Sitting of 6 August 1844

MINUTES.
BILLS. Public.—Reported.—Insolvent Debtors.
Private.—3o. and passed:—Duke of Hamilton and Brandon's Estate.
PETITIONS PRESENTED. By Mr. M. J. O'Connell, from Ireland (72 Petitions), for Repeal of the Union.—By Mr. Masterman, from St. Ann's, Blackfriars, and St. Andrew's-by-the-Wardrobe, for better Observance of the Lord's Day.—By Mr. A. Smith, from Merchants at Bombay, for Inquiry (China).—By Mr. T. Duncombe, from W. Byrne, for consideration of his case.—By Mr. Sheil, from Cashel, and M. Burke, against Charitable Bequests Bill.—By Mr. T. Duncombe, from Merthyr Tydvil, for a Pardon to Jones, Frost, and Williams; from Debtors in Whitecross-street, for Alteration of Insolvent Debtors Bill; and from S. Cobham, for Alteration of Joint Stock Companies Bills-

RAILWAYS.
Mr. W. E. Gladstonemoved that the Lords' Amendments to the Railways Bill be agreed to. As the Amendments proposed had been fully discussed, he hoped that the House would at once accede to them. The view of the Select Committee on Railways was, that the best course to take (as expressed in their Report) would be to have no legislation whatever upon Sunday travelling, but to leave the matter to the discretion of the Railway Companies. A strong impression prevailed, not only in this, but in the other House, that if Railway Companies were allowed in the exercise of their discretion, to run trains on Sundays, the principle of competition should be disclaimed. At the same time it was thought, that if such companies
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had the power to do so, they must not decline to make provision for the persons usually known as third-class passengers. On that principle, the Amendment of the hon. Member for Wolverhampton was agreed to; but that Amendment involved a good deal more. The Amendment, as carried by the hon. Member for Wolverhampton (Mr. Thornely) went to impose upon the Government of the country the duty of superintending the management of the Sunday third-class trains. Now, he thought it was impossible for Government to discharge these duties with any satisfaction to the public, as by the proposed arrangements it would be incumbent on the Board of Trade to say when the trains in question were to start, at what places they were to stop, and for what given time; and, in short, the details of every thing connected with the working of railways on Sundays, for the purpose of enabling the poorer classes to travel thereby, would be thrown upon the Board of Trade, and matters would be brought before them which they were very incompetent parties to decide. The course which he would be prepared to recommend to the House, waving his old opinion, would be to accede to the House of Lords' Amendments. They were very simple, and restricted the compulsory obligation to run particular trains, subject to the control of the Board of Trade, to every week-day in Scotland, and in England every week-day except Christmas Day and Good Friday. As to the Clause for carrying third-class passengers on Sundays, there was also a disposition to object to the Clause that it did not provide for the fares to be paid by such passengers. Now, he humbly conceived that it was not possible for the House of Lords to take the question of fares into consideration, and that they had no right to meddle with a power of charging which existed in the Railway Companies. He had no intention to make any proposal on the subject, as any change which he might suggest would compel him to depart from the arrangement to which he had come with the Railway Companies. There was another subject on which he was anxious not to be misunderstood, and it was, that these trains gave to third-class passengers as much accommodation as to the stations at which they stopped as to the passengers of other class-trains. That advantage had been secured by the Clause as it stands. There was but one other

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point on which a difference of opinion prevailed, viz. whether the third-class carriages run in trains should be covered from the weather, and the seats secured thereby from wet. As to that proposition he hoped that the House would not insist upon it. He did not think that they could adopt it in justice to the Railway Companies, and he believed that the Clause as it stood was more conducive to the objects in view than if such a provision was made. If such was done, the Railway Companies would find themselves in such a condition, that if they complied with the requisition to carry third class passengers in public carriages at the rate of twenty miles an hour, they would thereby offer a premium to the very best class of travellers to avail themselves of so cheap and safe a means of conveyance. Such a train, too, might be run as would meet the provisions of the law by arranging the carriages in a manner so uncomfortable as to exclude from them all but third class passengers. If they interfered with the power of the Railway Company to carry passengers and also with the covering of the carriages, he could not say but that the charge of injustice and indirect interference would be well founded, unless they agreed to prescribe a lower rate of speed, such as twelve miles by way of set off. One of the objects of the provisions as to the third class passengers was, that the labouring classes might be easily carried out of the neighbourhood of large towns into the country, and if they were allowed to go by quick trains, although without any security from being covered, it would give them much greater amount of opportunity for doing so than if their carriages were covered, and the Companies, from the smallness of the fare, were compelled to carry them with less speed. He was willing to propose, on the whole, that the House should accede to the Lords' Amendments. The points embraced in those Amendments were so few, that those who took an interest in the subject would have no difficulty at once in mastering them, and he trusted that the arrangements now contemplated would prove satisfactory to all parties.
Mr. Thornelysaid, that the effect of the Lords' Amendments would be, that Railway Companies should not be compelled to run railway trains on Sunday, but if they did so they should be obliged to attach during that day carriages for third
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class passengers only. He considered it to be his duty to propose that the charge on Sundays by such carriages should not exceed the charge for third class passengers on other days; and with such an addition he saw no objection to the adoption of the Lords' Amendments. He would move, accordingly, that a further provision be inserted in the rider introduced in the House of Lords to the sixth Clause, that the fare on third class passengers by Sunday trains should not exceed 1d. per mile.
Motion agreed to.

BIRTH OF A PRINCE—ADDRESS TO HER MAJESTY.
Sir R. Peelsaid, Sir, I am about to introduce a Motion of which I have not given notice, but I am convinced I shall be acting in accordance with the unanimous feeling of this House if I avail myself of the earliest opportunity of proposing that we should offer to Her Majesty our cordial congratulations on the happy event which has taken place this day. I am sure that there will be one feeling of universal satisfaction throughout this country that an addition has taken place to Her Majesty's family, and thus there is an increased guarantee that the Throne of these realms will long continue to be enjoyed by the direct descendants of Her Majesty. Every increase of domestic happiness to Her Majesty, will, I am sure, be a cause of grateful satisfaction to Her faithful Commons. And I, therefore, beg to move at once, that this House do present an Address to Her Majesty, expressing the sentiments which I have uttered.
Lord M. Hillseconded the Motion.
It was accordingly resolved, nemine contradicente:—
"That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, to offer the Congratulations of this House to Her Majesty on the birth of another Prince; and to assure Her Majesty, that every increase of Her illustrious Family, and every addition to Her Majesty's domestic happiness, afford the most unfeigned joy and satisfaction to Her faithful Commons."

BOROUGH OF SUDBURY.
Mr. Christiewished to know from the right hon. Baronet at the head of Her Majesty's Government, whether the statements contained in the Morning Herald newspaper, which was now considered the organ of

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the Government, were correct, that it was intended to give the franchise to be taken from Sudbury to part of the county of Middlesex?
Sir R. Peelsaid, that among other advantages which the Members of Government derived from their constant attendance in that House was the hearing of interesting reports of which they would otherwise have had no cognizance. As to the report which had appeared in the paper which the hon. Member was good enough to call the organ of Her Majesty's Government, he had never heard of it until mentioned by the hon. Member—he meant the report that Government was about to enrich the county of Middlesex with the spoils of Sudbury. It appeared also to be quite a novelty to other hon. Members. Now, in the first place, supposing that Government had formed any intention on the subject; nothing could be more unwise than to disclose it now, and thus afford food for local agitation during the whole of the recess; and, therefore, if he had come to such a conclusion, he should most cautiously abstain from mentioning it. He did not mean to say whether or not Government had come to a conclusion, and begged that no inference, one way or the other, might be drawn from his observations.

ART UNIONS.
A conference having taken place between the two Houses on the subject of the Lords' disagreement with the Commons' Amendments in the Arts Union Bill,
Mr. Wyseappeared at the Bar, and brought up their Lordships' reasons for not agreeing with the Commons' Amendments in the Arts Union Bill. Their Lordships objected to any legislation with reference to particular cases. It was stated by the dissentients that these individuals had sufficient cognizance of the illegality of their proceedings. They had the same knowledge, it was said, as those officially engaged in these Art Unions. He (Mr. Wyse) thought it was necessary to strike out the second Clause, in order to avoid forming a precedent. The House had, with reference to the qui tam actions, thrown its protection around certain individuals. The House ought to extend the same protection to those individuals who, by connecting themselves with a society for the promotion of art, had unintentionally violated the law. He, therefore,
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moved that the House of Commons should insist upon its Amendments.
The Chancellor of the Exchequerasked whether it would be politic to insist upon their Amendments?
Mr. T. Duncombesaid, if the Government would seriously take up the Amendments made by the House of Commons, he was quite sure that both the Bill and its Amendments would be carried, provided the Amendments were insisted upon. A great injustice would be done to three or four individuals if these Amendments were not agreed to by the House of Lords. Had not the House, with reference to certain gambling transactions, protected particular individuals? and it would be a gross act of inconsistency, cruelty, and injustice, if the House did not give those parties interested in the Bill its protection.
Mr. Bernalthought the case of these individuals particular cases of hardship. They could not separate these individual cases from the Art Unions themselves. It would be considered out of the House a hard measure towards these persons—individuals who had not, like other parties, the power themselves of bringing their grievances before either House of Parliament. Although he did not agree with the hon. Member (Mr. Wyse) with regard to the great utility of these Art Unions, he still protested against an act of injustice being done to particular individuals.
Sir R. Peelknew nothing whatever of the circumstances under which the alterations in the Bill were made. It certainly would be unfortunate if as the result of this interference the Bill was lost altogether, because they could not place the parties in the same position they were in prior to the introduction of this Bill. He hoped that the House would not insist upon its Amendments. He only suggested this course in order to avoid what he conceived to be a greater evil,—viz., the loss of the Bill, and an exposure of those parties to the penalties of the law. It was a great mistake to imagine that the Government had any hostility to the existence of Art Unions. Counsels' opinions had been taken with regard to their legality, and then it was that the Government thought it necessary to give notice to those parties that they were committing a violation of the law. It was under these circumstances that Parliament con-

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sidered itself justified in interfering. Without giving anything like a guarantee with regard to the course which the Government might think proper to take, he asked for the delay of twenty-four hours rather than hazard the loss of the measure altogether.
Mr. Wyseexpressed his entire concurrence in what had fallen from the right hon. Baronet, and he would move the postponement of the subject until tomorrow.
The Lords' reasons for dissenting from the Commons' Amendments to be printed, and taken into consideration on the following day.

CHURCH PATRONAGE (IRELAND).
Captain Bernalrose to move for Copies of any Letters or Instructions which may have been written to Lord Heytesbury, relative to the future disposal of Church Patronage in Ireland with reference to the Education Board. An hon. Member, who was not now present, had on a former occasion charged him with an attempt to revive what was called an Irish debate. But he was not open to that charge. It would be in the recollection of the House that the Irish Estimates were delayed to a very late period of the Session; so late, indeed, that the Member for Salford (Mr. Brotherton) was wanting in his supervisal duty in allowing 25,000 l. to be voted away after twelve o'clock at night. Neither did he think that he was guilty of any undue presumption in moving for these Papers, because the right hon. Baronet (Sir R. Peel) had himself during this Session spoken out boldly in favour of a system of National Education. It was, therefore, but natural for him to suppose that the right hon. Baronet would advance one step further, and having agreed to grant 25,000 l. additional for Catholic Education, he would give a specific assurance that the system of Church Patronage should be impartially administered. In a letter from the right hon. Baronet (Sir R. Peel) to Lord De Grey, in September, 1841, the right hon. Baronet said:—
"Let it be understood, that in respect to the Church preferments you will act upon your own sense of duty, and on the result of your own inquiries, and if that sense of duty prompts you to prefer the claims of professional merit, let your inquiries be directed to the ascertainment of those claims. * * *
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It is absolutely necessary, for the best interests both of the Church and State, that the patronage of the Irish Church should be applied on such principles. I will willingly forego any Parliamentary support which would only be conciliated by a disregard of those principles, though, indeed, the fact is, that if such considerations be attended to, the interests of Government are in the long run much better protected by the honest exercise of patronage than by administering it to favour individual supporters."
The letter read uncommonly well, and the House of Commons was so charmed by its being a private communication of the right hon. Baronet, to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, that they took no further proceedings on the subject, believing that those sentiments of the right hon. Baronet had been strictly attended to. But those hon. Gentlemen who had not that strong faith in the right hon. Baronet or in the documents that were to be found in the archives of Downing Street, suspended their judgment until facts should confirm or contradict the terms of that document penned by the right hon. Premier. What was the result? Three Bishoprics fell vacant. Two out of the three appointments that were made by the right hon. Baronet were of persons notorious for their hostility to the National System of Education. In 1841, Lord De Grey appointed the right rev. Dr. O'Brien Bishop of Ossory, who was well known to be opposed to the National System of Education. The next appointment was that of Dr. Stopford, as Bishop of Meath, who was equally well known as an Anti-National Education man. A third appointment was that of Dr. Daly to the bishopric of Cashel, who had been editor of the Christian Examiner, most bitter in its denunciations of the system of National Education. A fourth was the Very Rev. H. Newmam, Dean of Cork, brother-in-law of Dr. Daly, and of the same opinions and principles. A fifth was the Very Rev. Holt Waring, Dean of Dromore. A sixth was the Very Rev. H. Newland, Dean of Ferns; a seventh, the Very Rev. H. Packenham, Dean of St. Patrick; an eighth, the Very Rev. Charles Vignoles, Dean of Ossory; a ninth the Venerable Dr. Stokes, Archdeacon of Armargh; and a tenth, the Venerable H. Irwin, Archdeacon of Emly. Thus much for the dignitaries of the Irish Church; and without adverting to minor apppointments, he might observe that the

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Lord Lieutenant had the unprecedented number of thirty-nine chaplains, all, with only two exceptions, opponents of National Education. One of these exceptions was the Rev. Mr. Duncan, and for him there was of course no promotion. It might be remembered that in the course of a former debate the right hon. Baronet at the head of the Home Department drew down tremendous cheers by quoting Lord Bacon; but he would now ask him how he could reconcile such appointments with the warm interest he now felt in the cause of National Education. The right hon. Baronet at the head of the Government was reported to have said formerly that the feeling against National Education was gradually wearing out. Nobody acquainted with Ireland would be found to corroborate this assertion, and seeing that professional advancement was to be secured by hostility to National Education, it was no wonder that the feeling was so prevalent. In December, 1841, only two months after the date of the right hon. Baronet's letter, the Bishop of Down and Connor preached a sermon, in which he denounced the system of National Education as little better than inculcating Deism and Mahometanism. There was another point to which he wished to draw attention; the jurisdiction of the Bishop of Cashel and Waterford, and of the Bishop of Ossory extended over several counties, including 320 parishes, and more than 400 clergymen. What would be the conduct of those clergymen? National Education would be effectually excluded. What had been the conduct of Dr. Daly? It was a remark of Lord Orrery, in his Life of Swift, that he had been so long in the habit of giving way to his passions, that he at last mistook them for his duties. So with Dr. Daly, who had pronounced so many denunciations against National Education that he might begin to think them well-founded. At his last visitation of Lismore, a clergyman mentioned that he had been to a school upon the National Education principle, upon which Dr. Daly denounced him as having been engaged in doing the devil's work. During a tower of agitation this same peripatetic Prelate had denounced even the right hon. Baronet for entering into a God-denying compact with the Roman Catholics. During the present Session the Recorder of Dublin had presented a petition from the Bishop of Waterford and Cashel and the
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clergy of his diocese, stating that they could not carry out the system of National Education. One clergyman, indeed, of that diocese, was of a different opinion, the Rev. H. Woodward, who had written a pamphlet in favour of National Education, and who therefore remained only the rector of a parish. He could not help thinking that if Government had sincerely notified its intention of carrying that system into effect, they would not have experienced their present difficulties, and would have moderated the transports of vituperative Bishops. Depend upon it, these ecclesiastical dignitaries, the moment the warm and cheering light of Government favour was withdrawn from their eyes, would cease to kick against the pricks. If one man man more than another were indebted to National Education, it was the right hon. Baronet; it was very well for him to turn round and direct attention to his troops and to his barracks, but if it had not been for the exertions of Father Mathew and National Education, there would have been a rebellion in Ireland before now. If the money had been granted in 1835, and moreover, if an additional grant had been then made to Maynooth, and it had been placed on the footing of a Roman Catholic College instead of a wretched almshouse, he would appeal to the right hon. Baronet, who sat still and did nothing when it was useful to move, what might not now have been the state of Ireland? It was very well for him, under the pressure of circumstances, to come down to the House, to say that he deplored the present condition of affairs, to propose a larger grant to Maynooth, and to throw a little dust in people's eyes by his 25,000 l. increase for National Education, but he would find that such a course in the long run would not answer his purpose, and that he must speak out and deal plainly. His main object in moving for the papers of which he had given notice was, if possible, to draw from the Government a pledge that, in future, Church patronage should not be given away to the opponents of National Education.
Sir R. Peel: Sir, it is perfectly true that I stated to the House, in the course of the late discussion on Irish affairs, that I had written a letter in September, 1841, to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, to the Effect of that letter quoted by the hon. Member opposite. Whether the words

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were exactly the same I cannot answer for, but certainly the purport of them was that which the hon. Member has stated. In the course of that debate it had been remarked that one cause of the inferiority of the Irish Church was, that for a long series of years the promotions and patronage had been made conducive to the advancement of political interest. I said that this charge could not apply to this Government, for after the appointment of Lord De Grey it was intimated to the Lord Lieutenant that it was the opinion of Her Majesty's Government the best mode of strengthening the influence of the Irish Church was to appoint to the offices of the Church men of unblemished character and of the highest merit; and that understanding from Lord De Grey it was his intion to make these qualifications the condition of appointments in the Irish Church, that Lord De Grey would never have any solicitation from the Government on account of parliamentary interest in respect to these appointments. This was the understanding and engagement on the subject, and this engagement Lord De Grey did literally fulfil. Her Majesty's Government had never pressed those political or parliamentary claims which other Governments had advanced, believing that Lord De Grey would exercise the Church patronage with fidelity, and according to the principles stated in the letter to which reference has been made. And my firm belief is, that Lord De Grey has acted with fidelity to the understanding which was arrived at between himself and Her Majesty's Government, and that at no period has professional eminence and private character been more strictly adhered to as the rule of recommendation to the patronage of the Church. I do not believe that either parliamentary or political motives have ever influenced Lord De Grey in his recommendations to the patronage of the Church. [Captain Bernal: "Hear, hear."] And I again repeat, notwithstanding the hon. Member opposite cheers, that there never was a period when the appointments in the Irish Church were more influenced by a regard to professional character, learning, and professional worth. But what says the Report of the Commissioners? The Report says:—
"We have the gratification of observing that the unfounded impressions upon the subject of the national system, which we have had
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on former occasions to notice, are, at length, rapidly dying away."
The hon. Member has referred to Dr. O'Brien, Dr. Stopford, and Dr. Daly. I admit, and I regret the circumstance, that some of the Irish Prelates have exhibited hostility to the system of National Education. I do not mean to deny anything. I do not deny that some have displayed an overforward hostility to the system, but what I stated was, that the professional worth and merits of the parties who received the patronage of the Church formed the exclusive ground of their recommendation. The hon. Member has said that I have only recently exhibited remarkable zeal in favour of National Education. This is not the fact. In 1835, during the short period in which I presided over the Treasury, in that year I proposed an increase of the Vote for National Education. During the whole period of the late Government, did I oppose the Vote for National Education? On the contrary, I gave it my cordial support. As I said before, in 1835 a proposition was made by Government for an increased Vote. The hon. Gentleman quotes a pamphlet written by Mr. Woodward, to whose opinion he attaches much importance. Mr. Woodward begins by saying:—
"So fully bent is the Government which now sways the destines of the country upon carrying out this favourite project, that the Prime Minister is reported to have declared his intention of patronising and promoting those ecclesiastics only who will co-operate with him in the design. This report, however, seems to rest on but slender grounds; and it is well that it does so. For surely it were much to be deplored that an Administration who have hitherto dispensed their Church patronage with such clean hands, should, by a rash determination, tie up those hands from the further prosecution of so good a work."
This is the clergyman on whom the hon. Member relies and selects as an example. This very clergyman gives two opinions—first, he says that the Irish Government administered the Church patronage so as to entitle them to public approbation; and next he deprecates all intention of charging on the Lord Lieutenant that the opposition to or approbation of the system of National Education, was to be the test of the fitness of parties to receive the patronage of the Church. And, further, in this pamphlet it will be seen Mr. Woodward expressly states that up to

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the year 1843 he had been opposed to the system of National Education. Mr. Woodward in the pamphlet distinctly states that he never manifested any particular zeal in favour of the system up to a late period, and yet the hon. Member remonstrates with me because this Gentleman still remains a rector. I stated that I thought the objections to the system of National Education were gradually decreasing. And on what grounds did I make this assertion? I stated it on the authority of the Commissioners interested in the carrying out this system—the Archbishop of Dublin, Dr. Murray, Sir A. R. Blake, the Solicitor General, and others, who presented the last Report to this House. This Report distinctly states that the Commissioners have gratification in observing that the unfounded impressions on the subject of National Education, which existed at the outset, were at length rapidly dying away. So it will be seen it was not an unsupported opinion of my own, that the objections to the system were gradually weakening. I referred to the Report of the Commissioners, and from that Report I obtain an account of the increase which has taken place in the number of schools and scholars within these last few years. The Report in question states as follows:—

Date.

No. of Schools.

No. of Children.

1839

1581

192,971

1840

1978

232,560

1841

2337

281,849

1842

2721

319,372

1843

2912

355,320

At the close of 1842 we had 2721 schools in operation, attended by 319,792. At the close of 1843 we had 2912 schools, which were attended by 365,339 children. The increase in the number of schools amounted within the year to 191, and the increase in the attendance of children to 35,528. This, then appears to be a complete demonstration that the system is spreading; that the number of schools and of scholars is increasing; and that the increase does not arise from the increase in the number of the Roman Catholic children, but that the objections to the system are in fact fast vanishing. I do sincerely believe that many of the object-
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tions felt on the part of the clergy of the Established Church arose from mistaken impressions as to the intentions and objects of the system. I believe a general impression existed that the Divine Scriptures were absolutely interdicted in some of the schools. This impression arose from the fact not having been closely examined into, and this occasioned those vehement objections to participate in or to promote the system of National Education. But such is not the fact; and I am glad to have an opportunity of inculcating on the Protestant community of Ireland that no such prohibitions in respect of the Scriptures is contained in the National System of Education. On the contrary, it will be found that in 1000 of these schools the Scriptures are read daily, and that in 1400 extracts from Scripture are read. These details will be found in the Report. From a paper which was laid on the Table by order of the House of Commons last Session, I find that in 944 schools the Scriptures were read, and in 1300 the Scriptural extracts which the Commission published were read. So, therefore, the Report is totally without foundation that there is any prohibition of the reading of the Scriptures in these schools. What is the rule of the Commissioners on this head? The rule is published, and every one who impugns the system ought to have cognisance of it. The rule is that
"The patrons of the several schools have the right of appointing such religious instruction as they may think proper to be given therein, provided that each school be open to children of all communions—that due regard be had to parental right and authority—that, accordingly, no child be compelled to receive, or be present at, any religious instruction to which his parents or guardians object—and that the time for giving it be so fixed that no child shall be thereby in effect excluded, directly or indirectly, from the other advantages which the school affords. Subject to this, religious instruction may be given either during the fixed school hours or otherwise."
So that any of these schools may be attended by Protestant and Roman Catholic children, and there the Scriptures will be read. The next rule was
"That the reading of the Scriptures either in the Protestant authorised or Douay version, as well as the teaching of catechisms, comes within the rule as to religious instruction."
The pamphlet of Mr. Woodward is useful. Speaking of the regulations of the Commissioners, he states the several

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impediments in the way of clergymen or laymen of the Established Church becoming patrons of the national schools. Mr. Woodward then quotes the two orders to which I have referred, which shows that the Scriptures may be read in the schools, provided due regard is had to those differences in creeds for which provision has been made.
"Now," said this rev. Gentleman, "What, I would ask, would a patron desire more than this? What could he want beyond being enabled to read and explain the Scriptures for an hour each day to his own children, and to as many others as are willing to avail themselves of the opportunity; and, besides that, to convey what religious instruction he may thick fit?"
With such an impression, he added that he was not disposed to place himself in opposition to the system of National Education in Ireland, being desirous to derive all the benefit from the system it might possess or offer in the way of education for the mass of the people in Ireland. In answer to the question put by the hon. Member, I say that it is the intention of Her Majesty's Government warmly and cordially to give our support to the system of National Education in that country. I might add, as a proof of the sincerity of our intentions, that an application having been made for a separate grant in aid of other schools in connection with the Established Church, the Government had declined to recommend the grant, from a fear that a separate Parliamentary grant for such a purpose would defeat the object they had in view—united instruction of the children of persons of different religious creeds in one class of schools. The Government had reason to apprehend, that the effect of such a grant would be to induce the Protestant parents to withdraw their children from the present general system of instruction to place them in their own schools, and thus a separation would be effected in respect to the education of children of Roman Catholics and Protestants. It was suggested, that if it were granted there was great reason to expect that the Presbyterians in Ireland, who had hitherto displayed a sincere desire to co-operate with the promoters of the National System of Education, might feel they were entitled to a grant for the establishment of separate schools on their own principles, which would be a still greater
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inconvenience, as the co-operation of the Presbyterians would thus be lost, and three different and separate systems of education would be in operation, instead of one. I am fully aware of the advantages which the present system of National Education offers, and therefore I will not consent to abandon the Vote of the House for enlarging the means of a general and united system of education in Ireland, embracing the children of Catholics, Protestants, and Presbyterians, with permission to the pastors of each persuasion to instruct the children of their flock one day in the week, and without, the exclusion of the Scriptures from the use of the scholars upon the other days of the week. With respect to the correspondence required to be produced by the hon. Member, there is no such correspondence in existence. I had an interview with the noble Lord before he went to Ireland, in which this subject, amongst others, was discussed. That noble Lord knows full well it is the intention of Her Majesty's Government to support cordially the National System of Education of Ireland. He knows what are our sentiments with respect to Church patronage in that country. I have not pressed upon his Lordship any condition that in dispensing Church patronage there, he was to make advancement dependent upon political considerations, or the course which members of the clergy of the Established Church might adopt with respect to the system of National Education, from a conviction that it would be unwise in this way to enlist their pride in opposition to that system of education. I should be sorry to place the dispensation of Church preferment upon grounds so base. I wished it to be dispensed upon the only justifiable grounds, that is to say, upon the grounds of ability, activity, and purity of life in the clergyman preferred, convinced that if preferment were made to depend upon a clergyman's subscribing to any particular opinion, or set of opinions, as a test of his fitness for preferment, all hope of success in our object by means of Church preferment must be at an end. There is no such correspondence, at, I repe as that which the hon. Member requires, and I will say that no consideration could ever induce me to adopt such a test of fitness for clerical promotion. I repeat that it is the intention of Her Majesty's Government to give to the National System of Education its warm and cordial support.

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The Rev. Mr. Woodward begins his pamphlet by saying he claimed a right to address the clergy of the Established Church in Ireland, in consequence of what he had urged ten years before, in 1834, upon the subject of his indifference to Church preferment, in a pamphlet on the subject of tithes.
"For my part," says he, "in making these observations, I have no purpose to serve but the discharge of my own conscience, I seek the favour of no party. I expect no larger benefice than the one I hold; nor have I the slightest wish for advancement."
Having thus disavowed, in 1834, any desire for advancement, in the words I have quoted in his late publication, he writes:—
"My first impression when I heard of the plan of National Education was, I will confess, that in the discipline of the schools an unholy attempt was ventured on, so to amalgamate discordant creeds as to form a kind of neutral compound for the scholars. Whether anything of this kind entered into the original intention of the Board I know not, for I have very little acquaintance with the subject; but assuredly in the present conduct of the plan, they are wholly cleared of such a charge. On the contrary, one of the grand objections of the Committee of the Church Education Society to the National Board is, that they will not sanction the very amalgamation I so much deprecate."
So far I have been induced to enter into the arguments and statements of the rev. Gentleman alluded to by the hon. Member, and I shall now only add that in my opinion there never was nor could be devised a plan less likely to conciliate the Protestant and Catholic population of Ireland than that which would result from adopting the advice of the hon. Mover, which advice must obviously have the appearance of insinuating that men filling the sacred office were open to the influence of selfish motives when they changed opinions they had once conscientiously entertained.
Mr. Wysewas glad that public apprehension would, in a great degree, be removed upon this subject by what had passed on the present occasion. Stronger evidence of the gradual removal of prejudices could not be adduced than the increase in the number of schools and in the number of children sent to them; and it ought to be added, since it was an important addition, that the increase had been much larger in the north than in the south and west of Ireland. Any grant
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intended for the education of the lower classes of the community must go to a greater amount towards the Catholic majority than towards the Protestants, but the education of every peasant must be a benefit to the whole community. A charge had been often urged against the Roman Catholic Clergy of being opposed to the reading of the Scriptures. He had repudiated the charge more than once: he had himself seen a bible printed by a Catholic Prelate in the north of Ireland in the same form as the authorised version, for which there was the full authority of the Pope, sanctioning the reading, and in addition to this Father Mathew had, at his own expense, also printed a bible. That charge, therefore, was unfounded. One of the chief objections against the national system had been the inspection of the schools; those prejudices had altogether passed away, and the parties were now glad of an inspection, which taught them the improvemets which had taken place elsewhere. Another great improvement had taken place in the mode of writing the books intended for the classes. Their value was best shown by the universal circulation of the books amongst all classes of the community. He believed that they were the best productions of their kind in any country, and had been in circulation not only in America and in France, but had also been translated, and were used in Italy. What he would be anxious to dwell upon, however, were the words of the right hon. Baronet, that he would give to the system not only a general and Ministerial protection, but a warm and cordial support; but to give this warm and cordial support he must see the execution of his intentions left not to persons absolutely bound and pledged, but at least to those who had not given opinions indirect, he might say factious, hostility, to which his hon. Friend had ascribed many of the appointments. If the right hon. Baronet were anxious that the system should be worked cordially and warmly, he would find that it could not be worked by Prelates directly opposed to the plan. He regretted, with respect to the Bishop appointed to the Diocese with which he was himself connected, that his conduct should contrast so strongly with that o his predecessor, who had mingled the performance of his high duties as a Protestant Ecclesiastic with consideration and good feeling towards his Catholic fellow

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subjects, and who not only attended the schools as a part of his duty, but also assisted in every charity for the Catholics. Such were the watchers over education which it would do well for the right hon. Baronet to appoint—not fettering them and compelling them to adopt the national system, but directing their favourable attention towards it. If he would do this, the time would come when he would not hear such Motions as this of his hon. Friend, and would have to gratulate the House not only upon the progress of education, but upon a rich harvest, ripened by the spontaneous support of the people of Ireland.
Viscount Ebringtoncould have wished that the speech of the right hon. Baronet had been delivered upon some former occasion, when the question of Irish Education had been attacked, and had not reserved it for the period when he had the weight of Government upon his shoulders. Had he before stated his views the weight of his opinion might have mitigated the bitter and incessant hostility of the party by which he was surrounded and supported. He thought that it might have had influence with the hon. Member for Oxford, and might have dispelled what the right hon. Baronet himself admitted to be the utterly unfounded delusion as to the principle of the system which had pervaded not only this country but Ireland. It was now too late in the day so claim the character of a candid and warm supporter of those schools. Whether the right hon. Baronet, might upon some occasion, have given a silent vote in their favour he knew not; but when the system was threatened, and when it with difficulty bore up against the attacks, any expression of support from him would have come with a different force, and would have produced different results. There would have been no reason then to doubt the zeal which he now professed to feel, or to suspect that political motives were blended with his conscientious desire to extend the National System of Education in Ireland. Among the recommendations of the persons whom he had promoted to dignitaries in the Church was not that of accurately looking at a subject before they pronounced an adverse opinion as to what did not exist, for he believed that there was no one of the divines alluded to who had not sanctioned with his high authority, and had not disseminated the very delu-
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sions and errors which he (Viscount Ebrington) trusted the speech of the right hon. Baronet that evening would extinguish for ever. It had been well said that those who lived in glass houses should not throw stones. Upon a recent occasion the right hon. Baronet thought fit to throw out an insinuation against the rev. Dr. Hudson, dean of Armagh, that his only recommendation to the sinecure which he enjoyed appeared to be his large private fortune. That was not his recommendation, it was his zealous support of the National Education System. The right hon. Baronet called him a sinecurist. He was so, thanks to the Government, whose Attorney General had reconsidered the legal opinion he had formerly given, that the living of Armagh, with a cure of souls, was really attached to the deanery. But how did he employ his sinecure? He did not receive one farthing from the deanery; he was not one farthing the richer for it. He divided its revenue into four equal parts, one of which defrayed the tithes, taxes, &c., to be paid upon it. Another he devoted to the local charities of Armagh; another to the promotion of education, almost entirely in schools connected with the National Education Board, and the remainder to the promotion of temperance. It was only an act of justice to say thus much of Dr. Hudson. He only wished that the Dean whose establishment had been recently brought under the notice of the House had spent his income half as well. He was glad to find that the scruples of some of the Protestant Clergy with reference to these schools had been dispelled. He knew that many of the Clergy of the Establishment, especially in England, had come to the same conclusion as Mr. Woodward, that their objections to the system, as not allowing the reading of the Divine Scriptures, were untenable; and he thought the right hon. Baronet might better follow up his good intentions, than by making speeches in Parliament on the one hand, and promoting those who were scarcely known but for their hostility to the Board of Education with the other.
Mr. Darbyhad the pleasure of knowing Mr. Woodward, who had been, at one time, unfavourable to the system, but had now sanctioned it: and if the rule suggested by the hon. Gentleman opposite had been adopted, they would have excluded from appointments such a man as

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Mr. Woodward, who, upon further consideration of the subject had changed his opinions. Whether the Clergy of Ireland had or had not conscientious objections to the system, he thought they ought not to abstain from visiting the schools and preventing abuses. He thought this was the best thing for the clergy to do, even if they did object to the system. But when they talked of bigotry and intolerance, he must say that to declare a man who conscientiously objected to the system, and yet did his duty in every way besides, and was an able man, should be, on that account alone, excluded from preferment, would be the worst possible way of promoting the object which the hon. Gentleman opposite had in view.
Mr. Sheildid not complain of the right hon. Gentleman for not laying down a rule of exclusion, but what they did complain of was the practice. The modes in which the Government had exercised control, had effectually counteracted their own intentions. The right hon. Gentleman looked upon the system as fraught with benefits to the community, and declared that he would give to it his warm and cordial support. But how, and in what manner, did he give it? If the patronage of the Crown were applied in conformity with the system under the protection of the right hon. Gentleman, he would select those who were attached to the policy he supported. Let not the Government imagine that he charged them with any want of sincerity, they had given proofs of it sufficient, which some might argue upon, but none could controvert. But they had not carried out their support in an effectual way. He did not wish them to exclude every one who had opposed the system, but in practice, they had excluded every one who supported it. He had heard the list of the appointments read by his hon. Friend. The Government were charged with not having appointed one who supported the system. There were O'Brien, and Stopford, and Daly, and Newman, not one of whom was a supporter of the National Board. Their hostility was open, avowed, and undisguised; and he said that such appointments counteracted the intentions of the Government. They were not serving the Church by them—they were placing the Church in hostile array to the people—they were making it odious to the people. They saw this phalanx opposed to one of
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the most important measures, and they thence assumed that the Church of Ireland was hostile to this useful measure, and this excited, and justly excited, the hostility of the Irish people to that Church itself. How did this come to pass? The right hon. Baronet said that he did not control Lord De Grey as to his Church appointments. It was understood that the Irish Secretary had no control over the ecclesiastical appointments, but that they were left to the Lord Lieutenant whoever he might be. Surely the right hon. Baronet said that he had left those appointments to the Lord Lieutenant without control, and he said that these appointments were made in a manner which was injurious to the system supported by Government. But then it was said that this was a question which did not interfere with the Church, that it was a question merely political. It was not merely a political question, but was a religious question, it was a moral question. From the Education Board flowed morality, and charity, and Christian love; it was then a question of morals, and therefore religious. He thought they did wrong not to institute to preferments partizans of the system with merits for their appointments. His hon. Friend had spoken strongly against the Irish Church, but not half so strongly as the noble Lord the Secretary for Ireland had spoken, to the surprise of his Friends in that House, and to the disappointment of those in Ireland. The noble Lord had declared that the conduct of the Church had been most factious in this regard. [Lord Eliot: No, no.] The noble Lord certainly used the word "factious," and the term rendered him the subject of paragraph after paragraph in the columns of the Evening Mail. The word was certainly used, and he was surprised that the noble Lord's memory was so treacherous upon the point. The noble Lord found the whole Church arrayed against him—he found a misapprehension of facts, and a misapprehension of sentiments—and it was but natural that, in his exasperation, he had said that the conduct of the Church was factious. Were they not justified, then, in asking the Government to reconsider this question, and to decide whether a course more consistent with the feelings of the Government might not be adopted? The new Lord Lieutenant had continued in office as chaplains thirty-

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nine men, all of whom were opposed to the National Board, with two exceptions. If he thought they were acting a double part, he would not ask them to reconsider the subject, but he knew they were not; still they were acting a part which Mr. Burke had condemned again and again. Let them look at the very last work of that eminent statesman; they would find it laid down that the best intentions of the Government had been counteracted by their own officials, and so it was here. The dignitaries of the Church were selected on account of the hostility they displayed to the system supported by Government. He hoped, sincerely, as they were at the end of the Session, that they would part in good humour; there were many intimations given by the Government, for which he was thankful, and more particularly for the promises that they would promote education; he only regretted that they should have done anything to mar its good effects, and to disfigure, if not wholly to destroy, their good work.
Lord Eliotsaid, that as reference had been made to some expression of his two years ago, he wished to make one or two observations. This was the first time he was aware that the expression alluded to by the right hon. Gentleman had ever been attributed to him as applied to the Clergy of the Established Church in Ireland. What he said on the occasion referred to by the right hon. Gentleman was that in the communications he had received the failure of the system was attributed to the hostility of the Clergy of the Established Church, but that he was sure that hostility was governed by the most conscientious motives. He believed that if he had on that occasion made use of the expression alluded to, there were several of his hon. Friends behind him who would at the time have called upon him for an explanation of it. It was now some time ago, and he could not pretend to recollect every word he spoke on the occasion, but he was sure that he spoke with respect of Clergy of the Established Church, and declared his belief that their opposition was based upon conscientious motives. He differed altogether from the right hon. Gentleman if he thought that no Clergyman ought to be promoted unless he sacrificed his conscientious opinions, and as to the appointments of Lord De Grey, they were guided solely by a view of the zeal and ability and character of the individual,
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in utter disregard of all feelings of party. In the whole list there was not one who possessed any family influence, or could be said to have got promotion on such grounds. [Mr. Sheil: Bishop Daly.] Dr. Daly was certainly the brother of a gentleman who had been Member for an Irish county, but was no longer so, and surely this was no reason why his claim should be overlooked, he being in every other sense fully qualified. He believed that the majority of the most eminent divines of the Established Church were opposed to the National System of Education, but was this to deprive them of all claim to preferment, if they performed all the duties of a parish priest in an efficient and exemplary manner? He believed that although there was still considerable hostility to the National System, the opponents of the measure were beginning to look calmly into the matter, and to think that they may have been labouring under a misconception, and he believed that in a few years a great change of opinion would afford the means of a more beneficial application of the system, but that change must not be the consequence of any suspicion of a compromise of honour by a dispensation of promotion. When distinguished divines found that they were not proscribed on account of their conscientious opinions, they would begin to examine the system more calmly, and would see that it became their duty to superintend the schools, and improve them as much as they could, although they might not agree in the principle on which they were founded. He would repeat, that no Lord Lieutenant had ever dispensed the patronage of the Church in Ireland with more perfect impartiality than Lord De Grey did; or with a more anxious desire to select divines the most eminent for their ability, zeal, and piety; and to refuse promotion to such men, because of a difference of opinion, must surely be an injustice.
Mr. M. J. O'Connellasked whether the Government thought they promoted the interests of religion or of the Church in a great district, and in two extensive counties, in which there were many Catholics, by placing at the head of the Church there a man who had used such language as had been quoted by his hon. Friend? He was indebted to the noble Lord for a statement of Dr. Daly's qualifications, for all he had heard of his work as a parish priest at Powerscourt was, that during the

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minority of Lord Powerscourt he had advised the mother of that noble Lord to refuse the Roman Catholics a site for a place of worship, and that they were in consequence obliged to worship in a barn. He (Mr. O'Connell) believed, that upon one of the occasions referred to at Lismore, last year, he had told his congregation to avoid intercourse with Roman Catholics, and had enjoined, above all, Protestants in a wealthy condition of life not to employ Catholic servants. He believed that those were facts which could not be denied. There was a rev. Gentleman in Trinity College, known for his literary attainments, who had been passed over, but as for Dr. Daly, in the name of all that was sacred, what had he to do with literature? He had never heard of him, except as the Editor of the Christian Examiner [And of the "Life of Lady Powerscourt" from an opposition Member]. He (Mr. M. O'Connell) had never heard of that work, and except for the instance of intolerance which had been cited, and for his opposition to the National System of Education, he had never heard that Dr. Daly was distinguished for anything. Perhaps his brother's services had been rewarded vicariously through him, and indeed it had been said that the Mitre had been substituted for the Coronet in the family of the Daly's. But, of course, on the principle on which the right hon. Baronet administered his patronage that could not be.
Lord Eliotwished to say one word in explanation. Since he addressed the House an hon. Friend of his had brought him the Parliamentary Debates where he found the observations he had made on the occasion to which the right hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. Sheil) had just now referred, as to the hostility of the Clergy to the National System. He found that what he said was this:—
"He could assure the House that there was no dislike on the part of the Protestants to send their children to the national schools, and although the Protestant Clergy were opposed to the system, he did not doubt that they were influenced by conscientious motives."
The right hon. Gentleman did him an injustice, therefore, if he supposed that he had any intention to depreciate the Protestant Clergy of Ireland.
Captain Bernaldid not wish the right hon. Gentleman opposite to lay down any fixed rule, but he did wish him to appoint Clergymen to clerical offices who were
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not strongly opposed to the System of General Education.
Motion withdrawn.
House adjourned at half past eight o'clock.

MINUTES.
BILLS. Public.—2a. Arms (Ireland).
Reported.—South Sea Company; Merchant Seamen.
3o. and passed: — Slaughtering Horses; Tralee Navigation and Harbour; Salmon Fisheries (Scotland); Piccadilly Improvement; Spirits (Ireland); Woods and Forests Accounts; Grand Canal (Ireland); Controverted Elections; Joint Stock Banks Regulation; Savings' Banks.
Received the Royal Assent. — Three-and-a-Half per Cents. Dissentients; Ecclesiastical Jurisdictions; Debtors and Creditors; Militia Pay; Aliens; Clerk of the Crown in Chancery; Privy Council Appellate Jurisdiction Act Amendment; New South Wales, etc. Government; Trafalgar Square; Detatched Parts of Counties; Land Tax Commissioners Names; Farm Buildings; Transfer of Licenses (Post Horses); Duchy of Cornwall Lands; Criminal Justice (Middlesex); Customs (New South Wales); Books and Engravings; Transfer of Property; Unlawful Oaths (Ireland); Party Processions (Ireland).
Private. — Reported. — Middle Level Drainage and Navigation.
3a. and passed:—Paisley General Gas.
Received the Royal Assent.—Great Southern and Western Railway (Ireland); Monkland Railways (Wishaw and Coltness Railway); North Wales Mineral Railway; London and Croydon Railway; Ayr Bridge; Swansea Improvement; Kingston-upon-Hull Docks; Rochdale Improvement; Ventnor Improvement; Willenhall Chapel (Fisher's) Estate; Hitchin's (or Peach's) Estate; Ramsden's Estate; Passingham's Estate; W. H. B. Jordan Wilson's Estate; Harris's Estate; Lady Le Despencer's Estate; Ladbroke's Estate; Bowyer's Estate; Sir George Gervis's (or Pemberton's) Estate; Lord Lovat's Estate; Devayne's Estate; Bishop of London's Estate; Morton's Estate; Lord Cranstoun's Estate; Werrington, etc. Curacy (or Hele's) Estate; Bishop of Down, Connor, and Dromore's Estate; Cheape's Divorce (India); Hough's Divorce (India).
PETITIONS PRESENTED. From Kent Law Society, against Poor Law Amendment Bill.—By Lord Normanby, from Presbyterian Congregation of Mount Zion Chapel, Jamaica, for Reducing the Duty upon British Colonial Sugar.

HER MAJESTY'S ACCOUCHEMENT.
The Duke of Wellingtonrose and said: I am sure your Lordships have participated in the joy of the public upon the occurrence of this day, and that you must be anxious to avail yourselves of the earliest opportunity to express your congratulations to Her Majesty for Her safety, and upon the joyful event. I therefore move, in conformity with the usual practice, and without giving notice—
"That a humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, to congratulate Her Majesty on the Birth of another Prince, and to assure Her Majesty that every Increase of Her illustrious

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Family, and every Addition to Her Majesty's domestic Happiness, afford the most unfeigned Joy and Satisfaction to the House of Lords."
Lord Melbourne: I beg leave my Lords to second that Motion.
Carried unanimously.
The Duke of Wellington: I beg leave to move that the Address be presented by the Lords with White Staves.
Agreed to.

SERVIA.
Lord Beaumontrepeated a question which he had put on a former evening, as to the restoration of two Ministers by the Porte, on an assumed understanding with Prince Alexander Georgeowitch.
The Earl of Aberdeenin answer to the question of the noble Lord, wished to state that he had no knowledge whatever of any such engagement as that referred to by the noble Lord, nor had he any reason to know or to believe that any such promise had been made as the noble Lord had mentioned. But though he had no knowledge or belief of any such engagements, it might be satisfactory to the noble Lord to learn, that, from a recent communication received from Her Majesty's Minister at the Court of St. Petersburg, the Imperial Government had no objection whatever to the return of the two Ministers referred to.
Lord Beaumontwas perfectly satisfied with the answer of the noble Earl. He must have been misled by his information.

COURT MARTIAL ON LIEUTENANT GRAY.
The Earl of Mintoasked whether the court-martial which had recently been held on Lieutenant Gray had been held in consequence of any representations made to the Government by any Foreign Power, or whether that proceeding had been adopted by the exclusive directions of the Admiralty in carrying out their own views on this subject.
The Earl of Haddingtonsaid, the court-martial had been ordered in consequence of communications made in certain correspondence to the Foreign Office as to the conduct of the officer whose name had been mentioned.
The Earl of Aberdeenwished to add to the answer given by his noble Friend, that although the court-martial had taken
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place in consequence of the representations of a Foreign Government, yet no Foreign Government had ever suggested any such proceedings. The French Government complained of the violation of the Treaty, and of the Right of Search, a French ship having been searched without warrants; and, on that being reported in the proper department, the Admiralty had thought proper to institute an inquiry into the facts of the case, and the result was the proceedings that had taken place.
The Earl of Mintosaid, there could be no doubt if a grave complaint was made by a Foreign Government against a British naval officer, and the Admiralty considered the circumstanstances justified an inquiry by court-martial, they would be quite right in instituting it. In this case, what he was anxious to know was, whether the proceeding had taken place in consequence of the complaints made by the Foreign Government, or whether it had originated solely from the view taken by the Admiralty of the circumstances reported to them? For his own part, he saw no such irregularity in the circumstances complained of as to call for an inquiry by court-martial on a charge so serious as that on which this officer had been put on his trial. He would make no observation as to the proceedings which had taken place in regard to the sentence.
The Earl of Haddington: Every irregularity ought to be tried by a court-martial.
The Earl of Mintothought courts-martial were sometimes resorted to on light occasions, but he would not further enter upon the point. There was one other question he wished to put to the noble Earl—whether the senior Captain at the port at which the investigation took place, Captain Burgoyne, was a member of the court-martial?
The Earl of Haddingtonhad not read the minutes of the court-martial, and therefore was not prepared to answer the noble Earl's question. If the noble Earl wished for any information as to the proceedings of the court-martial, he had better give notice of a question for a future day. As to the noble Earl's previous question, he had only to say that on the face of the papers presented to Government from a Foreign Power, the Admiralty considered that a case for a court-martial was made out.
Subject at an end.

BUSINESS OF THE SESSION.
The Marquess of Normanbysaid, he would take the opportunity of the Motion for reading the Order of the Day, to call their Lordships' attention to the subject of which he had given notice on the previous evening. In using the words, "call attention," he might possibly have employed an erroneous phrase, for looking at what had passed that evening and the previous night, he felt sure that not one of their Lordships who entertained a conscientious feeling as to the discharge of his legislative duties, could feel other than ashamed of the manner in which, from some cause or other, within the last few days—he would not say their legislative faculties had been called into action, but their machinery for law making had been brought into play. Since he had given the notice last night, he, having remained until an early hour that morning, when most of their Lordships had left the House, had seen several important Bills passed through those stages in which it was usually considered they received the most deliberation, and when the greatest number of alterations were made, with a degree of rapidity and inattention which could scarcely be imagined by those who had not witnessed it. Many measures—not less, he believed, than ten—had passed through the Committee in less than as many minutes, his noble Friend (Lord Shaftesbury), who usually officiated as Chairman of Committees, merely informing the House that each had a title and a preamble. While these proceedings were going on, having been absent from the House for the last two or three days, he was not aware whether or not the subject matter of those Bills had been before explained to their Lordships. He naturally concluded that it had, but on inquiring of some of his noble Friends near him, he discovered that the subject matter of those various measures had not been opened to their Lordships at all. He remembered very well in former years a noble and learned Friend of his, not now in his place, used to insist—and properly insist, as he (Lord Normanby) was quite prepared to admit, that his noble Friend (Lord Besborough) who at that time took charge of the Government measures in that House, should take a different course, and that the subject matter of every Bill should be opened and its principles explained on the second reading. That practice, however, appeared now to have become obsolete. He did not by any means wish it to be sup-
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posed that he complained of the rapidity with which his noble Friend (the Earl of Shaftesbury) disposed of the numerous Bills in Committee; on the contrary, he thought his noble Friend, supposing the object to be to avoid all consideration and discussion, displayed a very laudable activity, and deserved much credit for the effectual means he had adopted to prevent any humbug on the matter. It might be said that this hurry at the close of the Session was to a certain extent necessary. He admitted that it was so to this extent, that the business of the country pressed hard upon both Houses of Parliament during the last few weeks of the Session, and that they were then obliged to smuggle through Bills without discussion, in consequence of neglect in the early part of the year. But if he looked back to former Sessions, he found some reason for this pressure of business as the Session drew to a close; for he found that, with very few exceptions, some important measure or measures, involving much consideration — some great discussions involving large and important interests had previously engaged the attention of both that and the other House. But when he looked at the proceedings of the present Session, he had to ask what had been done—what measures had been passed — what great interests had been conciliated — what constitutional bulwark had been strengthened — what salutary reform had been introduced, or what in the whole results of the Session was he to look to, to account for the manner in which these numerous Bills were now, in the month of August, to be forced upon their attention? He would make a few observations as to the two Bills which had first drawn his attention to this subject, and compelled him to trouble their Lordships on that occasion. The first of these Bills was the Poor Law Amendment Bill, and the other the Metropolitan Buildings Bill, which their Lordships had passed on the preceding evening. Now as to the Poor Law Bill, they had heard from every noble Lord who took part in the discussion on going into Committee (most of whom, he was sorry to see, were not now present), that it was a measure of very great consequence, and the noble Lord by whom it had been introduced to their Lordships' notice had stated that it was a Bill that was looked upon with great interest and anxiety, and excited the sympathies of the country generally. It had been also said that strong and unjust prejudices existed

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in many quarters against the measure, while, on the other hand, it was asserted that many of these prejudices and objections were well founded. Place the matter, however, in the most favourable point of view, he would put it to their Lordships whether, in a measure such as this, it was not desirable that their Lordships' deliberations should be backed by public opinion; and whether it was possible that that could be the case when they looked at the circumstances under which they were now called upon to pass that measure at almost a few hours' notice? The noble Lord opposite (Lord Hardwicke) had said that their Lordships' House was the Assembly best calculated to discuss with advantage the provisions of a Poor Law Bill—and why? Because amongst its Members there were no less than eighty-three Chairmen of Boards of Guardians. This circumstance in his opinion, formed one of the strongest reasons for the attendance of those noble Lords during its progress here; but he should like to know how many of those eighty-three peers had been in attendance at the discussion of the previous evening, or when the noble Lord opposite (Lord Wharncliffe) first introduced the measure, and made his statement upon it? When this important measure, containing, as he was disposed to think, many improvements, at all events many very material alterations in the present law, was introduced to their Lordships at ten o'clock at night, how many of those peers who were Chairmen of Boards of Guardians, and therefore best qualified to give an opinion as to the working of the law, and as to any Bill brought in for its improvement, were present? It might, perhaps, be as well that they were not, but they must deal with a legislative assembly as they found it; and if it was thought that a good attendance of Members was necessary to consider measures of great importance with that effect which they deserved, it was surely the duty of the Government to introduce them when the attendance of Members in both Houses was fullest. So much for the Poor Law Bill; and now as to the Metropolitan Buildings Bill. He did not complain personally of the circumstance in this case, but it did so happen that though, perhaps with the exception of the noble Lord at the Table, no Member of this House was more regular in his attendance there than he (Lord Normanby) was; he was nevertheless absent on an annual engagement with a noble Friend of his, of which he was
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not ashamed, at that particular time when the Bill was introduced to this House, and in these two or three days hurried through all its stages. But what had been the case with regard to this particular measure? So long ago as the 11th of June he had spoken to his noble Friend opposite upon the subject, and had then stated to his noble Friend that the Bill had been before the House of Commons three months, and yet no progress had been made in it, and had requested him to urge upon his Colleagues in office the importance of its being sent up to their Lordships sufficiently early in the Session to enable them to consider it fully, for though he (the Marquess of Normanby) fully approved of its principle, and many of its details, still there were several of its provisions to which he entertained decided objections. He had thought it better that some general regulation as to buildings should be passed, and that they should not trust to partial legislation, and he was anxious that their Lordships should have an opportunity of considering the subject fully. Now, was the objection he had so urged upon his noble Friend a captious one? Were there not many and grave objections to the measure as it stood? The noble Duke (the Duke of Buccleuch) the other night had said, on moving the second reading of the Bill, that there was very valuable information in the Report of the Sanatary Commission, on which it was founded; but what would their Lordships think, when they were told that this Bill, introduced in the last week of July, and passed in the first week of August, proceeded in direct opposition to the recommendations of the Commission, of which the noble Duke was President? The great and material provision in this Bill was that relating to party walls; but what said the evidence before the Commission on that subject? That it was the least important, and, at the same time the most expensive of any alteration that could be made in regard to dwelling houses. Mr. Austin and Mr. Boden, he believed, stated in their evidence that the improvement in regard to party walls would add 16 s. a-year upon every house in Manchester, while 5s. a-year would provide effectually for the improvement suggested, in regard to water and drainage. Yet his noble Friend called upon their Lordships to pass a Bill without consideration, and in a few days after its introduction, upon a subject intimately connected with the health of the people in every great town in this country,

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the provisions of which were in direct violation of the Report of the Commission upon which it was understood to be founded. Then their Lordships would naturally ask, was this Bill ever submitted to the Members of that Commission, and, if so, how was it that they now discouraged and discredited all the advice and recommendation which were given in their own Report? On this point, however, no explanation had been given, but all that their Lordships knew of the matter was that the Bill first appeared before them at the end of the month of July, and that at the beginning of August they were required to pass it. But what had they been doing during the previous five and a half months of the Session, that the Bill had not come up to their Lordships before? Where could Her Majesty's Government refer for the measures which had occupied their attention during that time? Two that had been passed with regard to England, and one in regard to Ireland, to which he should presently refer, was the full amount of their legislative business down to the month of July. One of these measures had been brought in by the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack (the Lord Chancellor), a measure which did that noble and learned Lord great credit—the Dissenters Chapels Bill. He was aware that he differed from some of his noble Friends on this subject; but he was anxious to give the noble and learned Lord his best thanks for the introduction of this Bill, and also for the manner in which he had presented it to their Lordships' attention. There was also another Bill, which the same noble and learned Lord had brought in, for which he could not accord to him and his Colleagues in the Government the same credit as he gave them for the Dissenters Chapels Bill—he meant the Ecclesiastical Courts Bill. What was the history of that measure? His noble and learned Friend stated when he brought it in, that the measure was not what it ought to be—neither was it what he himself desired it to be, or what the Report of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners led their Lordships to expect it would be, but that it had nevertheless one merit which he hoped would entitle it to be received with favour by the House, and that was, that they might safely calculate upon its success. But where was the Bill now? Where was that success which had induced their Lordships to sacrifice that principle for which, in regard to that measure, they had all along contended? These were the only two attempts even at legislation their
1794
Lordships had made at the instigation of the Government, and with the exception of the measure connected with Ireland, to which he should presently refer, these were the only two bills which had varied in any way the inanimate vacuity of the last five and a half months. When the Speech from the Throne was, delivered, at the beginning of the Session, it was the general opinion that it contained less than any previous document of the same kind, and promised but little future legislation; but it was also thought that those who had framed that Speech knew well what they would be enabled to do, and that though they promised little, there was every reason to hope and expect that that little would be performed. But what was the fact? One measure, and one only, to which any allusion was made in the Queen's Speech had passed. He alluded to the measure with respect to the Bank Charter; and in regard to that question their Lordships had concurred with the House of Commons in determining in what proportion the capital of the country should be convertible into currency. Upon that measure it was not for him then to give any opinion; but many persons much better qualified than he was to form a correct judgment upon it, had pronounced it to be a most hazardous experiment. For himself, he believed it was good in principle, but he could not utterly disregard the opinions of better informed persons, and he, consequently looked upon the result with some apprehension. But the most precise direct promise in the Royal Speech was in reference to Ireland; but before he came to that promise, and to the inquiry how far it had been carried out, he would refer their Lordships to the only measure affecting any material change in that country, or calculated to give satisfaction and peace to its people, which had passed their Lordship's House, and for that measure he was also grateful to the Government; and not only was he grateful for the introduction of the Bill, but also for the alterations which had been subsequently made in it. He referred to the Charitable Bequests Bill, in which very great and important concessions had been made. As he had said, he fully approved, of that Bill. But under what circumstances had it originated? In any comprehensive view, on the part of the Government, of what was due to Ireland? No such thing; but from the circumstance of a charitable and worthy Protestant clergyman in Ireland, who had exposed himself to much obloquy with the party in power

1795
in that country, in consequence of laying before their Lordships, not claims of his own, but the claims of his poor Catholic fellow parishioners to 7l. 10 s. a year. [A motion of dissent from the Lord Chancellor]. The noble and learned Lord shook his head, but he would not say that any alteration in the law would have been made but for that circumstance. [The Lord Chancellor: I beg your pardon, you are quite in error.] He (the Marquess of Normanby) was sure neither he nor any of their Lordships had any expectation that any such measures would have been introduced by the Government, for no such intimation had been held out in the Queen's Speech, or when the subject had been brought under the notice of the Government at the beginning of the Session. There was, however, one specific measure promised in that Speech, in reference to Ireland; and, in the paragraph of the Speech that alluded to it, it was stated:—
"I recommend to your early Consideration the Enactments at present in force in Ireland concerning the Registration of Voters for Members of Parliament.
"You will probably find that a Revision of the Law of Registration, taken in conjunction with other Causes at present in operation, would produce a material Diminution of the Number of County Voters, and that it may be advisable on that Account to consider the State of the Law with a view to an Extension of the County Franchise in Ireland."
And certainly it was only natural that the Government should recommend this important subject to the early attention of Parliament. And why? Because four years had passed since they had forced it on the attention of Parliament. During the previous Administration they had taken the subject into their own hands, and had urged that no delay ought to take place in legislating upon it. After three years of power, therefore, it was natural that such a sentence should have been put into Her Majesty's Speech. But what had been the result? A Registration Bill for Ireland had been brought in by the Government, and withdrawn—and properly so, as the measure was one in no way calculated to give satisfaction or improve the law. But that it was prepared in such a manner, showed a degree of ignorance on the part of the Government as to what was calculated to give satisfaction to Ireland, and what was not, that was highly reprehensible. On a previous occasion he had alluded to the Landlord and Tenant Commission—a subject which had also been referred to
1796
in the Queen's Speech, and nothing that had since occurred had altered the view he had then taken in regard to that Commission. He had looked upon the appointment of that Commission from the first as a measure that was calculated to excite delusive expectations, and he had also considered that it was not necessary for the Government to adopt that means of obtaining information upon the subjects with which they were anxious to deal. Had they no other information at their command? Within the last three or four months they had had a publication containing valuable, but at the same time most alarming, statistical information as to the condition of the Irish people, viz., the Report of the Census Commissioners. That Commission divided the dwellings in which the population of Ireland lived into four classes. The lowest consisted of mud cabins with one room; the second, mud cabins with two rooms; the third class were small stone houses—farm houses in some cases; and all above that were placed in the first class. And what was the social condition of Ireland in respect to dwellings, as exhibited by this Return? In the rural districts 1¼ per cent. only of the population inhabited the first class houses, 13 per cent. the second class, 40 per cent. the third class, and 43 per cent. lived in the fourth class houses; that was, mud cabins with one room only; so that in point of fact, 83 out of every 100 had no better dwellings than mud cabins. In the civic districts the case was somewhat better, but even there only 7 per cent. of the people lived in houses of the first class. The Commissioners further stated that 40 per cent. of the population of the rural districts had farms averaging only from one to five acres each, and 7 per cent. only had farms exceeding 30 acres, while two-thirds of the whole population lived upon the produce of their labour—by which they mean mere manual as distinguished from skilled labour; for the Commissioners expressly stated that they had not included in this estimate skilled artisans; but they say that 43 per cent. of the people subsist wholly by mere common rural labour. It appeared from the same Report that the ignorance prevailing amongst this population was not so great as their Lordships might be led to believe from their very depressed circumstances; for though there was a large percentage of the whole labouring population who could neither read or write, it still appeared that there was a greater degree of knowledge existing amongst the population

1797
of Ireland than was to be found in some districts of England. The ignorance that prevailed in the lowest districts of Ireland was exceeded by the ignorance prevailing in some of the districts of this country. He did not accuse those who proposed the Commission of having meant to evade the consideration of the subject; but delay was sometimes sought for the purpose of enquiry, enquiry sometimes for the purpose of delay. But to return to the subject. The small amount of business which had been transacted—when they looked to see how little had been done on the subject of legislation in the present Session, he thought he could anticipate the staple retort—the tu quoque reasoning—which would doubtless be employed in reply, that it would be said that in former Sessions the same complaints precisely had been made. But he was prepared to show that these complaints had not been made with equal justice. When his noble Friend near him was at the head of the Government he had but a small majority in the other House, and there was a positive majority against him in this. At that time noble Lords opposite had the remedy in their own hands, and the noble Lord on the Woolsack was in the custom of bringing down the forces that he had at his command to render nugatory the measures he disliked, and to defeat the Bills that he did not approve of. But was the noble and learned Lord content with doing that alone? Had they heard no other objection from the noble and learned Lord except his disapproval of the principles of the measures submitted to them? Was there not also another objection urged by him—the time of the Session at which such Bills were proposed? "How," the noble and learned Lord said, "how can we examine these Bills? How can we have time to consider them, when a fitting opportunity has not been given for deliberation upon them." He did say that such an attack was formerly made upon the then Government. And then, remembering that, he bade them look at the proceedings of the last few days—he bade them consider what had been done in that time, and how the whole legislation of a Session was brought up and heaped upon them within the last fortnight. He did not say that this showed general mismanagement on the part of the Government; but if the present Government, with its great majorities, were, driven to such a course, it certainly proved great mismanagement somewhere. He did not
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mean to affirm that there were not difficulties to be contended against. Such there must be with every Government in this country—such there must always be with a popular Assembly like the House of Commons. He admitted that with such there must at times be a difficulty in passing Bills; but then that difficulty could not afford a palliation for what had occurred; for, if they looked to the Votes of the other House, they would see how often that House had been counted out, how much of time had been thus wasted, how many days had been thus lost, every one of which would, if devoted to legislation, have been most valuable to their Lordships. It might have been accident; but then, if it were, the accident had occurred upon some occasions when Notices of Motions were on the Books of the House of Commons, that it might have been inconvenient to Her Majesty's Government to have discussed—at least, this might be affirmed: that when Her Majesty's Government boasted of having such a commanding majority in the other House of Parliament, they might, at least, have availed themselves of the forces under their control, to have prevented the delays, the unnecessary delays in legislation. In moving, then, for the Returns, of which he had given notice, he must say, that he was induced to do so, because he thought their Lordships were worthy of much better things, than being converted into such a mere mechanical machine of legislation, as they seemed solely to have been used for the last few days. Bills had been submitted to their Lordships, without a single word in explanation being vouchsafed; and if his noble Friend opposite, who managed the Government business in that House, was not able to give details of some of the measures that were proposed, and was found incapable of answering questions put to him with respect to a few of them—if his noble Friend could not do this, if he had not time to make himself master of the details of the question he is to propose for your consideration, how, he asked, was it possible for their Lordships to make themselves acquainted with them? A Bill had, as he understood, on the night preceding, for he was not present at the moment, passed through Committee, without one single word been said with respect to it.
Lord Wharncliffeobserved, that he had stated the objects of the Bill.
The Marquess of Normanbycontinued.

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He deemed it right to call attention to this subject, as the evil was one that ought to be pointed out, and he believed was capable of being corrected. He wished that, when Bills were sent up from the other House of Parliament, they should come not in such a manner as would try the patience, but almost defy the comprehension of their Lordships. He was sure that in thus putting the case, he was but doing justice to the feelings of their Lordships; for there was not one of them who must not desire anxiously, faithfully, and entirely, to perform their duties, whilst at this moment it was impossible for them to do so. In the hope, then, of thus attracting their notice to this subject, he should conclude, by moving—
"That the Clerk Assistant do prepare and lay on the Table of the House, a Return of the Number of Days in each Month which this House has sat, the Days on which the several Public Bills came from the Commons, and the Days on which they passed their several Stages in this House during the present Session."
The Duke of Wellingtonsaid, that the noble Marquess had, if he saw fit, a perfect right to refer to the state of public business, and to complain as to the manner in which it was disposed of in that House, and that proper attention was not paid to it. Now, he must say, that he was not aware that there was any inattention to the public business on the part of any noble Peer who represented the Government in that House. He knew that neither he himself, nor his noble Friend the President of the Council, nor the Vice-President of the Board of Trade, nor the Head of the Board of Control, were inattentive to the discharge of the duties that devolved upon them. Each of them attended to the immediate duties, and to the particular measures that belonged to them; and there was not any measure introduced into the other House of Parliament, of the subject of which either he, or some other Member of Her Majesty's Government, did not make himself master, and come prepared to answer any question that might be put to them there respecting it. It was certainly true, that it was not the invariable practice to open every subject in detail in that House; but it was the invariable practice to do so whenever the subject related to any matter that was considered of importance. There was no Bill presented to that House on which noble Lords might not receive every information that they re-
1800
quired; and there was no disposition on the part of Government to withhold any information they could afford. Further than this, he would say, that the business of Government in that House was done in a regular manner; the noble Lords connected with Government attended regularly; and for himself he could say, he attended them at the regular periods of the House meeting, until the regular period for its adjournment. He was always prepared to answer questions that might come under their consideration, whenever noble Lords might seek for information on any subject. He had to observe, too, that he took care to keep copies of every petition that required attention from any department of the Government of which there was no Member present in that House. He really then did not know what the noble Lord wished to complain of with respect to the conduct of Her Majesty's Government in that House of Parliament. It was quite true, no doubt, that he (the noble Duke) was not in the House last night, when a particular subject came under consideration. He had been there from five o'clock to eleven; and then, as he understood that no measure was to come under consideration except the Poor Law, which his noble Friend (Lord Wharncliffe) undertook the charge of, he had thought himself at liberty to leave, and had left accordingly. But, then, the noble Lord ought to recollect, that yesterday evening there were other matters of importance before the House—that the Poor Law Bill had been on the Notice Paper a considerable time, and that it was known it was to be taken into consideration on that night, and that it was to be brought forward when it came in its turn on the paper. His noble Friend was in his place, and ready to move the Bill, when the opportunity for moving it was afforded to him; but then the noble Earl opposite had given notice of another very important subject for discussion; and consequently, he did not think it quite fair to blame the Government for the measure being brought forward at a late hour, when other noble Lords were discussing other subjects. The other was a very pressing subject for discussion; but then he begged that the Government might not be blamed for bringing these measures forward at a late hour, when the early part of the evening was occupied with the discussion of other measures. He did not mean to follow the noble Lord through his review of the measures

1801
that had been before Parliament during the Session. He must say, that a considerable time in both Houses of Parliament had been employed in discussing subjects, which hon. Gentlemen and noble Lords thought to be important, and which certainly did deserve consideration from the House and the public; but he only begged to say, that it must not be supposed that the Government was the cause of the loss of time, or that they had caused the House to be counted out, or the time of the Session be misapplied, if the noble Lord chose to say that the time of the House had been misapplied. As to that House, his noble Friend and other noble Lords had introduced as many measures as, according to the usual forms of Parliament, they could introduce, or that they had any prospect of carrying through. As long as he had been in Parliament, there had always been some complaint as to the number of Bills originating in the House of Lords; and this was a state of things that could not be helped, as long as the present arrangement of both Houses continued what it was, and what it had been for more than 150 years. There was, however, one Bill which the noble Marquess had said was not originally a Government measure—that was the Charitable Bequests (Ireland) Bill. He begged the noble Lord's pardon—it was a measure that was deemed necessary by Her Majesty's Government. It was desired, early in the Session, that there should be a measure to enable persons to endow the Clergy of the Roman Catholic persuasion in Ireland: that measure rendered necessary the other measure to which the noble Lord referred. As to the other measure, the Ecclesiastical Courts Bill, it was true that they met a difficulty with respect to it in the other House of Parliament; but for these difficulties, no man in that House could be responsible, and he doubted whether any man in the other House could be responsible either, for if the noble Marquess would inquire, he might find that it would be impossible to state with exactitude what course would be taken in the other House with respect to any measure that might be presented to it. He had no objection to offer to the Returns or the information sought for by the noble Lord; but he must defend noble Lords and himself from the charge of neglect. He assured the noble Lord, that upon every measure they were prepared to give all the information of which they were capable, whether the measure was brought forward
1802
in that House, or was introduced into the other House of Parliament, by any servant of the Crown.
The Marquess of Lansdownesaid, that no one would imagine that the mismanagement which had occurred in the Government arrangements of the Session had occurred in consequence of any laxity on the part of the noble Duke. The noble Duke was most regular in his attendance in that House; there was no one who witnessed the proceedings in that House who must not bear testimony to the fact, and to the most useful and beneficial attention, which he gave to public business; but at the same time, he (Lord Lansdowne) must say that despite the noble Duke's attendance, it seemed to him that his noble Friend near him had ample grounds for the complaint which he had made. It was very easy, indeed, to say, that if any one wanted information they might ask for it, and they would obtain it. He had no doubt but that some noble Lord connected with Her Majesty's Government would be able to give some explanation as to these measures; but what was the use of obtaining such explanations, when no time for deliberation could be had? The just complaint that was now made he well knew did not now originate for the first time, for it was a matter in which all previous Governments were more or less to blame. It was a complaint for which additional ground was afforded every year, and it had at last risen to such a height that the House was become a mere court of registration for the Bills that were sent up from the other House of Parliament, for they came at a season of the year when it was impossible to expect, and impracticable to give, a full and deliberate attention to them. As to their measures of legislation, he observed to their Lordships that they would be actually astonished if they were to perceive what numbers of them there were which were merely directed to amend, not the old statutes, but the new laws passed in a hurry by themselves; and all which they seemed to think required a perfection which it also appeared to be manifest they were never destined to attain. If they looked to the recent statutes, they would be amazed to perceive what efforts there had been made to perfect their laws; and he must say, that if they were to judge of them by the continual "amendments" that had been made in them, they might

1803
naturally expect that they should at this period be brought to superhuman — to something like divine—perfection. For Session after Session they were passing Amendment Bills upon Amendment Bills, as if they never could amend too much nor too often. The desire for postponement, too, was most astonishing. Every measure was put off to the close of the Session, as if it was a part of their political faith that laws, like fruit, ripened best in the dog-days. He would give an instance of this feeling, and of its unfortunate consequences. In the early part of the present Session, a noble Lord, who had given his attention to a measure of great consequence, proceeded to occupy the then vacant ground, to cultivate the then sterile waste, by passing a measure upon the subject which had so long occupied his attention. No sooner had he done so than every body slept forward and asked him to postpone it. "Don't ask us," they said, "to consider the Bill now that we can consider it; but pray postpone it till we cannot." What was the consequence? Why, that the measure when it went down to the Commons in a very altered form was complained of there as crude and unsatisfactory, and as being sent at so late a period of the Session, that they had not time to consider the state of the law upon the subject. It was impossible—plainly impossible—that they could attain perfection in that which was brought forward, without the means of discussion. No later than the last night they had a most remarkable instance of the inconvenience of this mode of proceeding. He had, on the previous night, come up from the country for the purpose of opposing, unless it was modified or altered in some way, a Clause in the Railways Bill, which he was persuaded, but which he was sure was not intended, by the right rev. Prelate (the Bishop of London), would have the effect of inflicting an injury and an insult on the lower classes of their countrymen, by putting them on a different footing with the rest of the community. There was a concurrence of opinion on both sides on the subject. There was a general disposition manifested to promote the interests of the lower classes; but with this disposition there was felt on all sides a great difficulty to attain that object. There were various suggestions, and misunderstandings took place. A Clause was proposed and carried, and that
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in a way which he was sure noble Lords were unable to comprehend. He could not pretend to comprehend, when other noble Lords, accustomed to consider the phraseology used on such occasions, declared that there was a difficulty in doing so; and yet the request that a Clause of such paramount importance should be postponed for a single day, in order that it might be considered—a request that should have been granted as a matter of course—was refused, and refused solely on the ground of the state of the Session, and, of course, on account of the time at which the Bill had been brought up to their Lordships. Let them, then, see the situation in which they were placed by this crude and undigested legislation. It gave them laws that disfigured instead of doing honour to the Statute Book. It gave to them laws, and laws to amend the laws, changes and perpetual alterations; and their course in this respect reminded him of an eminent individual in this country, whose name he did not intend to mention, but who it was well known, had a good deal of money, which it was said he intended to distribute in legacies. In his old age, it was asked of him, how he occupied his evenings? The answer was, that before he went to bed he was engaged in drawing up his will and allocating legacies. And then it was inquired how he spent his mornings; and it was in undoing his will and altering the legacies of the night before. That, in his opinion, was very like the way in which they spent the early part of their Session. It was in curing the faults, correcting the errors, and remedying the defects in the Acts that were passed the year before, and considering how they might amend them. What, then, was the remedy? Something, he thought, might be done to remedy this evil by the Government introducing more Bills into that House with the simple expedient of leaving out the money Clauses. There might be blanks left for them, and by that means they might occupy the early part of the Session. He had more faith in this as a remedial measure than the noble Duke had; but whether adopted or not, he must say, that anything would be better than the present system of hurrying Bills through in the most slovenly manner —in a manner which often made him rejoice that the Strangers' Gallery was so small; for he really felt that sometimes he should be ashamed that the world should know how,

1805
in that House, Acts of Parliament were manufactured.
Lord Wharncliffewas sure that it would be a great convenience if the business were performed at an early period of the Session; but he did not think that the fault was with that House. It was perfectly true that many Bills passed through that House without more than a few words of explanation. That was the usual custom with that House, and he believed it was the custom also with the House of Commons. Unless Bills were likely to attract a good deal of attention, Members were satisfied with a short explanation respecting them. At the time that he sat in the House of Commons he had seen thirty or forty Bills on the Order Book, and in a very short time disposed of, unless some one required explanation. As to the Railways Bill, the noble Lord had complained that it was a most important Bill, and that it had come up at a time when they could not sufficiently consider its enactments, and he had instanced that which had occurred on the preceding night. Now, it ought to be considered that before such a Bill as that would pass the House of Commons, not only must it have been considered most maturely, but it must have taken great time to mould it, so as to meet the views of those who were interested in it. If they considered the vast property that was invested in Railways, it must be plain that out of doors much influence must be exercised, and much trouble must be taken before parties could come to a good understanding with regard to it. That, then, was some excuse for the lateness of the period at which it was brought into that House. His noble Friend opposite had made it a matter of accusation against the Government that, at the opening of the Session, the Queen's Speech contained less promises of future measures than any Queen's Speech he knew of. He thought that was rather a merit than a fault. He had seen Queen's Speeches promise many things more than were fulfilled. Now what were the suggestions in that Speech, and how many of them had been brought to perfection. Well, then, how many of them had been brought to a conclusion in the course of the Session. It referred to the Bank of England, and its promise had been fulfilled. It then referred to the Irish Registration Bill. That was a measure that undoubtedly they had not completed. It was a measure that affected the interests of Ireland as well as of this country. It was a most important measure, and, as the
1806
matter was, did not press exceedingly on them. It was not a pressing case. It was one which they wished to take full time to consider, so that when they did propose the measure, they might hope it would give full satisfaction. Many objections had been made against it. They wished to consider how much weight ought to be attached to them, in order that they might make it the more palatable. These, then, were the only subjects mentioned in the Queen's Speech. But had they done nothing more? Were there not other measures—and, as he contended, very great measures—measures that were difficult to frame so as to ensure their passing? He asked their Lordships whether they did not consider the conversion of the Three-and-a-Half per Cents. a great measure? In his opinion it was the greatest financial operation ever carried since the beginning of Parliament: it dealt with a vast sum of money, and it was satisfactory to the parties concerned. They had brought in an Amendment to the Factory Bill, and they had also brought to pass in the House of Commons the Amendment of the Poor Law Bill. It could not be said, then, that this was not a fruitful Session. It had been a most fruitful Session. Yes, he repeated the word, it had been a fruitful Session. The Ecclesiastical Courts Bill had not passed the other House it was true; but then with respect to the Irish Charitable Bequests Bill, his noble Friend thought that he was the suggester of the Bill, on account of his Motion with respect to some 7l. 10 s. 6d., which the Commissioners of Charitable Bequests had mismanaged. His noble Friend had certainly made out a case that these charitable Commissioners had been most neglectful, and that the body itself required alteration. But at that time that his noble Friend introduced the subject, the Government had that, in connection with another object, in view. They proposed a measure to enable Roman Catholics to endow their priests, and therefore they wished to have the means by which both objects could be effected—to enable Charitable Bequests to be made, and to have these endowments when it suited the Roman Catholics to establish them. [The Duke of Wellington: One was to be in aid of the other.] He did not mean to say that it might not be advisable that Bills should be sent up from the House of Commons at an earlier period of the Session, so that this House might have ample time to consider the measures prepared by the House of Commons, and

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perhaps be enabled to improve them. He did not know that there was much to regret in the circumstance that more Bills were not originated in this House, for such Bills were not received with so good a grace as to ensure to them so much chance of passing, as if they were commenced in the House of Commons. Whether, however, more Bills might not be originated in this House he did not know, but certainly they had not much encouragement, for he had over and over again seen the failure of Bills which were originated in the House of Lords. He had no objection to the production of the Returns.
The Marquess of Clanricardesaid, he could not acquiesce in the statement of a noble and learned Lord, who, on a former evening, identifying himself with the Government, said, "Whereas last year we promised a great deal, and did little; this year, we promised nothing, and have done a great deal." Nor could he give to noble Lords opposite all the credit they seemed disposed to claim for the measures they had introduced. As to the financial measures of the Government, he admitted them to be good; but when they talked of the conversion of the Three-and-a-Half per Cents. as an extraordinary measure, and one which nobody could have anticipated, he thought such language was more extraordinary than the measure itself; for everybody had calculated upon the adoption of some such plan. The noble Baron claimed credit also for the Factory Bill; but he must remind him, that the most important question connected with that measure—namely, education—had been totally omitted this year. With regard to the Ecclesiastical Courts Bill, it was said to be a very difficult Bill to carry. Nobody denied that; but what he and his noble Friends complained of was, that after that House had been prevailed upon, with a view to secure what they were told would be a great improvement of the law, to make great concessions of principle, even the meagre and mutilated Bill which was sent down from that House did not pass the House of Commons. With regard to Ireland, and particularly the Registration Bill, he admittted that that was a question which did not press, and that it would be better that the question should remain as it was than that the measure proposed by the Government should have been carried; but he must remind the Government that there
1808
was a time when the question of the Irish franchise was considered an important one; and so he still considered it, and felt it highly desirable that it should be taken up on a large scale. The Charitable Bequests Bill had also been referred to. Now, he considered that a most excellent measure, as an improvement on the old Board in Dublin. There were also Clauses, which, however had not been in the original Bill, but were introduced as Amendments, which were of great importance. He therefore gave great praise to the Government for the introduction of that measure; but it was a great mistake for the noble Lord, and also the noble and gallant Duke, to say that that Bill altered the law in Ireland so as to enable individuals to endow Catholic glebes. The Bill, when it passed, would give no greater facilities for such endowments than had existed, he believed, since before the Union, except that the party would have the advantage of the machinery of this particular Board. The law of the land, as it appeared, enabled an inividual, choosing his own trustees, and availing himself of the old Board, if he pleased, to endow a Catholic glebe, and leave it as he thought proper. With regard to the New Poor Law Bill, he thought that was a measure which might very well have been introduced in that House. It was said, indeed, that there was greater difficulty in passing bills which originated in that House than those which were brought forward in the other. He knew no reason why that should be so, but certainly the hurry and confusion—the hurly burly, as it had been called—in which they were compelled to pass measures at the close of the Session, was entirely owing to the Government, because a reference to the House of Commons would show that the Government could have had no difficulty in the course of the Session in forming a House any time when they chose to bring forward important measures. Their Lordships would find, if they chose to take the trouble of inquiring, that the days upon which there was no House, or when the House was counted out, were those upon which there was no important Government business, or when some motions were to be brought forward which might prove disagreeable or inconvenient to the Government. One consequence of the hurried manner of doing business at this period of the Session was, that there were some Bills of importance—the Duchy

1809
of Cornwall Bill and others—which were forwarded through their stages without a single word being said upon them. There was one Bill to which he wished to call their Lordships' attention. It was one of which they ought all to have made themselves masters, and yet he doubted if any of their Lordships' (he included the noble Lord who had moved it through its stages) had read its Clauses, except himself (the Marquess of Clanricarde). It was the Dublin Grand Jury Presentment Bill, a Bill consisting of 158 Clauses, and containing the principle upon which all the Grand Jury presentments throughout Ireland ought to be regulated. He said that the mode of conducting business in that House was not creditable to their Lordships, either as regarded the performance of their duty, or upholding their character with the public.
The Earl of Wicklowsaid, that ever since he had sat in that House, he had always heard, at the close of the Session, such discussions as these, the same complaints of the lateness of the period at which Bills came before their Lordships, and the consequent impossibility of considering them properly, and recommendations to the Government to originate more measures in that House; but still it happened that at the close of every Session things were just in the same state as before. He believed that state of things arose from the natural position and circumstances in which the two Houses were placed, and he therefore regretted that noble Lords did not attend more punctually at this period of the Session, when it was known from experience that there would be most business to be done. He had heard his noble Friend, the noble Marquess opposite, with regret, say that he had an annual visit of a week to pay at this period of the year, and in fact that absence of the noble Marquess last week had deprived the House of the valuable assistance of his experience and diligence in the consideration of the whole state of Ireland upon the discussion of an important measure relating to that country, which was debated before precisely the number of Peers which was necessary to constitute a House, namely, six. Noble Lords complained of Bills being forwarded without explanation. Why all the Bills were accessible to themselves, and if they neglected to examine them, and allowed them to pass without asking for observa-
1810
tion upon them, they should not make that a ground of censure upon the Government. Then, as to the House of Commons not making a House, surely that was as much the fault of the party whom the noble Lords opposite favoured as of the Government, for they had equally the power of making a House whenever any business which they considered of importance was to be brought forward. He, therefore, thought the complaints which were made were without foundation.
The Marquess of Normanby,in reply, said, that if he had been aware that the Bill to which his noble Friend had alluded was to be hurried through three stages during the three days that he happened to be absent last week, nothing should have prevented his attendance. But he had applied to the noble Baron to postpone the measure, and although there was no discourtesy in his declining to do so, yet the reason he assigned was the strongest possible proof of the justice of the complaints which he (Lord Normanby) had made, for the noble Baron said that it was so late that the measure could not pass this Session unless it was expedited. Before he sat down he wished to repeat a question which he had before put to the noble Duke opposite, whether the Metropolitan Buildings Bill had been referred to the Commission appointed to examine the subject? He would also suggest to the Government whether it would not be possible that that House should meet next Session at four o'clock instead of five. He was sure that by some means or other (the attention of the House having been called to the subject), an end would be put to the present legerdemain mode, as it might be called, of conducting the business.
The Earl of Haddingtonsaid he hoped, if the House was to meet at four, the noble Marquess would not expect the attendance of those servants of the Crown who had laborious duties to perform.
The Marquess of Normanbysaid he had himself had laborious duties to perform, and he had no hesitation in saying that the additional hour might be afforded.
The Duke of Buccleuch,in answer to the question put to him by the noble Marquess (the Marquess of Normanby), said that the Metropolitan Buildings Bill had not been specifically referred to the

1811
Commission, but it was under the charge of his noble Friend at the head of the Woods and Forests department, who was himself a Member of the Commission.
The Motion was then agreed to.

POOR LAW.
Lord Wharncliffemoved that the House should now resolve itself into Committee on this Bill.
The Bishop of Exeterrose and said,—My Lords, as our hours are becoming important to us, as, in fact, our hours are numbered, for we are not to sit beyond this week for purposes of business, and, as three valuable hours can be employed in the manner they have been employed this evening, it is perfectly certain your Lordships will agree with me that we cannot, with any degree of decency, go into Committee on this Bill. It is preposterous—absolutely preposterous to think of doing so. Your Lordships will recollect the reasons which the noble Lord near me (Lord Wharncliffe) gave last night for now proceeding rapidly with the consideration of this Bill; and, I confess, it struck me as being the most extraordinary reason that was ever suggested by any Minister to any House of Parliament. The noble Lord said, that as a great quantity of time had been taken up by the House of Commons in the discussion of this Bill, your Lordships were to have no time at all to consider it. I took down the noble Baron's words at the time he uttered them, but I will not now taunt him with what took place last night. Let us look at this question simpliciter. The Bill which is now to be gallopped through the House was introduced into the House of Commons on the 10th of February, and six long months have now passed during which that House of Parliament has thought fit to deliberate upon it. Why, my Lords, it is impossible that this House can agree to it in two days: two days, did I say?—we are confined to this night. The Motion which I shall therefore make is, that we go into Committee on the Bill this day six months. The noble Lord the President of the Council said that the Irish Registration Bill was not a pressing measure, and that it was a reason why it should be thrown overboard. Well, then, I entreat your Lordships to consider whether the passing of this Poor Law Amendment Bill is a pressing case. There has been a long time occupied in its consideration, as it is an experimental measure. We ought also to recollect that the present Poor Law Amendment Act was a
1812
great experiment; we were told that the powers given to the Commissioners were to continue only for a few years, and that, whether we should continue those powers was to depend on the experience of the working of the measure. Now, I ask, whether six months' more experience will not be of some utility? And I think that the postponement of this Bill falls admirably within the suggestion of the noble Baron. The noble Baron said the other House did not take particular pleasure to please your Lordships by the reception which they gave to the measures which your Lordships sent down to them, and in consequence of that your Lordships will have nothing to do at the commencement of the next Session. Now, then, I think an opportunity is here offered of taking up this Bill, as it has been brought to us from the Commons, and considering it at the beginning of the next Session. We shall then have something to do as soon as we assemble, and we shall have ample time to consider its provisions and to discuss its details. There was an expression which fell from a noble Lord opposite this evening that caused me great pain when I heard it. He told us that this House was used as the instrument of registering the decisions of the other House on matters of the greatest importance; and I should say, my Lords, that you would indeed be that instrument if you proceed to pass this Bill through the House, which does not at present contain one-twentieth part of its Members, for it is a Bill which, considering its importance, requires that your Lordships should bestow your most earnest attention upon it. Last night we were told that this House was peculiarly fit to consider this Bill, and it was truly said and urged as a reason for that remark that no fewer than eighty-three chairmen of Boards of Guardians were Members of this House; and, therefore, having the assistance of such a body of chairmen of Unions, we were peculiarly fit to consider this measure. I do not know whether any of your Lordships at present sitting in the House enjoy that very useful character of Chairman of a Poor Law Union. [Here we understood it to be intimated to the right rev. Prelate that some of the noble Lords present, three, we believe, were chairmen of Unions.] Well, I hope that those noble Lords will feel with me the great necessity of waiting until they can have the assistance of the other eighty noble chairmen of Boards of Guardians. I think that it is of great importance that

1813
we should have the assistance which may naturally be expected from the experience of those noble Lords who have presided over Boards of Guardians. It was also essentially necessary that the other Members of this House, who are not chairmen of Boards of Guardians, should turn their attention to this subject, for the experience of noble Chairmen of Boards of Guardians is very likely to deceive the House. When noble Dukes and noble Earls undertake (and I think that they are right in so doing) these posts of usefulness in this country,—when they mix with the yeomanry and gentlemen of the country in carrying into effect a measure like the present, they have, as they ought to have, great influence; and when one of your Lordships happens to be Chairman of a Board of Guardians it may be expected that that Board will conduct itself humanely, and that it will be desirous of doing everything to carry the law into execution usefully, charitably, and humanely. But while the experience of such noble Lords as are connected with Boards of Guardians goes so much in favour of those Boards with which they are acquainted, the experience of others brings us to a very opposite conclusion. I am not myself connected with any Board of Guardians, but in my immediate neighbourhood, it is notorious that there is a Board of Guardians which has proceeded in a tone of so much harshness to the poor, and of so little consideration for the feelings of those with whom it had to deal, that all the ex officio Guardians have abstained from attending its meetings, and one of these ex officio Guardians is a most distinguished county Member. Therefore, the representations made to your Lordships by the eighty-three noble chairmen of Boards of Guardians, as to the excellence with which the law works, are not to be taken without a great deal of reservation. I say that this present law is a law of experiment, and permit me to ask what has been the result of that experiment? Last night, we were told by several noble Lords, of whose presence here to-night we have not the advantage, that the experiment has answered marvellously. When the law was first introduced, we were told that it was to have a beneficial effect on the rates of wages, on the morality of the poor, and the contentment of the lower classes. Do we, then, find that the poor are now no longer at variance with their superiors; or that they look up to their superiors as their natural protectors and benefactors? We
1814
were told last night that this is the feeling. I am sure that the noble Lords who gave testimony to this effect were perfectly sincere in their declaration. I am ready to admit that their own experience in their own neighbourhood did assure them of the good will of their poorer fellow-countrymen; but is it necessary to remind your Lordships that a similar result has not been found realized in every part of the country? I wish to abstain from all unnecessary agitation of an appeal to the feelings, but it is impossible to forget that among the most serious causes of the recent insurrection in Wales was this present Poor Law. Is Wales the only part of this kingdom which has indicated similar feelings? I grieve to say that these feelings are exhibiting themselves even now in an awful and fearful manner in the eastern part of the kingdom. Within the last two or three weeks a right rev. Friend of mine has felt it his duty to put forth a circular letter to his clergy on the subject of the fires in Suffolk. I fear that we cannot disguise from ourselves—the fact (guilty as the incendiaries are, and reprobated as they must be by every man of right feeling—we cannot disguise from ourselves the fact that these fires do proceed from the feelings excited by the existence of the present Poor Law. I hope that we may derive some wisdom from this consideration, and that it will operate as a warning to induce us to correct the present measure. These reasons constitute a sufficient ground with him to urge upon your Lordships to deliberate whether other measures besides the present are not required to put the existing Poor Law of this country on a right footing. We are not now merely amending an Act of Parliament; we have to amend a system which is to have the greatest operation on the happiness and virtue of the people. If this were the case, we are bound to take care that we do not hastily rush into decisions which we should be glad afterwards to retract. I believe that the present Bill affords one of the most important occasions—I do not say, that the Bill is a most important Bill; but that the introduction of the Bill gives rise to one of the most important occasions that can be expected to occur in the lifetime of the longest living person present. We have to consider on what permanent footing we will put the laws for the relief of the poor in this country. On looking at the present Bill, I find that it is by no means of so extensive a character as might be ex-

1815
pected; for I find some of the most important parts of the duty of the Legislature absolutely forgotten in this measure. I allude particularly to the absence of all kind of provision respecting the spiritual interests of the poor of this country. Not one single Clause is directed to that greatest of all subjects relating to the poor. True it is, that there is a proposition (and I rejoice to see it) for having district schools for the deserted and orphan children of the poor, but as respects the adult poor there is not one single line respecting spiritual instruction for them; no provision for teaching them to discharge their first duties to God and man. Yet it will be in the recollection of your Lordships that the individual who now addresses you, did bring forward a case in the early part of this Session, which the noble President of the Council admitted to be one of fearful importance. I will not now dwell on that case, further than to say that I believe that throughout the country the facts I laid before this House produced the deepest effect. The noble Lord, when I urged that we should go into Committee on the subject, admitted that, unfortunately, the facts were too notorious—that the dreadful spiritual destitution in workhouses was not to be denied — but that the Committee would have nothing else to do but to register facts with which all were acquainted. I do not wish to taunt the noble Baron with what had passed on that occasion; but at least we might have hoped that something would have been done in the present Bill for this great purpose. It was not only the noble Baron who suggested the necessity of some important measure for spiritual instruction in workhouses; but an authority greater than the noble Baron's, at least on this question; and which in almost every case is considered absolutely imperative—I allude to the authority of the Poor Law Commissioners, which coincided with that of the noble Baron. The Poor Law Commissioners put forth in 1839 a Report addressed to the noble Marquess opposite (the Marquess of Normanby) on the continuance of the Poor Law Commission, and proposing further amendments to the law. In page 55 of that Report, I find a special recommendation for the enactment of a provision similar to a section in the Irish Poor Relief Bill, authorising the Commissioners to direct Guardians to appoint a chaplain of the Established Church in workhouses. This was the advice even
1816
of the Poor Law Commissioners, but still nothing was done. It may be said that there was nothing to be done, inasmuch as a Court of Justice had decided that the Poor Law Commissioners had the power to appoint chaplains. It follows then that the responsibility of not acting upon power rests primarily with the Poor Law Commissioners, but ultimately, according to all constitutional principle, with the Government. The Commissioners are obliged to report to the Secretary of State for the Home Department. He is responsible for the measures of these Commissioners, and therefore, if the Poor Law Commissioners do not do what the Secretary of State feels ought to be done, the Commissioners ought to be dismissed according to every constitutional principle. Consequently the blame for absolutely refusing to give spiritual instruction to the poor of this country rests with that Officer who is constitutionally responsible. It is the Secretary of State for the Home Department, the Colleague of the noble Baron (Lord Wharncliffe) and of the noble Duke (the Duke of Wellington) who is responsible on this point to his Colleagues, his country, and his God. I repeat that there is not one word in this Bill which relates to the appointment of chaplains. Let it not be supposed, however, that I think that the simple appointment of a chaplain is the right way of dealing with this matter. Though the Poor Law Commissioners could appoint chaplains, and have appointed them in many places, yet they have done so in such a form as is certain to render the appointment inefficient. Much consideration is necessary in order to ascertain the best mode of promoting the spiritual interests of the poor, and if nights were to be given to the subject they would be given usefully. This question cannot be discussed usefully unless it is discussed largely. You cannot pass a measure of this kind hastily. There must be great and grave considerations given to these important interests, if your Lordships wish to preserve the respect of the country and yourselves. I say this, because the few Peers who appeared to adhere to their places in this House during the present discussion, were led to do so from the important consideration that the interests, the security, and the protection of the poor are concerned. There is not one of the noble Lords who now hear me, but must feel gratified at thinking that he is discharging his duty by sitting here, and at the same time must feel ashamed at

1817
seeing how such a measure as the present is to be treated. What shall I say with regard to the Ministers of the Crown? As an Englishman, I feel gratitude to them for much that they have done; but I also feel indignant—and I do not scruple to express that indignation—that men in their high situation, with their deep responsibility, should thus try to trifle with the best interests of their country. If I look into this present Bill, and if I look further into the nature of the measure, I perceive additional reason for deliberating before assenting to it. I find the present Poor Law to be in direct antagonism to the great law of the 43rd of Elizabeth, which has been truly characterized as the Magna Charta of the poor, and which is part of the great Constitution of this country. I should rather say that it was part of the Constitution; for in this important respect the Constitution has been deeply shaken to its very basis. That great Act of Elizabeth was the Magna Charta of the poor of England; but it is not so irrecoverably lost that it may not be reclaimed; and I now call on your Lordships to take one step towards reclaiming it by refusing to go into the consideration of this present measure to-night. If you consent to pass this wretched tissue of miserable expedients, you put off the hopes and expectations of the poor to an indefinite period. I therefore implore your Lordships to weigh well the consequences. I do not mean that you should be influenced by any miserable fears for yourselves, but I mean that you should weigh well the consequences to the best interests of your country, if you set at nought the just expectations of the friends of the poor. I say that the present law, that great experiment of 1834, is in direct antagonism to the Statute of the 43rd of Elizabeth, and I will give reasons for my assertion. The Act of the 43rd of Elizabeth rests on this great principle—that the poor have a right to subsistence. The present law, on the contrary, proceeds on the principle that the poor have no such right, though by the bounty of the country, and by the kindness and mercy of the Legislature, something might be doled out to them according to the wisdom of that Legislature. "Right," and "No right" are the two principles which severally distinguish the 43rd of Elizabeth and the experiment of 1834. I say this on no slight ground. In the first place I declare myself decidedly of opinion that the poor have a distinct right to subsistence—sub-
1818
sistence in return for their labour I admit, but they have a right to be protected from absolute destitution. [Lord Wharncliffe: Hear.] I am not surprised to find that the noble Baron cheers me, when I make that assertion, and, therefore, I trust the noble Baron will act in conformity with it. [Here Lord Wharncliffe made some observation.] I must speak to order. If I misrepresented him, the noble Baron will have plenty of opportunity to refute anything I may say. I repeat that I rejoice to find that the noble Baron cheered what I stated. The poor have a right to subsistence, and I declare that that right rests on the most sacred authority, namely, the Bible. I have no hesitation in saying that this right is the gift to them of the Almighty, Giver of all Good. It is a gift to all men without exception or privilege. There is no special gift to the rich, and no special exception of the poor. They are all to be "fruitful and multiply, to replenish the earth and to subdue it," and the productions of the earth are given to man for his food. Therefore, I say that the Word of God has given to the poor the right to subsistence. The noble Baron admits that the poor have this right; but those who originated the present Poor Law, or whose principles at any rate originated it, allow of no such right. This New Poor Law is the great production of the Malthusian philosophy, and I am prepared to read to your Lordships what Mr. Malthus said as to the right of the poor to subsistence. In speaking of Mr. Malthus I may be permitted to gratify myself by bearing testimony to the excellence of that man. Mr. Malthus was a man of as singular talent as has been exhibited to the world. He was, moreover, a man of the purest benevolence, amenity of manners, and kindliness of demeanour; and exhibited a universality of charity which does not always distinguish men of high talents. I had the happiness and honour of his acquaintance, but I was much less intimate with him than I could have wished, particularly as he is now lost for ever. But my respect for Mr. Malthus's personal character must not prevent me from protesting against his principles. I am not going to enter into a discussion of his principles concerning population; but his doctrine certainly did induce him to come to a conclusion contrary, I rejoice to say, to that held by the noble Baron. Mr. Malthus held that the poor had no right to subsistence—that no man had a right to claim subsistence from

1819
society. In the second edition of his Essay on Population he permitted himself to say:—
"A man who is born into a world already possessed, if he cannot get subsistence from his parents, on whom he has a just demand, and if society do not want his labour, has no claim of right to the smallest portion of food, and, in fact, has no business to be where he is. At Nature's mighty feast there is no vacant cover for him. She tells him to be gone."
I am told that this passage was erased from the subsequent editions of the work; but it appeared in the edition of 1803. Now, if I had understood that Mr. Malthus had retracted his principles from which the passage I have quoted forms a legititimate conclusion, I should have been ashamed to taunt his memory, or to taunt his disciples by referring to that declaration. But the principles remain, though this particular passage has been erased from his work; and as he carried those principles to a startling and disgusting point, we ought to be glad that he has given us a deliberate practical view of the result. The present Poor Law, then, is founded on the Malthusian philosophy, which, at the period of the introduction of this measure, was so strongly recommended. It is the following up of this Malthusian philosophy which has caused this great experiment to be made on the happiness and virtue of the people of England. I understand that the biographer of Mr. Malthus has stated this to be the case, and has claimed all the merit, or rather demerit, of the New Poor Law for the philosophy of Malthus. Your Lordships are aware, that though the noble Baron (Lord Wharncliffe) and myself recognized the right of the poor to subsistence, this right is not universally recognized. It is not recognized in the Poor Law of 1834; but the Statute of Elizabeth proceeded on the principle of recognizing the right. Black-stone, in his Commentaries, says, on the authority of the Mirror of Magistrates, which I believe is a great authority for the Common Law of England, that by the Common Law the poor are entitled to subsistence from the parsons and the parishioners of the parish in which they live. That very Common Law to which your Lordships are indebted for your hereditary estates, and for the incidents of the honours you bear, for your power to legislate in this House for the interest and security of the country, and for the interests of the
1820
poor—that very Common Law gives to the poor the right of subsistence, and that right is recognized by the Statute of Elizabeth, for that Statute required that there should be work found for the poor in their own parishes. It recognized the parochial system, and it enabled the poor who remained at their homes to be sure that they should have the means of existence. That Statute of Elizabeth proceeded on a very different principle from the present Poor Law, which sends the poor to a distance from their homes to live in workhouses. The Statute of Elizabeth also enjoins the building of cottages, where necessary, for the accommodation of the poor; and it does not interfere with the poor by harshly disregarding their domestic affections; neither does it require of the poor, that for the purpose of getting a subsistence they should give up the rights of fathers and of husbands. The liberty of the people at large is recognized in that great Statute of Elizabeth, which was the Magna Charta of the poor. Is such the case under the present law? If the present law proceeds on the Malthusian principle, its enactment is intelligible, that the poor should have no right to subsistence; out it is neither intelligible nor justifiable on any ground. Was it ever before heard of that the poor should be dealt with as they are under the present law? They are told that they shall have a right to subsistence, if they consent to be prisoners in gaols, or (in other words) in workhouses, and to be separated from all those round whom their feelings and affections are entwined. If the poor consent to all this, then they shall have, under this New Poor Law, a subsistence as bad as human ingenuity can contrive consistently with the mere maintenance of life. But how can this be a right which is dealt with in this way? If the British Legislature recognize the right, would they dare so to restrict it? No; if they had recognized the right, they would have done in 1834 as in 1601, and they would have dealt with the poor as with freemen, though they might happen, from misfortune, to cease to have an independent means of existence. The thing is too plain for argument. I have said that these workhouses are gaols, where the poor are shut up and kept prisoners. This is a strong expression, and the noble Baron, I am afraid, thinks it too strong; but I will give him an authority on this subject—that of a most distinguished Assistant Poor Law Commissioner. I will read a letter

1821
which the Poor Law Commissioners peculiarly made their own. I am not speaking of the present Poor Law Commissioners, because I do not know whether any one of the Commissioners who authorized the letter I allude to continues in office. On referring to the Report of the Commissioners for 1836, your Lordships will find this letter. A very humane and excellent Gentleman, who represents the county of Kent, Mr. Plumptre, had occasion to complain of the prison-like character of the workhouses, and the Commissioners directed Mr. Tufnell to give them an answer on the subject; and I will read a part of that answer to your Lordships. Mr. Tufnell says:—
"At present these prison-like appearance, and the notion that they are intended to torment the poor inspires a salutary dread of them. I have taken several persons—ladies as well as others—to visit them, who have invariably turned loud in praise of the comfort they afford, and confest the groundlessness of their previous prepossessions against them. These praises, however, sound to me fraught with evil forebodings, the realization of which can only be prevented by carefully keeping up what seems to me our sole barrier against them—a system of restraint."
Therefore this description does not rest on any authority but on that of the Poor Law Commissioners. We have heard a good deal of the excellence of the workhouses lately, and the present system carried on there, and I will therefore read to your Lordships what Mr. Tufnell writes in 1841 in his Report on the Training of Pauper Children respecting the Schoolmasters in Union Workhouses. He says:—
"The extraordinary blunders I constantly hear committed by the schoolmasters in teaching the children are almost incredible. An hour before I am writing this, I requested a workhouse schoolmaster to examine his pupils on the last chapter they had been reading, which happened to be part of the 4th of St. John, when, amongst other blunders, he mistook the Publican for the Sadducee, confounded John the Baptist with John the Evangelist, made Galilee a city of Samaria, and put Samaria in Jerusalem. I once found a schoolmaster appointed who could neither read nor write."
Such, then, is the working of this system, and such is the instruction given to the poor. But this is not all; and again Mr. Tufnell states—
"There is also considerable danger of moral contamination to the children from their residence in the same house with adult paupers."
1822
This then has reference not to the merely young, but to the moral conditions of the aged and of the general inmates of those workhouses. Mr. Tufnell proceeds—
"It is perfectly well known to all who have had experience in Poor Law matters, that a very large proportion of the adult workhouse inmates are persons of the worst characters—the very refuse of the population—and there is a reason in the nature of the subject, which it is not now necessary to explain, why it is and always must be so. That this class, morally infected as it is, should be kept separate from the children, is of course of primary importance, and in every union workhouse means are taken to provide for this end by building separate wards and yards for each class. I am confident, however, that architectural arrangements can never effectually secure perfect classification in a workhouse. Conversation, sometimes of the obscenest description, is carried on over walls and through windows. The conversation engendered in such an establishment is anything but moral. Perhaps a woman comes into the house to lie in of a bastard child, and every circumstance relating to it becomes the talk of the house; another dies of a foul and loathsome disease, which gives rise to a multitude of inquiries. The atmosphere of a workhouse that contains adult paupers is tainted with vice; no one who regards the future happiness of the children would ever wish them to be educated within its precincts."
Here, my Lords, is ample evidence of the danger of bringing the sober and industrious poor into these moral pest-houses. Is it to be endured that the honest and well-conducted man, who is obliged to come to the parish for relief, should be compelled to go into these detestable places—nay, more, that his wife and children also should be forced into those polluted sties of infamy? Is it to be endured that the honest and deserving poor of this land should be made to pay this price for the miserable boon of such a subsistence as is provided for them in the workhouses? I am sure that it is only necessary for me to bring these things under the notice of your Lordships in order to convince you that you have not sufficiently considered this question. These things are before us. They are not prepared for the occasion. They show that the existing law is intolerable, and I am satisfied that no man who hears them will deny that they present what is the state of workhouses in general. The noble Baron says, no—[Lord Wharncliffe: No, I did not.] I am glad of it; for what I have read to your Lordships shows that there must be

1823
moral pollution in these poorhouses. I say also, that it shows this to be the general state of the poorhouses, and if so, I say they are not places to which you can persist in sending your poor. These, my Lords, are very serious evils. They are truths which ought to make a deep impression on the House. My Lords, I may have perhaps spoken on this occasion with more warmth than in my cooler moments I might wish, but I have nothing to retract. I feel myself excited and I cannot help speaking strongly. I maintain that the considerations I have urged are so important that I defy you to go on until you have taken them into your fullest deliberation. As Christians, my Lords, you cannot, as legislators you will not. My Lords, I have spoken of the prison-like character of the workhouses. When the subject of the separation of man and wife has been urged, we have been told over and over again that the same things as those now complained of occurred in some of the workhouses under the old system. The noble Baron repeated the same thing the other night. Now, I have the greatest respect, my Lords, for the authority upon which that statement has been made, but I must say I believe the facts stated to be impossible. My Lords, I understand the noble Baron when he makes this declaration with respect to well-regulated workhouses to apply it to workhouses in existence before the passing of the Act of 1834. I cannot tell where those well-regulated workhouses were. The workhouses under the 9th of George I., cannot be those he refers to. They were small workhouses adapted to single parishes, or sometimes two small parishes were permitted to join; but there was no pretence for the separation of the sexes; and with regard to the unions under Gilbert's Act the fact is, that under it, only the aged, impotent, and infirm, can be taken into the workhouses. Able-bodied men and their wives cannot be admitted there. There is a positive enactment against it. The words are—
"And to render the provisions of this Act more practicable and beneficial, be it enacted, that no person shall be sent to such poorhouse or houses, except such as are indigent from old age, sickness, or infirmity, or are unable to acquire their subsistence by labour."
Therefore in the well-regulated workhouses in the Gilbert unions the things alluded to could not possibly occur. But, besides what I have read from the Act, there are also the rules and regulations to
1824
be enforced in the poorhouses, and the third of those rules is, that the governor of the workhouse is to place in a separate and comfortable department persons who having been respectable householders shall have been reduced by misfortune, in preference to persons of an opposite character. Therefore, according to that regulation, man and wife were to be put together; and that they could not do it I maintain, on the authority of all the legal decisions that took place up to the passing of the Act of 1834. So sacred was the principle of not separating man and wife held to be, that in the case of an alien, who therefore could not have any settlement of his own, the wife, who had a settlement, could not, if she came to want, be removed to her own settlement, but remained and continued as a casual pauper, because the law would not permit the separation of man and wife. My Lords, that separation was first made legal by the Act of 1834. Not directly made legal—no, my Lords, this Parliament would never directly have made such an enactment. And not long after the passing of the Act of 1834, when the late Duke of Buckingham presented a petition from Stoke Poges, in which the petitioners expressed their sense of the grievance there was in the possibility of man and wife being separated, the noble and learned Lord who was the author of the Bill, and who carried it through this House—I mean Lord Brougham, whose distinguished ability displayed in carrying that Bill through will not, I am sure, be soon forgotten by any of those who heard him—that noble and learned Lord jumped up in his place, as he sometimes does in this House, and said that it was impossible—that it was supposing the Commissioners to be mad, to think that they would entertain the very notion of separating man and wife. My Lords, it happened to myself to put this question to the test. Believing that the separation of man and wife was not justified by any previous law, I thought that the question ought to be tested, all the Judges of the last century having affirmed the law to be, that man and wife could not be separated. I therefore undertook to try the question in a Court of Justice. I did so. The Commissioners afforded me every assistance in bringing the matter to trial. I was in communication with the Commissioners; and here I must state that whenever I was in communication with either the present or the late Commissioners, I experienced not only courtesy, but the

1825
utmost candour, fairness, and readiness to assist in the investigation I was making. My counsel on the occasion was then one of the most distinguished at the bar—he is now one of the most distinguished Judges. He moved the Court of King's Bench on the subject; but the Judges said they could not entertain so important a Motion so late in the term, and accordingly they deferred if till the next term. I had not been in personal communication with my counsel at that time. He received all the reasons why I thought the separation of man and wife were illegal, and he said there was a great deal in them. But there was one point he said, which I could not get over. He said, if the Act of 1834 had contented itself with giving the power to the Poor Law Commissioners of making laws and regulations for the management of the poor, they could not have contravened that great principle that man and wife are not to be separated; but the Act had gone further, for it said that the laws and regulations made by the Commissioners were to have the same effect as if they were part of the Act of Parliament itself. Then the question came, whether Parliament had the power to pass a law, for the separation of man and wife, and as he could not hold that Parliament was not competent to pass such a law he did not think that his application to the Judges would succeed. My Lords, the matter being thus brought to this point, I stood pledged to bring the question to a legislative issue, but when my own Counsel, a man of eminent ability, told me that I must fail, I felt that I had virtually brought the question to an issue, and that my honour was satisfied. I felt that to go further, would only be to agitate the question in a manner in which I was not entitled to agitate it—that I was entitled to say, that this law was wrong; but, finding that it was the law, I was bound to deal with it as the law. But I am entitled to mention this, in order to show how very special and stringent must be this regulation of the Commissioners for the separation of man and wife, when it required the authority of this Act of Parliament in order to enable them to make it. It appears to me that that part of the Act is not only mischievous, but also unparallelled—at least, if there are any parallels, I fear you must go a long way back for them. I fear no precedent can be found since the famous statute of Henry VIII., which gave to his proclamations during his life all the authority of law. I will defy any one to
1826
produce a later precedent for any such enactment. There was an earlier case in the reign of Edward II., when the obsequious Parliament of that day gave to the Spencers and some others of the King's minions a similar power. With these two exceptions, the Act of 1834 had in this respect no precedent. Then, my Lords, as regards relief, as it is called. We see what this "relief" is. It is to be shut up in a gaol, and a general order goes forth to refuse out-door relief to able-bodied paupers. That idea has gone forth to 460 Unions, to which therefore, it is absolute law. Under that rule, no out-door relief is to be given in those 460 Unions, except in some special cases which hardly ever occur. Relief in those Unions, with those exceptions, is not to be given except to those who come into the workhouses—into these moral pest-houses. But, my Lords, there is another question—there is the question of the facility of getting into these workhouses. One would expect that the miserable destitute poor would have had near at hand the power of obtaining relief. Such used to be the case. They used to have in their own parishes—at their own doors—the dispensers of—I will not say charity—but of the just dole given out by the country as the tribute to the Author of all Good for the property left to be enjoyed upon that condition. But how are the poor now situated in that respect? These Unions are of the most enormous extent. One of them extends over 330 miles. Your Lordships may well believe it to be incredible. [The Lord Chancellor — Twelve miles square would only give 144 miles.] In Lincolnshire, the most considerable agricultural county in England, there are 600 parishes, and only fourteen Unions. The average size of an Union in Lincolnshire, is 200 square miles. How is it possible that the poor can go so far as from the extremity of one of these Unions for relief?
The Lord Chancellorobserved, that the centre of such an Union would only be six or seven miles from the extreme point.
The Bishop of Exeter.But the seat of the Union is commonly not in the exact centre of the Union, but in the principal town of the district, and therefore I believe you will find that in ordinary cases, certainly in the old counties, they would have to go more than six or seven miles. I think, my Lords, that is a considerable distance for the poor man to go to get an answer, perhaps of no! and then to go

1827
further on the chance of getting an answer of yes! But we are told, that although we see the abuses of the new system, we do not bear in mind the abuses of the old, which were very great indeed. And so they were. But, then, my Lords, they were abuses. These things are not abuses, but necessary parts of the system. There is the great distinction. But those abuses of the old system are mainly of modern introduction. In fact, the year 1797 originated the greatest abuses which were specified last night by a noble Earl, who spoke in favour of the present Bill. Those abuses were, the "roundsmen," the allowance system, and the payment of wages out of the rates. It is notorious, that those abuses arose out of the extraordinary state of things in 1795 and 1796. One or two of your Lordships now present, are old enough to remember those years. They were years of singular scarcity; the price of provisions rose to a great height, and some provision for such a state of things became absolutely necessary. There were also other causes; there was the war, which contributed to raise the general prices of every thing. Wages did not rise at the same time, and it was thought expedient in some counties—Berkshire, I believe, was the first to adopt it—to give to the industrious labourer who could not earn wages enough to meet the increased price of bread, an allowance of a quantity of bread. The "roundsmen" took rise from the same cause. Those were the most operative causes of the evils of the old system. In the part of the country where I then resided, in the county of Durham, those abuses did not generally prevail; but they existed to a great extent in the southern parts of England; and, as those who witnessed them there believed that they prevailed generally, they were the more ready to lend an ear to the putting down of the old system and the trial of the new one. My Lords, I think it is our bounden duty, when we are endeavouring to fix the basis of a system of poor laws, to consider well whether we cannot revert to the system under the 43d of Elizabeth, with such checks as may and ought to be provided against the repetition of those abuses under that system which were made the plea for the present law. I think it is our duty to do so, and, feeling that it is my duty also, I do earnestly beseech your Lordships to join me in deferring the consideration of this Bill for the present Session. There are not a dozen of your Lord-
1828
ships present now. The House of Commons took six months to consider this Bill. Shall we, my Lords, get through the Bill as it is proposed, to night, and probably not in so many hours? Will that be right? Is it not a measure so complicated as to render it necessary that there should be in common sense a much longer time for deliberation? Not only is the measure itself complicated, but I must say, the necessity for passing it now is inconsiderable. It will be absolutely trifling with the sacred interests of the poor if you deal with them in the manner you are now pressed to adopt. I do hope, whatever I may have said this night—however I may appear to have spoken with greater warmth than I could have wished—I do hope that anything I may have said will not be permitted to injure the cause of which I am the advocate. I do hope, however, that it will be felt that I have brought forward facts in support of the proposition with which I now conclude—"that this House do resume the Committee on this Bill this day six months."
The Duke of Wellington: My Lords, I have given my best attention to the speech of the right rev. Prelate, and I beg to call your attention, in the first place, to the argument he has brought forward to induce you to postpone the consideration of this Bill at such a period. He told you about an hour and a half ago that it was too late in the evening to go into the consideration of such a Bill, and he further said that your Lordships were not in sufficient numbers for so important a measure to be disposed of. But I beg to remind your Lordships that we have frequently sat here to a much later hour in the night than this, and that, according to the constitution and practice of this House, you are not at all in numbers too few for the consideration of any measure, and more particularly for the consideration of a measure which has been so long under the consideration of the other House of Parliament, on a subject which is perfectly known to your Lorpships, and which has, in fact, been under the consideration of Parliament not in the present Session only, but also during the last three or four Sessions of Parliament, when measures for the amendment of the existing Poor Law have been considered. Measures recommended by the late Government and by the present Government have been under the consideration of Parliament

1829
during that time, only that on account of the pressure of the other business those measures have been postponed, and at last this measure has been considered and brought to maturity in this Session of Parliament by the House of Commons. It is a measure which comes to your Lordships recommended by that House; and yet at this period of the Session you are called on, night after night, to put off this measure, which has for its object the amendment of many of those evils in the existing Poor Law of which the right rev. Prelate complains. This is the real question, whether you will to-night enter into the consideration of a Bill which has for its object the amendment of the existing Law. My Lords, in the course of the argument of the right rev. Prelate on this Bill, which was quite a legitimate course of argument for the right rev. Prelate to take, he spoke on the subject of the omission of any amendment in relation to chaplains in workhouses—a subject on which he with great eloquence addressed your Lordships in the early part of the present Session. My Lords, I lament for one, that this Bill does not contain all the amendments to the existing law which I think it ought to contain with respect to this subject. But the right rev. Prelate after entering on this part of the subject, and stating as he did so forcibly, his objections to the Bill, warmed up in the course of his argument and came to that which was the real object of his Amendment, namely, to repeal the existing law. The object of all the right rev. Prelate's speech, and of all his views on the subject is the repeal of the law—that, my Lords, is what he wanted. He wishes that you should return to the system which existed before the present law was enacted, and that you should not pass this Bill which has been the result of consideration during many Sessions of Parliament and the object of which is the Amendment, of the law, but that you should at once repeal it. My Lords, if the right rev. Prelate would be pleased to give notice in the course of this week or of the next that he will bring in a Bill the existing Poor Law, and to restore the Act of the 43rd of Elizabeth, which I understand to be the object of the right rev. Prelate,—if he will do this I will undertake to say, that he will bring down to the House a sufficient number of Peers to discuss that proposition, or any other subject which is worthy
1830
their attention. But, my Lords, I entreat the right rev. Prelate not to set to work to repeal the existing law by preventing in the first instance the consideration of a Bill, the object of which is to amend the very evils in the existing law of which he complains. My Lords, the right rev. Prelate having passed so much of his time in discussing the policy of the existing law, I must be permitted to say a few words to you on that subject, having voted originally for the existing law, though I sat on the other side of the House at the time when it was proposed by the then Ministers, and having supported it on all occasions from that time to this. My Lords, the existing law brought in in 1834, was rendered obligatory by the state of abuse which had grown out of the law of the 43rd of Elizabeth in every parish in England — in some to a degree which threatened the total ruin of such parishes by a total cessation of labour in some parts of the country, but everywhere to such a degree as to have required the attention of some of the greatest men who ever appeared in England—I mean Mr. Pitt, for one, Mr. Whitbread for another, and Mr. Sturges Bourne for a third, who each and all of them endeavoured to introduce and carry through Parliament bills for the amendment of the law of Elizabeth, and every one of them failed, finding that they could not attain their object. The abuses were so great and so various, varying in almost every parish in England, that it became absolutely impossible by any system of legislation to meet those abuses so as to save the country from the ruin and destruction that was growing on it in consequence of the manner in which the law was administered. It was found at last that nothing would apply a remedy except to establish a central system of Government for the regulation and maintenance of the poor under the management of Commissioners, who were to be themselves under the general superintendence and control of the Government. That my Lords, is an epitome of the history of the establishment of this Poor Law. I say, my Lords, that you cannot depart from the system so adopted without going back again to the old system with its abuses differing as I said in every parish in England, and which must tend, as it tended before, to the total destruction and ruin of agriculture, and press particularly on the very lowest class, who were the ob-

1831
jects of the Act of Elizabeth. Now, my Lords, as to the management of the Poor Law under the Act of 1834. I am not, nor have I ever been, a guardian of the poor. It is not in my power to live in the country sufficiently often from time to time to enable me to undertake such a duty, and I never have undertaken to perform it. But, my Lords, I do visit the workhouses in the different parts of the country where I happen to reside occasionally. During the year, I reside a considerable length of time in two parts of the country, and I visit workhouses in both; and this I must say, that it is impossible for anything to be better managed than those workhouses are; and it is impossible for any system to have answered better as a system for the management of the poor, to have given greater satisfaction to those employed as labourers, and those who employed them, than this system of the Poor Law in those two parts of the country where I reside. I speak, my Lords, of what I know and I have always frankly stated the same in this House whenever I have had an opportunity in answer to a noble Earl who is an enemy to this law. And, my Lords, I always will say, the same thing whenever I am called on in this House. I must say, as far as I have any knowledge of this system, and I have frequently visited the union-houses in many parts but more particularly in two parts of the country where I reside, that I cannot but approve of what I have seen there upon every occasion. The right rev. Prelate has complained of some things which exist in these Unions, and for some of which this Bill is to find a remedy. One of them is the separation of man and wife; and the right rev. Prelate says there never was such a thing heard of as the separation of man and wife. My Lords, did the right rev. Prelate ever hear of workhouses and poorhouses under the old system of the law of Elizabeth? Did he ever hear of hospitals? Why, my Lords, the common decencies of life require, that when large numbers of persons are to be brought together, man and wife shall be separated. The women must be placed in one part and the men in another part of the house. It cannot be otherwise. This is what is required by the laws of decency. It is not only under this Act that it is done, it was done in the old workhouses under the law of Elizabeth. It had
1832
been done invariably in hospitals, and it cannot be otherwise. Then with respect to the education of children, instead of declaiming, as the right rev. Prelate has done to-night, about the inferiority of schoolmasters and the defective state of education among the children, who, by the by were kept separate, let him introduce a Clause to insure that the schoolmasters shall be properly qualified for their duties. But no, my Lords, that is not the object of the right rev. Prelate. He does not want to go into Committee that the present law may be amended, nor does he want the postponement of the Committee in order that your Lordships may have a better opportunity of considering this measure to-morrow or next day, but he wants you not to go into Committee because he wishes to destroy the Act which this Bill is intended to amend. If the right rev. Prelate is in earnest, let him come here with his Amendments in Committee—let him state what his objections are—let him propose his amendments, and see whether my noble Friend will adopt them or not. Upon one subject, with reference to chaplains, there can be no amendment, because the system of legislation in force between the two Houses would prevent it; but there are other points on which the right rev. Prelate may propose amendments; let him do that, and he will render a service to the country; but to pretend to prevail on your Lordships to stop this Bill to night, in order to render it absolutely necessary to repeal the existing Act, is a course unworthy of the abilities and station of the right rev. Prelate, and which I trust your Lordships will not attend to, but go into the Bill, and proceed with it as far as you can to-night in order to render it as beneficial as you can, with the view of amending the law as it now exists.
The Marquess of Normanbyentirely agreed in what had been so well expressed by the noble Duke both with reference to the original intentions of the framers of the Poor Law Amendment Act, the necessity which then existed for its enactment, and the execution since; and he could not help expressing his extreme surprise at the course which had been taken by the right rev. Prelate. When last night the right rev. Prelate proposed the adjournment of the debate, he certainly never contemplated that the result of the delay was to have

1833
been a Motion for the rejection of a Bill, almost every Clause of which contained some relaxation of a Bill which the right rev. Prelate had so warmly opposed. As he could see no connexion whatever between the general arguments of the right rev. Prelate and the Motion with which he concluded, he could only imagine that his reason for wishing the postponement was, that the right rev. Prelate desired to have a fuller audience; but he had cautioned the right rev. Prelate not to be too sanguine on that point, and the result had been that his audience was scantier that evening than it would have been last night. There were one or two facts mentioned by the right rev. Prelate to which for a single moment he would allude. The right rev. Prelate had alluded to the letter of the Poor Law Commissioners in 1839, addressed to him (Lord Normanby), as Secretary of State, suggesting the appointment of chaplains to workhouses; but it should be recollected this was previous to the decision of a Court of Law, and the advice of the Poor Law Commissioners at that time was perfectly consistent with the course they had hitherto pursued when they found out the power possessed by the Guardians. He was surprised the right rev. Prelate had said nothing with respect to the Bastardy Clauses in this Bill, considering how strongly he had spoken on the subject in 1834. In fact, this Bill amended the Bastardy Clauses in the existing law very much in the way suggested by the right rev. Prelate, and he was surprised he had not availed himself of that fact as a legitimate source of triumph. He was obliged to own with the noble Duke, that with respect to the Bastardy Clauses they had not answered all the objects they had in view, and therefore he agreed to this measure of amendment. Then, with respect to the size of the Unions, it almost appeared to him as if the right rev. Prelate had not read this Bill; for all the arguments he principally put forth against the original Bill were met by the present measure—the evils were either entirely connected or greatly mitigated by the provisions of this Bill. With respect also to the education of pauper children, there were provisions in this Bill for the creation of district schools. As to out-door relief, in respect of which the right rev. Prelate understood, that there were 500 Unions in which it was refused, the 26th Clause of this Bill introduced most material relaxations, which he thought would be extremely useful. His noble Friend
1834
(Earl Fortescue) last night had intimated a wish to restrict the allowance to widows to twelve months after the husband's death, but in that objection he did not agree. A widow wore her weeds for one year, but he did not know why her necessities should be confined to that period; he would not therefore support that amendment. The right rev. Prelate had apologised for the warmth with which he had spoken, and hoped their Lordships would excuse it. But so far as they were concerned, he was sure there had been no exhibition of warmth to be excused. The right rev. Prelate had spoken as he always did with great ability, with great fact, with great art—[The Lord Chancellor: With great earnestness.] Yes, with great earnestness, and great sincerity; but as to any warmth, why, there was no such thing; and in the state of the House, it would have been odd indeed if there had been any excitement. But a good deal of this was not intended for their Lordships' ears; and the right rev. Prelate knew very well that a little confession of warmth and excitement on this subject did not make such a discourse tell less where it was intended. He must bear his testimony from personal experience in confirmation of the noble Duke as to the management of workhouses under the present Bill. Within a very few days he had had the opportunity of going through the very worst parts in the eastern district of the metropolis and inspecting the new workhouse in Bethnal Green; and he must say, that the appearance of the inmates of every age, contrasted with those he saw in their own wretched abodes, was such as must excite feelings of gratification in every friend of humanity; and as to the children, he could detect the period they had passed in their prison, as the right rev. Prelate termed it, by their more healthy appearance. So much had been said in praise of the manner in which the Act had been administered, that anything he could say further in commendation of those Gentlemen who had had the conduct of the measure would be neither necessary nor useful to them, but having exercised the functions of that department to which the peculiar superintendence of the conduct of this law was intrusted during two years, he could not, in justice to his own feelings, avoid bearing his personal testimony to those who had exercised their functions with mildness, humanity, and unwearied perseverance, to carry out the true ends of this law, which, in spite of

1835
what had been stated by the right rev. Prelate, he must consider wise, just, and humane.
Lord Wrottesley,as Chairman of a Board of Guardians, protested against the first nine Clauses of this Bill, which he greatly feared would reproduce all the evils of the old bastardy laws, by offering a higher premium to perjury and incontinence, and placing the guilty in a better position than the honest and industrious. Still he felt the position a difficulty in which the Government were placed with respect to this measure, and as there were several material amendments of the Poor Law contained in this Bill, he certainly wished to see them carried. But he could not sit down without expressing his grateful thanks to the noble President of the Council for his speech in introducing this measure in favour of the Poor Law Amendment Act, in which he had always felt the deepest interest, and which, in his opinion, had been a most successful one.
The House divided on the question that "now" stand part of the Motion: Content 17; Not Content 1: Majority 16.
House then went into Committee.
Lord Wharncliffe,in proposing the first Clause, wished to say a few words, having been several times referred to personally by the right rev. Prelate. In one respect, he was very much obliged to the right rev. Prelate for the course he had pursued to-night; for this was the first time they had been enabled to learn what was the object of those out of doors who cried out so much against the existing Poor Law. The right rev. Prelate said, "Don't amend or improve the present law, for God's sake; let us go back to the 43rd of Elizabeth." But when the right rev. Prelate said, that a Bill passed in 1601, was the only thing that by possibility could answer the purpose of 1844, he would ask what, after all, was that Bill, and what was its occasion? The poor had, previous to the Reformation, been maintained by charity from the monasteries; and when they were put down, their means of relief were entirely cut off. It was necessary to get rid of bands of vagabonds who were going throughout the country; and the 43rd of Elizabeth was a restrictive measure, which compelled them to remain in their parishes. The right rev. Prelate contended that the poor had a right to subsistence;—he admitted that they had a right to relief in case of destitution, and that he maintained was the principle of the
1836
Poor Law Amendment Act. He admitted there were conditions attached, as in the 43rd of Elizabeth; but he did ask the right rev. Prelate, if he did think that in the altered state of society, and with a greatly increased population, they could reenact the 43rd of Elizabeth? Yet this was the mighty scheme of those persons who were in the habit of crying out against the present law! He would venture to say, if the right rev. Prelate would come forward and seriously propose the repeal of the existing law, and the re-enactment of the 43rd of Elizabeth, he and those persons out of doors who contended for such a thing, would become the laughing-stocks of the whole country. The right rev. Prelate, after what had passed, would not be doing his duty in that House, if he did not bring forward this subject in a more definite shape than he had done to-night. What were the provisions of the Bill which the right rev. Prelate refused to go into Committee to consider? With respect to bastardy, for instance, the Bill was a great relaxation of the present law. Then, as to the mixture of adult paupers with children, and the separation of man and wife, the right rev. Prelate denied that those things had taken place before; but he begged to inform the right rev. Prelate that, in workhouses under Local Acts, the separation of man and wife had been carried out to an extent as great, and with much less care and attention to the wants and wishes of the poor, than under the existing law. With respect to the extent of the Unions, he admitted they were too large. The Government were anxious to remedy the evil, and for that purpose they had inserted Clauses in this Bill; but the right rev. Prelate would not consider them; he would rather the grievance remained unredressed, in the hope of reenacting the 43rd of Elizabeth. The Government were accused of want of humanity; yet when grievances were pointed out, and when they sought to apply the proper remedy—when they endeavoured to mitigate the law, to render it more humane in many points in which they thought it too stringent, they were told by the right rev. Prelate the present law should not be amended, for nothing could be effectual without repealing the whole law. He certainly did not think the course recommended by the right rev. Prelate either very considerate or very humane.
The Bishop of Exeterbegged to say a very few words in reply to the noble Ba-

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ron. The noble Baron more than once was pleased to charge him with combining with persons out of doors for carrying a certain measure in that House. He did not think that could be wrong if it were so. [Lord Wharncliffe: Very far from it.] He begged, however, to say, that he had brought forward his Motion to-night wholly and solely on his own responsibility and to express his own views. That there were many persons out of that House who thought with him he fully believed; he should be very sorry indeed if among the many millions in this country there were not a large portion that thought with him, though none of the seventeen Peers who were going to discuss this measure in Committee did him the honour of voting with him. Without any disrespect to the noble Baron, he must say he was perfectly indifferent whether any one thought he was on this occasion seeking, with other persons out of doors (whoever might be designated by that expression), to effect a particular purpose. The noble Baron thought that he seriously proposed to renew the Act of the 43rd of Elizabeth. What he stated in that House he always stated seriously and sincerely; and what he did say was, that it appeared to him that it was the duty of Parliament now to place on a permanent footing the laws for the relief of the poor in this country, and that the wise course would be, to look to the 43rd of Elizabeth, as the foundation of what they ought to do, that having, on the whole, worked most beneficially for the country; at the same time taking care to add clauses that should meet and prevent the abuses which were introduced by the incidents of 1795, and the high prices of the war. The noble Baron said the 43rd of Elizabeth had been passed in very different circumstances from the present; and so he might say of Magna Charta, but still it afforded a good foundation on which to work. He had not accused their Lordships of want of humanity; on the contrary, he believed them entirely and sincerely anxious to promote the interests of the poor, although he believed them wholly mistaken in the way they were now endeavouring to do it. The noble Baron had referred to the history of the 43rd of Elizabeth, but there was nothing in that Act to confine the poor to their homes. So far from it, there was no restraint whatever, except as to begging. They might work at home, or go where they could get it. He thought that in comparison to the great men who
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lived in Queen Elizabeth's time and those who obtained Magna Charta, the greatest men of the present day would not be ashamed of being threatened with being placed on a par. When he recollected who had taken a part in the councils of this country when the 43rd of Elizabeth was passed—when he remembered such names as the Cecils and Throgmortons, Lord Keeper Egerton, Lord Coke, and Lord Bacon, and then looked round upon the Peer she was addressing, he was not ashamed of referring to that Act. Mr. Pitt had avowed that the 43rd of Elizabeth was necessarily the foundation of whatever enactment was to be made on the subject. His (the Bishop of Exeter's) recollection of the history of that time did not agree with that of the noble Baron. He believed that those vagabonds to whom he had referred existed in this country long before the suppression of the monasteries. More than that, he believed they were caused by them. There were enactments against those vagabonds in the time of Henry VIII. before the monasteries were suppressed. The noble Baron had pointed out to him what he considered to be his (the Bishop of Exeter's) duty. He must say that it had been his intention, and he had stated it to a noble Friend of his, to give notice, that at an early period next Session he would move for a Select Committee to inquire into the means of divine worship and spiritual instruction afforded in Union Workhouses. He now gave that notice.
The first and second clauses of the Bill were then agreed to.
On the 2nd Clause being proposed, enacting that Justices in Petty Sessions may make an order on the putative father for maintenance and costs, and enforce the same by distress and commitment,
The Bishop of Exetermoved that the following words in the Clause be struck out, "and if the evidence of the mother be corroborated in some material particular by other testimoney, to the satisfaction of the Court;" the Clause proceeding to say, that in that case "the Court may adjudge the man to be the putative father of such bastard child." He was aware that that was the law at present, but he considered it a very faulty part of the law. It was perfectly conceivable that the Magistrates might have full confidence of the truth of the evidence of the mother, whether corroborated or not, and in such cases he thought the Magistrates ought to proceed accordingly. There were more objections than

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one against requiring this corroborative testimony. He should say that in those cases where there was the greatest degree of modesty on the part of the woman, would the difficulty of advancing corroborating testimony be the strongest. If the woman had been seduced—if, although in other respects chaste, she in a moment of frailty had yielded to the man who had addressed himself to her, it was exceedingly probable that she, being a person of great modesty, would become the mother of a child under circumstances which no human being could be aware of save the parties themselves. He thought the very modesty of the mother would prove the means of her being unable to produce this corroborating evidence. If she were a person of a different character she might absolutely take the precaution of having corroborating testimony in order that she might secure a maintenance for the child. Instead, therefore, of being a security, he conceived that the words which he proposed to omit would prove the surest means of defeating the object of the enactment. It was also, in his mind, no trifling objection that they were, he believed, without example, except in the case of high treason. Let it be known, therefore, that according to law, if this Bill were passed, the affiliation of a bastard child would rank with the crime of high treason in requiring corroborating circumstances. If noble Lords thought it a wise enactment he would not trouble them with a division, but it appeared to him absolutely monstrous. Another objection to it was, as he had been credibly assured, that it was productive of the most gross and indelicate exposures, which might under this Bill be repeated and enlarged on by the appeal which it gave to the Quarter Sessions. He was quite ready to give the Magistrates the power of demanding corroborative testimony. He thought they might very usefully demand it when they conceived that the woman was an immodest woman, and desirous of trafficking upon her own wickedness, but when they entirely believed the oath of the woman he was for allowing them to adjudge the man to be the putative father, without additional testimony.
Lord Wharncliffecould not agree to the Amendment. The right rev. Prelate had probably had no experience in this matter; but those who had knew that under the old law, that which existed before the present, there were many flagrant instances
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of men being unjustly burdened with children of whom they were not the parents. The right rev. Prelate was very much mistaken if he supposed that the greatest number of the women who gave birth to illegitimate children were women who had been seduced. It would be nearer the truth to say, that in the majority of cases it was the men who were seduced. The women seduced the men, and then chose from amongst them the persons upon whom they wished to affiliate their offspring. The right rev. Prelate said that this corroborating testimony led to indecencies. He feared that the right rev. Prelate misunderstood the nature of the testimony. The right rev. Prelate's notion seemed to be, that there must be evidence of the fact of the intercourse. That was not necessary for corroborating evidence. It was enough, as in cases of seduction, that the corroborating evidence should merely amount to this—that the parties had been seen together under circumstances which, if they were so inclined, would have favoured a criminal intercourse between them. But it was not at all necessary to have a witness to speak to the fact of an intercourse. His firm belief was, that since the alteration of the law requiring corroborating testimony in those cases the instances of persons falsely charged with bastardy were exceedingly rare indeed.
The Marquess of Butethought the present Clause went a little too far. He preferred the practice of Scotland of not calling the woman at all unless the other testimony failed. He was, however, favourable to corroborating evidence.
Amendment negatived.
The Bishop of Exeternext called attention to that part of the Clause which enabled the Court to make an order on the putative father for the payment of a certain sum and costs to the mother of the bastard child, or any person appointed to have the custody of such child. He thought it of most importance that some other mode should be devised of enabling the woman to receive the money awarded. If made payable to her by the putative father, see what the consequences would be. She would have to go to him at certain times to receive it, and he asked whether that would not be almost enacting by law either the repetition of her sin or her maltreatment.
Lord Wharncliffeadmitted the force of the right rev. Prelate's objection, and would see and remedy it on the bringing up of the Report.
Clause agreed to.
On the 4th Clause being proposed, granting an appeal to the Quarter Sessions of the putative father,
The Bishop of Exetersaid, there was an appeal at present, and he thought it right there should be, but he wished to know how the expenses of it were to be met by the woman who would have to bring her corroborating witnesses to the Quarter Sessions. He spoke not of farmers' daughters, or persons who might be supposed to have a sufficiency of means to meet such expences, but of paupers, of poor women who actually required the money they sought for the maintenance of their child, and were unable to meet the expenses of the appeal.
Lord Wharncliffesaid, that no doubt such instances as the right rev. Prelate contemplated might exist, but as the man in appealing was bound by this Clause to give security for the payment of all costs, and as by much the greater part of those who were the object of the Clause would be able to find the necessary means of supporting the original application, he thought no hardship was likely to arise from it. If a woman were unable to pay the necessary expenses, he doubted not that there were many attornies who, if they found the case a good one, would readily take it up. Then let the right rev. Prelate look a little at the other side. Did he think it would be right to make the order of the two justices upon the putative father final?
The Bishop of Exeter: No, I have said so already.
Lord Wharncliffe: Then you must have an appeal to some court, and I see none more eligible than the Quarter Sessions.
The Bishop of Exeterfelt the difficulty of the case, and did not see how it was to be got over. He had not considered the details of the Bill, and would not press his suggestion; but he did feel, if they were to carry out their intentions on this point, they ought to devise some mode for rendering the remedy offered to the woman as perfect and as easily attainable as possible.
Clause agreed to; as were Clauses 5, 6, and 7, with some verbal amendments.
On Clause 8 being read, enacting penal-
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ties for conspiracy to procure false evidence to prove a man to be the putative father of a bastard child, &c.,
The Bishop of Exeterthought the woman equally entitled to protection. The Common Law applied equally to both, and if there was to be a special protection given by this Statute to the man, he saw no reason why they ought not to give the same to the woman.
Lord Wharncliffesaid he would take the point into consideration, and see how far he could meet the right rev. Prelate's view.
Clause agreed to, as also Clauses 9, 10, and 11, with verbal amendments.
Clauses to Clause 40 were then agreed to.
On the 41st Clause being proposed,
The Bishop of Exetersaid, he would take the liberty to suggest that the chaplains of the district schools should not be appointed by the guardians, but by the Commissioners. It was true that the Guardians of the District Boards would be of a higher order than they usually were, but as it was not merely a good kind of man who was wanted as chaplain, but a superior man; he thought that the Commissioners, whose eyes were all over England, would probably make a better appointment than the Guardians were likely to make. Mr. Brown, the chaplain at the Norwood school, had shown himself so admirably qualified for his office, that he was desirous that the chaplains who were to be appointed to all the other schools should be equally effective.
Lord Wharncliffesaid the Clause had been fairly discussed in the other House. He would take the right rev. Prelate's suggestion into his consideration, but he could not hold out much hope to him that it would be adopted. It should be recollected that the Clause, as it then stood, vested the appointment in the hands of the persons who were to pay the Chaplains.
That Clause, as well as the subsequent ones to 53, were then agreed to.
On the 54th Clause, enacting that certain poor should be chargeable to the whole Union, being proposed,
Lord Redesdalesaid, he thought this Clause was likely to give rise to abuse as regarded travelling labourers. He was of opinion, too, that until a party who was found destitute could be brought before the Board of Guardians and relieved out

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of the common fund of the Union, he should be relieved by the relieving officer of the parish in which he might be found.
Clause 54, and 55, to 63 agreed to.
On Clause 64,
The Bishop of Exetersaid, he hoped his noble Friend would consider the petition which he presented from the parishoners of Kensington, complaining of their being included in a Union. Their case was one of some hardship, for the population of the parish of Kensington exceeded 20,000.
Lord Wharncliffesaid, that he would consider the case of the petitioners.
The Clause and the three following agreed to.
Clause 68 was struck out and another Clause inserted, making a slight alteration in the mode of making application by district boards.
The remaining Clauses of the Bill agreed to.
House adjourned.