Sitting of 17 July 1849

MINUTES.
PUBLIC BILLS.—2° Disembodied Militia.
Reported.—Small Debts Act Amendment; Stock in Trade; Regimental Benefit Societies; Enlistment (Artillery and Ordnance); Royal Pavilion (Brighton); Railways Abandonment; Nuisances Removal and Diseases Prevention;

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Administration of Justice (Vancouver's Island); New Zealand Land Conveyances.
3° London Corporation; House of Commons Offices; Petty Bag, &c. Offices Amendment; Land Improvement Amendment Act (Ireland); Lunatic Asylums (Ireland); Labouring Poor Act Amendment (Ireland).
PETITIONS PRESENTED. By Admiral Gordon, from Aberdeen, against the Marriages Bill.—By Sir E. Buxton, from the Hair Dressers of the Metropolis, for an Alteration of the Sunday Trading (Metropolis) Bill.—By Mr. Beresford, from Yeldham, Essex, for an Alteration of the Law respecting Tithes.—By Sir J. Graham, from Penrith, for Repeal of the Duty on Attorneys' Certificates.—By Sir J. Walsh, from Rhayader, for Agricultural Relief.—By Mr. Wilson Patten, from Warrington, against the Audit of Railway Accounts Bill.—By Lord Ashley, from Manchester, and by other hon. Members, for Regulating the Hours of Labour in the Baking Trade.—By Mr. M. Wilson, from the Wharfdale Railway Company, for the Railways Abandonment Bill.—By Colonel Matheson, from Urquhart, Ross-shire, against the Registering Births, &c. (Scotland) Bill, and Marriage (Scotland) Bill.—By Mr. Adderley, from Mucclestone, for an Alteration of the Sale of Beer Act.—By Mr. Mackinnon, from London, for Extending to the Metropolis the Sheep, &c. Contagious Disorders Prevention Act.—By Lord E. Howard, from Horsham, for an Alteration of the Small Debts Act.

SMALL DEBTS ACT AMENDMENT BILL.
The House went into Committee on this Bill; Mr. Bernal in the chair.
On Clause 20, giving compensation to the officers of the Palace Court being proposed,
LORD DUDLEY STUARTsaid, he objected to the clause, because he could not agree to any compensation being granted to these officers. His hon. Friend the Member for Middlesex had stated yesterday, that the court was illegal; and, indeed, he could not himself help thinking that it was unconstitutional to tax people as that court had done without the consent of Parliament. Landowners, merchants, manufacturers, and shopkeepers were not compensated when new laws were made affecting their respective interests; and he knew not why such peculiar and tender concern was felt for the interest of the lawyer. If these gentlemen bought their places at an extravagant price, they did so upon speculation, and they ought, therefore, when the Legislature thought fit to alter or abolish the court, to take the consequences, in the same way that other persons did in other kinds of speculations. He must, therefore, again protest against compensation being granted to persons in the condition of these Palace Court officers. He would repeat the objection which he took yesterday to the Treasury being authorised to estimate and determine the amount of the compensation. The objection which he made was not a vague one, for when the Treasury had such authority given before, large sums were awarded to persons in the shape of com-
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pensation, when they had suffered no loss whatever. The officers, as had already been stated, had received compensation under the Act passed to abolish imprisonment for debt; and during the four years that had elapsed since then, they made more money than they did during the four years previously, He should mention, however, that there was one exception to this: the deputy prothonotary had received during the last four years 266 l. less, and to show in what way the Treasury compensated persons, they gave him 1,400 l. The Treasury were often extremely penurious and paltry—indeed so much so, that no gentleman in his private capacity would act so scurvily; but here was an instance of a very lavish and culpable expenditure. How could they be called upon to trust to the Treasury, after such instances of lavishness and disregard of the public interest, to decide upon the amount of compensation? The plan of referring the matter to a Select Committee was much better than that; it was more constitutional, and the House would have it more in their own hands; whereas if it were left to the Treasury, they might afterwards complain, but in vain. He must protest against this mode of proceeding—against those persons being compensated who had already been compensated more than enough. He should test the opinion of the House upon this point, for he felt convinced he should receive the support of the House, and that the sense of the country would be with him.
The ATTORNEY GENERALhoped that his noble Friend would not press his Amendment. It was quite clear that his noble Friend was desirous of abolishing the Palace Court; but if he succeeded in obtaining a majority against the clause, it would defeat the Bill altogether. Many Acts of Parliament had recognised the sale of these offices; and vested rights could not be abolished without giving the parties in whom they were vested, compensation. He had understood his noble Friend also to object to the manner of giving compensation, and that he would rather have that question referred to a Select Committee of the House than to the Treasury. Now, he (the Attorney General) believed that if the legal claims of the parties demanding compensation were to be strictly investigated, he was providing the best tribunal that could be devised. In a Select Committee of the House there was a divided responsibility, and Members of it were exposed to

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influences to which the Treasury was not subjected. His noble Friend said that he would not trust the Treasury, because, on a former occasion, they gave officers of the Palace Court too large a compensation. But his noble Friend should bear in mind that the Treasury was bound, under the Act of Parliament, to settle the amount of compensation within a certain time. It was alleged that the officers of the Palace Court would suffer by a loss of business in consequence of the operation of the Act, 7 & 8 Vict., whereas it turned out afterwards that their business increased. The present Bill, however, provided that compensation should not be calculated upon anything that occurred afterwards. He hoped, therefore, that his noble Friend would withdraw his opposition, as he was quite sure that he would be very sorry if the Bill were lost.
MR. J. EVANSobjected to sending the question of compensation before the Treasury. The Six Clerks in Chancery were receiving compensation equal to the incomes of Peers of the realm. They had already received 130,000 l.; and not only would they continue to get compensation at this extravagant rate, but their executors were to receive it for seven years after their death. He should, therefore, prefer the question of compensation to be referred to a Select Committee.
SIR F. THESIGERsaid, that the Legislature itself had fixed the scale for compensating the Six Clerks for the abolition of their offices. One word to the noble Lord he would now address, being certain that if the noble Lord would but look at the matter a little more clearly, he would see that he was really mistaken as to the facts on which he grounded his case against the Palace Court. As for what had been said about the "illegality" of the court, there was absolutely no sort of ground for such an imputation. It had been even affirmed that the Crown had had no authority to establish this court at all; but he begged to affirm that the Crown had an undoubted power to establish, under certain forms that were resorted to by it in this instance, any such ancillary court in aid of, or within, the jurisdiction of the common law. What were the facts? There had formerly existed an ancient court for the trial of causes of a limited and small amount, and in which the parties were officers of, or connected with, the Royal household. That old court having been abolished, another court was erected under letters patent granted by Charles
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II. for the trial of similar causes arising within twelve miles of the city of London, and for the benefit of all other parties, not for those exclusively connected with the household. Under the same authority by which the offices of the Palace Court were constituted, the right of those originally appointed, and of their successors, to purchase and to sell them, was clearly defined, and had been since repeatedly recognised and confirmed by constant practice. Therefore, the right of present holders to compensation in the event of the offices themselves being abolished, was unquestionable, and he was satisfied that the Treasury, on being appealed to, would entertain, without scruple, the question of such compensation for them. But then, it had been attempted to be shown that in a certain instance—(for it was not denied that very large sums had been paid from time to time for these appointments)—an excessive compensation had been already granted to the officers of the Palace Court, and that now, therefore, they were precluded from setting up any further claim. Nothing was easier, how-over, than to show that the transaction referred to could not in the least affect the present rights of the parties interested, to the compensation he must insist upon being due to them. Prior to the establishment of the county courts, the Palace Court, he would venture to affirm, had exorcised a jurisdiction which had been found of the greatest benefit to that portion of the public interested in such classes of causes; and for some years before those now courts were created, the Palace Court had tried and determined at least one-fourth of the whole number of such cases coming before the law courts. But he wished to be clearly understood as limiting his argument only to the title of its officers to compensation; for he had always been of opinion that whenever the county courts were established, the Palace Court ought to be abolished. Now, it was perfectly true that when, by the abolition of arrest upon mesne process, one part, and a very principal part, of the business and fees of the Palace Court was abolished, compensation was made to a specific amount for the loss sustained, and that subsequently the other portion of its business had very extensively increased. Surely the noble Lord would not contend that that compensation for a certain specified loss was to be held to satisfy their title to compensation for the abolition of their own offices? The two interests were not the same; the one had little or nothing to

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do with the other. The parties had, to all intents and purposes, a freehold in these offices which Parliament was called upon to abolish; and the question now was one of compensation for that freehold sort of property. It seemed to be supposed, that because he some years ago had had the honour to fill one of the offices in the Palace Court, therefore he was now speaking on behalf of compensation to others from some sort of fellow-feeling; but he protested that he was only advocating the claim on grounds of fair dealing and equity, which he was quite certain would be acknowledged by the Treasury—a department to which the arrangement of this matter might be much more advantageously referred than to any other, and who, he was convinced, would comply with the principle of the claim.
MR. HENLEYwould beg to ask the learned Attorney General one question: it had been stated by the hon. and learned Gentleman who had just sat down, that the officers of the Palace Court received a certain compensation some few years ago, on the abolition of arrest upon mesne process; and he admitted at the same time that since that period the other portion of the business of the court had very much increased. Now, what he (Mr. Henley) desired to know was, whether since or at the same time that larger powers had been conferred on the several new courts having jurisdiction over small debts, any similar extension of powers had been given to the Palace Court? [The ATTORNEY GENERAL: Certainly not.] As that was the ease, he could not press the point, which, had the hon. and learned Gentleman's answer been in the affirmative, he should have been supplied with against this claim of compensation for loss of offices.
LORD DUDLEY STUARTdid not consider that the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Abingdon, with all his ingenuity and ability, had made out any case to found the claims he had been advocating. As to the fact of that hon. and learned Gentleman's having formerly held an office in the Palace Court, everybody must be satisfied that he felt and intended that such a circumstance should not in any degree interest his advocacy on this occasion. Still it was possible that without being aware of the fact, it had influenced the learned Gentleman's better judgment. Perhaps he had been one of the parties who prepared the Bill under which compensation on the extinction of arrest by mesne
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process was granted, as one of the officers of this very court?
SIR F. THESIGER: No, I was not at that time. But I was Solicitor General, I think, if that will answer your purpose.
LORD DUDLEY STUARTtrusted, at any rate, that the Committee would not be led away by anything which had just been stated from the opposite benches to sanction a clause for giving compensation to the holders of office in a court whose very existence had long been felt to be a grievance, and the abolition of which was so loudly demanded by public opinion. According to the showing of the hon. and learned Gentleman himself, compensation had already been granted to these parties to the tune of 7,000 l. for the alleged loss to the business of the court occasioned by a particular measure of legislation; and the consequence of that measure had been, on the other hand, to improve the value of its other business by about 10,000 l.
Question put, "That Clause 20 stand part of the Bill."
The Committee divided:—Ayes 52; Noes 2: Majority 50.
The House resumed. Bill reported.

STOCK IN TRADE BILL.
Order for Committee read.
Motion made, and Question proposed, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the chair."
SIR H. WILLOUGHBYrose to avail himself of the opportunity to raise the general question of rating; he believed there was a real grievance which required a remedy, on the principles of justice and fair dealing to all classes of the community. In order that the House might clearly comprehend what was his object, he called attention to the facts of the poor-rate. In 1847, 5,290,000 l. was raised for the relief of the poor, and this sum was levied exclusively on 64,730,000 l. mainly on those that occupied houses, and especially land for productive purposes. The report of the Lords estimated the property in England and Wales, of various kinds, at about 250,000,000 l.; so that the whole burthen of the poor-rate in England and Wales fell on about one-fourth of the property in England and Wales. Now, viewing the purposes for which poor-law relief is required, was this a just apportionment of the burthen, especially in the altered circumstances of this country? He would take the population

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of land and houses alone to provide for principles hastily, and not to carry them of England and "Wales at 15,000,000; now, in 1847, one and a half millions received relief. He would take a county—Lancaster. There was a population of 1,624,000; a poor-rate levied 335,000 l., and 116,000 poor relieved; but, as a simple and single test, according to a high authority, is the best mode of elucidating political subjects, he would take a single parish, one of the chief seats of the cotton manufactures, Ashton-under-Lyne, and he found that in one year, 1848, the poor-rate levied was 16,875 l., on a class of property 107,000 l.; that 10,024 l. of this was spent in relief of the poor; 5,012 l. in the half year ending September, 1848; of this 2,400 l. was for outdoor relief. In one division alone, 1,623 l. was spent in outdoor relief. All the facts are taken from an authentic document, signed Charles Mott, auditor, November 3, 1848; and having heard the nature and objects of the expenses, the question he should put to the House was this—that it is not fair nor just to tax one class of property only for expenses, which, in great part, arise from other sources, and which do not contribute their fair proportion. He would take the first item. He found 305 parties who had received sums of money under the head "out of work." Why are the occupiers those who labour in all trades, when out of work? The next item was more extraordinary. He was sorry the Chief Commissioner of the Poor Laws was not in his place. He (Sir H. Willoughby) had resisted the appointment of the Commission, as he thought it would not remedy the evils that were said to exist. Now one of the chief accusations against the old management of the relief to the poor was, that wages were paid out of the poor-rate. He found this practice still existed, and most luxuriantly; 86 parties in this one division, in one half year, received sums of money under the head of "insufficient earnings." He claimed an answer to this from the sincere advocates of free trade. You proclaim competition for agricultural productions with the Baltic, the Black Sea, the Continent of America, the whole world, and yet those who occupy the land are called upon to pay rates in aid of wages to trades not their own. This is protection in the worst form for all other trades, at the expense of those who occupy land and houses. Again, 29 parties received money on account of the number of small children. The aged, 157; the sick, 157;
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in great numbers, orphants, infants, the lame, the blind, the deaf, the idiot, the lunatic, all are charged to this fund; 22 women, deserted by their husbands; 9 gone to America; 12 in prison; and I gone to beg, are all charged on the fund. Every accident is paid for; legs and arms injured by machinery are amputated; and finally, under one heading, "the stoppage of the mill," 13 parties expressly receive this relief in money. Now, he asked on what pretence can all the ailments, infirmities, and misfortunes that arise in cotton, silk, woollen, hardware, &c. trades, be fastened on one class of property without a violation of the first principles of justice? He contended that the real principle of the Act 43 Elizabeth, cap. 2, must be carried out, which meant that all should be equally rated—that every one should be taxed. It might be difficult to make an equal system of rating; but under the pressure of free trade the attempt must be made. Two courses were open—countervailing duties as equivalents for known burthens, or an absolute equalisation of the burthens—a fair adjustment of local taxation. The House had no other option. It might be bold to criticise the modern principle of imperial legislation, but he thought there was a disposition to adopt out to their legitimate conclusion. This was the case with the sugar colonies. First, the cry was to emancipate the negro, and the nation was saddled with a rent charge of 800,000 l.; but soon after a new cry arose—free trade in sugar. You import slave-grown sugar from Cuba, and the consequence is, that the colonies are beggared, and the principles are lost. He hoped the same course would not be pursued as regarded our domestic industry. Having proclaimed universal competition in the productions of the land, you must cither have countervailing duties or equal burthens. In Ireland the occupiers of land are to be exclusively burthened with poor-rates; what capitalist in his senses would purchase such property, having the choice of the whole world? and this principle of a fair apportionment of burthens applied to all parts of the united kingdom. He had a right to expect the support of the various parties in this House to a fair consideration of the question of rating. Those who believed in the principle of free trade would be glad to do justice. He was for fair play to all trades—corn or calico. The noble Lord at the head of the

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Government was, in 1842, in favour of a fixed duty. Duties are not in fashion in the House just now; therefore you must adjust the burthens, of which rating to the poor relief is the chief. The right hon. Baronet the Member for Tamworth, on the 9th of February, 1842, expressed an opinion that 54 s. to 58 s., a price for the quarter of corn required, "viewing burthens of the land and the relative position of those engaged in the cultivation of the land." That money price, 54 s. to 58 s. the quarter, does not now exist, and therefore a readjustment of burthens is equitable. He thought this question of rating pressed for a decision. There was a feeling abroad—a dangerous feeling, if neglected—amongst those engaged in the cultivation of the soil, that their interests had not been fairly treated. No wise Government would neglect such disposition. His object was to secure the attention of the Government, so that some legislation might take place early in the next Session of Parliament. The subject was a difficult one; it might not be possible to make an assessment entirely equal; you might, however, approximate to an equality, but in any case it would be the duty of the House to make an attempt to do justice to all in matters of local taxation—to hold even the balance between the various classes of the community in a spirit of equity, and which would prove its best title to the confidence of the people.
Amendment proposed, to leave out from the word "That" to the end of the Question, in order to add the words, "this House will, upon this day three months, resolve itself into the said Committee," instead thereof.
Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
MR. CORNEWALL LEWISobserved, that the hon. Baronet, with the exception of that episode in his speech on the West Indies, had confined himself to the question as to the real property being exclusively rated, and to the rates not extending to personal property. The question was one of great interest and importance to the community, and it had already received much consideration during the present Session, and no doubt it would receive more hereafter. He would, in the first place, confine himself to the question immediately before the House, as to whether or not they should rate stock in trade, or whether the interventions of the courts in
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the interpretation of the 43rd of Elizabeth should be continued. This, he admitted, was a simple and not very difficult matter for solution; but the question which the hon. Baronet had introduced was a wide one, and did not admit of easy solution. He trusted that he should be able to satisfy the House that it should renew for another year this temporary enactment with respect to rating stock in trade, as it did not give rise to any great difficulty. The question arose out of the interpretation of the Act of Elizabeth, and as to whether they should hold strictly to the letter of its provisions, without reference to the opinions of the courts. No doubt, according to the strict letter of the Act, every inhabitant of a parish was liable to be called upon to contribute to the maintenance of the poor; but then they must take the interpretation of the word "inhabitant" given by courts of justice since the time of Elizabeth. There could be no doubt of the legal meaning attached to the term since the time of William; and if the present Suspension Act was allowed to expire, they would soon know that such would be the interpretation of the courts. It might appear that the meaning of the word inhabitant was tolerably clear. To be rated, it was held, that not only must he live in the parish, but the personal property must also be there. If he lived in a different parish from that in which his personal property was, he was held not to be an inhabitant. According to this, persons might avoid being rated by residing out of the parish in which their personal property was. This alone would occasion a large reduction in the amount of property to be rated. The next decision of the courts was, that a farmer's stock in trade was not to be rated; such, for instance, as cattle, corn, hayricks, agricultural implements, &c. Although all these apparently came within the meaning of the Act of Elizabeth, they were held not to be rateable. Thus the stock of the farmer was not rateable; but the stock and tools of the artisan are, if he resided in the place. This occasioned another great diminution in the number of persons liable to be rated residing in a place. Then it was held, that stock in the public funds, money lent on real securities, wages of labour, salaries, and professional earnings, were not rateable; and when all these were deducted, a very large property was not left to be rated. It was further held, that the owner of stock in trade, to render it rateable,

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must reside in the parish in which his shop or warehouse was situated. This, of course, would be an inducement to a man to have Ms shop in one parish, and to live in another. Then, again, it must be shown that the stock in trade was profitable to render it liable to rating; and for this purpose the onus lay upon the owner to prove before the magistrates that it was so; and, if he could not do so, the rate upon such stack must be quashed. It was also held by the courts that allowance must be made for debts before they could rate a stock in trade. All these were points in which the courts appear to have had no doubt; and if the hon. Baronet would refer to Burn's Justice, he would see not only that these but other descriptions of property were exempted from rating. The courts, however, did not stop there; for in the time of Lord Mansfield the Court of King's Bench determined that stock in trade was not rateable, or, at any rate, so many difficulties and doubts were thrown in the way as to render it equivalent to the court holding an opinion against the rating. Lord Ken-yon, however, took a less equitable view of the matter, and after some time persuaded the rest of the court over whom he presided to revert to the literal meaning of the original Act of Elizabeth on this point, and it was held that stock in trade was rateable. The question again came before the Court of Queen's Bench in 1840, in the case of the Queen v. Lumsden, and the opinion was held, that the old Act was not repealed in this respect. The consequence of this decision was, that great alarm was produced in the manufacturing parts of the country; and the result was, that a Bill was brought into Parliament in that year, which passed into a law, by which rating of stock in trade was suspended for a twelvemonth, and since that period it had been annually renewed. He thought he had said sufficient to show the House that the adherence to the old law, as it was interpreted by the courts, would be of little benefit to the agricultural interest in consequence of the many exceptions which were allowed. There might be some parishes in which stock in trade was strictly or partially rated; but by the Act of 1840 there was practically no change in the law; it prevented appeals against the overseers' rate in consequence of that description of property not being rated. He would challenge any hon. Gentleman to mention two parishes in which stock in trade was actually rated between 1830 and 1840.
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Having thus gone through the fact" of the case, it appeared to him that the hon. Baronet laboured under some misapprehension as to the advantages which would result from the adoption of his suggestion. This misapprehension seemed to arise from looking to stock in trade in the aggregate, instead of taking it, as they were bound to do by law, parish by parish. No doubt, if the whole stock in trade of the country was rated together, it would produce a considerable sum, and might relieve the landed interest from a portion of its burdens; but this was not, and never was, the state of the law. The greatest anomalies were formerly held as to the law of rating in connexion with stock in trade; for instance, a shop was liable to be rated if the owner of it resided in the parish where it was; but if he did not, it was exempted. They should recollect that the great mass of stock in trade was centred in large towns, and if each parish was rated separately, the relief to the landed interest would be insignificant. In such parishes as St. George's, Hanover-square, and Marylebone, perhaps the rates upon the stock of shopkeepers would lighten in some degree the rates upon the inhabitants of dwelling-houses; but in the great mass of rural parishes, in Lincolnshire, Cumberland, or Yorkshire, no sensible relief would be afforded. If they extended the principle to the rural districts, they would find the only articles that could be rated would be the tools or implements of the carpenter or blacksmith, and in some villages the stocks of a few shops. He maintained, therefore, that under the present law, a rate upon stock in trade, if carried into effect all over the country, either for the relief of the landed interest or of the Church, would be productive of no sensible benefit whatever. No doubt the county and other rates were felt to weigh heavily on landed property; but if they rated all the personal property in rural parishes, the amount received would be so small, after all the deductions which he had stated, that the amount of relief afforded would be imperceptible. As it was, the landed population had lost no advantage by the Act of 1840, and nothing had been gained. One great reason why he asked the House to assent to the present Bill was, that the present law with regard to the rating of stock in trade was so intricate and complicated, that the legality of every rate made under it was liable to be questioned, and the magistrates at quarter-

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sessions would be constantly called upon to quash rates in consequence of some informality, so that the greatest inconvenience must arise. He fully admitted, with the hon. Member, who had argued the matter with the greatest fairness, that the real question was whether any means could be devised by which a system could be established for rating—not merely stock in trade, in excluding the stock of the farmer, but—personal property of all descriptions for local rating, as well as real property. If such a system could be devised, it was a subject open for consideration, and upon which persons of the greatest financial skill, and who had long studied the practice of taxation, might exercise their ingenuity. He maintained, however, that the present Bill did not raise that general question, and also that it was nothing but a delusion to suppose that the landed interest would be deprived of any great benefit by the operation of the present law.
MR. HENLEYadmitted that very great practical difficulties existed in rating stock in trade; but maintained that if stock in trade was to be exempted, it would lead to great difficulty and trouble; that if they had justice on their side, he would ask them why they did not repeal the law at present existing on the subject. That the great necessities of the country would ere long force it upon them for a total revision—that if the subject was not properly taken up, the House might depend that it would be forced on them; and the result would be, they would then have to get rid of this impost, which, as it at present stood, was objectionable to all parties.
MR. C. LEWISintimated that the subject was under the consideration of Government, and that a measure was in preparation.
MR. DISRAELIthought the explanation of the Under Secretary for the Home Department fully justified his hon. Friend in having brought the subject forward, and he confessed he was glad to hear his statement. It was clear, from what had fallen from the hon. Gentleman, that this was a question the consideration of which could not be longer delayed. Without being-guilty of an exaggeration, it could be proved that one-third of the income of the country had to bear the whole of their local burdens. The fact was incontrovertible that real property had burdens thrown upon it to the amount of twelve millions a year, from which other descriptions of pro-
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perty were exempt. This was a startling reality, which hon. Gentlemen opposite could not deny. These results the country was becoming fully aware of, and it was a matter which must force itself on the attention of the Government, with a view to a settlement. The question of local taxation was the greatest question of the day, and it had forced itself on public attention in consequence of the situation of Ireland. Indeed, in Ireland it had produced a second revolution, and the result had and must excite the strongest effect on public opinion in the two countries. He did not believe the stopping this suspending Bill would produce any great effect. The object of his hon. Friend that day was to show that stock in trade was only one of the classes of property which had escaped rating. To deal properly with it, the question must be completely considered, and just relief could only be given by taking-all descriptions of property into calculation. He was sure the statement of the hon. Gentleman the Under Secretary would be satisfactory to the country; and he trusted, when they met again, that the measure alluded to would be one of the first measures brought forward for consideration.
MR. WODEHOUSEthanked his hon. Friend for bringing this question before the House, and was happy to hear that they were to have some remedial measure. He submitted to the noble Lord that the subject of the land tax and the rating of the poor must at the opening of next Session be thoroughly brought under revision.
MR. MUNTZsaid, he was not going to support the Motion of the Gentleman on the other side, because he thought that the Bill had better pass. The hon. Baronet had, in his enumeration of things not liable to rating, fallen into a mistake. Machinery was liable, and was rated, as he could testify, even to the very hammers used in his own factory. He readily admitted that there was a difficulty in rating stock in trade, but still it could not be denied that the present system was both unequal and unjust. They must come to a national rate at last, and the sooner the Government turned their attention to the subject the better it would be for the country.
SIR H. WILLOUGHBYexpressed his satisfaction with the discussion his Amendment had called forth, and bogged to withdraw it.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Main Question put, and agreed to.
Bill considered in Committee, and reported; as amended, to be considered Tomorrow.

THE BAKING TRADE.
LORD R. GROSVENORwas aware what he should have to encounter in endeavouring to attract the attention of the House to the Motion he was about to propose. Accustomed as the House was to deal with questions affecting large classes of the community—not merely the inhabitants of this country, but those of the remotest parts of the globe—it was scarcely to be expected that they would condescend to give their attention to a measure which involved the interest of a small section only of the community. He assured the House he had no motive in bringing forward this Motion except that of elevating the position of a class of working men who toiled more continuously than almost any other class of persons in the British community. There were no less than 10,000 persons in this metropolis employed in preparing the staff of life, who were looking with anxiety to the result of this Motion. It was a question which involved their comfort, their happiness, their moral progress—aye, and the very duration of life itself. The noble Lord reminded the House that last year he moved for a Committee on this subject, but it was refused. He regretted that refusal, because if a Committee had been appointed, the truth of the allegations of the petitioners might have been ascertained. He was, however, not discouraged. He recollected that on the former occasion his right hon. Friend the Homo Secretary told him that he was out of court in moving for a Committee, because there was nothing more to inquire about, inasmuch as Dr. Guy had investigated the whole matter. His right hon. Friend the Member for the University of Oxford had stated that he would not be unwilling to consider a legislative remedy on the subject; and he believed that the general impression was that he, last Session, made out a primâ facie in favour of some enactment to relieve the evils of which he now complained. The Bill he now wished to introduce was precisely the same as that of last year. The principle and the details were now contained in one single clause. He trusted the House would pronounce their opinion upon it at once, and not permit it to be introduced, and then oppose
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it. After the statement he had made last Session, he hoped he should be spared the necessity of again repeating the grievances under which the journeymen bakers laboured. Their hours of work were usually from 11 o'clock at night till 6 or 7 o'clock the following evening, during which they could get no rest. These hours were increased on Fridays and Saturdays; and they generally worked five or six hours on the Sunday. The place, too, in which the journeyman worked in London was very little better than a cellar; he was exposed to every vicissitude of heat and cold. While 60 hours of work in the week were the average in other employments, 100 hours were the average of the journeyman baker's labour during the week. He was not able to go to any place of religious worship, and the House could not be surprised to hear that the result of this system was the moral and physical degradation of the individual—a recourse to stimulants, and an early decay of the vital energies. No inconvenience would result to the public from a relaxation of the hours of labour on the part of the journeyman bakers. The only difference would be that the batches of bread would be drawn at a later hour in the day, and, instead of hot loaves being delivered, they would come to the houses of the customers cold. It was a saying that one half of the people sat up all night to prepare poison for the other half in the morning. If the House should pass the Bill he proposed, the hot-bread poison would at least be put an end to. A strong argument in favour of this measure was the fact that no less than two-thirds of the master bakers in London were favourable to it. No less than 2,500 had petitioned for the measure, and he believed not one had petitioned against it. The objections generally urged against any measure of this description were that there was some immutable principle in political economy against all interference between master and man, and that if any exception were to be made in favour of any one particular trade, it must ultimately be made in reference to all trades. But these objections were much too late; for Parliament had already interfered in many instances between the employers and the employed. He might mention the Coalwhippers Act, the Mines and Collieries Act, and the Ten Hours Factory Protection Act. Thus it was clear that the House had shown that the principle of leaving trade uninterfered

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with, might be, under certain circumstances, most justifiably departed from. The hon. Member for the West Riding had observed that the Ten Hours Act was passed for children, and that the present Motion was therefore the first attempt to legislate upon the subject in reference to adult labour; but that the Ten Hours Bill did interfere with the hours of labour of adults, was, he believed, a notorious fact. This, therefore, was no new attempt. His right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade would perhaps say, it might be true that the bakers suffered very much from the causes he had mentioned, but that the fustian-cutters and some other trades suffered quite as much as they did. He (Lord R. Grosvenor) might be permitted to observe, that the case of those other trades was not then before the House, and that it was rather hard to oppose a case that was before the House by referring to other cases that were not before it. But he was quite willing to join issue with his right hon. Friend upon that subject, and to say, that supposing this Bill passed, and that in consequence of it various other trades come forward asking for legislative interference, if they succeeded in establishing a case of grievance, and proposed an effectual remedy, he saw no reason why the House should not sanction it. If the cases should be found so numerous as to render it impossible for the House to deal with them singly, they could be referred to a Select Committee for investigation, in order to see if the same principle could not be applied to them all. He recollected that his right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Home Department suggested last year as a remedy for the evil, that the bakers should be put under the inspection of the Sanitary Commission. Now, certainly, if in the Sanitary Bill for the metropolis which had been so long promised, but which seemed to demand the Cæsarean operation to bring it forth, a clause could be inserted, placing bakehouses under such inspection, he should be very glad; but that would go a very little way towards a complete remedy. He would appeal to that party of which the hon. Member for Montrose was so distinguished a leader, and which was so anxious for an extension of the suffrage, not to be contented with agitating for that alone, but to exert themselves in furthering such measures as would qualify the working classes for the exercise of the franchise, for he was convinced, that the
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more they succeeded in elevating the character of our working men, the more would they predispose the Legislature and the country to look with favour upon the extension of the franchise which they desired. From the best consideration which he had been able to give this subject, he was perfectly convinced that the more they tended to reduce the hours of labour within reasonable limits, the more would they tend to destroy, not that wholesome competition which was the secret of our industrial triumphs, but that unwholesome competition which perilled the lives and happiness of mankind by bringing all down to the same level of degradation and ruin. How stood the case with respect to this unfortunate class whose cause he pleaded? They came as youths, principally from Scotland, to pass through the fire of Moloch in this metropolis, about the age of fifteen or sixteen. After that period they had no time to give to mental improvement, religious instruction, rational recreation, or attendance on public worship; and if they did not all entirely "live without God in the world" it was no fault of the system to which they were sacrificed. Knowing what he did of the evils of that system, he, for one, declined to acquiesce in them without at least trying to provide a remedy for them. That remedy he now proposed by the Bill which he asked the leave of the House to introduce. He begged the House to agree to that Motion, on account of the sufferings of the unfortunate men whose case he had undertaken to lay before them. He implored them not to reject it on account of his feeble advocacy of their cause. He entreated them not to resist the growing demands on this subject, by applying a principle which the Legislature had refused to adopt in other cases, or by indulging fears which experience had shown to have no existence. He trusted that they would meet the question fairly and frankly, and say at once whether they thought the remedy he proposed was or was not a satisfactory remedy for the evil complained of; and if they rejected it, he hoped they would be able to justify themselves for prolonging a system which they all declared to be grievous and deplorable.
Motion made, and question put, "That leave be given to bring in a Bill to prohibit labour in Bakehouses during certain hours of the night."
MR. LABOUCHEREsaid, he was sure it was quite unnecessary for his noble Friend to have expressed any apprehen-

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sion lest the cause he had undertaken to plead should suffer anything from the manner in which he had brought it under the consideration of the House. On the contrary, he was certain that every one who knew him would admit that the manner in which he brought the claims of the working classes before the House, was always such as to recommend them to their most favourable consideration. His noble Friend had stated, that if the House objected to the principle of the Bill, he hoped they would at once clearly express their opinion to that effect, and refuse to allow the Bill to be brought in, rather than defer that decision to a later stage of the Bill. He agreed with his noble Friend in the propriety of that course; and it was because he felt himself compelled, reluctantly but decidedly, to express an opinion contrary to the principle of the Bill, that he should also feel it to be his duty at once to give his vote against the introduction of the Bill. He entreated the House to consider what that principle really was. It was a principle which he could not help saying, notwithstanding what had fallen from his noble Friend, was altogether novel in the legislation of this country. That principle was compulsorily to limit the hours of labour—not in factories, where large numbers of persons were congregated together, and where, consequently, a system of inspection was possible without the necessity of constant visits of Government inspectors, and the liability to information by private parties against the employers of labourers—but in dwelling-houses and workshops, where the system of minute and constant inspection that would be necessary to carry out the plan of his noble Friend, would be quite intolerable in a free country. His noble Friend, indeed, seemed to be aware that it was scarcely possible to carry out his principle to its legitimate consequences without including fustian-cutters and other trades who were at present subject to the evil of protracted hours of labour, as well as the bakers. It behoved the House, then, before they took the step now asked of them, to consider well the con-quences to which it must necessarily lead; and if they found that the system would be intolerable to the feelings of the people, that it would be impossible to work it out, that though they might employ an army of commissioners and a host of inspectors, they would never be able to control a system of labour carried on in dwelling-houses and workshops by any ma-
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chinery they could devise—if they found all this, then it became them to take their stand at once against the principle of the measure, and refuse to interfere upon the more statement of his noble Friend, that there would be some fancied advantage to a particular class by so doing. His noble Friend had quoted the case of the coal-whippers as analogous to that of the bakers; but he (Mr. Labouchere) denied that there was any similarity between the two cases. The coalwhippers were an organised body who worked in a limited space, and were not, like the bakers, scattered over the workshops of the country. And besides, there was another material distinction. The Coalwhippers Act did not interfere with the hours of labour or with their wages, in any way whatever. All that it did was to interfere with the manner in which they were hired and paid, and to enact that that should be done through the instrumentality of a public office, in a manner somewhat analogous to that which he ventured to recommend the other day with regard to seamen. That was quite a distinct principle from that which his noble Friend now proposed to introduce. The question before the House was, whether they were prepared to adopt the principle of restricting the hours of labour of adult persons scattered throughout the country in dwelling-houses and workshops, and to begin with bakers—because his noble Friend seemed to be aware that it was scarcely possible to stop there—and if other classes were seriously to urge their claims upon the House, after admitting that of the bakers, he did not sec how they could be resisted. The consequence would be, that by passing the Bill now asked for, the House would be involved in difficulties of which there was no practical solution. He believed that its adoption would do more harm than good, and he therefore advised the House to reject the proposition of his noble Friend, which, although he was sure it had been brought forward in a benevolent spirit, and with the best intentions, he firmly believed would confer no benefit on the classes for whom it was intended.
LORD DUDLEY STUARTfelt some difficulty with regard to the present Motion. Last year, when the question was before the House, he voted for inquiry into the best mode of relieving the operative bakers from their grievances. They complained justly of the very long hours of labour to which they were subjected by the

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present mode of carrying on their trade. He confessed having some difficulty in voting for the Bill without having further information, because the most conflicting statements were made upon the subject by parties equally respectable, equally experienced, and equally worthy of belief. If the Government held out a hope that next Session they would not object to the appointment of a Select Committee on this subject, the best course, in his opinion, would be for his noble Friend to withdraw the Bill; but he certainly could not offer this advice to his noble Friend unless the Government held out such a hope. In that case he should vote in favour of the Motion.
SIR DE LACY EVANSadmitted there was great difficulty in dealing with this question; but in his opinion the noble Lord the Member for Middlesex had made out a strong primâ facie case for interference. The facts had not been denied by the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Trade. Under these circumstances he wished for further information, and he trusted the Government would not object to a Select Committee next Session.
MR. DUNCANhad supported the proposition of the noble Lord last year, and his mind had no way been changed since as to the necessity of legislation on this question. The ease ought to be considered. The object of the noble Lord was merely to limit the hours of night labour; and, though no person objected more than he did to interfere between the employer and employed, yet after reading the evidence of Dr. Guy, he was convinced that interference in this case was absolutely necessary.
MR. STAFFORDsaid, he hoped the House would allow this Bill to be read a first time. He supported the measure for many reasons: first, because of its utility. Now, upon that point he might quote the evidence of a medical gentleman (Dr. Guy), whose statement respecting the diseases to which bakers, under the present order of things, were subject, was appalling. The spittings of blood, and the pulmonary diseases which followed, were lamentable, and demanded the attention of the Legislature. It was all very well to write in the closet, and there discuss the dry principles of political economy, but when they saw a human being wasting away to a skeleton, and finally perishing, from the unhealthiness of his occupation, it was high time for the Legislature to interfere. It was
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this parental regard on the part of Parliament which gave the humbler classes confidence in our institutions, which made them love and revere our constitution, which held the life of the meanest and poorest subject in the same estimation as the highest. But it was said Parliament would not interfere with labour—they would not interpose between the employer and the employed. But they had broken through this rigid rule. They had interposed with respect to the factory operatives and the coalwhippers—why not interpose on behalf of the bakers? That class were very numerous in this metropolis. Why neglect them? He hoped that before this discussion closed, the House would be favoured with the opinions of the hon. Gentleman the Member for the West Biding of Yorkshire, who, as the organ of the Manchester school, would, he trusted, enunciate his opinions, and tell the House whether there was anything in the economical principles which he and the school to which he belonged advocated, which would tie a man down to a duration of toil which deprived him of health, and which, in the opinion of the most eminent physicians, of necessity materially abridged the natural period of his existence. If so, it was really a mockery to call them free Britons—they ought to be designated serfs or slaves; indeed, their life was more wretched and unwholesome than that of slaves, whose condition they so often deplored.
MR. COBDENsaid, that if he understood the proposition, the House was asked to limit the hours of labour of a certain class of workmen in London. Now, that was an entirely new principle. The Coal Whipping Act had nothing in common with the proposed Bill—for that regulated the mode of hiring labourers, and did not restrict their hours of labour. As for the Ten Hours Bill, if there had been any attempt to restrict the hours of adult labour by means of that measure, he should have voted against it. But it would be admitted by all that the Ten Hours Bill was strictly applied to the limitation of the hours of labour of children in factories. The present proposition involved a new principle of world-wide application. He had been asked what his principle in respect to labour was; he would tell the House. He was for perfect freedom in this respect. He thought that the freedom of labour was to be identified with freedom of trade. The present was a case which might be argued on the same

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grounds as the corn laws. There must be perfect freedom of labour in the trade of bakers, or else the House would have the glassmakers, that useful class the night-men of London, the ironfounders, and indeed every other trade, coming forward and asking to be exempted from such hard work as they now performed. He warned the House against entering upon such a course of legislation. This proposition, in point of fact, was communism, although the noble Lord did not know it to be so. He had told the noble Lord that it was communism last year, when the noble Lord made the same proposal to the House, and he told him so now. Propositions of a precisely similar character had been put forward at Paris, in the commencement of last year. What had the result been? That in June of that year there was a horrid and bloody outbreak in Paris, which he distinctly and directly traced to the disappointment of the working classes at the non-fulfilment on the part of the socialist leaders, of the promises they had made to them. When Louis Blanc undertook that the State should become shoemakers, and tailors, and bakers, it was predicted that there would be a fearful reaction, when the fallacy became manifest, and a fearful reaction there was; so, if the State here undertook to regulate the hours and the mode and the remuneration of labour, and to provide healthful employment for the adult operative, depend upon it there will be terrible disappointment and terrible excitement when it was found out, as found out it soon would be, that the State had been taking upon itself a function which did not belong to it. The noble Lord admitted that he did not propose the principle to stop here: he admitted that he had no desire to exclude the Sheffield knifegrinder and his unwholesome occupation from a similar concession; that any trade which should make out a good case for such interference, should have interference extended to it by Parliament. The noble Lord, were his views adopted, would soon find out, to his bitter regret, how mistaken his benevolence had been. Allusion had been made, and very fairly, so far, as a question between modern freedom of trade and ancient restriction, and regulation, with reference to the old guilds; we had superseded these old guilds, happily, but let him ask, what were they when they existed? Little tyrannies, petty oligarchies, set up by a few privileged men in each particular trade, to prevent other men in
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the same calling from getting a livelihood. First, small bodies of men had got together in towns as a refuge from feudal oppression; by and by, as they advanced in the world, they made trade regulations for their own guidance; but still later, they extended these regulations to the exclusion of all other than themselves from the exercise of their particular trade. What was the effect of this exclusion? That the persons excluded set up their trade in places where these guilds did not exist, and the effect of this was that in previously obscure villages, the most flourishing trade had grown up, while the towns favoured with guilds had declined. Did these guilds exist in London, the Scotch bakers whom the hon. Gentleman had spoken of as coming up to exercise their trade here, would not be permitted to exercise it here at all. As to the grievance of the bakers, primâ facie, he thought there was something rather suspicious in the proposition that they would come up 400 miles from a country noted for the calculating caution of its inhabitants, to exercise a trade in London, if the trade were really so very bad in every way as it was represented to be. He objected to the proposition, however, more particularly on the ground that it was not the business or the policy of that House to meddle with the management of trade as between employer and employed. That House had enough to do, and more than enough to do, in transacting the business which really appertained to it; if it must insist upon a Ten Hours Bill at all, let it give itself a Ten Hours Bill, and set an example of more reasonable hours of work to the rest of the community. If the baker were to have a Bill, we should before long have the country labourer coming up to town for a Bill; the poor fellows who fagged away at bean threshing, for instance, were as hard worked as any body; and the wretched, draggled-tailed women who toiled at turnip hoeing, might make out a very fair case of grievance to the public, as they had made out, by the mere exhibition of their heavy labour, without any appeal at all to the hon. Gentleman opposite, who, when he was an amateur farmer, was so hurt at the sight of the weariness of his own turnip hoers, that he sent them home. He intreated the House not for a moment to encourage the idea that the labourer must look to Parliament for employment. The great principle was in every way to teach them to rely upon themselves.
SIR G. GREYsaid, he should not have risen, but to state the reasons why the Government could not assent to inquiry. All, however, he need do, was to remind the House of the discussion of last Session, upon the Motion for a Select Committee, and that the reasons he then urged were still in full force. Those reasons were twofold: first, that the information sought to be obtained was already before the House; and, next, that it would only encourage a vain and delusive hope, leading to inevitable disappointment, that the appointment of a Committee could lead to a legislative remedy for the evils of this class of persons. With regard to the Coalwhippers Act, he would read a few words which had fallen from the right hon. Gentleman the Member for the University of Oxford, upon the argument that it was an interference for the protection of labour:—
"He, for one, had taken great interest in the case of the coalwhippers, and was very far from repenting the course he had pursued with respect to that measure. The House would be very much misled were it to suppose that measure constituted a precedent for interference in the present instance. He should state very shortly what were the objects of that measure. A custom had grown up between the masters of coal vessels and the publicans, in that part of the city of London where the coalwhippers exercised their vocation, by which it invariably happened that the men whoso services were necessary to discharge the coal ships were hired through the publicans. The publicans had come to be hiring agents. The consequence was the greatest demoralisation—a demoralisation which he should have said was complete, had it not been for the fact, that the men were conscious of the servitude to which they had been reduced, and were unfeignedly anxious to escape from it. The Act did nothing to regulate wages or the hours of work; it did nothing towards the inspection of labour. All that the Act did was to establish an office and a public officer to control it; and it was required, under the sanction of a penalty, that every one having a coal vessel to discharge should repair to that office for the purpose of hiring men. Even that provision was attended with subsidiary arrangements which were intended to exclude interference. Whatever might be the merits or demerits of that Act, it did not form a precedent."
He agreed with his right hon. Friend that the House could not sanction the principle of this Bill, and that if it were sanctioned there would be no limit to it. He had risen, however, to caution the House against any impressions that the Government could consent to a Committee of Inquiry.
LORD R. GROSVENORfelt it necessary to go to a division, as the right hon. Gentleman had held out no hopes that any measure could be taken, or Committee ap-
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pointed, with the view of remedying the grievances to which the Bill related. It was well that the persons who were interested in the question should see what was really the mind of the House. In answer to a question which had been put, he begged to state, that the measure would not require one single inspector. In every instance in which the Legislature had deviated from what were held to be the strict principles of political economy with respect to the question of the employer and the employed, beneficial results had ensued. That circumstance would make him persevere in endeavouring to effect the object he had in view, whatever might be the result of the coming division.
The House divided:—Ayes 19; Noes 77: Majority 58.

SMITHFIELD MARKET.
MR. MACKINNONpresented a petition from several of the leading medical men of the metropolis, complaining of the sale of diseased meat in the London markets as being most injurious to the health of the inhabitants. The hon. Gentleman then proceeded to call the attention of the House; to the report of the Committee on the removal of Smithfield Market. With regard to the constitution of that Committee, he might be allowed to say, that eight of its members had been selected from the Committee of 1847, and the remaining seven were chosen on account of their high station in that House, and of their being connected with the grazing interest. He thought it right also to premise that he did not believe there was a single individual on that Committee who had the slightest personal interest in the removal of Smithfield market. He said this, because he knew that rumours had gone abroad that some of the members of the Committee had a private interest in removal of the market to another site; but both on his own part, and on that of the other members of the Committee, he was able to say, that not one of them had the slightest interest with regard to the selection of another site. Therefore he thought it would be admitted that the report of the Committee had emanated from fifteen honest and honourable men. With regard to that report, he might state the substance of it in three words. It was simply this: that Smithfield market, from its deficiency in size, and from the inconvenience which was thereby created, ought to be abolished; and that the area of a new

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market, its site and locality, should be left in the hands of the authorities of the city of London; or if they declined, in the hands of the Government. The great leader of public opinion in this country, which had been called by an hon. Gentleman opposite the Bude-light of the press, and which was remarkable for either following or leading public opinion on all occasions—the Times—had expressed itself as being entirely in favour of the removal of Smithfield market; and therefore there Was some ground for supposing that the current of popular opinion was in favour of the decision of the Committee. The question was not one as to the mere removal of a market, but it was a question as to the best manner in which two millions of human beings were to be fed—it was a question involving the health, comfort, and enjoyment, with regard to food, of two millions of Her Majesty's subjects. Now, in the first place, the report stated that the area of Smithfield was too contracted. It was a singular fact that Smithfield had been a market for upwards of five hundred years, and yet even in the earliest times the site was thought to be an improper one. How much more so it had become in the nineteenth century, he need not ask the House to consider. When they bore in mind the vast number of cattle that were annually brought into this town for sale, it must be obvious that an area of 5¼ acres, which was all that Smithfield contained, was not sufficient for the purpose to which it was devoted. It was said, that the Corporation of London derived a revenue of between 5,000 l. and 6,000 l. from this market, and that if the market were removed, the loss to the corporation must be made good by the country. He considered that to be an erroneous impression, because he did not see why the profits or tolls of any other market to be selected, should not be given to them to the same amount as they now derived from Smithfield. But in addition to that consideration, the Committee were of opinion that Smith-field ought not to be enclosed, but should be converted into a square which would occupy about four acres, while the remaining acre and-a-quarter would be devoted to a range of handsome buildings, the rents of which would go a great way in making up for the loss of tolls sustained by the corporation. There was a vast amount of evidence tending to show that the area of Smithfield market was much too small. In the year 1809 a deputation from the city of London waited on the
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Board of Trade, praying for an enlargement of Smithfield market; and the answer they received was, that "by no possibility can the enlargement of Smithfield market be made so as to meet the convenience of the public in any manner what over." In 1731, there were only 38,000 head of cattle taken to Smithfield market in one year. About the middle of the century the number had increased to 150,000, while, in the year 1846, the supply amounted to 310,000 cattle, and 1,600,000 sheep. In 1828, a Committee sat on this subject, and their report was—
"That the passing of live-stock to and fro from Smithfield is a nuisance to the inhabitants of the neighbourhood and to the public at large, and that the present size and arrangement of the market does not afford sufficient accommodation for the live-stock therein offered for sale; and these are propositions which your Committee are prepared to maintain."
The nuisance so described was, however, after twenty-one years, still allowed to continue and to increase. It produced very great injury to the graziers, to the public, and to the butchers. With regard to the graziers, it was an injustice that the producer of cattle should be deprived of that right which every man in a civilised country should possess of selling his own produce. In Smithfield the cattle must be consigned to some particular broker, and disposed of by a salesman at the market. The salesman might sell them at any price he pleased, or else the grazier must consent to send them back to the lair at an immense loss of his property. [The hon. Gentleman read some extracts from the evidence, showing the extent of this inconvenience.] He did not think it possible to adopt any other plan in Smithfield market; but at the same time he felt that it would be a very great advantage indeed to the grazier if he had the power of superintending the sale of his own cattle; and also, if he could have lairs in the vicinity of the market to which the stock could be removed without deterioration, if he did not choose to accept the price offered. But if the injury to the grazier was great, that to the population of London in general, and of Smithfield and its vicinity in particular, was ten times greater. Professor Owen had stated distinctly in his evidence that the greatest injury to the health of the inhabitants was produced by the retention of Smithfield market in its present overcrowded state. Professor Owen stated that—
"With regard to the places for the reception of those animals, they generally being in a ple-

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thoric condition, and full, therefore of blood, and of the nutritious elements of animal food, have more weight, and their extra quantity of fat is so disposed as to impede the action of the muscles; consequently, muscular exertion becomes more difficult, and thus it follows that, muscular exertion being rendered more difficult under those circumstances, the heart's action is increased, and respiration much quickened; and if compulsory locomotion, through Over-driving, is continued for a certain time, the respiration becomes unequal to the full oxygenation of the blood; in short, a state of fever is produced, and the blood is altered in quality, and that reacts upon the character of the flesh; and if to over-driving the animals in this condition, you add also pain and terror, all this tends to drive them more rapidly into that state of fever, and the consequence is, that when they are killed, the flesh as the butchers say, does not cut up bright; that is the common expression; it is of a dark colour."
Professor Owen also stated that there was no country in the world where the meat was so fine, and where there was so much attention paid to the rearing and fattening of cattle, and to the perfection of their breeds, and yet there was no country where meat was brought to market in a state so unfit for human food. This arose from the fact that there was no country where animals were so ill-used in bringing them to market, and where the mode of slaughtering them was so calculated to render the flesh unwholesome and liable to decay. The number of diseases which the unwholesome character of the meat offered for sale engendered, was also dwelt upon in the evidence; and there was one disease—cancer—which was said to be extending considerably among the lower classes from this cause. Many medical men had given it as their opinion that this disease was much more frequent than it used to be, and that its increase was owing to the disgusting and filthy manner in which animal food was kept, and allowed to be tainted, if not putrified, and then sold for the use of the people. Comparing London with other great towns in Europe, he believed that the drainage was much more efficient than in most other capitals, yet might be greatly improved, and that there was consequently less mortality here from the use of impure meat than would otherwise prevail. With regard to the nuisance arising from the driving of cattle through the streets, the evidence of Professor Owen and of the other medical witnesses was, he thought, conclusive. [Mr. OSBORNE: No, no!] The evidence was certainly conclusive, he would repeat, to this extent, that the present system of selling and slaughtering cattle in the metropolis, and of making tripe and disposing of the offal, was most injurious to the health
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of the inhabitants. Dr. Gavin, one of the witnesses, had stated that there was more sickness in the vicinity of Smithfield, arising from the stench and putrefaction of slaughtered animals, than in any other lo-locality in that part of the metropolis. But there was also an injury sustained by the butchers, as the meat of animals so treated was more liable to decay than country killed meat. This injury, however, most probably fell ultimately on the consumers. The beasts were subjected to dreadful brutalities. Their horns were sometimes broken. Sometimes their hoofs were torn off. At other times their hides were shockingly lacerated. In fact, beasts were at times so injured as to be scarcely fit to be cut up. One butcher stated to him (Mr. Mackinnon) in the Committee, when examined, that he always knew cattle that had come from Smithfield by the number and variety of the injuries they had sustained. Another evil attendant upon the sale of cattle in Smithfield was consequent upon the vast importation of foreign beasts and sheep which now took place. Those foreign cattle were in many cases diseased. Amongst the sheep, in particular, the small-pox was very prevalent. Being landed, and usually driven into Smithfield during the night, where they were penned in close contact with other sheep or cattle, those diseases were communicated. There was no possibility of discovering the presence of the disease. The inspectors themselves were often totally unable to discover it. And when the sheep were purchased by graziers, who intended them for stock and drove them home, the infection was carried to and spread amongst the sound flocks. There was one noble Lord, a friend of his, whoso name he would not mention, who had 2,000 sheep contaminated in that manner, and no doubt before he discovered it, many of those diseased sheep might have been sent to Smithfield and sold. Hon. Gentlemen might assert the contrary, but he would maintain Smithfield market was a most shocking annoyance. Besides the terror it occasioned, and the cruelty of which it was the scene, it was the source of great loss to the butchers and to the public. The only persons who did not suffer by it, and to whom, on the contrary, it was a source of gain, were the salesmasters. He believed that every individual member of the corporation was in favour of its abolition; but they were kept in awe by the salesmen, by whom also the butchers were influenced, and the latter had great in-

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fluence in the Common Council. [Mr. Alderman SIDNEY: The corporation does not consist of the Common Council.] He was perfectly aware of the fact. But nevertheless he repeated that the influence of the butchers in the Common Council was what overawed the corporation. There was a combination between the butchers and the salesmasters to prevent the removal of the market, and that combination was most injurious to the public. Several butchers had given in evidence that the price of butcher's meat in the London market was from 2d. to 2½d. per lb. higher than it ought to be. Indeed, if they took the price by the carcase in Newgate-market, and compared it with the price charged to the public when the meat was retailed, they would see that from 2d. to 2½d. per pound more was charged than ought to be to the upper classes of the community, even allowing the customary profit of 1d. per lb. to the butcher. If a combination did not exist, the graziers would be able to look after their own sales, and effect them more advantageously for the public. Now, if they looked to the history of the area now occupied by the market of Smithfield, they would find that it was always remarkable for being the scene of cruelty. In ancient times it was the usual place where the burning of witches, or rather of persons accused of witchcraft and sorcery, took place. Subsequently it was the scene where eminent men were placed on the faggot for entertaining religious opinions different from those in authority. So they now seemed to think that its tradition for cruelty would best be kept up by its being the place where animals were exposed to injury and torture. If the House would agree to the resolution he was about to propose, he thought that the Government should undertake the task of the removal of Smithfield market. It would be a popular act. One of the first attempts at gaining popularity by Napoleon, when he was made First Consul of France, was the removal of slaughter-houses from Paris, and the erection of abattoirs outside the city. He did not mean to say that the noble Lord at the head of the Government ought to follow in the footsteps of Napoleon, but he recommended his obtaining great popularity by the somewhat similar act of removing Smithfield market and causing the erection of abattoirs. The butchers were coming round, and beginning to think favourably of such a change. A person of high character and standing as a butcher in Bond-street, had assured him (Mr. Mackinnon) that morning, that the re-
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moval of Smithfield would not be an unpopular act with the butchers when done. What he would suggest to Her Majesty's Government would be, since sooner or later the removal must take place, that in the first instance they should pass a short Bill, empowering commissioners to purchase an area of some forty or fifty acres of land wherever they should think fit. That they should then establish a market for the sale of live cattle, a market for dead cattle, and abattoirs for slaughtering, with whatever houses for the accommodation of the poorer workmen that might be necessary. If that were done by the Government, or the city authorities, the cattle, instead of being slaughtered in the cruel and horrible manner in which they were at present, would be deprived of life with as little of pain or unnecessary torture as possible. It would be too harrowing to the feelings of hon. Members, were he to go into the particulars which he had heard of the shocking cruelties attendant upon the present mode of slaughtering. And one suggestion had been made to him by a butcher (Mr. Giblet) on the subject which was deserving of attention. It was, that cattle should be killed by machinery—that the beast might be fixed with the head in a particular position, and that a heavy sledge hammer, being loosed by means of a spring, could be so directed as to fall directly upon the forehead of the beast, thereby insuring instantaneous death. It might be objected that the proposed abattoirs would be an interference with the rights of the private butchers and the slaughtering-houses. But he would let them enjoy those private slaughter-houses as well, provided they were so situated as not to interfere with the public health. He believed that the butchers would very soon find that the establishment of the new houses would not be such a loss to them as they apprehended. If his plan were adopted, he believed that 'the price of butcher's meat would be lowered in the London market, and that the meat would be in better condition and more wholesome than it was at present. But he did not wish to commit the Government to any definite course as yet. The resolution he was about to move was merely a declaratory one, consonant with the report of the Committee.
Motion made, and Question proposed—
"That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, praying that She will be graciously pleased to give directions that the report of the Select Committee on Smithfield market, be taken into the early and serious consideration of Her Majesty's Ministers."
MR. BERNAL OSBORNEsaid, that in common with the rest of the House, he gave every credit to the hon. Member for Lymington for the great interest he took in the question. But he wished he had confined his energies to carrying out to its consummation the Motion which he had had so long in hand for preventing interment in towns. The hon. Gentleman had told the House that the complaint he made regarding Smithfield market depended entirely upon how far its existence affected the public health. Now if it could be proved that the present position of Smithfield interfered with the public health, the hon. Gentleman might make out a good case. But he (Mr. Osborne) did not think that the speech of the hon. Gentleman had at all made out his case. Having given his (Mr. Osborne's) serious attention to the consideration of the report, he should say that the hon. Gentleman's speech was not borne out by the evidence, which he had most wisely abstained from reading. He must be aware that the great proportion of evidence was directly against the assertions that he had made; and in a case in which so much money was at stake, it really was necessary to act with great caution. He understood that no less than 7,000,000 l. worth of property changed hands in Smith-field in the course of the year; and before any interference was attempted with an interest such as that was, a stronger case should be made out than the hon. Gentleman had presented to them. The hon. Gentleman had alluded to the bad effects upon the public health. Nothing was more easy than to raise an alarm by a cry of that description. He had also alluded to what he called "the Bude light of the press." He (Mr. Osborne) deprecated all allusions to the public press in the House. He did not like them. He did not indulge in them himself. But he certainly could not avoid expressing his disapprobation at such allusions to a paper on which the greatest talent of the country was employed. He did not always agree with the opinions advocated in it. He thought that in a great many points it had misled public opinion; but on others it had led it well. [Mr. MACKINNON: Led and followed.] He believed that in the present case it had neither led nor followed. The fact was, a great many old ladies, who were alarmed by meeting cattle in the streets, had gone to the hon. Gentleman, and had said, "Oh, Mr. Mackinnon, you are a friend of your species, for God's sake get Smithfield market abolished." But how
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had the hon. Gentleman set about making out his case? In the first resolution in the report it was set forth that "it is proved by experience that the existence of Smithfield market is attended with great inconvenience." The House would observe that it was said to be "proved by experience"—why not "by evidence?" They had evidence enough, but the case was not proved by the evidence. It was not proved certainly by the evidence of the butchers, nor of the graziers, nor of the medical men, because there the evidence was totally contrary to the case of the hon. Gentleman. The medical men's evidence went quite the other way. The hon. Gentleman had adverted to the evidence of Professor Owen. As a lecturer on science, he had a great respect for Professor Owen; but that gentleman never had a case of private practice in his life. It was the same with Mr. Grainger. In the first place, he should observe, that it was proved by all the evidence that Smithfield was a peculiarly healthy locality. One medical gentleman, Dr. Fortescue, gave as a reason for the peculiar healthfulness of the neighbourhood, that it was fifty feet above high-watermark at London Bridge; and said that there was only one case of cholera known to have occurred there in the year 1832. [Mr. MACKINNON: Dr. Gavin.] He would not take Dr. Gavin's evidence, because he was the one solitary doctor upon whom the hon. Gentleman had to depend. He was that party's great gun. But what did Dr. Fortescue say? Why, that the open space of Smithfield was positively a blessing to the place. Now, if they were to base their case upon doctors' evidence, let them see what it amounted to. Let them have a few facts. [Mr. MACKINNON: You have not read the evidence.] Well, then, would the hon. Gentleman show him in what part he would find those facts that were not the case he had just stated. Would he tell him how many instances had occurred of beasts from Smithfield disturbing tea parties by Walking up stairs, and into first-floor rooms? He had better move for a return of the number of tea parties in first floors interrupted by unexpected visits of bulls from Smithfield. What was the opinion of the inspector of sewers? Why—
"That Smithfield was drained by 2,000 feet of main sewer, averaging 4 feet 6 inches in height, by 2 feet 9 inches in width, into which the market was drained by 28 gullies, each furnished with a trap."
In fact, that it was the best drained part

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of the metropolis, the water running through the sewers at a strong flush, and the smell being wholly repressed by the traps to the gullies, preventing those horrible effluvia so much complained of in Belgravia and about the neighbourhood of the House, causing an hon. relative of his to say the other night, that the smells in the House were beastly. In Mr. Sadler's evidence it was stated that there were (including the smaller drains) 11,000 feet of sewerage, and four flush gates, which thoroughly drained the market, and that in all the sewers the water ran with great velocity. Dr. Lankester, the lecturer at St. George's Hospital, said that the large sewers and drains of Smith-field were excellent. Dr. Lynch, again—for as it was a question of doctors he would go through the weight of medical evidence, the more particularly as he did not think that hon. Gentlemen were justified in alarming the people of the metropolis with their cries of "mad bull!" and "cholera!" He supposed that the hon. Gentleman would not dispute the evidence of Dr. Lynch, or deny that it was against him. [Mr. MACKINNON: He is a servant of the city of London.] He might just as well, on his part, say that the Committee was packed, and that there were persons behind the curtain pulling the strings—persons who were interested in forming abattoirs at Islington—as for the hon. Gentleman to say that Dr. Lynch was a servant of the city of London. But he would not deal with the question after such a manner. But at all events Dr. Fortescue said that the wide opening of Smithfield was a blessing to the neighbourhood. Dr. Burrowes said, that, taking one day with another, Smithfield was one of the purest sites in the city of London. Mr. Lawrence was of a similar opinion. He was the treasurer of St. Bartholomew's Hospital. And when the hon. Gentleman talked about enlarging the streets and the area, was he not aware that the city of London had recently enlarged the area of Smithfield, and that the trustees of St. Bartholomew's Hospital had pulled down several houses for the same purpose? The hon. Gentleman was bound to consider the question upon a broader basis than that viewed by a mere partisan. The Hon. F. Byng, one of the most active of the commissioners of sewers, considered the market as being rather conducive to health. Mr. Lynn, the surgeon, was of the same opinion; and Dr. Conquest, who lived in the neighbourhood 56 years, and practised there above 20, considered
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it not more unhealthy than any other part of London. There was less of fever than in other places; and as to cholera, he knew of only one case in the year 1832. And, with regard to cholera, he (Mr. Osborne) should say that he believed a great deal of it was created amongst nervous persons by such alarms as had been given by his hon. relative, and those other hon. Gentlemen who had come down and talked about the danger of it. There was another argument which he should call the driving-into-the-first-story argument. He would read a little bit of evidence touching that point. He had before him the evidence of the coroner of the city of London (Mr. Payne), who was not a creature of the corporation. A more respectable man than Mr. Payne did not exist, and the rate in which he was hold was indicated by his position on the poll when he contested the representation of the city of London. When he retired from the contest, Mr. Payne gave 3,000 votes to the poll of the noble Lord at the head of the Government. Mr. Payne said he had searched his register of inquests for the last seven years, and the only cases he had during that period of deaths caused by bullocks in the city of London amounted to two, namely—one, a little girl, named Mills, who was killed by a bullock in Lower Thames-street, in October, 1845; and the other, a little girl who met her death in a similar way in Bridge-street, Blackfriars, in October, 1846. Did the hon. Member for Lymington mean to say that the smallpox in the sheep in the market was owing to the confined space in Smithfield market? Why, the hon. Member had said the sheep had come to Smithfield with the small-pox. Did the hon. Gentleman suppose that he could manage to give every sheep a loose box to himself? If such a proposition was sought to be carried out, the Government would have enough to do to furnish loose boxes for the sheep in the country. In the evidence taken by the Committee which sat last year, 6,580 questions were asked, and 5,000 of the replies were in favour of continuing Smithfield. The House could only legislate upon the evidence taken he-fore the Committee. If the evidence of Committees was to be disregarded, the whole system of appointing Committees was a farce and a delusion. Then the hon. Gentleman came down to the House and said, he and his party would not do anything, but they would throw the onus of improving or removing Smithfield market on the Government. That meant nothing more than having an English pull at

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the Exchequer. What did he suppose would be the price of the market? If that market was abolished, the building ground in Smithfield would be excessively valuable. The corporation raised no less a sum from the market than 5,600 l. per annum. If the hon. Gentleman made out a case that the health of the metropolis was seriously jeopardised by Smithfield market, he (Mr. Osborne) would say there was no sum of money which would not he well expended in its removal; but he did not think that the hon. Gentleman had made out any such case.
MR. ALDERMAN SIDNEYsaid, that the value of Smithfield was not the toll paid to the city of London, but the commerce of the city of London which was brought to such an immense amount annually by this market. The value of Smithfield was estimated at seven or eight millions sterling. On large market days it was stated that as much as 30,000 l. was spent in merchandise in the city of London by parties coming to the market. He asked the hon. Gentleman whether he did not think it right to take into consideration the vested interest of persons in trade connected with Smithfield? For what reason should the House interfere with channels of commerce so extensive in their nature as those of Smithfield market? The owners of property would have a right to ask for remuneration. It had been said that hotels on the lines of railways were not remunerated; but the two cases were totally distinct. In the case of the old turnpike roads, although the traffic was removed, the use of the roads was not prohibited; but, if by an Act of the Legislature, Smithfield, which had existed probably for upwards of twice 500 years, was to be closed as a market, then they were bound, not only to see the vested rights of the corporation of London respected, but the vested rights of those owners of property deriving benefit from the market. The House paid the corporation of London a poor compliment in wasting its time in discussing this question. The corporation of London had debated for three successive days the policy of removing this market, and they were almost unanimous in their decision; for of the 226 members who composed the corporation, only 12 were for the removal of the market. If Smith-field market were to be removed on the ground of a nuisance, how long would it be before Newgate was removed, and Leadenhall market, where the hides of oxen and sheep were sold? How long
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would it be before they asked for the removal of Billingsgate? The trade of the city of London, and much of the employment of its population, arose from its markets. As well might they ask for the removal of the steam-engines and chimneys which enriched Manchester. An hon. Member might get up a Committee of Inquiry, and prove that smoke and the noise of steam engines was a nuisance. The neighbourhood of Smithfield was not only not unhealthy, but the reverse. He would prove this by five large establishments in the neighbourhood. First, there was the West London Union Workhouse, numbering between five and six hundred inmates. He paid a visit of inspection the other day, and found all the inmates to be in a healty state. There was the crowded gaol of Giltspur-street, numbering frequently between 300 and 400 persons, covering half an acre of ground; and the gaol of Newgate; and he challenged comparison with any other gaols in point of health. He might also take St. Bartholomew's Hospital, where they had 50,000 patients annually, and the united testimony of whose directors was that a healthier site could not be found in the metropolis. There was, then, the Charter-house and Christ's Hospital, where there were 1,000 hoys, and where the average of deaths for the last seven years had not been more than five for every thousand. On the ground, therefore, of the unhealthiness of the spot, the present attempt must fail. The only argument that then remained was, that the site was too narrow for the extraordinary quantity of cattle. Here he must add that the constant agitation of this question prevented the corporation from taking those effective steps towards increasing the size of Smithfield which otherwise they would be bound to take. The hon. Member was wrong in saying that the corporation had done nothing of late years. They had enlarged the site of the market, and it was now six acres; they entertained the idea of purchasing property for the permanent increase of the market. As to instances of cruelty, he was quite sure that they would not be abated by any change of neighbourhood. It was impossible for any place to be found in which there was more attention and anxiety to prevent cruelty to animals. Before the House passed a resolution pledging themselves to the removal of the market, they ought first to hear the fullest evidence. He had carefully read that evidence, and if he sat as a juror, he should give a

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verdict, "not proved, upon my honour."
SIR DE LACY EVANSconcurred in what had fallen from the hon. Alderman, and complained that there had been something very much like packing in reference to the formation of the Smithfield Market Committee, and a decided disinclination to put the metropolitan Members upon it, he himself having been two or three times strenuously excluded from it. This showed clearly enough how the matter stood, and that the Committee had made up their minds before the evidence was heard. The hon. Member for Middlesex, however, had turned the whole case into ridicule, and he was far from saying that it did not afford a very fair field for the exercise of his faculties in that capacity. As the hon. Alderman who had just sat down had observed, the real truth was, that the only ground on which the case against this market could at all be supported was that it was not sufficiently large for the wants of the metropolis. The statement, however, which he had made, that the corporation were anxious to enlarge the market, might be taken as a pledge of the wishes and intentions of that body.
SIR E. FILMER, as a Member of the Committee, could say that, throughout the whole of the sitting, it appeared as if there was one party cutting against another, and one market against another; which rival markets hon. Members were forbidden to mention. The evidence was of so loose and contradictory a character, that he should recommend that it be taken, in future inquiries of a like character, upon oath, as was done before Committees of the House of Lords; for there was nothing of which he felt more entirely convinced, than that unless the Committees of that House took the evidence brought before them in a manner to afford just grounds for confiding in its accuracy and trustworthiness, their investigations would be of very little advantage to the public.
LORD R. GROSVENORsaid, that if Smithfield alone were to be considered, the crowding of cattle would be compensated in a sanitary point of view by the pains taken to clean the market, and the fact of having so large an open space in that part of the town. But it was not Smithfield alone that was to be looked to, but the streets and alleys in its immediate neighbourhood, with their knackers' yards, bone grinders, gut spinners, and various other similar establishments, which, collected within a small area, and amidst a dense
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population, continually exhaled the most noxious effluvia. If hon. Members had read the evidence, they would see that every one of the witnesses—even those pecuniarily interested in the maintenance of the market—were agreed upon one point, and that was, that the market was not large enough for the wants of the country, while there was no possibility of having it properly enlarged. On these grounds he had voted for the report. As to Government compensating the city of London in case of removal, he did not believe there was any valid claim for compensation in that quarter. His opinion was, that if the revenue derivable from Smithfield market were set on one side, and the expenses on the other, it would be found that the corporation made nothing at all by the property. As to enlarging the market, it would be impossible to get ground for the purpose, except at an expense which he felt sure the corporation would not undertake. With respect to another claim I for compensation, that of the traders in the vicinity of the market, he was of opinion that that claim should never have been set up. They had no claim whatever, their case being precisely that of the innkeepers injured by railways; and they must only follow their trade, to whatever might be its locality. The long time, 500 years, during which it was alleged the market had been held at the same place, was urged as an argument against its removal. He looked upon it in a contrary point of view. The market which served London 500 years ago, was manifestly insufficient now, and another should be provided more suitable to the times, and to the immensely increased size of the city. He was sorry to advocate any thing which might create loss to individuals, but he thought that the I removal might be effected gradually; and besides there was no reason why the trades I of the various parties should not thrive as I well in a new locality. His opinion was, I that on the Government should devolve the duty of selecting a site for the new market, when the care of it might be given to the corporation, who had certainly done their best to make the present circumscribed space fulfil the purpose intended. His wish had been, in the Committee, that a Government commissioner or inspector should be appointed for the purpose of selection. He had not at all looked upon the question as a struggle between Islington and Smithfield. Islington had never entered his head, as in his opinion it never could be made a suitable market. In his

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opinion, the market should not contain less than fifty acres, while Islington contained only fourteen. Further, he thought that there should be public slaughter-houses out of the town; and if such changes could be effected gradually, his firm belief was that great good would result to the community.
MR. BERNAL OSBORNEsaid, his statement as to the revenue arising from the market had been questioned by the noble Lord who last addressed the House. He (Mr. Osborne) begged to say that he held in his hand an account of the net income of Smithfield market, from the 1st of January, 1844, to the 31st of December, 1848; and the net annual income of the city of London, given by that paper, was in 1848, 5,641 l. 9s. 10 d.
LORD R. GROSVENORsaid, he would certainly undertake to produce a table showing the revenue arising from the market, though he had it not by him at that moment, from which it would appear that the city of London did not receive one farthing of that revenue,
MR. STAFFORDobserved, that though he had listened attentively to the speech which the House had just heard, yet he confessed himself somewhat at a loss to imagine how his noble Friend intended to vote. As to his hon. Friend the Chairman of the Committee, he was so completely absorbed by the subject of Smithfield market, that on a recent occasion he found it very difficult to define what he meant by smoke; and as to the evidence taken before the Committee, his hon. Friend seemed to think, that, like the meat to which it referred, there was no keeping it, and he was, therefore, evidently most impatient to serve it up to the House as soon as possible; hence, notwithstanding the morning sittings and the pressure of business towards the close of the Session, he urged this subject upon the attention of the House and the Government with extraordinary earnestness. It was to be regretted that his hon. Friend had so little confidence in the Government, and that so great were the eagerness and haste with which he pressed forward on this subject, that he went in direct contravention to the resolutions adopted by that Committee of which his hon. Friend was himself the chairman. As to the degree in which Smithfield was supposed to affect the health of the citizens of London, he believed that that question was set completely at rest—that the case in favour of Smithfield had been clearly established.
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Then, as to the enlargement of the market, although the population of London had reached to a very high amount, yet that of itself did not create a necessity for enlargement, inasmuch as the increasing wants of the metropolis were supplied by an increased transmission of dead meat killed in the country and sent to London by the railways. Amongst the gravest complaints urged against Smithfield market was, it created a necessity for driving cattle through the streets. Now, the hon. Gentleman told them that he would not abolish the slaughter-houses existing in various parts of London; and surely, if he did not, it signified little—so far as driving was concerned—where the market was situate; for so long as private slaughterhouses were permitted to remain, cattle would be driven through the streets. Even the establishment of Islington market, though a favourite scheme, would not prevent that evil. It happened, however, that that undertaking had proved an egregious failure, though it possessed the name of W. A. Mackinnon as a trustee and honorary director. If twenty or thirty markets were built in various parts of London, Smithfield would have nothing to fear from free competition. Neither the butchers nor the graziers would go to any other markets. He should now come to the question of cruelty. Some cases of great cruelty exercised towards animals were mentioned in the report; but he thought, considering the great number of cattle collected in the market, that it would be very difficult to prevent cruelty in all cases. The testimony of the witnesses, however, went to prove that these cruel practices were diminishing; and he believed it a vain delusion to suppose that by removing the site of the market they could altogether prevent such practices. The question of the cruelties committed in slaughter-houses, and of the nuisances arising from boneburners and tripemakers, had nothing to do with the locality of the market. Those nuisances might be put down under existing Acts of Parliament; and the witnesses who had complained most strongly of such nuisances almost unanimously admitted that they had never taken any measures for their prevention. The hon. Member for Lymington had not alluded to one important part of the question—the great extent to which Smithfield was now used as a transit market. The farmers in the southern counties found it to their interest to fatten their sheep, and cattle at a certain period of the year, and

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to send them to Smithfield for sale to dealers from the northern counties; and at another period of the year they came to Smithfield and bought cattle for their own use. Now, how would it be possible, if this system, which had grown up from the establishment of railways, continued, to prevent the driving of cattle through the streets? In the case of foreign cattle, also, which might be landed near a populous part of the city, how were they to be conveyed to the market without being driven through the streets? The question was one of so much magnitude, and with which so many interests were interwoven, that it was one with which it was very difficult to deal. If they determined that the market should not continue to be held in Smithfield, to what site would they remove it? If they placed it far from the metropolis, they would increase the expenses of the butchers, who would raise the price of meat to the consumers; and if they placed it near this advancing city, which was spreading out its streets in all directions, they might, before they had concluded their arrangements, find all the inconveniences of the dense population now accumulated in Smithfield. Then, if the market were removed, was Smithfield to be left an open space? Every one admitted that was very desirable; but no doubt the corporation of London would insist upon erecting buildings in such a valuable situation. It had been said that the price of meat was high in London in consequence of the maintenance of Smithfield market; but he could assure the House that meat was not dearer in London than it was in the country. Although the price of some joints of meat might be higher, others were cheaper, and he believed the average was much the same. But he might whisper to some hon. Gentlemen what had been whispered to him by west-end butchers—that if Gentlemen allowed their servants to take a large percentage, and did not pay till 1851 the bills which were due in 1849, it was very unfair to charge the poor butchers with raising the price of meat. The hon. Member for Lymington proposed that a Bill should be passed enabling certain commissioners to buy forty or fifty acres of land for the purpose of establishing a market; but it would doubtless occur to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, that it was necessary such commissioners should be provided with money for the purchase of the land, and where were these funds to be obtained? He thought they had better decide to what
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site they would remove the market, and in whose hands they would place its management, before they realised the fable of the dog and his shadow, and abandoned the meat they now had for the shadow beneath them. The question was, whether the House would act in opposition to the decision of the Committee—whether they would decide that they would not trust the Government to take the subject into consideration, but would force an immediate determination upon them. As no definite plan had been laid before the House for the substitution of another market in the place of Smithfield market, he would oppose the Motion.
SIR J. TYRELLwould support the Motion. He admitted that Smithfield market might to some extent be a transit market; but still it was necessary to establish a sort of quarantine after cattle had once been in there, in order to free the said cattle from any disease they might have imbibed. He also admitted that the hon. Member who had just sat down had adduced all that could be said in favour of the market, derived as his information had been from the whispers of the butchers; but it must be recollected in a matter of this kind that the consumer and the butcher had in some respects a conflicting interest. At present the owner of cattle was compelled to sell at almost any price in the winter months, if his beasts were driven to Smithfield; and, therefore, it was desirable that a larger market should be erected in a less objectionable situation, where the cattle could be supplied with sheds and water, and where they could be kept until disposed of, at a reasonable cost. It was probably true that Essex, the county he had the honour to represent, was interested in matters remaining as they stood at present, and that there were advantages, in a commercial point of view, in having Smithfield market in the neighbourhood of the Bank of England. The hon. Member for Middlesex, who had advocated the interests of the butchers, was perfectly welcome to make the most of that admission. [Mr. OSBORNE said that he had advocated the interests, not of the butchers only, but of the public] The hon. Member was called "the butchers' pet." He believed that the hon. Member, and also the hon. Member for Northamptonshire, were promised a fish dinner—concluding with roast beef and plum pudding—at the conclusion of this Smithfield debate. But whatever their advocacy might have been, and how-

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ever elaborate might have been their defence, still the broad facts were these—that there was great opposition upon the part of the city of London, represented by the First Minister of the Crown, to Smith-field market being removed; that vast interests must therefore be come in contact with; and that, although the hon. Member for Middlesex might consider himself one of the élite in representing popular grievances, still that it would be a great public advantage if another market were established in a suitable situation.
MR. ORMSBY GOREsaid, that the hon. Member for Lymington had been wrongfully accused of pressing this subject with unnecessary eagerness upon the Government. All the hon. Member and the country were anxious for, was to obtain from the Government some announcement of their views, not upon all the minutiae of the question, but upon the point whether it was their intention to countenance the labours of the Committee. A great part of the debate had turned on the sanitary state of Smithfield market. He looked upon that as the weakest ground the Committee could have taken, and therefore all the supporters of Smithfield had seized and enlarged upon it. But he must take the liberty of setting the hon. Member for Middlesex right with respect to some of his assertions on this point. It was true that Dr. Lynch had described Smithfield as being most salubrious; but in answer to a question, he had also stated that if he had a guarantee that the area of Smith-field would be kept open as a square for the purpose of recreation and health, he would much prefer that state of things to the existence of the market. The hon. Member for Middlesex was also mistaken when he stated that but one or two witnesses had spoken against the unwholesome influence of Smithfield; for amongst those who had given such evidence were Mr. Aldis, Professor Owen, Mr. Bullen, Mr. Grainger, and Mr. Grimes, the latter's evidence being the more remarkable on account of his having lost his wife through fever produced by malaria. In 1809, so convinced were gentlemen connected with the city of London of the nuisance of Smithfield market, that a deputation from the City Lands Committee waited upon the Board of Trade, having in view an enlargement of the market; but the Board of Trade told them that the inconvenience could not be removed by enlargement, but that the removal of the market to a more
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convenient situation, and to a space not less than twelve acres, was necessary. Where could the city of London, if they retained the market within the walls, get twelve acres for such a purpose? Yet forty years ago it was thought necessary that the space should not be less than twelve acres. It was said that the butchers and salesmen were very much opposed to a change of the site of the market; and so were the butchers of Paris before an alteration took place there; but having had the benefit of experience, they would not now consent to have the market in the interior of the city. Was it not extraordinary that this great metropolis, the first in the world, should be the only city in Europe which had the nuisance of a cattle market in its very centre? In all the great towns—in Manchester, Glasgow, Shrewsbury, and others—the nuisance of the cattle market was being removed without the walls. He would ask the opponents of the removal of Smithfield how they would like, supposing the cattle market did not exist in its present locality, if the Government were to attempt to impede the free and open circulation of the city by establishing a market in its centre? After adverting to the cruel treatment of the cattle and sheep in Smithfield market in consequence of its confined space, the hon. Member noticed the increase which had taken place in the animals sent there to be sold. In 1830, 159,000 cattle were sold in Smithfield; and in 1846, sixteen years afterwards, the number sold had risen to 210,775, being an increase of 51,775 head of cattle. In 1830, the number of sheep sold amounted to 1,287,000, and in 1846 to 1,518,500, being an increase of 231,000 sheep. The population of the metropolis was increasing, and, of course, the supply must increase; but it appeared that the area of the market must not. When Smithfield market was first established, it was placed within the walls; and all that was now asked for was, that it might be removed to some more convenient site than the present, and he trusted that the Government would hold out a hope that they would adopt some measure to get rid of this pestilent nuisance.
MR. CORNEWALL LEWIScould not allow this debate to close without offering a few remarks upon the observations of his hon. Friend the Chairman of the Committee. He (Mr. C. Lewis) was a member of the Committee last appointed, but not of the Committee of 1847, that previously

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investigated the subject of the removal of Smithfield market; and his object had been to come to the best opinion that he could, according to the evidence adduced before the Committee of which he was a member. At the commencement of the proceedings of the Committee, an attempt was made to treat the question mainly as a sanitary question, and various witnesses were examined to prove that Smithfield market was detrimental to the health of the neighbourhood, and ought on that ground to be removed. On that part of the case he entirely agreed with the very amusing, but also argumentative, speech of the hon. Member for Middlesex, who considered that it was not proved in Committee that the cattle market in Smithfield caused any serious injury to the health of the neighbourhood. He further thought it was proved, by satisfactory evidence, that considering the disadvantages that might arise from the congregation in Smithfield of a large number of animals two days in the week, on the one hand, and considering, on the other, the advantages arising from the existence of a large open space uncovered with buildings in the middle of the town, the balance preponderated in favour of the healthiness of Smithfield. That, he thought, might be taken as the fair result of the evidence taken before the two Committees. Strong opinions were given by the medical officers of St. Bartholomew's hospital on the subject; and he must say that he heard no evidence to show that the existence of the market could be objected to on sanitary grounds. But the case did not terminate with the sanitary part of the question. The reference to the Committee was simply the abstract question of the removal of Smith-field market. It was not called upon to choose a site in lieu of Smithfield market, but simply to give an aye or no to the question—is it desirable that the cattle market at Smithfield shall be removed? On going further into the question, it appeared to him to be proved by conclusive evidence that the space of Smithfield market was insufficient. It appeared to him that the question of the removal or non-removal of Smithfield market, resolved itself into a question of small area. The question was, whether the area of Smith-field market, as it now existed, was sufficient for all the exigencies of the public, and moreover, whether facilities existed for enlarging the area of the market in its present situation. For it must be re-
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membered that the population of the metropolis was largely increased, and would continue to increase, while the area of the market remained the same. The hon. Member then proceeded to refer to the evidence of the inspector of the city police, given before the Committee, the effect of which was to show that the present area of the market was not sufficiently large. With respect to the Motion then before the House, the hon. Member for Lymington had, within a few days, since the voluminous blue book had been laid upon the table of the House, and without giving sufficient time for the Government to form an opinion upon so difficult and intricate a subject, proposed an address to the Crown, pledging the Government to adopt a decisive course with respect to it. He felt that it was impossible to give his assent to the Motion of the hon. Member, or to give any other assurance on the part of the Government than that they would take the report of the Committee into their consideration. At the same time, he thought that the hon. Member could hardly expect the House to come to any decision on the subject so soon after the report had been presented, and trusted that upon reflection the hon. Member would consent to withdraw his Motion.
MR. MACKINNONsaid, that he had been induced to adopt the course he had taken in consequence of the representation of two or three Members of the Committee, that unless he brought forward the subject in the present Session, the report of the Committee would fall to the ground as a dead letter. He had no wish to press the subject unnecessarily upon the attention of the Government; and upon the assurance that they would take the subject into their serious consideration, he had no objection to withdraw his Motion.
LORD J. RUSSELLsaid, that the report of the Committee having been brought before the notice of the Government, it would have been, as a matter of course, taken into consideration by them. At the same time, he wished it to be understood, that by undertaking to take into consideration the report of the Committee, the Government did not pledge themselves to the adoption of the measures recommended by the Committee.
Motion, by leave, withdrawn.
House adjourned at half after One o'clock.

MINUTES.
PUBLIC BILLS.—1a London Corporation; Metropolis Buildings; Lunatic Asylums (Ireland); Land Improvement Amendment (Ireland); House of Commons Offices; Excise Benevolent Fund Society; Joint Stock Companies Act (1848) Amendment.
2a Admiralty Jurisdiction in the Colonies; Sewers Acts Amendment.
Reported.—Turnpike Roads (Ireland).
3a House of Lords Costs Taxation; Attorneys and Solicitors (Ireland); Marriages in Foreign Countries Facilitating.

THE AUSTRALIAN COLONIES.
LORD STANLEYrose for the purpose of asking the question, or rather of repeating the suggestion, which he had made to the noble Earl the Secretary for the Colonies about a fortnight ago. He had then
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stated that Her Majesty's Government would find some difficulty in passing the Bill for the regulation of the constitutions of the Australian Colonies through their Lordships' House in the present Session. It was now quite impossible for their Lordships to pass through Parliament with sufficient deliberation a Bill for regulating the constitutions of five or six of our newest and most important colonies. He wished to know whether the noble Earl would restrict that Bill to the mere separation of the colony of Port Phillip from the colony of New South Wales? To a Bill so restricted he should offer no opposition; but if the noble Earl intended to carry his Bill further, he warned him that it would meet with strong opposition, not only in the other, but also in that House of Parliament.
EARL GREYsaid, that the Bill now stood for a second reading in the Commons on Thursday; and he could give the noble Baron no decided answer to his question until he knew the result of the discussion which would then take place. He admitted that if that Bill were really a Bill for the establishment of new constitutions in the Australian colonies, it would not be proper to consider it at so late a period of the Session; but the Bill was limited to one point—the extension of that constitution which was established in New South Wales to our other colonies in its vicinity. It also made provisions that those colonies, by the authority of their respective Legislatures, should make alteration in those, subject, however, to the controlling power of Parliament. He believed that the parties in the colonies fully concurred in the propriety of the measure which had been introduced.
LORD MONTEAGLEwished to ask the noble Lord the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether it was his intention, in the progress of this Bill, to introduce any clause that entirely changed the present mode of selling land in the Australian colonies? That would, in fact, be a measure greater in magnitude than any other of the provisions of the Bill; and that a change ought to take place, he was ready to admit.
EARL GREY, in answer to the question of the noble Lord, would say that he entirely differed from him as to the expediency of malting any alteration in the Land Sales Act. He believed, on the contrary, that the maintenance in its integrity of the system established by Parlia-

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ment, was of the most vital importance to the colonies. Therefore, it was not his intention to introduce any clause to alter that part of the Bill. However, great complaints were made by many of the colonists, who were tied up by Parliament, and prevented from making changes affecting their own interests; and it was said, when representative institutions should be extended to all Australia, it was only just that this subject, amongst others, should be open to them to deal with. As to any one of the colonies dealing with the Land Sales Act, it was impossible to agree to that, as those colonies were connected so closely with each other. By the Laud Sales Act, a great portion of the price is spent on emigration; and supposing one colony imported emigrants with that money, it would be wrong that a neighbouring colony should be able to reduce the price of land, and induce those persons to go to that colony from the other. But in deference to what he understood to be the general wish of persons in the colonies, he (Earl Grey) said this—that he saw no objection to introducing a clause by which, if a federal legislature were brought into operation, that legislature, acting for all the colonies, and for their common interest, would have the power to amend the Land Sales Act. That power he would be willing to give; but in giving it, he must say he would greatly lament if the colonists availed themselves of that power to reduce the selling price of land; and to do so without making compensation to parties who bought land under the existing law, would be an act of great injustice. It was recommended by a Committee that the price, when once raised, should never be lowered but by the authority of Parliament; and it was the intention of his noble Friend Lord John Russell, who at that time was Secretary of State for the Colonies, to act upon that recommendation if he had remained Secretary of State. But on his noble Friend leaving office, it was left to the noble Lord opposite (Lord Stanley) to introduce this Act, which, with some modifications, is still the law of the land. He repeated, that it was not his intention to propose any alteration with respect to the sale of land; but on extending representative institutions to the Australian colonies generally, there was no objection to allow the colonists, by their representatives, to form a federal body to deal with the subject.
LORD STANLEYthought the noble
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Earl must have perfectly satisfied his Colleagues and the country that it was entirely impossible, from the statement he had made, that the Bill could pass in the present Session. The noble Earl was not disposed to deal by Parliamentary authority with the sale of land; but he was ready to establish that which was altogether new in colonial administration, namely, a federal government. Then the question not only of a representative government, but of a federal government, had to be discussed, and the power to be confided to it should also be discussed, involving matters of the nicest consequence and greatest importance. The noble Earl proposed not only to introduce the question of a federal government, but to transfer to it the power of adjudicating upon questions that were no less imperial than colonial concerns, He proposed to give a certain power to the federal assembly, although some of the parties represented in that assembly might dissent from the alterations made by the federal government. The Bill was not yet printed for the other House of Parliament in the shape in which it was to pass. Here, then, was an entirely new Bill that was to be discussed in the House of Commons without being yet printed. It should then be discussed in Committee in the House of Commons; and he (Lord Stanley) promised the noble Earl it would be so discussed. Then it would have to go through all the other stages in the House of Commons, and afterwards to be submitted for consideration to their Lordships. When they only commenced on the 18th or 19th of July, their Lordships must be convinced that it was impossible to carry through the whole of this Bill in the present Session.
LORD MONTEAGLEwas quite convinced that if they laid down the principle of compensation to which the noble Earl had referred, with regard to their home legislation, it would be utterly impossible to defend any portion of the legislation of late years, whether it affected agriculture or commerce.
House adjourned to Thursday next.