§ MR. W. H. GREGORYasked the right hon. and learned Member for the University of Dublin, If he will postpone his Motion in regard to the Correspondence between the Gort Board of Guardians and Master FitzGibbon till after the 7th July?
§ DR. BALLsaid, in consenting to comply with the request for postponement, he must express a hope that his hon. Friend would offer some explanation of expressions which were reported to have fallen from him on a former occasion, and which had caused a good deal of annoyance to many people who had a great respect for so eminent a judicial person as Master FitzGibbon.
§ MR. W. H. GREGORYsaid, he too entertained a very high respect for the private character of Master FitzGibbon. There had been, he might add, an entire misconception of the words which had fallen from him on the occasion to which 744 his right hon. and learned Friend referred, which he understood had given pain to that gentleman, and which, perhaps, not unnaturally might lead him to look upon him as a kind of Parliamentary Captain Duffy. He was reported to have expressed a wish that the Master might be condemned to pass a rainy night in one of the miserable cabins to which he was at the time alluding, and experience its discomfort until dysentery and fever removed him to another and a better world. Now, by a mistake on the part of the reporter the word "him" was substituted for "them," meaning the poor people by whom those cabins were inhabited. He had not the slightest intention of uttering any stronger wish with respect to Master FitzGibbon beyond that of passing for once an uncomfortable evening in one of the wretched hovels of which he was speaking, in order that he might be able to judge for himself how lamentable was their condition.