Sitting of 5 December 1837

MINUTES.
New Writs issued for Sudbury, in the room of Sir JAMES HAMILTON, accepted the Chiltern Hundreds; for Midhurst, in the room of Mr. POYNTZ, accepted the Chiltern Hundreds.
Petitions presented. By Mr. WILLIAM ROCHE, from the Limerick Chamber of Commerce, against the Tolls on the road between Dublin and Limerick—By Mr. WILBERFORCE, from Hull, for equalising the rate of Postage.—By Mr. COLQUHOUN, from Kilmarnock, to the same effect.—By Mr. GROTE, from Cirenecster, for Vote by Ballot.—By Mr. CAVENDISH, from thirty different parishes in the Hop districts, for the repeal of the duty on Hops.—By Mr. G. F. YOUNG, from Mr. Montgomery Merton, for an improved system of Colonial Government.—By Mr. HUME, from William Bryan, complaining of the oppressive treatment of Colonel Arthur.

SUBORNATION OF ELECTION WITNESSES.
Mr. H. Hinderose to call the attention of hon. Members to a subject intimately connected with the privileges of that House. He held in his hand a petition from a person named Chapman, an elector of the town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, who stated that he had given his vote in favour of the sitting Members (Mr. Holmes and Mr. Hinde), and since their return he had been waited upon by one Donald Sinclair, a solicitor in Berwick-upon-Tweed, who requested him to appear before the Committee of that House, appointed to try the merits of that election, for the purpose of giving evidence of bribery against the sitting Members, and on petitioner's stating that he could furnish no such evidence, Sinclair offered him a large sum of money to induce him to give such evidence. There could be no doubt, if the statement of the petitioner were true, that the person complained of deserved the severest penalties which the rules of the House could inflict; but he had some difficulty as to the course that
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should at present be adopted, particularly as a petition had been presented against the sitting Members. If that had not been the ease, he should have taken the earliest opportunity of moving that the solicitor complained of should be called on to answer for his conduct at that bar; but as that might, in some degree, prejudice the trial of the election petition, he should simply move that it be printed, with the view of founding upon it some further proceedings at a future time.
Lord J. Russellthought, the allegation in the petition was matter which might fairly come before the Election Committee. If any proceedings were taken upon it at present, they would go directly to prejudice the minds of the Committee. The better course, perhaps, would be to withdraw the petition, as had been done in the case of the Bridgewater petition on Friday night.
Petition withdrawn.

SPANISH PRISONERS IN PORTUGAL.
Mr. Maclean, seeing the noble Lord, the Secretary of State for Foreign Affaire in his place, took leave to ask a question relative to a petition which he had handed over to the noble Lord some time since, on the part of certain persons who had been imprisoned in Portugal. By the 4th article of the treaty, or rather the capitulation between the Portuguese, Spanish, and British Governments, when Don Carlos left Portugal, the Spanish refugees then in that country were to be guaranteed their liberty and sent to a dépôt to be provided for them, until it was found convenient to send them to some other country they might prefer. Eight hundred and thirty of those persons having surrendered themselves, they were placed in the depot, and by the severities they had suffered during their imprisonment, they were now reduced to 230. He wished to know, whether the noble Lord considered that, by the capitulation, the British Government were bound to protect those individuals, and whether he was prepared, supposing their case had been fairly stated, to interfere in their behalf.
Viscount Palmerstonwas not prepared to admit that those parties were, under the fair and proper construction of those articles, entitled to be set free. It was the duty of the Portuguese Government to detain them as prisoners until they were exchanged for prisoners taken by the Carlists. At the same time, it was the duty of Go-

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vernment to see that, while in safe custody, they were well treated. He believed they were well treated. There was a letter from the commandant of the depot, which clearly stated as much. He would, however, send the petition itself to Lisbon, in order that a fresh inquiry might take place; and if they had anything to complain of, he had no doubt steps would be taken to obtain for them redress.

CHURCH ACCOMMODATION IN SCOTLAND.
Sir Robert Peelrose to put a question to the noble Lord (John Russell), on a subject on which great anxiety was felt, particularly in that portion of the United Kingdom which took more especial interest in it—he meant the subject of the Church of Scotland. Some months ago, indeed he might say years ago, a Commission was appointed by the Government to inquire into the state of Church accommodation in Scotland, and into the means of affording religious instruction to the people of that country. One Report had been already made by the members of that Commission. He thought that he understood the noble Lord, on a former night, to say, that another Report, completing the inquiry into the condition of Glasgow, had been recently received by the Government. He trusted that the general inquiry of the Commissioners was then so far advanced, that Parliament might shortly have the advantage of the whole of their important labours before it. The particular question which he wished to put to the noble Lord, had reference to the condition of Glasgow, for he could not help thinking that if they had the Report of the Commissioners on two such important towns as those of Edinburgh and Glasgow, they might take a tolerably comprehensive view of the whole subject of church accommodation in Scotland, and that any measures which might be wanted, needed not to be deferred from the incompleteness of the inquiry. He understood the noble Lord, on a former occasion, to say that the Report on the state of Glasgow, had been actually presented to him; and he, therefore, could not refrain from expressing his earnest hope that the noble Lord would present, as soon as possible, to the House that Report, along with the evidence on which it was founded. It was a subordinate reason for presenting that Report as speedily as possible to the House that a Committee had recently been appointed to inquire into the state of the poor, so far as regarded their
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means of education in all the large towns of the United Kingdom. It would facilitate the inquiries of that Committee to have a full Report on the state of church accommodation, and of the means of religious instruction in two such large towns as Edinburgh and Glasgow. But independently of that consideration, and with reference to the subject itself, he had once more to express his earnest hope that the noble Lord would present the House, on an early day, with the Report of the Commissioners on the state of Glasgow.
Lord John Russellhad stated, on a former evening, that Government had received a copy of the Report of the Commissioners on the town of Glasgow. The only reason why he had delayed presenting it to the House was, that he had acceded to a proposition of the Commissioners that their Report should be printed in Scotland, and not in this country. They had sent to him three or four printed copies of their Report, but not a sufficient number for distribution among the Members of the two Houses of Parliament. He would, that evening, give directions that the Report should be sent down to the House, and he would himself present it to-morrow. He concurred with the right hon. Baronet in thinking that, as they had the Reports of the Commissioners on the towns of Edinburgh and Glasgow, they might fairly draw an inference from the state of those towns as to the general state of church accommodation throughout Scotland
Subject dropped.

MUNICIPAL CORPORATIONS (IRELAND).
Lord John Russell Lord John Russell moved, that the passage in the Speech of his late Majesty delivered in 1836; and the passage in the Speech of her present Majesty, referring to the Municipal Corporations in Ireland, be read.
The clerk at the table read the passages as follow:—
"You are already in possession of the Report of the Commission appointed to inquire into the state of the Municipal Corporations in Ireland, and I entertain the hope that it will be in your power to apply to any defects and evils which may have been shown to exist in those institutions a remedy founded upon the same principles as those of the Acts which have been already passed for England and Scotland."—Speech of William 4th, Session 1836.
"The Municipal Government of the cities and towns in Ireland calls for better regulation."—Speech of her present Majesty, Session 1837.
Lord John Russell: Sir, it is on the passages just read from the Speech of his late Majesty, and from that of our most gracious Queen, that I propose to found the motion which I am about to bring before the House, in doing which I do not consider it necessary for me to enter into any detail of the reasons and arguments which naturally suggest themselves. I take my ground as regards this Bill, on what has been the declaration of this House in former Sessions. The first occasion on which this measure was brought directly under the notice of the House was that in which the passage appeared in the Speech of his late Majesty, wherein he expressed his hope, that we should be enabled to base the Municipal Corporations in Ireland on similar principles to those on which the Municipal Institutions of England and Scotland had been before established. That passage, which was not intended to excite, which was not framed with an idea that it would excite, opposition, did provoke disagreement in this House, and an attempt was made, on the Address in answer to the Speech being moved, to get rid of those words which declared that the "same principles" which were applicable to England and Scotland, should be applied to Ireland. It was proposed to leave out those words, and to assure his Majesty only, that they would attend to the general defects in the institutions. Though that opposition was not expected by us, yet we did state at once, and without hesitation, that we could not consent to carry an Address to the Throne which laid it down as a principle that the Irish were unfit for that liberty which the people of England and Scotland were already enjoying. On that motion the House decided, by a majority of upwards of forty, in concurrence with the Speech of his Majesty, and against that proposition of the other side of the House, which denied altogether, that popular rights and popular control, should be the principles on which the Municipal Institutions of Ireland should be founded. I will refer further to the divisions which took place in the House during the late Session, which clearly showed the determination of the House on that important subject. The first division was on the amendment of the noble Lord, the Member for a division of Lancaster (Lord F. Egerton),who proposed, that instead of regulating and improving the Municipal Corporations of Ireland, that instead of extending to them the popular principle, they should be abolished altoge-
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ther. The number who voted against that amendment was 307; the number in its favour was 243, giving a majority of 64. When, again, the other House of Parliament declared that they were of opinion, that these corporations ought to be abolished, and they sent down to this House clauses framed with considerable skill for the purpose of entirely putting an end to Corporations of any kind in Ireland, and placing the power enjoyed by those Corporations in the hands of Commissioners named by the Crown and other bodies, we contended, that the vital principle of popular control should be preserved. The division on that occasion was 318 to 232, giving us a majority of 86. In the next Session of Parliament, the Session of the present year, there was only one division on the subject. That division was taken on an instruction moved by the same noble Lord who proposed the abolition of the Corporations, when there appeared in favour of his motion 242, and against it 322, giving a majority of 80. Now, Sir, I say, that the question having thus been three times under the consideration of the House, having been proposed twice by a Member of this House, and having been a third time taken into consideration upon the amendments of the Lords, with a view to seeing whether we would concur in their opinion—I say the opinion of the late House of Commons was decidedly declared, that whatever amendments might be made as to the details of the Bill, the same principle which was acted on in framing the Municipal Corporations of England and Scotland ought likewise to be applicable to those of Ireland. Sir, I ground my present, proceeding on that fact; and, until I hear that, in this House, other sentiments are entertained, I shall presume to think, that in bringing in this Bill, the present House will conform to the opinion of the late House of Commons, and that they will maintain, whether against Members of this House, or whether against Members of the other House of Parliament, that we do not consider the people of Ireland so much "aliens," as to induce us to refuse them a participation in the great privileges enjoyed by the other inhabitants of the empire. Having mentioned the number that voted for and against that measure in the last Parliament, I will state likewise the opinion of an individual, a Member of this House, which I think strongly expressive of the sentiments that were entertained by those who do not concur altogether or ge-

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nerally with her Majesty's Ministers. It is contained in an address to his constituents, the independent electors of the Northern Division of the county of Derby, and it is signed "George Crewe." The hon. Baronet states, that in the last year (1835), he had voted against this Bill, but that he had since that period deeply reflected on the subject, and examined it under all its bearings, and the result had been, that so far as regarded himself individually he had felt dissatisfied, and that in the present Session he could not reconcile his mind to the adoption of the plan proposed by the party with whom he generally concurred. He should, therefore, vote for the extension to the people of Ireland of the principle of the municipal corporations as they existed in England and Scotland. Now this, Sir, is the sentiment of an individual, which no doubt might be considered of little value if he had been one constantly acting with the ministerial party in this House, or if he were one of the Representatives for Ireland, contending for the privileges of his native country. But coming as it does from one who has always voted with the other party, I must consider that it shows, and that strongly, too, a great want of confidence in the course his own party have taken. I hold this to be a sufficient reason for not calling the attention of the House to either the principles or the details of the Bill which I have the honour to propose. In introducing the measure of last year I took occasion to enter into the whole question of the Government of Ireland. I did so because there had been a large meeting of persons calling themselves the Protestants of Ireland, falsely so calling themselves, inasmuch as they were but a small part of the Protestants of that country. They, however, did send forth certain denunciations against the government of Lord Mulgrave—denunciations which no Member of either House proposed to bring under the consideration of Parliament. I, therefore, myself thought it necessary to bring under the consideration of the House, at the earliest possible period, the manner in which that Government had been conducted, leaving it to the House to decide on the merits of the question according to the facts and the arguments. But that course which last year was pursued by the opposite party, and which I denounced as wanting in boldness and courage, has not been the course, I am happy to say, which has been pursued this year in either House. This year (as every one knows) they have thought pro-
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per to bring forward the charges they have to make against the Government of Lord Mulgrave directly in the other House of Parliament, and I am content to leave the defence of the Government to the impression made by Lord Mulgrave's speech on that occasion. After that speech I think it unnecessary on my part to say a single word in defence of the Government of that noble Lord. I am ready to declare now, as I have declared before, that as regards his Government I am prepared at all times to be judged by his conduct—that I hold myself responsible, so long as I am Secretary of State for the Home Department, for the general conduct of the Government of Ireland, and I shall never shrink from the defence of those acts of which Lord Mulgrave has been the author during the period of his Government in Ireland. Sir, not only with regard to this general inquiry, but in other respects, hon. Gentlemen have taken a more decided part than they did last year. They have thought proper, and I give them credit for so doings not only to impugn the general conduct of Lord Mulgrave, but individual acts of his Government. We had the other night one of the best specimens that could be afforded of the grievous acts of partiality and oppression with which the Government of the noble Lord has been charged. For the last two or three years we have heard of nothing but the monstrous acts of oppression and the dreadful acts of partiality and injustice of which the Irish Government have been guilty; and when a question is selected to be brought forward, it is natural to suppose that hon. Gentlemen will select the strongest which they can find. It would be absurd to suppose that they would take a light case. The proceeding which was made the subject of debate the other night was, no doubt, one of the strongest which could be alleged against Lord Mulgrave, and I leave it to the impression it produced on the House to decide how far that case is to be considered as established. I leave also to the hon. and gallant Colonel who brought it forward all the glory of having so done. Such being the state of the case, I feel under no necessity at the present moment for entering into the principles and details of the Bill I propose to introduce, founded as it is on the mature deliberation of the former House of Commons. I think it equally unnecessary to enter into any defence of the Government of Lord Mulgrave—a defence which those who are his enemies have taken out of my hands, and

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managed a great deal better than I could hope to manage it. I, therefore, Sir, now move for leave to bring in a Bill for the better regulation of the Municipal Corporations in Ireland.
Mr. Shawsaid, that he had listened with great attention to the noble Lord, anxious to learn something of the principle or details of the measure the noble Lord was about to introduce; but the noble Lord said something of the divisions of last year, a great deal about the case of Mr. Blake, and appealed to the sympathies of the hon. Gentlemen on his right for a cheer for Lord Mulgrave; but not one word about the Bill of which he had moved the first reading. The House would feel that that was not an appropriate occasion for him to discuss with the noble Lord the general condition and government of Ireland; but he could not avoid saying, in reply to the noble Lord's observations on the case of Mr. Blake, that that was not by any means selected as a sample of the various and just complaints which might be adduced against the Irish Government; but had merely been brought forward by his hon. and gallant Friend (Colonel Perceval) to redeem a pledge he had made to his constituents, and was of a local and personal nature. With reference to the conduct of the Irish Government, he (Mr. Shaw) would not on any proper occasion shrink from the fearless avowal and support of his opinion, in direct opposition to the praise of Lord Mulgrave, by which the noble Lord had elicited the cheers of his Irish supporters. With respect to the measure itself then under consideration, the only clue the noble Lord had given of its contents was, desiring the clerk at the table to read as well the part of the speech delivered by his late Majesty in 1836 which related to municipal corporations in Ireland, as the extract of the speech from the Throne of this Session, on the same subject, for the purpose, as he must suppose, of marking the striking distinction between them, the former having stated an objectionable principle as the foundation of the measure upon which an amendment had been moved to the address, and the House divided, whereas the latter, her present Majesty's declaration, that "the government of the cities and towns in Ireland called for better regulation," was no more than had already been affirmed by him, and those with whom he acted, in voting for the abolition of existing corporations, and pledging themselves to apply
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such remedies to their defects as could obviate all just causes of complaint, insure the impartial administration of justice, and provide for the good local management of the cities and towns in Ireland. He trusted that the noble Lord was prepared to proceed pari passu with the other two Irish measures that had been mentioned in the same paragraph of her Majesty's Speech. The noble Lord had laid upon the table a Bill for the relief of the Irish poor: of the Irish Tithe Bill the House had not as yet heard; nor one word on the untoward subject of the appropriation clause. But he was, for one, prepared to say, that if the property of the church in Ireland was placed on a secure basis, and if a standard was fixed for the franchise, independently of the oath of the voter, a custom that had led to so much evil and crime in Ireland, by the Poor-law Bill or other sufficient means, then he should desire to see those constantly-recurring and irritating Irish discussions brought to an end, and the three great Irish questions which they involved, safely, satisfactorily, and finally adjusted. He must, at the same time, observe, that, apart from political and party motives, he verily believed that there was no anxiety on the part of the Irish people generally for these new corporations. Where were the petitions or any expression of public feeling on the subject? Were they unexcited by those who only looked to ulterior objects, and desired that measure but as an instalment for their accomplishment? The sober-minded of both parties, he was persuaded, would prefer that the administration of the local affairs of the cities and towns in Ireland should be managed in a business-like and economical manner by local boards for the purpose, to being encumbered with the expense of corporate establishments, and suffering the irritation of frequent election canvassings, and the constant trials of party strength. On the other hand, perhaps an undue importance had been attached, from old associations, to the establishment of corporations, provided only that other institutions were first rendered secure, and a safe foundation was found on which to rest the elective franchise, without reference to the oath of the party seeking to establish his justification. He thought that it would be highly convenient as well as just, considering the great importance and population of the city of Dublin, and by analogy to the course pursued in London, that there should be separate legislation for the cor-

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poration of Dublin. He had taken a sheet of paper to note down the heads of the Bill as they should have been stated by the noble Lord; but as the noble Lord had not favoured the House with any account of the measure, there was nothing for him (Mr. Shaw) to note down, or consequently to say, on that point. He would, therefore, only further observe, that while he did not oppose the introduction of the measure, he reserved to himself the right to take such course as he might think fit on any of its future stages.
Leave given.

MORTGAGES ON SHIPPING.
Mr. G. F. Young Mr. G. F. Young moved for leave to bring in a Bill to amend the laws relating to mortgages of ships and vessels. It was not his intention to throw any impediment in the way of persons having property in ships, and having occasion to raise money on that property, but to put an end to fraudulent practices, which were injurious to the tradesmen who supplied ships with stores, and to those who had bonâ fide property in ships. He would not trouble the House with any discussion of the provisions of the Bill in that stage, but would only say, that it had the entire approval of the right hon. and learned Civilian, the Member for the Tower Hamlets.
Mr. Alderman Thompsonsaid, that this Bill would have the very opposite effect to what was intended by the Bill of last year, and the measure was not at all necessary for the protection of persons advancing money by way of mortgage on ships. Every person so lending money on ships had the means of knowing whether any part of the ship was already mortgaged. There was a book at Lloyd's in which every mortgage must be entered, no mortgage being valid that was not so entered, and no fee was charged for the inspection of that book. The effect of the Bill would be to prevent shipowners from mortgaging their property with the same facility as they could at present: and as the owners of ail other kinds of property; the shipowners had not been sufficiently consulted about it; still he would not oppose the motion.
Leave given.

PRESBYTERIANS (IRELAND).
Mr. James Gibson Mr. James Gibson moved for leave to bring in a Bill to allow all Dissenters from the Established Church in Ireland, known by the name of Presbyterian Protestants, to make oath in all cases in courts of justice, and other
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places where an oath is required, by swearing with uplifted hand. In bringing forward this motion, he said, that his object was to allow the Presbyterians in Ireland to take oaths in the same manner that they did in Scotland. There were, he remarked, various denominations of Presbyterians in Ireland—the Presbyterians of the Synod, Seceders, Covenanters, and Remonstrants; and all these parties he meant to include in his Bill. In 1782 the Seceders had obtained an Act from the Irish Parliament, by which they were permitted, in civil cases, to swear with uplifted hands. This, however advantageous to that sect, was injurious to others, because it interfered with the common law, which permitted each to swear in that manner which was most binding upon his conscience. He referred to the minutes of the general synod held in Ireland in 1836, to show that the matter which he sought to remedy was felt by the Presbyterians to be a very great hardship upon them. He had several cases to show how it operated; but one, he thought, was sufficient—it was a case which occurred at the sessions in Belfast, where Dr. Cooke was brought forward as a witness against his own servant, accused of petty larceny; and because Dr. Cooke refused laying his hand on the gospels, and kissing the Testament, his evidence was not taken. At the assizes Dr. Cooke presented himself before the Chief Baron of the Court of Exchequer, and demanded that he might take the oath according to the form prescribed by the Church of Scotland. This was refused, and the Chief Baron referred the point to the twelve judges, who decided that the oath could not be taken in the manner he wished, and by this means a person who might have been guilty was not punished. This, then, he submitted to the House, was a state of the law which required revision. The common law of England allowed every man to be sworn in the way which was most stringent upon his conscience. Mahometans, Jews, Bramins, all were allowed to be sworn according to their peculiar creeds, and yet Presbyterians were not allowed to be sworn according to the mode of adjuration that would be most binding upon their consciences. He concluded by moving for leave to bring in the Bill.
Sir R. Bateson, in seconding the motion, said he was sure that no opposition would be offered to the Bill by any hon. Member on the same side of the House as himself.
Motion agreed to.

THE LATE SPEAKER.
Sir F. Pollock, who had given notice of his intention to call the attention of the House to the Report of the "Select Committee on the losses of the late Speaker and officers of the House by fire of the Houses of Parliament," with a view to give effect to their claims on the consideration of the House, said, he was about to move that the House should resolve itself into a Committee of the whole House; but he should, if ii, were necessary, state the case then upon which he meant to rely. He did not wish, however, to occupy the time of the House unnecessarily, and he should, therefore, move that they resolve themselves into a Committee of the whole House. When in Committee it was his intention to move for an Address to her Majesty, praying for compensation to the late Speaker and other officers for losses sustained by the burning of the Houses of Parliament.
Mr. Humehoped, that some reason would be assigned for such a motion.
Sir F. Pollockhad, he said, no objection to state it at any length which the hon. Member might wish. The reason why he did not at once state the reasons for submitting his motion was, that he did not wish to make the matter the subject of a double debate. If it were, however, the general sense of the House, he should proceed to the discussion; though he should prefer the House resolving itself into a Committee.
The Chancellor of the Exchequerthought, that if an objection were taken to the proposition on the matter of principle, then that would be the proper time for the discussion; but if the objection were only to the amount of the vote, then they might go at once into Committee and consider what that amount ought to be. He for one was prepared to say this, that after due inquiry, after the evidence that had been given, and after an attentive consideration of the report which he held in his hand, he had come to the conclusion that there was an insuperable objection to the principle for which the hon. Member contended, and he was prepared to oppose the Speaker leaving the chair. Entertaining such an opinion, he considered that the discussion ought then to be proceeded with.
Sir F. Pollockwould then shortly relate to the House the circumstances under which Lord Canterbury sustained losses to the amount of several thousand pounds. During the whole time that that noble Lord
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had been Speaker of that House he had been under the necessity of occupying a part of the buildings attached to that House, and of being there with his family. For the purposes of maintaining the hospitality connected with his station, Lord Canterbury had. been under the necessity of living in a style of splendour and magnificence. According to the report which he held in his hand, it appeared that in October, 1834, during the absence of Lord Canterbury, his residence was burned down, and the furniture, &c., materially damaged, the greater portion being entirely destroyed. Under these circumstances he had to present the case of Lord Canterbury to the House as one highly deserving of their consideration. He would state very shortly the grounds on which he thought the claim of Lord Canterbury to compensation rested. He thought it sufficient to state that Lord Canterbury was a public servant of this country, compelled to reside in a certain house at a great expense, and that he had incurred a loss of many thousands in consequence of that house having been destroyed by fire, through the negligence of other public servants over whom he had no control. He would remind the House of what had been said on this subject in the last Session of Parliament by the hon. Member for one division of the county of Durham (Mr. Pease). That hon. Member said, that in any case where a servant of his occupied a house or part of a house, and a fire broke out, not through his negligence, but in a separate part of the premises, he should consider himself bound not to inquire whether the party had insured or not, but to grant him compensation. He would say a single word on what he considered to be the common law of the case. By the common law of England, the late Speaker, having lost his property by a fire which originated elsewhere than in his own house, and through the negligence of persons over whom he had neither a direct nor indirect control, was entitled to redress somewhere. He would not take up the time of the House in citing authorities—he would merely mention to the Attorney- General where they were to be found, namely in Comyn's Digest, letter A, number 6. It was there distinctly laid down, that an action on the case would lie against the owner and occupier of a house if a fire broke out there and destroyed the house, of his neighbour. This was the state of the law before the statute of Anne.

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It was clear, therefore, that in the case of a private individual a right of action would lie; and could the House, either in generosity or justice, say, because there might be a technical difficulty in bringing the action in respect of premises occupied under the Crown, that, therefore, the Speaker was to be disentitled? The right of parties to obtain compensation for losses occasioned by fire was regulated by the 6th of Anne, c. 81, s. 6; which statute was rendered perpetual by the 10th Anne. That statute enacted that no action, suit, or process should be had, or obtained, or prosecuted against any person in whose house or chamber any fire should accidentally begin, in consequence of damage occasioned by such fire. This Act only applied to houses and chambers, the object of it being to protect persons against domestic accidents. The case of factories did not come within the statute of Anne, neither did the case of warehouses, &c. But by the Building Act it was required that party-walls should be erected between every building. There was a remarkable provision in the Building Act, which provided that the operation of the Act should not extend to any of the royal palaces. By the 69th section, it was provided that nothing in the act should be construed to extend to any of the King's royal palaces, or to any house or building in the possession of the King, his heirs, or successors, or to any house employed in his use or service. There was good sense, reason, and justice in making this provision with respect to party-walls; and if the residence of Lord Canterbury had not formed part of a royal palace, and if the Building Act had been or could have been enforced, the fire would not have extended to the Speaker's house. Lord Canterbury being thus compelled to occupy a portion of a royal palace, in which, through the gross negligence of others, a fire originated, had become a sufferer to a great extent. He was aware that in the last Parliament, when there had been some opposition offered to this claim, it was asked was Lord Canterbury insured? To this he would give two answers. At the time the fire happened, in point of fact, the place was not insured; but he begged to say that Lord Canterbury was under no obligation to be insured in respect of this House. If Lord Canterbury, in virtue of his office, had been giving a dinner party to the Members of the House of Commons, and had found his house on fire and his property destroyed,
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and then had come to the House for compensation, that House might ask him why he had not insured? But Lord Canterbury had a perfect right to take upon himself his own domestic risks, and he had an equal right to call upon the House to protect him against consequences arising from the negligence of other servants of the Crown. If the negligence had been Lord Canterbury's own, he could understand the argument respecting his not being insured; but another argument arose on this point. Even if Lord Canterbury had been insured, his policy would not have been worth one farthing in point of law, as from the negligent construction of the premises, forming, as they did, part of the royal palace, and from the mixture of bricks and wood, there was in reality no party-wall within the meaning of the Act. The late Speaker had, for fifteen years, insured this property. He retired from the chair, not expecting that he should be called upon to fill it again, and his insurance had, therefore, been permitted to expire. The circumstances under which he had resumed the Chair at the request of Government, were well known; but even then, the late Speaker expected to remain in the Chair but a short time, and this was the reason why he did not insure. But if he had insured, the insurance company would have been under no obligation to pay the amount of the policy, inasmuch as the conditions of an insurance policy were not complied with. It might be said, that no insurance establishment would make the objection. That might be so; but in that case, the late Speaker would have received a certain sum of money, not by right, but as a matter of grace and favour at the hands of the insurance company. But even in that case, he was not sure that a public insurance company, in thus awarding money, would not be guilty of a breach of faith to the shareholders. He would, however, be glad to ask this question—"What could the late Speaker expect from any body of men whatever, if he could not expect it from that House?" He would ask hon. Members on both sides of the House this question—"If the fire had occurred, and the late Speaker had been insured, and the policy had been declared void; if the late Speaker were compelled to throw himself on the mercy of any assembly, what assembly should it be if not that House?" He had no doubt, at the same time, but that it was optional for the late Speaker to insure. The owner of a

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ship generally insured, but he was not bound to do so. Suppose such a person, without insuring, were run down by the negligence of another vessel, was it any answer to say, when the injured man came into a court of law to claim compensation, "Why did you not insure?" He had a right to say, that he had confidence in his own watchfulness and care to preserve his vessel, but he did not expect to be run down by others. This illustrated what he considered to be the state of the present case, and upon these grounds he was willing to present the case to the attention of the House. He had no complaint to make against his right hon. Friend, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, or against her Majesty's Ministers, as he had no doubt they were discharging what they sincerely believed to be their duty, in endeavouring to learn what was the sense of the House with respect to this claim. He was inclined to rest the case upon its legal rights; but whether hon. Members looked upon it as a matter of right, or as one of grace and favour, or whether they referred to the particular circumstances of the case, or to the circumstances under which the late Speaker was called up to fill the Chair, on all and each of these grounds he felt it was a case in which justice and good faith were involved; and he therefore hoped that the House would support his motion for going into Committee.
The Chancellor of the Exchequersaid, that it was at all times painful to interpose any difficulties in the way of a grant, but it was particularly unpleasant in the case of the noble Lord, at whose hands, during the many years he had presided over the deliberations of that House, he had had so many opportunities of experiencing kindness. His feelings of respect towards the late Speaker, were felt by other Members of that House, and on. their behalf, as well as his own, he protested against any inference that might be drawn as to those feelings from the vote which he, for one, and others believed themselves bound to give on this question. If it had been a question of regard—if it had been a question of voting this money to the late Speaker, independently of the principle involved in it, he, for one, should have been happy to have had an opportunity of agreeing in the motion. But the question was, whether, upon the facts set forth in evidence, the House would be warranted in granting the sum of public money claimed? His hon. and learned Friend,
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knew, he said, no cause to reproach him with the course he had taken. He hoped, that the House would find no reason to complain of the course he was about to take—a course which would stand justified on the grounds of public duty. This subject had come under the consideration of the last Parliament. On that occasion, his hon. and learned Friend introduced the matter to the attention of the House. He then stated, that the Government having had the question before them, did not feel justified, on their own authority, in awarding compensation to the late Speaker, but that, considering the circumstances under which the loss had been sustained, they did not consider it an unfit subject for the consideration of the House itself. Under these circumstances, the subject was brought forward. It was found, in the course of the debates, that matters of fact, as well as of law, were very much in dispute. It was then suggested that the matter should be referred to a Select Committee, impartially constituted, and which within a short period, would have the power of forming a just decision. The appointment of the Committee was opposed by those Gentlemen who were adverse to the grant. It was, however, appointed; they had reported the evidence, and upon that evidence, the House was now called upon to decide. What, then, were the facts of the case, and what were the principles involved in it? It appeared that the late Speaker, during the many successive years that he had occupied the chair of that House, had insured his property. He thought, that this fact met something of the argument of the hon. and learned Member. Undoubtedly, the late Speaker was not bound to insure; he was not compelled to insure; but, if he did not insure, the risk was his own. But the hon. and learned gentleman said, that he was not bound to insure against risks brought on by acts of other parties. Now he would appeal to any Members of that House connected with insurance companies, whether such a distinction had ever been made? It was impossible. Suppose the fire had occurred during the period the late Speaker was insured, would the circumstance of the origin of the fire deprive the late Speaker of the benefit of the insurance? He would be paid the amount of the insurance, whether the cause of the fire originated in the burning of tally-sticks or in his own house. They had the authority of Lord Canterbury himself, that during a period of many years

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he did insure; but the hon. and learned gentleman had stated, that no office in London was bound to pay the insurance. He begged the House to notice upon what fallacies the hon. and learned Member had rested his whole case. These fallacies of which he complained were contradicted by the very evidence which the hon. and learned Member held in his hand. Did the hon. and learned Gentleman mean to say that the insurance company would not be bound to pay? They had it distinctly in evidence in page 6 of the printed minutes, that it was stated by one of the officers connected with the very company in which Lord Canterbury had insured, that the practice of the company was, in case of a defect in the policy like the present, that a statement of the facts should be presented to the court of directors, by whom it would be taken into consideration, and in most cases favourably received, wherever it was proved to the court that the deviation was not known to the party who had made the contract. Now, there was no suggestion that the deviation, in the present instance, was known to Lord Canterbury; and there could be no doubt, therefore, that if he had continued his insurance, the insurance company would not have hesitated for a single moment to pay. But this was not all. There was a further question and answer in respect of the mode adopted at insurance-offices. The witness was asked, whether a party by such a deviation would forfeit his legal right? The answer was, certainly not. He was then asked, whether the paying the money was a matter of grace or a matter of right? The answer was, decidedly; if the person deviated from the contract, he must come before the company for mercy. He sometimes found hon. and even learned Gentlemen weakening their ease by asking a question too much, and the present was a marvellous instance of the impolicy of asking too many questions, for the next question was, "In those cases where you extend grace and favour, does the amount at all affect their decision?" The answer was, "Not at all, whether the sum be 5,000 l. or 6,000 l., or any other sum; if the case should be taken into favourable consideration, we look at the principle, and not to the amount." The next question was, "What is that principle?" "That it should be proved to the satisfaction of the court of directors, that the deviation was not known to the party making the contract." But was it suggested that the
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deviation was known to Lord Canterbury, and could there, then, be the least doubt but that his claim would have met with a favourable consideration from the insurance company, if he had been in a situation to bring it forward? But he begged to call the attention of the House peculiarly to this. Was Lord Canterbury the only person who came under the category of claimants? Was there no body else in the same situation, whose case ran upon all fours with the case of Lord Canterbury? Was there nobody whose case came before the insurance company, and in which they had the decision of an insurance company, and from which decision they would have a right to infer what would have been the decision in Lord Canterbury's case. He would pass from Lord Canterbury to a very worthy and excellent officer, Mr. Bellamy. That gentleman was an officer of the House of Commons, and had also a deviation in his policy; so that, in this respect, his case and Lord Canterbury's were exactly alike. He had suffered loss by the fire as well as Lord Canterbury. So far their cases were identical. Mr. Bellamy had, however, insured, as Lord Canterbury repeatedly had done before, but which latterly he had ceased to do. Mr. Bellamy applied to the insurance office, and was paid the whole amount of his policy without any difficulty being raised; on the contrary, the amount was paid readily and cheerfully. Was there a man, then, who could doubt, if Lord Canterbury had insured as Mr. Bellamy had done, whether the result to Lord Canterbury would have been the same as to Mr. Bellamy. His not being insured, therefore, was owing to the neglect or forgetfulness of Lord Canterbury himself. It might be stated, that there were particular grounds which entitled Lord Canterbury to a distinction which did not apply to the other case. He had endeavoured to show that, if Lord Canterbury wished to be protected, he ought to have insured. He had shown, by the evidence of an officer of the company with whom Lord Canterbury had before insured, that, if he had continued to insure, even as a matter of grace, a favourable consideration would have been extended to him; and the example of Mr. Bellamy showed that this was no hypothetical case, but one of absolute demonstration. It was stated, that there were two precedents to justify the present claim, namely, one with respect to Sir Robert Gordon, and the other with respect to the fire in St.

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James's Palace. Now, neither the one nor the other applied in the slightest degree to the present case. In Sir Robert Gordon's case there was a distinction which was perfectly obvious. The case gave rise to a great deal of discussion, and was only decided after a great deal of difficulty, but the point upon which the decision in that case turned was this, that the property was situated at Constantinople, where Sir Robert Gordon had no power to insure his property, and therefore he had a right to come upon the public for some degree of protection. But what did the House do? They did not give the full amount—they merely gave the amount of the outlay. In the case of the fire in St. James's Palace, there was this distinction, that the loss fell upon the domestic servants, and it was an act of bounty on the part of the Crown to make the compensation then granted out of the civil list. But supposing they granted the present claim, see to what the principle would lead. There were a great many public buildings in the country, in which officers were compelled to reside these officers were distributed throughout the whole country, in the revenue, the excise, the Post-office departments, as well as in the barracks. Now every one of those officers at present, as a matter of common prudence, insured the property of which he was possessed; but if they were to affirm the principle that every individual thus compelled to reside in a public building was to be relieved from the necessity of insuring his property, he would undertake to say that they would have abundance of claims like the present brought forward. On these grounds he felt bound, as a matter of principle, to resist the present motion. He thought it right, however, before he sat down, to advert to the particular circumstances of Lord Canterbury's case. It was stated by Lord Canterbury in his evidence that as long as he considered himself permanently in the service of the House of Commons, so long he insured his property; and that he discontinued insuring it when, not of his own seeking, but at the request of the Government and for the public convenience, he, not permanently, but for a temporary purpose, resumed his functions. This was the real point of the case. But there was no ground whatever for saying that if Lord Canterbury came back for a year or a session it was not optional with him to insure; so that such a reason for acceding to the present motion—although be stated it that Gentlemen discussing this
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question might not overlook any point bearing upon it—was altogether untenable. He could only repeat, in sitting down, that as a matter personally affecting Lord Canterbury it would have been exceedingly gratifying to him if he could fairly and justly accede to the present proposition; but having opposed it as a member of the Board of Treasury, and the question having been referred to a Committee of that House—having before him the evidence of that Committee, which, so far from supporting this claim, in his judgment, negatived it—and finding, further, that this principle could not be carried without being followed by consequences full of mischief, he was compelled, however reluctantly, to say no to the proposition of the hon. and learned Gentleman.
Mr. Warburtonentirely agreed with the observations which had fallen from the right hon. Gentleman, the Chancellor of the Exchequer. He adhered to the ground which he had taken last Session in opposition to the present motion, and that was, that the House of Commons should not show greater favour to Lord Canterbury than they would be disposed to do to any other individual. He thought they were disposed to act in the manner which he had pointed out; at least he was of that opinion last Session; and from the papers laid before the House he was inclined to form the opinion that the Members of the House of Commons and of the Government—he meant the Government of the right hon. Baronet (Sir R. Peel)—took that unfair view of the subject. He alluded to circumstances which came incidentally before the House in an appendix to the report of the Committee which investigated this case. He must say that if any one transaction deserved to be characterised by the name of a downright job, that to which he was about to refer came under that designation. It appeared that after the fire had taken place, and that the whole house of the Speaker was in a dilapidated state, an application had been made by Lord Canterbury the Treasury to purchase eight chairs, two screens, and two sofas, for the sum of 500 guineas, that he had given for them. These eight chairs, two screens, and two sofas had been purchased from Lord Gwydyr, who claimed them as a perquisite, because at the coronation of his Majesty George the 4th, that monarch had slept in that House the day preceding his coronation, and this event, by some old grant, bestowed the property on the individual who held the office which

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the noble Lord to whom he referred filled. The demand was made before the Court of Claims and granted. The late Speaker having purchased this furniture, it was preserved after a fire took, place on the premises; and in order to make it available to the new Speaker, it would be necessary to build a house to suit the furniture, and not the furniture the house. This offer was made during the short administration of the right hon. Baronet, and it seemed to have been accepted, and on the very point of being concluded, when a change in the administration took place. And thus was the most arrant job that was ever attempted to be perpetrated by any Government defeated. Having, then, this proof that there was a greater disposition to favour Lord Canterbury than any other person, he asked hon. Members not to outrage their own feelings of justice by voting unjustly towards others; and he begged of them, as they regulated their conduct by the rule of acting, necprece necpretio, not to suffer their sense of the hospitality and urbanity of the late Speaker, which he cheerfully acknowledged, to lead them into the commission of an unjustifiable act. One of the arguments used in support of this claim was, that in consequence of the neglect of the Government officers with respect to a party-wall, the premises were rendered uninsurable, and Lord Canterbury was consequently entitled to compensation. Now, in the first place, they were not uninsurable; and if Lord Canterbury had acted the part of a prudent man, he would have compelled the Government officers to save him from the liability to which their neglect exposed him. But suppose the property was uninsurable, were the Government, therefore, bound to compensate the party for their act? He would give them an instance in which it was proved that they did not consider themselves thus liable. The case to which he alluded was that which he had submitted last night, and in which money had been paid into the Treasury for the express purpose of relieving the suffering party. By the act of the Government the straits of Copenhagen were seized, and the ships that had to go up the Baltic, in consequence of his Majesty's fleet having quitted Copenhagen, were taken as it were in a trap, and wholly prevented from insuring their property. When these parties came forward and asked to be compensated, so far from the act of the Government being allowed as a valid ground for acceding to their claim,
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this was the very class that was excluded from relief. He, therefore, contended that, even where the act of the Government made property uninsurable, it was not their habit to grant compensation.
Sir E. Sugdenhoped that the fears of the hon. Member for Bridport with regard to his clients' chance of compensation would not be further entertained after that night's discussion, and that he would be persuaded that the Treasury was fully competent to meet that as well as the present claim. At all events, he thought that the reasoning of the hon. Gentleman was somewhat singular, and tended to press personally and severely on Lord Canterbury, to whom, every Member of that House was deeply indebted for his impartiality and courtesy in performing the duties of Speaker. The hon. Gentleman asked whether it was intended that the present motion should be considered as a matter of favour. Why, no man doubted that this claim to compensation was urged as a matter of favour. No one rested it on the ground of absolute right. His hon. and learned Friend who introduced the motion showed how the legal right would have existed, and how very nice a point it was to say whether, in point of law, Lord Canterbury was not entitled to compensation. He gave the right hon. Gentleman, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, full credit for entertaining the feelings which he had expressed with regard to Lord Canterbury; and he could not help thinking that the course which the right hon. Gentleman took was dictated rather by his sense of the duty which devolved on him in his present position than by his own intimate conviction. He thought it was most unreasonably feared that this case might be drawn into a precedent. The offices of other public servants were not at all analogous to that which the Speaker of that House filled. He put it to every hon. Member in that House whether there did not exist a feeling of generosity towards the man who was placed in the exalted position of Chairman of the congregated Representatives of the people; whether there was not, in fact, an acknowledged title to favour and consideration in the case of such a man to which no other public officer could possibly pretend. He was persuaded, therefore, that if this claim were acceded to as a matter of grace, it would never lead to inconvenience as a precedent. Much stress had been laid on the allowance made to Mr. Bellamy by the

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insurance office at which he had insured. It did not, however, follow, that the company at which Lord Canterbury might have insured would have followed the example thus set, because the buildings differed in situation and in description. He believed that no Gentleman in that House or in the country would hesitate to compensate his steward, if by no act of his own, but through the intercession of his master, he was induced to continue in the occupation of premises which, being destroyed by accident subjected him to a loss of property. He appealed to the House, then, whether they would refuse to act in a gracious manner towards one who had long presided over their deliberations, and the justice of whose case was at least as strong as those which the hon. Member for Bridport had last night advocated.
Mr. Humewas rather surprised to hear the right hon. and learned Gentleman complain of the allusion which his hon. Friend (Mr. Warburton) had made to the purchase by the late Speaker of the eight chairs and the two sofas.
Sir E. Sugden: I never referred to chairs or sofas at all.
Mr. Humeshould be glad to know, then, why the right hon. and learned Gentleman had at all reflected on the course of argument pursued by his hon. Friend. His hon. Friend had adduced a case which, in his opinion, was an apt illustration of Tory jobbing, and which certainly called for explanation from the noble Lord opposite (Lord G. Somerset) who was Commissioner of Woods and Forests under the Administration of the right hon. Baronet, the Member for Tamworth. He did not blame Lord Canterbury for getting what he could; but he considered the conduct of the noble Lord opposite highly censurable in promising five hundred guineas for five old chairs and three old screens, in order that they might be retained until a new Speaker was appointed, and a new House built. The case which his hon. Friend had laid before them was the most arrant job which had ever come under his knowledge. He had assisted in raking up many jobs in that House, but he ventured to say that a more disgraceful one than that which had been that night submitted was never yet disclosed. The Government of Lord Melbourne presented in this instance a strong contrast to that of the right hon. Member for Tamworth, in as mach as it demonstrated how anxious the existing administration was not to yield to the claim
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of any one as a matter of favour, but to rest every case upon its merits. This was rather a strange time for bringing forward such a claim. The fire took place in October, 1834, and no demand for compensation was made until April, 1837. He understood the right hon. and learned Gentleman, Sir E. Sugden, had abandoned the law of the case, though it had been mainly relied upon by the hon. and learned Gentleman who made the motion. "We give up," said the hon. and learned Gentleman, "our right as legal claimants, hut we ask you to be generous in your conduct towards a public servant." Now he told the right hon. and learned Gentleman that he ought to be just before he was generous. No man had a right to be generous with the public money. That was a doctrine which he could never admit, acting in his capacity of trustee of the public. Supposing, then, that Lord Canterbury appealed to them in forma pauperis, what could be produced to establish such a demand? Why should they be generous? Why should they give away the money of the people unjustly, and establish the precedent of partiality? He repudiated altogether the right of any Member of Parliament to be generous. Of the urbanity and impartiality of the late Speaker it was unnecessary to say more than that every Member, young and old, preserved a strong sense of them; and as for himself, he had ever had kind and generous feelings towards him. That generosity shall not, however, be exercised at the expense of the people. It was very easy for hon. Members opposite to give to their extravagant acts the praise of generosity; but if they had such a very strong regard for Lord Canterbury, why not put their hands to their pockets and pay him the amount of his claim? He was, in the present circumstances of the case, compelled to ask, what right had Lord Canterbury to appeal to the generosity of the public? His office was worth 7,000 l. a-year, with house and every convenience. The noble Lord then retired on an allowance of 4,000 l. a-year, whilst his son would gain, under a Bill to which he had in that House given the most strenuous opposition, and which was forced through Parliament in the most unusual manner, a sinecure in the Prerogative Court of Canterbury of 10,000 l. a-year. If any individual, therefore, received full and ample compensation for his public services it was Lord Canterbury. He trusted the House would not countenance a proposition which would establish a bad precedent.
Mr. Peasewas convinced, by much consideration of this case, he ought to support a proposition similar to that which was now submitted; and, under all its circumstances, he saw no reason for changing that opinion. He was not swayed by feelings of private friendship or by the recollection of hospitality. He had never partaken of the one or received the other; and the view which he felt bound to take, in opposition to those with whom he generally acted, was founded upon a sense of justice, and of the propriety of the course which he adopted, if called for in a case in which he was himself personally interested.
Mr. F. Baringmeant to detain the House with but a very few observations, as the legal question which arose out of the case had been completely answered by his right hon. Friend, the Chancellor of the Exchequer. If the question were one purely of law, the arguments which bore upon it might be much more conveniently urged before a legal tribunal than in that House. But the right hon. and learned Gentleman (Sir E. Sugden) had said, "This is a case calling for an act of peculiar grace and favour towards an officer of the House of Commons, and, as such, placed in a superior position to all other public servants—who has served you faithfully for a long series of years." He must venture to request the House to be a little cautious how they admitted that principle. He for one could not admit that those who served that House should be favoured beyond those public officers who were not equally fortunate in point of emolument or of the distinction of their position. He knew of cases of great hardship which occurred with respect to persons in public situations. He would mention one which occurred by the destruction of the Kent East Indiaman. After the occurrence of that event the officers were told that they could not receive anything more than the sum which, upon a strict calculation of their services, they were entitled to. He knew how invidious was the position of the Ministers of the Crown when the dictates of their duty required them to adhere to harsh official rule in opposition to humane and generous appeals; but he submitted to hon. Members how far it would be expedient for them, how far it would look well in the eyes of public officers or of the community, if they proclaimed this practice—"Here is a servant of our own, and we will treat him differently from other public servants. This was a case which had received much deliberation,
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and was sifted with the more care as Lord Canterbury was politically opposed to the Government; but he felt bound to declare that the claim urged in it was not established, and that if he were to give way to it he must also sanction other demands which might be urged incessantly upon the House as often as a public servant fancied himself aggrieved by the Government.
Colonel Sibthorpagreed with the hon. Member for Durham (Mr. Pease). The hon. Gentleman who spoke last asked what right Lord Canterbury had to any peculiar mark of favour from that House? He would answer that question by a quotation from the evidence before the Committee. Lord Canterbury, being under examination, said, "I received a letter from the present Lord Spencer, then Lord Althorp, saying that Lord Grey and his colleagues requested that, as I was returned to Parliament, I would retake the chair that Session, in order that the House should have the benefit of fifteen years' experience."
Sir Robert Peelmust, in the first place, state his sincere conviction that the opposition given by her present Majesty's Government to the present motion was free from the alloy of any political feeling, but that it was offered under the impression that imperative duty required them to act as they had done. He was desirous of removing a prejudice to the consideration of this claim which was attempted to be raised by the hon. Member for Bridport. The consideration of that point had nothing whatever to do with the matter properly before the House; but as the hon. Member had thought proper to attach to it the epithet "job," and, as if this term applied, he was, as forming part of the administration when the transaction took place, more or less implicated in it, he begged the indulgence of the House for a few moments while he endeavoured to place it in its true light. Previously to the coronation of George 4th, certain rooms connected with the Houses of Parliament, being royal property and furnished by the Crown, were attached to the official residence of the Speaker, and were by him used as reception rooms for the House of Commons when they visited him. They did not in the slightest degree contribute to the comfort of the Speaker; but on state occasions were, as well as the furniture, used by him when holding levees. During the coronation of George the 4th, these rooms were occupied by the Crown, and upon its conclusion the Great Chamberlain

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laid claim to the furniture; and upon investigation of his demand by the Court of Claims, it was awarded to him. Lord Canterbury (the then Speaker), instead of going to the Treasury and complaining that he had been deprived of the use of the furniture, and urging that he could not, in its absence, entertain the House of Commons as he had been accustomed to do, or call upon them to re-purchase the property, generously determined upon making a sacrifice to keep up his state, and, without referring to any party, stepped forward to purchase the furniture from the Great Chamberlain. The Parliament Houses were burned, and all that remained after the fire was this very furniture so purchased by Lord Canterbury. Seeing this, the Treasury, taking into consideration all the circumstances—considering in the first place, that for a long period the Speaker of the House of Commons, virtute officii, had had the care of this furniture, and that upon its being declared after the coronation no longer the property of the Crown, but of the Great Chamberlain, he had purchased it, not for his own comfort, but to enable him to receive the House of Commons as he had been accustomed—the Treasury determined, not upon giving Lord Canterbury the price he had paid for them, but upon having them valued by an upholsterer, and then giving him for them the sum which this person should decide as being their actual worth. Now in how far this transaction deserved the term job he left to the House to decide. With respect to the case under the consideration of the House, it would be affectation in him not to say that he thought it one of considerable difficulty. Thus much he would say, that had Lord Canterbury sought to remain in the office of Speaker, or had he continued in it without the expression of any wish to be permitted to retire, and, having insured for fifteen years, had discontinued without any visible motive, he did not think the noble Lord would have any valid claim. He admitted that the strong point against the claim was the discontinuance of the insurance. But what were the facts of the case? In 1832 Lord Canterbury, after seventeen years service in the office of Speaker, contemplated retiring, on the ground of indisposition entailed upon him by a constant attendance to the duties of his situation. He communicated his intention to Lord Grey, and in consequence, in the year 1832, Parliament on the recommendation of the law officers of the
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Crown, passed an Act securing to him the usual retiring allowance. A general election soon after took place, and Lord Canterbury having been returned to the new Parliament, Lords Grey and Althorp, on the part of the Government of the day, signified to him their wish—a wish which they alleged was entirely founded on considerations connected with the public service—that for one Session at least he should continue to occupy the Speaker's chair. Previous to this application he had discontinued paying the insurance on the furniture in the official residence, and calculating that his retention of office would be at most a year, he did not think it worth while to renew his insurance. Now, he put it to every Gentleman present if under similar circumstances, he would not have acted in the same manner. But, unfortunately, during this very year of discontinued insurance the fire took place, not originating, be it observed, in the Speaker's house, but in a distant part of the building; and the property having been destroyed, Lord Canterbury thought proper to present the matter to the House, not as a claim of right, but as the claim of the first servant of the House of Commons, praying for a generous consideration of his case. (He Sir Robert Peel) felt disposed warmly to support the claim. It appeared to him that the House of Commons stood completely in the situation of the Crown, and Lord Canterbury in that of a servant of the Crown, and he saw no more reason why the one should receive compensation in such a case as the present more than the other. In the case of the Crown the civil list would have been made available. He did not see why in the present instance the public funds, which represented the civil list of the House of Commons, should not become so. In a matter of this kind, which was not a matter of strict law, and looking to the peculiar circumstances of the case, which was not likely to be drawn into a precedent, he thought that the generous test applied by the hon. Member for South Durham was after all the best. The appeal made by that hon. Member was not to be defeated by the cold and calculating question put by the hon. Member for Middlesex—he meant Kilkenny—who asked, ''What right had they to be generous?" There were some occasions when generosity, though not perhaps required by the strict letter of the law, was most consonant with the honour and permanent interest of a

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great country. Let that House put itself in the place of a master in the present case; let it suppose itself in the situation of a private individual, whose steward had, on account of indisposition incurred in service, demanded permission to retire, but who, at the urgent request of his master, continued in office, to his own great inconvenience. Let the House further suppose, that this servant, after a short period, suffered a loss in consequence of a calamity for which he was not in the slightest degree responsible; and he then asked, whether it would not be consistent with justice, if not with law, to take an equitable view of the case? It was on this ground, that looking to all the various circumstances of the case, and considering that it was not likely to occur again, he should, not concealing from himself the difficulties of the question, but consulting the dictates of a liberal and generous justice, vote in favour, not of the grant of any particular sum of money, but of the motion for a Committee made by his hon. and learned Friend.
The Solicitor-Generalwas glad to perceive, from the speech of the right hon. Baronet who had preceded him, that the question of right in the case under consideration was abandoned, and that it now stood in the only position it could reasonably present itself, namely, as an appeal to the generosity of the House. In this point of view, he was willing to enter upon its consideration; and having said so much, and dissenting entirely from the position of his hon. Friend, the Member for Kilkenny, that Parliament had no right to be generous, he expected a favourable construction would be put upon his words when he stated, that upon this very ground of generosity, he felt bound to oppose the proposition under discussion. It was a very easy thing to be generous with other people's money; but he feared the public would be a little suspicious of the disinterestedness of the House, should they find that a different measure of justice was dealt out to Lord Canterbury, on the ground that he was a servant of the House, than that which the Government was almost every day, on equally, if not better founded cases, meting to humbler individuals. The right hon. Baronet had asked them, how they would individually act if the case of Lord Canterbury was the case of their private steward? Certainly, before he allowed his generosity to act, he should ask himself, had his servant done that which it
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was reasonable in him to expect he should do. Now, had Lord Canterbury done so? In his opinion he had not. In 1832, at the end of the year, he ceased paying the instalments on his insurance, having, as he alleged, the intention to retire. He, however, did not retire, and allowed all the years 1833 and 1834, up to the time of the fire, to pass over without renewing his insurance. Had the fire taken place immediately after he had been invited to return to the chair by Lords Grey and Althorp, and before he had time to arrange himself in the office, then the case would be different; but, as it was, a long period had been allowed to elapse, and even at the time the fire did take place, the noble Lord did not contemplate carrying into effect his plan of retirement. It was for this reason he had come to the conclusion that there had been such neglect on the part of Lord Canterbury as disentitled him to the favourable consideration of the House, and he, therefore, would resist the motion which his hon. and learned Friend had introduced.
The House divided—Ayes 163; Noes 173: Majority 10.

List of the AYES.

Acland, Sir T.

Copeland, W. T.

Acland, T. D.

Courtenay, P.

A'Court, Captain

Creswell, C.

Adare, Viscount

Crewe, Sir G.

Alexander, Viscount

Dalrymple, Sir A.

Attwood, W.

Darby, G.

Baillie, H. D.

De Horsey, S. H.

Baker, E.

Dick, Q.

Bannerman, Alex.

D'Israeli, B.

Baring, H. B.

Douglas, Sir C. E.

Barneby, J.

East, J. B.

Barrington, Viscount

Eaton, R. J.

Bateman, J.

Ellis, J.

Bateson, Sir R.

Estcourt, T. G. B.

Bentinck, Lord G.

Estcourt, T. H. S.

Bethell, R.

Farnham, E. B.

Blair, J.

Fergusson, R. C.

Blennerhasset, A.

Fitzroy, hon. H.

Bolling, W.

Follett, Sir W.

Borthwick, P.

Forbes, W.

Broadley, H.

Forester, hon. G.

Broadwood, H.

Freshfield, J.

Buller, Charles

Gibson, T.

Buller, Sir J. Y.

Gordon, hon. Captain

Burr, D. H. D.

Gore, J. R. O.

Canning, Sir S.

Goulburn, H.

Cantelupe, Visct.

Grimsditch, T.

Castlereagh, Visct.

Grimston, Viscount

Chandos, Marquess of

Grimston, hon. E. H.

Christopher, R. A.

Halford, H.

Chute, W. L. W.

Hardinge, Sir H.

Clive, hon. R. H.

Herries, rt. hon. J. C.

Conolly, E. M.

Hillsborough, Earl of

631

Hinde, J. H.

Pakington, J. S.

Hodgson, R.

Parker, M.

Hogg, J. W.

Parker, R. T.

Holmes, hon. W. A.

Patten, J. W.

Holmes, W.

Pease, J.

Hope, G. W.

Peel, rt. hon. Sir R.

Hope, H. T.

Peel, Colonel J.

Houldsworth, T.

Pemberton, T.

Howard, W.

Perceval, Colonel

Hughes, W. B.

Planta, J.

Humphrey, John

Powerscourt, Lord

Ingestrie, Viscount

Praed, Winthrop M.

Ingham, R.

Pringle, A.

Inglis, Sir R. H.

Pusey, P.

Irton, S.

Rae, Sir W., Bart.

Irving, J.

Ramsay, Lord

Jackson, Serjeant

Reid, Sir J. R.

James, Sir W. C.

Rolleston, L.

Jenkins, R.

Round, C. G.

Jermyn, Earl of

Round, J.

Johnstone, H.

Rushbrooke, Colonel

Jolliffe, Sir W.

Rushout, George

Jones, J.

Sanderson, R.

Kemble, H.

Sandon, Viscount

Kerrison, Sir E.

Scarlett, hon. J. Y.

Knatchbull, Sir E.

Scarlett, hon. R.

Knight, H. G.

Shaw, F.

Knightley, Sir C.

Sheppard, T.

Lascelles, hon. W. S.

Shirley, E. J.

Liddell, H. T.

Sibthorp, Colonel

Litton, E.

Sinclair, Sir G.

Lockhart, A. M.

Slaney, R. A.

Logan, H.

Smith, Abel

Lowther, Viscount

Somerset, Lord G.

Lucas, Edward

St. Paul, H.

Lygon, General

Stuart, H.

Lynch, A. H.

Sugden, Sir E.

Mackenzie, T.

Talfourd, Sergeant

Mackenzie, W. F.

Tancred, H. W.

Marton, G.

Thompson, Alderman

Maule, W. H.

Trench, Sir F.

Maunsell, T. P.

Vere, Sir C. B.

Maxwell, H,

Verner, Colonel

Miles, W.

Vivian, J. E.

Miles, P. W. S.

Wall, C. B.

Miller, Wm. Henry

Wilberforce, W.

Milnes, R. M.

Yorke, hon. E. T.

Neeld, J.

TELLERS.

Norreys, Lord

Fremantle, Sir T. W.

Packe, C. W.

Pollock, Sir F.

List of the NOES.

Aglionby, H. A.

Blewitt, R. J.

Anson, Sir George

Blunt, Sir C.

Archbold, R.

Brabazon, Sir W.

Attwood, T.

Bridgeman, H.

Barnard, E. G.

Briscoe, J. I.

Barron, H.

Brocklehurst, J.

Beamish, F. B.

Brotherton, J.

Bellew, R. M.

Browne, R. D.

Benett, J.

Brownrigg, S.

Berkeley, hon. F.

Bryan, G,

Bewes, T.

Bulwer, E. L.

Blackett, C.

Busfield, W.

Blake, W. J.

Butler, hon. P.

Blake, M. J.

Callaghan, D.

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Chalmers, P.

Melgund, Viscount

Chapman, M. L.

Morpeth, Viscount

Chichester, J. P. B.

Morris, D.

Clay, W.

Muskett, G. A.

Collier, John

Nagle, Sir R.

Collins, W.

O'Brien, C.

Craig, W. G.

O'Callaghan, C.

Crompton, S.

O'Connell, D.

Currie, Raikes

O'Connell, M. J.

Curry, W.

O'Connell, Morgan

Dalmeny, Lord

O'Ferrall, R. M.

Davies, T. H.

Paget, F.

Dennistoun, J.

Palmer, C. F.

Duckworth, S.

Palmerston, Viscount

Duff, James

Parker, J.

Duke, Sir J.

Parnell, Sir H.

Duncan, Viscount

Parrott, J.

Dundas, C. W. D.

Pechell, Captain R.

Dundas, F.

Philips, M.

Dunlop, J.

Philips, G. R.

Easthope, J.

Phillpotts, John

Elliot, hon. J. C.

Potter, R.

Erle, W.

Power, J.

Evans, Colonel de L.

Price, Sir R.

Evans, G.

Protheroe, E.

Evans, W.

Pryme, George

Fenton, J.

Ramsbottom, J.

Ferguson, Sir R. A.

Redington, T. N.

Finch, F.

Rice, E. R.

Fitzroy, Lord C.

Rice, rt. hon. T. S.

Fitzsimon, N.

Rich, H.

Fort, J.

Roche, E. B.

French, F.

Roche, D.

Gibson, J.

Rolfe, Sir R. M.

Gillon, W. D.

Rumbold, C. E.

Grattan, H.

Rundle, J.

Greenaway, C.

Russell, Lord J.

Grey, Sir G.

Salwey, Colonel

Guest, J.

Seymour, Lord

Hastie, A.

Sharpe, General

Hawes, B.

Smith, R. V.

Hawkins, J. H.

Somers, J. P.

Hayter, W. G.

Standish, C.

Hindley, C.

Stanley, E. J.

Hobhouse, Sir J. C.

Stanley, W. M.

Hobhouse, T. B.

Stansfield, W. R. C.

Hollond, R.

Steuart, R.

Horsman, E.

Stewart, J.

Hoskins, Kedgwin

Stuart, V.

Howard, F. J.

Strickland, Sir G.

Howard, P. H.

Strutt, E.

Howick, Viscount

Sturt, H. C.

Hume, J.

Style, Sir C.

Hutton, R.

Talbot, C. R. M.

Jephson, C. D. O.

Thomson, rt. hn. C. P.

Jervis, John

Thornley, T.

Johnston, W. A.

Tollemache, E. J.

Labouchere, H.

Troubridge, Sir T.

Langdale, hon. C.

Tufnell, H.

Lennox, Lord G.

Turner, W.

Lennox, Lord A.

Vigors, N. A.

Lushington, C.

Wakley, T.

Macleod, R.

Wallace, R.

Macnamara, Major

Warburton, H.

Mahony, P.

Whalley, Sir S.

Marsland, Henry

White, A.

Martin, J.

Wilbraham, G.

633

Williams, W.

Woulfe, Sergeant

Williams, W. A.

Wyse, Thomas

Wilshere, W.

Yates, J. A.

Winnington, T. E.

Young, G. F.

Winnington, H. J.

TELLERS.

Wood, G. W.

Baring, F.

Wood, T.

Godson, R.

Paired Off.

FOR.

AGAINST.

Egerton, W. T.

Hall, B.

Houstoun, G.

Leader, J. T.

Lowther, J. H.

Molesworth, Sir W.

THE BATTLE OF THE DIAMOND.
Colonel Vernerrose and said: The indulgence of this House has always been manifested towards any one of its Members who had anything of a personal nature to complain of. Encouraged by this generous and always conceded indulgence, I come forward reluctantly to trespass upon its time and crave its attention, while I endeavour to relieve myself from the temporary stigma cast upon my character and conduct, which, if merited, would render me unworthy of addressing you from this place, and unfit me for the high honour conferred upon me y those whom I represent here. Inadequate as I am to the task, and embarrassed as I feel, I am obliged thus early to force myself upon the kind consideration of the House, in order that it may be enabled to judge whether I am deserving the imputation made, and the punishment inflicted, without a trial; and whether I shall be able to vindicate myself before it and those friends who are eagerly and anxiously waiting the result, as well as the public. I cannot expect to make any impression by force of language or powers of oratory. My defence is a simple statement of facts, supported by incontrovertible documents. My crime and that of my family is a steady and undeviating attachment to, and support of, our invaluable constitution in church and state. Throughout a long life of public service I have never swerved from these principles; and I am bold to say that, even at the risk of incurring the still stronger censure of the Irish government and its advisers, I do not think I ever shall. I am fully sensible of the awkwardness of my position, but I hope my friends will find that the few topics to which I shall advert will not add to it. Sir, I need hardly remind the House that I have been lately deprived by the Irish government, of the deputy-lieutenancy of the county of Tyrone, and
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of the commission of the peace for that county, an office which I had held for upwards of three-and-thirty years; the reason assigned by the Government for that deprivation being, that I had proposed, to a number of my friends whom I entertained, by special invitation, at dinner, after my late election, as a toast, "The Battle of the Diamond." The public papers have dealt so largely with the subject that it would be but affectation in me, humble individual as I am, were I to imply that any hon. Member was ignorant either of my alleged offence, or of the punishment with which the Irish Government has been induced to visit it. I shall leave untouched what might be said of my performance of my magisterial duties, the offence for which I was dismissed from them being avowedly unconnected with them. I shall state some facts to the House, and leave hon. Members to draw their own conclusions from them. I feel I owe it to myself and to the guests I entertained, and for whose acceptance I proposed the toast, indignantly to repel the character which—in their ignorance, or from some unexplained cause—the Government has been pleased to give to that toast. The toast was not a new one—was not one given at my table for the first time—but one which had for nearly half a century been proposed and cheered in very many of the convivial meetings in that part of the country. It was a local toast, but one well known in the county of Armagh and the adjoining counties, and which had been current, uncensured, and unrebuked, from September, 1795, up to August last. I am therefore bound, not merely for the credit of myself, or of my friends who were assembled at my table, but for the credit of all belonging to the county I have the honour to represent who have so often pledged that toast, to show to the House and to inform the Government of Ireland of the true character and qualities of those whom they have inconsiderately and unwarrantably designated as a "lawless and disgraceful mob." Happily I shall be able to do this very shortly, by reference to documents, to which I shall beg the attention of the House, and from public records. But, before I enter into an explanation of the circumstances out of which the toast arose, and the sense in which I proposed, it, I think I ought to read so much of the correspondence that took place between the

635
Government and myself as will be necessary to make my statements intelligible to the House. And here I must observe, that this is not a question of orange and green, of Protestant and Roman Catholic, but it is a question between the unpaid independent magistracy of Ireland on the one hand, and an unconstitutional and tyrannical exercise of the executive authority on the other. I shall now proceed to read the letter of Mr. Secretary Drummond—the first communication I had upon the subject:—
"Dublin Castle, August 22,1837.
"Sir—It appearing in The Newry Telegraph, of the 10th instant, that at an election dinner given by you on the 7th one of the toasts was 'The Battle of the Diamond,' I am directed by his Excellency, now that the elections are all terminated, to desire that you will inform him whether it can be possible that you were thus a party to the commemoration of a lawless and most disgraceful conflict, in which much of the blood of your fellow-subjects was spilt, and the immediate consequence of which was, as testified at the time by all the leading men and magistrates of your county, to place that part of the country at the mercy of an ungovernable mob. I have the honour to be, Sir, your most obedient humble servant,
"T. DRUMMOND.
"To Lieut.-Colonel Verner, Churchill, Moy."
This is the letter which I received from Mr. Drummond, and I submit it to the judgment of the House; and I ask, is it a letter such as ought to have been written? Is it a letter to which a calm answer could be returned? I shall make no further comment upon it now. The letter of the noble Lord, the Secretary for Ireland, which I shall presently read, will supply the best comment upon it. I shall now read my answer:—
"Carlton Club, London, Aug. 29, 1837.
"Sir,—I have received a letter, dated August 22, bearing your signature, and inquiring of me, by the direction of his Excellency, 'whether it is possible that I was a party to the commemoration of a lawless and most disgraceful conflict, in which much of the blood of my fellow-subjects was spilt, and the immediate consequence of which was, as testified at the time by all the leading men and magistrates of your county, to place that part of the country at the mercy of an ungovernable mob?'
"I am disposed to think that, when you put a question in a form like this, you can hardly expect, on cool reflection, that I should condescend to answer it—at least, I would ima-
636
gine you could expect no other answer than one which I hold superfluous, namely, that I am not capable of being a party to the commemoration of anything 'lawless and disgraceful.' I would request, if I am ever again to be favoured by a question which you are directed to propose, that it may be expressed in terms better calculated to invite an answer, and more likely, also, to be understood. I must say that your letter does not appear to me very intelligible,
"His Excellency seems to assume that the appearance of a statement in a public newspaper authorises a call upon me to contradict or confirm it. I do not feel myself at liberty to do either. I had the honour to entertain several of my friends at dinner on the day to which your letter refers. I am bold to affirm, that at that entertainment nothing took place which loyal and honourable men would hesitate to avow most frankly: But I speak, I am confident, the sentiments of my friends, and of every gentleman whose freedom is not restrained by official station, when I say that a question like this in your letter ought not to be proposed to me, and that I am bound to decline replying to it."
I pass over a few sentences, in which I complain of some slanderous observations made in a paper, the supposed organ of the Castle of Dublin, and I come to a paragraph to which I would beg the attention of the House, as it has been tortured by the most perverse ingenuity into a meaning which I defy any straightforward intellect to give it:—
"Upon the various misrepresentations, unintentional I have no doubt, which your letter contains, I have no desire to comment. I feel it necessary only to assure you that, of all the conflicts, and they are, unhappily, numerous, which took place at any of the various places called by the name of 'Diamond,' in the county of Armagh, there is none to which your description is, in the least degree, applicable."
I disclaim for the conflict which I commemorated, and for every other of the same name and nature, the opprobrious character which the Irish Government of the present day have been taught to affix to it. I now come to the letter of the noble Lord, the Secretary for Ireland, who, it will appear, had received my reply to Mr. Secretary Drummond's letter, and submitted it to the Lord-Lieutenant. The noble Lord says:
"Dublin Castle, Sept. 5, 1837.
"Sir,—I have had the honour of submitting to the Lord-Lieutenant your letter of the 29th ult.
"His Excellency regrets that you should have had any difficulty in understanding the

637
letter addressed to you on the 22d of August, But for such an assurance, his Excellency would not have supposed the unsatisfactory nature of your answer could, in any degree, have been ascribed to that cause.
"As a magistrate, appointed to administer justice between her Majesty's Protestant and Roman Catholic subjects, his Excellency desired that you should be called upon to state whether, at an election dinner, of which an account appeared at length in a public paper, you had proposed, or been a party to the proposal of, a toast commemorative of a sanguinary feud between the Protestants and Roman Catholics of Armagh. By whom, or to whom, that dinner was given—on what occasion, or in what place—his Excellency considers a matter of comparative indifference; but, as head of the executive government in Ireland, it concerns him to know whether you and other gentlemen in the commission held up such an event as that known by the name of 'The Battle of the Diamond,' as one deserving of being commemorated.
"You profess yourself unable to recognise the conflict alluded to under the above title, by reason of the many such conflicts which have unhappily occurred in the county of Armagh, at places called by the name of the Diamond."
I ask the noble Lord where, or in what form of words, I have professed myself unable to recognise the conflict alluded to? I say boldly my letter contains no one expression which can excuse the noble Lord for his most singular misconceptions of my meaning. I shall again read the passage in my letter which the noble Lord has so unaccountably failed to understand.
"I feel it necessary only to assure you, that of all the conflicts which took place at any of the various places called Diamond, in the county Armagh, there is none to which your description is, in the least degree, applicable."
These were my words—surely they are not capable of being perverted into anything which can justify the noble Lord's representation of them. I did not say that I was unable to recognise "the Battle of the Diamond," as I have been taunted with doing, in consequence of the many occurrences to which the name could be applied; but I will tell the noble Lord in what I could not recognise it—in the unfaithful and exaggerated picture which official personages in the castle of Dublin thought proper to call a representation of it. As the noble Lord's letter is a long one, I pass over some passages of it, in which an effort was made to form an analogy between a toast given in private for the reception of persons, all of whom profess the same opinions, and a procession
638
with arms, flags, banners, and symbols calculated to produce irritation upon the part of an unfriendly and excited population. The noble Lord continues.—
"It is the invariable practice, when any representation is made to Government affecting the character or usefulness of a magistrate or other public officer, for whose appointment or continuance the executive government is responsible, to communicate such representation to him before any proceedings are taken thereon, that he may have an opportunity of explaining or disavowing the statements made to his prejudice. That course was followed in the present instance, and his Excellency conceives that he had a right to expect a distinct and unequivocal avowal or disavowal of your having been a party to the proceeding in question, or a satisfactory explanation that the nature and tendency of the proceeding did not deserve the character imputed to it!"
The noble Lord describes the course invariably adopted by the Government when addressing an inquiry to a gentleman holding the commission of the peace. Two questions, he says, are addressed to them. The first—Has a certain act imputed to them been committed? The second—Have they any explanation to offer? This was not the course pursued towards me. I was told an act was highly criminal, and then asked had I committed it? These are the words:—"I am directed by his Excellency to desire that you will inform him whether it can he possible that you were a party to the commemoration of a lawless and disgraceful conflict," &c. To which I replied—"I am not capable of being a party to the commemoration of any thing law-less and disgraceful." This is my answer: it does not appear to have given the noble Lord satisfaction. I can only say it would have been far more gratifying to me to have had an opportunity of framing my answer differently, but I could not, after the fullest consideration, reply in any other spirit. Had I said, "Yes," I admitted that I was guilty of commemorating what was "lawless and disgraceful." Had I said "No," I should appear to equivocate, as if I had denied the fact of the toast, when I only meant to deny the description given to it by the noble Lord at the head of the Irish Government. This manifesto of the noble Lord did not appear to me at the time to require any answer from me. The greater part of it consisted, as I have already said, of a laboured effort to draw an analogy between a private party and a public procession, and in an endeavour to pervert my meaning, as if I was myself

639
ignorant what battle of the Diamond I intended proposing; and it ended by-telling me that "his Excellency deemed it expedient to recommend to the Lord Chancellor that I should not be included in the new commission of the peace about to be issued;" and also directed that my name should be omitted from the revised list of deputy lieutenants for the county Tyrone. Had I supposed for one moment that this letter required any reply from me, I should not have been so deficient in courtesy to the noble Lord as not to have given it an immediate answer. This was conclusive. I shall now proceed with my statement. The noble Lord may recollect the state of England sufficiently well at the period to which I have alluded to render it unnecessary for me to remind him what it was. Struggling against the designs of foreign and domestic enemies, engaged in an expensive war, suffering under a scarcity of grain, and an accumulation of taxes, her people excited by dangerous associations, the very life of the King attempted, she was unable to give to Ireland that military assistance which "secret and treasonable associations of dangerous extent and malignity" from within, and a threatened invasion from without, imperatively called for. For the state of Ireland I shall refer the noble Lord to documents ready at his hands of a public nature and indisputable evidence; or if the noble Lord would prefer the authority of writers not favourable to Protestant or Conservative principles as to the state of Armagh in the year 1795, he will find the facts proved in the trial of Jackson—he will find them noticed in the memoirs of Wolfe Tone, and confessed by M'Irwin and Emmett. However, the noble Lord will find in the speeches of the Lord-Lieutenant to both Houses of Parliament, in the year 1796', that there existed then in Ireland "secret and treasonable associations of dangerous extent and malignity;" and it was "the scene of insurrection and of outrage;" and that the King had been obliged to direct an addition to be made to the regular forces in Ireland by troops sent from Great Britain. The noble Lord will find in an Act of the same year that during the year 1795 "several parts of Ireland were disturbed by treasonable insurrections of persons assuming the name of Defenders;" in another, that "traitorous insurrections had arisen, principally promoted and supported by persons associating under the
640
pretended obligation of oaths unlawfully administered;" in a third, that "it was necessary, in order to deter men from entering into conspiracies to murder, to increase the punishment of persons convicted of such horrid crimes;" and in a fourth, that "tumultuous risings had of late happened in Ireland, and that the persons engaged therein had practised various secret contrivances for being supplied with and keeping arms and ammunition," This shows to the noble Lord, on the one hand, a secret, extensive, armed, and organised confederacy, pillaging, destroying, burning, murdering—and, on the other, a government willing, perhaps, but unable—few troops, no police, no yeomanry. In this state of things was it "lawless and disgraceful"—was it deserving of blame and stigma—for the well-disposed to take up arms on behalf of "the security of property and the preservation of tranquillity and good order?" The Lord-Lieutenant of the present day, at his ease, and with England and its whole army at his back, may say so; but so did not say the Lord-Lieutenant of that day. In his address to both Houses of Parliament he says:—
"At a time when the ambitious projects of our enemies have threatened to interrupt the happiness and prosperity of his people by making a descent on this kingdom and Great Britain, his Majesty has been graciously pleased to direct an addition to be made to the regular troops in this kingdom by troops sent from Great Britain, the greater part of which is already arrived; and, in pursuance of his Majesty's commands, I have also encouraged the loyalty and zealous disposition which has generously displayed itself to associate in arms for the better security of property and the preservation of tranquillity and good order."
This announcement, made by the Government in the month of October, followed the first institution of the yeomanry, which had taken place during the recess. My father, in his own county, where he resided, Armagh, and in the adjoining county, Tyrone, where he also possessed property, with his brother magistrates, entered into resolutions, to which I request the attention of the House.
"Whereas we have observed with much concern that great pains have been taken, in many parts of this country, to excite discontent among his Majesty's faithful subjects, thereby to alienate their affections from his person and Government, and to induce them to be willing to change our excellent free constitution for the system of anarchy and con-

641
fusion which is now threatening desolation over other parts of the world.
"And whereas we have reason to believe that such miscreants have carried their wickedness so far as to hold treasonable correspondence with the French, with whom his Majesty is now at open war, to invite them to invade this kingdom, and, as an encouragement, have held out the following audacious falsehood, viz., that his Majesty's subjects in this kingdom are ready to rebel against him, and to adopt their principles; and that a few, seduced by the emissaries of the French, through the management of a desperate and traitorous society, have bound themselves by oaths to be ready in furtherance of their purposes in case of invasion, either to join them, or to rise and take possession of our country and the property of its peaceable inhabitants:
"Now we, whose names are hereunto subscribed, sincerely attached to our most excellent constitution, sensible of the benefits we enjoy under the mild Government of our most gracious Sovereign, and of the present prosperous state of the country—prosperous to a degree heretofore unexampled—where wealth and comfort are sure to follow honest industry—unwilling to put at hazard these solid advantages—and abhorrent of the machinations of a set of desperate adventurers, who, without property themselves, aim at that of others, and hope to rise in wealth and consequence in a general confusion,
"Resolve,—That we will, at the hazard of our lives and fortunes, support and defend our gracious King George the Third against all foreign and domestic enemies.
"That we will discourage and oppose all treasonable and seditious practices, and resist all attempts to disturb the peace of the country; and further, should his Majesty, in his wisdom, require such exertion, that we will embody ourselves for his defence and for the protection of our lives and properties, and enrol ourselves under such officers as he shall commission, and with their assistance, and under their command, will train and discipline ourselves, so as to be able to render him the more effectual service, and frustrate the hopes of the traitors and banditti who vainly rely upon finding the country naked and defenceless, should the regular troops be drawn off to oppose an invading enemy."
These resolutions were unanimously approved of, and warmly recommended to be adopted in the different towns and parishes throughout the country by the magistrates, whose names were affixed to them, at the quarter sessions held at Dungannon on the 15th of July, 1796, viz.:—

Northland,

R. Lindesay,

Castle Stuart,

James Verner,

James Stuart,

T. Caulfield,

James Richardson,

W. J. Armstrong,

T. Knox,

Edward Evans,

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John Staples,

A. Stewart,

Robert Lowry,

T. Foresythe,

T. K. Hannyngton,

Samuel Strean.

In this spirit, and acting upon these resolutions, my father presented himself to the Lord-Lieutenant at the head of a list of several hundred men, of whom some of the first yeomanry corps were formed. I need hardly add, that amongst them were many of that small but gallant band who, at the battle of the Diamond, associated themselves upon the side of the King and his Government for "the security of property, and the preservation of tranquillity and good order." The "ungovernable mob," including my old friend, who favoured me with his company at my dinner, and whose name I coupled with the toast, were, "under his Majesty's authority," enrolled in yeomanry corps, and gallantly, faithfully, and fearlessly did their duly to their King and to their country as soldiers, I ask the noble Lord were the yeomanry of Armagh an "ungovernable mob" when the French invaded Ireland? Were they an "ungovernable mob" when the rebellion of 1798 broke out? Were they an "ungovernable mob" in the rebellion of 1803? When (he Lord Chief Justice (Lord Kilwarden) was butchered in the streets of Dublin, did England look upon the yeomanry of Ireland as an "ungovernable mob," when both Houses of Parliament, upon two occasions, passed a unanimous vote of thanks to them for the services they had rendered to their country? And were those in whose honour I proposed the toast an "ungovernable mob," and was their conduct "lawless and disgraceful" from the day they took up arms voluntarily, the 21st of September, 1795, until they laid them down to be replaced by new ones under a Whig Government in 1831? I must now beg leave to call the attention of the noble Lord to a very few short testimonials, in order to let his Lordship see the opinions entertained by the Government and those in authority at that period of the "ungovernable mob" who constituted the yeomanry of Ireland. Upon the 16th of January, 1797, I find the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland addressing both Houses of Parliament in these terms:—
"I have beheld with pleasure the zeal and alacrity of his Majesty's regular military forces, and the prompt and honourable exertions of the yeomanry corps, whose decided utility has

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been so abundantly displayed. I have not failed to represent, to his Majesty this meritorious conduct of his faithful subjects in Ireland, and am expressly commanded to convey them his cordial acknowledgment and thanks."
Again, upon the 18th of March, in the same year, the Lord-Lieutenant. thus addresses the. House of Commons:—
"The dangerous and daring outrages committed in many parts of the province of Ulster, evidently perpetrated with a view to supersede the laws and prevent the administration of justice, by an organized system of murder and robbery, have lately increased to so daring a degree in some parts of that province as to bid defiance to the exertions of the civil power, and to endanger the lives and properties of his Majesty's subjects in that part of the kingdom,
"These outrages are encouraged and supported by treasonable associations to overturn our happy constitution. Threats have been held out against the lives of all persons who shall venture to disavow such their treasonable intentions. The frequent treasonable assemblages of persons, and their proceeding by threats and force to disarm the peaceable inhabitants; their endeavours to collect great quantities of arms in obscure hiding-places; their assembling by night to exercise in the practice of arms; their intimidation, accompanied by the most horrid murders, to prevent his Majesty's faithful subjects from joining the yeomanry troops; their having seized on some of his Majesty's justices of the peace, and threatening with murder any who should have the spirit to stand forth in support of the laws, which threats have been recently exemplified; their attacks on the military, by firing on them in the execution of their duty; have so totally bid defiance to the ordinary exertions of civil power, that I found myself obliged, by every tie of duty to his Majesty, and of regard to the welfare of his faithful subjects, to provide for the public safely by the most effectual and immediate application of the military force entrusted to me.
"I have accordingly ordered the General commanding in that province to dispose of and employ those troops under his command, with the assistance and co-operation of the Yeomanry, to suppress these outrages, &c.
"I have the satisfaction of informing you that by the firm and temperate conduct of the general, and the troops under him, and the zealous co-operation of the yeomanry corps, a very considerable number of arms has been taken," &c. &c.
On the 17th of May, in the same year, I find a proclamation by the Lord-Lieutenant and Council in Dublin, to this effect:
"That there exists within this kingdom a seditious and traitorous conspiracy, by a number of persons styling themselves United Irishmen.
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"That they have frequently assembled in large armed bodies, and plundered of arms the houses of many of his Majesty's loyal subjects in different parts of the kingdom, and cut down and carried away great numbers of trees, where with to make handles for pikes and other offensive weapons to arm their treacherous associates, and have audaciously attempted to disarm the district yeomanry corps enrolled under his Majesty's commission for the defence of the realm.
"We do hereby strictly charge and command all our officers, civil and military, and ail other of his Majesty's loving subjects, to use their utmost endeavours to discover all pikes, pike-heads, concealed guns and swords, offensive weapons, or ammunition of any kind whatsoever.
"And we do hereby strictly charge and command all officers, civil and military, and all other his Majesty's faithful subjects, to be aiding and assisting in suppressing all treacherous, tumultuous, and unlawful assemblies, and in bringing to punishment all persons disturbing or attempting to disturb the public peace."
On the 3rd of July in the same year, the Lord-Lieutenant, on proroguing Parliament, in his speech n both Houses, expresses his approbation of the yeomanry. He says:
"The powers with which you entrusted me by the suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act have enabled me to bring to light and to disconcert the formidable and secret conspiracy which had been formed for the total overthrow of your establishments, the destruction of property, and the dissolution of government. This conspiracy has been so fully unfolded by your wisdom, that it con no longer spread itself under the insidious pretence which it had artfully assumed of improving the constitution.
"I cannot too often repeat my full sense of your wisdom in the establishment of district corps. I have the most satisfactory accounts of their improvement in discipline as well as of their exertions in quelling and preventing insurrection; and I have myself witnessed the unexampled exertions, good conduct, and military appearance of the corps of the metropolis, whose unceasing and unvaried vigilance at a most important crisis, checked, every attempt to produce confusion by riot and tumult at the same time that it destroyed the hopes of our enemies, and restored confidence to the country in general."
The noble Lord concluded his speech in these words; I shall make no comment upon them:—
"We have a common and a sacred cause to defend—the independence and constitution of Great Britain and Ireland, from which both kingdoms have derived innumerable blessings under his Majesty's auspicious reign. They were purchased by the dearest blood of your

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ancestors, in a crisis not less formidable than the present. I trust we shall not fail to imitate their great example, and that we shall be enabled, by similar courage and continued firmness, to transmit to our posterity inviolate that invaluable inheritance which their valour rescued and their perseverance preserved."
Notwithstanding the impatience of some hon. Gentlemen opposite who seem unwilling to hear me, I must trespass further upon the attention of the House and the noble Lord by reading two or three circulars issued about that period. The first is dated "Dublin Castle, August 25, 1797," and is marked "Circular:"—
"SIR,—His Excellency has directed me to express, in the strongest terms the very high sense he entertains of the exertions which have been so conspicuously and so universally displayed by the district corps in preserving the tranquillity of their several districts.
"W. ELLIOTT '."
The next is dated. "Dublin Castle, December 18, 1797," and is also marked "Circular:"—
"SIR,—I have his Excellency's particular injunctions to convey in the warmest terms to yourself and to the officers and privates under your command his high approbation of the zeal which you have manifested by your regular and assiduous attention to your military duty, and which is no less honourable to yourselves than it has been conducive to the protection and security of your country."
"PELHAM."
To the letter I am now about to read, I would beg the attention of the House, because it is addressed to Captain Atkinson, a gentleman who resided not more than half a mile from where the "Battle of the Diamond" was fought, and who commanded the Crawthhill Corps of Yeomanry, the greater part of whom had been engaged in that conflict:—
"Armagh, Sept. 5, 1793.
"SIR,—I am desired by Major-general Goldie to know from you what number of loyal men you can bring forward, in case of necessity, to join your corps, and act under the yeomanry standing orders as supernumerary men, and for whom you think you can be responsible.
"H. ARCHDALE, M.B.
"Directed to Captain Atkinson, &c."
The next is dated the. 31st of October, 1800, and is from Dublin Castle, marked "Circular":—
"SIR,—His Excellency is desirous of taking this opportunity to express the high degree of satisfaction with which he has witnessed the loyalty, zeal, and spirit universally displayed
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by the yeomanry of this country—whose exertions have already so materially contributed to its security, and which he is persuaded will ever be in readiness to maintain the blessings of peace, by the promotion of good order amongst all his Majesty's subjects.
"CHARLES KNIGHT."
I have already informed the House that, upon two occasions, a vote of thanks to the yeomanry of Ireland passed both Houses of Parliament. Upon one of those occasions it was accompanied by an order of the House, which I shall read:—
"That there be laid before it a return of all corps, &c, in order that such return may be entered on the Journals of the House, and the patriotic example of such voluntary exertions be transmitted to posterity. "J. LEY."
I shall trouble the House with but one more document upon this subject, and I introduce it in order to let the House see that the services of the yeomanry of Ireland were not merely nominal, or that the thanks they received and the House bestowed upon them were for a mere profession of service. It is dated Dublin Castle, August 24, 1798:—
"SIR,—I have the honour to acquaint you that on the 13th of September inst., a Board will be held at the Royal Hospital, for the admission of such yeomen as have been disabled in active service. "CASTLEREAGH."
The battle of the Diamond took place before I was of sufficient age to take part in it, but I have a full recollection of the state of the country at that period, and I knew the course of life, the character and the loyal and constitutional principles of the gallant and respectable Gentleman who at my table represented them who took the side of "good order" and of the King at the battle of the Diamond, and the who tenor of his life and character, and those principles, forbade me to believe that he would have been a participator in anything "lawless and disgraceful." It might be supposed that in bringing that Gentleman thus forward I was subjecting him to the vindictiveness of the Government, and putting him in the way of punishment. I shall, therefore, refer the noble Lord, who does not seem to be deeply read in the narratives of those times, to an Act of Parliament, which will show him that those who took part in the endeavour to preserve the peace of the country in those days-ran no risk, and which bears most materially upon the battle of the Diamond. It is the 36th George the 3d chap. 6, passed early in the year 1796, a few months after the affair of the Diamond. It says:—

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"Whereas, during the year 1795, several parts of the kingdom were disturbed by treasonable insurrections of persons assuming the name of Defenders, and the lives and properties of many peaceable an i faithful subjects destroyed, and several of his Majesty's Justices of the Peace and other officers and persons, in order to preserve the public peace, the lives and properties of his Majesty's faithful subjects, and to suppress and put an end to such transactions, have apprehended several criminals, &c., and without due authority have sent other accused and suspected persons out of the kingdom, and also seized arms, and entered into the houses and possessions of several persons, and done other acts not justifiable by law, but which were yet so much for the public service, and so necessary for the suppression of such insurrections, and for the preservation of the public peace, that the persons by whom they were transacted, ought to be indemnified. Be it therefore enacted," &c.
This is the law the Parliament thought proper to enact a few months after the battle of the Diamond, for the protection of those who had come forward upon that and similar occasions "to preserve the public peace, the lives and properties of his Majesty's faithful subjects;" and yet, Sir, in violation of that law, and in the face of that Act of Parliament, the Government in Ireland have denounced me for commemorating what the Legislature of that day pronounced to be "so much for the public service, so necessary for the suppression of insurrection, and for the preservation of the public peace." I have stated enough to show that the "battle of the Diamond" was an event which could not have been disapproved of by the then Government, and that the conduct of those who took part in it was hut little likely to call forth the censure of those in authority. From what I have stated it is plain that to describe as "lawless and disgraceful" the conduct of the loyalists of the Diamond is to rebuke the Government and the Legislature of that day; it is to pass a censure upon the several Governments who permitted such a frequent delinquent to the same extent for so many years to continue to hold the commission of the peace—to sanction my appointment as a deputy-lieutenant—to allow me to be advanced in the honorable profession to which I belong, and even in the yeomanry to pass through the several gradations of rank, from carrying a musket as a private to having the command of a corps, I have thought it becoming in me to say thus much, and to say it in this place, as a defence against the insult and attempted degradation, which coming from
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the high quarter it did, was not to be defended at a public meeting, a dinner-table, or through the medium of the public press. I conceive I owed it to the dignity of this House, of which I have the honour to be a Member, and to the preservation of my own character, to stand up in my place and say that I am not a commemorator of anything that is "lawless and disgraceful." I regret that I have been obliged to trespass upon the House at such length, and cannot conclude without expressing my high sense of the obligation I am under for its patient hearing. I cannot, however, sit down without making one remark in addition to what I have already said, because it conveys to my mind this pleasing reflection, that I am, at the end of three and thirty years, during which time I held the office of a magistrate, deprived of the commission of the peace as unworthy any longer to be permitted to hold it; the alleged offence for which I am dismissed is wholly unconnected with the performance of my duty as a magistrate. Were the state of Ireland again, which God forbid, such as it was in 1795, and were there arrayed on the one side secret associations, traitors, and rebels, and on the other zealous persons who, to preserve the peace, had assembled in arms, I should not hesitate which side to take, certain that though in the estimation of the advisers of the present Irish Government I acted "lawlessly and disgracefully," the wise, and just, and good, would say, that my conduct, though not perhaps in strict accordance with law, was so necessary, and so much for the public good, that it deserved no blame. I have now no hesitation in assuring the House that I had not the remotest intention of proposing as a toast "The Battle of the Diamond." It was not upon my list of toasts, and it was not until after at least two-thirds of those who honoured me with their company at dinner had left the house, and I was about to retire myself, that the toast was given—when, observing a gentleman in the room who was at the Diamond conflict, and whose name I had heard coupled for so many years with that event, I did out of compliment to him propose the toast, never intending the slightest offence, or supposing it could be made the subject of animadversion. Now, with regard to the public press, I think it. only fair to tell the House that there was no reporter present. A respectable gentleman of the county, connected with the press was amongst my

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guests. But he came because he was specially invited, the same as any other gentleman. But as the noble Lord and the Under Secretary have so pointedly alluded to the newspaper report, I conceive I have an equal right to do so, and what do I find? "The Battle of the Diamond" was the very last toast given, followed immediately by this observation: "At this period (half-past twelve) Colonel Verner retired." I could not, then, have remained only for the purpose of giving that toast. In giving this candid and true explanation, and which I would have given at the first had it been required, of me in less unbecoming terms, I beg I may not be understood as intending, by the admission thus made, to convey the impression that I consider the toast one, the commemoration of which ought to, be objected to by any loyal subject hut as one, like many others, which has been wilfully perverted and misrepresented. The hon. and gallant Gentleman concluded by moving for "a copy of the correspondence between her Majesty's Government in Ireland and Colonel Verner, with respect to his removal from the offices of deputy-lieutenant and justice of the peace for the county of Tyrone."
Viscount Morpethsaid, the hon. and gallant Gentleman had himself intimated, and indeed his speech of this evening had made further provision that sufficient publicity was already attached to these transactions; and he might also observe that some vacancies which met his eyes in the benches opposite seemed to say that there were others who entertained this opinion. He had no objection to the production of the papers for which the hon. and gallant. Gentleman had moved; but he hoped he should be allowed to make a few comments on the observations with which the hon. and gallant Gentleman had accompanied his motion. In the first place, however, he begged to declare that at the present moment, as well as at the period of the transaction itself, he experienced sincere regret at having been put in a situation in which he felt himself called on to act in a manner that might seem ungracious and harsh towards a Gentleman for whose personal honour and whose conduct in all the relations of private life he had always been led to form a high estimate. So much as to what was merely personal between them. He would now address himself to the question itself. As regarded the Battle of the Diamond, the
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hon. and gallant Gentleman objected to the terms of the letter originally written to him by the Under Secretary, Mr. Drummond, wherein that gentleman asked him whether he had given the objectionable toast, and whether he had assisted at the dinner. If, however, the House compared the letter written by Mr. Drummond with the reply to that letter written by the hon. and gallant Gentleman, he thought it would not suffer by the contrast in point of courtesy, and general propriety of style. But the hon. and gallant Gentleman contended that the Battle of the Diamond having been described in the letter as "a lawless and disgraceful conflict," on being asked if he had given the toast, he was called on to admit he had been guilty of an act that was discreditable to himself. Now, in his, (Lord Morpeth's) opinion, the hon. and gallant Gentleman was bound to afford the information required of him as to the simple matter of fact, whatever might have been his individual opinion on the subject. He thought they had a right to expect that when the representative of the Sovereign demanded an explanation of a Gentleman holding the commission of the peace, his answer would be explicit, with some appearance of deference, and that at least it would be addressed to the point at issue, instead of deviating into matters contained in The Dublin Evening Post, which the hon. and gallant Gentleman called the organ of the Irish Government; but he begged to assure the hon. and gallant Gentleman that for no opinion or expression in that journal was the Government in any way responsible. The hon. and gallant Gentleman complained of the use made of certain expressions in his letter in allusion to the conflicts that had taken place in the neighbourhood of the Diamond. He was glad to find that the hon. and gallant Gentleman did not intend to raise any doubt on that subject, because when he spoke of all the conflicts—and of numbers having unhappily taken place in the county of Armagh—it did seem as if he wished to distract attention, by the multiplicity of these transactions, from what Colonel Blacker called that "great day, the 21st of September." But if it were true that in the same neighbourhood many similar conflicts had taken place, (the only material point for the hon. and gallant Member being that a battle had been 'fought, that blood had been shed), then surely the case of the Government against the hon. and gallant

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Gentleman was greatly aggravated. He would carry the House as quickly as he could over the historical facts, but he would ask whether he had not received some provocation from the speech of the hon. and gallant Gentleman to enter a little into details? For some time previously to the Battle of the Diamond, the adjacent country had been the seem: of repeated conflicts between the two parties, one of them composed of what were called the "Peep-of-day boys," consisting of Protestants and chiefly, he believed, Presbyterians, and the other consisting of Roman Catholics. The most painful excesses were the result of their respective hostilities. Now, he was not curious to dispute the fact, that in the actual affray, which went by the name of "The Battle of the Diamond," the defenders or the Roman Catholic party for that day were not the aggressors. But assuming that it was quite clear they were the aggressors, it appeared equally plain that they were the sole sufferers. What was the account given by Colonel Blacker, an early witness of the transaction? In his examination before the Orange Lodge Committee, he was asked the following questions, and gave the following answers:—
"What did you see at the Diamond?—When I got up I saw the Defenders making off in one direction, and the filing had nearly teased, I may say had ceased except a dropping shot or two, and I saw a number of dead bodies.
"Can you slate about the number?—No: they were conveying them away on cars in different directions, so that I could not make an exact calculation.
"Were there fifty?—No; if there were thirty killed, that was the outside.
"Were there any Protestants killed?—Not that I could hear of."
Impute what they would to the Roman Catholics, talk as they might of their bad faith and treachery, say what they would of the provocation, he asked whether the blood that had been shed was not sufficient to expiate, and the intervening period of forty years sufficient to obliterate, these unhappy proceedings?
"Satis jam pridem sanguine nostro
Laomedoiuæ luimus perjuria Trojæ."
Was such a result as that which he had described a fitting object for commemoration at moments of convivial relaxation, to give the plea its best colour, in the neighbourhood, and among the descendants., or even the remnant of the sufferers,
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nay worse, the inflictors of that tragic retribution. But it was said that the Battle of the Diamond put an end to the insurrection, and secured the peaceful administration of the law in the province of Ulster. Documents of all kinds had been referred to with a view of showing such an effect; even the orderly-book of a regiment had been brought into court to afford, proof of this. After the numerous quotations read through by the hon. and gallant Member, he should refer to a few scattered materials from the history of the same period, more especially after part of a speech which an hon. and learned Gentleman opposite—he meant the learned Sergeant—had been pleased to address to his constituents at Bandon. Mr. Sergeant Jackson there stated:—
"There has been gross misconception (the letter of Colonel Verner shows it) respecting the event which it commemorated. The individual who dictated that letter was ignorant of the history of the country. An aged and veteran general officer has slated the true history of the transaction, and it would appear to have been a gallant and successful resistance by a body of Protestants to an attack by a body of Defenders."
The House would see that the points against which he had to contend were, first, that the Battle of the Diamond put an end to the insecurity of Ulster and the disturbances of Armagh, and next, that it was a contest between traitors on the one hand, and loyal and faithful subjects on the other. It would be seen how history bore witness to this statement of the case. The Battle of the Diamond took place on the 21st of September, 1795, and the state of the county of Armagh, a short time afterwards, was described as follows at the
"FIRST MEETING OF THE MAGISTRATES OF THE COUNTY OF ARMAGH, OCT. 19, 1795.
"Whereas the peace of this county has been, and continues to be, disturbed by mobs of riotous and disorderly persons, who assemble in considerable bodies, attack the houses of well-disposed inhabitants, and rob them of arms, money, and other matters of properly."
"SECOND MEETING, OCT. 26, 1795.
"As we find that bodies of armed men still continue to parade through different parts of this country, both by day and night, committing great outrages, and disturbing the peaceable inhabitants."
Resolutions signed and subscriptions entered into, by
GOSFORD,
WILLIAM ARMAGH, the Primate,

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CHARLEMONT,
CAPEL MOLYNEUX,
W. BROWNLOW,
H. HAMLTON, Dean of Armagh, after Bishop of Ossory,
W. BISSETT, after Bishop of Raphoe,
JAMES VERNER (it is stated), &c, &c, &c.
The next extract he should read was, from the Earl of Gosford's address, as chairman of the Quarter Sessions of the county of Armagh, on the 21st December, 1795. Lord Gosford said—
"Gentlemen,—It is no secret that a persecution, accompanied with all the circumstances of ferocious cruelly which have, in all ages, distinguished the dreadful calamity, is now raging in this county. Neither age nor sex, nor even acknowledged innocence, as to any guilt in the late disturbances, is sufficient to excite mercy, much less to afford protection. The only crime which the wretched objects of this ruthless persecution are charged with is a crime, indeed, of easy proof; it is simply a profession of the Roman Catholic faith, or an intimate connexion with a. person professing that faith. A lawless banditti have constituted themselves judges of this new species of delinquency, and the sentence they have pronounced is equally concise and terrible; 'tis nothing less than a confiscation of all property, and an immediate banishment. It would be extremely painful, and surely unnecessary, to detail the horrors that attend the execution of so wide and tremendous a proscription—a proscription that certainly exceeds in the comparative number of those it consigns to ruin and misery every example that ancient or modern history can supply; for where have we heard, or in what history of human cruelties have we read, of more than half the inhabitants of a populous country, deprived at one Mow, of the means as well as the fruits of their industry, and driven, in the midst of an inclement season, to seek a shelter for themselves and their helpless families, where chance may guide them.''
Such was this noble Earl's opinion of the state of the country two or three months after the battle of the Diamond, such was the description he gave of the situation in which this illustrious conflict placed it. Similar language was used in the Irish Parliament, as to the condition of the county of Armagh in the winter of 1795. Some resolutions were moved on this subject by the Attorney-General of that day, which led to a length, tiled debate. In quoting from the speeches then used, he should, as much as possible, refer to those who entertained opposite views to himself on political subjects. But he should, in the first place, quote the language of Mr. Grattan, and he felt that no
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apology was necessary for him for repeating the glowing and eloquent language of that distinguished, man. Mr. Grattan said:
"Of these outrages, he had received the most dreadful accounts; that their object was the extermination of all the Catholics of that county. It was a persecution conceived in the bitterness of bigotry, carried on with the most ferocious barbarity, by a banditti who, being of the religion of the state, had committed with the greatest audacity and confidence the most horrid murders, and had proceeded from robbery and massacre to extermination: that they had repealed, by their own authority, all the laws lately passed in favour of the Catholics, and had established in the place of those laws, the inquisition of a mob resembling Lord George Gordon's fanatics, equalling them in outrage, and surpassing far in perseverance and success; that their modes of outrage were as various as they were atrocious. They sometimes forced, by terror, the masters of families, to dismiss their Catholic servants: they sometimes forced landlords, by terror, to dismiss their Catholic tenantry. They seized, as deserters, numbers of Catholic weavers, sent them to the county gaol, transmitted them to Dublin, where they remained in close prison until some lawyers, from compassion, pleaded their cause and had procured their enlargement, nothing appearing against them of any kind whatsoever. Those insurgents, who called themselves Orange boys, or Protestant boys, that is, a banditti of murderers, committing massacre in the name of God, and exercising despotic power, in the name of Liberty."
But lest any one should distrust the authority of Mr. Grattan, and the pregnant and fervid terms in which he embodied his sentiments, in this same debate, he was followed on the same side by Mr. Maurice Fitzgerald, then, as now, knight of Kerry, to whose calmer corroboration he would next refer. Mr. Fitzgerald said:—
"He could not reconcile it to himself to remain silent at the statement made by the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Grattan) of the outrages which had occurred in the county of Armagh, He was sorry to say, he must subscribe to it in its fullest" extent. He lamented that, in that picture which the right hon. Gentleman had drawn, he could trace no exaggeration. ft was, he feared, the melancholy truth that numbers of the unoffending and peaceable inhabitants of that county had been expelled from their habitations and their property by the violence of a bigoted sect; that there existed in that county, a furious and unrelenting persecution of a particular denomination of his Majesty's loyal subjects. Idle and nugatory would be good dispositions on the part of the Government as long as they continue to be counteracted by those who must be employed to carry them into effect. It is

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lamentably the fact, that in the county of Armagh, multitudes of families are driven from their homes, the victims of a dreadful persecution, while the magistracy rest, in a kind of lethargy, supinely indifferent to this outrageous violation of justice. He deplored that the magistracy should be so blind to the danger which they were suffering to grow. He trembled at the pernicious effect of mixing any religious prejudices with the distractions which already agitated the kingdom. There was no man so ignorant, but must be aware of the poisonous acrimony which religion adds to any contest in which it shall mingle; nor can any man, in the utmost scope of speculation, calculate the honors to which that conduct may give birth, which would infuse into the agitations of this country a spirit of bigoted religious animosity. A reform in the conduct of the magistracy is the remedy for the peculiar evil alluded to, and no legislative act, no exertion on the part of Government, would have any effect unless that magistracy would concur in the impartial administration of its laws,"
Whether such was the case at present he would leave to Mr. Maurice Fitzgerald to determine, who, no doubt, entertained the same opinions now that he formerly so eloquently expressed. This Gentleman was followed by Mr. William Smith, who afterwards tilled the high situation of Baron of his Majesty's Exchequer in Ireland, and in quoting that gentleman's opinion he could not help calling to mind the high homage to the ability and talents of that gentleman, and to the impartiality with which he administered justice in that country, which was showered at one time from the Leaches opposite. They, no doubt, would receive with respect the opinion expressed by him as to the state of Armagh at this period. Mr. William Smith said:—
"He was persuaded that Government would never prefer one treason to another, or use less severity towards the bigotry and excess of Break-of-day-Boys than towards the equally abominable outrages of Defenders. He bad heard it insinuated, on both sides of the House, that though Defenderism might call for the extraordinary interposition of the Legislature, yet the opposite class of insurgents might be left to the vigilance of Armagh magistrates, and to the ordinary efficacy of the law, as already established. To such a doctrine he must express entire dissent. He viewed both species of offence with equal abhorrence, and thought the Legislature ought to meet them with equal indignation."
The scene next shifted to the special assizes of the county of Armagh, at which
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more than 100 prisoners were tried for capital offences. Mr. Attorney-General Wolfe, who, by a singular coincidence of name, bore the office at the time, (may the parallel extend to all but the closing scene!) was sent down to prosecute on the part of the Crown. The assizes that he alluded to were held in the spring of 1796. In addition to the two judges, Downes and Smith, Sergeant Stanley was sent down specially to assist as a judge in the Crown Court, and tried prisoners alternately with Baron Smith. The Attorney-General (Wolfe) came down to conduct the prosecution. The Attorney-General said:—
"That by order of the Government, who were determined to exert their power to the utmost, in order to restore and preserve the peace of the country, he was come down to prosecute, and he would have it understood that, in the exercise of this his indispensable duty, he would steadily pursue his instructions, which were to prosecute all men charged with crimes; of whatever religious profession they might be—of whatever description—whether in high or in low life—he would bring them to the bar of public justice. What has recently been the situation of Armagh? Man against man; societies formed for the illegal purpose of opposing each other by open force and hostility. The honest and peaceable inhabitant could find neither safety nor repose. In the field and in the house he found himself in danger; he could not retire to his bed without apprehension of violation to his house or injury to his person. Was there a father of a family secure in his children? He did not know the moment that his son was destined to the halter or the assassin's dagger. There was neither security for age nor youth, for sex nor for industry."
Such was the strong language of the Attorney-General of that day; and he did not think that an incorrect description of the Battle of the Diamond was given by Mr. Secretary Drummond when he called it a lawless scene of outrage. The Attorney-General went on to say:—
"Acts had been committed shocking to human nature; cruelties that would disgrace savages had been perpetrated in the county of Armagh. Perhaps these acts had been exaggerated on both sides; but, taking them on the mildest representation, they called for the immediate interference of law and exertions of justice. With whom those enormities commenced he considered as immaterial, for both parties were aggressors against the law, and both must suffer; however, when the law was satisfied, it would then become a national object, a duty incumbent on every man who loved his country, to inculcate on the minds of all parties forgiveness and oblivion."

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The law was satisfied—numerous trials took place—and there were several capital convictions, and many executions. After the close of the assizes congratulatory addresses were presented by the grand jury, to the Attorney-General, for the impartiality and ability which he had manifested, and also to the high-sheriff for his impartial conduct in the selection of jurors. Thanks were also voted to the Lord-Lieutenant for the vigour which he had displayed in the administration of the law, and for the timely aid which he had afforded, by which the outrages of these marauders were effectually put down. The law was thus satisfied; but he would ask whether Lord Kilwarden would have thought it consistent with the duty incumbent on every man who loved his country, of inculcating on the minds of all parties forgiveness and oblivion, after the settlement of the disturbances, and the putting a stop to the commission of the outrages which had disgraced the country, to give, to be in the habit of giving, a toast commemorative of that bloody scene which he had described, and thus keep this unhappy circumstance festering in the minds of the population? During the subsequent Session of Parliament the attention of the House of Commons was again called to the state of the county of Armagh. Several gentlemen, with whose opinions he would not trouble the House, took part in the debate, and amongst others Mr. Archdall, Mr. Corry, Mr. Bushe, and Sir Hercules Langrishe. Mr. Archdall said:—
"The disturbances were such as every man laments, and no man would justify; but where after all they were only the disturbances of individuals among themselves, great in their extent and melancholy in their circumstances, but originating only in private and personal antipathies. Those individuals were the adverse parties of Puritans and Papists; that is, certain obstinate Roman Catholics on the one side, and various sectaries, perhaps more obstinate still, under the name of Presbyterians, on the other. From the unhappy temper of the times, which seems so prevalent every where, could it be a matter of wonder that in the north such combustible materials should kindle a warmth, especially when contiguous to each other in the same neighbourhood, and blaze into outrage without what the right honourable Gentleman was pleased to call the cruel connivance of the government? But how did this connivance appear? Had assistance ever been asked, and had it been withheld? No. Had means of prevention ever been pointed out, and had they been
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neglected? No. Had any culpable magistrates ever been particularised, and had they been protected? No. If any magistrate shall be hereafter sentenced as culpable, will he not be punished? Yes; certainly and exemplarily."
He regretted that it had been the painful duty of the present Government to fulfil the prediction of Mr. Archdall. Again, on the 1st of December, 1796, a proclamation was issued against certain disturbances in Armagh, which described the state of that country in nearly similar terms to those he had just read. The hon. and gallant Gentleman said, that he would refer to history as to the state of the county of Armagh, and undoubtedly the hon. Member had referred to certain statements, but not to such as bore on the state of that county at the period in question. By the quotations he had just read he had supplied the defect. He had not entered into the conduct of the yeomanry of Armagh, whether or not they had done their duty, or whether to those who had opposed foreign invasion and resisted rebellion a debt of gratitude was not owing by the country. He had, however, showed that the parties who at the period of the Battle of the Diamond disturbed the county of Armagh and the neighbouring districts were equally censurable—that both the parties that divided the county, and excited it by their religious rancour and bitter feelings, were equally to blame, and ought equally to be stigmatised. The hon. Gentleman referred to the 37th of George 3rd; but that Act appeared to be for the protection of the people who fled from the county of Armagh, who notoriously were not the Peep-of-day-boys, but the Defenders; industrious and peaceable persons. The hon. Gentleman had referred to the Indemnity Act of Lord Carhampton; but it was not necessary at this time of day to attach much importance to that document. Thus much, however, he would say with reference to passing that Indemnity Bill, that however necessary and expedient it might be for the Parliament to pass that Act, it was one thing to indemnify and another to commemorate acts of lawlessness and violence. Such was the state of things which he had endeavoured to bring under the attention of the House in a continued series; and he had referred for his authority to the evidence of magistrates, law officers of the Crown, Lord-Lieutenants of counties. Members of Parliament, Mini-

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sters of State, Judges, and Viceroys, His proposition was, and the motive for the letter that was sent to the hon. and gallant Gentleman was, and his defence of the Government was then as now, that it was not a state of things which it was wise or discreet, he did not say humane and merciful, for he believed that the error was not in the intention, but in the judgment of the hon. Gentleman; hut that it was not wise or discreet to make it an object of commemoration and approval, nay of imitation on the part of those whose duty it was to protect the innocent and to punish the disturbers of the peace in the midst of a sensitive and excited population. The hon. Gentleman said, that it had been customary to give the toast during the last forty years. He was sorry to hear that such was the case; but he could say thus much, that it had only recently, for the first time, been brought under the notice of the Irish Government, and he hoped that the Government had taken such steps as to prevent the repetition. The fact of such a toast having been given was brought under the notice of the Government by persons of high rank and character, who directed the attention of the authorities to the account of the Armagh election that appeared in a local newspaper. After describing the scene that took place at the election, and the proceedings at the hustings, (I presume these were not to be accounted private,) with the speeches of the several proposers and the candidates, there appeared in large letters the words "The Dinner," at which entertainment this toast was given. The hon. and gallant Gentleman said that this was a private party. I' do not question that the hon. Gentleman invited all the guests or paid the whole bill. This fact was not disputed; but it appeared, though no reporter was present, that there was a gentleman present who was connected with a newspaper, and of course he considered himself authorised to publish what took place. The hon. Gentleman referred to what he was pleased to call the conversation that took place at the dinner table; but he for his part must contend that any thing less in a conversational tone he had never read; for the hon. Member, as well as other gentlemen, made extremely long speeches, and they all concluded with toasts, and among others given was the "Battle of the Diamond." The hon. Gentleman said the toast was given without premeditation, when most of the party
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had withdrawn. Now, he had no hesitation in saying, if the hon. and gallant Gentleman had stated this, and had shown any disposition to palliate or explain what appeared to the Government to be a matter calling for explanation, the gallant Member would not have had reason to complain of the matter being too rigorously or enviously sifted. The Government had showed this to be the case in the conduct they had pursued towards other gentlemen who Mere magistrates and who were pre-sent at the dinner in question. They had felt themselves justified in calling upon the hon. Gentleman to offer an explanation of that which appeared to them to be offensive and ominous in the proceeding. He regretted much that the answer of the hon. and gallant Gentleman left them no discretion on the subject. He begged the House to recollect that toasts at public dinners had not always been considered matters of trifling importance by the party opposite. It was known to all those who heard him that a person of much higher rank and station than the hon. Gentleman, namely, the Duke of Norfolk, was turned out of the situation which he held of Lord-Lieutenant of Yorkshire, for giving as a toast "The sovereignty of the people." He did not intend to revive any question upon the propriety of the toast, nor, on the other hand, upon the act of rigour with which it was met by the Government. He must say, however, that the toast of "The sovereignty of the people" at any rate admitted of an interpretation compatible with the sentiment of all lovers of a limited monarchy, such as existed in this country; at all events it embodied no sentiment of ill-will, it gloated on no images of carnage. George 4th, on his return from his visit to Ireland, dictated a letter in which he strongly condemned the continued use of party toasts, and he was understood principally to refer to the well-known instance of the "Glorious memory." He might object to this toast on the other side of the water; though in this country he could hardly be inclined to object to any thing commemorative of one whom he on this side of the water must ever consider as a hero and a deliverer. But this was not the case on the other side of the water; for there it was offensive to the great body of the people, and was considered to involve an attack upon their religious feelings. The memory, however, of King William was a very different toast from that of "The

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Battle of the Diamond." The former toast was commemorative of a victory fought by the lawful Sovereign with the concurrence of the Parliament of the realm, and not of a scene of lawless conflict, where man was set against man, and neighbour against neighbour, and by which disturbance and desolation were spread throughout the country. The hon. and gallant Member appealed to his conduct while he had acted as a magistrate, and to the thirty-three years, during which he had held the commission. He had already borne testimony to the personal character of the hon. and gallant Gentleman; but he begged to remind him, that his public character had already before been brought into question for conduct in his own neighbourhood in 1831, when a number of houses were wrecked at Maghera, in the county of Armagh. Mr. Servant Perrin was sent down to make inquiry, and he (Lord Morpeth) would only read the concluding expression of the report of that hon. and learned Gentleman:—
"I am further of opinion, that Colonel Verner appears not to have performed his duty as a magistrate at Verner's-bridge, in order to disperse (as he was bound and required by law), the persons there tumultuously and unlawfully assembled, and compel them to depart to their habitations; that he did net take the measures and precautions proper for that purpose, which he was empowered and required by law to take, and which the result evinces to have been necessary for the preservation of the peace, and the threatened breach thereof; and that he is liable to be prosecuted at suit of the Crown by information for such (as it appears to me) criminal neglect of his duty."
He might be tempted to feel surprise that the unpleasant duty which they had performed, had been reserved for the Government of the Earl of Mulgrave. He would not proceed to rip up old sores. [Mr. Shaw: You are doing so now.] Yes, it became necessary when the conduct of the Government had been attacked in the way in which it had been by the hon. and gallant Gentleman. He had a right to show what had been the previous conduct of that hon. and gallant Member himself, when the propriety of his being retained in the commission was the direct point at issue. He had a right to show that, although the painful duty which they had performed had been reserved to the present Government, still the previous conduct of the hon. and gallant Member had not escaped the observation of former Governments.
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He was bound to say, however, that without reference to any other matter of debate, the toast of the battle of the Diamond was quite sufficient to justify the Government in railing for the explanation which they had called for from the hon. and gallant Gentleman; but he refused to give any explanation, and appeared to sneer at the Government when explanation was demanded from him. He could quite feel, from the party feelings and lifelong habits which appeared to belong to the hon. and gallant Member, that there was nothing even in the circumstance of his giving this toast which the hon. and gallant Member considered contrary to his own sense of honour and duty, and incompatible with his entertaining feelings of kindness and humanity, when unwarped and left to their own direction; but there was every thing to make him believe that his Roman Catholic neighbours and clients, could not have poured out their complaints to him with any feeling of security in his freedom as a magistrate, from partial and prepossessed dispositions towards them, entertained no doubt unwittingly by him, but still not the less deeply because insensibly pervading his views, and colouring his conduct. He thought that a magistrate who had given such a toast, when his attention was called to the subject in his cooler moments, and who refused to condescend either to retract, excuse, or explain, had given grounds for such, a feeling, and therefore, he was perfectly prepared to leave the conduct of the Government in the hands of the House and of the country.
Mr. Colquhouncould not but think the conduct of the Government towards the hon. and gallant Member afforded a strange contrast to their proceedings in other cases. He was ready to admit that the toast of "the Battle of the Diamond" was an ill-advised toast, and that it had even been somewhat uncalled for; but did it therefore follow that the hon. and gallant Member should, in consequence of having given it at a public dinner, without the slightest hesitation he dismissed by the Irish Government from the commission of the peace? Such treatment, at all events, savoured somewhat of sharp practice. It showed certainly a very vigilant inspection by the Irish Government of the conduct of the Irish magistracy—that they were not determined to rip up old sores, or make grievances by reviving and exacerbating of religious animosity. What, then, had

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been their conduct on other occasions? He believed the hon. and learned Member for Dublin still held the commission of the peace. To quote a precisely analogous case, he would take that of a dinner and a toast given, not at midnight when the chairman was about to leave the room, but publicly, prominently, as the main toast of the evening, and received with the most vociferous cheering. He quoted the very words used by the hon. and learned Member, "An unqualified repeal of the legislative union." It was unnecessary for him to recal the importance of that subject to the hon. Gentleman opposite, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, having discussed it for six mortal hours, and impressed it with all his talent and eloquence on the recollection of the House; but according to the authoritative declaration of a noble Lord, then the leader of the Government in that House, the repeal of the legislative union was to be resisted even at the hazard and expense of the awful bloodshed of a civil war. Was that hon. and learned Gentleman to escape all inquiry, even from Government, after giving such a toast, while the hon. and gallant Member was visited with such condign punishment? But to take a case still more analogous,—for the hon. and learned Member supplied him with many,—the hon. and learned Member was reported to have delivered a speech in Carlow, it had indeed been contradicted by the hon. and learned Gentleman, and to that extent he was intitled to the advantage of his contradiction, but it was sufficient for his purpose that the hon. and learned Gentleman had been reported to have delivered the speech to which he now referred. The report was in these words—"Men of Carlow, are you ready? I am the last man to recommend the shedding of one drop of blood, but we have tried every means of obtaining our just rights, and they have failed; we have no means left but what I have hitherto deprecated—the shedding of blood, and blood must be shed." Such were the expressions which the hon. and learned Member had contradicted, no doubt, but which still were reported in the Irish newspapers to have been uttered by him, and which he (Mr. Colquhoun) had seen copied into the French papers as the ever-memorable word? of the distinguished Member for the City of Dublin. Did those expressions call forth an equally prompt letter from Mr. Under-Secretary Drummond? The Speech came one month, the explanation and contradiction halted and
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lagged a little behind. Was the denunciation of the Government against the shedding of blood equally emphatic with the language used in the case of the Battle of the Diamond? He was curious to see the correspondence which had taken place on that occasion; the careful and elaborate epistle of the noble Lord opposite, and the answer if any, of the hon. and learned Gentleman. The noble Lord and the Irish Government were most vigilant of all their officers, of all justices of the peace, and all official stipendiary magistrates, under their most pure and unblemished administration. And certainly, taking the prompt visitation on the hon. and gallant Member as a sample of their proceedings, it must be confessed they appeared perfect purists in Government. What had been their mode of dealing with another Gentleman, as stipendiary magistrate in Ireland, Mr. Duff, who told a Committee of that House, in 1835, that he had advised the magistrates, in 1831, to plant a gun in the streets of Dungarvan, and sweep away, by an indiscriminate massacre, a great number of the citizens? Such was the advice he declared he gave to the magistrates of Dungarvan, and which they had bravely rejected. When a sub-inspector he laid hands on a free citizen,—Mr. Delany,—who was about to preach in a chapel, and arrested him in most scandalous violation of all public decency and popular lights; and when the case was brought before Lord Mulgrave, what did Lord Mulgrave do? Did he dismiss Mr. Duff? He reprimanded and promoted him. He was at that time a sub-inspector and a stipendiary magistrate, under the watchful, vigilant, prompt, and just Government of the enlightened Earl Mulgrave. On the 12th of July, 1837, a day of peculiar excitement, that Gentleman, justly obnoxious to the Protestants of Dungarvan, marked alike by the reprobation of the magistrates and the people, who knew what he desired, was sent down to Dungarvan, as the conciliator, the harbinger of peace, by Lord Mulgrave. There was another case—exhibiting another proof of the even-handed justice of Lord Mulgrave—the case of Mr. Gore Jones, formerly a violent Orangeman, and, as extremes frequently met in the same person, now a violent liberal. Mr. Gore Jones was selected by the Irish Government as a stipendiary magistrate. Mr. Gore Jones brought a charge before the committee, in 1835, against the magistrates of Deny and Antrim, stigmatising them as violent Orangemen and perverters of

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justice. The magistrates of Antrim denounced the statement as a calumnious and deliberate falsehood. The noble Lord had called on Jones to vindicate himself before the tribunals of the country. He accordingly brought an action for libel against the magistrates of Antrim and Derry, when the jury, after a patient investigation, returned a verdict for the defendants thereby proving that Jones had vented in the Committee of the House of Commons a calumnious libel and a deliberate falsehood against a large portion of the bench of Irish magistrates. Was that Gentleman's conduct inquired into? Did he receive letters from Mr. Under-Secretary Drummond? Was he reprimanded and dismissed? On the contrary; he still retained his situation as stipendiary magistrate. There were many other cases to which he might allude, but there was one in particular in which the noble Lord himself acted a most conspicuous part, which occurred in September, 1836, and to which he must for a moment allude. A most disgraceful attack was made in September, 1836, by the priestmen, as they were called, for the purpose of interrupting Mr. Nolan, who was preaching in the parish church of Tuam; and a very furious riot was the consequence. The curate and Mr. Nolan went to the bench of magistrates; but, instead of receiving justice from them, they were told by one, named Kirwan, that they, forsooth, having ventured to preach the Gospel in the parish church of Tuam, were the abettors of the riot which had been occasioned solely and entirely by the intrusion of scandalous and mischievous men. But not satisfied with that reception, they carried the. case to the noble Lord; and what did he say? Why, that "as Mr. Kirwan had expressed his 'regret,' his excellency does not feel himself called on to pursue the matter further;" and then, having been appealed to, he went on to use the following most extraordinary expressions:—"His excellency can conceive that a magistrate might have seen reason to regret that the placards in which the preaching of Nolan was announced were drawn up in terms necessarily offensive to the religious opinions of a large majority of the people; "the terms being that a sermon was to be preached in the parish church of Tuam, on the Romish doctrines. Most offensive certainly; so offensive that a magistrate from the bench when appealed to by an unoffending clergyman must repel him from the court, and deny him justice,
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while the high executive took no steps to find out the miscreants concerned in this flagitious outrage, but threw its shield over the offender, the noble Lord lolling at his ease in Dublin Castle, contenting himself with saying that the magistrate had expressed his "regret" on the matter. Within the last four months a deputy-lieutenant of the county of Sligo had preferred charges, which Lord Mulgrave himself had declared were destitute of all truth, against a respectable magistrate, Major Brown. Had any step been taken to visit him with punishment? There had been no such proceeding, and yet they were to hear of the even-handed justice dealt out by Earl Mulgrave. Captain Vignolles attempted at the time of the election to quell a most disgraceful riot in Carlow, and appealed to the chief constable, Gleeson, for his assistance. Gleeson refused; he would not assist in seizing the offender and keeping the peace. The only offence charged against Captain Vignolles was, that he had been a little too active, a little too vigorous—that in a most violent riot he had kid hands on the offender, and what sentence had been passed upon him? Captain Gleeson refused to discharge his duty as chief constable, and swore at his superior officer, and yet he received no more censure than Captain Vignolles. Earl Mulgrave said, "Captain Vignolles seemed a little too eager to resort to force, which generally indicates an absence of moral influence." "Moral influence!" When a bludgeoned mob was using every species of violence, and brick-bats were flying in the streets of Carlow, Captain Vignolles was to pour the oil of his "moral influence" on so sanguinary a mob. Really this correspondence of the noble Earl afforded a lesson in moral philosophy which was worthy of the age in which he lived, and merited the approbation of all enlightened statesmen. At the battle of the Diamond the contest had been between two parties, both inflamed by religious animosity, Presbyterians on the one side and Roman Catholics on the other; the object then was, as appeared from the testimony of Wolfe Tone, to unite both with those rebellious associations of the time; and, in 1795, Armagh became like a field of battle. What happened? The Protestants of the Church of England came forward to assist the Presbyterians, whom the Roman Catholics had challenged to fight at the Diamond. A truce was entered into, which had been scandalously

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and perfidiously broken by the Roman Catholic party, when the Protestants were obliged, the danger having become so serious, to make common cause and attempt to put down the insurrection; and what had been the result? Had not peace been maintained ever since? Had any battle been fought since in the province of Ulster? By the Association of the Church of England Protestants peace had been carried into Ulster, and without the aid of coercion bills and insurrection acts, had still been maintained. He did not stand there as the defender of the toast which had been complained of, he should not have been a party to it, but he was also bound to say, that the Government which visited the hon. and gallant Member with such stern promptitude of punishment was bound to visit equal infliction upon the hon. and learned Member for Dublin, who had given a much more atrocious toast, as well as those other individuals to whom he had alluded, as having been guilty of much more scandalous offences than the hon. and gallant Member.
Mr. O'Connell: I am glad, I am exceedingly glad, to have the opportunity of discovering the precise spot in this House which the hon. Member dignifies with his presence. He has had a journey through Ireland, and he has brought home with him a great many stories, and a budget full—I will not say of blunders—but of mistakes; mistakes, too, of the most curious kind. A small one is, that Delany ever was a priest; it is another that his friend Delany is a respectable person; for that respectable person now lies in one of her Majesty' gaols, convicted of an atrocious assault. His excuse, indeed, is that the spirit overcame him. Yes, it was the spirit of pot-teen. Then there is, too, the notion of the hon. Member that he is acquainted with historical facts! He says that Ulster was quiet the moment that the Protestants united with the Presbyterians! Did he never hear of the battle of Antrim? Does he know that in that battle Lord O'Neill lost his life? Does he know that Antrim is in Ulster. Now, that happpened in the year 1798, and there then is his defence for peace being preserved in the north from 1797. Does he know that there was a battle fought in Down by the rebels? Did he ever hear that there was a committee of United Irishmen established in Belfast. Oh! but then said the hon. Member they were Presbyterians. What? Is he for throwing the Presbyterians overboard? I
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thought that some of his constituents were Presbyterians. Oh! they do some bad jobs sometimes. Here, then, is the denouncer of the Presbyterians? Let it sound through the streets of Kilmarnock—let the people be told what their Representative thinks of them. "If it were not for those Presbyterians all would be quiet—it was they who really did all the mischief." I rejoice at beholding the advocate which these Presbyterians have sent into this House. Then he gave us the story of Mr. Nolan, a priest, and of other highly respectable persons—respectable and fit enough perhaps, in his opinion, to be Presbyterians; although not considered quite fit to belong to the religion which they originally professed. In his journey through Ireland he appears to me to have picked up weeds, and cherished them as if they were flowers. But then the hon. Member quoted a speech which he made for me. That was the amount of his assertion respecting it. Now if a man in Ireland were to say to another, "Sir I beg to quote this as your speech, though I know you did not make it," he would be laughed at, and I conceive he would deserve to be laughed at. But here is another of his facts; he says Mr. Drummond did not write to me respecting that speech. Now I tell him that the first intimation I ever had of that speech having been made for me, was by a letter that I received from Mr. Drummond. I was in Dublin when I received that letter. I got it at my house, and the moment I read it I asked for liberty to see Mr. Drummond. I did see him, and I then said to him, "Good heaven! who told you that I ever made such a speech?" "Oh!" he replied, "it was stated in The Evening Mail of last night." I said to him, I was then going to a public meeting, and I would, if he wished it, contradict that; speech. Now, I never said a word in contradiction of that speech, but others did. The high-sheriff of the county, who was present at the dinner where the speech was said to be delivered, contradicted it. The late Roman Catholic bishop, Doctor Nolan, who is since dead, contradicted it. Mr. Houghton, and one or two other magistrates who were present, contradicted it. Their statement was published in the newspapers, and by their signatures they attested the utter falsehood that I ever made such a speech. There happened, too, to be the reporters of the Dublin morning papers present; there was, too, a reporter from The Morning Advertiser at the dinner, and

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the moment he saw such a statement attributed to me, that gentleman came forward and stated distinctly, upon referring to his report, that there never was a grosser falsehood than the imputation of such words to me. I really never should have contradicted the speech, nor paid any attention to its contradiction, if my attention had not been called to it by Mr. Drummond. There was another speech said to be mine, and made in the public streets in Carlow. That was quoted in the House of Lords by the Bishop of Exeter. Now, I never contradicted that speech from that day to this, and yet it was equally false with the other, with this difference, that it was ridiculously false, not atrociously false, like the calumny in question. It is really not worth my while to contradict all the calumnies that are uttered against me. I could not have time to do any thing else if I took the trouble of refuting all the calumnies that are published respecting me. I have been calumniated in Ireland, in England, and in Scotland; and when I have replied to my calumniators I have been met with a total silence. The hon. Member says I gave the repeal of the union as a toast. Well, to be sure I did; and did I not make a motion in this House for the repeal of the union. But although the hon. and gallant Member for Armagh gave the toast of the Battle of the Diamond, he did not move in this House to raise a monument to the heroes of that battle. I was heard in this House for five hours, and I am sorry the hon. Member for Kilmarnock was not present. Oh! I understood the hint about the extremes; and if the hon. Member will but come to my part of the country, we will receive him with as much hospitality as our means afford, and I should not despair of hearing him himself giving a toast advocating the repeal of the union. Whoever has hopped across the channel of politics, like the hon. Member, would not object to give such a substantial good toast as that. It may be a bad measure, and a majority of the Members of this House deemed it so; but it is fully a question on which every man has a right to give his opinion, and I had one English Member to support my motion. It may be a foolish proposition, but it is not a sanguinary one. There is no raising up of old feuds or of old discords, nor no gloating over the shedding of human blood; It did not animate any old resentments, it did not, in the name of Christian charity, seek to perpetuate hatred and revenge.
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The gallant Colonel may pull out again as long a budget as he has just concluded, he will only procure cheers from those who were dumb enough whilst the noble Lord was making his magnificent reply. I never witnessed a more exemplary silence than that which reigned on the opposite benches during the castigation, which the speech of the noble Lord gave them. I do not regret that I made a motion for the repeal of the union, though when I made it I did not know that I should ever see such a Chief Governor of Ireland as the Earl of Mulgrave, or such a Chief Secretary as the noble Lord, who, instead of hunting the small deer of society, had pulled down the chief stag of the forest. Yes, a stag of ten antlers,—and who had taught the lordly dominator of the forest of Maghera, that he was bound, as well as the meanest peasant on his domains, and that he must expect punishment and dismissal if he ventured to set a pernicious example.
Mr. Litton: Sir, as one connected by residence and many other ties, with the county of Tyrone, I feel myself called upon to enter my protest at once against the version given by the noble Lord to the transactions which have taken place between him and my hon. and gallant Friend. I tell the noble Lord that such a version will not be received by the country. I tell him that there is but one sentiment pervading the mind of every independent gentleman and magistrate in Ireland respecting this transaction, and that is, a sentiment of distrust and alarm. Of alarm, because they deem that the conduct of the Irish Government has been an infringement of their privileges as magistrates, and of distrust, because they believe that the act of the Irish Government, in Col. Verner's case, has been a party act, directed and instigated by a faction, to which the Government scarcely deny they are compelled to yield obedience. Sir, with respect to the history of the Battle of the Diamond, I must totally dissent from the historical reminiscences of the noble Lord. He has culled from newspapers the speeches of Members of Parliament of that day, and from them has taken an account of the transaction favourable to his views; but he has, he must permit me to say, studiously avoided reference to every thing that deserves the name of history upon the subject. I refer him for a history of that dangerous conspiracy, in which the Defenders were actors, to the writings of that able but unfortunate man, Theobald Woulf

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Tone, who had himself been a party in forming the conspiracy, and who was a principal leader of it. How does he describe the Defenders? As a party bound by a solemn oath to the separation of Ireland from England—bound to separate from the monarchy of England, and to bear allegiance to France; and one of whose oaths was, in the words of their leader, "to be faithful to the united kingdom of Prance and Ireland." A body which the same individual described as ready to rise to a man the moment a landing of French troops was effected. Now, Sir, such being the history of the body who were the aggressors at the Battle of the Diamond, I say that the noble Lord has no right to apply to that battle the epithet of a disgraceful conflict. A band of rebels and traitors was bravely and successfully resisted by a body of brave and loyal men—then, as they are to this day, firmly attached to England and to British connection. But suppose that it was a conflict of the nature described by the noble Lord, (whose statement. I maintain is collected from scraps and shreds of newspapers, not from any authentic sources)—still the toast was one given at a private dinner—a dinner from which all were excluded save the friends, and relatives, and supporters of my gallant Friend—and I say that the Irish Government has on this occasion adopted a system of espionage, of prying into the social circle, which I trust every English Gentleman, no matter what his politics may be, will join with me in deprecating and condemning. But even if the fact were otherwise, if the toast was given with open doors, has any answer been given by the sitting Member for Dublin, or by the noble Lord to the charge which, (not we), but the entire country makes against the Government respecting him. I say, the conduct of the Government in his case, has convinced the Irish public that impartial justice is not administered by that Government. The hon. Member for Dublin says, he has given as a toast the repeal of the union—that he will do it—and let him do it. But I ask, is it right or proper that a magistrate and a Member of this House should be permitted, in the midst of an excited population, with thousands of the lowest classes around him, to make speeches which the press carry to millions of a similar description, in which he calls on his deluded countrymen to "agitate, agitate, agitate," for a repeal of the union—and in which he calls on "the young blood of Ireland to arise as one man,
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and to agitate to the last for a repeal of the union, "which the present Government has declared, and every thinking man must know, must lead, if effected, to a dismemberment of the empire; and still they allow him to hold the commission of the peace. But, Sir, there is another subject to which I would wish to call the attention of the noble Lord opposite. I ask him how can he allow the Member for Dublin to hold the commission of the peace, knowing that the hon. and learned Gentleman did, last year, in the Irish association declare, "that he had not advised the people against the payment of tithes, but that he would rather permit the bed to be dragged from under him, and his body thrown into jail than pay one farthing of tithe." If the noble Lord wished to know the date of his speech, it was made in January, 1836, and is reported in The Evening Post of the 14th of that month. Such, Sir, was the language used by the learned Member for Dublin. Thus did he talk to the country of the "blood-stained tithes," blood-stained, I say, by himself.
Mr. O'Connell: I submit, Mr. Speaker, that the hon. Member is out of order in imputing to me a share in tithe conflicts.
The Speakerthought the hon. and learned Member (Mr. Litton) was out of order.
Mr. Litton: Oh, there is no Gentleman in this House who will, I am sure, imagine that I meant to say the learned Gentleman was ever present at a tithe conflict—he takes too good care of himself for that.
Mr. O'Connell: The hon. Member knows he is safe in insulting me, but I submit, Mr. Speaker, that he is out of order in accusing me of having instigated tithe conflicts.
Mr. Litton: And I repeat the charge. Can any man assert that the learned Member has not instigated tithe resistance?
The Speakeragain intimated to Mr. Litton that he was out of order.
Mr. Litton: I shall always bow with cheerfulness and respect to the opinion of the chair; but I tell the hon. Member that I come here to do my duty, and, therefore, will not by threats or intimidation be prevented from taking that course which I conscientiously believe to be my duty. When misrepresentations are made I think it my duty to correct them, and for this reason I have endeavoured to give a true version of these transactions. I shall now read the actual words used by the hon. and learned Gentleman, and then leave the

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matter to the opinion of the chair. [Mr. Litton repeated his quotation.] And this was said amidst tremendous cheering from the excited thousands by whom he was surrounded. Thus did he pour forth the language of excitement to his followers against the payment of a legal and just demand, which the clergy have an undoubted right to, and which, with the assistance of the law, they will obtain. And what has been the consequence? The country has been deluged with blood. There is no man who wishes to see the tithe question equitably settled more than I do; but while the law stands, I ask, should the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland permit a man to hold the commission of the peace, to openly excite the people to a breach of the law, and to resistance to an undoubted right. Gentlemen on the other side may cheer—they would rather not hear such matters detailed; but as long as I am borne out by fact, I care little for their cheers. I ask the noble Lord once more—I ask of the Irish Government how can they justify themselves to the country for dismissing my gallant Friend, and yet retaining in the commission of the peace the learned Member for Dublin? I ask him can an Irish clergyman of the Established Church go before that Lord-Lieutenant in a tithe case, and hope for impartial justice? Sir, I throw back the polite words of the noble Lord—I tell him, if he wishes to give the country an impression of his justice, he has no choice but to dismiss from the commission of the peace the hon. Member for Dublin—the gallant Colonel has been dismissed after a period of active and efficient services of thirty-three years—he has been dismissed for a magisterial offence—and it was one as nothing, when compared with the magisterial offences of the Member for Dublin—you have dismissed the one, retain the other, and no man in the country will believe that impartial justice is administered by her Majesty's Government in Ireland.
Major Macnamarasaid, that some opinion might be formed of the state of the law at the time of the "Battle of the Diamond "—a period at which he had himself been on military duty in the county of Armagh—from the fact of there having been written on the church doors," To Hell and Connaught with every Papist," &c, on a certain day.
Mr. Shawrose principally for the purpose of referring to a letter which he had received within the last few days from a clergyman of the county of Wexford, in
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Ireland, relating to a transaction which had recently occurred there, and in respect of which he wished the House and the public to contrast the conduct of the Irish Government with that which they had pursued towards his hon. and gallant Friend in the case then under the consideration of the House. The letter was from the Rev. Dr. Elrington, of Templeshambo, in the county of Wexford. It stated, that early in the present year a man employed by him to serve law subpoenas for composition rent, had been brutally attacked and nearly killed close to Mr. Ellington's house, to which he was brought with difficulty, and attended by a surgeon for a fortnight. Soon after, an anti-tithe meeting was held in the immediate neighbourhood of Mr. Ellington's house, and presided over by a magistrate of that county—but the circumstance to which he (Mr. Shaw) more immediately desired to draw the attention of the House was—that on Sunday, the 5th of last month, another anti-tithe meeting was held in the same parish, and presided over by the same magistrate. Resolutions were passed, to levy half a year's tithe throughout the parish, for the purpose of resisting the legal demand of the clergyman; and he would read to the House a copy of the advertisement under which the meeting was assembled; it was as follows:—"Great Anti-Tithe Meeting, to be holden at Ballindaggin, on Sunday, the 5th instant. It is requested that all those who do not wish to remain slaves to the oppressive and bloodstained impost, tithe, will attend, and register their names with their friends, in the cause of civil and religious liberty. The demon of persecution is let loose on the industrious inhabitants of Ballindaggin. The Ellingtons are abroad. 'To your tents, O Israel.' "These were plain and intelligible hints in Ireland. Now he did not know what this magistrate might have to allege in his defence, nor then pronounce an opinion whether that magistrate ought or ought not to have been dismissed—but this he did know, that in point of fact such a notice as he had read had been given of an anti-tithe meeting—that the meeting was held in pursuance of it—that a resolution was passed to collect money to resist the payment of a legal due—that at that meeting a magistrate of the county was the chairman—that the facts and circumstances were reported to the Government, and that the magistrate still continued in the commission of the peace—while that same Government, boasting

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of their impartiality, had dismissed his hon. and gallant Friend, after three-and-thirty years' service as a magistrate, during which time an imputation had not been cast against his public or his private character; a man of high station, of ample fortune, of independent usefulness in the county where he resided—and he lamented there were too few such residents in Ireland—and under what circumstances? Why, the noble Lord, the Secretary for Ireland, did not himself know the facts of the case till that night.
Lord Morpeth: Why did not the gallant Colonel explain them in his answer to Mr. Drummond?
Mr. Shaw: Because the letter of Mr. Drummond was couched in such terms, that in the answer to it no man of spirit and independent feeling could have condescended to enter into an explanation hut what were the facts, as his hon. and gallant Friend had stated that night? His hon. and gallant Friend, at a dinner given to his private friends, not having intended to give the toast in question (the expediency or propriety of the toast itself he was not then discussing), not having had it upon his list of toasts—but at a late hour, when the principal part of the company had retired, there being present an old Gentleman who had been engaged in that battle of self-defence and necessity, on the part of the Protestants—and the opposite party being (he aggressors, as admitted by the noble Lord (Lord Morpeth,) his hon. and gallant Friend, as a compliment to that old gentleman, gave his health coupled with the battle of the Diamond, at which he had distinguished himself by his personal bravery. Colonel Verner was removed; the Wexford magistrate (to say nothing of hundreds of similar cases) continues. And this then was adduced as a proof of that equal and impartial justice to Ireland—that holding of an even balance between contending parties, which they were told, forsooth! distinguished the present Irish Government from all others that had ever administered the affairs of that country. The noble Lord (Lord Morpeth) in his speech had certainly committed plagiarisms very largely from speeches made in the Irish Parliament. Those speeches no doubt expressed in very glowing terms, the party sentiments of the individuals who made them, in a warm party debate. And it was competent to the noble Lord now to quote them as expressing his own, but to rely upon them as historical proof, or in
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the nature of a judicial opinion in reference to the events in question, or the characters of the parties adverse to the speakers, which they described the noble Lord might well, twenty years hence, cite the violent speeches made in the present day by the hon. and learned Gentleman, the Member for Dublin (Mr. O'Connell,) or of the son of that distinguished man to whom the noble Lord had referred, Mr. Grattan, the hon. Member for Meath as true and just descriptions of the character and conduct of the Irish clergy or the Irish Protestants of this time. The noble Lord had noticed a cheer of his during the noble Lord's speech as meant to express dissent from the line the noble Lord was taking at the moment; it certainly was so meant; and he must say that he considered it inconsistent with the good taste and the good feeling usually displayed by the noble Lord even to his political opponents, to have referred upon the present occasion—to have "ripped up," in the words of the noble Lord himself, an old complaint of many years' standing against his hon. and gallant Friend, connected with some proceeding at Maghera, and reported upon by Mr. now Judge Perrin, By the noble Lord's own statement that case was known for many years to the Government. If it had been a sufficient cause in itself for the removal of his gallant Friend why had it not been acted upon? If it had been considered by the Government necessary to throw it into the scale as a make-weight with the present matter why was not that stated in Mr. Drummond's letter, or in any way made a part of the charge against which his hon. and gallant Friend was to defend himself, when he received notice of his intended dismissal? But, above all, these opportunities being passed by, was it becoming in the noble Lord to use it that night, to bolster up the present case against his hon. and gallant Friend, after he without any notice that that was to be any portion of the alleged offence from which he was to discharge himself—and not till after his hon. and gallant Friend had made his statement in his own defence against the only charge of which he was apprised; and he was bound to say, that his hon. and gallant Friend had made that statement in a candid, manly, and straightforward manner that did him infinite honour. Among other observations of the noble Lord's there was one with respect to which he was entirely at issue with the noble Lord. The noble Lord boasted that amongst the effects he

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calculated upon from the step taken by the Government in the dismissal of the hon. and gallant Colonel, was the discontinuance of the toast in question for the future. Now he was convinced that the very reverse would be the consequence; for himself, he declared that up to the moment he read the official letter of Mr. Drummond on the subject, he never in his life had heard of the toast of "the Battle of the Diamond." His hon. and gallant Friend said it had been well known in the county of Armagh. But he believed it was wholly unknown out of that immediate district; but since it had been brought into notoriety by the Irish Government, it was heard in every place and every shape; it was now celebrated in verse as well as prose it was set to music, and made the subject of ballads and of songs throughout the country. One couplet of one of those he recollected, and he believed it would be rendered perfectly prophetical by the course the noble Lord and the Irish Government had pursued. So far from the toast of the "Battle of the Diamond" being on that account discontinued, he had no doubt that in the words of the song to which he referred—
"Still it shall be in Ireland
A toast for ever more"—
The noble Lord might have spared the taunt that many of those who usually sat on his (Mr. Shaw's) side of the House, were absent on that occasion. The fact was, there was a very considerable number of them present; but their attendance was entirely spontaneous. His hon. and gallant Friend, intending no division, he was persuaded, asked no single Member on his side to attend, desiring simply to lay the plain facts of his case before the public. But if he was not much misinformed, the noble Lord had no such reliance on the intrinsic merits of the facts which were to sustain the Government; for although the noble Lord had never meant to refuse the papers, he still was anxious for a full bench of cheerers, and had sent forth a treasury summons that morning to all the adherents of the Government to attend "on the motion of Colonel Verner." In conclusion, he had only to observe that the question was not whether the toast was better to be given or omitted—not one of criticism upon the correspondence which had ensued upon it between his hon. and gallant Friend and the Irish Government—but, under all the circumstances of the case, he considered, and he believed the public would think with him,
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that the removal of his hon. and gallant Friend from the deputy lieutenantship and magistracy of his county was an unworthy—he was going to say a paltry—act on the part of the Irish Government.
The Chancellor of the Exchequerwould have been satisfied to have left this question to the House, with the speech of the noble Lord, the Secretary for Ireland, but for one observation which had fallen from an hon. Member, and he must say, he thought in bad taste, as to the conduct of the officers of Government, When the hon. and gallant Colonel put any portion of his conduct in issue, he put the whole of it in issue, and the whole question was before the House. With respect to the suggestion that it was unjust to refer to past transactions, in which the hon. and gallant Colonel was concerned, he would ask, whether it was not also unjust or cruel to refer to other acts committed by another hon. Member long ago, and which were not acts done by him in his capacity of a magistrate? He thought, that the hon. and gallant Colonel had suffered enough from the castigation he received on a former occasion. He almost fancied he heard the hon. and gallant Member exclaim, "el tu Brute!" Oh, it was the most unkindest cut of all! He had never known, in the course of Parliamentary discussion, an hon. Gentleman attempt to make a blow at his political opponent; and instead of doing that, inflicting so deadly a wound on his political friend. But that was not all. He must confess, that the hon. and gallant Officer, who, from his personal and military character, ought to be better able than his learned Friends to enter the lists, was, on this occasion, little indebted to his Friends. Not one of them had attempted to justify him; not one had justified the Battle of the Diamond, or the course which the hon. and gallant Member had taken on the occasion of the toast being proposed. They all had recourse to the memorable tu quoque argument; they did not defend the hon. and gallant Colonel, but they said that others had been equally guilty, without receiving equal punishment. Now, assuming the fact to be true (for he would not attempt to controvert them at that hour of the night), but assuming the facts alleged to be perfectly true, that Mr. A. here, or Mr. B. there, or some other person at Ballybeg, had been guilty of an offence—an offence which he had never heard of. He had then heard of it for the first time; but, assuming that

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this anonymous person at Bally beg had committed an offence, was that to justify the hon. and gallant Colonel? He owned he almost sympathised in the situation of the hon. and gallant Colonel: it was too bad, after the severe infliction to which he had been subjected in the eloquent speech of his noble Friend, that he should be again subjected to the almost equally severe infliction of his Friends. He must say, that that there might be something in the argument, if they could establish an analogy; but he almost regretted the situation in which the hon. and gallant Colonel had been placed by the line of argument taken by his hon. Friends on this occasion. Of the Friends of the hon. and gallant Colonel, the Ministers had no cause to complain; on the contrary, he thanked the hon. and gallant Officers from the bottom of his heart, for the discussions they had done him the favour to introduce before Parliament, on Irish affairs. They were by far the most generous opponents he had ever met with. They had exhibited a degree of chivalry of which modern times had afforded no example. And why? Because, in their consideration for their opponents, they had been willing and ready to sacrifice themselves. This, he must admit, was to be expected from their country; it was left to the chivalry, or perhaps to another characteristic which belonged to the country to which they in common belonged, that there should be found Gentlemen willing to make a sacrifice of themselves for the sake of their political opponents. Therefore, as far as he was concerned, he most respectfully and most sincerely, to both the hon. and gallant Officers, returned his most profound and reverential acknowledgments. But he thought, that in other respects, they had cause of complaint. The hon. Gentlemen opposite introduced debates, but they would come to no division. Why not bring forward a motion to justify the toast of the "Battle of the Diamond." Why not endeavour, by a division, to justify the course taken with respect to the conduct of Mr. Blake. An hon. and gallant Officer, in the course of the debate on that occasion, had referred to the charges brought against that individual, but he sought to keep out of sight the recommendation of the tribunal before whom the charge was tried. They were loud in their charges in other places; why not redeem their pledges, and place them upon a substantial issue upon which the sense of Parliament could be pronounced, and upon
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which the judgment of the people might also be called for? He would say one word with respect to this unfortunate toast. He believed, with the hon. and learned Gentleman (Mr. Shaw), that the discussions which it had produced, were calculated to raise the toast into an importance which it ought never to have met with. Upon whom ought the fault to lie? Was it upon those who discharged an always painful duty—painful from the personal considerations and feelings of those concerned—a duty in strict accordance with the obligations which they owed to the public, or upon those who endeavoured rashly, he might venture to say wickedly, not in the sense of any moral offence, but a carelessness, recklessness, wickedness, in scattering firebrands amongst inflammable materials—individuals who went back to history, not to seek lessons of moral instruction to lead them to avoid danger and escape crime, but who ransacked history for the purpose of exasperating party feeling, and exciting a rancorous spirit of hatred and revenge. He considered it no greater offence in the barbarian to poison wells under the idea that he was performing the office of legitimate warfare. He should think, that he had but ill discharged his duty if he sat down without saying a word on the character of the tranquillity of Ireland. No ties that connected him with a British constituency, much as he valued and greatly as he respected them, could ever absorb the earlier ties of the country of his birth. He had lately visited that country. He had there performed the duties of magistrate at times, when the impartial exercise of those duties required strong interference. But he had never been remiss in the discharge of those duties. In that capacity, he would take upon himself to say, after a residence in Ireland which enabled him to judge of the condition of the country, in the capacity of a witness, that he felt bound to give the most perfect and complete testimony that could be rendered to the tranquillity of that country, and to the peace, order, growing good feeling, and respect for the law which exhibited itself there. The columns of local and party newspapers had been raked to furnish a catalogue of disgraceful crimes; but where was there a great and thickly-populated country in which crimes of great magnitude and of the worst character were not to be found? But crime was diminishing in Ireland, as might be seen on reference to the returns

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made under the Government of Lord Talbot, and various others. As an instance of the way in which the long catalogue of crime was made up, he could state that during the course of the last year a Bill was passed to impose a severe penalty upon drunkenness in Ireland; and in one county 400 persons had been convicted of drunken ness. Cut the convictions were made a charge against the Government; they went to swell the catalogue of convictions, and to prove that Ireland was far from being in a state of tranquillity, and the increase of the commitments for this crime had actually been brought as a charge against the present Government in Ireland. He was not surprised that the hon. Members opposite were not enamoured of the present discussion. He was exceedingly sorry that this sorry discussion was not to be followed by as sorry a division, and that the House would not be able more emphatically to mark its opinion of the resuscitated Battle of the Diamond.
Colonel Percevalsaid, it was quite impossible for him to remain silent after what had fallen from the right hon. Gentleman. He never had heard a speech more full of ungenerous declamation, and he could not congratulate the right hon. Gentleman on his good taste in comparing to a barbarian the gallant Gentleman who had given the toast of the battle of the Diamond. Such an imputation was ungenerous, he would say unmanly. Nor could be congratulate the right hon. Gentleman on the discrimination which led him to point out the company who drank the toast as inflammable firebrands, and made him blind to the dreadful consequences of the turbulent agitation set on foot by hon. Members on his own side of the House. The right hon. Gentleman could see plainly the smallest speck, nay, even imaginary specks, on the character of any hon. Gentleman who sat opposite to him, but was blind to the faults or the crimes of those who gave him their support, however dearly he might purchase it. When the right hon. Gentleman talked of the paucity of numbers on that (the Opposition) side of the House, compared with those on his side, he seemed to have forgotten the note issued from the Treasury that morning. With regard to the insinuation that he had pressed harshly the charge against Lieutenant Blake, he had understood from the noble Lord, the Secretary at War (Lord Howick,) and from the Judge Advocate-General (Mr. Fergusson,) that government would not
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object to the production of the papers for which he moved. Government, however, had refused to grant them, and obliged him to go into the case at some length, so that if any cruelty had been shewn, it must be laid at the door of Ministers. He exceedingly regretted that he had not read the recommendation to mercy agreed to by the court-martial that sat on Lieutenant Blake, but all the papers relating to his case were in the hands of the Secretary-at-War, who might have read it had he thought proper. But the right hon. Gentleman would find, on reading that recommendation to mercy, how far he had merited the censure lavished on him by the right hon. Gentleman, with the view of diverting the attention of the House from the subject before it. The right hon. Gentleman forgot that he offered to read it to the House, and he would find in the document itself some excuse for not doing so. It was the duty of the right hon. Gentleman to have read the recommendation before attempting to pass on him a censure which he conscientiously felt he had not deserved—Having said so much, and having endeavoured to throw the imputations cast on him on those to whom they were more justly applicable, he should only say, that the noble Lord, the secretary for Ireland, had been forced to admit the appointment of Lieutenant Blake to have been wrong. That case, he could assure the House, was not brought forward by him from personal feelings, but from a desire to show the partiality and injustice of the administration. One word as to the battle of the Diamond. He had never heard of it before he read the letter of Mr. Under-Secretary Drummond, who was, he thought, greatly to blame for the phraseology he had used. He was sorry that it should be added to the list of party toasts current in Ireland, or that it should contribute to perpetuate those unkind feelings which no man was more anxious than himself to abate.
Mr. John Ellissaid, that it was with great sincerity he assured the House that there were certain circumstances which compelled him to forego any feeling of reluctance that he might have otherwise entertained to add to the length of this debate, and which induced him to offer a few observations upon the subject matter then under its consideration. During the late general election, and on his way through Newry, it happened that he became, for the first time, acquainted with

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the hon. and gallant Member for the county Armagh, and was then and in that place earnestly and verbally invited by him to meet at dinner in Armagh, on the Monday following, some of the hon. and gallant Member's friends, whom he said he should entertain on that day. Now, the House would observe, that nothing could be more private than the invitation which he received, having been invited accidentally, verbally, and by the host himself; not, be it remarked, in the name of a committee, given in the form of a circular and inclosing a list of toasts, as he believed was the usual way adopted for the furtherance of any great public entertainment; but he was asked in the same way and in no other than every day produces in the common interchanges of civility in private and domestic life. He had been given to understand that all the guests of the hon. and gallant Member had been similarly invited. The dinner was given, not at a public hotel, as represented in that elaborate epistle of the noble Lord opposite, but at some rooms hired for that purpose. And though his opinion might not be deemed of much weight when put in opposition with that of the noble Lord opposite, still he would venture to remind the noble Lord that it was a broad rule of the English law, that when a person hired a room it was virtually his own, under such circumstances, to enjoy in as ample a manner the advantages of private independence as he might in any House of which he was in the enjoyment of a lease, and if this was the law as applied to rooms hired in a public hotel, it applied with greater force in granting immunity to the occupier of rooms which did not belong to a public hotel from the curse of domiciliary espionage. When "The Battle of the Diamond" was proposed, he (Mr. Ellis), in common with many other Members of that House, knew no more of the historical incidents connected with it than he did of the Emperor of China. But had he thought that the room wherein he was then sitting was open to the public, or not being open to the public, was infested by Government spies—he would have refused to pledge the toast until he had been made acquainted with its real character. But, believing that the English Government would scorn to become the patrons of eavesdroppers, he felt sufficient confidence in the honour of the hon. and gallant Member that he would not be called upon to pledge an exceptionable toast.
Colonel Vernersaid, that it was not his intention to occupy much of their time by a reply. The noble Lord had stated, that he had been unable to give the Irish Government a satisfactory answer; but this was not the ease, as he should have felt happy to have given the Irish Government the explanation which he had that night given to that House. He was absent when Mr. Drummond's letter was received; but even if he had seen it at the moment, it was such a letter as, on consideration, he should have found it wholly impossible to comply with. He had acted for thirty-three years as a magistrate, both in his own county and in the county of Armagh, and he would defy the noble Lord, or any one else, to show a single instance in which he had acted unjustly towards either Roman Catholic or any one else. He had many Roman Catholic tenants, and he did not think any of them would be found to say that he had ever in his life acted harshly towards any of them. With respect to the observations which had been made about the toast of "The Buttle of the Diamond," all he could say was that he should be greatly obliged to the Government if they would institute proceedings against him on that ground, because he well knew he would be acquitted on it. He was conscious he had always discharged his duty uprightly and honestly, but (said the hon. and gallant Officer) I must be permitted to say, that the language used towards me by the right hon. Gentleman, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, was not only uncalled for but wholly undeserved. I am obliged to my hon. and gallant Friend, the Member for Sligo, for the manly way in which he has stood up to defend me; but when the right hon. Gentleman, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, charges me with "scattering firebrands to excite an inflammable population, and poisoning wells," I feel myself called upon to repel such a charge with the indignation which it deserves, and there is no language which the rules of the House will admit me to use, which I do not use in giving it my flat contradiction and denial. Sir, there is no word which the English language supplies which I do not intend to use to express my indignant and just contradiction and denial, and I repel the charge of my having "scattered firebrands or poisoned wells," utterly, and declare that I never did any thing of the kind in the whole course of my life, nor do I believe any one who knows me would believe me capable of such conduct. I repeat, Sir, that

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there is no word of the English language which I do not use to repel the charge brought against me by the right hon. Gentleman.—[Cries of Order and Chair.]
The Speakersaid, that the hon. and gallant Member must feel that he was bound to confine himself to that language which was fit and proper to be addressed to the House itself, and, therefore, when the hon. and gallant Member said that he would use language that was lit for a Member to use towards the House, but that be would leave it to the imagination of any hon. Member to supply oilier terms than those that were fit and proper to be used, the hon. and gallant Member must feel that he was exceeding the limit which was permitted to Members in the use of language in that House.
Colonel Vernerexpressed a hope that he had not made use of any language which was unbecoming in him to use towards the House.
The Speakerobserved, that the hon. and gallant Member must know that language used by any hon. Member which was not fit to be addressed to another was an offence, not only to the individual, but to the House. He hoped the hon. and gallant Member would at once say, that he intended by what had fallen from him to limit himself to the use of those expressions which were proper to be addressed to the House itself.
Colonel Vernersaid, he was very ready and willing to make any apology in his power to the House, but he must say, that he considered the language used by the right hon. Gentleman was an insult to him, and he also conceived that it was an insult to the House.
Mr. Robert Steuartsaid, that after what had fallen from the hon. and gallant Member he scarcely felt that he had any right to interfere in this matter; yet as no other hon. Member had risen, he thought he should not be acting improperly by declaring it to be his opinion that his right hon. Friend beside him might as well at once state that in the expression he used he did not mean to say anything personally offensive to the hon. and gallant Member; again, that hon. and gallant Member stating that he also, in the language he had used, did not mean to say anything personally offensive to his right hon. Friend.
Viscount Morpethwas quite sure that his right hon. Friend did not use any language which he was not justified in using. He conceived that his right hon.
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Friend had been misunderstood by the hon. and gallant Officer. What his right hon. Friend had said was, that the moral effect of the conduct of the hon. and gallant Gentleman was like scattering firebrands among an excited population. That he conceived was entirely within the fair scope of Parliamentary debate, and therefore his right, hon. Friend, not having used language calculated to insult any, had nothing to explain.
Sir Robert Batesonsaid, that it not only struck him, but many Friends near him, that the language used by the right hon. Gentleman was most personally offensive. It was certainly harsh language, and he must also say offensive: he hoped, therefore, the right hon. Gentleman would at least tell his gallant Friend that be did not mean it in that sense in which it had been understood by him and his Friends around him.
The Chancellor of the Exchequersaid, he should be happy to repeat that which he actually did say, and then submit himself to the judgment of the House, and the deliberate judgment of the hon. and gallant Officer, having nothing to explain, and still less anything to retract. In the course of his speech he (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) observed, by way of a general proposition, that those who quoted history, not for the purpose of extracting useful lessons from its pages, but for the purpose of exasperating the feelings and exciting the animosities of party by making their guilty deeds subjects of commendation and praise, were like those who poisoned wells or scattered firebrands among inflammable materials. That was what he had stated, and what he would repeat. If be thought he had said anything that was calculated, he would not say to insult the hon. and gallant Gentleman, but to give him a moment's pain, or had used language which was unbecoming in one Gentleman to use towards another, he should be perfectly ready to recant, to explain, to apologise in any way in which any Gentleman could explain, retract, or apologise. But he had no self-reproach in that respect; he felt upon his honour that he had given no just cause of offence, and, therefore, he had no explanation to give, no retraction to make.
After a pause,
The Speakerrose, and expressed a hope that the hon. and gallant Member (Colonel Verner,) must now be entirely satisfied that the right hon. Gentleman had no in-

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tention of saying anything that could be offensive.
After another pause,
Mr. Jackson, said, he trusted that his gallant Friend would feel quite satisfied after what had fallen from the right hon. Gentleman. No Gentleman could expect more from another than saying he did not mean any personal offence.
Colonel Vernersaid, he should be sorry not to express himself perfectly satisfied with the explanation of the right hon. Gentleman, after the observation of his hon. and learned Friend; but he could not avoid saying that the language used by the right hon. Gentleman was language to which he had not been accustomed, and appearing to come directly from the right hon. Gentleman to himself, was such as he ought not to suffer under.
Motion agreed to.

MINUTES.
Petitions presented. By the Marquess of BUTE, from Renfrewshire, for the extension of the Standing Orders relating to Railroads.—By Lord LYNDHURST, from the Distillers of London, against the Imprisonment for Debt Abolition Bill.

IMPRISONMENT FOR DEBT.
The Lord Chancellorrose to move the second reading of the Bill for abolishing imprisonment for debt. He said that, he should not occupy much time in calling the at-

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tention of noble Lords to the very important subject of the Bill which he had formerly presented to the House. The object of the Bill was, to make a very great alteration in the law, and in a branch of it which, perhaps more than any other, involved the interests of commerce. He did not believe that there were many persons who were not in the situation of either creditor or debtor, unless those in the lowest classes of society; therefore, any proposition affecting such a large proportion of the community demanded the serious attention of the Legislature. He admitted that if the proposed alteration of the law were carried into effect, it would materially alter the relative situation of persons engaged in commerce and manufactures, or on whose dealings with respect to each other the prosperity of the community might be considered, in a great measure, to depend. It was a subject which had for a long time been before the public and under the consideration of Parliament. It had occupied the attention of the other House for several Sessions, and two Bills had been sent up from the other House, having for their object the same purpose as that proposed by the Bill on the table. It was true, however, that these Bills differed in many respects from that he had introduced; they differed as to the extent to which those Bills proposed to carry the measure rather than in the provisions which would be found to form the subject matter of the present Bill. In the Bill which he had had the honour of introducing in 1836 there was a part which he had thought it expedient to omit in the present Bill. It made provision not only for altering the situation of creditor and debtor, as related to the remedies one had against the other, and to the relief to which the debtor was considered entitled; but it also contained provisions which he thought of a very salutary nature, but which it was thought so far encumbered the present Bill that those who prepared it found it far better to leave that part of the subject entirely out of it. He meant that part of former Bills which framed a machinery which enabled parties to make what was called a cessio bonorum, that was to make a division of their property equally among their creditors; in short it was to a considerable extent to extend the provisions of the bankrupt laws, at the option of the debtor for the benefit of his creditors. In omit-
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ting, therefore, parts of the measure of 1834, 1835, and 1836, he by no means wished to express any opinion against leaving out those provisions from the present Bill; on the contrary, he thought that it was a matter which should be reserved for another and separate measure, and therefore the House would have to consider this measure alone, without its being prejudiced, as the former Bills were, by any additions which did not necessarily belong to it. The object of the present Bill was strictly confined to improving the mode of process and the remedies which the creditor had against a debtor, and of relieving a debtor from some of those hardships to which, as the law now stood, he often was exposed at the suit of his creditor. If the measure he proposed would not, in his opinion, leave the creditor in as good a situation as he now stood, and if he did not entertain the firm conviction that it would improve that situation, he should have hesitated before he took upon himself the task of proposing the Bill. He was convinced, that the remedy the creditor now had was wholly inadequate to that which he was entitled to, and in a state of society in which of necessity credit must be given to a great extent, that the law did not afford to the creditor adequate means of obtaining payment of his just debt. It was, nevertheless, perfectly true that, at the same time, although the creditor had not the means of enforcing or obtaining payment of his just debt, yet that he had the means of oppressing a debtor, and of keeping him in prison when there was no just reason or ground for his exercising this power; in short, the creditor had that power against the person of his debtor which he ought not to have, while he had not that remedy against the property of a debtor which he should have. If the House would listen to him for a short period, he would give a brief outline of the course of proceeding which the law allowed' to a creditor for the purpose of compelling payment of a debt due to him, and he thought that they could not fail to see that the law was greatly defective. At present, any person might be arrested and deprived of his liberty, if any other person would make an affidavit that he owed him £20. The other parts of the laws of this country were extremely careful in guarding personal liberty, and every possible precaution was taken to

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prevent the unnecessary imprisonment of a person. But any person was enabled to arrest another on the mere affidavit of debt, and this power was given him on the assumption that it was necessary to enable the creditor to get his debt paid. He was satisfied that the House would agree with him that all the legitimate objects of the creditor could be obtained without this process. He was sure that the House would not think that a law which put it in the power of one individual to deprive another, whom he chose to call his debtor, of his liberty, at least for a time, was a just and expedient law. It was true, the debtor had the power of obtaining his liberation on putting in bail, a proceeding which was not a matter of great difficulty, if a party had friends ready to come forward and subject themselves to that responsibility: if, however, the debtor was poor, he must go into the market and hire bail. Upon this point their Lordships would find it stated in the report on the subject, that when the debtor went into the market and hired bail, it was found that great inconvenience, expense, and sacrifice of moral feeling resulted from his being compelled to go amongst those who made it their business to procure bail. So far, therefore, it appeared that the power of the creditor was much larger than the House would feel disposed to continue. After the arrest the action proceeded, and, either with or without trial, the creditor obtained his judgment. He was previously armed with the power to arrest upon affidavit of debt, and he had two remedies when judgment was obtained. If he proceeded against the defendant's property he had a very inadequate remedy. If the debtor were possessed of land he had the power of obtaining possession of one half his income. The goods or chattels of the debtor might be obtained towards the payment of his debts through the instrumentality of the sheriff. But, either from the debtor's suspicions being excited, or from his being in a state of insolvency, he might feel it expedient to arrange his property and means of living so as to defeat the object of his creditor. He might have horses, carriages, and other means of living luxuriously, and yet the creditor have no power to take his property. He might be possessed of large funded property, and yet the creditor had no means of touching it. Persons might be indebted in large sums to the debtor, but the creditor had
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no means of enforcing the payment of them to himself. In short, the creditor might find his debtor to be a rich man, fully able but unwilling to pay, and he had no means of enforcing payment by the seizure of the property, and thus was without adequate means of obtaining redress. The creditor, however, might take another course—he might take the person of the debtor, but if he took the chance of enforcing payment of his debt by the pressure of the person of the debtor he discharged the property. If the debtor preferred suffering imprisonment to paying his debts the law afforded the creditor no other remedy. There were now individuals in prison—in one instance, the debtor had been imprisoned for twenty-three years—who were quite able to pay their debts, but were content to remain confined rather than do so. They lived within the rules of the prison, and spent their property in luxury, rather than pay their debts. A creditor might see all this, but he could only say—"I have no remedy against this man's property—I cannot touch it—I can only hold his person." He was only calling the attention of the House to old and acknowledged grievances. The state of the law was formerly such that it induced Parliament to pass Acts from time to lime, and ultimately a permanent law, which defeated the remedy against the imprisonment of the person of the debtor—he meant the Insolvent Debtors' Act. After the creditor had gone through an expensive process of law, and had obtained his suit, and had succeeded in getting the person of his debtor, the latter took the benefit of the Insolvent Act. If the debtor should have any estate, and that was very seldom the case, that creditor, instead of deriving advantages from his exertions, found that it was divided among all the creditors, without distinction; and the result of long experience proved that the dividends paid in this court were not very large—that, in short, they were a mere mockery. The creditor, in most instances, actually got nothing. Before they proceeded to apply a remedy it was necessary, in the first place, to see what the disease was, and he was confident that that House, when it knew what the state of the law really was, would not wish to continue it. The grievance on the part of the creditor was the inefficient remedy which the law gave him to obtain payment out of the property of the debtor, and the grievance on

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the part of the debtor was the harsh, cruel, and vindictive power which the law gave the creditor the liberty of exercising towards the debtor. The present remedy, as he had said before, was execution against the debtor's property, or arrest of his person upon mesne process. In reference to execution after judgment, though the Insolvent Debtors' Act was passed from feelings of compassion; yet it was deemed necessary to give unfortunate debtors relief who were lying in prison without the means of paying their creditors, and who otherwise would probably have to continue there for the remainder of their lives. It appeared to Parliament in consequence of the cruelty that might be thus exercised, that it was absolutely necessary that some alteration should be made in the law. Execution, therefore, to a certain extent in this respect ceased in a great measure to be operative at all. As the law now stood, however, the debtor could not take the benefit of the Insolvent Debtors' Act without being imprisoned upon an average for eight weeks. He, therefore, could not get relief under this Act without being taken from his trade or occupation for this period, giving up any situation that he might hold, and sustaining all the loss of credit and character which belonged to a person who was to be found in prison for the non-payment of his debts. Then, again, although the law provided a remedy for the creditor, yet it gave that remedy only in terms that were extremely hard, and in many cases absolutely useless. What benefit could result from imprisoning a debtor, provided the latter gave up his property to his creditors? If he was of any occupation he was obliged to abandon it, and by being kept in prison he was deprived of the means of supporting himself or family. Even the very means that he might have of paying his creditors might thus be taken from him. Undoubtedly at the end of two months' imprisonment he would be much less able to pay his creditors than when he was first arrested. In what situation would a party stand against whom a writ of execution was obtained in regard to his debts? He might not have the means of paying all his creditors, but he might have means of paying a portion of his debts. If this party had property, the Legislature could, without the intervention of the Insolvent Debtors' Act, devise means whereby a direct remedy could be obtained; for what
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possible reason could they give to the creditor the right of taking in execution the person of his debtor, the object only being, by pressure, to compel the debtor to give up the property he possessed? On the other hand, if the unfortunate debtor was possessed of no property, and had no means of paying, what could be more harsh, more cruel, or more unnecessary than to allow the creditor to send such a person to prison? A middle case, however, might arise—a debtor might have no property, but he might have some friends or relatives who, in order to prevent him undergoing imprisonment, or passing through the ordeal of the Insolvent Court, would afford him the means of paying his creditor. Did the House think that that was a course of law that they ought to encourage? What reason could there be for allowing a creditor, by pressure upon a debtor, to induce the friends of the debtor to come forward to pay a sum of money into the pocket of the creditor? Supposing a man had property enough to pay 10 s. in the pound, and a creditor obtained execution against him, and threw him into prison, and kept him there either till the Insolvent Debtors' Court discharged him, or until he paid that particular debt, that creditor would be paid by a sum which should be divided among all the creditors. It appeared to him that the only three cases that could exist of a debtor being taken into execution were productive of unmixed evil. Then, again, if their Lordships should be of opinion that there ought to be no imprisonment for debt, it was to be apprehended that they had made up their minds there ought to be no arrest for debt. It had been said there ought to be arrest for debt at a certain amount, but no execution for debt, and he (the Lord Chancellor) had heard persons say, that it was extremely expedient in many cases to arrest for debt, because, upon arresting, they very often got paid. He did not believe this was an uncommon opinion among tradesmen who did not look to the legal effect of the proceedings, but only for their own purposes. But if their Lordships should think there ought to be no execution on the arrest, was it possible they could be prepared to sanction this arrest? For what purpose was the arrest? It was only that the individual might thereby be made subject to the law by having execution go against him upon the

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arrest. Their Lordships could not possibly maintain the law of arrest on mesne process, if, immediately upon a man being arrested, he was to be again discharged. From the result of all the inquiries upon the subject it appeared that the greater proportion of arrests were made for debts under 50 l. This necessarily produced the greatest possible injustice. The power of arresting did not exist in a court of equity unless under one form of process. He had practised all his life in a court of equity, and therefore could speak with confidence on the subject. In the courts of equity the amount of money involved was most enormous: indeed more property was adjudicated upon in a court of equity in one month than in a year in a court of common law. As he had said before, there was no arrest in equity unless in one case and the writ empowering it was granted at the discretion of the judge. It was the writ of ne exeat regno, In this case affidavits were made and filed, and, provided after examination the case was made out to the satisfaction of the judge, the writ was issued, and the person against whom it was directed could not leave the country. No judge that ever sat in a court of equity had not felt that this power should be exercised with the greatest caution. It was said by Lord Eldon, who so long presided in the Court of Chancery, that there was no part of the duty of a judge which he exercised with more fear and trembling than issuing this writ. In a court of justice, however, any man who made an affidavit to the amount of 20 l., could stop a person who was engaged in the most important business, and when his absence in the country or abroad might be of essential consequence. On one side, therefore, a person might by a simple affidavit of debt to the amount of 20 l. arrest a person, while, on the other, care was taken that imprisonment for debt should not take place without the exercise of the greatest caution. Why was it that such laxity should exist as regarded the liberty of the person in suits for debt in a court of common law, while it was necessary to use such caution in a court of equity? When he recollected the enormous amount of property involved in proceedings of equity, he should have thought that it would be more essential that this power should exist than in a court of common law. If any man came down to that House and asked for a
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Bill for this purpose he was sure, that the application would not be attended to. He would now proceed to state the remedies now proposed to be applied. In the first place, the question was, in what manner was the creditor to obtain payment of his debt? The debtor might be possessed of real estate. The law said, that the creditor might take a moiety of the income of that estate. But why only a half? Why was the creditor only to get the moiety when he was entitled to the whole for the payment of his debt? He thought that it would be difficult to show why such remedy should be confined to goods and chattels, and not be extended to every description of property. In the first Bill which came up on this subject it had been proposed that there should be a forced sale of the land by the sheriff; but as that would be found to produce very little for the creditor, the present measure provided that, after judgment, the creditor should have an equitable lien on the land, which he might work out, as if he had obtained it by the act of the debtor, so that the interest of the debtor might be ascertained, and the estate be fairly brought to sale. Again, with regard to the stock of a debtor; it might be his own or not, or it might be standing in the names of trustees for the debtor; then if it were the property of the debtor it was of course desirable that it should be made available for the payment of his debts, and the alteration proposed in that respect was, not to make the creditor the owner of the stock, for the purpose of selling it, but to give him a lien on the stock until a sale could be properly worked out. The same observation did not apply to such securities as promissory notes or bills of exchange, because on the face of them little doubt could exist as to the person in whom the property was vested, and because no danger could result from a Judge putting a sheriff in possession of such securities. The object of these provisions was to prevent the effects of forced sales by the sheriff. There was still another description of property—goods in the hands of an agent for sale. The old Bill proposed to give the Judge a power to impose a lien upon this kind of property. It was apprehended that this provision would give rise to much inconvenience, and that it would never do for a merchant to be withheld from selling a hogshead of sugar until he had proceeded for judgment against the owners of

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it. There was another part of the measure to which he would direct their Lordships' attention, though it would not alter the rights of parties in any respect—he meant the clause which provided that goods of which a debtor was the reputed owner, supposing him to be subject to the bankruptcy laws, should be subject to the debts of the so reputed owner. A man might appear to be possessed of goods, and yet, when it was sought to attach to them any liability for a debt, he might say that they were not his, and thus avoid the payment. He confessed he could see upon principle no reason why reputed property ought not to be liable to execution creditors. There was another provision in the Bill which would become necessary in the event of the abolition of the imprisonment for debt. Their Lordships were aware that the fact of a man remaining in prison a certain length of time was considered to be an act of bankruptcy. If they took away this proof of insolvency they must make some equally good proof of the inability of the trader to pay. This Act therefore provided that after a demand had been made and no security given for the payment of the debt, that must be considered an act of bankruptcy. Of course, the fact of a refusal to give security must be on oath. These provisions would give material assistance to the execution creditors, and for all legitimate purposes creditors would be in a better condition to work out the payment of their debts than they now were. On the other hand, the debtor would be protected from the pressure which was improperly used towards him heretofore, and from the operation of those motives of revenge which frequently influenced the creditor under the existing law. If a debtor were about to leave the country, to abscond from his creditors, it would then become essentially necessary that the creditor should have the power of arresting the property. If at present the creditor could arrest the person he would give bail, and his friends would be responsible for his appearance; but when the creditor learnt that the debtor was about to abscond he would, if he lived at a distance from London, have to send up to town for a writ, and to wait the return, by which time his debtor might have vanished, while, on the other hand, if he did not arrest at the commencement of the suit, he would have no opportunity of
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doing so afterwards. Again, the occasion might not arise till the middle of the suit; for the debtor might remain in his usual place of residence so long as he deemed it safe—he might not even form the intention of absconding until the matter became pressing. To meet cases of that nature, therefore, it was proposed by the present measure that the creditor, upon making affidavit of the debt, and also of the intention of the debtor to abscond before a justice of the peace, should have the power to arrest the person of such debtor; and he submitted that that was a much better and much more expeditious process than even the writ of ne exeat in the Court of Chancery. Thus the Bill provided a remedy in the only case in which it could be at all requisite, viz., that of the intended escape of the debtor. If, then, the double purpose were answered—that of giving security to the creditor and of preventing the exercise of powers which might be injurious to the debtor without serving the interests of the creditor—he thought the measure was entitled to the approbation of their Lordships; but there was also a further provision, which he considered was a salutary one, and to which he did not apprehend their Lordships would hesitate to give their assent. After judgment—(and this machinery was established to meet various cases in which, after all the care that might be taken, the creditor, although he knew the debtor possessed property, found it still impossible to reach it)—this provided that the debtor might be called on to produce a schedule of his property, and be examined before an officer in London, or before commissioners in the country, as to the amount of the property he possessed; in short, such an examination would take place as would put the creditor in possession of information as to the property of the debtor, so that it could be produced to meet the debt. No doubt it would be useless to make such a provision without at the same time investing the proper officers with power to enforce it, and to compel answers by commitment. Thus could the property of a fraudulent debtor be in many instances reached. The House, he presumed, would recollect that this was no new provision; that under the Lords' Act a similar provision existed, but then it was limited to debts under 300 l., while he proposed to make it unlimited, for he saw no reason why a man

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who owed 3,000 l. should enjoy immunities which were denied to the smaller debtor for 300 l. As regarded this part of the Bill, debtors and creditors were the only parties concerned; it would clearly be a benefit to creditors; debtors had no right to object, and for this simple reason, that they ought not to refuse submitting themselves to an examination; that they ought not to refuse to furnish a description and statement of their property; they were not entitled to set their creditors at defiance, and refuse information, as the law at present allowed them to do. He was not aware that it was necessary he should enter into any further particulars. The general scheme of the Bill was to render property available for the benefit of creditors. He was aware it had been said of this measure that it was not popular. He was sure that it would be unpopular with those creditors only who did not understand its provisions. It was quite necessary that creditors should be deprived of the power of making an unjust use of the law, and it was equally necessary that the debtor should be protected. There remained but one topic which it was requisite that he should notice, and that was, privilege of Parliament. With respect to it, he should say, that he saw no reason why those enjoying that privilege should be placed in a worse situation than before. They had the privilege, not for their own advantage, but for that of the public; and certainly he did not propose to make any change that should deprive them of it. He was sure it would not be thought that he addressed these observations to their Lordships from supposing that their individual feelings would be affected by it; but he repeated, that a privilege which they possessed for the purpose of enabling them to attend to their public duties should remain unchanged. Besides the alterations which he mentioned, he had others to propose, with which he should not then trouble the House, but which he should take the liberty of submitting, if they allowed the Bill to go into Committee; he trusted that they would, and that the Bill would pass into a law, for he believed it calculated to produce the most beneficial results.
Lord Lyndhurstsaid, that he agreed with his noble and learned Friend in the greater part of those observations which he made at the outset of his address, especially those remarks of his which went
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to show the great importance of the proposed measure, the great difficulty which attended any egislation on the subject, and therefore the careful and anxious attention which it demanded at their Lordships' hands. It was so considered by the Common Law Commissioners, for in their report they pointedly noticed the various sources of embarrassment by which the subject was surrounded. Without, therefore, detaining their Lordships with any attempt further to impress upon their minds either the arduous nature of the undertaking in which they were engaged, or the scrupulous examination respecting it which they were bound to institute, he should enter at once upon the question itself: but before he proceeded to its details he should make a remark or two on the principle and progress of the measure both in that and the other House of Parliament. When his noble and learned Friend opposite (Lord Brougham) held the great seal, he directed the attention of the Common Law Commissioners to the question, and those Commissioners, as their Lordships were aware, had made a report, whence it appeared that on the question of imprisonment for debt they were not agreed; certainly the majority were for the abolition of that practice; but a very learned member of that commission (Mr. Serjeant Stephen) differed from his brother commissioners, and stated very fully and very ably the grounds of that difference. Now, he earnestly exhorted their Lordships, before they came to any final decision on the question, carefully and deliberately to consider the arguments urged by that learned Gentleman on the proposed abolition of imprisonment for debt. It was necessary now that he should call the attention of the House to some of the facts connected with the introduction of the bill. It was in the Session of 1835 that his Majesty's Attorney-General obtained leave to bring in his first bill. As late in that Session as the 17th of August the bill passed the House of Commons, and was sent up to their Lordships. When it came before them, every one agreed that they could not then enter with any advantage into the consideration of the measure; even his noble and learned Friend opposite himself did not say that the question could then be satisfactorily disposed of by the House of Lords, but on the contrary, that the course which the House then took with regard to

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that bill was the only course open to them. In the following Session nothing was done till some questions were put on the subject to Lord John Russell, and when that noble Lord was distinctly required to inform the House what was intended to be done, the reply was, that his noble and learned Friend on the woolsack had been anxiously directing his attention to the subject, and that very speedily a bill was to be introduced for the purpose of abolishing imprisonment for debt. It was introduced, but the second reading of that bill did not take place until the 11th of July. Their Lordships would probably recollect, that the measure, when it then came to be considered, underwent material change, and he was bound to say, that of some of the alterations then made he fully approved; and he begged to add, that what took place on that occasion very strikingly showed the advantage of deliberation and consideration. On the 1st of July the bill came before them; his noble and learned Friend was then absent in consequence of indisposition; several noble Lords had left town; his noble and learned Friend the Chief Baron of the Court of Exchequer, and another noble and learned Friend of his, the Chief Justice of the Court of Queen's Bench, were both on circuit. A noble Duke, then near him, together with a large proportion of their Lordships, were of opinion that the House could not, with any advantage to the public, consider such a question, and it was therefore postponed. The next bill was brought in by the Attorney-General, and it was not a little remarkable that the learned Gentleman abandoned as many as 150 clauses of the original measure. On the 6th of February this new bill was introduced into the House of Commons; the stages of it were postponed from day to day, and it did not get into Committee till the 6th of April. A bill so important—a bill in the support of which so much eloquence was expended—had been allowed to slumber till the close of the month of June, a period of three months, when just on the eve of a prorogation, the Attorney-General moved the recommittal, and it was with the utmost haste read a third time, and sent up to the House of Lords. Such a proceeding could not be regarded otherwise than as a mockery. Their Lordships felt that the bill could not then be fairly or fully considered, and it was, as a matter of necessity,
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postponed. From the dates to which he had called their attention, and from the circumstances which it had become his duty to state, every one must see that the most beneficial results had followed from the course which the House of Lords had adopted. His noble and learned Friend on the woolsack had told the House that the present was not a very popular measure. In that statement he might be perfectly right. For his part, he did not profess to say that he possessed any extraordinary means of judging whether the bill was popular or otherwise. Present and temporary popularity on a question of that nature was a consideration which should not in the least influence him. The measure, if wise and proper under the circumstances, could not fail ultimately to become popular; but he would on the present occasion take the liberty of suggesting, that the opinions and feelings of the people ought to have some weight on a question that from its peculiar nature must be one with which they had a practical familiarity, and of which they must therefore possess a much clearer and more exact knowledge than of the great mass of subjects which engaged the attention of Parliament. He did not say that he had any means of knowing what might be the degree of popularity which the bill enjoyed; but, judging from the petitions, he should agree with his noble and learned Friend on the woolsack that the bill was very unpopular. In the first place, the number of petitions against it greatly exceeded those in its favour, but that was not enough; the number of persons by whom those petitions in favour of the bill were signed vastly fell short of those who were against it. If strictly reckoned, there would be found ten to one against the bill. Let it also be recollected that no trifling portion of those petitions originated at public meetings where the chairman signed on behalf of the meeting, so that if the signatures of chairmen were only taken as expressing the opinion of individuals, it would be an estimate much more favourable to the bill than it was entitled to, yet still, counting those who presided at public meetings only as individuals, the number of petitions in favour of the bill were only as one to ten compared with those who had petitioned against it. He could not help observing, that with respect to the present bill there had been no little

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mystification. They were told that the purpose and effect' of the measure would not be to abolish imprisonment for debt, and its main object was represented to be that of giving additional security to creditors. Ex concessis, imprisonment for debt was not to cease unless the creditor received additional security—at least that that class of creditors who were mainly interested in the question of imprisonment for debt should by the bill be put in a better situation than they were before, He had been in communication with several of those individuals who felt anxious on the subject—men quite alive to their own interest, exceedingly astute, full of intelligence and of practical knowledge. Most certainly their view of the bill was, that the machinery for giving additional security to creditors was mere rubbish; they did not care for any one of the advantages which the bill professed to confer—it was not what they wanted. In the first place, the advocates of the bill told the House and the parties interested, that it would give increased power to the creditor over the lands of the debtor. To that he should feel no objection, but it was for their Lordships to consider whether the class of creditors affected by the abolition of imprisonment were those who could derive any advantage from increased power over the whole of a debtor's lands. His noble and learned Friend on the woolsack had correctly stated that the great majority of those debtors sent to prison were men who owed sums under 50 l. Now he desired to ask, if persons who went to gaol for such sums were likely to be possessed of interest in land that came within the description of freehold, copyhold, or customary tenures? The persons arrested were generally men who owed very small sums; what could such a provision as the bill contained have to do with them? A debtor might most truly say that the effect of the bill would be to enable him to defeat some of his creditors, and to favour others, and that by its means he could alienate his lands. His noble and learned Friend would, perhaps, tell them that the bill would prevent that. He believed it would be no difficult matter to show that the bill would have the effect of cheapening the exercise of the power to which he now referred. The debtor, if he found his creditor proceeding against him, could say, "I will create charges upon my estate; I will alienate,
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and though you should issue a writ of capias ad satisfaciendum, I can still defeat you, and I give you notice that I will." The fact was, that the bill did not apply to the subject matter, and that it professed or attempted to deal with things which it could not reach. It professed, or seemed to undertake to give the creditor power over the money, bills, and bonds, of the debtor. What could be more moveable than the money, bills, or bonds in the possession of a fraudulent debtor? It was perfectly ludicrous to suppose that an Act of Parliament could reach property of that nature. Surely, there were no assets of that description which a creditor could not endorse the day before judgment was entered up against him. Then came stock in funds. Under the existing law, a man possessing property of this nature, who did not wish to pay his debts, might go to prison and live upon the income of his stock. His learned Friend had said he would put an end to all that by making stock seizable. There was one of the additional securities. Now, in the first place, debtors to the amount of 30 l. being that class of debtors who, as allowed by the noble and learned Lord, was the most liable to arrest, were not very often stockholders. So much for the security on that part of the subject. But what might debtors holding property of this kind do under this bill? Why, if it should pass into law in its present form, all they would have to do in case they chose to act fraudulently would be to sell out their stock, and invest it in foreign securities. They could quit the capital of London, live on the income of their securities in a princely manner on the continent, and set their creditors at defiance. Thus, instead of, under the present law, exchanging the comforts of a mansion in Grosvenor or some other square, and the luxury of a carriage and horses, for the dull confinement of the King's Bench Prison, the debtor by this bill, had only to change the nature of his stock, and transfer his establishment to the other side of the Channel. He really did not understand the provisions of this bill; it appeared to him a mere mockery. There was another point to which the noble and learned Lord had alluded. A plaintiff in an action might become a substitute for the defendant, and act as if he were the real plaintiff, by suing in his own name for debts due to the defendant. According to the seventh

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clause, debts due to judgment debtors were to be vested in the creditor by order of the judge. But suppose the original plaintiff averse from that course of proceeding, and that the defendant in the action succeeded; the defendant would undoubtedly look to the substitute plaintiff for his costs. What creditor would become substitute plaintiff in suits for the recovery of debts due to the defendant, if he were liable to be saddled with the costs? He asked their Lordships, was it not absurd to suppose that the plaintiff would undertake to conduct suits without knowing whether they were likely to lead to a prosperous issue, and in case they failed be called on to pay the costs? These were the principal benefits to be produced by the bill, upon which his noble and learned Friend relied to induce their Lordships to agree to it, if in the operation of this bill the interests, as was proposed, in the personal property of the judgment debtor should be charged, by order of the judge, with the payment of the amount for which judgment should be obtained, no one in London would venture to purchase a bale of goods without first searching every judge's chamber to see whether there might exist against it any such charge or order. Were they then to be called on to pass a bill of this kind, a bill containing so many imperfections and defects that he should only wear out their Lordships' patience in attempting to go through them all? Every part of it seemed defective. There was, however, another singular feature in it which he could not pass by without noticing. It would seem as if the persons who had framed this bill were not aware that defendants sometimes obtained judgments against plaintiffs. According to the present law, if the defendant succeeded in an action, he could put the plaintiff in prison for his costs; and in such a case how was he to be liberated? The remedies contained in this bill did not apply to him. He was left out of the second, out of the sixth, the seventh, eighth, and nine clauses, as if the defendant never in any instance obtained judgment. How it happened that a bill drawn by the Attorney-General, and introduced by his noble and learned Friend on the woolsack, could contain so many and such imperfections he could not conceive. Whether this one might have occurred through a slip, or been made upon the presumption that plaintiffs were
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always right, and defendants always wrong, he could not say, but there it was on the face of the bill. His noble and learned Friend had alluded to the power of seizing securities. Suppose a judgment creditor lucky enough to get hold of those securities and recover money on them, how was he to act according to the provisions of this bill? He was to pay himself first, and then hand the difference to the defendant in the original action. Here again the bill proceeded on a presumption similar to the last—viz; that the plaintiff was always rich and right, and the defendant always poor and wrong. The bill empowered the plaintiff to seize securities, and bring actions for the recovery of the sums due on some, and in case he succeeded, to pay himself, and then if there were a surplus, to hand it to the unfortunate creditor; but suppose this man, the judgment creditor, to be in need of money for his own purposes, to be pressed perhaps by some of his own creditors, and to allocate that surplus or part of it to his own use, what remedy had the defendant in the original suit? So very unjust and unequal was the bill in this respect, that it appeared extraordinary to him how these things could have escaped the observation of the learned persons who had framed and introduced it. So much for its defects. Then as to the mode of getting evidence. If a person obtained judgment against another, and the defendant did not satisfy such judgment within ten days after it had been entered up, the attorney might call on him to deliver up within fourteen days a schedule containing a full and perfect account of all his property, whatever its description. If he happened to be a man of large estate, involved in his affairs, whether on these estates there were charges and incumbrances, whether his effects were in possession, reversion, remainder, or expectancy i whether his property were personal or real, the particulars of all, together with the names and residences of his debtors, and those of the witnesses who were to prove the debts, were to be formed into a schedule and delivered up. If moreover the defendant did not do so to the satisfaction of the attorney, he might be summoned before the commissioners, and if the commissioners were not satisfied with his answers they might send him to prison. If one of their Lordships should have the misfortune to be sum-

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moned before the commissioners under such circumstances, and those commissioners did not like the noble Lord's answers, or the mode of giving them, they could immediately send him to prison. But mark the dates: judgment might be obtained at the commencement of the long vacation. The time for making those disclosures was not to be extended beyond six weeks. In case the party were consigned to a prison, a considerable time might elapse before an application for a new trial could be made, and supposing at the ensuing term a new trial to be obtained, and the opinion of the jury to be that the original verdict was a most scandalous one, they had in the mean time a disclosure of the affairs of this unhappy person. He must say there had been little caution observed in framing this clause. But similar powers were given to the commissioners of bankruptcy. He had had some experience in that respect, and could bear testimony to the great and heavy expense attending examinations in cases of bankruptcy. Who were to pay the expenses of them under this bill? There was no provision made for them in it. There was a similar power in the Insolvent Debtors' Court, by means of which a creditor got into his possession the whole property of the debtor, and his noble and learned Friend had said that the result was also similar. The average return from these examinations before the commissioners of bankruptcy was only 1½d. in the pound. That was another oversight. By the Insolvent Debtors' Act, if the party seeking the benefit of it committed a fraud, or had done that which was not consistent with justice, the commissioners could remand him; and persons were remanded for three, six, nine, and sometimes twelve months, on account of frauds proved against them. By the operation of this bill, all those persons were to be immediately liberated. Was that the intention of the framers of the bill? Whether it were or no, such would be undoubtedly the operation of the bill. His noble and learned Friend had directed their attention to another power in the bill, meant to be given for the arrest of debtors about to abscond, which he said was analogous to a power at present existing in courts of equity. Now, Lord Eldon had stated, and he thought with great correctness, that it was very difficult to exercise that power with proper care
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and discretion. Certainly no person had been more careful or vigilant in the exercise of it than that noble Lord; but here inquiry was necessary. By this bill, however, the party had only to make an affidavit that the defendant was about to leave the kingdom; he was not even bound to state his reasons for thinking so. There was no inquiry by the Court of Chancery, or by any court, judge, or other tribunal. It depended entirely upon the assertion of the party. He had gone through these details, painful as it had been to him, for the purpose of leading their Lordships to this conclusion—that the opinion entered into by the great body of this metropolis was, that these "additional securities", as far as they were concerned, were of no value. They did not care about them; and if the argument was, that by reason of those additional securities arrests for debt were rendered unnecessary, and if at the same time those things called additional securities should turn out not to be additional securities, the whole case fell to the ground. He was not at all disposed to say he was of opinion that the true way to consider the subject was by going through the classes. The question was, should arrest for debt continue or not? Without expressing his opinion one way or the other on that point at present, he would say he had no objection to the second reading of the Bill. When he spoke of his opinion, he did not mean to say he had formed a decided opinion on the subject. What struck his mind was, that there should be further inquiry and investigation. He felt that further inquiry was absolutely necessary with reference particularly to the complicate clauses to which he had alluded. It was not there they could be discussed with advantage, but in another place, and in another form. He was anxious, without committing himself to any opinion, to express himself respecting that part of the subject upon which all seemed desirous of doing justice—namely, of giving greater security to the creditor on the one hand, without, on the other, being unnecessarily harsh or severe towards the debtor. His noble and learned Friend had divided this subject into two parts—arrest before, and arrest after judgment. They were certainly open to different considerations. Arrest before judgment was entirely an ex parte proceeding. The plaintiff", without being obliged to go before any tribunal, or pro-

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cure the authority of a judge, could, upon the affidavit of his clerk that he (the clerk) believed the defendant to be indebted to his master in a certain amount, have the defendant arrested and sent to prison. Nothing could be more harsh than that: but what made it peculiarly harsh was, that although the defendant should have the clearest case possible, he was not permitted to show it for the purpose of preventing the arrest or of procuring his discharge from custody. The plaintiff, consequently, had the game entirely in his own hands, and certainly nothing could be more harsh than that, at least at the first view of it. But then it was said that this power was justifiable. He did not assent to that doctrine. They should not confer a power capable of being, or liable to be, abused, unless in cases of extreme necessity. The question was, whether such necessity existed in this case, and, how did it appear that this power had been abused? He did not mean to say that it had been abused by respectable tradesmen or solicitors, but still it had been abused. The common law commissioners had stated in their report instances of abuse of the most grievous and oppressive kind which had occurred in the inferior walks of life; and when they found persons of that class possessing such a power over those who were at their mercy, he would ask whether it were not and would not be made use of for the purpose of extorting more than was due, for the purposes sometimes of vexation and sometimes of vengeance? A multitude of instances might occur, and no doubt had occurred, without being made public; and unless it could be shown that these powers were absolutely necessary, they ought not to be granted. There was not a commercial country in Europe in which this power existed except in England It did not exist in Scotland—at least not to the same extent. It did not exist in the low Countries, in the commercial towns of Holland. It did not exist in Prance, except under peculiar circumstances, and even then modified to a certain extent. It did not appear to him, then, that there was any great necessity for it. Still he was ready to admit, that when the business of a country had been for a long period carried on under one particular system, and when creditors had built and acted upon that system, the question whether or not the powers should be suddenly abrogated deserved and demanded their utmost attention and consideration. He
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did not. mean to say, that they should not be abrogated, but that the question required great consideration. Many persons had given credit upon the foundation of this power, to whom, if it were removed without substituting an equivalent, they would be doing an injustice. On the other hand, he should state the advantages arising from the existence of this power. There was no doubt that it had an advantageous effect in rendering persons cautious of incurring debts. He did not mean to say it had that effect upon men of all characters and turns of mind, but with the public at large it certainly acted as a restraint, and rendered them more cautious than they otherwise would be of running in debt. Again, let them see how it operated beneficially as regarded the tradesman. If a man could pay his debts or had it in his power to procure the payment of them, but delayed doing so, this power could be made available, but still without this power they might be paid. It was useful then to accelerate payment; it was a convenient and easy mode of compelling prompt payment from those who had the means of payment, and would avoid or postpone it. But with respect to those who had not the means of payment or could not procure payment, it was altogether useless, for the moment a process was issued against a debtor so circumstanced he either absconded or took the benefit of the Insolvent Act. This power, then, formed a security, a beneficial security to the tradesman, inasmuch as it enabled him to obtain payment without going through all the details of a court of justice, from those persons who were either capable of paying, or of procuring means to pay. His present impression was, that this power required some way or other to be modified. But they should give to it the deepest consideration, the most minute inquiry, and ought not by any means suddenly to alter or abrogate it. Arrest after judgment had been obtained was different. In that case the question had been heard and decided, and the amount ascertained by a competent tribunal. As he had referred to the law of foreign countries in the first case, he would say respecting this, that there was not a country in Europe in which the power of arrest for debt after judgment did not exist; but then let them see how it worked, and whether there was any great objection to it. If a party had visible property, a writ was never issued and for most obvious reasons. After taking the person

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of the debtor you cannot take his goods, and therefore wherever there was tangible property it was seized in preference to the person. But in cases where there was property not visible, then this power of arrest was of great consequence, because it compelled the defendant to disclose it, or remain in prison; but if this Bill passed into a law, stating, as it did, that a debtor should not be arrested after judgment, what would happen? Why, the defendant would be quite at his ease. He might say to the creditor, "Find my property if you can; I shall not assist you; on the contrary, I shall throw every obstacle lean in your way to prevent your arriving at a knowledge of its nature or locality." Therefore, he said it was of the greatest importance that the exercise of this power after judgment should be retained. What he proposed to do was, and those whom he had consulted were of the same opinion, to allow the Bill to be read a second time; and, with a view to give every possible consideration to a measure so important in principle, so extensive in its operation, and of so much interest to the trading community at large, to let it go before a Select Committee of their Lordships' House. Those complicated clauses which his noble and learned Friend had referred to, would there receive that consideration which he was sure their Lordships would at once acknowledge to be necessary. The difference of opinions amongst the Commissioners upon the general principle of the Bill was another reason for their referring it to a Committee; and here he would request such of their Lordships as might not have perused the opinions of that able and discreet lawyer, Mr. Serjeant Stephen, to do so, if only in justice to that Gentleman. There had been as yet no Committee of that House on this Bill. A Committee of the House of Commons had sat upon it; and, considering the nature and importance of the subject, ought not their Lordships to inquire for themselves? If it went to a Select Committee of the other House, why not go to one of that House, particularly as they had means of inquiry much superior to those possessed by the House of Commons? He begged their Lordships' pardon for having trespassed so long upon their attention. In conclusion he would say, that he did not at all consider this a party question. He was desirous simply of adopting what, should appear to him,
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according to the best of his judgment, and after bestowing on the subject his most careful attention, the wisest course. He wished to get rid of every thing arbitrary. Certainly if they could do that, they were bound to do it. If, at the same time, in providing security for the creditor, they found that the law should be slightly tinctured with severity, why they must only submit to that necessity. If they could make an adequate substitute for the power of arrest, let them do so and abolish it. That, however, was a point requiring more time for consideration than that House could bestow on it. It was not clause by clause alone they should consider, but after having considered them separately, to consider them in reference one to another, and then again with reference to the general principle of the Bill, and the evils of arrest. He would move, that after the Bill were read a second time, it should be referred to a Select Committee.
Lord Broughamspoke as follows:* Whatever diversity of sentiment may prevail among us on the merits of this question, there can be but one opinion; and that a most favourable one, of the fairness and candour with which my noble and learned Friend (Lord Lyndhurst) has entered upon the discussion of the whole subject. I sincerely hope, and I feel assured your Lordships will join me in this hope, that so important a measure may in all the stages through which it is fated to pass, both here and elsewhere, both within the walls of Parliament and without, be treated with the same calmness, the same absence of party and personal feeling which has marked the speech of the noble Baron. I differ with him certainly respecting the course we ought to take in considering this Bill. It is not correct to represent the House or the country as taken by surprise. The measure is not now for the first or even the second time offered to your Lordships; nor will the community be subjected by its adoption to a change all of a sudden brought about, as my noble Friend would describe it, in the laws upon the faith of which they had been conducting their most important concerns. The question has been before the country, and indeed before Parliament, for the last five or six years. It is nearly ten years since the general principles upon which the Bill has been framed were discussed by me in the other
* From a corrected Edition published by Ridgeway.

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House of Parliament. It is near seven years since the Common Law Commissioners thoroughly investigated the subject, and examined some hundreds of witnesses, taken both from the trading part of the community and from the legal profession. It is between five and six years since their elaborate Report was laid before both Houses; and upon that Report a Bill was framed with their assistance, which passed the Commons two several times, after full discussion in a Select Committee, and was in a third Session introduced here, but postponed as having been presented too late to be fully considered. In these circumstances I do not see any necessity for the further delay attending so tedious a proceeding as a reference to a Committee above stairs. But even if I agreed with my noble Friend, and had arrived with him at the conclusion that we are not in a condition to legislate upon the question without further inquiry, I should still be disposed to offer a few observations upon his arguments; because, although in some of his views I entirely coincide, yet differing upon others, I do not think it would be just towards the merits of this important measure that the impression which his remarks upon it are calculated to make, should remain unaltered before the Committee finished its labours. First, I will avow that I entirely agree with my noble Friend in holding the popularity or unpopularity of any proposed legislative change to be nothing like a criterion whereby we may safely judge of its claims to support. That it is most fit to consider and respectfully to weigh the opinions of the country upon any measure touching its interests; that the estimate ought to be taken into account which is formed by any portion of the community respecting a plan affecting its particular relations with the rest of society, no one can doubt. But we should be oftentimes greatly misled were we to be guided entirely by the impressions generally prevailing among bodies of men respecting the probable bearing of an untried measure, even upon their own particular interests. It may be safe enough to trust them upon the effects of any policy already tried; or upon the tendency of any plan proposed, where the merits of the case are simple, he within a narrow compass, and the question 'is neither calculated to excite alarm nor obscured by opposing considerations. But when my noble Friend asserts that the trading part of the community are generally ad-
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verse to the abolition of arrest for debt, and apprehensive of injury from it to their concerns, I would recal to his recollection a recent and memorable instance of an important body of men, engaged in a very extensive business, and as acute and well-informed as any portion of the community, I mean the owners of newspaper property, being, with very few exceptions, so greatly mistaken regarding the tendency of reducing the stamp, that they strenuously opposed it for a long time, as they had an undeniable right to do if they thought it prejudicial to their interests; and jet they now have all found themselves materially benefitted by the alteration. Their opposition, however, produced a most unhappy effect, for it made the Government, agree to a compromise, the result of which has been levying a stamp duty sufficient to check the diffusion of knowledge, general as well as political; to put many hundreds a-year of profit into the pockets of the proprietors; to save a few pounds a-year to the rich, who hardly feel the benefit, as they never could have suffered by the burthen; and to deprive the poorer classes of cheap papers, which it is the true interest of all classes that they should possess. I have not the least, doubt that such of the traders as now apprehend any mischief may arise to them from abolishing the right of arrest, will find themselves as entirely mistaken; and that we should commit an error equal to the mistake of the lamentable compromise I have just mentioned, were we to mould the present measure according to their unfounded apprehensions. The more it is considered the more clearly will it appear, that while all parts of the community must gain by the proposed change, no part will lose any advantage to which they are justly entitled; nay, no part will incur any loss at all, for which ample compensation is not provided in some advantage conferred by it.
In many of my noble' Friend's observations upon the details of the measure, I agree. But he has greatly undervalued the securities which it is calculated to give creditors. He is quite right in all he has said of the present remedy by elegit. The creditor hardly ever can derive any benefit from it. Indeed, it is absurd to talk of this as a substitute for the remedy by arrest, which is hardly ever used against those who have any lands to be seized. So the enabling cash or bank notes to be taken in execution is certainly no substantial increase of the creditor's remedy;

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nor is it intended, I presume, as such—but rather to remove a glaring absurdity in the law, which, upon a ridiculous fiction will not allow money to be seized in payment of a man's debts. But I am far from considering the other additions to the creditor's recourse as unimportant. I think the power of seizing the debts due to his debtor may be of material benefit; I am sure that provision which gives him the power of seizing | money in the funds, and other annuities, will remove one of the most vexatious and gulling abuses which now exist. Can any thing be more mortifying to an honest tradesman than to see his debtor living within the rules of a prison, and squandering away the income of his stock, or his money lent on other securities, only taking care to have no chattels which can be made available to satisfy the just demands against him?
But the principal omission of my noble and learned Friend, owing, perhaps, to a similar one by the noble and learned mover of the Bill (the Lord Chancellor) has been, leaving out of his view the most important argument in favour of the measure, regarded as a benefit to creditors. I mean the argument deduced from the use now actually made of the odious process in question. To begin with arrest on mesne process, or before judgment. There are now half as many more instances of creditors using serviceable process, as bailable process, that is to say, for every two thousand cases in which the plaintiff begins by arresting, or holding his debtor to bail, there are three thousand in which he merely issues the serviceable process, that which dots not attach the person. Which of the two kinds of proceeding best effects its object—the obtaining payment or settlement without the cost, and risk, and delay of a law suit? That is the test of the advantages of arrest; and that test we have the means of accurately and easily applying. One half the cases where serviceable process has been used are settled before even an appearance is entered, that is, before a single step is taken, or can be taken in court. How many do your Lordships think are settled where the body has been seized in the first instance, or has been saved from prison by finding bail? Just one-sixth. Surely this is a striking illustration of the view which the friends of the present measure, take, that the efficacy of arrest on mesne process has been overrated; and that it has not the
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tendency to produce payment of debts really due, which had been urged as the principal reason for its continuance. That many opinions in its favour upon this ground have been advanced by tradesmen, and recorded in the Report of the Com. missioners, is certain. But I will set against them all the facts stated by one of those respectable persons, and the rather that it makes against his opinion. A grocer, in very extensive business, whose dealings amounted to no less than 200,000 l. in the year, had formed a judgment favourable to the process of arrest, which he held to be beneficial to the creditor. But see what was his own experience of its benefits, and you may then say what really ought to have been given as its result. It appeared that if he set off all the expense attendant upon the use of the process in cases where it availed him nothing, against all the sums recovered in cases where it proved effectual, there was no balance left, the money fruitlessly spent being just equal to the whole gain. A fact like this is worth a thousand opinions, and lets in the broad day-light of actual experience to dissipate apprehensions and imaginations, from which so many inferences have been drawn. The Commissioners paid regard to the facts adduced as well as the opinions given before them: and though I entirely agree with my noble and learned Friend in his praise of Mr. Sergeant Stephen's able and learned paper, and join in recommending it to your Lordships' perusal, yet I must also request your attention to the equally able, equally learned paper against which it is a protest,—the Report itself, the mature judgment of all his four colleagues, men in no respect the inferiors of my hon. and learned Friend, and some of them, in practical acquaintance with the subject, necessarily his superiors. That judgment had been deliberately formed, and is supported by irresistible arguments, drawn quite as much from a regard to the right of the creditor, as to the interests of the debtor.
But my noble Friend has argued that the fear of imprisonment operates beneficially to both parties, by deterring men from imprudently contracting debts. Granting the apprehension of being arrested to have this influence over the customer, will my noble Friend only look to the influence which the power of arresting has over the tradesman? If it makes the one somewhat less willing to borrow, it makes the other much more ready to lend. He knows that

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he can in an instant pounce upon his debtor and obtain payment for himself, even if all other demands should go unsatisfied; payment, too, made under a pressure that prevents any narrow scrutiny of its amount or its justice. Every one knows that the practical effect of this is an increase of the disposition to give credit; every one, be he lawyer or no lawyer, every one living in this town, knows that credit is thus imprudently given, to the real injury of the customer, who is induced to buy what he cannot pay for, and to the injury also of those who do pay what they owe, but pay the dearer, in proportion to the bad debts which the tradesman is led to let others contract with him. Even if we allow then that the fear of being imprisoned has a tendency to prevent the one party from running in debt, we must remember that the power of imprisoning him leads the other party to give him credit too easily; and the increased facility of obtaining credit, is far more than a match for the supposed repugnance to take it; so that instead of preventing, the process encourages, bad debts, and stimulates by facilitating imprudent expences. Nor is this all. The law of arrest lends itself not merely to the encouragement of improvident dealing both of tradesmen and customers, but to proceedings which have all the moral guilt, and all the practical effects of fraud. The tradesman who has carelessly suffered an insolvent person to contract debts with him, is enabled to clothe him with an appearance of credit, by lending him more goods, which serve as a bait or decoy to others that have not yet trusted him: and when the net is full of their property, he can at once rush in upon the insolvent with his mesne process, draw the net full of other men's property, and extort from him enough to satisfy all his own demands, while all whom he has helped to deceive in vain cry out for either a return of their goods or a. payment of the price.
The expense to which the community, that is to say the trading part of it, are put by the present state of the law on this subject, has not yet been adverted to either by my noble and learned Friend (the Lord Chancellor, who moved the Bill, or by my noble Friend opposite (Lord Lyndhurst) The Commissioners have formed an unhesitating opinion upon this part of the case, in which I entirely concur. They pursued this branch of their inquiry through all its details, and arrived at the conclusion that the cost entailed upon the community by
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the process of arrest, probably much exceeds, but is certainly not less than, 300,000 l. a-year. Now, almost the whole of this sum must be either charged as dead loss to the creditors, or at the very least, as so much taken out of the fund from which their debts and those of other creditors were to have been paid; for a very small portion only of the expense is borne by debtors, who have enough to pay all their debts, and all the charges too. It is therefore a dead loss, for which no compensation whatever is received by any party, except the practitioners and officers of the law.
That the caption of the person may produce payment of what is due, no one ever thought of denying. It may, and often docs enable a creditor to wring property from the hands of his reluctant debtor. But how often does it enable him to wring more than his due? How often to give a doubtful or other security for what is not due, or at least most doubtful, to purchase escape from a first imprisonment, or rather postpone it to a more distant day? How often to obtain that security, or some other settlement from friends, by working on their feelings of compassion, or of shame that one of their family should go to gaol? And how can the power be continued at all without being of necessity liable to such abuse, and being made the instrument of such cruel, iniquitous oppression to the one party, while it does not render in anything like an equal number of instances, justice to the other.
But let us come at once to the gist of the whole question. There is not one argument that can be urged in defence of arrest before judgment, which does not apply with ten-fold force to imprisonment after judgment; when the claim is no longer matter of contest, when the justice of the demand is ascertained, and when the seizure of the person is authorised by the sentence of the law, not directed by the mere desire, it may be the caprice, of the party. A man has been served with process for a debt of twenty-five or thirty pounds (nearly four-fiths of all the arrests on mesne process are for debts under 80 l., and the great majority for debts under 40 l..) Bail has been found, at an expense of half the debt—appearance has been made—the suit brought, the pleadings perfected, and the cause tried in Court—an operation, one may be permitted to say, not unattended with expense, nor unaccompanied by large draughts on the pa-

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tience, the temper, and the comfort of all concerned—judgment has been entered up and execution sued out—the defendant has run the whole gauntlet of the law from the arresting officer to the presiding judge, and the cause is ripe for his body being at length taken upon the execution.—I ask in how many instances the creditor takes it? I ask further in how many of the few instances in which he takes it at all, does he think it worth his while to keep hold of it? Here and there we find a case of revenge or spleen making a man detain his debtor in execution; but that must be gratified at a certain additional and useless expence. Now and then we see a debtor detained in the hope of some friend coining to his relief and appeasing the creditor. But it is rare indeed, that any one finds his account in casting his debtor into prison or keeping him there, after all his estates have been parted with, all his money squandered, the little that remained been absorbed by the process of the law, and nothing is left for either party but mutual disappointment and heart-burning. Indeed in most cases, the hopelessness of redress to the creditor is made manifest at a much earlier period of the proceedings. When it is found that the debtor intends to defend the suit and not to settle it, that is when he enters an appearance, the creditor has little prospect of benefiting by legal remedy against the person, in any case where the property is known to be gone. This is the proper line of demarcation between the two kinds of process, the arrest before and the arrest after judgment. Up to this time little expense is incurred, and there is a chance of payment by the debtor or his friends. Once let. the line be passed, once let it appear that the action is to be defended, and the creditor knows that he must drag his debtor, now become his adversary, into court at his own expense, that he must at any rate advance all his own costs, and that in the vast majority of instances, he never can be repaid even that outlay, much less receive his debt, the funds for paying which will be carefully and effectually exhausted by the proceedings. He knows that beside all this, he runs the risk of being defeated and having to pay his adversary's costs, and that even when all is done, and he has succeeded, his remedy is the power of imprisoning a man utterly ruined, coupled with the obligation of contributing to his support under confinement. Thus when his claim is established, and it is for the first time ascertained that he has a right
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to seize the debtor's person; it is a right which he has no interest in exercising, and the use of which can avail him nothing; the only real benefit he could ever receive from the process being before, the line was passed by the debtor appearing and defending, that is before the force of the arrest upon mesne process was spent. But what shall I say of that summary power, the efficacy of which is not denied, that most hateful, most oppressive power—a power so open to every kind of abuse, so often foully abused, that no man can contemplate its existence without abhorrence, its continued existence without astonishment,—that frightful power fitted by its very nature for being perverted to the working of the worst injustice, and valued for that very capability—enabling any one without check or control, except from his own conscience, to arm himself with the whole force of the law to accomplish purposes of sordid injustice, which no law ever sanctioned, or gratify feelings which no breast deserving the name of human ever could entertain—a power in refusing which to such remorseless hands, the Law is utterly impotent, lending itself unresisting to the work of oppression, but resistless in those hands to perform that work? Let the wrong-doer but screw up his conscience to swear a twenty pound debt, and it is not in the power of man to stay his hand, or withstand the force which it then wields—the whole force of the law. His victim is instantly hurried to a prison.
Lords Lyndhurst, and Wynford.—But the man may find bail, or lodge the amount in Court.
Lord Brougham.—Aye, provided he has the money to lodge, or the Friends to bail him, or the sum that the bailing costs. But it is quite possible that he may be thus oppressed, because, he has neither the one of these things nor the other. Let him find the money, or pay it into Court! It is easily said. The question whether money shall be so paid while a suit is pending, and to abide its event, is in all Courts of Equity, a matter of the most serious contest, and after obstinate resistance is only ended by a solemn decision. But the party at law claiming a sum is to have the power of at once calling for the deposit, and throwing into prison his adversary, who denies the claim altogether. Even if he must pay, he is forced to be in gaol while he finds the money; and he then goes free, but goes also marked and stigmatised for life as having once been

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the inmate of a gaol. Let him find bail! says my noble Friend. For a debt of 20 l. or 30 l. this may be easy enough, at least to those who have friends, or can pay the expense of procuring it. But I should like to see the man, out of this and the other House of course, who could find bail if a debt of 30,000 l. or 40,000 l were sworn against him? Show me the man who could find two householders to swear themselves worth 60 or 80,000 l. each to bail him! To gaol that man must go. I am not putting an imaginary case for the enforcement of an argument. I am not taxing my fancy for a tale to illustrate the question. The very thing has happened in this neighbourhood, in very recent times, and in well known Courts—as certainly as there has been a common pleas fixed at Westminster since Magna Charta—happened too in the case of no obscure individual, but of a person distinguished throughout Europe, of ample resources, of great capacity, and who rose to be first minister of an ancient monarchy. Threatened with an arrest for near 100,000 l, to find bail was impossible, and he was driven from the country until he could procure the sum to be paid into Court. It was afterwards returned to him after the result of the trial proved favourable; but if he had not effected his escape he must have languished in prison until either the money could be raised or the cause be tried.
But, if some are, by the abuse of this dreadful power, driven from the country, others are oppressed by being detained forcibly within it. I will suppose a trader who has fitted out his vessel at Liverpool or Bristol for the Spanish main—and here, again, I am putting no imaginary case, except as to the port of outfit—a rival trader is minded to frequent the same market, but his preparations are not so far advanced, and he is unable to sail for a week or ten days after his competitor. The law steps in to his assistance and enables him whose cargo is still ashore to place himself on a level with the captain who has his anchor a-peak and his sails loose. While indulging in the prospect of having a long start of his rival, he is arrested on the point of sailing, and, unable to find bail, lies in prison until the other has proceeded on his voyage. But all these things are done, we are told, at the risk of an action for malicious arrest. They are, it is true; but no less true is it that an action more hard to maintain is not known in the law. Not only must proof be made
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of actual malice, but what is infinitely more difficult, and what I have rarely seen successful, the injured party must give proof of the negative, that there was no probable cause for the arrest. But then if the whole was a fiction this action may possibly succeed, or, at any rate, the wrongdoer many be indicted for perjury. Aye—but suppose he is a foreigner, who will not again visit this country, or even a native trader, who has only to take care not to be found in the same country where the offence was committed, at any time that a grand jury is sitting there, and his adversary is near at hand—in either case he is quite safe; the injured man goes without redress, and the guilty has been enabled by the process of the law to gratify the vile purpose of his sordid or malignant desires, without a single accomplice, and with perfect impunity. No one then, who reflects ever so little upon the subject, can doubt that the only kind of arrest which creditors practically regard as of any value, that before judgment, is liable to so many objections is so contrary to all principle, and so capable of being perverted to the worst of purposes, that it must at length be abandoned, and no longer suffered to bring discredit on the English law—to which it is as peculiar as it is repugnant to common humanity, to sound policy, and to every thing like justice.
But though the main object of this Bill is deserving of the entire assent of your Lordships, I agree with my noble and learned Friend on the woolsack, that some of its provisions require to be altered. I concur in what he said respecting trusts, and powers of disposition. In several of the remarks on the details made by my noble and learned Friend opposite (Lord Lyndhurst) I also agree. The extension of the provisions of the Bankrupt Laws respecting order and disposition, to the case of all persons within those laws, I entirely disapprove of. That part of our jurisprudence is contrary to all sound principle; it is indeed a remnant of the darker ages of which it was the growth; and if I were called upon to say whether I would rather see it expunged from the law altogether, I mean in cases of actual bankruptcy, or extended to all process against solvent traders, I should at once prefer its total extinction. This part of the Bill must certainly be altered, and there are other material changes which must be made.

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But in some other objections of my noble and learned Friend to the details of the Bill I cannot agree. Nor do I think that he dealt with those details as fairly as he did with the principle, particularly, when he ridiculed the provision requiring a debtor, on the demand of any judgment creditor, to produce a specification of all his property; particulars, said my noble Friend, of his lands, an inventory of his chattels, a list of his debts, and so forth. Is this a new contrivance, peculiar to the present measure? No such thing—it is a part of the Lords' Act—which provides, by the 16th section, that any creditor, if his debt do not exceed a certain amount (100 l. by that Act, 'afterwards raised to 300) may compel his debtor (having first taken his person in execution) to file a schedule of all his lands and all his chattels. But that Act has not only the unjust and partial restriction on the amount of the debt, which confines this compulsory process to debts of inferior condition, while it lets those of a higher order go free; it also contains an enactment of extreme rigour; for it enforces the filing of the schedule by the punishment of seven years' transportation.
My Lords, I rejoice to see the prospect of this measure at length receiving the sanction of the Legislature, and of by far the foulest stain being wiped from our civil code. It is now many years—.nearly ten—since I urged the serious consideration of it upon the attention of the other House of Parliament, when I brought forward the motion upon the reform of the law which led to the issuing of the Commission. The great principle which I then stated, and afterwards recommended to your Lordships, has been fixed and rooted deeper and deeper in my mind by whatever experience I have since had, either at the bar or on the bench; all I have heard both of argument and of authority has increased my confidence in its soundness and in the safety as well as efficacy of the remedy to which it points. What is that principle? Simply this—That mere debts should never be treated as a crime; and still less as a crime to be punished at the sole will and pleasure of the creditor; that the line should be drawn broad and deep between misfortune and guilt; that the latter only should be visited with punishment; and that the judge, not the party, should award it. When a man owes money, let his property be made available of all kinds, whether in possession
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or owing to him, and by all means, to satisfy the debt, for it belongs to his creditor, not to himself; but when he has committed no offence, let his person go free. But it is in nowise repugnant to this principle—on the contrary, it is by manifest implication parcel of it, and so I always distinctly stated,—that if he has offended either in the manner of contracting the debt, or in defying the law by refusal to give up his property, or in any fraudulent practice to his creditor's damage, then he is no longer an unfortunate man, but a guilty one; and his person may be justly imprisoned, either for the purpose of compelling him to obey the commands of the law, against which his contumacy is indeed also an offence—or in order to visit with condign punishment the fraud which he has committed. Thus if any one shall obtain the money or the goods of another, knowing that he cannot have the means of making payment—or if a man not worth, fifty pounds in the world shall buy a thousand pounds worth of goods and conceal them, or borrow a thousand pounds and squander it away—that is a criminal and not a debtor. Or if one who had fairly contracted debts shall withhold the money which he has, and refuse payment, he too is guilty of an offence; or if he shall make a fraudulent conveyance of his property, to screen it from the process which the law has appointed for its distribution among his creditors—again he is an offender; and all these cases may most justly be visited with adequate punishment, in the form of imprisonment. The distinction between the cases is merely that which separates the innocent from the guilty; and, sparing him whom misfortune alone, or a degree of improvidence falling short of gross and reckless extravagance, disables from satisfying the demands against him, exacts the penalty of imprisonment from him only whose conduct has been profligate, or contumacious, or fraudulent—but never suffers his adversary either to decide upon his guilt or to mete out the punishment. Founded upon this principle, recognising throughout this distinction, the Bill before us comes strongly recommended to the approval of your Lordships, although its details require to be revised and amended; and for such alterations my noble and learned Friend (the Lord Chancellor) professes himself ready.
But, my Lords, there is one alteration in this measure, this just, humane, and in

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my conscience I believe most politic measure, which the noble Lord has announced, that I confess fills me with astonishment and dismay. I mean that provision which he is to introduce for the purpose of drawing a line of distinction and protection around both Houses of Parliament, and screening their members, iniquitously, invidiously, and, to the community at large, insultingly screening ourselves from the operation of the law, and proclaiming that against us alone of all the people it shall be powerless. Are we indeed prepared to clothe ourselves with the proud prerogative of being law-makers and, therefore, law-breakers? of having the power to frame the law, and, by the possession of that power, contriving an enactment by which we retain in our own hands the other power of violating it with impunity—arming ourselves alone of all our fellow-subjects, with the privilege which both my noble and learned Friends have so justly described as the privilege not to do what every man ought to do, and what every honest man does? What, I ask my noble Friend on the woolsack, is the avowed object of the compulsory clauses in his Bill? He has already answered me—he has said that their object is to compel all to do what all honest men do already without compulsion. See then in what an odious position he is about to plant you—and that too by way of saving your privileges, of exalting you in the eyes of men, of enabling you to command the respect and win the affections of the people! You of all mankind are not to do, at least are not to be required to do, what those who propose this ill-advised alteration, in the same breath tell you every honest man does, and requires no compulsion to make him do. My Lords, this appears to me ominous of the fate of the measure. I think I sec its destruction in this most inauspicious change which the Government have resolved to make upon its frame. So much upon its utter repugnance to the grounds of the Bill as stated by the authors of the proposed change. But what shall I say when, reminding your Lordships of the general principles of the whole measure, as I have already sketched them out, and as I presented them ten years ago to the Commons, I recall to your recollection, that upon those principles the address was presented to the Crown, and the Commission was issued, of which the first and most precious fruit was this measure? Mark well, I beseech
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you, the leading position winch formed the ground-work of all these proceedings. It was the distinction drawn and persisted in throughout, between misfortune and crime—between honest poverty and fraud—between contumacious resistance of a just demand, and innocent, because unavoidable, inability to satisfy it—between, the want of power and the want of will to do what my noble and learned Friend says, every honest man does freely of his own accord. That was the view which presided over this amendment of the law—that, the origin of the Commission—that, the object of the report—that, the basis of this whole measure, which is built upon that principle, that impregnable position alone. If that be not its foundation, then has it not an inch of ground where on to rest. Then how are you following up this principle—in what manner are you applying it? The rule being, that every man who does a wrongful act—every man who is guilty of a fraud—every man who fraudulently conceals his property or fraudulently makes it away, or any how fraudulently traffics with it to cheat his creditor—all, in a word, who knowingly and wilfully cheat their creditors,—shall be dealt with not as unfortunate debtors, fit objects of compassion, hut as offenders, as criminals, just subjects of punishment—such being the whole pervading principle of the Bill, what is the course announced by the noble and learned Lord on the woolsack, as about to be pursued with regard to your Lordships? That you, the Peers of this realm—the Aristocracy of England—the head and ornament of the State—whose honour is more esteemed than other men's oaths—who decide upon honour higher matters than others upon oath—you, who are not only the Peers of England, the counsellors of the Monarch, the Aristocracy, the head and ornament of society, but the hereditary lawgivers of the empire,—and are desired to abuse your right as such, for the purpose, they tell you, of raising and aggrandizing yourselves, but I tell you, in order to lower, to debase, to stigmatize yourselves—you who are beside all this the judges of the land in the last resort, exercising the highest functions of the judicial office; supremely and without control, in all cases, administering both civil and criminal justice—what is it that you, clothed with these various powers, wielding all these lofty prerogatives, holding

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the whole law in your hands as legislators and judges, are about to do, with the purpose of protecting your privileges——of exalting yourselves yet higher in the world—of amplifying your title to respect,—and of recommending yourselves to the love of your unprivileged fellow-subjects? Why, you are required to adopt a provision for enabling you to do that which I will not repeat in such near juxta-position to your names; enabling you to do that by your honest creditors, which, if any other men were to do, you would, as administering the criminal law, be bound to visit them with punishment, as knaves, rogues, cheats, swindlers!
Now, let me see the man who will propound this clause! Let me see this alteration brought forward to cripple the Bill! But if it shall be brought forward, I pledge myself to give every one of your Lordships an opportunity, by your vote, of redeeming yourselves from the shame of such an act, by guarding yourselves against the stain—the foul and revolting stain—attempted to be fixed upon your names!
Lord Wynfordsaid, that the clause referred to by his noble and learned Friend who had just sat down would be in his opinion most injurious to the character of their Lordships' House, and to that of the other House of Parliament. The law ought to be equal to all. There might certainly be reasons why the persons of Members of the Legislature should be free, but there was no conceivable ground for exempting the property of a Member of Parliament from the payment of his debts. With respect to the other points raised, there was very little difference between his noble and learned Friends and himself. It had however been stated, that according to the present law of arrest, a man might be put to an expense of 20 l., when the debt for which he was arrested was perhaps only 30 l. Now, he would say that this could not be. He was himself the judge of the Common Pleas to whom his noble and learned Friend (Lord Brougham) had referred, when alluding to the case of M. Mendizabal. In that, case he introduced a rule which had since, he believed, been passed into a law, that any party who had been arrested on mesne process might, instead of applying for bail, pay the money down in lieu of bail. This was not like a payment of money into Court in ordinary cases, as it did not admit the debt. The grievance, then, of which his noble and learned Friend complained was an imagin-
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ary one, for the man who had 30 l. to pay had nothing to do but to pay the money, and if he allowed himself to be put to 20 l. expense for costs, he was fit for a very different kind of custody from that to which he was consigned. In fact, the man must be a candidate for Bedlam. He did not differ very materially from his noble and learned Friends with respect to the objects of the Bill, but he differed entirely as to the mode of carrying them into execution. He considered this Bill to be a most inefficient one, notwithstanding all the consideration which it had undergone, He believed, and he would state his belief broadly, that the measure was so defective, that he was much mistaken if a single clause passed as it stood. The principle on which he went was this—he would not allow any man to be deprived of his liberty, if possible, on mesne process. He admitted that arrests on mesne process were frequently the result of passion; an angry man did not look so much to the security of his property, as to the gratification of his wrath, and the exercise of the power given him by the law very frequently defeated its own object. He agreed, then, that arrest on mesne process ought to be avoided, except in cases when it was absolutely necessary. He would not allow a man to be a judge in his own cause, and arrest another in a fit of passion, but let him lay affidavits before a competent judge, upon which the judge might decide whether he thought the facts disclosed were sufficient to warrant an arrest. His noble and learned Friend near him (Lord Lyndhurst) said, that the debtor Mould in the mean time be off, but the defendant would not know that such affidavits were made, and he would be in custody before he thought of absconding. He thought also that this power should be extended to the plaintiff in an action commenced by serviceable process, when he; had good cause to believe that the defendant was going abroad, although he had not arrested him in the first instance. He was quite of the opinion expressed by his noble and learned Friends, that all property belonging to the debtor ought to be subject to execution in some way or other. But to effect this object the Bill took a new course, and in his opinion a very wild course. The application of a very simple remedy would remove the necessity for all these clauses in the Bill. They had only to extend the Lords' Act to all descriptions of debts, and every purpose of these

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parts of the Bill would be answered. That was an old remedy, and one which had been recommended by every one of the five commissioners. He had on a former occasion attempted to carry such a measure into effect but he was then defeated, though he hoped that would not be his fortune now. He had stated that he was quite ready to abolish in all cases, except where absolutely necessary, arrest on mesne process; but he thought that after judgment, execution against the person should still be enforced. If a man were at large, there would be no inducement to him to give up his property, and he would frequently be tempted to conceal it; but if the creditor had the power of giving him into custody, he would be willing to give up his goods to procure his liberation. He must say, that the clauses in this Bill were the most unintelligible that he had ever read. He considered that they would not be justified in pressing forward this Bill without a full and careful consideration. The authority which the measure had received by passing the House of Commons was much weakened by the fact that many important alterations had been since made in the Bill by his noble and learned Friend on the woolsack. When that enlightened body had made so many mistakes as his noble and learned Friend admitted they had, their Lordships had but a weak motive for pressing the measure. With respect to the change introduced by the Bill into the law of execution by elegit, he must observe that under the old law the tenant by elegit took half the profits of the land, but it was now proposed that he should have the whole. Under the old law the tenant by elegit might take the land to be extended, so that the profits went immediately in satisfaction of his debt, and he continued in possession till the debt was paid. Now, however, he was to have the rents and profits of the whole, and was to be placed in the agreeable situation (the most agreeable in which a man could be) of accounting to the Court of Queen's Bench for all he received till the estate could be sold. Now, with such a state of things, a man who had a judgment for 1,000 l. might seize upon the estates of any noble Lord in that House, though the rents and profits might amount to perhaps 40,000 l. a-year. The tenant by elegit would soon change places with his former debtor, and might, if he felt so disposed, soon cross the Channel with the proceeds of the estate, of which he had in this man-
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ner come into possession. It did appear to him that a more wild scheme than this, for making compensation to creditors, never was devised. He strongly recommended their Lordships rather to have recourse to the wise old plan of calling on the debtor to deliver up all his property to be applied to the benefit of the creditor, and then these clauses would in all cases be rendered unnecessary. Another part of the Bill which he did not like was that which related to the functions to be exercised by the Commissioners of Bankruptcy. Those gentlemen were to be taken from their own court, in which important business was always pending, and all round London, at least, they were to be the examiners under this Bill. He had no doubt that the business of this court was done extremely well, but the business was equally well done in another court, the Insolvent Debtors' Court, and this examination would be much better done by the Commissioners of Insolvents than by the Commissioners of Bankruptcy. With respect to the Commissioners of Bankrupts in the country, by whom the examination was to be conducted, he must say, although there were many learned and respectable men among them, that if there were any part of the administration of justice which was disgraceful, that was it. He was therefore extremely sorry to find that the Bill extended their powers. He had thus adverted to the alterations which he should wish to make in the Bill. He thought that some time or other it might be converted into a proper and practicable measure, but it would require much consideration, and hurrying it through at this time without such consideration would be highly inexpedient and unwise.
Lord Denmanwould take the liberty of mentioning one or two circumstances which seemed to him to show that the Bill ought to be passed without any material delay. This was necessary if it were only to set the question at rest, and to quiet the minds of a large body of the people. As a further proof of the necessity of passing the measure with as little delay as possible, he would mention a case similar to that which had been alluded to by his noble and learned Friend opposite, and which occurred about fourteen years ago. It was the case of a gentleman who came to this country as the government counsel of one of the South American states. He gave orders, as one of the cabinet council of that

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country, for a certain quantity of goods; and in his public capacity, and whilst residing in this country, he was actually arrested as one of the partnership for whom the goods were ordered. Of course he was thrown into prison, where, though a person of high rank and station, he was confined for many months. Upon his release he brought an action of malicious arrest, and recovered very great damages. He forgot whether those damages were ever paid or not; but he asked their Lordships for a moment to make the case of this distinguished foreigner their own. Suppose any one of their Lordships were residing in another country, and were to be arrested upon such a pretext as that which he had stated, and confined many months in prison, what sort of opinion would they form of the code of a country in which they had met with such treatment? Since he had held his present station upon the bench another instance of a somewhat similar kind had occurred. A Portuguese nobleman (the Duke de Cadaval, he believed,) on landing at Fal-mouth, or while he was residing at Plymouth, was arrested on a pretended debt, thrown into prison, and obliged to pay a large sum of money to procure his release. He also brought an action for malicious arrest, and recovered large damages against the person who had imprisoned him, not one farthing of which, however, had ever been paid. But what compensation could any amount of damages be to a person who was so outraged by the abuse of a law which was always in operation in this country? It was impossible to suppose that either of the two distinguished individuals to whose cases he had referred, however wealthy they might be, could be provided with sufficient money at the moment to purchase their release. But let it be considered how many persons there were continually exposed to the operation of the cruel law, who had it not in their power to command the very smallest sums; and let it be remembered how much that difficulty was increased when they were suddenly thrown into prison, and every means of gaining money, either by their trade or labour, closed against them. It was idle to say that an action for malicious arrest could afford the slightest degree of compensation in cases of this kind. The parties who had been confined became injured, perhaps utterly ruined for life. It
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was, therefore, to prevent the possibility of actions like these, and the possibility of the ruin of numbers, that he was in hopes that the arrest upon mesne process would have been at once declared a practice that ought not to be continued in this free and enlightened community. It was dreadful to think how many persons had been imprisoned for long periods for very small sums. It was found upon inquiry that a very large proportion of the persons imprisoned for debts were for sums under 30 l., and it was a fact, that four-fifths of the whole number were imprisoned for various sums under 80 l. There was one consideration connected with this subject which had not yet been pressed at all upon their Lordships' consideration, but which he was sure no one at all conversant with the history of the courts of justice would be insensible to. It was this, that the less the means of the debtor to pay the expenses and costs of his arrest, the more completely was he placed at the mercy not only of his creditors, but of the low practitioners of the law, men who were in the habit of pushing the abuses of the law to the very uttermost to secure their own gain, and without the smallest regard to the feelings or interests of the unfortunate beings who fell within their power. He found that their Lordships were all agreed that the Bill should be read a second time, and referred to a Committee up stairs. He trusted that the only object of that Committee would be to discover, and that without any unnecessary loss of time, the best substitute for the existing law, and that they might now venture to consider that the principle of the present Bill was adopted and sanctioned by their Lordships. His noble and learned Friend opposite had put the question very fairly, "is it, or is it not, right that the power of arrest should continue?" but he confessed he was sorry to hear from that noble and learned Lord so much pleasantry upon the details of the Bill. He was sorry also to hear his noble and learned Friend (Lord Wynford), who spoke last characterise the measure as one that was perfectly inefficient and absurd. He thought that it carried with it the recommendation of an extremely simple and intelligible code. It might not be strong enough to effect all its purposes, but he confessed he looked with great jealousy on any kind of arrest, especially if it were grounded only upon ex parte statements,

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He did not like to see the liberty of any one of his fellow subjects restrained or put an end to without a formal and regular trial in a court of justice. He would not say one word about the views of the question which had been introduced by other noble Lords; but he must observe, that considering that the principle of the Bill was now adopted by their Lordships, and was to be sent to a Select Committee, he thought it would have been much more desirable that it should have gone to the Committee without that degree of disparagement which the many objections made to its clauses, must necessarily throw upon it. He must take the opportunity of adding that he hoped, in common with his noble and learned Friends who last addressed the House, that the particular clause to which his noble and learned Friend upon the woolsack expressed himself not hostile would never find its way into the Bill, because he thought that the great principle of relief from arrest, which would apply to every one in the kingdom, would take from the members of Parliament all claim for a peculiar exemption from liabilities to which the rest of the community were subject. He trusted, therefore, that a clause of that kind would never be allowed to find its way into the Bill. Going into the Committee without any unnecessary delay, and with a real desire to find an effectual substitute to spare the liberty of the subject and at the same time to provide all the security that the creditor could receive, he trusted that their Lordships would in a very short time see the law of England relieved from that foul stigma which must ever attach to it as long as the law of arrest was allowed to remain.
Lord Abingerdid not propose to go through the details into which his noble and learned Friends had entered. He, however, thought that this Bill was erroneously entitled. It was called a Bill to abolish imprisonment for debt in certain cases; but he thought it might be much more properly called a Bill to add to the duties of the Commissioners of Bankrupts, to increase their emoluments, and to raise a fund for that purpose. He was, however, ready to lend his best assistance in carrying out a Bill for the abolition of imprisonment for debt, and to make such a measure perfect; but he must say, that the Bill as it now stood did not contain a single clause which met his approbation.
Lord Broughamsaid, his noble and learned Friend dealt most unjustly with the Bill. He had not looked at the returns upon the table or he would have seen that the funds in the court of bankruptcy were already overflowing.
Lord Abingerremarked, that under the Bill now before their Lordships, proceedings were to be pursued in certain cases before a Commissioner of Bankrupts, who would be entitled to fees every lime he moved. Now there were also other proceedings which this Bill would throw before one or other of the judges in chambers, and upon the judges, if this Bill were to pass, great additional labour would be imposed, while no additional remuneration was provided by the Bill.
Lord Brougham: Ah! that is the objection, I see.
Lord Abingerrepeated that the Commissioner of Bankrupts would get a fee for every step he took under this Bill, and the fees so acquired were to form a fund, out of which the Chancellor was empowered to provide additional salaries for those Commissioners.
The Lord Chancellorremarked, that the Bill had not been very accurately examined by some of his noble and learned Friends who had gone into the details at some length. He (the Lord Chancellor) had no objection to go into a Select Committee if the object was merely to endeavour to improve the provisions of the Bill, but he trusted that, by seeking a reference to a select Committee it was not intended to go into evidence, especially after such a mass of evidence had already been secured, and thus to defeat the Bill. With regard to the exemption from arrest of Members of that and of the other House of Parliament, he should not be one to struggle in favour of a privilege of that kind.
Lord Broughamreminded the House that even under this Bill there were a whole class of cases in which defendants would still be liable to arrest. Those cases were all actions of tort, such as for criminal conversation, seduction, slander, libel, and false imprisonment.
The Duke of Wellingtonsaid, that he should not trouble their lordships with more than one observation upon the present occasion. He begged to say that he consented to go to a select Committee with this Bill in the hope that some security would be afforded to the creditors of this

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country for the recovery of their debts other than by personal arrest. He repeated that he hoped this Bill would come out of the Committee affording some satisfactory security to the country in that respect. If it did so come out of the Committee, he would consent to go through the other stages of the Bill; but, if it did not give that security, he should certainly oppose all further proceeding with the measure. He agreed in many of the arguments advanced by the noble and learned Lord opposite. He entirely agreed with him that one of the causes of debts being incurred in the country was, in a great degree, the power which creditors at present possessed to arrest their debtors upon mesne process; and he still further believed that it was the facility which was thus given of obtaining credit which had been the cause of the great mercantile prosperity of the country. The enormous transactions upon credit in this country were such, that both individuals and the public generally required further means of recovering debts than existed in other countries. Under these circumstances he entreated their Lordships not to suppose that he gave way in this matter from his feelings, and on that account to put an end to a system which he admitted, in some instances, had been abused; but he gave way with a view seriously to look into the subject, and see whether, instead of arrest, some efficient substitute could not be found which would afford good security to the commercial interests of the country.
The Marquess of Lansdownehad every reason to hope that the Bill, particularly as it might be expected to come out of Committee, would give increased security to the creditor. He quite concurred with the noble Duke, that this was a most necessary object to effect; but he certainly could not agree with him that it was desirable that every species of credit, as it now existed in this country, should be maintained as hitherto. He was convinced that much of the credit which had prevailed in this country had been prejudicial to its prosperity, and noxious to society at large, and that it was at the root of many of the evils which existed in the country; and it was his opinion that this Bill would not produce all the good which he expected from it, if it did not in that sense diminish the amount of credit which was now given; for while he looked upon
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the powerful sanction of the law as necessary for the purpose of enabling the creditor to recover his just debt, he considered that the chief object against which the power of the law should be exerted, was that foul and perverted species of credit by which, under the law as it now stood, a numerous class of persons were induced—though with the certain know, ledge that the parties they trusted had not the means themselves for paying them—were induced on a mere gambling speculation, which it was contrary to the duty of a Legislature to encourage, to give credit, in the hope that, exercising the power of the law with which they were armed for their own private and selfish purposes, they might so work upon the feelings of the friends of their debtors, by calling into action all the best sympathies of society and human nature, as to succeed in throwing the burden on parties on whom it ought not to be thrown, and thus give increased encouragement to the contraction of debts, which both the person paying, and the person giving credit, knew perfectly well the debtor was entirely unable to repay himself. The whole class of transactions of this nature, and it was an extensive one, was quite unconnected with the prosperity of the country, was indeed prejudicial to it—it was a class of transactions which the House, so far from protecting, were bound to discourage; and though there might be cases in which the creditor might advantageously be put in possession of power with reference to persons of a different character, yet, if the noble Duke looked to the returns, if he looked at the state of these transactions in other countries, be would find that this description of credit, which was connected with that commercial prosperity which he so justly regarded as entitled to their Lordships' best protection and support, was precisely that species of credit which did not rely for its security on the power of arrest. In France, the power of arrest prevailed to a certain degree; and it was well known, that in the great commercial cities of that country, Marseilles, Bordeaux, Rouen, Havre, &c., the power of arrest was very seldom exercised. It was only among the shopkeepers of Paris, among the class of gambling and fraudulent transactions such as he had described, and which prevailed to an enormous extent in Paris—it was only there that the power of arrest was put in force to any extent.

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He should go into the Committee with as great an anxiety as the noble Duke, to protect and give the support of the laws to the honest creditor, but at the same time with an anxious desire that there should in future be less credit given in this country than hitherto. He was convinced that this would operate greatly to the benefit of society, and effect a great diminution of the misery and destitution to which the law of arrest; in this country, had given rise.
The Bill was read a second time, and ordered to be committed to a Select Committee, which was appointed accordingly.