessary to create a central authority for the metropolis. He had been in communication with the Metropolitan Board of Works on the subject, and having given to it all the attention in his power it appeared to him that this measure could not be properly carried into effect unless in connection with the measures for creating a general government for the metropolis.

ELEMENTARY EDUCATION BILL.

  QUESTION.
  SIR GEORGE GREYsaid, he wished to ask the Vice President of the Council, Whether, in addition to the Amendments of which he has given Notice for the Committee on the Elementary Education Bill, it is his intention to propose any alteration in the 14th and 22nd Clauses of the Bill as to the religious instruction which may be given in schools supported or aided out of local rates?
  MR. W. E. FORSTER: In reply, Sir, to my right hon. Friend I may say that it is not the intention of the Government to anticipate the discussions of the Committee on the Education Bill by proposing any Amendment of importance beyond those I put on the Table of the House last evening. Those Amendments were in fulfilment of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister's promise at the close of the debate on the second reading. That debate seemed to show that the clauses of the Bill were by some hon. Members supposed not to fully carry out two important principles which we had always intended to embody in it—namely, the most complete protection of the conscientious scruples or feelings of the parent, and the utmost possible security that the Boards which have to deal with the education of the children should be freely elected by the parents. We have therefore re-placed sub-section 3 of Clause 7, which is the

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  Conscience Clause of the Bill, by a self-working time-table clause, and we have secured that, in the election of the Vestry School Boards, there should be no plural voting and that there should be Ballot. We are well aware that there are other clauses of the Bill, by which important questions are raised; not merely that most important Question referred to by my right hon. Friend—namely, the religious instruction which may be given in schools supported or aided out of local rates, but also other important questions to which I need not now allude. We are, also, well aware that upon these questions there will be much difference of opinion, and in a constructive measure of this kind it would, indeed, be curious were this not the case; but we have thought it the best course to put these clauses of the Bill before the Committee as they now stand, in order that hon. Members may fairly judge the reasons which have actuated us in framing them. At the same time, I hardly need add, that it is also our intention most carefully to consider all the Amendments which may be advanced and all the arguments which may be used in support of those Amendments. With regard to the special Question raised by my right hon. Friend, I may remind him that though the Amendments I tabled last night are not directly upon Clauses 14 or 22, yet they affect the meaning of those clauses. The Bill contemplates three descriptions of schools—schools aided out of the taxes, but receiving no aid from the rates; schools provided by the School Boards, and under their control; and schools aided out of the rates, but not under the control of the School Boards. Clause 14 relates to the rate-provided schools, and Clause 22 to those that are simply rate-aided; but Clause 7 relates to all three descriptions of schools. I merely mention this in order that hon. Members, and especially those hon. Members who have put Amendments on the Notice Paper with regard to Clauses 14 and 22, may consider how far their views are affected by our Amendments of Clause 7. I may add that though, for these reasons, I am not empowered by the Government to put any further important Amendments on the Notice Paper, I shall probably have to give Notice, a day or two before we go into Committee, of some unimportant Amendments, chiefly formal
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  and verbal; and I hope to take the opportunity of putting on some fresh clauses with regard to compulsory sites for schools, in accordance with the statement of my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, in his speech on the Bill brought forward by my hon. Friend the Member for Denbighshire (Mr. Osborne Morgan).

HALFPENNY CARD POSTAGE.

  QUESTION.
  DR. LYON PLAYFAIRsaid, he would beg to ask the Postmaster General, Whether the Government have come to any resolution in regard to the establishment of a Halfpenny Card Postage, a Memorial in favour of this having been some time since presented to the Postmaster General, supported by the signatures of Members of Parliament, of mayors and merchants of many towns in the United Kingdom, of members of learned societies, and of a large number of officers of Volunteers?
  THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTON: Sir, I am very glad to say that the Government have decided, in conjunction with the reduction of postage on newspapers and printed matter, to adopt a halfpenny card postage—that is to say, cards will be issued bearing a halfpenny card stamp, on one side of which an address will be written, and on the other any communication whether in writing or in print. We believe that this will be a great accommodation to the public, and on account of their uniform size, light weight, and small bulk, be extremely convenient to the Post Office, which will be able to deal with them with much greater ease than ordinary letters. At the same time, as they will afford a means of very brief communication, they will not materially interfere with the revenue of the Post Office.

ALLEGED OUTBREAK OF CATTLE PLAGUE.—QUESTION.
In reply to Sir HENBY SELWIN-IBBETSON,
MR. W. E. FORSTERsaid, he held in his hand a letter from the Foreign Office, which stated that a telegram was yesterday received from Her Majesty's Ambassador at Paris, to the effect that the Prefect of the Department of the Doubs in France had informed the Mi-

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nister of Agriculture that no cattle plague in the Department had been reported.

ARMY—PAYMASTERS OF RECRUITING DISTRICTS.—QUESTION.
In reply to Major ANSOW,
MR. CARDWELLsaid: No fresh appointments of paymasters of recruiting districts under the Warrant of 1860 will in future be made, it being considered an unnecessary expense to keep up a special department for payments on the recruiting service. With respect to paymasters generally, I have made no new appointments since I came into Office, every vacancy at my disposal having been employed in providing for reducible officers. As regards the Control paymasters, no new persons have been appointed, the places being filled in every instance by gentlemen already in the service.

SUPPLY.
Order for Committee read.
Motion made, and Question proposed, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair."

FALSE WEIGHTS AND MEASURES.

  RESOLUTION.
  LORD EUSTACE CECILrose, pursuant to Notice, to move:—
  "That this House is of opinion that the present state of the Law as regards the use of False Weights and Measures, and the prevention and punishing of adulteration of Food, Drink, and Drugs, is most unsatisfactory, and demands the early attention of Her Majesty's Government."
  The noble Lord said, he had brought forward a similar Motion to the present one last year, and withdrew it only on the understanding that the Government would deal with that portion of the question which related to the use of false weights and measures as soon as the Report of the Royal Commission on Weights and Measures was published. That Report, he believed, would shortly appear; and he presumed the Government were acquainted with its recommendations. The object of his present Motion was to obtain from the Government a definite statement of what they meant to do on that question and the other kindred subject embraced in his Notice. As far as the use of false weights and measures was concerned,
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  although he could not say that things were going from bad to worse, they had certainly not improved. He did not propose now to go at any considerable length into the statistics with regard to false weights and measures, because he did so last year; but he thought he might appeal to the hon. Member for Southwark (Mr. Locke), the hon. Member for Swansea (Mr. Dillwyn), and the hon. Member for Frome (Mr. T. Hughes), if they had not, after the perusal of those statistics, arrived at the same conclusion that he had—namely, that when in parishes like St. Pancras and the Strand there were no convictions at all, and very few in parishes of almost equal area and population, there must either be an amount of honesty in those districts, which was very much to be valued because unexpected, or else the law was ineffective in its administration and in the penalties it imposed. But in order to show the working of the law, he would read some very valuable evidence recently given by Mr. Martyn Roberts before the Standards Commission. Mr. Martyn Roberts said—
  "By the system of inspection now in operation much facility is given to fraud. The inspector goes his rounds with cart, horse, and police attendants, giving full notice of his approach; fraudulent tradesmen hasten to conceal their false weights and bring out a good set for inspection; and, as soon as the officer's back is turned, these weights are put safely away and the false ones brought out for the next poor customer. The same thing happens when the police attempt to detect and seize false weights: they make an imposing progress from shop to shop—the country is well alarmed, warnings run from place to place, and all dangerous weights are put safely away."
  To show the necessity which existed for an alteration in the law, he might refer to the information obtained by the Standards Department. In the Report of that Department, dated July, 1868, and signed by Mr. Chisholm, there was this statement—
  "I have reason to believe that the information thus obtained, together with other information furnished to the Department from other sources, and laid before the Standards Commission, will demonstrate the existence of many imperfections in the present system of inspection, and the necessity of introducing material changes and improvement in this system and in the laws by which it is regulated."
  He now passed from this portion of the subject to a more monstrous and more crying evil—namely, the adulteration of food, drink, and drugs. Last year

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  he endeavoured to show how widespread was adulteration throughout this country; and he compared our laws on this subject with the laws of other countries in Europe, for the purpose of showing that the latter were more effectual for the suppression of fraud. He believed he succeeded in convincing the House, though he did not succeed in convincing the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Trade, which, perhaps, was not to be wondered at, although the arguments he brought forward on that occasion had remained, as they were then, uncontradicted. Indeed, they had been strengthened by Returns which he had moved for. The first Return he had moved for was for the number of convictions during the previous three years in the Metropolitan District under the Adulteration Act of 1860, and to that requisition the reply was that there had been no conviction during the previous three years—for a very good reason, for, as far as he could make out, there had been none since the Act was passed nine years ago. The second Return was for the number of convictions under the Revenue Acts in the metropolis during the same time. From it he learnt that in the year 1868 there were only five convictions. Those had been for the adulteration of beer. And here he must observe that, as the penalties inflicted by magistrates for breaches of the Revenue Laws were generally remitted on appeal, sometimes to the amount of one-half, it was impossible for the magistrates to look forward to any of those penalties being duly enforced. To show the House how utterly null and void the law was, he would quote the opinion of a gentleman who was competent to form an opinion, and whose opinion represented that of the scientific portion of the community. He alluded to Dr. Letheby, who said—
  "Parliament has, therefore, attempted to deal with the matter by legislation, as in the Act for preventing the adulteration of articles of food or drink of 1860; but as the Act is only permissive, little or no effect has been given to it. Even in those places, as in the City of London, where it has been put in operation, and public analysts have been appointed, no good has resulted from it, and it really stands upon the statute book a dead letter.
  Last year he brought those and several other facts before the House. He was then accused of unintentional exaggeration—a somewhat serious charge, be-
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  cause it implied that a Member of the House of Commons made a statement without having given himself the trouble of finding out whether it was accurate or not. What he did state was that the quantity of a certain noxious drug, cocculus Indicus, imported into this country in the years 1866–7–8 was, for the first of these years, 394 cwt.; for the second, 689 cwt,; for the third, 1,064 cwt. In 1869, though the importation fell off a little in quantity, it reached the large amount of 820 cwt. Taking the average of the four years, more than 850 cwt., or 42 tons, had been imported annually, and he might add that this fact was not likely to be contradicted, because he had obtained the Return from the Customs. Certainly there was a missing link in his statement, and he was obliged to an hon. Friend of his who, when he sat down, remarked—"You have shown that so much cocculus Indicus has been imported, but you have not shown that it has been used in the adulteration of beer." Well, he had written to Dr. Letheby, with whom he had no personal acquaintance, to ask him his opinion as to how much of the cocculus Indicus was used in adulterating beer, and how much was used as medicine. The reply was—
  "With respect to the question you have put as to the use of cocculus Indicus in medicine, I believe that little or none of it is ever used medicinally, there being only an ointment of it; but that the whole of the 850 cwt., annually imported on an average during the last four years, is used for the adulteration of beer and porter. There is a class of persons, colled brewers' druggists, who regularly deal in the article, and there are many books, called 'Guides to Publicans,' which give explicit instructions for the use of it. But the chief adulterators of beer are the publicans, who convert two butts of beer into three by the aid of the brewers' druggists, who supply them with liquorice, spruce, and cocculus Indicus.
  He did not think that in the debate of last year there was any difference of opinion among hon. Gentlemen as to the fact of there being adulteration; but in taking up the cudgels to defend the existing law hon. Members had used some of the most extraordinary arguments he had ever listened to. The ex-Member for Stafford (Mr. Pochin) said he thought that there was no harm in mixing alum with bread, because Professor Liebig had stated that the ordinary mixture of alum in bread, as practised in this country, was wholesome. The arguments used on that

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  occasion went, in effect, to this—that there was, perhaps, considerable harm in poisoning people, but very little harm in cheating them; and as far as he could gather from his tone, the opinion of the President of the Board of Trade went very much to endorse that notion. The right hon. Gentleman said—
  "My own impression with regard to this adulteration is that it arises from the very great, and perhaps inevitable, competition in business; and that, to a large extent, it is promoted by the ignorance of customers. As the ignorance of customers generally is diminishing, we may hope that before long the adulteration of food may also diminish."—[3 Hansard, cxciv. 729.]
  He did not quote those words for the purpose of taunting the right hon. Gentleman, who, unfortunately, was absent from his place, and whose absence from it was a great loss; but he thought it necessary to make the quotation, because the right hon. Gentleman spoke as the head of a great Department, and as his words had never been contradicted by any Member of the Government, they must be taken as expressing the maturely-formed opinion of the Government. And what did that opinion amount to? Why this—that the Government thought themselves perfectly excused from protecting ignorant customers against fraud. But that doctrine, if carried out to its full extent, would lead to the disbanding of the police and the handing over of the subjects of Her Majesty to the tender mercies of burglars, garrotters, and assassins. Who were the ignorant customers whom the right hon. Gentleman thought had no title to protection? Were they the rich, brought up in the lap of luxury, to know good food from bad; or were they the poor—the artizan, earning his bread by the sweat of his brow, or the widow, content if only she could give a bit of unadulterated bread, a cup of pure milk, or a glass of wholesome beer to her large and perhaps suffering family? He laid great stress on the statement of the right hon. Gentleman because he thought it important that it should be answered. There was a very large class of persons, both in and out of the House, who attached great weight to any statement proceeding from such an influential authority, and they therefore believed that there was really very little harm in mixing ingredients with food provided they were not poisonous. Against that assumption
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  he must protest to the utmost of his power. The practice of harmless adulteration, as it was called, like the use of false weights and measures, was neither more nor less than picking people's pockets, and the punishment that was awarded to the one should be awarded to the other. But was this so-called harmless adulteration really harmless? He had endeavoured to show how extensively beer was adulterated, and his statements upon that point were fully supported by the Reports of the Committee of that House which had sat to inquire into the subject, and of the Commissioners of the Board of Inland Revenue, and also by every speaker who had spoken upon this subject, from the Bishop of Exeter down to the poor labourer whom he had quoted last year as giving his evidence before the Malt Tax Committee. Again, the adulteration of tea had specially attracted the attention of the public during the last two or three months, and the following extract had appeared in the columns of a daily newspaper:—
  "A decided gloom has come over our tea tables since the revelations made by Dr. Letheby regarding the 260 chests of Moning Congou of which six only were seized. The remainder were very quickly shuffled off between the wharfingers and the consignees, and curiosity anxiously speculates as to what they will do with it, seeing that the article is all made up of filthy débris mixed with the droppings of animals and all the mess of a Chinese gutter. But worse remains to be learned. The pensive public is informed by a trade newspaper that thousands of pounds of so-called 'tea' are annually sold at Mincing Lane, compared to which 'Moning' is really a superior sample. The commodity is proffered under the names of scented caper, gunpowder, and siftings, and consists of a very small proportion of the genuine leaf, the rest of the bulk being made up with silk worms excrement, warehouse dust, dirt of various kinds, and a solution of gum. This delightful compound sells to the retail dealer at 6d. per pound, and pays a duty as 'China mixture.'"
  And, in adjudicating upon this case, on the 21st of March following, at the police court, Alderman Stone said—
  The preponderance of evidence as to the tea being unsound, unwholesome, and unfit for human food, was in favour of the complainant, and he should make the order for its destruction, but would restrain its operation until an appeal had been made to the Court of Queen's Bench, and the decision of that Court was known."
  And in the meantime Her Majesty's subjects were being cheated and poisoned to any extent. Then, as to butter—and here he must apologize for entering into these details; but he felt bound to

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  do so, in order to meet the assertion that those who attempted to prove the existence of adulteration were guilty of extravagance, and that adulteration only extended to mixed pickles; they all had read an astonishing story in the newspapers of butter being manufactured to a large extent from Thames mud. He did not answer for the truth of that statement, and he hoped that the thing was not only improbable but impossible, and that the only foundation for the story was to be found in the imagination of the writer; but it was beyond dispute that butter was adulterated with large quantities of salt, water, and rancid fat. Sugar, again, was adulterated with sand—not, perhaps, so much in the West as in the East-end of London. And, lastly, he came to milk, the adulteration of which, no doubt, would be called harmless, mixed as it was with large quantities of water. Dr. Hassall and Professor Voelcker both characterized the milk sold in London "as a fraud of the gravest description;" and Dr. Letheby said, in a Report to the City Commissioners of Sewers, that "while a gallon of good milk contains about 9,400 grains of solid nutriment, the poor milk of London furnishes only from 6,800 to 7,000 grains of it," And upon whom did the loss arising from this so-called harmless adulteration fall? Why, it fell principally upon the old, the feeble, the poor, and the sick. He asked whether such a state of things was not fraught with the greatest mischief, and the question was—how was this great evil, the existence of which had been amply proved, to be met? He asserted that the mischief could only be properly dealt with by the Government taking up the subject, and by their bringing in a Bill to put a stop to adulteration. It had been said to him in private—"Oh, if you have these ideas upon the subject of adulteration, why don't you frame a Bill yourself, and endeavour to carry it through Parliament?" His answer to that observation was, that such an attempt had been made more than once, and had signally failed. Mr. Scholefield, who had taken great interest in the subject, had moved for and obtained a Committee to inquire into the extent of adulteration, and had subsequently twice brought in a Bill dealing with the question, which had been so mutilated before it passed that it was
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  utterly worthless. Two hon. Members for Birmingham, one after the other, with praiseworthy diligence and energy, had also endeavoured to carry a Bill upon this subject through Parliament; but their Bills had never obtained a second reading, chiefly owing to the fact that every difficulty had been placed in their way, but also because Government had always thrown a wet blanket upon their attempts. Under these circumstances it was imperative that the Government should take up the matter. Of course, as an individual, he had formed an opinion as to how the evil should be met, and he had not the slightest objection to place his lucubrations, such as they were, at the disposal of the Government. In his opinion the amendments of the present law that were necessary were as follows:—First, the Bill should be compulsory and not permissive. The local authorities should be required to appoint, according to population and area, a sufficient number of inspectors of food, drink, and drugs exposed for sale, as well as a proportionate number of medical and chemical analysts. Secondly, there should also be a chief analyst appointed by the Board of Trade, to whom the dealer should be allowed to appeal, in ease of his feeling aggrieved by the report of the analysts appointed by the local authorities, and whose report should be final and conclusive. Thirdly, the local authorities should be required to take the necessary legal proceedings on the report of the local analyst, or in case of appeal, on the report of the chief analyst. Fourthly, provision should be made for the prevention of the sale of unsound, unwholesome, or adulterated food or drink and drugs at wholesale houses or by brokers, for, at the present time, the matter could not be dealt with. Then, as to the penalties to be inflicted upon the delinquents who might be convicted of breaking the law, Parliament could not do better than follow the example that had been set them by our ancestors. He did not say that he wished the pillory and flogging at the cart's tail to be reverted to; but still the principle contained in those punishments was the only true remedy for the offence. In the Assisa Panis, as set forth in the Liber Albus, it was laid down—
  "If any default shall be found in the bread of a baker in the city, the first time let him be

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  drawn upon a, hurdle from the Guildhall to his own house through the great streets where there be most people assembled, and through the great streets which are most dirty, with the faulty loaf hanging from his neck; if a second time he shall be found committing the same offence, let him be drawn from the Guildhall through the great street of Chepe in manner aforesaid to the pillory, and let him be put upon the pillory, and remain there at least one hour in the day; and the third time that such default shall be found, he shall be drawn, and the oven shall be pulled down, and the baker made to forswear the trade within the city for ever."
  A like punishment was awarded to butchers and vintners for fraudulent dealings; for it was stated that a butcher was paraded through the streets with his face to the horse's tail for selling measly bacon at market, and the next day he was set in the pillory with two great pieces of his measly bacon over his head, and a writing which set forth his crimes. And he believed the publication of the offence, as well as fine and imprisonment, to be the true punishment for its commission. The ancient punishments for the offence were therefore, in his opinion, severe, but in principle wise. Having said this much, he would leave his case in the hands of the House, feeling perfectly sure that they would do justice to it. No doubt, he should be told that there were many difficulties in the way of legislating upon this subject; but, with the enormous majority at the back of the Government, they need not be afraid of any difficulties which they might have to encounter. At all events, the Government might depend upon the support of his side of the House if they undertook the matter; and surely the most powerful Government since the days of Sir Robert Peel should not shrink from dealing with it. He also asked for the support of those who represented "working - class constituencies." The question peculiarly touched the interest of the labouring population. The rich could command the market; but the poor were too often tied by the bonds of debt to the tradesman around them. He had been told that a measure such as he had described would work badly in the interests of trade. He, however, was of a contrary opinion, for people would only be too glad to leave co-operative societies for the tradespeople who resided in their neighbourhood, when they were sure of getting unadulterated articles and full weight at cheap rates. One reason why action should be taken in
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  this matter was, that the reputation of the country for honesty since the unfortunate crisis of 1866 had materially suffered abroad. It was not surprising that foreigners smiled at our setting up a peculiar claim for honesty when adulteration and the use of false weights were widespread throughout the land, and the law was such that, instead of punishing such offences, it rather encouraged their commission. He would not ask the Government to bring in a Bill on the subject this Session; but he expected some definite declaration from them—some pledge of action in the future. He should be sorry to speak in a menacing way, for his purpose was rather to entreat, nay to implore, the Government to take the matter into their consideration; but if he was unfortunately forced to divide, by the unsatisfactory answer he might receive from the Treasury Bench, he trusted independent Members would accompany him in the Lobby, and give distinct proof that they at least were the true friends of the labouring classes. He concluded by moving the Amendment he had placed upon the Paper.
  MR. T. HUGHESsaid, he rose to second the Motion with much pleasure, but, he must acknowledge, without much hope. The present Home Secretary was not the first, and he feared would not be the last Minister to whom he should have to appeal on this subject. The efforts he had made to bring about an Amendment of the Law had reminded him of one striking a feather bed. He had already brought the question to the notice of three different Ministries. On the last occasion, in 1868, he had appealed to his right hon. Friend opposite (Mr. Cave), then Vice President of the Board of Trade, who promised to have the suggestions he then laid before him considered by the Standards Commission; but it did not appear from the very able Report of the Commissioners that they had dealt with the matter. They had contented themselves with abolishing Troy weight, but had not touched the larger question. The noble Lord (Lord Eustace Cecil) had so fully canvassed the subject of adulteration that he proposed to confine himself to the question of weights and measures. The state of the law was eminently unsatisfactory. When he first entered the House he found that the convictions for

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  using false weights and measures in his own borough of Lambeth presented a high average—as high as five to one as compared with North London. He had inquired into this startling difference, and the explanation given to him was that in Lambeth the inspectors were appointed by the magistrates of Surrey, and paid in part by fees upon procuring convictions, while in the north of London a different system prevailed. That system, he believed, was about 600 years old. The evidence of Mr. Gibb, the vestry clerk of St. Pancras, in 1869, was, that in St. Pancras the vestrymen selected by lot 160 ratepayers, arbitrarily selected by their position on the rate-book, from whom they chose 63 to act on the leet jury, or annoyance jury, whose duty it was to examine the weights and measures. One-fourth of these jurymen were shopkeepers, liable to inspection themselves. The persons appointed as jurors divided themselves into four bodies, and marched round the parish in company with a beadle, who carried the standards of weights and measures, and the result of their labours sufficiently proved the unsatisfactory state of the law. In St. Pancras there were no convictions during a period in which there were 165 in Newington. It was intended that the Act passed in 1835, which enabled magistrates in quarter sessions to appoint proper inspectors, should be applicable to the whole country; but, unfortunately, by the last section the jurisdiction of the old Courts Leet was maintained. It would not, he thought, be too much to ask the Government, even with the largo amount of business they already had on their hands, to introduce a short measure abolishing the Courts Leet, and authorizing the magistrates in all parts of the country to appoint inspectors, and see that the inspection was properly carried out. On the general question he agreed with the noble Lord, that the only thing required to cure this public scandal was real publicity, and two years ago he suggested to his right hon. Friend opposite that it was in the power of the Government to give that publicity at once. There was nothing which fraudulent shopkeepers dreaded so much as publicity. In proof of this assertion, he would remark, that although the local Acts, applicable to St. Pancras and other northern parishes, contained a special clause enabling them to publish
  1510
  returns of the convictions, they hardly ever availed themselves of that power. It might, perhaps, be said, that the insertion of such returns in the ordinary newspapers might damage the proprietors. He, therefore, suggested that the Government should publish in the London Gazette the names of all persons convicted of using fraudulent weights and measures, and fined a certain amount—say £1 or upwards. He would further suggest that something like the French system should be adopted, and that a mark should be placed upon or near the premises of convicted persons for a fixed term. Such a system, he believed, might be at once carried out by the Government without getting an Act of Parliament passed. At present notices were put up in the streets with reference to cabs, postal arrangements, and other matters; and if the Government caused to be put up in each parish a board, to be called the "Rogue's Board," with a list of convicted tradesmen, these abominable practices would be almost entirely suppressed. We could not now revert to the old punishment of the pillory; but the modern pillory must be publicity of the kind he had described. He had great pleasure in seconding the Motion.
  Amendment proposed,
  To leave out from the word "That" to the end of the Question, in order to add the words "this House is of opinion that the present state of the Law as regards the use of False Weights and Measures, and the prevention and punishing of adulteration of Food, Drink, and Drugs, is most unsatisfactory, and demands the early attention of Her Majesty's Government,"—(Lord Eustace Cecil,)
  —instead thereof.
  Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question.
  MR. BRUCEsaid, the Motion divided itself into two parts—the first relating to the use of false weights and measures, and the second to the adulteration of food, drink, and drugs. The first of these subjects had been investigated by the Commission, which had not yet presented their final Report, although the evidence had been published; and in their Third Report they promised to consider the defects of the existing law and to suggest remedies for those defects. Now, he was informed that, although their final Report had not yet been pub-

  1511
  lished, they had fulfilled their promise, and had made recommendations for the amendment of the law. He readily admitted that the law was extremely defective. When Notice was given by the noble Lord (Lord Eustace Cecil) of the present Motion, he caused an independent inquiry to be instituted into the working of the law, and thus discovered many defects which must be removed. He believed he was not anticipating improperly the Report of the Commissioners, by saying that one point they specially dealt with was the necessity so strongly insisted upon by the hon. Member for Frome (Mr. T. Hughes) of doing away with the absurd, antiquated, and useless jurisdiction still retained in some parishes in London. He believed the noble Lord would say that he had, like the deity of old, "granted but half his prayer;" but he trusted he would not add "the rest dispersed in empty air." With regard to the suggestion of the hon. Member that the Government might carry out some such scheme as he shadowed forth, he would remark that although, with regard to great political measures like the Irish Land Bill, the Government could successfully appeal to the loyal attachment of their own party, yet, on questions like the present, independent Members would scarcely be inclined to waive their own opinions as to the remedy to be provided, and a proposal to cover the country with inspectors, to inquire into the proceedings in every shop, would somewhat try the attachment of many followers of the Government. However, he frankly admitted that there did exist a very considerable evil. While making this admission, he would say, without complaining of the use his noble Friend made of the speech of his right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade, that the noble Lord's remarks on that speech rather tended to mislead the House as to the right hon. Gentleman's meaning. His right hon. Friend did not deny that adulteration, even though it might not be noxious and poisonous, was a fraud which ought to be punished; but he said in mitigation of the evil that what was deficient in quality was sometimes compensated by the lowness of the price. The noble Lord had stated that milk was adulterated with water in the proportion of 6½ to 9. He was delighted to hear that the evil was so much less
  1512
  than he anticipated. But supposing the milk were supplied pure, there could be no doubt that the price would be higher than at present, and if the pathetic appeal of Liston to the milkwoman—to put his milk in one cup and the water in another—had been successful, there was no doubt that he would have had to pay as much for the small quantity of milk as he had before paid for the milk and water mixed together. He (Mr. Bruce) was not there, however, to defend any adulteration whether noxious or otherwise. In his opinion it was a very grave offence, and analogous to obtaining goods under false pretences. A man who sold a 3½ lb. loaf for a 4lb. loaf obtained money by a false pretence, and the same applied to one who sold as genuine a spurious article. This evil prevailed widely, and that the remedies hitherto applied were inadequate he freely admitted. This might be owing to the defects in our legislation on the subject, and his hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham (Mr. Muntz) had brought forward a measure providing that every local body in the country should be compelled to employ an analyst. He confessed he did not see how the difficulty could be effectually grappled with except by the diligence of officials, whose duties it should be to inquire into these cases and to examine into all complaints which might be made to them. If his hon. Friend had pressed his Bill it would, no doubt, have received a candid consideration from the House. Here he might remark that the Government were not open to the charge made by the noble Lord that they cast impediments in the way of legislation by private Members. A very large proportion of the time of the House was in the hands of private Members, and these questions could be well dealt with by them. The Government had given the Bill of his hon. Friend (Mr. Muntz) every consideration, and were prepared to afford him every facility for proceeding with it next Session. He (Mr. Bruce) was not prepared, like the noble Lord, to sketch out the remedies. He was, however, prepared to admit the evil, and would undertake to give the matter his best consideration. The question of weights and measures had been referred to a Committee, and that Committee had made certain recommendations, which he hoped to be able soon—in all proba-

  1513
  bility next Session—to embody in a Bill. With respect to the other portion of the Question, he could not pledge himself to introduce a measure, the provisions of which he had not sufficiently considered; yet admitting, as he did, the evils which existed, it would, of course, be his duty to endeavour to provide a remedy.
  MR. STEPHEN CAVE,as the only member of the Royal Commission on Standards who was also a Member of the House, would like to say a few words on this subject. He thought the noble Lord (Lord Eustace Cecil) had done excellent service in bringing the question before the House. It was one which required frequent and special attention from those who professed to legislate for the good of the people, especially for those in the lower grades of the social scale. What could be more inconsistent for them than to remove political disabilities, to insist upon education, to lay down strict rules as to the habitations of the people, to regulate the number of cubic feet of air which are to pass through their lungs, to insist upon the duty of landowners to provide fit and proper habitations for the labouring class, and yet to allow them, year after year, to be the victims of the grossest frauds—frauds which not only robbed them of a portion of that scanty food which too many had so much difficulty in procuring, but worse than that, frauds which, together with reduced quantity, gave them quality so bad that the food failed to afford them that nourishment so essential to enable them to perform their daily work? And even worse than that, which substituted for the wholesome stimulant—the refreshing beverage, compounds so noxious that a man who intended to do no more than take that moderate amount which persons in his position could do with impunity and advantage, was so overpowered by the poisonous drugs with which his liquor was adulterated that he proceeded to excesses which caused more than half the crimes of violence in the country, and excused the strong language of those philanthropic people inside and outside the House, who had proclaimed a crusade against the use of fermented liquors, which might be directed with more justice and better chance of success against the sale of these abominable poisons. He thought it was Sydney Smith who gave in former days an amusing catalogue of the
  1514
  taxable articles, from the materials of the cradle to those of the coffin, which a man was compelled to use during his passage through life; and, a few days ago, he saw in an American paper a similar estimate of the additional cost imposed upon almost every article of dress and use by the heavy duties of the United States. But those were taxes most part of which, at any rate, went to meet the exigencies of the State, and were, moreover, imposed on all alike; whereas these frauds, of which his noble Friend had given instances, had the great vice of protective duties—namely, that they went, not into the Exchequer, but into the pockets of individuals, and fell, moreover, almost exclusively on those classes which were least able to bear them. They heard a great deal in those days of the free breakfast table, and of the pressure of indirect taxation on the working classes. He wished the working classes were a little more alive to the amount of taxation levied upon them by some of the most violent declaimers in the cause of what was called financial reform in the shape of short quantity and bad quality. They heard, from time to time, denunciations of the extravagance of Governments, and elaborate calculations of the deduction from the wages of the labourer and artizan for useless pageants and bloated armaments. He should like to see a similar table of deductions from their wages by means of short weights and measures, by unwholesome meat and milk, adulterated bread, sugar mixed with potato flour and worse things, tea literally marts expers; besides the enormous cost to individuals and to the ratepayers on account of the intoxication, and crimes, the result of intoxication, caused by the sale of beer mixed with deleterious drugs. He saw, himself, a few days ago in a bye street, the driver of a coal cart diligently watering the sacks of coal or coke to increase their weight. Bread, the chief necessary of life, was perhaps most tampered with. One could hardly take up a local newspaper without seeing convictions for short weight. Latterly, there had been prosecutions for adulteration of bread, chiefly with alum, which was said, by the medical men who gave evidence, to be unwholesome and indigestible. In the Food Journal was an account of a sample of sugar received from Cheltenham—

  1515
  "So fearfully adulterated (to use the words of the journal) with chromate of lead, that we wonder how the unfortunate partakers of it survived to tell the tale."
  It seemed to have been used to improve the colour of inferior sugar. Chromate of lead was also used in confectionery; and, for the satisfaction of those who liked such things, he might say that, in one of the cases before the Bench of magistrates, witnesses for the defence declared that cakes and buns could not be made without it. Alum was also used in cheap wines to give dryness and fix the colour. With regard to milk and cream, a paper published by the Royal Agricultural Society last year, stated that not only was the adulteration with water from 30 to 50 per cent, but the measures were 25 per cent short. And in that, as well as other cases, one of the worst consequences of the system was, that the whole trade became demoralized, and the man who wished to be a fair dealer declared that he was obliged to follow suit, otherwise he could not live. Well, then, the question was—"Is the law in fault, and, if so, how can it be amended?" He might say here that the Standards Commission had been considering this subject very carefully, and their Report, which would shortly be issued, went very fully into the question, especially that portion of it which related to fraudulent and incorrect weights and measures. He would remind his hon. Friend the Member for Frome (Mr. T. Hughes), who appeared very impatient in this matter, that he did not allow him to remain in Office long enough to give effect to his suggestions: and as to the Report of the Commissioners, his hon. Friend had only read their third Report; but if he waited till their fourth Report was in his hands, which would be in a few days, he would find that there was no foundation for his charge of their having neglected these points. The question, indeed, would be found fully gone into in the forthcoming Report of the Commission. It would not be proper for him to forestall this Report. But he might make this observation, that when it was stated—and no doubt truly stated—that the number of convictions for incorrect weights was not large, and that of these only a small proportion, variously stated at from 8 to 25 per cent of the whole, are for practices positively fraudulent, yet it must be remembered that, as had been
  1516
  accurately stated by the hon. Member for Frome, the inspection was carried on in many places in a wholly unsatisfactory manner, and this also should be borne in mind—namely, that the worst cases of fraud were not committed by means of false weights and measures—which were tolerably easy of detection, but by using correct weights and measures in a fraudulent way. The Irish law provided for those cases, and in certain instances inflicted imprisonment. In England there was no such provision, though in a few cases lately magistrates had convicted and imprisoned offenders of this class under the charge of obtaining money under false pretences. That, however, notwithstanding what had just been said by the Secretary of State for the Home Department, was generally considered to be somewhat straining the law. No doubt in all such cases a public inspector and prosecutor was requisite, with power to deal with such frauds. The poor who bought small packages of sugar and other commodities on a Saturday night in a crowded shop were great losers by these malpractices. The packets were already weighed and placed in readiness on the counter, and the buyers had no means of checking the weight, and even if they had, they had no money to prosecute, and being generally in debt to the shop, dared not complain. Consequently, Mr. Scholefield's Act was almost wholly inoperative, as he had ventured to predict it would be when it was passing through the House. Then, again, punishment by fine was in most cases inadequate. Imprisonment had lately been inflicted with excellent effect in the case of sellers of diseased meat, and the publication of the names of offenders, either according to the French system by a placard, like those detailing offences against decency and order, which were suspended on the park gates and in railway stations, or in the newspapers, as was done in some metropolitan parishes, would act as a most wholesome check to fraudulent tradesmen. But, then, on the other hand, care must be taken that these are real cases of fraud. He must say that tradesmen had reason to complain of the indiscriminate administration of the law in many cases; and he thought that magistrates should dismiss many of the trivial cases on which they now convicted, for to punish a man for incorrect weights

  1517
  when the error was against himself was manifestly absurd. Again, small traders complained that purchasers would insist upon the "turn of the scale," as it was called, and, therefore, tradesmen were obliged to counter-balance that by a draught in their favour, just as when some extra-punctual Paterfamilias kept all his clocks five minutes in advance, in which case, of course, his household soon found it out, and allowed for it, and more besides. Small tradesmen also said, with less justice, that their bad debts were so many that they must protect themselves by giving short weight or lowered quality. That, however, would scarcely apply to such cases as the pint of ale, just filling half a tumbler, at which hon. Members would probably grumble next week at Epsom. There were, however, some purchasers who, by their own proceedings, did much to cause, and almost justify, fraud. He had spoken of the "turn of the scale," and he had heard, too, that tenders for supplying milk at 2d. a quart had been accepted by Boards of Guardians—a price at which genuine milk could not possibly be sold. He did not know whether his noble Friend intended to take a Division or not. In the prospect of the speedy publication of the Report of the Commission he should hardly advise him to do so, though he should certainly support him; because he thought he (Mr. Cave) had said enough to show that there could be no doubt of the absolute truth of his proposition, and of the existence of practices highly injurious to the poor, and discreditable to a large number of the trading classes—practices which, in the interest of the humble purchaser, as well as the honest seller, it was incumbent on the Government to abate by every means in its power.
  MR. MUNTZsaid, he was glad to hear that the Government had given consideration to his Bill, which he would take care to reintroduce early next Session. The first question was that of weights and measures. The people had to complain, not only of false weights and measures, but also of the variety of weights and measures. They had Avoirdupois weight and Troy weight, and Apothecaries weight, and Long weight and Short weight, and he did not know how many other weights. It was impossible that the working classes should understand all these weights and mea-
  1518
  sures. In addition to that, a bag of wheat in some counties contained three bushels, and in others four; and in one county a bushel contained 60 lbs., and in another 70 lbs. It seemed to him that, in a civilized country, the people might surely agree upon some definite standard, and he could not see any reason why the French system should not be adopted. The question of adulteration, however, was a much more serious one than many hon. Members might be disposed to believe, for it was not only a matter of cheating, but in some cases one of life or death. He told the House, in moving the second reading of the Bill which he had now withdrawn, that two-thirds of the people were plundered and one-third poisoned; but he found he had understated the case, and that he should have said all were plundered and two-thirds of them poisoned. All of the latter class might not die; but in many cases a very injurious effect was produced upon them by the poisonous ingredients which they consumed. This was essentially a poor man's question, for the wealthier classes could take care of themselves, as they had the power of dealing with whom they pleased; but the poor were compelled to deal with those to whom they owed money, the greater number of them being in debt. In towns the matter was bad, but in agricultural districts the matter was worse. He had heard it said that the working classes ought not to be in debt, and should lay by something to provide for a rainy day; but did hon. Members ever think what it was to have to keep a wife and three or four children on 10 s. or 12 s. per week? How could they save any money to meet the emergencies to which they were liable? As to adulteration, he found it stated in The Lancet that an examination was lately made of articles purchased at shops in London. Taking the article of coffee, that purchased at the West-end shops was pure; but out of samples from 27 shops at the East-end, 23 contained only 25 per cent of coffee, the rest being composed of equal parts of beans, crusts of bread, and brick dust. A similar article was sold in the poorer quarters of Paris, and French medical men said that wherever gastric fever prevailed they could trace the sale of that most deleterious mixture. When he was engaged in commerce some years ago, a traveller in the drug trade

  1519
  called at his office and left a price list. Being asked about discount he said that there was none allowed in London, but 25 per cent was allowed to country dealers and 50 per cent for export. The purity of the article was according to the price, so that a physician in Australia would have to prescribe eight grains to produce a result equal to four grains given in London or six in the country towns. A friend of his made an analysis of blue pills he had purchased. Of late years blue pills had become fashionable amongst the working classes, and it might surprise hon. Members to hear that many of the blue pills which were sold in the poorer districts were made of slate filings and blue clay. He came now to the question of beer, which was most important. It appeared that the Shropshire magistrates of quarter sessions, with Sir Baldwin Leighton as chairman, appointed a committee to inquire into the causes of the increase of drunkenness, to which their attention had been turned. That committee reported that there could be no doubt whatever that many cases of drunkenness, of assault, and of other offences of a kindred nature arose, to a considerable extent, not from the quantity, but the quality of the malt liquors consumed, and that the so-called drunkard, who was brought up for punishment, often owed his degradation not so much to his intemperate habits as to the misconduct of others, who most richly deserved the penalties of the law. They added that the ingredients used in brewing malt liquor were malt and hops; that any foreign matter found in it should be proof of adulteration; and that it was well known that cocculus lndicus was frequently used. But the wealthier classes had also their share of the poisoning; for instance, it was notorious that verdigris was used in pickles. That was an old-fashioned story, but he would give them an approved mixture for port wine—45 gallons of rough cider, six gallons of brandy, tincture of logwood sufficient to colour, and three gallons of decoction of sloes. He heard that in the month of February last a baker in Cardiff was summoned, under Mr. Scholefield's Act, for making bread, not with alum but with plaster of Paris; he was convicted, and fined £5. He threw down the money on the table, saying that a week would make it up again. Now, if that
  1520
  gentleman, instead of living in Wales, had lived on the banks of the Euphrates he would have been nailed by the ear to his own door-post until the going down of the sun. What was wanted was a good system of inspection and analysis, and a stringent enforcement of severe laws against adulteration. The difficulty in dealing with this matter was not so enormous that it could not be met by Her Majesty's Government. We had a whole network of Excise officers all over the country; they had plenty of time, and if instructed to act now and then they would be able to cope with the difficulty. In Paris alone there were 60 men employed in going around constantly examining the various articles sold, and if a person was convicted they did not insert his name in The Gazette which his poor customers were never likely to see, but they put up "adulterated" on a board in his shop, and if he took the board away a policeman was placed there for a month at his expense. That was what we wanted here, and with all his love for liberty he would like to see a little of Imperialism in this country in reference to this subject. This might be called a social evil. Medical men assured him that cocculus Indicus, which was much used in adulteration, very often seriously affected the brain and spine. He trusted the matter would receive the attention of the Government, and that hon. Gentlemen would be found in that House to bring the subject forward until it should. He had found by experience that the only way to get anything done was by importunity, and as the widow obtained all she wanted by importunity, so the House would get in the same way whatever they required from Her Majesty's Government to put an end to this system.
  SIR CHARLES ADDEELEYsaid, that though he fully agreed with the first part of his noble Friend's (Lord Eustace Cecil's) Motion, and admitted that the state of the law was most unsatisfactory, yet, in the concluding portion, which called upon the Government to give their early attention to the subject, if that meant immediate legislation, he could not concur. The Royal Commission, which was engaged in consolidating all the sanitary laws, of which he was Chairman, had not yet reported, and if the Government were to attempt to deal with the question now, they would

  1521
  probably by-and-by have to legislate on it over again. The second part of the subject was one essentially for the local authorities of the country, and not the Imperial Government to carry out. If they were of opinion that the local authorities all over the country should deal with the matter, Parliament would find absolutely nothing to be done but to alter the word "may" in the existing law into "must," and the Act of 1860 would be perfectly adequate to the requirements of the case. The Act of 1860 empowered all vestries and district Boards in the metropolis, the courts of quarter sessions in the country, and the town councils in boroughs to appoint analysts to analyze suspected food—and any person might bring it to be analyzed—to fine the guilty, and to publish their names after a second conviction. Therefore, every possible provision was made, if the word "may" were only turned into "must." The Sanitary Act of 1866 also made it the duty of the inspectors of nuisances, not only to examine suspected food, but to enter premises where it was likely to be found; and, if any were found unfit for consumption, to destroy it. The Pharmacy Act for registering the sale of poisons gave considerable control over those who sold such things as cocculus Indicus. From the evidence taken before the Commission, it appeared that wherever the analysts had made use of their powers, the adulteration of food rapidly diminished. Under these circumstances, he should be sorry if the Government were prematurely to undertake to pass a measure on the subject, for this simple reason, that it might only complicate the law.
  MR. LOCKEsaid, the right hon. Gentleman who had just sat down was averse to immediate legislation, and yet he appeared desirous of having it, for he had. stated that all that was required was to change "may" in the Act of 1860 into "must." If the Secretary of State for the Home Department were to introduce that change, he would make the Act of Mr. Scholefield operative where it was now a dead letter. He disliked permissive measures, believing they were never effective; and he had never voted for one of them in his life. Nobody was desirous of putting the Act of 1860 into execution, because, in the first place, it was very expensive to do so. The Government might legislate with perfect
  1522
  ease on the whole subject, and place in the hand of the magistrates the powers now exercised by leet juries. A Bill of two short clauses might dispose of the entire question, and it might pass both Houses in as many minutes. Education was, no doubt, a most excellent thing; but the body and mind might be reduced by bad food to such a state as to be incapable of benefiting by education. Therefore, he would suggest that, before pressing on the Education Bill, the Government should put the children of the country into a fit condition to derive advantage from it.
  MR. KINNAIRDsaid, he wished to call attention to the strong language embodied in the Report of the Committee, of which lie had been a member, on the subject. He deplored the fact that the only result of that Committee had been the passing of a Permissive Bill by the Government, which was practically a dead letter. He certainly thought that when hon. Gentlemen had devoted so much time and labour to a question of such importance to the community at large, more attention ought to be paid to their recommendations. He agreed with the hon. Member for Southwark (Mr. Locke), that two clauses effectively drawn would accomplish the object they had in view. He might be asked—"Then why do you not bring in a Bill?" To this, he must reply, that were he to do so, the Chancellor of the Exchequer would immediately, in all probability, cut it to pieces, on the ground that it would in some way affect the Revenue.
  MR. PEEKsaid, no one could deplore the adulteration of food more than respectable tradesmen did. He believed, from his experience as a magistrate, that the question of false weights might be easily dealt with by the Government; but the subject of adulteration could not be dealt with so easily, because the first question was what was adulteration? There were, for instance, various classes of sugar, paying different rates of duty. If the first class, paying the highest duty, was pure sugar, all the others, paying less duty, must necessarily be more or less adulterated—or rather there must be less saccharine matter in them. He had no hesitation in saying that tea was an article very little adulterated, and of that adulteration not 1 per cent of the adulteration occurred in this country. With regard to sugar a

  1523
  highly respectable tradesman had recently suffered much in consequence of a parcel sent by him to one of the workhouses being pronounced adulterated. Immediately on his being informed of the fact he obtained another sample from, the docks, and after considerable trouble and expense he satisfactorily proved that the sugar he had supplied was in precisely the same state as when it was brought into this country. It was hard that if the Government called that article sugar, and received duty for it as such before it left the docks, a respectable tradesman should be taken before a police-court on a charge of adulteration, and put to an expense of £200 to clear his character, as clear it the man did in the case to which he referred, but without obtaining any redress. He knew a case some years ago, when pepper was subject to a high duty, where an exciseman found in a ground sample some 8 or 9 per cent of foreign matter—wood and meal mixed in. The tradesman, who was fined £100 for such offence by the Commissioners, came to him for advice. On their going to the docks they were fortunate enough to find some of the same bulk remaining, and a package being obtained and carefully analyzed, it was found to contain exactly the same proportion of foreign material as the pepper which the officer had discovered to be adulterated. Under the circumstances the Excise did not enforce the penalty; but the tradesman was put to a great expense, and if he had not been a man in good circumstances his character must have suffered. The Government, he thought, ought not to receive duty on goods, and allow them to go out of the docks, if they were not satisfied that the articles were fit for human consumption, and as a practical man, he asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if he brought in a Bill on that subject next Session, to take that point into his consideration.
  MR. M. T. BASSsaid, it was a mistake to suppose that beer was almost universally adulterated. He repudiated the notion on the part of the brewers, and he firmly believed, after a very long experience, there was not one in a hundred publicans—he thought he might add not one in a thousand—who ever adulterated. It was next to impossible to adulterate ale without its being detected, and as to
  1524
  the use of cocculus Indicus it was all a mistake. He brewed 2,000 barrels of ale daily, and he appealed to the hon. Member (Lord Eustace Cecil) to say how it was possible for him to cart sufficient cocculus Indicus to his premises to adulterate that quantity of ale without detection. It was, in fact, a joke. The Chancellor of the Exchequer in Ms Budget speech referred to what he had been told about turning the New River into the beer cask. It was quite possible the flavour of the New River water might improve the beer; but he did not believe a word the right hon. Gentleman was told upon that subject. The right hon. Gentleman went even beyond that, and said that if a tax on beer was substituted for the malt duty brewers would brew the strongest possible beer, export it, make four barrels out of one, and cheat the Revenue to an unheard-of extent; but the thing was absurd. The Excise officers could tell almost to a grain of malt how much was put into a barrel of beer. Speaking on behalf of the body with which he was connected he had no hesitation in saying that in the event of any measure being adopted by Parliament which would diminish adulteration of every description, he was convinced that no class would derive so much advantage from such a measure as the respectable publicans of this country.
  LORD EUSTACE CECILsaid, he would beg leave to withdraw his Amendment. He did so because it seemed to be the opinion of the House that a monstrous evil in the way of adulteration did exist, and the Secretary of State for the Home Department had promised to consider the subject.
  Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

ARMY—INDIA—KIRWEE PRIZE MONEY.

  MOTION FOR ADDRESS.
  MR. GOLDNEYsaid, he rose to call the attention of the House to the Petition of Major Generals Miller, Nott, and Ludlow on behalf of the officers and men of the late Sir G. C. Whitlock's force, employed during the War in India in 1857–8, and to move an humble Address to Her Majesty that their claim to have Rs. 25,60,000 and other debts, due to the Kirwee Chiefs, treated as booty, may be fully inquired into, and referred for the decision of a legally constituted

  1525
  tribunal. He wished to treat the subject from the view of a civilian. He had no personal interest in it; nor did he happen to know any of the parties who would be benefited if the prayer of the Petition were complied with. When the Mutiny in India broke out every inducement was offered to our troops to use their utmost efforts to put down the rebellion. The Governor General, while endeavouring to guard against pillage, caused to be published proclamations in which the soldiers were informed that every proper provision would be made for distributing among them any booty to which they might become entitled. The case of a mutiny differed, of course, from that of a war as regarded prize as well as other matters; but the troops were informed that anything which might be taken from the rebels would follow the ordinary course of things as regarded prize and booty, except what had been taken by the rebels from loyal natives, and afterwards recaptured by soldiers of the Queen. For a long course of years the Court of Admiralty had exercised jurisdiction over Navy prizes, and in respect of operations in which the Army and Navy were combined, that Court decided as to what constituted booty and as to the manner in which it should be distributed. But up to the year 1839 the Treasury, with an appeal to the Privy Council, generally decided as to what should be considered booty for the Army when it carried on operations by itself, and as to the manner in which that booty should be distributed; thus naval prize money up to 1839 came solely under the decision of the Court of Admiralty, and army prize money up to that period was dealt with by the Treasury. But by an Act of the 3rd and 4th of Her Majesty, the power of dealing with questions of prize money for the Army was also transferred to the Court of Admiralty; and in 1864, during a discussion on the subject of the Banda and Kirwee prize money, that Act was especially brought under the notice of Parliament by Lord Palmerston. Lord Palmerston then expressed an opinion that all cases of disputed prize money should be determined by the High Court of Admiralty, and that opinion was supported in a work published as late as 1867 under the authority of the Indian Department. That was the footing upon which matters stood at the
  1526
  breaking out of the Indian Mutiny. It had been decided in the Deccan case that not only all property actually captured by the troops should be regarded as booty, but also that all monies that found their way into the hands of the East India Company in consequence of the war, should be equally booty. Three Orders had been issued by Lord Canning, in 1857 and 1858, taking a similar view of this question. At the period when General Whitlock's force was advancing on Central India the Kirwee Chiefs, who were in rebellion, held promissory notes of the East India Company to the value of about £250,000, which sum they had deposited in the hands of the Company, those notes being payable to order on demand. The advancing force having come in contact with a large body of rebels under the Nawab of Banda, a battle ensued, and the result was that the Nawab's army was defeated, and Banda taken possession of by the victors. Immediately after the engagement the Nawab went to Kirwee—a distance of 40 or 50 miles—to join the Chiefs there; and negotiations were opened, in which the Kirwee Chiefs, in the first instance, refused to submit. Ultimately the Kirwee Chiefs surrendered; but their troops retired to the hills, and General Whitlock took possession of the city, and afterwards defeated the troops. The treasure seized was very large, and included a number of jewels and some money; but these promissory notes were, it was believed, carrried off by one of the principal retainers, and afterwards destroyed. There was abundant evidence, however, to show that they should be treated as prize money—the number of the notes, the amount they represented, and the specific dates of each were set out in a Proclamation of Lord Canning some time before the capture of Kirwee. Those officers who were engaged in the affair had presented a Memorial to the Queen, praying that the notes might be dealt with, and treated as prize money, both under the general rule, and also under Lord Canning's Proclamation. The value of the booty seized was estimated at £700,000; but when the matter was remitted to the Admiralty Court the sum amounted to only £500,000, and the memorialists prayed that the value of the promissory notes should be added. The Treasury, in reply, offered to hear

  1527
  the parties by counsel, but limited them to one counsel, and the period to be within 10 days; and the memorialists expressed their satisfaction at what they then considered the great impartiality and condescension of the Lords of the Treasury. But that condescension was not continued, because on their making requests for information, including a request for a copy of the opinion of the Law Officers of the Crown on a precisely similar point their requests were not complied with.
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERsaid, probably the hon. Member was not aware that the document could not be found, and that it was so stated.
  MR. GOLDNEYsaid, he thought the memorialists had acted indiscreetly in pressing the matter in the way they had; but the Lords of the Treasury should not have come to a decision on such slight considerations as they had, after hearing only one counsel. In the year 1860, when these claims of the troops were being urged, the question as to the amount held by the East India Company, and due from the Company on these promissory notes, was referred to several authorities in India, who were divided in opinion as to whether the troops were entitled to the amount or not. A dispute also went on for some years as to the jewels and cash actually seized, though eventually it was determined that they did belong to the soldiers. He mentioned these circumstances in order to show the great difficulties interposed to prevent the men from deriving advantage from the prize they had actually captured. There could be no doubt that the promissory notes were constructively among the property seized, and that they had been actually returned as such by the prize agents in their report to the Government. This either was booty or it was not, and the Army was entitled to be satisfied on such a point by the decision of a competent tribunal. The opinion of the Duke of "Wellington was that Orders in Council by the Governor General of India were binding upon the Government, and he maintained that after the Orders in Council at the end of 1857 and the commencement of 1858 the troops had a right to expect that this money would have become their prize, and it would have been so treated had the Company remained in power. He thought it exceedingly unwise that
  1528
  the Imperial Treasury should refuse the claim of the Army to have a decision on this subject—to have their rights fairly recognized and adjudicated upon by a legal tribunal. It was not competent for the House to decide the question at issue; but he thought that, Both upon general grounds and upon the special ground that the original Kirwee prize money fell short by the sum of £200,000 of the amount which appeared in the Order in Council, it was competent for the House to send an humble Address to the Crown, praying to have the matter submitted to a Court of judicature. The hon. Member concluded by moving the Address.
  MAJOR ANSON,in seconding the Motion, said, he desired to express no opinion as to the legal right of the troops to this money, but simply to support their claim to a decision from a Court of Law. Soldiers, who were not as a rule lawyers, when they came to read this debate to-morrow, would say it was perfectly clear that they had a legal right to this money, for the Government would not otherwise have been afraid to refer the matter to legal decision. Now, upon these matters he had had some experience. He was the English Commissioner appointed to divide the spoil and plunder taken at the Summer Palace at Pekin, and in that capacity he had a quarrel with his French colleague, who told him that he was utterly ignorant of the noble art of looting, and was unaware of some obscure code of honour by which his decisions ought to be regulated. To this he expressed his regret, adding that that was only the third Imperial Palace at whose sacking he had assisted, but that he should, he hoped, be better instructed on the subject by the time he came to assist at the taking of the Tuileries. With an Army such as ours, from which we expected twice as much work as was expected from the army of any other nation, it was impossible to get on unless discipline and the power of the officers over their men were thoroughly preserved, and this necessity existed more especially in India, where our troops had to contend not only against overwhelming enemies but apathetic allies. Those who were acquainted with the history of the Indian War would acknowledge that the turning point in the mutiny was the storming of Delhi by two or three thousand of our troops. Those

  1529
  troops were almost lost in the vastness of the place, and if the soldiers had given way to straggling, or gratified their tendency to plunder, India would probably have been lost to us. But they were told that the plunder would be divided among them, and, placing implicit faith in their officers and in the Government, they resisted the temptation. Our Army was the only army in the world where there was any system of distribution of the prizes of war. He would give an illustration to show how it worked. When we were advancing on Pekin the English Army was on the right, and our allies, the French, upon the left. On arriving where we expected to find a very large force of the enemy our allies were no longer to be found, and it was not until early next morning that we discovered that, by some extraordinary mistake, they had marched straight across our rear, had gained the Summer Palace, and spent the night in plunder. Three days after the French Army, as an army, ceased to exist, there was neither regiments nor organization. But during the whole of that time the English Army were encamped in front of the gates of Pekin, and not a single man was found in the Summer Palace, and the consequence was the complete success of the operation. He mentioned that to show the difference of discipline, which arose altogether from the fact that in our Army the men knew that they would receive what they fairly gained in time of war, and that it would be distributed to them afterwards. It was the reverse in the French Army, and, therefore, the French soldiers took what they could get. If the Government were to arrogate to themselves the right of deciding upon these questions, they would very materially shake the confidence of the soldiers. It was of the utmost importance to the discipline of the English Army that the Government should consent to allow this question to be tried by a Court of Law, and not settle it themselves in an arbitrary manner.
  Amendment proposed,
  To leave out from the word "That" to the end of the Question, in order to add the words "an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, praying that the claim of Major Generals Miller, Nott, and Ludlow, on behalf of the officers and men of the late Sir G. C. Whitlock's force, employed during the War in India in 1857–58, to have Rs. 25,60,000, and other debts, due to the Kirwee Chiefs, treated as booty, may be fully in-
  1530
  quired into, and referred for the decision of a legally constituted tribunal,"—(Mr. Goldney,) instead thereof.
  THE ATTORNEY GENERALsaid, far be it from him to dispute the justice of the eulogy pronounced by the hon. and gallant Gentleman (Major Anson) on our troops in India, or to disparage the importance of the services they had rendered to their country in suppressing the Indian Mutiny. Those services were invaluable; he was sure they were appreciated highly by all, and not least by Her Majesty's Government; and he was certain that neither the Government nor any man in that House would grudge to those troops any booty, spoil, or remuneration to which they were entitled by the amplest construction it was possible to put on the rules of prize. It was satisfactory to know that a sum amounting to about £550,000 had already been distributed among those troops, and if they were entitled to that further sum by all means let them have it. But he thought he should be enabled to show to the House conclusive reasons why it was impossible for the Government to agree to the present Motion. The first reason he had to allege was, that that matter had been referred to a competent tribunal, with the consent of the claimants—indeed, at their desire—that they had been fully heard before that tribunal, and that that tribunal had decided. His hon. and learned Friend (Mr. Goldney) laboured under some misapprehension as to the law relating to the matter, and also as to the nature of the tribunal competent to deal with prize cases. There was no positive law whatever bearing on the subject. All booty belonged to the Crown, and it was at the absolute discretion of the Crown how it should be divided. The Courts of Law had more than once said that that question was not a legal one. He might refer to a case in Chancery, which was well known to his hon. and learned Friend—that of the Rajah of Coorg—in which this was said—
  "Where the property of a captive Prince is taken by a hostile sovereign Power in war, no Court of Justice has jurisdiction over the transaction."
  And the great Deccan case, which his hon. and learned Friend cited as a great authority in his favour, was decided by the very same tribunal which his hon. and learned Friend now sought to de-

  1531
  preciate—namely, by the Treasury. The Treasury was, and always had been, recognized as the proper tribunal for advising Her Majesty in these matters; and his hon. and learned Friend would find, if he would turn to the report of the case of the Army of the Deccan, that on an application being made to the Privy Council to entertain it, the Privy Council refused to do so, on the ground that Her Majesty's Treasury was the proper Court for the determination of the question. Therefore, the only great case that had been decided at all on prize law was one that had been decided by the very tribunal which his hon. and learned Friend sought to depreciate. His hon. and learned Friend appeared to be under the further misapprehension that that jurisdiction of the Board of Treasury had now been transferred to a legal tribunal. That was not so. There had been no transference whatever. The Board of Treasury still retained the same functions which it had exercised before, and which it exercised in the great Deccan case, and exercised, as far as he could understand, to the satisfaction of his hon. and learned Friend. The 3 & 4 Vict. c. 66 said no more than this—that if Her Majesty thought fit, by Order in Council, she might send a case for consideration before the Court of Admiralty; but the jurisdiction of the Treasury, which existed and was exercised before, still remained, and it was a question for the discretion of Her Majesty whether she should go out of her way by Order in Council to transfer a case of that kind for consideration to the Court of Admiralty. Therefore, he said that matter had been heard by a competent tribunal. He said farther that it had been heard with the consent, he might almost say at the request, and with the full concurrence of the claimants; and he said, also, that it had been fully and completely heard. He confessed he was somewhat surprised to hear his hon. and learned Friend, in a rather sneering manner, say the case had been argued by only one counsel, especially, too, as it had been argued most fully and most elaborately by his hon. and learned Friend the Member for Oxford (Mr. Vernon Harcourt), than whom no man was more competent to do so, and who urged everything that he could urge on behalf of the claimants. He was the more surprised to hear that ob-
  1532
  jection from a lawyer, seeing that in almost every special case, in arguments on demurrers, arguments in Courts of Error, involving questions of the highest importance, one counsel and one only was heard. Therefore, in hearing one counsel the tribunal of the Treasury adopted the course often followed by Courts of Law in cases of the utmost importance. He himself had appeared on behalf of the East Indian Government, and he would ask why were the parties who had submitted their case to a competent tribunal not to be bound by its decision? If the decision had gone against himself, arguing the question on behalf of the East Indian Government, and he had disputed the competence of the tribunal, would it not have been said he was acting most unfairly? Even if the case had been referred to arbitration, by the consent of both parties, surely both parties would have been bound to accept the award of the arbitrator. It would not be competent for the House to deal with a complicated case; but this was a simple one and involved no difficulty. The claim on behalf of troops as against the Crown was made in respect of certain promisory notes of the Indian Government, which it was alleged were captured at Kirwee—in other words, it was alleged that the Crown by its troops captured a debt due from itself, and the claim set up was that it should distribute that debt due from itself among the troops. The statement of the case disposed of it, and no prize court ever entertained so absurd a claim. But the promissory notes were never captured at all, for they were never found—a fact which had been conveniently ignored; and it was consistent with what took place that they had been destroyed or transferred by the Rao before the troops took Kirwee. Assuming that the notes had been captured, they were only a written acknowledgment on the part of the East India Company—which soon afterwards became the Crown, of so much owing to the Rao; but there was no such debt due, because six months previously, payment of the notes had been stopped, on the ground that the Rao was in open rebellion; and a man could not invoke the laws he was in rebellion against. It could not be said that the Crown could have made a claim against the Company, because there was no claim against the

  1533
  Company; and it was a conclusive answer to the claim against the Crown that, at the time of the alleged capture the Rao was in open rebellion. If the Rao had no claim how could anyone else have one? The precedents which his hon. and learned Friend had relied upon did not apply. In the Deccan case, the Company had in their hands money belonging to the Peishwa, and the Crown treated them as agents holding this property for him. Further, the Peishwa was an enemy, while the Rao was a rebel; and, therefore, different considerations applied to the two cases. If the Treasury had decided that a debt due from the Sovereign of a conquering army could be treated as a prize and could be captured, that decision was wrong, and the same tribunal was justified in reversing it. It was not as if the Treasury were bound by a long series of precedents; indeed, there were scarcely any; and if the Crown had been wrongly advised 30 years ago, that was no reason why it should be wrongly advised again. He trusted there would be no misunderstanding as to the Government wishing to treat the Army with liberality. The troops had a large amount of booty; all that by the widest latitude could be described as such the Government willingly gave them; but their further claims were referred to the Treasury, without the expression of any desire to carry the matter to the Court of Admiralty, and the Treasury had decided that there was really no pretence for treating these notes as booty. In this ease the debt, being due from the Sovereign of the capturing army, was extinguished by the rebellion, and upon these two grounds the case was clearly distinguishable from other cases in which the doctrine of constructive capture had been carried to great lengths.
  SIR JOHN HAY: Sir, I shall be glad to make a few observations on the subject under discussion. My hon. Friend the Member for Chippenham (Mr. Goldney) has fully stated the legal bearings of the case. I confess that I do not feel myself competent to deal with the legal subtleties involved in this matter. I am no lawyer, and I think I shall do well to follow the example of the hon. and gallant Member for Bewdley (Major Anson), and view the matter as it will be reviewed by the soldiers whom it concerns. The hon. and
  1534
  learned Gentleman the Attorney General has just said that perhaps unlearned Members were not aware that in a case of this sort it was not usual for more than one counsel learned in the law to plead. Well, we have heard from him one side of the ease most ably argued; and, probably, the fact that one counsel is sufficient may account for the absence of the Solicitor General. But the absence of the Solicitor General may, perhaps, also be accounted for by the fact that he does not agree with the Attorney General in the views which he has now thought fit to submit to Parliament. I am justified in that presumption by the following opinion, which I find in the Papers presented to Parliament, and which I now hold in my hand:—
  "Opinion of Counsel on the question of the Government Loan Bonds belonging to the Chiefs of Kirwee, submitted to the consideration of Counsel by the Special Prize Committee, September, 1868:—

  "1. Booty of war, in the sense of army prize, being a question of the bounty of the Crown, and not of strict right, is not susceptible of accurate legal definition. We are of opinion, however, that the notes in question are such property as has been distributed in other instances amongst a successful army by the Crown, and in such a matter precedent is usually and properly followed.

  "2. We see no reason why in such a question any distinction should be made between the case of the insurgent forces in India and a foreign enemy.

  "3. Having regard to the precedents, we are of opinion that the present case affords good ground for presenting a memorial to the Crown for the grant of the value of the notes in question to be distributed on the footing of booty.

  "Until a memorial has been presented, and has been dealt with by the Crown officers, we do not see any point upon which we can usefully advise further.

  (Signed)
  "J. D. COLERIDGE.
  "W. V. HARCOURT.
  "HARRIS PRENDERGAST.
  "J. F. STEPHEN.
  "FREDERICK RAMADGE."
  I believe the name of J. D. Coleridge here mentioned is the Solicitor General, at present absent from the House. Now, when I find such a divergence of opinion even among the Law Officers of the Crown—when a question is so difficult that two gentlemen so eminent in their profession cannot agree upon it; how much more difficult must it be for those whom it affects, the officers and soldiers of our Army, to understand a decision which may deprive them of their rights. I express no opinion as to the proprietary rights of anyone in the booty under

  1535
  discussion; but I think the Treasury should refer the question to the decision of the High Court of Admiralty, as is demanded by the soldiers of the Army who are claimants, and as is provided by law. The Attorney General has said that the notes in question do not exist; that, in fact, there is nothing to distribute. Well, if that be so, the High Court of Admiralty will decide that as there is nothing to distribute they cannot divide it. I suppose, however, that these notes are, or were, the representatives of some value; and I gathered from the Attorney General that they did, in fact, represent value of moneys appertaining to the Peishwa or his representatives, but that the value they represented had escheated to the Crown, by reason of the treason or rebellion of these Princes. It then, no doubt, becomes a question whether the property so escheated had fallen to the Crown before or after the occurrences which gave the troops a claim for prize. But what, above all, presses upon me the necessity for a reference of the matter to the High Court of Admiralty is this—the High Court of Admiralty is pointed out to the Army of India by the Queen's Regulations as the final Court of Appeal in matters of prize. It will be unfair to the Army to issue these Regulations, and not to abide by them. The following is the article in the Regulation to which I refer—
  "The final jurisdiction in all disputed cases of prize money now rests with the High Court of Admiralty, under the Act 3 & 4 Vict., c. 65, s. 2."—[See Cochrane's Regulations, p. 608.]
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER: That is not true.
  SIR JOHN HAY: That is not a very courteous remark on the part of the right hon. Gentleman.
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER: I say it is a mis-statement made in the Regulations.
  SIR JOHN HAY: The Chancellor of the Exchequer says that the Regulations of the Army of India are not true, as if they did not exist.
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER: I beg the hon. and gallant Gentleman's pardon. I did not say that. I said that the statement contained in these Regulations is not true, because it contradicts an Act of Parliament.
  SIR JOHN HAY: I am sorry, then, to find that the Secretary of State for India has given his sanction to Regulations which, according to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, are contrary to an Act of Parliament. How, I ask, are soldiers to know whether these Regulations, to disobey which would be death in some cases, contradicted an Act of Parliament? The Chancellor of the Exchequer is conceived by the Indian Army to have robbed those soldiers of money to which they believed they were entitled, and he now comes down to the House and tells us that these Regulations are not true. I am sorry to find that the Secretary for War is not here, for there can be no excuse for withholding this case from the High Court of Admiralty, particularly as the Solicitor General has given an opinion that he saw no reason why there should be any distinction made between the insurgent forces in India and a foreign enemy.
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER: The hon. and gallant Gentleman is attributing all sorts of motives to me. This is the property of the Indian Government, and not that of the Treasury, which has no more interest in it than the hon. and gallant Gentleman himself.
  SIR JOHN HAY: Then let the case be referred to the High Court of Admiralty, which is an impartial tribunal. At this moment the Treasury is not impartial. I again repeat the observation. That remark appears to irritate the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The right hon. Gentleman and the Government are doing that which will sow distrust and want of confidence between the Army and the Crown, by not keeping faith with the soldiers who have served the Crown. It is my duty to appeal to the Government to refer this question to the High Court of Admiralty, whose business it is to decide it.
  SIR HARRY VERNEYsaid, there could be no doubt that at the present moment the feeling of the House was that the decision of the Treasury would not be satisfactory to the Army. As representatives of the nation, the Members of that House were called upon to convince the Army that they were desirous of doing them justice. They did not complain of the Chancellor of the Exchequer defending that which he considered

  1537
  right; but the Army of India believed that this money belonged to them, and the question should be decided by a competent legal tribunal.
  MR. EASTWICK: Sir, I should be glad to support any Motion in favour of rewards to troops who acted so nobly and suffered so much as those that suppressed the Indian Mutiny. At the same time, I must own I see very grave objections to the Motion of the hon. Member for Chippenham (Mr. Goldney) both as regards the claim that the Kirwee promissory notes should be regarded as prize money, and also that such claim should be referred to the Court of Admiralty, or to any Law Court whatever, for decision. First, as regards the claim itself. Kirwee, a small town in the Allahabad division of the North-West Provinces, was the Jágír or barony of Amrit Rao, a Maratha Prince, who joined the British troops under Arthur Wellesley in the war against the Peshwá Bájí Rao. He gave up his claims to be Peshwa on our granting him an allowance of £80,000 a year. His son, Vinaek Eao, died at Kirwee in 1853, leaving an adopted son named Mahdu Rao, a boy about seven years old. He had formerly adopted another boy named Narayan Rao; but had disinherited and imprisoned him. We have, therefore, to do only with Mahdu Rao. This boy was about 11 years old in 1857, when the Mutiny commenced. He was under the guardianship of one Radha Govind, whose conduct was such that the Governor General, in The Calcutta Gazette of the 9th of January, 1858, declared the Kirwee Chiefs to be rebels. The boy Mahdu Rao, amongst other property, had inherited Government promissory notes to the value of £250,000. On the 7th of January, 1858, these notes were stopped by the Government of India, and all persons were warned in The Calcutta Gazette against receiving them. The Advocate General states at page 45 of the Papers of 1869, they were confiscated; and, as Lord Canning says he concurs with this officer, we must conclude that in his view the notes really were confiscated. They became State property, and as such were specially; exempted by Lord Canning's Proclamation of November, 1857, from being dealt with as prize. On the 4th of June, 1858, five months after the notes were confiscated, General Whitlock having inarched on Kirwee, Radha Govind,
  1538
  Mahdu Rao's guardian, who was the real rebel, decamped to the hills. Mahdu Rao and Narayan Rao at once gave themselves up, or rather sought protection in the British camp, for they were probably in great danger themselves from the numbers of our mutinous sepoys, who had made Kirwee a rendezvous. There was no fighting, or the slightest attempt at defending Kirwee. Mr. Mayne, the Collector of Banda, took peaceable possession of the palace, and was there for two days before General Whitlock discovered that the mistake of civil occupation might deprive him of prize money. In September, 1858, the boy Mahdu Rao was tried by Mr. Mayne under the Mutiny Acts of 1857, and was found guilty of treason, but, "with no fixed criminal intent!" whatever that may mean, and was sentenced to have all his property confiscated. Our Advocate General declared the sentence "irregular and unwarranted;" but saw no reason why we should not so far act on it as to strip this child, the adopted grandson of our ally, of all he had. This was done, £500,000 was realized, and even the drummer - boys of General Whitlock's force were rewarded for their services in marching from Banda to Kirwee, 35 miles, in very hot weather, with about £30 each. But the troops, or rather the prize agents, were not satisfied, and claimed the promissory notes, which it appears, from the Papers, they did not capture, for they were carried off by Radha to the hills and there lost, and which, if they had captured, could not, the lawyers say, have been regarded as prize money, unless transferable to bearer, and as they have been lost, none can say whether they were so transferable or not. But even if they had been captured and found to be transferable to bearer, they had been, as I have said, specially declared not to be prize by the Government—that is, by the Crown. This decision was affirmed by the Law Adviser of the Indian Government to be correct, and has been re-affirmed by the Lords of the Treasury in this country. Sir, I do not go into the precedents which have been adduced by the claimants, such as the Dakhan tribute, and the Coorg promissory notes. They are wholly irrelevant, because they are all wanting in the special feature that marks this particular case—namely, that the Government had declared the Kirwee notes to be State property, and had spe-

  1539
  cially exempted State property from being prize. With respect to that part of the Motion which would refer this claim to the Court of Admiralty, I object to it most strongly. That Court might, indeed, decide who should share in what the Crown of its bounty assigns as prize; but, in my humble opinion, to give up the Prerogative of the Crown to a Law Court, by allowing that Court to pronounce what is prize and what is not, is to be deprecated in the strongest possible manner. On one account I am glad that this Motion has been made, and that is because I think it is high time that Government should declare, in the most positive terms, that all such property as is not actually recovered by the troops at the point of the bayonet, all debts and papers and property not in the hands of the enemy, shall henceforth be reserved by Government to meet the expenses of the war, and to enable it to discharge the numerous just claims which are always made upon it in consequence of war. As for these notes, an hon. Member has asked what has become of them, or, as they have been lost, of their money value. I will tell him what has become of them. They have been very properly applied by Government to make a provision for Mahdu Rao, when he comes of age, and I hope that that arrangement will not be disturbed. In the case of Dhalíp Singh, and others, their private property had not been taken from them. But suppose the money had been appropriated by Government, or given to the troops, I ask the House to consider what would have been the effect on our credit in India? Would any Native invest money in our loans, if he found it was liable to seizure on the imputation of treason or disaffection? I will read to the House what a great authority—Vattel—says on the subject of the immunity from seizure of money similar to these notes—
  "Everything that belongs to the nation is subject to reprisals whenever it can be seized, provided it be not a deposit entrusted to the public faith. As it is only in consequence of that confidence, which the proprietor has placed in our good faith, that we happen to have such deposit in our hands, it ought to be respected even in case of open war. Such is the conduct observed in France, England, and elsewhere."
  And again—
  "The State does not so much as touch the sums which it owes to the enemy. Money lent to the public is everywhere exempt from confiscation and seizure in war."
  1540
  If the Army were to be allowed to consider all property to be prize, the effect would be general discontent, while the Government would be deprived of the means to meet its own expenses. He thought it would be exceedingly impolitic to agree to the proposition before the House.
  MR. WHALLEYsaid, in answer to the arguments advanced by the Attorney General, he must deny that the decision of the Treasury could in any respect be regarded as that of a Court of Law.
  COLONELNORTHsaid, that some years ago he moved an humble Address to Her Majesty for the appointment of a Commission to inquire into the subject of the distribution of prize money generally throughout the Army. Lord Palmerston, who was at that time Prime Minister, said the subject was a proper one for inquiry; a Royal Commission was appointed, and it reported that in disputed cases the Act of 3 and 4 Vict. should be put in force. In 1864 the Lords of the Treasury issued a Minute, in which they expressed their concurrence in that recommendation. The present Prime Minister was at that time Chancellor of the Exchequer. He regretted the absence of the Solicitor General on the present occasion, because on two occasions the hon. and learned Gentleman gave an opinion in favour of the claim now under consideration. He must observe that since he first entered the House he had never heard a declaration that astonished him more than the one made this evening by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The right hon. Gentleman said that a statement contained in the Regulations for the Army was not true, because it was in contradiction of an Act of Parliament. The question before the House was not merely whether a sum of £250,000 should be paid or not; it was also whether the confidence which the soldiers had hitherto reposed in their officers and in the Government with respect to prize money should be shaken. The soldiers believed that the money now claimed would be paid out of the Treasury, if paid at all, and, therefore, they would not be satisfied if the matter were not referred to some disinterested tribunal.
  MAJOR DICKSONsaid, that the Attorney General and the hon. and learned Member for Penryn (Mr. Eastwick) had argued the question on different premises. The Attorney General said that

  1541
  the property of the Chiefs had been confiscated for rebellion, and therefore the Army had no claim to it. The hon. and learned Gentleman (Mr. Eastwick) said it belonged to a minor, that it had not been confiscated, and that, therefore, it could not be given to the Army. The Attorney General was employed against the soldiers by the East India Company, and, no doubt, then, as now, he spoke from his brief; but the difference of opinion between learned Gentlemen in that House showed the necessity for an inquiry before a competent tribunal. He trusted that the House would accede to the Motion of the hon. Member (Mr. Goldney), and then the soldiers would feel that every class of Her Majesty's subjects could obtain justice from that House.
  MR. GOURLEYsaid that no proof had been adduced in support of the claim that had been put forward on behalf of the soldiers engaged in the capture of Banda and Kirwee, neither was there any proof of the existence of the notes in question. They had already received £550,000 from the booty taken during the expedition. He could not tell why soldiers who were paid for their services by the nation should have any claim to booty at all, and he believed that the hope of booty was calculated to demoralize them. Under these circumstances he hoped the House would not accede to the Motion.
  COLONEL BARTTELOTsaid, that the hon. Member who had just sat down appeared to think that soldiers had neither feeling nor sense, or anything, but that they were to be put up to be shot at by the enemy. Soldiers, however, had as much feeling as other persons. The soldier was told that he was neither to loot, plunder, nor destroy, but that if he did his duty honestly and well he would receive his reward in the shape of his share of the booty captured; and the House ought, in the interest of the country, to take care that this promise to the soldier was faithfully kept. The hon. Member who spoke last had said that it was not known that the notes had ever existed; but they had been returned as prize by the prize agents themselves. An opinion to the effect that the soldiers were entitled to the value of the notes had been signed by Sir John Duke Coleridge, Mr. Harcourt, Mr. Prendergast, Mr. Stephen, and Mr. Ramadge. The right hon. Gentleman
  1542
  the Chancellor of the Exchequer had had a great deal to do with this matter. On the 10th of May, 1869, when the matter had been brought before him in the Treasury Chambers, the right hon Gentleman had observed in reference to the decision in the case of the Deccan prize money, that the force of absurdity could no further go, to which Mr. Harcourt replied that he should not have ventured to apply such an expression to a decision arrived at by Lord Liverpool and his Colleagues, under the advice of the Duke of Wellington and Lord Lynd-hurst. In his opinion, the right hon. Gentleman would do well, after having heard the almost unanimous opinion of the House upon the question, to yield in the matter, and thereby place himself in a much better position with respect to it than he occupied at present. It was unjust and ungenerous to delay the further distribution of the prize. It would be detrimental to the Army and its interests, and he hoped the House would affirm the Resolution.
  SIR CHARLES WINGFIELDsaid, that if this claim had been put forward on behalf of the troops who had been engaged in the sieges of Delhi or of Lucknow, he should have been the last to oppose it. The 7,000 troops in question had, however, taken Banda and Kirwee after a very slight engagement, and they had already received £50 per man, which he regarded as ample reward for the services which they had rendered. It was a question of the munificence and bounty of the Crown—whether, in fact, the army engaged at Kirwee had been fully recompensed by the gift of the whole of the moveable property which had fallen into their hands, for it must be remembered that the notes had never been found to this day. Nobody would fail to admit that the men engaged had been extremely fortunate, and everyone who had at heart the financial position of India should feel thankful to the Government for declining to accede to an unreasonable demand.
  MR. R. TORRENSsaid, he remarked with surprise that the Chancellor of the Exchequer declared the Queen's Regulations to be null and void, and contrary to law.
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERsaid, he had made no such statement.
  MR. R. TORRENSsaid, he would

  1543
  appeal to hon. Members opposite as to whether the right hon. Gentleman had not declared the Regulations null and void, and expressed the opinion that the House should adhere to the precedent already laid down, and maintain the Act of 3 & 4 Vict., by sending this case to the proper Court, so that the whole facts might be clearly ascertained for the satisfaction of the Army and the country.
  MR. SINCLAIR AYTOUNsaid, that the point under discussion should not be dismissed on military, Indian, nor legal grounds, but should be dealt with on the simple issue whether the Treasury had gone beyond the strict line of its duty. He thought it had, and that the matter should be referred to the Court of Admiralty.
  MR. STANSFELDsaid, he feared that hon. Members might have become somewhat confused in considering how far the questions at issue were questions of law, policy, or fact. He was quite sure his hon. and gallant Friend (Sir John Hay) had no intention to mislead in his reading of the Regulations he had quoted, and yet he feared the impression produced differed from that which the facts would support. The hon. and gallant Member had read extracts from the Regulations, not the Official Regulations of the Army, but from a copy published by the authority of the Secretary of State for India, and the words used were that "the final jurisdiction in all disputed cases of prize money now rests with the High Court of Admiralty." Not only when his hon. and gallant Friend read, that passage, but upon other occasions when hon. Members referred to the jurisdiction conferred by the statute on the Court, the impression produced was that the Act conferred a positive jurisdiction on the Court of Admiralty to decide questions of booty and of prizes. That impression was incorrect, for the 22nd section of the Act said—
  "The High Court of Admiralty shall have jurisdiction to decide all matters and questions concerning booty of war or the distribution thereof which it shall please Her Majesty, her heirs, and successors, by the advice of Her and their Privy Council, to refer to the judgment of the said Court."
  The House would see, therefore, that the Court only had jurisdiction on the motion of the Crown by an Order in Council, and that its jurisdiction would be confined by the terms of that Order
  1544
  and the questions thereby referred to it. He would now allude to the Regulation read by his hon. and gallant Friend, who would, no doubt, acknowledge that a few words extracted, from a document could not be accurately interpreted without reference to the context. Now, the only words cited by the hon. and gallant Baronet were to the following effect:—
  "The final jurisdiction in all disputed cases of prize money now rests with the High Court of Admiralty under the Act 3 & 4 Vict. c. 65 s. 2."
  If, however, the context were before the House, he believed it would be found that the disputed cases referred to were disputed cases of distribution. As many hon. Members were aware, the vast majority of the cases referred to Courts of Law were not questions of what was booty and what was not booty, which was a matter for the decision of the Crown and its Advisers. The question usually referred to a Court of Law was—given a certain amount of booty, how should it be distributed among certain troops?
  SIR JOHN HAYsaid, that the Court might decide what was booty.
  Mr. STANSFELDsaid, the Court, no doubt, had jurisdiction as regards booty as well as regards distribution, if the subject were referred to it by an Order in Council. His hon. and gallant Friend had quoted three lines from one of the Regulations; but he maintained that it was unfair to judge of the effect of the whole document from so short an extract.
  SIR JOHN HAYsaid, the book was in the Library.
  MR. STANSFELDsaid, he had no doubt it was, and he felt assured that his hon. and gallant Friend, familiar as he was with the accuracy with which Regulations of this kind were drawn up, would admit it was highly improbable that any Regulations had been issued which were inconsistent with the terms of the statute or of the law. Some hon. Members had referred to a legal opinion, signed by the Solicitor General and other counsel. Now, that opinion was a very guarded one, and one must know that the opinion of a counsel called in to advise a client on his own statement of his case could not be regarded as having the weight of a judicial decision. On the case submitted, to them the counsel for the claimants began by saying—

  1545
  "Booty of war in the sense of army prize, being a question of the bounty of the Crown, and not of strict right, is not susceptible of accurate legal definition."
  How, then, could it be obligatory on Her Majesty and her Advisers to submit the question to a Court of Law? The learned counsel went on as follows:—
  "We are of opinion, however, that the notes in question are such property as has been distributed in other instances amongst a successful army by the Crown."
  It would be observed that the counsel for the claimants recorded their opinion on a question of fact and not of law. Without for a moment referring to the question whether the notes were actually captured or not—for the opinion in no way bore on the question of actual or constructive capture—all they ventured to say was, that notes of that description had been allowed to be distributed as booty among troops. And what was the advice of the learned counsel? As the postscript of a letter often contained its pith, so the practical advice tendered by counsel was the most important part of their opinion. In the present instance they did not venture to assert that the claimants had a right which the Crown could not refuse to recognize, but they said—
  "Having regard to the precedents, we are of opinion that the present case affords good grounds for presenting a memorial to the Crown."
  The whole extent of that opinion, then, was, that counsel very fairly advised the claimants to try the effect of a memorial. So that even if the opinion could be held to be binding on the House, and, of course, no opinion of any counsel who was instructed to advise one of the parties could be binding, it went no further than to say that the case was one which might fairly be submitted to the judgment and the generosity of the Crown. His hon. and learned Friend who brought this question forward (Mr. Goldney) was under a mistaken impression as to the proceedings of the Treasury. The function of that Department was not to sit in judgment as a legal tribunal, but to advise the Crown how to act in this matter of discretion. Counsel were heard on both sides. His hon. Friend had said the Treasury refused to furnish copies of the opinions given by the Law Officers of the Crown in 1825, and of other documents. The fact was, however, that the parties only wanted these documents if time and opportunity allowed of their production; and it hap-
  1546
  pened that time and opportunity did not allow of it. The case was most fully argued on behalf of the claimants. He must endorse the opinion of the Attorney General that they were most efficiently represented. The hon. and gallant Gentleman who seconded the Motion (Major Anson) had alluded to the great exertions, risks, and sacrifices of the troops; and, insisting on the importance of maintaining discipline, he had urged the Government to take a liberal and generous view of the matter, because, he said, it was of vital importance that our soldiers engaged in foreign wars should not search for booty themselves, but should have a well-founded confidence that whatever booty was taken would be fairly distributed among them. But in the present instance no question of fair distribution was raised. If it had been, it would, of course, have been referred to the consideration of a Court of Law. The question here raised was—"What is booty?" His hon. and gallant Friend's argument about the danger of our troops indulging in looting was really in favour of the policy upheld by the Government—namely, that we ought to keep as near as possible to the doctrine of actual capture. In the Deccan case which had been quoted against the Treasury it was laid down that, although in some cases constructive capture was allowed, yet that doctrine ought not to be enlarged. The question now at issue was, he maintained, not a legal one, but one of justice and good faith. If the soldiers had not had ideas on this subject instilled into their minds by persons who were more lawyers than soldiers, it would never have occurred to them that they were entitled to the money value of promissory notes which had never been found. There were only two legal points in this matter, and they wore quite simple. The first was that, save under Lord Canning's Proclamation, there could be no right to prize money, because the law did not recognize any such right in the case of civil war—an assertion in which every lawyer in the House would support him. The claim must rest upon a fair interpretation of that Proclamation, the terms of which were that all movable property belonging to the rebels that was ordinarily distributable and was captured by the troops should be held to be prize. Could anyone say that promissory notes, of which the soldiers never dreamt, were property within

  1547
  the meaning of that Proclamation? It was impossible to raise upon that Proclamation any question which Her Majesty's Advisers were bound to refer to a legal tribunal; but even if the Government agreed to refer the subject to such a tribunal, would his hon. and learned Friend say what question should be submitted? No legal question could be defined. It was impossible that his hon. and learned Friend could submit to the Government and the House any question which could be submitted to a legal tribunal, for, in addition to whatever he might suggest, it would still remain for the Government to advise the Crown with respect to the exercise of its prerogative, and its generosity in dealing with this question of bounty.
  MR. HENLEYsaid, he understood that, in 1868, when the idea of making this claim first arose, the opinion of the Solicitor General was obtained, and he advised that there was a ease on which to memorialize the Treasury. An application was thereupon made to the Treasury, and the case was heard, counsel appearing on both sides, nor could he find in the correspondence any request that the matter should be referred to the Court of Admiralty; on the contrary, the memorialists expressed their thankfulness at the Treasury having undertaken to hear their case. Much had been said about the Treasury in the course of this debate; but it should be recollected that it was not this country but the people of India who were interested—a material point which had not been kept in view. The Treasury could, to say the least, act impartially between the Army and the people of India, who would have had to pay, had the decision been in favour of the soldiers; nor had he heard a word in this debate to show why there should be any appeal from the tribunal which had already given a decision on the subject to that Court to which it was equally open to the memorialists to have applied in the first instance. The parties had sought the decision of a tribunal whose offer they accepted with thanks, and they ought now to be bound by the result.
  THE SOLICITOR GENERALsaid, he should not have taken any part in this discussion had not some observations been made respecting his absence from the House during the debate. He only desired to say now, that having been
  1548
  counsel for those on whose behalf an application was now made to the House, he thought it would be only becoming in him to abstain from taking any part in this discussion; and he preferred to absent himself from the House in order that he might not be appealed to and forced into taking part in a debate on a matter in which he had been engaged as adviser before he held his present Office. His opinion had been read to the House, and by that opinion he was still bound. He believed there was a case for the consideration of the Treasury, and he advised that a memorial should be presented; but he gave no opinion whatever as to what was likely to be the result of the application. He hoped the House would, not think he was acting unbecomingly, either as a Law Officer of the Crown, or as former adviser to the claimants, if he stood by that opinion, and refused either to advance or to recede.
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER: After having been so much called upon in this debate, it is hardly possible for me to avoid saying a few words. I will just state what I understand to be the question before the House, and how matters now stand. Her Majesty's troops took Kirwee, and they were entitled to receive, and did receive under a judgment by Dr. Lushington, a very large share of the booty which they took there. Their advisers and friends then raised a further claim—that in addition to booty valued at £500,000, they were entitled to the proceeds of certain promissory notes worth £250,000 more. Those promissory notes were not taken in Kirwee, but are supposed to have been lost or destroyed; at all events, they are not forthcoming, and could any one claim upon them except he was able to present them? They claim to be constituted the creditors of Her Majesty for the value of those promissory notes in addition to the £500,000 they have already received from the bounty of Her Majesty as prize money, and their claim is upon the Indian revenues for £250,000. There is a proper and constitutional tribunal for giving an opinion on the subject of that claim, and for advising Her Majesty whether she shall extend her Royal bounty beyond the amount already given. That tribunal is the Treasury Board, and no other body whatever. That is absolutely beyond dispute, and

  1549
  there is a precedent for it in the case of the Deccan prize money, which was heard and decided by Lord Liverpool and the Lords of the Treasury. That case has been cited against us by those who wish to deny our authority; but, under the circumstances, what were the Treasury to do in this case? They had the power, if they so chose, to advise Her Majesty to issue an Order in Council referring this matter to the Court of Admiralty, and such a course was adopted by Lord Palmerston's Government in the case of the £500,000 already distributed among those troops; but that led to immense expense and litigation, and to the great delay which has been complained of by almost every speaker who has blamed the Treasury Board for their conduct. No doubt that delay is a matter very much to be lamented; for, as has been said, many times soldiers die, and they lose the reward to which they are justly entitled. The Treasury felt that this was not like the question which was referred to Dr. Lushington, that being a complicated and difficult matter, and one which involved disputes as to issues of fact as well as raising points of law. In this matter, there was one simple question with which the Treasury believed themselves perfectly able to deal, considering the assistance they would receive from the learned counsel who would be engaged in the case; and, therefore, out of kindness to the claimants, and for no other reason, the Treasury took upon themselves the heavy responsibility of exercising their jurisdiction instead of pushing it off upon the Court of Admiralty; for the effect of the latter course would inevitably have been to put the parties to an enormous expense, and to cause them to suffer endless delay before a decision was given. The decision of the Court would have been subject to an appeal to the Privy Council. To save the soldiers this, to give a speedy decision, and in the confidence—though that may have been misplaced—that we should be able to do justice in this matter, the Board of the Treasury undertook to discharge this duty, and their offer, as has been already stated, was received with gratitude. Not a word of objection to their undertaking the duty was ever stated; the two litigant parties, the Indian Government and the representatives of the troops, appeared by very able counsel and
  1550
  were heard. All sorts of imputations have been cast on the Board of the Treasury, but we were absolutely impartial; it mattered not to us whether this money was given to the troops or to the Indian Revenue. All we wished was that justice should be done between them, and that it should be done cheaply and speedily. My right hon. Friend the First Minister of the Crown presided on that occasion, and the other Lords of the Treasury, myself included, were present. We heard and considered the matter without the slightest bias or feeling, and, having considered it, we gave our decision in favour of the Indian Government. We are now asked virtually to cancel that decision—to treat it as null and void. Why? Because those against whom we decided are dissatisfied. Of course, one side or other must always be dissatisfied with a decision; but I ask the House, in its anxiety to further the ends of justice, not to do a great injustice in this matter. Both parties appeared and were heard, and asked the decision of the Treasury upon their ease; each side took the risk of the decision being adverse, though of course hoping that it would be favourable. Suppose the decision of the Treasury had been in favour of the soldiers, would they now be coming forward to speak of the tribunal as improper and inadequate? Had the decision been against the Indian Government they would have lost £250,000, yet they raised no objection to the question being determined by us. They could have made no valid objection; but they did not even attempt to do so. I contend that a litigant has no right to bring his case before a tribunal, taking his chance of what the decision may be, and then, when it is adverse, to turn round and raise the question whether the Court was a proper one to try the case. If there were any objection to the jurisdiction of the Treasury it ought to have been urged before the arguments were proceeded with, and not afterwards. In trying the case, we took upon ourselves a heavy responsibility, without any motive whatever to bias us; we discharged that duty to the best and utmost of our ability, and we deserve a better return than to be accused of partiality and arbitrary conduct by those against whom we have committed no offence whatever, except it be that, after the best consideration we were able to give to the subject, we

  1551
  could see no justification whatever for their claim. Under these circumstances, I trust the House will be content to let the matter stand, and will not desire to re-open the question.
  SIR JOHN HAYread from the Articles of War a passage in support of the statement which he had made, and which he understood to have been impugned by the right hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. Stansfeld).
  Question put, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
  The House divided:—Ayes 108; Noes 67: Majority 41.

CHILDREN EMPLOYED IN AGRICULTURE.—OBSERVATIONS.
MR. FAWCETT,in rising to call attention to the Report of the Commission appointed to inquire into the condition of Children Employed in Agriculture, said, this was now the third time he had endeavoured to direct attention to the subject, and he would do so as briefly as possible. In all the discussions which had arisen upon education in and out of that House, scarcely a single reference had been made to this Report; yet there never was one which embraced more important information, or threw more important light on the educational problem in various aspects. It would tend to correct an unfortunate feeling which was growing up, and which had been fostered by the action of the Government and by what had occurred during the present Session. It was supposed we had solved the most important part of the education problem when we had brought the means of education within the reach of every child; but this Report conclusively demonstrated that it was not enough to bring the means of education within the reach of every child. Beyond this there was something more important—to secure that children should avail themselves of these educational advantages. Although the ignorance that prevailed in the rural districts was deplorable, it did not exceed the extent of ignorance in some of our largest and wealthiest towns. No language could be used too strongly in praise of the efforts made by the clergy to extend education in the rural districts; and, although the zeal displayed by land-
1552
owners was not so great as that of the clergy, everything that could be done had been done to improve in their own districts the means of an excellent education. But if they found that, after all, the state of education in the rural districts was scarcely more satisfactory than it was before that new zeal began, the conclusion was irresistible that something more was required, and that education in the rural districts never would be rendered what it ought to be simply and solely by the provision of schools. He would show this by some references to the Report, which he believed would be found marked by fairness and candour. Mr. Stanhope, one of the Assistant Commissioners, who visited the counties of Nottingham and Lincoln, stated that they were well supplied with schools. Scarcely was there a village in which there was not a good school; yet he added that the state of education in those counties was becoming more unsatisfactory as the schools were becoming more satisfactory. The reason was, that the age at which children were taken from school was gradually dropping, owing to the demand for juvenile labour, and the provision of good schools was powerless to counteract it. Schools were not so much wanted as the securing the attendance of children at them. The Bishop of Manchester, one of the highest authorities on the subject, who had been employed on the Commission, and who had investigated this subject carefully, accurately, and completely, stated that in 19 counties of England which he had visited there was school accommodation for one-half more children than attended them. It had been shown again and again that good schools in many districts had been provided, and that the state of education did not improve one iota. So long as the children were taken away and sent to work, the school was little more than an infant school. In Gloucestershire, Mr. Stanhope found children as young as six years were sent to work, and if that was so, how could the provision of schools secure the education of children? In the county of Dorset boys of eight or nine years were sent to follow the plough. Mr. Woolaston, diocesan inspector in the county of Sussex, admitted that schools had improved; but school results were not more satisfactory, because during the last 10 years the average age at

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which children were taken from school had been dropping. At the present time the average age at which boys left school in that district was less by 11 months than it was 10 years since. But the evil did not stop here. School attendance became also more irregular and intermittent. One diocesan inspector stated that an average school attendance of five years represented an actual attendance of only three years. There was only one way to cure the evil—by placing some restriction on the age at which children might go to work. When the Factory Acts were passed the principle was laid down that the State had a right to interfere between the parent and the child; and, therefore, it could not now be contended that the State had not a right to interfere between the parent and the child employed in agriculture. It was said that the farmer wanted the labour of the child; but to that he replied that the evidence before the Commission brought out the fact that the prosperity of agriculture varied inversely with the age at which children were sent to work. In Northumberland, where children were rarely sent to work until they were 12 years old, a superior class of agricultural labourers was to be found; and in consequence the farmers were able to pay 20, or 30, or even 40 per cent more wages for labour than in the worst counties of England. Mr. Culley, who was employed by the Agricultural Commission, stated that so superior was the labourer in Northumberland in consequence of increased intelligence resulting from the practice of not sending the children to work until they were 12 years old, that the labourer, on account of his increased efficiency, was enabled to receive higher wages. Upon the point whether it was necessary for a child to go to work at eight or nine years of age in order to learn his trade, the evidence given before the Commission was conclusive. Mr. Fraser and other Commissioners examined the labourers, and their testimony was unanimously to the effect that it was not necessary for a child to go to work at that early age, and that a child would learn his trade better if kept at school until he was 12 years old. The poverty of the parents was urged as a most formidable objection to the adoption of a system of compulsion in respect to the schooling of the children, because the parents, it was said,
1554
could not afford to lose any portion of the earnings of their children. On the other hand, a good deal was to be said in favour of a general system of compulsion, which would limit the supply of juvenile labour throughout the country, and thereby directly increase its price. At the same time, it would indirectly produce important effects on the wages of adult labour, for nothing more depressed the wages of adult labour than the competition of juvenile labour. This argument, however, would cease to have effect if, instead of a general compulsory system throughout the country, some hybrid and permissive sort of compulsion was introduced, according to the scheme of the Government, establishing compulsion in one village and not in another at a certain distance from it. But whatever the House might do with respect to compulsory education, the labourers in counties where the wages were 8s., 9s., or 10 s. a week, could not be worse off than they were at present, for it was not the competition of the labour market which controlled the rate of wages in those counties, but the rate of wages was determined by a consideration of the minimum on which a labourer could live. The result, therefore, of the introduction of a general system of compulsion would be that the labourers in those counties would not starve, but when the wages of the children were taken away a slight addition would be made to the wages of the adults in order to enable them to live. Then came the question, how was this system of compulsion to be worked out? He did not wish to bring forward any definite scheme of his own, but would refer to the schemes of two Commissioners, which were directly opposed to each other. Mr. Tremenheere proposed that up to the age of 11 years every child employed in agriculture should be compelled to attend school 160 times during the year, or, in other words, to have 80 days' schooling; but if a child of nine years could pass an examination in the fourth standard, then the number of school attendances should be reduced from 160 to 60, and if at 10 years of age a child was able to pass an examination in the next standard, then all obligation to attend school should cease. The plan of having 160 school attendances was a proposal analogous to the clauses in the Print Works Act, and it was remarkable that the Secretary of State for the

1555
Home Department was about to introduce that very evening a Bill to amend the Print Works Acts, because the educational clauses in them had proved a miserable sham and idle mockery. Mr. Leonard Horner, one of the most experienced Factory Inspectors, said he regarded the Print Works Acts as mockeries of legislation and absolutely useless. The scheme of Mr. Tremenheere was unfortunately marred by that fatal principle which would drag all children to one dead level, for he proposed that the clever and industrious boy of nine should be required to attend school only one-third of the time that the less gifted or less industrious boy did. This would defeat one grand end of education, which was to discover and develop talent, and to enable the clever boy to advance from the National School to the University. Mr. Tufnel said he would forbid the employment of children not only in agriculture but in any industry whatever until they were nine years of age, and that he would gradually advance the age to 10, 11, and 12; but he did not seem to be prepared to recommend, as a necessary corollary, the securing of the attendance of children at school when they were not permitted to work; and it would be obvious we should only be encouraging idleness and vice if means were not taken to secure the schooling of every child not permitted to work. He therefore maintained it was absolutely necessary to have, not permissive compulsion, but a general system of direct compulsion, to save from ruin the children forbidden to work. Admirable as were the results obtained by the Factory Acts, one effect of their operation was, that parents, knowing their children must attend school when they began work, neglected their early education, so that the factory children when they began work were less well educated than those not intended to be employed in factories. This showed that it would be mischievous and disastrous to forbid the employment of children, unless we had a general system of compulsory school attendance. Mr. Tufnel urged the importance of uniform legislation, because he showed that, if one branch of industry was more restricted than another, children were attracted from the more restricted to the less restricted occupation, the natural flow of labour was unduly disturbed, and injustice was inflicted upon those
1556
engaged in the industry subjected to the most onerous restriction. He had been accused of holding extreme views upon the religious question; but he attached far more importance to compulsion than to the religious aspect of the Government Bill, because, without compulsion, the best schools, with the most liberal regulations, would, not accomplish the education of every child. This done, many questions touched upon in the Report, connected with the condition of the agricultural labourer, would solve themselves. It was of little use building good cottages for people who did not appreciate them; but the more highly cultivated peasantry of Northumberland would not live in bad ones. Those who were well taught would acquire a taste for rational pleasures, which would do more to keep them from intemperance than any Licensing Bills. In conclusion, he would beg to move—
"That, in the opinion of this House, the evidence obtained by this Commission proves that the ignorance which prevails in the rural districts is in a far greater degree due to the early age at which children are taken from school to be sent to work, than to any general deficiency in the means of education."
ME. SPEAKERreminded the hon. Member that, according to the forms of the House, the Motion could not be put.
MR. BRUCEsaid, the main object of the speech of his hon. Friend seemed to be to show the necessity of a compulsory system of education. He (Mr. Bruce) would be the last to say that the educational condition of children in the agricultural districts was satisfactory; but there was ample evidence to show that the children in the agricultural districts were not worse educated than children in the towns. As many persons were able to read and write in the agricultural districts, and as many persons signed the register there, as in the towns, and he was sorry to say that the places where ignorance was the largest and deepest were the large manufacturing towns. He had hoped to find some light thrown upon the special difficulties connected with education in the agricultural districts; but his hon. Friend (Mr. Fawcett), though he had been successful in showing the objections to the schemes of the Commissioners, had made no suggestion of his own upon the subject. This might be no reason why the Go-

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vernment or the House should not attempt to legislate, and apply, in some modified form, the half-time system to the agricultural districts. But it was a proof of the difficulty of the question that his hon. Friend, who had made it a special study, did not assist the House in getting out of the difficulty. For his own part, before any further legislation was attempted, he should like to see how the House would deal with the principle of compulsion in Committee upon the Education Bill. If the Bill were carried, even in its present form, the compulsory clauses must apply to large portions of the agricultural districts. His hon. Friend said that the ignorance which prevailed in the agricultural districts was not due to the want of good schools; but it was certainly a fact that the proportion of schools which were in a position to receive aid from the State, and which were alone recognized by the Bill, was very small in the agricultural districts. The Bill provided for a more elastic system in dealing with children in the rural districts than elsewhere, because no other class were employed at such uncertain periods. Clause 66 empowered every school Board to make by-laws requiring the parents of children above 5 and under 12 years of age to cause such children, unless there was some reasonable excuse, to attend school; and the next by-law was to determine the time during which children were so to attend school—
"Provided that no such by-law should be contrary to anything contained in any Act for regulating the education of children employed in labour."
It was clear, therefore, that if these clauses were passed, and the local Boards did their duty, a system of compulsory education adapted to the.condition and the wants of the agricultural classes would be applied in cases where it was needed. His hon. Friend apparently wished to make the system of compulsory education general and instantaneous. But in the rural districts of Scotland there was no compulsion, yet the parents made their children attend a sufficient time for the purposes of education, and they were better educated than any children in the same class throughout the whole country. He would rather that the compulsory principle were applied gradually, as suggested in the Bill, than generally and immediately, for he feared
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that in the latter case the system might break down altogether. The speech of his hon. Friend might, perhaps, have been better made upon the second reading of the Education Bill, or upon the clauses in Committee. On the part of the Government he could assure his hon. Friend that they had every desire to supply what was needed for the education of the people; and when the Bill passed Parliament and the country would be in a better condition to judge what further legislation would be necessary.
MR. SCOURFIELDsaid, that a fact which had great weight with Parliament in requiring the compulsory education of children employed, in factories was the injury to their health caused by their continuous employment; but this objection did not apply to agricultural employment. He was certain that any attempt to carry inspection and compulsion too far in matters of education would only shipwreck the whole system.
In answer to Colonel CORBETT,
MR. W. E. FORSTERsaid, it was true that the Elementary Education Bill did not interfere with districts in which, in the opinion of the inspectors who would inquire, a good sufficient, and suitable education was given, even though that education might be given in schools which were not receiving aid from the State. But the number of schools of the latter class existing in the country was not great, and his right hon. Friend (Mr. Bruce) was therefore right in assuming, for the general purposes of argument, that in those districts in which there were no assisted schools the education given was not sufficient. This, however, was a point which could not be prejudged; it must be determined by inquiry.
Original Question, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair," by leave, withdrawn.
Committee deferred till Monday next.

BURIALS (re-committed) BILL— [BILL 123.]
(Mr. Osborne Morgan, Mr. Hadfield, Mr. M'Arthur.)
BURIALS (re-committed) BILL— [BILL 123.]

  COMMITTEE.
  Bill considered in Committee.
  (In the Committee.)
  COLONEL BAETTELOTsaid, he would beg to move that the Chairman report Progress. It was impossible to discuss fairly the provisions of so important a measure at that late hour.
  Motion made, and Question put, "That the Chairman do report Progress, and ask leave to sit again."—(Colonel Barttelot.)
  The Committee divided:—Ayes 47; Noes 89: Majority 42.
  Clause 1 (After passing of Act notice may be given to incumbent of intention that burial shall take place in churchyard without the rites of Established Church, and either with or without any other religious service).
  MR. CAWLEYmoved, in line 8, to leave out "or being concerned in," and insert, "and responsible for."
  Several hon. Members protested against proceeding with the clauses at that hour of the night. Mr. GOLDNEY moved that Mr. Speaker do leave the Chair. Motion negatived: Mr. NEWDEGATE thereon moved to report progress: but afterwards withdrew his Motion.
  After some time in considering the clause,
  The Committee report Progress: to sit again upon Wednesday, 15th June.

PUBLIC SCHOOLS.
  MOTION FOR AN ADDRESS.

    ADJOURNED DEBATE.
    Order read, for resuming Adjourned Debate on Question [3rd May],
    "That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, humbly to express the desire of this House that in the exercise of the power conferred upon Her Majesty by the 9th, 10th, and 19th sections of the Act 31 and 32 Vic. c. 118, with respect to the five Statutes for determining and establishing the constitution of the new governing bodies of Shrewsbury, Winchester, Harrow, Charterhouse, and Rugby Schools, Her Majesty will be pleased to ascertain whether the said Statutes correspond with the provisions of the 17th and 19th sections of the Endowed Schools Act of 1809, and, if they do not correspond with the said sections, to disapprove of them, or of so much of them, accordingly."—(Mr. Thomas Hughes.)
    Question again proposed.
    Debate resumed.
    MR. NEWDEGATEstated that no further proceedings ought to be taken upon this matter until full time had been afforded for the consideration by the Governing Bodies of the different schools of the important Motion which had been moved by the hon. Member for Frome (Mr. T. Hughes), and of the Amendments to it which were to be brought forward. He begged accord-
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    to move that the debate be now adjourned.
    After short debate,
    MR. W. E. FORSTERsaid, he thought it would not be desirable to proceed with the measure to-night, as he had not had an opportunity of considering the Amendment of the right hon. and learned Member for Southampton (Mr. Russell Gurney).
    Debate further adjourned till Monday next.

VACCINATION ACT (1867) AMENDMENT BILL— [BILL 126.]
(Mr. Candlish, Mr. Serjeant Simon.)
VACCINATION ACT (1867) AMENDMENT BILL— [BILL 126.]

  SECOND READING.
  Order for Second Reading read.
  Moved "That the Bill be now read the second time."
  MR. D. DALRYMPLEsaid, he had some objections to the Bill, but would not press them on the present occasion.
  MR. W. E. FORSTERsaid, he thought the proposed alteration would tend to promote the better working of the existing law. He trusted, therefore, that the House would assent to the second reading, as any objections which might be entertained in regard to the measure could be raised in Committee.
  SIR CHARLES ADDERLEYsaid, he thought the Bill would, if passed, bring the existing law into contempt, as it proposed to enact that after the existing law had been twice enforced it should be enforced no longer.
  Motion made, and Question put, "That the Bill be now read a second time."
  The House divided:—Ayes 18; Noes 8: Majority 10.
  House adjourned at Two o'clock till Monday nest.