Lords Sitting of 25 August 1857

MINUTES.
ROYAL ASSENT.—Consolidated Fund (Appropriation); Customs and Excise; Customs; Court of Session (Scotland); Charitable Trusts Act Continuance; Jurisdiction in Siam; Reformatory Schools; Married Women's Reversionary Interest; Valuation of Lands (Scotland) Act Amendment; Joint Stock Companies; Bankruptcy and Insolvency (Ireland); Episcopal and Capitular Estates Management Act Continuance; Probates and Letters of Administration; Lunatics (Scotland); Boundaries of Burghs Extension (Scotland); Police (Scotland); Smoke Nuisance (Scotland) Abatement; Dunbar Harbour Loan; Metropolitan Police Stations, &c.; Militia Pay; Revising Barristers (Dublin); Mutiny (East India); Parochial Schoolmasters (Scotland) (No. 2); Probates and Letters of Administration (Ireland); Joint Stock Companies Act (1856) Amendment; Burial Acts Amendment; Militia; Sale of Obscene Books, &c. Prevention; Dulwich College; Pimlico Improvements.

PROMOTION IN THE ARMY.
LORD PANMURE: I take this opportunity, before your Lordships adjourn for the recess, to present the Report of the Commission appointed by Her Majesty to inquire into the system of purchase and sale of commissions in the army. The Report has already been presented to the other House of Parliament; and it is on account of the evidence given before the Commission that I am anxious that evidence should be in the hands of your Lordships during the recess. I carefully abstain from making any remarks on the Report, which I shall now lay before your Lordships; but there are some facts with regard to it which I think it right your Lordships should know. Ten Members were originally appointed under the Commission. This Report is signed by six Members, including my noble Friend the Duke of Somerset, the Chairman of the Commission; but one of the six, Sir De Lacy Evans, entered a protest at the end of the Report, and intimated his intention to send, through the Chairman of the Commission, a separate document stating his own opinion. Four other members of

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the Commission have refused to sign the Report, as they differ from the opinions which it contains; and Mr. Ellice, one of those Commissioners, has intimated to me officially that it is his intention to send in a separate Report in his own name, and also in the names of Sir H. Bentinck and General Wynyard, which will reach me during the recess, and which I shall be prepared to lay upon the table at the commencement of next Session. I may add further, that the other Commissioner—Colonel Wetherall—before the evidence was entirely complete, was called away on active service in China, and is in China at present, discharging military duties. I shall have an opportunity of communicating with him before Parliament meet again, and I dare say I shall be able then to announce his opinion with regard to this very important subject. I thought it necessary to make these remarks, because it is quite clear that, as the Report is signed by only one-half of the Commissioners, it ought not to go forth to the country as a Report unanimously agreed to by the whole of the Commission.

SANITARY STATE OF DUBLIN.—THE RIVER LIFFEY.
LORD ST. LEONARDScalled the attention of the Government to the state of the River Liffey, which took its course through Dublin from one end to the other. That state was most melancholy—it was during two hours of the tide an absolute sewage. Those who had seen the Liffey higher up knew what a beautiful river it was; but it was melancholy to see it as it was in its course through Dublin—it was a positive sewer. The stench was so great that, when he passed by it, he was obliged to increase his speed to escape from the pestilential air. Now, from the circumstance of its being quayed up on both sides, it offered every facility for a system of intercepting sewage.
LORD PANMUREsaid, that it was deeply to be regretted that not alone in Dublin, but in all our great cities, the streams which seemed to be placed there by Providence for sanitary purposes should be made pestilential rather than wholesome to the inhabitants. He would draw the attention of the Lord Lieutenant to the subject, and he was certain that no one was more disposed to do what he could to remedy the mischief than his noble Friend now at the head of the Government in Ireland.

DIVORCE AND MATRIMONIAL CAUSES BILL.
Message from the Commons,—
That they agree to the Amendments made by this House to the Amendments made by the Commons to the Bill; but propose a consequential Amendment in Clause (E); and do not insist on the Amendment to which the Lords have disagreed.
Said Amendment in Clause (E) agreed to; and a Message sent to the Commons to acquaint them therewith.
House Adjourned at half-past Five o'clock, to Friday next, half-past Twelve o'clock.