Lords Sitting of 3 July 1854

MINUTES.
PUBLIC BILLS.—2a Customs Duties (Sugar and Spirits); Excise Duties (Sugar); Warwick Assizes.
3a Gaming-Houses.
Royal Assent—Excise Duties; Customs Duties; High Treason (Ireland).

OFFICE OF THE SECRETARY OF WAR— THE FOREIGN OFFICE.
THE EARL OF MALMESBURYsaid, that according to the notice which he had

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given, he wished to call the attention of the noble Earl at the head of Her Majesty's Government, to a few remarks that he was desirous of making with respect to a rumour which he had heard, and believed was generally prevalent, to the effect that the new Secretary of War, with his staff, was about to be put into the office now occupied by the Inclosure Commissioners in Whitehall Gardens. Of course it was necessary that the new Secretary of State should have every facility afforded him, and all proper room given to him, so as to be enabled to transact the very important duties connected with his office without inconvenience; but he thought he should be able to show that a great sacrifice of public interest would be made if such a change as that which this rumour reported as contemplated should really be carried out and effected; and he hoped that the noble Earl at the head of Her Majesty's Government would satisfy himself as to the correctness of his remarks by taking an opportunity personally to inspect the office of the Inclosure Commissioners and the documents that were there kept. This office was one of the most useful and most efficiently managed and arranged of our great public offices, and it contained within its walls upwards of 50,000 documents of the greatest value, and, among other papers, had about 20,000 tithe maps, all of which had been drawn up at the office of the Inclosure Commissioners, and were in every way carefully arranged, and correct even to the most minute particulars. Any of their Lordships might visit that office when they pleased, and in a few minutes could see, for a shilling, any of these maps, and for fifteen shillings could have any one of the maps traced, and thus obtain for a trifling sum what they could not in many instances otherwise obtain, except at a cost of 70 l. or 80 l. There were also most important documents in the office of the Inclosure Commissioners respecting the exchanges which had taken place under the Inclosure Act, the operations under which were now very simple and moderate—as a proof of which he could mention that in many cases the average expense of the office fees for the exchange of an estate amounted only to something like 4l. The Inclosure Act had, in fact, proved such a boon to the public generally that he should be sorry to see its operation in any way interfered with or disturbed. There was another department of the building which the Inclosure Commissioners occupied that was set apart
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and made use of solely for the custody of original documents; and these documents were now so arranged that they could be at once inspected by applying at the office, and this at a very small and comparatively trifling expense. There were also other papers of great public importance, with respect to drainage and other matters connected with the Inclosure Act, which it had taken many months to arrange in their present excellent order—an order which could not be too highly commended, particularly as it was equally distributed throughout every department of the office. For these reasons lie had heard with great regret the rumour that the new War Office was to be established in the building now occupied by the Inclosure Commissioners, and that the Inclosure Commissioners were to be turned out and put into a house in St. James's Square. In that case, all the documents to which he had referred would have to be moved out from the places where they were now deposited and so well arranged, and would have to be stored again m some new place, and be again arranged. Putting aside the trouble and inconvenience of moving them, it was to be remembered that, while the operation was taking place, it would be absolutely impossible that the public business could be carried on as usual, and it would be impossible for the public to make use of the documents in the office in the same way as they did now, at least for some considerable time; so that very great inconvenience would be felt in every way, and business of great importance checked and interfered with. It would be at least a year or eighteen months before any new office could be properly fitted up for the Inclosure Commissioners, and before the documents could be put in order and arranged. He wished also to suggest to the noble Earl at the head of Her Majesty's Government that, if any such change was really in contemplation, the greatest care should be taken that a place of safety and security was selected for the disposal and custody of these documents—an advantage which the present building so thoroughly possessed. If this were simply a question as to Whitehall Gardens or St. James's Square, there was little doubt that it would be much less inconvenient to send the new Secretary of State to St. James's Square than to remove the Inclosure Commissioners from their present house; and he believed the greatest mischief would follow if an endeavour was made to pull to

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pieces, by interfering with it, this important office, which it had taken so much time to arrange in proper order, and to make it in every way so thoroughly efficient as it undoubtedly was. Taking, therefore, into consideration that the public would be prevented, for at least a year and a half or two years, from having access to the documents of this office, and from all advantage of referring to them, he considered that he was not asking too much when he requested the noble Earl opposite to consider the subject again, and also to make every inquiry to ascertain whether it would not be possible to find proper accommodation for the new Secretary of State without causing so much inconvenience as this removal of the Inclosure Commissioners would occasion. He (the Earl of Malmesbury) had no desire to trespass upon their Lordships' time at any great length, but while he was upon this subject he would take the opportunity of alluding to another matter which he considered might not improperly be brought before their Lordships' attention at the present time. He wished the noble Earl would state whether the Government intended to do anything with respect to repairing or rebuilding the Foreign-office. Their Lordships well knew that it was dreadfully out of repair. He had never seen anything worse than it had been for some years past. The roof looked as if it might fall at any moment, and certainly he must say that the building was not only an eyesore, but a positive disgrace to the Government and the country. Parliament in its generosity had, or supposed that it had, given to the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, the First Lord of the Treasure, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and the First Lord of the Admiralty a house to live in and carry on their business. But such was not the case. Formerly, indeed, the Foreign Secretary had resided there, but that had not been since the days of Canning. In those days the business of the office did not exceed some 7,000 or 8,000 despatches per annum. Now, owing to its great increase, they amounted to 33,000 in a year. This, of course, necessitated an increase of clerks, and, in fact, the office was so filled and occupied that it could not be inhabited by the Secretary of State. That inconvenience, however, though great, being a personal one to the Secretary of State, he should not dwell upon. The duties of the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs were in a cer-
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tain way more onerous than those of any other Minister, except the Prime Minister. Other Ministers, whether hospitably inclined or not, were not positively obliged to go through a great quantity of receptions and entertainments, which the Foreign Secretary was compelled to do, and ought to do if he performed his duty. Their Lordships might remember some observations which fell from Lord Palmerston when he was examined before the Committee of the House of Commons upon this subject, and he thought they would agree with the noble Lord when he said that the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs carried on almost as much business by conversation with Foreign Ministers in society as he did in Ids own room. What was the state of the Foreign-office now within its walls? There was only one room in which the Minister could receive company. The diplomatic corps alone amounted to upwards of 100 persons. He was at times obliged to invite distinguished foreign, and even Royal visitors; and it certainly was, he thought, the least that could be expected of this country that they should provide such a place of reception as other countries and other Governments possessed, when those illustrious persons honoured the Secretary of State with their presence. That office was in such a ruinous state that he recollected that two years ago the ceiling of the room in which the Secretary of State sat fell in. It could not be better now that it was two years older. The only room that was fit for receptions was, as his noble Friend opposite knew perfectly well, so unsafe that if he gave a party it was obliged to be propped up, or none of his friends would dare to go near the place. It was regularly propped up upon those occasions, and, in order to prop it up and to make those provisions which were necessary for safety whenever the Secretary of State gave a party, the whole office was unhinged. The two Under Secretaries were obliged to turn out of their rooms, and a great many other functionaries were compelled to do the same thing. The large room in which the private secretaries sat must be rearranged, and the whole office was turned upside down, because there Was absolutely in that office no place where the Secretary of State could receive company, unless he turned out all official persons. Even then, he could not give a dinner at his office, because, as his noble Friend opposite must

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be aware, there was no kitchen. Really, considering the generosity of this country and the liberality of Parliament in all our public works, and in the treatment of public functionaries generally, he thought it was very disgraceful that the Foreign-office should remain in its present state, an eyesore to passers-by and a discredit in the estimation of foreigners to the Government and the service. He should be extremely glad to hear that a new Foreign-office was about to be built, large enough to accommodate the staff of the office, and to provide for the safe keeping of its important documents; and he should be very glad, whatever salary Parliament might attach to the office of Secretary of State, that they should, in respect to their residence, be placed upon a footing similar to that adopted abroad, and have an hotel in which they should find everything necessary for them belonging to the public, and which, when they quitted, they should leave to their successors in the same state as when they had entered.
THE EARL OF ABERDEENsaid, that when it was found expedient to separate the office of Secretary of State for the War Department from that for the Colonies, it of course became necessary to find some convenient position in which the duties of the new office should be carried on. Their Lordships would easily conceive that it was of great importance that the office of the Secretary of War should be in the immediate neighbourhood of Downing Street and the Horse Guards. There were only two buildings which could comply with that condition—the building called Gwydyr House, and that in which the Inclosure Commissioners carried on their business. Gwydyr House was occupied by the Poor Law Commission, which was in constant communication with the Home Office; and, as the Chief Commissioner was in the House of Commons, and the business was very much connected with the House of Commons, it would have been extremely inconvenient to remove that office to any distance. With the Inclosure Commissioners there was not the same inconvenience. They had no constant communication with any other office or with the House of Commons, and it was thought that they might, without any material disadvantage, be removed to a house which they themselves had strongly pressed on the Board of Works as peculiarly suitable for them in St. James's Square. Of course any
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removal must be attended, more or less, with evils. He had not himself seen it, but he had no doubt that the description given by the noble Earl of the manner in which all those documents which he had described were arranged in the Inclosure Office was perfectly accurate. At the same time he could not believe that he was correct in supposing that it would require two years to rearrange those documents in a proper manner. He should have thought that two months would be more likely than two years. It was a mechanical operation which certainly could be performed, with care, without any very great injury to the documents, and with no danger whatever. However that might be, he believed that the matter had been very fully considered by the Treasury, and he should doubt if there would be any such inconvenience as the noble Earl had pointed out, more particularly when it was recollected that the building which was appropriated to the Inclosure Commissioners was the very one which they themselves had chosen before they were removed from Somerset House as peculiarly applicable for their office. He would, however, inquire more minutely into the amount of inconvenience and difficulty, and if the noble Earl's surmise should prove to be correct, he would see what alteration could be made in the arrangements. With respect to the other subject which had been referred to by the noble Earl, he must say that he had been but too accurate in the description which he had given of it. The state of the Foreign-office of this country was disgraceful, and even dangerous, as he well knew from experience many years ago. Of course, notwithstanding the annual inspection which it underwent by competent persons, with the view not to repair, but to ascertain its safety, it must become worse instead of better. The rents and settlements in the building were really quite alarming to look at. At the same time, although this was a subject which had engaged the attention of various Governments, he could not say that Her Majesty's Government were prepared to propose to Parliament at this moment any plans or any grant for a new building. Plans were in course of preparation for a new building, and they possibly might be completed in the course of the summer; but he was not prepared to say that the Government were now in a position to propose to Parliament the necessary grant for the purpose of carrying out those plans.

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He hoped, however, before the noble Earl came into office again, that the place would be quite fit for his reception.
THE EARL OF ELLENBOROGHsaid, notwithstanding the picture which his noble Friend has drawn of the dangerous condition of the Foreign-office, it had lasted as long as the Treaty of Adrianople. He doubted, however, whether either would last for twenty-five years longer. They had been told last year that they were to expect a great triumph of diplomacy, and he had ventured at that time to say that, if diplomacy should, indeed, secure the continuance of peace, he should think better of it than he had ever done before. Nothing, however, had occurred hitherto to improve the opinion which, during a long course of years, he had entertained with respect to the efficacy of pure diplomacy. But this he thought perfectly clear, that if diplomacy should achieve the triumph which had been predicted, and secure the tranquillisation of Europe, some building like that which had been referred to by the noble Earl should be erected in order to enable the Foreign Secretary to celebrate that triumph, and to entertain the hundred guests who had been alluded to by his noble Friend. But, in the meantime, lie confessed that he concurred in the opinion which he understood to have been expressed by the noble Earl opposite (the Earl of Aberdeen), that it would be very improper to spend a large sum of money—it could not be less, he presumed, than 70,000 l. or 80,000 l.—in building a magnificent house for the accommodation of the Foreign-office at a time when they required the whole of their available income for the purpose of terminating the war. He could not help thinking, with all respect to the noble Earl, that that sum expended in war would be much more serviceable than the same sum expended in diplomacy, or in any purposes which might make diplomacy more brilliant. At the same time he entirely concurred with the noble Earl near him (the Earl of Malmesbury) in the objection which he had taken to the removal of the Inclosure Commissioners. It appeared to him to entail a great public inconvenience, at the same time that he saw no necessity for its removal. He must say that he thought a house in St. James's Square, or upon Carlton House Terrace, or any decent gentleman's house in that neighbourhood, would be entirely adequate to all the re-
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quirements of the Secretary for the War Department, and of that branch of the public service over which the Secretary for the War Department was to preside. But there was another question besides that of the house in which he was to be located, and that was by whom he was to be assisted. He had ventured sense weeks ago—before the separation of the War and Colonial Departments had been determined on—to suggest that what the new Secretary would require would be a military staff, and not a staff of civil clerks. The men who would be really useful to bins would be military men—men who had seen service in different parts of the world, and in the various arms of which the service was composed—cavalry, infantry, artillery, and engineers—and who would be able to bring some recent experience to the assistance or the chiefs of the office. He thought this of the more importance, because he was quite sure that as long as our Constitution practically required that the officer at the head of that department should be a civilian, it was essential to his efficient control of the military departments under him that he should be assisted by military men of weight and authority in the country. If he should not be assisted by their advice—if he should not have the weight and authority which he would derive from the facility of constantly communicating with them—not as a Board, not as his equals, but as persons bound to advise him, and responsible for the advice which they would be bound to give—he was perfectly satisfied that all the advantages which the country expected to derive from the severance of the two offices would not be obtained. He had been desirous of saying something more in connection with the subject, but in the absence of the noble Duke (the Duke of Newcastle) he did not think it would be right to do so.
LORD REDESDALEhoped that nothing would be done in the way of building until some great design for laying out that portion of the metropolis in the vicinity of the Houses and of the Government offices was fairly considered, because it was impossible, when the building in which they were assembled should be finished in its full magnificence, that Parliament Street should remain in its present state. At present it really was not safe, owing to the narrowness both of the carriage way and footpaths. It was obvious, if anything were to be done to render the approach to the

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Houses what it ought to be, that Parliament Street must be widened, and the whole of the ground known as King Street, now covered with extremely inferior buildings, made to form part of that approach. Nothing could be more inconvenient than the extremely scattered state of the public departments of this country. The expense of enlarging, raising the roofs, and so on, was very great, and he believed that real economy would be found to consist in getting all the buildings together in that spot, which was unquestionably a most convenient one. This might be done by continuing the line of new Government offices in a straight direction, from the corner of Downing Street to Great George Street, and pulling down the block of houses upon the west side of Parliament Street. Unless they did that, the approach to the new Houses of Parliament would be very inferior to the Houses themselves.
LORD CAMPBELLsaid, that he understood there was a plan in contemplation; but he hoped, at all events, that the courts of law at Westminster would not be permitted to remain in their present state. Something must be done, if it were only for the sake of the Houses of Parliament, for they considerably obstructed the completion of Sir Charles Barry's great plan, and their removal had been always contemplated. But something must be done, also, for the sake of the decent administration of justice. He wanted no splendour, no luxury, but he did want what was essential for the accommodation of the witnesses and jurymen; for at present there was no accommodation either for witnesses, jurymen, or judges. As a sample of the present state of things, he might mention that within the last ten days three of his learned brethren sitting in the Bail Court—he was himself absent at the time, in the discharge of public duties elsewhere—had been in danger of their lives; for there was an invasion, not of the Russians, but of a stench that was sublime. Their Lordships were aware that Mr. Burke stated, in his Essay on the Sublime and Beautiful, that an intense stench was a source of the Sublime, and this, to which he was alluding, really was a sublime stench, for, so intense was it, that the Judges were obliged to fly from it as from an enemy seeking their destruction. If any of their Lordships would go there they would be the better qualified to form an opinion on the subject. It was sublime, but it was pestiferous. He,
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being chief of his court, was relieved from sitting there, but his learned brethren were obliged to go there very frequently, from day to day, and it really was absolutely necessary something should be done. From the situation he had the honour to occupy, he often came in contact with jurists from the different States of America, and he had been quite ashamed to show them where the sittings of our courts were held. Those persons had expressed their astonishment that, on coming to the mother-country, they had found the accommodation so very inferior, not only to that which was provided in New York, but to that which was to be found in other States of much less importance. He repeated that the Judges had no desire for luxury or for architectural ornament, but he did trust there would be a building provided, with something like proper accommodation and good ventilation, in which they might sit without danger to their lives.
LORD ST. LEONARDSsaid, accommodation might be found for the common law courts at Westminster, by locating the equity courts elsewhere, and transferring the common law courts to their rooms, without carrying out the scheme which he believed was contemplated in some guarters, but which Parliament had never sanctioned, for extending the new Houses of Parliament, at a very considerable expense, and eventually in closing Palace Yard.
THE LORD CHANCELLORsaid, the Judges of the Exchequer Chamber, having complained of the inconvenience of sitting in the Bail Court, had applied for leave to sit in the Court of Chancery, and permission had immediately been granted, and he understood that they had been sitting there.
THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNEsaid, it had always been in contemplation that the buildings in which the courts of law were held should not remain after the Houses of Parliament had been completed, although there was of course great difficulty as to the time and manner of making arrangements for their removal.
THE EARL OF MALMESBURYwished to remind the noble Earl at the head of the Government that the choice of the Inclosure Commissioners to which he referred scarcely answered his remonstrances, as it was made previously to the last removal. If the noble Earl would but take the trouble to see the Commissioners themselves, and make inquiry as to the proposed arrangements, he was sure he would be

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convinced that he was not exaggerating when he said that more than a year would be necessary to do over again all that would be undone, and there could be no doubt that in the meantime the business of the Commissioners would be very much impeded. With respect to the Foreign-office, which was now referred to the Greek kalends, all he would say was, that he feared lest some day it might come down and bury some Members of Her Majesty's Government in its ruins.
LORD BROUGHAMcould not allow the references which had been made to the new Houses of Parliament to pass without observing, that he and those who thought with him had not changed the opinions which they had formed from the commencement of these buildings. They were by no means converted by the great success which had attended the execution of the plan, for they still retained the same mental objection as ever to the barbarism of having erected a Gothic instead of a Grecian building in the middle of the nineteenth century.

THE COURT OF CHANCERY.
LORD ST. LEONARDSrose, pursuant to notice, to call the attention of the House to the present state of business in the Court of Chancery in the Masters' Offices, and to move for certain returns. In the course of a discussion some time since he had taken occasion to observe, in answer to seine strictures which had been made on the Court of Chancery, that he believed there was no court of justice in this country in which a decision could be obtained at an earlier period, or in which justice was more satisfactorily administered. This observation had led to a great deal of correspondence, and not a few persons had declared that there was no place in which greater delays took place than in the Court of Chancery. He had ascertained, however, that those complaints referred to the business in the old Masters' Offices; whereas his observations were especially addressed to the new state of things in the Court of Chancery, and he certainly had not in view the remaining matters in the old Masters' Offices. But, in consequence of communications made to him, he had been induced to look into that part of the subject, and to move for returns of all the matters which were depending in the Masters' Offices at the time he made the Motion. Those returns had been for some time upon their Lordships'
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table; but, although he had been very anxious to save the public the expense of printing them, he had found it impossible, upon full consideration, to do so, and they would therefore be before their Lordships in a printed form in the course of a few days. They contained a complete index to cases at present remaining in the offices of those Masters who had not yet been relieved of their duties, the state in which they were at the time when the returns were made, and various details relating to them; so that they would form, when published, a complete book of reference, and he believed that their publication would lead more than any other measure to the speedy winding up of these cases. Their Lordships would remember that the Act of Parliament which abolished the Masters in Chancery allowed them to wind up the matters which were then depending before them; and in order to bring the old system as nearly as possible into harmony with the new, it gave them as nearly as might be the same powers for this purpose as were given to the Vice Chancellors. It directed them at the same time to take certain steps by which the winding-up of the estates remaining in their offices Might be hastened, and, in the event of these steps not succeeding, to certify the fact to the Court. But the Act had, in this respect, either not worked well or had not been carried out. At the time the returns were made there remained in the Masters' Office, in round numbers, about 1,200 cases, many of which were very far from being ripe for final adjudication by the Court. This was undoubtedly a great evil, and it appeared to him to be absolutely necessary that there should be some strong measure in order to meet that evil, and to wind up these remaining cases, which were at once a clog and a reproach to the administration of justice. It reflected great credit on the Vice Chancellors that they had allowed some of the cases in the Masters' Offices to be transferred from the Masters to themselves in order to be worked out at chambers; but he confessed he thought there was great danger of the new system being obstructed in its working by the introduction of these old cases. The matters in the Masters' Offices were not matters which depended upon questions of legal construction; they were almost, without exception, matters of account and of inquiry, and of course the difficulty of taking such accounts and of prosecuting such inquiries was much

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greater after a delay of ten or twelve years than if they had been prosecuted with earnestness when they were originally directed. Rules of practice had been made under the authority of the Act to avoid all unnecessary delay and expense before the Court itself; and the Masters were directed, as far as they could, to adopt these new rules in their offices, and carry out the new system; but he had been often asked why there were two systems—why the old business already before the Masters was left there, subject to any of the old rules, while the new business was put on an entirely new footing? The answer was plain. The new system was worked out by means of communications between the Vice Chancellor and his clerk, who, it must be borne in mind, was a chief clerk, and nothing more. He should have been glad if the Masters also could have been put in communication with the Judges; but they had represented that they had accepted their offices on an entirely different footing; that they were judicial officers of old standing, and had never been accustomed to communicate in this way with the Court; and that, if they were compelled to do it, their consequence would be lowered and their position materially affected. He had felt the force of this argument so much that he had yielded to it, and the Masters were not required to enter into personal communication with the Judges. Great improvements had, however, been made in the Masters' Offices. Short reports had been substituted for long ones, and the result had been a great reduction of expense. But it appeared that there was an inveterate habit among suitors of delay in the Masters' Office; it was not easy to alter habits, and when a case had been lingering for six or eight years, to make parties suddenly active and compel them to bring it to a close. Therefore it was, the Masters told him, that, although they had endeavoured very earnestly to put the Act of Parliament in force, the delays were not much less than before. Looking at the reports of the Masters, they had the satisfaction of knowing they were dealing with public officers willing and anxious to execute the duties of their office. As the report of Master Tinney was the first returned to the House, he had gone through it and extracted a brief statement of the position in which matters before him stood. The noble and learned Lord proceeded to read a tabular statement prepared from the report of
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Master Tinney, giving the names of the causes, the date when reference was made, and how far the inquiry had advanced; from which it appeared that in charitable suits many had been fourteen years in the Master's Office and no scheme settled. Of suits for taking accounts, several had been in the Master's Office twelve years, and little done until forced on by the Master. Of administration suits there were instances of twenty-two years, seventeen years, and ten years having elapsed since the reference without any result. A remedy should be found to put an end to this state of affairs; and though he considered that the powers which they possessed would have enabled them to do a good deal more than had been done, still he thought that further powers should be given to the Masters to conclude these long-standing matters, and some additional aid afforded them to get through the business. As regarded the existing Courts, under the Vice Chancellors and the Master of the Rolls, a great delay in business was occasioned in the cases of passing accounts, as the clerk employed to look into and report on cases had also to pass accounts. In consequence of want of time to attend to them, these cases were not passed so regularly as they ought to be; he therefore proposed that a new officer attached to the Vice Chancellors and the Master of the Rolls should be appointed, whose duty should exclusively be to attend to the passing of accounts. If a particular officer were appointed whose duty it would be to investigate these cases, and to compel parties to account in due time, not only would much time be saved, but a great deal of money would be brought in which ought at once to find its way into the pockets of the suitors. The Masters had now 511 different causes in which accounts had to be passed; the time the passing of those accounts occupied prevented the preparing the necessary reports. If, as he proposed, a new officer were appointed, whose duty it should be exclusively to attend to the passing of accounts, he was convinced there would be not only great celerity in winding up cases, but a great deal of money would be brought in which ought to find its way into the pockets of the suitors. He hoped his noble and learned Friend the Lord Chancellor would agree in that suggestion. There were a good many cases which the Masters considered and treated as abandoned; but they had not been reported to the Court,

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or included in the return. He very much feared many of those cases would be revived; and he proposed that the Masters should certify all abandoned cases to the Court, so that they should be declared closed and finally disposed of. He thought, also, that power should be given to the Master to refer accounts to accountants. They had given that power to the new system, but not to the old system, and he thought it most desirable to extend it, so as to wind up many of those suits which had been standing still for eighteen or twenty years. A further delay was occasioned under the present mode of proceeding in conveyancing matters. Under the Acts recently passed, the Lord Chancellor had power to appoint a certain number of barristers as conveyancers of the Court, to whom reference was made of questions of title for their advice and settlement; and he proposed that the Masters should, when they required assistance, have the same power of referring matters to the conveyancers of the Court. It was not, indeed, clear that they did not already possess that power. He might observe that it was impossible that gentlemen who had been appointed conveyancers of the Court should retain that appointment unless they used that reasonable despatch which was consistent with the Act of Parliament, for, whether the delay was in the conveyancers' chambers, or in the chambers of the Judge, the mischief was the same. Then, he thought provision should be made for intricate matters of abatement and bankruptcy now before the Masters, which he explained. He proposed, further, to give a discretion to the Masters to admit accounts on such evidence as they might deem satisfactory, although not such as, in strictness, the Courts might require. There was a class of cases in a singular predicament, such as they ought not to be left in. The retiring Masters transferred bodily what causes remained in their offices to the remaining Masters, and in several instances no papers had been transferred. The consequence was, the Masters had the name of the case and the names of the suitors, but not a single paper; and, therefore, he proposed that the Masters should advertise all those cases, calling on the parties to bring in their papers by a certain time. Lastly, he proposed that the Lord Chancellor should have power to appoint additional clerks temporarily to assist the Masters. He had not the slightest doubt that the calling the attention of all parties
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to the state of matters in the Masters' Offices had already led to much despatch, and though at one time he thought he should have to propose that the Masters should be formed into a court, and should hear one by one, in turn, the causes remaining, and make orders upon each of them, he would refrain at present from making such a proposal, in the confident hope that when they met next Session the return from the Masters would be of a satisfactory character. He begged to move for—
"1. Returns by the Masters of the Court of Chancery of all Causes and Matters not included in former Returns made by them in pursuance of the Order of the 24th of March last, which they have treated as abandoned. And, 2. Returns by the Masters of the Court of Chancery on the 1st of February, 1855, in continuation or the former Returns, made by them in pursuance of the Order of the 24th March last, stating the further Cases in which Reports shall have been made since the former Returns."
He hoped the Lord Chancellor would turn his attention to this subject, and bring in a short Act embodying such of the provisions he had mentioned as he might think necessary, to give full and complete powers to wind up these matters.
THE LORD CHANCELLORsaid, he was sure no Member of their Lordships' House would feel more indebted than he did to the noble and learned Lord for the Motion he had made, and for having called attention to this subject. And if he did not entirely concur in the suggestions made for remedying the evil, it was not that he felt less strongly than the noble and learned Lord the necessity of some remedy. There was one matter which he thought the public ought to understand, and it was this—that, after all, this was more a nominal than a real scandal to the Court. The Court was perfectly open, and the statement of his noble and learned Friend showed the truth that all the delay was not the delay of the Court, but of the parties. It happened in these complicated suits—what happened out of suits and in their own experience—that when parties were involved in a very troublesome matter of accounts, they became weary, and would not proceed. Since the alteration, two years ago, the Masters were not only not instrumental to the delay, but in every possible manner tried to force on the parties to bring the suits to a termination. The difficulty was, they could not get the parties to come forward. Under the Act of 1852, when parties were in default, and

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would not go on, the Masters had the power of reporting them to the Court. In conversation with the Masters he had asked why they did not exercise their power, and the invariable answer he had received was, that if they did summon the parties and threaten to report them in a week, they begged for longer time, and declared it impossible to proceed in the time named. The Masters yielded to these solicitations on a variety of considerations, and amongst others there was this—that in punishing a party for not going on they might be punishing not the party guilty of the delay, but a number of innocent parties, not parties to the carrying on the cause, but interested in the results. For instance, a decree being made to take account of the property of a deceased person, and to apply it to the payment of his debts, the course was to advertise in the papers for the creditors to come and prove their debts. The creditors were stopped from taking any proceedings on their own account—the person obtaining the decree was the person to prosecute it, and the creditors were entirely dependent on him for the diligence with which the proceedings were carried on. Thus, if the Masters were compelled to dismiss suits, great injustice might be done to the unfortunate creditors who had proved their debts, and who might be willing and read to proceed. He therefore did not think that the Masters would be quite justified in acting with great stringency. After all, there were no individuals in the three kingdoms who were so much interested in getting causes wound up as the Masters, because the moment that was done they were released, and in the full enjoyment of their salaries for the rest of their lives; and, therefore, in every case in which they abstained from exercising the power which they possessed of compelling parties either to go on or to have the cause, as it were, destroyed, they acted directly against their own interests, and only from a sense of public duty. He was inclined to agree with his noble and learned Friend that the proper business of the Masters was interfered with by passing receivers' acccounts; but the evil could not be remedied without the appointment of one new officer at least. He also thought that abandoned causes should be certified to the Lord Chancellor, and dealt with in the way suggested by his noble and learned Friend. He was not certain that he had not already the power to refer to an accountant; but if he had not, it
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was quite right that such a power should be given by the Legislature. At the same time he might state that it was only in the case of intricate mercantile accounts where a reference to an accountant was at all important; and the truth was, that, although the Judges had at present the power to make such a reference, yet they found it necessary to exercise it only upon rare occasions. With regard to the power to refer to conveyancers, he thought that such references were made at present, but no harm would be done by the power being given by the Legislature. So with respect to the power of the Judges to bring parties before them for bankruptcy and cases of that sort. It was within the power of the Lord Chancellor to advertise causes in which there were no papers, and that course would continue to be adopted. As to the power of the Lord Chancellor to appoint additional clerks, he believed that under an existing Act the Lord Chancellor was authorised to appoint such officers as he might consider necessary; but he thought that the power referred to by his noble and learned Friend had better be given by the Legislature, because it might be a question whether or not the powers already possessed by the Lord Chancellor included the appointment of additional clerks. It appeared to him, however, that if the Masters were directed to make returns to the Court twice within the year, or every term, setting forth the state of the causes, and if such returns were regularly laid upon their Lordships' table, more good would be done than if a mere written document were hung up in the Court of Chancery. They might depend upon it, that the real difficulty was this—that it was not the interest of those who were conducting the suits to devote that extent of time and attention to them to which they were entitled. He hoped he would not be understood as throwing out improper insinuations or reflections upon guy class of men. He believed that there was not a more honourable or a more useful body of persons than the solicitors; but of course there were solicitors of every sort and grade, and undoubtedly a solicitor was much more profitably employed when engaged in dealing with new causes than when involved in the unremunerative and irksome details of old worn-out suits. That was the real source of the delay which occurred; but by the publication at certain fixed periods in every year of the state of all causes, the parties interested would see

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what their agents had done, and the latter would be shamed into a more vigorous course of attion—although it was but fair to state, in favour of the solicitors, that they were frequently unable to proceed for want of funds. Upon the whole, he thought the suggestions of his noble and learned Friend were most valuable, and would take them into immediate consideration, with the view of seeing what could be done by way of legislation in the present Session, to provide an effectual remedy for the evils complained of.
Ordered to be laid before the House.
House adjourned till To-morrow.