Commons Sitting of 14 May 1888

MINUTES.
PUBLIC BILLS—Ordered—First Reading—National Debt (Supplemental)*[264].
Referred to Standing Committee on Trade, &c.—Railway and Canal Companies Charges [49].
Report of Standing Committee on Law, and Courts of Justice, and Legal Procedure—County Courts Consolidation [No. 172].
Committee—Parliamentary Under Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland [201]—R.P.;Reformatory Schools Act (1866) Amendment [161]—R.P.
PROVISIONAL ORDER BILLS—Considered as amended—Local Government (Poor Law) (No. 4)* [218]; Local Government (Poor Law) (No. 5)* [219].
Third Reading—Local Government* [213]; Local Government (No. 2)* [214]; Local Government (Poor Law)* [215]; Local Government (Poor Law) (No. 2)* [216]; Local Government (Poor Law) (No, 3)* [217], and passed.

MR. SPEAKER'S INDISPOSITION.
The House being met, the Clerk at the Table informed the House of the unavoidable absence of Mr. Speaker, owing to the continuance of his indisposition:—
Whereupon Mr. Courtney, the Chairman of Ways and Means, proceeded to the Table; and, after Prayers, took the Chair as Deputy Speaker, pursuant to the Standing Order.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.
  CORK AND BANDON RAILWAY BILL.

    CONSIDERATION.
    Order for Consideration, as amended, read.
    DR. TANNERsaid, he wished to have an assurance in regard to the Bill. Various remonstrances against it had reached him from Cork, and among those who complained were the Corporation of Cork and the Cork Harbour Commissioners, both of which Bodies had petitioned against the Bill. He wished to know, therefore, whether, before the Bill was considered and ordered to be read a third time, they were to receive some assurance from the hon. Members in charge of it that the Petitions to which he referred would receive due consideration.
    MR. DEPUTY SPEAKERsaid, the Question before the House was "that
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    the Bill be ordered to be read the third time."
    DR. TANNERsaid, he wished to point out that the Bill dealt with very important matters.
    MR. DEPUTY SPEAKERsaid, that if the Bill was opposed it must go over until to-morrow.
    Bill, as amended, to be considered To-morrow.

  ULSTER CANAL AND TYRONE NAVI- GATION BILL [Lords].

    SECOND READING.
    Order for Second Reading read.
    Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a second time."—(Sir James Corry.)
    MR. BIGGARsaid, he had no special objection to urge against the Bill; and if the Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. Jackson) would give him a satisfactory assurance that the Canal dealt with by the Bill would hereafter be dealt with in a proper manner, and that they would not lend any more money to the undertaking, his opposition to the measure would be very much removed. His special opposition rose from the fact that he had reason to believe the Government might be tempted to lend money to the Company who were promoting the Bill. He had an inherent horror of the lending of money by the English Government to such an undertaking, and he thought the experience which had been gained in regard to such loans in the past was by no means encouraging. In the case of one of these undertakings, which passed through the Northern part of Ireland, it had never yet paid interest upon the borrowed money. In another case, which involved a scheme of reclamation, a Government had lent to those who were engaged in carrying out the scheme more than the value of the property, even if the scheme had been successful. He was, therefore, desirous in this case that the Government should give an assurance that they would make no further advances to this undertaking, and in that case he would not oppose the Bill. He was afraid that, although tile Secretary to the Treasury might resist further applications, yet in the end he might be tempted to lend the money. The promoters professed to

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    offer a security; but their security would be entirely at the mercy of the Great Northern Railway Company of Ireland. Certainly, if he were director of that railway, he should use all his efforts to make it impossible for the Canal to be worked in competition, seeing the amount of mischief it was calculated to do the railway without any corresponding benefit. He might further remark that, if this were a bonâ fide scheme, there would not be the slightest occasion to go to the Government in order to borrow money, for the reason that the Chairman of the Company was a man of large means and the head of a successful stock broking firm. His clients would be quite ready to lend the money, and if their security were offered for any loan that was required there were plenty of people belonging to stock broking firms who would advance the money. Those persons, however, thought it more satisfactory to deal with the Government, because the Government were not likely to enforce payment of interest. He had not only great fear that the Government might be tempted to lend money at once; but he had, however, a further fear that if a commencement were made in the way of lending money, the first loan would not be the last. What would occur would be this—the money borrowed in the first instance would be spent, and then a fresh application for another loan would be made. It was alleged that it was desirable to keep up a certain amount of competition by means of this Canal with the Great Northern Railway Company; but, if that were so, how did it happen that while the Canal was in operation, even before the railway was made, other people were able to compete with it satisfactorily? For instance, Mr. John Quinn, a successful carrier, found himself in a position to make a good business by conveying goods to and from Dungannon in competition with the Canal. Therefore, it was difficult to adduce any argument in favour of the Bill. There was another matter which only came to his knowledge a short time ago. It appeared that there was certain property now held under lease from the Government which it was proposed to transfer into a new Company, so that the tenants, instead of being under a landlord like the British Government, might find
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    themselves dealt with in a harsh and arbitrary manner. He thought such a transference would inflict a very great hardship upon those unfortunate persons who held terminable leases which expired in 13 years. In the first instance, they had obtained the property at a very moderate rent, on the condition of paying a small fine on the renewal of the lease. If, instead of being under the British Government, they were compelled to deal with a Company which was trading for a profit, they would run the risk of having their entire property confiscated. In one case, the tenants of John Stevenson and Company paid a rent of £10, and professed to have laid out £6,000 upon the property; another tenant paid £10, and professed to have laid out £5,000. The property brought in a total revenue of £50 14 s. a-year, and the tenants professed to have spent upon it no less than £30,000. It would be hard for them to find that their property was confiscated, and it must be remembered that these were not agricultural holdings that would come under the provisions of the Land Act. On the contrary, when the leases expired the tenants would be liable to be called upon to pay an unreasonable rent, or to find themselves evicted. Under those circumstances, and seeing that the Bill was one which was calculated to give rise to a considerable amount of discussion, he thought it would be better that it should be postponed until after Whitsuntide, when there would be more time to consider its provisions. He would, therefore, move that the debate be now adjourned.
    Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Debate be now adjourned."—(Mr. Biggar.)
    MR. T. M. HEALYsaid, he had had some expectation that when the hon. Baronet the Member for Mid Armagh (Sir James P. Corry) rose, not from his usual place, but from a responsible seat on the Government Bench, to move the second reading of the Bill, he would have said something in support of it. As the hon. Baronet had not done so, his (Mr. Healy's) hon. Friend the Member for West Cavan (Mr. Biggar) had felt himself compelled to offer some reasons why the discussion should be deferred until a later date. Nobody could know better

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    than Mr. Deputy Speaker how important this question was, and what an amount of discussion it might give rise to. This question of the Ulster Canal had for some years excited great attention, and it was altogether impossible that adequate discussion should take place upon it that day, for this reason—that Irish Business had been put upon the Paper. Most important matters were down for consideration, and it was not to be expected that the House would address itself to a calm consideration of the present Bill. He had given Notice on Friday to the First Lord of the Treasury sury (Mr. W. H. Smith) that the Bill could not be properly discussed that day; and he would now appeal to the Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. Jackson) whether it was not desirable to postpone it for a few days? He would give his reasons for making that suggestion. The Bill itself was drawn on the principle of the Bills which had preceded it, all of which had been brought in by the Government. It was a Private Bill, not brought in by the Government on their responsibility. He did not complain of the course pursued by the promoters in endeavouring to obviate discussion in that House by bringing forward the Bill as a private measure; but he did think it an unreasonable course that the Government, who were the immediate parties concerned, and who were really engaged in getting rid of their own property by means of a Private Bill, should not themselves have taken the action implied in the answer which was given by the First Lord of the Treasury to the Question addressed to him on Friday, and have asked the hon. Member for Mid Armagh to postpone the Bill, in order to see whether a short postponement might not have the effect of getting rid of all opposition. He knew that there was considerable anxiety in North Armagh for the passing of the measure, and he had received telegrams requesting him to support it. He was quite ready to do so, if he found that it was possible; but, in the first place, he was anxious to see whether the Government would not make such a promise as would insure the withdrawal of all further opposition, and would allow the Bill to pass with all reasonable speed. But, before withdrawing the opposition, hon. Members should be allowed an opportunity of expressing
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    their views to the Secretary to the Treasury. They had not yet had that opportunity, and he would suggest that a joint deputation consisting of the promoters of the Bill, such as the hon. Baronet (Sir James Corry) and some others, together with some of the opponents of the measure, like his hon. Friend the Member for West Cavan, and persons like himself (Mr. Healy), whose opposition was of a very modified character, should wait upon the Secretary to the Treasury and make representations which would be the means of enabling them to arrive at an agreement that would get rid of all opposition. He would, therefore, support the Motion for the adjournment of the debate, so that the opponents might have an opportunity of placing their views before the Government better than they could possibly have that day. If that step were not taken, of course the opponents would be obliged to enter into a debate upon the merits of the Bill. He himself should strongly deprecate any hostile demonstration against the measure at the present moment; and he had a strong hope that if the Bill were postponed until a later period, all the opposition now raised against it would disappear. If he were in Order upon the Motion for the adjournment of the debate, he would suggest to the Secretary to the Treasury that he should put into the Bill certain clauses that would have the effect of entirely modifying the objections now entertained to it. For instance, an assurance ought to be given that if the purchasing Company should be enabled to turn the Canal to useful purpose, their rights would be transferred to the County Boards of Armagh, Derry, Monaghan, Antrim, and Tyrone, should such Boards be constituted in the future. In that way, he thought, they would get rid of the opposition which his hon. Friend the Member for West Cavan felt disposed to offer to the Bill. Therefore, apart from the consideration whether to-day was a fitting day for the consideration of the measure, he thought the Government might see their way to a compromise, with the view of putting some provisions in the Bill which would have the effect of getting rid of all the difficulty. He, therefore, ventured to support the Motion of his hon. Friend. He certainly thought that the Great

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    Northern Railway Company should never, by any possibility, be allowed to come into possession of this Canal; but the Bill, as it stood, gave no guarantee upon that point. He felt surprised that the Government had not themselves proposed the postponement of the Motion for the second reading. He asked the Secretary to the Treasury to concur in the adjournment of the debate, so that a friendly conference might take place between the Irish Members, seeing that this was a Bill upon which Irish opinion should essentially prevail—whether it was Conservative or Home Rule.
    THE SECRETARY TO THE TREASURY (Mr. JACKSON)said, he hoped the hon. Member for Cavan would not persist in his opposition to the Bill; and he would point out to the hon. and learned Member for Longford (Mr. T. M. Healy), who had made an appeal to him, that the passing of the Motion for the second reading of the Bill would not prevent any arrangements from being made which it might be necessary to make. He could assure the hon. and learned Member that personally he should be glad at any time to receive any communications or representations which either he or his Friends desired to make in reference to the amendment of the Bill. Hon. Members must be aware that the Bill had been before the House for a long time—[Mr. T. M. HEALY: Not this Bill.]—well, a Bill for the same purpose had been before the House on more than one occasion, and all the present measure did was to give the Lagan Navigation Company power to acquire the Canal. No terms were as yet fixed in the Bill, and therefore it was entirely open to hon. Members opposite and their Friends to make any reference to the Treasury which they thought desirable. He, therefore, hoped that the Motion for the Adjournment would be withdrawn, seeing that the second reading of the Bill would not prevent proper precautions being taken to secure that the interests of the Treasury and the interests of the district should be duly considered, and also to secure that provisions should be introduced into the Bill to make it impossible for the Canal to be acquired by the Great Northern Railway Company. He thought that all those questions might be met without any difficulty after the Bill had been read a second time.
    MR. T. M. HEALYsaid, he also ought to have suggested that if the County Board system were established in Ireland, the Canal should be transferred to that Body.
    MR. JACKSONsaid, he was not in a position to give an answer upon that point, as the question, which was raised now for the first time, was a somewhat important question. The proposal was that the Government should make terms or impose conditions in the event of a certain thing taking place. It was on the supposition of a County Authority being established that it was suggested by the hon. and learned Member that that County Authority should take over the Canal. No doubt, at the proper time, that question would be considered. He would only point out that the people of the district had had an opportunity of making known their wishes, but they had not signified any opposition to the Bill. He might say, in answer to the hon. Member for West Cavan (Mr. Biggar), who was good enough to inform him the other day that there had been a quantity of land let on lease by the Board of Works, that he had made inquiry upon that matter, and was told that there were some tenants in that position; but although there were a considerable number of tenancies the rental value was only £40 a-year. Some of the tenants held very long leases, and the Bill did not, in any way, affect the position of their holdings under the leases, and, of course, the leases would hold good, whatever arrangement might be made; certainly it would be the duty of the Treasury or the Commissioners of the Board of Works, who would have to make the conditions under which the Canal Company would acquire the property, to take good care, as far as was necessary, that those tenants were left in full possession of their rights. He trusted, therefore, as there was really no substantial opposition to the Bill, that the second reading would be taken at once, so that the present opportunity might not be lost for making progress with the measure. In the meantime, he would undertake that those points which had been very properly raised by hon. Members opposite should receive full consideration.
    MR. T. W. RUSSELLsaid, that, as the Representative of a county which was vitally interested in

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    the Bill, he should like to say a word or two in regard to its provisions.
    MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Question before the House is the adjournment of the debate, and the debate ought to be confined to that Question.
    MR. T. W. RUSSELLsaid, he only rose for the purpose of expressing a hope that the debate would not be adjourned. He quite agreed with the Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. Jackson) that all the points which had been brought forward by hon. Members below the Gangway could be considered quite as well at a later stage of the Bill as now. As that was to be a night devoted to Irish Business, he hoped that hon. Members below the Gangway would allow the Bill to be taken at once, so that they might be able to proceed to more important Business.
    MR. MAURICE HEALYsaid, he thought the reason which the hon. Gentleman who had just sat down (Mr. T. W. Russell) had given—namely, that that was to be an Irish night, ought to be a reason for postponing the second reading of the Bill. The Bill, as it stood at present, contained provisions which were of an eminently contentious character. It was quite evident that sufficient time could not be devoted to it that day, the more especially as the merits of the Bill could not be discussed on the question of adjournment. That being so, and having regard to the fact that two Bills of much interest to Ireland, one of which involved the payment of a salary to the Parliamentary Under Secretary for Ireland, were upon the Paper, he hoped the Motion for the postponement of the debate would be assented to. He certainly thought that the reasons which the Secretary to the Treasury had given for opposing that Motion were somewhat inconclusive. No doubt, the hon. Gentleman had dealt very fairly with the objections which had been raised, and he had intimated that considerable concessions would be made. He had, however, understood that all matters could be considered at a later stage, and there was no reason why the second reading should not be taken that day. He (Mr. M. Healy) would point out that that would not be the case; because, if the promoters were placed in the position of having got this stage of their measure, they would be much less disposed to consider any objections that might be
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    raised to the scheme, or any point that might be submitted to them, than they would be if the House had not assented to the second reading. The hon. Gentleman the Secretary to the Treasury had not questioned the fact that as regarded many of the matters which had been raised—for instance, the position of the leaseholders, the ultimate disposition of the property, the control of the County Boards in the event of their being established, and others matters—were matters which must be carefully considered. It was most desirable that an agreement should be come to upon those points, and, if so, there would be a great deal more prospect of arriving at such an agreement and compromise if the Bill were not read a second time. He did not propose to discuss the merits of the Bill, nor did he desire to defeat the Bill. On the contrary, he was disposed to facilitate its passing into law, if that could be done consistently with proper attention being paid to the various interests involved. For his own part, he thought that it was an unreasonable thing to press the second reading upon the House that day.
    COLONEL SAUNDERSONsaid, the hon. Gentleman who had just sat down (Mr. M. Healy) said that there were highly contentious matters involved in the Bill; whereas the hon. and learned Member for North Longford (Mr. T. M. Healy) had pointed out that the Bill was one upon which all sections of the Irish Representatives ought to agree.
    MR. T. M. HEALYsaid, his point was, that in that part of the House, as far as he could see, there was a disposition to come to an agreement, if possible, on the subject, although there were contentious matters involved.
    COLONEL SAUNDERSONsaid, he had listened to the various reasons which had been urged against the Bill; but the only serious objection was that which had been made by the hon. Member for West Cavan, who protested, as far as he could see, to the money of the State being advanced upon what he regarded as indifferent security. [Mr. BIGGAR: Hear, hear!] For his own part, he was always glad when the State was prepared to advance money to any undertaking that was calculated to develop the resources of Ireland and give employment to its people. So far from

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    its being an objectionable Bill, he would point out that the measure was one which dealt with one of the few questions that were of the most vital importance to the North of Ireland.
    MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER: The hon. and gallant Member must confine himself to the Question of adjournment.
    COLONEL SAUNDERSONsaid, he had understood that the argument in favour of adjournment was that the Bill contained contentious matter. He would simply venture to submit that, knowing a good deal about the Bill, and about the course which had been pursued in the part of Ireland in which he lived, a part of the country, which had the advantage of being represented, he believed, by the hon. Member for West Cavan, that so far from being contentious all persons who lived in the locality, with the exception of the hon. Member himself, were of opinion that the Bill would be of great advantage to the North of Ireland. He asked the House to concur with the Secretary to the Treasury that all the objections which had been urged against the Bill, and the reasons which had been given for the adjournment of the debate could be met when the Bill got into Committee. So far as he and his Colleagues were concerned, they were quite ready to meet hon. Gentlemen opposite, and so frame the Bill as to bring it in harmony with the wishes of the people of Ireland and the Representatives of Ireland on both sides. He denied that the Bill was in any way contentious, and he thought it could be easily shown that the Bill was really for the improvement of the North of Ireland. He hoped that hon. Gentlemen below the Gangway would see that that was one of those rare occasions on which they could all join in supporting a measure which would be for the advantage of a considerable portion of the Irish people. He, therefore, trusted that the hon. Member for West Cavan would withdraw his opposition to the second reading of the Bill, and reserve the consideration of any Amendments he might suggest until the Bill came before the Committee. He could assure the hon. Member that the promoters would be glad to consider any proposals that might be made. The effect of the measure might be imperilled, if the second reading were not taken then.
    MR. J. O'CONNORsaid, the hon. and gallant Gentleman who had just addressed the House (Colonel Saunderson) told them that if the second reading were not proceeded with then, the measure itself might be lost for the Session. He would, therefore, point out that the Bill was a Private Bill, and it could be brought on in the House at the commencement of Business at any time the Authorities chose; that there was no serious opposition offered to it; and that, on the contrary, it had met with approbation on all sides of the House. Nevertheless, as one who approved of the principle of the Bill, he joined with his hon. and learned Friend the Member for North Longford (Mr. T. M. Healy) in supporting the Motion for the adjournment of the debate. They had been promised by the Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. Jackson) that when the Bill went into Committee, some of the suggestions which had been made would be accepted; but they were told not to put their trust in princes, and he was inclined, from the performances of some Members of the Government in other matters, not to repose the strictest confidence in the performance of the promises of the Government. For that and other reasons, he would strongly support any Motion that would succeed in extracting from the Ministry some special promise that the principles and suggestions which had been put forward by his hon. and learned Friend would be accepted before the second reading of the Bill was agreed to. He should certainly join with his hon. Friends in opposing the second reading of the Bill, until the House had some better assurance from the Secretary to the Treasury, that the suggestions which had been made to him would be carried out. For that reason, he trusted that the Financial Secretary to the Treasury would not insist upon opposing the Motion for the Adjournment of the Debate.
    MR. ARTHUR O'CONNORsaid, he had understood from the observations of the First Lord of the Treasury (Mr. W. H. Smith) on Friday last, that he would seek an opportunity for conferring with the hon. Baronet the Member for Mid Armagh (Sir James Corry), with a view of seeing whether the measure could not be postponed from that day until a subsequent evening,

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    having regard to the Business upon which the House wished to be engaged that day. He would put it to the Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. Jackson) whether it would not be proper on the present occasion to accept the proposal for the Adjournment of the Debate, that proposal certainly being in keeping with the promise of the right hon. Gentleman the First Lord of the Treasury. [Mr. JACKSON said, there was no promise.] If there were not a positive promise, the First Lord of the Treasury said he would consult with the hon. Baronet, and see whether some arrangement might not be made for the despatch of Business which would prevent the present Bill from being put down that day. On his own account he joined in the appeal to the Secretary to the Treasury to consent to the adjournment of the debate, for this reason—the Bill had been introduced for three or four years in succession from the Treasury Bench, and he had consistently opposed the Bill on every occasion. The Bill now before the House was a different Bill, and the provisions contained in it were very different from some of the provisions which were included in past Government Bills. In consideration of the alterations which had been made, he was no longer disposed to oppose the transfer of the Ulster Canal to the new Company. He was bound to admit that, so far, he had not made up his mind to vote either for or against the Bill. That was a most unsatisfactory position to take up on the part of one who had for several years strongly objected to the Government Bills, and he therefore hoped that a little further time would be afforded for consideration.
    Question put.
    The House divided:—Ayes 101; Noes 158: Majority 57.—(Div. List, No. 105.)
    Original Question again proposed.
    MR. T. M. HEALYsaid, he would appeal to his hon. Friend the Member for West Cavan (Mr. Biggar) not to offer further opposition to the second reading of the Bill. They had made their protest against it, and they had received some promise in the nature of a suggestion that the Secretary to the Treasury would undertake, between this and the next stage of the measure, to devote some consideration to the views
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    which had been put forward that day. He would, therefore, simply ask for some information as to what the future course of procedure in regard to the Bill would be. He would suggest that the course to be taken should be similar to that which was taken in the year 1886—namely, that the Bill should be referred to a Committee of Irish Members. He did not know whether that would be possible under the Rules of the House, or whether the Committee of Selection possessed the power of referring it to an Irish Committee or not. As, however, the hon. Baronet opposite (Sir James Corry) had the matter in hand, he would suggest to him that a Select Committee should be appointed to consider the provisions of the Bill, that it should consist of Irish Members only, and that it should include Members from both sides of the House. He believed that such a Committee would be better able to deal with the Bill than any other, and that the consideration it would undergo would have a valuable effect. The Bill involved an entirely new departure in the history of Private Bill legislation. It seemed to him that the Government were handing over to a private Company a sort of damnosa hereditas. Government property to the value of tens of thousands of pounds was proposed to be handed over to a private Company by Her Majesty's Government. He believed there was no instance in the history of Ireland in which the State, finding that it had made a bad investment of the public money, and that it was impossible to make a profit out of it, proposed to hand it over to private individuals. If that was to be the way in which the State cow was to be milked for the Irish people, he entirely repudiated being a party to the transaction. All that he could see in the matter was that the Government had made a bad investment, and that they were now seeking to get rid of their responsibility by handing it over to private individuals. He maintained that if the canal was to be handed over to private individuals, it should be done only with proper safeguards, the first of which was that neither the Great Northern Railway Company, nor any other company, should, under any circumstances, be allowed to get hold of the canal; that it should be vested in some persons

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    who would work it to a profit; and that if the unfortunate Lagan Navigation Company found they could not work it, it should then be handed over to a representative Board, and that the Lagan Navigation Company should not be allowed, having got the property for nothing, to apply to the Irish Courts for a winding-up order, so that the assets of the Company, including themselves, might become assets for the benefit of their creditors. He did not see why that canal property should ever be allowed to become an asset so far as the debts of the Lagan Navigation Company were concerned. On the contrary, it should be preserved intact. He would further suggest, as a third point, that wherever private rights existed, as in the case of the Tyrone Tile Making Company, they should be duly protected. His hon. Friend the Member for West Cavan had made a fourth proposition—namely, that no further sums of money should be lent by the Government. His hon. Friend thought that if money were lent, it would be lent on very bad security. The Government might think that in getting rid of their liabilities for a payment of £1,000 a-year they might be making a good bargain; but he was of opinion that if they were going to give away the money at all, they should give it frankly, and not as a loan; because He could assure them that they would never receive one penny of the money back again, as long as any water continued to flow in the Lagan, which he was advised would not cover a very lengthened period. It was quite evident that the Government had made a bad investment, and it would be just as well that they should treat the matter frankly, and part with the property with a good grace. He certainly trusted that the Secretary to the Treasury would give the House an assurance that no more money would be advanced by the Exchequer to that undertaking. Perhaps, if a strong feeling prevailed among Gentlemen who represented the minority of Ulster Members opposite, he might not feel called upon to oppose their wishes; but as the Government were making a new departure, and were proposing to hand over the assets of the State to a private Body, he thought the best course they could follow would be to provide that the provisions of the measure should be
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    considered by a Committee composed entirely of Irish Members.
    SIR CHARLES LEWISsaid, he was prepared to oppose the extraordinary suggestion which had been made by the hon. and learned Gentleman opposite (Mr. T. M. Healy). That was a private Bill and unopposed, and the question before the House was that it should be read a second time. He apprehended that under those circumstances there was only one course which the House could pursue, and that the Bill must take its ordinary and legal course. It had been suggested that the Government had placed themselves under certain pledges, and that a certain understanding had been come to; but that was no reason why the measure should only be considered by a Committee composed of Irish Members. The Question before the House was, whether the Bill ought to be read a second time or not. He did not think that it was possible for the House to come to any understanding such as that which had been suggested by the hon. and learned Member for North Longford—namely, that the Bill should be referred to a Special Committee of Irish Members. He understood that it could only go before the Chairman of Committees in the usual form, with one Member of the House sitting with him, and he entirely repudiated the suggestion of the second reading being taken on any understanding whatever. Why any hon. Member should object to the ordinary course being taken, he could not for the life of him understand, and he should be glad to hear definitely from the Government what they intended to do. He had understood the Secretary to the Treasury to say that he would endeavour to mediate between the promoters of the Bill and certain persons who might not have a locus standi to oppose it, but with whom it might be desirable to make some arrangement before the Bill received the sanction of Parliament. That was a perfectly fair course, and it might be desirable to insert certain safeguards in the Bill, but he altogether objected to any proposal to take the Bill out of the ordinary course.
    MR. JORDANsaid, he was most anxious that the Bill should pass as quickly as possible; but, at the same time, he must join with his hon.

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    and learned Friend the Member for North Longford (Mr. T. M. Healy) in endeavouring to arrive at some understanding by which, if the Bill did pass, and the canal were handed over to the Lagan Navigation Company, it should not be possible for the Great Northern Railway Company or any other Railway Company to purchase or lease the canal hereafter. He thought that the Secretary to the Treasury should give some sort of assurance to that effect, or otherwise the canal would be of very little use. It was of no use at present, although it might be of great value if it were put in order. If, however, it were put in order at the expense of the State, and then allowed to be purchased by the Great Northern or any other Railway Company, it would be of very little advantage to the North of Ireland. So long as it could be used as a competing line with Northern Railways, it would be of much advantage to the commercial community in securing the lowering of rates and the price of the carriage of provisions and other goods. But if a loop-hole were left by which Railway Companies could purchase the canal, it would be of no use whatever, but would rather be in direct opposition to the interests of the North of Ireland. Representing as he did the commercial interests of that part of the country, he protested, anxious as he was that the Bill should pass, against the canal being handed over to the Lagan Navigation Company for the purpose of selling it. No one could be more anxious than he was, that the measure should pass. He had supported the provisions it contained in various forms, locally and otherwise, for many years, and he was glad that the Bill had now arrived at the stage it had reached in that House, but he thought there ought to be some guarantee before they consented to pass it, that it should be worked in the interests of the people of the North of Ireland. He thought it was not unreasonable to ask the Secretary to the Treasury to give an assurance to those who were anxious that the Bill should pass, that it should not be handed over to a Railway Company which up to the present time had saddled the people of the North of Ireland with very high and prohibitive rates. His hon. and learned Friend the Member for North Longford (Mr. T. M. Healy) had also made another valuable suggestion—namely,
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    that if it could not be worked with advantage it should not be permitted to be sold, or thrown into a bankrupt estate; nor was the suggestion unreasonable that the Committee appointed to consider the provisions of the measure should consist of Irish Members only. He thought it was only fair that Members from the North of Ireland, whose constituents were most interested in the measure, should be selected to consider the Bill. If it were found that it was a measure for the good of the country, it would certainly not be against the interests of the Lagan Navigation Company or the North of Ireland that the Committee should be composed of Irish Members. He therefore approved of the suggestion that the Committee should be an Irish one, and he would further press upon the Government the propriety of giving a guarantee that the canal should never be handed, by lease or otherwise, over to the Great Northern or other Railway Company, but maintained as an independent competing medium.
    MR. JACKSONsaid, a question had been asked as to the desirability of inserting previsions in the Bill, to take care that in handing over the canal to the Lagan Navigation Company, they should be prevented from transferring the property they acquired to a Railway Company. He regarded that suggestion as a most reasonable one, and he had no hesitation, therefore, in saying, in view of bringing the present discussion to a termination, that he would himself undertake to say that no such provision should be inserted in the Bill, or in the agreement which it would be necessary to make for carrying it into effect. He need hardly point out that in regard to forming a Committee composed of Irish Members only, that was a matter that was not in his power to control. The Bill stood at present as an unopposed Bill, and in the ordinary course would be before the Chairman of Committees. What he had promised the hon. and learned Member for North Longford was, that he would be prepared to accept any information in regard to the measure which he or his Friends were prepared to place before him.
    SIR JOHN MOWBRAYsaid, it would not be in the power of the Committee of selection to do what the hon. and learned Member for North Longford desired, or to place

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    on the Committee to which the Bill would be sent, any one interested in the matter. If the hon. and learned Gentleman desired something out of the ordinary course, it would be necessary for him to make a Motion to that effect to the House.
    Original Question put, and agreed to.
    MR. T. M. HEALYsaid, he wished to ask as a question of Order, whether it would be regular to give Notice that day, that he would move to-morrow that the Bill be referred to a Select Committee.
    MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER: The hon. and learned Member can give Notice; but he cannot make such a Motion now.
    Bill read a second time, and committed.

  CRIMINAL LAW AND PROCEDURE (IRELAND) ACT, 1887 (CONVICTION OF MR. CONDON).
  MR. DEPUTY SPEAKERacquainted the House that he had received the following Letter, relating to the Conviction of a Member of this House:—
  Limerick,
  10th May, 1888.
  Sir,
  I have the honor to report that on the 7th instant, at Mitchelstown, Mr. Condon, M. P., was tried and convicted before a Court constituted under "The Criminal Law and Procedure (Ireland) Act, 1887," of which I was a member, and sentenced to 14 days' imprisonment without hard labour. The offence charged was for taking part in an unlawful assembly, under Sec. 2 of said Act.
  I have the honor to be,
  Sir,
  Your obedient servant,
  J. B. IRWIN, R.M.
  To the Right Honble. the Speaker,
  House of Commons.

  CRIMINAL LAW AND PROCEDURE (IRELAND) ACT, 1887 (CONVICTION OF MR. DILLON).
  MR. DEPUTY SPEAKERacquainted the House that he had received the following Letter, relating to the Conviction of a Member of this House:—
  County of Louth.
  Drogheda,
  12th May, 1888.
  Sir
  I have the honour to report that on yesterday,
  140
  11th inst., at Molls, in this county, before a Court of Petty Sessions, under "The Criminal Law and Procedure (Ireland) Act, 1887," of which I was Chairman, found Mr. John Dillon, M.P., guilty of having on 8th ulto., in this country, taken part in the "Plan of Campaign," and the sentence of the Court was that Mr. Dillon be imprisoned in Dundalk Gaol for six months, without hard labour.
  Mr. Dillon was again tried to-day, before the same Court, on a charge of having on the same occasion incited others to take part in the "Plan of Campaign," on this charge he was also found guilty and sentenced to the same term of imprisonment, to run concurrently with first sentence.
  From these orders Mr. Dillon has appealed to the County Court Judge, to be heard on 20th June next.
  I have the honour to be,
  Sir,
  Your obedt. servt.
  THOS. HAMILTON,
  Resident Magistrate.
  Right Honble. Arthur Wellesley Peel, M.P.,
  Speaker, House of Commons.

QUESTIONS.

  LAW AND JUSTICE (SCOTLAND)—DILL MILL FARM CROFTERS—APPEAL.
  DR. CAMERONasked the Lord Advocate, Whether it is true that an appeal to the Court of Justiciary has been lodged at the instance of the Procurator Fiscal against the recent judgment of Sheriff Fraser acquitting certain crofters tried before him on a charge of criminal mischief at Dill Mill Farm; whether he can mention any instances of an appeal to a Higher Court taken by a Public Prosecutor against a judgment of acquittal pronounced on the merits of the case and after proof; and, whether the Procurator Fiscal, at whose instance the appeal is said to have been taken, is agent for the proprietor of the farm in question, or connected with any firm of agents who act for the proprietor?
  THE LORD ADVOCATE (Mr. J. H. A. MACDONALD): An appeal was lodged to keep the matter open till Crown Counsel could be consulted. The appeal is not to be proceeded with. There have been cases such as are referred to in the second paragraph; but of course they are rare, and are not

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  raised with a view to a second trial before the Summary Court, but only to obtain an authoritative decision on points of law, which is the only matter on which appeal is permissible in summary cases. The Procurator Fiscal is not agent for the proprietors. His partner is the local agent. The criminal proceedings in the case were not at the instance of the proprietor, but at the instance of the tenants, for whom neither the Procurator Fiscal nor his partner acts as agent.

  LOCAL GOVERNMENT (ENGLAND AND WALES) BILL, SCHEDULE 4—MUNI- CIPAL BOROUGHS (TRANSFER OF POWERS, &c.)
  MR. HENRY H. FOWLERasked the President of the Local Government Board, Whether, having regard to the representations that have been made to him on behalf of the Municipal Boroughs, he proposes to make any additions to the boroughs to be included in Schedule 4 of the Local Government Bill?
  THE PRESIDENT (Mr. RITCHIE): The Government are sensible of the strength of the representations which have been made to them on the subject referred to by the right hon. Gentleman. The matter is now being carefully considered; and I propose, when the Amendment of the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Bury (Sir Henry James), which is one of the first Amendments in Committee on the Bill, comes on for consideration, to make a statement on the subject. I am afraid I cannot do so until then, as it is essential that I should enter into particulars, which could not satisfactorily be done in answer to a Question.

  IRISH LAND COMMISSION, SUB-COM- MISSIONERS' AND CIVIL BILL COURTS—FAIR RENT.
  MR. FLYNNasked Mr. Solicitor General for Ireland, If the Land Commission will in future Returns state the number of applications to fix fair rents under the Land Acts of 1881 and 1887 brought before the Sub-Commissioners, as also the number of fair rents fixed, distinct from the fair rent applications brought and fixed by the Civil Bill Courts; and, if he can state the
  142
  number of fair rents fixed respectively by the Sub-Commissioners and by the Civil Bill Courts for the three months ended December 31, 1887, as also for the three months ended March 31, 1888?
  THE SOLICITOR GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. MADDEN): The Land Commissioners inform me that it is their intention to make in future monthly Returns the distinction indicated in the first paragraph of this Question. The number of fair rents fixed during the three months ended December 31, 1887, was, by Sub-Commissions, 2,573; by Chief Commissioners on reports of valuers, 8; by Civil Bill Courts, 62—total, 2,643. The number of fair rents fixed during the three months ending March 31, 1888, was, by Sub-Commissions, 3,423; by Chief Commissioners on reports of valuers, 41; by Civil Bill Courts, 404—total, 3,868.

  NEWFOUNDLAND SALMON FISHERIES —FRENCH ENCROACHMENTS.
  MR. SAMUELSONasked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Whether, it is a fact that last year the French erected, or caused to be erected, for the taking of salmon, a weir in the River of Ponds, on the West Coast of Newfoundland, which barred the said River, and prevented the ascent of salmon to its upper waters; whether such obstruction exceeds the fishing rights possessed by the French by virtue of Treaties; whether the British naval authorities in those waters have power to remove the weir; and, whether the Report of the officer commanding H.M.S. Emerald on the weir at River of Ponds has been taken into consideration by the Government, with a view to prevent the erection of a similar obstruction next summer?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE (Sir JAMES FERGUSSON): These matters are at present the subject of correspondence between the Governments, and I would rather be excused from making any statement regarding them. Many questions relating to fishing on the coasts of Newfoundland have been discussed between the Governments of Great Britain and France, and difficulties connected with them have been obviated by mutual forbearance. Delays have, un-

  143
  doubtedly, occurred in the settlement of pending questions through the disinclination of Newfoundland to adopt the arrangement arrived at in Paris.

  EDUCATION (IRELAND)—CATHOLIC SCHOOL AT ANNALITTON, CO. MO- NAGHAN.
  MR. T. M. HEALYasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Is it the fact that, upon a Catholic school being opened at Annalitton, Castleblayney, County Monaghan, the parents of several Catholic children who attended, and who had hitherto been obliged to go to a Protestant school kept by an Orangeman, were visited by the police and asked to explain why their children were sent to a school of their own denomination?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR): The District Inspector of Constabulary reports that it is not the case that the parents of any of the Roman Catholic children who recently left the Annalitton National School—which, though taught by a Protestant, is a mixed school—have been visited by the police for the purpose mentioned in the Question.
  MR. T. M. HEALY: If I supply the right hon. Gentleman with the names of the parents so visited, will he make inquiry?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: Certainly, I shall be glad to make inquiries. I think that certain parents were visited; but, as far as I can make out, not with the object stated in the Question; but I will give the hon. and learned Gentleman all the information I have.
  MR. T. M. HEALY: Will the right hon. Gentleman state what was the object with which they were visited?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: What I understand is this—that the Roman Catholic clergy objected to the National school, presumably on the ground that it was taught by a Protestant, and started a new school in the place, to which all the Roman Catholics went over, with the exception of three families who were in the employment of a Loyalist (Mr. H. Cuming). It was stated that Father Gaughran, C.C., was bringing pressure to bear on these three families to make them send their children to the new school, and it was on this subject the police made inquiry.

  SOUTH AFRICA—SOUTH AFRICAN (TRANSVAAL) REPUBLIC AND THE NEW REPUBLIC TREATY OF UNION.
  MR. O. V. MORGANasked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Whether it is the case that a Treaty of Union has been entered into between the South African (Transvaal) Republic and the New Republic; and, whether, in accordance with Treaty rights, the sanction of Her Majesty's Government was given to such union?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE (Sir JAMES FERGUSSON): Such a Treaty has been entered into, and it will be found in the Papers relating to Zululand lately presented to Parliament. The sanction of Her Majesty's Government has not yet been given.

  SOUTH AFRICA—THE TRANSVAAL GOVERNMENT—RAILWAY CONCES- SION.
  MR. O. V. MORGANasked the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies, Whether it is a fact that a concession has been granted by the Transvaal Government to a Dutch-German Syndicate for a railway from the Portuguese border to Pretoria; whether one of the conditions of the concession is the right to take in goods free of Customs Duty; whether Her Majesty's Government consider such a concession is consistent with the Treaty rights secured to this country; and, whether any Correspondence has taken place between the two Governments regarding the matter; and, if so, when it will be laid upon the Table?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Sir JAMES FERGUSSON)(who replied) said: The answer to the first two paragraphs of the Question is in the affirmative. Her Majesty's Government have under their consideration the question whether such a concession is consistent with the Treaty rights secured to this country. Correspondence is in progress with the South African Republic on the subject; but no decision can be arrived at as to presenting it to Parliament until it is concluded.

  GREAT BRITAIN AND THE COLONIES —TREATY OBLIGATIONS.
  MR. O. V. MORGANasked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, When the Government will lay upon the Table of the House the promised Return of the Treaties in force which stand in the way of reciprocal concessions in one another's favour by the Mother Country and the Colonies?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE (Sir JAMES FERGUSSON): The Return is now in the printers' hands, and it is hoped that it may be ready to be distributed to hon. Members in a week or 10 days.

  TRADE AND COMMERCE—INVOICES ON SHIPMENTS FROM GERMANY TO THE UNITED STATES—CONSULAR FEES.
  Mr. O. V. MORGANasked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Whether he has yet received information from Berlin as to the absence of any charge for declarations in connection with invoices on shipments from Germany to the United States; and, if so, whether the Government will take the necessary steps to relieve shippers from England of the payment of 2s. 6d. at present levied on each invoice?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE (Sir JAMES FERGUSSON): The inquiry has been made through Her Majesty's Minister at Washington—not at Berlin. There has not yet been time to receive a reply.

  LOTTERIES—PRIZE DRAWING FOR FUND OF CATHEDRAL OF SAINT MACARTAN, MONAGHAN.
  COLONEL WARINGasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Whether his attention has been called to a "Bazaar and Grand Art Union Prize Drawing," which has been announced to take place on the 11th, 12th, and 13th of September next, for the benefit of the fund for the completion of the Cathedral of Saint Macartan, Monaghan, at which a carved money box containing £150 is offered as a prize; and, whether he intends to take any steps with regard to this infraction of the law as to lotteries?
  MR. M'CARTANsaid, that before the right hon. Gentleman answered the Question, might he ask him whether he was aware that the Act referred to provided that one-third of the fine imposed should be paid to the person who gave the information to the Government?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR): I am not acquainted with the provisions of the Act to which the hon. and learned Gentleman has called my attention. The attention of the Attorney General for Ireland has been drawn to the case referred to by my hon. and gallant Friend (Colonel Waring); and he is now looking into the matter, and finding out what are the precedents for action in such cases—that is to say, what has been done under like circumstances on other occasions.

  IRISH LAND COMMISSION—INCREASE OF EXPENSES.
  COLONEL WARINGasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Whether his attention has been called to the Rule issued by the Irish Land Commission, under the date of the 24th of March, 1888, whereby the expenses of proceedings before the Land Commissioners, which are already felt to press heavily on suitors, are seriously increased?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR): The Land Commissioners inform me that the increase of solicitors' fees under the Rule of the 24th of March, 1888, which was laid on the Table on the 11th of April, was sanctioned by them in consequence of the Incorporated Law Society having brought under the notice of the Commissioners the small scale at which costs were fixed in ordinary cases of tenants from year to year, and the inadequacy of remuneration where leases existed which involved further labour and expense unless the scale of costs was increased.

  LAW AND JUSTICE (IRELAND)—IM- PROPER CONVICTION AT LOUGHREA COURT HOUSE—COLONEL TYNTE, R. M.
  MR. J. E. ELLISasked the Chief Secretary to the

  147
  Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Whether his attention has been called to the fact that, in spite of an assurance given to their solicitor that the cases had been adjourned, three persons were tried and convicted, when absent from Court through the refusal of the constabulary to allow them to enter, by Mr. Tynte, R.M., at Loughrea Courthouse, of participating in the proceedings at Loughrea, on the 8th of April; and, whether such a practice of trying and convicting persons in their absence has the sanction of the Government?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR): The Resident Magistrate named reports that this Question does not accurately represent the facts. The cases against the three persons referred to had been originally entered for hearing at Petty Sessions on the 19th of April, before Mr. Paul, R.M., who adjourned them, informing the counsel for the defence that they would not be taken until after a Crimes Court case, which was also adjourned, on the application of the defendants' counsel, to the 26th of April. On the latter date Colonel Tynte, R.M., unaware of what Mr. Paul had stated on the 19th, came to the Court at the usual hour, and began to hear the ordinary business. He heard the cases against the three defendants, their names being first duly called in Court. The District Inspector of Constabulary reports that there is no ground for the allegation that the defendants were refused admittance by the police. Later on, the counsel for the defendants appeared, and stated that he had a promise from the presiding magistrate on the previous occasion that the ordinary Petty Sessions business would not be taken until after the Crimes Court case. Colonel Tynte, having satisfied himself that there was a misunderstanding as to the time for the defendants to appear, and, not having signed the order, ruled that these cases should be re-heard.
  MR. J. E. ELLIS: Then am I to understand that Colonel Tynte had come to a decision?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: If he gave his decision, he evidently rescinded it, because the cases are to be re-heard.
  MR. J. E. ELLIS: Did he not come to a decision?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: I have no further information.
  MR. T. M. HEALYasked, was it not the fact—as he was present in the Court—that these three persons were excluded from the Court and kept out of the Court when their own trial came on; and that, notwithstanding that, Colonel Tynte proceeded with the cases, and that it was only after the appeal of counsel that he rescinded his decision?
  MR. A. J. BALFOURsaid, he understood that there was no foundation for the allegation that the police refused admittance to the defendants; and it was perfectly clear, from the facts he had laid before the House, that the defendants suffered no loss in the matter, and that full justice was done them.
  MR. T. M. HEALYasked, would the right hon. Gentleman give an undertaking that no person would be tried under such circumstances; because, had it not been for the intervention of counsel, Colonel Tynte would have signed the order, and great injustice would have been done?
  MR. A. J. BALFOUR: Of course, no one will be intentionally tried under such circumstances.
  SIR JOHN SWINBURNE: May I ask, whether the Government will grant these men compensation for the loss of time for having been brought to the Court, and their cases not having been tried?
  [No reply.]

  GAME ACTS—SALE OF RUSSIAN PAR- TRIDGES AND HARES.
  MR. O. V. MORGANasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Why Russian partridges and hares may be sold in Leadenhall and Central Markets but not by licensed retail dealers?
  THE SECRETARY OF STATE (Mr. MATTHEWS): So far as I am aware, there is no difference as to the right of selling foreign game in Leadenhall and Central Markets, or in any retail shop. The same licences apply to wholesale and retail dealing in game, and the same restrictions apply to both.

  CHARITY COMMISSIONERS—CHRIST'S HOSPITAL SCHEME.
  MR. MUNDELLAasked the Vice President of the

  149
  Committee of Council on Education, Whether the Christ's Hospital Scheme, which has been for two years in the hands of the Education Department, has yet been dealt with; and, if not, why not; and, when the scheme will be finally approved?
  THE VICE PRESIDENT (SIR WILLIAM HART DYKE): Points of some importance in connection with the scheme have still to be finally disposed of; but the decision of the Department will be made known before very long.

  IRISH INDUSTRIES—LECTURES IN LACEMAKING.
  MR. R. POWERasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, If the Lord Lieutenant has been able to give a favourable answer to the communication addressed to His Excellency from the School of Art at Waterford, and the branch Art Class at the Carmelite Convent, New Ross, respecting the continuance of inspections of, and lectures on, lace making, by Mr. Alan Cole?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY FOR IRELAND (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR): The Irish Government are giving the matter consideration.

  LUNATIC ASYLUMS—DARENTH ASYLUM.
  MR. FIRTHasked the President of the Local Government Board (referring to Return on Lunatic Asylums, No. 101), Whether he is able to say what is the explanation of the annual cost per head at Darenth Asylum being higher than that of any other asylum in England, and more than £10 per head higher than the cost at either Leavesden or Caterham?
  THE PRESIDENT (Mr. RITCHIE): As regards the first part of the Question, the annual cost per head in the case of the County and Borough Asylums in the Return referred to applies only to the cost of maintenance. In the case of the Metropolitan Asylum District Asylums, however, the cost includes items which are not included in the cost of maintenance at the other Asylums. With regard to the cost at Darenth, as compared with the Leavesden and Caterham Asylums, it is to be observed that the
  150
  latter asylums provide for a very much larger number of inmates than the Darenth Asylum. As regards the actual cost of the food of the patients, it is practically the same at Darenth as in the other asylums. The excess of cost arises under other heads of expenditure, and is to some extent accounted for by the fact that the Darenth Asylum has not had its full number of inmates; and also that the expenses of maintaining an establishment are not necessarily in proportion to the number of inmates which it provides for. I am not prepared to say, however, that these circumstances satisfactorily explain the difference in the cost, and I will direct the attention of the Managers to the matter.

  LAND COMMISSION OFFICE, DUBLIN— PAYMENT OF FEES IN STAMPS.
  MR. M'CARTANasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Whether he is aware that there is no stamp distributor attached to the Land Commission Office at Dublin, and that persons requiring copies of orders or other documents there are obliged to pay the fees in stamps, and cannot obtain any stamps at the Land Commission Office; and, whether, considering the inconvenience and delay involved thereby, he will take into consideration the appointment of a stamp distributor at that office?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR): This Question should be addressed to the Secretary to the Treasury, as also should the Question of the hon. Member (Mr. Kilbride) in reference to loans to The MacGillycuddy.

  RIOTS, &c. (IRELAND)—CAPTAIN L. S. PAYNE AT FERMOY—REMOVAL OF BANNERS, &c.
  MR. T. M. HEALYasked the Secretary of State for War, Whether his attention has been called to the report in The Cork Examiner of the 8th of May of the trial of Captain Ludlow Strange Payne, at Fermoy, on a summons charging him with tearing down after midnight certain banners and decorations erected across the streets of Fermoy in honour of the visit of the hon. Member for North-East Cork (Mr. W. O'Brien); whether the evidence showed that Captain Payne was caught in the act by the night watchman; whe-

  151
  ther, although the summons was dismissed on the ground that the complainant should have been the Town Commissioners, the presiding magistrate stated that—
  "So far as the emblem was concerned there was nothing to object to in it. We cannot understand why Captain Payne interfered with them;"
  and added, in giving judgment,—
  "That both Mr. Furlong and himself considered that Mr. Payne had acted not only with very bad taste but with the most extreme imprudence and danger. By the insult he committed he not only placed himself in danger, but also other people who might be supposed to regard Mr. Payne's action with favour; but on the legal point they did not see their way to a conviction;"
  to what military command is Captain Payne attached; and, do his superiors intend to take any notice of his conduct?
  SIR HERBERT MAXWELL (A LORD of the TREASURY)(who replied) said: The gentleman referred to in this Question is a Militia officer, whose battalion is not out for training, He is not employed on any military duty, and nothing is known of the matter by the Military Authorities in Ireland beyond what they have seen in the newspapers.
  MR. T. M. HEALYsaid, he considered that a very unsatisfactory reply. There was a captain of the Militia who committed so grave an offence that the magistrate who tried the case said—
  "So far as the emblem was concerned there was nothing to object to in it. We cannot understand why Captain Payne interfered with them;"
  and added, in giving judgment—
  "That both Mr. Furlong and himself considered that Mr. Payne had acted not only with very bad taste, but with the most extreme imprudence and danger. By the insult he committed he not only placed himself in danger, but also other people who might be supposed to regard Mr. Payne's action with favour; but on the legal point they did not see their way to a conviction;
  I beg to ask, whether Her Majesty's Government will allow the gentleman to remain in the Service?
  SIR HERBERT MAXWELLsaid, he was prepared to make further inquiries into the case; but he doubted whether the Military Authorities could do anything to a gentleman who was not on military service at the time.

  WAYS AND MEANS—THE FINANCIAL RESOLUTIONS—THE HORSE TAX— INCUMBENTS OF PARISHES.
  SIR JOHN MOWBRAYasked Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer, Whether, having regard to the fact that clergymen going on duty did not pay turnpike tolls, he will exempt from taxation horses kept by incumbents in charge of parishes with large area, who are compelled to keep such horses for the pastoral visitation of their parishes?
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER (Mr. GOSCHEN): It is provided in the Bill that duty be repaid in respect of one horse used by a minister of religion in the course of the year; and beyond this I do not think that any concession should be made.

  INLAND REVENUE—MEDICINE STAMPS TAX—LEGISLATION.
  DR. FARQUHARSONasked Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer, If, in view of the widespread dissatisfaction existing at the manner in which the Medicine Stamps Tax has lately been enforced, especially in Scotland, he would be prepared, pending the introduction of a Bill dealing with the whole question, to repeal the clauses which apply to medicines not coming under the head of patent or secret compounds?
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER (Mr. GOSCHEN): I am not aware that there has been any expression on the part of the chemists and druggists of the "widespread dissatisfaction" which the hon. Member's Question assumes to exist. In fact, the leading trade journals have on more than one occasion expressed an opinion that these duties are administered in a considerate manner. There is no difference between England and Scotland in the mode of enforcement. The adoption of the hon. Member's suggestion would destroy the greater part of the produce of the duties.

  WALES—RATES ON TITHE—RENT CHARGE—THE VICAR OF LLANFI- HANGEL, DENBIGHSHIRE.
  MR. T. E. ELLISasked the Secretary of State for the

  153
  Home Department, Whether the Vicar of Llanfihangel, near Cerrig-y-Druidion, Denbighshire, declines to pay his rates to the overseers of the parish; whether Mr. W. Kerr, a magistrate of the Petty Sessional Division of Cerrig-y-Druidion, refused to sign the summons to bring the case before the Petty Sessions; and, whether such a refusal on the part of the magistrate is in accordance with the law, and, if not, whether he will bring the conduct of the magistrate under the notice of the Lord Chancellor?
  THE SECRETARY or STATE (Mr. MATTHEWS): Yes, Sir; I am informed that the Vicar did decline to pay the rate on the tithe rent-charge, on the ground that it had not been paid to him. The magistrate did refuse to sign the summons. I have no authority to express opinions on points of law. If the magistrate has claimed to have a discretion in the matter of issuing the summons, which the law does not give him, a simple remedy is provided by 11 &12 Vict., c. 44, s. 5.

  BOARD OF WORKS (IRELAND)—AD- VANCES TO THE MACGILLYCUDDY OF THE REEKES.
  MR. KILBRIDEasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, How much money has been advanced to the MacGillycuddy of the Reekes by the Board of Works since the year 1879; what is the Poor Law valuation of the property on which this money is chargeable; how much, if any, of this loan has been paid back into the Treasury; who inspected the works for which this money was advanced; and, what provision is made to satisfy the Board of Works that money advanced for drainage purposes is so expended?
  THE SECRETARY TO THE TREASURY (Mr. JACKSON), in reply, said, he had made inquiries on getting Notice of the Question; but had not yet got the information which would enable him to answer the Question fully.

  EDUCATION DEPARTMENT (ENGLAND AND WALES)—INSTRUCTION IN THRIFT.
  SIR JOSEPH BAILEY(for Mr. NORTON) (Kent, Tunbridge)
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  asked the Vice President of the Committee of Council on Education, If his attention has been directed to the following passage in the Report issued last year by the Select Committee on National Provident Insurance:—
  "Your Committee are of opinion that it is highly desirable that the Legislature, which has made education compulsory, should cause instruction in sound principles of thrift and insurance to form part of that education;"
  and, whether he has considered the propriety of introducing an elementary text book on the principles of provident insurance into the routine of elementary schools?
  THE VICE PRESIDENT (Sir WILLIAM HART DYKE): The Department have had under consideration the passage referred to by my hon. Friend; and will place no difficulty in the way of managers exercising their discretion as to the choice of such a reading book as he describes if it fulfils the ordinary conditions.

  VACCINATION ACT, 1871—HALESOWEN PETTY SESSIONS.
  MR. CHANNINGasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether he has received a letter, dated March 11, 1888, from Enoch Harper, of Quinton, Staffordshire, making complaint that he was not allowed to appear to a vaccination summons at Halesowen Petty Sessions by a representative, duly authorized in his behalf, under Section 11 of "The Vaccination Act, 1871," and that the Chairman, having refused a hearing to his representative so authorized, proceeded to impose a fine of 20 s. and 9s. costs; whether the statements in Enoch Harper's letter are correct; and, whether such fine and costs were legally imposed; and, if not, whether he will take steps to cause the amount of fine and costs to be refunded to Mr. Harper?
  THE SECRETARY or STATE (Mr. MATTHEWS): Yes, Sir; I have received such a letter. The statement is correct that the Bench refused to hear Mr. Harper's representative. Under these circumstances, the proceedings were, in my opinion, irregular; and I have accordingly advised the remission of the fine, and have written to the Justices that the defend-

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  ant should also be re-imbursed the costs.

  LOCAL GOVERNMENT (ENGLAND AND WALES) BILL—CLAUSE 3—TOWN COUNCILS.
  MR. HULSEasked the President of the Local Government Board, What will be the future position of the Town Council under Clause 3, Sub-section 4, of the Local Government Bill; and, whether the County Council will maintain and have entire control over buildings in boroughs which are used for the Assize Courts, now belonging to the Council of such boroughs, and in which Assizes may be, and are, held?
  THE PRESIDENT (Mr. RITCHIE), in reply, said, that neither the County Council nor the Joint Committee of the Quarter Sessions and County Council will have transferred to them any powers with regard to any Assize Court which are not now possessed by the Quarter Sessions of the county. The Local Government Bill will not interfere with the powers of the Town Council of a borough as to their control over buildings which belong to the borough, and which are used for the Assize Courts.

  ROYAL IRISH CONSTABULARY—JOHN S. DEANS, OF THE ENNIS POLICE FORCE.
  MR. CONYBEAREasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Why Constable John S. Deans, of the Ennis Police Force, has been dismissed; and, whether, on the occasion of his dismissal, any cause was assigned?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR): This man was discharged, on the ground that his retention in the Force would no longer be of advantage to the Public Service.
  MR. CONYBEAREasked, if the Chief Secretary would state on what ground that conclusion was arrived at.
  MR. A. J. BALFOURsaid, he was afraid he could not go into the question.
  MR. CONYBEAREsaid, he should again call attention to the matter.

  PUBLIC WORKS DEPARTMENT (INDIA) —OFFICIALS IN SERVICE OF PRI- VATE COMPANIES.
  MR. MALLOCkasked the Under Secretary of State for India, What number of officers belonging to the Public Works Department in India are now in the employment of Private Companies or private persons in whose undertakings the Indian Governmen has no pecuniary interest?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE (Sir JOHN GORST): Twenty-eight. Of these, 22 are employed in Native States, mostly in connection with railways, and six are lent to the Government of Egypt.

  IRISH LAND COMMISSION—SITTINGS AT CARRIGALLEN.
  MR. HAYDENasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Whether there were 71 applications recently listed for hearing before the Land Commission from the district of Carrigallen; whether the Land Commission was applied to to fix Carrigallen as the place for hearing these applications; whether that request was refused, and on what grounds; and, whether, in consequence of this refusal, the suitors were obliged to walk 14 or 15 miles, and most of them to be absent from their homes from Tuesday to Saturday, being detained to suit the convenience of the landlord, who did not attend when the cases were called?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR): The Land Commissioners inform me that the number of applications listed from the Carrigallen District was about 71. The Land Commission has been applied to to fix Carrigallen as the place for hearing these applications; but they were of opinion that the balance of convenience was against selecting that place, and that it would conduce to the more rapid discharge of business to hear the cases elsewhere. The cases taken up and heard each day were fixed in advance, so as to avoid the possibility of any loss of time.

  INLAND REVENUE—EXCISE— BREWERS' HOUSES.
  MR. HANDEL COSSHAMasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether the Go-

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  vernment could obtain and give the House a Return of the number of public-houses owned by brewers in half-a-dozen typical towns in England and Wales?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY Of STATE (Mr. STUART-WORTLEY)(who replied) said, he was afraid that the Return could not be granted, because if the information could be obtained it would not be of a reliable character.
  MR. HANDEL COSSHAMsaid, he had been able to obtain the information from the Mayor of Bath, and asked if it could not be obtained from other towns?
  [No reply.]

  THE LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL (INDIA) —THE CALCUTTA MUNICIPALITY BILL.
  MR. ARTHUR WILLIAMSasked the Under Secretary of State for India, Whether the new Calcutta Municipality Bill, now before the Bengal Legislative Council, contains novel features unknown to like legislation in the United Kingdom; for example, giving the power of voting under the municipal franchise to the Calcutta Chamber of Commerce and to the Calcutts Trades' Association, the members of which Bodies already possess the right of voting in their private capacity as citizens; and multiplicity of votes, it being alleged that plurality voting according to property qualification and by the cumulative system obtains in English municipal franchise procedure; whether he is aware that the proposed measure is unpopular with a large majority of the inhabitants of Calcutta, owing partly to the inclusion on arbitrary grounds of certain suburban places within the future municipal limits of Calcutta, although such places are already included in a local municipality; and, whether the Secretary of State will instruct the Viceroy in Council not to sanction the Bill until the inhabitants of Calcutta have had an opportunity, by deputation or otherwise (advantage to be taken of such opportunity before the close of the present Session) of expressing to the Secretary of State their objections to the measure as at present framed?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE (Sir JOHN GORST):
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  The Calcutta Municipality Bill, which contains provisions of the kind referred to by the hon. Member, has been for two years under discussion in the Bengal Legislative Council; and the inhabitants of Calcutta have had ample opportunities of expressing their objections to the Secretary of State, if they thought fit to do so. No such representations have been made; and the Secretary of State has no intention of interfering with the discretion which the Governor General possesses under the Indian Council Act of assenting to or withholding his assent from the Bill after it has passed the Bengal Legislative Council.

  LOCAL GOVERNMENT (ENGLAND AND WALES) BILL—CENTRAL CRIMINAL COURT—OFFICERS, &c.
  MR. FIRTHasked the President of the Local Government Board, Whether the "officers of the Central Criminal Court," mentioned in section 23, sub-section (k.) of the Local Government Bill, include the Recorder, Common Serjeant, and Commissioner; and, what are the authorities of the Metropolitan Board of Works to incur costs mentioned in section 37, subsection (3)?
  THE PRESIDENT (Mr. RITCHIE), in reply, said, that the term "officers of the Central Criminal Court," was not intended to include the Recorder, Common Serjeant, and Commissioner. The authority referred to was conferred on the Metropolitan Board of Works by the Metropolitan Management Act, the Acts amending the same, and numerous other Acts. The Metropolitan Board of Works had no power to rate the City under the Artizans' Dwellings Act; the authority for administering which in the City was the Commissioners of Sewers. The City was also not rateable for the administration of the Cattle Plague Acts, for explosives, offensive trades, and slaughter houses.

  POST OFFICE (ENGLAND AND WALES) —CENTRAL TELEGRAPH OFFICE— PROMOTIONS.
  MR. BRADLAUGHasked the Postmaster General, Whether he is aware that the specific promise made by him on the 28th of February,

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  1887, in relation to Central Telegraph Office promotions, is now being departed from, in that it is proposed to promote certain transferred telegraphists to the first class over London men of longer service; and, whether this new departure has his approval?
  THE POSTMASTER GENERAL (Mr. RAIKES): I have no recollection of the specific promise to which the hon. Member alludes. I find that on the 28th of February, 1887, I answered him to the following effect:—
  "I am not quite sure that I understand the Question; but if the hon. Member will call at the General Post Office, I will take care that he shall receive the fullest information."
  On February 23 last, in answer to the hon. Member for South Down (Mr. M'Cartan), who asked me a similar Question, I stated—
  "That since January 1, 1882,84 telegraphists have been transferred from the country to London; that out of this number eight have been promoted in advance of London telegraphists of equal or longer service; and that all these promotions have taken place since March 1 of last year. The 84 telegraphists, most of whom have been brought to London at a time of extreme pressure, and who were all transferred in the direct interest of the Service, were incorporated into the London Establishment according to their qualifications and pay; and in the case of the eight to whose promotion the hon. Member refers, it happened, owing to the fact of their having joined the Department as skilled telegraphists, that both their qualifications and pay were higher than those of their Metropolitan colleagues of equal service, who had joined as learners direct from the School of Telegraphy."
  This seems to show the practice of the Department in the matter, which has not since been varied, and I have no present intention of varying it.

  THE TRUCK ACT—BRISTOL.
  MR. BRADLAUGHasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether the Inspector of Factories for the Bristol District has made any further Report on the alleged breaches of the Truck Act within such district, and if he will state the nature of the Report; what further action is being taken in the case; and, whether he will state the date and substance of any Circular issued to Inspectors of Factories since the passing of and relating to the Truck Law Amendment Act of last Session?
  THE SECRETARY Of STATE (Mr. MATTHEWS): Yes, Sir; a further Report has been made. The matter has been placed in the hands of the Solicitor to the Treasury, with a view to the immediate prosecution of the offenders. An abstract of the Truck Act was circulated among the Inspectors of Factories for their instruction in January last.

  DISPENSARIES (IRELAND)—LOCAL DISPENSARIES COMMITTEE, CLONES UNION—JOSEPH GRAYDON.
  MR. H. CAMPBELLasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Whether a bailiff named Joseph Graydon, residing at Rosslea, County Fermanagh, is a member of the Local Dispensary Committee in Clones Union; is his house used as a dispensary; is he in receipt of rent from the Union for the use of the house; is it the fact that he is paid by the Union for permitting his servant to act as attendant to the medical officer; does he also receive a salary for acting as Deputy Registrar of Births, Deaths, and Marriages; was the rent of the dispensary increased some time since; and, if so, on what grounds; is it true that this man's son is a shopkeeper in Rosslea, and that it is to him the people requiring tickets entitling them to medical relief have to apply; and, whether, if the facts are as stated, he will take steps to remedy the matters complained of?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR): The answer to the first three paragraphs of the Question is in the affirmative. It is the case that the rent paid by the Union included remuneration for the servant's attendance. Mr. Graydon did not receive any salary from the Union, or any other public fund, for acting as Deputy Registrar of Births, Deaths, and Marriages. The rent of the dispensary has not been increased since 1878, when it was raised from £8 to £12. The Board of Guardians appeared to be unanimous in granting the increase, on the ground that the accommodation was equal, if not superior, to that at Rosslea. It is the case that Mr. Graydon's son is a shopkeeper at Rosslea. He has no legal authority to issue tickets for medical relief.
  MR. EDWARD HARRINGTONasked, if the Chief Secretary, when he said that this man received no salary from a public fund for acting as a Deputy Registrar, was aware that the salary which was given to him was portion of that given to him by the Registrar who employed him?
  MR. A. J. BALFOURsaid, if the Registrar chose to remunerate someone to assist him he was not aware that that should be considered as coming out of the public funds.
  MR. H. CAMPBELLasked, on what grounds had the rent of the dispensary been raised?
  MR. A. J. BALFOURsaid, on the ground that the accommodation, in the opinion of the Guardians, was superior to that which was being paid for already by them.
  MR. H. CAMPBELLasked, whether this man, while in receipt of rent from the Union, was eligible to be a member of the Dispensary Committee?
  MR. A. J. BALFOURsaid, he did not imagine that his receiving rent disqualified him.
  MR. ARTHUR O'CONNORsaid, he understood the Chief Secretary had stated that it was not legal that the son of this man to issue medical relief tickets. Did the right hon. Gentleman, then, approve of the fact that the people who required medical relief were obliged to go to his shop?
  MR. A. J. BALFOURsaid, he had told the House that he was not aware there was any ground for believing that the son did issue tickets.
  MR. H. CAMPBELLasked, was it not the fact that Graydon's son actually did issue these tickets; and would the right hon. Gentleman ascertain whether he did so or not?
  MR. A. J. BALFOURsaid, he was not aware that he did; but if the hon. Member would give him any evidence of the fact he would make further inquiry.

  WAR OFFICE—"FORTRESS AND RAIL- WAY ENGINEER CORPS" FOR EDIN- BURGH AND LEITH.
  MR. BUCHANANasked the Secretary of State for War, What has been the cause of the great delay, extending over two years, in giving the sanction of the War Office to the proposed "Fortress and Railway Engineer Corps" for Edinburgh and
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  Leith; and, whether he will take steps to have a definite decision given at the earliest possible moment?
  SIR HERBERT MAXWELL (A LORD of the TREASURY)(who replied) said: Provision has been made in the Estimates of this year for the formation of four companies of the Fortress and Railway Engineer Corps for Edinburgh and Leith. The existing Volunteer battalions and regiments at Edinburgh and Leith have strongly protested against the formation of this corps, on the ground that it would be likely to interfere with recruiting. The matter has been referred to the General Officer commanding in North Britain for further Report.

  TURKEY (ASIATIC PROVINCES)— ARMENIA—PERSECUTIONS OF THE CHRISTIANS.
  MR. MUNDELLAasked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Whether his attention has been called to a statement circulated by the Armenian Patriotic Association setting forth the horrible sufferings and persecutions of the Christians of Armenia, owing to which many of the Southern and Eastern Districts of the Province of Van are nearly depopulated of the Christian element; whether it is true, as alleged, that the British Consuls in Armenia are well aware of the facts set forth in the said statement, amongst others, that in certain districts—
  "The prisons are filled by numberless Armenians (many of whom are clergymen), all of them arrested for groundless reasons."
  That—
  "Some of them have been kept more than 40 hours without food and water, their hands, feet, and necks in chains extended cruciform on the wall, in a dark, cold, damp underground cell;"
  whether, under the 61st Article of the Treaty of Berlin, Turkey did not engage to ameliorate the condition of its Christian subjects, and to introduce indispensable reforms; and, whether the Government has addressed any remonstrances to the Turkish Government on the subject, and with what result?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE (Sir JAMES FERGUSSON): A copy of the statement in question has been communicated to the Foreign Office. The particular facts mentioned in the question have not

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  been reported by any British Consular officer. A previous Memorial of the Armenian Patriotic Association was forwarded to Sir William White, who has replied that the statements contained in it go over so much ground, and that the means of testing their accuracy at his disposal are so limited, that he must ask for time before he can report upon them. The engagements of the Porte contained in the 61st Article of the Treaty of Berlin are contracted with all the Signatory Powers in common. No useful object would be attained by official representations to the Porte unless they are made upon well-substantiated facts, and in common with the other Powers.

  ISLANDS OF THE SOUTHERN PACIFIC —SAMOA.
  MR. W. A. M'ARTHURasked the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies, Whether, so long ago as 1886 or early in 1887, the British Government agreed with the German Government to give them practically a free hand in their dealings with Samoa; whether the United States Government, as one of the parties to the agreement between Great Britain, Germany, the United States, and Samoa, was consulted prior to the decision of the English Government being communicated to Germany; whether any attempt was made to ascertain the opinions of the Colonies of Australia and New Zealand before taking a step so important to their interests; whether, when the Conference on Samoa met at Washington, the United States Government were informed of the agreement of Great Britain with Germany; if not, when was that information given to the United States Government; what were the instructions given to our Commissioner at the Washington Conference; whether any remonstrance has been addressed to the German Government as to their treatment of our faithful ally Mahitoa, and whether any guarantee has been asked for, or given, that he shall be well treated by the Germans at the Cameroons; and, whether the Government know if it is proposed to detain him permanently in that unhealthy district?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE (Sir JAMES FERGUSSON): I answer the first two Questions in the negative. But the policy of Her Majesty's Government was stated at the Colonial Conference early in 1886. It will be found on page 167, vol. ii., of its proceedings—namely, Sir John Thurston, Her Majesty's High Commissioner for the Pacific, advised Her Majesty's Government that—
  "The only satisfactory mode of preventing the peace of the Islands from being disturbed by rival Native claimants to the Throne, and of securing the interests of the three civilized nations on an equal footing, would be found in an agreement between Great Britain, Germany, and the United States, that one of them should, as the mandatory of the other two, exercise for a limited term, to be renewed if it should be so determined at its expiration, supervision and control over Native affairs in the Islands;"
  and although, as was stated at the Colonial Conference—
  "Her Majesty's Government had arrived at the same opinion, and were prepared to advocate at Washington an agreement of this nature,"
  no "decision" could be taken by Her Majesty's Government before the conclusion of the Conference for the consideration of Western Pacific affairs. (3.) The Colonial Representatives were so informed on the 23rd of April, 1887. (4.) On the meeting of the Conference at Washington, the proposal was laid before it. (5.) Until that Conference has been concluded its proceedings, and the instructions given to our Representative, cannot be made known. (6 and 7.) Her Majesty's Government have no doubt that Mahitoa is treated in a proper manner.

  EDUCATION DEPARTMENT (ENGLAND AND WALES)—SECONDARY SCHOOLS —REGISTRATION OF TEACHERS.
  SIR RICHARD TEMPLEasked the Vice President of the Committee of Council on Education, Whether the Government will consider the question of registration of teachers of secondary schools at an early date, in order to insure their greater professional efficiency; and, whether the Government will offer to inspect those private secondary schools, the proprietors or masters of which may desire to submit them to inspection?
  THE VICE PRESIDENT (Sir WILLIAM HART DYKE): The questions raised by my hon. Friend

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  form part of the whole subject to which the Government are pledged to give their attention, and are, therefore, being considered in connection therewith.

  ROYAL IRISH CONSTABULARY— PRIVATE EMPLOYMENT.
  MR. HARRISasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Whether it be true that, in consequence of not having been paid their wages, the labourers who were in the employment of Mr. J. S. Eyre, of Kiltormer, County Galway, refused to continue working for that gentleman, and that they informed the Constabulary, who strove to influence them, that they were quite willing to return to work if Mr. Eyre paid them their wages out of the £95 he had got from the Board of Works for such purposes; and, whether Constable Boardman spent three days last week ploughing and harrowing Mr. Eyre's land, and was also engaged on the 7th instant putting out manure for that gentleman; and, if so, is it allowable that constables may supplement their incomes by wages earned as day labourers, or has instructions been issued which would compel members of the Police Force to work for landlords who may be unable or unwilling to pay their labourers?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR): All, or almost all, of the statements of fact in this Question are declared to be incorrect. It is not true that these workmen left their employer for not having been paid their wages, having been paid in advance. The reason they left him appears to have been that they desired to Boycott him. They did not complain to the police; and the police did not try to induce them to remain with, or return to, their employer. It was not a fact that Constable Boardman had done any agricultural work for Mr. Eyre.
  MR. HARRIS: I fear very much that the right hon. Gentleman is very much misinformed.

  PRISONS (ENGLAND AND WALES)— CHELMSFORD GOAL.
  MAJOR RASCHasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether any Report has been received from Her Majesty's Inspector of Prisons on the alleged
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  defective ventilation of prison cells at Chelmsford?
  THE SECRETARY of STATE (Mr. MATTHEWS): No Report has been received from Her Majesty's inspector of Prisons on this matter; but in consequence of representations made by the Visiting Committee last year, such steps were taken as seemed necessary to make the means of ventilation act properly. The medical officer of the prison has since reported, and has not suggested the necessity for any further provision being made, as the sanitary condition of the prison is, as far as he can judge, satisfactory. The subject, however, will continue to be kept in view.

  WAYS AND MEANS—THE FINANCIAL RESOLUTIONS—HAWKERS' LICENCES.
  MR. JACOBYasked Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer, If a retail draper who travels with a horse and trap, but sells from samples only, will be considered by the Excise Authorities to be a hawker?
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER (Mr. GOSCHEN): In strictness he would be liable; but it has not been our practice to require a hawker's licence to be taken out in cases where a draper called for orders with samples only on his regular local customers.

  INLAND REVENUE—EXCISE—LICENCES TO BREWERS' HOUSES.
  MR. CALEB WRIGHTasked the President of the Local Government Board, If he will lay upon the Table of the House a Return of victuallers, beerhouses, and other licences for the sale of intoxicating liquors that have been refused during the five years ending 1886, on the ground that they were not required; and, whether he can give the number of public-houses and other licensed premises for the sale of intoxicating drink that belong to brewers and spirit merchants?
  THE PRESIDENT (Mr. RITCHIE): I have no information as to the number of cases in which licences for the sale of intoxicating liquors have been refused on the ground that they were not required; neither can I give the number

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  of public-houses and other licensed promises for the sale of intoxicating liquors that belong to brewers and spirit merchants.
  MR. T. W. RUSSELLasked, whether it would not be possible to get some such Return before the Local Government Bill came on for discussion in Committee?
  MR. RITCHIEsaid, the matter was one with which the Home Office was concerned; but he would make inquiry.

  ROYAL IRISH CONSTABULARY—THE SUNDAY CLOSING ACT—MR. A. E. FLEURY AT LISBURN.
  MR. P. M'DONALDasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. Whether A. E. Fleury, reported in The Lisburn Standard, of the 14th of April last, as having been appointed incumbent's churchwarden, at a meeting of the annual Easter Vestry of the parish of Christ Church, Lisburn, held on the 4th of April last, the Rev. Arthur J. Moore, M.A., in the chair, is the Constabulary District Inspector of Lisburn; and, whether Mr. Fleury was present at said meeting, when a Resolution in favour of the continuance of the Irish Sunday Closing Act and its extension to the five cities now exempted was passed unanimously; and, if so, whether it is in conformity with the regulations of the Service for a member of the Constabulary Force to accept or hold any such appointment, or to support or assist in the passing of a Resolution at any meeting condemnatory of any Act of Parliament which it is his duty to enforce?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR): I have not yet been able to get the necessary Report to enable me to answer the Question. Perhaps the hon. Member will put it on a subsequent occasion.

  POST OFFICE (ENGLAND AND WALES) —RECEIVING HOUSE FOR PICCADILLY.
  MR. W. BECKETTasked the Postmaster General, What is the reason of his not having yet re-established a Post and Telegraph Office in place of the one abolished a year ago by the demolition of houses in Down Street, Piccadilly; and, if he is aware of the great inconvenience caused by there being no Post or Telegraph
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  Office in Piccadilly from Burlington House to Knightsbridge?
  THE POSTMASTER GENERAL (Mr. RAIKES): All efforts to find a person to undertake the duties of receiver in or about Down Street, Piccadilly, or to obtain premises for a branch post office at an expense which the amount of the business would warrant, have hitherto proved unsuccessful. I can assure the hon. Member that I shall be ready to entertain any proposal for providing an additional post office between Burlington House and Knightsbridge at a reasonable cost.

  IRISH LAND COMMISSION—COMPEN- SATION FOR IMPROVEMENTS.
  MR. MAURICE HEALYasked Mr. Solicitor General for Ireland, Whether his attention has been called to the recent decision pronounced under the Land Law Acts by the Sub-Commissioners sitting respectively in the Counties of Dublin and Cork—namely, that where a lease contains a clause precluding a tenant from claiming compensation for improvements at its determination, all improvements made by the tenant are to be treated as the property of the landlord, and that on the tenants applying to have a fair rent fixed under the lease-breaking clause of the Act of last year, the landlord is entitled to claim rent on such improvements, though he has not in any way contributed to the cost of them; whether he is aware that nearly every lease made in Ireland since the Land Act of 1870 contains such a clause, where the valuation of the holding exceeded £50, and that the result of the decision in question, if upheld, will be to confiscate tenants' improvements to an enormous extent, and in the case of the most improving class of tenant; and, whether the Government will take the opportunity provided by the Bill now before the House to redress this injustice?
  THE SOLICITOR GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. MADDEN): I have ascertained that a decision to the effect mentioned in the first paragraph of the Question was pronounced by one of the Sub-Commissioners referred to, and I have no reason to doubt the accuracy of the entire paragraph. I have no information as to the matters of fact stated

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  in the second paragraph; but I cannot admit that the operation of the decision referred to, whatever be its extent, can fairly be described as confiscation. It is not the intention of the Government to introduce any legislation for the purpose of nullifying clauses in leases defining the respective rights of landlord and tenant with regard to property in improvements effected by the tenants.

  RIOTS, &c. (IRELAND)—THE MITCHELS- TOWN INQUEST.
  MR. BRADLAUGH(for Mr. LABOUCHERE) (Northampton) asked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Whether in view of the fact that two old men and a youth were killed by shots fired by the Irish Constabulary from their barracks at Mitchelstown; that a Coroner's Inquest found a verdict of murder against certain of the constables who fired from the barracks; that this verdict and the proceedings at the Coroner's Inquest were quashed upon technical grounds in regard to the proceedings; it is intended to direct that a second inquest be held upon the bodies of the three persons who were killed; or to prosecute the constables who killed them; or to hold any sort of public inquiry, at which the evidence of the constables and of those present at these deaths may be forthcoming, in order that a primâ facie decision may be arrived at in respect to the legality of the action of the constables concerned in this matter; and, whether, in the event of such inquiry taking place, it will be entrusted to persons who have not expressed an opinion upon the matter under investigation, and who were neither directly nor indirectly responsible for what occurred?
  THE CHIEF SECRETARY (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR): Having regard to the fact that the Coroner's Jury, while inculpating some members of the Constabulary for firing in the Mitchelstown affray, wholly exonerated the District Inspector, who ordered the firing, and to the fact that the inquisition as regards those members of the Constabulary who were inculpated was quashed by the unanimous decision of the Court of Queen's Bench, not alone
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  for technical errors, but for matters of substance—namely, the misconduct of the Coroner—and to all the circumstances of the case, it is not intended to hold another inquest, or to prosecute the constables, or direct any other inquiries than the Departmental one already held.
  MR. CONYBEARE: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman what was the misconduct of the Coroner?
  [No reply.]

  LAW AND JUSTICE (IRELAND)—THE ALLEGED INSURANCE FRAUDS AT BELFAST.
  MR. TUITEasked Mr. Solicitor General for Ireland, with reference to the insurance frauds at Belfast, Whether he can now state if the Government intend to make any inquiry or to take any proceedings in connection with the forgery of the name of Mr. Finlay M'Cance, J.P., Belfast, as proven by that gentleman during the recent trials at Belfast, and by means of which a policy of assurance was obtained on his life in favour of Mr. James Henderson, proprietor of The Belfast News Letter, notwithstanding that Mr. Henderson had no insurable interest in the life of Mr. M'Cance; and, whether, considering the shocking practices which have been recently carried on in Belfast with respect to assurances by certain persons on the lives of others who were supposed to be in delicate health, and in whose lives the assurers had no insurable interest, the Government will make a searching inquiry into these cases, and take steps to have the offenders brought to justice?
  THE SOLICITOR GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. MADDEN): I must again deprecate being called upon to answer Questions relating to individuals whose names have been mentioned in the course of the proceedings to which the Question relates. In answer to a former Question I have already stated that the Attorney General for Ireland has assumed the conduct of the prosecution on behalf of the Crown; that a searching investigation is being made into the entire matter; and that no effort will be spared to bring all guilty persons to justice.

  LOCAL GOVERNMENT (ENGLAND AND WALES) ELECTORS BILL—RATING OF OCCUPIERS.
  MR. HANDEL COSSHAM(for Mr. LAWSON)(St. Pancras, W.) asked Mr. Attorney General, Whether it will be necessary for each occupier to be separately rated in order to secure the municipal franchise under the Local Government Electors Bill?
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL (Sir RICHARD WEBSTER): In my opinion, as the Bill at present stands, it will not be necessary for each occupier to be separately rated, provided that he is, in fact, the occupier of buildings which are separately rated to the poor.

  THE SWEATING SYSTEM—THE LORDS' COMMITTEE.
  MR. KENRICKasked the First Lord of the Treasury, Whether, having regard to the fact that the "sweating system," now being inquired into by a Committee of the House of Lords, is not confined to London, the Government will consent to the reference to the Committee being extended so as to include the chief Provincial towns in the scope of the inquiry?
  THE FIRST LORD (Mr. W. H. SMITH): The Committee referred to being one of the House of Lords, any steps to be taken for an extension of the powers of the Committee must be taken not here, but in "another place."

  METROPOLITAN POLICE—ALLEGED BLACKMAILING.
  MR. DARLING(for Mr. HOWARD VINCENT)(Sheffield, Central) asked the First Lord of the Treasury, having regard to the serious nature of the public charge made on the 19th ultimo by the hon. Member for Dundee (Mr. Firth)—
  "That the London police levy blackmail on the great distributors of goods in London,"
  Whether the promise to furnish Her Majesty's Government with the grounds of the allegation has been fulfilled; and, in such case, if all possible inquiry has been made into the facts, and with what result?
  THE FIRST LORD (Mr. W. H. SMITH): On the 19th ultimo, when the hon. Member for
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  Dundee (Mr. Firth) made in this House his charge against the police of levying blackmail on the great distributors of goods in London, he was at once challenged by my right hon. Friend the Member for the Tower Hamlets (Mr. Ritchie), by me, and by other Members for the authority on which this grave charge was made. The hon. Member then said that, of course, the charge was not against the police as a body, and went on to say that he would give me the names of his informants. I at once said that if the names were given it must be under such conditions as would enable the Government to test the accuracy of the statement; and the hon. Member, as I understand, and as I think the House understood, accepted my conditions. Some few days having elapsed, I wrote to the hon. Member to remind him of his promise, and on the 25th ultimo he gave me the names of his informants, but said they objected to have their names brought into public notice, "unless the whole police system is subjected to a public inquiry." I replied that it was not for his informants to make such conditions, and asked him to carry out the pledge given in the House. The hon. Member, in answer, said he understood that I objected to a public inquiry, and expressed approval of the conditions imposed by his informants. My reply stated that I had never objected to a public judicial inquiry into any specific charges against the police; that the accusation was a criminal one; and if he would bring it forward, or if his informants would do so, the Public Prosecutor would at once be directed to take such measures as were necessary to bring the incriminated to justice. The hon. Member, in reply, stated that his charge was merely meant as an illustration to his speech; that he always understood a Member of Parliament took the responsibility of his own statements; and that his informants adhered to their decision. The House has now all the facts before it; and I must leave it to hon. Members to judge how far the hon. Member has redeemed his pledge, and how far "illustrations" which contained criminal charges against a large body of public servants, and which are made on grounds apparently not sufficient to stand judicial investigation, are justified.
  MR. FIRTHwas bound to say, with regret, that he took the state-

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  ment of the right hon. Gentleman as amounting to a suggestion that he had not completely fulfilled the undertaking into which he had entered. He trusted he should always be prepared, when he gave an undertaking upon certain allegations, to withdraw both undertaking and allegations unequivocally if he could not, or did not, fulfil them. Throughout he had taken the advice of men whose judgment upon questions of Order in that House they all respected, amongst them being the hon. Member for Bedford (Mr. Whitbread), and they were all of opinion that he had completely fulfilled the letter and spirit of his undertaking. He wished to draw the attention of the House to what had passed between the First Lord and himself. Challenged by the First Lord of the Treasury to produce his authority, he wrote to his informants and then to the right hon. Gentleman, telling him that they were prepared to prove the truth of the allegations, but that they objected to their names being brought into public notice unless the whole police system were subjected to a public inquiry. The First Lord of the Treasury wrote back, saying that his informants had no right to impose the condition which they had laid down, and that he (Mr. Firth) had failed to fulfil his undertaking. He then submitted the case to several Members of the House, who all said that, in their judgment, he had fulfilled, both in the letter and in the spirit, the undertaking which he had given. He wrote again to the right hon. Gentleman, pointing out that as the matter was one of public importance it ought to be inquired into publicly; and that the unsatisfactory nature of the recent police inquiry was hardly such as should encourage a repetition of proceedings of the kind. The right hon. Gentleman subsequently wrote, saying that he had never objected to a public judicial inquiry into specific charges; and that if he was prepared to bring forward any specific charge the Public Prosecutor would at once take steps. That letter he brought to the notice of his informants, and they replied that they were not prepared to modify the conditions on which they would give evidences; that they did not think that a prosecution would succeed; and that their names must not be made public unless a public inquiry were allowed into the whole
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  system. That letter he sent on to the First Lord of the Treasury—
  MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER (interposing)said, the hon. Member was, of course, entitled, as a personal explanation, to give his version of the occurrences referred to by the First Lord of the Treasury; but he must not introduce exraneous matters.
  MR. FIRTH,in conclusion, said, that he pointed out to the right hon. Gentleman that a Member of Parliament might be satisfied as to the truth of statements laid before him without being able to control the decisions of his informants; but that if at a future time the public inquiry which had been asked for were granted, he had no doubt that the evidence of his informants would be forthcoming.
  MR. W. H. SMITH: By what I said just now I did not wish to cast any reflection upon the hon. Member. My original request to him was to furnish me with evidence on which judicial action could be taken, and judicial inquiry made into the criminal charges brought against the police; and I understood the hon. Member, from his place in the House, to promise that I should have that information.
  MR. FIRTHsaid, there was nothing in the right hon. Gentleman's statement as to the judicial inquiry. What he (Mr. Firth) said was that he would give the names under such conditions as to test the accuracy of what he had said.

  THE EARL OF CARNARVON AND MR. PARNELL—PRIVATE CORRESPOND- ENCE.
  MR. ANDERSONasked the First Lord of the Treasury, Will the Government lay upon the Table of the House the written communication, stated by the Earl of Carnarvon in the House of Lords to have been sent by him to the Prime Minister in 1886, on the subject of the interview between the Earl of Carnarvon and the hon. Member for the City of Cork (Mr. Parnell), relating to the future Government of Ireland, together with a copy of the reply of the Marquess of Salisbury, and any further Correspondence on the subject?
  THE FIRST LORD (Mr. W. H. SMITH): The hon. and learned Member will see that the Correspondence to which he refers,

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  if it exists, was obviously of a private and confidential character as between Colleagues in the Government, and it would be entirely contrary to all precedent to produce it.

  WAR OFFICE—MANUFACTURE OF GUNS.
  MR. HOYLEasked, Whether the Secretary of State for War had seen the letter from Lord Brassey, published in The Times of Saturday, in which the writer said that the resources of the Whitworth Company's works were being largely applied to the manufacture of guns of the heaviest calibres for the French Government; and whether there was any foundation for the statement?
  SIR HERBERT MAXWELL (A LORD of the TREASURY)(who replied) said: My right hon. Friend has communicated with the Whitworth Company, and has received a reply, stating that they are not making any guns for the French Government, and have not any intention of doing so.

  NEW MEMBER TAKING HIS SEAT—MR. BRADLAUGH'S MOTION ON FRIDAY.
  MR. BRADLAUGH: I wish to ask the First Lord of the Treasury a Question of which I have given him private Notice. I wish to ask, Whether he is aware that on Thursday last the Attorney General intimated to me that if the words "unless the House otherwise resolve" were inserted in my Amendment on going into Committee of Supply, the Government would accept the Amendment; whether such words were inserted; and, whether, in spite of the insertion, 17 Members of the Government voted against the Amendment, and only four in favour of it?
  THE FIRST LORD (Mr. W. H. SMITH): It is a fact that the Attorney General, with my sanction, did give the hon. Member to understand that, as far as I was concerned, and as far as my Colleagues were concerned, the course which the hon. Member has described would be taken. I am not aware that so many of my Colleagues as 17 voted against the Resolution. As I stated in the House on Friday I was obliged to be absent from the debate, having to attend elsewhere to matters of urgent public
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  importance. It was only after the Division that I was made acquainted with the circumstances that had occurred.

  BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.
  MR. JOHN MORLEY: I wish to ask the First Lord of the Treasury a Question with reference to the course of Public Business. I understood from his answer on Friday that after 10 o'clock to-night the Resolution with reference to Imperial Defences would not be brought forward, and that if that Order were not reached before 10 o'clock there would be a Morning Sitting to-morrow. Now, in that case the very important Motion of my hon. Friend the Member for West Nottingham (Mr. Broadhurst) will be postponed to a 9 o'clock Sitting, which will be the second time within a very few days that an important public Motion will have been so postponed. I wish to ask whether the right hon. Gentleman will not consent at 10 o'clock tonight to proceed with the Imperial Defence Bill, whatever may have been the progress made with the two Irish Bills that precede it upon the Order Paper, and so to obviate a Morning Sitting tomorrow?
  THE FIRST LORD (Mr. W. H. SMITH): I am anxious to consult the convenience of the right hon. Gentleman opposite; but we cannot consent to interrupt the proceedings upon the Parliamentary Under Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland Bill or the Land Law (Ireland) (Land Commission) Bill at 10 o'clock to-night. We shall be bound to endeavour to pass those two Bills through Committee; and if we do not succeed in getting them reported before 10 o'clock we shall have to take the Imperial Defence Bill at a Morning Sitting tomorrow. It is very important that we should adhere to that arrangement.

MOTIONS.
  PARLIAMENT—PRIVILEGE.

    RESOLUTION.
    MR. T. M. HEALYsaid, he wished to bring before the House a question which affected the Records of the House. The Deputy Speaker had read out a letter apprising the House that one of its Members—

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    the hon. Member for East Mayo (Mr. Dillon)—had been sentenced to imprisonment on the following charge—"For having taken part in the Plan of Campaign." He (Mr. T. M. Healy) wished to ask, whether it were possible in case of inaccuracy, or, as he would charge, a deliberate misstatement, or to the legal effect of the conviction, on the hon. Member for East Mayo, it would be in Order to move a Motion on the subject? The practice was to move that such letter be inserted on the Journals of the House; but he proposed to move that as it contained a falsehood such record should be deferred, and that the Clerk of the House should communicate with the Resident Magistrate, and the exact terms of the sentence on Mr. Dillon be communicated to the House. He referred to the informations on which the hon. Member for East Mayo was charged. He was not charged on any summons, but was arrested on April 18 by a District Inspector, and brought before Mr. Kilkelly, R.M., charged with taking part in an illegal assembly and criminal conspiracy to induce certain persons not to pay their rents, and upon that charge only could he have been convicted. The Magistrate invented a charge, which was not a legal charge, with the deliberate object of prejudicing his hon. Friend, and chiefly, it might be, in regard to a recent Papal document. The statement which this Resident Magistrate wrote was as follows:—
    "County Louth, Drogheda,
    "12th May, 1888.
    "SIR,—I have the honour to report that yesterday, the 11th instant, at Mells, in the county of Louth, before a court of petty sessions, under 'The Criminal Law and Procedure (Ireland) Act, 1887, of which I was chairman, found Mr. John Dillon, M.P., guilty of having, on 8th ult. in this county, taken part in the Plan of Campaign."
    Now, there was no such offence known to the law. The law under the Criminal Law and Procedure Act took cognizance of and enabled magistrates to convict the Members of that House and non-Members of taking part in an illegal conspiracy. There was no other offence known to the law, and he therefore submitted that as formerly the practice of the House always was, when these letters were read by the Chairman, for some Member of the Government to move that they be laid on the Table of the House. Where a gross and delibe-
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    rate misstatement was made by a responsible Executive officer as to the charge upon which an hon. Member was convicted, it ought not to appear that the House gave its sanction to its insertion on the Minutes. He wished to know whether he should be in Order in moving—
    "That as it was alleged this letter from the Resident Magistrate conveyed a false impression as to the ground on which the hon. Member for East Mayo was convicted, that the Clerk do communicate with the Resident Magistrate as to the exact terms of the conviction, and that in the meantime the letter be not inserted on the Minutes."
    If he was in Order, he begged to make that Motion.
    MR. T. P. O'CONNORsaid, he wished to call the attention of Mr. Deputy Speaker to the fact that the hon. Member for the Lough-borough Division of Leicestershire (Mr. De Lisle) drew the attention of Mr. Speaker to the fact that the Crimes Act last year was described in a Question to the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary for Ireland (Mr. A. J. Balfour) as a Coercion Act, and the hon. Gentleman asked the ruling of Mr. Speaker as to whether it was right to apply to the Statute the popular instead of the legal title, and Mr. Speaker ruled that that title was out of Order.
    MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, order! As far as I am aware, it is not the practice to make a Motion to lay such a communication on the Table of the House. Many communications are made to the Speaker, such as, for instance, those of Election Judges. They are read from the Chair as a matter of Order, and inserted as read from the Chair. They can be inserted in no other fashion. If the hon. Member desires to make on a subsequent day any Motion in respect of this, he will be in Order to do so; but having been read in discharge of a Ministerial duty from the Chair they appear on the Journals as a matter of course.
    MR. T. M. HEALY: Then I would ask you, Sir, whether in the meantime, a deliberate statement having been made by me as a Member of this House that this letter must be false on the face of it, whether the Clerk will insert it in the Minutes pending the moving of such a Resolution?
    MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER: The letter will appear with the authority of the

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    signature appended to it, with the Votes of the day. I have no doubt the statement of the hon. and learned Member will reach the ears of the public in the usual way.
    MR. PARNELL: Are we to understand, Sir, that when a communication of this kind has been made to the House, and has been read by Mr. Speaker to the House, and the truth of this communication is challenged on the spot by Members having cognizance of the facts connected with the case, that as a necessity this untruthful statement must forthwith be published as if by Order of the House? I do submit that under these circumstances the matter at once becomes a question of Privilege. If the House, through Mr. Speaker, directs the printing of a false document, I submit that the document in question and the fallacy concerned in the document in question at once become a question of Privilege; and I would ask you, Sir, with reference to the opinion you have just expressed, that it will be within the competence of any Member to move a Resolution with reference to such matter, whether the question of Privilege would not be lost sight of in postponing such a Resolution to a subsequent date, and whether it would not be necessary, in order to preserve the character of Privilege, that immediate action should be taken?
    MR. DEPUTY SPEAKERsaid, Privilege must undoubtedly be defended by prompt action, but he did not think it need be defended by instantaneous action.
    SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTsaid, he would put this possible case. Supposing a person reported to Mr. Speaker that a Member of that House had been convicted, and such a Member had never been convicted at all, and it was notorious, and could be proved by persons in the House, that no such conviction had ever take place, would it then be tolerated that under this authority upon the Journals of the House should be entered a statement that a Member of the House had been convicted of felony, whereas he had not been convicted at all? It was impossible to conceive a grosser insult either to the Member or to the House itself. Then there was another case which might be put. Supposing a Member had been convicted of one offence, it might be a
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    minor offence, and a report was made to the House that he had been convicted of a totally different offence of a higher and graver character, was it to be tolerated that upon the Journals of the House there should be entered a false statement, and that the friends of the Member should have no remedy of vindicating his character and position at once and upon the spot; but that the Clerks at the Table should be the instruments of entering on the Journals of the House what, under the hypothesis he had put, might be the grossest libel on a Member?
    MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER: The letter has already been read, and, having been read, it must appear on the Journals of the House. No doubt attention may be called to the matter as a point of Privilege, and a Motion may be made to expunge the record.
    MR. T. M. HEALY: Then I will call attention to the matter as a gross Breach of Privilege. Last Session Parliament passed the so-called Criminal Law Procedure Amendment Bill, which gives to certain Resident Magistrates of Ireland power to try summarily persons charged with certain offences. These offences are defined by Statute, and the power of trying prisoners is a statutory power, and every statutory power must be strictly within the limits of statutory authority. No one can step outside those statutory powers for any purpose whatever, and the Resident Magistrates are only empowered to try prisoners for offences committed under this Act. By Sub-section 3A they are empowered to convict any person who has committed any of the offences mentioned in the sub-section anywhere in Ireland, and the offenders may be prosecuted in a Court of Summary Jurisdiction. The 2nd section defines the offences, one of which is taking part in any criminal conspiracy now punishable by law, and the acts which amount to the criminal conspiracy are defined. No Resident Magistrate in Ireland has the power to convict or to deal with any criminal conspiracy except in the direct words of the Statute. Yet exists this fact—a Resident Magistrate "of whose legal knowledge the Lord Lieutenant has satisfied himself"—namely, Mr. Thomas Hamilton—sends to this House a communication which is not only a Breach of Privilege, but a gross libel in every sense of the term, and he sends it away

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    hot-footed the moment the conviction has taken place. I beg, Mr. Deputy Speaker, to call your attention to the letter which you read to the House in your Ministerial capacity. (See page 139). The sentence of the Court was that the hon. Member for East Mayo (Mr. Dillon) should be imprisoned for six months without hard labour. Now, Mr. Deputy Speaker, I say that that statement in itself is a falsehood. Either the hon. Member for East Mayo was convicted or he was not. If he was convicted, he must have been convicted of an offence within the terms of the section; but this section takes no cognizance of the Plan of Campaign. I myself could not, without having legal evidence before me, and this House could not, determine without legal evidence what the Plan of Campaign is. The Plan of Campaign may be a thing good, bad, or indifferent; but no magistrate is empowered to go outside the Statute. Yet this magistrate, for the purpose of creating a prejudice, debauching public opinion, and misleading this House, has committed a deliberate and wilful falsehood. I submit to you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, that the records of this House ought not to be tainted by having placed upon them a corrupt and wilful falsehood of this kind, although it be invented by a man of whose legal knowledge the Lord Lieutenant is satisfied. I maintain that it was invented for a deliberate purpose, and that the only purpose for which this communication was made was to incite prejudice in this House, and to convey a false impression as to what the hon. Member for East Mayo had been convicted of. This House considers it wise and prudent that it should be made acquainted with any offence of which one of its Members has been convicted, and yet here we have a case in which a solemn judicial sentence has been passed upon a Member of this House of six months' imprisonment with hard labour. [Cries of "No, no!"] Well, six months without hard labour; but the difference is so slight that I do not think my hon. Friend the Member for East Mayo will appreciate it. Immediately after the conviction has been made, this magistrate, of whose knowledge of the law the Lord Lieutenant has satisfied himself, sends off a notification to Mr. Speaker that my hon. Friend has been convicted of taking
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    part in the Plan of Campaign. I would ask the House to observe the effect of that statement. If this House had on its records under a process of certiorari a certificate of the conviction of one of its Members, and my hon. Friend, instead of appealing, had applied for a writ of habeas corpus, if the certiorari was found to be bad, there would be no power residing in any of Her Majesty's Courts to detain my hon. Friend; and if it could be shown that my hon. Friend had been convicted by the Resident Magistrate of an offence not sanctioned by the Statute, but an offence which did not exist, and that appeared in the certificate of conviction, my hon. Friend would be entitled to walk out a free man. No magistrate has a right to obtain cognizance on certiorari of a crime that does not exist, and yet the legal knowledge of this Resident Magistrate is such that he has penned a letter which is not only false, but which shows that he does not understand the Statute. I submit that the sending of this document to the House by Mr. Thomas Hamilton is a Breach of Privilege, that we should compel Mr. Hamilton to appear at the Bar and apologize for this libel on a Member of the House, and also for this insult and flagrant deception which he has endeavoured to practice on the House itself. This man has acted deliberately. I do not know whether he penned the letter in conjunction with any of the Law Officers of the Crown, I do not know whether the letter is one which has been drawn up as part of a common form suggested by the Law Officers of the Crown, but, at any rate, I think that the distinct withdrawal of the letter by Mr. Hamilton is absolutely necessary. Further, I am of opinion that the letter should not only be withdrawn, but apologized for, and that the author of time libel should appear at the Bar in person to make such apology. We may gather what the character of the persons is, of whose legal status the Lord Lieutenant is satisfied, when we find one of them writing a document which is not only false in law, but false in fact in every way in which you may view it. What chance would any unfortunate persons have who might be brought before such a Resident Magistrate who has such slight attachment to the forms of law. When, Sir, I heard you read the letter of Mr. Hamilton, I could not help

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    being startled at such a declaration from the hands of a gentleman who has been entrusted with the power of life and death, for a sentence of six months' imprisonment for a man in the position of my hon. Friend the Member for Mayo may very well involve death. As soon as I heard the letter read I proceeded to the Table and obtained a copy of the letter, and I found that it born out, in every respect, the reading of the Chair. That being so, I considered that it was necessary for some hon. Member to take action in the matter in view of requiring in future that the legal form of Procedure under the Crimes Act should be carried out with common decency. I beg to move—
    "That it is a Breach of the Privilege of this House to communicate to Mr. Speaker a letter containing an inaccurate and untruthful statement concerning the arrest and conviction of a Member of this House."
    MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER: I must point out to the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for North Longford that the Motion he has submitted is purely an abstract Resolution, and in order to raise the question of a Breach of Privilege, there ought to be attached to the Resolution some reference to a specific Breach of Privilege.
    SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT: May I ask if it has not been the practice in most cases of Breach of Privilege to have, in the first case, a general allegation of Breach of Privilege, and then to allow it to be followed up by a specific Motion afterwards.
    MR. T. M. HEALY: I will move the Resolution in the following form:—
    "That the letter of Mr. Thomas Hamilton, Resident Magistrate, dated the 12th May, addressed to Mr. Speaker, is a Breach of the Privilege of this House, as containing an untruthful statement in regard to the arrest and conviction of a Member of this House."
    MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER: Will the hon. and learned Member bring up the corrected Resolution?
    MR. T. M. HEALY: Certainly.
    Motion made, and Question proposed,
    "That the letter of Mr. Thomas Hamilton, Resident Magistrate, dated the 12th May, addressed to Mr. Speaker, is a Breach of the Privilege of this House, as containing an untruthful statement regarding the arrest and conviction of a Member of this House."—(Mr. T. M. Healy.)
    MR. W. E. GLADSTONE: Perhaps it would be for the convenience of the House if the letter of Mr. Hamilton were read again by the Clerk at the Table, as many hon. Members have not heard it read.
    Letter again read. (See page 139.)
    THE SOLICITOR GENERAL FOR IRELAND (Mr. MADDEN): The hon. and learned Member for North Longford (Mr. T. M. Healy) has taken occasion from the reading of this letter to make accusations against the magistrate who presided at the trial of the case against the hon. Member for East Mayo (Mr. Dillon) of the most serious, and, I may say, of the most unfounded character—accusations which ought not to have been made, and insinuations of motives which I submit ought not to be made in this House upon such grounds as the hon. and learned Member has alleged. The hon. and learned Member has complained that the magistrate, to use his own expression, went on "hot foot" from the trial to write this letter. Now, surely it was the bounden duty of the magistrate, when he had convicted, to lose no time in apprising Mr. Speaker of the fact, and if all the grounds which the hon. and learned Member had for the suggestions he has made are as unfounded as that, I submit to the judgment of the House whether they ought to be made against a magistrate who writes a letter in the simple discharge of his duty. Now, Sir, what is the nature and character of a letter of this kind? It is a notification given to Mr. Speaker of a certain alleged state of facts. If it be the case of the hon. and learned Member that in this instance the hon. Member for East Mayo was convicted of what was not an offence, and for which the Court had no power to convict and sentence him, I need hardly say that the legality of the sentence would depend not on the notice given to the House, but on the record and certificate of conviction. If the certificate of conviction is for a something which is not an offence, and if the hon. Member for East Mayo has been convicted for taking part in a criminal conspiracy, that would appear on the certificate of conviction and will speak for itself. If he has not been so convicted, the hon.

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    Member will have the benefit of it in any proceedings which he may institute. It has, however, been suggested, and I earnestly protest against the suggestion, that because it does not appear from the letter that the hon. Member has been convicted of criminal conspiracy, but of taking part in the Plan of Campaign, that, therefore, the writer was influenced by motives of the basest kind. Whether the letter to Mr. Speaker should be expressed with all the accuracy of the certificate of conviction or not, can any human being doubt what was the meaning and purport of the communication? Is it not the fact that the Court took judicial notice that the Plan of Campaign has been pronounced by the Lord Chief Baron in a recent case to be a criminal conspiracy? The Plan of Campaign is perfectly well understood, and every Court must take judicial notice that it has been pronounced a criminal conspiracy. Can anybody say that the Resident Magistrate, in describing the offence as the Plan of Campaign, when he knew that the Judges of the land had pronounced the Plan of Campaign to be a criminal conspiracy, has been guilty of wilful and deliberate falsehood, because he has not followed the exact language of the certificate of conviction? Whether the magistrate ought to have followed the terms of conviction or not, I will leave to be discussed by hon. Members more experienced in the Forms of this House. But if no offence has been committed, no letter to Mr. Speaker from the magistrate convicting can make it so, and the suggestion which has been made by the hon. and learned Member for North Longford is, I think, not one which will commend itself to the judgment of any fair-minded man on either side of the House.
    SIR CHARLES RUSSELL: The hon. and learned Gentleman the Solicitor General for Ireland (Mr. Madden) has not, I think, touched the real point of this matter. As I understand the hon. and learned Member (Mr. T. M. Healy) who brought forward the Motion which the House is now considering, his contention is that by the law of Parliament any magistrate or judicial functionary who proceeds by sentence against any Member of this House is bound by the Rules of Parliament to communicate the cause of his action to the House. I need hardly
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    point out that that can only mean the true cause of the conviction. The hon. and learned Solicitor General for Ireland tells us that it is a mere matter of extreme technicality to follow the precise words of the Act of Parliament. Now, Mr. Deputy Speaker, I humbly submit that it is a great deal more than that. It is perfectly true that certain Judges in Ireland have expressed opinions with reference to what is called the Plan of Campaign. But they have been for a great part obiter dicta, and not decisions of the Judges at all. Does the hon. and learned Member opposite mean to say that the House is to accept these obiter dicta pronounced by certain learned Judges in Ireland as applying beyond the particular case in which they were uttered, or to take anything which any removable magistrate chooses to call the Plan of Campaign as necessarily covering a legal offence? I dispute that altogether, and I must say that hon. Members on the other side of the House must not be surprised if we on this side take every legitimate opportunity which may present itself of bringing before the House and the public the action of these magistrates, and the mode in which the law is being administered. The right hon. and learned Gentleman opposite well knows that I never concealed my view of this Act—namely, that it is noxious in its inception, and injurious every day in its operation. So far from serving the purpose for which it was stated to have been introduced—namely, the putting down of real crime as we understand it, it is not being so directed. This is our justification for the Motion—namely, that the Act is being insidiously directed against matters with which it was never intended to deal.
    THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA (Sir JOHN GORST)said, he was not astonished that the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for South Hackney (Sir Charles Russell) should take every possible opportunity of attacking the Act which was passed by Parliament last Session, and the way in which it was being administered by the Irish magistrates. What, however, the House had a right to expect was that the attacks of the hon. and learned Gentleman should be moderately reasonable. The question now before the House was that of a Breach of Privilege; and what was the

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    allegation? It was that one of the magistrates of Ireland, in the fulfilment of his duty, had written to inform the Speaker of that House what he had done, and it was maintained that in doing so he was not to use popular language which would be intelligible to Mr. Speaker, and intelligible to every Member of the House, but that he was to use some technical terms which were to satisfy the hon. and learned Member for North Longford (Mr. T. M. Healy), and, as had been said, to stand the test of a special demurrer. That was the only question the House had to settle. There was no pretence for saying that the certificate of conviction when it came to be examined would not accurately describe the offence.
    MR. T. M. HEALY: How do we know that?
    SIR JOHN GORST: The magistrate has written to Mr. Speaker to say that he has convicted the hon. Member for East Mayo (Mr. Dillon) under this Act, that he has convicted him for an offence which he describes in popular language as taking part in the Plan of Campaign; and the only question before the House is whether that letter is to be declared by the House to be a Breach of Privilege? Having now said what the real question before the House is, I do not think the matter is further debateable.
    MR. PARNELL: I would like to ask the hon. Gentleman the Under Secretary of State for India (Sir John Gorst) if he could inform the House what is the object of communicating this information to the House at all? Does it not indicate that the House desires to know the offence of which the person tried has been convicted, and not some other offence of an imaginary character coined for the political exigencies of the moment, which the magistrate or Judge may assign as having been the offence, but which really has not been the offence at all? Now, Sir, I will assume that the hon. and learned Solicitor General for Ireland (Mr. Madden) has made a mistake in supposing that this is not a communication to the House, but a communication to the Speaker only, for it is a communication to Mr. Speaker as a servant and agent of the House, and is for the information and judgment of the House as the highest Court of the Realm. Undoubtedly the House desires to know, if a Member of the House has
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    been convicted, why he has been convicted; and I submit that a mistake and error of this kind, which would not have been committed by one of the humblest Petty Sessions clerks in Ireland, should not be passed over in silence when committed by a magistrate, who has the responsibility of meting out cumulative sentences of hard labour for political offences. [Cries of "No, no!"] Hon. Members say "No!" I contend that this magistrate has shown his entire ignorance of all law by writing to the House, and informing us that the hon. Member for East Mayo has been convicted for the offence of taking part in the Plan of Campaign. He is a magistrate who is entitled to inflict cumulative sentences of imprisonment with hard labour for any number of years that he may choose to inflict them. His power is an unlimited power, and, as was very fitly stated by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for North Longford (Mr. T. M. Healy), it is absolutely a power of life and death, because we have it on the authority of one of the Irish Judges that a sentence of two years' imprisonment with hard labour is the severest sentence which can be inflicted by the Criminal Law in Ireland. Now, Sir, here is this Irish Magistrate who has sent to this House an incorrect and inaccurate statement; and who is he? He is a Mr. Hamilton, of whose knowledge of law the Lord Lieutenant—who knows, by the way, a great deal about law—is satisfied, because he has chosen him as one of those magistrates who had a sufficient knowledge of the law to administer the Act. This magistrate is not a barrister; he has never passed a legal examination in his life; and yet in a case of this extreme delicacy, involving the liberty, and perhaps the life, of one of the most important of his political opponents, the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant is not ashamed to entrust such issues as this to such a man in order to show his utter flippancy and disregard, not only of the decency of the law in Ireland, but of the lives of his political opponents, by entrusting the consideration and decision of such questions as these to a man who has been obliged to admit that he has had no legal education, and never passed even an examination in law. These are the kind of men whom the Go-

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    vernment put over us in Ireland to carry out the notions of the Front Bench as to the administration of law and justice. How can you expect that the Irish people, even if this House chooses to swallow such a letter as this, written as it is in such colloquial phrases—how can you expect the Irish people, after such evidence as this of the utter incapacity of these persons to fulfil judicial functions, to have any regard for your law or your administration?
    MR. LOCKWOOD: I should not have joined in this debate had it not been for the way in which the hon. Gentleman the Under Secretary of State for India (Sir John Gorst) has chosen to deal with the remarks of my hon. and learned Friend the Member for South Hackney (Sir Charles Russell) and the late Attorney General. The hon. Gentleman, whose more recent experience in connection with India may possibly have led him to forget some of the extensive experience he had at the English Bar, addressed this as a matter of no importance. Now, I venture to think that it is a matter of much importance both inside the House and out of it. It is a matter of importance inside of this House that we should see that the Privileges of the House are complied with by those who have duties to discharge, and if it is part of the duty of a judicial officer to return to this House an account of the conviction of a Member of this House, surely it is the duty of the House itself to see that the record of conviction is accurately returned. Now, Sir, on the face of this letter, we know that we have no such accurate record of the conviction of the hon. Member for East Mayo (Mr. Dillon), because we know perfectly well that it returns a conviction for that which is not known as any offence under our statutory law. Then surely the House is entitled to take notice of the matter, and I think the House would best consult its own dignity by communicating to the person who has made this statement to the House, and requiring him to give accurate information to the House of the conviction which has taken place before him. It is almost too much—although the hon. and learned Member for North Longford (Mr. T. M. Healy) has drawn a picture which made one's mouth water—to expect to see a Resident Magis-
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    trate standing at the Bar undergoing the process of apology. I am afraid that that is too much to look forward to, but I think we are entitled to have from the Resident Magistrate an accurate account of the conviction which has taken place. So much for the view which I think this House is entitled to take, so far as it is itself concerned. But what will be said outside the House when persons read the letter which contains the record of a conviction for an offence which is not an offence at all as known to our statutory law? They will say this—that the Resident Magistrate in writing, aye, with hot foot, such a letter, showed by the terms he used that he had got the Plan of Campaign on his brain. It was the Plan of Campaign he was thinking about, and it is not what I may say of this judicial officer, but it is what people will say outside the House. In order to protect responsible judicial officers from having reflections of a serious character made upon them outside the House, I think this Resident Magistrate should be required to make an accurate return of the conviction which took place before him.
    MR. DARLING: Sir, the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for York (Mr. Lockwood) is concerned to know what will be the opinion of people outside the House with regard to this question. I am quite sure that the first thing they will say will be that those inside the House have their feelings remarkably well under control, and that they have been able to get into a terrible passion about a very little matter. [Cries of "Oh, oh!"] I take the interruption of hon. Gentlemen opposite as a distinct compliment. The hon. Member for Cork (Mr. Parnell) has simply described as incorrect and inaccurate a statement which the hon. and learned Member for North Longford (Mr. T. M. Healy) has described as a corrupt and wilful falsehood, intended to convey a false idea. I think that is a tolerably warm description of what the hon. Member for Cork has described as incorrect and inaccurate. But what is there incorrect or inaccurate in the statement of the magistrate I venture to say that to his statement neither the term inaccurate or incorrect is applicable. That an hon. Member of this House has been convicted of taking part

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    in a criminal conspiracy there is no doubt. If any one doubts that statement, he must first of all pretend that he does not know what the Plan of Campaign is. It is not denied that the Plan of Campaign has been pronounced by the highest Courts in Ireland to be a criminal conspiracy. The hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for South. Hackney (Sir Charles Russell) said that that was an obiter dictum. Happily for the right hon. and learned Gentleman, his remarks are obiter dicta, and he has made many remarks on this subject that are of that character. The question in the case which was to be decided was whether the Plan of Campaign was a criminal conspiracy or not, and it was decided that it was so. We must therefore shut our eyes very hard if we pretend not to see that the hon. Member for East Mayo (Mr. Dillon) has been convicted of taking part in the Plan of Campaign. We must pretend very much that we do not learn that the hon. Gentleman has been convicted of taking part in a criminal conspiracy from the letter sent by the magistrate to Mr. Speaker. But I do not know that the magistrates are told anywhere to make their reports in the technical language of an indictment. The material part is to know that the hon. Member has been convicted. [Interruption.] If hon. Members have not yet appreciated the point, I will state it again. The material point is to know that the hon. Member for East Mayo has been convicted of an offence against the law, for which he has been sentenced to undergo treatment which will seclude him for a time from this House. No doubt, it is convenient that the House should know whether the offence committed is that of burglary, conspiracy, or larceny, or anything else; but there is no need of such accuracy in the communication of the magistrate to this House, and the hon. and learned Member for North Longford himself well knows that no certiorari lies to this House. [Cries of "Oh, oh!"] I am glad that my remark has called forth that manifestation. The material point is that a Member of the House is absent, and how long he is likely to be absent. But so far as the language of the hon. and learned Member for North Longford is concerned—namely, that this is a corrupt and wilful falsehood, I say that oven the language
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    of the hon. Member for Cork, which is by comparison a temperate statement, does not represent the case correctly. We are told that the hon. Member has been found guilty of taking part in the Plan of Campaign, and we all know, and have known before, that the Plan of Campaign was the hon. Member's own invention. Everyone knows the law, or is presumed to know it, and if the hon. Member did not know it he has not done his duty by himself as a subject. We are told that the Plan of Campaign is a criminal conspiracy, that he has taken part in it, and therefore that he has taken part in a criminal conspiracy. But we are told something more—namely, what that criminal conspiracy is, and because the magistrate has told us this, we are asked to bring the magistrate to the Bar of the House to apologize for what has been called a libel on a Member of the House. But does not the House know that the hon. Member for East Mayo started the Plan of Campaign; do we not know that he gloried in devoting himself to taking part in it; and is the House to be told that a magistrate has written a libel upon him when he says that he has done what he has been constantly boasting of doing? That, I say, is asking the House to take up a ridiculous position. It is quite true that the magistrate has not written the letter in the words of a legal indictment; but I submit that he has told the House in decent, becoming, and perfectly comprehensible language all that the House need to know, and it is, therefore, an abuse of language to call the letter a libel, or corrupt, or even inaccurate.
    SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT: Sir, I thought that the comments which the hon. Gentleman the Under Secretary of State for India (Sir John Gorst) made upon this letter were the most unfortunate comments that it was possible to make; but when the hon. and learned Member for Deptford (Mr. Darling) got up I found out my mistake. I do not think I ever heard a counsel make a case much worse than the hon. and learned Member has done in the case which he was defending. This matter is a very plain one. When a Member of this House is arrested or convicted, notice has to be given of such arrest or conviction. A Member of this House is not to be kept away from it without the House knowing

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    he cause why he is kept away. For that purpose the cause, and the true cause, must be stated in order that the House may know whether there is any justification of the conduct of the tribunal or authority who detains an hon. Member. This was according to the ancient law of Parliament, and in former days the judgment of a Court for Contempt, by which a Member was imprisoned, was not recognized by the House of Commons as a valid ground for his detention, and it was disputed and resisted. I do not mean to say that this law in recent times has not been altered. I put it forward as an illustration. Supposing that the old law was in operation in these days, when a Member was detained, and it was not stated that it was for Contempt, the House would be ousted of its right to know the cause of the detention of the Member. Therefore, it is necessary that the true cause of detention should be stated in order that the House may judge whether or not it should take cognizance of what has been done; and, therefore, to send to Mr. Speaker a letter which does not state any legal cause or cause known to the law on which the House can proceed is, on the face of it, an insult to the House. It is as much as to say—"I have detained the Member, and I will not give you any legal cause whatever for his detention." The hon. Gentleman the Under Secretary of State for India says—"Oh, it was done out of consideration for your understanding, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and for fear that if the cause had been stated in the statutory language of the Act of Parliament, you might not have understood it; it was couched in popular language in order to meet the feebleness of your apprehension." This is the only defence we have heard offered by the Government for this act. The hon. Gentleman the Under Secretary of State for India said that the letter should be couched in popular language. I think that advice a little dangerous to those unlearned gentlemen who are called Resident Magistrates; and I feel that a more extraordinary comment on the learning of those gentlemen could not have been given. But I will suggest another form of popular language, which will be perfectly familiar to the House, and perfectly satisfactory, no doubt, to the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary for Ireland (Mr. A.
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    J. Balfour). Suppose a Resident Magistrate were to write a letter and say—"Mr. Speaker, I have got hold of a Nationalist Member, and I have sent him to prison." That is a very popular way of expressing exactly what is going on in this case. It would be perfectly intelligible even to your intellect, Mr. Deputy Speaker; you would then know exactly what had happened, and the House and the country would also know; while the Resident Magistrate would be spared the trouble of exhibiting his ignorance of the law. In order to save the trouble of writing such a letter, I suggest that there should be a common form lithographed, and that a parcel containing them should be supplied to Resident Magistrates—a dozen or so might be served out, and they might be in this form:—"We have got hold of a number of Nationalist Members; we do not exactly know what we are to try them for, but we have sent them to prison, and I beg to inform you of the fact." Now, that is exactly what has been done in this case, and that is what the hon. Gentleman the Under Secretary of State for India calls popular language. Hon. Gentlemen on these Benches raise their protest against, what I will call, the unbecoming levity of the hon. Gentleman in adopting this form of defence of the present transaction, which, however, is the only defence that has been offered. There has not been the smallest attempt to offer any serious explanation to the House. I do not impute anything to the Resident Magistrate, except crass ignorance. The Resident Magistrate did not know what it was that Mr. Dillon was sent to prison for; and, therefore, we cannot impute to him any bad motive—[Cries of "Order!"]. He is described here as Mr. Dillon.
    MR. DEPUTY SPEAKER: It is usual in this House to refer to an "hon. Member."
    SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT: All I complain of is that the magistrate, in informing the House that he had committed the hon. Member for East Mayo (Mr. Dillon) to prison, has not adopted the ordinary form of satisfying the House of Commons that he had sent him to prison for some offence known to the law. It was all very well for the hon. and learned Member for Deptford to say that we knew all about the Plan of Campaign; but it is necessary that the magistrate

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    should state that the hon. Member had committed some offence of a statutory character. But he has not done that, and therefore, not merely with reference to this case alone, but with reference to future cases in which Members of this House may be detained, I think that we ought to take some proceedings to assert that a legal offence should be stated as the cause of imprisonment of a Member of this House.
    SIR HENRY JAMESsaid, he was desirous of narrowing the discussion to the only question which ought to be brought to the attention of the House—namely, whether a Breach of Privilege had been committed or not. He did not quite share the views enunciated by his hon. and learned Friend the Member for Deptford (Mr. Darling), and he quite agreed with his right hon. Friend the Member for Derby (Sir William Harcourt) that if the House had had such a flippant communication as he had sketched, stating that a Member had been caught and sent to prison, the writer of such a communication would deserve the greatest possible censure of the House. He (Sir Henry James) would ask the House to take into consideration what it had before it, not from outside sources, but from the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for North Longford (Mr. T. M. Healy). The House would agree that if they had had from this Resident Magistrate the most technical statement of the offence that he learnt from the hon. and learned Member for North Longford had been committed, he should have sent to the House a communication that "Mr. Dillon had been convicted of taking part in a certain criminal conspiracy—to wit, the Plan of Campaign."
    MR. T. M. HEALY: No, no! According to the report in The Times, informations were sworn by District Inspector M'Donnell, before Mr. Kilkelly, R.M., charging Mr. Dillon with taking part in an unlawful assembly at Tallyallen—that was afterwards departed from—and in a criminal conspiracy to induce certain tenants to refuse to pay their rents.
    SIR HENRY JAMESsaid, they were asked to find that a Breach of Privilege had been committed on the statement of a newspaper that there had been a conviction for a particular offence. If the
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    letter of the magistrate had stated that Mr. Dillon had been convicted of taking part in "a certain criminal conspiracy—to wit, the Plan of Campaign," there would have been no Breach of Privilege. All that the magistrate had done was to omit the words "a certain criminal conspiracy—to wit." No doubt, looked at from the narrow view of a lawyer, the letter was couched in slipshod language; but persons who were not lawyers would simply say that the result had been stated briefly without reciting the legal means by which it had been arrived at. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Derby did not impute any motive to the magistrate, and only charged him with ignorance; but was an error committed in ignorance to be treated as a Breach of Privilege? He was afraid that he and others had often committed Breaches of Privilege in ignorance. Taking the admission that this gentleman had not intended any insult to the House, and that he had to satisfy the Lord Chancellor of his legal knowledge—[Mr. T. M. HEALY: No; the Lord Lieutenant]—it was scarcely worth the while of the House to consider what penalty should be imposed upon him for a Breach of Privilege committed in ignorance.
    MR. W. E. GLADSTONE: The right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Bury (Sir Henry James) has come to the assistance of the defence of the hon. Gentleman the Under Secretary of State for India (Sir John Gorst) in this matter with his usual gallantry. He has stepped into the breach on behalf of the Government, and endeavoured to induce us to dispose of this matter on the ground that there was no intention or apprehension of giving offence to this House. I do not know whether my right hon. Friend is right in so pronouncing upon this matter; but I believe that I am quite right when I say that in debates on this question, whether it is a Breach of Privilege or not, we have nothing whatever to do with the intention of the person who has committed it. The intention of the person is a matter for after action. The custom of this House is first to decide whether a Breach of Privilege has been committed or not, and subsequently it is the duty of the House to consider whether it has been innocently committed or not—whether it

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    has been an innocent or a guilty Breach of Privilege, and on this head the House takes what course it may in its wisdom deem right. In considering the conduct of Mr. Hamilton, we have to look at the facts by themselves. I do not want to go into the motives that my right hon. Friend the Member for Derby (Sir William Harcourt) and others think they see in what has taken place. I want to restrain thorn from looking at any motive, or of presumed innocence, there may be associated with the whole matter at this stage. What are the facts with which we have to deal? It appears to be supposed by the hon. and learned Member for Deptford (Mr. Darling) that there is nothing to be done in a case of this kind except to certify a certain fact to the House, that the House is minus one of its own Members, and that when they are put in possession of that information as functi officio in the matter, they had nothing to do but to receive it and to record it, and to have nothing whatever to say upon the proceedings that have taken place. I think, Sir, that this is one of the gravest matters in which we can possibly be engaged. I think I see a smile on the face of some of the right hon. Gentlemen on the Treasury Bench, but I do not think that I have said anything in my utterance which should have provoked that smile. Sir, there is no question that can come before this House more important than the personal liberty of the Members. If this House is bound to respect the tribunals of this country, then the tribunals of this country are bound to respect this House. When we have had to deal with the Judges of the land in matters of this kind, not one of those Judges failed in the proper discharge of their duty; but we are here dealing with a case where the Judges of a Court have infringed the Privileges of this House, and I want to know, after the smiles I have observed on the Front Government Bench, if the Government does not consider the question raised of the highest Constitutional importance that this House should be made aware of what has happened to one of its Members according to legitimate authority, and whether the powers vested in the magistrates by the law have been properly exercised, and how can the House know that unless the Judge states a legal offence? This, I say, is a matter
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    of the highest Constitutional importance. I do not say that the House ought now to enter into the merits as to whether the magistrates were actuated by right motives or not; but what we have a right to know is, whether the magistrate has acted within the limits of the law. My right hon. and learned Friend (Sir Henry James), with his boundless ingenuity, has, hypothetically, patched up a form of expression which the magistrate might have used, but which, as he says, the magistrate has not used.
    SIR HENRY JAMES: What I said was that the magistrate ought to have used certain words which I stated. What I did say was, that if he had used certain language which I repeated, he would have accurately described what took place before his tribunal.
    MR. W. E. GLADSTONE: I confess that when I heard that from my right hon. and learned Friend I did not then estimate the high importance of it; but I think the way in which the magistrate has communicated with this House is one of the most extraordinary, strange, and unnatural that it has ever before experienced. But my right hon. and learned Friend says that the magistrate has omitted only four or five words, and the right hon. and learned Gentleman asks whether we were going to and that there was a Breach of Privilege because of the omission of those words; but it so happens that those are the only words that are in the slightest degree material. It is the duty of the House to know that the magistrate has been acting within the law; but the magistrate left out the words that would afford the information, and the right hon. and learned Gentleman said—"I will supply them." What the House desires to know is why the hon. Member has been prevented from attending in his place in this House. If it is necessary that the intimation should be made to the House, we ought to know that the ground of the conviction is a legal offence; but no statutory knowledge, no judicial knowledge of the legal offence on which the hon. Member for East Mayo has been detained, is conveyed by the magistrate's letter. It is the duty of the House to maintain with strictness the regularity of these proceedings; and unless it does so it will be better that these letters should be discontinued altogether, for they will become a mockery if they are to convey

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    to the House, in what is called popular language, only what the newspapers have already conveyed. We want to be assured of the legality and the regularity of the proceeding. This is the purpose of the letter. If the letter does not convey such an assurance, the writer of the letter, however innocent, seriously failed in his duty to the House, and it is the duty of the House to take note of the Breach of Privilege; and if inquiry into the circumstances justifies the conclusion of innocence, which has been prematurely assumed, the honour of the House will have been vindicated. I so regard it.
    THE CHIEF SECRETARY FOR IRELAND (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR): The hon. and learned Member for York (Mr. Lockwood) in his desire to place this question clearly before the House, asked what would be said by those outside the House when they read this debate. I think, Sir, that those outside will say that a great many and very learned and distinguished Gentlemen have been occupied in discussing a very trivial and frivolous question; that the storm which has been raging has been a storm in a tea-cup, and that it is really difficult to believe that the avowed motive of the debate to which we had been listening is the real one. It will also, perhaps, be said that the House by this debate has shown no very great anxiety to approach the Business which appears next on the Paper. They will probably say, when they read the speech of the hon. and learned Member for North Longford (Mr. T. M. Healy) and the hon. Member for Cork (Mr. Parnell), and, of course, the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Derby (Sir William Harcourt), that the hon. Members opposite could not lose an opportunity—however ill-chosen that opportunity might be—for the purpose of attacking a Resident Magistrate. The hon. and learned Member for North Longford has taken the opportunity which this debate allowed him to use language not only of extreme violence but absolutely and totally without foundation with regard to this magistrate (Mr. Hamilton). He has attacked his morals and attacked his learning. There is not the slightest ground, as far as I know, for believing that this gentleman acted otherwise than in the most perfect good faith. As to his learning
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    and his qualifications, and as to the Lord Lieutenant testifying to them, I do not say much, but what I say will be sufficient—namely, that if any Lord Lieutenant is to be attacked on the question at all, that Lord Lieutenant is Lord Spencer. For not only was the appointment of Mr. Hamilton one of Lord Spencer's appointments, but it was Lord Spencer who declared that he had adequate legal knowledge. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Derby gave us his view of the object with which these letters are written to the House, They are written to the House in order that the House may become cognizant of the reason why it is deprived of the service of one of its own Members. That is the reason, and I apprehend that every letter couched in respectful language giving the House that knowledge is a proper letter. It may not satisfy the appetite for technicalities which consumes the legal mind, but it may well satisfy the lay mind; and I would ask, have those who have made a most violent attack on the magistrate concerned maintained for a moment that he has misled the House with regard to the detention of the hon. Member for East Mayo (Mr. Dillon)? Can anybody, even under the influence of the violent passions which the very name of Resident Magistrate excites in the breasts of hon. Members below the Gangway, maintain for a moment that any deception has been practised on the House of Commons by this gentleman? I humbly admit that I approach this question as a layman, and without that refinement of technicality which the right hon. Gentleman opposite regards as of so much importance. Surely when you say that a man is convicted of taking part in the Plan of Campaign, if it be admitted that the Plan of Campaign is an illegal conspiracy, do you not assert by implication that he has been proved to be guilty of an illegal proceeding? If it be true that the Plan of Campaign is an illegal conspiracy, for the magistrate to state that the hon. Member has been convicted of taking part in the Plan of Campaign is to say that he has convicted him of illegal conspiracy. The Plan of Campaign has been distinctly stated by more than one Judge of the High Court to be illegal without qualification or drawback, and what has been stated by a Judge of the High Court in

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    Ireland may surely be stated by a Resident Magistrate and accepted by this House. This debate is a happy illustration of the kind of language which hon. Gentlemen opposite are prepared to use with the very smallest provocation when they think any political capital can be made out of it. The hon. and learned Member for North Longford thinks he has a good opportunity of attacking a Resident Magistrate and myself because a political opponent has been sentenced to imprisonment. [Cries of "Hear, hear!"] Exactly; in those cheers lies the explanation of the debate. It is not the dignity of this House, it is not the Privilege of this House which hon. Gentlemen have at heart. They are animated, not by love of this House, but by a hatred of the tribunals in Ireland. That is the motive and that is the mainspring of the whole debate; and I think it is really wasting the time of the House to pretend for one instant that any great question involving the dignity or Privilege of this Assembly is concerned in the fact that one Resident Magistrate has, in perfectly clear language, but not in language technical enough to suitlawyers, explained to Mr. Speaker that the hon. Member for East Mayo has been sentenced to imprisonment.
    MR. JOHN MORLEYsaid, that the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. A. J. Balfour) had, as usual, infused into the debate a spirit of bitterness. [Ministerial cries of "Oh!"] Yes; he had deliberately imputed the lowest motives to his opponents that he could possibly find; he had said that the public would see that hon. Members below the Gangway and right hon. Gentlemen on the Front Opposition Bench had been actuated solely by a desire to make a little political capital, and were determined to lose no opportunity of discrediting Resident Magistrates. He (Mr. John Morley) maintained that they ought to lose no opportunity of bringing before the scrutiny of the House every act committed by every Resident Magistrate done in pursuance of the Coercion Act of last year. If he could be amazed at anything after the circumstances of the passing of that Act, he was amazed that hon. Members opposite should think that anything relating to the arrest of a Member of that House could be a light and frivolous matter, and could only be
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    made the subject of debate by hon. Members from frivolous, vexatious, and partizan motives. The right hon. Gentleman had attempted to make the point which he was always attempting to make, in referring them to something that had been done by Lord Spencer. The right hon. Gentleman had said that it was Lord Spencer who appointed Mr. Hamilton. He (Mr. John Morley) was prepared to believe that that was perrectly true; but it was not the point. Lord Spencer might have appointed Mr. Hamilton; but his selection was for duties very different to his present course of action, for his action now was action taken by virtue of what the present Lord Lieutenant had done pursuant to a clause in the Coercion Act of last year. The question was not the original appointment of Mr. Hamilton, but the selection of that gentleman by the Lord Lieutenant as a person of whose legal knowledge and competency to administer the Crimes Act he was satisfied.
    MR. A. J. BALFOURsaid, that his point was that Lord Spencer had certified to Mr. Hamilton's legal knowledge.
    MR. JOHN MORLEYsaid, he must be allowed to question whether Lord Spencer had certified to the legal competency of Mr. Hamilton in respect of a legal subject so delicate and intricate as conspiracy. Conspiracy was not an offence under the Act of 1882, and, therefore, the allusion of the right hon. Gentleman to Lord Spencer had no bearing whatever upon Mr. Hamilton's present position. [Cries of "Oh, oh!"] Well, the truth was, that the right hon. Gentleman and hon. Gentlemen behind him, who were so ready to make light of these arrests of Members, were only showing the same arbitrary and reckless disregard of the spirit of legality which they showed at every stage of the discussion of the Act of last year. If the case were that of an English Member the Party opposite would be as earnest as any of those on his (Mr. John Morley's) side of the House in taking care that every formality and technicality was scrupulously followed. But their views regarding hon. Members from Ireland were well known. Anything was good enough for an Irish Member. It was against that view that he and his hon. Friends protested, and they would lose no opportunity, how-

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    ever light and frivolous hon. Members opposite might regard it, of insisting that every formality should be strictly and scrupulously respected. It was clear that in the present instance, the formalities had not been observed. It was not even contended by the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Bury (Sir Henry James) that the magistrate had used the proper language. He had not done what he ought to have done, and had therefore been guilty of a breach of the Privileges of this House. The circumstances were so serious—[Laughter]—the circumstances of the arrest of any of their Colleagues were so serious, that they ought to let no opportunity ever pass without insisting that the letter of the law and the usual practice should be rigidly and strictly observed.
    SIR HENRY JAMES: I desire to make one correction of my statement. I spoke from memory when I said that the legal knowledge of the Resident Magistrate was certified by the Lord Chancellor. I find on reference to the Act, subsequent to that which I referred to, that this rested with the Lord Lieutenant. The hon. and learned Member for North Longford was, therefore, correct in saying that it was not as I stated.
    MR. T. P. O'CONNOR: The slight explanation we have just heard from the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Bury (Sir Henry James) is an instructive commentary on his appearance in this debate. The right hon. Gentleman got up with the air which he always assumes in speaking on affairs of Ireland; he contradicted the hon. and learned Member for North Longford (Mr. T. M. Healy), and his ignorance is exposed. The House, however, will not expect that the exposure of the right hon. Gentleman's ignorance will lead to any diminution of that self-confidence with which he always speaks on Irish affairs. The right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary for Ireland, if he has not succeeded in getting a portion of that programme carried out—which, in a moment of singular and unexpected frankness, he expressed with regard to Mr. Blunt,—has at least succeeded in getting the hon. Member for East Mayo (Mr. Dillon) sent to jail, and, therefore, he has an opportunity in carrying out that Christian, gentle,
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    and courteous policy of torturing, but not killing a Member of the Nationalist Party. On one occasion I endeavoured at Question time to draw the attention of the House to the fact that Mr. Speaker would not allow popular terms to be employed in Questions addressed to Ministers in the House of Commons. A Member on these Benches put a Question on the Paper relating to the Crimes Act which was referred to as the Coercion Act. Attention was called to the fact, and the Speaker ruled that the term "Coercion Act," although popular, was not a term that ought to be used in this House. Why should not we apply the same test to a letter sent to the Speaker by a Resident Magistrate as we apply to a Question addressed to a Minister in the House of Commons? If the Speaker rules it to be necessary not to employ popular language in a Question addressed to Ministers, à fortiori, it is necessary in Reports made by Resident Magistrates to the House with regard to the conviction of Members of Parliament. The hon. and learned Member for Deptford (Mr. Darling) is in the habit of giving the House legal disquisitions. I rejoice at the fact, but the more I hear these disquisitions the more I wonder how the constituency which he represents could have chosen him in preference to Mr. Blunt. The hon. and learned Member for Deptford laid it down that the terms of the report did not matter, and that the only thing that the House wanted to know is that the Member was convicted.
    MR. DARLING: I beg the hon. Gentleman's pardon. Those are neither my words, nor do they represent the sense of what I said.
    MR. T. P. O'CONNOR: I should like to know what was the sense of the hon. and learned Member. But I think it is in the knowledge of the House that I represent the meaning of the hon. and learned Member with sufficient accuracy, when I say that his point was, whether the hon. Member for East Mayo was in prison or not. This admirably sums up the policy of the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary for Ireland that the charge is immaterial on which the Resident Magistrate has convicted the hon. Member. The opinion of the magistrate is not the question under discussion. We have first to decide whether or not he has

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    given an accurate representation of the case. If we decide that he has not done this, we can by-and-bye summon him to the House and compel him to make an apology. But I say there is a corrupt intention in sending this letter. Why does he use the term Plan of Campaign? Because he knows that it is a term discredited in this country, and that it has been discredited by the Holy Office, which might, I think, be better employed than in interfering in the political affairs of Ireland, an intervention which will be repulsed by Irish Members with emphasis. We know that the words Plan of Campaign are what Jeremy Bentham would call an odious term. The right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Bury (Sir Henry James) said the letter would have been all right if the words "criminal conspiracy" had been put in after the words "Plan of Campaign." Why did the Resident Magistrate not say that the hon. Member for East Mayo was convicted of a criminal conspiracy to induce people in Ireland not to pay rent? It was because if he had used the words "criminal conspiracy to induce people not to fulfil their contracts," he would show that a man can be convicted in Ireland for doing that which a man in England is entitled to do. There is no such thing in England as criminal conspiracy of this kind. I will go further, and say that under the Trades Union Acts an artizan is distinctly entitled to induce others to break their contract; he is safeguarded in doing so, and that is the reason why Mr. Hamilton used the words "Plan of Campaign" instead of the legal term "criminal conspiracy to induce people to break their legal contracts." The right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary for Ireland has said that Mr. Hamilton was appointed by Lord Spencer. I am not prepared to say that Lord Spencer did not make many appointments in Ireland that were not very good; but surely it is one thing to appoint a man as Resident Magistrate for a particular kind of work, and another to appoint him for work of an entirely different character. If he appointed a Resident Magistrate to do the humble work of Petty Sessions, is it to be held that he is competent to go into a Court of Equity and decide questions of a very delicate kind? Why did not the right hon. Gentleman inform the House
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    that under the Coercion Act which Lord Spencer administered Mr. Hamilton could not have tried this case? Mr. Hamilton was employed on Coercion work by Lord Spencer, but in the Crimes Act of 1872 there was no conspiracy section. The only section analogous was that which dealt with intimidation, which has nothing to do with conspiracy; and because Mr. Hamilton was employed by Lord Spencer for this comparatively trivial work of trying Coercion offences, we are to be told that he was also employed by Lord Spencer in trying important and delicate questions of criminal conspiracy. This is only another specimen of the way in which these affairs are conducted in Ireland. I find that in the enactment, which the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Bury did not take the trouble to peruse, it is provided that some of the Resident Magistrates are to be certified as competent by the Lord Lieutenant and others by the Lord Chancellor. Mr. Hamilton has been certified to be legally competent by the Lord Lieutenant, but not so by the Lord Chancellor. This is a remarkable circumstance, because the Marquess of Londonderry, although probably qualified to give his judgment on a racecourse, is wholly incapable of forming any opinion as to a man's legal knowledge. Then, he asked, why was Mr. Hamilton sent to try this most delicate and most important case; delicate because of the nature of the charge involved, and important because of the person brought before the Court. Why was Mr. Hamilton, who was an uncertificated lawyer, if he might use the phrase, but who, possibly, was a certificated judge of horseflesh—why was this man sent to try the case of the hon. Member for East Mayo? Mr. Harrington, the counsel for the hon. Member for East Mayo, asked in Court which of the Resident Magistrates he was to regard as legally qualified to try the case, and Mr. Hamilton replied that he was to be regarded as legally qualified. What were his qualifications; he was Lieutenant of the Revenue Police, and, secondly, he was a Constabulary Officer, but he certainly never passed a matriculation examination. This was a man legally qualified to try one of the most trusted and important Members of the

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    Irish Party. Why was he sent there at all; not because of his legal knowledge, because he had none; not because of his impartiality, because he had none; but he was sent there by the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary because he was thought the best instrument to do the dirty work of the Government.
    Question put.
    The House divided:—Ayes 189; Noes 250: Majority 61.—(Div. List, No. 106.)

QUESTIONS.

  ARMY (INDIA)—THE CONTAGIOUS DISEASES ACTS—CAMP FOLLOWERS.
  MR. STANSFELD: I wish, Sir, to ask the Under Secretary of State for India, Whether he is now prepared to make the statement he promised as to the recent correspondence with the Government of India on the subject of the Contagious Diseases Acts?
  THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE (Sir JOHN GORST): (1.) In consequence of the action taken by the Secretary of State upon the Questions put to him in "another place" last year by the Lord Bishop of Lichfield, what is known as the regimental system has been absolutely stopped. The Commander in Chief has prohibited women from accompanying regiments on march or to camp, and also from residing in regimental bazaars. (2.) The administration of the Contagious Diseases Act in Bombay, Madras and Bassein, the only places in which it is in force, has been suspended by the Government of India under a power contained in the Act. (3.) The Government of India is now engaged in a revision of the Regulations made for preventing the spread of venereal disease in cantonments, under Section 27 of Act III. of 1880; and a despatch is going out to India from the Secretary of State in Council which will prohibit the compulsory examination of women, and the making of any regulations which can be justly construed into a legalization of prostitution.

  SITTINGS AND ADJOURNMENT OF THE HOUSE—THE WHITSUNTIDE RECESS.
  In reply to Dr. CLARK (Caithness),
  THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY (Mr. W. H. SMITH)said, that whether he should move the adjournment of the House on Thursday or Friday depended entirely on the pleasure of the House. If it were to be on Thursday, it must be understood that the Government Business would be disposed of, and that the Motion would be made at a late hour, and agreed to without discussion. If not, and the Motion was to be made on Friday, it would be necessary to have a Morning Sitting on that day. It would be necessary to take a Vote on Account before the adjournment on Thursday.

ORDER OF THE DAY.
  PARLIAMENTARY UNDER SECRETARY TO THE LORD LIEUTENANT OF IRELAND BILL.
  (Mr. William Henry Smith, Mr. Arthur Balfour, Mr. Jackson.)
  PARLIAMENTARY UNDER SECRETARY TO THE LORD LIEUTENANT OF IRELAND BILL.

    [BILL 201.] COMMITTEE.
    Bill considered in Committee.
    (In the Committee.)
    Clause 1 (Office not to disqualify for seat in Parliament).
    MR. HENEAGEsaid, he rose to move an Amendment to this clause, which empowered the Treasury and the Lord Lieutenant to provide a salary for the additional Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant. He objected altogether to the proposal to establish and endow what he believed to be an useless and unnecessary Office, and he proposed to strike out what he regarded as the essential words of the clause, the words "to be" in order to raise the whole question again, as he considered the vote taken on the second reading was not taken on the merits, or perhaps, he should say, on the demerits of the Bill, but was taken rather for personal reasons on account of the personal and political controversial points which were introduced into the discussion. This was not the first time that a Bill had been dealt with in this way. A Bill of a very similar character was brought in 1884, by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for South Edinburgh (Mr. Childers). In that Bill there were proposed annuities to Lord Wolseley and Lord Alcester. The House then allowed the second reading of the Bill to take place, because they thought it would be a disparagement to those officers if the

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    Bill were opposed on the second reading, but immediately the Bill was set down for Committee the hon. Member for Staffordshire put down an Amendment to strike out the word "annuity" and thus raised the whole principle of the Bill. The Government opposed the Amendment for some time, but afterwards finding that the feeling in the House was strongly against the measure, they withdrew it. He did not believe there was ever a stronger feeling on all sides of the House against a Bill than there was against this Bill. He believed that nearly every Member sitting on the Opposition side of the House looked upon it as a most objectionable measure from every possible point of view, and he did not believe there was the slightest support of it on the other side, but that hon. Members opposite would gladly have got rid of it long ago if they could have done so. What was the case for this new Office? Did the Lord Lieutenant require any further assistance in Dublin? What were the duties which the Lord Lieutenant and the Attorney General for Ireland had to do which they could not now perform? These gentlemen were always resident in Dublin, neither of them had any Parliamentary work, they had not to take journeys to and from London, they had no Cabinet meetings to attend, they had the whole of their time at their own disposal to do the work of their respective offices. The present Lord Lieutenant was in a much better position than his Predecessor, because the Lord Chancellor of Ireland was a Cabinet Minister, and he could, with all the responsibility of a Cabinet Minister, not only assist in the Government of Ireland, but he could go over to London and move Bills, or take part in the debates in the House of Lords. The right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary for Ireland (Mr. A. J. Balfour) told them that he required assistance in that House. Now, he (Mr. Heneage) believed that no Irish Secretary was ever in a better position than his right hon. Friend. The right hon. Gentleman had very little to trouble him in Dublin; indeed, he hardly ever went there.
    THE CHAIRMAN: The right hon. Gentleman's Amendment upon the Paper does not appear to prevent the creation of the Office, but provides that the salary shall be paid out of moneys
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    already provided by Parliament for the Lord Lieutenant and the Chief Secretary. If that is the right hon. Gentleman's Amendment, he must direct his argument to it.
    MR. HENEAGEsaid, that, of course, he would bow to the Chairman's ruling; but he imagined that the question before them was whether the Under Secretary was worth the salary which was proposed to be given to him. He maintained that the country would derive no benefit whatever from the payment of this salary. He proposed to show that there would be no work for the Under Secretary to do; because those Ministers who were already doing the work, or ought to be doing the work were perfectly competent to perform that work. If that line of argument were out of Order, of course he must depart from it; but he did not see how it was possible for him to prove that the salary was not required unless he proved that the Office itself, to a certain extent, was not required also. He asserted that the Chief Secretary for Ireland was not only in as good a position to perform his duties, but in a better position to do that than any of his Predecessors; because he had very few journeys to Ireland to undertake in comparison, for instance, with the late Mr. Forster; because he had no heavy legislation on hand, and because the hours during which the House sat had been considerably curtailed.
    THE CHAIRMAN: Order, order! I must point out to the right hon. Gentleman that he must speak to his own Amendment. He proposes that the salary of the Parliamentary Under Secretary shall be taken out of the salaries of the Lord Lieutenant, and the Chief Secretary. It is not pertinent to that to argue the question of the creation of the Office.
    MR. HENEAGEsaid, that he was in great difficulty as to how to argue the question; because, if he could not argue that there was no work for the Under Secretary to do, he must admit that every man was worthy of his hire, and so he was bound to admit that the salary ought to be paid. Perhaps the best course he could take under the circumstances was not to move the present Amendment, but to wait until the end of the clause, and move to omit the clause entirely.
    MR. T. P. O'CONNORsaid, that he agreed with the Amendment of the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Heneage), and he felt justified in making a proposal to him, which was that he should stick to his Amendment. As he (Mr. T. P. O'Connor) understood the ruling of the Chairman, they were not entitled to discuss the creation of the Office of Under Secretary, but they were entitled to discuss whether the Under Secretary should be paid by means of a new demand upon the Exchequer, or paid out of funds already at the disposal of the Lord Lieutenant and the Chief Secretary. He would take up the argument which the right hon. Gentleman had endeavoured to enforce upon the House—namely, that the present Chief Secretary for Ireland was so sparsely employed as compared with his Predecessors that it would only be decorous in him, not to say, generous, if he gave up so much of his salary as would pay for the employment of the new Under Secretary. He had said that the present Chief Secretary was less employed than previous Chief Secretaries, but he did not intend to make any allusion to the tenure of Office of his right hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle-upon-Tyne (Mr. John Morley) who probably would take part in the debate, and would be better able to speak concerning his own period of Office. But he would point to the example of the late Mr. Forster; he (Mr. T. P. O'Connor) was a very fierce opponent of the late Mr. Forster, but at the same time he did not think there was ever a public servant more devoted to the discharge of his duties. What did the late Mr. Forster do compared with the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. A. J. Balfour)? He was here at Question time almost invariably, and the Questions then were very different to the Questions now; in those days there were 10 Questions put to every one asked now. The right hon. Gentleman had a much more disturbed Ireland to deal with than the present Chief Secretary, and he was interrogated constantly as to the administration of the Coercion Act then in force; whereas the present Chief Secretary was shocked if even a couple of hours were occupied, as there were to-night, in discussing the merits or demerits of the imprisonment of a Member of Parliament. The late Mr. Forster attended to business in Ireland;
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    but one of the most remarkable things about the present Chief Secretary was the absolute want of attention on his part to the duties of his Office in Ireland. The right hon. Gentleman never took an opportunity of going to Ireland in order to remove a certain small proportion of that gigantic ignorance under which he laboured. He did not say that the right hon. Gentleman should go to Ireland while the House was sitting, though he might remark that the late Mr. Forster went no less than 13 times in the course of half a single Session, and in spite of the enormous work he had to do in the House of Commons. But the right hon. Gentleman opposite did not go to Ireland during the Session, neither did he go to Ireland during the vacation. He (Mr. T. P. O'Connor) saw it announced in the public Press that the right hon. Gentleman was going to spend the forthcoming vacation by the sounding sea. That might be a very pleasant way of spending the vacation to the right hon. Gentleman, but he thought that the right hon. Gentleman would be better discharging his duties if he would go to the country over which he was at the present moment almost as supreme as if he were appointed by the Russian Autocrat as Governor General. The right hon. Gentleman received a very large salary indeed; £5,000 a-year was an extremely good salary, and it was a salary which very few other Ministers of the Government got. Everybody knew that £5,000 a-year was confined to one or two Secretaries, like the Colonial Secretary, the Foreign Secretary, and the Secretary of State for the Home Department. Under these circumstances, he (Mr. T. P. O'Connor) thought the right hon. Gentleman might very well afford to cut out of his salary £1,000 or £1,200 a-year for the benefit of the Gentleman who discharged his duties; duties which were discharged by all his Predecessors, but which he was either too lazy or too unwilling to discharge himself. If the right hon. Gentleman were a poor man, he could quite understand his opposing this Amendment, but the right hon. Gentleman was well known to be a man of wealth.—[Mr. A. J. BALFOUR dissented.]—Well, he would regard the right hon. Gentleman's income as establishing the

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    title of wealthy; but, perhaps, his (Mr. T. P. O'Connor's) tastes were humbler and more modest than the right hon. Gentleman's, certainly he would very willingly exchange incomes with the right hon. Gentleman. But his point was that the right hon. Gentleman was what modest people regarded as a man of considerable substance and wealth; he was also, so at least his friends were always saying, a patriot; being a patriot he could afford to do all his work for nothing. But he (Mr. T. P. O'Connor) did not make so heroic a proposal as that, but he thought that under all the circumstances, they might confidently look forward to the right hon. Gentleman following into the Lobby the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Great Grimsby (Mr. Heneage).
    Amendment proposed, in page 1, line 7, after the word "moneys," to leave out the word "to be," and insert the word "now."—(Mr. Heneage.)
    Question proposed, "That the words 'to be' stand part of the Clause."
    MR. JOHN MORLEYsaid, he did not propose to follow the hon. Gentleman the Member for the Scotland Division of Liverpool (Mr. T. P. O' Connor) in his strictures upon the excessive salary paid to the Chief Secretary. To do so would perhaps be unbecoming in one who had been Chief Secretary, but he intended to vote for the Amendment of his right hon. Friend (Mr. Heneage). The salary of the Chief Secretary did not appear to be at all in excess when they considered the harassing duties the Chief Secretary had to perform, and when they considered the conditions under which he lived in London or in Dublin. But there was an officer of the Irish Establishment whose salary and allowances were well capable of diminution if the creation of another Office required remuneration. The salary and allowances of the Lord Lieutenant were, no doubt, on a scale entirely out of proportion either to the duties of the Office or to the condition in the matter of wealth of the country over which he governed. It had always seemed to him (Mr. John Morley) to be one of the most extraordinary things connected with the Government of Ireland that the Lord Lieutenant should be remunerated as if he were ruling one of
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    the richest, instead of one of the poorest, parts of the dominions of the Crown. Therefore, he was fully of opinion that if it were necessary to create this Office, and into that question the Chairman would not allow them to enter—if it were necessary to create this Office, the emoluments which the Parliamentary Under Secretary might claim ought to be provided from the resources already at the disposal of the Lord Lieutenant. The expensiveness of the Irish Establishment was one of the scandals of our Administration. In the judicial Establishment, and in nearly every branch of the Irish Establishment the expenditure was enormously in advance of the requirements of the Public Service; and it was, it appeared to him, an aggravation of the existing scandal, which had for many years been recognized on both sides of the House—it was an aggravation of that scandal to create a new Office, and to apportion to it a salary. He would be out of Order in referring to another Bill which they were to discuss, probably at a later period of the evening, but they could not forget that by that other Bill a still further aggravation was to be made of the charges of the Irish Establishment. There were two Bills before them to-night, each of which very largely, very considerably, added to an expenditure which was already admitted to be, as he had said, of the nature of an administrative scandal. As they could not secure the rejection of the proposal for creating this Office, the next best thing they could do was to vote for the proposal which would at least protect the public Treasury from an increased demand upon it for the remuneration of a public officer, whom they regarded as entirely superfluous and unnecessary. That being his view, he should certainly support the Amendment of his right hon. Friend.
    THE CHIEF SECRETARY FOR IRELAND (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR)said, that as he understood the speech of the right hon. Gentleman, he approved of one-half of the Amendment of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Grimsby (Mr. Heneage) and not of the other half. The Amendment consisted of two parts, one of which proposed to mulct the salary of the Chief Secretary, and the other to mulct the salary of the

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    Lord Lieutenant for the purpose of providing the salary for the new official.
    MR. HENEAGEsaid, that what he proposed was, that the salary should be paid out of monies now provided by Parliament for the Lord Lieutenant and the Chief Secretary. Therefore, the salary of the new Office might be taken out of either one or the other, or both.
    MR. A. J. BALFOURsaid, that the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Heneage) proposed to cut down the salary of both the Lord Lieutenant and the Chief Secretary, but he understood the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Newcastle-upon-Tyne (Mr. J. Morley) to restrict this mulcting process to the salary of the Lord Lieutenant. The Amendment, however, would not carry that out, because the salary of the Lord Lieutenant was not voted by Parliament, but came out of the Consolidated Fund. The Amendment, therefore, would require to be entirely recast, in order to carry out the object which the right hon. Gentleman who moved it had in view. He would, however, leave that point to go to the substance of the Amendment. Now, the salary proposed to be given to the Under Secretary was not an addition, as some Members supposed, of £1,500 a-year to the cost of the Irish Establishment. The new burden thrown on the Irish Establishment would be £300 a-year, because they took power, in a latter clause of the Bill, to abolish an Office which now cost £1,200 a-year. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Newcastle-upon-Tyne went on to say that the cost of the Irish Administration had long been a scandal. Let him (Mr. A. J. Balfour) remind the House that if the cost of the Irish Establishment was at one time excessive, or was even now excessive, it was far less excessive than it used to be. In other words, the amount of work thrown on the Irish Administration was enormously greater now than it was at the time when these salaries were fixed. He apprehended that no one would doubt that. There was a well known story told of Mr. Horsman, who was Chief Secretary about 30 years ago, but never found it necessary to go to the office at all. He declared he had nothing to do in his office, and lounged down to the House, and had, practically, an extremely easy time of it. He (Mr. A. J. Balfour) was
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    not sure that at that time the salary was not even greater than at present; at any rate, it was higher in the earlier part of the century. No one would say that the Chief Secretary was not, at that moment, a tolerably bard worked official. Of course, he could not please the hon. Gentleman the Member for the Scotland Division of Liverpool (Mr. T. P. O'Connor). The hon. Gentleman was unhappy when he (Mr. A. J. Balfour) was in London, and he was unhappy when he was in Ireland; when he was here the hon. Gentleman regretted that he was not in Ireland; and when he was in Ireland the hon. Gentleman regretted he was not in England. He was sorry he could not oblige the hon. Gentleman by being in the two places at one time; but he did not think that the hon. Gentleman, even in his higher flights of eloquence, would go the length of saying that the Office of Chief Secretary was not a tolerably hard worked Office. Leaving the question of the salary of the Chief Secretary, and leaving the general question of the cost thrown on the Irish Establishment, which he had shown was extremely small—namely, £300 a-year, he came to the main point urged by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Newcastle-upon-Tyne, which was that the new salary should be taken out of the salary of the Lord Lieutenant. The right hon. Gentleman said, was that not an enormous salary, considering the Lord Lieutenant was Governor of a poor country. He (Mr. A. J. Balfour) frankly admitted—he had never concealed it from the House before, and he did not conceal it now—that the whole question of the Lord Lieutenancy of Ireland was one which might at the proper time require revision. He was far from considering that that was a closed question; but let not the House make a mistake—it was rather a big question, and they could not at one stroke of the pen abolish the Lord Lieutenant's Office. It was an immemorial Office, around which there had collected an incrustation of duties, social and otherwise, which they could not destroy at a blow without making a great social revolution—well, he would not say a great social revolution, but a social revolution on a scale which made anyone hesitate before he engaged in it.

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    The right hon. Gentleman described the salary of the Lord Lieutenant as an excessive and an enormous salary, but it entirely depended upon what they expected the Lord Lieutenant to do. If they expected the Lord Lieutenant to do that which all Lord Lieutenants had always done up to this time, as Lord Aberdeen and Lord Spencer had done—he would not go through the long list of distinguished men who had filled the Office—then he contended that the salary evidently was not an excessive one, but was an extremely meagre salary. Everyone who knew the facts knew that the Lord Lieutenant was not only out of pocket, but enormously out of pocket always. [An hon. MEMBER: What about Lord Abercorn?] He did not believe there had ever been a Lord Lieutenant, certainly there bad not been one within his experience, who did not lose money by being Lord Lieutenant. Much as the salary of £20,000 might appear to the Committee, and much as the salary, no doubt, was, he was sure there had been many years in which the Lord Lieutenant had spent out of pocket another £20,000. [Cries of "Oh, oh!"] Yes, he did not exaggerate in the least when he said that. Therefore, when the right hon Gentleman opposite (Mr. John Morley) said that the Lord Lieutenant had too big a salary, he was pointing to a revolution which would abolish the Lord Lieutenant as they had always known him. This Bill was a much humbler measure, and he asked the House to reject the Amendment, not because they thought that the Lord Lieutenant's Office must necessarily for ever be kept up at its present scale, but because the Bill did not deal with that Office, and the idea of getting £300 a-year out of the salary of the Lord Lieutenant in order to supply the deficiency caused by the salary of the Under Secretary seemed to be tinkering with a question which ought to be dealt with in a very different spirit by the House. He hoped the House would reject the Amendment. He thought he had given reasons, not reasons wholly undeserving of consideration, why they should reject the Amendment and refuse in this Bill to touch the question of the Lord Lieutenant's salary, which was not voted by Parliament and which was a charge on the Consolidated Fund.
    MR. JOHN MORLEYsaid, that the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary had said that this Bill would make an addition of £300 a-year. That would be true but for the latter part of the 2nd clause. The assumption of the right hon. Gentleman was that one of the members of the Local Government Board would disappear, and that the Parliamentary Under Secretary would do his work.
    MR. A. J. BALFOURsaid, he ought to have stated that the Bill would make no permanent addition.
    MR. JOHN MORLEYsaid, that the Government took power to employ an Inspector, from time to time, if it should be necessary, and they said that such an Inspector should be paid an allowance or salary such as the Lord Lieutenant might think fit. Unless he was very uncharitable to Dublin Castle, that Inspector would be very soon found to be wanted, and that allowance or additional salary would be very soon proposed by the Lord Lieutenant, and assented to by the Treasury. He could not assent to the statement that there would only be the difference between £1,500 and £1,200 a-year.
    Notice taken, that 40 Members were not present; Committee counted, and 40 Members being found present,
    MR. EDWARD HARRINGTONthought the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Great Grimsby (Mr. Heneage) had made a very sensible and practical proposal to the Government. He was very glad the right hon. Gentleman had stuck to his guns, though he had been disappointed in the delivery of his speech, with which he intended to support the proposal. The object of the Amendment was to provide that the salary of the Under Secretary should be paid out of the moneys provided by Parliament, or out of the salary fixed for the Lord Lieutenant, which was at the present time a charge on the Consolidated Fund. He should hope to show that, in his and his hon. Friend's opinion, at least, there was ample ground for the Amendment proposed, and ample room enough, both in the salaries and allowances of the Lord Lieutenant and of the Chief Secretary, to take out the little slice wanted for the patronizing job of the Government in creating an Office for their pet, the forthcoming

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    Under Secretary for Ireland. The Lord Lieutenant received a salary of £20,000 a-year. He supposed it would not be very generous to say the Lord Lieutenant did not earn such a salary; but, certainly, to their mind, he did not, even having regard to the ornamental dignity supposed to be attached to the Office of the Lord Lieutenant. They believed that a salary far less than £20,000 a-year would meet the exigencies of the case. The right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary (Mr. A. J. Balfour) had remarked that Lord Lieutenants spent in entertainments £20,000 a-year in addition to their salary. Granting the truth of that statement, whom did the Lord Lieutenant entertain and feast? Let anyone look at the list of those who partook of the Lord Lieutenant's entertainment and hospitality, and they would find that they were such men as Mr. Hamilton, who had sent the Speaker a letter that evening, and men of that class who were known for their antipathy to the Irish people. Something had been said by the Chief Secretary in regard to the duties of the Lord Lieutenant. In mercy's name they ought to talk common sense when talking of these things. What duty had the Lord Lieutenant to perform? He had merely to register whatever was the policy which the Chief Secretary for Ireland wished to put forward as the mouthpiece of the Cabinet. They never heard of the present Lord Lieutenant of Ireland having an opinion of his own in regard to the government of Ireland. His most onerous duties seemed to be to engage in the game of golf, or to indulge in that manly English game of cricket, or to have his photograph taken in one of the principal streets of the City of Dublin. If the Government thought such duties worth £20,000 a-year, he (Mr. Harrington) and his hon. Friends did not; they believed that out of that £20,000 a slice might be taken for the salary of the Office which it was now wished to create. He could not now enter into the question of the propriety of creating that Office, that had been justly ruled out of Order; but he might say that they were totally against the creation of the Office, and that was the justification of the demand that the salary of the new official should not be made a burden upon the taxpayer. It was said that the Lord Lieutenant lost by the very lavish hospitality he indulged
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    in. He (Mr. Harrington) did not think that the history of the present Lord Lieutenant of Ireland would bear that statement out. But even if the present Lord Lieutenant had dispensed something over his £20,000, he received dignity and status and office in return for it, and could save in his rents. It was a well-known fact in the North of Ireland that the proclamation of the Plan of Campaign in Ireland was issued the very day after the present Lord Lieutenant's tenants had announced their intention of combining for the protection of themselves, and that was a scandalous fact that might claim the serious attention of the Executive Officers of the Irish Government. Now, turning to the Chief Secretary, they found that he had a salary of £4,225 a-year. They considered that the duties of the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Balfour) were not very serious duties, but that such as they were, they were to be considerably lightened by the Bill. What did the Bill propose to do? It was proposed by the Bill to give power to transfer from the Chief Secretary to the Under Secretary the privilege of signing certain documents, and performing certain functions which would altogether lighten the burdens of the duties of the Chief Secretary. It was very hard to dissociate the two lines of argument, one of which was not in Order, and which applied to the nesessity or non-necessity for the introduction of this measure, and the other which applied to the payment of the salary of the Office being made out of the moneys provided for the Chief Secretary and the Lord Lieutenant, and for the reason, as he had said, that provision was made in the clauses of the Bill for the transference of duties to the Under Secretary which were now discharged by the Chief Secretary himself. He could not discuss the propriety of having those duties discharged by one whom he must describe as an underling, though he said that with all respect. As the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary was to retain his salary intact, he ought to continue to perform his duties. Certainly, it was only fair to propose that if any of his duties were transferred or delegated to a new officer, that officer should fairly, in return for the functions he performed, receive a portion of the salary of the Chief Secretary, instead

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    of the payment made to him being made a charge upon the public funds. What was the argument the right hon. Gentleman advanced that night? It was the argument always advanced in respect of Irish appointments. The Chief Secretary had said the Office would only entail a trifling additional expense. That argument had been time out of mind advanced in favour of offices created for those place hunters, who clung on a parasitical way to every Party in power. In the case of the appointment of Resident Magistrates, even of Judges, and of every other kind of official, the same argument had been used. New office after new office had been created. Day after day they had added to the expenditure of the Government of Ireland until the cost of that Government had become a scandal. Many items might be carved out of the Chief Secretary's office, which, put together, would make a very decent salary for the Parliamentary Under Secretary. Besides the Chief Secretary there was an Under Secretary, who was paid £2,500 a-year. There was the Assistant Under Secretary, Clerk of the Council, and Deputy Keeper of the Privy Seal, and he received £1,350 a-year. There were several principal clerks, and they got £1,825 a-year. There were first clerks and second clerks; and there was a washerwoman who was paid £15 a-year. He did not object to attention being paid to the sanitary arrangements of the office, because the office really required a lot of washing and renovating. There were allowances for cost of lighting, &c., and there were special allowances for the cost of the Chief Secretary's alternate residence in England and Ireland. He ventured to say that any man who had in his mind the intention of advancing economic reform in this House would support this Amendment, and he very much regretted that, on an occasion of this kind, when economy was in question, those hon. and right hon. Members, who from time to time asked such stinging Questions here, either about the pay of a sergeant in the Army, or some small matter of that kind, had not thought it worth while to attend to support the arguments of the Irish Members. He regretted very much that those pioneers of reform to whom he had referred were not in their places to support the proposal of that reform
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    which was now under discussion. I was a scandal to the people of Ireland to ask Parliament for this peddling sum, when they paid the Lord Lieutenant £20,000 for indulging in the recreation of cricket, or walking down to the establishment of some particular photographer in Dublin, and getting his picture taken for the purpose of sending it round as that of a landlord who had "protected himself" from the Plan of Campaign, by getting it proclaimed throughout Ireland at the very time that his tenantry had adopted it. It was no wonder to him (Mr. E. Harrington) that the Government from time to time thought it their duty to bring forward such measures as this. Poor as they were in Ireland they might somehow scrape together this £1,200 as a salary for the Parliamentary Under Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, if only for the purpose of showing the English people how well the English Parliament diverted itself from its legitimate purpose for supporting a man who had a rent roll of £40,000 a-year, at a time when there was no need for the creation of the new Office. It could be easily pointed out to the Government how they could make up the salary of this now official out of the present swollen allowances made for the purpose of carrying on the Irish Government. It could be easily pointed out to them how this salary could be made up out of scraps and odds and ends. The Government would not go in that direction, however, although they would find no difficulty in obtaining what they wanted without saddling the taxpayers with any further burden. He felt that there was a great deal to be said upon this question, but he did not like to occupy the time of the Committee unduly. He believed it would tax the legal ingenuity of the hon. and learned Gentleman the Solicitor General for Ireland (Mr. Madden), and when he used the word "ingenuity," he intended it in no disrespectful sense, for he was glad to recognize that the hon. and learned Gentleman always met them very fairly in these matters—to find out a defence for this burden of £300 even, which the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary told them was the whole sum to be taken out of the public purse in regard to this new Office. But even this £300 need not be taken out of the National

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    pocket. The whole £1,200 could be saved without derogation to Public Business, simply by not rigging up as a national cock-shy in Ireland this broken down landlord for all Irishmen to be constantly throwing at him as a living example of all that is abominable in the Irish governmental system.
    MR. T. D. SULLIVANsaid, before a Division was taken, he should like to say a few words in support of the Amendment before the House. The new Office had been created, and now a new salary was about to be created for the Office. The Government of Ireland in proportion to the population of the country was one of the most costly in the whole world, and in spite of that fact it was now proposed—as he contended—to put a new and totally unnecessary burden upon it. If this new salary was to be attached to the new Office, in his opinion it ought to be paid out of the sums already allocated by Parliament for the Government of Ireland. He thought the Lord Lieutenant and the Chief Secretary might very fairly be expected to take out of their own large salaries the amount required to pay the Under Secretary if they considered it absolutely essential that this appointment should be made, and that a salary should be attached to it. He thought the people of Ireland would be somewhat surprised, and perhaps edified, at all this stickling on the part of hon. Gentlemen opposite for salaries. Hon. Gentlemen opposite were wealthy men, and affected to be great patriots, and yet they were to be found on the Floor of this House of Commons night after night fighting this stiff, tough, protracted battle in the matter of salaries. He should not have been so much surprised at that if they had not from time to time treated with scorn and contempt the idea of getting any money whatever for the performance of public duties. It was not so long since these self-same Gentlemen who were so anxious about this salary question, and more particularly the Under Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant, spoke with contempt of the secretaries of the National League branches who, he alleged, received salaries for their services. So far as he (Mr. T. D. Sullivan) was aware, no salaries were attached to those positions. It might be the case that in some par-
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    ticular districts the branches of the National League had determined for a while to allocate some remuneration to their secretary, but he was not aware of any specific instance in which that had been done. Even if such were the case, it was not for the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Under Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant (Colonel King-Harman) to speak in a tone of contempt and scorn of the men who received those small salaries. He certainly thought it was a public scandal that such a Gentleman as this should be endeavouring to extort this salary from the House of Commons and the British people. He said the British people, but, of course, the Irish people had to pay their share of the expense, and it was a wonder to him that the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet was not ashamed of that fact. He (Mr. T. D. Sullivan) knew perfectly well that no secretary of the National League would take any petty remuneration if it was only to be obtained after such a continuous struggle as had been made on behalf of the right hon. and gallant Gentleman. As a matter of fact, the whole system of government in Ireland was over-paid and over-manned. It was a system of corruption. The right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant had lately told the public that his chief worry was in trying to deal with the numerous applicants for place and pay under the Government of Ireland. But now they saw him creating a new Office, and endeavouring to attach a new salary thereto without any necessity for the appointment. But even if the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant did require assistance in getting through the work of his Office, it was only reasonable and fair, taking all the circumstances of the case into consideration, that he and the Lord Lieutenant should pay this drudge. The Lord Lieutenant had a magnificent salary appropriated to him by the Parliament of England, and the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary was also in the enjoyment of a splendid salary for the duties he performed, and it was no excessive burden upon these Gentlemen to require them to subscribe between them the salary of their new assistant. The whole discussion did not redound to the credit either

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    of the Government who sought to promote this job, or to the right hon. and gallant Gentleman who sought to profit by it.
    MR. J. O'CONNORsaid, he had little to add to the arguments of his Colleagues in support of the Amendment; but he wished to refer to one of the reasons adduced by the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary in support of the passing of the Bill. The right hon. Gentleman had pointed out that in adopting the Bill and appointing a new Under Secretary one member of the Irish Local Government Board would be suppressed, and that the Government would be saved nearly the whole of the extraordinary sum about to be allocated to the payment of the new Under Secretary. Well, it was once stated that Ireland was the most be-boarded country in the world; and if that were so, he would say, at any rate, let them have efficient Beards. He could not see how, by the creation of an Assistant Parliamentary Secretary to the Chief Secretary and the consequent suppression of a member of the Local Government Board, they were increasing the efficiency of the Boards in Ireland. In that country the people suffered severely from inattention to their duties on the part of members of public Boards. They suffered severely from the slipshod manner in which these Government officials performed their duties; and he certainly failed to see how the Local Government Board of Ireland would be improved by the suppression of an active member and the creation of a new official who would be unable to pay any attention whatever to the duties of the post. The Parliamentary Under Secretary to the Chief Secretary for Ireland would spend most of his time in that House—that was to say, most of that time which he did not spend on holidays on the Continent or in the Isle of Thanet. The right hon. and gallant Gentleman came to the House to answer Questions in his own jaunty and insulting fashion; and he (Mr. J. O'Connor) asked the Committee how they could reasonably believe that the man upon whose shoulders were placed so many onerous duties as the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet would be able to give the necessary amount of attention to the duties imposed upon him in con-
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    nection with the Irish Local Government Board? The reason the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary gave for this arrangement was one that, to his mind, ought to induce the Committee to vote by a large majority the acceptance of the Amendment of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Great Grimsby (Mr. Heneage). He (Mr. J. O'Connor) thought the House was very much indebted to the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Great Grimsby for having brought this matter forward, because the House was the guardian of the public purse, and his Amendment afforded the Committee of the House an opportunity of passing its opinion upon an attempt that was being made to fritter away the public resources, He (Mr. J. O'Connor) quite admitted that if there had been any necessity shown for the proposal contained in the Bill the Committee and the House would have been justified in rejecting the Amendment. But no necessity had been shown for the creation of this Office; on the contrary, during all the discussions which had taken place upon this matter it had been pointed out most energetically, and to his mind most conclusively, that there was no necessity whatever for the Office, and therefore it was that he thought the Committee of the House, and the House itself, ought to be grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for having afforded it an opportunity of passing a judgment upon the proposition. As he had said, there had been no reason shown for the adoption of the proposal of the Government; but there was every reason why hon. Members from Ireland ought to offer most strenuous opposition not only to the creation of the new Office, but also to the payment of it. It was hoped that at no distant day, no matter what had been said to the contrary, there would be extended to the Irish people a system, if not of National, at least of local self-government; and one of the first duties that would be imposed upon the Local Bodies which would be set up in Ireland would be to establish an economic system of government, in which spirit it would be necessary to decrease every establishment in Ireland. It would be necessary to decrease the establishment of the Lord Lieutenant, and the various other establishments which were paid out of the public funds. Well, it was in the

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    spirit of the times to compensate vested interests, and here, in view of this ultimate state of things which be pointed out, the Government were about to create a vested interest valued at £1,200 a-year. It came to this—that at some future day the Irish people might be called upon to pay compensation for the abolition of vested interests of which the emoluments of this Office would form no inconsiderable item. That was the reason why he maintained that the Irish Members should offer the most strenuous opposition to this proposal. If the Government took the salary of the new Under Secretary from the salary of the Lord Lieutenant or the Chief Secretary they would take away from the Irish Members this argument. On the other hand, whilst they persisted in the proposal to pay this out of the public funds they gave the Irish Members the best reason for opposing the Bill. A short time ago the House seemed to have entered on a season of economy. From the number of Committees sitting upstairs day after day investigating public Departments, it would seem as though they had entered upon a season of great economy. They were investigating the administration of the Army; they were investigating the affairs of the Navy; and they were investigating Civil Service affairs; but he would ask the Committee, and he would also ask the people of this country, where were the economists from the Benches opposite—what were they doing? These Gentlemen, by speeches in that House, and by their action in Committee, were endeavouring to cut down the expenses of the administration of the country; but where were they to-night when an important matter affecting the economic administration of Ireland was under discussion? Why were they not in their places? For the reasons he had given he felt it his duty to give the most determined opposition to the manner in which it was sought to pay this new Office of Parliamentary Under Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant, and to render his support, by speech and vote, to the Amendment of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Great Grimsby.
    DR. TANNERsaid, he certainly regretted that on an occasion like the present, after the great opposition the Bill had met with at that stage, that hon. Gentlemen who were
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    always preaching about economy, did not endeavour to practise what they preached. The hon. Gentleman the Member for South Tipperary (Mr. John O'Connor) had mentioned a point known to all of them—namely, that a number of Committees dealing with all manner of economical conundrums were sitting upstairs. While these efforts at economy were apparently being made, what were the Government trying to do at the present moment? Were they anxious to see the expenditure on the Army and the Navy curtailed, and various extravagances put an end to, in order that they might be able to establish sinecures such as that involved in the present Bill? It was not often that he had to praise a Liberal Secessionist; but he recognized that it was with that House as it had been with the Cities of the Plain—if only one good man had been found in them the cities might have been saved. At any rate, he hailed as an omen that there were a few such good men above the Gangway on that (the Opposition) side of the House, who seemed anxious to follow in the right way. Hon. Gentlemen who had hitherto opposed the Representatives of the Irish nation in trying to obtain for their country, as it was their duty to do, justice and fair play, were beginning to see that, after all, there was something to be said for the efforts of those Members. There was some hope for the situation at the present time, when some of those hon. Members above the Gangway were beginning to show that they were not so impervious to argument and reason as would seem from what happened in the past. The Amendment moved by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Great Grimsby (Mr. Heneage) was, practically speaking, an attack upon a job. As the House was entrusted with the care of the public money, and it certainly was its business to try in every case and on every possible occasion to discourage a job, and especially to discourage a job when that job was perpetrated by the Representatives of a class against the wishes of a majority of the people. That was practically the case in the present instance. Ordinarily the House had to vote away immense sums of money at a late hour of the night. He had seen from those Benches enormous sums of money voted away without a single protest being made, and notably without a

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    single protest being made by any hon. or right hon. Gentleman opposite. Of course, he knew very well that in the past, when money had been voted, it was mostly by a Liberal Government; and that at those times hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite, who paid very little attention to the voting away of public money to-day, sat on the Opposition side of the House, and had a great deal to say against such payments. In the days of which he spoke, the right hon. Gentleman the present Chief Secretary for Ireland (Mr. A. J. Balfour) was, he might say, a champion obstructionist. At any rate, if hon. Members opposite had forgotten the interest they took in economy, it was not for the Irish Members to do so, especially in the present case, when there were many other reasons for resisting the Government proposal. The right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary declared that it was necessary that he should have assistance in carrying on the government of Ireland under the Lord Lieutenant. Well, but it was very little they saw of the right hon. Gentleman in Ireland. When he did go to that country he disappeared amongst the ranks of the policemen. He was very brave, very plucky, no doubt; but he was lost amongst the police, and disappeared into Dublin Castle directly he got amongst the Irish people. They wished him joy of his associations. The right hon. Gentleman was anxious to increase the number of his associations; and by all means let him do it, if he did it at his own expense. If he wished for a satellite to revolve around him, by all means let him have it, but do not let him perpetrate a job in order to effect his object. Let him pay the Gentleman who was to act as his shield and buckler himself. The Gentleman was for his own protection and convenience and glorification; therefore, let him pay him himself. When a servant was necessary, he (Dr. Tanner) did not begrudge that servant a salary. Every public servant, even the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary himself, had money coming to him in a legitimate manner. The right hon. Gentleman, of course, had to be paid just like a housemaid or a cook. He did not grudge the money to the right hon. Gentleman, but he did grudge the money which it was proposed to pay under this Bill. He did protest against the right hon. Gentleman being generous
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    before he was just. He objected to the right hon. Gentleman putting his hand into the public purse in order to subsidize his private satellite. The proposal in the Bill was absolutely unfair, and would not commend itself, he felt sure, even to a number of hon. Gentlemen opposite. Many hon. Gentlemen would say that, even as a matter of common sense, it was desirable that the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary should pay the occupant of the new Office out of his own pocket, or, at any rate, that he should be paid by the Dad Lieutenant. If the right hon. Gentleman did not feel himself called upon to pay this £1,200 a-year, then let the amount be given out of the salary of the Lord Lieutenant. The right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary had stated to-night that the Lord Lieutenant always spent double the salary he received—which was £20,000 a-year—during his term of Office. Well, as far as he (Dr. Tanner) was aware of the facts in connection with the expenditure of most of the Tory Lord Lieutenants of Ireland, he could assure the Committee that they always tried to do things in the cheapest possible way. In the case of the present Lord Lieutenant, every penny he could spend out of Ireland he spent in that way, and that had been the case with all Lord Lieutenants in recent times, with the exception, perhaps, of Lord Spencer. Instead of spending their money, and £20,000 a-year in addition, they tried to save all they could. Why did the Lord Lieutenant spend £20,000 a-year in addition to his income?
    An hon. MEMBER: What does he spend it on?
    DR. TANNER: Yes; what did he spend it on? If the present Lord Lieutenant spent that amount, it was on bookmakers and on promoting the game of cricket. It was all very well to try to cram those innuendoes, those chimerical ideas of the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary, down the throats of the English public and of Gentlemen who sat in that House; but anyone who was at all acquainted with the facts as they existed in the City of Dublin was perfectly aware that those ideas existed only and totally in the brain of the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary. Again, he must regret that hon.

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    Gentlemen on the opposite side of the House, who went in for preaching economy, were not in the House at that moment. He very much regretted that the noble Lord the Member for South Paddington (Lord Randolph Churchill), who had tried to keep down expenditure in connection with the great spending Departments of the State, was not in his place. The right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary had said that the amount in dispute was only a small amount—was only a little affair; and that reminded him (Dr. Tanner) of the story in Midshipman Easy, where the baby was stated to be only a little one, and being a little one it had to be accepted as it was given. As was the case with the baby in Midshipman Easy, this Vote was illegitimate, and the fact of its being a little one did not render it any the more acceptable. The moneys which were at present provided by Parliament ought to be amply sufficient for the government of Ireland. If the charge proposed in the present Bill were admitted, they would simply be creating a precedent for the establishment of further posts, and a precedent for converting unpaid posts, into which the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary placed his personal friends, into paid offices. He regarded this proposal not only as the creation of a sinecure for the enjoyment of a Member on the opposite side of the House, but an attempt, by patronage and bribery, to corrupt a nation which had always defied the insidious attempts made upon them by Gentlemen in the position of the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary. [Laughter.] The right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary laughed that dulcet laugh which was peculiar to him. It was always refreshing to hear that laugh; but he would remind the right hon. Gentleman that this was no laughing matter. It would be no laughing matter to the right hon. Gentleman if he had to put his hand into his own pocket in order to pay his subordinate out of it. The right hon. Gentleman himself was paid practically for laughing at the country which he had, to a very large extent, to administer. But the subject under discussion was no laughing matter. If the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet (Colonel King-Harman) was to be paid by private individuals, or was
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    to be paid in any shape except out of the public purse, there would be no objection raised either to the creation of the post or to the payment of the individual; but what was objected to was the method by which it was proposed that the Under Secretary should be paid. With brute force, the Government could do anything, no doubt. The right hon. Gentleman might laugh, and might be able to gain his point, no doubt; but still, if the Government insisted upon doing this insensate thing, it was the duty of the Irish Members to point out that they were doing what was wrong and unjust, though the act would be thoroughly characteristic of the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary.
    MR. ILLINGWORTHsaid, that having listened to the debate so far as it had gone, he could not help thinking that this was a most gross job that was being attempted by the Government, and he was extremely glad to think that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Great Grimsby (Mr. Heneage) had found a limit beyond which he would not go in sanctioning the perpetration of a job. It looked to him (Mr. Illingworth) like a case where a post had been made for a man—not a man found for a post. Although they were precluded, by the stage they had arrived at on the Bill, from saying whether the payment was necessary or not, if it were necessary they might ask who was to be relieved of the duties that the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet was going to discharge? It could not be contended that the Lord Lieutenant would be relieved from any of the onerous duties which pressed upon him, and he hardly thought that when the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet returned they would find him doing much work as a Local Government Commissioner in Ireland; and he looked upon the suggestion made by the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary as hardly credible—that was, that after the passing of this Bill there would, in the course of time, be a Commissioner the less in Ireland, and that the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet, the Assistant Under Secretary, would be expected to do some work in that direction. They had been reminded by the right hon. Gentleman

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    the Member for Newcastle-upon-Tyne (Mr. John Morley) that provision was made that the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet should not be over-burdened with duties in that direction. Provision was made in the Bill that when one of the Commissioners of the Local Government Board retired a successor would not be appointed, and there were words in italics in the Bill which showed that it would be open to fill the place rather than make some extraordinary proposal for the discharge of the duties by the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet in the future. He (Mr. Illingworth) should like to ask this question—whether the duties of the Office of Chief Secretary were at this moment heavier than they had been under such Chief Secretaries as the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Newcastle-upon-Tyne and his late lamented Friend and Colleague, Mr. Forster? The right hon. Gentleman man the present Chief Secretary would hardly say that the duties of his Office were more onerous than they were at the time those Gentlemen held the Office. The right hon. Gentleman did not deny that Ireland saw very little of his presence in discharge of the peculiar duties that belonged to the Chief Secretaryship. It might be that for personal reasons the right hon. Gentleman was entitled to some consideration. It might be that being a Scotchman, and knowing very little of Ireland, and not liking Ireland or the Irish, it was desirable to relieve himself as much as possible from the disagreeable duties inseparable from his Office; but, if that were so, a case was clearly made out by that admission for the right hon Gentleman sharing his salary with the person who was going to share his duties and to relieve him from a great deal of that which was so disagreeable. Certainly, no case had been made out for casting such a charge as this on the whole country. There was a cry for economy in fashion in the country at this moment, and the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary himself had been obliged to admit that the present method of governing Ireland could not go on for very long—that there must be a change before long, even involving the reconstitution of the Lord Lieutenancy of that country, and the right hon. Gentleman had hinted
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    that that change would bring about with it a social revolution, if the right hon. Gentleman's words could be so qualified. Well, if that were the case, he (Mr. Illingworth) thought they had a right to expect that during the short time the present state of things existed—the present doomed order of things—the right hon. Gentleman might himself have been content to continue in discharge of the whole of the duties of his Office. It was one of those things which they were ordinarily called upon in the House of Commons to resent—that there should be a new prominent appointment made at the time when it was admitted that the whole system of which that appointment was a part was about to undergo a thorough reconstruction. On this principle it was clearly their duty to resist the present proposal, when it was admitted that the system of government in Ireland was in a state of transition. It seemed to him (Mr. Illingworth), as he had already said, that the Office had been made for the man, and that the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet had received this appointment as a sop, because, in the course of certain relationships, certain misfortunes had happened to him in connection with Ireland. The right hon. and gallant Gentleman had been banished from Ireland as a Representative, and forced to take refuge in another country; and, forsooth, for that reason, they had the right hon. Gentleman who held the principal Office under the Lord Lieutenant as a Scotchman proposing that he should be assisted by another Gentleman who had been banished by his countrymen, and was about the most unpopular man in the whole of Ireland. All this, no doubt, would be as a cap thrown against the wind; but there was certainly evidence in the House on that (the Opposition) side to a spirit of fair play in dealing with Irish questions. He congratulated the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Great Grimsby upon the manly stand he had taken against the proposal made by the Government, and he trusted that the country would recognize that this proposal of the Government was a job from first to last, looked at in any aspect—either regarded as a personal matter so far as the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for

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    the Isle of Thanet was concerned, or as an attempt to give relief to the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary. There was no justification whatever for this attempt to burden the country with increased expenditure, and he trusted that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Great Grimsby would not be singular amongst his political Friends in voting against the Bill.
    MR. T. M. HEALYsaid, there was one thing he had expected in the course of this debate, and that was that they should be told by the right hon. Gentleman the chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant (Mr. A. J. Balfour) how he would define the difference between his own Office and that of the new Parliamentary Under Secretary. He (Mr. T. M. Healy) thought the Committee had a right to be told, in view of the fact that the right hon. Gentleman's own salary was £4,500 a-year, with residence, and that it was proposed to give the new Under Secretary £1,200 a-year, what the work of each Department would be respectively As to the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet (Colonel King Harman) being a member of the Local Government Board in Ireland, he (Mr. T. M. Healy) submitted that the right hon. and gallant Gentleman would be unable to attend to the duties, owing to the necessities of his Parliamentary functions. As matter of fact, it would appear as if the right hon. and gallant Gentleman tin Member for the Isle of Thanet was simply intended to stand at the whipping post for his right hon. Colleague. At any rate, the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary should give them soup statement as to his opinion of the work the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thane would have to do in connection with the Irish Local Government Board Supposing that in the future a question should arise, and the Irish Member might wish to lay their finger upon certain blot in the Irish Administration how would they be able to make the Irish Parliamentary Under Secretary responsible for certain alleged evils, connection with the Local Government Board of Ireland, and then how would they be able to discriminate between the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant
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    and the Parliamentary Under Secretary, and to say the Chief Secretary was responsible for this and the Under Secretary was responsible for that?
    THE CHAIRMANsaid, he desired to point out that the subject under discussion was not the necessity for the Office, but whether the money should be paid out of funds already provided by Parliament, or whether a fresh sum should be voted.
    MR. T. M. HEALYsaid, he bowed to the Chairman's ruling; but he submitted that on the question of the description of work for which the salary had to be paid would, to some extent, depend the view they took as to the manner in which the payment should be made. If they did not consider how the work was to be done in settling the payment, the salary might just as well be paid to the occupant of the new position out of consideration for his personal beauty, or for some other reason apart from his ability to do the work.
    THE CHAIRMANsaid, the Question was whether Parliament should vote this money for the salary, or take it out of sums already voted.
    MR. T. M. HEALYsaid, that was so, and what he was trying to point out was this—that supposing it was endeavoured to subtract the salary from that of the Chief Secretary, was that endeavour to be resisted on the ground of the amount of work the Chief Secretary had to do, and in the performance of which it was necessary for him to have an assistant? Would the right hon. Gentleman give the House a guarantee that his own personal attention would be directed to Irish affairs, and that the simple duty of reading answers would be entrusted to the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet? The right hon. Gentleman would, of course, be anxious that a scandal should not be perpetrated in Ireland. If the right hon. Gentleman was to decide everything, then they might be disposed to agree to the extra salary; but he was bound to submit that if they were to be left solely at the mercy of the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet—if to him was to be entrusted the real work of the government of Ireland—then the Government were not entitled to ask for payment of the additional salary out of the public purse, and it

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    was only fair to assert that one salary for the Office was adequate. He would ask the Government to tell the House exactly in what manner the work of the Office would be allotted, and then they would be in possession of the means of judging the reasonableness of the proposal.
    MR. A. J. BALFOURsaid, the hon. and learned Gentleman (Mr. T. M. Healy) had asked how it was proposed to apportion the duties. The only possible answer was the one that was given in all similar cases. It was impossible to lay down beforehand exactly what duties should be done by the Chief and what should fall to the share of the subordinates of the Department. But the responsibility rested solely on the Chief, and no responsibility would fall on the shoulders of the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet, any more than it fell on the shoulders of any other Under Secretary. The Chief Secretary for Ireland, the First Lord of the Admiralty, the Home Secretary, and the Secretary of State for War, were alike responsible for the administration of their respective Departments; but it was impossible to convey to the House exactly what work was to be done by the Head of a Department, and what was to be done by his subordinates. The matter would be arranged between the right hon. and gallant Gentleman and himself; but he could assure his hon. and learned Friend that the responsibility would rest solely with him as the Head of the Department.
    MR. T. M. HEALYsaid, he would like to ask the right hon. Gentleman a personal question. Let them take, for instance, the question of the appointment of Land Commissioners and of Resident Magistrates. Was the House to understand that the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet was to have the power to make these appointments? That was a matter on which the Irish Representatives were very sensitive. For his (Mr. T. M. Healy's) own part, he did not care very much about the right hon. and gallant Gentleman giving the answers to certain Questions. Of course, there were Questions of a purely administrative character, such, for instance, as that of National Education, which did not concern Irish policy. He could very well understand
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    such minor questions of detail being dealt with by an Under Secretary; but it was with regard to higher questions affecting the administrative policy—the appointments of Resident Magistrates and of Sub-Commissioners—that anxiety was felt. Was the right hon. and gallant Gentleman to continue to sit on the Privy Council, as he had done within the last six months with regard to a Bill rejected by that House which he supported, but which the Chief Justice of Ireland very properly scouted out of Court? Was he to be able to attend and act in that manner, and to speak with the responsibility of Her Majesty's Government? Surely the House was entitled to some fuller explanation?
    MR. A. J. BALFOURasked, what case was the hon. and learned Gentleman alluding to?
    MR. T. M. HEALY: The Claremorris Tramway case?
    MR. A. J. BALFOURsaid, the right hon. and gallant Gentleman was the spokesman of the Government on that occasion. His right hon. and gallant Friend would not occupy a position different from that held by any other Under Secretary. It was a position perfectly well understood in that House. The responsibility would rest with him (Mr. A. J. Balfour) entirely.
    MR. MAURICE HEALYsaid, he thought the House was pretty much in the same position now as prior to the right hon. Gentleman having volunteered his explanation, for they were still in the dark as to what duties would be performed by the Under Secretary. The principle of the Amendment before the House, as he understood it, was that the right hon. Gentleman, who had the privilege of calling the tune, should have the obligation of paying the piper; and the object of the Amendment was to provide that, instead of the salary of the Under Secretary coming out of the pockets of the ratepayers, it should be paid by the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary himself, or, at any rate, by the officials who were to be relieved by the new appointment. The question had been raised whether the salary should be paid by the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary or by the Lord Lieutenant. He (Mr. Maurice Healy) confessed that to him it was a matter of absolute indifference, and the decision

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    was one which he was prepared, with the utmost confidence, to leave in the hands of Her Majesty's Government. No doubt, the salary of the Lord Lieutenant was of such a nature as, perhaps, to allow of such a paring down; but, perhaps, on the other hand, the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary would experience such relief that it would only be fair that he should pay for the assistance he was to receive. But, as he (Mr. Maurice Healy) had said before, that was a matter as to which they were absolutely indifferent. All they asked was that the salary should not come out of the pocket of the general taxpayer. Up to the present, no answer had been given to the arguments on which the Amendment was founded; nothing had been advanced to show that the business falling to the lot of the right hon. Gentleman opposite had so increased in amount as to render necessary the appointment of an assistant, and he could only urge that, when proposals of that kind were made, they should be made with full information as to the effect. It would, he thought, be very interesting if they could have a Return showing the amount of work now falling to the lot of the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary as compared with what was done by his Predecessors. It would be interesting to have a Return, showing how many times the right hon. Gentleman had crossed the Irish Channel as compared with his Predecessors; but there did not seem to be any disposition on the part of the Government to supply hon. Members with information on which they might safely make up their minds on this question. It had pleased the Government on this, as on many other occasions, to throw the Bill on the Table of the House, and endeavour to pass it by the brute force of their majority. They did not condescend to give to the House anything which could reasonably be considered a justification for the course they had taken. The only sort of defence which had been made for this job—for such it might very properly be called—was that it would add very slightly to the burdens of the taxpayer. The right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary for Ireland had tried to make out that it would only add £300 a-year to the burdens of the taxpayer. But the device resorted to in order to bring
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    about such a result made the Bill ten times more offensive than it otherwise would be. It was ridiculous to suggest that the new official who was to be appointed specially to do Parliamentary work in the House of Commons, who was, in the words of the Bill, "Parliamentary Under Secretary," would be in a position to do anything in the nature of serious work at the Irish Local Government Board. The right hon. Gentleman told them the other day, in a moment of frankness, that the Irish Local Government Board never met. If that was so, it would be very easy for the Parliamentary Under Secretary to do the work of supervising the Local Government Board. If all the work of the Board was done by the Secretary and under officials the Parliamentary Under Secretary would, no doubt, be able to discharge the duties of a member of the Board in an admirable manner. But if there were any serious duties to perform, it was idle to suggest that they could be efficiently performed by any person appointed for the purpose of doing Parliamentary work. For all these reasons, he contended that the Amendment before the Committee was a most proper Amendment. It was most cheering to find there was a point beyond which Liberal Unionism would not stretch. He trusted the Committee would find that the Member of the Liberal Unionist Party who had ventured to differ, to some extent, from the policy of Her Majesty's Government would not be left in the Division Lobby severely alone by his Colleagues.
    MR. STAVELEY HILLsaid, that the Bill was one for the regulation of the Office of Parliamentary Under Secretary. The Under Secretary was to be paid a salary, and the question which was raised by the Amendment of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Great Grimsby (Mr. Heneage) was whether the salary should be an additional burden upon the resources of the country. The first question which always arose when they were creating an additional office was whether the additional office was required. Therefore, they ought to have it made out most clearly by the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary for Ireland (Mr. A. J. Balfour) that there was a necessity for this Office. Had any such

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    necessity been proved? It had not been proved by anything that had arisen in the House. It had not been proved by anything that had arisen out-of-doors. He had been very glad, indeed, to find the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet (Colonel King-Harman) standing up with that courage and pluck that so distinguished him to answer Questions which it might have been troublesome for the Chief Secretary to answer. He had been glad to find the somewhat irrelevant Questions put by hon. Gentlemen below the Gangway opposite for the purpose of troubling the Chief Secretary answered in a blunt, able way by the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet; and to that extent he had recognized the advantage of having a butt, so to speak, between the Chief Secretary and hon. Gentlemen below the Gangway opposite. To that extent the right hon. and gallant Gentleman had been useful, and to that extent he was deserving of the thanks of the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary. To that extent hon. Members sitting upon the Government side of the House ought to be thankful to the right hon. and gallant Gentleman. Most sorry they were that the right hon. and gallant Gentleman was absent now, and that, in consequence of illness, he was unable to defend himself against any aspersions which might be made upon him. But that was no reason why they, the Members of the House of Commons, should vote him the salary proposed. He wanted to hear from his right hon. Friend the Chief Secretary for Ireland a much better reason than had as yet been given why they should vote the salary proposed. He certainly should not vote that this salary should be paid to the right hon. and gallant Gentleman, unless they heard from the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary some better reason than had been given up to now for the creation of the Office—some better reason than had been given why some of the work which the country paid him for doing should be thrown upon the right hon. and gallant Gentleman, for which he should be paid a salary of £1,500 a-year.
    MR. WADDYsaid, it seemed to him a somewhat invidious thing to appoint a ser-
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    vant, and then to refuse to pay him. If that were really the state of things, he should have no difficulty whatever in voting against the Amendment of his right hon. Friend (Mr. Heneage). But he thought they did not pay quite sufficient attention to the fact that this thing had been put upon them by slow—he was almost going to say crafty—degrees. In the first instance the appointment of the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet (Colonel King-Harman) to the post which he now held was one that was very seriously questioned on the Opposition side of the House in April of last year. The Government were asked whether the appointment was not one which in the natural order of things would cause the right hon. and gallant Gentleman to seek re-election at the hands of his constituents, and it was said—"Oh, no: certainly not." Why not? The right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary for Ireland would remember that he explained that the fact that the right hon. and gallant Gentleman would not need to seek re-election arose from the circumstance that he was not to receive any salary. What did they find? They found that as the result of this nice little arrangement the right hon. and gallant Gentleman was to continue Under Secretary with a salary, and escape the test of merit—re-election by his constituents. He did not think that was an ordinary case of the House appointing a man to a post, and then being called upon to pay him; and it was because it did not appear to him that that matter had been conducted quite in accordance with precedent, and—if he might say good-humouredly—quite upon candid lines, that he thought they were justified in voting for the Amendment.
    MR. T. P. GILLsaid, he would like to hear from the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary (Mr. A. J. Balfour) whether any limitation was to be put upon the tenure of Office by the right hon. and gallant Gentleman, because there was nothing in the Bill, so far as he could make out, to prevent the appointment being a permanent one. The present Government might go out of Office the day after the right hon. and gallant Gentleman commenced to receive his salary: was there to be anything inserted in the Bill to provide that the right hon. and gallant Gentleman should

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    quit Office at the same time? Further-more, he would like to know whether it was necessary that the holder of the Office of Parliamentary Under Secretary should be a Member of the House of Commons? Suppose Parties changed sides, was it to be possible for the right hon. and gallant Gentleman to sit upon the Opposition side of the House and hold his Office? He (Mr. T. P. Gill) did not think there could be two opinions in the House, especially after the speech of the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for the Kingswinford Division of Staffordshire (Mr. Staveley Hill), upon the question whether the salary of the Under Secretary could or ought to be provided out of moneys already granted for the Chief Secretary and the Lord Lieutenant. The whole House seemed to be agreed that, whatever might be said as to the necessity for this Office, the question of increasing the burdens of the taxpayer in order to pay a salary to the incumbent of the Office was one which could not willingly be entertained. Nothing could be said in defence of such a proposition. £24,500 was now paid in the shape of salaries to two Members of the Irish Government, and many of the duties discharged by those officials were to be discharged by the holder of the new Office. The very least which might be expected was that the salary of £500 for the Under Secretary should be paid out of the £24,500 now paid to the Chief Secretary and the Lord Lieutenant. The right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary could not deny that the impression—speaking broadly—which was originally left on the minds of hon. Members was that no burden would be placed on the taxpayer by the creation of this Office. He could very well understand the right hon. Gentleman setting up as a defence an explanation of his original statement that, although the new Office was to be a salaried one, it was not to be a salaried one in the sense that the taxpayer was to pay the burden. But the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary did nothing of the kind. Before they proceeded further, they ought, at least, to be satisfied as to the permanency or otherwise of the Office which the Bill created.
    THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY (Mr. W. H. SMITH)said, he hoped that the
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    Committee would now think it right to come to a decision. The Amendment had been discussed for two hours and a half, and he was sure the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Great Grimsby (Mr. Heneage) would agree with him that sufficient time had been occupied upon a question which was, at all events, limited in its scope. He, therefore, claimed to move, "That the Question be now put."
    Question put accordingly, "That the Question be now put."
    The Committee divided:—Ayes 190; Noes 145: Majority 45.—(Div. List, No. 107.)
    Question put, "That the words 'to be' stand part of the Clause."
    The Committee divided:—Ayes 191; Noes 183: Majority 8.—(Div. List, No. 108.)
    MR. ARTHUR O'CONNORsaid, he wished to move an Amendment which was not on the Paper, and of which he would give a few words of explanation. The Amendment in the name of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Great Grimsby (Mr. Heneage) had reference to the salaries of the Lord Lieutenant and the Chief Secretary; but those salaries were provided from two sources. The salary of the Lord Lieutenant was taken from the Consolidated Fund, and that of the Chief Secretary only was voted in the Estimates. What he proposed to do was to insert before the word "provided" the word "annually," in order to secure that the question of this payment to the Parliamentary Under Secretary should annually come under the review of the House of Commons. This would secure that the money to be paid to the Under Secretary should come in the Estimates for the Chief Secretary's Office every year. Obviously this was a reasonable and necessary proposal in view of the fact that though the Bill was one regulating the Office of Parliamentary Under Secretary they had, as had been pointed out by the hon. Member for South Louth (Mr. T. P. Gill), had no guarantee that the holder of the salary would even for the most part of his time be a Member of the House at all. The Bill as drafted contemplated the Parliamentary Under Secretary as being a person who was not a Member of the

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    House, for in the 1st section the words were—
    "The Office of Parliamentary Under Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant shall not render the person holding the same incapable of being elected."
    So that holding the Office was considered as antecedent to his election. The official might, therefore, be a person not a Member of the House. What guarantee had they that not being a Member of the House he would not continue to hold this nominally Parliamentary appointment? As the hon. Member for South Louth had gone on to point out, there was no guarantee furnished in this Bill that although appointed nominally as Parliamentary Under Secretary the official appointed might not continue to hold the post, whether in that House or out of it, for the remainder of his natural life. Under those circumstances, it was reasonable that they should ask that the Vote for the Office should be annually submitted for revision at the hands of the House. He was afraid that if this provision were made according to the suggestion of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Great Grimsby, and the money provided by Parliament or to be provided hereafter from the Estimates was to be taken as sufficient for the purpose, they had no guarantee at all that the sum needed would be drawn from the salary of the Chief Secretary or anyone higher in Office. Everyone acquainted with the Civil Service was aware of this fact—that if it was desired to give any extra allowance or extra salary it was always possible to obtain the needful funds for the purpose, net by reducing the salary of any high-placed official, but by squeezing the lower ranks in the Office. They might very easily in this way get out of the Vote for the Chief Secretary's Office £1,000 or £2,000 a-year without in any way trenching on the salaries of the higher officials. Unfortunately they had no guarantee that if they provided £1,500 a-year out of the Vote for the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the member for the Isle of Thanet (Colonel King-Harman) they would in any way diminish the inflated salaries of any of the higher officials of the Department, because he was sure that those who had the management of the Office would be able to scrape out of the salaries of
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    writers and Lower Division clerks as much as would pay this demand. There was always ample margin amongst those small officials for the payment of such a salary as this. Therefore, it was absolutely necessary that this Bill should not only create the Office and provide for the payment of the occupant, but that the holder of the post and the conditions under which he held his Office should be brought from time to time under the consideration of the House, and the only way of doing that was by including the Vote in the annual Estimate. He proposed, therefore, to meet the need he had indicated by inserting before the word "provided," at the beginning of line 8, the word "annually."
    Amendment proposed, in page 1, line 8, after the word "provided," insert the word "annually."—(Mr. Arthur O' Connor.)
    Question proposed, "That the word 'annually' be there inserted."
    MR. A. J. BALFOURsaid, he entirely agreed in the view of the hon. Gentleman that this salary should be subject to annual revision by Parliament, and there was nothing in the Bill, as at present framed, which precluded such a course being taken. At present the salary of every Minister, every Secretary, and every Under Secretary was in the Votes, and he agreed that the salary of the Under Secretary in this case should be no exception to the rule; but the Amendment of the hon. Member opposite was entirely unnecessary. The hon. Member's object was already amply carried out.
    MR. T. M. HEALYsaid, he might, perhaps, point out that by refusing to accept the Amendment the Government were letting the cat out of the bag, because if they would turn to the next page of the Bill, they would find that, although the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet (Colonel King-Harman) might not be in the House, he might still be a member of the Irish Local Government Board, and that the Bill practically gave him a life appointment whether he was in the House or not. The Parliamentary Under Secretary for the time would, by virtue of his Office, be a member of the Local Government Board of Ireland, and then they had it that when a

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    vacancy occurred in the Local Government Board no other person was to be put in it. In other words, the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet would become the holder of a life appointment on the Irish Local Government Board. [Cries of "No, no!"] Well, if that was not so, why did not the Government make it clear? Supposing the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet did not care to become President of the Irish Local Government Board, the House conferred the position upon him whether he liked it or not, and what was there to compel the right hon. and gallant Gentleman to resign the Office when he had obtained it? Nothing whatever. He might say—"I hold my Office during good be-haviour as other Members of the Board hold theirs." A new Lord Lieutenant might discharge—as he might do—Mr. George Morris or Sir Henry Robinson, both of whom held office during pleasure. It would be a monstrous thing if Mr. George Morris were to be turned out by an incoming Lord Lieutenant, and no doubt the case of the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet would be looked upon in the same light. What was to prevent the Government, when the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet was put into this post, saying—"We have given him a life appointment in this Bill." What was the proof of that? Why, that Parliament with its eyes open, and knowing that there were three distinct members of the Local Government Board for Ireland appointed for life—or during pleasure—had replaced one of them by the Irish Under Secretary; and, as nothing at present compelled Sir William Kaye to go out of office with the Government, what would compel the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member of the Isle of Thanet to do so? Supposing the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet, on a change of Government taking place, were to put his foot down and say—"I will not go out." If, then, an incoming Government were to turn him out, the Tory Party would come down to the House and make a great noise, declaring that the right hon. and gallant Gentleman had been turned out at the instance of the Nationalist Party
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    because he was a landlord and had resisted their claims to Home Rule, and notwithstanding the fact that he had been appointed for life. He (Mr. T. M. Healy) submitted that, at any rate so long as the right hon. and gallant Gentleman remained a Member of the House of Commons, he could continue to hold this office under the Local Government Board of Ireland; and, that being so, the inclusion of this word "annual," as proposed by his hon. Friend, became a very important matter. The salary might be put upon the Consolidated Fund, and the House might have no opportunity of debating the arrangements of the office. The proposal of his hon. Friend the Member for East Donegal (Mr. Arthur O'Connor) had a backing of reasons to it; and, that being so, why did not the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary agree to the proposal? What harm could it do? The right hon. Gentleman could have no objection to it, unless there was something lurking under his refusal. It was admitted that the word could do no harm; then why not accept it? Looking at the fact that the Government had only carried the salary of the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet by eight votes, and even then only under pressure of the clôture, it was not unreasonable that the Government should give at least this guarantee. The Government should bear in mind that they had only just, by the skin of their Liberal Unionist teeth, been able to carry the proposal for this salary.
    MR. A. J. BALFOURsaid, he had thoroughly explained to the House that a Vote must be taken by Parliament for this salary, and that, therefore, this Amendment was unnecessary. If, under these circumstances, the Irish Members persisted in their demand, Heaven forbid that he should oppose their wishes. If they desired to put in a word wholly superfluous, and which was not put in other Acts of this kind creating offices of this description, he should offer no further objection. Of course, it had always been his desire to treat Ireland in the same way as England had been treated.
    Question put, and agreed to; word inserted.
    MR. J. E. ELLISsaid, in rising to move the next

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    Amendment which stood in his name—that was to say, in line 13 of Clause 1, to leave out all after "voting" to the end of the clause, he was raising what he conceived to be an important Constitutional question, and he should consider it his duty to take the opinion of the Committee upon the proposal. The object of the words the omission of which he proposed was, of course, to relieve the person appointed to this Office from the necessity of presenting himself before his constituents for their verdict on his conduct since his election to the House. This question was first raised, he believed, by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Wolverhampton (Mr. Henry H. Fowler) on the 15th of April last year. On that occasion the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Newcastle-upon-Tyne (Mr. John Morley) asked a Question, with regard to the right hon. and gallant Gentleman who was appointed to this Office (Colonel King-Harman), and he received a reply from the right hon. Gentleman the First Lord of the Treasury (Mr. W. H. Smith) to which he (Mr. J. E. Ellis) would not further allude. After the right hon. Gentleman the First Lord of the Treasury had sat down, the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Wolverhampton also asked the hon. and learned Attorney General for England (Sir Richard Webster) whether his attention had been called to the Act of 41 Geo. III., which dealt with this point. He (Mr. J. E. Ellis) mentioned this because he was well aware that on this question of vacating seats on the acceptance of Office there was in some quarters a disposition to think that it was unnecessary, and he believed that the second reading of a Bill rendering it no longer necessary was moved in that House quite recently. Well, he (Mr. J. E. Ellis) was one of those, he confessed, whom it would take stronger arguments than he had yet heard in that House or elsewhere to induce to support a Bill taking away from any constituency the right of passing a verdict on a Member of the House on accepting Office. But the hon. and learned Attorney General, on the occasion to which he had referred, used some language to which he ventured to recall the attention of the House. The hon. and learned Gentleman pointed out to the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Wol-
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    verhampton, alluding to this particular Act of Parliament, that it expressly recognized the possibility of appointments being made by the Lord Lieutenant, but only vacated seats or rendered gentlemen ineligible to sit in the House if they held Office of profit under the Lord Lieutenant. Now, that was precisely the point which arose under the present Bill. Here was a Bill creating an Office of profit under the Lord Lieutenant, and he ventured to ask why they should pass an Act of Parliament taking away from the constituency represented by the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet the right which they possessed under the Act of George III. of passing their verdict upon his conduct in accepting Office? The Government were always talking to the House about the Act of Union. Well, he would remind those who so freely mentioned the Act of Union that this very Act of 41 Geo. III. was passed, as the Preamble stated, in order to carry out the Act of Union. Now, with regard to the reply of the right hon. Gentleman the First Lord of the Treasury, his right hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle-upon-Tyne had used a very strong expression the other day. The right hon. Gentleman the First Lord of the Treasury had told them on the 15th of April what was equal to saying that no salary was attached to the Office of Parliamentary Under Secretary; but they had been told by the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant that, at the very moment the right hon. Gentleman the First Lord of the Treasury was using these words, the Government were intending to bring in a Bill to give a salary to the recipient of the Office. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Newcastle-upon-Tyne had used the expression that the conduct of the Government on that occasion and on the introduction of this Bill, and the whole circumstances attending it, were neither more nor less than an equivocal manœuvre. In that term he (Mr. J. E. Ellis) ventured to include the assertion which was made at that time as to the non-vacation of the seat. Unless it was not in the mind of the Government at that time to introduce an exception in the case of the Parliamentary Under Secretary to the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland from the

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    operation of the Statute of 41 Geo. III., he could not look upon their conduct at that time as other than an unworthy manœuvre, and wanting in strict frankness. He would leave the precise interpretation of the Act of Parliament in the hands of those who were sometimes called learned Gentlemen. His ground of objection to the Bill divided itself into three heads. He ventured to assert, without fear of contradiction, that the authority of that House of Commons depended upon the fidelity of its Members to the pledges they gave to those whom they asked to vote for them. He remembered perfectly well that an hon. Member—when the Liberal Party was sitting on the other side of the House in 1886—(Mr. Edward Leatham), who then represented the borough of Huddersfield, got up and said he did not represent his constituents, and did not say what they wished him to say, but that he was speaking exactly contrary to their desires, and that, therefore, he was speaking in a most disinterested manner, because he knew he was going to lose his seat—[Cries of "Order!"] Some hon. Members called him to Order, but he maintained that the subject of an hon. Member going against the wishes of his constituents was clearly germane to the point at issue, as he desired that the Parliamentary Under Secretary should be compelled to go before his constituents in order to receive their approval of his conduct on his accepting Office. Possibly his words were rather an unpleasant reminder to some hon. Members opposite who probably contemplated the loss of their seats through the loss of confidence of their constituents. The clover and versatile politician who sat on the Front Opposition Bench—he referred to the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham (Mr. J. Chamberlain)—had used a very curious expression the other night, which he (Mr. J. E. Ellis) had taken down at the time, and which he thought would be remembered. The right hon. Gentleman had spoken of those who "had to submit to the annoyance of public election." He (Mr. J. E. Ellis) could quite understand that in the General Election coming there might be some annoyance to those who—like the right hon. Gentleman the Member for West Birmingham, the noble Lord the Member for the Rossen-
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    dale Division of Lancashire (the Marquess of Hartington) and others—sat on that (the Opposition) side of the House. He could quite understand the term as applied to those hon. Gentleman; but, speaking generally, he did not believe there would be much difference from him in his view of the subject. The occupants of the Benches opposite would not differ from him when he said that hon. Members came to that House to represent the views of their constituents, and that their fidelity to their election pledges was the best way in which they could carry into effect the representative principle of government. Apart from the general question, surely the moment chosen for attempting to deprive the electors of the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet of the right they would otherwise have to pass judgment upon their Representative was a most unfortunate one. In spite of every effort of hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite to make things appear the contrary, they knew that the great controversy before the country just now was the Irish Question. They knew the pledges which had been given by the supporters of the Government—and he trusted he might not be interrupted by cries of Order when he mentioned one striking illustration. They knew how one noble Lord, a Member of that House, had placarded his constituency with "Vote for Weymouth and no Coercion." He was justified in asking if that pledge had been kept. [Cries of "Question!"] He understood that interruption. Hon. Members opposite did not like the allusion, and he would, therefore, pass to the third point. If they searched the House of Commons through, they would not be able to find a person who had departed more from his election pledges—he would defy them to find a better illustration of that political virtue than the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet. What had the right hon. and gallant Gentleman said to his constituents on the 30th of June, 1886? He used this language. He said—
    "If I am returned to Parliament I shall use my best endeavours to insure that equal law and equal justice shall be administered in Ireland and England."
    That was what the right hon. and gallant Gentleman had told the electors, and he

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    (Mr. J. E. Ellis) asked the House not to deprive the electors of the Isle of Thanet of their power of passing judgment as to whether his pledges had been kept or not. Equal law and equal justice in Ireland and England! Why, the debate which took place earlier in the evening gave the lie to that assertion——
    THE CHAIRMAN: Order, order!
    MR. J. E. ELLIS: I beg pardon if I have used an un-Parliamentary expression—I would say a contradiction.
    THE CHAIRMAN: That cannot be relevant to the subject under discussion.
    MR. J. E. ELLISsaid, he stood corrected, and begged to apologize for having strayed. He said again that the promise contained in these words that equal justice should be done to Ireland and England had not been fulfilled by the right hon. and gallant Gentleman. He (Mr. J. E. Ellis) would, as he had said, be no party to depriving the electors of the Isle of Thanet of this opportunity of passing judgment upon their Member. He did not suppose for a single moment that the constituents of the right hon. and gallant Gentleman would endorse the view that the Opposition took as against the Government on these matters; but the responsibility, if they had to reelect the right hon. and gallant Gentleman, would be with them. He contended that they should not be deprived of the opportunity they would have under the Act of Parliament which he had mentioned—not under the Act of Queen Anne, but under that to which he had referred—of expressing their opinion of their Representative; and he, therefore, begged to move the Amendment that stood in his name.
    Amendment proposed, in page 1, line 13, to leave out all the words after the word "voting" to the end of the Clause.—(Mr. J. E. Ellis.)
    Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Clause."
    MR. A. J. BALFOURsaid, he did not catch the full relevance of the whole of the observations of the hon. Member; but he thought he could give him an answer which he would see deserved the consideration of the Committee. He (Mr. A. J. Balfour) did not propose to discuss the merits of the existing rule, which required that Ministers should be re-elected on being
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    selected to Office, which some hon. Members considered a very wise provision, but which he himself thought rather belonged to the by-gone traditions of Parliament. The whole of the Bill was in absolute conformity with all recent legislation in the House with all regard to subordinate positions. Every Under Secretary, he believed, took Office without his being required to seek re-election, and there was no reason that he could see why the Parliamentary Under Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland should be placed in a different category from every other Under Secretary. The hon. Member for the Rushcliffe Division of Nottingham (Mr. J. E. Ellis) had argued against the Bill as if it had reference solely to the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet. ["Hear, hear."]Well he had never heard a Bill avowedly argued on the ground of the character of the person who it was proposed should be the first occupant of the position it was designed to create. He was the more surprised to hear hon. Gentlemen opposite taking up the position they did with regard to the Bill when they were so fond of telling the Government that their tenure of Office was to be so short. Surely, if they were right, the matter was hardly worth much consideration. Parliament not long ago constituted the Office of Secretary to the Board of Trade—it was in 1867. That Act provided, exactly as the present Bill provided, that the Member appointed to the Office should not vacate his seat on the acceptance of that Office, and should be eligible, if not a Member, for election. The First Commissioner of Works did vacate his seat upon his being appointed; but when the Act was passed it especially exempted the first holder of the Office, so that they had an unbroken precedent in regard to recent appointments.
    MR. ANDERSONinterrupting, said, he wished to ask whether in any other cases Under Secretaries had been appointed first without salaries?
    THE CHAIRMAN: These interruptions are extremely irregular.
    MR. A. J. BALFOURsaid, the Government were acting in this matter in strict accordance with Parliamentary precedent in excepting the first Parliamentary Under Secretary from the

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    necessity of re-election, putting him into the same position as the Surveyor General of the Ordnance, the Financial Secretary to the Treasury, the Financial Secretary to the War Office, the Secretary to the Board of Trade, the Secretary to the Admiralty, and the four Under Secretaries. Under these circumstances, he hoped the House would see the absurdity of making a special exemption in the case of his right hon. and gallant Friend the Member for the Isle of Thanet.
    MR. JOHN MORLEYsaid, he quite agreed with the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary for Ireland in his statement of what he (Mr. John Morley) had gathered to be the right hon. Gentleman's own view of the prevailing policy in recent times, and, no doubt, the tendency in the House during recent years had been to limit and not to increase the number of Offices the acceptance of which necessitated an appeal to the constituency; but they must remember that the whole circumstances connected with the Bill were exceptional and peculiar. The right hon. Gentleman had complained that so much criticism on the clauses of the Bill, and on the second reading, had turned upon the qualification and position of the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet. But what was the reason for that? There was a perfectly good reason for it, and it was this—that the right hon. and gallant Gentleman was put into some sort of position—he did not know whether to call it an office or what to call it—which was only now being regularized; and it was on that account, if he might say so, that such strong objection was taken to the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet being appointed to the position without being required to seek re-election at the hands of his constituents. The Parliamentary Under Secretary was created first, and the Office was now being created, and that was the reason why there was so much criticism bearing upon the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet, and why his hon. Friend the Member for the Rushcliffe Division of Nottingham (Mr. J. E. Ellis) was perfectly justified, in bringing forward his Amendment, in referring to the Election pledges of the
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    right hon. and gallant Gentleman. He (Mr. John Morley), however, did not wish to dwell upon that aspect of the question. All he had to say was that, though he agreed with the right hon. Gentle man the Chief Secretary in his general view as to re-election not being necessary on the acceptance of those subordinate offices, yet the conditions under which the particular subordinate office in question was first introduced last year—and he did not wish to repeat any of the harsh words he used—were such, and there was so much that was peculiar in the creation of the Office, that while, he agreed in the view of the Government as to the general policy in the matter on this occasion, he felt bound to support the Amendment of his hon. Friend.
    MR. ANDERSONsaid, he had been very sorry to interrupt the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary just now; but he had desired to ask—as the right hon. Gentleman had stated certain case or precedents in the creation of these Offices which this Bill was said to follow—the right hon. Gentleman to point out to the Committee one case which could be fairly taken as a precedent Could the right hon. Gentleman find a precedent in the whole legislation of this country where an Under Secretary; had been appointed with a salary, and, where it had been stated that he was not to have a salary, but where, subsequently, when it was found convenient to avoid an election, came forward and legalized their appointment with a Bill of this kind? There was no such precedent, and therefore it was that he ventured to put a question to the right hon. Gentleman whilst he was speaking. He had asked him if he could point out any thing of the kind? It had been positively asserted on both sides of the House that hon. Members opposite, as well as hon. Members on the Opposition Benches, had come to the conclusion that this appointment from beginning to end was not to be defended, and that the more they looked into it, and attempted to justify it, the worse it became. As the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary had said, they were bound to bring forward precedents in a case of this kind; but when the right hon. Gentleman referred to the precedents they entirely failed him. What he (Mr. Anderson) said was this, and he said it advisedly,

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    that the House had been entirely taken in as to this appointment from the beginning. They were asked to sanction the appointment, in the first place, on the ground that it did not come within the Act of Parliament, and was not an Office of profit. The matter was then passed over; but now it seems that it was an Office of profit, and that there were provisions in the Bill the object of which was to avoid the necessity for a re-election. He hoped the Amendment would be pressed to a Division, as it would emphasize the strong feeling which he believed to exist on both sides of the House, and which he was sure existed in the country, against this appointment.
    MR. W. E. GLADSTONEsaid, he wished to state the grounds upon which he should support the Amendment of his hon. Friend the Member for the Rushcliffe Division of Nottingham (Mr. T. E. Ellis), and he also wished to refer to the arguments made use of by the right hon. Gentleman the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant. The right hon. Gentleman said, and said truly, that there had been a good deal of legislation of late years in this direction. Various Offices had been constituted, in each of which the holders had not been made subject to the condition of re-election. That was perfectly true, and the right hon. Gentleman had taken the opportunity of expressing an opinion which he entertained, that it was a very doubtful policy which made the vacation of a seat a necessary condition of the acceptance of Office. He (Mr. W. E. Gladstone) knew that that opinion had obtained great currency in the House; but he must say that he did not share it, as he thought it was an important item of popular control that persons taking Office under the Crown should in general be subject to re-election. There had undoubtedly been, in his time, a great relaxation of the rule which was originally too rigid. When he first entered Parliament the rule was not only that a person should be subject to re-election on taking Office, but that he should be also subject to re-election on any change of Office. He remembered perfectly well himself being the Vice President of the Board of Trade half-a-century ago, and that on his becoming President of the Board of Trade, a question was sub-
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    mitted to the Law Officers of the Crown to ascertain whether the fact of a Member becoming a President of the Board of Trade instead of a Vice President of the Board of Trade did not constitute the taking of a new Office in such a sense as to render re-election necessary. But what he wished to call the attention of the House to was this, that when the right hon. Gentleman said that precedents were in favour of releasing this new Office from the condition of re-election that might happen to be true; but there was another question to be considered—namely, whether it was wise to go on increasing indefinitely the number of those Offices not subject to re-election? There had been a considerable increase in those Offices. He could not be quite certain, but his belief was, that 40 years ago there had been no more than six or seven of these Offices in the House, and now they numbered about 10, and the right hon. Gentleman proposed to add another. He must say he was very much disinclined to add to the number of those Offices which could be taken without re-election. He had no desire to restrain or narrow the influence enjoyed by the Government in this House which was exerted through its official Members, but he thought it was quite a fit subject for careful consideration whether they should increase the number of Offices which could be accepted without re-election. He was much disinclined to agree with the proposition on this ground; but he was bound to say that he should vote with the hon. Gentleman who moved the Amendment, on a ground altogether apart from the mere question of the creation of this Office, and that was the ground that the appointment so completely and pre-eminently realized the highest idea of what might be called a Parliamentary job. This was an Office which was absolutely unnecessary. No Department less required its hands strengthening by the multiplication of Offices than the Irish Department; and the old and sound principle of every right-minded Government always was that when at any particular time there was particular pressure upon a certain Department, it should be provided for by calling in the aid of some less occupied Member of the Government. That was a sound and good principle, and ought always to be adhered to. The creation of the Office was most unnecessary; and,

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    having regard to that and to the unfortunate and deplorable choice of the man who was to fill it, he must decline to be a party to asking the House to afford any facility either for the taking or the holding of the Office.
    MR. T. M. HEALYrose to Order. He asked whether the right hon. Gentleman who was about to move the Closure could make a speech in advance, or whether he should not confine himself to that Motion?
    THE CHAIRMANhaving called upon the First Lord of the Treasury,
    MR. W. H. SMITH: Mr. Courtney, the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Mid Lothian (Mr. W. E. Gladstone) has thought it right to express his opinion that the Office sought to be created by this Bill is totally unnecessary. I should have thought that the right hon. Gentleman's knowledge of Irish Administration would have led him to take precisely the opposite view. With the greatest courtesy, I wish to remark that a want of knowledge of the actual details of Irish Administration, and the necessity which exists for intelligent supervision in that Department, is not such as might be expected from a right hon. Gentleman of such distinguished position in public life. But, Sir, apart from that altogether, I may say that the Government would not have proposed the Office if they had not felt it necessary for the good administration of Irish affairs. We felt it to be necessary for that purpose, and it is with that conviction that we press it upon the House. I entirely agree with what has fallen from the right hon. Gentleman as to the creation of Offices held by Members of this House which are to have immunity from re-election, and the Government has shown how desirous they are of lessening, rather than increasing, the number of Members of the Government holding Offices subject to re-election by having this year suppressed two paid Offices—namely, that of Judge Advocate General and that of the Surveyor General of Ordnance, which have ceased to be Offices of profit under the Crown. I mention that fact, to show that the Government are as anxious as the right hon. Gentleman himself has been, not to provide salaries for Officers who are not really necessary to the service of the country, and not to provide immunity
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    from re-election unless such immunity is also necessary. I trust the Committee will now come to a decision on a question which, I venture to think, has been sufficiently discussed.
    SIR GEORGE TREVELYAN: The right hon. Gentleman the First Lord of the Treasury has started the whole question as to whether this Office is or is not necessary. He appears to forget, however, that the present Chief Secretary for Ireland has two assistants whom I never had, and whom no Gentleman who preceded the Chief Secretary ever had—namely, the Closure and the 12 o'clock Rule.
    An hon. MEMBER rose to Order. He asked whether the remarks of the right hon. Gentleman were not more appropriate to the Motion for the second reading?
    THE CHAIRMANsaid, the remarks of the right hon. Gentleman were, no doubt, somewhat divergent at the moment; but he would probably apply them to the question before the Committee.
    SIR GEORGE TREVELYAN: I could not allow the right hon. Gentleman, having such enormous weight in the discussion as the First Lord of the Treasury, to close this very important debate with the expression that this Office is called for by the extra work on the shoulders of the Chief Secretary for Ireland; and I can only say, once for all, that the work of the Irish Chief Secretary in the old days would not have been too much for one man to do before 12 o'clock. I should have been ashamed to ask for assistance in that work, although, from my own experience, I know that the work which came on after 12 o'clock was the hardest, and might have fairly required the attention of two men. If ever there was a post to which we should apply the old rule of appealing to the country as to whether a Gentleman, not at present in the service of the Crown, should take that service, it is this post of the Assistant Irish Secretary. It is absolutely impossible to separate this appointment from the right hon. and gallant Gentleman who is going to take it, and I maintain the appointment of that right hon. and gallant Gentleman is a most serious step, out of the many serious steps which the Government have taken with regard to Ireland. I certainly would

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    not refrain from voting for the Amendment, which means that one of the constituencies of the country shall be able to say whether, at this crisis of affairs in Ireland, the Irish people should have any share in their own administration, or whether they should have none. [Cries of "Question!"] That is the question. It is whether a constituency is to be debarred from being able to say whether or not it wishes to have a right hon. and gallant Gentleman second in command in Ireland, who is not neutral or impartial, but in sympathy with the governing minority of the people.
    MR. T. M. HEALYsaid, he had to congratulate the First Lord of the Treasury on having made a speech without moving the Closure.
    Question put.
    The Committee divided:—Ayes 230; Noes 191: Majority 39.—(Div. List, No. 109.)
    MR. CONYBEAREsaid, he had some confidence in rising to move the Amendment which stood in his name by reason of the remarkably diminished Government majority which they had witnessed that evening, and the fact that the first Division resulting in so small a majority had induced the Chief Secretary for Ireland to give way upon another Amendment. Those circumstances induced him to hope that the Government might see the reasonableness of the proposal which he was about to lay before them. It would be observed that the Amendment referred to two points. He proposed, first of all, that the salary to be given to the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for the Isle of Thanet Division of Kent (Colonel King-Harman) should, in no case, exceed £500 a-year; and, in the second place, he proposed that this salary should not commence until the end of the present Session. Those two proposals appeared to him to be justified by all that had gone before in the history of the Bill. He did not propose to detain the Committee with a detailed reference to the circumstances; but he thought that they showed the undesirability, in the first instance, of providing a salary for the right hon. and gallant Gentleman; and, in the second place, the importance of seeing that he was not paid for his services during the past
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    year. The remarks which had just passed between the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the House and the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the Bridgeton Division of Glasgow (Sir George Trevelyan) had shown very clearly what had been proved over and over again—namely, that there was no absolute necessity for the post which the Government were seeking to create. He thought, under the circumstances, that he would be justified in proposing that the salary of the person to be provided with this post should, at any rate, be proportioned to the work he was likely to have to do, which was nil. But it might be held to be somewhat severe, if it would not be trifling with the Committee, if one were to make a proposal of that sort. He believed, however, that it would be possible to say that, in proposing that the salary should be £500 a-year, they were dealing very liberally with the right hon. and gallant Gentleman. He considered that they were dealing with him far too liberally; but hon. Gentlemen on those Benches were inclined to take a somewhat generous view of the matter, because they knew that the Gentleman to be provided by the House with a salary was a broken-down rack-renter. [Cries of "Name!"] Had the Government not sent him to South Africa because he was broken down? [Cries of "Name!"] It might, perhaps, be that the right hon. and gallant Gentleman was sent out there because he had tried to break down the Government. It appeared to him distinctly, if he might judge from what he knew, that in the County of Roscommon, at Boyle, there was a deliberate attempt on the part of the Government to set up Humpty Dumpty on the wall again, and if only for that reason he should be inclined to protest, as far as possible, against voting any salary to the right hon. and gallant Gentleman. But what were the services for which the right hon. and gallant Gentleman was to be paid? He was not aware that the right hon. and gallant Gentleman was good as a shorthand clerk, and as a very skilful shorthand clerk could be obtained for the payment of 20 s. or 40 s. a-week, if he were skilful in that respect £100 would be ample for him as clerk to the Chief Secretary for Ireland. But if they could not discover that his qualifications lay in that direc-

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    tion, were they to pay him £1,500 a-year for answering Questions in that House which the Chief Secretary for Ireland was too indolent to reply to? [Cries of "Order!"] If it was not on that account, he wanted to know on what ground they were asked to pay this money? When he considered the possibilities pointed out by the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition, which made the appointment almost the most mischievous which could be conceived, he felt that they ought not to assume that the services of the right hon. and gallant Gentleman were worth £500 a year, but rather that they should be willing to pay £5,000 to get rid of him altogether. There had been no reason stated for the appointment, except that he was in need of the salary proposed to be provided to help him out of his difficulties; and that he believed was the sole object with which this provision was being made.
    It being Midnight, the Chairman left the Chair to report Progress.
    Committee to sit again To-morrow.
    MR. W. H. SMITHsaid, he would fix 2 o'clock to-morrow for the consideration of the Bill to be resumed.
    MR. T. M. HEALYsaid, he must submit that the proposal of the First Lord of the Treasury to continue the discussion at 2 o'clock to-morrow was Opposed Business which, under the Standing Order, could not now be taken. The Standing Order of the 24th February, 1888, provided that, unless the House should otherwise order, the House should meet on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays, at 3 o'clock. The Order of the House would be required to meet at 2 o'clock, and as that was in the nature of Opposed Business it was manifestly impossible that the House could meet at that hour.
    MR. W. H. SMITHsaid, he ventured to submit that the preponderance of voices would give the House this power to fix the hour.
    SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTsaid, that this was an extraordinary proposition on the part of the right hon. Gentleman. It seemed to him that all the laws and practice of the House of Commons were to be set aside by the right hon. Gentleman's ipse dixit. He had heard over and over again questions of Morning Sittings discussed, and Divi-
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    sions had been taken upon them, and he asked by what right was that Rule to be abrogated? What was the history of this question, and how had it arisen? By the Government wasting the time of the House.
    MR. DEPUTY SPEAKERsaid, that the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. W. H. Smith), in referring to the question of a preponderance of voices, alluded to the New Rule, which provided for the fixing of Business at the time of Business being suspended. That Rule provided—
    "That the Business then under consideration and any Business subsequently appointed shall be appointed for the next day on which the House shall sit, unless the Speaker ascertains by a preponderance of voices that a majority of the House desires that such Business shall be deferred until a later day."
    He must, therefore, point out, that the preponderance of voices could only prevail to defer business to a later day, not to take it at an earlier hour.

  IMPERIAL DEFENCE [EXPENSES] COMMITTEE.
  Order for Committee read.
  THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY (Mr. W. H. SMITH)said, this Order would be taken at 2 o'clock to-morrow.
  MR. T. M. HEALYsaid, that the objection to the last proposal applied to this also.
  MR. W. H. SMITH: Sir, I beg to give Notice that, at 3 o'clock, I shall move that this Business be taken before the other Orders of the Day.
  An hon. MEMBER: We shall oppose it.
  MR. T. M. HEALYsaid, he had no desire whatever to object to the Imperial Defence Bill being taken. His only objection was to a Morning Sitting.
  Committee deferred till To-morrow.

  EMPLOYERS' LIABILITY FOR INJU- RIES TO WORKMEN BILL.— [BILL 145.]
  (Mr. Secretary Matthews, Mr. Attorney General, Mr. Ritchie, Mr. Forwood.)
  EMPLOYERS' LIABILITY FOR INJU- RIES TO WORKMEN BILL.— [BILL 145.]

    SECOND READING.
    Order for Second Reading read.
    THE FIRST LORD OF THE TREASURY (Mr. W. H. SMITH): It is possible that we

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    may be obliged to postpone the Bill on Thursday, in order to take other Business.
    SIR WILLIAM HARCOURT: Are we to understand that the Employers' Liability for Injuries to Workmen Bill, in which the English people are interested, is to be sacrificed to the Bill for the Under Secretary for Ireland?
    MR. W. H. SMITH: I must point out that if it is delayed, it will be owing to the factious opposition of hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite.
    MR. CONYBEAREasked whether it was in Order for the right hon. Gentleman to charge Gentlemen on that side of the House with factious opposition?
    [No reply.]
    Second Reading deferred till Thursday.

  NATIONAL DEBT (SUPPLEMENTAL) BILL.
  On Motion of Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer, Bill to make certain Amendments in the Law consequential on the passing of "The National Debt (Conversion) Act, 1888," ordered to be brought in by Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer, Mr. William Henry Smith, and Mr. Jackson.
  Bill presented, and read the first time. [Bill 264.]
  House adjourned at a quarter after Twelve o'clock.