Lord Torrington, in presenting a petition from four hundred and fifty owners and occupiers of land in the neighbourhood of Tunbridge, complaining of agricultural distress, and praying for a repeal of the duties on Malt and Beer, observed that he could assure their Lordships, that the distress in the neighbourhood of that district, which was emphatically called the Garden of Kent, was so great that nothing could exceed it. He himself resided in the parish of Mereworth, and he would, as a specimen of the distress which prevailed in that county, describe to them the condition of that parish. The number of acres it contained was two thousand two hundred, of which one thousand were very poor land. The rental of the parish was 1,668l. The poor-rates, church-rates, and highway-rates, for the last year, were 1,251l. The poor-rates on the tithes were 372l., making a total charge 581 of 1,623l.,—a sum very little inferior to the rental out of which it was to be paid. The population of the parish consisted of seven hundred and fifty-five persons. The number of paupers resident in the parish, who received relief, was three hundred and twenty-three; the number of paupers resident out of the parish, but having claims on it, was one hundred and thirty-three. The severe weather of the present winter had cast thirty additional families on the parish, thus making an addition of ninety persons to the list of paupers, none of whom had ever before applied for relief. The inhabitants were paying before 15s. 6d. in the pound for poor-rates, and this addition would of course bring a heavier charge upon them.