§
Address for—
Copies of a Minute by His Excellency the Governor General of India, dated the 5th day of February 1859;
Of a Letter from the Governor of India to the Governor of Bengal, dated the 4th day of March 1859;
Of a Letter from the Governor of Bengal to Mr. William Tayler, dated the 12th day of March 1859;
And, of a Letter from the Governor of Bengal to the Governor of India, dated 6th April 1859, with enclosure."—(Sir John Gorst.)
§ SIR HENRY HAVELOCK-ALLAN (Durham, S.E.)asked the Under Secretary of State for India, Whether his attention has been drawn to three letters in The Times and one in The Morning Post of that day absolutely denying that Mr. William Tayler, ex-Commissioner of Patna, had been offered an inquiry into his conduct in 1859, and had declined that offer; and whether, as that statement materially affected the Divi- 456 sion on that question prejudicially to Mr. Tayler's interests, he was prepared to Mr. Tayler's interests, he was prepared to lay on the Table of the House copies of the whole Correspondence pro and con on which he based that statement, including Mr. Samuells' letter containing offensive imputations against Mr. Taylor, which he subsequently entirely withdrew, and which withdrawal caused Mr. Taylor to say that he did not think it necessary to pursue the matter further; also, whether he would lay on the Table copies of Mr. Taylor's two letters of September, 1856, in which he not only invited, but urgently requested, a judicial investigation into his conduct?
§ THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE (Sir JOHN GORST) (Chatham), in reply, said, that the statement he made on Friday was that Mr. Tayler was offered an inquiry into the correctness of Lord Canning's belief that in the course of Mr. Tayler's proceedings at Patna men were condemned and executed upon insufficient evidence. The Papers which the House had just ordered to be laid on the Table would amply justify that statement. The Papers which the hon. and gallant Baronet required were already before Parliament, with the exception of the letters of September, 1856, for which search would be made in the India Office.