Sitting of 23 May 1843

MINUTES.
BILLS. Public—1° Queen's Bench Prison; Church Endowment.
3°. and passed:—Millbank Prison.
Private.—1°. Watson's Divorce.
2°. Londonderry Bridge.
Reported.—Bury, etc. Navigation, and Llanelly Harbour, (No 2); Plymouth, etc. Roads, Carriages, and Boats Regulation; Oxnam's Estate; Scarborough Harbour; Milden-hall Drainage; Belfast and Cavehill Railway; Great Bromley Inclosure.,
3°. and passed:—Caswall's Disability Removal; Edinburgh and Glasgow Union Canal.
PETITIONS PRESENTED. By Messrs. Hayter, Thornely, Trelawney, Strutt, Gisborne, J. J. Bodkin, Dickinson, R. Yorke, Busfeild, Brotherton, M. Philips, Barnard, Blewitt, Pendarves, Hume, B. Wood, Villiers, W. Ellis, Christopher, Gill, T. Duncombe, Cowper, Ellice, Cobden, Ross, J. Parker, Gore, E. Buller, and F. Maule, Sirs G. Stanton, R. Howard, J. Duke, J. Trollope, R. Inglis, G. Strickland, Lords Castlereagh, Courtney, H. Vane, and Ebrington, Dr. Bowring, Col. G. Langton, Captain Berkeley, from an immense number of places, against, and by Lords Ashley and Courtenay, from Manchester, and Devonport, in favour of the Factories Bill. —From Preston and other places, for further Limiting the Hours of Labour in Factories.—By Mr. S. Crawford, from Rochdale, for altering the Ecclesiastical Courts Bill.—By Mr. R. Palmer, from Berkshire, against, and by Messrs. Villiers and Cobden, from St.

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George's, (Middlesex), Reading, and Horsham, for the Repeal of the Corn-laws.—By Mr. S. O'Brien, from Limerick, Mr. French, and Lord Castlereagh, and Mr. J. O'Brien, from three other places, against the Irish Poor-law.—By General Lygon, from Kidderminster, for Carrying out Rowland Hill's Plan of Post Office Reform.—From Epworth, for amending the Bankruptcy Act.—From Hacconby and Clare, against the Canada Com Bill—From Tiekhill, in favour of Infant Schools.-From Inch and two other places, in favour of the Church Education Society's Schools.—From Dorsetshire, against the Union of the Sees of St. Asaph and Bangor.—From a number of places in Ireland, against transferring the Mail Coach Contract to Scotland.—From Kirkheaton and Mirfield, against the Repeal of the Mines, etc. Act.—From Llandudno, in favour of the Waste Land Allotment Bill.— From Cork, against the Municipal Corporations (Ireland) Bill.—From St. Margaret's and St. John's (Westminster), in Favour of the Health of Towns Bill.—From Plymouth, against the Turnpike Roads Bill. —From Liverpool, for giving Employment and Education to all British Subjects deprived of their Work by Maehinery.

CANADIAN WHEAT AND FLOUR.
Mr. Humewished to call the attention of the House to a circumstance which occurred relating to the resolutions as to Canada corn on which the House had decided last night. In the resolutions as they had been agreed to last night, were the words, " duties imposed upon wheat and wheat flour;" but in the same resolution as published in the votes of to-day were interpolated the words, " the produce of." Now, it appeared to him that these words limited the concession to flour from corn grown in Canada, but that was not the sense in which he had voted for the resolution. He hoped the noble Lord would give some explanation of the circumstance.
Lord Stanleywas sorry that he and his hon. Friends bad obtained the benefit of the vote of the hon. Member—[Mr. Hume: " And my speech, too."]—and the hon. Member's speech, which he did not mean to undervalue, under any misapprehension, but if the hon. Member really voted under any such misapprehension, he would have an opportunity of correcting it at a future stage of the proceedings on the resolution; but, in fact, the alteration of which the hon. Member complained was merely verbal, and made no change in the principle of the measure. It had been asked six times over since the subject was first introduced, whether any distinction was to be made between flour the produce of wheat grown in Canada and flour the produce of wheat grown in the United States? and the answer was that there was to be none; and that no change was to be made in the law respecting wheat and Hour brought here from America. Flour the produce of American wheat
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ground in Canada was, he repeated, to be considered as if it had been grown in Canada.

BUBBLE COMPANIES — MERCHANT SEAMEN'S FUND.
Mr. Laboucherewished to know from the right hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. Gladstone) what was the particular course he intended to pursue with respect to bubble companies? He should also like to know whether Government intended to adopt any measure with respect to the mal-administration of the merchant seamen's fund?
Mr. Gladstoneintended to revive the select committee of 1841, relating to such companies. The subject to which the second question referred was one involving very complicated details, many of which were already under consideration. As to the course which it might be advisable to adopt, he was unwilling at present to pledge himself to any particular measure,

DANISH CLAIMS.
Mr. Hawes:Sir, when I recollect how often the subject of the Danish claims has been brought under the consideration of the House in the interval from 1808 to the present time, and how often it has been discussed by many of its most distinguished Members, I own I wish it had fallen to the lot of some one, whose learning and authority would give weight to his argument in advocating these just claims, again to solicit the attention of the House to the subject; but, Sir, being requested by those who are deeply interested in the question to bring it once more before the House, and believing as I do that these claims are founded in justice, I have yielded to their wish. Sir, there are two points of view in which I shall regard this subject. First of all, I shall review the proceedings of the House with regard to these claims; and next, I shall briefly allude to the peculiar circumstances of the case, and the principles of justice and of equity upon which, without any reference to the proceedings of the House, I believe these claims to be founded. Sir, I might rest my case upon the proceedings of the House alone, but if I did it would restrain me from urging those claims of justice, on which it might be said it ought to rest; and though I cannot therefore avoid reopening the whole case, yet it has but so recently been powerfully argued as to demand but a brief recapitulation of the

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principal points involved in the discussion. Sir, during the late war with France, in 1807, it is matter of history, the English Government, apprehending from the conduct and policy of France, of which it had secret intelligence that the Danish fleet would be pressed into its service, and used against us, the more effectually to maintain the blockade of the Continent against our commerce, determined to anticipate the designs of France, and take possession of the fleet. This act of course led ultimately to a war between England and Denmark; and previously to the formal declaration of which, which was delayed for political objects, ships, and property, belonging to the subjects of the two countries, were reciprocally seized and confiscated. Out of these acts arise the claims of certain British merchants for compensation. During a period of five-and-thirty years their claims have been urged on the attention of the Government, but it was only in 1834 they were successfully brought under the consideration of the House of Commons. In that year they were brought before the House by my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield. On that occasion, the House, by a general concurrence of opinion in their fairness and justice, induced the Chancellor of the Exchequer of that day to yield to inquiry. And in consequence of the motion of my hon. Friend, to which I have referred, a commission was appointed to inquire into the nature and extent of the claims. The Commissioners so appointed divided the claimants into three distinct classes; those three classes were these; the first, consisting of the owners of book debts confiscated; the second, of the owners of goods seized on shore; and the third, consisting of the owners of ships and cargoes afloat. The Treasury left the question to Parliament, to decide whether any or all these claims were to be admitted or not; and I beg to remark, that the Treasury, by consenting to the inquiry, adopted at least the opinion of the House in favour of the general principles of equity on which the claims were contended for by the Member for Sheffield. In 1836 Parliament sanctioned the payment, and the Treasury paid the claimants comprised within the two first classes, but refused to pay those of the third class, consisting of the owners of ships and cargoes afloat. The refusal to pay this class was grounded on the opinion given by the law officers of
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the Crown, that all ships and cargoes, whether in port or on the high seas, might be seized and confiscated, though the two, the Danish and English Governments were not formally at war. At the present moment I do not mean to raise any question with regard to that decision I am now simply recalling the several decisions the House has come to from time to time when these claims have been brought under consideration. But notwithstanding the opinions so said to be given by the law officers of the Crown, in the year 1838 these claims were again brought under the notice of Parliament, and on that occasion the House, by a majority of thirty-four, authorized the Government to pay this third class. The Treasury determined not to give effect to the opinion of the House, and therefore while it yielded to a further inquiry called for by the House, it restrained the Commissioners from coming to any judicial decision. All, therefore, the Commissioners could do was to make the inquiry, but without coming to a judicial decision. This not being satisfactory to those who thought the demands of the claimants were just, in 1839 the question was again brought before the House, and a motion carried that the Commissioners should be called upon to adjudicate upon the claims sent in. The Commissioners then embodied their decision in a Report dated May 12, 1840, in which they stated, as the result of the whole investigation, that there were 116 claims, amounting, in all, to the sum of 225,000 l.. Notwithstanding these repeated decisions of the House of Commons—decisions come to certainly after considerable discussion, in which some of the ablest Men in Parliament delivered their opinions upon the subject, the Treasury still declined to ask the House for a vote in liquidation of them; and, accordingly, in 1841, another motion was made and carried for a committee of the whole House to address the Crown, and give an assurance to provide the sum necessary to meet the claims ascertained to be due by the commissioners. Still the Government determined to resist, and nothing was done in consequence of that motion. In June 1841, however, Mr. Cresswell, then Member for Liverpool, and since raised to the Bench, whose name alone gives weight to the cause of the claimants, and strengthened by which I venture to follow him,

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again successfully brought the subject under the consideration of the House, expressing a strong opinion in favour of them, and arguing in support of them not only on legal but on grounds of general policy and justice. He was opposed on that occasion by my hon. and learned Friend near me, the Member for Worcester (Sir T. Wilde) then Solicitor-general. I have now brought the House down to the last motion made on this subject; and I have shown that, by a succession of decisions, the House has repeatedly assented to the justice of the grounds on which these claims are supported. I shall just mention the various majorities by which the motions on this subject were carried in this House. The first majority amounted to 34, the next to 62, the third to 31, and the fourth and most important motion, recognising the third class of claims, was carried by a majority of 11. Having thus shown that I have the opinion of the House of Commons in my favour, I wish to say one word upon the justice and the special circumstances of the case. It has been said in previous debates that the payment of these claims involved the important question of the justice or injustice of the expedition to Copenhagen. But I raise no such question. It is not necessary that I should do so. The question, however, that I do raise is this:—Whether, should it be the interest of this country to pursue a certain line of policy for the general safety of the empire, demanding great secrecy and great caution in order to ensure success— whether, should that be the case, it would not be a great injustice to make British merchants, and especially that class of merchants most likely to suffer in such a case—namely, the shipowners and parties connected with the foreign trade; — whether it would not be altogether unjustifiable to make that class only bear the consequences of that course of policy which, under special circumstances, the Government thought it advisable to adopt? a course of policy in this case be it remembered quite without a parallel, and unlike every other act committed during the period of our long and arduous conflict with France. I know it has been urged, and urged very strongly by the noble Lord, the Member for the City of London, that this injury to our merchants and ship-owners was an unavoidable injury, in the ordinary course of war. But that I dis-
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tinctly deny. It was not under the ordinary circumstances of war that these losses were incurred. War did not formally commence till a period after the seizure of the ships in question, and I believe I may safely say, that no precedent can be quoted of hostilities being commenced or having risen under similar circumstances. There is no precedent of the kind. 1 find no trace of an allusion to any parallel case in the course of the previous debates upon the subject; and am, therefore, entitled to consider this as a wholly special case, not likely to be quoted hereafter, and not likely to lead to other claims upon the Government. It is a ease so distinct in all the circumstances accompanying it, that if the House accede to my proposition there can be no ground for the apprehensions of the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer, that future claims will arise in consequence of yielding to a claim of justice in this case. I think I am quite entitled to take this view of the case, even from what has fallen on a former occasion from my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Worcester. My hon. and learned Friend has in fact shown that this is a special and peculiar case, both as to the principle of the claims, and therefore as to the consequences which would follow their acknowledgement. My hon. and learned Friend has asked whether the seizure of the goods of British merchants in a time of war, would involve a claim for compensation? I admit that it might not. But that is not the case. The policy pursued in this instance was a policy of a peculiar character, necessarily involving perfect secrecy, which deprived our merchants of all the ordinary means of protecting their interests. My hon. and learned Friend stated on a former occasion, that the Government had obtained secret information that it was intended that the Danish fleet should be used against this country, that there was a secret article in the treaty of Tilsit to that effect, and that the Government having received information of it, had anticipated and defeated the project. But then a Government acting in anticipation of the presumed arrangements of a treaty for national interests, let it be admitted, on that account, is surely under stronger obligations generously to consider the peculiar interests of the owners of goods and ships | afloat. Such was the argument of my

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hon, and learned Friend, and without combating his argument, I rest my case upon the special circumstances attending it, as admitted by him. With the policy of that anticipation of the secret article of the treaty of Tilsit I do not quarrel —with the policy where the interests of the country were concerned, of maintaining perfect secrecy, and acting with promptitude and vigour, I do not quarrel; but I do say, that the merchants were deprived of all the ordinary forewarnings of hostilities, and that their claims are entitled to a more favourable consideration, because it was utterly impossible that they could have exercised that caution and vigilance which, on ordinary occasions, they are bound to exercise to guard against losses of the kind in question. Therefore, upon my hon. Friend's own statement, the Government acted upon secret information, in anticipation of something which they thought might happen; and if so, that has invested this case with a peculiar character, and has given to these merchants a claim, in my opinion, to compensation from the country, which is novel and special, and such a claim as can hardly ever arise again. It must also be recollected that it was strongly argued by my hon. and learned Friend that the known fact of the fleet having been fitted out, and having arrived on the coast of Denmark, ought to have been a warning to British subjects. Now, Sir, I have been looking over the former debates, and 1 find it stated that the fleet was not sent out for the purpose of immediate hostilities, but to aid in carrying on negotiations; and the presence of the fleet was made the groundwork of negotiations— negotiations begun, and renewed even after the attack on Copenhagen, and the very first proclamation of the British admiral, which first threw light upon the object of the expedition expressly declared so. I find Mr. Canning stating that the declaration of war was actually delayed in the hope that negotiations might even after that event be successfully renewed. Now, if that were the case, I think it anything but a fair argument on the part of my hon. and learned Friend to say, that British merchants ought to have taken warning from the fitting out of the fleet. The statement of Mr. Canning entitles these claimants to great consideration. It was also mentioned during the late debate, that all these claims had occurred
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after the 16th of August, 1807, when a proclamation had been issued by the Danish government, which was tantamount to a declaration of war, but that proclamation was never so considered; and this is proved by the proceedings in the case, of the ship Orion, taken the 10th of October, which was made the subject of litigation in the Admiralty Court, and in which the Court decided that the seizure had taken place prior to the declaration of hostilities. I take that decision of the Court as an authority on that subject greater than the statement of the hon. and learned Gentleman. My hon. and learned Friend takes the 16th of August as the date of a formal and official declaration of war. But the fact is not so. I find, only on the 4th of November, three months after a formal declaration of war against Denmark, on the part of England. In fact, the Danish proclamation, dated Gluckstadt, 16th of August, was not a declaration of war, because negotiations were not broken off; and the Danish declaration of war was not issued until as late as the 24th of December. Now, Sir, I think, therefore, I am free to say that I have shown there are very special circumstances in the case, that compensation to these claimants is not likely to be quoted as a precedent; and if then, in addition, I show that my cause is just—and I have a right to assume that it is from the frequent decisions of this House—if I show that, and further that it is a special case, I overcome a great portion of the objections which the present Chancellor of the Exchequer has taken, on more occasions than one, to the settlement of these claims. It has been said, however, that the claimants have been guilty of laches, and thereby have forfeited their claim to the attention of the House. That, however, is an unfounded statement. There was a memorial presented to the Treasury in 1808, another in 1809, to which Mr. Wilberforce was a party; there were also memorials in 1810, in 1818, and in 1820. It is true, that from 1825 to 1834, there does not appear to have been any proceedings instituted on the subject, either with respect to the Treasury or the House of Commons, — perhaps the important events, and the frequent changes in the administration during those years, may account for this. I trust, however, in deciding this question to-day, that the House will keep in mind the large amount

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of money that came into the possession of the British Government—1,100,000 l.—by the confiscation of Danish property. That property ought to have been held us a trust fund, out of which the claims of this nature might be paid were to be liquidated,—and it was at one time so considered, inasmuch as in 1810, Mr. Perceval stated that the confiscated Danish property was a fund out of which British merchants might have their just claims satisfied. And in another point of view it appears to me this fund is justly liable to pay these claims. I think I have shown that this seizure did not take place during a time of war, and I do not know to what document or what date the hon. Gentleman opposite, who dissents from me, refers, when he says that there was a prior declaration of war. I contend that the declaration which has been said to be a declaration of war is no such declaration. If, therefore, these seizures took place before the formal declaration of war,—and that they did so Mr. Canning is an un impeach able evidence,—then I say, they are to be looked upon in the light of reprisals. As we raised a large fund by the seizure of Danish property, I think our own merchants have a fair right to consider a fund obtained by acts of reprisal on Danish property, a fund out of which their claims arising out of the seizure of English ships and cargoes ought to be paid. But I should not presume to urge this argument upon the House so confidently as I do, were I not supported in it by others who have preceded me, in comparison with whose opinions my own must be of very little value. I can, however, refer to an opinion of the greatest weight concurring with the views which I now take the liberty to state on this subject,—I mean that of the hon. and learned Gentleman the Solicitor-general opposite. I find the hon. and learned Gentleman the Solicitor-general said, in 1836, in an opinion upon a case submitted to him,
" It appears to me that the claimants for losses by the seizure of their ships and cargoes make out a very strong case for the equitable consideration of the Government."
Now, this, the equity and justice of the case, is the main ground on which I rely. I do not rely upon technicalities. I rest upon the broad ground of justice. Nor does the hon. and learned Gentleman stand alone in his opinion. He speaks in conjunction with another eminent lawyer,—a
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lawyer peculiarly qualified to pronounce an opinion on a case of this nature, on account of his great acquaintance with international law. Dr. Lushington, the present judge of the High Court of Admiralty, the very highest authority in this country upon this subject, and in a branch of law to which this question peculiarly belongs, gave a similar opinion, and said, in 1835, that
"The retention of Danish property, without compensating the British sufferers, is not consistent with my notions of justice. The ground upon which the claimants rest is that it is a great hardship for British subjects to lose their property by Acts of the Crown, when those very Acts of the Crown brought to the country a much greater properly than it lost,"
Dr. Lushingtonsaid, in fact, that the British Crown, having obtained by this act—whether rightly or wrongly, I do not now inquire—more property than the subjects of the Crown had lost, the subjects of the Crown might fairly look to that fund or compensation. I hope, therefore, the Solicitor-general will not now oppose a motion which in 1836 he thought fairly entitled to the equitable consideration of the House. Now, Sir, before I conclude my case, I must refer the House to one or two of the names of Members who voted for those claims. A very large number of the Gentlemen opposite voted for their liquidation, and it will not now, I am sure, be considered a party question. It is one which I trust will be decided on equitable considerations, and without reference to parties. On former occasions such was the intermingling of parties, that it was impossible for any one to know beforehand what the decision of the House would be from the party in power. So I trust it will be on the present occasion, and I hope that hon. Gentlemen opposite will recollect the voles they gave on former occasions, and will not alter their opinions from the imperfect manner in which 1 have stated the case. There were seventy five members who voted for the liquidation of these claims, and amongst them I find the name of the hon. and learned Member for Woodstock, whom I specially name, because his vote was given after the question had been legally argued. J also find the name of Mr. Freshfield, also a lawyer of great experience, and if 1 mention these only, it is because they as lawyers were called upon to vote, and did vote upon a question which involved legal

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considerations of great importance. Sir, I believe if the House now decides in conformity with its previous decisions, that the right hon. Baronet, the First Lord of the Treasury, will not interpose his authority between the claimants and the concession of their just demands. I do not think, after the repeated decisions of the House of Commons, that it was a justifiable mode of opposing the votes of the House, to offer that passive resistance which has been issued by the Treasury. The Government found itself destitute of support in the House of Commons, beaten in argument, and reduced to the necessity of giving only a passive resistance to the votes of this House. The House of Commons having on many occasions addressed the Crown in favour of these claims, promising to make good any sum that might be required to pay them, I believe it is almost without precedent that, having expressed that readiness, it should not have been called on by the Government to fulfil its expressed intentions. I do not believe the right hon. Gentleman will be able to show me a precedent that can justify the conduct of the Government. I will not refer to the case of Mr. Palmer, in 1807, because though in that case the House voted that certain claims ought to be liquidated; and though the Treasury interposed its resistance, yet there was a distinct Act of Parliament, which gave Mr. Palmer the right to what he claimed, and under which 1 believe it was ultimately settled. We have no such Act, and therefore I do not insist upon that case. I have, Sir, laid the whole statement, as fairly as I could, before the House, and 1 now leave the question to its sense of justice. I ask it to bear in mind that no precedent can be found adverse to the settlement of these claims after the repeated decisions of the House. I ask it to keep in mind the opinions of the Solicitor-general, of the judge of the Court of Admiralty, and of those lawyers who took part in the debate, and especially of the arguments of Mr. Justice Cresswell. I ask the House, keeping these things in mind, to give its support to the motion, with which I shall now conclude,—
" That an humble Address be presented to her Majesty, praying that her Majesty will be graciously pleased to take into consideration the report of the Commissioners for the investigation of Danish claims, dated 12th May, 1840, to whom it was referred, to examine and adjudicate upon the claims of cer-
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tain British subjects, (or losses sustained by the seizure and confiscation of their ships and cargoes by the government of Denmark) in the year 1807, and that her Majesty will be pleased to advance to such claimants the amount of their respective losses, as ascertained by the said Commissioners, and assuring her Majesty that this House, in pursuance of frequent former decisions upon these claims, will make good the same."
The Speakersaid, that by a standing Order of the House, no Address could be voted to her Majesty for a grant of money except in a committee of the whole House; and that the House could not resolve itself into a committee of the whole House on a motion by an hon. Member, without that hon. Member giving notice of his motion previously.
Mr. Huttsaid that the late Chancellor of the Exchequr had, when the subject was previously before the House, stated that in consequence of the repeated decisions of the House of Commons in favour of the claim of Mr. Palmer, he did not think it proper or becoming to come forward and stand between the feelings of the House and the subject, and that although be was personally opposed to the claims, he thought it his duty to signify his assent to the motion. Now, as the present case was precisely similar to that one, he could not believe that the right hon. Gentleman opposite (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) would wish to throw over the question on a mere point of technicality. That precedent being so completely in point, he trusted the right hon. Gentleman opposite would come forward and imitate the example of his predecessor.
The Chancellor of the Exchequersaid, that he thought it of the utmost importance that the House should strictly adhere to the rules laid down for the conduct of its proceedings. The hon. Gentleman was clearly acting in violation of those rules. He was ready to discuss the question, but he felt so strongly the necessity of supporting the rules of the House that he would not take any other course than that which he conceived in accordance with those rules.
Colonel Sibthorphad come down upon that, as upon all former occasions, to support the claims of men who had, he considered, been refused common justice. He should much regret that the hon. Member should be prevented upon a point of form from taking the sense of the House

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upon the subject he had brought under their consideration. He had no hesitation in saying that it was a disgrace to the Government to have so long refused a claim admitted by the House.
Sir R. Peelsaid, that his experience with respect to grants of money made by the House of Commons, convinced him that it was advisable strictly to adhere to the forms of the House upon such subjects. The hon. Gentleman had not adduced any instance of a departure on the part of the House from the course usually adopted with respect to money grants, and which had been laid down by the Speaker. The hon. Gentleman might give a notice for another day of a particular mode in which the grant should be made. That was the course which had been adopted by Mr. Cresswell, and to which he thought the hon. Gentleman ought to conform. He should repeat, that his experience convinced him that it would be wise, in all cases of money grants, to adhere to the strict and technical rules of the House.
Motion withdrawn.

KNUTSFORD GAOL.
Mr. T. Duncombesaid, that in rising to call the attention of the House to the motion of which he had given notice, he might be allowed to explain how one so totally unconnected with the county of Chester, came to be mixed up in a question apparently of a local character. When, on the 22d of February, he rose to call the attention of the House to the conduct of the Lord Chief Baron (Lord Abinger), at the special commission, held last October, while he (Mr. T. Duncombe) found fault with some of the sentences passed by that noble and learned Lord, he said that the severity, of these sentences was much aggravated by the severity, with which the prisoners were treated in the gaol at Knutsford. On the following day the hon. Member for Cheshire asked why he had not given him notice of his intention to allude to the discipline enforced at Knutsford, and at the same time the hon. Member said that he had been altogether misinformed on the subject. He immediately wrote to his informant to say that his statements were likely to be disputed. The statements which he had made relative to the treatment of the prisoners at Knutsford, amounted to this; that the Chartist prisoners complained that on their arrival at the prison, they
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had been addressed in very violent and insolent language by the gaoler; secondly, that some of those prisoners were put upon the treadmill out of their turn for the amusement of some ladies and gentlemen who visited the prison; thirdly, that the overseer of those prisoners was himself a felon, and that these prisoners were thus compelled to associate with a felon; and fourthly, that their food was insufficient both in quantity and quality. On the following Monday, the hon. Member for Cheshire gave a most unqualified contradiction to the statement which he had made on the authority of his informant, a gentleman resident at Stockport, and the testimony of one of the prisoners was produced in support of the contradiction. He immediately observed that such contradictions coming from prisoners, under the control of the magistrates, ought to be received with extreme caution, and therefore he begged leave to adhere to the statement he had originally made. After that contradiction, he might fairly complain that an attempt had been made to mislead the House. If he had himself given way on that occasion, perhaps not one of the iniquities connected with this prison would ever have come to light. In consequence, however, of his perseverance in adhering to his statement, the right hon. Baronet opposite announced his intention to send down an inspector to investigate the circumstances connected with the case. Captain Williams accordingly proceeded to institute an investigation into the case, and among other witnesses, examined the chaplain of the prison; and if hon. Gentlemen would take the trouble to read the report of Captain Williams, they would find that every statement made by him was fully proved and substantiated by that report. With respect to the charge against the governor of having used to the prisoners violent and insulting language, the inspector said that, upon the concurrent testimony of the prisoners themselves, corroborated in a considerable degree by the evidence of Mr. Tracy, an officer of the county gaol, it appeared that the words addressed to prisoners by the governor, on their arrival, were to the following effect:—
" Now, you special commission men, you were sent here to be punished, and you shall be punished. The discipline of this prison is so rigorously enforced, and the laws so strict, that if I have to punish any of you, it will have

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such an effect upon your constitutions, that even under the most favourable circumstances, the strongest man among you won't have a constitution that I would give twopence for when your sentence shall expire."
Mr. Tracydescribed this as " harsh language," but he believed the House would agree with him that it was a most brutal speech. The report afterwards proceeded:
" The chaplain also deposes, that on the 5th of December the governor met him in the prison yard, and apparently under considerable irritation, addressed him in these words; ' Fairhurst, and some of these Chartists, have been complaining about their beef;' and further said, ' Damn these Chartists, I'll give them their belly-full before I have done with them.'"
It appeared, when this speech was made, no third person was present. [Mr. Egerton " hear"]. From that cheer it was evident that the hon. Member intended to give credence to the testimony of the governor in preference to a man of respectability like the Rev. Chaplain of the gaol. If the governor denied the accuracy of the charge, why had he not cross-examined the chaplain on that point? In consequence of what had taken place, he had other testimony respecting the language which Mr. Burgess, the governor, was in the habit of using with respect to his prisoners. It was a letter from a tradesman of Knutsford, who was quite ready to come before a committee of the House, if a committee should be granted. The letter ran thus;—
"Knutsford, March, 17,1843.
"Sir—After perusing your remarks lately made in the House of Commons relative to the House of Correction at Knutsford, I beg leave to state that Burgess, who is the head gaoler, has in the most unfeeling manner publicly boasted in the midst of a promiscuous company, in the bar of the George Inn, where he occasionally goes to pass his evenings,' of the short time in which by his prison discipline he can break down (as he expressed himself) the constitutions of prisoners,' who unfortunately by their misdeeds placed themselves under his tender mercies; such is this man's boast, his favourite theme; no person of any respectability will in the most distant manner associate with him. He had orders from the hostess of the George Inn to take a room whenever he came there, as people who frequent the inn retire with horror from his presence on account of the merciless remarks he habitually indulges in, relative to the treatment of his prisoners."
For his part he believed Mr. Brown,
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and he did not believe Mr. Burgess; and he thought there would be great difficulty in finding any one out of that House to believe that Mr. Burgess did not use the words attributed to him by Mr. Brown. The report went on to say—
" It is alleged that certain of the prisoners were, on Thursday, the 20th of October, in the sessions week, placed upon the tread-wheel, out of their regular turn, for the purpose of showing it working to strangers visiting the house of correction. It appears to be customary for the grand jury at every sessions and adjourned sessions, to go through the house of correction previous to their discharge, and that they are occasionally accompanied by females; that at such times if the tread-wheel is not at work, prisoners are called out from their wards and placed upon it for a short time, to show the manner of its working. The complaint made by the prisoners of having on one occasion been placed on the wheel for such purpose in the sessions week, is I consider, just, and that the practice is at all times objectionable."
Here again the inspector fully bore him out in the charge he had made. At the General Quarter Sessions, held on the 17th of last month, the magistrates there assembled agreed to a report to the Secretary of State, in reply to the report of the inspector. In speaking of the practice of placing prisoners on the tread-wheel, for the purpose of showing its working to visitors, the report of the magistrates said—
"It appears to the court that the practice has prevailed upon the occasions of the visits of the grand jury, and, as Captain Williams alleges, on some other occasions; but, as the latter instances appear to have occurred always in the presence of a magistrate, this court considers the governor to be exonerated."
He was ready to prove that the statement that this was never done except in presence of a magistrate was false. He could prove that last summer a party went to see the prison, between four and five in the afternoon, and that some prisoners were called out for the amusement of the visitors to show the working of the wheel, and that neither a governor nor a magistrate was present. The employment of a felon as overseer was admitted. The magistrate said—
" It appears to the court that a prisoner convicted of felony has been appointed by the governor to instruct misdemeanants in the weaving, but he had no authority over them, and was never with them, unless he was called for by them to fetch materials or to instruct

821
them. This court have given directions that such practice shall not occur for the future."
The insufficiency of food was also admitted, and thus was each of his charges fully borne out by the report of the inspector. It appeared that the magistrates called the chaplain before them on the 17th of March, and subjected him to an examination, requesting him to state what had pasted between him and the inspector. The magistrates knew very well what bad occurred, for many of them had been present at the examination of the chaplain by Captain Williams. It would have been better, certainly, under these circumstances, if the chaplain had answered at once, and had said, " Yes, I did say so and so; I did give this information; I was on my oath, and bound to speak the truth." He was asked why he had not informed the magistrates at the time the words were used by the governor? He said he bad received orders, several years ago, to confine himself to his spiritual duties. He had, however, repeatedly entered on the journal cases of irregularity on the part of the governor, such as non-attendance at prayers, or divine service, which, according to the rules, he was bound to attend. The result of all this had been the dismissal of Mr. Brown, the chaplain. One charge brought against Mr. Brown was, that he was in the habit of corresponding with him (Mr. Duncombe). He had not been aware that there was any very serious wrong in a man's corresponding with him, but if there was, it was an offence Mr. Brown was wholly innocent of; for until he heard of his dismissal, he bad never known of Mr. Brown's existence. The right hon. Baronet the Secretary of State for the Home Department, in a letter addressed to the Chairman of the General Quarter Sessions for the county of Chester had pronounced his opinion on the conduct of the Governor, in these words—
" I have the honour to transmit to you a copy of the report of the inspector of prisons for the northern district, on an inquiry into the treatment of prisoners in the Knutsford House of Correction. It is unnecessary for me to enclose a copy of the report which I received from the visiting justices soon after the termination of the inquiry, as they will doubtless already have transmitted to you a copy for the information of the magistrates; but I enclose a copy of the inspector's remarks en the latter part of that report, relating to certain particulars which were not con
822
nected with the inquiry, but which the inspector deemed necessary to bring before the attention of the visiting justices. I have to request that you will submit these several statements to the magistrates of the county, at their first general meeting in quarter sessions, and request their attention most especially to those which relate to the conduct of the governor, that they may determine whether, after what has occurred, they can, with confidence and with safety, continue him in an office of such responsibility. I forbear pointing out the various particulars which show indiscretion in the governor and inattention to his duties: but I cannot omit to mention one instance in which he appears to me to have been guilty of very great misconduct. I refer to a certain case in which, after the express directions of the surgeon, that corporal punishment should cease, he insisted that it should be continued, and it was continued accordingly. The magistrates are fully aware that if on that occasion, life had been endangered, and death had ensued, the governor must have been tried on a charge no less than of homicide. And I am persuaded the magistrates will be sensible of the great responsibility which must be incurred by them from subjecting prisoners any longer to the custody of one who could so misconduct himself."
The magistrates, however, had addressed the Secretary in these terms:—
" This court remarks, that it would be very convenient and conducive to the discipline of the prison, if the inspector would report to the visiting magistrates any misconduct in the officers, or any other matter requiring their notice, as soon as it came to his knowledge, to which the magistrates will pay immediate attention. This court concludes by saying, that after a careful investigation of the charges referred to its consideration, it is of opinion, that with the exception of the case of the boy Trainer (which has already been adjudicated upon), such charges are in themselves not of much importance, and their recurrence provided against, and are not such as to deprive the governor of the confidence which the magistrates have hitherto reposed in him, and which his general good conduct, and the discipline which he has maintained in the prison have appeared to deserve."
He would maintain again, that all his charges had been fully borne out by the inspector's report, and if the correctness of that report was doubted, that was an additional reason why this committee, for which he was about to move, ought to be granted. Among other charges against the governor was, that be had neglected to affix the rules in a proper part of the prison. This was treated as a matter of little importance, but he thought there was no part of the prison regulations of

823
more importance to the unfortunate prisoners, to whom it was of the highest importance to know the rules by which they were governed, and the nature of the rights of which they were not deprived. It was found, that the gaoler had employed the prisoners, contrary to law, in mending his gig; the iron was said to be only worth 6d.,but he (Mr. T. Duncombe) believed it to be really worth 3s. 6d. But suppose it to be only worth 6d., they saw men committed every day for stealing a few halfpence worth of apples or turnip-tops. Then as to the circumstances connected with the whipping of the boy, Edward Trainer, the case was said to have been adjudicated upon; but the fact was, that he had been merely reprimanded by the magistrates. There was another case in which a boy named Beacroft, had been flogged previously to his removal to Park-hurst prison; and he was flogged so carelessly, that his eye was severely injured by the thong. He understood that when a person was to be flogged in this gaol, the town crier of Knutsford was called in to inflict the punishment at the rate of 2s. for each person. It was often the case, that no surgeon, or assistant-surgeon, attended to witness the flogging administered, but merely an apprentice. The report of the surgeon, Mr. Deane, on the state of the gaol, prison diet, &c, stated, that since his appointment to the office, he had noticed the falling away of the men employed in labour; that his conviction was, that after an experience of fifteen years, it was impossible to keep men undergoing a long sentence of imprisonment, in ordinary health, on a reduced allowance of food, and he, therefore, recommended that the allowance should be increased. Instead, however, of the gaoler giving the prisoners an increase of food, as recommended by the surgeon, the punishment continually resorted to was a stoppage of their food. During the three months, ending the 10th of March, 1843, the stoppages of diet had been, on the average, 392 daily. [An hon. Member:" No; that was the number of prisoners."] Stoppage of diet was the only description of punishment resorted to, and it fell frequently on the same individual. The magistrates, however, seemed to think, that all these matters were of no consequence; they retained the gaoler, but dismissed the chaplain. If they thought the chaplain an improper person, why
824
had they given him all favourable testimonials when applying for the chaplaincy of the Pentonville prison. In July, 1842, the magistrates spoke of the assiduous manner in which he had performed his duties as chaplain—of his upright and moral character as a clergyman and a Christian, although in their report to the Secretary of State, they said he was not entitled to their confidence, and had not been so for the last three years. The gaoler, the surgeon, the schoolmaster, the taskmaster, and the matron, all added their testimony to the exemplary conduct of the chaplain. [The hon. Member read a variety of testimonials in favour of Mr. Brown, including one signed by ten magistrates.] Mr. Brown might, indeed, be well proud of forfeiting the confidence of such magistrates. They, however, had made up their minds six weeks before to dismiss the chaplain, and they did not condescend to argue the matter with those who defended his interests, Mr. G. Wilbraham, Mr. E. Stanley, and Mr. Davenport. One of the magistrates asked, " Is this gaol to be governed by the Secretary of State or the magistrates of the county?" The Secretary of State wrote to the visiting justices, stating his regret that the governor of the gaol should have been considered fit to be continued in his place, and expressing an opinion that the conduct he had followed, should have led to his immediate dismissal. That letter, he thought, reflected great credit on the right hon. Baronet. It was a bold and true statement of the case—a bold and true censure on those for whom he might be supposed to have had some political predilection. The right hon. Baronet had proved that he was above political feeling on this important occasion, and had passed a censure on the magistrates, to which he was satisfied the whole public would respond. But now that the Secretary of State had done his duty, he maintained that it was for Parliament to do theirs. It was impossible that the question could stop where it was. The responsibility, said the right hon. Baronet, lay on the magistrates, but he maintained, that it lay on Parliament. He did not think the right hon. Baronet could carry the matter further than he had done. He might certainly have cancelled the commission, and remodelled it; but that would lay a responsibility on the right hon. Baronet, which no man had a right

825
to impose. It was now for Parliament to interfere. He did not think they had yet probed to the bottom the iniquities and corruptions of this gaol; he believed, that still greater existed than appeared on the face of the report, and for this reason, he asked for a committee. He was prepared to prove, that I within these few days, Burgess, the gaoler, had collected some of the prison officers, and told them that the magistrates were determined to stand no more of this nonsense, and that if any of the officers were found divulging any-thing that passed in the prison, they would be immediately dismissed. This was a speech lately made by this man, who possessed the confidance of the majority of the Cheshire magistrates. It ought not to be forgotten, that from 2,000 to 3,000 individuals passed annually through this gaol, and, therefore, the administration of it was of some importance. If nothing further were to be divulged respecting it, the inspectors of prisons would never be able to arrive at the truth. If the magistrates doubted the accuracy of the inspector's report in this instance, and thought he had misled the Secretary of State that was an additional reason for granting the committee. But at all events, he thought that Parliament would see the necessity of strengthening the hands of the Secretary of State, and granting further powers for the regulation of a system so devoid of justice and humanity, as had prevailed with reference to this prison. The hon. Member concluded by moving the following resolution:—
" That it appearing to this House that the Secretary of State for the Home Department, after inquiry made under his authority into certain circumstances connected with the discipline and management of the Knutsford House of Correction, in the county of Chester, has thought it right to advise that the governor of the said House of Correction should be removed; and it also appearing, that the magistrates, in sessions assembled, have, after an alleged careful examination, deemed the charges referred to them by the Secretary of State, with one exception, not of much importance, nor such as to deprive the governor of the confidence reposed in him, and which, as they allege, his general good conduct, and the discipline he had maintained, appeared to deserve; and, therefore, that such governor, contrary to the recommendation of the Secretary of State, has been continued in his office; and it being alledged by the rev, William Browne, in his petition presented to this
826
House, that he has been dismissed by the magistrates, after giving evidence against the governor, before the inspector of prisons, upon the examination instituted by such inspector, under the authority of the Secretary of State; and this House considering that the due and proper management of the said gaol must be of importance to the public, and that the same must most materially depend upon the character and conduct of the governor thereof, and upon the protection being afforded to persons who may from time to time be called upon to give evidence before the inspector of prisons in respect thereof: it is resolved, that a select committee be appointed, to inquire into the conduct and management of the said House of Correction, in respect to the matters referred to in the report of the magistrates, and also into the circumstances connected with the dismissal of the rev. William Browne, the late chaplain of the said House of Correction; the said committee to report the evidence taken, and their opinion thereon, to the House."
Mr. Tatton Egertonsaid, there was the greatest anxiety on the part of the magistrates of the county to meet fairly and openly the charges of the hon. Gentleman. The hon. Gentleman had attempted to carry the House from the consideration of the real question, which was, the conduct of the chaplain of the gaol. The hon. Gentleman had said scarcely one word upon that subject, and all his arguments went to the conduct of the magistrates and the governor of the gaol. He did not appear there as the apologist of the governor. The hon. Gentleman said the governor possessed the confidence of the magistrates. He did not entirely agree with that, for the governor did not enjoy his confidence. But the magistrates did not shrink from the consideration of this subject. They might have erred in judgment as to the conduct of the governor; but the hon. Gentleman had alleged against them no one single corrupt or unworthy motive. He regretted their decision; but in justice to a very large body, consisting of thirty-four gentleman actuated by no political motives residing on the spot and accurately acquainted with the whole circumstances of the case, having minutely investigated it two or three times, he must say, with all deference, that they were better judges than that House might be what was the real state of the question. They might have been led away by a feeling of attachment to the governor from his long service, and he gave them credit for the best mo-

827
tives when, in the face of two letters from the Secretary of State they retained the gaolor in his office. But when the House was told so much of the errors of magistrates, he might ask was the inspector free from error? The right hon. Baronet in his letter said, the gaoler as soon as such misconduct was known should have been dismissed; but for himself, he could say, that he knew nothing of the circumstances until within the last few days. The case of the boy, mentioned by the hon. Gentleman, took place in November 1840. In January 1841 the inspector knew the circumstances connected with it I but did he consider it his duty to report it to the Secretary of State. No; and when his report came out, there was not one word said, with respect to it. But in the teeth of these very things of which he was cognizant, he reported most highly of the governor, and stated him to be worthy of the greatest confidence, and even advised the Secretary of State for the Home Department to send down persons from the Pentonville prison to be instructed under that gaoler in the best manner of performing their duty. The hon. Gentleman had alluded to the circumstances in which had originated the whole of this inquiry, but he had not quite fairly stated the matter. He (Mr. Egerton) had never denied, that strong language had been used; the only thing he denied was, the statement that the conduct of the gaoler was calculated to cause breaches of prison discipline. The hon. Gentleman would have seen that, if he had read other parts of the inspector's report. The hon. Gentleman observed, that the surgeon had complained of the rules of diet. All those rules were established by the magistrates and alluded to by the inspectors in their reports, and they must have been well known to the right hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. F. Maule) when he was Under-Secretary of State. In every one of those rules stoppage of bread as a punishment was laid down, therefore it was not in the power of the governor to alter it. The surgeon had stated that he had to increase the diet of those persons who were confined for political offences; there were 300 prisoners there, and the surgeon said he could not recommend the magistrates to increase the whole diet—a diet approved of by successive Secretaries of State; but in every one of the cases of political offenders the diet was increased in regard to milk,
828
cheese, and so on; but the main subject for the consideration of the House was that from which the hon. Gentleman had attempted to distract its attention—the conduct and dismissal of the chaplain, of whom the hon. Gentleman had spoken in such high terms. He was sorry to differ from the hon. Gentleman upon that head, because it was a most painful thing for for him to say anything against a person bearing a clerical character; but a greater tissue of misrepresentation and falsehood he had never seen. What was the charge which the chaplain made against a highly respectable body of magistrates? The rev. gentleman stated openly, and the hon. Gentleman had insinuated, that they were influenced by political motives, and that for political reasons alone they had dismissed him from his situation. It was not the first time he had heard the assertion that judges learned in the law or magistrates must necessarily be actuated by political feeling in the discharge of their duties when certain political offenders were concerned. The petitioner stated, that he,
" Was warned by one of the magistrates (an entire stranger to him) that if his politics were as reported, different from those of the chairman of quarter sessions and a great majority of the magistrates, he must keep them to himself if he wished to retain his situation, for from what transpired at his appointment, no doubt the first opportunity would be taken to get rid of him."
Now, whoever that magistrate was, he had libelled the magistrates of the county of Chester. Who appointed that chaplain? Why, his hon. Friend and Colleague was one of those who appointed him. Those magistrates had increased his salary from 150 l. to 200 l. a year. Who moved his dismissal? The chairman of the visiting justices, a Liberal, a man strongly opposed to him (Mr. Egerton) in political principles. The visiting magistrates of the gaol unanimously came to the conclusion, that if that rev. gentleman continued, discipline and good order could not be maintained in the gaol; and one half of them were Liberal magistrates. He only wished that the hon. Gentleman had seen a letter which had been addressed to his hon. Colleague, and then he would have a different opinion of the feeling and principles of those parties. Who dismissed the chaplain? A majority of thirty-four magistrates to five, one-third of whom were persons whose politics were

829
liberal. When the House considered all those things, he thought the statements of the prisoner would not go for much The next point in the petition was:—
" That your petitioner, according to his duty, reported the keeper's continued absence from divine service, for which he was reprimanded by the chairman of the quarter sessions, who told him that prayers were not divine service, and he must not report them as such in future. That he was desired by the chairman on this occasion (April, l840) to confine himself solely to his spiritual duties, and not interfere; that he (the chairman) would not have an imperium in imperio)."
That statement was perfectly false from beginning to end. The following was an extract from the minute-book, November 28, 1840:ߞ
" The attention of the gaoler is called to the prison rule requiring his attendance at the chapel at the performance of divine service. He states to the committee that he attends service only on the Sunday, and says he makes a distinction between prayers only and divine service, and that he complies with the prison rule by attending chapel when full service, and not prayers only, is performed. The committee are of opinion that the gaoler's construction of the rule is not correct, but that he is bound in pursuance of it to attend the chapel whenever a public and general service is performed, whether that service consist of prayers only or of the full service of the Church, unless he has good cause for his absence, to be entered on the journal, and he is therefore enjoined to observe the prison rule according to the committee's construction of it."
Now that minute, it must be acknowledged, was wholly opposed to the whole letter and tenor of the rev. gentleman's statement. Again, with respect to the chairman's conduct, he would quote a minute, dated October, 1840:—
" In consequence of the chaplain having interfered in a case of the conviction of a female at the sessions, and also in the case of the sentence of a court-martial, under which a soldier was confined in the house of correction, an inquiry was directed by the quarter sessions, and the chairman was desired to reprimand the chaplain; in the course of which he told him that he ought to have reported any circumstances which might have come to his knowledge to the visiting magistrates, whose province it was to consider them and act thereon; his province was to attend to his spiritual duties. In the course of this examination it was proved that the chaplain was constantly interfering in the interior management of the gaol; so much so, that when the governor offered to punish a prisoner, he was
830
constantly told that they would apply to the chaplain."
Now that was rather different from the statement of the rev. Gentleman. But he had omitted to state another circumstance which he stated before the inspector, and that was, that he did not consider it his duty to report because he had been desired not to report. Now, the minute of the gaol committee dated February 27th, 1841, was:—
" In consequence of the chaplain having made incorrect entries in his journal respecting the surgeon, and altering and erasing original entries in the journal submitted to and signed by the quarter sessions, he apologised to the visiting justices, and the minute on the report was read to him, and he was directed in future to report each meeting of the gaol committee on the state of the gaol, and any observations he had to make on the discipline of the gaol."
Now, how the rev. Gentleman could have the face to tell the inspector that he considered himself bound not to report, he could not understand. But to go on with the assertions of the petitioner, which he should be able to prove were perfect fallacies. The next was: —
" That your petitioner afterwards reported the keeper for employing prisoners to his own profit and to their detriment, emptying the sewers of the gaol, and in withdrawing thirteen prisoners, on one occasion (December 13th, 1842) from prayers, to fill carts with the ordure from behind the solitary cells, where it had been deposited and mixed; that this entry on his journal remained unnoticed by the visiting justices."
Quite the contrary was the case. What was the entry upon the rev. gentleman's journal of that very date?
" Two services at chapel at nine o'clock a. m.; present, taskmasters, warders, thirteen felons detained to fill the carts with dung from the heap behind the solitary cells. Service at half-past twelve; present, female warders and one male; thirteen felons detained from morning service present."
The magistrates did not entertain complaints of irregularities without giving an opportunity to the parties to explain themselves. Captain Williams bore them out in this, for he said:—
" I am inclined to this recommendation by observing certain entries, calculated to produce unfavourable impressions of the officers, of whom, if complaints were necessary, they should have been made at the time personally to the justices. It should be recollected, that ex parte statements before inquiry or adjudica-

831
tion may on the one hand defeat the ends of justice, and, on the other, form hereafter a very incorrect record reflecting on character."
But the petitioner further slated:—
" That the governor employed prisoners to empty the main sewer, and that its contents were deposited behind the solitary cells, and mixed up by prisoners into a large heap during the hot weather, in the month of August last. The smell was very offensive, these cells being used both for punishment and sleeping cells. That on December the 13th, 1842, thirteen felons were detained from chapel to fill dung-carts from the heap behind the solitary cells; that your petitioner had made an entry of this transaction on his journal, and no notice had been taken of this entry; that prisoners were constantly employed in cleaning at the governor's house, and that the petitioner had seen one of the governor's female servants one morning tap at the window to a felon on the opposite side of the yard, when the prisoners were going to chapel, and that he went into the governor's house, and that your petitioner sent for him to come to chapel; also that prisoners were often employed in cleaning at the houses of the subordinate officers, all contrary to the statute and gaol regulations."
The first time that one single word of that statement came before the magistrates was, that when the report was communicated in certain minutes left by Captain Williams. [An hon. Member: That does not make his statements false.] He left the House to judge, after what he had staled, what reliance could be placed upon the allegations of the rev. gentleman. The magistrates were anxious for the fullest investigation into the circumstances which had led to the dismissal of the chaplain. The inspector had been sent down, the chaplain was examined, and the inspector received certain memoranda, not only from the chaplain, but from some of the magistrates, so far were they from wishing to shut up inquiry. A liberal magistrate thus reported respecting the conduct of the chaplain after having examined several witnesses:—
" The chaplain visits the hospital daily; he never remains there above seven or eight minutes. He has never spoken to one of the sick on any religious subject, nor inquired of what religion they are. To a prisoner who died of a lingering disease, during the whole time he was ill the chaplain never offered any spiritual consolation till requested to do so. On Friday he reads prayers on the landing-place of the stairs, that he may be heard in all the three rooms; these prayers, with an exhortation upon a text, never last above ten minutes altogether. His visits have been more
832
frequent to the prisoners since this inquiry has been going on."
He would ask the House now, whether they could wonder at the dismissal of the chaplain? That hon. Gentleman had stated things that were not correct. The hon. Gentleman took a very easy course of proceeding for his purpose. But why did he not produce confirmation of the statements in the petition? In pressing his motion upon the House the hon. Gentleman had turned attention to the conduct of the Government, but the real question was the conduct of the chaplain. He thought he had sufficiently proved how unfounded were the statements of the petitioner. He should oppose the motion of the hon. Gentleman.
Sir G. Stricklandsaid the hon. Gentleman seemed to desire a full investigation; so did he, and the public too would expect it. The public were under great obligation to the hon. Member for Finsbury for having brought this question forward in so fearless a manner. During the ten or twelve years he had been a Member of that House, he had never lost an opportunity of defending the " great unpaid" magistrates, and sometimes when it was not at all a popular course to take. The case of Knutsford gaol was this,—that there had been gross mismanagement by the gaoler; that there had been corruption; that he had misapplied the public property, having used iron and manure that was not his own; that he had deprived the prisoners in an injudicious, if not in an illegal manner, of their quantities of food. But, after all, there was that case of punishment of the boy who was flogged in such a manner that the surgeon said it ought to be stopped, but it was not stopped. What was the statement of the surgeon? That if the boy had died, the gaoler must have been tried for murder. But though the boy survived, ought the gaoler to escape punishment? Ought he not to be tried for a most gross act of injustice and cruelty? Was he to escape altogether, because the extreme consequence of his act had not followed? It was quite obvious, that the magistrates dismissed the chaplain because he thought proper to speak of that subject. An attempt had been made to inculpate the chaplain; but ten of those very magistrates had given the chaplain a good character. The matter could not, rest where

833
it was. If the committee were not appointed, perhaps some other means might be devised to obtain a full investigation into the circumstances of his suspension. He agreed with the sentiment expressed in the letter of the right hon. Baronet, who said:—
" The responsibility of these proceedings at the general quarter sessions is upon those magistrates who recommended and adopted that decision."
That was all he said; and he thought that if all the allegations could be proved, although the mal-practices had been connived at by persons of high name and character, their position should not free them from the consequences of their conduct. If the inquiry was resisted, it would give the greatest blow ever yet given to the unpaid magistracy. He trusted that the committee, if granted, would whitewash the magistracy from the charges brought against them.
Mr. Curteishad listened to the statement of the hon. Member for Finsbury with some degree of prejudice, thinking that it might have been made the vehicle of some wit and pleasantry, and a little of party spirit, but after having heard the speech of the hon. Member, and having also heard the reply made by the hon. Member for North Cheshire, he had come to the conclusion that the House ought to grant the committee asked for. He bore willing testimony to the excellence of the letters written by the right hon. Baronet the Secretary of State for the Home Department, and if full effect were given to them, they would, in his opinion, prove of great benefit to the community. The real secret of the matter appeared to him to be this—the magistrates did not like to be interfered with by the Secretary of State. But in his opinion, the Secretary of State was a very proper person to interfere and arbitrate between the chaplain and the gaoler. If the House shrunk from an investigation into this case, he was firmly of opinion it would do great damage to the character and reputation of the magistracy of the country. This was no party question, and he therefore called upon hon. Members on both sides of the House to assist in giving effect to the admirable principles laid down in the letters of the right hon. Baronet the Secretary of State for the Home Department.
Sir J. Grahamwas happy to say that
834
it would not be necessary for him to detain the House at any very great length. In the first place, he was bound to acknowledge that the hon. Member for Finsbury, after what had occurred on this particular subject, was fully justified in bringing this matter to the consideration of the House. More than that, he must be permitted to say that the hon. Member had brought it forward in a most dispassionate, clear, and able manner. He would very shortly address himself to what he conceived to be the real point for consideration in the motion of the hon. Member for a committee to investigate still further into this matter. He quite agreed with the hon. Baronet, the Member for Preston (Sir G. Strickland), that this was a subject in which complete investigation was indispensable. And if he saw any advantage that could result from any further inquiry—if he thought, by pursuing the matter further, any new or concealed facts would be brought to light, he would not oppose the motion. But the facts of the case, he believed, were all clearly before them, and further inquiry could therefore be productive of no benefit. It had been alleged, and truly, that the prison inspectors had no power to interfere with or to alter the gaol regulations. It was true that the powers granted to the prison inspectors by law, under the direction of the Secretary of State, was to inquire and report as to the state of the several gaols; but they had no power to control, to make or to alter the regulations which it was the duty of the visiting magistrates to make. In one respect, he must be allowed to differ from his hon. Friend the Member for Cheshire. He thought the case of the chaplain was settled, and that it was not advisable to revive it. With regard to the conduct of that gentleman, he was not prepared to offer any opinion. He had no knowledge of the leading facts on which his hon. Friend had relied. The prison inspector had not preferred any charge against him, but that gentleman differed from the chaplain in one particular. The prison inspector had reported to him, that no communication made to him on the part of the chaplain was confidential; on the contrary, the inspector distinctly told the chaplain that any communication made to him would be considered official, and not confidential. The hon. Member for Finsbury complained that all the reports of the prison inspectors had not been

835
laid on the Table. But the great object of the control which was vested in the Secretary of State, over the management of prisons, would be in a great measure defeated, if not altogether frustrated, unless the reports of the prison inspectors made under his direction were considered of a confidential nature, and if they were to be laid indiscriminately before the House, that confidential nature would be at once destroyed. So also in regard to the communications between the Secretary of State and the bench of magistrates in reference to prison regulations—he did not agree that on all occasions it would be advisable that those communications should be laid before Parliament; at the same time, in reference to the present case, looking at the particular circumstances, he did not think it would have been right to refuse to lay on the Table the communications which had passed between himself and the magistrates, and the opinions which upon full consideration he had formed in reference to it. With regard to the conduct of the magistrates in retaining the governor of the gaol, contrary to the opinion of the Home-office, he must say, the charges against that officer were either admitted or denied. He was bound to state that the control and management of the gaols in this country formed a most difficult and onerous part of the duties of the Secretary of State; but in the performance of that duty he had received from the magistrates generally the most effective assistance and co-operation. He must further state his deliberate opinion that any change in the law which should take the control and superintendence of gaols out of the hands of the visiting magistrates and vest it in the Secretary of State would not conduce to the public good. No Secretary of State, with the aid of any number of prison inspectors, however diligent, would by his own individual authority, be able to exercise that effective control and superintendence of the gaols which was now exercised by the visiting magistrates. And, further, if the visiting magistrates were to exercise that effective control which he held to be indispensable, the power of appointing the officers of the gaol must be vested in them. He did not think the control could be effectual unless they also had the power of removing as well as of appointing these officers. He would not dispute the proper exercise of that authority on the part of the magistrates of Cheshire in the
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dismissal of the chaplain of Knutsford Gaol, but in respect to the exercise of the power of the magistrates in maintaining the governor of the gaol in his office, upon that point his opinion was upon record. He was bound to say that, in his opinion, the magistrates of that county had in this respect acted without due consideration. He did not impugn their motives, but he regretted their decision. He agreed with his hon. Friend who represented the county, and whose statement was to be relied on, that the majority in favour of maintaining the gaoler in his office was overwhelming. [Mr. T. Egerton—" It was unanimous"]. He had thought that the decision was that of a large majority, but his hon. Friend reminded him that it was unanimous. He had, however, understood that an overwhelming majority, composed of men of opposite opinions, had decided upon retaining the gaoler in his office, contrary to his recommendation. He was quite satisfied that there was nothing corrupt in the motives which had influenced that decision, he was rather disposed to adopt the opinion of the hon. Member for Rye (Mr. Curteis) that there was some slight feeling of jealousy on the part of the magistrates arising from the interference which he in the discharge of his duty had thought it necessary to offer. That being his opinion he was not willing to speak harshly of the decision of the magistrates, though as he already said, he could not regard it as a judicious exercise of the power which they undoubtedly possessed. He repeated that he saw no advantage that could result from any further inquiry — all the facts of the case had already been ascertained. He was of opinion that the power of appointing and dismissing the officers of gaols should remain in the hands of the magistrates; but without pledging himself to any ulterior step—and he hoped the House would acquit him of any disposition to extend the powers of the office he held—without pledging himself to any ulterior step, he could conceive that it might be necessary to give to the Secretary of State a concurrent power of dismissal with the magistrates. The exercise of that power should be the exception and not the rule—for its due exercise the Secretary of State would be always responsible, and if he exercised it lightly or capriciously, the representatives of the local magistracy in that House would have an opportunity of calling him to an ac-

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count. The exercise of such a power should be rare; but judging from his experience—and again he trusted the House would acquit him of desiring to extend the powers of his office, judging from his experience, he was disposed to think it would be beneficial to the country that the Secretary of State should have, not the power to appoint, but a concurrent. power with the magistrates in the dismissal of the prison officers. With regard to the motion he must agree that no ground for the proposed inquiry had been shown. He thought with the hon, Gentleman opposite, that after what had occurred the question could not stand on its present footing; and he had stated to the House, without pledging himself to legislative interference, what he thought was a better course than the proposed inquiry. He advocated with the hon. Member for Preston the propriety of retaining the power in the local authorities rather than in the executive, but at the same time he thought some control in respect to the dismissal of officers was necessary. He would strongly urge upon the hon. Member for Finsbury the propriety of not forcing the question to a division on that occasion; if he should insist upon doing so he should feel it his duty to resist the motion. Whether the hon. Member adopted his suggestion or not, he would say this, that the matter would be carefully considered by the Government, and, without giving any pledge on the subject, he was disposed, as at present advised, to suggest some legislative remedy during the present Session.
Sir T. Wilde,who was suffering under a severe cold, was understood to say, that, however much had been made known to the House of the conduct and management of the gaol at Chester, yet there was much more that the House did not know. He was quite content with the remedy which had been suggested by the right hon. Gentleman—that of giving a concurrent power of dismissal to the Secretary of State, because that power would be exercised under a sense of responsibility, and he was sure it would not be administered with any feeling of fear of offending the magistrates. The facts brought before the House formed the most overwhelming case he had ever read or heard of in his life, and unless the House had full confidence that it was a matter which would receive ample atten-
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tion from the right hon. Gentleman and the Government, he was of opinion that the proper course to be taken was the appointment of a committee of inquiry. There was a case upon record which might serve as a precedent, if any were wanted; it was that of the warden of the Fleet, who held a patent office: on one occasion, he grossly misconducted himself, and the House granted a committee of inquiry notwithstanding he was irremoveable. He recommended, that his hon. Friend, the Member for Finsbury should leave the matter in the hands of the Secretary of State, who had promised to take all the necessary steps for accomplishing the objects of the petition.
Mr. W. O. Stanleyregretted the imputations which had been thrown out, and the language which had been used by the hon. Member for North Cheshire, in reference to one of the parties principally implicated. If the hon. Member had only remembered that the evidence of that individual had been given on oath, he was sure that the hon. Member would not have thought of using such expressions. The speech of that hon. Member had certainly done much to confirm his impression that inquiry into this case was highly necessary, and he thought it was only on receiving the assurance of the Home Secretary that he Would not let this matter rest where it was; but would vindicate the authority of the Home-office, that they ought to consent to forego a division on the present motion. He should not go into the facts of this case, but he could not help observing, that he thought there was no sufficient cause for the dismissal of the chaplain. With respect to one fact connected with that officer, he wished to correct what he believed to be an erroneous impression. He believed that the chaplain had never been shown the minute of the magistrates; and that he had never been called upon by them to send in any monthly report. He rejoiced that the question had been calmly considered; and he hoped the magistrates would derive a lesson from what had been said, and that the whole discussion would tend to a beneficial alteration of the present system. He hoped, too, that if would not be without its good effect upon the Government, by teaching them the advisability of instituting a better system of gaol discipline.
Mr. Leghwished, before this discussion

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closed, to read a single extract from the surgeon's report. It was as follows:—
" Ever since my appointment as surgeon to the gaol, I have noticed with regret the gradual falling away of the men sentenced to long terms of imprisonment and I have endeavoured by various means to obviate this. 1 have exempted them from the ordinary gaol labour, employed them in irregular labour in the yards, increased and varied their food, but without any very satisfactory results. My conviction after fifteen years' experience is, that it is impossible to keep men under long sentences of imprisonment in robust health; it is not that they fall actually sick, but that they become pallid, care-worn, and enfeebled, and loose all their energy and exertion. This is not the effect of the diet or the labour, the locality or discipline of the gaol, but arises I believe solely from their being in confinement, and the depressing circumstances attending that confinement."
With respect to the statement of the hon. Member for Anglesea, to the effect that the magistrates minute had not been communicated to the chaplain, he could not from his own knowledge positively assert the contrary, but he was instructed to say, that the minute was communicated to that officer, and that that view was corroborated by the minute made at the justices special meeting:—
"Mr. Dean stated, that having seen the entry in the journal, he wrote to Mr. Browne complaining of it, but Mr. Browne had not replied to that note, but had shown it in the town, and the subject had been freely canvassed. The chaplain's journal was produced, and, an erasure appearing in the entry of the 16th of June last, he was asked whether that erasure was made previous to the journal being submitted to the court of quarter sessions on the 29th of June last, to which he answered that he believed it was. The chaplain stated, that in making the entry, he had done on the 16th of June last, he had no intention to make any charge against Mr. Dean, or to reflect on his conduct as surgeon. The chaplain apologized to the visiting justices and to the surgeon for the entry made in his journal on the 10th of June last. The committee are of opinion, that the chaplain should in future report to each meeting of the gaol committee on the state of the gaol, and any observation he has to make on the discipline."
At the proceedings connected with this matter, he was not himself present, and therefore he should not then trouble the House at any greater length than to say, that the hon. Member for Finsbury had referred to the present state of the gaol, under the influence of a total misapprehension. He had stated, that the average
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number of punishments was 392. That, however, was the daily number of prisoners, while the daily average of punishments was only twelve. As to the conduct of the chaplain, he did not take on himself to pronounce any opinion upon that.
Mr. Henleywished to say a few words lest his silence should be construed into an acquiescence in principles and proceedings to which he altogether objected. In the first place, he wished to express his full conviction that the subject of prison discipline must undergo a complete revision, and be subjected to an entire change. He was fully persuaded, that no patch work system ever would do. Again, he could not help noticing the operation of the various new rules and new practices which had been introduced into prisons. The chaplain was independent of the gaoler, and the gaoler of the chaplain. The duties of those parties might clash, and then the inspectors might come down and interfere with either, being independent of both. The governors might have their view of improvement, and the inspectors might have theirs — one man might have one crotchet, and one might have another, and each might labour in opposite directions for the accomplishment of the objects which they had severally in view. This was surely a state of things which could not be allowed to continue. He had recently seen the report respecting the prison at Northleach. The statements made with respect to that place of confinement, showed very clearly that it was by no means the best conducted of all the prisons. There was no one who read the report, and who took a view more or less accurate of the statements which it contained, but must be struck with the fact that there existed no competent local authority—nothing to make the parties concerned to act in unison. The justices possessed no authority—every official person connected with the system was independent of every other, and no means existed to make them work harmoniously together.
Mr. T. Duncombein reply, observed, that from the beginning he stated that he went far beyond the dismissal of Mr. Browne. There were several points in the case—that was one of them; but it did not constitute the whole of the case. Mr. Browne did not dispute the power of the magistrates to dismiss him; all that

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he did was, to pray the House to institute an inquiry. After what fell from the right hon. Baronet, he felt that he could not press his motion any further. He hoped that no such occurrences as those which had been made the subject of complaint, would ever take place again; and feeling satisfied that the right hon. Baronet would redeem the pledge he had given, he should consent to withdraw his motion.
Motion withdrawn.

MILLBANK PRISON.
On the Order of the Day for the Third Reading of the Millbank Prison Bill,
Mr. T. Duncombesaid, that those persons who had become insane in consequence of their confinement were by this bill to be removed to a lunatic asylum. It was also provided, that if a cure should be effected in the asylum before the term of imprisonment had expired, they should then be removed back to the prison. Now that was a cruel provision in any Act of Parliament, for it was very likely, he thought, that in such cases the insanity would return. Such a clause, in his opinion, ought not to be continued in the bill.
Sir J. Grahamsaid, the hon. Gentle man was mistaken if he supposed that this provision was peculiar to this bill. It was part of the general law of the land. When a prisoner was proved to the satisfaction of the medical officers of the prison to be lunatic, the Secretary of State for the Home Department had power to remove him to a lunatic asylum; and, again, when the officers of the lunatic asylum certified that he was recovered, to send Rim back to prison and let the law resume its force; unless in the exercise of his discretion he should advise the Crown to exercise its prerogative of mercy and to remit the rest of the punishment. He had every day to advise the Crown in such cases. He was not prepared to alter this general principle of the law. It worked well and safely, and its enforcement might with propriety be left to the judgment of the advisers of the Crown.
Mr. Henleysaid, that Millbank Penitentiary was extremely unhealthy. Some years since epidemics arose there from shortness of food. What had occurred in it showed that we were not sure to escape great mischief because a prison was under the control of Government. Yet, this
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new prison was to be solely under the control of the Secretary of State for the Home Department and the inspectors appointed by him, and no other human being was to know what took place within it.
Sir J. Grahamhoped, after what had fallen from the hon. Gentleman, that the House would allow him to explain the real intent and object of this measure. The hon. Gentleman was right in stating that Millbank Prison was generally unhealthy. It was now quite clear that long confinement there on low diet was fatal to the constitution. Since the alteration of the diet experience had proved that, from the site of the prison, long confinement there with even the fullest diet could not be consistent with health. This was the unanimous opinion of the medical authorities and others who had been consulted. As, therefore, the idea of using this prison as a penitentiary was abandoned, the next thing which the Government had to consider was, what use might be made of it; for it was a large building and had many conveniences as a prison. He had on a former occasion stated to the House the earnest endeavours made by him and his colleagues for the classification of prisoners. For juvenile offenders there was the prison at Parkhurst, where they would remain till they were eighteen years of age, before which age it was not considered desirable that they should be sent to Pentonville, which was to be appropriated to adults; and for older offenders there were the penal colonies. They had lately introduced a complete system of classification which was known to the judges. Speaking generally of sentences of transportation at the sessions or assizes, the general rule was that the sentence was to be carried into execution. But the criminals were to be divided into three classes. The first was to consist of those who could get tickets of leave on their arrival on account of their general good conduct. The second class was to consist of those whose reformation was certain, and to whom tickets of leave would be granted after some probation in the colony, if their conduct should be satisfactory. The third class was to consist of those who were completely depraved, and who would suffer the utmost punishment awarded to them. It was desirable, with a view to classification, that there should be a term of probation before the

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classification should be determined. For this purpose there should be a general de pot for all convicts, in which they would not be kept more than nine or twelve months—experience showing that confinement in Millbank—which was selected for the depot; beyond that period would not be quite consistent with health. In that period some opinion might be formed as to the character of the convicts. From that depot the juveniles would be sent to Parkhurst, the adults to Pentonville, and the others on board the hulks. In making this classification, he acted in conformity with the views of the Committee of Management of Pentonville Penitentiary, who thought that the discretion as to classification should be left with the Crown.
Bill read a third time and passed.
Queen's Bench Offices Bill was read a second time.
House adjourned at a quarter past ten.

MINUTES.
BILLS. Public.—Reported.—Turnpike Roads (Ireland); Privy Council.
3a. and passed:—Liberty of (he Rules (Queen's Bench); Queen's Bench Offices.
Private.—la Belfast Harbour; Piel Pier.
2a.Bethnal-Green Improvement; Clarence Railway; Thames Lastage and Ballastage; Portsea Improvement; Glasgow and Three-Mile House Road; Cliffe-cum-Lund Inclosure.
Reported. — Anderton Carrying Company; South-Eastern and Maidstone Railway; Drumpeller Railway.
PETITIONS PRESENTED. By the Earl of Radnor, from Middlesex, for the Total and Immediate Repeal of the Corn-laws.—By Earl Powis, and the Bishops of Salisbury, Exeter, and Rochester, from the Clergy of Anglesey, Lindisfarne, Clare, Suffolk, Cornwall, Rutland North Froome, Baldock Seend, Melksham, Lacock, and the inhabitants of St. Mary-le-bone, against the Union of the Sees of St. Asaph and Bangor.—From several places, against further Grants to Maynooth College. — From Bridgewater, against the Bankruptcy Act.—From Farmers of Braintree, Bocking, and Chelmsford, against the Canada Corn Bill,

REPEAL OF THE UNION—DR. HIG-GINS.
Lord Camoysbegged leave to say a few words, which he thought were due to the character of a reverend and amiable prelate, who had been animadverted upon in severe terms on a recent evening by a noble Lord on that (the Opposition) side of the House. He did not think that the reverend prelate had used the language attributed to him. But, if he had, it was calculated very much to widen the breach between two classes of her Majesty's subjects. With respect to the present agitation which disturbed the peace of Ireland he was a sincere friend of the union between the two countries, but if he should be required to give his vote in favour of any measure of harshness or coercion to that country, he should do so with great reluctance.
Lord Beaumontsaid, he had not believed, that in their Lordships' House, there could have been found a Member to palliate the conduct of the reverend prelate to whom allusion had been made. But he was glad that the noble Lord who had just sat down had not attempted to defend the reverend prelate for the gross abuse of the privilege which attached to the sacerdotal character of which the reverend prelate had been guilty at the meeting at Mullingar. He had spoken to several of his co-religionists, and upon their authority he could assert that the reverend prelate on this occasion had not spoken the sentiments of the general body of the Roman Catholics of Ireland. Since he had addressed their Lordships' House on this subject, he had received letters from several influential Roman Catholics, who all approved of what he he had said; and he now said more, that if any case of difficulty or danger arose he would be quite prepared to trust to her Majesty's Government, who might be supposed to have more information on the subject than himself, to take the steps necessary for the suppression of any attempt to dissever the empire. He distinctly pledged himself to support any such measure, if it became necessary, even though it bore the appearance of being what the noble Lord described, a measure of coercion. In consequence of the conduct of the clergy at the repeal meetings, it became the duty of all the friends of the empire to open the eyes of the people to the impropriety of their conduct, and to tell them that the duties of the clergy were to attend the

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beds of the sick, to instil hopes into the bosom of the desponding, to lighten the afflictions of the distressed, and promote peace and good-will to all, but not to attend meetings for the purpose of preaching revolutionary opinions,
The Duke of Wellingtononly rose to remark upon the irregularity which was going on in alluding to a speech delivered on a former evening—a speech which was also irregular, in having been delivered when there was no question before the House.
Lord Broughamsaid, that the aristocracy could not so much complain of the reflections that were made elsewhere upon their order, when they must acknowledge themselves to be so disorderly. Perhaps he, too might be a little out of order, but he hoped he should be excused, as he only troubled the House in justice to Dr. Higgins himself. He held in his hand an important document, signed by Dr. Higgins himself, the sentiments of which were quite incompatible with the language which the reverend gentleman was said to have used at Mullingar. The noble Lord read from the pastoral address of twenty-six Roman Catholic prelates of Ireland (of whom Dr. Higgins was one), calling on the Catholics to show their respect and gratitude to a wise and enlightened Parliament, and to their wise and parental King and his council, for having restored religious freedom to Ireland by passing the Emancipation Act. The document was signed the 9th of February 1830, and he (Lord Brougham) did not think that in ten years the opinions of Dr. Higgins could be so altered, that he should now denounce the Parliament and aristocracy, whom he then held up to the reverence and love of the Irish Catholics.
The Earl of Wicklowknew that several right reverend prelates in Ireland were opposed to repeal. He knew himself, of two, Dr. Curteis and Dr. Murray, both of whom were men well acquainted with the country, and the circumstances in which it was placed. Had Dr. Murray been favourable to the principles of repeal he would have avowed it himself, and not have allowed it to have appeared through such an obscure medium as that of Dr. Higgins, at a bacchanalian meeting.
Lord Brougham:he knew from a meeting of the Catholic clergy, headed by
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the primate, that the Catholic clergy were not, as a body, opposed to the union.

CORN LAWS.
The Earl of Radnor,pursuant to notice, rose to present a petition against the Corn-laws from the farmers of Uxbridge. This petition was agreed to at a meeting lately held in Uxbridge, and was signed by the chairman on behalf of the meeting. The corn market of Uxbridge, as their Lordships were aware, was one of the largest in the kingdom. The farmers of Uxbridge had invited Mr. Cobden, with whose name their Lordships must be well acquainted, to attend a meeting of farmers in Uxbridge, for the purpose of discussing the question of the Corn-laws with Mr. Pownall, a gentleman also well known, who once stood as candidate for the county. That invitation was accepted by Mr. Cobden, and he went down accompanied by Mr. Moore. This meeting was a select meeting, and confined exclusively to farmers. The greatest pains were taken to prevent the introduction to the meeting of persons of a different description. Considerable discussion took place, the result of which was, that a resolution was agreed to by a majority of about three to one, adopting the present petition against the Corn-laws. Some time back a noble Lord opposite, the President of the Council, said that it was not the present intention of her Majesty's Government to make any alteration in the Corn-laws. The agitation on this subject amongst the public had since been very much increasing, and he believed that the farmers themselves were very generally beginning to become converts to a repeal of the Corn-laws, and he must say that he thought the conduct of her Majesty's Government, in respect to this agitation, was anything but such as would conduce to a settlement of the question.
The Earl of Mountcashelbegged to say, with respect to the meeting, that he had been informed that it was quite a hole-and-corner affair, He understood that Mr. Cobden, on going down to Uxbridge, found the farmers totally opposed to his views, and finding that he could get no support amongst them, it was no difficult matter for him to get one gentleman to take the chair and sign the petition in that character. If the farmers had not been opposed to the principles of the petition, was it not reasonable to suppose

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that they would have pursued the usual course, and signed the petition with their own hands? With regard to the assertion of the noble Earl, that the farmers were beginning to become favourable to a repeal of the Corn-laws, he believed that that apprehension was quite without foundation. Considering all the money which had been spent in order to influence the minds of the farmers, who were a class of persons not generally very well informed on all subjects, the wonder only was that more had not been brought over by the League to their way of thinking.
The Earl of Radnorsaid it was extremely disagreeable to him to be obliged to repel the statements of a noble Lord with statements for which he had not the authority of his own personal cognizance. He had not been present at the Uxbridge meeting, but he was informed by credible persons that what he had stated was true. He had admitted, that by the forms of the House the petition could only be received as the petition of the individual who signed it, although emanating from a large meeting. The noble Earl asserted that the meeting was a hole-and-corner affair, and that Mr. Cobden could get nobody amongst the farmers of Uxbridge to support him. He could only say that the meeting was advertised by placards for several days previous, and that it was attended by Mr. Wood and Mr. Byng, the members for the county, and by Colonel Wood, the member for Brecon, together with several of their tenants and friends. He was convinced that the meeting was anything but what could be called a hole-and-corner meeting, and the petition was entitled to as much attention from their Lordships as one coming from any public meeting could be. The noble Earl said that, in spite of the exertions of the League, very few converts had been made to their principles amongst the agriculturists. He would refer the noble Earl, however, to the result of the large agricultural meeting in Dorsetshire, which was attended by upwards of 3,000 persons, and where resolutions in opposition to the Corn-laws were almost unanimously adopted. Only two hands were held up against them. He would also refer to the Berkshire meeting, where the petition was adopted by a majority of about three to two. With respect to the Uxbridge meeting be declared again that he thought a
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more straightforward meeting never took place, whilst the resolutions were agreed to by a majority of three to one.
Petition laid on the Table.

THE NEW HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT.
Lord Broughamwished to draw the attention of their Lordships to a subject materially affecting their own proceedings and comfort; he alluded to the state of the new buildings which were to be appropriated to their Lordships' use as a legislative assembly. For the last fortnight or three weeks he regretted to observe, that these works had come to a complete stand still; whilst considerable progress had been making in other parts of the new buildings not designed for the use of their Lordships. He was sure that this was quite contrary to the contracts with the Woods and Forests, and if he did not see some progress made very shortly in these works, he should feel it his duty to call the attention of the committee to the subject. He understood that some umbrage had been taken elsewhere upon the allegation that greater progress had been making with respect to their Lordships House, than with respect to that of the House of Commons. But in his opinion it was quite right that it should be so, for the fact was, that the House of Commons had turned their Lordships out of their House. Their Lordships were as ill off as it was possible for a legislative assembly to be, whilst the House of Commons was as well off as it was possible they could be. He had never been in the other House since he had been an unworthy Member of it, until he went there the other morning, when nobody was there, and he must say, that he never saw any House so admirably adapted in all respects for the purposes of the House of Commons as the House they at present occupied. With respect to the new buildings for their Lordships' accommodation, he trusted that steps would be immediately taken to compel the architect to go on.
The Marquess of Lansdownesaid, the architect had told him that the delay was occasioned by the non-arrival of some stone which had been expected.

SEES OF ST. ASAPH AND BANGOR.
The Earl of Powis,after presenting petitions against the union of the sees of St. Asaph and Bangor, addressed the

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House as follows:*—I shall now, my Lords, proceed to move the second reading of " An act for preventing the union of the sees of St. Asaph and Bangor," As I have the misfortune to be under the necessity of introducing this bill, one of the greatest ecclesiastical importance to the principality of Wales and to the Established Church, under the avowed opposition of the most rev. Prelate, who so worthily presides over the English Church, and his right rev. brethren the original members of the ecclesiastical commission, I feel it a duty which I owe to your Lordships to endeavour to vindicate myself from the charge of presumption. It will not be sufficient for me, my Lords, to endeavour to extenuate or apologise for the step that I am taking upon this important Church question. I do not wish to diminish or underrate my own responsibility. I ought to justify my course; I trust and believe I shall be able to do so. Nothing, I can assure your Lordships, but a sense of public duty, of the duty which I owe to my countrymen and to the Church in Wales, would have induced me to undertake the task of submitting to your Lordships' notice the details of this very important and interesting case. The first point which I shall take the liberty of urging in vindication of the course which I am pursuing, is, that the inhabitants of the principality, although they have the misfortune to know that their prayers and petitions are objected to by the most rev, Prelate, and by some of his right rev. Brethren, the original members of the ecclesiastical commission, know also, and that fact should also be borne in mind by your Lordships, that in preparing this bill I have had the advantage of the advice, and experience, and countenance of both the respected Prelates of St. Asaph and of Bangor, and their full approbation of the course I am about to pursue. Your Lordships will be pleased to bear in mind, throughout the whole of this important discussion, that the great complaint in the principality is that there is a general non-acquaintance with the facts of this import ant case on the part of those with whom the final decision in respect of the interests of the Church in North Wales has rested My countrymen reside in a distant district; they have not the same facilities of communication which exist in other parts
* From a corrected report.
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of the country; their country is an impracticable one, and consequently an acquaintance with the local and parochial difficulties of the Church in North Wales, and the steps necessary to maintain its interests, is limited, nay almost confined, to those who are immediately concerned in its administration. On the present occasion it is a satisfaction to me to know that the two right rev. Prelates who preside so worthily over the dioceses of North Wales are united in their testimony against the union of the sees of St. Asaph and Bangor. They are the best and most unexceptionable witnesses who can be produced; they are perfectly acquainted with what is due to the interests of the church in the principality, and their evidence is disinterested, the union of the two sees being deferred until both these rev. men shall have been removed from this sphere of their labours. If they had merely consulted their own ease, they might have left to posterity to deal with the anticipated evils when they should arise. They have pursued a very different line of conduct; they feel the duty they owe to the country which has been placed under their spiritual guidance; they feel the duty which they owe to the Church, of which they are distinguished members; and they have endeavoured to avert the consummation of those evils against which I am now contending. In addition to the evidence of these two right rev. Prelates, I must avail myself of the indirect testimony of unwilling witnesses—for so, I fear, notwithstanding their exalted station, I must describe the highly respected individuals I am about to name, as regards the act I have charge of—I mean the most rev. Prelate and his brethren, members of the Ecclesiastical Commission, who are also members of the Convocation. Your Lordships are aware that the assembly of the Church expresses its sentiments on some occasions in Convocation. The Convocation is composed of two houses, the upper and the lower, and the last time the Convocation met was in the year 1841. The Church is reported to have then declared in her public synod, and in a most unequivocal way, her objection to the proceedings of the commission with reference to the union of the two sees, which is now under the consideration of your Lordships. I will rend an extract from a letter addressed to his Grace the Archbishop of Canterbury by a gentleman who signs himself R. W.

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Huntley, who was proctor from the diocese to which he belongs, to the Convocation, and present during the occurrences which he relates. He says:—
"On the last meeting of Convocation, early in the autumn of 1841, it seemed good to the upper House to send down to the representatives of the clergy an address to the Queen, to be passed by them, and to be presented to her Majesty, It was understood that this would be the only business proposed to their notice. The address, however, was found to contain a clause, recognizing and assenting to the commission and its acts, and making them express matter of congratulation. Now this clause, without any attempt either at modification or abatement of terms, was absolutely and entirely thrown out. The curtailed address was accepted by the upper House, and so was laid before the Queen, and by her Majesty was graciously received. Now this short history proves, beyond gainsaying, that the Church, on the sole occasion on which she has been permitted to speak, and then as far as power of speech was given to her, has, in a manner that cannot be misunderstood, and which ought to be known, declared her want of sympathy with the commission. She has declined to acknowledge it, and in her lawful assembly of bishops and representative priests she caused the mention of it to be erased; and yet, my Lord, it is in the face of this disclaimer—I say it with the most real respect, for I am well aware that the point has been overlooked—still in the face of this disclaimer it is, that the Ecclesiastical Commission are as yet maintaining the proposition that a bishopric shall be abolished. This being the case, I beg to submit to your Grace and their Lordships the bishops, and the Church at large, that the Ecclesiastical Commission, and consequently the resolves and acts also grounded on its report, do really become subjects of grave uneasiness, after such an expression of our ecclesiastical synod; that we have reason to fear a spirit of Erastianism, when the acts of the state continue to be promoted notwithstanding the church disapproves thereof, and declines to recognize the same; and, to come close to my present subject, when it appears that even a bishopric is to be suppressed, notwithstanding the public protests delivered against it, through the voice of the two bishops whose sees are concerned, through the voice of many other of her bishops, through her priests in Convocation, and through her clergy and laity expressing their sentiments in petitions."
In addition to this evidence, and in further justification of the course I am taking, I beg to state that I have been entrusted with petitions from Jesus College, Oxford; from different bodies of the clergy of the counties of Hereford, Hertford, Derby, Bedford, Suffolk, and
760
Salop, Gloucester, and Hants; as well as the petition which I have this day presented, signed by 468 lay inhabitants of the important metropolitan parish of Marylebone and its vicinity, with the residences of the petitioners attached to their signatures. 1 have also had the honour of presenting petitions in favour of the proposition I am about to make to your Lordships, from the counties of Flint, Denbigh, Merioneth, Cærnarvon, and Montgomery in North Wales; and from Cardigan and Carmarthen in South Wales. Both the Universities have also petitioned Parliament on behalf of North Wales; one petition only has, I believe, been presented to this House. There is another petition to which I beg to call the particular attention of your Lordships;—first, on account of the power and ability with which it has been penned, and next, from the recollection of the success which followed the exertions of my noble Friend behind me (the Earl of Ripon), when he undertook on the part of the clergy and inhabitants of the Isle of Man, to obtain the repeal of the clause which went to annex the see of Sodor and Man to that of Carlisle, and by that repeal to continue the see of Sodor and Man as a separate diocese. The petition states:—
" That your petitioners will ever most gratefully remember the powerful co-operation and the generous support which, in that arduous struggle, they received from the universities, the various chapters, archdeaconries, and numerous bodies of the clergy and laity of England and Wales, in advocating their cause with your right hon. House; and still more do your petitioners feel impressed with gratitude to the Parliament of the United Kingdom for their gracious compliance with the earnest prayers of the Manx people. That your petitioners feel in a peculiar manner the affinity between the sees of Sodor and Man, and St. Asaph and of Bangor—(I entreat your Lordships' particular attention to the following sentences) — all bishoprics of independent states for many centuries previously to the Isle of Man and the principality of Wales being incorporated in the British dominions —all in the earliest time endowed with funds for the maintenance of their several churches within their respective dioceses; all amid the revolutions of succeeding ages, the change of dynasties, and the reformation in the Anglican Church, preserved un-impaired by the storms of time or the sacrilegious hand of arbitrary power; — and all having poor, scattered populations, requiring the entire care and attention of the most jealous bishop. With these recollect-

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tions your petitioners feel themselves called upon as fellow-Christians to retnrn good for good, sympathy for sympathy, and most respectfully to express their earnest hope to your honourable House that these two most interesting remains of the episcopacy of former days, which ages of barbarism, of war, and of revolution have spared, may not, in these enlightened times be sacrificed to the expediency of measures which, however otherwise important, they beg leave most respectfully to express their hope may by other means be attained. That the ancient revenues of these sees may not be diverted from their legitimate object to assist in founding another see in a district unconnected with their own, and which is one of the most wealthy in the kingdom, but that the inhabitants of North Wales, by the blessing of Divine Providence, and through the wisdom and the justice of Parliament, for all time yet to come may be permitted to retain unchanged the incalculable advantages of their present episcopal establishment; and each see to continue to possess a separate resident bishop to preside over their churches, and personally to superintend and promote the spiritual and the temporal welfare of the people; and that at a time when it has been deemed expedient by the Government and sanctioned by the Crown, to consecrate prelates to all the widely-extended colonies of the empire in the four quarters of the globe, and even to the more-recently discovered shores of Australia; and whilst the rapidly-augmenting population of the British isles would appear likewise to demand an augmentation of episcopal superintendence, your petitioners would willingly hope that the next step in this great work will not be connected with the extinction of one of the very ancient bishoprics of the most ancient people of Britain."
I am also happy to be able to quote in favour of this measure the kind and fatherly reception with which the most Rev, Prelate at the head of the Church has been pleased to honour an address which was presented to him by the clergy of the diocese to which I have the happiness to belong—I mean the diocese of St. Asaph, From the address itself I will first take the liberty of reading the concluding sentences. They are as follow:—
" But all representations, however forcible, must, of necessity, fail in conveying to your Grace that knowledge of our peculiar position which nothing but an actual residence in Wales can afford; and we feel persuaded, that had the Ecclesiastical Commissioners been perfectly conversant with the almost overwhelming difficulties we have to contend with, from the fearful prevalence of dissent, the difference of language, the poverty and inaccessible nature of the country,—the question would rather have been how to strengthen the arm of the church by an additional bishoprie,
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than to annihilate one of those sees which have existed for so many centuries amongst us. We entreat your Grace to believe that we are actuated by no interested motives in making this solemn appeal, but by a warm and filial attachment to the episcopal constitution, a jealous regard for the dignity and efficiency of the church, and an ardent zeal for the spiritual welfare of those who are ' committed to our charge.' We now most respectfully commend our petition to your Grace's serious consideration, earnestly trusting that the high powers with which it has pleased Providence to invest your Grace, may be exerted in rescuing from spoliation the sacred heritage of our fathers; and humbly praying Almighty God long to spare your Grace to edify and adorn the church, which is the common Mother of us all."
The following is the reply of his Grace: —
"My Dear Lord,Lambeth, May 1, 1843.
I have to acknowledge an address on the subject of the union of the dioceses of St. Asaph and Bangor, recommended by the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, which is signed by so many clergymen, both incumbents and curates, that it must be regarded as speaking the collective sense of the diocese of St. Asaph. I cannot but feel that such a declaration, proceeding from a body of clergy so strongly attached to the Church, and so zealous for its honour and its interests, is entitled to great attention; and I beg your Lordship to assure the petitioners, that I have received their address with the respect which is due to the importance of the subject, to the motives and character of those whose names are attached to it, and to the venerated Bishop by whom it has been placed in my hands.
I remain, my dear Lord, Your Lordship's faithful servant and friend,
W. CANTUAR.
To the Right Rev. the Lord Bishop of St. Asaph."
I trust I may be allowed to express a hope that the most Rev. Prelate will at some future, if not upon the present occasion, grant to the prayers of the petitioners the countenance and support which this letter indicates. I have now, 1 think, established sufficient grounds of justification of the course which I am taking in submitting this proceeding to your Lordships' consideration. I will next proceed shortly to detail the state in which the principality stands with respect to this great change; and, in doing so, I must take the liberty of assuming as an historical fact, hardly to be doubted now, that the union of the sees of St. Asaph and Bangor, and the creation of the bishopric of Manchester, are part of the same scheme of alteration, and were intended to be co-! existent and dependent on each other

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No person will believe that so wild a proposition would have been submitted to Parliament as the extinction of one of the Welch sees, if it had not been accompanied by a proposition for establishing a bishopric of Manchester. It would be my duty and my desire to obviate objections to any measure which I have to submit to your Lordships' consideration. Upon the present occasion I am bound to conciliate those who have supported the proceedings of the Ecclesiastical Commission, or may for other reasons be opposed to my motion, since I feel that having taken no active steps in opposition to the 6th and 7th of William 4th., originally, when passing through Parliament, I shall undoubtedly add to the labour of Commissioners and of Parliament. A respectful consideration of other persons' opinions is therefore due from me. I shall, however, ask no concession which Parliament and the Commissioners ought not to concede, and may not concede, if they have the disposition to consider the case fairly and reasonably, and certainly none which will not benefit the Church at large. Two principal difficulties present themselves in the creation of a see at Manchester. First, the addition of a spiritual member of your Lordships' House; secondly, the want of means to provide an income for the bishop. Both objects were, however, attainable, by destroying an ancient Welch bishopric, and North Wales was doomed to be the sufferer, notwithstanding the protests of her bishops. The interests of North Wales were to be sacrificed to the expediency of creating a Bishop of Manchester. I have heard, in the course of my political life, many objections to the doctrine of political expediency. If that doctrine is objectionable in politics, surely it is undeniably more so in ecclesiastical and religious affairs; yet expediency is the only defence of this act of spoliation. Of the expediency, nay, necessity of creating a bishopric of Manchester no one can doubt, but who will venture to affirm the expediency of depriving North Wales of a Bishop, or deny that it must be an injury to the Church establishment there? With regard, then, to the first of the two difficulties which I have mentioned, I, for one, see no objection to an additional Prelate sitting in this House. On the contrary, I should readily concur in such a measure, and rejoice in at once securing to the great and wealthy population of the town
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of Manchester the benefits of an immediate episcopal superintendence. But, in order to meet the opinions of those who object to the introduction of an additional Bishop into this House, a course may be taken which I think may obviate all reasonable ground of opposition. Your Lordships are aware that whenever a reverend individual is first placed upon the Episcopal Bench, he becomes, as a matter of course, the Chaplain of your Lordships' House, and continues to discharge the duties of Chaplain until another vacancy occurs on the Bench. In the discharge of these duties reverend Prelates have been engaged one, two, and in one living instance, three years, accordingly as vacancies on the Bench are delayed; and during this period unremitting attendance on your Lordships' House during the assembling of Parliament is required of the newly-appointed Bishop. I beg to suggest that when a vacancy occurs on the Episcopal Bench, the individual nominated to succeed to the vacancy as junior or 27lh Bishop, should not become either Chaplain of your Lordships' House, or a Peer of Parliament until a second vacancy should occur. To me it appears that many ecclesiastical advantages would arise from such a delay. The individual thus appointed would be able immediately to proceed to learn the duties of his high station, and to acquire a local knowledge of his diocese, and would be enabled thereby more effectually to fulfil the duties appertaining to his office when absent in attendance upon Parliament. Upon the next vacancy occurring the junior Bishop would at once succeed to the chaplaincy of your Lordships' House, and to his seat upon the Episcopal Bench. One reserve should be made in respect of this routine, in the event of a rev. Gentleman being elected in the first instance to either of the sees of London, Durham, or Winchester, a contingency which, inasmuch as it has occasionally occurred, (as in the case of the most rev. Prelate,) your Lordships will perceive ought to be provided for. The next topic I shall advert to is the income of the see of Manchester. In so doing let me first inquire, why, if it is right to create an episcopal see at Manchester, and you are in earnest as to the creation of it, why should it be delayed until both the diocesans of North Wales shall have been removed? Is it not conclusive, my Lords, that the spi-

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ritual interests of Manchester are made I subservient to the acquirement of the tithes of North Wales, and the establishment of the bishopric is thus indefinitely postponed? From information which has reached me, I cannot doubt that the revenues which will eventually be placed at, the disposal of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners will be abundantly sufficient for endowing the bishopric of Manchester without any abstraction of the revenues of the Bishops of Bangor and St. Asaph. If a full income is not immediately to be had let the most rev. Prelate at the head of the Church solicit the right hon. Baronet at the head of the Government to supply the wants of the see of Manchester by a temporary loan out of the funds known as Queen Anne's Bounty, which funds it has been proposed to mortgage for another important Church object. These funds are fully equal to the purpose. The aid required would be only temporary, since the surplus income of the archbishopric of York will amply supply an income for Manchester whenever a vacancy shall occur in the archiepiscopal see. I have stated at the commencement of my observations, that due consideration has not according to my judgment, been given to the interests of the principality, I now proceed to substantiate that opinion. The Principality, it should not be forgotten, contributes very largely to the ecclesiastical endowments of England. The establishments of Christ Church and of Jesus College, Oxford, derive a material income from the tithes of North Wales; and the dioceses of Lichfield and of Chester also receive a considerable income from the same source; while the sees of St. Asaph and Bangor have no revenues which do not accrue from the Principality itself, With these properties I do not wish to interfere. But I object to the further abstraction of any portion of our mountain tithes for the benefit of wealthy England, and their transfer from an individual holder, a kind and venerable inhabitant of our Principality, to any corporate body; the one anxiously alive to the wants of those around him, the other necessarily unacquainted with and indifferent to them. The Commissioners, in their first report. state, that—
" One advantage which will result from the union of these two sees will be, the opportunity afforded of applying a part of impropriations, which constitute nearly the whole
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property of the bishoprics, to the augmentation of poor and populous vicarages in the united dioceses."
This recommendation of the Commissioners, instead of being followed up, has since been forgotten and laid aside; for it is now proposed that a considerable income should be taken from the Welsh bishoprics, and placed at the disposal of the Commissioners. The Order in Council issued under the provisions of the Act of the 6th and 7th William 4th, chap. 77, directs that the Bishop of the united dioceses of St. Asaph and Bangor shall pay annually into the hands of the Commissioners the sum of 4,750 l.* During the last Session of Parliament a continuation Act (5th and 6th Victoria, chap. 112), was passed with the additional object of securing certain property to the said sees of St. Asaph and Bangor. Clause 2 of this Act is as follows:—
"And be it enacted, that all lands, tithes,
As regards revenue it seems doubtful whether the Bishop of the united see of St. Asaph and Bangor would actually enjoy the income of 5,200l., adjudged to him by the Second Report of the Commissioners.
The Commissioners, in their Second Report, recommend that he should pay over to the episcopal fund 3,800 l. per annum, whereas the Order in Council enacting the union of the sees requires him to pay to that fund 4,750 l. The Commissioners, in their First Report, estimated the future net revenue of the see of St. Asaph at 5,280 l.; the income having fallen gradually from 1827 to 1834, and add, "there seems to be no prospect of improvement."
They estimate the future net revenue of the see of Bangor at 3,814l.; stating that " the tithes have fallen in value in 1833 and 1834 below the average of the three years ending 1831 650 l.; and there is no prospect of increase."

£

Future net income of St. Asaph

5,280

Future net income of Bangor

3,814

Total future net income of united dioceses

9,094

Deduct payment to Episcopal Fund by Order in Council

4,750

Income remaining to Bishop after fixed payment

4,344

Income allotted to Bishop by Second Report

5,200

Income actually remaining after fixed payment

4,344

Deficiency

856

tenements, and other hereditaments, and endowments whatsoever, held, possessed, or received by the right Rev. William Carey, Bishop of Saint Asaph, and the right Rev. Christopher Bethel!, Bishop of Bangor, respectively, as such bishops, not being so held, possessed, or received in respect of any benefice with cure of souls, shall be, and be deemed to be to all intents and purposes part and parcel of the lands, tithes, tenements, and other hereditaments and endowments of the respective sees of Saint Asaph and Bangor, or of the united see of Saint Asaph and Bangor, as the case may be, and shall continue to be held, possessed, and received by the bishops of the same sees for the time being; subject nevertheless to any Order in Council issued under the provisions of an Act passed in the seventh year of the reign of his late Majesty, intituled ' An Act for carrying into effect the Reports of the Commissioners appointed to consider the state of the Established Church in England and Wales, with reference to ecclesiastical duties and revenues, so far as they relate to episcopal dioceses, revenues, and patronage, or of any other Act of Parliament."
My Lords, I have some difficulty in explaining this part of my case. I should certainly not have understood the object of this Act had I not seen a Bill which had been previously introduced into the House of Commons last year by Sir James Graham and Dr. Nicholl; the fourth section of which is as follows:
" And be it enacted, that from and after the commencement of this Act, the dignity and office of Archdeacon of Saint Asaph shall no longer be holden by the Bishop of Saint Asaph; and the dignities and offices of Archdeacon of Bangor and Archdeacon of Anglesey shall be dissevered from the bishopric of Bangor, and be no longer holden by the Bishop of Bangor; and the then Bishops of Saint Asaph and Bangor respectively, or the Bishops of the united see of Saint Asaph and Bangor, and their successors Bishops of Saint Asaph and Bangor, shall forthwith and from time to time collate fit persons to the said archdeaconries respectively; provided that all lands, tithes, tenements, and other hereditaments and endowments formerly belonging to such dignities and offices, but now forming part of the respective sees of Saint Asaph and Bangor, shall continue to be possessed and enjoyed by the Bishops of Saint Asaph and Bangor respectively, and their successors Bishops of Saint Asaph and Bangor"
This Bill was withdrawn in consequence of objections raised against its being introduced when most of the Welch Members had left London to attend the summer assizes. It is remarkable, my Lords, that no previous notice of the archdeaconry of Anglesea occurs in the reports. It is not
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named except in the map attached to the Third Report. It is not noticed in the list as an old or a new archdeaconry. No mention is made of it until the introduction of the withdrawn Bill of last Session which had for one of its objects to separate the office and duties of the archdeaconry of Anglesea from the bishopric of Bangor, whilst the endowments of the archdeaconry were to continue annexed to the bishopric, not, as heretofore, in order to provide for the bishop of the diocese, but to enable the bishop of the united sees to contribute 4,750 l. per annum to the Episcopal Fund. This remarkable omission tends to confirm my opinion of the want of knowledge of North Wales, upon the part of those who had the charge of these proceedings. The Act 5th and 6th Victoria, chap. 112, before referred to, has this remarkable difference,—it enacts the continuance of the property as therein described to the united bishopric, but omits all notice, by name, of the archdeaconries. Why is the mention omitted? Is the omission accidental or intentional? Another feature in this case is, that in its result it will practically continue one of those evils of church preferment which it was a principal object of your Lordships to do away with— I mean that of commendam. The archdeaconries of Anglesea and St. Asaph are both held by the bishops in commendam; the archdeaconry of Anglesea by Act of Parliament, that of St. Asaph by deed of commendam. It is, my Lords, objected to me that my proposition goes to repeal what is the law of the land. Here, my Lords, are two laws of the land, at variance with each other; one, the 6th and 7th William 4th., cap. 77, sec. 18, which enacts
" That after the passing of this Act, no ecclesiastical dignity, office, or benefice shall be held in commendam by any bishop, unless he shall so hold the same at the time of passing thereof; and that every commendam thereafter granted, whether to retain or to receive, and whether temporary or perpetual, shall be absolutely void to all intents and purposes;"
The other, the Act of last year, which continues property so held as the property of the Episcopal Fund. The duties of the archdeaconries are separated from the bishopric; the income of the archdeaconries is to be applied to the Episcopal Fund; the Act despoils the archdeaconries of their own proper endowments, and

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leaves them totally without income; a proceeding directly at variance with the promises held out by the Commissioners, in their Fourth Report, in which they state,—
"We desire to make a proper provision for the archdeaconries in Wales, which we are of opinion ought to be, as well as those of England, efficient and useful offices."
Again, while the First Report professes an anxiety to give aid to the poorer livings in North Wales the sinecure rectories in North Wales will, it is apprehended, be taken away to the general fund. The value of the sinecure rectories to be suppressed in England and Wales is somewhat above 9,000 l., of which those in St. Asaph alone amount to near 4,000 l. [Vide Second Report, p, 29, and note.] Under this head, there-fore, the single diocese of St. Asaph will contribute to the general fund almost as much as England and South Wales together. Your Lordships would naturally suppose that arrangements would be made, with reference to this sum of money, to secure to St. Asaph, a proper share, Far otherwise. Payments by the Commissioners are made according to a scale which is regulated by the population of the parish to be assisted. As regards North Wales (a thinly-peopled but extensive country, where extent of surface, not population alone, must be the criterion, if justice is to be done), the result will be that the income will be taken away in a mass, and returned to the principality, if at all, in driblets; but the probability is, that no part of this income would again find its way into the principality. If these sinecures, as they became vacant, were applied (as they ought to be) to the increase of our poorer Welch livings, a most beneficial result must ensue. Another instance of the want of acquaintance with North Wales occurs in the transfer of the rural deanery of Montgomery from the diocese of Hereford to the promised united diocese; and that of Marchia, which includes the hundred of Oswestry, in Shropshire, from the diocese of St. Asaph to that of Chester. This change makes the intercommunication between the bishop and the clergy of the deanery of Montgomery more inconvenient than at present. Montgomery is about 50 miles from Hereford; it is between 60 and 70 from St. Asaph; between 80 and 90 from Bangor. From St. Asaph, the only road to Montgomery
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lies through Oswestry, in the deanery of Marchia, which is taken from St. Asaph and added to Chester, From Bangor to Montgomery the bishop and clergy must equally pass through Oswestry or cross the Berwyn mountain range. This difficulty was such that Mr. Telford, in laying out the Irish road from London, viâ Shrewsbury to Holyhead, felt himself obliged to adopt the circuitous route by Llangollen, instead of ascending that boundary of the counties of Denbigh and Montgomery. Mr. Telford says,—
" I made three attempts to cross the Berwyn Ridge, which separates them (the valleys of the Severn and the Dee), but found the lowest pass 1,000 feet above Corwen bridge, and that the two others were respectively 1,100 and 1,200 above the same place. It therefore became necessary to proceed from the English plains, where the river Dee leaves the mountains at the bottom of the valley of Llangollen," &c., &c.— Telford's Life, p. 207.
The deanery of Montgomery has a population exclusively English. I do not believe a single native family in that deanery speaks the Welch language as their native language. In the hundred of Oswestry, on the other hand, there is a considerable Welch population. To satisfy your Lordships that this is no idle view of the case, I have only to name, that a few years since, a chapel was built and endowed for the purpose of enabling the Welch population of the parish of Oswestry to have the benefit of our Church service in the Welch language. Thus, the English population is transferred to a Welch diocese, the Welch population to an English diocese. The change may not be productive of any very material inconvenience, but it appears to be a change for the sake of change; no practical good is to be expected from it. It might, and would, have been avoided, if the commissioners had studied the locality otherwise than by a map; and the valley of the Severn might have been permitted to continue, as it has hitherto been, the natural boundary of the dioceses, and the division between those of my countrymen who speak the English and those who speak the Welch language. Another subject of great importance is the difficulty which the bishop in North Wales must encounter in the discharge of his duties. The united diocese consists of 3,250 square miles, the average dimension of English dioceses is not more than 2,196 square miles Thus, where the roads are worse, the

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means of communication between the different parts of the dioeese far more difficult than in England, it is proposed to make the Welch diocese half as large again as the average of English dioceses. The bishop of the united diocese will have double duties to perform, and half the income of the diocese is to be taken away. In those districts of the country where there are so few persons resident, your Lordships are hardly aware of the value of the constant residence of right rev. prelates. To remove one is to do a serious fiscal injury to the principality. To satisfy your Lordships of the spiritual injury my countrymen will have inflicted on them by the removal of one of their bishops, I will read to your Lordships the sentiments of a right rev. and eloquent Prelate (the Bishop of London) at a meeting of the clergy and laity, for the purpose of raising a fund towards the endowment of additional colonial bishops. The right rev. Prelate said:—
" I am not about, my lord, to prove to this meeting that the episcopal regimen is essential to the perfect ness of the Church. I hope, I believe I am addressing those who have imbibed that truth with their mother's milk; who have avouched it in their own persons; who are living in the enjoyment of its realities. For episcopal government is a reality; it is not a mere phrase; it is not a mere theoretical quality of the Church. The very name indicates its practical nature. The title of ' bishop ' or ' overseer ' implies an actual oversight of the household of Christ, members and ministers; and when that oversight is no longer possible, the Church, in so far as it ceases, to be under that oversight, ceases, as your Grace has before observed, to be an episcopal church, at least as to the practical advantages of episcopacy; except, indeed, that it may still have he word preached, and the holy sacraments ministered, by those who have been duly commissioned for the work. I have elsewhere remarked, that an episcopal church without a bishop, is neither more nor less than a contradiction in terms; and the Church ceases effectively to have a bishop when it is removed beyond his possible superintendence or ministrations. This ought not to be the case with any portion of Christ's church—with any department of his vineyard."
I intreat your Lordships to apply these beautiful sentiments to the presence of bishops in Wales. Another evil to the principality will arise from the whole patronage of the diocese being vested in one individual. Out of 250 livings, upwards of four-fifths will be in the gift of the bishop, while the patronage of the
772
Crown, or of individuals, does not amount to one-fifth of the whole number. It will be impossible for the bishop, taking the difficulties of language into consideration, however conscientiously he may labour to discharge his duty, to make himself adequately acquainted with the qualifications of his clergy. The dioceses are, like the parishes, divided into localities, and to pass from one to the other is generally difficult, and sometimes impossible. My objections to these proceedings are, that they under the protection of an act for church reform, in almost every case make that which relates to Wales more inconvenient than formerly. The bishopric is to be doubled in size, the correspondence and communication necessarily doubled, while the means of the bishop are diminished in the same proportion that the inconvenience is increased, or his assistance likely to be required. The circumstances under which this unconstitutional act of the 6th and 7th of Will. 4th passed through Parliament give me an additional claim to your Lordships' attention. It was introduced at a period of great political excitement. Although objected to by the venerable prelates connected with North Wales, little attention appears to have been given to it in either House of Parliament. The unfavourable feelings towards the Church which were attributed to the previous Parliament, and the distant period to which the loss of one of the bishops of North Wales was apparently deferred, equally contributed to induce the laity in England and Wales to withhold expressions of objections to the measure. I think I have now satisfied your Lordships that I had good grounds for submitting this case to your Lordships' notice. I have shown that those best acquainted with the North Wales dioceses, advise against their union. That the Church, as a body, is almost unanimously opposed to it. That it is impossible to believe, that those who have decided to promote the union could be aware of the extent of the evil which it will entail upon the principality. These considerations will, I trust, induce your Lordships to receive with indulgence a proposition which, however humble the individual who proposes it may be, affects seriously the Church, and the spiritual interests and welfare of a large portion of her Majesty's dominions. 1 trust your Lordships will not disregard the numerous petitions upon your Lordships' Table pre-

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sented by other noble Lords, as well as by myself, from all parts of this kingdom, or the almost unanimous voice of the clergy, where they have been enabled to express their opinions — a unanimity greater I believe, than has ever before been expressed by that powerful and respected body, which indicates their apprehensions of the injury the church will sustain by the destruction of an ancient bishopric, and their sympathy for their brethren in North Wales, who are to be the more immediate sufferers by this objectionable and unconstitutional act. I feel I should have ill discharged the duties I owe to my countrymen, had I not submitted their case to your Lordships' House. The responsibility of deciding how these petitions are to be dealt with now devolves upon your Lordships. Before I conclude, I hope I may be allowed to address myself more particularly to the most rev. and right rev. Commissioners, under whose auspices the Act of the 6th and 7th Will. 4th, has hitherto been carried out. Individually I have no right to ask any favour from them, nor should I, as an individual, presume to do so. Honoured, as I have been, with the numerous petitions which I have laid upon your Lordships' Table, and thereby invested with a representative character; I, in that character, may venture to ask of those venerable Prelates whether they ought to refute to consider the prayers of the petitioners. I hope they will allow me to remind them that they have higher duties to discharge than those conferred on them as Commissioners by this modern act of legislation;—that they are, my Lords, tire Apostolical representatives of the church in this country;— that their duties as such are far more important than any which Parliament can confer. I hope they will allow me to urge earnestly, but respectfully, with how much greater satisfaction they will return from this discussion to their private retirement, if they shall be induced to reconsider the steps taken, and, by listening to the prayers of the petitioners, prove themselves no less the guardians and protectors of the church in North Wales than the promoters of her welfare in Manchester. Let these venerable men imagine to themselves the gratitude of the people of North Wales for having continued to them a blessing which their country has enjoyed for twelve or thirteen centuries. Allow me, my Lords, in urging these considerations to that
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venerable bench, to add that I am asking for my countrymen nothing of which they are not in possession, I ask no favour, no fresh boon. I merely ask your Lordships to arrest this prospective act in its course, and not. by your countenance and support to aid in depriving the principality of blessings which have been consecrated by time, and of which neither revolution, civil war, nor change of dynasty, has hitherto been enabled to despoil us. 1 have, my Lords, only further to express my grateful thanks for the patient attention with which your Lordships have honoured me, and to move that the bill for preventing the Union of the Sees of St. Asaph and Bangor be now read a second time.
The Duke of Wellington:My Lords, 1 have listened with the utmost attention and respect to the speech of my noble; Friend, and I must say, that there never was an occasion on which any of your; Lordships has thought proper to apologise for his presumption—as was staled I by my noble Friend—in addressing the House on any subject, in which such an apology was so little necessary as on this occasion on the part of my noble Friend. My Lords, I listened with the utmost interest to the statement made by my noble Friend on the part of those petitioners,; whose petitions he has, during various periods of the Session, including the present evening, presented to your Lordships on the part of his fellow-countrymen of the principality of Wales, and particularly of the inhabitants of the territory, composing the dioceses of St. Asaph and Bangor. My Lords, I respect those persons on account of their sincere attachment to their Church, and their desire to maintain it in their country in the state in which it existed for a great number of years. I respect my noble Friend, my Lords, on I account of the zeal with which he has advocated their cause. But, my Lords, 1 beg leave to remind your Lordships that you have other duties to perform besides those of attending to that call, however interesting, on the part of my noble Friend, and of the persons whose petitions he has presented to your Lordships from his fellow-countrymen, inhabitants of the principality to which he has adverted. My Lords, it is my duty—a duty which I have undertaken to perform, and which I must perform in this House—to call your Lordships attention to the nature of the propo-

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sition made by my noble Friend, and to what it is that you are now called on to repeal. I have to call your Lordships attention to what that law is, and to all the circumstances belonging to it, and I hope my noble Friend will excuse me if I should be under the necessity of discussing freely the arguments which he has brought forward in support of the measure which he has submitted to your Lordships. My Lords, I beg leave to remind your Lordships that the clause of the act which my noble Friend has proposed to you to repeal, is part of an Act of Parliament passed through this and the other House of Parliament, and certainly, as my noble Friend has said, with little opposition, at the time that it was passed. There certainly was no great degree of opposition, considering the importance of the question to which the Act of Parliament related. We certainly, at the time, never heard in this House a word of objection to the arrangement then proposed. There was, indeed, a question raised in the other House of Parliament respecting the use of the Welsh language, which question I see by the reports of the commissioners, and by the Orders in Council, has been settled in the most satisfactory manner. But with respect to the present part of the arrangement, until this Session of Parliament, I must say I never heard of any opposition to it. My Lords, my noble Friend has adverted, in the latter part of his speech, to the powers confided by this Act of Parliament, and which my noble Friend has styled as unconstitutional. I think I did hear that term applied before, and when the measure was before Parliament, I think that a similar objection was made to it; but, my Lords, considering the immensity and importance of the objects to be carried into effect under this Act of Parliament, I conceive that the powers it conferred, though great, were not too great to be conferred on those on whom the task devolved of carrying those measures into execution. I beg to remind your Lordships of what the foundation of those measures was. There was a desire universally felt, in the years 1834 and 1835, to render the Established Church more efficient or more useful, and the desire was to make its action more extensive, and to increase the attachment of the people to it by rendering it more useful, by removing anomalies and objections which might be made to it. by some,
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and which might check the attachment of those who entertained a sincere affection and attachment to it. It was desired to attain those objects by means of the heads of the Church Establishment themselves, and that was done by the appointment of a commission, consisting of the principal dignitaries of the Church, of the Lord Chancellor, of the principal officers of the Government, and of some of the first statesmen then alive, or who had appeared in this country for many years. My Lords, these commissioners were appointed, made a report to the late King, and they proposed, if the Crown relinquished its patronage, the relinquishment of some of their own patronage. They proposed the eventual curtailment of the revenues of many of these dioceses, and they proposed a new distribution of the revenues of the Church, with the view of the more equal distribution of that part appointed to the episcopal order. They proposed the establishment of two new dioceses in the North of England, in those populous districts in the North of England, to be composed of parts taken from other dioceses; thus carrying into execution the object which every person reflecting on the subject must have wished to be fully carried—that is, of extending the influence and power of the Church of England in those great populous districts which have grown up in this country for the last century and a half. These desirable objects were to be attained, my Lords, by sacrifices there is no doubt; but my noble Friend, in bringing the subject before your Lordships, appeared to think that, in order to remove any inconvenience which might arise from the union of the dioceses, there would be nothing more easy than to create a Bishop of Manchester, or a Bishop of Ripon, and introduce him to the House of Lords. He appears to think, that nothing would be more easy than such a proceeding, but I am afraid that he forgot in his zeal what experience must have taught him,—namely, that the introduction of a twenty-seventh or twenty-eighth bishop into the House of Lords is not so easy as he appears to imagine. Public opinion must be consulted with reference to such subjects, and my noble Friend ought to recollect that, however attached he and his friends in North Wales may be to the Established Church, and however affectionately attached a vast portion of the population of this country may be to the

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Church, yet it has some enemies in this country-that it is looked on with jealousy by some, and that it is not all who walk the streets in these large towns who would approve of the admission of new bishops to the House of Lords; and if my noble Friend will read the history of this country, he will find that there have been times when the presence of bishops in the House of Lords was not very agreeable to some. It is not, I repeat, so easy to add two bishops to the number in the House of Lords, and, therefore, when (he commissioners took into consideration the propriety of appointing bishops to Ripon and Manchester, and when such a measure was approved of by them, they found it necessary to unite dioceses, so as to make two seats in the House of Lords, in order to make room for the Prelates who should be appointed bishops of Manchester and Ripon. It was in consequence of this necessity that it was proposed to unite the Sees of Bristol and Gloucester, and the Sees of St. Asaph and Bangor. I have been in this country, my Lords, ever since the union of the dioceses of Bristol and Gloucester, and I must say, that 1 have not yet heard any complaint of any j evils resulting from that measure. Yet those sees were both important, and since they have become united, the affairs of the Church have been carried on in that united diocese with equal satisfaction as elsewhere. The greatest possible advantages on the contrary, have resulted from following the recommendation of the commissioners, and I am satisfied that (he same advantages would result from carrying into execution immediately, if possible, the recommendation of the commissioners with respect to a bishop for Manchester, and it is desirable that it be carried into execution as soon as possible. But my noble Friend says, that the greatest possible inconvenience would arise from this union of the sees of St. Asaph and Bangor. Now, my Lords, I do not mean to say, that inconvenience may not result from this union, for on that subject ray noble Friend is better capable of judging than I am; but it is not exactly the fact to say, that the bishops of these dioceses were not consulted when the proposition was under the consideration of the commissioners, for at that period both the Bishop of St. Asaph and the Bishop of Bangor were called on to assist the commissioners.They did attend on that
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occasion, and they made a proposition with respect to impropriate tithes in the dioceses. I beg leave also to say, that when this subject was previously discussed in the presence of the right rev. Prelates, (and there are not two more respectable Prelates on the Bench), it was not objected to on the ground of any inconvenience resulting from the union, but it was objected to in reference to the appropriation of certain impropriate tithes. So far as the argument of the inconvenience of the union of the sees is concerned, I admit that there may be some inconvenience; but there is no greater inconvenience now, nor is there likely to be any greater hereafter, than when the measure was proposed, and when the objections were made on a different ground. I do, therefore, submit, my Lords, that if the measure were admissible at a former period, in the 6th and 7th Will 4th, it is admissible at the present moment. If there should be any inconvenience, it cannot be of that magnitude which ought to induce your Lordships to take the first step in a course which would be looked on as a symptom of your intention to depart from this great measure. 1 feel it my duty, as a Minister of the Crown, therefore, to ask your Lordships to pause and consider well before you adopt such a bill, under these circumstances, as that which has been proposed by the noble Earl. I wish, my Lords, that the House would declare, on this ground, its sense of the motion, and show lo the country that it is not its intention to depart from any portion of the measure of which this bill proposes to repeal a part; but that, on the contrary, it is the intention of the House of Lords that the whole of it shall be carried into execution as early as circumstances will permit. This is not a measure, my Lords, in which the credit only of individuals is involved; but it is a measure in which the credit of the Church, and the honour of Parliament are involved, and therefore I entreat your Lordships' not to listen to the affecting speech of my noble Friend when such great interests as those I have alluded to are at stake. I have already stated, that it will be impossible to carry into execution a measure to appoint a bishop for Manchester. If your Lordships pass this bill, I beg to remind your Lordships that there are other dioceses in, Wales that require assistance. There are

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the dioceses of Llandaff and St. David's, and they will get assistance to the amount that will be saved by the arrangements that will be carried into effect. My noble Friend referred to a measure passed last Session, with reference to the archdeaconry of Anglesea, but the words of the act which he quoted were not inconsistent with the words of the 6th and 7th of William 4th. My noble Friend adverted to carrying to the account of the general fund the income arising from the revenues of sinecure rectories, and he complains of the dioceses being thus deprived of some advantages in respect to the ministration of the duties of religion. What, my Lords, duties from sinecure rectories. The very word precludes the idea of the performance of duties. No!—the revenues were taken away because there was no duty performed, and they will be taken into account, with respect to the performance of duties, in any arrangement that may be made hereafter. I have stated this much, my Lords, in consequence of the observation of my noble Friend that the duties of the diocese would receive injury from that application of the revenues. With respect to the other points of my noble Friend's speech, having reference to matters of detail, 1 can only say that I was not a member of the commission, and that it is not in my power, therefore, to enter into a lengthened statement with respect to those details —but this I must say, that there can have been no object in the measure (a portion of which this bill proposes to repeal) but to make all the arrangements in the manner most convenient to the country generally. There would have been no desire to injure the dioceses of St. Asaph and Bangor, or any other district in the kingdom; but the object was to make a better distribution of the revenues of the Church, and to satisfy the public of a sincere desire to effect such a reformation as would be a real one, and such as would give satisfaction not only to those who were attached to the Church, as my noble Friend and myself, but also to others who looked on it with indifference. Now I have shown to your Lordships, as far as I am able, the object of the measure. I have shown the advantages that have arisen from its being carried into effect so far as it has gone, and I have endeavoured to show your Lordships the advantages that would result from carrying it completely into exe-
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cution. I have shown how important it is that the public should not entertain the notion that it is the intention of the House of Lords to give way on any part of this subject, and I entreat your Lordships not to consent to the bill proposed by my noble Friend. With regard to the act for the union of the diocese of Sodor and Man with Carlisle, and their separation afterwards, which was brought forward by my noble Friend as a precedent, I was in the House when the bill which has been alluded to as a precedent passed, and I recollect that both my noble Friend, who moved the bill, and the most rev. Prelate who sits on the bench above me, and the noble Viscount who used to sit in this place (Viscount Melbourne), and whose absence in consequence of illness no man more regrets than I, all three remonstrated against it, and objected to its being used at a future period as a precedent. That bill, my Lords, cannot be considered as a precedent for this bill, that union of Sodor and Man with Carlisle was connected with nothing else, and I recollected that my noble Friend who moved the measure stated that inconvenience would arise from the necessity of the Bishop being required to reside in the Isle of Man, whilst his other duties would require his attendance at Carlisle and his attendance also in the House of Lords occasionally. That bill, therefore, had no more resemblance to this measure than any bill which my noble Friend could mention, and, under all the circumstances which I have stated to your Lordships, I feel it my duty to move that the bill be read a second time this day six months.
The Earl of Powis: I beg to state in explanation that I am equally with the noble Duke opposed to the continuance of the sinecure rectories according to their present system. My objection was not to the suppression of these rectories, but to their income being abstracted from the poverty of Wales and applied to the endowment of livings of wealthy England.
The Bishop of Bangorowed it to the Church, and to the people of his diocese, to press himself, however unwillingly on his part, upon the notice of their Lordships. First, as to what had fallen from the noble Duke, who had said that he and his right rev. Brother of St. Asaph had attended a meeting of the commissioners, and proposed that the surplus of the impropriated tithes should be applied to

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the improvement of the poorer benefices-. When he and his right rev. Brother at tended the commission, and when they were asked whether the united dioceses of Bangor and St. Asaph could be administered by a single prelate, they felt that they could not say it was impossible to be done when they considered the extensive districts over which other bishops presided This, however, was the only question which was put to them. They were not asked anything as to the feelings of the people upon the subject. It was said that he was present when the question was debated in that House; but neither he nor his right rev. Brother of St. Asaph was present on that occasion. The debate came on at a late period of the Session, and as they felt it would be in vain to attempt any opposition they had not remained in town. He would say, on behalf of the supporters of the present bill, that it was not their wish to disturb the great measure which had been carried, nor was it their wish in any way to interfere with that measure; but he was at the same time desirous of calling attention to some of its provisions, and of expressing a wish that their Lordships would yield their assent to the bill now before them. The removal, by the union of Bangor and St. Asaph, of an ancient see which had existed for 1,300 years, was a matter of some consideration, and it must be admitted that the extinction of a bishopric so ancient was in itself a great evil—an evil which should by all means be avoided unless some case of absolute necessity were made out. Now those who advocated the present bill contended that no such necessity had been established. Not one of those who wished for the present measure was not desirous of seeing a bishopric established in Manchester. Indeed, they lamented that such was not already the case. They also rejoiced to see that a bishopric had been established in Ripon, not only because of the establishment itself, but because of the excellent person who had been appointed to preside over the diocese with such credit to himself and such advantage to the people; but they did not see that to effect these changes it was necessary that an ancient bishopric should be destroyed by the union of St. Asaph and Bangor. When the commission first reported in 1835, their object appeared to be to procure a seat in that House for a Bishop of Manchester; but even if this could not be effected, it surely would be
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more desirable that there should be a bishop without a scat in that House than that an ancient diocese should be annihilated. The noble Duke observed, that many persons would object to increase the number of episcopal seats in that House. He was aware that many persons entertained such objections. Perhaps some of their Lordships might entertain such objections, and similar objections might be entertained in the other House of Parliament; but those who entertained such objections to the bench of bishops on principle would not be likely to oppose an individual addition. He must say that he thought the inhabitants of the diocese had great reason to complain of the conduct of the commissioners, who had in fact withdrawn the proposition made in the first instance, and devoted the revenues of the diocese to purposes very different from those to which it was expected they would have been applied. He trusted that in making this observation it would not be supposed he was speaking disrespectfully of the commissioners; he spoke of them as a body, he did not call in question the motives or the principles by which they had been actuated. Suppose it had been necessary that these revenues, the application of which had been solemnly guaranteed, as far as the recommendation of the commissioners went, should be appropriated to other purposes—suppose it had been considered ever so advisable that such an alteration should take place, he thought that a better, and a more conciliatory course might have been adopted than had been pursued with reference to such a change. It might naturally have been supposed that the commissioners would have afforded some explanation, which might have satisfied those whose expectations had been disappointed that the change had not been made without just and sufficient reasons. He thought the commissioners could not have recommended a course different from that which they had previously urged without some reason for their conduct; and they ought to have been stated. He had endeavoured to obtain some explanation from the commissioners, in order to give satisfaction to the people of the diocese, who were greatly dissatisfied when they found that the revenues which had been pledged to the support of the poorer vicarages had been applied to different purposes, but he had been unsuccessful. In 1836, when the commissioners recommended the union of the sees he wrote

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to the secretary to the commissioners stating, that the proposed appropriation of the tithes had excited a great sensation in the diocese, and that the contemplated union of the sees was regarded with strong dissatisfaction by the clergy, the gentry, and the people, and he requested to be informed on what grounds the proposed alteration was recommended. The secretary replied, that his letter had been received, and that it would be laid before the commissioners, but he had been disappointed at receiving no communication from the commissioners with reference to the grounds on which the change was proposed. On the 21st of March, 1837, he presented petitions from his diocese, praying that their Lordships would adopt such measures as might prevent the application of the surplus tithes to any other purposes than the augmentation of the poorer benefices; and in 1839 he presented several similar petitions from different parts of the diocese. In 1840, when the measure known as the Cathedral Bill was brought into the House of Commons, a noble Earl and several Gentlemen connected with the principality waited upon the noble Lord (Lord J. Russell), who then conducted the business of the Government in the other House, and called his attention to the general state of the Welch dioceses, requesting his Lordship's careful attention to those portions of that bill which referred to those dioceses; and the noble Lord then proposed to strike out of the bill the clauses relating to those dioceses, stating that a measure relating to them might be the subject of future consideration. A bill was afterwards introduced by a right hon. Baronet, a Member of the present Government, with reference to the Welch dioceses, which included nearly all the clauses which had been struck out of the former bill by the noble Lord. This bill was introduced at a very late period of the Session, and at a time when he (the Bishop of Bangor) and many Gentlemen connected with Wales were absent from London. He was at the time in Wales, and he immediately wrote to the right hon. Baronet to inquire whether it were his intention to proceed with the bill? and the right hon. Baronet replied that it was his intention to press the measure. The bill was, however, at a subsequent period of the Session withdrawn; but the right hon. Baronet intimated his intention to introduce a similar measure during the next Session of.
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Parliament. The subject then began to excite increased attention and apprehension in the principality, where, among some classes, great ignorance had prevailed with respect to the proceedings which had previously taken place, and the effect of the proposed alterations. The clergy, after full consideration, were convinced that the course they ought to adopt was to apply to Parliament to repeal the act 6 and 7 Will. 4th, c. 77, so far as related to the union of the two sees of St. Asaph and Bangor, and for the rescinding of the orders in council which had been issued to give effect to the provisions of that act. The measure now under their Lordships consideration would not have been proposed if it had not met with strong and general support throughout the country. The number of petitions which had been presented to their Lordships afforded clear evidence of the strong feeling which was entertained on the subject by the general body of the clergy of the kingdom, and especially by those whose interests were so deeply affected by the measure which had formerly received their Lordships' sanction. All for which they asked was the preservation of their own ancient dioceses. The clergy in every part of the kingdom evinced the strongest sympathy on their behalf; and from the petitions which had been presented in support of their views from so many ecclesiastical corporations, from the two universities, and from a great body of the clergy, they had been led with some hope of success to make this appeal to their Lordships. A right rev. Prelate had expressed his surprise, that if so strong a feeling existed against the union of the sees, the opposition had not been pressed at an earlier period. But, considering the state of feeling which existed in the country at the time when the bill providing for the union of the dioceses was introduced, and considering also that about the same period a considerable reduction was effected in the number of bishops, it was not deemed advisable at that time to oppose the measure. As he had before stated, however, the feeling of the clergy and of the people was strongly opposed to the act, and they earnestly entreated their Lordships to assent to its repeal. The spiritual interests of the two dioceses would suffer most seriously if the two sees were united ; he therefore implored their Lordships not to turn a deaf ear to the prayers of the whole principality, to the petitions of the two Universities, and of so many of

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the clergy and respectable laity in different parts of the country, by rejecting this bill.
The Earl of Ripondid not think this at all analogous to the case of Sodor and Man. If that see had been united to Carlisle as had been proposed, the result would have been, that the Bishop of Sodor and Man would, under an act of the local Legislature, with which Parliament bad no power to interfere, forfeit a great portion of his income. At all events, he had taken no step in the matter till he knew that the different members of the commission were not indisposed to sanction the alteration he proposed. He felt quite incompetent to enter into the merits of this particular case. He was content to rest the vote he should give on that most able and remarkable speech which had been addressed to their Lordships by his noble Friend, the noble Duke. Although he might be accused of inconsistency, all he could say was, that the course he took in the course of Sodor and Man, and that he intended to take upon the present occasion, were dictated by the most solemn conviction of what was best for the interests of the Church.
The Archbishop of Canterburyfelt bound to acknowledge the courtesy and temper which had marked alike the speeches of the right rev. Prelate and of the noble Earl who was the mover of this bill. He also felt the highest respect for all the authorities which had been quoted by the noble Earl. To these authorities he would not refer further than to observe, that there was no ground whatever for representing the convocation as condemning not this measure in particular, but the acts of the commission generally. He had been a member of the Ecclesiastical Commission since its first institution; and if there was any merit in having been one of the original advisers of its appointment he could claim that merit also. Placed in this position with regard to the commission, he hoped to be able to show to their Lordships that with reference to that branch of their duties which was now under the consideration of the House they could not have done otherwise than they did; and that, although, as in all earthly affairs, there must doubtless have been an admixture of evil with the good they had effected, still they had, under all the circumstances, done the best they could. By the terms of the commission, they were to inquire into the state
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of the dioceses of England and Wales, with reference especially to the amount of their revenues, the more equal distribution of the episcopal duties, and the practice of holding commendams with the cure of souls. It appeared to the commissioners, that in the archdiocese of York there were 831 benefices, and a population of 1,400,000; that in the diocese of Chester, there were 544 benefices, and a population of 1,900,000. That dioceses with such a population (to say nothing of their vast extent) ought not to remain as they were, could not admit of a doubt. The commissioners, therefore, proposed to form the two new dioceses of Ripon and Manchester; he believed they were all agreed as to the good results that had followed from the establishment of the former bishopric, and also as to the eminent services of the right rev. Prelate who had the charge of the diocese; and, with regard to the latter, he must say, that looking at the population of Manchester and its neighbourhood, and bearing in mind events that had recently occurred, the commissioners would have been wanting in their duty had they not recommended the erection of an episcopal see in that great town. Even now the population of the diocese of Ripon was 739,000 souls, while that of the proposed diocese of Manchester was upwards of 1,300,000. But the population of the existing diocese of St. Asaph was but 197,000, and that of Bangor was but 158,300. The number of benefices in St. Asaph was 131, and of those in Bangor 124. So that if the two sees were united, the number of benefices would be about 255, and the population would be a little above 350,000, being less than that of sixteen other dioceses, about equal to five, and more than that of four. Looking at these facts, looking also at the contiguity of the two dioceses, and the impossibility of effecting an union of either with any other diocese, he really did not see how the commissioners, with due regard to their instructions, could have acted otherwise than they did. His right hon. Friend had complained of the mode in which the commissioners proposed to dispose of the surplus revenue of the two dioceses. All he could say was, that if they took with one hand, they were prepared to give with the other. The surplus was to be paid into the episcopal fund. The commissioners had found the means of providing sufficient incomes for all the bishops, without the addition of any preferment in commendam.

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This he looked upon as a liberal proceeding towards the subordinate clergy, whose fait expectations of promotion had been so much abridged by the suspension of canonries and other dignities. Preferments to the amount of 39,000 l. a-year were then laid open to the clergy at large, and the bishops were enabled to devote their whole time to the duties of their respective dioceses, instead of residing, as before, during a part of the year, at cathedrals in dioceses not their own. This salutary arrangement was effected by a redistribution of the episcopal revenues at the expense of the richer sees. And it is surely but reasonable, that the united sees of St. Asaph and Bangor should contribute to this object in its due proportion. His right rev. Friend had dwelt much on what he supposed to be the temper of the commissioners; a temper which he seemed to think had been communicated to the House. But he must say, that although the second commission included some names that were not in the first, the proceedings of both commissions were carried on in the same spirit of regard to the interests of the Church, and he was happy to bear testimony to the fairness that had actuated the commissioners on all occasions. These commissioners were parties to the arrangement with respect to the union of the two sees, with the tacit acquiescence, not only of the Welch, but also of the English clergy. No memorials were presented at the time, against the proposed union, and he was entitled to ask what injury had been done to Wales since the passing of the bill, or what alteration had taken place in the Church which should require this change in an act, which had been passed, without a division, by both Houses of Parliament? He believed that Wales would suffer no material damage from the consolidation of the two bishoprics, he did not think that the extent of country, or the population, or the number of benefices, would be such as to exceed the powers of one man to attend to. There were in the kingdom three bishoprics with a greater extent of country and population, and with twice the number of benefices. The nature of the country was objected, and he made no doubt but that there were places very difficult of access; but was that not the case also in other dioceses? If it were the duty of the diocesan to make parochial visitations, which was not possible in the present state of our episcopacy, he apprehended that in parts of Kent and Sussex,
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the bishop would find great difficulty in making his way to some parishes. If he thought that any evil would result which would not be greatly counterbalanced by good to the principality or to the Church at large, no consideration whatever should prevent him from retracting the opinion which he had before given. But when he looked at the population of the united dioceses of St. Asaph and Bangor, and the population of Manchester and its neighbourhood, he could not think that the two were to be set in comparison. They must consider the general interests of the Church, and whilst they did the best they could for every part of it, they must not overlook the whole. If what had been done five years ago, for the purpose of settling the Church, was to be undone without any alteration having taken place in the circumstances, there might be other alterations proposed with respect to the Church, which would be really injurious. He saw no necessity for undoing what had been done by the deliberate wisdom of Parliament. With regard to the appointment of any additional bishop much consideration was requisite, and the act did not provide for this, but only for the consolidation of the Welch bishoprics. With great deference to the judgments of others, he must adhere to his original opinions.
The Bishop of Salisburywould beg leave to remind their Lordships that this was no mere question of Welch bishoprics; it was a measure deeply important to the whole Church, and which interested the feelings of the laity of that district in an almost unprecedented degree. He should proceed to state to their Lordships the grounds on which he should vote in favour of the bill which had been introduced into their Lordships' House. The consolidation of two such ancient bishoprics was a measure which could not but hurt the feelings of all the inhabitants of the district—of a sensitive people still possessed in a considerable degree of a national feeling on this subject. This was a measure which it must be allowed weakened the Church in a part where least of all it could bear it, and in a part where it behoved them to consider how it was possible to add new strength. This measure was further objectionable with respect to that part of the country, in consequence of the peculiar nature of the property on which the revenues of these bishoprics depended, inasmuch as it would abstract from that part of the country a species of property which,

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if possible, ought to be of local expenditure. On these grounds he was sure that there was not one of their Lordships but would feel that, except under the pressure of necessity, these two ancient bishoprics ought not to be consolidated by the act which it was proposed to repeal. Their Lordships who had addressed the House, and the noble Duke, had stated, that there was a case of urgent necessity to build up the Church in that most populous district of our island, where in late years, accumulated millions (he might say) had grown up in a manner never before heard of. There was a necessity to provide, if possible, means by which the Church might be built up as the population grew, and that it might have its full developement and its complete organisation in those districts where its influence was most needed to contend with the mass of irreligion and vice which unhappily, circumstances had caused so much to abound. He entered so much into this subject, and felt so much the necessity that there existed for the establishment of a bishopric at Manchester, that if he believed in order to accomplish this the consolidation of these two dioceses was an indispensable measure he should feel placed in great doubt as to the vote he should give. It was because he believed that it was capable of being shown that no such necessity really existed, and that a more suitable and better arrangement could be adopted as to both these points, which had been urged as the ground of that necessity, that he should feel himself free to give his vote in the manner in which he had expressed his intention to give it. The case then was, in what manner was a bishopric to be provided for Manchester? The first point was, how the funds wore to be provided. Both the noble Duke and the most rev. Prelate had stated that in order to obtain that object it was necessary to consolidate these two Welch bishoprics. The manner in which he should be disposed to look at this necessity would be as follows. There already existed a collegiate church in the town of Manchester. The proposal which the commissioners had made, and which was through this act to he carried into execution, was to raise that collegiate church into an episcopal see. This was analogous to what had taken place in the early part of the Reformation, when new sees had been founded at Oxford, Chester, Peterborough, Bristol, and other places. These sees had bean endowed with the revenues of the monastic establishments
790
which they supplanted, and this, he conceived was the natural course to adopt in the first instance on this occasion. They proposed to raise a collegiate church to the station and dignity of an episcopal see. Where ought they to look for the funds to carry that object into effect? He hardly doubted that there was one amongst their Lordships who would not readily assent that the first funds to be taken for this object, and to which they ought to look, were the funds of the collegiate church. The sum of money wanted for the endowment of the Bishopric of Manchester was 4,500 l. a-year. The sum which it was proposed to charge on the united sees of Wales was 4,700 l. a-year; and as the Bishopric of Manchester could not be created till the consolidation of the two Welch bishoprics, the requirement and the charge both commenced at the same moment. They might say, therefore, that the payment was only necessary on one side in order to meet the necessity on the other; therefore, if the funds for establishing the Manchester bishopric could be got elsewhere, the consolidation of the Welch bishoprics was not necessary. He held in his hand a return of the ecclesiastical commissioners of the revenues of the Collegiate Church of Manchester from 1828 to 1834; and he really thought their Lordships would be surprised, for he had been so himself, when he stated, that if this whole sum of 4,500 l. a-year, which was required for the establishment of a Bishopric of Manchester were taken out of the revenues of the collegiate church in the same place, there would still be left for the support of the chapter, of the dean and canons of that cathedral where it would be, then, more than was sufficient to support the dean and canons of the cathedrals of Ripon, of Chester, of York, or Salisbury. The return stated, that the average income of the warden ship of Manchester was 2,50 l. 13 s. 6d. a-year, and that the average of the recepts of each of the fellows was 1,251 l. 5s. 9d. a-year. Therefore, if they were to take from the warden, who would then be called the Dean of Manchester, 1,500 l. a year, and from each of the fellows, who would then be called canons, 750 l. a-year, they would have precisely the sum of 4,500 l. which they wanted. The provision for the dean and chapter would then be 1,000 l. a-year for the dean, and 500 l. a year each for the canons, which was the provision fixed for the dean and canons of

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other cathedral churches. But if, again, it was said, that this Church being so wealthy, it was not fair to reduce the income of the dean to 1,000 l. a-year, and that of the canons to 500 l. a-year each, if they took from the dean 1,000 l. a-year, and from the canons 500 l. a-year each, they would then have a fund of 3,000 l. a-year for the bishopric, and the dean and chapter could then be more amply endowed than the deans and chapters of St. Paul's Cathedral, of Canterbury, of Christ Church, Oxford, or of Lincoln. If this were done even, he believed there would be a ready response to make up the deficiency from that wealthy district, and not from that alone. But if that were not thought right, he held in his hand a paper which would give an answer as to this deficiency also. This was a return of the ecclesiastical commissioners of the revenues of all the more wealthy sees, and of the sums at present received, and to be hereafter received by all the less endowed districts. Deducting the surplus revenue of the richer sees, and deducting also the surplus over and above the income to be appropriated to making up the deficiency of the less wealthy sees to the amount of income to be allowed, the ultimate annual surplus would be 6,821 l. a year from these sources;so that even when 4,700 l. was not to be received from the union of the diocesses of St. Asaph and Bangor there would still be an ample fund. With these observations he thought he might leave altogether the subject of funds. He must, however, add one word on the subject of the funds arising from these united dioceses consisting of tithes. It was much to be lamented that the bishoprics of North Wales were so largely endowed with this species of property, and no man felt more strongly than himself the great evil of the extensive appropriation which had been permitted to take place, and the transfer of tithes from ecclesiastical to lay persons; but he presumed that it would be admitted by all those who were acquainted with the subject, that the support of a bishop in a diocese by tithes was one of the first and earliest applications of that source of income. Upon that point all writers, including Sir H. Spellman and Bishop Kennett, concurred; and, therefore, however much it was to be lamented that the sees of North Wales were so largely endowed with tithes, there was in this nothing contrary to the principle upon which the Church was founded. But when it was proposed to transfer those tithes to the
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bishop of another and a new-created diocese, then the public had a right to say that this was a misappropriation which excited the feelings of the public in those parts of the principality which were to be, and would be, affected by it. And here he must take the liberty of saying, that the most rev. Prelate (the Archbishop of Canterbury) had fallen into a mistake when he stated, that the ecclesiastical commissioners had power to apply these tithes in the improvement of the small vicarages in North Wales. Unless he were greatly mistaken, he believed that they had no choice or power in the matter. The charges on the bishopric of St. Asaph were already settled by act of Parliament, and they had no power to alter that disposition. There remained only one other point to which allusion had been made, and against entering on which the most rev. Prelate had rather warned their Lordships; but it was a point upon which, having been introduced to their Lordships' notice by the noble Earl, who had moved the second reading of the bill now under consideration, and being of such importance to the Church, that he must claim to be permitted to offer upon it a very few remarks. The point to which he adverted was that which the noble Earl had mentioned with reference to the seat in their Lordships' House of the new bishop when the see was created. He thought the noble Duke (the Duke of Wellington), when he spoke that evening, did not quite understand what the noble Earl had stated on that subject; but still it was a proposition not unworthy the consideration of the House. He was not unaware that the question of a seat in that House must have presented itself to the consideration of those who regarded this measure as one of great importance. Looking at the judgment of those to whom the matter was referred, he owned that great weight was to be attached to their decision. It would not be difficult to show that it would be unreasonable to object to the increase of the spiritual peers of that House by a comparison of the number of lay peers introduced. It was undisputed that since the reformation the lay peerage had been in modern times increased four-fold, not so the spiritual peers, who remained unaltered in number, notwithstanding the vast increase of population. Looking at all the circumstances of the nation and of the Church, he confessed he should not be disposed to contend for an additional seat in that House for a Bishop as a necessary

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condition for the creation of a new diocese. He was not indifferent to the advantages which he believed accrued to the Church and the nation from the respect shown to religion in admitting into their Lordships" House men who held the high calling to which he had the honour to belong. It constituted one of those links between the Church and State of the country which all the friends of both must be anxious to see undisturbed. It secured the presence in this House of persons who might be supposed to be best acquainted with those matters relating to ecclesiastical polity which were so frequently the subject of discussion by their Lordships; whilst at the same time it gave an opportunity of raising members of that Church to a distinguished and exalted position in the eyes of the country, to which they could not have a right by any other means to aspire. But whilst he felt the temporal station and honour which their seats in their Lordships' House entitled them to, he felt that these honours should be a help, and not an incumbrance to the Church. If the difficulty in the way of according a seat in this House were always to be an obstacle in the way of constituting a new Bishopric where it was required; if there were to be no more Bishops to attend to the spiritual welfare of the country, because it was considered inconvenient to increase the number of spiritual peers in their Lordships' House, then he would submit that the temporal honours should give way to the spiritual duties of the Church, and that they should constitute a Bishopric where it was needed, even though it was not connected with a seat in their Lordships' House. To act otherwise—to restrict the spiritual efficiency of the Church by the measure of its temporal honours, would be a subserviency to precedent, a chaining of the living to the dead, a temporising with the important responsibilities and high functions of the Church, which he, for one, could never approve of. Except for these two reasons to which he had referred, he had not heard any others tending in any degree to establish the necessity for the consolidation of these two sees; and he would, therefore, only say in conclusion, that, to obviate any objections which seemed to prevail, he fully concurred in all that had been stated by the most rev. Prelate, that it was not intended by the measure in any degree to shake the general framework of the settlement come to under the labours of the Ecclesiastical Commis-
794
sioners. From their measures he considerably differed in some respects, and he hoped that the resolutions of that body were not of so stringent an authority, as not to be cabable of being revised. On all these grounds he would support the second reading of the bill.
The Bishop of Londonhad derived great satisfaction from having heard the present debate, conducted with so much equanimity, so much calmness, and so much courtesy on the part of all who had addressed their Lordships this evening. It seemed to be admitted on all hands, that to establish a bishopric at Manchester was a step calculated to prove of much advantage to the Church. The effect of the bill introduced by the noble Earl, and recommended by him with so much candour and calmness as to disarm the opposition to it of all hostility—the result of this bill, if passed into a law, would be to put an end to the bishopric of Manchester; because the act for the erection of the bishopric of Manchester stated that, upon the union of the two sees of St. Asaph and Bangor, and not before, the bishopric of Manchester should be erected. Therefore, if by passing this bill Parliament declared that the bishoprics of St. Asaph and Bangor should not be united, it declared also that the proposed bishopric of Manchester should not be erected. It was true, it might yet be a point for inquiry, whether it might not be possible to erect a bishopric for Manchester by other means than those now provided for it; but, considering all that had taken place since the recommendation of the commissioners on this subject was first made—considering that it was only within the last two years that any strong expression of dissatisfaction had reached the Legislature on the subject, whilst five years had elapsed since the proposal was passed into a law—considering also that it was admitted by his right rev. Friend who had just addressed their Lordships, that the chief ground of objection to the measure arose out of the abstraction of a large portion of the tithes belonging to the bishoprics from the principality — considering all these circumstances, he thought he might be excused if he abstained from consenting to a bill, which would put an immediate extinguisher upon all that had been proposed and agreed to in this matter. His right rev. Friend, in whose general remarks he entirely concurred, had pointed out some other sources whence the bishopric of Manchester might

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be endowed. He agreed in the soundness of the right rev. Prelate's deductions from the calculations which he had made; indeed he (the Bishop of London) had himself thought of some such plan before. But the real fact was, that there would be no difficulty in providing funds for the endowment of the bishopric of Manchester; the real difficulty in the matter was in creating a bishopric the holder of which should not be entitled to a seat in their Lordships' House. It should be borne in mind that the principle of the scheme now proposed in respect to these bishoprics was one which had already been adopted in respect to other bishoprics, with success and general approval. The commission had recommended that the bishoprics of Gloucester and Bristol should be united; and they were united by general consent. The commission also recommended the founding of the bishopric of Ripon, and that recommendation had been carried into effect, to the general satisfaction of all persons. The founding of the bishopric of Manchester had been as unanimously recommended by the commissioners; and the question then was as to how that bishopric could be constituted. They might have recommended the creation of a suffragan bishop, or of a bishop having no seat in their Lordships' House. He agreed entirely in the propriety of not increasing considerably the number of bishops in this House. He thought that the right rev. Prelates occupying the Benches on which he sat were already sufficient in number to constitute an adequate representation of the Church in that House; he thought, that by their general conduct they had always deserved and commanded the respect of their Lordships, and he should be sorry to see the time when the leaders of any powerful party in the State should look with anxiety to commanding a great number of votes on the ecclesiastical Bench. With respect to the labours of the ecclesiastical commissioners, he thought that when the variety and difficulty of the questions brought before them were considered, they might well be excused if their judgment had not in all particulars proved infallible. It should be borne in mind, that this commission was first instituted several years ago, at a time when a feeling of political hostility to the Church existed to a considerable extent in the country; at a time too when the Church had not begun its own reform, a reform which it had since undertaken, and which he thought would do more to strengthen its position
796
than any act since the Reformation. The novelty and difficulty of the inquiry brought before them should be considered and above all it should be borne in mind, that it was of paramount importance, that in all matters the commissioners should recommend what was practicable as well as desirable. It was considered by the commissioners desirable to increase the number of bishops; for it was plain that the number which had been sufficient for six or seven millions of people, was not sufficient for sixteen millions. But the question then came for consideration, whether they should recommend that the new bishops should have seats in Parliament or not. With respect to this point he was not prepared to say whether he agreed in all that had been urged with so much ability by his right rev. Friend who had last spoken. He apprehended, that to create certain bishops without seats in this House would lead to injurious comparisons between them and those who had seats; and, eventually, to a general inclination to dispense with the attendance of Bishops in the House of Lords. He did not apprehend, that any feeling of this sort would exist in the minds of their Lordships. For sixteen years, during which he had had the honour of a seat in this House, he had never observed any inclination on the part of any of their Lordships to dispense with the attendance of the right reverend body to which he belonged, or to treat their opinions with neglect; but he feared, that if a step of the kind suggested were carried into effect, there would grow up amongst the general body of the people some feelings of the kind he had described. Another course had been suggested to smooth over this difficulty, which was, that the additional bishop should be created, but that he should not have a seat in the House of Lords, as long as there were twenty-six bishops in that House, but that on the death of any one of them, he should succeed to the seat in that House, and that the junior bishop for the time being, should always be without a seat in the House. There were some advantages apparent in this proposal, but there was also this difficulty, that by the constitution of Parliament, the bishops sat by virtue of their baronies, and if the precedent should be introduced of a bishop who might ultimately succeed to a seat, but who did not actually hold one by virtue of his barony, how was the constitutional principle upon which bishops held their seats in this House to be maintained? This was a

797
difficulty which, perhaps, might be got over; but whether it were got over or not, it was admitted on all hands, that it was highly desirable that a bishop should be appointed to Manchester. Now, the adoption of the bill, this evening moved by the noble Earl, would deprive them of the means of establishing this bishopric; and it was because he considered the establishment of this bishopric indispensably necessary to the spiritual welfare of the country, that he felt compelled to record his vote against this measure.
The Bishop of Exetercould assure their Lordships that after the able speeches which had been addressed to them this evening, he had but a very few remarks to trouble them with. He must say, that he had derived the greatest gratification from hearing the speeches which had fallen from the. right rev. Prelates who had last and last but one addressed their Lordships. He was glad to hear from his right rev. Friend who had last spoken that he did not consider this question as desperate. He would go along with him in declaring that he considered the establishment of a bishop for Manchester to be absolutely indispensable, and it was because he so thought that he felt bound to vote for the second reading of the bill now before their Lordships. If the scheme which had been adopted on this subject was to be considered as a final measure, it must become obvious that Manchester could have no bishop, until both the Bishop of Bangor and the Bishop of St. Asaph had ceased to exist. He hoped that many years would elapse before such an opportunity could occur, and when he looked at his right rev. Friend near him, and considered the firmness of his constitution, he was induced to hope that it would be very many years before, under such an arrangement, as that now contemplated, the bishopric of Manchester, would be founded. He would say, then, give Manchester at once what it was proved her spiritual welfare stood in need of. It had been admitted by his right rev. Friend who had last addressed their Lordships, that there were funds in abundance for the purpose and that the only difficulty was upon the question of the bishop's holding a seat in that House. But he really thought, that the only difficulty attaching to that question, namely, the constitutional principle of bishops sitting by right of their baronies, ought not to prevent them from doing that which was proved to be essentially
798
necessary for the good of the Church and the country. Holding, as he did, that episcopacy was necessary for the weal of the Church, he would ask, how was the Church to be made most efficient, unless by taking care, to have a sufficient number of bishops? How many bishops there ought to be was another question; he thought there should be more than there were at present. For his own part, he felt, every day of his life, the almost impossibility of adequately serving the Church in all the duties attaching to his episcopal station, and in desiring a large increase in the episcopacy, he did look for a large increase in the number of bishops sitting in that House. Did their Lordships forget that there was already a large integral portion of our episcopacy which had not seats in this House. He alluded to the bishops in Ireland, and though he thought the arrangement of their sitting in turns for a year at a time, an inconvenient one in many respects, yet he thought that some arrangement might be adopted to free the principle of episcopacy from a necessary connection with seats in that House. At all events, he thought it would be better to waive this constitutional privilege of episcopacy, where it was found to be necessary to the efficient service of the Church. With respect to North Wales, he thought it a great hardship that in order to get over a constitutional difficulty of this kind, that district should be deprived of one of its bishops. It was true that the district was not a very populous one, but it was of very wide extent, and under any circumstances, he thought that it would be an act of injustice to deprive the inhabitants of that district of any advantages which they at present enjoyed. It might with just as much reason be proposed to throw two rectories into one, for the purpose of founding an extra rectory in Lancashire, where additional churches were much wanted, as to take away the revenue of the diocese of North Wales to found a bishopric for Manchester. He considered, that this was an attempt to mitigate the distress existing in one district by committing a robbery upon another; and such being his conviction, he should vote for the second reading of the present bill, the object of which was to prevent such a step from being persisted in.
The Bishop of St. David'ssaid, great excitement had prevailed in Wales upon the subject of the suppression of one of

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the sees, and the cause of that excitement was a very strong impression which prevailed in the minds of the people that an injustice had been done to the Church— that its interests and honour—that something precious and valuable had been sacrificed. The measure had been defended sometimes on the ground of necessity, and sometimes on the ground of expediency. Surely the first ground must now be given up; at all events, from the admission made that night, it did not now exist. There was one reason why the union of the sees was deprecated by the inhabitants of the principality of Wales. From a national spirit they were in the habit of making a distinction between English Bishops and Welch Bishops. They did not consider that they were two numerously represented in that House, and they did not wish to see the number of Welch Bishops reduced, but the great grievance complained of was, that the revenues of a poor church would be withdrawn from it in order to endow and enrich an English one—that the overflowings of Welch poverty were to be dropt down upon the riches of Manchester. He trusted that some step would be taken to satisfy the inhabitants of the principality of that subject.
The Bishop of Lincolnsaid, one of his right rev. Friends had placed the matter on the right footing. He said there was a very great necessity for the erection of a bishopric at Manchester, but that he must either forego the erection of that bishopric or assent to the union of the two sees. His right rev. Friend had had some difficulty in deciding on the alternative, and that was precisely the position in which he now stood. He certainly should take what he considered to be the strongest side of the alternative—he should adhere to the recommendation of the commissioners, and give his vote against the second reading of the bill.
The Bishop of Exeterventured to submit to the noble Earl who had moved the second reading of the present bill, whether what had fallen from the right rev. commissioners and the sentiments expressed by them were not better than even a favourable vote on this question; and whether he might not withdraw the bill, and leave the question on the footing on which it was left by those right rev. Prelates.
Earl Fitzwilliamsaid, that he was not
800
altogether satisfied with the Ecclesiastical Commission, and the right rev. Prelate the Bishop of London himself was compelled to make something like an apology for the commission. The difficulty felt by the commission was, whether they should introduce into the Episcopacy a Bishop who should not have a seat in the House. But, if they felt that the number of Bishops was not sufficient, they ought not to have been actuated by so small a consideration. Even if they had recommended a large addition to the number of Bishops, without that privilege, they would have had the support of several right rev. Prelates. It appeared to him, however, from the debate, that the measure for the union of the sees of St. Asaph and Bangor, instead of being, as he had anticipated, a measure of reform, would be an obstruction to measures of real reform. Under these circumstances he felt bound to give his vote in favour of the second reading of the bill of his noble Friend. He found that the benefits to be derived from the contemplated changes were dependent upon the lives of two right rev. Prelates, one of whom was present, and he hoped the other was likely to live as long as the right rev. Prelate who was then present, and gave promise from his appearance of a long life.
The Bishop of Norwichcould not allow this bill to pass without expressing his opinion. He should be sorry that it should go forth to the public, that he was hostile to the continuance of bishops in Wales. So far from it, he should be desirous that these two bishops should continue, and he should be glad to see the number of the bishops generally increased, particularly in the larger dioceses where the work to be done was more than could be effect u ally performed by one individual; and for this reason, he should be grateful if the noble Duke at the head of the Government would allow of the appointment of another bishop in the extensive district which he (the Bishop of Norwich) had to superintend. But there was another and pressing consideration to be attended to— and here he should have thought it his duty to trouble their Lordships with some statistical accounts which he had drawn up, had he not been anticipated by the most rev. Prelate (the Archbishop of Canterbury). He would, however, just refer them to the number of benefices in a certain number of dioceses in support of his views,

801
thus—Lincoln contained 1072; Norwich 897; Chester about 700; York 690; Lichfield 491; St. David's 454; while the joint sees of St. Asaph and Bangor contained only 258. That is not much more than half the number in St. David's where there was only one bishop, and about one quarter only of the number in the diocese of Lincoln. When it was therefore borne in mind, that the dioceses of St. Asaph and Bangor comprised but 258 benefices, and that the district proposed for the diocese of Manchester contained 1,340,000 souls, it was hardly possible to hesitate in preferring the interests of the latter. Anxious though he was to preserve to both the Welch sees their bishops, provided it could be secured without endangering more momentous interests. Before he sat down, he would take the liberty of turning their Lordships' attention to a singular argument urged by a writer of whose name he had not the slightest knowledge, and on whose opinion he might therefore animadvert, without any supposed feelings of a personal nature, for the retention of two bishops in North Wales. This writer, he begged to observe, professed him self to be a staunch friend to the Church, and vented his disapprobation of the conduct of the ecclesiastical commissioners in no measured terms, asserting that—
" His late Majesty was pleased, in an evil hour, to issue a commission to certain persons lay, as well as ecclesiastic, to advise him respecting certain alterations in the spiritual state of the kingdom, which the commissioners undertook to do, to the satisfaction, as it turned out, of none but those whose enmity to the Church was notorious."
That the prelates in that day quailed beneath the popular cry. That these alarming intermeddlings with the episcopal seats and diversion of the revenues of the cathedral churches could be justified only upon the principles of the great rebellion, that the union of these two sees might be looked upon as a deed of sacrilege—that the division of a diocese against the will of the bishop was a robbery upon him, and such violent attacks upon the unity of the Church were of the highest sin. After such remarks, the professed friend of the Church went on to vindicate the necessity for the two sees, by alleging the disreputable character of the clergy, asserting that the increase of sects in that country (North Wales) was beyond the imagina-
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tion of those who had never seen it, that the Church was literally desolate, that the clergy required a careful and watchful superintendence,—that being cut off from many of the advantages which their more favoured brethren in England possessed, they were the more ready to fall into habits of indolence or of disobedience. That discipline was almost disused there, and that habits of life that would and did shut a man out from worldly society, were not so rare in that country as they ought to be, and that, in consequence, these clergy required most active episcopal superintendence. Now, he (the Bishop of Norwich) was prepared to say, that whatever their conduct might have been in the lamentable state of apathy in which the Church had for a season allowed to creep over and cripple its exertions, such charges were, at present, in great measure, libellous, and he would appeal to his right rev. Friend (the Bishop of Bangor), whether a change had not taken place. He could speak from good authority, that they were following the example of the other clergy of England, and were greatly advancing in spirituality and devotion, and fully participated in the revival going forward in the Church, sincerely desirous of upholding alike the efficiency and the honour of their order, the estimation and dignity of the Church, and the real welfare of the country. Fully alive, then, though he was, to the importance of preserving as close as possible a juxta-position and connexion between the dioceses and their clergy, he was compelled by a sense of duty to an enormous and unprovided population to adhere to the existing arrangement.
Lord Lyttletonsaid, that after the gratifying speeches he had heard from right rev. Prelates, he felt satisfied that the proposed union could not take place; and he doubted not that their Lordships felt every desire to avoid it. There was no force in the objections urged against entertaining the present proposal, as, for instance, that the surrender of the Bishopric of Manchester was involved in adopting it, or the analogies suggested between the present and such cases as that of Bristol and Gloucester. As little ground did there appear to be for the apprehensions hinted, rather obscurely, about disturbing existing arrangements, the fact being that, existing arrangements were only prospective, and as they had effected as yet

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no alteration, a change of them as regarded the present case would only be a return to the existing state of things. The question, then, resolved itself really into one of the simple merits of the case—a balance of the alleged convenience of the union with the positive evils of that measure; and upon this point he did not think there could be any doubt. No one had attempted to deny the great evil of the union; and as it was also generally admitted that the question of the increase of the number of bishops must be separately, seriously, and speedily considered, there was no counterbalancing benefit at all to be attained by the adoption of the measure. While every class of men (including the clergy) were rapidly increasing with the augmentation of population, and while every order, every rank was perpetually and proportionately increased, it was utterly impossible that the important, the essential order of episcopacy, should remain long in its present position. There was, therefore, no evil to be avoided —no advantage to be gained, and, great mischief, it was admitted, would be produced by an adherence to the present measure.
The Marquess of Salisburyexpressed his opinion, that after the measure providing for the Manchester district had been permitted to rest so long— [The Duke of Wellington: " And has been acted upon by order in Council!"]—it would not be expedient to alter it without a proper substituted provision for so immense a population as that the interests of which were at stake. Till that object were answered—and gladly should he find it so—he must adhere to the existing arrangement; and he hoped the present proposal would be withdrawn.
The Bishop of London,in explanation, said, he should wish to correct the common error, that the first commission existed as a deliberative body, whereas it had been superseded by the existing commission, established for the purpose of executing the measures recommended by the former one, and sanctioned by Act of Parliament. He should be happy to find any means of reconciling, unobjectionably, the two great objects in view.
The Earl of Powissaid, I feel considerable difficulty in deciding what course is the most advisable for me to take under he appeal made to me, unaccustomed as I am to have such responsibilities thrown
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upon me, and knowing that a difference of opinion prevails as to whether it is or is not well now to go to a division. Under ordinary circumstances I should prefer to follow the same straightforward course on a public question which I should in private concerns, and, as we are all prepared for it, conclude my motion by going to a division. But after the suggestions of the right rev. Prelate and the noble Marquess (Marquess of Salisbury), and the universal feeling among your Lordships in favour of the early establishment of a Bishopric of Manchester, I think it will be a prudent course for me, with your Lordships' permission, to withdraw the bill for the present, reserving to myself the power of again bringing the subject to your Lordships' notice, if satisfactory measures are not adopted in respect of the bishopric of Manchester and the bishoprics of St. Asaph and of Bangor.
The Duke of Wellingtonhad no objection to his noble Friend's motion being withdrawn. When his noble Friend brought in a bill another time, he would recommend him, in the first instance, to have the Queen's consent to have the subject taken into consideration.
Amendment and motion withdrawn.
The House adjourned at a quarter past twelve o'clock.