Mr. HORNER (for Mr. Fetherstonhaugh)asked whether Mr. Thomas Montague, recently appointed a justice of the peace for county Tyrone by the Lord Chancellor of Ireland, was in October last arrested by the police at Beragh on a charge of being drunk in charge of a horse and cart, was detained in the police lock-up, and subsequently prosecuted and fined at Sixmilecross Petty Sessions for the offence; who recommended Mr. Montague as a suitable person to be appointed a justice of the peace; was the Lord Chancellor made aware of the recent conviction; and is Sixmilecross Petty Sessions, at which he was convicted, one of the courts in which he is to act as a justice?
§ Mr. BIRRELLThe Lord Chancellor informs me that he was not aware at the time of Mr. Montague's appointment that 258 I he had been charged with insobriety, but it appears from inquiries now made that he was fined as stated in the question. Mr. Montague's attendance at Petty Sessions is limited to Ballygawley. The Lord Chancellor does not consider it desirable to make a practice of stating the sources from which applications for appointment to the Magistracy have reached him in individual cases other than those recommended to him by the Lieutenant of the county.