Sitting of 7 June 1861

MINUTES.
PUBLIC BILLS.—1° Parochial and Burgh Schools (Scotland) (No. 2); Leases, &c. by Incumbents Restriction; Voters (Ireland) (No. 2); Durham University.
2° Lace Factories; Naval Medical Supplemental Fund Society; Transfer of Stocks and Annuities.
3° Volunteers, Tolls Exemption (No. 2).

INDIAN COMMISSIONS.

  QUESTION.
  MAJOR GAVINsaid, he rose to ask the Secretary of State for India, Whether first Commissions in the Regiments transferred from the Local Army in India to the Crown are obtainable with or without purchase, or by competitive examination?
  SIR CHARLES WOODsaid, that the first commissions would be available in the first instance for providing for the demands of the sons of officers in the Indian Service, to whom the privileges they had formerly enjoyed were to be continued. The general question of entering the Queen's Army was a different matter, on which he was not now prepared to give an opinion.

SOVEREIGNS OF THE SYDNET MINT.

  QUESTION.
  MR. ALDERMAN SALOMONSsaid, he would beg to ask Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer, If Her Majesty's Government have any Reports from the Master of the Mint, or other official persons, on the subject of making the Sovereign coined at the Branch Mint at Sydney a legal tender throughout Her Majesty's Dominions; and, if so, whether there is any objection to produce such Reports for the information of the House?
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER, said, there was a correspondence now in progress upon this difficult and at the same time interesting question, whether the Australian sovereign should be allowed to circulate throughout Her Majesty's Dominions, or at least through the United Kingdom. That correspondence, of necessity, proceeded but slowly, as there were several parties to it—the Colony on the one hand, and on the other, in this country, the Treasury, the Bank of England, and the Colonial Office in particular. He should be glad, however, if it were desired, to produce the correspondence as far as it had gone, for it was very desirable that public attention should be called to the subject, as it might assist the Government in the consideration of the subject—and much consideration would be necessary before a safe conclusion could be arrived at.

UNITED STATES—THE CIVIL WAR—PRIVATEERING.—QUESTION.
MR. LIDDELLsaid, he would beg to ask the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Whether the proposal made by Her Majesty's Government to the United States, and the so styled Confederate States of America, to interdict the armed ships and also the privateers of both parties from carrying prizes made by them into the ports of the United Kingdom, or of any of Her Majesty's Colonies or possessions abroad, is or is not at variance with former practice; and also whether it is true that the Government of the United States have agreed to act towards the ships of this country on the principles laid down in the declaration of Paris?
LORD JOHN RUSSELL: With regard, Sir, to the last question of the hon. Gentleman, that forms a part of the subject which the hon. Member for Galway county (Mr. Gregory) has intimated his intention of bringing forward to-night, and it is, therefore, better that I should defer any remarks upon it. We have made no proposal to the Government of the United States or to the Confederated States with regard to bringing in prizes to any of Her Majesty's ports; what we have done is to give orders to the authorities in the ports of the United Kingdom and to Her Majesty's Governors in the Colonies to interdict the entrance of ships of war or privateers with prizes into any of our ports. With regard to the usage it is difficult to say what the usage has been, because there is hardly any instance of a considerable maritime war, being carried on in which many prizes were made where this country has been neutral. There is no doubt, according to the opinion of the Queen's Advocate, supported by the authorities on the Law of Nations, that every Power has a right to interdict the entrance of prizes into their ports. Mr. Wheaten in his well known treatise lays it down that it is entirely within the discretion of any Power so to interdict the entrance of ships of war or privateers with prizes.

THE ENGLISH AGENT AT PESTH.

  QUESTION.
  MR. DUNLOPsaid, he wished to ask the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Whether it be the case that the Austrian Government has demanded the withdrawal of Mr. Graham Dunlop from Pesth, and
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  whether he has been, in consequence, recalled to Vienna; also, whether his conduct while fit Pesth has given occasion of dissatisfaction to Her Majesty's Government, or any just cause of complaint to that of Austria?
  LORD JOHN RUSSELLsaid, the position of Mr. Dunlop was that of an Attaché to our Embassy at Vienna, and he was sent to Pesth by his (Lord John Russell's) desire, and according to the wishes of our Ambassador at Vienna; but it was remarked soon afterwards by the Austrian Government that his presence there might seem to give some countenance to the disaffected party in Hungary. His answer to that was that if at any time the Austrian Government should wish him to leave, as we had no right to keep an Attaché there, he should be withdrawn immediately. The Austrian Government did express their desire that he should leave, but it was not founded on any part of the conduct of Mr. Dunlop. On the contrary, the Austrian Government had no fault to find with him; and Her Majesty's Government had every reason to be satisfied with the faithful and impartial reports which he had sent home.
  MR. T. DUNCOMBEsaid, he wished to know whether there is any objection to produce Count Rechberg's Despatch requiring Mr. Dunlop's withdrawal?
  LORD JOHN RUSSELLsaid, there were no despatches from Count Rechberg on the subject. He had stated some time ago in conversation, that if Mr. Dunlop was to remain at Pesth other agents from other countries would be sent there, and it would be inconvenient to the Austrian Government. Count Rechberg never made a formal demand that Mr. Dunlop should be withdrawn.

THE VOLUNTEER VOTE.—QUESTION.
In answer to Sir JAMES FERGUSSON,
LORD ELCHOsaid, his wish was to bring on the Motion of which he had given notice with regard to the Volunteer Vote as soon as possible. He was informed by the Under Secretary for War that it was his intention to bring on the Volunteer Vote the first in Committee of Supply on the Army Estimates to-night, and if so, he (Lord Elcho) should bring his Motion on-then.

PROTESTANT WORSHIP IN SPAIN.

  EXPLANATION.
  LORD JOHN RUSSELL: Perhaps the House will allow me to make a statement

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  which affects myself personally. I wish to explain what has been my conduct with regard to a debate which took place in this House, and at the same time to answer certain charges made against me. It appears that on the 18th of May a question was put in this House to my noble Friend (Viscount Palmerston) with respect to Mr. Brackenbury and the Vice Consul at Xerez. After that debate my noble Friend called my attention to the subject, and I immediately sent for the papers and examined them carefully. Some days were necessarily employed in framing a draught despatch on the subject; but on the 28th of May I wrote this draught to Consul Brackenbury—
  "Foreign Office, May 28.
  "Sir,—With reference to your correspondence with Sir Andrew Buchanan respecting Protestant worship at Xerez, I have to state to you that the refusal of Mr. Gordon to allow Protestant service to be performed in his house, on the ground that he could not, as a Roman Catholic, conscientiously do so, makes it desirable that his office as British Vice-Consul should be transferred to some other person. Her Majesty's Government are perfectly aware that, as Mr. Gordon points out in his letter to Mr. Methuen, there is no Act of Parliament under which British subjects have a right to claim the use of a Consul's house for the performance of Divine worship; but it is obvious that in Spain, where the laws are such that British subjects are unable to obtain permission to worship according to the tenets of the vast majority of Englishmen, in any other place than the Consular residence, Her Majesty's Government are bound to favour the appointment to Consular offices of persons who are not impelled by conscientious scruples to refuse to their countrymen facilities for Protestant worship in their Consular residences. I have, therefore, to instruct you to recommend, as a successor to Mr. Gordon, some other British resident at Xerez, who would not object to the performance of Protestant service in his house."
  The House will now be able to judge whether I am in fault or not.
  SIR ROBERT PEEL: I wish to say one word in explanation. The date of the despatch is the 28th of May. The discussion took place in this House on the 18th of May. I said last night that I had read a letter dated the 27th of May, and up to that period Consul Brackenbury had received no orders from Her Majesty's Government or the British Minister at Madrid. As I know that the mail only takes five days from Cadiz to London, I ask the House whether or not the noble Lord, with due submission to his important duties, might not have made the communication at an earlier period?

UNITED STATES—THE CIVIL WAR.

  OBSERVATIONS,—MOTION POSTPONED.
  COLONEL WILSON PATTENsaid, that, before the Order of the Day for going into Committee of Supply was read, he wished to make an appeal to the hon. Member for Galway (Mr. Gregory), and to ask him whether it was absolutely necessary that he should proceed with the Motion of which he had given notice:—"To call the attention of the House to the expediency of the prompt recognition of the Southern Confederacy of America"? He believed he was speaking the opinion of a great number of persons who were well acquainted with everything which related to the United States of America, and who were deeply interested in our maintaining friendly relations with those States, when he said that it would be very inexpedient at the present moment to enter upon such a discussion.
  MR. GREGORYsaid, in answer to the question of the hon. Member, he could assure the House that he was the last man who would willingly involve the country in any embarrassment, or take any course which would in any degree be prejudicial to the maintenance of friendly feelings with America. He had proposed to bring forward this Motion because he thought it only fair that one section of the States should have an opportunity of justifying the course which they had taken, and the only object which he had in view in bringing forward the subject was that he might endeavour, if possible, to give a perfectly impartial statement of the differences which exist between the two sections of that country. He must say that he felt himself almost pledged to do so, in consequence of the letters that have been published in the papers, and the speeches that have been made by American Plenipotentiaries; but, although they had heard only one portion of the question, although the information which had been published came almost exclusively from Northern sources, and although he was almost pledged to persevere in his Motion, yet seeing that there was such a strong feeling in the House on the subject, he was unwilling to do anything which could in the slightest degree aggravate or embitter the dispute. He would not put himself in opposition to the wishes of the House, so generally expressed, and, therefore, he would postpone the Motion to some future opportunity. His hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham said, "Withdraw it." He would

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  postpone it sine die, with the hope that he should have some opportunity before the close of the Session of bringing forward the subject; because he must say that it was most unfair and most unjust that publications should be circulated throughout England in which the Southern Confederacy were accused of unwarrantable secession, and its members were called traitors and perjurers; and that he should have no opportunity whatever of putting forward their case in a manner in which it could be dispassionately considered.
  MR W. E. FORSTERsaid, he wished to know whether the hon. Gentleman meant to bring the subject forward on another occasion or to postpone it altogether?
  LORD ROBERT CECILsaid, he hoped it would be understood on behalf of those who did not take the same view as the hon. Gentleman who had just spoken—["Order."]
  MR. SPEAKER: I must remind the noble Lord that there is no Question before the House.
  MR. MONCKTON MILNESwished to ask the hon. Member for Bradford (Mr. W. Forster) whether it was his intention to proceed with his Motion; which, he apprehended it was perfectly competent for him to do, notwithstanding the withdrawal of the Motion of the hon. Member for Galway?—"To call the attention of the House to the inexpediency of interfering in behalf of those Citizens of the United States who are now in insurrection against their Government, by a recognition of the Confederacy which they have formed."
  MR. W. E. FORSTERentirely agreed in the feeling of the House that it was most undesirable there should be a discussion on the merits of the quarrel between the States of America. He should never hare thought of putting his notice on the paper had it not been for the notice of the hon. Member for Galway. If it were only the intention of the hon. Member to postpone his Motion for a short period he believed it would conduce to a better understanding of the relations with America and to preventing misconception were he to bring forward his Motion to-night, [Cries of "No!" and "Agreed."] With the understanding that the Motion of the hon. Member was postponed indefinitely, he would withdraw his Motion altogether.
  MR. CRAWFORDasked the hon. Member for Galway, whether his notice would remain on the paper? ["No—he said sine die."]
  On Motion for the House to go into Committee of Supply,

APPOINTMENT OF MAJOR GENERAL EDEN &C.—OBSERVATIONS.
MR. CONINGHAMrose to call the attention of the House to the appointment of Major General Eden to the colonelcy of the 50th Regiment. He said that in bringing forward this subject he desired to disclaim all personal motives; he desired to ascertain on what principle these important offices, giving considerable emoluments, were conferred. He understood that the principle on which the appointments in the Army and Navy were made was the principle of solution by merit. If they were made on that ground, he did not know how it was applied to the case of Major General Eden; and if they were made on the ground of seniority certainly this appointment of General Eden could not be justified. It was clear that Major General Eden had not received his appointment on the ground of seniority, for there were many officers who stood before him in the Army List, and whose names had been honoured by distinguished services. There was, for example, General Nicoll, a full General, who entered the service in 1803, and was severely wounded in his 107th action. In the list of major generals he found the name of Major General Cole, who had entered the service seventeen years before Major General Eden, who stood fifth on the list of major generals, and to whose name many distinguished services were attached; while General Eden stood twenty-fifth on the list. Then, if the principle of seniority was abandoned and if the principle to be adopted was that of meritorious services, he might say that Major General Eden's name did not appear on the list of good service pensions. There were a number of other officers whose services were almost fabulous, and, therefore, if those appointments were to be made on the ground of merit, nothing could be more unfair than the choice of Major General Eden. If the selection were owing to the circumstance of his being a Guardsman it was equally unfair, as there were distinguished names before his on the list of Guardsmen. Among the General Officers who were not colonels of regiments he might mention the following:—Major General Porter, who entered the service in 1810, and who went through six campaigns in the Peninsula, Major General Elliott,

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who also entered the service in 1810, and had the war medal with five clasps; Major General Pringle Taylor, also an officer of distinguished service; Major General Sir Robert Garratt, who entered the service in 1811, and served till 1854–5; Major General T. Williams, Major General Napper Jackson, Major General M'Pherson, Major General Bell, who had obtained a medal of three clasps; Major General Sir Robert Law, who wore a medal with six clasps. In fact, it was only necessary to turn to the Army List in order to see with how much unfairness this lucrative sinecure had been conferred. He had reason to know that that appointment had created great dissatisfaction throughout the service. He had received a letter from an old officer at Liverpool who stated that Major General Eden had no services to point to, and neither a medal nor a bit of riband to display, and that the appointment was regarded by all veterans as a most atrocious Horse Guards' job. He did not suppose that it was Major General Eden's fault that he had not had an opportunity of rendering distinguished services to his country, or that, if he had had such an opportunity, he would not have taken full advantage of it; but he held that important emoluments such as those of a colonelcy should be bestowed, not merely on a good man, but on the best man that could be selected. There was a similar appointment last year, which excited not a little dissatisfaction, and the Horse Guards could not be allowed to continue to dispense patronage in the same fashion. He wished to ask the Under Secretary for War on what principle the appointment was made, and whether the same principle was to be applied for the future? He felt that no apology was required for bringing the subject before the House. It was not a matter of prerogative, with which the House had nothing to do, but one which it was not only their right but their duty to consider.
MR. T. G. BARINGsaid, he thought if the hon. Gentleman had taken back his recollection to a conversation that took place in this House last year, he would not have supposed that there was any doubt as to the responsibility that attached to the appointment to the colonelcy of regiments. The noble Lord the Secretary of State for War, in his evidence before the Committee on Military Organization, distinctly stated that the responsibility of these appointments rested on him; and in a discussion that subsequently took place in this House
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he in no way disputed the right of the House of Commons to call in question anything connected with the administration of the army. With regard to the observations the hon. Gentleman had made, he did not collect from them that he had raised any fresh point from those which had been raised in the previous discussion. He had certainly mentioned the names of two or three officers who he considered should have been preferred to Major General Eden for this appointment. But before doing so he hoped the hon. Gentleman would permit him to say that he wished he had consulted those who were acquainted with the, position of officers in the Army List; because he had mentioned the names of several officers who were not on the established list, but who had retired in one way or other, and who had not even the right to be considered. That disposed of his statement about General Cole and others. [MR. CONINGHAM: What others?] He believed that Major General Piper also was not on the established list. He thought it unnecessary to discuss the names of those officers who had been mentioned by the hon. Member, with this exception, that in mentioning the name of Major General Bell, whose name had been before mentioned in the House and in the public prints, as an officer who had a first claim to such an appointment, he thought he might be allowed to say that Major General Bell stood forty or fifty lower down in the list than Major General Eden; and there were many other officers not mentioned by the hon. Gentleman who could not have been passed over in favour of Major General Bell. Sow the principle on which these appointments were recommended by the Commander-in-Chief to the Secretary for War was this—the fixed list of General officers was taken as they came in seniority, with this exception, that officers who had rendered distinguished services in the field—and by distinguished services he meant officers who had distinguished themselves by command in the field, not officers who had by the accident of the service been engaged in the field—should be considered before those who had not been fortunate enough to have been so engaged. Now, let them see how this principle had been carried out in the case of General Eden. No less than twelve officers junior to Major General Eden had been appointed to regiments previous to his appointment. He would not trouble the House with mentioning the

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names of those officers, because he thought it better to avoid, as far as possible, discussion on the comparative merits of officers. But with regard to the services of Major General Eden, he begged to repeat what he said on a former occasion. It had been stated elsewhere that Major General Eden was a Guardsman. He (Mr. Baring) stated the other in this House that Major General Eden was not a Guardsman. Of course, he conceived that any Gentleman who paid attention to these subjects would have understood that he meant that General Eden did not rise to the rank of lieutenant colonel by service in the Guards, which was the advantage which officers of the Guards had in respect to their promotion to the rank of Major General over the Line. General Eden served to the rank of lieutenant colonel in a regiment of the Line, taking his share of service like any other officer attached to Line regiments. It had been stated that Major General Eden had not served in the Colonies; but the fact was that he had served in the West Indies twice. The first time he served with his regiment as major for a year, and the second time as lieutenant colonel of his regiment for the same period, and the reason he did not stay longer was, that his health suffered so much that he was obliged to return home. Was it a reason that he should be deprived of his chance of these appointments, that he had not been able from the disposition of the regiment he commanded, to render service in the field? General Eden served uninterruptedly for thirty-seven years on full pay. After his promotion to the rank of Major General he had the command of the Western District for four years. That was not a lucrative command—on the contrary, the officers who had those commands were in all probability put to considerable expense; therefore, so far from that being an objection to the appointment of General Eden to the command of a regiment, it might be said on the contrary that it gave him an increased claim. He, therefore, thought the principle of selection, as he had stated it, had been fairly carried out in this case, and the Commander-in-Chief and the Secretary for War were fully justified in giving Major General Eden a regiment, and no such words as "Horse Guards' job," and so on, ought to be applied to this appointment. If the expression used by the anonymous correspondent of the hon. Gentleman were to be considered for a moment by those who had the management of the affairs of the army,
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and if the officers who had not been to the seat of war were to be debarred from consideration in appointments of this kind, the greatest dissatisfaction would be created, and great injury done to the service.
COLONEL NORTHdid not withdraw a word which he had said the other evening upon this subject. The post of honour for an officer was that to which he was ordered by his Sovereign, and nothing could be more fatal to the Army than only to reward service in the field. And what was service in the field? If an officer sat upon his horse at the head of his regiment or his brigade, exposed only to the same fire to which every drummer boy in the regiment was exposed, that was not distinguished service, and did not merit peculiar reward; but, on the other hand, if he had performed services such as those of General Sir Hope Grant, who had recently concluded the war in China, no one would grudge him any honour or reward which might be conferred upon him. General Eden had had on all occasions fulfilled his duties as an officer. He never refused to go to the colonies. On the contrary, he was two years there with his regiment as major and lieutenant-colonel, and returned home, not of his own choice, but to the command of the depot. Three years afterwards he received the command of his regiment, and immediately joined it; but his health was so seriously injured that he was obliged to return home two years afterwards, and was then told by his medical advisers that if he was again exposed to a tropical climate his life would be in considerable danger. That surely was a service which did not disentitle him to the rewards of his profession. He did not think that he should ever have a better opportunity than this of asking the hon. Member for Brighton (Mr. Coningham) to explain why he and his Friends availed themselves of every opportunity like this to make attacks upon the Guards—as gallant and distinguished a body of men as ever served in any army in the world? Had the hon. Gentleman anything to say against the conduct of the officers of the Guards? Had they not always performed their duty in the most honourable and distinguished manner? Had the hon. Gentleman anything to say against the non-commissioned officers of the Guards? They were as fine a body of men and as good soldiers as any in the world. If he had nothing to say against them he had better spare his remarks, which old soldiers must feel to be ex-

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tremely disagreeable and insulting. One of the complaints most frequently urged against the Guards was that they did not serve in India or the Colonies; but the hon. Gentleman himself once belonged to a heavy dragoon regiment, and it was only very recently that the heavy dragoons began to take Indian or colonial service. If the hon. Gentleman thought that he could excite a feeling of hostility or jealousy between the Guards and the Line, he should recommend him to employ his time in some more profitable manner, because that was an undertaking in which he would never succeed.
SIR JOHN TRELAWNYthought that his hon. Friend the Member for Brighton had been rather hardly used by the gallant Officer. His hon. Friend did not say a word against the non-commissioned officers of the Guards, because it was known that in those regiments all the work was done by the non-commissioned officers. He was rather surprised that hon. and gallant Officers should be so anxious to come forward and defend the acts of the Commander-in-Chief and the Secretary for War. It was much the same as if all the lawyers in the House were to rise to defend the Lord Chancellor, or a number of clergymen the Archbishop of Canterbury. He wondered that the hon. and gallant Gentlemen had not better taste, and did not see that the public might be led to imagine that they took this course in the hope that they themselves might get a turn some day—an imputation under which he was sure that the hon. and gallant Officer who had just spoken would be most unwilling to suffer.
MR. BERNAL OSBORNEsaid, that he was not backward in giving the name of "job" to any act either of the Horse Guards or of the Admiralty which he thought deserved that title; but in this instance he thought that his hon. Friend the Member for Brighton (Mr. Coningham) had been misinformed, and had not sufficiently acquainted himself with the circumstances. General Eden had much cause to complain of the conduct of the hon. Gentleman towards him. He had not the honour of knowing General Eden, but he had taken the trouble to acquaint himself with the facts of the case. That gallant officer came under the second category laid down by the Under Secretary of War—namely, officers who had not had the good fortune to be distinguished in battle, but who had served their country long and faithfully in whatever part of the
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world they were called on to do so. The hon. Member for Brighton had endeavoured to prejudice his case by saying that, as, a Guardsman, he had received extra pay. [Mr. CONINGHAM was understood to express dissent.] Yes, a particular stress had been laid on extra pay. Now, what were the facts? General Eden on joining the service entered the 84th Regiment, and having served in it for some time he went into the 52nd, and did duty wherever he was ordered. Finally, he went to Jamaica with the 56th Regiment, which was so wasted with illness that a number of men, greater than that which originally left home, was buried while the regiment remained there under the command of General Eden. That he called much harder and perhaps as meritorious service as if he had been called to meet death on the stern field of battle. A Medical Board sat upon him, and he was ordered to come home; he went out again in nine months, and, being once more attacked with yellow fever, another medical board sat upon him, and declared that unless he went home at once his life would not he worth a month's purchase. He wished to return to Jamaica, but his medical advisers would not allow him to do so. And now came the question of extra pay. He laid out £3,000 on exchanging from lieutenant colonel in the Line to be captain and lieutenant colonel in the Guards; and everybody knew what loss of rank was involved in giving up the command of a regiment to do captain's duty at St. James's. The hon. Member ought to have informed the House that of the long list of officers which he had mentioned all, with one exception, had long retired from active service, and were what was called vulgarly in the navy "Yellow Admirals." A very great injustice had been done in this discussion not only to General Eden, but to the Horse Guards. Let the hon. Member put his finger on a job and support the statements with good arguments and sound information, and he would support him; but it was prejudicing the cause of reform both in that House and in the public mind to bring forward a case such as that of General Eden proved to be upon investigation.
GENERAL LINDSAYwas exceedingly sorry that this, to some extent, should have been made a Guards' question. It had been said that it was the non-commissioned officers who made the privates, but from something like thirty years' experience in

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the Guards, he knew that it was the officers who made the non-commmissioned officers, and they in turn helped to keep up the discipline of the battalion. He supposed that when the hon. Member for Brighton alluded to the increase of pay, he was not so much speaking of the increase of pay as a Guardsman, but as a General Officer removed from the Guards. He would remind the hon. Gentleman that that increase of pay entirely ceased when the officer became a colonel of a regiment, and was absorbed in the general pay. The hon. Gentleman must be aware that the whole subject of military appointments had been explained before two Parliamentary Committees—one in 1833, and another which sat last year—he meant the Committee on Military Organization. The rule laid down in appointments was that those officers were first preferred who had performed distinguished military service, and then colonial service. He would remind the hon. Gentleman that Major General Eden had been under this principle passed over by a number of officers junior to him on account of meritorious war services. Two of these had served in the Peninsula, one in India, one with distinction in the Crimea, one in the Crimea and at the Cape, one in the Mahratta war, and one had served in India and also distinguished himself at Lucknow. Remembering that with the exception of the Crimean war there had been no great European conflict since the Peninsular campaigns, it was only natural that the great majority of officers in the rank of generals should have seen little service in the field, though they had commanded regiments with distinction in every part of the world. Whose fault was it that they had not been engaged on war service? One of the most painful feelings to which an officer could be subjected was when war was going on to be excluded from his share of the glory and advantages. Would it not, then, be additionally unjust to lay it down as a rule that any man who had not seen actual war should be debarred from becoming colonel of a regiment? He thought it would be most injurious to the service if the claims of those who had been debarred the opportunity of war service, because their regiments were employed in other or colonial service, were neglected. The Duke of Wellington, while always taking care to reward distinguished merit in the field, had always laid it down as a principle that officers unable to be with the army in a campaign, but who were serving their country
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in other parts, should not be passed over. He could corroborate the statement made by the hon. Member for Liskeard, and he might add that General Eden, as it happened, did not exchange from the 56th Regiment into the Guards till the former had been ordered from Jamaica to Canada.
MR. WHITEsaid, if hon. Gentleman entertained a low estimate of the impartiality of the Horse Guards the hon. Member for Liskeard himself was responsible for that impression, having while in office, or shortly after his retirement, stated that the best thing which could happen at the Horse Guards would be for the Serpentine to be turned through it, as that would be the only effectual method of getting rid of all the jobbery and corruption which prevailed there. General Eden ought to be grateful to his gallant colleague the Member for Brighton, as his Motion had been instrumental in eliciting all the testimony which had been given to his good services and admirable conduct. He only regretted the gallant Member for Oxford should have felt it necessary to import the Guards' element into the discussion. [Colonel NORTH: Why do not you leave the Guards alone?] He hoped they would not be left alone, but that on all occasions testimony would be borne in that House to the gallantry and good service of the household troops. But he thought they showed an excessive sensitiveness on all occasions.

DEATH OF COUNT CAVOUR.

  OBSERVATIONS.
  SIR ROBERT PEEL: Sir, may I be permitted to call the attention of the Government and the House thus early to a subject which has been alluded to in the other House of Parliament, and which, I am quite sure, without any reference to party-feeling or prejudice, might now elicit an expression of feeling in this House—I refer to the death of Count Cavour? It does appear to me that this is a fitting occasion when the House of Commons might take an opportunity of expressing its deep feeling of regret and sympathy for the loss which Italy has just sustained in the premature death of that statesman—a man who was certainly the most conspicuous statesman that ever directed the destinies of any nation on the Continent in the path of constitutional liberty. I believe it would be well that some slight allusion should be made to this subject. It is not for us to scrutinize the decrees of Providence in the

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  dispensation of human affairs, but I do think that the calamity which has fallen on Italy, and which has darkened the prospects and the peace of Europe at this moment, is a subject that ought to engage the attention of this House, and that, irrespectively of that tribute which the public opinion of this country will pay to the memory of Count Cavour, it becomes us to give an official expression to our own feelings of regret for the loss of the man, and of condolence with that nation on whom this loss must most heavily fall. I may remind the House of that which is, perhaps not, within its knowledge—that in 1850 the French National Assembly entered in the procès verbal of the 5th of July a record of its regret at the loss which at that moment this country was sustaining. I think that, without doing anything derogatory to this Assembly, we might take some such course now. The noble Lord at the head of the Government might suggest some mode by which we could enter on the records of this House an expression of our sense of the loss which Italy and Europe generally have sustained in the death of Count Cavour. Many hon. Gentleman in the House disapproved the policy of Count Cavour. Many of us—perhaps from not knowing the difficulties and dangers which encircled his course—questioned his policy and criticised his conduct. But he is gone; he lies wrapped in the sleep of death, and I believe it is befitting us, when we now see the merits of his character rising so conspicuously to our view, to give some expression to our sympathy and regret. I am sure I not only give utterance to the opinions of many in this House, but also of very many in this country, when I tender to the memory of that man my tribute of respect and regret as a simple Member of Parliament.
  LORD JOHN RUSSELL: Sir, having been engaged in diplomatic transactions with Count Cavour, and the hon. Baronet having thought proper to mention the subject on this occasion, I cannot but feel it due to the memory of him who is gone to say that I believe there never was a man who devoted himself, heart, and mind, and soul, more entirely to his country than the late Count Cavour. Undoubtedly he had great ability, he had capacity for great labour, and that ability and that labour were devoted, from the earliest time at which he was capable of giving an opinion, to achieve the independence of the people
  774
  of Italy. There is no one who looks back to the time when he commenced that enterprise but must see that it was a task attended with the greatest difficulty. The manner in which he began to interest the Powers of Europe, by proposing to act in concert with England and France in the Crimean war, and afterwards at the Congress of Paris, by stating, in the face of European statesmen, what he considered to be the grievances and wrongs of Italy, while it showed how deeply he felt those grievances and wrongs, showed also that he had an intuition as to the means by which alone the independence of Italy, now happily achieved, could be accomplished. This is not the time to speak of the various transactions in which he has been engaged. I had the good fortune both diplomatically to treat with him and to be personally and privately acquainted with him, and I cannot forbear offering this tribute to the memory of a man destined to stand conspicuous in history.
  THE O'DONOGHUE: Sir, I rise for the purpose of expressing my entire dissent from the proposal of the hon. Baronet the Member for Tamworth, and from the praises lavished on the late Count Cavour by the noble Lord the Foreign Secretary. One of the principal features of Count Cavour's policy was hostility to the temporal power of the Pope. And, Sir, the character of that policy was a persistent and systematic misrepresentation of the state of things in the States of the Church, in order to screen and favour the aggrandisement of Sardinia. Sir, this policy—such a policy—may, I have no doubt, harmonize with the prejudices of many hon. Gentlemen on both sides of this House, who are ready to believe every story about Papal misgovernment with that stupid bigotry of many of the people of this country, who are equally ready to believe it; but I have no doubt that it is a policy which is a gross outrage on the feelings of the great majority of Christians throughout the world. I say that I yield to no man—either to the hon. Baronet or the noble Lord the Foreign Secretary—in my desire to see the Italian people free. I say that I yield to no man in my desire that Italy should be entirely free of Austrian domination; but I refuse to accept the armed supremacy of Sardinia over the heretofore free peoples of Italy as a true definition of Italian liberty. Sir, I am not afraid, even in this House of Commons to say that I think I see the finger of

  775
  God's justice in the death of Count Cavour. [Loud cries of "Oh, oh," and interruptions.] Sir, do not let the House misunderstand me. ["Oh, oh!" and renewed interruptions.] I am far from exulting ["Oh, oh!"] at the termination of his career. ["Oh, oh!"] On the contrary, I regret it. I regret the death of Count Cavour ["Oh, oh!" and continued interruptions], though, no doubt, I regret it for reasons very different from those of many other hon. Gentlemen. [Renewed cries of "Oh, oh!"]
  MR. MONCKTON MILNES: Sir, I think that the hon. Gentleman opposite (the O'Donoghue) entirely misapprehended the intention of my hon. Friend the Member for Tamworth. It was not his intention that the House of Commons should dispute over the dead body of a great man. He desired, and I believe most Members of this House desired, without reference to any particular form of opinion, to pay the homage of constitutional opinion in this country to a statesman who founded constitutional institutions in his own, and who, in addition to that glorious achievement, has doubtless brought about a great national unity—has realized and made a fact what for so many years has been the dream of the best men in Europe. We feel here—I know that I feel—so deeply the disappearance of this foremost man in Europe from this earthly scene that I am conscious that words are utterly inadequate to express the solemnity of the occasion. We are not called on to discuss the character of an individual, but to express as solemnly and as simply as we can our sense of the mighty loss which Europe has sustained in the removal of a great guiding mind—a mind which had the power not only to grasp the destinies of Italy, but in a great degree to contribute to the peace of the world by the combination of a determination, a moral courage, and an intellectual vigour which I believe exist in no one other statesman of Europe. My hon. Friend has alluded, with a modesty which becomes the son of so great a man, to the fact that the National Assembly of France entered upon its formal records the sympathy of France and Europe for the death of Sir Robert Peel. Perhaps it is not so much in accordance with our usages—separated as we are from the immediate action of continental struggles—to adopt such a formal proceeding; but, as in the other House of Parliament, so in this, I believe it would
  776
  be well that both sides should give expression to their sympathy and regret, all the better, perhaps, for being the less mixed up with political feelings and political opinions. And, Sir, on that matter I should not have said a word had it not been that the hon. Gentleman opposite has taken upon himself the function of interpreting the ways of Providence in a manner which I am sure he himself, in his better moments, will not approve. Even though led away by religious enthusiasm—[The O'DONOGHUE: No!]—it is hardly for him or for me, or for any mortal man, in the exercise of his miserable, feeble judgment, to say whether the disappearance of Count Cavour from this world will tend to that object which the hon. Gentleman himself wishes to promote—whether the confusion and difficulties which the Catholic Church has sustained in later times may not be rendered more distant, and those difficulties may not be increased—whether that humiliation, which I never wished to see, may not be effected in the absence of that great man, who, I believe, never let out of his mind the important fact of the constitution of the Catholic Church, and who, having lived and died a sincere member of that Church, did nothing more against it than he believed to be consistent with his character as a statesman, and necessary for the prosperity of his country. It would ill become me to pronounce a panegyric on his name, for the best panegyric is to be found in the sympathy of the whole civilized world. The feelings we entertain are not merely to be attributed to a sense of the loss we have sustained, but to the fear which, I believe, will agitate the mind of every far-seeing statesman who looks to the difficulties that may arise on the great questions which are now to be discussed, and which will be discussed without the aid of that great and powerful spirit whose wisdom and patriotism have so often directed such discussions to success.
  VISCOUNT PALMERSTON: Sir, I cannot refrain from adding a few words to what has been said by those who have preceded me. I must own that there can be no person more fitted to introduce this subject to the consideration of the House than the son of that eminent statesman whose memory was made the subject of a formal tribute of admiration by the Legislature of the neighbouring country of France. Sir, my hon. Friend has suggested that some proceeding of the same

  777
  sort might be adopted on the present occasion. But, with all submission, I would say that every country is guided by its own habits in such cases, and that that which may be congenial to the customs of countries on the Continent may not be in accordance with our own. I believe there is no instance on record of any proceeding such as my hon. Friend would suggest even in the case of the most distinguished statesmen of our own land whose departure from among their contemporaries may have been the subject of regret. Therefore, I think the House will content itself with an expression of sympathy with what has fallen from my hon. Friend the Member for Tamworth, and from other Gentlemen who have taken part in this discussion. I am not going to follow the hon. Member who has spoken on the other side of the House (the O'Donoghue), who has introduced matter which I think had better been omitted. But I feel that I should be wanting to my own sentiments if I refrained from concurring with those who have expressed the deep regret which is felt for the loss of this distinguished man—a loss not only to his own country, which will deeply deplore him, but to the whole of Europe, and whose memory will live embalmed in the grateful recollection of his countrymen and in the admiration of mankind so long as history records his deeds. When I speak of what Count Cavour has done it ought to be borne in mind that the most brilliant acts of his Administration, and those which have most attracted the notice of the world—namely, the political extension of unity throughout Italy—are, perhaps, not those for which his countrymen will most revere his memory. It should be remembered that he laid the foundation of improvements in the constitutional, legal, social, and, indeed, in all the internal affairs of Italy, which will long survive him, and confer inestimable benefits on those who live and en those who are to come hereafter. It may be truly said of Count Cavour that be has left a name "to point a moral and adorn a tale." The moral which is to be drawn from the life of Count Cavour is this—that a man of transcendant talents, of indomitable energy, and of inextinguishable patriotism, may, by the impulses which his own single mind may give to his countrymen, aiding a righteous cause—for I shall so call it, in spite of what may be said to the contrary—and, seizing favourable opportunities, notwithstanding difficulties that
  778
  appear at first sight insurmountable, confer on his country the greatest and most inestimable benefits. That is the moral to be drawn from the history of Count Cavour. The tale with which his memory will be associated is one of the most extraordinary—I may say the most romantic—recorded in the annals of the world. We have seen under his influence and guidance a people who were supposed to have become torpid in the enjoyment of luxury, to have been enervated by the pursuits of pleasures and to have had no knowledge or feeling on politics, except what may have been derived from the traditions of their history and the jealousies of rival States—we have seen that people, under his guidance and at his call, rising from the slumber of ages with the power of "a giant refreshed," breaking that spell by which they had so long been bound, and displaying on great occasions the courage of heroes, the sagacity of statesmen, the wisdom of philosophers, and obtaining for themselves that unity of political existence which for centuries had been denied them. Sir, I say these are great events in history, and that the man whose name will go down to posterity connected with such a series of events, whatever may have been the period of his death, however premature it may have been for the hopes of his countrymen, cannot be said to have died too soon for his glory and his fame.
  Motion agreed to.

SUPPLY—ARMY ESTIMATES. VOLUNTEER CORPS.
House in Committee.
Mr. MASSEY in the Chair.
(In the Committee.)
Motion made, and Question proposed,
"That a sum, rot exceeding £133,276, be granted to Her Majesty, to defray the Charge of Volunteer Corps in Great Britain, which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1862, inclusive."
LORD ELCHOsaid, a notice had been on the paper in his name for a long time, having reference to this Vote, with a view to his calling the attention of the House to the wants of the Volunteer Corps. He regretted that he had not had an opportunity of calling attention to the subject sooner, as much misunderstanding had prevailed as to the views of those who wished it to be discussed in the House. If he had introduced this question at the first formation of the Volunteer corps, the

779
main want to which he would have had to call the attention of the Committee, he would have been to the want of popularity experienced by the Volunteers—for there was no denying the fact that when the Volunteer movement first began it met with little sympathy from the public and little encouragement from official men. He recollected the Prime Minister talking, in his jocular way, about "the Rifle fever;" but a great change had come over the public mind. To be popular a man must now be a Volunteer; the Volunteer service was now always associated at public dinners with the toast of the Army and Navy, and he hoped the Volunteers would prove themselves worthy of the honour; and as for his noble Friend the Prime Minister he was himself a member of a Rifle corps, and they all knew that he could not go through the forms of an election without being attended by a Volunteer guard. It was not, therefore, to any want of popularity on the part of the Volunteers that he had to call the attention of the House, but to more material wants which, if not attended to, would lead to a diminution of the number of the force. He had endeavoured to ascertain the numbers of the Volunteer force, and he was able, on the authority of Inspector General McMurdo, to state the numbers with near accuracy. There were, of Cavalry and Mounted Rifles, 562; Artillery, 20,360; Engineers, 1,482; and Riflemen, 125,551; making a total of 147,955. That statement was made up from returns which had been in the office for two months previous, and since then the numbers had increased by about 2,000, so that altogether the force might be taken as numbering 150,000 men. That was a large force to have been raised by voluntary enlistment. But the Committee would readily see that something more than public spirit and patriotism were necessary to call into existence a force of this description. Such a force had not been raised without a very considerable outlay incurred by those who had either served in or assisted it. The expenses of a Volunteer corps were not confined to the mere uniform, accoutrements, and drill-sergeants. They had to provide themselves with drill and musketry instruction, drill-grounds, ranges, targets, armouries, armourers, head-quarters, and then came advertising, printing, postage, stationery, travelling expenses, and bands. The Committee might smile at this last item, but it was very dull work, and the men could with difficulty be got together, without
780
bands, and although he admitted that they led to a considerable expenditure, bands were really a sine quâ non. Prizes and incidental expenses must also be taken into account; and he did not think he should exaggerate when he stated his conviction that these 150,000 men had spent, or had cost those who supported the movement, the sum of £10 per man—so that about £1,500,000 had been raised by voluntary taxation for the establishment of this force. A conviction existed on the part of those who had the means of forming a judgment, that unless some further assistance was given in addition to that which they now received from Government, a very large proportion of the force would gradually fall away; and he should endeavour to show that Government could give further assistance without in any way interfering with the Volunteer character of the force; at all events, without interfering more than at present. It was said out of doors that if the Government gave any further assistance they would destroy the independence of the force, and alter its Volunteer character. Now he, as a Volunteer, must express his utter inability to understand the meaning of the word "independence" as applied to a military force. If the independence of the Volunteers meant that this force of 150,000 men was not to be under proper control and authority—if it meant that any Volunteer officer, on his own responsibility, and without the consent of the authorities, might at any time collect together 10,000 or 20,000 men in any part of the country, of whom he was to be the self-appointed commander—the sooner such a force was done away with the better; because the day might come when such a force might be a source of danger instead of safety to the State. He was confident, however, that he expressed the opinion of nine-tenths of the Volunteers when he said that, while they wished to retain such an amount of indpendence as was their due, being Volunteers, and as was consistent with the War-Office Memorandum of June last, they felt also that the force ought to be under legitimate control and authority; they felt that they were constitutionally under the War Office, and under the War Office they wished to remain. A great deal had been said about the Horse Guards. The Horse Guards was a bugbear which frightened a great many people, but he did not believe it frightened the Volunteers. As to the illustrious Duke now at the head of this

781
Department, he, from the commencement of the Volunteer movement, had done all in his power to foster it. He was colonel of a Volunteer Rifle regiment; he was president of the National Rifle Association; on all occasions he had given them good advice; and, moreover, he had done signal service to the Volunteers and to this country by setting the example of binding together in a sort of brotherhood of arms the Regulars and the Volunteers. He (Lord Elcho) hoped, therefore, they would hear no more of attempts on the part of the Horse Guards to interfere with the independence of the Volunteer force. It was observable that those who decried further Government assistance, and who declared that it would alter the character of the force, were generally persons who made eloquent speeches in favour of the Volunteers, but who did not further assist the movement either in purse or in person. If the Volunteer character of the force was destroyed by Government assistance that character was gone already. When about two years ago the Secretary of State for War brought into operation the old Act of Geo. III., under which the Volunteer force was Constituted, the only inducement he held out was that if the Volunteers lost an arm or a leg, Chelsea Hospital was open to them, and that, if killed, their widows would receive a pension. On the other hand, they were to clothe, accoutre, arm themselves, and bear all expenses. It was soon found out, however, that Volunteers did not come forward so freely as was hoped for, and the pure Volunteer principle was, therefore, broken in upon. The Government first armed the Volunteers; and then, with a view to teach them the use of their arms, adjutants were provided, with inspectors and a staff, and the Government also provided ammunition. Though, however, there was here a departure from the pure Volunteer principle upon which the force was originally constituted, still assistance was given according to a strict principle, which was that Government gave such assistance as was necessary to secure the efficiency of the men. All they now asked for was that this principle should be extended, and that the Government should give only the further assistance which was necessary to their efficiency. The conviction that something more was necessary in order to maintain this force led to a meeting of commanding officers of the metropolitan corps, and the resolutions passed at that meeting embodied the views both of those were
782
present and of those who did not attend, the latter having subsequently given their assent to them. These resolutions amounted to this:—That the Government, who now gave the Volunteers aid in the shape of adjutants, arms, inspectors, and ammunition, should extend the assistance to drill sergeants, practice ranges, and some allowance for enabling them to take proper care of their arms. For his own part, he confessed that he could see no difference in principle between giving an adjutant and giving a drill sergeant. Drill sergeants were difficult to obtain, each cost £40 or £50 a year, and in the country a company of fifty or sixty men could not incur the expense of providing themselves with drill sergeants. Then, subscriptions from honorary members could not be permanently relied on; they formed a most uncertain source of income; and, what was worse, the Volunteers were put to shifts to obtain money by means of bazaars and balls, to which, though such devices might not be discreditable, the House of Commons ought to save them the necessity of resorting. He had received a letter from Sir Arthur Elton, the late Member for Bath, in which the same views were set forth, and the writer expressed his opinion that the Volunteers ought not to be left to raise the wind in any such way. The assistance asked for being strictly in accordance with the principle on which Government aid had been hitherto given, it was only right and fair that the Government should render such further aid. The resolutions which he had referred to were, as he had said, adopted by the officers of metropolitan corps; but in order to ascertain the views of the officers in the country he, having been chairman of the meeting, took the liberty of circulating these resolutions throughout the country. To his letter there had been between 100 and 200 replies, and, with one exception, all were favourable to the proposals contained in the resolutions, the writers declaring almost invariably that without some assistance of this kind the Volunteer force could not be expected to continue at anything like its present number. The following were found to be the expenses of various corps taken indiscriminately:—The Brecknock Rifles of 347 men expended on drill, maintenance of rifle range, and similar expense, exclusive of orderly room and so forth, £244; the 15th Suffolk, an administrative battalion, 569 men, £516; the 2nd Essex, with 700 men, £830; the

783
15th Cumberland, with 900 men, £850; 4th Gloucester, 800 men, £389; 1st Northamptonshire, 345 men, £415. His own corps, which mustered about 670 men, spent £350. The Inns of Court Corps—[Mr. MALINS: Hear, hear!]—he thought he recognized the voice of, he hoped, an efficient member of that corps, and he would correct him if he were wrong—mustered between 400 and 500 man, and their expenditure on these items was £303; but they expended £1,346 for their share of a rifle range. The members of this corps had peculiar advantages; they lived in barracks at Lincolns' Inn, in the Temple, and Gray's Inn; they had drill grounds close to their own doors, they hung up their rifles with their wigs and gowns, and whenever they had a spare hour they took their rifle off its peg—whether with or without the wig and gown he did not know, for he never saw them at drill—ran down and had an hour's drill on the green in their own courts. Therefore, if at a review they appeared to do better than other corps, it must be remembered that they were very advantageously situated, besides the peculiar intelligence which belonged to gentlemen of the long robe. The 1st Orkney, numbering 56 men, expended £47; the Robin Hood Rifles, of 600 men, spent £531. The result showed that the expenses to which the Volunteers were put on these heads amounted to between 10 s. and 15 s. per man. A sum of £1 per man had been mentioned at the meeting at the Thatched House, as the amount which should be contributed by the Government, but that was merely meant as an index to the Government of the maximum cost of these things. The additional 5s. was proposed to be expended on what were called travelling expenses. This might be a point open to dispute; but it must be borne in mind that we never could get administrative battalions into a proper state of efficiency unless they were brought together and exercised in battalion and brigade drill. That would, of course, he a source of expense; but it was a matter for the Government to consider whether these companies ought not to be brought together. They certainly never could be efficient without such meetings. There never had been any question of asking the Government for anything so foolish as that each individual Volunteer should have £1 to spend as he liked; though, of course, if the Government thought it most convenient to give the assistance in money, they
784
would take security that it was properly spent. It was for the Government to decide whether they would give aid at all, and if they did give it they would decide whether they would give it in money or in kind. His own impression was that it would be better to give it in kind. It was drill sergeants in particular that were wanted; but in regard to the cost of ranges, the custody of arms, and such expenses, different corps were so differently situated that perhaps it would be simpler for the Government to say that such a sum per man would be a reasonable expenditure to allow. All these points were logically connected with the assistance already given to the Volunteer character of the force, and did not in any way affect the determination which had always been studiously kept in view to preserve the movement from anything like an eleemosynary character. The present Vote of £40,000, spread over a force of 148,000 men, amounted to about 5s. per man, and in addition there was about £4,000 a year for staff and inspectors at the Horse Guards; and if the additional assistance were granted which he asked for, the whole Vote would amount to about 20 s. or 25 s. per man. The question for the House to decide was whether the Volunteers were worth from 20 s. to 25 s. per man? There were some persons who thought that through the Volunteers they might bring about some reduction of the regular army; but that was not the feeling of the Volunteers. They wished that the regular army should be maintained at its full strength. The Volunteer force, after all, was only held together by a rope of sand—fourteen days' notice, and your regiment was gone, and the regular army, therefore, ought not to be diminished by a single man. In any remarks, therefore, which he made as to the comparative cost of the Volunteer and regular forces, he had no wish to argue for the diminution of the regular forces. Including in the calculation the four Votes of the Estimates, pay and allowances, clothing, provisions, and barracks, and the expenses of the Horse Guards and the War Office, the annual cost of a regular soldier was £55, and including other items it would come up to about £83 per man. The Volunteer, of course, could never be as efficient as the regular soldier, but he certainly could not be said to be dear at 25 s. per head. It would ill-become him as a Volunteer to speak of the efficiency of the force; but he thought everybody

785
must have been surprised by what he saw at the reviews in Hyde Park, at Edinburgh, and at Knowsley. Wherever they had appeared, in fact, they had conducted themselves in a most satisfactory manner. It was said that the opinion of the Continent was the opinion of history. Last year the military attaché of the French Embassy was present at an inspection of the City of London Rifle Brigade at the Horse Guards. That gentleman, looking at the inspection, said to a friend of his, "I came here expecting to see a National Guard, and I see soldiers." In a few words he would refer to the corps to which his hon. and learned Friend opposite belonged—the Inns of Court. Colonel M'Murdo assured him, after he had inspected them in Richmond Park, that it was the best regiment he had ever seen." "Perhaps," he added, "the 60th Rifles, when they went first to Scinde, under Lord Melville, were as active and efficient in skirmishing as the Inns of Court." It showed what intelligence could do, and it was a great comfort to know that if the Inns of Court were ever called into the field they were likely to be as formidable to their enemies as they were to their clients. Being a Volunteer, he would not dwell further on the efficiency of the force, but he would take this opportunity of saying a word in reference to the social and political bearings of the Volunteer movement. He did not believe that it was possible to exaggerate the social good which the movement had done. They lived in a country where the different classes of society had but few opportunities of mixing together and understanding and appreciating one another. They met at cricket, at the Derby, on the Serpentine in a hard winter, and in Scotland at curling on the ice. But in this country the opportunities of meeting were few, and it was a great social want—a want rendered greater on this account, that unfortunately they had in this country men who, by the studied perversion of history and fact, endeavoured to set class against class. He said the antidote to this was to be found in the Volunteer movement which brought men together and bound them together in a patriotic and holy brotherhood of arms. Of the physical good he would not speak, because healthful exercise and improved habits spoke for themselves. But he would say a word on the political bearings of the question. Let them look at the position in which England stood a few years ago, before the Volunteer movement was started. Their fleet
786
was little, if at all, superior in numbers and appointments to that of France. He heard a gallant officer say that in case of invasion they could not put more than 13,000 infantry in line. They had an untrained population, and the result of a consciousness of weakness was to produce periodical panics. He would not attempt to say whether those panics were or were not justified by the aspect of things on the continent of Europe, but he would say that they were justified by a state of weakness which, to say the least, invited aggression. That was not the state for a great country like England to be in—England which, at the commencement of the century had defied invasion and had stemmed and rolled back the tide of French flood of conquest that had desolated and swept over the rest of Europe. The Russian war did not add to our military prestige, notwithstanding the sufferings and heroism of our gallant soldiers, because it was believed that we were defective in military organization. The feeling engendered by such a state of things, rendering the country liable to periodical panics, was intolerable to every man whose love of country rested on higher considerations than their own unrivalled power of producing cotton prints at the lowest figure, and the Volunteer movement was hailed as a deliverance from this state of things. Many persons now claimed to be the authors of the Volunteer movement, and their various pretensions had given rise to some controversy. He had heard a gentleman, in returning thanks for the press, say that he knew personally twenty-seven gentlemen who claimed to be the originators and authors of the movement. But he would name one person who, in his opinion, was the main cause of the improved position in which they now found themselves. His belief was that it was the Nestor of Parliament, the trumpet-tongue of Lyndhurst, that first roused the spirit of the country to a due sense of its position. He should never forget the words spoken by Lord Lyndhurst in "another place"—
"I will not trust the liberties of this country, its honour and its interests, to any declaration or any promise of any friendly Power or any Power whatever. I will rely on my own power, on my own resources, on my own vigour, and on the strength of my own right arm."
Those words ought to be written over the doors of Parliament, as they were engraved on the heart of every Volunteer. But this was, in fact, not a new movement. The spirit of the Volunteers of 1803 survived,

787
and only wanted to be kindled into a flame. The man who gave the necessary stimulus was Lord Lyndhurst. Before the revival England was in danger of losing her moral weight in the councils of Europe, through a disbelief in her physical power. What was her position now? The fleet was reconstructed; the army was perfected and organized; there was on efficient Yeomanry force, and a fine Militia. But, as a French writer recently expressed it, "Behind all this we have the British nation in arms." The position of England was much more honourable and creditable than it was, and if they wished to know what had been the effect of the change, he would say ask public opinion on the Continent, would that he could say, "Ask Cavour." But let them ask the Emperor Napoleon—let them ask the Prime Minister and the Foreign Secretary, whether the state of this country now did not enable them to speak and write as the Prime Minister and Foreign Secretary of England ought to speak and write, and whether they had not now that weight in the councils of Europe which a country such as this ought to have. They had had an incidental discussion to-night on the state of Italy, His conviction was that England, by her moral influence, backed by her physical strength and under the able guidance of his noble Friend the Foreign Secretary—and, though he saw sneers on the faces of some hon. Gentlemen opposite, he would repeat, under the able guidance of his noble Friend—the moral weight of England had done more to consolidate the liberties of Italy than the active intervention of France. If, then, they wished to consolidate those liberties; if they wished to retain the French Alliance, they must render England inviolate against attack. It must not be supposed, because he thus spoke of the Volunteer movement, which he believed to be the main cause of the improvement in the position of England, that it was encouraging an aggressive spirit on the part of the people. He believed the contrary to be the fact. He believed that with nations, as with individuals, when not conscious of strength or of the justice of their cause, they were touchy and quarrelsome, and that when strong they could afford to treat with contempt or pass unheeded that which otherwise they would feel bound to notice. In proof of this he might state that some months ago a distinguished diplomatist said to him, "The cause of peace is now greatly strengthened because we diplomatists feel ourselves
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strong enough, when necessary, to make concessions." He had endeavoured to state the views of the Volunteer force temperately, and he hoped without exaggeration. What reply he should receive from Her Majesty's Government he was unable to divine. He trusted that it would be favourable. He trusted that they would not make those who were working and slaving in the cause bear the whole burden, because they could not rely on the subscriptions of honorary members to the same extent being continued. He hoped the Government would be prepared, without departing from the line which they had chalked out for themselves, and from which they need not depart, to accede to their request. He hoped the Government would be prepared to support and maintain the great force which had thus been raised, and which it had been well said was laid at the feet of the Sovereign as the noblest present ever made to any ruler. He was confident that if by withholding timely assistance and pursuing a shortsighted economy they allowed the Volunteer force to be starved out of existence, a heavy responsibility would rest on the Government and on the House of Commons.
VISCOUNT VALLETORTthanked the noble Lord for bringing the subject before the House, and expressed his concurrence in all he had said; for he fully agreed that the time had come when the Volunteer force had a right to demand some further assistance from the central Government. There was, however, no reason to complain of what the Government had already done for them, because the Government had pursued a wise and prudent course in leaving the Volunteer movement at its commencement to be supported by private zeal and liberality. With regard to the origin of the movement which had led to the great results which no one anticipated, he believed the question would never be satisfactorily settled. It was not the movement of any individual, but of the whole people, who had shown a growing desire that the nation should be secure and not exposed to periodical panics. If, indeed, there was any one who by his zeal, assiduity, and hard work in the cause, coupled with unobtrusiveness, had entitled himself to the gratitude of the public, it was the noble Lord who had brought the subject forward. Thanks to the indefatigable exertions of the noble Lord, and of others who had taken a lead in the matter, and to the liberality of the public who desired to escape from constantly re-

789
eurring panics, the force was now established on, he hoped and believed, a permanent basis. He believed that upwards of £1,500,000 had been spent in establishing the movement, and that mainly by the Volunteers themselves. With regard to further aid from the Government, he reminded the House that it was one thing to get subscriptions for the support of a corps when a general interest was first excited in the movement, and quite another thing to secure a steady annual amount of subscriptions in the future. He confessed he was not one of those who thought that the War Office had exercised any undue control over the Volunteers, and, therefore, he did not join in the complaint against that Department. The movement had produced a great change in the sports and pastimes of the people. A few years ago scarcely any one who did not visit the deer forests of Scotland could use a rifle, but men were now to be found in almost every village who could handle it expertly. The growing popularity of rifle-shooting as a sport would tend greatly to give permanence to the Volunteer force. The bulk of the expense of the different corps of Volunteers had been borne by themselves, and it was only fair, when they paid for their own personal expenses, that they should not be mulcted on every occasion for travelling and other necessary purposes. All they asked was that the permanent expenses necessary for the efficiency of a corps should be paid by the Government, and in such a way that the Government should be no loser. Those expenses came under the heads of instruction, both in musketry and drill, care of arms, and means for rifle practice. But what the Volunteers required more than money was that they should continue to enjoy the cordial goodwill of their fellow-countrymen, which would be jeopardized if the country supposed that any money was granted to them for which they would not give a fair and full equivalent. He, therefore, trusted that whatever the Government did in this matter they would do it cautiously for the sake of the Volunteers themselves, as well as the public.
SIR HARRY VERNEYwas very much in favour of the proposal of the noble Lord (Lord Elcho), which he believed Members generally would consider involved no excessive amount of assistance. The strength of this country had been immeasurably increased in the opinion of people on the Continent since the establishment of the Vo-
790
lunteer force, and he for one expected from it great things. He would trust the safety of the country far more to the Volunteer force than to any fortifications for which they were called upon to vote so much money. But they could not expect that force to be kept up in its present state of efficiency unlesss the Government gave them some further assistance and bore the expense of one non-commissioned officer to every two companies. He looked upon the movement as one of the best which had ever orginated in the country, and he thought they were much indebted to the noble Lord (Lord Elcho) for the energy, temper, and tact which he had shown in promoting it up to the present time.
MR. A. F. EGERTONsaid, the corps composed almost entirely of working men—one of which he had the honour to command, and the organization of which often involved considerable expenditure on the part of the officers commanding companies—had, in his opinion, a certain claim upon the State for such assistance as was necessary to render them efficient. The want of efficient instructors was much felt. In country places great difficulty was often experienced in obtaining drill sergeants, particularly such as were acquainted with the new drill, and much inconvenience arose in consequence in battalion drill. He thought this was a form in which assistance might very properly be given by the Government. War-office interference was a bugbear of which he was not afraid; indeed, his impression was, that if the War-office had committed a fault, it was in not interfering enough.
VISCOUNT ENFIELDsaid, the question was what was the best way of rendering the Volunteer movement a permanent institution; and he thought that this was not to be attained so much by any grant of money per head, as by contributions in kind—by providing those necessary details which were now defrayed at the expense of the corps: such as practice grounds and instruction, If Government made an annual grant of money to the Volunteers, the public might possibly demand additional surveillance, and require that additional powers should be granted, either to the Horse Guards or to the War-office, in order that they might see that the money was properly expended, but there was a mode in which the Government might give most valuable aid in kind—that was by granting, in proportion to the number of effectives who were present at

791
the annual official inspection, a certain number of drill sergeants to each corps. Those sergeants should be, not retired soldiers, but supernumeraries, borne on the effective strength of their regiments, as that would furnish a security for their good behaviour, and would create a new link between the Volunteers and the regular army. Many a corps that was competent to go through its company and battalion drill had never fired a shot at a target; and working men, who had subscribed for their uniforms and other incidental but necessary expenses, found it impossible to defray the cost of a rifle range. In this respect, especially in the neighbourhood of large towns, where difficulties existed in the way of procuring sufficient space for the purpose, the Government might render material assistance.
MAJOR BARTTELOTsuggested that in many corps the officers would find it a very complicated duty to have funds entrusted to their hands for which they would be compelled to render an account to the War-office. If non-commissioned officers of the disembodied militia regiments could be allowed to serve as drill sergeants to the Volunteer force, he thought it would add much to the efficiency of a body which had become a permanent necessity in the country.
SIR JOHN OGILVYsaid, that at one of the largest and most influential meetings of Volunteers which had ever been held, it was determined to call the attention of the authorities to the fact that, while in England Volunteers had the advantage of access to the musketry establishment at Hythe, in Scotland they were debarred from that advantage on account of the distance. Lord Herbert, under whose attention this subject had several times been brought, had undertaken to give it his most serious consideration; and as he had some little hope that the boon which he sought might ultimately be granted, he ventured to urge it again on the attention of Her Majesty's Government. He hoped the request made by the noble Lord, the Member for Haddington, would be acceded to by the House, as it certainly would be endorsed by the country; and, on the part of the Volunteers, he begged to tender to the noble Lord his thanks for the able and satisfactory manner in which he had made known their wants.
MR. H. BERKELEYsaid, he took a very different view of this question from any which had yet been put forward. He
792
divided the subject into two parts. In the Estimates he found a sum of £42,000 to be applied to the requirements of 150,000 Rifle Volunteers, and another of £90,000 for 14,000 Yeomanry Volunteers. He had listened with very great attention to the speech of his noble Friend (Lord Elcho) and concurred in every word of it. It was impossible to overrate the importance of the Volunteer movement, which had achieved safely for the country, had prevented the recurrence of monetary panics, and had given us a position among nations which previously we did not hold. How had these results been attained? By downright hard work; by continual attention to drill; by attendance, night after night, for weeks and months, on the part of men who attended to their shops all day, and gave up their time for recreation in order that they might learn the business of soldiers. Military officers in that House would confirm his statement that these results could only be secured by continued application, and that to think that men, by dint of wearing fine uniforms and congregating for a short time, were to become Heaven-inspired soldiers, was a perfect farce. If, instead of £42,000, a demand had been made for £100,000 on behalf of Rifle Volunteers who worked thus arduously, he would willingly have given it. That was one picture: now he turned to the other, upon which he would not willingly cast his eyes, did not duty compel him to do so. This sum of £90,000 was to be disposed of for the amusement of some eighteen colonels who were noblemen, including three Dukes, and thirteen colonels who were squires, including four Baronets. One of the most respected of those colonels sat opposite—the great Field Marshal of the Yeomanry of the West. For that hon. Baronet (Sir William Miles) he had the most sincere respect, and he had not the slightest intention of saying anything personally offensive to him or the gallant men whom he commanded. But if he found that they had gone backwards instead of forwards, that they did not attend to their drill, his duty bound him to tell the truth. To suppose that by riding forth once a-year with a band of music at their head, or that thirty two hours' drill would make them fit to stand shoulder to shoulder with the regular cavalry, would be an egregious mistake. If it were supposed the Yeomanry could do the duty of regular troops it was a gross error. If it were thought they might be useful as a constabulary force it was a gross delusion. The Yeomanry could

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not be depended on to quell a local disturbance of a serious character, for it would take twelve hours to collect them in any county. The Volunteer Riflemen would be a much better force to stand by the constabulary in case of need, and, being on the spot, could be summoned in an hour. He had seen a mob of 10,000 run away from the shaking of the tails of a troop of Life Guards' horses. Could hon. Gentlemen show him that the Yeomanry were a successful body in that way? Wherever they had met with anything like opposition they had invariably behaved ill. Why, a whole regiment of them had laid down their arms to an unarmed mob, and a body of Yeomanry had run away, major and all, from a mob armed with stones and a couple of fowling pieces for which they had no ball cartridge. If such was the conduct of the Yeomanry in the face of an unarmed mob, were they of any use in repelling an invasion? In 1798, when 900 Frenchmen found their way from Rochelle to Killala Bay in Ireland a little too late, for the battle of Vinegar Hill had put down the Irish rebellion, a regiment of Yeomanry, to their great honor, found themselves face to face with some of those Frenchmen. How did they act? They turned their horses' heads to where their tails ought to be, and got them into a frantic gallop, which ended in some of themselves being thrown into a ravine and destroyed. No one doubted the courage of Irishmen. It was the want of discipline that led to such conduct; for, when the Limerick Militia came suddenly on the vanguard of these same Frenchmen, the colonel took off his hat and exclaimed, "Here they are, my boys!" and the militiamen went at them with the bayonet and gave them such a handling that they never made head afterwards. At Ballina the Yeomanry were tried again; but they turned their rear front to the French and ran away incontinently. He hoped that so many fine men and horses as the Yeomanry now had would not be thrown away, but that they would consent to dissolve themselves into that more efficient force the Volunteers. The Volunteers had shown that with a little more study they would be prepared to take their places by the side of the Line. The illustrious Duke at the head of the army, whose courage had been tried, and whose professional knowledge no one could doubt, had spoken in high terms of what the Volunteers promised to become, and in eloquent terms enforced on them the ne-
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cessity of discipline. Let the country refuse to pay for what was worthless. If the Yeomanry did not make themselves good soldiers, they had no right to ask the House to put its hands into the pockets of the people to pay them. Their own officers corroborated what he had said as the non-efficiency of the drill in the evidence given before a Commission which sat at the War Office, evidence from which the hon. Member quoted to prove the impossibility of getting the Yeomanry to attend squad drills. The horses which many of them rode were battered old hacks, hired for the purpose, or borrowed from their friends. He knew cases where omnibuses had been stopped in order that Yeomanry might go forth to glory on their horses. He had heard of a trumpeter who used to drill on a fine black horse which was the pride of the troop. Being one day late the captain of the troop was angry and remonstrated with him; when, with great simplicity, he replied, "Why, sir, I was waiting till the hearse came home." It had been stated in evidence by the Earl of Dudley that this Yeomanry force could be only induced to attend drill by being invited to dinner, and they required a vast deal of that sort of persuasion to do any drill work at all, his Lordship was Colonel of the Worcestershire Yeomanry and gave his testimony of that corps in particular. This was the old way of recruiting doctors' mates for the navy—put down a burgoo tub on the pier at Aberdeen and they came of themselves. So the Yeomanry would not come unless they were fed like animals. Why should the Yeomanry be in a better position than the Volunteer force? It was better for the Yeomanry to dismount from their horses, shoulder their rifles, and let the cavalry business be done by those who really understood it. When he found that such men as the Duke of Newcastle, the Duke of Beaufort, the Duke of Buckingham, and eighteen other noblemen, colonels in the Yeomanry, went knocking at the War Office door for £10 a piece, which he supposed they wanted to pay their expenses with. He thought it was a bad thing to go forth to the country that these wealthy noblemen possessed so little patriotic spirit as to receive these sums, while the Volunteers laid so heavy a tax on themselves. He should propose that the Vote for the Yeomanry force be reduced by £30,000.
Motion made, and Question proposed,
"That a sum, not exceeding £73,276, be grant-

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ed to Her Majesty, to defray the Charge of Volunteer Corps in Great Britain, which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1862, inclusive."
SIR WILLIAM MILESsaid, he hoped the Government would take into their consideration the proposal of his noble Friend the Member for Haddingtonshire (Lord Elcho). The noble Earl asked for little enough; and he felt certain that when the novelty of the Volunteer movement was worn away, that Volunteer Rifle force, which was at present so efficient and so constantly increasing, would dwindle down both in numbers and in discipline unless some support was given to them either in kind or in money. The Volunteers did not seem to have determined in what form they ought to accept assistance from the State, but he would recommend them to try to keep at their own disposal any money that might be granted to them, for they might depend upon it that they would find their drill-serjeants would be much more efficient if they had themselves the power of paying and of dismissing those men. He should be glad to see our 150,000 Rifle Volunteers increase to 200,000; and he saw no reason why the Government should not make them an allowance at the rate of £1 for each man. He believed that a sum of £200,000 in our public Estimates would be a small sum to pay for the services of so many hearts and hands prepared to defend the country in any emergency. It was for the Government to choose between the Rifle Volunteers and the Yeomanry, and if they thought they could get an efficient corps of Mounted Rifle Volunteers as of Yeomanry, he would gay at once accept the services of the former. The hon. Member for Bristol (Mr. H. Berkeley) had spoken in depreciation and ridicule of the Yeomanry. The regiment that he (Sir William Miles) had the honour of commanding had twice saved the town of Frome—once from burning. He was sorry to say that there was a considerable effusion of blood, but still the Yeomanry preserved the town. That, at least, was one occasion on which the Yeomanry had acted well, and he was certain that other corps would act well, also, if occasion arose. The hon. Gentleman must know very well that the force was more efficient than he chose to admit. They had permanent Serjeants in his corps, almost all of whom were old soldiers or pensioners; they resided in the neighbourhood of the troops; and the result was that the troops could hare squad
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drill several times between the fixed periods of permanent duty, so that they were sufficiently drilled when they came together to do their regimental duty. If his hon. Friend the Member for Bristol had any doubt upon the matter why did he not ask the inspecting officer his opinion? Surely the Government would be informed by that officer of their shortcomings, and they would be mentioned in the report. The question was whether the Yeomanry force was an efficient one for the purpose for which it was intended? They were not intended to act with the regular army, but he should like to know where the hon. Member would find a better qualified body of men to perform such duties as that of escorts, outposts, and other duties auxiliary to an army in case of an invasion than the Yeomanry, who knew every bye-lane and hedge in the country. That was the duty for which they were designed, and having commanded a Yeomanry force for many years he could vouch for their efficiency. He should very much like to see the Rifle Volunteers, the Pensioners, and the Yeomanry force brigaded together occasionally, as in case of invasion they would be the forces called upon to act together. The Militia was the proper force to act in concert with the regulars, but the Rifles, the Yeomanry, and the Pensioners should be subsidiary. He recollected waiting some years ago upon the noble Lord now at the head of the Government, when he was Home Secretary, on this subject; when the noble Lord admitted that it would be an admirable thing for the force if the permanent duty were prolonged; and he quite agreed with the noble Lord in this. All the common movements were learnt in squad and troop drill, which were entirely voluntary—not a single farthing was allowed for them. But when they were called out for duty, when they were absent seven or eight days, and were thirty or forty miles away from their homes, he put it to the Committee whether 7s. a day was a higher rate of pay for horse and man than they were entitled to. As to the officers' pay, did anybody for a moment think that noblemen like the Duke of Beaufort would care for the paltry £10 or £12? Did the officers decline when the question was put to them whether they would accept the 7s. a day as well as the men? The contrary was the case. Was it likely the colonels cared for the £10 or £12, when they often laid out in regimental expenses as much as £20, £60, and even £150? He thought,

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therefore, that the hon. Member for Bristol had thrown out a taunt against the colonels of the Yeomanry regiments which they little deserved. Either the Yeomanry force ought to be a paid force, and should be properly paid as such, or it ought to be a purely Volunteer force. They ought to come to some distinct understanding on the matter. The recommendation of the Yeomanry Committee at the War Office was that the allowance clothing and the contingent allowance should be reduced by 30 s. He wished to know whether at the same time the Government were going to pay for the clothing? or whether, as now, the colonels were to pay and receive the amount from the Government? It would be easily understood that in a Yeomanry regiment, where the clothing and accoutrements were for a considerable period in the entire charge of the men, and could only be looked after by the staff when the force was out, the repairs would be considerably greater than in a regular regiment; and, as was stated by the officers examined, it was only by putting their clothing and contingent allowances together that they hitherto had been able not only to maintain their clothing in good repair, but to leave a handsome sum in hand when it was necessary to clothe anew. During the sixteen years he had commanded his regiment he had paid to the tailors, accoutrement makers, and saddlers, £8,078, and for repairs, £3,174, making in all £11,252. In the same time he had received for the Government allowance for clothing, £9,990. Therefore, in order to keep the regiment in good order, he had submitted to a loss of £1,260, or about £76 a year. The sum was not much, and it might be said that he had the honour of commanding the regiment. It was not for himself that he spoke, but for those good men and true who were inspired with military ardour and a love for the service, but who had not sufficient money to stand the expense. He should understand if Yeomanry were mounted Volunteers, but they were a corps existing from 1809, and they had always been paid the sum the Government now paid. The question arose, could they not take something less. He had been considering what they could take off without affecting the service. A question was put to the effect what would he say to reducing the contingency to £1. He doubted the ability of the colonels to do it; but on full consideration he found he could pay all the men, and even the sergeants, to be raised
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from £30 to £36 10 s., and he would merely leave to the Government the payment of £36 10 s. for the adjutant. That would make a considerable alteration in the estimate, because he found that if 10 s. was taken away from the Vote on each man there would be a saving of £7,250 on the whole Vote; to which must be added £3,500, making £10,500. But they must take from that the additional adjutant's pay. They would, therefore, deduct £912, which would leave merely £10,000 saving. It was his desire to meet the wishes of the Government; but if the pay of the Yeomanry for contingent and clothing was reduced 30 s. he knew it could not be done for this money, and it would be better to disband the force at once and trust to the Rifle Volunteers.
MR. BUXTONacknowledged that the Volunteers had expended an enormous amount of pains and patience as well as money, and that the movement had added greatly to the reputation of the country. There was no military man who would not allow that, in case of invasion, ten Volunteers would be equal to at least one trained soldier. He was a Volunteer himself, and, therefore, made a modest estimate of their efficiency. In that case 150,000 Volunteers would be equivalent to 15,000 regular troops, and the cost of that number of regular troops would be upwards of £1,000,000. In that point of view the Volunteers had some claim on the liberality of the Government. He did not, however, complain of any want of liberality on the part of the Government, because he thought the Government had always acted towards the Volunteers with great tact and judgment. But if the Government did make up their minds to give additional aid, he hoped it would be in kind and not in money. He was persuaded that if they received money they would lose their prestige in Europe. The thanks of the country were due to the noble Lord (Lord Elcho), who by his speech to-night had crowned his energetic services to the Volunteers.
MAJOR EDWARDSsaid, that he was extremely gratified by the eloquent speech of Lord Elcho who had brought forward this subject, and he was sure that every hon. Member would be equally gratified with himself, and would acknowlede that they were under deep obligations to the noble Lord for the interest he took both in the Yeomanry corps and the Volunteer corps, and he (Major Edwards) hoped that the latter would increase until

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it was equal to the old Volunteer corps which was raised at the time of the threatened invasion by the French, in 1803, when their numbers amounted to 400,000 men. The present force did immense credit to the noble Lord, and other noble Lords (Lord Ranelagh for instance) and hon. Gentlemen who took as deep an interest in it as himself, and he was sure that the country was proud of the magnificent body of men which was now attached as a contingent to our regular army. Having said thus much of the speech of the noble Lord (Lord Elcho), he wished he could say as much of that of the hon. Member for Bristol (Mr. H. Berkeley), who seemed to labour under one or two remarkable delusions. The hon. Member for Bristol made two great speeches in the Session usually, one in favour of the Ballot, the other against the Yeomanry Cavalry, and on both of those subjects he seemed to entertain the grossest delusions. There were one or two remarks which the hon. Member for Bristol had made which were capable of easy refutation. Three or four years ago the hon. Member, in a more humourous speech than he had made that night, took the liberty of calling the Yeomanry Cavalry—or rather of comparing them with—"hogs in armour"—but that joke fell as flatly on the House as the jokes which the hon. Member had perpetrated that evening as to the efficiency of the Yeomanry Cavalry. Now, he (Major Edwards) could place in opposition to that hon. Gentleman's opinion that of a distinguished and gallant officer, late a Member of the House—namely, Major General Sir James Chatter-ton. He remembered that gallant officer stating that he had inspected more than sixty regiments of Yeomanry, and he could not wish to see, under the circumstances, a more efficient body of men as a contingent to the army. He thought such an authority as that of General Chatterton would perhaps have a little more weight than the authority of any civilian, and even than that of the hon. Member for Bristol. With regard to the number of days during which the Yeomanry cavalry were permitted to assemble, he thought that the hon. Member had got into a little confusion even on that question. It was quite true that they were miserably paid, thanks to the parsimony of the hon. Member and those who entertained similar opinions; but he could tell the hon. Member that the regiment to which he had the honour to belong
800
not only assembled eight days in the year, but had troop and squad drill perhaps as many as fifty, or at all events forty times during the year. It was to be remembered that the Yeomanry Cavalry were not paid for those days upon which they assembled for drill, but that that was an entirely voluntary act upon their part, in order to make themselves as efficient as possible. In point of fact they cared very little comparatively, about their pay for permanent duty. He thought no one could deny that they well deserved their pay; and he was sorry to see Members of that House doing everything they possibly could to rob them of it. In reality it was by no means an efficient pay, but a mere acknowledgment of the services they rendered to their country. He would remind the House that the Yeomanry Cavalry were in a position altogether different from that of the rifle corps. They had to provide their horses; they were under the immediate control of the War Office: and they were bound; at any time they were called upon, to render any services demanded of them by the Commander-in-Chief. How efficiently they had performed that duty in agricultural districts, or in country towns, the hon. Member below him (Sir William Miles) had explained by citing an instance which he thought the House would agree with him ought to be sufficient to convince any hon. Member. However, if that were not sufficient, he (Major Edwards) could cite another case of more importance. Did not, he asked, the Yeomanry Cavalry save Manchester, and had they not the thanks of the country for the service they rendered? He hoped that the remarks and the ridicule which the hon. Member for Bristol had lavished on this force would fall as flatly upon the country as it had fallen upon the House. He had read most diligently the report of the Committee which had been sitting at the order of the Secretary of. State for War, for the purpose, as he believed, of cutting down the expenses of the Yeomanry Cavalry which was the oldest constitutional force of the country, and had been established throughout England during the last two centuries. It was at the command of the Secretary for War that the Committee had sat; but he had failed to find out in the evidence adduced before it any reason why the allowance for clothing or contingencies ought to be cut down in the slightest degree. On the contrary, any one who care-

801
fully looked over the evidence would, he thought, be of opinion that the present rates could not afford to be diminished with due regard to the maintenance of the efficiency of Yeomanry Cavalry. In regard to the officers' pay and the recommendation for its reduction, what, he asked, did it amount to? When they were dealing with money questions in that House they thought very little of £1,000 or even £100,000; and what was the sum which they expected to gain by this proposed reduction? They would simply save £3,500 by placing the officers of the Yeomanry Cavalry on a par with the privates. Were they to understand by this proposition that it was considered that the officers were at no greater expense than the privates? He could tell them that there was hardly a Yeomanry officer in Her Majesty's service who ever saw a shilling of his pay; and not only was he mulcted of all his pay, but every officer commanding a regiment, was called upon annually to make up an enormous deficiency for unavoidable expenses, and, in fact, every Yeomanry Cavalry officer of whatever grade he might be, going on permanent duty, was put to a very serious expense. Those gallant officers, however, did not grumble. They considered it necessary that they should perform their duty, and they performed it to the best of their ability. Something had been said as to placing the Yeomanry Cavalry on a par with Rifle Volunteers, but the House would remember that they were placed in very different circumstances. They had their horses to provide for, whereas the Rifleman had none; nor was he liable to be called out for duty at any moment as the Yeomanry Cavalry were; and that great difference would always exist, and continue to be a difficulty with which they would have to deal. They had heard a good deal about the practicability of raising Volunteer Cavalry rifle regiments. Why, that had been tried and had utterly failed. In his opinion if any such system were attempted to be adopted, instead of having a magnificent force numbering 14,000 mounted men, as they had at present in the Yeomanry Cavalry, they would fail, he might add they had already failed, to raise a force of 500 men as Yeomanry Volunteers. He thought it was absurd—the experiment having been tried and having failed—to have it brought forward as a suggestion in that House. For his part he trusted that it would never be tried again. Whether they looked at the prospect of affairs
802
in the manufacturing districts and considered the probability of large masses of operatives being thrown out of employment, or whether they had regard to the threatening aspect of affairs on the Continent, he thought in either case the House would agree with him that this was of all others the most unfit time to endeavour to retrench so old, so constitutional, and so respectable a force as that of the Yeomanry Cavalry.
SIR WILLIAM RUSSELLsaid, he rose to bear testimony, as a military officer, to the extreme efficiency of the Volunteers, and would urge upon the Government to give the Volunteer force that assistance which they had a right to expect. But he thought that assistance should only be given in kind. There were four things which he thought necessary for placing the Volunteer force of the country in a state of efficiency—first, the supplying them with good and efficient arms; secondly, the furnishing them with a good and plentiful supply of ammunition for practising; thirdly, the supplying them with good practice ranges; and fourthly, the placing at their disposal good drill instructors, who should be supplied from the regular regiments of the Line. With regard to the Yeomanry, he assured the hon. and gallant Member who had last spoken (Major Edwards) that the object of the Committee appointed by the War Office was to inquire how the position of the Yeomanry Cavalry might be improved. His own belief was that they constituted a very efficient force considering the small amount of money spent on them. The Committee recommended that the annual allowance for clothing should be £1 8s. per man and 2s. per man for contingencies, making a total of £1 10 s. per man per annum, as they had gone carefully through the cost of the various articles, and as they had recommended that the Staff of sergeants and one trumpeter should be paid directly by the Government and taken off the contingent fund out of which it was at present paid. The Committee also recommended that the adjutant's pay should be increased.
MR. DEEDESsaid, the Committee that sat upon the Yeomanry had to consider the smallest amount of expense at which that force could be kept in a state of efficiency. They recommended a reduction under the head of contingencies, in consideration that the Government would allow and pay a drill sergeant for each troop. The hon. Gentleman who had brought forward this

803
proposition (Mr. H. Berkeley) complained of the inefficiency of the Yeomanry when they went out for duty; but the hon. Member now proposed to take away the chief means they had for increasing their efficiency. He should like to have the hon. Gentleman down at Dover with him for drill for eight days, and he had no doubt he should be able to work a great change in the hon. Gentleman, The reason why the Yeomanry were paid when upon permanent duty was, that they were then taken away from their homes, and incurred considerable expense on account both of themselves and their horses. The sum allowed was only 7s. per man; but he could state that it cost the members of his own regiment, when assembled for training, 12 s., 13 s. 6d., or 14 s. per man per day. For the voluntary drills, which also impose some expense upon the members of Yeomanry corps, no allowance was made. He was sorry that this question had been mixed up with the discussion of that which had been so we'll introduced by his noble Friend (Lord Elcho) in all of whose recommendations he concurred. He could not agree with his hon. Friend (Sir William Miles) that the Government had to choose between the Yeomanry and the Volunteers. The duties of the two forces were perfectly distinct, and need not at all clash with each other. He acknowledged the advantage which Volunteer corps had derived from the appointment of adjutants to administrative battalions by the Government; but he thought that the attaching a sergeant to each company, or to two companies, as might be convenient, would be of infinitely greater service. He thought assistance should be given not in money but in kind. He trusted the Yeomanry force would have the confidence of the country, that it would be found increasing, and he for one should be prepared to vote an increased sum, if necessary, to keep it in a state of efficiency.
MR. TURNERsaid, there was an observation made by the hon. and gallant Member for Beverley (Major Edwards) which he could not allow to pass without some remark. The hon. and gallant Gentleman stated as one of the distinguishing services of the Yeomanry that, in 1819, Manchester was saved by the Yeomanry of Cheshire. It was very true that the Yeomanry of Cheshire attacked a peaceful assembly of persons who had met together to declare their want of bread and of representation. The people complained of
804
want of representation, and that want had been supplied, in part at least, by the Bill of the noble Lord the Member for the City of London; and they were crying for bread, and that want was supplied by the policy of the late Sir Robert Peel, and the repeal of the corn laws but the charge of the Cheshire Yeomanry had created a feeling of ill-will which was not yet allayed. The people of Manchester did not look on Rifle corps with ill-will, though there were now regiments both of Foot and Mounted Rifles. They regarded them with feelings of cordiality and good-will, knowing that they had no disposition to suppress the feelings of their countrymen, even though these might be clamorously expressed, but were united with the sole purpose of defending the country against a foreign foe.
MR. CAYLEYadmitted that the reference of the hon. Member for Beverley (Major Edwards) had been a little unfortunate, but wished to say that the discontent referred to by the hon. Member for Manchester (Mr. Turner) was caused, not by the price of food, which at the time did not exceed 42 s. a-quarter, but was consequent on the want of employment occasioned by the Bill of 1819. The hon. Member had made an invidious reference to the cost of the Yeomanry, and to their not paying their own expenses. He should have remembered, however, that the Manchester Mounted Rifles were on the spot, and consequently required no payment; but the Yeomanry had in some cases to be moved thirty or forty miles to their duty. Moreover, as there were but 500 Mounted Rifles in the whole of England, it would be poor policy on that ground to deprive the country of the services of 14,000 or 15,000 Yeomanry. The sneer of the hon. Member for Manchester and the jokes of the hon. Member for Bristol would be estimated, no doubt, at their proper value by the noble Lord at the head of the Government, who, he trusted, would give due weight to the speech of the noble Lord the Member for Haddington, so admirable and comprehensive in all its parts. He did not think undue assistance was asked on behalf of a force which had enabled the noble Lord the Foreign Secretary—to whose policy he gave his entire approbation—to maintain language more emphatic that British Ministers could previously have held. The Committee should bear in mind that Volunteering, which was a relaxation in towns, was, in fact, an addition to the labour of persons in the coun-

805
try; and it required all the influence of country gentlemen to insure its being introduced with anything like success.
SIR JOSEPH PAXTONsaid, that he, like so many other hon. Members, felt great satisfaction at the able speech of the Member for Haddingtonshire, and fully concurred in the opinion he had stated, that without some further assistance the Volunteer force could not be maintained in its present state of efficiency. In the country districts in particular, where there was great difficulty in forming full companies, he thought there must be a great defection from the ranks unless they were supplied with the means of learning their duties with less expense. He thought that some erroneous views were held with regard to the sum of money which was claimed for providing for the proper custody of their arms. It was not intended that the money was to be paid to each Volunteer; and, even if it was, did any one suppose that Volunteers would be less independent because the Government povided them with armouries, practice ranges, and more efficient means of studying drill? The noble Lord (Lord Elcho) had seemed to lay the chief stress upon the formation of Volunteer corps in towns. On this point he (Sir Joseph Paxton) was at issue with him, believing that if the entire force was to be efficient, and was to possess a national character, it must be largely made up from the rural districts. He had made some calculation as to the sacrifices which those who joined the corps were required to make, and he had brought out the following results. The Government required that a man should undergo every year twenty-four days drill before he could be considered efficient; and starting on that date a man with an income of £150 a year would pay £11 10 s. 6d.; a man with £100 a year, £7 13 s.; and man with £75, £6; £50, £3 14 s.; and £36, £2 16 s. In the country districts they would find very few with an income of £150, and it was quite out of the question that without the assistance of Government the corps could be maintained in those places. He supported the movement on national grounds, but he also supported it because he believed that it would ultimately tend to economy in their Army Estimates.
SIR JOHN PAKINGTON: I suppose it was inevitable that in the discussion on this Vote the question of the old Yeomanry Cavalry and that of the new Volunteers should have been mixed up; but taking
806
those two subjects together has caused great inconvenience. With regard to the Volunteers, I think that as the matter had to be brought under the notice of the Committee, it could not have been brought before us more appropriately than by my noble Friend the Member for Haddingtonshire, who has been so conspicuous for the zeal, energy, and ability which he has shown in connection with this new force. No man can deny that this Volunteer movement has been a most magnificent, national movement, and that it has been carried on with a spirit of patriotism which is most honourable to the country; and I believe that if occasion should require it—if an emergency should arise—we should see that force amount to double or treble the number who now surround their standards. If it be in the power of the Government to encourage this movement and give it permanency by conceding such a proposal as my noble Friend has suggested, I think they would act well in doing so. With respect to the other subject of this discussion, it is not my intention to follow the hon. Member for Bristol in that annual exhibition—his field-day he might call it—by which he seeks to amuse himself and the House on this topic. I must leave his views to be dealt with by Her Majesty's Government, for if those views go to anything at all, they go to doing away with the old Yeomanry force. I wish, however, to say a few words on the Report of the Committee; and I think I may speak more freely on it than any other Yeomanry officer who has addressed the Committee, for I have not the honour to command the regiment with which I am connected. I have heard the views of many officers in respect to this Report, and I believe I am justified in saying that the gentlemen connected with Yeomanry regiments regard it with unanimous disapprobation. I believe that the Committee were actuated by good intentions, but that they made a great mistake. I look upon the recommendations as of a most paltry and unworthy character; and I earnestly hope that the Government will not adopt them. I could very well understand the Government saying that the new Volunteer force would supersede the Yeomanry—I could understand their saying that whatever the Yeomanry might have been in past times they were no longer required. If that be the view of Government let them say so plainly, and let them part on honourable terms with a force which has existed

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for so many years and done good service. On the other hand, if they intend to maintain the Yeomanry, let me entreat of them not to take a course which, as a pecuniary saving, it is not worth their while to adopt, but which cannot be received otherwise than as an offence by those whom it will affect. I regret the Report of the Committee, and I hope it will not be acted upon by the Government.
MR. T. G. BARINGsaid, the House and the country could not but regard it as a novel thing that there should have been three or four hours' discussion of a question with hardly any difference of opinion. No man was better entitled than his noble Friend the Member for Haddingtonshire to bring this subject before the House, and he had done so with a correct appreciation of the interests of the force which he so worthily represented, with an eloquence which he could not attempt to imitate, while the moderation with which he had stated his views entitled him to the thanks of the Committee. The Committee were aware that Her Majesty's Government had shown their sense of the value of the Volunteer force on every occasion on which they had had on opportunity of doing so, and he was glad to say that, in the whole course of this discussion, not one word had been uttered savouring of jealousy between the Volunteers and the regular military force of the country. He could fully corroborate what had been said by his noble Friend with reference to the desire of His Royal Highness the Commander-Chief to render every assistance which personally he could give to the Volunteer force, and it was well known to the Committee that His Royal Highness had, on every occasion on which an opportunity occurred, exerted himself to improve and extend their efficiency. The position in which he (Mr. Baring) stood that night was a new one—he had rather to defend the smallness of the Vote than its largeness. But the sum of £42,000 in the Vote was very far from being the actual cost of the Volunteer force—it only went to pay the adjutants. There was for the pay of the staff for the inspection of Volunteers and other establishment expenses a sum of £9,000. There was a sum of £2,000 for Volunteer batteries; there was in addition to these sums an expense for ammunition of £64,000: so that in the Estimates of this year there was an actual charge of £117,000 on account of the Volunteer force. In ad-
808
dition to that there were a large number of rifles in the hands of the Volunteers—and in the opinion of the Government there was no place where the reserve of rifles could be better placed, though certainly they would not last so long as if they had been kept in the Tower store. About one-twelfth of their cost was calculated for the tear and wear of the arms this amounted to £43,000 so that the actual expense of the Volunteer force could not be put at less than £160,000 for the current year. There would next year be about £20,000 more, for there were many new corps entitled to adjutants who had not yet received them. The Government did not think the sum proposed for the Volunteer corps too much. On the contrary, they thought that a still larger expenditure might, if necessary, with propriety be devoted towards the maintenance of a force so valuable. The Committee would see, however, that the amount of £1 a head, which the noble Lord proposed to give to each Volunteer, had already been more than equalled by the proposal of the Government; but the real question was how far the present amount of payment was sufficient to maintain the force. The only part of the speech of his noble Friend which he disagreed with was that in which he rather shadowed forth than distinctly proposed that a money allowance should be given to the Volunteers. He did not understand his noble Friend to stand by that proposition. He agreed with those hon. Members who had stated that there were strong reasons why assistance given in kind should be of more advantage to the force than money allowances. His noble Friend argued that, as assistance was already given to the Volunteers, they should not, by increasing that assistance, change the nature of the force. That was true; but, if they were to give a money allowance instead of giving assistance only in kind, that would be such a change as might have an injurious effect on the feelings of independence of the Volunteers, while it might also lead foreign nations to the inference that the force was not, after all, the offspring of patriotism, but was called forth by the payment of money. Therefore the Government were of opinion that it would not be desirable to hold out any expectation of money allowances being given in aid of their expenses. He thought his noble Friend had stated most correctly the objects for which the country might properly incur expense. With re-

809
spect to ranges, however, there was a strong objection to Government interference. He was certain that if the Government bad agreed to provide ranges for the force they would have had to pay ten times the price that was now paid for them. But the instruction of the corps in drill was by far the most important matter, and should, he submitted, be the first object of Government. The Government had had this subject under their consideration, and he hoped that something further would be done in the course of this year towards the promotion of that end, either by the course which had been suggested that evening of employing noncommissioned officers for that purpose—not detaching them from their regiments, but allowing them to be sent back or by some other mode that might be devised. If the course to which he had just referred could be carried out, it would be done at little cost to the country, and greatly to the advantage of the Rifle corps. He would now say, with regard to the permanence of the Volunteer movement, that he saw no symptoms of a falling off. His noble Friend computed the number at 147,000; and while this was a great increase upon the number of last year, hardly a day passed without some applications at the War Office for the recognition of new corps. The Volunteer movement was based mainly, on the patriotism of the people; but he believed that the rifle shooting was one of the surest elements of its permanence; and the noble Lord the Member for Haddingtonshire had done the greatest possible benefit to the movement by the part he had taken in the formation of the National Rifle Association, and in the organization of the summer shooting matches at Wimbledon. There were great differences between the numerous corps throughout the country, as to their financial condition. Some were badly organized at first, no subscriptions for members being required, and in others the members did not pay their subscriptions regularly. A few of such corps might not be able to maintain their position; but looking broadly at the whole force, and believing that £2 a head—£1 for clothing, and £1 for other expenses—was amply sufficient to keep up a corps, he did not apprehend that many corps would fail for want of the requisite support; indeed, he gathered, from a Return which had been communicated, to him by the noble Lord the Member for Haddingtonshire,
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that the average necessary expenses of a Volunteer were about 15 s. over the whole country. In Middlesex the average subscription was about £1, and in many other counties it was quite sufficient, added to the subscriptions of the honorary members, fees upon commissions, and other receipts, to defray the charge of the corps. He had no fear, therefore, that the movement would not be permanent. In answer to the remark of the hon. Member for Dundee (Sir John Ogilvy) he would say the Government were not prepared at present to establish a school for musketry instruction in Scotland; but one was about to be opened at Fleetwood, which would be a more convenient locality for Scotch Volunteers than Hythe. He would now address himself to the' Amendment of the hon. Member for Bristol—although he thought he might very well leave him in the hands of the hon. Member for Somersetshire (Sir William Miles), who had pretty clearly shown that his hon. Friend was less acquainted with the details of the Yeomanry force than with those of Parliamentary corruption. He (Mr. Baring) thought it obvious that if the Yeomanry were not occasionally to be called out for permanent duty they had better be given up altogether, and the Motion of the hon. Gentleman would take away the money required to pay the expense of the permanent duty. He could not, therefore, agree with the Amendment. But neither could he agree with those Gentlemen who complained of the Report of the Committee that had lately recommended a reduction in the expenditure for the Yeomanry. Some hon. Gentlemen said that the reduction was too trifling to be worth the making; but he could not agree that a saving of £13,000 a year was a trifling affair. The only question was whether this reduction could be made without detriment to their efficiency? But he could not believe that Lord Eversley, Lord Aylesbury, and his hon. Friend the Member for Kent (Mr. Deedes), who commanded Yeomanry corps second to none in the kingdom for efficiency, could have recommended any reductions that would injure the efficiency of the force. The hon. Baronet the Member for Somersetshire (Sir William Miles), who commanded a corps that was a model for its numbers and spirit, admitted that the contingent expenses might be reduced from 30 s. to £1 per man without detriment. This would give for his regiment £400 per annum. From that he would reduce

811
£77 as expended on objects that might he thought be spared; and, if that were done, the hon. Baronet's proposal would give the regiment which he commanded £323, while the Report of the Committee proposed to allow £328. So that he hoped the hon. Baronet would be able to keep up the efficiency of his regiment upon the reduced allowance without any difficulty. It was proposed that the officers should receive only the pay of privates. For his own part, as a Yeomanry officer, he should have preferred receiving no pay at all; but the reason why the Committee had made that recommendation was that if the officers had been asked to give their services for nothing, many of the men would have followed their example, and as others could not have afforded to do so, the result would have been the introduction of a class feeling which could not have failed to prove most detrimental to the interests of the force. The Government regarded the Yeomanry as a body of Volunteer Cavalry, which might be of essential service in time of emergency. It was far from their wish or intention to diminish the efficiency of the force; but they had no fear that such would he the result of the reductions recommended by the Committee. He trusted, therefore, that while the Committee sympathized with the noble Lord the Member for Haddingtonshire in the statement which he had made with respect to the increased efficiency of the Volunteer force, they would not at the same time take a course which would tend to create a rivalry—which he should be sorry to sec exist—between that force and the Yeomanry, by making a deduction from the allowances given to the latter.
MR. W. WILLIAMSsaid, he had generally been opposed to the Government in his desire to reduce the Estimates, but in this case he must urge on the Government to agree to the proposition of the noble Lord the Member for Haddingtonshire. He fully concurred in the eulogiums that had been passed on the Volunteer movement. That force, it appeared, consisted of 150,000, while the regular army only amounted to 146,000. Yet upon this latter force we spent £15,000,000; though it was stated by Colonel M'Murdo that there were many of the regiments of Volunteers that were fully equal to the troops of the Line. He hoped, therefore, the Government would not hesitate to agree to the proposition of the noble Lord; and if they had any difficulty in procuring the
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money he would suggest that they should deduct it from the sum spent on the army.
MAJOR EDWARDSwished to say one word with respect to the proposed reduction of the money voted to the Yeomanry. There was a meeting of sixteen field officers held on the subject the other day, and they were all of opinion that the reduction in the Vote was unjust and undesirable. Another meeting had since been called of all the officers of the Yeomanry that could be got together, to discuss the question, and he hoped that this Vote would not be reduced until their mind was known.
SIR JOHN SHELLEYthought that the speech of the Under Secretary for War would afford considerable satisfaction to a large number of Volunteers. It was a mistake, he added, to suppose that the members of that force—at least, so far as he was aware—wished to have aid given them in the shape of a Vote of money; while, if assistance were rendered them in kind, considerable service might be done.
CAPTAIN JERVISwas sorry to hear invidious distinctions made between the Yeomanry and Volunteers, They were both admirable bodies of men. The Yeomanry, he considered, was the finest Volunteer Cavalry in the world. But he wished to point out this distinction between the Yeomanry and the Volunteers. The Yeomanry were liable to be called out at any time by the civil authorities, while the latter were responsible as to the Secretary for War, and could be called out only in case of invasion. This, he thought, justified the difference in the expenditure in their favour.
MR. WYLDremarked that the services of drill sergeants could be obtained in London for 18 s. per week, and in the provinces at 25 s.
MR. PEACOCKEobserved that the Volunteers in the county with which he had the honour to be connected (Essex) would prefer having assistance afforded them in kind rather than by a Vote of money. The force experienced great difficulty in procuring sergeants, and the consequence was that there was not among the several corps that uniformity of drill which it was desirable should prevail, and which would prevail if sergeants were duly furnished by the Government.
MR. CONINGHAMsaid, that a short time ago a very successful review was held at Brighton; and that was one of a number of facts which led him to believe that it

813
would be better to leave the Volunteer force to manage their own affairs.
LORD ELCHOsaid, that while he admitted that the review at Brighton was a great success, he thought he was correctly representing the feeling of the large majority of the Volunteer corps when he stated that it was on the whole better that manœuvres on an extensive scale, such as were there executed, should be regulated and controlled by proper military authorities. He felt extremely grateful, he might add, to his hon. Friend the Under Secretary for War for the reception which he had given to the remarks which he had felt it to be his duty to make that evening as well as for the zeal which he manifested in the Volunteer cause. He thought that it might be collected that the Government intended to give to the Volunteers drill sergeants, and he hoped that they would be in sufficient in number and of the best description. There were undoubtedly other causes of expense, such as practice ranges and the custody of arms, and he trusted the Government would consider whether they could not take those burdens from the Volunteers too. He was sorry to find that the hon. Member for Bristol was disposed to act on the principle of robbing Peter to pay Paul. For his own part he believed the Yeomanry Cavalry to be a most valuable force, and if they could possibly be amalgamated with the Volunteers they might act as Mounted Rifles.
MR. H. BERKELEYhaving intimated that he would not press his Amendment to a division.
Motion, by leave, withdrawn.
Original Question put, and agreed to.
Motion made, and Question proposed,
"That a sum, not exceeding £158,185, be granted to Her Majesty, to defray the Charge of Fortifications at Home and Abroad, which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1862, inclusive."
SIR FREDERIC SMITHasked for some explanation with respect to an item of £4,000 in the Vote for the purchase of land at Alderney. It appeared that £30,000 had been already voted on that account, while only £25,000 had as yet been expended. Under those circustances he did not see how a further sum could be required for that purpose.
MR. CHILDERSsaid, he should be glad to receive some explanation of the item for the improvement of the defences of the Mauritius. He believed it to be necessary to complete the defences of Fort
814
George, but there was a plan on foot for carrying out enormous defences on land, which would involve a complete waste of money. He trusted the sum now asked for had nothing to do with that general scheme. With regard to the Ionian Islands, the improvement of the defences was estimated to cost £50,000, and he feared that some general system of fortifying the Ionian Islands was contemplated. In the present state of the navy he did not see the necessity of throwing away this sum, which would not render those Islands impregnable against an attack from France, for instance. With respect to Gibraltar, there had been every successive year Votes for improving the fortifications. Unless satisfactory explanations were given, he should move to reduce the vote for the Ionian Islands, the Mauritius, and Gibraltar.
LORD WILLIAM GRAHAMsaid that by a memorandum in the account of the receipt and expenditure for Army and Militia services in 1859–60, it appeared that certain sums had been received from various Colonies in aid of the Military expenditure. There had been received from the Ionian Islands, on account of staff expenditure and fortifications, the sum of £49,000; from Malta, £12,400; from Ceylon, £47,954, &c. Could the Under Secretary for War state on what principle these payments had been made; whether these colonies undertook to pay the whole of the staff expenditure and half the amount of the fortifications; and whether the Colonies would undertake to pay the same proportion of the increased expenditure now going on?
MR. W. WILLIAMSasked whether the proposed expenditure of £4,000 for Alderney was in addition to the former grant of £1,000,000, and how it happened that the marginal note referred, not to Alderney, but to Guernsey? He also asked what was meant by £2,000 for Volunteer batteries? Further, he called attention to the item of £5,000 for Malta.
MR. CONINGHAMcalled attention to the Vote of £3,000 for Gibraltar. He believed that this expenditure which the Government had embarked upon was one of the most extravagant possible, and ought to be arrested.
LORD HOTHAMwished to make an inquiry relative to the item of £40,000 for the defences in the Humber. He never had stated, and never would state, the reasons why these works were necessary, but they were perfectly well known in the lo-

815
cality and also to the Government. The necessity for something being done had never been denied. The Secretary of State for War told him last Session, he need take no further trouble, and that a Vote would be taken. Ground was purchased, and everything indicated a commencement of the works. It had, however, come to his knowledge that an alteration had taken place in the intentions of the Secretary of State. Could the hon. Gentleman state what that change was, and for what reason it had been come to?
MR. T. G. BARINGsaid, he was not aware of any change in the intentions of his noble Friend, the Secretary for War, but he had had no special communication with him on the subject. Land had been purchased, and it was proposed to commence a battery near Hull. The money would be taken in the Vote for commercial harbours. In answer to the noble Lord (Lord W. Graham) he had to state that the sum received from the Ionian Islands had been paid into the Exchequer, and could not be applied in diminution of the Vote. With regard to the Gibraltar fortifications the sum asked for was increased in consequence of less convict labour having been available than had been contemplated. The Vote for the Ionian Islands was to complete certain works of defence on the land side; but it was not intended to enter upon any new scheme of fortifications there this year, and if any such extended scheme were brought forward the House would have the opportunity of deciding upon it in the Estimates of next year. The Vote for the Mauritius was to be spent in continuing the fortifications of Fort George. By agreeing to these Votes for the Ionian Islands and the Mauritius the House would not be committed to any extended plans of fortifications. It was the opinion of Government that the less spent in fortifying distant dependencies the better; and that the best defence of our distant colonies and possessions was the British Navy. With regard to the Vote at Alderney, the sum had nothing to do with the naval works there, but was for the purchase of land necessary in order to unite the works already completed; and if the present Vote were agreed to, he believed that £2,000 would complete the whole sum required at Alderney. As to the plans at Harwich and Newhaven, it had not been the custom to lay the plans for military works before the House, but they had been carefully considered.
MR. H. A. BRUCEsaid, the Estimate of the proposed expenditure at the Ionian Islands was £50,000, of which £5,000 was asked in the present year, leaving £45,000 to be voted. Now, he thought the House of Commons would utterly object to such an expenditure upon the Ionian Islands. These Islands were kept as a political necessity, but they did not add to the military strength of the country. On the contrary, they were rather a cause of weakness, inasmuch as they caused our force to be distributed.
SIR FREDERIC SMITHsaid, he believed the works at Alderney to be a mistake from first to last, and he should, therefore, move the reduction of the Vote by £4,000, being the sum proposed to be spent there.
MR. LIDDELLasked whether Alderney was to be considered as a defensive position or a harbour of refuge? If it was a military position, what was it intended to defend? If it was intended as an harbour of refuge he was prepared to show that it would be uttely useless. It was really a barren rock, which nature had provided with the best defence; but the Government had erected works of defence, and now there were to be new works to defend those previously constructed.
VISCOUNT PALMERSTONsaid, the answer to this was a very short one. Alderney was not a harbour of refuge. It was a military post connected with the defence of the Channel, and a post considered of the utmost importance by the best military authorities. The Duke of Wellington, who was somewhat of a judge of war, laid great stress on the fortification of Alderney, which, in connection with Portland, would be a station of the utmost importance with a view to the defence of the Channel.
MR. GREGORYreminded the noble Lord that, in the Duke of Wellington's time, the present improvements in maritime war were unknown. In his opinion, Alderney was a source of positive weakness to us. In order properly to defend it, a numerous garrison was necessary, and when in France this very year, a French officer, in speaking to him upon this subject, said, "It will be impossible for you to place a sufficient number of men there to protect it against us; but we con afford a sufficient number to enable us to hold it, and, therefore, every penny you are spending there is spent for our benefit, and not for your own." It was notoriously the opinion of every officer who commanded a

817
ship of war that it would be better to throw the money into the sea than continue this expenditure. The expenditure was not merely useless, but positively detrimental. The harbour was nothing better than a shell trap, for an enemy's vessel might anchor outside and shell every vessel taking refuge there.
VISCOUNT PALMERSTONsaid, that so far from the improvements in navigation diminishing the value of Alderney they very much increased it. So long as vessels were impelled by sails, communication with Alderney might be difficult; but the application of steam rendered Alderney much more valuable, both as a work of defence, and as a place from which to watch Cherbourg, and as a means of communicating with our side of the water. If the House was to adopt the principle laid down by the hon. Member and go to French officers of the army and navy for their judgment of the value of our defences, it would, no doubt, be very easy to demonstrate that it was ridiculous for England to keep up her army, that we were throwing away money in maintaining a navy, and that, as to fortifying Portsmouth and Plymouth, it was the most childish thing in the world; in fact, that it would be much better to trust to the forbearance of our enemies, to leave everything at their mercy and discretion, and thus save our money.
COLONEL NORTHsaid, that if it was the opinion of the Commission, of which Sir John Burgoyne was the head, that Alderney should be fortified, there could be no further question about it.
VISCOUNT PALMERSTONpointed out that the question now was not whether Alderney should be fortified, as all the fortifications were complete, but whether we should buy a piece of ground lying close to the fortifications, which it was necessary to keep clear of buildings, in order that they might perform their purpose?
MR. CONINGHAMsaid, that when he crossed over to Cherbourg with the late Sir Charles Napier, that great naval authority ridiculed the idea of Alderney being useful as a post of observation on the French harbour.
MR. JACKSONsaid, he crossed over at the same time, and he asked the gallant Admiral whether, if the French fleet were in Cherbourg, they could be kept there? His answer was, "Without a doubt."
SIR FREDERIC SMITHsaid, that if the French had possession of the Channel
818
for twenty-four hours we should lose not only Alderney, but all the Channel Islands, and whatever garrisons we might have placed in them.
Motion made, and Question proposed,
"That the item of £4,000, for the Purchase of Land in Alderney, be omitted from the proposed Vote."
The Committee divided:—Ayes 35; Noes 128: Majority 93.
Original Question again put,
MR. CHILDERSthought the answer of the Under Secretary as to the item for the fortification of the Ionian Islands was not satisfactory. If only £5,000 were required, they ought to know why £50,000 was put as the total estimate in the first column. The Government seemed to have changed their mind as to the whole work. He moved that the Vote be reduced by this £5,000.
MR. BAILLIE COCHRANEsaid, he wished to remind the Committee that the Ionian Islands were not a colony, but a State that was placed under our protection upon certain conditions. Now, according to the principle laid down by the Foreign Secretary, that the majority of a people had a perfect right to claim their independence, the Ionians ought to be annexed to Greece, as they had expressed their desire for annexation. If, then, they were allowed to follow up the noble Lords' principle, these fortifications would be turned against ourselves.
COLONEL DUNNEsaid, if the people of those Islands wished to separate from us, and if we wished to keep them, the sooner those fortifications were completed the better. The fortifications there belonged to us, although the people might not. Unless the Government finished those fortifications there all the money we had laid out on them would be thrown away.
MR. T. G. BARINGsaid, he had the authority of Lord Herbert for assuring the Committee that by assenting to this Vote of £5,000 they would not pledge themselves in any way to the £50,000 which appeared in the first column of the Estimates. It would not be expended in any new works, but simply in repairing works to make the town safe against a coup de main on the land side.
MR. E. P. BOUVERIEsaid, that before Lord Seymour's Committee a few years ago it was stated that if those fortifications had never been begun we should have practically been in a better position, as we had the command of the sea. Did

819
the hon. Gentleman the Under Secretary mean that this £5,000 was not part of the £50,000?
MR. T. G. BARINGsaid, the £5,000 had nothing to do with the £50,000.
SIR FREDERIC SMITHasked why the £50,000 was placed in the first column at all?
MR. BAILLIE COCHRANEasked why in another column it was stated that after this Vote £45,000 would be required to complete the works?
CAPTAIN JERVIScould state of his own knowledge that this Vote was absolutely necessary to complete the fortifications. Whether the Ionian Islands should be held as a military post was a very different question, and should be discussed at another time.
COLONEL DICKSONpointed out that £50,000 was stated in the Estimates as the total cost of the works.
SIR JAMES FERGUSSONunderstood that the £5,000 now asked for was required for the restoration of certain works now in existence, and that the rest of the £50,000 was intended for fortifications as to the construction of which the House would have a future opportunity of deciding. On that understanding he would agree to the Vote.
MR. T. G. BARINGconfirmed the statement of the hon. Baronet, and repeated that the £5,000 had nothing to do with the £50,000.
MR. MONSELLhoped the Under Secretary would inform them what the definite object was which was to be accomplished for the £50,000. The destruction of the fortifications at Corfu had interfered with the drainage, and caused much pestilence and misery to the people.
CAPTAIN JERVISexplained that a certain part of the fortifications were pulled down in order that they might be held by a smaller body of men, and denied that the operation had been attended with any un-healthiness to the inhabitants.
COLONEL DUNNEbelieved that the £5,000 was to be applied to the enceinte of the principal work, and that the £50,000 was required for the erection of a lunette or covering fort,
Motion made, and Question put,
"That the item of £5,000, for the Improvement of Defences in the Ionian Islands, be omitted from the proposed Vote."
The Committee divided:—Ayes 59; Noes 92: Majority 33.
Original Question put, and agreed to.
House resumed.
Resolutions to be reported on Monday next.
Committee to sit again on Monday next.

EXCISE AND STAMPS BILL.

  COMMITTEE.
  Order for Third Reading read, and discharged.
  Bill re-committed in respect of Clause 15.
  House in Committee.
  MR. HEYGATEcomplained of the injurious operation of the right hon. Gentleman's legislation on his (Mr. Heygate's) constituents. Continually renewed, and changed from year to year for two or three years past, it threw trade and business into uncertainty and confusion.
  Clause 15 (Imposing a penalty on persons signing any agreement for the hire of a furnished house),
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERmoved the addition to Clause 15 of the following proviso:—
  "That nothing herein contained shall be construed to render any person liable to any penalty for or on account of any letters or correspondence by post, containing the terms or conditions offered or accepted for the taking or letting of any furnished house."
  MR. CRAUFURDthought the words did not meet the difficulty, as they only exempted persons from the liability of the penalty on account of letters and correspondence sent by post. The penalty was incurred for omitting to use the stamp on all memoranda of agreements.
  MR. HENNESSYthought the proviso did not meet an objection which he had previously stated. The clause enacted that where the adhesive stamp was not cancelled all who asigned the instrument and those who prepared it were liable to a penalty of £20. By a previous section the stamp must be cancelled by both parties, so that if one party alone cancelled it, and the other also signed the agreement, all parties were liable to the penalty.
  MR. AYRTONhoped that the proviso as to sending letters by post would be amended. It was at present as preposterous a piece of legislation as ever was submitted. If a person sent a letter by post it was to be recognized; but if it was sent by a footman the sender would be liable to a penalty. The law at present as to agreements was satisfactorily established, and he hoped the clause would not be insisted upon.
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERdeprecated the strong language used by the hon. Member. When high duties were imposed upon leases and agreements which could not be levied, that appeared to the hon. Member to be a satisfactory state of things. The matter had been discussed on the previous evening, and decided by a majority of the House. With respect to the observations of the hon. Member for Ayr (Mr. Craufurd), it was true that in certain cases the effect of the Bill would not be to reduce the duty upon letting houses where the rent was under £20, but there was no reason why, when the duty was moderate, there should be no means of levying it. With respect to the observations of the hon. Member for the King's County (Mr. Hennessy) he could only say that he did not see how if the stamp was cancelled the other party could be liable to the penalty. As to sending letters by post he thought ninety-nine out of every one hundred were sent by post, and to omit that requirement would be to nullify the clause.
  CAPTAIN JERVISobserved that as the defacement of the adhesive stamp was for the protection of the revenue, its cancelment by more than one person was unnecessary.
  MR. HENNESSYrepeated his objection that, as the adhesive stamp was to be defaced by both parties to the agreement, if one omitted to write his name upon the stamp not only both parties but all who were concerned in the preparation of the agreement would be liable to a penalty.
  MR. AYRTONsaid, that the general form of penal clauses was to impose the penalty upon persons who violated the law; but this clause said that unless a certain thing was done every person who signed the document, or was concerned in preparing it, should be liable to a penalty. That was not the mode in which the House had been accustomed to legislate, and he hoped that it would not now adopt such a system.
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERdid not wish to punish any one except on his own default. He would, therefore, not ask the House to read the Bill a third time that night, but would consider this matter,
  House resumed; Bill reported; as amended, to be considered on Monday next.

EAST INDIA (COVENANTED SERVICE).

  PAPER MOVED FOR.
  MR. VANSITTARTmoved for an Ad-
  822
  dress to the Crown for copies of the Report of a Special Committee of the Council of India to the Secretary of State upon the subject of opening, upon certain conditions, the Covenanted Service of India; with dissents, if any, therefrom. The hon. Member said the answer given the previous evening by the right hon. Baronet the Secretary of State for India was most unsatisfactory, and unless he could obtain a response of a more assuring character he should be reluctantly compelled to divide the House. The right hon. Baronet had not offered any opposition to the production of papers relating to two of the Bills, and the information he now sought had reference to the third, which was regarded out of doors as the most important of these measures.
  SIR CHARLES WOODfelt it his duty to resist the Motion, which he hoped would not be pressed by the hon. Member, who had always acted in a spirit of perfect fairness and candour. The papers which he had formerly produced were despatches from, the Governor General and the Governor of Madras; but those now asked for were Reports of the Council to the Secretary of State for India, which partook of a confidential character.
  SIR MINTO FARQUHARsupported the Motion, thinking it most important that the House should have before it every paper bearing on that subject.
  SIR GEORGE LEWISsaid, he opposed the Motion, as the House was not entitled by the Act to have the dissents of a Committee of the Council laid before it.
  MR. SEYMOUR FITZGERALDregarded the production of the papers as essential for the guidance of the House in forming its opinion on the Bill for regulating the Indian Civil Service.
  MR. AYRTONdid not think it was usual or proper to seek to compel the Secretary of State to give those papers.
  SIR JAMES FERGUSSONthought the House was bound to insist on their production.
  Motion made, and Question put,
  "That an humble Address he presented to Her Majesty, that She will be graciously pleased to give directions that there be laid before this House, a Copy of the Report of a Special Committee of the Council of India to the Secretary of State, upon the subject of opening, upon certain conditions, the Covenanted Service of India; with dissents, if any, therefrom."
  The House divided:—Ayes 28; Noes 43: Majority 15.
  House adjourned at a quarter before Two o'clock till Monday next.

MINUTES.
PUBLIC BILLS.—2a Customs and Inland Revenue.
Royal Assent. Consolidated Fund (£10,000,000); Smoke Nuisance (Scotland) Act Amendment; Combination of Parishes Dissolution (Scotland).

PUBLIC SCHOOLS.—QUESTION.
LORD BROUGHAMtrusted his noble and learned Friend on the Woolsack would be able to give the same answer which had been given in the other House to his inquiry whether a Commission was prepared and would be forthwith issued for examining the state of the great public schools. He trusted that such inquiry would be subject to no exceptions of establishments under the Universities, or Cathedrals, or other Collegiate body, or of institutions having special visitors. The necessity of inquiry now arose from such exceptions having been introduced into his Bills of 1818 and 1819, and which had prevented the inquiry into, and correction of abuses at that time and ever since. But for the inquiry having thus excluded the great schools, the evils now complained of would long since have been remedied. He had most reluctantly allowed these exceptions to be introduced into the Bill of 1818, but as the second reading of that Bill had only been carried in their Lordships' House by a sort of political miracle in these days, against the opposition of Lord Eldon and the Government, he felt certain that unless he agreed to the exception, the measure must have been lost in its subsequent stages. The year after 1819, he had attempted to get rid of the exception and without success. But the Education Committee had while it sat, after the Bill with its excepting clause passed, inquired into some of these institutions, and had found that the cases where the greatest abuses and errors prevailed were in those institutions which came within the exception. Therefore, he trusted that the inquiry about to be instituted would have no exceptions whatever.
THE LORD CHANCELLORcould assure his noble and learned Friend that the Commission was general and without any exceptions. But he was happy to state that the greatest readiness had been certified by the great schools to further and assist the inquiry by every means; so that it
696
was found unnecessary to introduce any Bill for the purpose of giving powers to the Commissioners.

CUSTOMS AND INLAND REVENUE BILL.

  SECOND READING.
  Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
  EARL GRANVILLE: My Lords, I rise, according to notice, to move the second reading of this important Bill. I had last year the honour of proposing for your Lordships assent a portion of this measure, but under circumstances of a different character. Notice was then given by a noble Lord, whose former connection with office as Chancellor of the Exchequer, and his present connection with the Treasury gave weight to his opinions on a subject of this kind, for the rejection of the Bill. On that occasion your Lordships' House was crowded and great excitement prevailed. I, therefore, thought it necessary, even at the risk of being very tedious to your Lordships, to go at great length into all the details of the Bill, to endeavour to anticipate all the objections which I thought might possibly be urged against the proposals of the Government, and to make every appeal, as urgently as I properly could to your Lordships, to take the course which seemed to me expedient and prudent with regard to so important a measure. And I cannot help believing that the arguments I then used have had some effect, for we find ourselves this year met to discuss the same Bill upon a somewhat different footing. My Lords, it was not until this morning that notice was given of any Motion adverse to the Bill; indeed, from statements made in "another place," if I may advert to them, I drew the conclusion that it was not likely any opposition would be raised to it in this House; and if I am not mistaken the noble Earl the leader of the party opposite, stated at a City entertainment that it was not his intention, should the Bill pass the Commons, to offer to it in this House any further opposition. For these reasons I do not now certainly anticipate the rejection of the Bill. A noble Duke (the Duke of Rutland) has, it is true, given notice of a Motion for its rejection; but I can hardly believe him to be serious in so suddenly adopting what your Lordships must feel would be a most serious step for this House to take, by thus placing itself in opposition to the other House of Parliament, and on

  697
  grounds which, until I hear them again stated and heightened, I can hardly believe to be tenable. The notice of the noble Duke has, I believe, already excited great alarm among the mercantile community. But I cannot believe that alarm to be well founded—I am rather inclined to assume that the noble Duke put his notice on the paper merely with the intention of infusing spirit into the debate, or possibly with a view of showing that his confidence was not quite unbounded in the noble Earl who is generally regarded as the leader of his party. The noble Duke, perhaps, wishes to show that he can take his own course with respect to a great question; but I can hardly imagine that he means to press his Amendment to a division. With this conviction I shall confine myself to a very simple statement of the substance of the Sill, and of the principal reasons which have induced the Government to recommend it to the adoption of this and of the other House of Parliament; reserving to myself the right of replying at greater length should any argument be put forth in the debate requiring in my judgment more detailed observation and remark. I beg to say, however, that I do not take this course with any view of deprecating discussion. On the contrary, I think it most desirable that the measure should be most fully debated; but I think that, in the first instance, the course I have indicated will be the most convenient to the House. It is not my intention to go over the financial plans of Her Majesty's Government in detail; I will merely recall a few circumstances connected with the Budget of last year. I will merely state that the results were not altogether satisfactory; that there was a deficiency, as compared with the anticipated revenue, of £850,000; and adding to that the extreme sum of £800,000, as saved by the non-repeal of the paper duties, there would have been a total deficiency, as compared with the calculations of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, of above £1,600,000. To explain this deficiency we have only to look to one fact, and it is one of extreme importance. It was Mr. Huskisson who, speaking of a deficiency in a year following a bad harvest, stated, without meeting contradiction, that the average diminution of revenue likely to be produced by a bad harvest in this country amounted to 7 per cent upon a revenue of £60,000,000. Upon that calculation last year, instead of a defi-
  698
  ciency of £1,600,000, the sum ought to be, with so bad a harvest as we unfortunately had, something like £7,000,000. I think, in addition to the estimate of Mr. Huskisson as to the effects of a bad harvest, it is hardly necessary to appeal to the fact that more than 20,000,000 quarters of corn have been imported into this country within the year, nor to appeal to the personal experience of any noble Lord who is connected either directly or indirectly with agriculture, that there was a great deficiency last year in the production of food for man and beast. Therefore, while on the one hand I think it is a satisfactory proof how recent commercial legislation, by enabling us to obtain a sufficient supply of food, has tended to the advantage of the revenue and the comfort of the country, I may also say that to my mind it also shows that if the last harvest had been, not a good one, but an average one—that sort of harvest upon which calculations are always based—the Chancellor of the Exchequer would have exposed himself to the charge, not of over-estimating, but of under-estimating, the produce of the revenue. As to the provisions of this Bill, I may say that the calculations of the Chancellor of the Exchequer have been made, not in any fanciful manner, but in the mode in which all past Chancellors of the Exchequer have made their calculations, and the same which, probably, all future occupants of that office will continue to adopt—namely, careful comparison of the opinions of the heads of all those departments which are especially conversant with the facts:—and this appears to me the most sensible mode of approaching the question. From those calculations of the Chancellor of the Exchequer it appears that there will be a surplus in round numbers of about £2,000,000. Although some doubts have been thrown upon that surplus, yet I think I may say that the time is now past for calling in question the existence of a surplus. It is quite clear that, if there are doubts upon such a point, those who entertain them are justified in seeking to turn out the Government or that particular Minister whose calculations they believe to be mistaken; but as a general rule, so long as the Executive Government are permitted to retain office their calculations are accepted as correct; nor, indeed, could they be held accountable to legislative control unless their statements be accepted as the basis on which their propositions are to be founded. And

  699
  it seems that in "another place" all the hon. Gentlemen formerly connected with office who took a prominent part in the discussion frankly admitted that they considered the calculations of the Chancellor of the Exchequer were correct, and that was still more proved by the fact that a large and important section of the other assembly proposed to reduce the surplus by an amount greater than was proposed by the plan of the Government. Having, then, this surplus to dispose of, we come to the question as to the manner in which the Government propose to deal with it, and which is embodied in the Bill which is now before me. In the first place it is proposed to reduce the income tax from 10 d. to 9d. in the pound. I am very glad to have to propose such a reduction, and I am sure that satisfaction is shared by all of your Lordships, and I am also sure that we should all be very glad if a still further reduction could conveniently be made. The feeling, however, is so general upon this subject that I have heard no practicable mode suggested on either side for the further reduction of this tax. Then comes the question of tea and sugar. Upon these articles the Bill proposes to continue the same duties as were levied last year. It would have been agreeable to Her Majesty's Government—as it would beyond doubt have been agreeable to many out of Parliament—if they could have proposed a reduction of duties upon articles which tend so much to the comfort of all classes of the community. Some attempts have been made to prove that the tea and sugar duties press more heavily upon the poorer classes than upon the richer. ["Hear."] A noble Earl cheers the observation; but my answer to it is that four years ago the then Chancellor of the Exchequer, Sir George Lewis, made a statement to the other House, founded upon very careful calculations, showing that in round figures about 60 per cent of the duties upon those articles was paid by the richer classes, leaving about 40 per cent to be paid by the poorer classes. That statement was adopted by the present leader of the Opposition in the other House, who has himself filled the office of Chancellor of the Exchequer. The reasons which have induced the Government not to propose any reduction in the tea and sugar duties are these. In the first place, all experience has shown that a small reduction of duty does not produce to the consumer that proportionate decrease in the price of the article that a
  700
  larger reduction would do, and it is quite clear that a small reduction in the amount of these duties is all that the revenue at present could afford. In the second place, by diminishing the amount of these duties we should not in the slightest degree diminish the cost of collecting the duties; and also, although it is certainly most desirable to reduce these duties whenever an opportunity shall occur, yet the increasing revenue derived from these articles of consumption proves that there is not that urgency for a reduction which would otherwise exist. Her Majesty's Government, therefore, did not think that there was any urgency for such a reduction in the duties on tea, as we could possibly have proposed: and with regard to sugar, I do not think any proposal with reference to that article was made in any quarter. There is another smaller item in this Bill which it is not necessary to dilate upon. The only reason for raising the Excise and Customs' duties upon chicory is to protect the revenue and to prevent adulterations of coffee by means of that article. I now come to the question of the abolition of the Excise duty upon paper. Last year I detained your Lordships for nearly an hour, pointing out what I considered to the the imperfections and impolicy of that tax. However feebly I may have urged those opinions, they must have had, I think, some effect, as, with the exception of one or two casual remarks, no answer was attempted to be given to the statements that this was a tax which impeded the manufacture of paper; which affected all who had the sale of that article in this country; that it was a tax which pressed in a slight degree upon every article that was sold, an export duty upon all articles sent abroad which were necessarily wrapped up in paper. I showed, too, how injurious it was to commerce, and how it operated to check the diffusion of cheap literature. I showed, most conclusively, I believe, that it operated most injuriously upon the diffusion of cheap literature, and that the tax operated a hundredfold more to the injury of cheap publications intended to spread political and educational knowledge than it did upon that deleterious literature which has too wide a circulation among the people. I do not intend to go over that ground again: the arguments for and against the repeal have been long before the public. I will merely state the position in which the Government found themselves when they attempted to deal

  701
  with this tax. They were aware of the amount of authority in favour of its repeal During an agitation of thirty years what has happened? A Commission which was presided over by one of the most able financiers upon this question condemned the tax in strong language. An abstract Resolution, recommending its abolition, passed the House of Commons. The speeches of private persons—of almost all the leading men of both parties, including the noble Earl opposite; the present leader of the Opposition in the other House; Lord Stanley, Sir Bulwer Lytton—who, notwithstanding political associations, has recently shown how strong an opinion he entertains upon the subject—all have condemned the tax. That condemnation has been conveyed in words such as these, "morally and physically wrong, "bad in theory and in practice." Upon this tax the Government, upon its responsibility, proposed to legislate. The House of Commons passed the Bill after many discussions and divisions. It then came up to this House, and your Lordships rejected it; but on what ground? Nobody, as far as I can recollect, spoke in favour of the tax, or expressed any abstract dislike of its repeal. The language held was that the state of things either at the time of its first being proposed or subsequently made the repeal improvident; that there was no surplus to deal with in the way of remissions; and that, therefore, as a measure of prudence, and with a view of keeping sufficient money in the Exchequer, it would be wise to retain the tax for the present, and give the House of Commons another opportunity of considering the subject. Surely, then, the Government would not now be warranted, believing that they have more money at command than they had last year, when they proposed to repeal this tax, if, other circumstances remaining unchanged, they did not renew their proposal to abolish it. Had they refrained from doing so, I scarcely know how they could have met the remarks which your Lordships might have made upon their inconsistency. It might have been said that the rejection of the repeal of the paper duty having taken place, not upon the merits of the tax, but upon other grounds, and those other grounds no longer existing; and as, moreover, they were in justice to the people going to propose the remission of taxation, it would be unfair that the only bone of contention between the two Houses, and which might at any
  702
  moment bring about a difference of feeling between them, should not at the earliest opportunity be removed. There is only one other point to which I will refer before I sit down. I have spoken as to the substance of this Bill. Let me now say a few words as to its form. The principal parts of the financial scheme of the year are on this occasion included in one measure. I think hardly anybody here will suggest that such a course is not perfectly constitutional and consonant with precedent. In 1787 Mr. Pitt—certainly no enemy to the established institutions of this country—introduced a comprehensive financial scheme founded on no less than 3,500 distinct Resolutions, and containing a schedule of sixty pages. Objection was raised in this House to the measure, on account of the multiplicity of the provisions which it combined; the question was fully debated, and on a division your Lordships adopted the Bill in the shape in which it stood. On another occasion Mr. Pitt took the same course. In fact, in 1808, 1809, 1810, and every subsequent year up to 1822, similar precedents were established; so that as to the strictly constitutional and regular character of the present Bill there can no possible doubt. Tour Lordships, as I have said, threw out the Paper Duty Repeal Bill last year. I will not now argue whether that proceeding was constitutional or wise; but all will, I think, acknowledge that whether the reasons for it were sufficient or insufficient, it was at least unusual. Some excitement was, doubtless, created in the other House of Parliament by that result; but I must say that the conduct of the House of Commons—both last year and this, singularly moderate as it was—was, I believe, owing, in a great measure, to the calm, sagacious, and temperate manner in which the Government proposed that the matter should be dealt with. A Select Committee of the other House sat on the subject, of which Mr. Walpole, formerly Home Secretary in the Ministry of the noble Earl opposite, was the Chairman, and that Gentleman himself proposed a Resolution declaring that the House of Commons had lost much of its power by the recent habit of enacting taxes for an unlimited time, and that that power might be recovered by the House if the different parts of the financial scheme of the year were combined in one measure. [The EARL of DERBY: That Resolution was moved, but not carried in

  703
  the Committee.] But a Resolution in strict analogy with the passage contained in the draught report was moved in the House of Commons by the Prime Minister, and unanimously agreed to. Her Majesty's Government thought it the only course respectful at once to the House of Commons and to your Lordships to act in accordance with the recommendations of the Committee, concurred in as those recommendations were by the leaders of all parties in the other House. This Bill was accordingly introduced, and while it places the House of Commons in the position which it ought to maintain in respect to the taxation of the country, it certainly offers no sort of affront or insult to your Lordships. On the contrary, it was thought more respectful to your Lordships, instead of bringing in again separately the measure which you before rejected, to bring it in coupled with the other portions of the Budget, inasmuch as it was more likely to be agreeable to you to consider and adopt it in that form than to deal with it in a manner having anything like the appearance of the retraction of a previous decision. I think, my Lords, we are all agreed that whether or not you were justified, in circumstances of supposed emergency, in arresting the alleged rash financial measures of the other House of Parliament, it is not for this House to be constantly interfering with the details of public finance. And if that be so, it must be more convenient to your Lordships to have the whole fiscal scheme before you in one view and to discuss it in its entirety, instead of piecemeal. It seems to me that that course leaves the rights of both branches of the Legislature, whatever they are, very much as they were before; your Lordships retaining intact the power of rejecting, if you cannot alter, Money Bills. I will now only express my earnest hope that the noble Duke opposite (the Duke of Rutland) will withdraw the Amendment of which he has given notice, or that, if unfortunately he persists in it, he will not be assisted by the majority of your Lordships. I believe that by adopting this Bill we shall undoubtedly attain three great objects. In the first place we shall complete that commercial legislation which has been so universally useful in developing the industry and unshackling the enterprise of this country, thereby increasing to an almost incredible degree that revenue from direct, and still more from indirect taxation which has enabled
  704
  us to meet our present large expenditure. In the second place, we take away the only irritating question which I firmly believe now remains between the two Houses of Parliament, and which is likely to engender a bad feeling between them; and, thirdly, you will record a practical protest, by passing a measure partly for a reduction of the income tax, and partly for the repeal of the paper duties, that it is not the intention of the Legislature to sanction a project which I hold would be injurious to this country—namely, the adoption of a system of direct taxation alone as the only means of supplying the wants of the national Exchequer. For these reasons, my Lords, I beg to move the second reading of this Bill.
  Moved, that the Bill be now read 2a.
  THE DUKE OF RUTLAND: My Lords, in rising to move the Amendment of which I have given notice I feel I must throw myself on the indulgence of your Lordships for that kindness and consideration which you have ever evinced towards me. I can assure your Lordships that in putting myself forward on the present occasion I am solely influenced by the fact of seeing no notice on the paper to undertake the task of moving the rejection of this Bill, which I believe to involve a very great injury to the Constitution. When the noble Earl taunts me with having put my notice upon the paper only yesterday, I must be allowed to remind your Lordships that the second reading of the Bill was only announced on the notice paper of the previous day. I should have thought that for a Bill of this vast importance the noble Earl would have given your Lordships a much longer notice. Under the circumstances I have not been enabled to discuss the question with that complete information I would otherwise have obtained. I think, my. Lords, that this is a question, both politically, financially, and constitutionally, of the very greatest importance. My principal objections to this Bill are threefold:—In the first place, I object to it because I venture to doubt whether you have any real or substantial surplus. In the second place, I object to the Bill, because, even if you have a surplus I am prepared to maintain, with the concurrence of the majority of your Lordships, of the majority of the House of Commons, I believe of the majority of Her Majesty's Ministers themselves, and certainly of the majority of the public out of doors, that a greater amount of benefit

  705
  would be conferred in the reduction of the taxes on tea and sugar than by the abolition of the tax which this measure proposes. I have a third objection to the measure. I consider that it comes before us in such a shape as paralyses your Lord-ships' action and prevents your giving that consideration to the subject which a proposition of this magnitude demands. In reference to my first objection, I must say I think it is much strengthened by the doubtful and hesitating way in which the noble Earl who moved the second reading alluded to the existence of a surplus. In addition to this, since the Customs' Bill has been introduced, there is already £175,000 to be deducted from any surplus that may be said to exist—namely, £150,000 for the Stade Dues, and £25,000 for the increased interest during the next six months on Exchequer Bonds. And when the noble Earl referred to the deficiency of the late harvest, as not having entered into the calculations of the Chancellor of the Exchequer in his last Budget, I ask your Lordships whether you are more secure this year against the occurrence of such a calamity than you were the last? I hope and trust that the harvest may be a good one; but who can be so bold as to say that he can prognosticate with certainty that our harvest this year, will be more abundant than the last? Now, my Lords, with regard to the second objection—what duties should be taken off, supposing you have a real and bonâ fide surplus. I will put it to your Lordships whether any person who considers this subject in a fair and impartial spirit must not at once admit that the labouring classes consume more tea and sugar than they do paper, and whether, therefore, they would not benefit more by the reduction of the duty on tea than by the repeal of the Excise on paper? I think the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer will himself agree with me on this point, because I remember that last year when introducing his Budget he felt the difficulty of his position, and distinctly admitted that directly the labouring classes would benefit more by the reduction of the tea and sugar duties than by the abolition of the paper duty; but, then, he added, they would benefit indirectly, because it must be remembered that every pound of tea and sugar must be wrapped in paper. Now, however, with that boldness for which he is so remarkable, with that subtlety which
  706
  is so startling, with that ingenuity in which no one surpasses him, he comes forward with a different plea, and recommends your Lordships to repeal the paper duty, not because their repeal would directly benefit the consumer—for he has now discovered what we on this side of the House have been telling him for the last twenty years that the consumer does not benefit in anything like the proportion the revenue loses by a repeal of the duties of Customs and Excise; in fact, the right hon. Gentleman admits that one-fourth only of the reduction of duty went into the pockets of the consumer—therefore, he now urges the advantage that will arise to trade, and the expansion of commerce which will be the consequence of the repeal of the paper duties. As to the benefit to commerce, I should be glad to know how or in what manner the repeal of the paper duty will assist commerce more than a reduction of the duties upon tea and sugar? The noble Earl, in alluding to the tea duties, said that 40 per cent of tea was consumed by the lower classes, and 60 per cent by the upper classes. I will not venture to contradict the noble Earl, but I maintain, that if the duty upon tea were lowered so as to bring the article more within the reach of the consumption of the labouring class, that more people would be enabled to consume that beverage, and that they would receive more benefit from the reduction of the duty than from the repeal of the whole Excise on paper. But what is the time at which we are called upon to take off the paper duty? Is it a time when all around appears tranquil and secure? Are there no indications of approaching difficulty? Are we quite certain we shall not require this tax we are now called upon to abandon? If we look abroad, across the Atlantic, what did we see? A nation plunging into civil war. The cannon has already sounded, and is reverberating on our own shores. We know not whether we may not be drawn into that contest; we know not what demands will be made upon us; yet this is the time when we are called upon to give up, without any benefit, some million and a half of revenue. Again, if we looked at Italy—that country which had but lately emerged from a revolution—what do we behold? Monarchy destroyed, with hardly any settled Government; authority overthrown, a generous and excitable people given up alternately as the prey to a

  707
  victorious army, a disbanded soldiery, and a desperate brigandism. Only yesterday we heard, with the deepest regret, however much some of us may differ from his political views, that the great mind that has hitherto kept together the elements of that divided and unhappy country has passed away; and who can tell what the future of that country will be? Then if we look nearer home—if we look to the two countries which stand so close to each other—divided, or, as Mr. Cobden happily expressed it, united by a few miles of sea—what do we there find? While each with one hand signs a treaty of commerce, with the other both nations are convulsively grasping the hilt of their swords, each doubtful of the other's intentions. Mr. Cobden, who is looked up to as a great authority on all occasions, has lately come from Paris, and your Lordships will, therefore, look to his testimony with the greatest, possible interest. And what does Mr. Cobden say? In his speech yesterday, on the occasion of his receiving the freedom of the City, the hon. Gentleman stated that he viewed with the greatest alarm the naval preparations that are going on in France and England. His speech is so remarkable that if I were not afraid of wearying your Lordships I should very much like to read a short passage from it. Mr. Cobden said—
  "Even now there is much that is doing by the Governments of the two countries which is calculated to fill us with disappointment, if not with dismay. Probably at no time in our history—and I say it advisedly—had France and England so large a warlike preparation in the only means of war by which they can be brought into collision as at this moment in a time of peace. It was not too much to say that at no period of history were ever Franco and England so prepared by formidable naval forces for hostile operations against each other as at present; and this is going on—if we may believe what we read and hear—at the present moment simultaneously with this commercial treaty which is intended to facilitate the intercourse between the two nations. There is something saddening and inconsistent in this fact."
  The speech goes on in the same strain; and at the close Mr. Cobden says that even if Trance were preparing for war we should prepare for peace, and we should have it. These are Mr. Cobden's sentiments; but, my Lords, I am sure that while France is the initiator of these great naval preparations—while she is building these leviathans of war—there is not one of your Lordships who will not concur with, me in the opinion that if this great commercial country has any regard for
  708
  the maintenance of her position and the security of her colonies she must be, at all events, equally prepared to defend herself as that great and powerful Empire of France. I trust I may be allowed to express my admiration, in common with all patriotic loyal Englishmen, at the spirited address which the Prime Minister of this country made to the House of Commons the other night on the occasion of the discussion upon the Navy Estimates. The noble sentiments expressed by the noble Viscount thrilled every patriotic breast in England. My Lords, I come now to the third objection I have made, and I approach it with the strongest possible desire to say nothing that can in any way provoke any spirit of rivalry or hostility in the remotest degree between the two Houses of Parliament. I come now, I say, to the constitutional part of the question—to the position in which your Lordships have now been placed by the manner in which the Bill has been sent up to your Lordships' House. A proposition for repealing a tax and also for the imposition of taxes has been sent up in one Bill. My Lords, when I see so. many noble and learned Lords around me so much more capable by their learning, their ability, and their experience, to guide and instruct your Lordships on so delicate and difficult a subject, I will not venture to dive into the depths of this part of the question; I will not venture to do more than to draw your Lordships' attention to this subject, in order that we may be favoured with their opinion of the position in which we now stand, in consequence of the step that has been taken—I will not say by the House of Commons, and I will not say by Her Majesty's Government—but I will say by that overruling and powerful mind which seems to guide both the one and the other. Now, the noble Earl (Earl Granville) said we are now placed in a very different position to what we were last year. Then the Bill was sent up to repeal the duty, which Bill your Lordships decided not to assent to, not in consequence of its merits, but in consequence of there then being no surplus: but the noble Earl says we are now in a different position, that we cannot now reject the proposal to repeal the paper duty on the ground and for the reason we rejected it last year, because the Chancellor of the Exchequer has now shown that there will be a surplus at the close of the current financial year; and he,

  709
  therefore, hoped your Lordships would not divide upon the matter. But, my Lords, if this is the case, I want to know why the present proposal has not been sent up from the other House in such a shape as would have enabled your Lordships to consider and pass a deliberate judgment upon the repeal of the paper duty apart from the other details of the Budget? I apprehend, notwithstanding all the noble Earl has said about the certainty of a surplus, that it was a suspicion that your Lordships would again throw out any proposition for the repeal of the paper duty that has induced the Government to adopt the underhand course of "tacking" their proposition with respect to the paper duty to a Bill containing other provisions, and so sending it up to this House in a shape which should prevent your Lordships from resisting it, without at the same time interfering with the other financial arrangements for the year. Almost every constitutional authority—and amongst them Lord Macaulay—had concurred in condemning the practice of "tacking" Bills. Lord Macaulay in his History, vol. 5, p. 274, gave the following striking condemnation of the practice:—
  "Not only—such were the just complaints of the Peers—not only are we to be deprived of that coordinate legislative power to which we are, by the constitution of the realm, entitled. We are not to be allowed even a suspensive veto. We are not to dare to remonstrate, to suggest an amendment, to offer a reason, to ask for an explanation. Whenever the other House has passed a Bill to which it is known that we have strong objections, that Bill is to be tacked to a Bill of Supply. It we alter it we are told that we are attacking the most sacred privilege of the representatives of the people, and that we must either take the whole or reject the whole. If we reject the whole public credit is shaken; the Royal Exchange is in confusion; the Bank stops payment; the army is disbanded; the fleet is in mutiny; the island is left without one regiment, without one frigate at the mercy of every enemy. The danger of throwing out a Bill of Supply is, doubtless, great. Yet it may on the whole be better that we face that danger, once for all, than that we should consent to be, what we are fast becoming, a body of no more importance than the Convocation.
  Now, my Lords, I will call your attention for one moment to the position which the noble Earl (Earl Granville) asks us to occupy. And I will ask what is the use of a debate which is to have no practical end? If the whole thing is already settled, because the House of Commons have Bent up the whole financial arrangement for the year in one Bill, which your Lordships cannot alter or amend, I ask what is
  710
  the use of my wasting my breath and your Lordships' time in addressing you? We are even placed, by the course which has been pursued, in a worse position than any other class in the country. We are told that we are not competent to have an opinion, and if any one of us ventures to give expression to our views, as the noble Earl below me (the Earl of Derby) did at the Mansion House, we are told that we should wait till the Bill is before us before offering even an opinion in reference to it. I would briefly call attention to the views entertained by the people of France in regard to retrospective debates. I perceive from the correspondence of The Times that in an article in the Revue des deux Mondes they condemn the practice of debating questions in the French Chambers after they have been practically decided, and remark on the happier condition of this country, where all-important questions are decided by the Legislature. Yet this is the very position your Lordships are now invited to occupy. I have now, briefly, my Lords, and I fear, very inefficiently, laid my reasons before you for the course I have pursued, and I hope your Lordships will consider this measure is one which ought not to become an Act of Parliament. I have only taken the part I have done because I could not find that any other noble Lord proposed to move an Amendment, and, therefore, I ventured to move one, as I think this Bill is so adverse to the interests of your Lordships, and to those of the country at large, that I venture, at all events, to enter my protest against its passing your Lordships' House.
  THE EARL OF DERBY: My Lords, no one who has the pleasure and the honour of the personal acquaintance of my noble Friend who has just sat down can, for a moment, doubt that any step he takes in this House, as elsewhere, is dictated by the most conscientious motives; and no one who has listened to the manner in which he has brought forward his Motion this evening can fail to perceive that he is capable to deal with the great questions that come before us with an ability, good judgment, and moderation, which make me regret that he does not more frequently take an active part in our proceedings and join in our debates. I must, my Lords, preface the few observations I am about to offer by saying, in the first instance, that notwithstanding the high respect which I entertain, and which I believe your Lordships all entertain, for the opinion and

  711
  character of my noble Friend, and notwithstanding the clear and able manner in which he has submitted his views upon this question to our notice, he has not induced me to come to the practical conclusion to which he has arrived. But I must at the same time express my concurrence in a great part of the objections which he has urged against the measure now under your Lordships' consideration—if, indeed, on such a question it is permitted to us to have any deliberative consideration at all;—I concur with the noble Duke in thinking that the Bill is objectionable in point of substance as well as in form—in point of substance, because, if that surplus does exist which the Chancellor of the Exchequer anticipates with so much confidence, but of which serious doubts are entertained by a very large proportion of the Members of the other House of Parliament, and in which doubts I confess I share—even, I say, if that surplus does exist, in my judgment, and, I believe, in the judgment of many others, and in the deliberate judgment of the House of Commons, and I am not sure I am incorrect in saying in the deliberate judgment of Her Majesty's Government—there are other taxes which have a greater claim for remission than the paper duty. There are other taxes which press far more injuriously on the springs of industry, which press with far greater hardship upon the comforts of the great mass of the community—there are taxes which have been imposed for special and temporary purposes, to meet a temporary exigency, and which have, consequently, a far preferable claim over the paper duty to be taken off, or, at all events, reduced, so soon as the temporary exigency for which they were imposed has ceased to exist. I think the Bill objectionable in point of form, on the grounds stated by my noble Friend—because it is sent to your Lordships, and sent deliberately, with the view and intention of precluding your Lordships from exercising upon it that deliberate judgment which I think it is for the benefit and advantage of the Constitution as it is for the honour of your Lordships' House that you should be able to exercise on all matters submitted to you. The noble Earl who moved the second reading of the Bill stated that last year we stood in a very different position from that in which we do now; inasmuch that last year it might be a question open to doubt whether we had or had not a surplus; whereas, on the
  712
  present occasion, that fact is universally admitted. I will not here stop, my Lords, to take exception to the assumption of my noble Friend that the existence of a surplus is universally admitted. The fact is that it is agreed in the House of Commons that in these matters it is to be assumed that the Chancellor of the Exchequer is the best authority as to the facts, and that upon his statement we must be prepared to rely in our legislative capacity—whatever personal and private opinions may be as to the soundness of the reasoning or the validity of the conclusions to which he has arrived. My Lords, I accept this principle; but as the noble Earl took great pains to show that if it had not been for the very bad harvest last year the anticipations of the Chancellor of the Exchequer with regard to the revenue would have been entirely realized, I may be permitted to point out that the noble Earl did not take into account the £800,000 additional and unexpected Customs' revenue which the Chancellor of the Exchequer received, and which we may regard as some set-off against the falling off of his receipts from that cause. Moreover, although in ordinary cases it is perfectly fair for the Chancellor of the Exchequer to reckon, not on circumstances of an unparalleled prosperity, but upon a fair average revenue, yet I find at the period when the Chancellor of the Exchequer brought forward his first Budget—which I presume is the one to which we are directed—about the period when we were discussing the measure relative to the paper duty, and before the Chancellor of the Exchequer brought forward his second or supplemental Budget—it was perfectly clear that we could expect nothing but a very bad harvest. Perhaps the noble Earl will permit me to remind him also that, at the period when the Budget was under consideration, Her Majesty's Government were in doubt—a doubt in which no other person shared—as to whether or not there would be a war with China, and the provision taken in the Budget for the China war last year only reached the very modest amount of £500,000. Subsequently the Chancellor of the Exchequer found out that that had taken place which every one had foreseen, but to which he had wilfully shut his eyes; and consequently he found himself under the necessity of coming down to the House of Commons and asking for a Supplementary Vote of £3,800,000. That appeal, however, had

  713
  not been made when we discussed the question; but I hope your Lordships will do me the honour to recollect that I found it to be my duty to fatigue your Lordships with a very lengthy analysis of the estimates of the revenue and the expenditure of the country, in which I assumed, for the purpose of argument, that the whole of the calculations of the Chancellor of the Exchequer were perfectly correct, that he was not wrong in any of his figures, that no unexpected circumstances would occur to derange his calculations. And I took the liberty of showing—on the faith of that statement—to your Lordships, and, as I believe, proved to your Lordships, that if circumstances remained precisely the same, the provisions of the Budget were so contrived as to secure, not for the year 1860–1, but for the year 1861–2, a deficiency to the amount of £2,800,000. In short, I rested my support to the Motion brought forward by my noble Friend the Comptroller of the Exchequer, not upon any supposed error in the calculations of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, but upon the fact that the statement of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, assuming the correctness of all his figures, involved us in a certain deficiency of £2,800,000, at the very least, for the year 1861–2. Under those circumstances your Lordships were induced—and I think very advantageously for the country, and I believe that the country generally now feel that it was to their advantage, and that your Lordships acted very wisely—to exercise your indubitable right to refuse to assent to this lavish and imprudent sacrifice of the permanent revenue of the country. My Lords—I do not quite know about Her Majesty's Government—but I am afraid the Chancellor of the Exchequer has not shown himself sufficiently grateful to us, because we certainly contributed very largely to reduce or diminish the enormous deficiency there would have been upon the revenue, not of 1860–1, but of 1861–2, by the present we made to him of a million and a quarter of money by continuing the paper duty. The right hon. Gentleman made no difficulty about accepting this present; but he took advantage of the amount, eloquently protesting that there never was a Government, there never was a people, so ill-used and so grossly affronted as that Government, the House of Commons, and the country had been by your Lordships' House. But, my Lords, with a meekness worthy of all praise, the right hon. the
  714
  Chancellor of the Exchequer proceeded to frame his new Budget to meet the altered circumstances of the year, and he at once took credit for the million and a quarter secured to him by "the unparalleled conduct of the House of Lords." How was the remainder made up? The remainder of the deficiency—by a course of proceeding which, certainly, is of an exceptional character, but justified by the circumstances of the time—was made up by withdrawing the sum of one million and a half from the balances in the Exchequer—that is by diminishing the assets prepared to meet the liabilities of the country. That was the mode—in addition to what he got by the relief afforded him by the retention of the paper duties—in which the Chancellor of the Exchequer contrived to make ends meet for the service of last year. The revenue, in short, of last year, was made up of waifs and strays, odds and ends, pickings here, anticipations from another quarter, and throwing into the service of one year that which belonged to another—a combination of casualties which might occur that year but could never occur again, and anticipations which, unless circumstances changed favourably, would leave the revenue of another year in a deficiency to the amount of two or three millions. But when we come to this year, and when every one is thinking how the Chancellor of the Exchequer will make up the deficiency in his revenue, the right hon. Gentleman comes down to the House and deals with the Budget of the present year with the same courage and dexterity as he exhibited in dealing with the Budget of last year. Last year he astounded the House by announcing that they had to provide for a deficiency of £9,400,000, and, nevertheless, the right hon. Gentleman proposed a remission of taxes that would increase the deficiency to £12,400,000. He provided for that deficiency by the anticipation of revenue from a variety of sources, partly on the faith of £250,000 to be received from Spain, and partly from other windfalls, but principally by the addition of a penny to the income tax—or rather by the imposition of an income tax of 10 d. in the pound—and of this income tax the right hon. Gentleman contrived not only to get four quarters in the year, but he arranged so that five quarters should be paid within the year. That, of course, was an operation that could not be repeated, and their Lordships and the public were anxiously asking, "What will the Chancellor of

  715
  the Exchequer do with his deficiency of £5,500,000?" Many resources were wanting which last year he possessed—the prospect before him, in short, seemed as black as possible—when the right hon. Gentleman comes down to an admiring and wondering House of Commons and declares that there was no deficiency at all, but a surplus of £1,900,000. And it is just as simple as the case of Columbus and his egg. The deficiency last year was £9,400,000, assuming that the income tax was to expire, and that the tea and sugar duties would be reduced to their ordinary amount. This was the right hon. Gentleman's demonstration of last year. This year he proceeds upon a different assumption, that all these duties are to continue, and not only to continue, but that they are to continue with the additional penny income tax imposed last year, and distinctly imposed for one year only. If you assume, in the first instance, that the taxes have expired which produced between £10,000,000 and £11,000,000, and, thereby show a deficiency of £9,400,000 in the one year, it is not very difficult to come to the conclusion that if those taxes are to be continued in their full amount, as they produced a surplus for last year, they will also provide a surplus for the year to come. And then the House of Commons lifts up its hands and its eyes in admiration, and says, "What a wonderful man this Chancellor of the Exchequer is!" I say that also; but I likewise say, what a wonderful body is that House of Commons to be cajoled and juggled by this transparent fallacy of creating a deficiency last year, and having a surplus this year. I must be permitted to say, in passing, that this solution gives a very easy explanation of an extraordinary discrepancy which appears between a statement I made and one made by the Comptroller of the Exchequer, in which I anticipated a deficiency of between £2,000,000 and £3,000,000, and my noble Friend a deficiency of between £10,000,000 and £11,000,000. The difference consists in this: I said, if these taxes are continued there will be a deficiency of £2,000,000 or £3,000,000; and my noble Friend said, "There will be a deficiency of between £10,000,000 and £11,000,000 unless you break faith with the country and continue those obnoxious tea and sugar duties, and also the income tax at its present high rate." Our statements, therefore, precisely tally, and our estimates would have
  716
  been perfectly correct, as a general rule, if it had not occurred in the meantime that the China war came to an end, and consequently it was in the power of the Government and of the Chancellor of the Exchequer to make some reduction of the expenditure, the effect of which was to give a small apparent surplus. As I said before, I shall assume that the calculations of the Chancellor of the Exchequer are all correct, and I shall not dispute the fact, whether £750,000, which he calculates to receive from China, is likely to come into the Exchequer or not, or whether he has not made a most extraordinary miscalculation with regard to the military and naval expenditure of the country. I take the facts as I am told them; and then the question arises how this surplus shall be disposed of most advantageously for the country? I will not say whether it is for your Lordships to-night to decide, but it is a question for Parliament to decide. I will assume the version of those who say that the Chancellor of the Exchequer has dealt most fairly and impartially in dividing the relief between direct and indirect taxation. If, on the one hand, it is said, he takes off the paper duty, on the other hand he takes off an equivalent amount from income tax. That is true; but the relief given in respect of direct taxation consists in taking off the individual penny he put on the year before, and the relief in respect of indirect taxation consists in depriving the country permanently [The Duke of ARGYLL: Hear, hear!]—I am glad to hear that my observation is gratifying to the noble Duke—you are taking off a tax which, from the nature of things, when once taken off cannot be reimposed. I am not going to discuss the merits of the paper duty. I always admitted, and I am quite ready now to admit, that it is an objectionable tax, and one which, with an overflowing Exchequer, it might be desirable to relieve the country from the pressure of; but I do not believe that its repeal will have those marvellous effects that have been predicated, or will give any-extraordinary relief to commerce or to any portion of the community. With regard to cheap literature, and to the various applications of paper, and the immense spread of knowledge which are to follow from the repeal of this duty, these arguments may do very well for Parliament, but I have not the least faith in them. My noble Friend, I hope, will not repeat these stale arguments about cheap litera-

  717
  ture, which have been all controverted long ago. [Earl GRANVILLE: Where?] Why, in every house, in every conversation, in Parliament, and in every society where the question has been argued. Look at the most important publishers. Look at the authority of Mr. Bohn, who ought to have some knowledge upon the subject. Look to the assertions made in every society and every place where the question is discussed. I know one class to whom the relief will be considerable, and that is the class of proprietors of penny newspapers. I do not know that they will get all the benefit they expect, but they will get the raw material of their business cheaper, and certainly they will not make the least reduction in the price to their consumers. Neither do I see that so great a benefit will be given by the remission of the paper duty to those tradesmen who sell groceries, tea, sugar, and other articles on account of the paper in which these articles are wrapped—or to use my noble Friend's peculiar phraseology "wropped." I believe that the main argument for taking off the paper duty consists of an argument introduced for the first time this year, and which may call "the great bandbox argument." Next to the proprietors of penny papers the makers of bandboxes will derive the greatest benefit from the remission of the duty; but as to all the other classes of the community, I believe its benefits will be found to be nearly nil. I will say utterly nil as compared with a proportionate reduction of the income tax or a proportionate reduction of the tea and sugar duties. My noble Friend will surely not deny that these reductions would be more beneficial to the working classes than the repeal of the paper duty; and when he says that the tea and sugar duties are paid in higher proportion by the higher and middle classes than by the lower, surely, that circumstance constitutes a strong reason for reducing those duties and so cheapening the articles to the lower classes. I only wish to enter my protest against being supposed to concur in the great benefit to be derived to the community at large from taking off the duty on paper. It is, however, a financial question upon which the House of Commons has a second time expressed an opinion to the effect that it is desirable that that duty should be taken off. I will not stop to examine what may be the various motives that induced the House of Commons to come to the conclusion at which they have
  718
  arrived. It will be sufficient for mo to say that to my certain knowledge that conclusion was not simply guided by the merits of the tax itself, or the degree of relief to be afforded to the community. It was carried, undoubtedly, by a somewhat larger majority than carried the third reading last year—a majority of fifteen; but it is perfectly notorious that that majority, small as it is, was obtained by the votes of a certain number of Gentlemen sincerely opposed to the removal of the paper duly, but more opposed to running the risk—not a great risk, I think—of disturbing Her Majesty's Government, or compelling them to resign or to dissolve Parliament. I am not in the secrets of the Government; and I am not averse to having something strong in hand to meet an emergency; but looking to the complacent manner in which they took the check by the House of Lords last year, I confess to entertaining a very strong opinion that the only resignation Her Majesty's Government would have shown would have been that calm and placid resignation with which they submitted to the benefit we conferred upon them last year; and as to the dissolution of Parliament, I have too high an opinion of the prudence, sagacity, and wisdom of the noble Viscount at the head of that Government to think that he would appeal to the country on any such question as whether paper was to be preferred to tea. But, whatever the motive, a majority of the House of Commons has decided in favour of the repeal of the paper duty, and I am perfectly ready to admit that, upon a question of the repeal of a duty and the financial arrangements generally, it is not expedient that your Lordships, except in very exceptional cases, should interfere with the discretion of the House of Commons in that matter. Suppose, therefore, there is a surplus, and that the House of Commons, on full and deliberate consideration of all the circumstances, have come to the decision that it is expedient that this paper duty should be repealed, I certainly should not wish to take on myself the responsibility of advising your Lordships, whatever might be your opinions as to the merits of the case, to set yourselves upon such a point in opposition to the deliberate judgment of the House of Commons. Last year the question was widely different. The question then was whether, upon the showing of the Chancellor of the Exchequer himself, that there would be

  719
  no surplus in the following year, you would not give to the House of Commons a further opportunity of considering the policy' of sacrificing that which was in point of form at least a permanent tax? But the question arises now; not so much with regard to the merits of the case as with regard to the amount of interference which might be justifiable or desirable on the part of your Lordships' House. And here is a point on which I feel myself compelled to differ in some degree, though not altogether, with my noble Friend (the Duke of Rutland) as to the discretion to be exercised on this occasion. With regard to the right of the House of Lords to deal with questions of taxation, and with regard to the privileges of the two Houses generally, I think it is extremely desirable that there should be no mistake as to their respective limits. While there is undoubtedly debateable ground between the two Houses there is certainly one point which admits of no debate and no discussion whatever. With regard to those other matters, they must be settled as they arise, by the prudence and discretion of each House individually. But there is nothing more clearly laid down and recognized than that to the House of Commons belongs the initiation of every Money Bill; and on the other hand nothing is more in disputable—and that is the vindication of your Lordship's conduct last year—than that the House of Lords have the power of accepting or rejecting any Money Bill. The debateable point is whether the House of Lords has power to alter a Money Bill submitted to them by the House of Commons? What is the meaning of having power? The privileges of the two Houses depend upon the mutual recognition of their respective powers, and on the power of enforcing that recognition. The House of Commons would not look at a Money Bill originated by the Lords; and their remedy is obvious—they would refuse to deal with it. The Lords, on the other hand, reject a Money Bill coming up from the Commons that they do not approve of; and the result is clearly the same—the Bill falls to the ground, and there is an end of it. But the question is as to the right of the House of Lords to alter a Money Bill which the Commons have originated. Let us see upon what the claim of the House of Commons to refuse to entertain a Money Bill so altered is founded. It rests upon a Resolution of 1671, passed by the House of Commons,
  720
  as to the privileges and rights of that House, and incidentally as to the limitation of the rights and privileges of the other House. With regard to the privileges of the House of Commons, their Resolution may be perfectly sufficient to bind them; but as to what is the privilege of your Lordships' House a simple Resolution of the House of Commons, with all due respect to that high authority, except so far as they can themselves act upon it, is a piece of waste paper. The rights of your Lordships' House cannot be restricted by a Resolution of the House of Commons; and, however prudence may have induced your Lordships' House to refrain from altering Money Bills, you have never at any time repudiated, rejected, or resigned the right of making Amendments in those Bills, although you have tempered the exercise of that right by discretion, and by the knowledge that if you do make such Amendment it is equivalent to the rejection of the Bill. Every constitutional authority concurs in giving to the House of Lords this right of amending Money Bills if they choose to exercise it. Mr. Hallam and Lord Macaulay have so laid it down; but I will only trouble your Lordships with a short extract from a work recently published by my noble Friend (Earl Stanhope), the Life of William Pitt, in which I find the opinion of Mr. Fox thus stated—
  "Pitt proposed a measure to regulate our commercial intercourse with America. The views of Pitt upon this question were of the largest kind. The Bill was complicated and extensive. It was several times committed and re-committed with a variety of Amendments, and at last, under the next Administration, was further altered by the Lords. It was, no doubt, a Money Bill. ['Hear.'] 'But I am of opinion (said Fox) that the Order of the House respecting Money Bills is often too strictly construed. It would be very absurd, indeed, to send a Loan Bill to the Lords for their concurrence, and, at the same time, deprive them of the right of deliberation.'"
  This is the judgment of Mr. Fox—a great constitutional authority—upon the Resolution of the House of Commons in 1671. This privilege depends upon the power of enforcing it; and if you send down a Money Bill to the Commons altered the Commons reject it, and it falls to the ground. In former times—I do not know whether the practice is still continued—it was usual for the House of Commons to kick such a Bill out of the House, or to throw it under the table—which does not appear to me to be a very dignified mode of proceeding, more especially when it was frequently

  721
  followed by the introduction of another Bill embodying the Amendments of the Lords. No doubt the House of Commons, if you choose to act on your constitutional right, may refuse to entertain the Bill so amended by your Lordships, in which case it falls to the ground; or they may introduce another Bill or Bills carrying out the same object, and send them to the Lords in a form that they believe to be more acceptable. These, my Lords, are the real limitations of the rights and privileges of the two Houses of Parliament—namely, the manner in which these rights can be enforced, by either the one or the other, by the rejection of the measure in one form or the other, the result of which is that the proposed legislation falls to the ground. In Bills, however, which are for the special purposes of taxation, not Bills in which money clauses may be introduced incidentally, this is a matter of the highest consequence, because whenever either House insists on the maintenance of its strict privileges, in that case, according to the circumstances of the case, the matter would be judged of by the supreme judge of all in this country—public opinion; and that House of the two which pushes its assumed privileges to the utmost, and which shows an unreasonable and unconciliatory spirit towards the other House, will be the one, in the case of a great national calamity, such as the stopping the Supply of the means of carrying on the Government, which will be visited by great public indignation; and that is the real control and the real means by which the apparently conflicting privileges of the two Houses are presented from bringing the working of the Constitution to a dead lock. That is the position in which we find ourselves at present. There is one point more to which I must advert—the mode in which the Commons have dealt with this question and with regard to "tack Bills." In former times it was the habit of the Commons to introduce the most conflicting and incompatible things into the same Bill and send it up to the House of Lords. According to the interpretation of their privileges by the Commons, that Bill, if it contained some money provision, could not be amended by the House of Lords, but the whole measure must be swallowed by this House or rejected altogether. It is apparent that such a practice excludes the House of Lords from the exercise of their deliberative and legislative func-
  722
  tions. There never has been any doubt to the inadmissibility of "tacks;" in the strict sense of the word—that is the introduction into a Money Bill of matter wholly different from and unconnected with the main object of the measure. But a more difficult question comes when you have to deal with a large financial scheme, in which nothing is introduced that has not reference to finance but in which various matters of finance are introduced and submitted to your Lordships' consideration. I do not hesitate to admit to my noble Friend opposite that there are repeated precedents for the introduction of whole fiscal schemes into one measure, and of that measure being sent up by the House of Commons and acceded to by the House of Lords. On the other hand, there are repeated cases of financial measures being amended by the House of Lords, and the Amendments being accepted by the House of Commons. Supposing one Bill had been sent up last year for imposing 1d. income tax and repealing the paper duty, no one could complain of excess of authority on the part of the Commons; and, likewise, nobody could complain that the House of Lords had not the opportunity to exercise their judgment by accepting the whole or rejecting it, and the thing could be fairly counterpoised by the action of the House of Commons. But the case is totally different where, by the action of the House of Commons, it is proposed to take away a permanent tax and to substitute for it a purely temporary one. This point has been urged in the House of Commons by a right hon. Baronet, a Member of great weight and experience, and was referred to by my noble Friend opposite, as having been laid down in a draft Report which was not accepted by the Committee, and which Report was drawn by a right hon. Friend for whom I have the highest esteem and regard (Mr. Walpole), but both these Gentlemen, I think, have come to an opinion on this question which is most fallacious in its origin and dangerous in its conclusions. The argument is this—that if, after the House of Commons has declared against it, you allow a large portion of the Revenue to be raised by permanent taxation that cannot be taken off without the consent of the House of Lords—and it is admitted that it cannot be taken off without their consent—you weaken the power of the House of Commons—that power, it is allowed, has been weakened—and it is argued that it would be expedient, and

  723
  good policy, to recover that power even at the expense of the permanent revenue of the country. I say that this is a gross fallacy in argument—I say so with the greatest respect for the right hon. Gentleman—it is a perfect fallacy in argument to say that dealing with a portion of the permanent taxation of the country can affect the control of the House of Commons over the revenue from whatever source derived. It might, no doubt, have been necessary in the early days of our history, at a time when the necessities of the Crown alone compelled it to call Parliament together, and when measures were always attempted to enable the Crown to dispense with the Parliament and to enable it to carry on the Government without summoning Parliament at all, to take precautions that Supplies should only be voted in such a way as not to make the Sovereign independent of Parliament. But all apprehensions of that kind have long ago fallen to the ground, and ceased to have any practical effect. "What is the control which the House of Commons now exercises? The army, the navy, all the great services of the country, are voted from year to year; and without the sanction of the House of Commons to the application of the Ways and Means, the payment of these services at once falls to the ground. The Army Estimates, the Navy Estimates, the Miscellaneous Estimates, are all provided for by annual Votes; and this enormous proportion—amounting in fact to almost the whole—of the Ways and Means of the country are entirely and absolutely under the direct control of the House of Commons. And even after these Estimates have been provided for, the House of Commons has complete and absolute control not only over the levying of the taxes but over their application. Not a single shilling of the taxes—not even of the permanent taxation of the country—can be applied to the purposes for which they are required without an Appropriation Act, which, as your Lordships know, must originate in the House of Commons, while it must receive the sanction of your Lordships' House. The control, therefore, of the House of Commons over the finances of the country consists, first, in the absolute control it has over the Estimates for the support of all the great services of the country; and, next, in the fact, that after these Estimates are voted not a step in regard to the payment of those services can be taken without the introduction of
  724
  all the items of that expenditure into an Act which must originate in the House of Commons. Let us look, my Lords, at what the consequence would be of acting on the opposite principles. Let us suppose the principles that have been put forward in the House of Commons carried out to the uttermost, and that you do away with the whole permanent taxation of the country—and, observe, that if this precedent is to be followed up, the Supply for the year may be purchased by the abolition of some permanent duty, then permanent taxation will be gradually reduced to a minimum; and if permanent taxation be reduced to a minimum—if all the great permanent services of the country are to be provided for by the annual Votes of Parliament—and, moreover, I say, if all the taxes that affect trade and commerce financially are to be made dependent on the annual Votes of Parliament; if, above all, the payments for the National Debt are to be made wholly dependent on the annual Votes of Parliament—then, I say, the most serious and even ruinous consequences may result from the substitution of the system of annual for the system of permanent taxation. Therefore, while I do not say I am disposed to object to the present exercise of the discretion of the House of Commons, I do say it is a very serious question, not only for your Lordships' consideration, but for those of the House of Commons—and they are, I believe, the great majority—who value the institutions of the country, to beware of the danger and temptation that lurk in the policy of substituting annual for permanent taxation—of the danger of unsettling the great institutions of the country, shake the stability of our engagements, rendering uncertain all matters that affect the course of trade and commerce, and producing in all these matters an uncertainty that must be most prejudicial to the highest and best interests of the country. Why, my Lords, within my own recollection, there was one great tax—that of the sugar duties—which was voted annually; but such was the paralysis caused to trade by the uncertainty of these duties, whether they might be diminished or increased from one year to another, that it was found absolutely necessary to make those duties permanent. It was this, I suppose, that the right hon. Baronet to whom I have referred complained of as an infraction of the privileges of the House of Commons. But it is unnecessary for me to say that on

  725
  that occasion the House of Commons acted not in deference to the privileges of House of Lords, but from regard to the necessities of the commercial interests of the country. Therefore, I hope that this question of substituting annual for permanent taxation will be deliberately and carefully weighed both by this and the other House of Parliament, before we proceed on it to an extent that may be dangerous to the best interests of the country. From what I have said your Lordships will infer that it is not my wish or intention to recommend your Lordships to interfere with the exercise of the discretion of the House of Commons in determining to abolish the paper duty. I think that Resolution an imprudent and improvident one, especially in the face of the future difficulties which menace us. But it is proposed purely as a financial measure; as a financial matter it is within the province of the House of Commons; and I should be sorry to see your Lordships set your authority and opinion on ordinary occasions at variance with the opinion of the House of Commons in a matter that is strictly within their province. But the question remains as to the power of the House of Lords—not putting itself in opposition to the vote of the House of Commons, but taking the step which, in a constitutional point of view, we have an undoubted right to take—of dividing this Bill into two and sending the two Bills, both of them agreed to, down to the House of Commons for them to accept or reject as they please. That is a course which has much to recommend it in point of principle. But, in point of prudence, I doubt whether it would be desirable. The noble Earl (Earl Granville) has repeated to-night, what has been said elsewhere, that in sending this Bill to your Lordships' House, the Commons intended it as a measure of a conciliatory character, as one intended to remove from the way a subject of controversy between the two Houses. It is certainly an odd way of conciliation for a man, when we have refused to accept his proposition, to turn back and tell us, "You may adopt or reject it as you please; but if you don't accept it you will expose the country to the most serious inconvenience; you may do as you please, but I take care to send it up to you in such a form as practically to prevent you from the free exercise of your judgment." I repeat I cannot see how this proposition is to be regarded in a conciliatory point of view. Moreover,
  726
  I am inclined to the opinion that if the majority of the Government thought and desired this to be regarded as a conciliatory proposition, I doubt if that was the view of the right hon. Gentleman who proposed the measure. I cannot but believe that the right hon. Gentleman, unfortunately for his own reputation, has allowed himself to be influenced by feelings of mortification at the rejection of his measure last year by the House of Lords, and that he has indulged in what I consider the wounded spirit of mortification in a manner which is not consonant with the right hon. Gentleman's high eminence or reputation. But the question is this—the House of Commons has sent up this measure, and in a form which, I must own, is fairly within their competence. And without placing ourselves prominently in opposition to the House of Commons we have it in our power to divide the Bill which has been sent up to us by that House; and, so divided, we have it in our power to adopt it, and to send it back to the Commons for acceptance or rejection. By that course we always have a remedy in our hands by which we can vindicate our privileges when we so please; and should circumstances ever arise so extreme as to justify us in taking that course, I hope your Lordships would not be slow to vindicate your rights. But I think it would be an act of power that would undoubtedly be extreme on the present occasion. "We should, I think, only be imitating an example that we deprecate and blame, and should take a course likely to excite angry feelings and animosity in the House of Commons. We should lay ourselves open to the charge of having it said, "You have no objection to these propositions, and yet you send them down to the House of Commons in such a manner that it is a challenge and defiance to the House of Commons," and I think the merits of our case would thus be brought forward at the greatest disadvantage. Therefore, while I protest against the policy of this measure—while I think you are making a sacrifice of the resources—and again I say of the permanent resources of the country, because they are secured by permanent Acts of Parliament, and that at a time when you require to husband all the available resources of the country—at a time when, as my noble Friend (the Duke of Rutland) has said, the state of affair? abroad is too critical to allow us to tam-

  727
  per with the finances of the country, or to place them in such a position where they are not at once available, but where for the ordinary expenses of the country you must rely on extraordinary efforts—while I think that this policy is unwise and improvident, and the form of the Bill, notwithstanding all the noble Earl has said of its conciliatory character, objectionable—still, I cannot advise your Lordships to separate the Bill, and to send it back in such a form as will render it necessary to reintroduce the whole question, to re-discuss every part of the measure, and to induce a feeling of irritation in the House of Commons which I should be the last to excite, but which I would rather endeavour to allay. It is very far from our desire, my Lords, to curtail the privileges of that House. While I uphold the privileges of our own House, I yield to no man in my desire to maintain those of the House of Commons, which are as essential to the right balance of the Constitution as the privileges of the House of Lords. I hope, therefore, my noble Friend will not call on us to divide on his Motion; and I hope that no proposition will be made at a subsequent stage of the nature which I have indicated, and which, however consistent with your Lordships' privileges, would place the country in difficulties and expose your House to merited censure. I concur with my noble Friend in many of the objections he has made; but I hope your Lordships will allow this Bill to pass as it has been introduced, and leave to the Government the responsibility—and I think it is a heavy one—of dealing in the manner they have done with the finances of the country, entailing on the country a great sacrifice and depriving her, for apparently the most insignificant objects, of resources which may be required in the hour—and God knows how soon that hour may come—when we are threatened with foreign dangers or internal difficulties.
  THE DUKE OF ARGYLLsaid, he could by no means agree with the noble Duke who moved the Amendment, that debates in that House were of no use unless a division took place. He thought the feeling of the House must be one of gratification that they had now reached the close of the controversy upon the paper duties, and that in the speech of the noble Earl (the Earl of Derby) they had heard the last accents of a party contest which had been one of the keenest and strangest that had happened for many years. He said the
  728
  "strangest," for what were they debating about? Her Majesty's Government, having an estimated surplus of two millions, propose to divide it between the reduction of the income tax and the removal of the Excise duty on paper:—and on this proposal they were met by an opposition which was most violent and almost fanatical. He must admit to the noble Earl that there was some show of justification last year for the opposition to the proposal for the repeal of this taxation which did not now exist; but he must say he had never heard anything more erroneous than the observations that had fallen from the noble Earl respecting the deficit of last year. The noble Earl, for instance, said that the debate in that House upon the paper duty took place at a time when it was quite manifest from long continuance of bad weather that we must have a bad harvest. The fact was that the debate in their Lordship's House took place at the end of May, when there was the most magnificent weather that could be desired. It was not for a week or ten days afterward that the bad weather began. Then the noble Earl said that the deficit was overcome by the Chancellor of the Exchequer taking into account five quarters of a 10 d. income tax within the year.
  THE EARL of DERBY: I admit that was an error. I meant to have said that he imposed an income tax of 10 d. and provided that three quarters of that income tax should come into the service of the year instead of two quarters, making five quarters of the whole income tax, instead of four quarters. It is quite true that in the early part of the year there was a 5d. income tax. I never meant that he had taken five quarters of 10 d. income tax.
  THE DUKE OF ARGYLLsaid, he could only deal with the statement as it was made, and it did appear that the noble Earl attributed to the Chancellor of the Exchequer the including of five quarters of 10 d. tax within the year. The truth was Mr. Gladstone took credit for two quarters of the 5d. income tax due in arrear from the previous year, and he made a new arrangement for the future, whereby he collected three quarters in the remainder of the year. Another error of the noble Earl was one that had been repeatedly refuted last year—that Mr. Gladstone had estimated £500,000 as the whole cost of the China war. The sum really provided by Mr. Gladstone for the China war at the time of the paper duty debate was two

  729
  millions and a half. There were £850,000 charged for the service of the previous year, a sum between £1,100,000 and £1,200,000 in the Army and Navy Estimates for the China war, and the half million which the noble Earl had assumed to be the only provision that was made. In point of fact, the Chancellor of the Exchequer had in his Supplementary Estimate of July overestimated the expense of the China war by £800,000. There had been a saving upon the Chinese war in reference to the Estimates, and this went to the reduction of the deficit. This was an accumulation of mis-statements which was extraordinary, even upon financial questions, from the noble Earl. Another objection which had been raised by the noble Earl against Mr. Gladstone's calculations was that that right hon. Gentleman had shifted his ground, and had adopted a different basis of calculation this year to that which he took last year. But it was quite legititimate for Mr. Gladstone to take one basis one year and a different basis the next, provided that he clearly stated to the House of Commons in each case what basis it was on which his calculations were founded. The noble Earl himself had attempted to bamboozle the House as to the principle upon which the revenue for the year was calculated, and said that the difference between the deficit predicted by one noble Lord and that predicted by another noble Lord arose from their calculating upon a different basis. The predicted deficit of this year was last year stated at £10,000,000 or £12,000,000, on the basis of not taking into account the falling taxes. If it had been intended to include in this the falling taxes, then the deficit might just as well have been put down at £22,000,000. This explanation, therefore, must be abandoned. He thought it would be of advantage if noble Lords and hon. Members who indulged in predictions could be compelled to come forward at the beginning of each Session and state how far their prophecies of the preceding year had been verified or falsified. The noble Earl himself predicted last Session a deficit for this year of £2,800,000. As there was an actual estimated surplus of nearly two millions the noble Earl was in error by nearly five millions. But, deducting the taxes which were imposed in July to meet the cost of the China war, the noble Earl was in error to the extent of two millions, or £1,400,000 at least, a
  730
  sum equal to the whole amount of the paper duties, which was the subject of this long-continued controversy. The noble, Earl had assumed that the expenditure of this year would be fully equal to that of last, and hence his error.
  THE EARL OF DERBY: What I stated was that if the expenditure of the next year was equal to that, we should have a deficit of £2,000,000.
  THE DUKE OF ARGYLL: But surely the Government had a right to calculate as much on the termination of the China war as the noble Earl had upon its continuance. The calculation of the noble Earl, therefore, had proceeded upon a basis which might be erroneous, and which subsequently had proved to be erroneous;—he wished, however, to point out that it was in a great degree upon the strength of that calculation that their Lordships were invited last year to reject the Bill for the repeal of the paper duty since, however, a deficiency could not be predicted of this year, the great objection to the repeal of that duty was the place which it occupied in the general system of taxation, especially as opposed to the repeal of the tea duty, the repeal of which was now advocated as a preferable measure. A few words might be said with regard to the latter duty. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had stated in Parliament that if last year the House of Commons had expressed a preference by its vote for the reduction of the tea duty, the Government would have been ready to accede to that proposal. To that statement he might have added that the Government came to the consideration of the choice between the tea and paper duty with a perfectly impartial mind and with a sincere desire to choose that for remission, the abolition of which would conduce most to the public good. There were, of course, circumstances affecting this decision last year which no longer existed now. The existence of war with China last year made it more doubtful than it otherwise might have been, whether the advantage of any reduction of the tea duty would reach the consumer. But there were other considerations more powerfully than any other had influenced the Government, and which were exactly the converse of those to which their conduct had been attributed. It had, for instance, been perseveringly represented that it was the object of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and the tendency of the po-

  731
  licy of the Government, to remove the permanent sources of our indirect taxation, and to throw an undue burden upon the shoulders of those who bore the direct taxation of the country. Such was not the case. Now, in regard to the tea duties, he would direct attention to the scale of duties on that article for the last few years, since this bore materially on the choice between tea and paper. The power of a nickname was always very great, and he had noticed during those debates that the tea duty had been constantly referred to as a war duty. The facts, however, would point to another conclusion. In 1852–3, before the Russian war, the tea duty stood at 2s. 2½d. per lb.—that is in a time of profound peace. In 1853 the present Chancellor of the Exchequer, who was then in office, proposed that a descending scale should be adopted, to terminate in 1860 by a duty of 1s. per lb. The Russian war then broke out, but so far from the arrangement having been stopped by that event the two first remissions were allowed to take place; in 1853–4, the duty fell to 1s. 10 d. per lb., in 1854–5 to 1s. 6d. per lb., and it was not till 1855 that any addition was made. In that year Sir George Lewis, who was Chancellor of the Exchequer, raised it to 1s. 9d. But at the conclusion of the war, in 1857, it was placed at 1s. 5d. per lb. and at that figure it had remained ever since. What he wished to point out, therefore, was that the figure of 1s. 5d. in the pound had no reference whatever to the expenditure of the Russian war or any other war. It was a duty lower by 9½d. per lb. than had existed in times of profound peace previous to the Russian war. It had reference no doubt to increased expenditure, but not to increased expenditure due to any particular war. When, therefore, they had to consider the question of the tea duties last year, they had to bear in mind the fact that the expenditure of the country for military and naval purposes, although we had had several years of peace, so far from being less than in 1857, was very considerably higher—higher, in fact, by several millions. The question, therefore, really came to this—whether they were under any obligation to reduce the tea duties still farther at a time when they had been obliged to augment still farther naval and military expenditure? Certainly one consideration which weighed with the Government was this—that with
  732
  such large military establishments to provide for it was reasonable and just that the whole consuming mass of the country should contribute to their maintenance and that the entire burden should not be laid upon the income tax or any other direct impost. That reason prevailed at the present moment. The military and naval expenditure was still six millions above the figure at which it stood in 1857. There was, therefore, no reason why the Government should advance farther in a reduced scale of duty which had been fixed in contemplation of a very different condition of affairs. The noble Earl had several times stated that he objected to the repeal of the paper duty because it involved the sacrifice of an important part of the permanent revenue of the country. He listened with some surprise to that statement of the noble Earl. Surely there ought to be some relation and consistency between the language of men when in office, and that which they held when out of office. True the noble Earl's Government in 1858 was in circumstances of considerable difficulty; he was
  I weak as to his Parliamentary condition, and it was necessary for him at times to act upon the principle of "anything for a quiet life." But then they must also remember that the abstract Resolution respecting the paper duty proposed by Mr. Milner Gibson was not simply adopted as he proposed it, but was to a certain extent modified to meet the views of the Government of the noble Earl, so that with that modification, and in the terms finally adopted, the Resolution must be taken as expressing the opinion of an unanimous House of Commons. They were—
  "That this House is of opinion that the maintenance of the Excise on paper as a permanent source of revenue would be impolitic."
  Now, he maintained that the noble Earl who was at the head of the Government which acceded to that Resolution was hardly entitled to argue that the paper duty could be retained as a permanent source of revenue. But supposing the noble Earl had reluctantly agreed to that Resolution, he (the Duke of Argyll) was at least entitled to draw his inference from the language of the noble Earl's Chancellor of the Exchequer, Mr. Disraeli. The words of that right hon. Gentleman were these—
  "The Government, on the subject of this particular tax, does not wish to conceal its general

  733
  opinion that it is a tax that ought not to form a permanent source of revenue."
  He thought that, after such an admission from Mr. Disraeli, together with his own conduct, the noble Earl was not entitled to assume that the paper duty could be maintained as a permanent source of revenue. He would not go into the details of the paper duty, of which he believed they were all heartily tired; but in determining between paper and tea there was another very important consideration, namely, that the paper duty had been declared by the practical officers of the Inland Revenue to have become untenable, not that it could not be collected; but their statement was that the system of partial exemption which had been forced upon the revenue authorities in the course of years, and which favoured one class of dealers while it pressed heavily on another, had rendered the impost so unjust as between the different classes of traders, that the tax had become morally untenable. What was the real cause of the opposition to this Bill? He could not help thinking there were reasons for that opposition which had not been stated, and he drew that inference very much not only from the speech of the noble Earl that evening, but also from a speech of a noble Friend of his whom he was sorry not to see in his place, the late Lord Lieutenant for Ireland (the Earl of Eglinton). In a recent speech that noble Earl stated that, even if it were true that a most flagitious bargain had been made in respect to the Galway contract with a certain party in Parliament, that would not have been so bad as the throwing away of a great source of revenue by the repeal of the paper duty. How was it possible to argue with men whose minds were so intensely prejudiced as that assertion indicated? Was it not true that for the last thirty years the repeal of the paper duty had been the subject of a scientific, rather than a popular, agitation? He believed that the opposition to the repeal of that duty arose in a great measure from a dislike on the part of the noble Earl and his followers to the cheap press. It had been said that the whole of the duty would go into the pockets of the editors and proprietors of the penny papers. He believed that such an opinion was directly contrary to the known principles of political economy, and that, although for a period the proprietors of the penny papers might receive some benefit, the public would ultimately reap
  734
  the advantage, if not in a lowering of the price, in the superiority of the article supplied to them. They would have a better article and more of it for their money, and in one form or another would receive the full benefit of the repeal of the tax. He believed that when such taxes were repealed, although the benefit might in the first instance go to some particular class, sooner or later the public were the gainers; and both political economy and experience taught that their repeal gave a stimulus to trade and industry. With regard to the incidence of the paper duty upon cheap publications, he had recently been supplied with some interesting statistics by Mr. Robert Chambers, the head of a great publishing establishment in Scotland, whose firm had done so much for the last thirty years for the education of the people and the extension of cheap literature. That gentleman had informed him that of the whole expense connected with the popular journals, including literary talent and printing, the item for paper was by far the largest, and that the tax upon that article was 25 per cent. He further informed him that his paper maker had announced to him that in the month of October next Mr. Chambers would receive the entire and full benefit of the remission of duty in the price of paper. That showed, he thought, that the benefit arising from the repeal of the tax would not be retained by any one class, but would be distributed over the community at large. With regard to the form in which the Bill had come up to their Lordship's House, he did not know that there was any remark of the noble Earl which was open to very great exception. The form of the Bill was said to be unusual. So it was; but then the circumstances were unusual. Even the noble Earl himself must admit that the course taken by their Lordships last year was at least unusual, even although it might not be held to be unconstitutional. He fully admitted that the Government had last year considerable difficulty in making out a technical objection to the course taken by the noble Earl. No doubt many Bills of Supply had been rejected by the House of Lords. But the course pursued by the noble Earl and by their Lordships was not so much a technical violation of the privileges of the House of Commons as a substantial violation of the established usages between the two Houses of Parliament. The real objection to that course was, not that the

  735
  Lords had rejected a Money Bill, but that they had rejected a Bill for the supply of the year which was connected with the financial proposals of the Government, and that that rejection took place entirely in reference to financial grounds. He believed that on every previous occasion when the House of Lords had rejected a Money Bill, it was in connection, not with questions of finance, but questions of general policy, which were incidental to the tax, and that in almost every instance it was distinctly stated by the Lords that the ground of their rejection of the Bill was their disapprobation of some general policy connected with it. He could not help thinking that if the offence to the House of Commons was what he had incated, the course pursued by the Commons, though unusual, was perfectly legitimate. He was glad that the noble Earl had thrown over the argument of the noble Duke (the Duke of Rutland) that this Bill was in the nature of a "tack"—it was beyond controversy that in no respect whatever it was so. The whole propositions were strictly and purely financial; there was no question of general policy not connected with finance included in the Bill, and the only question was whether the Government project, being brought in as a whole, might not fairly and legitimately be sent up to their Lordships in one Bill? With regard to the general question of making large sources of the taxation temporary instead of permanent, he confessed that, to a very great extent, he agreed with the noble Earl. He thought that that would be a very dangerous course; the interests of the country generally were such that, practically, a very large portion of the revenue must continue to be raised by permanent taxation. But it was quite possible that, in consequence of the steps taken by that House last year, the House of Commons might think it due to itself and to its own constitutional power over the finance of the country, that in future, as until a very few years ago, some one great annual source of revenue should he kept in their hands, so that they might be able to send up the financial proposal of Government coupled with the renewal of some annual tax. That was quite possible, and he did not see any objection to it in point of constitutional practice. It was a course which would naturally follow from the unusual course taken by their Lorships, and besides being strictly Constitutional it had the great argument of expediency to re-
  736
  commend it. It would be a most dangerous practice if the Government, in making their financial proposals, had to risk a serious conflict in both Houses of Parliament. At present every Government had to consider the position of parties in the Commons when they proposed either to remit or to impose a tax; but surely it would be a serious derangement of constitutional practice, and would place the House of Lords for the future in a somewhat invidious position, if the Government had to consider, not merely the tax which would pass or the remission which should be proposed to the Commons, but the taxes and remission which were most likely to receive the separate and independent sanction of a majority of the House of Lords. If such a precedent were established, it would probably tell very seriously upon the action of Government. At present the Government were sometimes compelled to propose financial measures which were not particularly palatable among the great masses of the population; but if the House of Lords were to take advantage of popular feeling, as an attempt had been made in this case to set up Tea versus Paper, the decisions of the Government would be very seriously biassed. It could scarcely be considered a Conservative doctrine that a Government must always be swayed by the feeling uppermost among the great masses of the people. In his opinion the Government ought to have due regard to such feeling, but there were times when they ought to take higher ground. Before sitting down he could not help alluding to that part of the speech of the noble Earl in which he had attributed personal motives to the Chancellor of the Exchequer in respect to the form which had been adopted by the Government in sending up this Bill to their Lordships' House. Now, he could not help thinking that when personal motives were attributed to a Minister the imputation should be made in that House where the Minister was present and had the power to reply. But was it reasonable for the noble Earl to attribute to personal motives on the part of his right hon. Friend a course of conduct and policy which had been recommended by one of the noble Earl's own most distinguished colleagues, and which had received the assent of an almost unanimous House of Commons? He must add that if it were true that the just authority of the Lords were assailed, that House had a right to

  737
  expect succour from the Conservative party in the House of Commons. Had any such succour been afforded. He happened personally to be present in a place which should be nameless, when a member of that Assembly—one of the Conservative party—proposed a Motion which would, if adopted, have saved the House of Lords from the assumed affront. But what was the conduct of the Conservative party? There was such a rush out of the House that he believed some of the Members were almost in danger of receiving personal damage. He believed only thirty Members of the Conservative party voted with the honest and independent Member who tried to save the House of Lords from the insult which was about to be offered to them. The inference, therefore, was that if the vast majority of the Conservatives—if that distinguished Member of the noble Earl's Government (Mr. Disraeli)—refused to interfere to save their Lordships, it ought not to be attributed to any member of the present Government that he had personal motives in sending the Bill up in its present form. He had only one more observation to make before sitting down. The noble Earl closed his speech by a few solemn words of warning to the Government, that they were responsible, and not he, for the result of the course they were pursuing. On the part of the Government he was ready to accept that responsibility. He was happy to say that the financial operations of that year closed a very long series of operations which, begun in the time of Mr. Huskisson, were carried on by Sir Robert Peel, and had now been carried to completion by his right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Surely they had no reason to be ashamed of the results at which they had at length arrived. Last year they had raised, and they were to raise again this year, no less a sum than £69,000,000, and that with a facility greater than that with which any other nation in the world could raise a tenth part of that enormous sum. That revenue was raised without having recourse to one single tax which was protective, or in other words, without one single tax which was unjust to the consumer, in order to serve the interest of any particular producer; they raised that revenue without one single tax which bore upon particular trades to the injury and disadvantage of others. And last, though not least,
  738
  they raised that enormous sum with an entire exemption of all the necessaries, and not a few of the luxuries, of life. That was surely a triumphant result; and in spite of the solemn adjurations of the noble Earl, he must be allowed to tell him that all the ability and eloquence he had displayed in attacking the measures of the Government were only another instance of the eloquence and ability which could be displayed in attacking the most salutary reforms, and in defending a bad, but he rejoiced to think, in that case at least, a losing cause.
  EARL GREY: My Lords, though I can hardly doubt that the noble Duke (the Duke of Rutland) who has moved an Amendment to the Motion before the House will follow the advice so wisely given him by the noble Earl opposite, and will not put your Lordships to the trouble of a division, I shall take the liberty of making some observations upon the financial policy of the Government as embodied in the Bill now under discussion. But, in the first place, allow me to congratulate your Lordships upon the conclusive testimony which this Bill bears to the propriety and wisdom of the course which you adopted last year in the rejection of the Bill for the repeal of the paper duties. We all remember how the vote of this House was condemned, not only out of doors, but within the walls of Parliament itself. It was argued that for the House of Lords to throw out a Bill for the repeal of a tax which the House of Commons had passed was in effect to impose a tax upon our sole authority. It was argued that our passing a Bill sent up to us by the Commons for reducing or abolishing a tax was a matter of form, and that we were not entitled to exercise a discretion on the subject. So far was this carried out of doors that from that time to this a paper of considerable circulation has headed its daily impression with a statement of the proportion of taxation which is daily levied upon the sole authority of the House of Lords. The present Bill puts an end to that kind of argument, because the House of Commons have admitted that the paper duties are legally and properly enforced—nay, more, that they ought not to be repealed until October next. I think it is of great importance that this principle has been established; because if it were once admitted that our passing a Bill for repealing a tax was a matter of form, and that the House of Commons

  739
  was the only judge of what burdens should be imposed upon the people, the same doctrine must be applied not only to Bills for taking off taxes, but also to Bills for taking off permanent appropriations. Yet, it has always hitherto been held to be a doctrine of the Constitution that there are certain great expenses which ought not to be left to the mercy or caprice of a popular assembly; that the Civil List, which provides for the dignity of the Crown, the fund necessary for defraying the salaries of the Judges and maintaining their independence, and the sums required to pay the public creditors, should be settled by permanent appropriations; and, therefore, a great distinction has heretofore been drawn, not only by writers on the Constitution, but also by Parliament, and, indeed, all parties in the country, between those permanent taxes which it requires the consent of the whole Legislature to repeal and the sums which are annually voted by the House of Commons. If the doctrine put forward last year had been acquiesced in, this great principle of our Constitution would have been at an end; but, fortunately, it is no longer in danger, because it is now freely admitted that this House is entitled to exercise its judgment upon all Bills that are brought before it, whether they refer to matters of taxation, appropriation, or anything else. At the same time, I quite concur with the noble Earl opposite, that the right is one which ought to be exercised with discretion and judgment. No man could be more convinced than myself that, except in extreme cases, we ought not to interfere with the financial arrangements which have been made by the Commons; and, therefore, though I cannot say that I see in the form in which the present Bill comes before us that desire to conciliate to which reference has been made, but, on the contrary, discover in it traces of a mortified feeling, a sense of being in the wrong, and yet of inability to get out of it, a desire at all hazards to annoy the other party—I concur with the noble Duke who spoke last that the House of Commons had an undoubted right to pass the Bill in its present shape. I am not sure, indeed, that in those extreme cases in which alone our interference is desirable, their passing the financial arrangements of the year in this form would at all interfere with the exercise of our discretion; because if they proposed any arrangement so clearly wrong that public
  740
  opinion—which is the ultimate arbiter of all these questions between the Houses—would not support them, we might send it back for reconsideration, with the perfect certainty that they must bow to that supreme tribunal. I even see some incidental advantages in this form of Bill, and I am quite sure that if the Government had brought forward the financial proposals of last year in the same shape there never would have been any occasion for our exercising our power; because all those who remember what took place in the House of Commons with respect to the financial arrangements for the year will agree with me that if the whole of those arrangements had been included in one Bill—the addition to the income tax, the reduction of the duty upon foreign wines, and the repeal of the paper duty—the final majority in the Commons in favour of the repeal of the paper duty, which was only nine, would have been converted into a minority. The noble Duke who spoke last says the noble Earl opposite (the Earl of Derby) was entirely incorrect in his statement as to the calculations upon which your Lordships were persuaded to reject the Bill for the repeal of the paper duties last year, and he tells us that if it had not been for the bad harvest, which reduced the revenue, the original Estimates of the Government would have been borne out by facts. Let us consider for a moment how far that is true. I rest the decision of this House, in the matter of the paper duties last year, upon an entirely different ground. I say it was justifiable quite irrespective of the harvest and the ultimate result to the revenue. The information at that time before us clearly proved, upon the calculations of the Government themselves, that if the paper duties were repealed there would not be the means of balancing the account at the end of the year. We rejected the Bill on the 21st of May. Less than two months after—on the 16th of July—the Chancellor of the Exchequer brought a supplemental Budget before the House of Commons. In that Budget he was obliged to inform the House that he wanted £3,300,000 more than was provided in the original Estimates. He did not say that this necessity arose from any deficiency in the revenue; he said nothing about the harvest—quite the contrary; he told the House that up to the end of June the revenue was in every respect satisfactory, coming up to or rather exceeding the ex-

  741
  pectations of the Government. The sum of £3,300,000 was wanted for the expenses of the China war. It is quite true, as the noble Duke has stated, that the Chancellor of the Exchequer had made some inadequate provision for the expenses of that war in February; but upon the authority of Parliamentary Returns I deny that he had made as large a provision as information in the possession of the Government at the time warranted. A Return was moved for at the end of last Session by Sir John Pakington of the dates of the orders for sending out the whole force to China. Those orders, as far as the troops are concerned, range from October until the end of 1859; and, as far as the stores are concerned, they begin in September and goon until March, 1860, the great bulk of them being dated before the close of 1859. Therefore, the chief expenses of the expedition had been at that time incurred. Moreover, there is a despatch from Lord Elgin, dated the 11th of July, stating that two days before the whole force to be employed in the war had been collected—I think at Shanghai—and would be ready for action early in the year. Tour Lordships may remember that before we entered into a discussion upon the paper duties, I asked my noble Friend the President of the Council whether the India troops serving in China would be allowed increased pay and allowances, and, if so, whether the Government had made any provision for this additional cost? My noble Friend answered that those troops would be allowed such increased pay and allowances; but that the Government had not then made any provision for this extra cost. In the month of February of last year, when the Budget was laid before the House of Commons, a sum of £500,000 was asked for to defray the expenses of the Chinese war, and Her Majesty's Government had the means of knowing, if they chose to avail themselves of them, that that amount was ludicrously inadequate for the purpose which it was intended to meet. The point was still more clear when, we came to discuss the question of the paper duty in this House, and to assent to the repeal of that tax under such circumstances would have been to deprive the country of a sum absolutely necessary for the expenses which we were about to incur. It is, however, contended—and no doubt it is true—that the calculations embodied in the Budget of last year were seriously affected by the badness of the harvest;
  742
  but it should be borne in mind that the prospects of that harvest were from an early period of the year extremely doubtful; that the sowing-time was most unfavourable, and that throughout the year the growing crops never looked well. It is also true that if a larger amount was lost to the Government owing to the state of the harvest, they obtained as a set-off £800,000 more in the shape of Customs than the Chancellor of the Exchequer had anticipated. I may add that when the right hon. Gentleman introduced his supplementary Budget on the 16th of July he not only availed himself of the entire sum which had been saved to him by the action of this House, but found himself compelled to raise by means of an increased duty on spirits an additional sum of £1,000,000 sterling. Despite, however, of this additional million, and the maintenance of the paper duty, the Government were obliged to admit a deficiency on the expenditure of last year of £2,500,000. It appears, then, that our financial situation at the close of last year was £3,500,000 worse than it was supposed to be at the beginning of the year. Now, it appears to me that the right and wise course, under these circumstances, to adopt would have been to take, in framing the financial scheme for the present year, the most unfavourable view of the revenue as well as of the expenditure, and thus to make sure that we should have, even in the worst state of things, a surplus in the coming year. It has hitherto been the wise practice of Governments and of Parliament so to arrange their financial schemes that if, owing to unfavourable circumstances in one year, there should be a deficiency, there might be in a subsequent year a balance on the other side, so that in the course of a series of years the debt of the country might rather be decreased than augmented. That, it appears to me, was the only honest course to pursue. But I would ask you whether, on the showing of Her Majesty's Government themselves, that is the character of the present Budget? For my own part, I am of the contrary opinion. I believe it to be a Budget which is eminently speculative. If, indeed, your expenditure should happen to be cut down as much as you anticipate; should your harvest be a good one; and none of those threatening circumstances which we now observe affect the revenue, then undoubtedly you may find yourselves in the possession of a surplus, and the cal-

  743
  culations of the Chancellor of the Exchequer prove to be correct. Reflect, however, for a moment to the contingencies to which we are exposed. What is likely to be the result of a short supply of cotton, or a great augmentation in its price? If I am not misinformed its price will be increased, even though the production of the raw material should not be interfered with by that lamentable civil war, the occurrence of which on the other side of the Atlantic we all so much deplore. I am told that in Liverpool the rate of freight of cotton has been raised from ¾d. to 2½d. per lb.; and, if there be this augmentation in the cost of the raw material, is it not certain that you will have a slack trade during a portion of the year, and accompanying a slack trade, as a necessary consequence, a deficient revenue? Then, as to the prospects of the harvest, we know that the autumn was in many parts of the country very unfavourable to the sowing of the corn crops, which are not, I am afraid, very promising in many districts throughout the country. These are facts, my Lords, which the Chancellor of the Exchequer seems not to have taken into account. "We have, I think, an augmentation already of the interest of our unfunded debt. We have, I am told, a very considerable sum to pay in connection with the Stade Dues. Great doubt prevails with respect to the receipt of the indemnity from China, on which so much stress has been laid. Indeed, I am afraid that even if we should receive that indemnity we shall find that we have not made due calculations as to the cost at which it is to be obtained, because we know that it is contingent on our keeping up a force at certain ports. Then comes a most serious question, with respect to which I find no allowance made in the estimate of the Chancellor of the Exchequer—I allude to the probable cost of the war which is now raging in New Zealand. I am afraid that that expenditure, like the expense of the Chinese war, is kept studiously out of sight. These are considerations which, I confess, prevent me from placing confidence in the financial policy of the Government. Looking back at it for several years, I cannot help saying that it is one which appears to rest on no principle deliberately considered and steadily adhered to. Recollecting the speeches of the Chancellor of the Exchequer for some years past, I am struck with the contradictory principles they exhibit within a brief space of time;
  744
  and which principles were thrown overboard as soon as they had served the purpose. A few years ago the present Chancellor of the Exchequer invented, as a novel principle, the plan of raising money by Exchequer bonds, stating that they constituted no loan, but merely an advance, and that, the faith of Parliament being pledged, there was not the slightest doubt that at the proper time the bonds would be paid off. I doubted that that would be the case, and predicted that the bonds would turn out a permanent addition to the debt. "Well, experience has proved that I was correct. In the last year and in the present year the Chancellor of the Exchequer turns round and says that the bonds could be renewed, and that there is not the slightest occasion to pay them off until convenient. Well, if that were so—if it was intended that these bonds should be renewed from time to time—why depart from the old system of Exchequer bills? Again, a few years ago, we were told by the right hon. Gentleman that it was inexpedient that our taxation should rest to too great an extent on annual taxation. That doctrine was also altogether thrown aside last year, before the question of privilege arose, and a very large and dangerous amount of revenue was made to depend on annual taxation. The same high authority, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, denounced the income tax in most unmeasured terms, declaring that it was a tax that ought to be reserved for war, and war only, and urged the claims of the poor for a reduction of the duties on tea and sugar. This want of steadiness and consistency in the views taken by the Government, and especially by a Member of the Government responsible for the finances of the country, leads to very serious evils—to a changing backwards and forwards of taxation which greatly adds to its burden. The inequality and injustice of the income tax are the more felt when the tax is imposed for short periods; but when the income tax varies backwards and forwards, being now high and now low, it presses with extreme severity on certain classes of income. What has been the consequence of the want of steadiness in the views of the Chancellor of the Exchequer? In 1855, with his entire and cordial support, the income tax was reduced to 5d. in the pound. It has since been 10 d., and is now to be 9d., and in one half year it was practically 13 d. in the pound. Parliament and the country have

  745
  a right to expect from the Government greater stability in the measures they submit to Parliament, and in their policy with respect to the taxation of the country. None of your Lordships can have forgotten that in the course of the year 1854, when the Russian war was breaking out, the Chancellor of the Exchequer made most eloquent speeches enforcing the duty of providing for the expenses of that great European war, not by loans, but by taxation. What, however, did the Chancellor of the Exchequer do last year? The expenses of the comparatively small Chinese war were taken in great measure from the balances of the Exchequer and other sources, which proceeding was equivalent to a loan; and the Chancellor of the Exchequer himself submitted to Parliament a proposition for embarking in a great scheme of national defence on borrowed money. Shakspeare says that "borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry," and that is true in respect to States as well as to private individuals; and it is important, when it is proposed to embark in a system of fortifications which will only lead to an absolute waste of enormous sums, that the Chancellor of the Exchequer should call on the House of Commons to provide the money by taxation, and not by borrowing. I find that it is the opinion of officers both of the army and the navy that the expenditure will be fruitless, that the fortifications when completed will be useless owing to the improvements in gunnery; and I believe that this extravagance would not have been sanctioned by the Commons if they had not been enabled to shift a great portion of the burden from their own shoulders to the shoulders of those who are to come after them. There is another important matter, the unanimity of the Government. For the last two or three years it has been said in common conversation that there are portions of the measures proposed by Her Majesty's Government to which certain Members of the Government are entirely opposed. It was rumoured last year that these national defences were opposed by the Chancellor of the Exchequer and other Members of the Government. On the other hand, a rumour was equally current that there were other Members of the Government who rejoiced exceedingly over the decision to which this House came last year on the paper duty. I have no means of knowing any of the secrets of the Cabinet. I hope such reports were not true, but they were cur-
  746
  rent in men's mouths, and they derived much confirmation from the language held by various members of the Government. It is impossible not to be struck by the discrepancy in the tone of various Members of the Government, when the necessity of this expenditure is in question. It reminds one of a humorous passage in Sir Walter Scott's novel of The Antiquary, in which Sir Walter talks of the two partners of the bank. When he was in good circumstances the civil partner was brought to him, who was everything that was smooth, and who asked him only to say what he wanted and the thing should be done. When, on the contrary, difficulties accumulated, the smooth speaker retired, and the other partner came forward, who held very different language, and told him he should be outlawed unless he produced an impossible sum by a given day. The Government resemble, in fact, one of those Dutch clocks in which one figure or another comes out according to the state of the weather. Now, we have one Member of the Government coming forward to recommend a reduction of taxes and dilate on the enormity of the expenditure; and then, when it is argued that a good state of defence ought to be maintained, we have language of a totally different character from other Members of the Government. I should like to see more steadiness in the conduct of the Government, and less want of harmony in their measures. I wish to see a judicious economy and a thrifty provision for our expenditure; but I see a reduction of taxation made that would only be prudent and justifiable in the event of a determination on the part of the Government to make a great reduction of the expenditure; while at the same moment they are proposing measures which tend to keep up this large expenditure. I should like to see a more judicious economy enforced. When I see what is going on abroad and the immense preparation that is going on in various ports of France, I do not think that any reduction can safely be made in our means of defence. But the Government have not taken a statesmanlike view in regard to what ought to be done. Two years the Speech from the Throne recommended an increased grant of money for the navy. I then observed that it was most impolitic, in the then state of naval science, to go on increasing the large ships of war. I was not listened to. The present Government were not then in office, and they

  747
  are not, therefore, responsible for what was then done. The body really responsible is the House of Commons, which takes up these matters so lightly, and urges the Government into measures which, have not sufficiently been considered. What has been the result of the expenditure of 1859? The result is that before these large ships are completed there is not an officer who does not agree that they have become perfectly useless for the purposes for which they were designed. The other day I went on board one of our splendid line-of-battle ships—the Duke of Wellington, at Portsmouth. I was told what an admirable ship she is; how well she sails and steams, and that if she had new engines she would be the finest ship of the class. But how did the officer who told me this conclude? He said, "It makes me melancholy to think that the day for these three-deckers is gone by." What with iron-plated ships, gunboats, large shells, and molten iron, it is impossible to risk these huge three-deckers in action. I believe it is under consideration whether these great ships cannot be cut down with advantage and plated with iron. The Government are doing precisely the same thing with respect to the fortifications that they have done with these ships. The whole art of gunnery and the science of fortification are in a state of revolution. They are spending enormous sums of money, the repayment of which is to be spread over thirty years, and, long before these fortifications are finished, they will be pronounced useless. The public have a right to complain, and to ask the Government on the one hand to keep down the expenditure as low as they can, and that, on the other hand, some settled views shall be deliberately adopted and steadily adhered to by which the expenditure thus increased shall be provided.
  LORD MONTEAGLEsaid, he would not long detain their Lordships, but as he was responsible for the Motion made last year to resist the repeal of the paper duty, and as his arguments on that occasion had been impugned in the present debate, he desired to vindicate the accuracy of the calculations he had made on the probable amount of the deficiency which he apprehended would be found to exist in the Estimates for the late year. He knew that this calculation had been attacked "elsewhere," and a similar charge had been made, and with equal error against his noble
  748
  Friend Lord Derby. The only error they had either of them committed was that of having adopted, as the basis of their reasoning, the hypothesis of Mr. Gladstone's respecting the expiration of the property and war duties. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had admitted that there would be an enormous deficiency if things remained exactly as they were last year and the expiring taxes had not been renewed. This he called, as would be remembered, his great chasm. He (Lord Monteagle) had based his calculations on the same ground; adopting for the sake of argument, Mr. Gladstone's statement of facts, and he had further assumed that good faith would be kept with the public, and that the income tax, and the tea and sugar war duties would be reduced. It was, of course, very easy to say that a calculation was erroneous when the person who made it had not the power of giving an answer, and when the objector claimed and exercised a power of comparing two calculations made upon different bases, as if they rested on the same principles. The fact was that the difference between himself and the right hon. Gentleman arose from the difference of the meaning of the terms which they employed; the right hon. Gentleman used words in one sense at one time, and in a different sense at another, surplus, deficiency, little chasm and great chasm with him had their peculiar meanings; and the consequence was that there was confusion and alternate identity and difference which did not in reality exist. At any rate those who live in glass-houses should not throw stones; and if ever anybody did live in a glass-house it was the right hon. the Chancellor of the Exchequer himself; for seldom was there a case presenting a greater contrast between the predictions of the financier and the results of his measures, than was to be found in relation to the financial propositions of the last few years. According to the Chancellor of the Exchequer's last balance sheet on the 31st of March last the expenditure was no less than £2,558,000 in excess of the income; and he should like to know by what ingenuity it could be shown that this sum could be reconciled with the estimated surplus of £464,000 promised to Parliament, on the 10th February, 1860, or the more modest admission of a deficiency of £1,286,000 acknowledged on the 15th July, 1860. Was there ever witnessed "a greater crash and ruin of unfulfilled prophecies?" How could the deficiency of

  749
  £2,558,000 have been provided for out of the small balance of £464,000 surplus that was calculated on for that year? But it was provided for in part out of very different sources. Financially, the Government had been living by anticipating the Revenue. The income tax, collected in the ordinary manner, would have produced £8,900,000, but by the mode of collection adopted by the Chancellor of the Exchequer it was made to produce £10,900,000; the malt duty, which in the ordinary course of receipt would have produced £5,700,000, actually realized £6,274,000. This could not be considered as a natural increase of revenue, it was a mere discount of Government bills before they were due. The hop duty had proved a disappointment; but by anticipating the two former duties the Chancellor of the Exchequer had added £3,000,000 to the receipts, though not to the Revenue of the year. Thus last year the Government were living, not on increased income, but by anticipated receipts; they were now repeating the same ingenious process, and on a large scale. But it could not be continued, and, unless the expenditure should be largely reduced, or new sources of income discovered, the deficiency must continue, or, perhaps, increase. He feared, therefore, that the financial statement of this year would prove fallacious like the last. This year, as well as the last year, there were financial charges kept back. Last year, although the Budget was not stated until after the Defence Commissioners had completed and even presented their Report, and the Government, therefore, well knew the recommendations it contained, they carefully kept out of sight that a large sum of money would be required for fortifications. They maintained an obstinate silence, refusing all information, and withheld a Report which, though dated 7th February, 1860, was not delivered to Parliament till the 13th June. They then obtained a loan of £2,000,000 to be raised on terminable annuities for the expenditure of the last year. The total estimate was no less than £9,000,000; yet the Government had not informed Parliament how much would be required for these defences in the course of the present year. Nor had they told them how the means were to be provided for to defray the increased interest on the unfunded debt. What would be the full and ultimate demand on the public purse was still left a matter o mystery and concealment Nor was this
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  all; further services were now named, though not included in the Budget; there was a proposal to settle the question of the Stade Dues by money compensation; but how much was to be paid, and when had not been as yet officially stated. The inconvenience of such a mode of dealing with the finances piecemeal had been shown last year when the Chancellor of the Exchequer was compelled to go down to the House and propose a supplementary Budget. How will they reconcile this course with that which they now propose as for their new but not very constitutional decision? The course they propose to adopt was not more rational than extraordinary. It was avowed that the combination of all the financial proposals in one Bill was intended to restrain the free action of the House of Lords, and to this course as a friend to the Constitution of England he (Lord Monteagle) was strongly opposed. He did not think that House in consequence of its successful vote of the last Session was fairly open to the charge of disregarding the rights of the Commons. The new mode of coercion recommended by the Government had been censured by one of the most faithful friends of popular rights. Mr. Fox, in 1787, in allusion to a proceeding similar to that now proposed by the present Government warned the House of Commons against a step that he described as being "Not only a bad precedent for the Commons, but one which would as absolutely preclude the House of Lords from the rights of free debate, as if they followed the example of Oliver Cromwell and silenced that necessary and constitutional branch of the Legislature." [Hansard's Parliamentary History, vol. 28, p. 508.] On a subsequent day Mr. Fox repeated his argument pointing out "the difficulty in which the House of Lords would be placed by the blending together of two objects in one Bill," concluding by the advice that "instead of giving the Lords reason to complain of the Commons for having narrowed their grounds both of debate and voting, they ought studiously to avoid giving cause for such complaint." [March 21, 1787. Hansard's Parliamentary History, vol. 26, p. 757.] He (Lord Monteagle) did not ask their Lordships to reject the Bill for a repeal of the paper duties now sent to them by the Commons a second time, but he called upon them to act with caution, lest in acquiescing in the objectionable union of two differing and contradictory

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  financial enactments they might be held to adopt a principle capable of unlimited application, and practically restricting the rights of that House, and its legislative freedom of action. In the present instance could the House of Lords believe that the blending together of these two Sills was at all necessary to prevent any interference with the rights of the Commons? The deliberate decisions of the other House were always received with respect by their Lordships, and the decision of the Lords as pronounced last Session by a majority of eighty-nine votes was no assertion of usurped privileges, but the exercise of an unquestionable right. This had now ceased to be a matter of controversy. Yet that decision had last Session led to an almost unexampled amount of vituperation coming from certain quarters not, perhaps, wholly disinterested. That vituperation had been overcome mainly by the good sense and feeling of the people at largo. Their Lordships would recollect the opening of an office in Parliament Street to organize a resistance to what was most untruly designated as the aggression of the Lords. It proved a miserable failure. The proposition to substitute annual for permanent taxation was another mode which was recommended for coercing the House of Lords; but he begged again to warn the Government of the serious nature of the course they seemed but too ready to untie in adopting. Let them consider the consequences that would flow from converting our permanent taxation into taxes annually voted. This would be fatal to Mr. Pitt's greatest measure—the establishment of the Consolidated Fund—and would disturb the security of all charges placed upon that fund from the Civil List of the Sovereign to the deposit of the peasant in savings banks. To deprive the fund holders of the security they at present possessed was a proceeding of too much danger to be compensated even by the magnificent idea countenanced by high authorities of coercing the House of Lords. He feared that the abandonment of the paper duty had been resolved on, not for any public purpose but to afford some consolation to certain parties for the check they had received last year from the wise and he would add the popular proceeding of that House in the last Session. Another important question deserved a more serious consideration. A contingency which now seemed imminent, had in 1842 been foreseen and announced by the sagacity of Sir Robert Peel. It
  752
  seemed to be approaching rapidly. In considering the financial state of England you are told by official authority that you are bound to take into account the financial position of India. Mr. Laing, the financial representative of the Government of India, had recently included in his Budget an announcement of incalculable importance. His words were as follows:—
  "I have only allowed for a small decrease in the Home Charges proportionate to what we know of the actual numbers in Report—namely, from £2,772,610 in 1860–1, to £2,500,000 in 1861–2; but I hope and believe the reduction will be much larger. It is perfectly manifest that the officers and men belonging to Indian regiments in depôt are as much a reserve for England as for India. In case of any sudden and serious danger threatening England there is no doubt that these troops would be available there, and it is not fair that India should pay the full cost of the reserve establishments in India under such circumstances. The day is past when England can consider India as a sort of milch-cow on which to draw for a little here and a little there in order to ease an English Estimate or resuscitate an English Budget. Strict and impartial justice must be the rule in all money matters between England and India if England wishes to get a return for her capital, which will soon amount to £100,000,000 invested in Indian securities and railways, and wishes to see India the best source of supply for her raw material and the best market in the world for her staple manufactures. I know that arrangements are pending at home by which we hope to commute all charges for depot or, otherwise, for a fixed sum for every soldier in India."—Bombay Times, May 11.
  This is frank, and these statements held out very clearly a prospect that at least some portion of the military expenditure in India must hereafter be provided for in the English Estimates. From the observations he had already felt it his duty to make he (Lord Monteagle) believed that there would be a difficulty in meeting expenditure so increased, and in such case next year we might be driven to impose new taxes. We shall then regret the unwise step we take in repealing the paper duties. They were now about to repeal an indirect tax on paper, and to diminish a direct tax—the penny in the pound imposed on property. But this apparent equality in the apportionment of relief was but delusive, the country must remember that the penny of the income tax might, and probably would, be reimposed hereafter to meet any deficiency; while, if they now gave up the paper duties, it was perfectly impossible ever to revive them. He must not, however, be misunderstood. He was no admirer of the paper duties, or indeed of any other

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  tax. All taxes were necessary evils. He would be glad to repeal a tax if it could be done without risk; but it behoved Parliament to select well the taxes chosen for repeal, and above all things to be cautious in dealing with a source of revenue which, once given up, could never be restored. The taxes which had the first claim to be remitted or repealed were, in his judgment, those imposed to provide for the exigencies of war. Introduced to meet the pressure of an emergency, Parliament was logically and even morally bound to reduce or abolish them after that emergency had ceased. To this the faith of Parliament was pledged. He was surprised to hear it asserted that the increased tea and sugar duties were not to be considered as war taxes. Why, that was the very appellation which bad been applied to those taxes by the Ministers themselves. The noble Lord concluded by disclaiming any asperity of feeling towards the Government in the remarks which he had made. He had risen before the noble Lord to his left (the Lord President) to give him the advantage of a reply, and he did not apprehend in his case, as unfortunately had been shown in the case of his colleague the noble Duke (the Duke of Argyll) who had preceded him, that Doris amara suam intermisceat undam.
  THE DUKE OF RUTLANDsaid, that as he had gained his object by eliciting an expression of the opinion of the House, he would accede to the suggestion of his noble Friend (the Earl of Derby) and would not press his Amendment.
  EARL GRANVILLEsaid, that since the noble Duke (the Duke of Rutland) had acceded to the appeal made from both sides of the House and had withdrawn his Amendment, he would not trespass on their Lordships' time by offering any lengthened reply to the observations made in the course of the debate. His embarrassment in rising to address their Lordships on a question of such vast importance was increased by finding himself so liable to offend the critical ears of his noble Friend opposite (the Earl of Derby). His noble Friend had objected to his peculiar phraseology in pronouncing the word "wropped," which he presumed the noble Earl pronounced "wrapped." This, however, was a question of personal pronunciation, and he must assert the right of every Englishman to pronounce certain words in the way which pleased him best; and before he could bow to the noble Earl's cor-
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  rection he must know whether it was wrong to pronounce the name of the capital of the central county in England "Derby" instead of "Darby." He must say he felt much gratified with the course the debate had taken. It was most satisfactory to him to know that, after that very short discussion, the Bill would receive the assent of their Lordships' House without further opposition. They had now heard all that could be said against the present Budget. ["No!"] He had a great opinion of the mercy of the noble Lords who had spoken against the measure, but he must presume that they had urged all the objections which they could find against it. The points upon which the noble Duke chiefly relied in opposing the proposals of the Government were the absence of any surplus, the superior claims of the tea and sugar duties over the paper duties for repeal, and the mode in which the Bill had been introduced into their Lordships' House. He had already stated the reason why the Government were entitled to assume that their estimated surplus was correct. The noble Earl had laid down a rule with which he could not agree. It was incumbent on the Chancellor of the Chancellor of the Exchequer to give a straightforward account of his anticipation as to the revenue, founded on the calculations laid before him by the different Departments. The noble Earl said it was his duty to place his estimate of the expenditure at the highest possible point, and to place the income at the lowest amount which he expected to receive. The noble Earl employed the word "honest" repeatedly in his speech; yet the course he suggested would not be, he would not say honest, but either expedient or wise. The Minister was bound to explain distinctly to Parliament the exact financial position of the country, and if he anticipated a large surplus it was not competent for him, especially in times when Governments were not omnipotent, to represent that surplus at a fancifully reduced amount, instead of proposing to apply it to the remission of taxes which, in his deliberate judgment, ought to be, and safely could be, remitted. By following the noble Earl's recommendation he might gain his object the first year; but, when the House of Commons and the country came to know that the Minister was in the habit of extracting from the pockets of the people more taxation than was required to defray the pub-

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  lic expenditure, there would be an immediate reaction, and the proceeding would be defeated. He would not enlarge on the inconsistency of denying the surplus and yet advocating a reduction of the tea duty, involving a greater sacrifice of revenue than that proposed by the Government. As to the tea duty being a war tax, its present rate was imposed after the war had been entirely closed. The present Chancellor of the Exchequer strongly objected to that measure at the time, and in a manner, as he thought, more violent than the occasion required, even if he had been right in his opinion. But only three months afterwards, when the expenditure—although at a period of peace—came to bear more of the character of a war expenditure, his right hon. Friend came forward and cordially approved the course taken by the then Chancellor of the Exchequer. With respect to the form in which the present Bill was introduced, he owned that the debate entirely satisfied him. The noble Duke opposite (the Duke of Rutland) was the only person who thought the measure offensive to their Lordships and unconstitutional. Most of the other speakers had admitted that it was quite constitutional, and perfectly within the powers of the other House. A noble Earl near him (Earl Grey) had gone even further, for he said the House of Commons were justified in the course they had taken. The noble Lord the Comptroller of the Exchequer (Lord Monteagle) had said that to frame the Bill in its present shape was wholly unnecessary. It was all very well to state that, but, if last year, before the rejection of the repeal of the paper duty, he had suggested in the Cabinet that the second reading of the Bill would be thrown out by their Lordships, the idea would have been treated as incredible. The noble Baron had directed his remarks principally against the Chancellor of the Exchequer; but, as the right hon. Gentleman was not there to answer them, he thought it would have been better and more dignified if some of those remarks had been avoided. A great part of the noble Baron's argument was levelled, not against that Bill, but against the proceedings of the Chancellor of the Exchequer last year, and even against the propositions of the present Chancellor of the Exchequer when he was previously in office. Noble Lords opposite seemed exceedingly anxious to defend themselves. The noble Baron said they discussed the
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  repeal of the paper duty in August last with the knowledge of a bad harvest. A simple reference to Hansard would show that it was in May that they debated and rejected it. Another noble Earl (Earl Grey) said they had a knowledge of the bad harvest in May.
  EARL GREYexplained that he had said there was then a suspicion as to the harvest, but that the rejection of the Bill was not justified on that ground, but on the fact that in a subsequent statement the Chancellor of the Exchequer said there was a necessity for additional taxation.
  EARL GRANVILLE: It was certainly stated that there was a great deal of doubt as to the harvest. The noble Earl went further; he said that in July the Chancellor of the Exchequer did not admit that the chances of the harvest were bad, but that up to that moment the revenue was very good. The noble Earl complained that troops and stores were ordered out to China in the autumn. That was perfectly true, and it was for the purpose of sending them that increased Estimates were taken, an additional sum of £500,000 being asked for in the military and naval departments. The whole depended on when that war broke out and how long it lasted. The noble Baron, who was formerly Chancellor of the Exchequer (Lord Monteagle), laughed at the idea of the weather being regarded as an element in the deficiency. He must say he was not a little surprised at this. That very autumn on malt and hops alone there was a deficiency of £1,000,000, attributable, of course, to the weather; and something like another £900,000 on spirits, from the state of the barley crop. A good deal of irrelevant matter had been introduced into the debate to which he would not refer. He should not enter into the financial statement of Mr. Gladstone, and it would be even more out of place to go into the question mooted by the noble Earl (Earl Grey) with regard to the Government having borrowed money last year for fortifications. Again, with regard to the construction of a certain class of ships now building, to which the noble Earl had objected, he thought that a very fair subject for debate, but certainly not upon the present occasion. He did not think it necessary to go into the financial statement of Mr. Laing, an extract from which had been read by the noble Baron, whether directly bearing on this country or on India; but this he might say, that the in-

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  ference which the noble Baron drew from it was altogether unfounded. The noble (Earl Grey) had spoken of rumours of disunion in the Cabinet. Considering the noble Earl's connections and intimate relations with them all, he could not help observing that if such a thing as disunion existed and was known to the noble Earl, it could have become known to him only by the confidence of private communication, and then his high sense of honour would have made it impossible for him to introduce the matter as an element of discussion; but if it was unknown to him, and he had based his observations merely from flying rumours, there was no justification for the noble Earl having made it an argument in debate. But he did not think that his noble Friend was quite the person to talk about disunion in Cabinets. With regard to what took place in Lord John Russell's Cabinet, his (Earl Granville's) lips were of course sealed; but, earlier than that, when he was very young in political life, he remembered hearing a story which was current at the clubs at the time of Lord Melbourne's Government. His noble Friend the noble Earl objected to all the measures of his colleagues; at length Lord Melbourne requested him to sit down and write his objections. Rumour said that the noble Earl declined to do so; whereon Lord Melbourne, rubbing his hands, said, "When you have no one to object to but yourself you cannot get on." He congratulated their Lordships on the general tone of the debate, and still more on the practical termination of it. Prophecies were not safe things to indulge in; but this measure had been, well considered. It was right in principle, and likely to lead to the same happy results that all similar measures for the removal of restrictions on commerce had succeeded in accomplishing.
  Motion agreed to; Bill read 2a accordingly; and Committed to a Committee of the Whole House on Monday next.
  House adjourned at Ten o'clock, to Monday next, Eleven o'clock.