Lords Sitting of 19 March 1901

Preamble
Several Lords took the Oath.
PRIVATE BILL BUSINESS.
  HARPENDEN DISTRICT GAS BILL [H.L.]
  Committed; the Committee to be proposed by the Committee of Selection.
  POULTON-LE-FYLDE GAS BILL [H.L.]
  Report from the Select Committee, That the Committee had not proceeded with the consideration of the Bill, no parties having appeared in opposition thereto; read, and ordered to lie on the Table: The orders made on the 8th instant and Thursday last discharged, and Bill committed.
  DOVER CORPORATION BILL [H.L.]
  Report from the Select Committee, That the Committee had not proceeded with the consideration of the Bill, no parties having appeared in opposition thereto; read, and ordered to lie on the Table: The orders made on the 8th instant and Thursday last discharged, and Bill committed.
  HENRY DIAPER AND COMPANY (DELIVERY WARRANTS) BILL [H.L.]
  Reported with Amendments.
  MANCHESTER (MARKET STREET AREA) IMPROVEMENTS BILL [H.L.]
  Read 2a (according to order).
RETURNS, REPORTS, ETC.
  SOUTH AFRICA.
  Papers relating to negotiations between Commandant Louis Botha and Lord Kitchener.

  FACTORY AND WORKSHOP (USE OF LEAD IN THE MANUFACTURE OF POTTERY).
  Reports received by the Secretary of State for the Home Department from
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  Professor T. E. Thorpe, C.B., LL.D, F.R.S., Principal of the Government Laboratory, on the use of lead in the manufacture of pottery.
  Presented (by command), and ordered to lie on the Table.

  SUPERANNUATION.
  Treasury Minute, dated 14th March, 1901, declaring that William C. Hoskins, labourer, Royal Laboratory, War Department, was appointed without a Civil Service certificate, through inadvertence on the part of the head of his department. Laid before the House (pursuant to Act), and ordered to lie on the Table.

  SOUTH AFRICAN WAR—PEACE NEGOTIATIONS WITH GENERAL BOTHA.
  EARL SPENCER: My Lords, I wish to ask the noble Marquess at the head of the Government if he can give the House any information as to the result of negotiations between Lord Kitchener and the Boer leader.
  THE PRIME MINISTER AND LORD PRIVY SEAL (The Marquess of SALISBURY): My Lords, such information as I have I shall be glad to give, though I am afraid it will not be satisfactory to the noble Earl. General Botha has informed Lord Kitchener by letter that he is not disposed to recommend the terms of peace which Lord Kitchener had been instructed to offer to the earnest consideration of his Government, and he adds that his Government and chief officers are entirely in agreement with his views. Papers in connection with these negotiations will be laid on the Table at once.

  PRISONS (SCOTLAND) BILL [H.L.]
  Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
  *THE SECRETARY FOR SCOTLAND (Lord BALFOUR of BURLEIGH): My Lords, I do not think I need detain the House many minutes in explaining the. provisions of this Bill. It is not at all an ambitious Bill, but in its clauses will be found a series of small reforms which the experience of the working of the prisons in Scotland during the last few years has shown to be expedient, and some of which were actually the subject of recommenda-

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  tions by the Departmental Committee, presided over by my noble friend Lord Elgin, which I appointed about eighteen months ago, and which presented a report last year. The clauses of the Bill require but very little explanation. In the main, I think, they tell their own tale to anyone who reads them with ordinary care. The first one provides statutory powers for the appointment of visiting committees for the three general prisons in Scotland. In the case of all the ordinary prisons the visiting committees are appointed by the town and county councils in the district which the prison serves. There are three general prisons, and in regard to them there is no statutory power for the appointment of a visiting committee. Two of these prisons are mainly used for the confinement of ordinary prisoners, and in the case of those prisons the visiting committee will, if this Bill passes, be appointed in the same way as the committees of the ordinary prisons—by the town and county councils concerned. In the case of the Peterhead prison, which is the only establishment in Scotland entirely occupied by convicts, the visiting committee will be appointed by the Secretary for Scotland, but instead of being a purely voluntary body, as it is at present, it will, when appointed, have certain statutory functions and duties which will, I think, put it in a better position than it is at present.
  In regard to Clause 2, I have only to say that it deals with the vexed question of corporal punishment. Your Lordships will remember that during the passing of the Prisons Bill for England two or three years ago a considerable amount of discussion arose in regard to the question of flogging. In Scotland our law is different from that which obtains in England. No ordinary prisoner can under any circumstances be flogged, but only convict prisoners. This clause therefore applies only to the convict prison at Peterhead. The punishment is very rarely resorted to; not more than two or three times in the year. At present it is only inflicted by order of one or other of the Prison Commissioners when he is at the convict prison. The proposal of the Bill is to take it out of the power of the Commissioner to order this punishment, and to provide that it can only be ordered by the Sheriff or the Sheriff-
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  substitute of the district. The third clause of the Bill is copied from a section in the English Act, and its object is to insure that in the event of any prison having inadequate accommodation for those confined in it the fact shall be brought immediately under the notice of the Secretary for Scotland.
  The next clause is also similar to one in the English Act, and it introduces the principle of allowing a remission, in the case of ordinary hard-labour prisoners., of part of their sentence, provided they earn it by good behaviour or in some similar way. At the present time in Scotland, as was the case under the old procedure in England, the remission of part of a sentence can only be earned in the case of convicts. For the last two years there has been a provision in the law of England to allow hard-labour prisoners to earn a remission of part of their sentence, and we propose to extend that to Scotland. I am informed that it has been found to work with success in the English prisons in which it has been introduced. The fifth clause also corresponds to a procedure in the English Act. and it is of an entirely technical nature. It provides, in common with what is the general practice in Scotland in the case of all common law prisoners, that when a month is passed of the sentence it shall be held to be a calendar month and not a period of four weeks. The sixth clause of the Bill provides that part of the duties which used to be carried out by the Governor of the general prison at Perth., who is now not in control of the criminal lunatic department, shall be carried out by the medical superintendent, who has been placed in supreme authority over that department.
  Clause 7 is intended to remove a certain. ! ambiguity in Section 72 of the Prisons (Scotland) Administration Act, which provides that when a prisoner is affected with a disease which is dangerous to life, and the treatment of which cannot be carried out in prison, he may be sent to an ordinary infirmary with the consent of the managers of that institution. The alteration which this clause makes is to allow us to send a prisoner into an outside infirmary either when the disease from which he is suffering is dangerous, or when the treatment cannot be carried out in prison. At present both of these

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  conditions have to be fulfilled before we can carry out this measure. It is obvious that in many small prisons we cannot keep up a full infirmary and hospital staff' on the chance of a prisoner requiring treatment, and it is on that ground that the proposal to remove them to a workhouse infirmary or to some such place is part of the law of Scotland. We propose by this alteration to slightly extend it. The eighth clause is intended to give effect to a recommendation of Lord Elgin's Committee, and to provide that in all eases of a prisoner dying in the prison an inquiry shall be held with regard to the cause of death.
  The noble Earl behind me, the Earl of Glasgow, has very courteously given me notice that he intends to raise the question of providing for a, further classification of prisoners. I think it will be found that in practice we go further than he wishes us to do. Our system is to some extent different from the English one. For example, we have not nearly the same proportion of hard-labour prisoners in Scotland to ordinary prisoners as there is in England, and as the work is carried on in cells, and not in gangs, classification is not so necessary. If the noble Earl will put the proposals he wishes to make in the form of an Amendment on the Paper, I shall be glad to give them my most careful consideration before the Bill goes into Committee. I do not anticipate any opposition at this stage.
  Moved. "That the Bill be now read 2a"—(The Lord Balfour of Burleigh.)
  On Question, agreed to. Bill read 2a accordingly, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House on Tuesday next.

  BERWICKSHIRE COUNTY TOWN BILL [H.L.]
  House in Committee (according to order). Bill reported without amendment: Standing Committee negatived; and Bill to be read 3a on Thursday next.

ROYAL DECLARATION AGAINST ROMAN CATHOLICISM.
LORD HERRIES: My Lords, in rising to move the motion standing in my name I wish to say, in the first place, that con-
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siderable dissatisfaction, to make use of a mild term, has been aroused in the minds of the Roman Catholic subjects of His Majesty by the words used in the Declaration from the Throne which His Majesty was bound by statute to make on the occasion of his first opening Parliament. I wish to dissociate at once His Majesty the King from any responsibility for those words. I could not but admire the tact which His Majesty showed in the manner in which he read the Declaration, the low tone being evidently intended to make the words as little as possible offensive to ears of the Roman Catholics who were present on that occasion. At the same time, I must say this: that the Declaration itself, drawn up as it was two centuries ago, is not the sort of Declaration which might be expected from the King of Croat Britain, Ireland, and the Colonies, wherein there are at least twelve millions of Roman Catholic subjects. My noble friend Lord Braye has, I believe, introduced into the House a Bill with the object of abolishing this Declaration: and, if this Declaration used by the King on the opening of Parliament could be swept away in that manner. I should be only too glad to welcome such a Bill; but it appears to me that we are more likely to arrive at the desired end by a Committee of both Houses, composed of the leading members of both political parties, who would meet together and devise some means by which the Declaration in its present offensive form could be abolished, or at least so modified as to meet the objections which we, the Roman Catholic subjects of His Majesty, feel to it.
I regret very much indeed the absence of my noble friend Lord Kimberley, not only for the cause which we all deplore, but also because we are always glad to see him in his place as Leader of the Opposition, in which capacity he show's so much tact, ability, and good feeling. The noble Earl many years ago had charge of a Bill for the abolition of such a Declaration by the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, and I should like to quote a few words from his speech. On that occasion Lord Kimberley said—
"He had himself been called upon to make that Declaration before the Irish Privy Council in the presence of a large number of

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persons of the Roman Catholic faith, and he must say he had never in his life made a Declaration with more pain than when he was required, before men holding high office and for whom he had the highest respect, to declare the tenets of their religion to be superstitious and idolatrous."
If that was the effect of the Declaration on one who was at that time Lord Lien-tenant of Ireland, how much stronger must have been the feelings of His Majesty the King when he knew that what he was saying in that Declaration was attacking the tenets not only of a few friends around him, but of twelve millions of his most loyal subjects? I feel confident that it was with great pain that His Majesty made the Declaration. This Declaration was not framed in order to be taken by the King of this realm. It was framed at a time when Titus Oates was at the zenith of his power, when by a series of perjuries, which are unexampled in history, he had induced the whole country to believe that there was a plot among the Roman Catholics to upset the religion of the country, and when numbers believed that when James II. became King the country was to be made Roman Catholic, and the whole of the Protestants of the country were to be burned. This is history, and I ask your Lordships whether, at the time Titus Oates was publishing these perjuries, the country was in a proper state of mind to impose a Declaration of this sort. This Declaration—which is known to your Lordships, and which I will not defile my lips by reading—was made with the object of driving Roman Catholics out of the House of Peers and out of the House of Commons, and it was obligatory upon them from 1678 until the Catholic Emancipation Act of 1829. I think we may judge of the state of mind of the people who framed that Declaration when we remember that it was made obligatory, not only if the King was of age and was therefore able to know for himself what was right and what was wrong, but should the King succeed as a minor, he was obliged to take it at the age of twelve years. That is to say, a little boy, or, in the case of a Queen, a little girl, might be brought—and this is even within the. range of possibility now—to the Throne, and be compelled to take the Oath that tran-substantiation was not to be believed in.
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How on earth could the child know what was the meaning of transubstantiation? I dare say that it is not known to all of your Lordships. How. therefore, would a boy or girl be able to take an oath contradicting a doctrine of that sort? For 150 years this Oath was the means of keeping every Roman Catholic out of the House of Peers and the House of Commons. Does that not show that no question of dispensing by the Pope, no question of mental reservation was sufficient to enable them to sit in this or the other House? I could point to a number of Roman Catholics who were put to death who could have had their fortunes and their lives saved by taking this Oath. I think, therefore, that this Declaration which is put into the mouth of the Sovereign, by which he is made to insinuate that Roman Catholics in taking oaths are capable of mental reservation, is an insult to Roman Catholics.
I quite agree that the fundamental laws of the country cannot be lightly-changed, and it is for that reason, perhaps more than any other, that I thought, before any alteration was made, there should be a Joint Committee of both Houses, who should carefully consider the words of the Declaration. We must remember that there is a great distinction between these fundamental laws. Any law that affects the succession I must be unalterable. But with regard to the other provisions in the Bill of Rights and the Act of Settlement, that is not necessarily so, and it has never been considered so. In fact, some of the provisions of the Act of Settlement were repealed within a few years of their first being passed. allude, in the first: instance, to the clause by which the Sovereign of this country was not allowed to leave it without the permission of Parliament. As we may imagine, that could not be allowed to remain long, and the clause was repealed during the reign of George I., who naturally wished to visit his kingdom of Hanover. There was another clause by which members of the Privy Council were obliged to give in writing their opinions on matters that referred to them. That was repealed. I mention these to show that minor provisions of the Bill of Bights and the Act of Settlement have been altered. It is a

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principle of our Constitution that we should not be governed by our ancestors, but should govern ourselves, and we are quite prepared to do so. The Empire was very different in the days of William and Mary from what it is to-day. In those days we had not the colonies that we possess now. and we had not Canada, which contains 43 per cent. of Roman Catholics. When we are so dependent on our colonies, when we have had such an outburst of loyalty from all parts of our colonies, is it right that this Declaration, which affects so many of our colonies, should remain in its present form?
Is it necessary for the existence of the Church of England in this country that a Declaration in these words must be made? The Protestant succession to the Throne and the position of the Church of England are, I contend, sufficiently safeguarded by the Bill of Rights. I am aware that the Church of England is the Church of this country, and it is quite right that those who belong to the Church of England should retain the King as a member of that Church. I do not wish to do anything to weaken the hold of the Church of England on the King, but surely the Protestant succession and the position of the Church of England as the Church of this realm can be secured without insulting the conscience of Roman Catholics and introducing words into the Declaration made by the King which attack the most cherished convictions of his Roman Catholic subjects. I suggest that there is a way out of the difficulty, and for that reason I ask your Lordships to agree to the appointment of this Committee to consider the subject. As regards the constitution of the Committee, I see no reason why Roman Catholics should be represented upon it. Our purpose is not to prevent members of the Church of England from obtaining guarantees that the King shall remain a member of the Church of England, but that the offensive words should be removed, and I trust entirely to the impartiality and good feeling of your Lordships to ensure that result. I believe that in the other House it was promised that Roman Catholics should be on the Committee. Of course, we have nothing to do here with what takes

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place in the other House. I am only speaking as to what I think would to the best plan to pursue with regard to the constitution of the Committee as fixed by your Lordships, I feel sure that if you will agree to this motion it will be the means of satisfying the consciences of your Roman Catholic fellow-subjects, and I am confident that it will not be in any way injurious to the Church of England. If you look to the history of the country during the last century you will see that there has been opposition to every favour which has been granted to Roman Catholics. I would ask, Have there been any bad results from the Catholic Emancipation Act of 1820, or from the relaxation of the rule which prevented Roman Catholics from being officers in the Army and the Navy, and which prevented them from occupying the chief offices of the Crown? I submit that there have been no dangerous results, and I ask your Lordships to agree to this Committee, the result of which will, I hope, be to remove those expressions from the Declaration which we consider are not only of no advantage, but are most offensive to the Roman Catholic subjects of His Majesty.
Moved to resolve, "That it is desirable that a Joint Committee of both Houses be appointed to consider and report upon the Declaration which the Sovereign is by Statute compelled to make upon oath after his accession to the Throne."—(The Lord Herries.)
LORD BRAYE: I regret that when a fortnight ago I brought this subject before the House the noble Marquess the Prime Minister gave a very discouraging-answer. A few days after we were informed that the House of Representatives of Canada had passed, by an overwhelming majority, a resolution to the effect that this Declaration was offensive. In the meantime I ventured to introduce a. Bill into your Lordships' House directly dealing with the subject, and it was read a first time. The Bill is a very short one, but it aims at abolishing altogether the objectionable words in this Declaration. At the present moment I do not wish to press the Bill, but at the same time I am unwilling to withdraw it altogether. There

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fore I will leave it on the Table of the House and watch the result of the Committee which, I understand, will be granted. I must say that I would have preferred to have an expression of the House directly upon the Bill, as I fail to see the necessity of referring the matter to a Committee. If, however, the result is the same I shall be quite content, and I am sure the appointment of the Committee will be welcomed by all Catholics in the Empire. This statute is polemical. This is not the place to enter into acute theological questions. Theological difficulties and controversies enter, as we know, into political questions, but since the principle of the Revolution has overspread the whole of Europe the tendency is that theological questions should be withdrawn into the sphere of churches and theological assemblies. Therefore I refrain from entering into the subject-matter of the Declaration. Rut I would i mention that the doctrine of tran-substantiation and the honour paid to the Mother of Cod arc the two test doctrines 'which have divided Europe for more than three hundred years. This Committee will probably not report until July, and it is quite possible, although I sincerely trust such will not be the case, that the present Sovereign may die in the meantime. I therefore hope the Committee will expedite their labours and come to a conclusion as soon as possible, as otherwise Parliament could not prevent this Declaration being taken again. I will now call attention, in a very few words, to the Bill which I ventured to lay—
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: Order, order
LORD BRAYE: If I am out of order I will not refer to the Bill I introduced ! the other day. I would only say that it does not deal with the Coronation Oath, but only with the abolition and cancelling of the specific Oath. This is a free country, and if the King disbelieves in the Roman Catholic religion he is at liberty to declare his disbelief.
*THE EARL, OF PORTSMOUTH— who had given notice to ask (1) the Lord Privy Seal whether he will lay upon the Table of the House the
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terms of the proposed reference to a Committee of the language of the Declaration made by the King according to the Constitution on the occasion of his opening his first Parliament; (2) is the language of the Coronation Oath also referred to a Committee; (3) what is to be the constitution of the Committee?—said: My Lords, perhaps I may, for the convenience of your Lordships, say what I have to say now, instead of putting to the noble Marquess the question standing in my name, which was placed on the Paper before the motion of Lord Herries was handed in. The speech of my noble friend Lord Herries has answered two of the points of my question, and it is now quite clear that the Coronation Oath is not to be referred to this Committee; and as to the constitution of the Committee, I have no doubt we shall in due course know that from the noble Marquess. My only reason in rising to address the House is to draw a distinction which I think has been rather lost sight of by the two noble Lords who have spoken. I agree entirely with those noble Lords that the words of the statutory Declaration which refer to the Sacrifice of the Mass in the Roman Church as "idolatrous and superstitious" are most offensive, and naturally offensive, to Roman Catholics, and I think they are most unnecessary; still, I hope your Lordships will bear in mind what the noble Marquess himself, I am sure, is fully conscious of, that you cannot deal with a question of this kind, touching questions of religion and religious controversy, without incurring the very serious danger of arousing a great deal of religious excitement; while the language referred to is deserving of condemnation as applied to Roman Catholics, it is felt by a large number of people to be important that His Majesty should state that he himself does not believe in transubstantiation, because there is a large school of thought not within the pale of the Roman Catholic Church, but within the pale of the English Church itself, which is in favour of that doctrine. I should be the last person to wish that any words should remain in the Declaration which could be naturally and fairly interpreted and accepted by Roman Catholics as an insult to then-religion. I hope, therefore, that the

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terms of reference, which the noble Marquess will no doubt lay upon the Table, will be perfectly clear, as I cannot imagine anything more likely to cause uneasiness and distrust in the country unless the exact points which the Committee have to consider are plainly set out.
*LORD KINNAIRD: My Lords, this question is not quite so simple as it has been made to appear. There are a certain number of His Majesty's subjects who feel strongly that alterations are not desirable in this direction. They do not want for one moment to interfere with individual liberty, hut there are. they say, certain possible dangers which may be incurred if the Book of Common Prayer is tampered with. The Thirty-nine Articles include a good many strong statements as to the Mass and other Roman Catholic doctrines. There are others who feel that the liberty given to Roman Catholics in this kingdom ought to be reciprocated by Roman Catholic countries. The noble Marquess knows cases in which such intolerance prevails in other countries that it is difficult to protect Protestants, who are constantly molested and have their property interfered with. Those who are in authority in Rome and elsewhere do not give the same liberty with regard to holding property and other matters as is given in Croat Britain. We do not call the Reformation a revolution, as the noble lord called it: we prefer to call it a reformation. We believe that it is not quite right to say that all religions equally bring liberty and progress, and we believe that our national progress has had something to do with the liberty of conscience which we hold so dear. With regard to the question of strong language, those of your Lordships who take the trouble to read the daily newspapers will have seen that strong language is not used by one side alone. We had some strong language lately from Cardinal Vaughan in a pastoral in which he asked his co-religionists to use their political influence in a certain direction, and they have done so to some purpose. We were told that this question was not going to be opened, and that the country was not to be disturbed by these discussions. Many people, therefore, regarded with dismay the surrender in the House
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of Commons and the circumstances under which this Committee was promised, especially as in this House we had had an assurance that we would have a quiet summer without these controversial matters with reference to the King's Declaration being raised.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: Nothing of the kind.
*LORD KINNAIRD: We hoped that we should not be disturbed by discussions on this question. We believe that there are principles involved in the proposed alteration which are very far-reaching and important. There are many who feel strongly on the other side with reference to what is now being agitated in this House and elsewhere.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: My Lords, this debate has wandered somewhat widely from the point, and I do not intend to follow its erratic course. Many historical and theological questions have been dealt with from various points of view, but it does not seem to me necessary that we should at present examine them. In the same way I do not propose to go into the question how far there is an exhibition of intolerance abroad, and whether there are any proceedings which from that point of view we might condemn. I think I heard a certain pastoral of Cardinal Vaughan referred to in terms of severe condemnation. I have not seen the pastoral and I do not know what it contains, but I am certain that any question with regard to it does not arise upon the subject which we have under our discussion now, for nobody has ever proposed that now or at any later period the Sovereign of this realm should be compelled to recite the pastorals of Cardinal Vaughan.
I confess that until I heard the speech of the noble Lord who has just sat down I thought that upon the substance and essence of this matter there was very little difference of opinion. Until the contrary is proved, I shall assume that, with quite infinitesimal exceptions, we all of us regret very much that language of such indecent violence has ever been placed by statute in an oath which is required to be taken by the Sovereign of the realm. It is a matter of deep regret.

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But it does not follow that the damage that is done can be removed simply by repealing the enactment. You never can retrace your steps at so little cost as that. From what we have heard to-night and what we have heard elsewhere we know very well that if this House did—I do not say it will not do so—come to a decision to modify or repeal the Act in question there would be a great many people, perfectly sincere, though not very wise, who would say that you were giving some support to the doctrine of transubstantiation. Therefore it behoves us to move cautiously in this matter. I entirely repudiate the idea, however, that I have ever held out any assurance that the matter should not be meddled with. I only pointed out the great difficulties that attended it, and. in view of the material obstacles to legislation on difficult questions which exist elsewhere, I felt myself unable to hold out any confident hope that we would be able to deal with the question in the present session. I do not desire now to hold different language. The future will reveal to us what it is has to bring.
At present the difficulties are still very great; but certainly the most effective manner of dealing with those difficulties is to inquire into them; and, therefore, when it was intimated on the part of Lord Herries that he wished to ask for the reference of this question to a Committee, I assented at once. I thought a Committee would be a very suitable means of examining into it. But in doing so, I do not bind myself to accept the terms of the motion of the noble Lord, because I think that the motion as it I stands now would be exposed to some of the misunderstanding that I have already pointed to. There is no doubt that this Declaration has been imposed on the Sovereign for the purpose of securing that arrangement which for brevity I shall call the Protestant succession. That is the object of the Oath. If we remove the Oath and do nothing further, I think there will be a very large number of people who will think you have not treated the matter as sufficiently important, and have not paid sufficient regard to the dominant considerations which for centuries have led the nation to cherish the Protestant succession. That is a difficulty which,
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of course, is inherent, and by the mere fact of retracing your steps you are always believed to be doing and intending to do something further than the mere negative of the course you took before. Therefore if the noble Lord proposes the motion in this form I shall be compelled reluctantly to oppose it; but if he would be willing to allow me to add a clause of this kind—or. if he does not like to commit himself to language which might not be agreeable to him, would allow the Government to move it with the addition which I am about to propose—there would be very little difficulty in setting on foot the investigation he desires.
The words I should like to add are these—
"And whether the language can be modified advantageously without diminishing its efficacy as a security for the maintenance of the Protestant succession."
I am rather disposed to agree with the noble Lord, without being in any way bigoted, that it would be better if the Roman Catholic Peers stood aside from the Committee and allowed their fellow Peers to judge in this matter, as I think they would be somewhat embarrassed in dealing with it. I know that if we do this we shall have to confront the somewhat anomalous arrangement that the Roman Catholic members of the Lower House might be members of the Committee. I hope the Roman Catholic members of the Lower House may not be too sensitive, or they may think it implied that we thought their consciences less susceptible than those of the Roman Catholic members of this House. However, that is for them to decide. I think the Joint Committee should be an ordinary one, composed of five members from each House. With respect to the Coronation Oath, I should like to have an opportunity of examining it—I have not its terms in my mind—before deciding whether it should be included in the reference; but I do not see any reason, in the nature of things why the Coronation Oath should not be dealt with by this Committee. If the noble Lord leaves it to the Government, I shall move it on Thursday, and at the same time put down the names of the Peers we should propose to contribute to the Joint Committee.
LORD HERRIES: I have been appealed to by the noble Marquess, who appears to be ready to accept the motion on condition that the words which he has read to your Lordships are added. I thought that in proposing the motion I had made it as wide as possible, and I presumed that the Committee would see that those guarantees which the noble Marquess seems to think necessary were carried out. But as the noble Marquess prefers that in the reference to the Committee these words should be added in order to make that quite certain. I have no objection to their being added, although I do not propose them myself.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: Will the noble Lord withdraw his motion now. and allow me to move it in its amended form on Thursday?
LORD HERRIES: Yes. I beg to withdraw my motion.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: On Thursday next I shall move. "That a Joint Committee of both Houses be appointed to consider the Declaration required of the Sovereign on his accession by the Bill of Bights, and to report whether its language can be modified advantageously without diminishing its efficiency as a security for the maintenance of the Protestant succession."
THE EARL OF CAMPERDOWN: Would that embrace the Coronation Oath?
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURY: Subject to examination of its terms. I do not think that the motion as amended would take in the Coronation Oath; that would have to be a separate reference.
Motion, by leave of the House, withdrawn.

MILITARY INSTRUCTION FOR OFFICERS.
*THE DUKE OF BEDFORD: My Lords, I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for War if. in future, it would be possible to establish the rule that commissions for cavalry and infantry in the Regular Army should only be granted to candidates who have served for four years in a Militia regiment, and who have reached
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a certain standard of efficiency in specified courses of military instruction. I do not wish to detain your Lordships by a lengthy programme for the education of young officers, but to make my moaning clear I must mention the outline of the plan, the possibility of which is the subject of my question. I suggest, then, that commissions in the cavalry and infantry of the Regular Army should be given only to those candidates who. have served for a period of four years in the Militia, the limit of age being from seventeen to twenty-two. Four months of each year would be spent with the Militia battalion; that is, three months preliminary drill and one month training. The remaining eight months, with some deduction for leave, would be available for courses of military instruction, comprising the School of Musketry at Hythe and use of machine guns; a garrison class very similar to the present course at Sandhurst; signalling; elementary field engineering, similar to a course which used to be, and, I think, still is,. conducted at Chatham; the principles of sanitary science especially applicable to the dangers arising from large numbers of men crowded for a. considerable period on a small area; instruction in Army transport duties and in the care and management of horses, to be learnt by actual work in the stables, and pro ficiency tested by the condition of the horses trained by the pupils themselves. It is very possible, as your Lordships are aware, to be a brilliant horseman but an utterly useless horse-keeper.

I would add one more subject, and that a most important one. A regimental officer's duty is to instruct his men. A staff officer's duty is to instruct officers. Yet the art of imparting instruction to others, than which no more difficult art exists, is not a recognised branch of study in the Army. Your Lordships, no doubt, remember that in those days, when you contended with examinations, one man could teach in a few weeks what another could not teach in eternity. Ignorance of the art of teaching is by no means confined to regimental officers. It is very-conspicuous amongst those exalted heroes who dwell completely in the clouds on that military Olympus of the Army—the staff. All your Lordships who have been connected with the Service will recal

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countless field days conducted by brilliant staff officers, which for the purposes of instruction to regiments and battalions and officers were the sorriest farces imaginable. The distinguished staff officer and the learned scholar are alike useless as instructors if they scorn to learn how to teach. The entrance examination to the Militia for Army candidates should be purely literary and qualifying, to ascertain if the candidates come up to a good standard of general capacity. The final examination at the end of the four years must be competitive, assuming that there are more candidates than vacant commissions; but with the details of these examinations I need not trouble your Lordships. During the four years, sixteen months would be given to regimental duty and thirty-two months to courses of military instruction.
The advantages which I claim for my proposed plan are as follows:—First, the problem of finding subalterns for the Militia is immediately solved. The Secretary of State for War has announced that by a rearrangement of bounties, by a stamp of his foot and a stroke of his pen and three copper pennies a day, 50,000 men are to be straightway added to the Militia. He does not mention the further magical means by which officers are to be produced. Secondly, Army candidates are, at present, useless as company officers whilst in the Militia, because they have not yet learned the A B C of their duties. I would ensure the four years Army candidate being during the last three years an increasingly useful company officer in the Militia by removing him from that service if he showed that the reverse was the case. Thirdly, officers retiring from the Army, after a preliminary four years in the Militia, are likely to return to the Militia battalions in which they have served, and in which they have friends. The return of officers from the Army to the Militia is most desirable. A last advantage is this. I expect, my Lords, that nearly every Militia commanding officer has had the experience of having his battalion inspected by some distinguished soldier, whose remarks reveal an absolute ignorance of the peculiarities of the force which he is called upon to inspect. If every officer passed through the Militia into the Army Army officers would per-
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force become much better acquainted with the Militia than they are now, and the Militia and the Line would be more closely welded than at present.
The advantage which the Army would derive from my plan is the disappearance of the school-boy officer. When officers join the Line under the conditions I suggest, they will have done all their elementary schooling, and be available for continuous regimental duty. At present, young officers, during the first six or seven years of their service, have to be sent away continually from their regiments to go through some of those courses which I propose they should thoroughly accomplish before joining the Army. Taking young officers away from their regiments is most undesirable, and throws extra duty upon those officers left with the regiment. I well remember, not so very long ago, and my noble friend the Under Secretary of State for War will have the same recollection, that officers were supposed to go to Hythe and other classes of instruction out of their leave, in order to avoid throwing extra garrison duty on officers remaining with the battalion. The disadvantage which I see for the public service is on the score of expense. It will be necessary to give subalterns' pay to all Army candidates all the year round. But a good and useful military training will be given to a very much larger number of young men than is at present the case, and this military training will be very useful in times of emergency such as we have for the last year and a half experienced.
I foresee, my Lords, great opposition to the scheme I suggest from many quarters. I have not myself had the advantages of a Sandhurst education, but I know that Sandhurst is a most sacred institution in the eyes of the War Office, and that changes such as I suggest would be strenuously opposed for the sake of preserving Sandhurst as it is. Public schoolmasters would probably be opposed to my plan, for it does away with the Army classes at public schools. I daresay that Army tutors and crammers will not approve of it. Then parents of unsuccessful candidates will ask, "What are we to do with our sons when they are returned to us at twenty-two years of age, having failed to get into the Army? "My Lords, there is but one answer to

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all such objections, and it is, I think, an amply sufficient one. The Army exists for the defence of the country. It does not exist for the benefit of Sandhurst professors, public school pedagogues, or even prolific parents. If the particular interests of particular classes are to come first, the interests of the Army must come second and suffer accordingly.
*THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (Lord RAGLAN): My Lords, although the noble Duke's question was a very small one on paper, his speech embraced a variety of subjects, for he alluded to everything from the first appointment of officers to the final inspection of their battalions. I am not in a position to give a thorough description of all the methods which might be adopted for the first appointment of officers to commissions, whether candidates for the Militia or otherwise. The whole question, as the noble Duke is aware, is a very difficult and a very complicated one, and requires most careful consideration, which we propose as soon as possible to give to it. The suggestion that every officer should serve for four years in a Militia battalion, and the other suggestions of the noble Duke, would be very startling changes in the present system, and if they were adopted officers would either join the Army at an unduly late age, or else would leave their school at an unduly early age. As a general rule neither of these courses would be a good one. I can assure the noble Duke that at this moment in the War Office there is a tendency to look with greater intelligence on the claims of Militia officers than perhaps was the case in the past, and with that tendency I most cordially sympathise.
LORD MONKSWELL: The noble Duke seems to think it would be a capital thing to do away with the Army classes in public schools. I have only risen to say that in my opinion to do that would be a very retrograde step indeed. Those classes have done a great amount of good work in the past, and I should be very sorry to see them abolished.

PRESERVATION OF ANCIENT INDIAN MONUMENTS.
*LORD STANLEY OF ALDERLEY: My Lords. I wish to ask the Under Secre-
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tary of State for India who it was that sanctioned the vandalism at Bijapur, described by Lord Stanmore on page 204 of the Imperial and Colonial Magazine of December:—
"I hear that this fine monument has now (1895) been turned into a house for the deputy engineer, cut up and ruined by lath and plaster partitions and ceilings, divided by floors, and its arabesques defaced by wall papers. The oratory is a lady's bedroom, and its delicately-carved mihrab, with a door fitted to it, is converted into a cupboard for hanging up dresses."

I am glad that the first occasion of my making the acquaintance of the noble Lord the Under Secretary for India should be through the medium of a question which is of an entirely non-contentious character. I say non-contentious because it is well known that the Viceroy has done all in his power to discourage the destruction of ancient monuments; and when I gave the question in I was assured of the sympathy of a high official in the India Office. The monument to which I refer, and which has been almost destroyed, was that of an ancient historical tomb near Bijapur. It has not only been the subject of vandalism, but also of desecration, for this fine monument has been turned into a house for the deputy engineer, and the oratory into a lady's bedroom. It is a misfortune that this article was not published sooner, so that the attention of the India Government could have been drawn to what was going on. The article was written in 1873, but only published this year. In the concluding words of the article Lord Stanmore says:—
"They are terrible vandals, too, are some of these officials. I was driving with a high functionary at Ahmedabad and complimented him on the excellence of the roads where there was so little road metal. 'Yes,' he said, 'there are plenty of tombs and temples here. I do not know what we shall do when they are used up.'"
Before I sit down, I would venture to say that I read with much satisfaction the able and candid reply of the noble Earl the Under Secretary for India to the captious remarks that were made on his appointment.
*THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INDIA (The Earl of HARDWICKE): My Lords, the question which the noble Lord has placed on the Paper

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is based upon an extract taken from an article written by Lord Stanmore in 1873. Lord Stanmore, in that article, refers to a visit he paid to Bijapur, and to the night he spent in a certain mausoleum. He published this article in December last, and, I presume, desiring to be accurate, he put a foot-note at the bottom of the page in which these words occur: "I hear that this fine monument." etc. The noble Lord, I understand, has no further evidence that there has been any act of vandalism committed than the statement of Lord Stanmore that he heard that this had happened. It is possibly the case that a deputy engineer lives in this particular tomb, but I do not know whether this is so or not. In Bijapur there are hundreds and hundreds of tombs, and if the Indian Government had to preserve every tomb that exists in Bijapur it is very questionable whether the resources of India would be equal to the task. In 1872 the India Government decided to make Bijapur a civil station. They have since that time had an archæological examination made of all the mausolea and tombs. and they decided in 1890 that forty-four should be maintained in good repair, and that a further forty-six should be saved from decay. So far as the other tombs are concerned, I think it is more than probable that various inhabitants of the town are using them as living-houses. I do not think that the particular tomb to which the noble Lord has referred—namely, Khawas Khan—can be a very important one, because it does not occur in either of the two lists that the Indian Government have had made of the tombs that they mean to maintain in repair; but it is quite possible that Lord Stanmore may have been thinking of what is known as the mosque of Khawas Khan. If that is the case, I am happy to tell the noble Lord that this is on the list to be maintained in good repair, and that the Indian Government are paying every attention to the matter. I am sorry I have not been able to give the noble Lord more information. The India Office communicated with India when the question was first put down, and the only reply we have had has been a telegram to the effect that every inquiry has been made, and that full particulars will be received by the India Office, regarding
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the rooms referred to in the question on the Paper, in the course of next month. If the noble Lord wants further information, I shall be pleased to give it to him later.

THE LORD CHANCELLOR'S PATRONAGE—CASE OF REV. A. N. VOWLER.
THE EARL OF MOUNT EDGCUMBEasked the Lord Chancellor if his attention had been directed to a letter in the Westminster Gazette of 15th March, from a clergyman (the Rev. A. N. Vowler), stating that after he had been offered a benefice, and paid certain fees, the offer had been cancelled.
THE LORD CHANCELLOR (The Earl of HALSBUBY): My Lords, it is perfectly true that, by reason of certain recommendations which I thought I had a right to rely on, I offered this small benefice in Devonshire to the reverend gentleman whose name has been mentioned. For reasons which, I am sure, your Lordships will appreciate, I have thought it right to make it a rule that every clergyman to whom I offered preferment should undertake to render proper canonical obedience to his Bishop. This was the only condition I proposed to this reverend gentleman. He then said he had a conscientious objection. He had already mentioned to my secretary that he hesitated to give any such pledge. I thought it right that he should have an opportunity of seeing me himself, and he then explained that his objection was founded on the declaration he had signed against simony. When that objection was made to me I confess I had not the least idea of what it meant, and I have not at this moment. I have not the faintest conception of how a promise to render canonical obedience to the diocesan can by any conceivable perversion of the imagination be regarded as having anything to do with simony. I wish that when the reverend gentleman wrote to the newspapers he had thought right to add that the fees had been returned to him, as one of the inferences to be drawn from his communication is that fees had been exacted from him and not returned. Whatever fees there are, my right hon. friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer is interested in, and not any officer of

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mine. The fees were not in one sense exacted at all, because his own cheque was sent back to him exactly as it was received. I cannot imagine how any human intellect could extract out of the declaration against simony any such conscientious objection: but it may save trouble to those who think it right to apply to me for such ecclesiastical patronage as it is my duty to distribute, if I point out that I shall always insist upon that condition every time I offer ecclesiastical preferment. It does not appear to me to have anything to do with the law of simony, and I should have doubted whether anyone of ordinary education could think so. It is enough to say that if this reverend gentleman has a conscience in one direction, I have a conscience in another, and my conscience will not allow me to confer a benefice on a person who is not prepared to obey the laws of the Church.
THE LORD BISHOP OF MANCHESTER: I should like to point out, in view of what the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack has said, that if this amounts to simony, then every clergyman of the Church of England is guilty of simony, for no clergyman can he instituted to any benefice without making the promise referred to.
House adjourned at five minutes past Six of the clock till Thursday next, half-past Ten of the clock.