Sitting of 27 June 1865

MINUTES.
PUBLIC BILLS—Committee—Marriages (Lambourne) * [Lords] [237]
Report—Marriages (Lambourne) * [Lords] [237].
Considered as amended—Clerical Subscription [Lords] [199]; Turnpike Acts Continuance * [227]; Colonial Docks Loans * [226].
Third Reading—County Courts Equitable Jurisdiction * [Lords] [236]; Expiring Laws Continuance * [235]; Poor Law Board Continuance, &c. * [238].
The House met at Twelve of the clock.

COURT OF REFEREES ON PRIVATE BILLS.

  STANDING ORDERS.
  Standing Order 88 read.
  COLONEL WILSON PATTENin rising, pursuant to notice, to call attention to the Report of the Committee on the Court of Referees on Private Bills, said, that before he adverted to the alterations in the Standing Orders which he was about to propose, he wished to say a few words on the Private Business of the House, not only in its present state, but as it had existed for some years past. The attention of the right hon. Gentleman in the Chair had been directed to the subject for several
  862
  years past; but many hon. Members might not recollect the period when the introduction of railways so greatly increased the Private Business of the House, that it was found necessary to abandon the old system of district Committees, no longer adequate to deal with the Railway Bills, and to substitute Committees of five for each Bill. That was a most important change, and one which gave satisfaction to the public. But business continued to increase so much that it was soon found impossible to transact it without appointing so many Committees that the Parliamentary Bar made complaints of their inability to discharge their duties to their clients. It was also found that so much variety of opinion and such conflicting decisions were arrived at by Committees that it was impossible for parties applying for Bills to form a judgment in regard to the result of the inquiry. These difficulties led to another alteration—the formation of the Chairman's Panel of seven or eight Members, who acted as Chairmen of all the Committees to which the railway business of the Session was referred; railways were grouped into districts, and the number of tribunals was thus greatly reduced. This was a great improvement. Greater uniformity was obtained, and the length of the proceedings on Private Bills was curtailed. This system, however, now failed to meet the requirements of the day. If hon. Members would look at the Votes they would find that in no one Session for some time past had either House of Parliament been able to transact the Private Business in a proper manner. Its increase in the meanwhile so largely added to the duties of Members that complaints were continually made and hopes expressed that some other mode of transacting it might be devised. The present Session was not altogether a fair illustration, but he would remind hon. Members that a few days since he had brought under the notice of the House the fact that there stood on the notice paper not less than sixteen Notices of Motion by the hon. Member for Walsall (Mr. Charles Forster) for suspending the Standing Orders as the only means by which the business of the one House might be properly transmitted to the other. During the last eight days not less than fifty-five Motions of that kind had been made. On that very day there were five or six Motions of a similar kind—making sixty Notices of Motion within nine days to suspend the Stand

  863
  ing Orders. These Orders had been enacted for public objects and for the protection of private and public interests. If they were of no importance, let them be wiped off at once; but, if otherwise, it was inconsistent with the order and regularity of their proceedings that they should be suspended sixty times within nine days. Several Committees had been appointed from time to time to consider this subject, and on all hands, without exception, a common complaint was heard that the system of transacting the Private Business of the House did not work satisfactorily. Last Session several Members met together to consider what improvements might be made. Mr. Sotheron Estcourt, the right hon. Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Bouverie), and several others were present, and offered suggestions. He (Colonel Wilson Patten) had suggested that at least time might be saved to Members by detaching from the inquiry before Committee all that part of the business that did not relate to legislative merits, but to the engineering and other statistical details. The subject was afterwards referred to a Select Committee, which recommended that a trial should be made of the suggestion which he had the honour to make; and the House ratified the recommendation of the Committee. Having had the experience of one Session the House was now in a position to determine whether, on the whole, the advantages gained by the appointment of the Court of Referees were such as to induce it to continue the system for another Session, or for good. He would now tell the House the result of the inquiry of its Select Committee. The Committee proposed to themselves three heads of inquiry. The first was, had there been a saving of time to Members of the House? Secondly, if there had been such saving of time, had there been a saving of expense, or, if not, what increase of expense to the parties had occurred? Thirdly, had the new system tended on the whole to expedite the Private Business of the House? The Committee called before them several witnesses best calculated to give a Bound opinion on the matters at issue; but with regard to the Bar, he (Colonel Wilson Patten) did not select a single witness. He requested that at least two barristers who were most opposed in principle to the Court of Referees might be deputed to give evidence. He did the same by the Parliamentary agents. He also endeavoured to ascertain the
  864
  opinion of the Chairmen of Select Committees in regard to the saving of time by hon. Members serving on Committees. The following Members of the Parliamentary Bar were examined by the Committee:—Mr. Phinn, Mr. Davison, Mr. Coleridge, Mr. Rodwell, and Mr. Vernon Harcourt. Mr. Phinn was unfavourable to the new system; he doubted whether it had either saved expense to the parties or the time of the House. It appeared, however, that Mr. Phinn had not only included the time spent by hon. Members, but also the time during which the Referees had been occupied. Mr. Davison doubted whether there had been a saving of time, yet thought that one branch of the inquiry, the locus standi, was better dealt with before the Referees than the Committees. Mr. Coleridge was of opinion that there had been a saving both of time and expense. Mr. Rodwell expressed a similar opinion, and was in favour of the Court of Referees. Mr. Vernon Harcourt was adverse to the principle of the double inquiry, but, in justice to the Court of Referees, he (Colonel Wilson Patten) should like to read to the House a portion of the evidence given by this gentleman. Being asked his opinion upon the results of the Court of Referees during the present Session, he said—
  "I should wish, in the first instance, to say that it is impossible to express too strongly my opinion of the extraordinary work which has been done by the Referees in the course of this Session, both in respect of the stupendous industry which they have shown, and the great ability which has been brought to bear upon the questions with which they have dealt. All I have to say is, that if you could find a sufficient number of persons to constitute Committees, as efficient as the Courts of Referees, the whole system would be superfluous, because I do not suppose that anybody would think of removing from a body so constituted the consideration of the whole of the question which is to be decided. I have been before the Referees in cases of the greatest possible consequence, and the only feeling which I have had is one of regret that, after gentlemen of such competence to deal with the question have gone into the inquiry in a most elaborate manner, just at the moment when the matter is ripe for a final decision, it should be withdrawn from them and carried before another tribunal, which has, necessarily, a much less acquaintance with the question upon which it has to pronounce."
  The Parliamentary agents examined were Mr. Coates, Mr. Venables, and Mr. Gregory. Mr. Coates doubted whether time had been saved, and pointed out instances in which the new system had caused unnecessary delay and increased expense. Mr. Venables was in favour of the new

  865
  system in all respects, and hoped it would not be given up. Mr. Gregory preferred a system of his own, but thought that the new system led to a saving of time. The only engineer examined was Mr. Harrison, who suggested a mode by which estimates might be put forward in greater detail at the commencement of the Session. His hon. Friend the Member for Ipswich (Mr. Adair) had given notice of a Motion for carrying that suggestion into effect. The Committee also had the evidence of the Chairman of Ways and Means (Mr. Dodson). He had given the subject his impartial consideration, and he was in favour of a further trial of the new court. The hon. Member for Knaresborough (Mr. Woodd) and the hon. Member for Taunton (Mr. A. Mills) were also examined, and they were on the whole favourable. The former was of opinion that the labours of Members in private Committees had been materially shortened by the Referees; and the latter was of the same opinion, but thought that further improvements might be made. The result was that it appeared to the Committee desirable to continue the present system, subject to such modifications as he had given notice of. There was a Standing Order limiting the number of counsel before the Court of Referees to one. Complaints were made by Mr. Phinn, Mr. Vernon Harcourt, and Mr. Coates against that restriction. On the other hand, evidence was given that in the generality of cases the rule was beneficial. There were only three or four cases in which an inquiry occupied more than one day, and the Committee came to the conclusion that the existing rule should be adhered to, but that the Referees should have the power of admitting more than one counsel if they thought fit, on the application of the parties. Another suggestion was, that where the Referees decided that the estimates were insufficient, the Bill was not to be proceeded with except by Order of the House. The Committee held this to be a good rule, as tending to insure a stricter performance of the requirements of the House, and that the estimates and the engineering details should come before the House in a more perfect state than they had hitherto done. A few Sessions ago the leading members of the Bar complained of the shortness of the sittings of private Committees, which nominally met at twelve and adjourned at four; but the average duration of each
  866
  sitting was practically about three hours and a half. With a view to remedy this defect the hon. Member for Ipswich (Mr. Adair) proposed that all the Committees over which he presided should meet at eleven instead of twelve. The right hon. Member for Durham (Mr. Mowbray) also endeavoured to carry this change into effect, but it was found impossible to obtain the concurrence of Members generally; and this was not surprising. To be in the Committee-room at eleven, a Member must leave his house about half-past ten. This allowed a totally inadequate interval for a due attention to his duties to his constituents, to say nothing of his correspondence and private affairs. At four o'clock he had to perform his duties in the House, which sat from that hour to twelve and one o'clock, and sometimes later. He thought, therefore, that this alteration ought not to be forced on Members. Every witness before the Committee spoke in favour of two points—the taking away the decision of locus standi from private Committees and giving it to a separate tribunal. The Court of Referees had sat on an average six hours a day, and one witness stated that they did more in six hours than would be done in a sitting of two days before a Committee of that House. Under these circumstances it was for the House to determine whether they would adhere to the recommendation of the Committee—namely, that, with certain alterations, the Court of Referees should be continued to another Session. The Committee believed that many of the defects of the new system might be met by the experience acquired in its working. No doubt the system of double inquiry was open to objection; but on the whole the Committee were, he thought, justified in the conclusion to which they came, that there had been a great saving of time to Members. There had been an increase of expense, no doubt, to certain parties, but on the whole it was clear that a saving of expense had been effected, and that the expedition with which the Private Business of the Session had been transacted had been much greater than if it had been referred entirely to Select Committees of the House. The Committee were of opinion that when the Court of Referees had discharged their duties under the Standing Orders with reference to estimates and statistics, they should inquire into the whole case, with the consent of the parties, and report to the House, and that when the

  867
  Referees agreed that a Bill should be proceeded with, it should be referred to the Chairman of Ways and Means, and treated as an unopposed Bill. He thought that, without infringing upon the constitutional rule of the House, some further time might be saved by adopting this rule. He was convinced that the House had done wisely in keeping the Private Business within its own jurisdiction. He believed that the Private Business was on the whole well Conducted by the House, but that the time was coming when it must be still more seriously considered by both Houses of Parliament. Every one knew the dilemma in which the Legislature was placed at the present moment. Parliament had been sitting for five months, and now, at the end of June and on the eve of a dissolution, he believed there were forty Bills before the other House which their Lordships had not yet had time to consider. One great advantage of the new Court he had omitted to state—namely, their lengthened sittings. Two Members of that House—the hon. Member for Waterford (Mr. Has-sard) and the hon. Member for Ipswich (Mr. Adair) had by a sacrifice of time, which the public could scarcely sufficiently appreciate, devoted themselves in a manner beyond all praise to the duty of presiding over the Courts of Referees. He begged to thank also his right hon. Friend in the Chair for the selection he had made in the members of the Court of Referees, which had given satisfaction to every one. He had not heard a single doubt or criticism in regard to the Gentlemen selected to sit upon these Courts. They had been selected by the Speaker without regard to party or to any other consideration, except the best mode of transacting the business of the House. The Select Committee having seen that the Chairman of the Court of Referees had given up their time from the very beginning of the Session to the discharge of their onerous duties, thought it was not fair to ask them to continue their services without compensation. He (Colonel Wilson Patten) was in the first instance opposed to the payment of Members of that House for the services in question; but he saw no other way of meeting the difficulty, and he was now prepared to waive every objection to the payment of the two Chairmen who presided over the Court of Referees. He must now apologize to the House for having taken this matter up. The management of the
  868
  Private Business of that House was really in the hands of his hon. Friend the Chairman of Committee of Ways and Means (Mr. Dodson). He looked upon himself as acting under his hon. Friend and it had been with some reluctance, and only because he had for many years filled an office which made him more immediately acquainted with the services of Members on Private Committees, and their grievances, that he had put himself forward on the present occasion.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the said Standing Order be repealed."—(Colonel Wilson Patten.)
  MR. AYRTONobjected to the suggestion of the hon. and gallant Member for North Lancashire as an important change in the constitution of the House, and as contrary to the solemn assurance given by the late Chairman of Ways and Means that the new system should be so carried out that the House should never be reduced to the position of paying its Members. But by this proposal the Speaker was enabled to convert any two Members into his own stipendiary officers. He must also say that the House was not in the position to consider a change of so much importance, inasmuch as it must itself soon cease to exist. One of the greatest evils of the present system of conducting the Private business of the House arose from the fact that there were none of those legal rules of procedure which, in his opinion, were necessary to enable a Court to arrive at a proper judicial conclusion. It would certainly be an improvement to separate the question of locus standi from the trial of the cause, and to that extent he entirely acquiesced in what had been done; but after that preliminary point had been disposed of he could not understand upon what principle there should be two Courts to hear each case.
  MR. LIDDELLsaid, he could not believe it to be fair to call upon two Members of the House to devote the whole of their time to expediting the Private business, and to make great sacrifices of their own affairs without awarding them some adequate compensation—it was another question whether, at the close of a Parliament, and in a very thin House, hon. Members should be asked to come to a decision upon so important a question as whether they should be paid. Possibly it might be well to leave it over to a future occasion. He entirely acquiesced in the decision of the

  869
  Committee, and he thought that the Court of Referees might be allowed in many cases to give an opinion upon the question of expediency as well as of fact.
  SIR EDWARD COLEBROOKEsaid, he quite agreed with the hon. and learned Member for the Tower Hamlets that the question of paying Members was one which ought to be maturely considered before the House came to any decision, but he had no hesitation in saying if the system was to be continued it was a question which ought to be faced, for it was impossible that any Gentlemen should be expected to give their continuous attention to the business of Committees without some remuneration. The tribunal was, from the nature of its constitution, a weak one, and it was necessary to consider whether it could not be improved. With regard to the important question, how far the system had inspired public confidence, he felt a strong conviction that it had done so to a considerable extent, and that if it was continued it would maintain its position in that respect. A suggestion had been made that when a question was before the Referees they should be at liberty to inquire into the whole matter. He was convinced that the success which had hitherto attended the working of the new plan arose from the Gentlemen who acted as Chairmen and their assessors giving their continuous and undivided attention to the business, and he was of opinion that if questions were to be wholly decided by the Referees, there would be a great saving of time and expense, and greater equity in the ultimate decision. The work spread over a great number of Committees might be concentrated in two or three tribunals, and he thought it desirable that power might be given to Committees to sit when the House was not sitting. Two or three tribunals sitting continuously would, he believed, be able to dispose of the whole of the Private business in a satisfactory manner; but then the House must be prepared to give an adequate remuneration to the Gentlemen who gave up their whole time and experience to the work.
  LORD HOTHAMdesired to point out that if the settlement of this matter were left over to the new Parliament a considerable portion of the Session would be lost for the transaction of Private business. He concurred in wishing to continue the system, so that the House might give it a fair trial, which it had not yet
  870
  had. While the House had had an unusually large number of Private Bills to deal with, it had had an unusually brief period to dispose of them. There might be forty Bills yet to be disposed of, but these would be got through without inconvenience if Parliament sat until the usual period of the year. He felt confident that his hon. and gallant Friend (Colonel Wilson Patten) had fairly quoted the evidence of witnesses before the Committee, yet it was contrary to the practice of the House to come to a decision on the very day that the evidence was laid before them. He had always entertained the greatest objection to the introduction of a system under which Members of the House were to be paid for their services, and he should reserve his judgment on the point until a Motion for the payment of the Chairmen of the Court of Referees should be formally made.
  MR. HENLEYsaid, he did not think the House ought to tie themselves or those who might come after them in the new Parliament to the great changes which were indicated in the proposal submitted to the House by the hon. and gallant Member. He was perfectly willing to consent to the pure and simple continuance of the Court of Referees, for he was not only willing but desirous to give the present system another fair trial. But the hon. and gallant Gentleman had given notice of important alterations in the system introduced this Session. It was not two Chairmen alone who might be appointed. The Resolution referred to an unlimited number, and it appeared to be the necessary consequence of agreeing to it that the Chairmen should be paid. The House, in its present condition, ought to pause before it acceded to so grave a proposition. No one would undervalue the labours of the hon. Gentleman the Member for Waterford (Mr. Hassard) or the hon. Gentleman the Member for Ipswich (Mr. Adair); but directly they opened the door to the payment of Members they did not know where the thing might stop. The three principal questions referred to the Court of Referees were the estimates, the engineering details, and the locus standi. But, according to the plan sketched out by the hon. and gallant Member for North Lancashire, every other issue that the parties could agree to submit to them was to be decided by the Court. The opponents and promoters of a Bill were usually the only parties before a Committee, and

  871
  on this new scheme he did not see who were to take care of the public. If the Court of Referees agreed to the Bill, it was to go before the Chairman of Ways and Means. But suppose he said the preamble was not proved? The Bill would then come to be debated on the floor of the House. The House had not yet seen the evidence taken before the Select Committee, and they ought to have an opportunity of considering the subject fully before coming to so important a conclusion. He trusted the House would not be called upon to express any opinion beyond that of simply saying that the system should be continued.
  MR. DODSONsaid, that the House must have felt that no apology was needed from his hon. and gallant Friend (Colonel Wilson Patten) for undertaking to bring this subject before the House. The appointment of the Court of Referees had proved successful beyond all his expectations. He had deemed it open to the fundamental objection of a divided jurisdiction. That was still his opinion. He had also doubted whether it would practically work; but herein he had been mistaken. It had worked on the whole well, and had effected a great improvement on the former state of things. The effect had been to expedite business, to save time and labour to Members of that House, and at the same time the questions of engineering and estimates, which were the special subjects of consideration before the Referees, had been sifted and investigated in a manner never before performed. He thought that the Courts of Referees might be composed of Members of the House assisted by permanent assessors, and should then have the same power as ordinary Committees of dealing with Private Bills, and reporting upon them; but as the Committee had recommended that the system should be continued as it had hitherto been conducted he hoped the House would consent to the Resolution—which proposed that where all parties are agreed the Referees shall have power to inquire into the whole subject matter of the Bill and report to the House; the Bill thereafter to be treated as an unopposed Bill. The right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Henley) asked who were to represent the public, but the public would not be in a worse position than if the Bill went before a Select Committee. He did not see how the interests of the public would be in the least degree endangered if the whole question went
  872
  before the Referees. With regard to the payment of the Chairmen, it was not in reason to be expected that the present system could be continued for another Session unless the House were prepared to remunerate Members who devoted the whole of their time to the duties. The payment of these gentlemen was almost a sine quâ non of the continuance of the system, for he did not believe the House would find gentlemen who would permanently undertake these duties another Session without payment. Their duties had been very great and serious. The Courts had been sitting at the rate of six hours a day, and then the Chairman had, in addition, the labour of framing their reports in the evening to be laid before the House the next day. It was said an expiring Parliament should not deal with so important a question, and this appeared to be one of the principal objections felt to the repeal of the Standing Order before them; but there was always a great deal of pressure at the beginning of a Session, and if the House could not start with the Private Business at once there was the greatest possible difficulty in getting through with it. The duty of the present Parliament, as it seemed to him, if they thought the new system of Private Business worked well, was to bequeath it to the next Parliament with every facility to enable that Parliament to take up and continue the experiment. He could not believe that the present House of Commons would be exceeding its limits if it handed down the present system with such alterations and improvements as experience had suggested. If the present Parliament rescinded the prohibition of the payment of Chairmen of the Courts it would not preclude the next Parliament from dealing as it thought fit with the question of remuneration. No remuneration would be granted except by a Vote of the House, when the whole question would be discussed. He trusted that the House would agree to the repeal of the Standing Order now proposed.
  MR. MOWBRAYthought that the speech of the hon. Gentleman, the Chairman of Ways and Means, had disclosed the greatest possible objection to the proposal now made, for he said that the payment of the Chairmen was a sine quâ non of obtaining the services of competent gentlemen to act in that capacity. The answer was, first, that such a question should not be brought before Parliament without distinct notice.

  873
  The blue-book was only delivered at ten that morning, and at twelve o'clock the House was invited to weigh the evidence and decide upon the recommendations of the Committee. An important question affecting Members of that House was now raised—namely, whether their attention was to be withdrawn from the consideration of the national, imperial, and political questions intrusted to them, and to be entirely occupied with the details connected with Private Bills. Another objection was, that the present Motion raised the question of the payment of these hon. Members in the most indirect manner, and without the least notice. He did not wish to prejudge the question, but he entertained the strongest objection to the payment of Members for services rendered in that House. A belief prevailed in the minds of some people that Members of Committees on Private Bills received ten guineas a day for their attendance. The reply had always been that, with the exception of the Speaker and the Chairman of Ways and Means, no Member of that House received any remuneration for the discharge of the Private Business of the House. If they once began to remunerate Members where was it to stop? If the Referees were to be paid would not the Chairmen of Committees on Private Bills expect remuneration? If their claims were admitted how long could they expect Chairmen of Select Committees, who sat day by day for several weeks of the Session, to serve without payment? If the House agreed to this Resolution, the Government would feel compelled in the next Session of Parliament to propose a Vote for the payment of these Chairmen. The next Parliament ought not to find the question thus settled for it, and he trusted that his hon. and gallant Friend would not press his Motion.
  MR. MILNER GIBSONsaid, the House must see that his hon. and gallant Friend, having moved for the appointment of the Committee to inquire into the working of the new system, could not do otherwise than bring under its notice the recommendations of the Committee, and to propose such Standing Orders as they deem desirable. It was, however, obvious that, if they went beyond a mere Continuance Bill, there ought to be something like a general concurrence of opinion in any change that might be made. It was difficult to answer the appeal that the evidence had only just been laid before
  874
  the House. Late, however, as the period of the Session was, it became the duty of the House to signify to the public what kind of tribunal would next Session begin the consideration of Private Bills—the present House of Commons ought to leave some directions to the future Parliament; but he would suggest to his hon. and gallant Friend that he would do well either to withdraw his Motion and move it again on Monday or agree to the adjournment of the debate.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Debate be now adjourned."—(Mr. Milner Gibson.)
  COLONEL WILSON PATTENsaid, it would not be desirable to withdraw his Motion, and have his speech to make over again, but he would not object to the adjournment of the debate. At the same time he wished to remind the House that at present there was no proposition made by the Committee to pay the Chairman. He only asked the House to try the plan proposed by the Committee as an experiment, and let it be for future consideration whether it should be made permanent or not. All he desired was that these Resolutions should be a continuance of the experiment which had already been tried, subject to the improvements suggested by the Committee. He had no objection to postpone the consideration of the question until Monday, although he could not see what satisfactory object could be attained by a postponement.
  SIR GEORGE GREYsaid, it was natural the House should wish to examine the evidence before it came to a decision, and it was only with that object his right hon. Friend had moved the adjournment of the debate. No doubt the passing of the Motion now before the House would be regarded as an expression of opinion that the Chairmen ought to be paid, and would pledge the Government to propose the Vote in the next Session of Parliament. He would not express any opinion whether such payment would be advisable or not, but the House ought to know the evidence on which the Committee found their recommendation.
  COLONEL WILSON PATTENsaid, that in spite of their utmost exertions it had been found impossible to get the evidence printed and in the hands of Members before that morning.
  VISCOUNT CRANBOURNEagreed that it was undesirable to come to a vote

  875
  on the question until the evidence had been considered. Still the House would do well not to form an opinion too rashly against the payment of these two gentlemen, or without considering the enormous amount of business performed by them.
  SIR JOHN SHELLEY, in voting for the further trial of the experiment, distinctly understood that the two hon. Gentlemen referred to would not continue their labours next Session unless they were paid. In recommending the continuance of the system next Session, therefore, the Committee regarded the payment of the Chairmen of the Courts of Referees as a sine quâ non. The work they had been called upon to perform had been truly described as enormous.
  MR. LYGONsaid, that if there was a general concurrence of opinion that the experiment ought to be continued, he did not see how the House could postpone the question of the payment of the Chairmen Until next Session.
  MR. GATHORNE HARDYsaid, that if the House rejected the Motion of his hon. and gallant Friend it would be understood that it was opposed to any payment being made. Now, he had been as unwilling as any one to begin a proceeding of that kind, but he had come to the deliberate conclusion that if they insisted on the Chairmen being Members of the House, they would be unable to carry on the present system unless they paid them. He suggested that the House might amend the Standing Orders with the exception of No. 88, and leave the question of remuneration to the Chairmen to be dealt with next Session.
  COLONEL WILSON PATTENthought it probable that if the debate was adjourned to Monday there would be a still smaller House than at present.
  MR. MOWBRAYsuggested, that instead of adjourning the debate it would be better to let any alteration in Standing Order No. 88 remain over for consideration till next Session.
  COLONEL WILSON PATTENconsented to withdraw the proposition for the payment of the Chairmen of the Court of Referees, on condition that the other recommendations of the Committee, to which he did not think there could be any objection were agreed to.
  VISCOUNT CRANBOURNEregretted that his hon. and gallant Friend had yielded himself in this way into the hands of the enemy. Another discussion
  876
  on this subject two or three days hence would have done a great deal of good. The argument that if they paid the Chairmen of these Courts they could not refuse to pay Chairmen of all other Committees was a hobgoblin argument of the purest breed. A superstition more utterly baseless never interfered with a practical, sensible, business-like proposal. He was sure that the salary paid to these gentlemen would not exceed the value of the services they had rendered. The only Member who was paid, except the Speaker, was the Chairman of the Committee of Ways and Means; and if the payment of Members proceeded in the ratio of past progression, the House would arrive at the fifth "point of the charter"—the payment of Members—in about 10,000 years. It was calculated that the new Parliament would be composed to the extent of about one-third new Members, who would have had no experience of the conscription exercised by his hon. and gallant Friend, or the evils and inconvenience of the present system of private business. Surely a Parliament that had had experience was fitter to deal with this subject than a Parliament that had none. He trusted that his hon. and gallant Friend would lose no time, but that in the very first week of the new Session he would introduce the question on which he had now unfortunately given way.
  Motion and Original Question, by leave, withdrawn.
  Standing Order 89 read, and amended.
  Standing Order 90 read, and amended.
  MR. SPEAKER: I wish to offer my personal thanks to those Gentlemen who were so good as to take upon themselves the duties of the Court of Referees at my request. I wish to mention the names of the Chairman of Ways and Means (Mr. Dodson); Mr. Hugh Adair, Chairman of Court of Referees; Mr. Hassard, Chairman; Mr. Rickards, Counsel to the Speaker; the right hon. Sir W. Gibson Craig, Sir John Duckworth, Colonel Stuart (Bedford), Sir Edward Colebrooke (Lanarkshire), Mr. Leveson Gower (Reigate), and Mr. C. W. Wynne (Montgomeryshire) the last three Gentlemen lending their assistance when the pressure became greatest. By the ability and assiduity which all these Gentlemen brought to bear upon their duties, the Private Business of the House has been performed in a manner satisfactory to the House and to the country.
  SIR GEORGE GREYsaid, that although the House, for the reasons assigned, appeared to be disinclined to consider the payment of the Chairmen of the Court of Referees, both the House, and the public, were deeply indebted to those hon. Gentlemen for the time they had bestowed and the ability with which they had conducted the business of the House.
  Resolved, That, in case the Promoters and Opponents of any Bill shall agree that all the questions in issue between them upon such Bill shall he referred to the Referees, it shall be competent to the Referees to inquire into the whole subject matter of the Bill, and to report their opinion thereon to the House; and, in case they shall report that such Bill ought to be proceeded

  ESTIMATE of the proposed

  (Railway).

  Line, No.

  Whether Single or Double.

  Miles.

  f.

  ch.

  Length of Line

  ——

  Cubic yards.

  Price per Ld.

  £

  s.

  d.

  £

  s.

  d.

  Earthworks:

  ——

  ——

  Cuttings—Rock

  Soft Soil

  Roads

  Total

  Embankments, including Roads

  Cubic yds.

  Bridges—Public Roads

  Number

  Accommodation Bridges and Works

  Viaducts

  Culverts and drains

  Metallings of roads and level crossings

  Gatekeepers' houses at level crossings

  Permanent way, including fencing:

  Cost per Mile.

  Miles.

  fgs.

  chs.

  ——

  £

  s.

  d.

  at

  Permanent way for sidings, and cost of junctions

  Stations

  Contingencies

  per cent.

  Land and buildings:

  A.

  R.

  P.

  TOTAL

  £

  The same details for each Branch, and General Summary of Total Cost.—(Mr. Hugh Adair.)
  Resolved, That when a Railway is intended to form a junction with an existing or authorized line of Railway, the course of such existing or authorized line of Railway shall be shown on the
  with, the same shall, unless the House shall otherwise order, be referred to the Committee on unopposed Bills, and shall be treated as an unopposed Bill.—(Colonel Wilson Patten.)
  Standing Order 91 read, and amended.
  Resolved, That, in case the Referees shall report, with reference to any Bill, that the Estimate deposited in respect thereof is insufficient, or that the engineering is inefficient for the proposed object, the Bill shall not be further proceeded with unless the House shall otherwise order.—(Colonel Wilson Patten.)
  Standing Order 149 read, and amended.
  Resolved, That the Estimate for any works proposed to be authorized by any Railway, Dock, or Harbour Bill, shall be in the following form, or as near thereto as circumstances may permit:—
  deposited plan for a distance of eight hundred yards on either side of the proposed junction, on a scale of not less than four inches to a mile.—(Mr. Hugh Adair.)
  Resolved, That when a Railway is intended to form a junction with an existing or authorized

  879
  line of Railway, the gradient of such existing or authorized line of Railway shall be shown on the deposited section, and in connection therewith, and on the same scale as the general section, for a distance of eight hundred yards on either side of the point of junction.—(Mr. Hugh Adair.)
  Ordered, That the said Resolutions be Standing Orders of the House.
  Ordered, That the Standing Orders of this House relating to Private Bills, as amended, be printed. [No. 420.]

CLERICAL SUBSCRIPTION BILL— [Lords.]

  [BILL 199.] CONSIDERATION.
  Bill, as amended, considered.
  MR. NEWDEGATEsaid, that the effect of the 12th clause of the Bill would be this, that the oath of canonical obedience would be retained as part of the service for the ordination of priests and the consecration of bishops, whilst the oath giving assent to the articles of religion of the Church of England and the oath of supremacy would not be retained in the service. He could not believe that it was the intention of the framers of the Bill to place a matter of mere discipline in the position of higher importance than a question involving obedience to the Sovereign.
  SIR GEORGE GREYsaid, that the oath of canonical obedience did not rest upon statute, whereas the oath as to assent to the articles of religion and as to the Royal supremacy rested upon the statute law. It was the statutory oath only that was dealt with by this Act, and there was no intention to interfere in any way with the canonical oath of obedience.
  Bill to be read 3° To-morrow.

LEEDS BANKRUPTCY COURT.

  OBSERVATIONS.
  MR. LONGFIELD: Sir, having given notice of my intention to comment on the Report of the Committee on the Leeds Bankruptcy Court, and to ask the Attorney General what steps the Government propose to take against the parties implicated by that Report, I do not know how far I shall be in order in prefacing my Question by a statement of facts. I shall endeavour to compress that statement into as narrow a compass as possible, in order that the House and the country may understand—[Order, order!]
  MR. SPEAKER: Does the hon. Member intend to conclude with a Motion?
  MR. LONGFIELD: I shall put myself in order by moving, at the conclusion of my statement, the adjournment of the House. ["Oh, oh!"] I am aware that the course is an unusual one, and one which I have never before taken; but the circumstances themselves are so unusual as to afford a complete justification for the step. These circumstances, unhappily, are rather notorious. A Member of Her Majesty's Government, holding the very highest station which can be held under the Crown, has within three months given occasion for two separate inquiries into the purity and propriety of his conduct. The general outline of those inquiries is sufficiently indicated by stating that they bear a considerable resemblance to each other. Having in the course of his judicial functions ascertained that certain offences had been committed, the noble and learned Lord took advantage of those offences to force out of offices which they held the persons by whom it was alleged that those offences were committed, and the proceedings thus instituted on the part of the Crown he made profitable to himself by appointing members of his own family to the vacant offices. One of these investigations took place in the House of Lords, and was connected with a gentleman named Edmunds. That inquiry has a considerable bearing upon the inquiry which has just been concluded by this House; for scarcely had that inquiry terminated when another unfortunate circumstance was adverted to in this House. A gentleman named Wilde was forced to resign his appointment at Leeds, and his appointment was at once promised to the Chancellor's son, although, from circumstances which afterwards occurred, that appointment was not actually made. The matter formed the subject of some discussion in this House, and resulted in the appointment of a Committee to investigate the entire transaction. It was stated that the Chancellor courted the fullest and fairest and openest inquiry; and the Committe of Selection named five Gentlemen of the highest character and respectability to inquire into the circumstances which thus, a second time within two months, cast the deepest possible slur on the administration of justice and on the judicial authority. That Committee, following a most objectionable precedent set in another place, fell, I regret to say, into the very grave mistake—for mistake everybody now confesses it to have been—of conducting that most solemn inquiry, which the Chan-

  881
  cellor had declared he desired to be full, free, and open, with closed doors. They concluded their labours rather more than a week ago; their Report, embodying the conclusions at which they have arrived, has been in the hands of Members for the last day or two, and it is now my duty—a painful duty I feel it to be—to bring the subject under the notice of the House, and to ask the Attorney General what steps Her Majesty's Government feel it necessary to take under the circumstances. The persons involved are members of the profession that I was proud of belonging to some little time ago, though certainly, if two or three more transactions of the same kind should take place, I do not know that we may not all have to hang our heads for shame. It was a noble profession, piquing itself justly on its esprit de corps, on the high character which its members had always borne, and especially on the reputation of those looked up to and revered as the head of the profession. These investigations, however, tend not only to shake our faith in the administration of justice, but to excite something more than suspicion of corrupt practices. Corrupt practices, at least, have been established, in which the Chancellor's family participated. Let me go through this Report, pausing here and there to interpose an observation connecting the dates, and we shall see how grave this matter has become, and how important it is in the interests of the public that satisfactory explanations should be given by the Government. The Government, I assume, have no object in screening the guilty; they can have no proper political object in screening an offender from justice. There is no motive which should animate a Government that ought to restrain them from meting out to him the same measure of justice which he insisted on meting out to others, untried and unconvicted, who were under his power. I will now come to the commencement of this melancholy, dark, and discreditable transaction. The Lord Chancellor seemed to be a great law reformer, and especially a reformer of bankruptcy proceedings. In 1801 he passed a Bill on that subject, but from that time he slumbered and slept upon the matter. No very lucrative appointments fell to his gift, all the good places had from time to time been filled by his predecessors; and this and the other House disappointed him of the opportunity of appointing the Chief Judge in Bankruptcy
  882
  which was regarded as the prize of greatest amount in connection with the new system. But in 1864 he awoke from his lethargy, and in very disagreeable mood. He found that everything was going wrong in Bankruptcy, in the courts over which he had jurisdiction, and, among other matters, that there were grievous complaints of the impropriety with which some of the officers in the Leeds Court of Bankruptcy had acted. Paper No. 295, referred to in the Report of the Leeds Bankruptcy Court Committee, contain some documents which give us the first insight into the origin of these transactions. I will trace them date by date, and as we pursue the inquiry we shall see that this nobleman for the second time fell into the unfortunate error of ignoring guilt that he might profit by the guilty. On the 6th of April, 1864—and it is essential to bear these dates in mind—Mr. Miller, the Chief Registrar of the Court of Bankruptcy, who was the intimate friend of all the Bethells—of the Hon. Slingsby Bethell, and also of the Hon. Richard Bethell—forwarded a very startling communication to Mr. Wilde, of whose eyes and health we have heard in this House before. The letter was in these terms—
  "Dear Sir—By direction of the Lord Chancellor I lately transmitted to Mr. Commissioner Ayrton the accounts of the official assignees and messengers of the Leeds Court, with a view to an investigation of them, and in a letter dated the 27th ult. Mr. Commissioner Ayrton writes as follows—'I have not yet looked into the accounts of the official assignees, but on opening the large paper returns made to you, I see the words, "Submitted to and approved by Mr. Commissioner Ayrton on the 8th of April, 1862. H. S. Wilde, Registrar."—The fact being that I never saw that sheet or the accounts it refers to, till I received it from you.' I am now directed by the Lord Chancellor to ask what explanation you have to give of this very grave offence."
  On the 9th of April Mr. Wilde replied, and his letter drew out a further communication from Mr. Miller, dated the 14th of April, in the course of which Mr. Miller said—
  "Mr. Carrick, one of the official assignees, asserts that you owe him £131, and Mr. Needell, one of the messengers, that you owe him £25, all for money borrowed. I am directed by the Lord Chancellor to ask you whether these statements are true?"
  On the 16th of April, by one of those curious coincidences which are found all through this correspondence, Mr. Wilde wrote a reply giving explanations. That brings us to the middle of April, and to the intervention of another gentleman,

  883
  who, I am sorry to say, is a clergyman—because we must remember that judicial patronage is not the only patronage vested in the Lord Chancellor. The Rev. George Rogers Harding stated, in his evidence before the Committee—
  "That about the end of April, or the beginning of May, 1864, he was at Mr. Bethell's office in Quality Court, and took a letter of introduction from Mr. Bethell to Mr. Welch, who was then in chambers at the Temple; that an arrangement had been previously made that Mr. Bethell should use his influence to procure an appointment from his father in favour of Mr. Welch; that Mr. Welch should pay £500 down, and on obtaining an appointment should pay £1,000 more; that he (Mr. Harding) mentioned this arrangement to Mr. Welch, who acquiesced in it; that the understanding was clear; the £500 was to be paid to Mr. Bethell on the security of his bill at short date, which was to be destroyed or returned if Mr. Welch obtained an appointment, and that he (Mr. Harding), was to receive one-third of the further £1,000, when paid."
  Now, that transaction brings us to the end of April, the correspondence of Mr. Wilde and Mr. Miller having closed on the 16th with a letter of explanation from Mr. Wilde, which, for nearly a month afterwards, as he heard nothing more, he had reason to believe was satisfactory. Some discrepancy seems to exist from the Report of the Committee between the evidence of Mr. Bethell and Mr. Welch, but there is no dispute on either side that on the 6th of May, 1864, a check was given by Mr. Welch to Mr. Bethell for the sum of £500, as Mr. Harding positively states, there being an arrangement that £500 should be paid down, that £1,000 was to be afterwards paid by Mr. Welch upon obtaining the appointment, and that Mr. Harding was to get a third of it. The bill was at short date, and Mr. Bethell having got the £500 very soon found it desirable to go on the Continent, and nothing more was done just then. Mr. Wilde had sent in an explanation of the charges against him, and that explanation, as I have said, had been received. But some time after the money was obtained by Mr. Bethell, the bill being at short date, Mr. Miller, a friend of the Bethell family, thought it necessary to stir up again the charges which he had allowed before to remain dormant, and on the 16th of May, some ten days after the receipt of the money by Mr. Bethell, he wrote the following letter to Mr. Wilde:—
  "Court of Bankruptcy, May 16, 1864.
  "Dear Sir,—By the same post which carries this you will receive copies of four reports lately made to the Lord Chancellor by Mr. Commis-
  884
  sioner Ayrton and Mr. Harding on the subject of the returns and accounts of the official assignees and messengers of the Leeds Court, and of the examinations on which these reports proceeded; and I am directed by the Lord Chancellor to request that you will immediately furnish Mr. Commissioner Ayrton with any explanation you may desire to give of the charges against you involved in these documents, and which appear to be:—1. That accounts which ought to have been submitted to and allowed by your Commissioner were certified by you as having been submitted to and sanctioned by him, without his ever having seen such accounts, and that thereby large sums had been improperly allowed to the official assignees. 2. That you have been in the habit of taxing the bills of the messengers without calling for the production of the vouchers for the sums alleged to have been paid by them; and 3. That you had borrowed money both from the official assignees and messengers of the court, and thereby destroyed your independence and efficiency. I must trouble you to acknowledge the receipt of this letter, and of the copies of the reports and examinations.
  "Yours, &c.,
  "JOHN F. MILLER."
  "H. S. Wilde, Esq."
  That was ten days after Mr. Bethell had received the cheque, and exactly one month after Miller's letter, in which he said Mr. Carrick had stated he had borrowed the money. For some time nothing further was done. Though the Bill was running on, Mr. Welch did not seem particularly urgent; he relied on the interest which Mr. Bethell had expressed in him, and he probably thought that in a short time the appointment would be made. But having lent the money and having got Mr. Miller as a friend, Mr. Welch soon again solicits the Lord Chancellor for a place. He had paid for it; there was no vacancy, Mr. Wilde having been officially exculpated by the Lord Chancellor, and, curiously enough, contemporaneously with a letter written by Mr. Miller to Mr. Wilde the Lord Chancellor receives a letter from Mr. Welch, soliciting an appointment, and the appointment is made. It will be seen that for some time after the £500 was given by Mr. Welch, little was done, in consequence probably of the absence of Mr. Bethell on the Continent. Until the end of July no letter appears to have been written by Mr. Miller to Mr. Wilde. The next letter of the correspondence is dated the 26th of July. And here, by the way, I may mention that the Committee elicited a most extraordinary circumstance in connection with one of Mr. Miller's letters. The Report of the Committee says—
  "Mr. Miller states that copies of the last-mentioned report and other documents were sent on the 9th of June, with the letter of that date, set

  885
  forth in the Appendix, to Mr. Wilde and to Mr. Payne. Mr. Wilde denies that the letter and copies were ever received by him or Mr. Payne; and no acknowledgment of the receipt of this report was either asked for or received by Mr. Miller. About the same time, however, it appears that both Mr. Wilde and Mr. Payne received blank envelopes from the Court of Bankruptcy, about which neither of those gentlemen thought it necessary to make any immediate inquiry. Your Committee have directed their attention closely to this matter, because it appeared, on examining the letter-book kept in Mr. Miller's office, that he had with his own hand entered in the book a copy of the letter of the 9th of June, which was the only letter so copied by him; and because, from the state of the page in which the letter was copied, and the erasures and alterations of the paging in the index referring to these and other letters to Mr. Payne and Mr. Wilde, there was grave cause for suspicion that the entry of this letter was a subsequent interpolation. Mr. Miller, however, stated that he copied the letter on the day of its date after his clerks were gone. Copies of the report and other documents were undoubtedly made for the office at the time by the law stationer, and it is certainly possible that in the hurry of business the copies were lost or mislaid, and were not, in fact, sent. Both Mr. Miller and Mr. Stewart, his clerk, were examined on this point, and were unable to explain the erasures and alterations in the index referring to these letters; but the erasures and alterations in the index to the letter-book are not confined to these letters only, and the book generally has not been kept in a creditable manner."
  There could be no doubt that this letter was an interpolation. It would be seen that it was the only letter copied in the handwriting of Mr. Miller, and that he interpolated it in order to give a colour to his letter of July, which I have just mentioned. Meantime the Bill of £500 become due; if, was not honoured; Mr. Wilde slept in security; he had had no communication with Mr. Miller; he had, indeed, got a blank envelope, but that was all. From the 16th of May Mr. Miller does not appear to have had the slightest communication with Mr. Wilde until the 26th of June. The bill became due, Mr. Welch was dissatisfied lest he should lose both his money and his place, a communication took place between Mr. Bethell and Mr. Welch, and Mr. Miller was put in action between Mr. Welch and the Lord Chancellor; and then again occurred the transactions, the hapless transactions between Mr. Miller and the Lord Chancellor—transactions which if they are permitted to continue without public notice being at once taken of them in such a way as to insure that public reparation shall be made, the purity of official appointments may for ever be despaired of. On the 26th of July, Mr. Miller,
  886
  finding it necessary to be a little expeditious, writes this letter to Mr. Wilde—
  "Sir,—It grieves me much to inform you that, unless I hear in course of post that you mean to apply to be allowed to retire, I have instructions from the Lord Chancellor to serve you with notice to appear before him publicly in open court, and show cause why you should not be dismissed from your office of Registrar. It is said that your state of health is such that you can have no difficulty in obtaining such a medical certificate as would entitle you to retire under the 33rd section of the Bankruptcy Act, 1861; and, if this he so, I sincerely trust, for your own sake, that you will see the propriety of relieving the Chancellor from the very disagreeable and, indeed, painful duty which is thrust upon him."
  There are some interesting points connected with this letter. The Committee says—
  "Mr. Miller states that the first part of this letter, including the passage as to the course of post and the application to retire, was strictly in accordance with the directions of the Lord Chancellor, but that for the second part"—
  which would inculpate the Lord Chancellor, and with regard to which we are asked to believe that noble and learned Lord knew nothing, they say—"he had no instructions." But the fact was the first part of the letter had answered its purpose. Mr. Wilde, the unfortunate Mr. Wilde, could not discriminate between that for which Mr. Miller had no authority and that for which he had. The letter was official, it was imperative, "the course of post" was all the time allowed this gentleman for consideration, and therefore the House would not be surprised, though the country might be, that Mr. Wilde took the hint so kindly conveyed to him, and he at once procured a certificate of ill health and forwarded it. In the course of some professional experience and of a long life I never heard of more disgraceful transactions. The letter, which was peremptory, suggested that Mr. Wilde should escape the discreditable position of being called upon to answer for his conduct before a Judge who had already prejudged his case, and that he should send up a certificate of ill-health. Mr. Wilde had not in fact suffered from anything but some affection of the eyes, and he states that he had consulted Mr. Hey, an eminent surgeon of Leeds, during some months previous, and says that Mr. Hey had suggested his retiring but that he had not felt the inconvenience so great as to induce him to do so. He now applied to Mr. Hey for a certificate, who must be held to be a man of honour and conscience,

  887
  and who was almost the only one that was not implicated with the Bethell family, then gave the following certificate:—
  "I hereby certify that I have been consulted by Mr. Henry S. Wilde, on account of a failure in his sight, which was a serious hindrance to him in the performance of the duties of his office. Mr. Wilde first consulted me in August, 1863. At his age I cannot look for any improvement in his vision."
  I have seen the gentleman in question, before the Committee, and I must say a sharper one I have seldom seen, though, "at his age, one cannot look for any improvement in his vision." That was the certificate sent to Mr. Miller, who actually drew up the petition to the Lord Chancellor praying for a pension. The Committee state in their Report—
  "The petition, affidavit, and certificate were submitted by Mr. Miller to the Lord Chancellor on the 30th of June. Mr. Miller states that he called the attention of the Lord Chancellor to the unsatisfactory nature of the certificate, and that the Lord Chancellor said that, coupling the language of the petition, the affidavit, and the certificate together, there was a sufficient case to enable him to make the order."
  Conscientious and kind-hearted person! "Coupling together"—what a lawyer's phrase !—the petition, the affidavit, and the certificate, he thought there was a sufficient case. Of course this must mean that, taken per se, each of these documents was unsatisfactory. This is Mr. Miller's version. The Lord Chancellor's version makes matters worse—
  "The Lord Chancellor, in his evidence, states that he cannot remember his attention being called to the certificate. He says—'The petition, affidavit, and certificate were presented to me, and I ought in strictness to have read them all.'"
  That is precisely what Mr. Wilde ought to have done. However—
  "That in the captain's but a choleric word
  Which in the soldier is flat blasphemy."
  And poor Mr. Wilde, who ought to have investigated accounts before signing them, received strong hints that he must retire from his office. Says the Lord Chancellor—
  "I ought in strictness to have read them all. I certainly could not have read the medical certificate, or I should not have allowed it to pass upon that certificate."
  There is a confession from the Keeper of Her Majesty's Conscience! An officer is guilty of misconduct which is punishable, and for which the Lord Chancellor has summoned him to appear and account for his conduct, and the Keeper of the Queen's Conscience, upon a sham certifi-
  888
  cate which he did not even go through the formality of looking at, winks at his escape from the punishment of his misconduct! We know it is said that the judge who cannot punish will in time connive at—nay participate in crime. We have the Lord Chancellor not punishing, we have him conniving, and I will presently show that he participated. The Lord Chancellor says—
  "Those papers were certainly all laid before me, and I felt very great embarrassment, undoubtedly. … I felt that the charge against Mr. Wilde was not one upon which I could dismiss him without pronouncing a very severe sentence. I was painfully struck with the great inconsistency of having directed him to be served with a notice to show cause why he should not be dismissed, and then permitting him to resign on a pension."
  Hero the Lord Chancellor admits that he gave Mr. Miller full authority for part at least of his letter of the 26th of July; and I think that any persons who have attained a judgment more mature than that of children must be of opinion that Mr. Miller had authority for the whole of that letter.
  "The inconsistency," continues the Lord Chancellor, "was obvious; but, at the same time, unless I determined to dismiss him, I had no alternative but to allow him to remain in that Department. I thought him a bad public officer, and I thought that it would be a gain to the public if he was permitted to resign; and, therefore, having only those two alternatives, either to permit him to remain or to allow him to resign, I certainly decided upon allowing him to resign; and I accordingly signed the order for granting him a pension."
  Upon this the Committee remark—
  "Such haste and want of caution necessarily give rise to suspicion that a vacancy in the Office is the object sought rather than justice to the officer or the public."
  In that opinion of the Committee I think no man will hesitate to concur. ["Read on!"] Yes, I will read on—
  "In this instance, however, your Committee consider that no improper motives are to be imputed to the Lord Chancellor."
  I give the friends of the Lord Chancellor the benefit of this candid statement by the Committee; but there is a Committee beyond the Committee. There is an appeal to the Committee of the public, and the public will not endorse this verdict. You cannot convict the Lord Chancellor by a confession or a document under hand and seal; but coupling this case with another of the same kind in which the Lord Chancellor condoned a criminal offence and got the place, I ask, Is there not connivance?

  889
  Is there not a wilful shutting of eyes to transactions to which the Lord Chancellor ought to have been awake? Is there not a delay which shows how unfit he is, either by the guilelessness of his nature, which I never heard of before, or by the audacity and insolence of office, which may be characteristic of the man, for the exercise of patronage? Is it possible, upon the evidence cited by the Committee, to say that the Lord Chancellor is not answerable for this second appropriation of public funds for the endowment of misconduct or crime for which he had himself pronounced sentence of dismissal? Sir, the very day that this order was signed by the Lord Chancellor without looking at the papers—thus committing the fault for which he had sentenced Mr. Wilde so severely—that very day the office was filled up, and, curiously enough, it was filled up at Mr. Miller's suggestion, Mr. Miller being the friend of Mr. Bethell, who had been always put in motion whenever it was necessary to extricate Mr. Bethell from embarrassment or make him fulfil his pledges. On that very day the office was filled up, without the slightest appearance of necessity, by the appointment of Mr. Welch, who had lent £500 to Mr. Bethell, and who had applied for the office. The Committee say they—
  "Are satisfied that no imputation can fairly be made against the Lord Chancellor with regard to this appointment."
  Now, again, I ask, what do the public think on the subject? I should like to know what other candidates applied to the Lord Chancellor for the office? Was Mr. Welch the only applicant? Or was he the only applicant who had lent Mr. Bethell money on that gentleman's flimsy security? Sir, Mr. Welch was not the only applicant, but he was the only applicant who had lent money to Mr. Bethell. Mr. Welch having got the place, Mr. Bethell's credit at once rose. He returned to the country and became as importunate as ever. We then turn back—because the dates are a little mixed up—and we find that shortly after his return to this country—about July or August—having got into credit by fulfilling his engagement with Mr. Welch, he appears to have asked that gentleman for more money. There was an "engagement," to which both Mr. Harding and Mr. Welch were privy, and the latter gentleman frankly admits that he lent the money for the purpose of getting the place. Having asked for more
  890
  money, we find that on the 10th of September, 1864, Mr. Bethell, after he had become hopelessly insolvent, obtained a further loan of £200 from Mr. Welch without any security. On the 7th of February, 1865, Mr. Welch lent him £50 more, and about the 20th of the same month a further sum of £300; but Mr. Welch states that he had refused him accommodation in the previous November. The fact, however, is that on the 20th of February, 1865, Mr. Welch, then the Registrar at Leeds, had advanced Mr. Bethell £300 in addition to £750 before advanced to him. Then the Report says—
  "Your Committee have given the more prominent facts or statements bearing on this matter. For minute details they refer to the evidence of the parties concerned. The statement of Mr. Harding is irreconcilable with that of Mr. Bethell and Mr. Welch."
  But is it not possible to reconcile that statement with the facts? We have the fact of the loan, the motives of the loan, the promise of the loan—we actually have the agreement on which the loan was obtained, and evidence that the agreement was carried out; and it is too much to say that we are called upon to ignore the facts and not pronounce an opinion upon them. The facts are clear, and demonstrate a corrupt bargain. Mr. Welch made the further advances in order that he might be advanced to a more lucrative place in London—
  "Mr. Harding's statement, "say the Committee," if true, discloses a corrupt bargain between the three parties; if false, it is a gross attempt at extortion. One or other of these conclusions would be established by a judicial investigation of the facts of the case; but as each of them involves the liability to a charge of a highly penal character, your Committee, not having the opportunity of examining witnesses upon oath, or of bringing the persons inculpated to a formal trial, purposely abstain from expressing any opinion as to which of the two views above mentioned ought to be adopted. They consider it their duty to observe, that the indisputable facts are such as to render it essential to the public interest that the case should, as soon as possible, be made the subject of legal investigation."
  In that opinion I entirely concur; thus you have the first part of the Report inculpating the Lord Chancellor in the severest way for haste and oversight, for permitting this gross transaction to be blotted out as far as he was concerned, and for granting a pension to an officer whom he believed wholly unde-

  891
  serving of a pension, and who could never have obtained it but for the connivance of the Lord Chancellor, and the fact that he willfully abstained from looking at this certificate. You then have Mr. Harding, Mr. Welch, and Mr. Bethell implicated in the corrupt bargain for the sale of an office. But now what takes place further? It is clear that the further loan from Mr. Welch was on the condition that Mr. Bethell would obtain his transfer to a more lucrative office in London, Mr. Bethell succeeding to Mr. Welch's place at Leeds. It appears that, on the 22nd of February, two days after the advance of the £300 by Mr. Welch, the Lord Chancellor, at the instigation of Mrs. Bethell or Mrs. Skirrow, hinted that Mr. Bethell might obtain an office in the country, if a vacancy were to take place. Mr. Bethell knew where to look for a vacancy. Mr. Welch was his creditor, the liberal lender of money, without the slightest prospect of being paid in kind, trusting to the honour of a gentleman who appears to have rather fugitive notions of honour. Mr. Bethell went to Leeds on the following day, and saw Mr. Welch at his office on the 24th, and it is clear it was generally understood that Mr. Bethell was shortly to be appointed registrar at Leeds, and that Mr. Welch was to be transfered to London. Mr. Welch had bought one place cheaply, having given only £500 for it, or about half a year's salary. So satisfied was Mr. Miller, the intimate friend of Mr. Bethell and Mr. Welch, that the arrangement was to be carried out, that with great zeal, and without authority, he prepares two appointments carrying out the corrupt agreement, which the Lord Chancellor wilfully abstained from knowing—because he must have been aware that the persons about him were trafficing in his name; that he was appointing a gentleman to a valuable office at the solicitation of a worthless son, and that it was not likely that his influence had been obtained in a creditable manner. The transaction was clearly disgraceful to all concerned. On the 26th the Lord Chancellor states that, in consequence of some information he received as to the misconduct of his son at Paris, he determined not to appoint his son to office. Now I believe I can state what was the real nature of the information that led the Lord Chancellor to come to that decision. On the 24th of February in the present year it so happened that
  892
  the Edmunds' scandal in the House of Lords was completed, and very shortly afterwards, on the 26th and 27th, it became the common topic of discussion in the clubs and newspapers, and a few days later it likewise became the subject of a Question in this House. The information, the receipt of which induced the Lord Chancellor not to appoint his son was simply the universal outcry which followed upon the other job—the transaction by which the Keeper of the Queen's Conscience ignored the offence of a most unworthy officer, and connived at his getting a pension, which, to the Lord Chancellor's eternal disgrace, has been ignominiously rescinded on the ground that it was improperly granted, and that its continuance would be dishonest and disgraceful to the country. That transaction began to be noised about, and that was the true reason that the appointment of Mr. Bethell was not carried out, and that Mr. Miller's zeal was not successful. The transaction was blown up and disclosed in the House of Lords. A Committee on the Edmunds' case was appointed, and on the 7th of March a question, leading to a discussion, was asked in this House by the noble Lord the Member for King's Lynn. You see the two things are entirely coherent. On the 20th of February the money was lent, and the appointment was sanctioned by the Lord Chancellor at the instance of his daughter-in-law. On the 24th Mr. Bethell goes to Leeds to carry out the transaction, and on the 27th the appointment was annulled because the country was scandalized by the Edmunds' case, and thought—to use the language of the Duke of Wellington—that"it was too bad." These were unfortunate transactions for this unfortunate family, and left beyond hope the possibility of wiping a way the stain on the pure administration of justice. The highest officer of the Crown has been twice convicted and twice pardoned for having connived at and sanctioned, for the advantage of his family, perhaps in the hope that things might be done secretly and pleasantly, the grant of an improper pension. I may say, and I am sure the country will re-echo my sentiment, that it is wonderful that the person now filling the situation of Lord Chancellor, who is the highest judicial officer of the Crown, is still Lord High Chancellor. Has the pension granted by his gross misconduct been withdrawn? Is there no pride in him, and is there no attempt to make his

  893
  conduct pure in the eyes of the country? Is he insensible to shame, and is it possible that he is destitute of the merest glimmerings of those feelings which operate upon gentlemen? If he have not a virtue, why does he not affect one? Why does he not tender his resignation and thereby make some return for the outrages he has committed? The questions I am about to ask are connected with the last observations in the Report of the Committee on the Leeds Bankruptcy Court. It is there stated that—
  "Although some of the questions asked in your honourable House, which led to the appointment of this Committee, were founded on information which was not thoroughly accurate, yet the general impression created by the sudden retirement of Mr. Wilde, and the pecuniary transactions which took place between Mr. Bethell and Mr. Welch, coupled with the representations made by Mr. Bethell on his visit to Leeds, were calculated to excite the gravest suspicions; and your Committee are of opinion that the inquiry which they have conducted was for this reason highly desirable for the public interests."
  I wish to ask the Attorney General, whether the pension to Mr. Wilde has been re-called; whether Mr. Welch has been dismissed from his office; whether Mr. Miller has been dismissed from his office; and whether the Lord Chancellor has been kindly asked to retire on a pension in justice to those officers who were guilty of no greater misconduct, but who were not equally protected by the arm of the law?
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."—(Mr. Longfield.)
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL: Sir, The hon. and learned Gentleman has imposed on me a task of no ordinary difficulty. The difficulty which I feel is much more owing to my own determination not to permit the feelings which I entertain to get too much mastery over me, than to any inability to deal with the speech of the hon. and learned Gentleman or with the questions he has addressed to me. I thought that in this assembly, of all others, the highest in England and the world, even the meanest man might expect justice, and I should have imagined that the same measure of justice would not have been deemed unfit to be extended to one filling the highest and moat dignified position under the Crown. It appears that there are hon. Gentlemen sitting opposite, whose ideas of justice are far different from mine. I thought that in order to judge
  894
  and condemn it was necessary that we should he in possession of the evidence on which our opinions might properly be formed. The Report of the Committee on this occasion was in print on Saturday last, and no time will be lost in printing and distributing the evidence. On Thursday next—two days hence—or on Friday at the very latest, the evidence will be printed and in the hands of all Members, who will then be able to form their opinions on it; and those who are disposed to attack will have legitimate materials for their object, while those who have to meet the attack will also be in possession of materials for reply; but I never before heard, whether in the case of a man of high degree or a man of low degree, that it was deemed a course worthy of this House or of any Member having the honour of a seat in it, that there should be made a deliberate attack, founded on a Report, itself based on evidence, without waiting until the evidence was in the hands of Members. If anything could aggravate the wrong done on this occasion it is the fact that the hon. and learned Member (Mr. Longfield) does not adopt the decision of the Report; for in that Report I find it stated as the deliberate judgment of the Committee, founded on the evidence and the facts, which they considered to be established by the evidence, that they acquit the Lord Chancellor from all charge except that of haste and want of caution in granting a pension to Mr. Wilde. Well, that may or may not be the conclusion which the House will adopt when the evidence is before it; but to ask the House not only not to wait for the evidence, but to reverse that decision of the Committee, is a course which I believe has hitherto been unprecedented, and which I trust will never again be followed. It is not competent for me to follow the example of the hon. and learned Gentleman and go at full length into all the matters to which he referred; but to a certain extent I am able from information which is public, and with respect to which we need not wait for the evidence, to point out the wrong that has been done by many of the hon. and learned Member's remarks. The hon. and learned Gentleman has spoken as if the House had no grounds for believing that there were in the Court of Bankruptcy any abuses to be inquired into.
  MR. LONGFIELD: I said there were many, owing to the Lord Chancellor's supineness.
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL: All I can say is that I think it would have been at least more candid to believe that the head of that Court, who was bound to discharge the grave function of superintending its administration, might, in the inquiries which he instituted into the manner in which subordinate officers had performed their duties, have had some other motive than that of obtaining appointments for his own advantage. And unless the House, departing from the judgment of the Committee, are really prepared to presume and believe that the Lord Chancellor was cognizant of the corrupt means which are stated to have been used by a particular individual to procure an appointment in the Court of Bankruptcy, then I say that upon grounds which are apparent to all in this matter, the Lord Chancellor cannot possibly have been actuated by any improper motive. For what are the facts? They are these—that he instituted inquiries which commenced on the 6th of April, 1864, when the son of the Lord Chancellor, who has been named, was already in possession of an office more valuable than that at Leeds, and could have no possible reason for desiring to have that office; and it was after these inquiries had been instituted that the Lord Chancellor called upon and required his son to resign the appointment which he held, on account of his being in pecuniary embarrassment. And the Lord Chancellor from that day to this, so far from having been open and accessible to influence exercised by his son in any matter of appointment, has not since then even seen him, nor had any communication with him, even by letter, except upon the occasion of a family event to which I need not refer, and when letters were written by him on the subject of these very inquiries. So that whatever may have been the culpability of that person—and it is the deep misfortune of the Lord Chancellor to have a member of his family so little worthy, I regret to be obliged to admit, to bear his name—I should have thought that a generous House of Commons would not have regarded that, at all events, as a ground for believing all sorts of evil against the highest judicial officer in the realm. It will be seen, when the evidence is before the House, what ground there is for believing that, after Mr. Bethell was compelled by the Lord Chancellor himself to give up a more lucrative appointment in London,
  896
  in April, it was impossible for him to exercise any influence in obtaining any appointments whatever. Were these things done in a corner? Far from it. In June the Committee of this House on the Law of Bankruptcy was sitting, and the Lord Chancellor then communicated to the Committee the whole of the proceedings that were being taken in the matter of Mr. Wilde, at Leeds, and the evidence connected with that matter was printed and laid before Parliament before Mr. Wilde's resignation occurred. It is impossible, therefore, to believe for a moment that in the conduct of these proceedings the Lord Chancellor had or could have had any motive whatever except a desire to discharge his duty to the public. With regard to the appointment of Mr. Welch, the Lord Chancellor never saw Mr. Welch in his life. ["Hear, hear!"] Does the hon. and learned Gentleman mean to say that recommendations coming from professional and creditable sources may not be such as to justify the appointment of an individual who is personally unknown to the Officer of State who makes that appointment? Mr. Welch had been long before recommended to the Lord Chancellor for a similar office by Sir William Atherton, by Mr. Edward James, the Attorney General of the County Palatine of Lancaster, by Mr. Manisty, one of the leading counsel of that circuit, and other gentlemen of eminence. And whatever may have been said in his favour by the Lord Chancellor's son was said long before these transactions of which we have heard with so much sorrow. Mr. Welch had been recommended by competent persons in the ordinal way; and unless the House is capable of believing, against the judgment of the Committee, that the Lord Chancellor knew of this attempt to bribe (supposing such an attempt to have been made), what possible motive of an improper character could the noble and learned Lord have had in appointing Mr. Welch? But it is not this alone. There was another person in the same position as Mr. Welch—namely, Mr. Payne, who resigned a little later, and the Lord Chancellor appointed another perfect stranger in his place. There could never be a more unworthy and unjust accusation than upon these materials to say that the Lord Chancellor was actuated by anything like a corrupt, personal, or improper motive, either in the steps which led to Mr. Wilde's resignation, or in the appointment of Mr. Welch in his stead;

  897
  and the Committee have arrived at that conclusion. The hon. and learned Gentleman, using the language of an advocate at the bar, of a counsel addressing a jury at the Old Bailey, and departing from the language of the Committee, said the Lord Chancellor had thrown out hints that there might be circumstances under which he would consent to his son having an appointment in the country. Surely the right hon. and learned Gentleman, in the absence of the evidence, might have limited himself to what the Committee said about the candid statement made to them by the Lord Chancellor. ["Hear, hear!"] Gentlemen might do better if they suffered their own feelings to guide them in such a matter instead of party spirit and personal animosity. ["Oh!"] I think there are few Gentlemen present who would severely condemn a father for no more than this—that on intimate personal friends and near relatives coming and representing to him that there was a prospect of improvement in the conduct of the son for whom, after all, a father may be permitted to have a father's feelings, he did not say that he would or could then accede to what he had at all former times refused to do, but simply said he would take what they had represented to him into consideration; for it never went further than that. After a consideration of three or four days more, he finally decided that it could not be done; and he candidly told the Committee that in coming to that conclusion he was influenced by information he had received as to the unsatisfactory conduct of his son in Paris. What is the sum and substance of the Lord Chancellor's offending here? Why, that for a period of four days he suffered himself to consider whether it was possible to justify a more merciful and lenient course towards his son than he had previously thought it was his public duty to take, and arrived at the positive conclusion that he could not do so. The Committee have given their verdict upon these transactions, and have found that there was no ground for imputing to the Lord Chancellor anything but a want of caution with respect to the pension to Mr. Wilde. But the hon. and learned Gentleman, without waiting for the evidence, desires the House to infer that in some way or other the Lord Chancellor has been guilty of corruption in this matter. With respect to the pension to Mr. Wilde, the Lord Chancellor states that
  898
  Mr. Wilde's offences were quite serious enough to justify him in giving him the notice which was served upon him, but that it would have been a harsh and severe course of proceeding to have summarily dismissed him. Therefore, the pension, although it was granted in a hasty manner, was given from no really improper motive. I must now deal with the questions which the hon. and learned Gentleman has put to me with respect to the persons implicated in this matter. I will state what the Government has thought it their duty to do. As soon as the Report was in print they took it into consideration, and on Saturday last this Resolution was come to by my noble Friend at the head of the Government—to cause the Report to be laid before the Law Officers of the Crown, in order that, if they found that sufficient grounds existed, those criminal proceedings might be instituted against the persons implicated in the charge of corruption, which the Committee appeared to think ought to be taken. I think the House will be of opinion that that was the right course for the Government to adopt. I also think that the House will, probably, be of opinion that, if these proceedings ought to be taken, it would not be right now to discuss the grounds upon which a criminal charge may be brought. As to the other persons concerned, who, if the Committee came to a right conclusion, may be subjected to criminal prosecution, I think it would be unjust towards Mr. Welch, pending those proceedings, to remove him altogether from his office, but my impression is that, if a criminal prosecution is resolved upon, it would be proper to suspend him from the discharge of its duties under the circumstances. With regard to Mr. Miller, I do not understand the Committee to have done more than to express their disapprobation of his mode of proceeding, and his officiousness on several occasions. I do not understand them to consider that he was implicated in any act of corruption, although the hon. and learned Gentleman seems to be of a different opinion. Whether there are grounds for a prosecution against him we shall be better able to judge when we see the evidence. As to Mr. Miller also, the evidence ought to be seen before we determine whether any steps ought to be taken with regard to him. I think that I have now answered all that the hon. and learned Gentleman can expect me to

  899
  answer; and I believe the House will agree with me that it is to be regretted that he did not deem it right to postpone this discussion till a future opportunity.
  MR. GATHORNE HARDY: Sir, I do not rise to say many words on this subject, particularly after what has fallen from the hon. and learned Gentleman (the Attorney General), who has stated that if the evidence bears out what is contained in the Report with respect to certain parties to these transactions, prosecutions will be instituted against the parties implicated, by direction of the Government. But, while I pass by that part of the case, I cannot help adverting to that part which does not require the support of extraneous evidence. Having regard to the position which the Lord Chancellor holds, and actuated by no party feeling, I must say, looking to his own admissions, that it appears to me they do affect in the strongest degree that dignity and integrity which ought to attach to a person holding the high office which he fills. And when we consider the course which has been pursued with regard to the pension of Mr. Wilde, the dissolution being so near at hand, and no one knowing when the evidence will be ready, the House would have neglected its duty if it had not taken the earliest opportunity of calling attention to the Report of the Committee. What are the facts of the case? There was a charge made by the Lord Chancellor on the 16th of May against Mr. Wilde, consisting of three items—first, that accounts had been certified by him which had never been seen by him; second, that he was in the habit of taxing the Bills of the messengers without calling for vouchers for the sums alleged to have been paid by them; and, third, that he had borrowed money both from the official assignees and messengers of the Court, thereby sacrificing his independence and efficiency. These were three grave and serious charges against a man in the position of Mr. Wilde, and certainly called on the part of the Lord Chancellor for scrutiny, and punishment if the offence imputed had been committed. I shall not go into the merits of the case, nor pronounce any opinion upon them—I proceed entirely on the admissions which have been made. It appears that on the 26th of July, by direction of the Lord Chancellor, according to Mr. Miller's account, and by the Lord Chancellor's direction to a certain extent, according to his Lordship's own account,
  900
  Mr. Miller wrote a letter to Mr. Wilde in these words—
  "Court of Bankruptcy, July 26, 1864.
  Sir,—It grieves me much to inform you that, unless I hear in course of post that you mean to apply to be allowed to retire, I have instructions from the Lord Chancellor to serve you with notice to appear before him publicly in open court and show cause why you should not be dismissed from your office of registrar."
  The Lord Chancellor, therefore, must have supposed that the charges against Mr. Wilde were such as, if committed, would have rendered him liable to be dismissed. I do not quote the latter part of the letter, because the Chancellor says he did not sanction it. I will refer to nothing but what the Lord Chancellor himself admits. Mr. Miller, whom the Attorney General, to my great surprise, says has been acquitted of all blame, whereas the Committee charge him with the grossest falsehoods, with having acted officiously, with having undertaken duties which did not belong to him, and other things which seem misdemeanors in his office—Mr. Miller then suggested that Wilde had better get a certificate of ill-health and ask to be allowed to retire on a pension; and Miller, after denying that he had drawn up the petition, and asserting that he knew nothing about it, admitted that he had drawn up the petition containing the certificate which Wilde had so obtained, and upon that petition the pension was granted to Mr. Wilde. What was the certificate? It was of so remarkable a character that it ought to have challenged the scrutiny of any man of ordinary intelligence and desirous to do his duty. Mr. Miller said he called the attention of the Lord Chancellor to it. The Lord Chancellor, on the other hand, said his attention was not particularly called to it. But the House must remember that it was a certificate respecting a man who had been called upon only four days before to resign his office of registrar, or appear before him in open court to answer for his misconduct. On the 30th of July the Lord Chancellor received an application from Mr. Wilde to be allowed to retire with a pension founded on a certificate which does not say that his health is in the least affected, but only that he had consulted some one, at some unknown time, on account of failure in his sight, which was then a serious hindrance to him in the performance of the duties of his office. There is this material fact also in reference to that

  901
  certificate, that the date appears to be in a different handwriting from the body of the certificate itself. The Lord Chancellor says his attention was not particularly called to this certificate; but when it is considered that the Lord Chancellor had called upon Mr. Wilde to appear and show cause why he should not be dismissed, and Mr. Wilde said he would resign, but asked for a pension of nearly £700 a year—when without a moment's delay—upon the same day—the resignation was accepted and the pension was granted—did the Lord Chancellor consider him a culprit or did he not so consider him? If he considered him a culprit, liable to dismissal, by allowing him to retire upon a pension he was disgracing the office which he held; and by allowing a man whom he had considered a culprit only four days before to escape inquiry into his conduct and the consequences which attached to it, and to retire upon a pension on a certificate which was only a subterfuge and an evasion, he made himself a party to the transaction, and ought to take the responsibility and the consequences. The Lord Chancellor's statement is that the certificate and affidavit were presented to him, and that he ought to have read them, but he does not think that he did. Now, I can readily conceive that the Lord Chancellor might at times be overwhelmed with business and obliged to trust to the officers under him; but here was a man who had been charged with offences, and called on to show cause why he should not be dismissed from his office; and by allowing one whom he alleged to be such a culprit to escape the consequences of his misconduct he has not only grossly neglected his duty, but perverted justice, and made the country a party to the transaction by conferring a pension of £600 a year on a person who, according to the Lord Chancellor's own view, had rendered himself liable to dismissal if not more serious consequences. These are the circumstances of the case as they appear upon the Lord Chancellor's statement; and I repeat that it seems to me that the House of Commons would have grossly neglected its duty if it had not at the earliest opportunity taken this matter into consideration. We could not tell whether the evidence would be produced before Parliament was dissolved, and we have known cases where papers have been delayed to the end of a Session so that no notice could be taken of the sub-
  902
  ject to which they referred. That might have been so in this instance. The Lord Chancellor upon his own showing had grossly neglected his duty; he had not done that which in his office he was bound to do—he had allowed a man whom he considered a culprit to receive a pension and retire into private life, as deserving the thanks of the country instead of receiving its condemnation—and the House would have failed in its functions if it had not, without waiting for evidence, which might not have been forthcoming in time, expressed its opinion on his conduct.
  MR. E. C. EGERTON: Sir, as a Member of the Committee, I must say I think it premature in the House to enter into this discussion until the whole of the evidence is in its possession. It would have been most fair to those whose conduct has been impugned, and also to Members of the Committee, who endeavoured to discharge their duty honestly, faithfully, and impartially, that the House should have had an opportunity of reading the whole evidence and taking a full, impartial view of the whole circumstances, before it was called on to pronounce an opinion on this subject. I rose, however, chiefly to impress on the Attorney General the necessity of having the evidence produced with the greatest expedition. There is naturally grave suspicion in the public mind with reference to this subject. The Report of the Committee has been circulated by the press through the whole length and breadth of the land—the Committee have been violently attacked for having dealt lightly with some of the evidence; and it is most important for the public interests that the whole evidence in the case should be produced as soon as possible. The House, I am sure, is too just and too honest to come to any decision till it has read the evidence in extenso.
  THE LORD ADVOCATE: As I also was a Member of the Committee, I am anxious to say a few words before the discussion closes. I entirely agree with the hon. Member who has just sat down (Mr. E. C. Egerton), that it is impossible for the House to come to any just conclusion without the evidence on which the Report of the Committee is founded. The hon. Gentleman says Parliament is about to be dissolved, and the time is short; therefore he is anxious to call the attention of the House to the subject. But this surely can be no excuse for doing injustice,

  903
  or attempting to draw conclusions when you do not know the facts on which those conclusions are founded. That was exemplified in the strongest manner in the speech of the hon. and learned Member for Mallow (Mr. Longfield). I listened to that speech with the greatest possible wonder and surprise; for he not only chose to draw his own conclusions as to motives from facts he found stated in the Report, but he also chose to assume other things as facts which he cannot find there. I shall mention one or two of these. He said that Mr. Miller was a friend of Mr. Welch, and he wished the House to believe that Mr. Miller was cognizant of the transactions between Mr. Bethell and Mr. Welch. There is not one tittle of evidence to that effect. On the contrary, Mr. Miller says distinctly that he knew nothing of Welch until the Lord Chancellor had appointed him. The hon. and learned Member made another statement that startled me—he said that, between the time the money was paid to Mr. Bethell and the time Mr. Welch was appointed, communications passed between Bethell and Miller, and that in consequence Mr. Welch was appointed. There is not one word of that in the Report. On these grounds and on grounds like these the hon. and learned Gentleman, with a strength of language unexampled in this House, as far as my experience goes, and with a profusion of epithets I never heard before, charged the Lord Chancellor substantially with being privy to corrupt practices in regard to this office. I am not going into the evidence; but what I state is this—the Lord Chancellor knew nothing of Welch except from the recommendations he had received of him from persons of eminence, and the conversation with his son in 1863. The inquiry into the matter of the Bankruptcy Court of Leeds took place in 1864, at a time when public attention had been called to the state of the Bankruptcy Courts all over the country, and called certainly not without reason, as the Report showed. When the Lord Chancellor commenced his inquiry that inquiry could not by any possibility have been instituted for the benefit of his son, because that son was at the time in possession of a still better office in the Bankruptcy Court in London. That inquiry, too, was not confined to Mr. Wilde, but included the whole of the officials connected with the Leeds Bankruptcy Court. It concerned not only Mr. Wilde,
  904
  but the other Registrar, Mr. Payne, the official assignees, and the messengers. That inquiry had, he believed, led to the repayment of over £20,000, which had been improperly retained by the officials of the Leeds and other Bankruptcy Courts. In the course of these proceedings the Lord Chancellor instructed Mr. Miller to send notifications, not only to Mr. Wilde, but to other officials, that unless they forwarded sufficient answers to the charges he should call upon them to show cause in Court why they should not be dismissed. This was on the 16th of May. On the 14th Mr. Richard Bethell, for whose sake it is asserted the Lord Chancellor was privy to a corrupt bargain, was compelled by his father to resign his office. The hon. and learned Gentleman seemed to insinuate that Mr. Bethell and his father were in communication upon the subject of this office. Now, from the 14th May down to the month of February of the next year the Lord Chancellor had had not only no communication of any kind or description with his son, but, notwithstanding the expostulations addressed to him by Mr. Miller, the Chief Registrar of Bankruptcy, he refused over and over again to retain his son in office. Is it not too bad that under those circumstances the Lord Chancellor should be accused of plotting at the end of April, 1864, to make a vacancy for his son, when his son was at that time in possession of a better office, and when he compelled him to resign that office a fortnight afterwards? Was there anything more improbable? Even with the evidence before the House, he believed the attack of the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Mallow would have been inexcusable, but it was still less excusable in the absence of that evidence to make such an attack at the close of a Parliament upon the character of any man, high or low, when the means of defence would, to a certain extent, be soon withdrawn. The whole affair spoke for itself. The Lord Chancellor had and could have no personal motive for insisting upon the resignation of Mr. Wilde. But it was argued by the hon. and learned Gentleman that the Lord Chancellor knew nothing of Mr. Welch. The Lord Chancellor, however, knew that Sir William Atherton and the leaders of the Northern Circuit had recommended that gentleman for an appointment of this nature. The question as to the conduct of the Lord Chancellor in permitting Mr.

  905
  Wilde to resign at all was entirely unconnected with the question as to his participation in the corrupt transactions detailed before the Committee. The Lord Chancellor did not require Mr. Wilde to resign, but he directed Mr. Miller to send to him the same notice he was to send to other officials. Whether the Lord Chancellor ought to have weighed this certificate more cautiously was a question entirely separated from anything else; and, supposing that that certificate had been thoroughly correct, he could not agree with the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Mallow in believing that the Lord Chancellor did wrong in permitting Mr. Wilde to resign. The charges against Mr. Wilde did not, as in another unfortunate case, involve any question of personal dishonesty. Mr. Wilde was, no doubt, accused of practices which had brought the Court into considerable disrepute, but the charge against him was simply that of permitting the official assignees and the messengers to retain certain sums of money in their hands, and with exhibiting a laxity in reference to the taxation of the accounts. It should be remembered also that Mr. Wilde said he had only followed the practice of Mr. Payne, a gentleman of more than eighty years of age, and that the Lord Chancellor, severely condemning the conduct of both, had permitted both to retire. There was no imputation against their honesty, though there were great imputations upon the mode in which they had conducted the business of the Court. That is an element the House ought to entertain when they are considering this question, but it is a totally different matter to that of which the hon. and learned Gentleman has spoken. From May, 1864, until February, 1865, the Lord Chancellor had nothing to do with Mr. Richard Bethell. He had been warmly appealed to by his family on behalf of his son, but he had absolutely refused in the strongest manner to give him an appointment. But in February, 1865, he did say, that if his son's debts were adjusted and his creditors satisfied, he would consider whether he could not give him a country appointment. Was there anything wrong in that? I think if it is so held it will be dealing out a measure of injustice to the Lord Chancellor, because no man would so deal with a stranger, much less his son. That was on the 22nd of February, and on the 26th Mr. Skirrow, the person to whom the statement was made, went to the Lord
  906
  Chancellor at his own request, and was told by his Lordship that he was resolved not to give his son any appointment at all. The hon. and learned Member for Mallow threw out the insinuation that it was in consequence of the scandal in another place that the appointment was not made; but he did not go into the dates. The hon. and learned Gentleman said that the appointment of Mr. Bethell was announced on the 24th; but two days afterwards the Lord Chancellor announced that he would do nothing for his son. In the interval nothing had taken place. The Question was asked in this House on the 3rd of March, and no proceedings took place in the House of Lords until the 27th. It is an injurious and an incorrect insinuation. It is manifest that the Lord Chancellor had resolved from the beginning not to give the appointment to his son; that he was for a moment overcome by strong pressure to say that he would not finally exclude him from office; but when he came to inquire how his son had been conducting himself in the interval he returned to the sternness he had maintained for eight months previously, and resolved that he would not appoint him. So far from there being any imputation upon the Lord Chancellor's conduct, as far as these matters are concerned, I say, on the contrary, that the noble and learned Lord has suffered under imputations founded on no facts whatever, and that he has suffered the still more grievous hardship of having been brought into that position by a member of his own family, although he himself has acted in a firm and honourable manner, however painful it was to the feelings of a father to do so. The disclosures in the Committee in regard to other characters in those transactions are very painful certainly—upon these I do not wish to say a word; but the impression on my mind is that, so far as the purity of his motives are concerned, the Lord Chancellor had no object whatever except on the one hand to do—as I believe he has done—call the attention of the public to the state in which the Bankruptcy Courts of the country were placed, and to deal with a strong hand with those who seemed to require it; and, on the other hand, to deal out the strictest and most impartial justice even to a member of his own family.
  VISCOUNT CRANBOURNE: I do not rise to say much in reference to this subject, because I concur in the opinion that it was not desirable that those who have

  907
  their knowledge on hearsay only should enter into such a discussion. But I am bound to say that, although one must excuse a good deal of the language which falls from advocates who have received a brief for the defence in rather a difficult case, the imputations which have been thrown out against the hon. and learned Member for Mallow are wholly without foundation. That hon. and learned Gentleman, at all events, has not spoken without a knowledge of the evidence, for he was present during the investigation; and he has not spoken to a Government ignorant of it, because the evidence was furnished them from day to day.
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL: I have not seen a word of it.
  VISCOUNT CRANBOURNE: Then I regret that the hon. and learned Gentleman should have been so ill instructed. But the Lord Chancellor had seen the evidence. It was not, therefore, true that either the attack or the defence had been made in ignorance.
  COLONEL DOUGLAS PENNANTrose to explain. The Lord Chancellor, in his evidence, stated that so far from making any complaint of not having received the evidence, he wished to come before the Committee and be examined before he was aware of what had been said. The Committee, however, considering that it was virtually a trial of the Lord Chancellor, thought it to be their duty, in strict fairness to all parties, that the hon. Member for Devonport (Mr. Ferrand), who made the accusation, and the Lord Chancellor should be furnished with the evidence from day to day.
  VISCOUNT CBANBOURNE: That bears out my statement accurately, and so disappears that whole fabric of virtuous indignation with which the Attorney General, almost bursting into tears——
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL: I have not seen any one of the papers.
  VISCOUNT CRANBOURNE: That is another proof of the amount of cordial harmony and co-operation existing between the Members of this admirably constituted Government. We can, of course, understand that the Lord Chancellor may not have thought it wise to intrust the evidence of his proceedings to the Attorney General, We are all of us acquainted with the high character of that hon. and learned Gentleman, and we can well understand that the Lord Chancellor may not hare cared to submit to him the details of
  908
  these disclosures. In defence of the hon. and learned Member for Mallow, I desire just to say that the natural indignation which any one would have felt at hearing these details affords a very sufficient explanation of the course he has taken in laying before the House his own conclusions on the subject, and also for asking the Government the questions which he has put. I heard with regret from the Attorney General the statement, which on reconsideration I think he will feel it wise to retract, that no proceedings whatever were to be taken against Mr. Miller.
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL: I stated that until I saw the evidence it was quite impossible for me to judge whether any and what proceedings ought to be taken. But I do not find that the Committee charge Mr. Miller with being a party to any corruption.
  VISCOUNT CRANBOURNE: That is precisely the point to which I wanted to draw the attention of the hon. and learned Gentleman—the bearing of the Committee on the evidence of Mr. Miller. I am not now speaking of the motives of the Lord Chancellor; but what appears to have been the case is, that the Lord Chancellor's patronage was set up for sale; and not only the patronage of the Lord Chancellor, but something infinitely more sacred and important—namely, his judicial power of inflicting penalties. I do not say that Mr. Miller was cognizant of the circumstances, though he certainly was a warm friend of Mr. Bethell; but Mr. Bethell, for the sake of certain money transactions, appears to have used his influence with Mr. Miller, and to have induced him, without authority, to write to Leeds this summary letter, and to take steps for procuring Mr. Wilde's resignation, and afterwards to draw up the appointment in Mr. Bethell's own name, which the Lord Chancellor subsequently refused to confirm. These appear to me to be circumstances full of grave suspicion. When a corrupt transaction has taken place, and a public officer, a friend of one of the parties, has been an instrument, it is difficult to avoid entertaining a suspicion that he was cognizant of the transaction. The Government, therefore, will not be doing their duty unless they institute a close investigation into the facts, and ascertain how far Mr. Miller was really cognizant of what Mr. Bethell was doing, and also, I am bound to add, unless they inflict some punishment upon

  909
  Mr. Miller for his extreme and singular misuse of his official trust.
  MR. DENMAN: AS I understand it, what the Government have undertaken to do is precisely what the noble Lord (Viscount Cranbourne) suggests that they should do—namely, examine closely the evidence when it is in their possession. The noble Lord, who rose for the purpose of justifying the hon. and learned Member for Mallow, put forward a very odd ground of justification. He said that the hon. and learned Gentleman had been present when the evidence was given. The position of the hon. and learned Member for Mallow was that of a juryman in waiting, who may be called on to discharge important functions in the next case; but whose opinion, as a mere spectator, without responsibility, is worth nothing in this case, in which he so glibly volunteers an opinion. In this case he was not called on to act as a Member of Parliament at all, nor did he, as the Committee were bound to do, remain in the Committee-room from hour to hour and from minute to minute taking notes to corroborate his own recollection. I rose, not for the purpose of justifying the Lord Chancellor, but to beg the House to do justice to the Committee, upon whom the responsibility of the inquiry was cast, and who, I think, have been hardly dealt with in this discussion. Five Gentlemen were appointed on that Committee, in addition to the two who conducted the case; three were Gentlemen sitting on that side of the House, and two of them sitting upon this side. From the very moment that their names were mentioned they found acceptance, because those names were felt to afford a guarantee that they would approach the inquiry with a sole desire to do justice in the matter. We are in this position now, that we have not the evidence before us; yet an hon. and learned Gentleman volunteers in its absence, not only to impeach the Chancellor, but to overrule the Committee from whom the Report has emanated. Such, I apprehend, has never been the practice of this House, and it ought, I think, to be discouraged.
  MR. HENNESSY: It is said that we have only the Report before us, and, therefore, can do nothing; but the whole of the evidence given before the Committee was actually printed on the 17th of June, ten days before a word of the Report was in type. The Committee very wisely had the evidence printed from day
  910
  to day, so that every word must have been in type before the preparation of the Report was approached. Ten or eleven days have elapsed since the Committee closed its inquiry, and the evidence is not yet produced. According to an announcement made in another place—which the noble Lord will no doubt repeat—the dissolution will take place nine days hence. Having waited ten days already, if we wait ten days more Parliament, consequently, will be at an end. In the papers presented to Parliament some weeks ago with reference to the Leeds Bankruptcy Court, and in the present Report from the Select Committee, the hon. and learned Member for Mallow had, I think, abundant information to warrant his remarks.
  MR. AYRTON: The hon. and learned Gentleman opposite (Mr. Hennessy) seems to think that somebody has grossly failed in his duty because the House has not already received this evidence. That, I think, is jumping to a very summary conclusion, regardless of the facts; because, although the inquiry may have closed, some days are usually allowed to have the proceedings regularly indexed and examined by the Clerk. I say this upon general grounds merely. I know nothing about the evidence, and therein I fancy I am in precisely the same position as the hon. and learned Member.
  MR. HENNESSY: I have ascertained that the evidence was in type ten days ago.
  MR. AYRTON: We all know as well as the hon. Member that the evidence is printed from day to day; but beyond that fact I venture to think that the hon. Member knows nothing to justify him in imputing motives. The noble Lord (Viscount Cranbourne) also appeared to labour under some misconception with regard to Mr. Bethell's share in this matter, and one might have thought that a reasonable amount of imputations was to be found in the Report without exaggerating or adding to them. As far as the Report goes, there is nothing whatever to show that Mr. Bethell in any way counselled the steps taken in connection with Mr. Wilde's resignation, or derived any advantage from it. I mention this to show how injurious it is to embark in a discussion of this personal nature, without having proper materials before us; for if the noble Lord has evidence in support of his statement outside the contents of this Report, he is speaking of something with which

  911
  the House is not acquainted. But I take it for granted that the Report is correct on the point; and if so grave a matter had been proved to their satisfaction, the Committee would not have slurred it over or concealed it, and therefore that the noble Lord fell into error. From the terms of the notice given by the hon. and learned Member for Mallow, I had no notion that he was going to travel into anything outside the four corners of the Report, or to build up a much wider case than could be made up from the materials supplied in that document. I scarcely think that he was right in travelling beyond its statements. Some hon. Members appear to think that the Government ought to possess a perfect knowledge of all the proceedings of the Committee. I cannot help thinking that a very gross assumption. Copies of proceedings in Committee, when furnished to any person, are always held to be confidential, and it would be a breach of faith to let documents which were thus supplied for a particular purpose go out of a person's hands and be applied to objects entirely distinct. I therefore cannot see how the Attorney General or how the other members of the Government can be expected to have cognizance of the proceedings before the Leeds Committee. It is very easy for us to sit in judgment upon the delinquencies of other people; but if any one were to sit in judgment upon the acts of any Member of this House, upon our sins of omission and commission, I think we should find it very difficult to escape without censure.
  SIR LAWRENCE PALK: I desire to say only one or two words in connection with this subject. I beg the House to observe that through either the extreme leniency or negligence of the Lord Chancellor upon two occasions pensions have been granted to persons unfit to receive them. I trust that this fact will not be forgotten, and I feel convinced that the country will ask whether a high official who has twice been guilty, under circumstances of peculiar suspicion, of permitting pensions to be given to unworthy persons, is one who is deserving of the honour and respect of the profession of which he is the leader.
  MR. SCULLY: I must express my regret at the tone the discussion has taken. I am in the same position as the hon. and learned Member for the Tower Hamlets (Mr. Ayrton). From the terms of the Question which the hon. and learned Mem-
  912
  ber for Mallow put on the paper, I did not think it possible that such a discussion could arise, and, therefore, I did not take the trouble to bring the Report with me to the House. I hold that it is quite premature to enter into this question at present. We have not got the evidence, and therefore we must take the decision of the Committee for the present, and they say that they "acquit the Lord Chancellor from all charge except that of haste and want of caution." What, then, are we to do? We all know that when a witness gives his evidence it is printed by the next morning; but the usual course for Committees is to report first, and then the evidence is afterwards laid before the table. I do not think it fair to sit in judgment upon the Lord Chancellor without having the facts before us, or to try to damage the character of a distinguished dignitary, because it is supposed that certain evidence is given before the Committee, which evidence we have not seen. It would be more worthy of the dignity of the House and in better taste not to act in a hostile manner towards the Lord Chancellor, when the evidence may probably show that he has been unjustly suspected.
  VISCOUNT PALMERSTON: Sir, I am sorry to prolong this discussion even by a few words; but I cannot let it close without expressing the pain, and—if the hon. and learned Member for Mallow (Mr. Longfield) will allow me to say so—the indignation with which I listened to his speech. Sir, this House is composed of opposite parties, and it is perfectly right for Members of one party to take advantage of any fair ground for commenting upon the conduct of persons belonging to the other party, and especially of persons who happen to hold office. But hitherto it has been the characteristic of this House that, however great our animosities or strong the party feeling which divides Gentlemen on one side from the other, at all events the persons accused should have fair play. Now, the Lord Chancellor has not had fair play from the hon. and learned Member. It appears that the hon. and learned Member for Mallow was present during the whole investigation; he knows, therefore, exactly what the evidence given was; and yet it is stated by those who were also present that the hon. and learned Member has made assertions of matters, as if contained in that evidence, which will not be found in the evidence when it is produced. It

  913
  will be for the hon. and learned Member to justify his conduct by making out the correctness of what he has asserted.
  MR. LONGFIELD: I did not make a single assertion which was not in the evidence; not a single one.
  VISCOUNT PALMERSTON: I was also, I must say, much grieved to hear the bitterness of invective which the hon. and learned Member threw into the charges which he made against the Lord Chancellor. He might be slightly justified in stating that which was borne out by the evidence, and which, he says, he heard; but he was not justified in indulging in that bitter personal invective which was not unjustly characterized by the Attorney General as more suitable to the practice of the Old Bailey than to the ordinary practice of the profession to which he belongs. But I complain, moreover, of the manner in which the hon. and learned Member has brought the subject under discussion. If he had intended to make an attack upon the Lord Chancellor, founded on evidence not in the hands of Members, but of which he had cognizance, he ought, at all events, to have given notice of his intention. But the notice which he gave was of a question to be asked; and so little did that notice indicate his intention of making a virulent personal attack on the Lord Chancellor that I was going to answer the question instead of the Attorney General, believing that the real point which he wanted to know was what course the Government was to take when the evidence was produced. I was going to tell him that it was the intention of the Government to submit the evidence to the Law Officers of the Crown, in order that such legal steps might be taken as might be justified by the state of the case. And so much did the Question put upon the paper imply that it was directed against other persons, and not against the Lord Chancellor, that it asks what steps are to be taken against "the parties implicated?" Sir, I can only regret that the hon. and learned Member has taken a course which, I think, is so entirely different and so much opposed to that which even the most violent party Members are in the habit of pursuing; and I am convinced that when this evidence is in the hands of Members they will come to a very different conclusion from the hon. and learned Member, and that they will find that, so far from
  914
  that evidence being the foundation of charges such as those which the hon. and learned Member has made against the Lord Chancellor, it will bear out the Report of the Committee, which acquits him of being actuated by any improper motives throughout the whole course of these transactions.
  Question, "That this House do now adjourn," put, and negatived.

PROROGATION OF THE PARLIAMENT.

  QUESTION.
  MR. CHARLES FORSTERasked the First Lord of the Treasury, When it was probable, taking the state of Public Business into account, that the Session might be brought to an end?
  VISCOUNT PALMERSTON: I believe, as far as the Public Business before the two Houses of Parliament is concerned, there is nothing which would keep Parliament sitting longer than Thursday week; and that event which we are all looking forward to may take place on that day—Thursday, the 6th of July—at the latest. I know that there are railway Bills now before the House of Lords which some are of opinion would be concluded some few days later than the 6th, and that a wish has been expressed that Parliament should be kept sitting for the purpose of settling the squabbles of those railway companies. But we all know the great public inconvenience which would result from any unnecessary delay with respect to the elections. The whole of the United Kingdom, in fact, is interested in the matter. Great trouble has been taken, great expense incurred, and great inconvenience is felt; and therefore I think the House will be of opinion that Government is right in preferring the public advantage to the interest of these particular railway companies. Indeed, it is entirely in the power of those who have an interest in these disputes to reinstate the Bills next Parliament in the position in which they will be left by the dissolution, which will take place next Thursday week.
  House adjourned at a quarter after Eight o'clock.

MINUTES.
Sat First in Parliament—The Earl of Morley, after the Death of his Father.
PUBLIC BILLS—First Reading—Expiring Laws Continuance * (226); Poor Law Board Continuance (227).
Second Reading—Peace Preservation (Ireland) Act (1866) Amendment * (200); Greenwich Hospital (179); Fire Brigade (Metropolis) * (215); Turnpike Trusts Arrangements * (216); Ayr Burghs Election * (186); Falmouth Borough * (201); Comptroller of the Exchequer and Public Audit * (212); Inland Revenue * (221); Indemnity * (222); Compound Spirits Warehousing * (224).
Committee—Prisons (155); Salmon Fishery Act (1861) Amendment (199); Carriers' Act Amendment * (198); Foreign Jurisdiction Act Amendment [H.L.] * (211); Rochdale Vicarage [H.L.] * (213); Naval Discipline Act Amendment [H.L.] * (214); Sugar Duties and Drawbacks * (195).
Report—Carriers Act Amendment * (198); Foreign Jurisdiction Act Amendment [H.L.] * (211); Local Government Supplemental (No. 4) * (208); Navy and Marines (Property of Deceased) * (220); Rochdale Vicarage [H.L.] * (213); Naval Discipline Act Amendment [H.L.] * (214); Sugar Duties and Drawbacks * (195).
Third Reading—Land Debentures (Ireland) * (219); Constabulary Force (Ireland) Act Amendment * (168); Navy and Marine (Wills) * (169); Pier and Harbour Orders Confirmation (No. 8) * (184); Naval and Marine (Pay and Pensions) * (177); Harbours Transfer * (182); National Gallery (Dublin) * (196), and passed.

TYNE IMPROVEMENT BILL.

  THIRD READING.
  THE EARL OF ELLENBOROUGH, having presented two petitions from Tynemouth and South Shields against this Bill, which stood for third reading to-night, said,

  849
  he must, in the first place, explain how it happened that he had not presented these petitions earlier, that reason being that he had not seen the Bill put down on the paper. All he could now do was to present the petition and request the attention of the noble Duke (the Duke of Somerset) to them. He regretted to see that there was another Bill to be read the third time that night, by which it was intended to transfer to the Board of Trade all the powers now exercised by the Admiralty over the harbours of this country. Now that he looked on as a most unwise step, believing, as he did, that those powers would be much better exercised by the Admiralty, whose views were, generally speaking, of a higher nature, and whose first duty was towards the seamen. Up to recent times there was a bar on the harbour of the Tyne river, which was now, however, almost entirely removed. While that bar existed, a vessel, whatsoever dangers she might previously have encountered, the moment she passed it found herself in still water; but now that it had been taken away, the great dangers to be overcome were those to be met with in the inmost recesses of the harbour itself. During the last year nineteen vessels had been stranded at the entrance to the harbour, instead of eight or ten which was the usual average, and in the case of three of these vessels, forty-four lives were lost. He feared that so long as the harbour remained as it was, dreadful loss of life must be expected to take place year after year. Under those circumstances he hoped the noble Duke at the head of the Admiralty would allow the third reading of the Bill to be postponed until he had obtained the opinion of a competent officer sent down expressly to report on the present position of the harbour.
  THE DUKE OF SOMERSETthought the proposal of the noble Earl was scarcely reasonable in the case of a Private Bill which had passed through the House of Commons and been before a Committee of their Lordships' House. Those who were interested in the navigation had had ample opportunities of being heard before Committees of that and the other House, and it was not fair that they should withhold their opposition until the third reading of the Bill, and then ask that it should be postponed until the Admiralty had instituted an inquiry into the subject. The Admiralty had, in fact, nothing to do with the Tyne Harbour, which, like most other
  850
  commercial harbours, was a few years ago transferred to the management of the Board of Trade.
  LORD RAVENSWORTHsaid, that the Committee of their Lordships which sat upon this Bill bestowed great attention upon it, and if any one had any complaint to make against its provisions, they ought to have appeared before the Committee and stated their objections.
  THE EARL OF ELLENBOROUGHsaid, that no doubt the petitions were intended to have been presented before the Bill was referred to a Committee. Unfortunately those from whom he received them omitted to inform him when the Bill would pass that stage, and it was only recently that he discovered it in the list of Bills waiting for third reading. He was as anxious as any one that the harbour of the Tyne should be improved, but no one could look at the chart of that harbour without seeing that the proper mode of improving it was to excavate the Black Middens.
  EARL GREYsaid, he saw no necessity for adopting the course suggested by the noble Earl in reference to this Bill.
  Bill read 3a.

THE DISSOLUTION OF THE PARLIAMENT.
EARL GRANVILLE: My Lords, before the reading of the Orders of the Day, I wish to make a communication to your Lordships on behalf of Her Majesty's Government with respect to the Dissolution of Parliament. After the statement which the Chairman of Committees was good enough to make to the House last night regarding the state of the Private business, I and one of my Colleagues communicated with Lord Palmerston on the subject. Her Majesty's Ministers greatly regret having to interfere with the finishing of the Private business before the House; but, at the same time, there are various and important reasons why the dissolution of Parliament should not be postponed for any considerable time after the Public business has been brought to a conclusion. Therefore, without giving any distinct pledge on the subject, Her Majesty's Government have thought it necessary to advise Her Majesty to prorogue Parliament on Thursday week, the 6th of July. With regard to the anticipated interference with the Private business, in consequence of the dissolution, I do not think the inconve-

851
nience will be so great as has been supposed, as, since the appeal made by the noble Lord the Chairman of Committees to the House, considerable progress has been made in that business. With regard to the class of Bills referred to by the noble Lord yesterday—namely, those to which parties are offering opposition—I do not think that the limitation of the time for the prorogation of Parliament will affect them in any great degree. It appears to me that there are weighty reasons to induce Her Majesty's Government not unnecessarily to delay the dissolution of Parliament. Such delay would cause great expense to candidates, who all earnestly wish to proceed as soon as possible with the elections. The delay would also most injuriously affect trade and manufactures, which are much affected by the electioneering contest about to take place, and I am quite sure a greater amount of evil would be caused to the country by delaying the dissolution, than would result from the non-completion of so much of the Private business as yet remains to be done. Under these circumstances Her Majesty's Ministers are of opinion that the prorogation should take place on Thursday the 6th July, which would give more than ample time for disposing of the Public business.
LORD REDESDALE: Of course I have not a word to say against the decision of Her Majesty's Government. It is no doubt their duty to do the best they can for the general interests of the country, and having come to the conclusion to dissolve Parliament at an early day I can no longer contend against that determination. I hope, however, that the amount of injury to those interested in the Private business will be less than was at first expected, as I believe that by the end of the Session there will be but few, if any, Private Bills undisposed of, as a great number of those Bills have been passed within the last few days, and in nearly every instance where the Bills will remain undisposed of the fault will rest with the parties themselves. I hope no attempt will be made to hang up any of the Private business until next Session—a course which in my opinion would be clearly wrong. Any intimation of such a nature would have the effect of preventing amicable arrangements between the contending parties which otherwise might possibly take place, and I am very glad that no notice of such an intention
852
has been given by the noble Earl. I think I shall be able this evening to appoint additional Committees, which will facilitate the disposal of the remaining business. I shall watch the progress of the business carefully, and we shall be enabled in a few days to see what prospect there will be of concluding it before the rising of the House.

PRIVATE BILLS.—RESOLUTION.
Standing Order No. 179. Sect. 1, considered (according to Order).
LORD REDESDALE LORD REDESDALE moved—
"That Wednesday next shall be considered as a sitting day with respect to any petition praying to be heard upon the merits against any Bill mentioned in either of the two classes of private Bills."
LORD BROUGHAMdid not rise to oppose, but to second, Lord Redesdale's proposal for expediting the business, and hasten the dissolution so necessary for preserving the peace and for relieving all parties from the anxieties, labours, and enormous expense under which so many were now suffering. But he never could see measures taken to expedite the Private Business of Parliament without rendering the tribute of justice to the memory of the illustrious man whose loss we daily have to deplore on all questions, whether of peace or war, of foreign or domestic policy, his illustrious friend, the Great Duke, never to be replaced. When in conjunction with him he (Lord Brougham) had referred the new Standing Order to a Committee of this House, the Duke said, "Why not propose our great plan?" Lord Brougham answered that the Committee was certain to reject it. "Never mind," said the Duke, "we can but be defeated, and then we retreat upon the lesser one." Accordingly, we were defeated, and the present Standing Orders were adopted, first by the Committee, and then by the House, and effected a great improvement in our Private Business, and were afterwards, though with great reluctance, adopted by the other House. It was, however, a far inferior measure, as the Duke justly said, to that which they had worked out together. That was the true remedy for saving both time, labour, and expense. It consisted in having a Joint Committee of the two Houses, seven Commoners and five Peers, the Duke at first was for six of each, but with his wonted sagacity he soon perceived the necessity of giving a majority to the Commons, and with his

853
never-failing candour he assented to this change. The whole matter of each Bill, both law and fact, were to be referred to this Committee, with a professional Judge to assist and inform it on questions of law and evidence, but in no way to guide or control. The Report made to each House was to be conclusive only on the facts, leaving the whole question of the Bill to the entire and free decision of each House. Such an improvement in our course of legislation would effectually prevent the enormous labours, delay, and expense of a double inquiry in each case, and although the pains taken by an able and experienced Member of the other House had effected considerable improvements of late, yet he (Lord Brougham) was convinced that this plan thus sanctioned by his illustrious Friend must sooner or later be adopted, as the real and effectual remedy for evils at present so severely felt by all but those interested in the continuance of the evil.
Resolved, That Wednesday next be considered as a Sitting Day with respect to any Petition praying to be heard upon the Merits against any Bill mentioned in either of the Two Classes of Private Bills.—(The Chairman of Committees.)

PRIVATE BILLS.
Standing Order No. 178. Sect. 9. considered (according to Order), and dispensed with for the Remainder of the Session.—(The Chairman of Committees.)
DIVISIONS OF THE HOUSE.
  STANDING ORDER NO. 25 AMENDED.
  Standing Order No. 25. Sect. 2. considered (according to Order), and amended as follows: After the Words ("to be kept on the Table for that Purpose") add ("and the Tellers shall be appointed"); and after the Words ("as indicated by the Sand Glass") add ("or after such shorter Time as the Tellers appointed on both Sides may agree to.")—(The Chairman of Committees.)
PRISONS BILL—(No. 155.)

  COMMITTEE.
  House in Committee (according to Order).
  Clause 68 (Prohibition of Sentence of Solitary Confinement).
  THE EARL OF CARNARVON THE EARL OF CARNARVON moved the omission of the clause. The Select Committee of their Lordships' House, which had inquired very fully into this subject, had expressed an opinion in favour of this punishment, as being very
  854
  valuable, especially in cases of short sentences. The clause formed no part of the Bill as it emanated from the Home Office, but was inserted in the Bill in the other House. The abolition of this punishment had no connection with the subject-matter of the Bill, which was for the regulation of the administration of prisons. The abolition of the punishment of solitary confinement was a matter of judicial procedure, which ought not to be imported into a Bill of this sort. The Bill did not apply to military prisons, and military tribunals, as their Lordships were aware, were frequently in the habit of imposing sentences of three and six months' imprisonment, with solitary confinement for one week in every month. How was it possible that such a sentence could be carried out if this clause were passed? There were often offences committed in prison which required to be dealt with by means of solitary confinement, and if the justices were deprived of this power they would be unable to deal with them. He hoped, therefore, that the noble Lord (Earl Granville) would agree to the omission of this clause.
  EARL GRANVILLEsaid, the noble Earl was quite right in saying that the clause formed no part of the Bill as it left the Home Office, but he could not agree that it was an anomaly in a Bill of this character. The clause, he believed, had been unanimously agreed to by the Select Committee of the other House, and he hoped their Lordships would agree to retain it in the Bill.
  LORD HOUGHTONthought the clause went beyond the scope of the Bill. No doubt very exaggerated ideas were entertained at one time of the effects of solitary confinement; but still, for certain purposes, it was a useful punishment, and Her Majesty's Government would do well to omit the clause.
  The Marquess of SALISBURY and The Earl of ROMNEY urged the omission of the clause.
  EARL GRANVILLEsaid, that in deference to the opinion of the noble Lords he would consent to strike out the clause.
  Clause struck out.
  THE EARL OF CARNARVON THE EARL OF CARNARVON moved an Amendment to Schedule I., Rule 34, which he said was rendered necessary by the omission of Clause 68. It was admitted that where hard labour in any

  855
  form was imposed low diet could not be inflicted. The object was to make the punishment in cases of short sentences sharp and severe, and therefore that object would be defeated if hard labour were imposed, thus rendering it impossible to give the prisoner a low diet. He therefore moved to omit certain words from the clause which would prevent the addition of hard labour in short sentences.
  Amendment agreed to.
  Schedule II. (List of Gaols to be closed.)
  THE EARL OF CARNARVONdesired to be informed why the gaol at Poole was not included within its operation. The Committee ascertained that the average number of prisoners in that gaol was only two, and the maximum number in the course of the year only eleven. The food of the prisoners was not cooked in the gaol in the usual manner, but there was a contract with a neighbouring hotel, and the dinners of the inmates were brought in upon trays by the servants of that establishment. Several prisoners were allowed to sleep in one cell, and he was not sure that two had not been permitted to occupy the same bed. The tread-mill was so constructed that one prisoner could turn the wheel; and when the governor went out he was compelled to lock up the one or two prisoners who might be in the gaol, and trust to their own industry for the performance of the tasks imposed upon them.
  EARL GRANVILLEsaid, that he did not know why this gaol had been left out of the schedule, but he was sure that there must be some good reason for its omission. He would inquire into the subject, and would answer the noble Earl's question upon a future day.
  Schedule agreed to.
  The Report of the Amendments to be received on Thursday next; and Bill to be printed, as amended. (No. 228.)

GREENWICH HOSPITAL BILL—(No. 179.)

  SECOND READING.
  THE DUKE OF SOMERSET, in moving the second reading of the Bill, said, it was founded on the Report of a Royal Commission. Having pointed out the principal clauses of the Bill, the noble Duke said, that as there was no objection to the general principle of the Bill, he should content himself with moving that it be read a second time.
  Moved, "That the Bill be now read 2a."—(The Duke of Somerset.)
  THE EARL OF HARDWICKEsaid, that it had been repeatedly represented that after the passing of this Bill the Hospital would remain very much as it was before. It appeared to him, however, that the Bill proposed to substitute in lieu of the present Hospital a fund which should be entirely at the disposal of the Admiralty, which was to have the complete and entire control of the revenues of the Hospital, and to have the appointment of the pensioners. The Bill, therefore, must be regarded as entirely abolishing Greenwich Hospital as it was generally understood, and to hand over its revenues to purposes quite foreign to the purpose for which it was founded—namely, that of being a great almshouse for the reception of aged and wounded seamen. It now seemed to be the desire of the Admiralty to get rid of the pensioners altogether. The noble Duke had entirely changed his opinion on this subject since last year, when he expressed a strong opinion that the building should be retained for the purposes to which it had been so long applied, and that the revenues should be kept distinct; whereas, the Bill proposed not only to take away the building from the seamen, but also to place the revenues in the hands of the Admiralty, who would have to create a new office for its management at a great annual expense. Now, he might be asked what arrangement he was prepared to advise? He replied that the revenues could be better managed if a Commissioner were placed over them, whose accounts would be audited and submitted to Parliament. The management of the property of the value of £200,000 a year would require a certain number of clerks at the Admiralty, and constitute an imperium in imperio, while the Admiralty had quite enough to do in governing the navy. And yet the estates would not be managed as efficiently as if they were under a Commissioner with a steward in charge of them. He (the Earl of Hardwicke) would keep the Hospital for the unmarried seamen, and with regard to the married men, he would give them pensions outside. If the Hospital was not then sufficiently filled he would reserve a part for the cure of diseased and wounded men, and in time of war it would again revert to its ancient purpose. The officers at present in the Hospital he would have liberally compensated, and he would have placed

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  the three captains on the list of retired Admirals. There were two remarkable instances of such, as both Captains Cook and Lord Rodney had been on the Greenwich Hospital list, and afterwards returned to active service. He deeply regretted the step taken by the Admiralty.
  THE EARL OF COLCHESTERexpressed his opinion that the Bill would not work so well as the Government expected.
  THE DUKE OF SOMERSET, in reply to the observations of the noble Earl (the Earl of Hardwicke), said, that the Bill was only what had been shadowed out in a memorandum which he had laid upon the table some time ago, and which he believed had met with the general approbation of both Houses of Parliament. Pensioners who were not quite worn out felt that a residence in Greenwich Hospital was a monotonous sort of existence—a kind of monastic life—and, no doubt, very many of them would gladly avail themselves of the permission to go out and live with their friends.
  Motion agreed to: Bill read 2a accordingly, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House on Thursday next.

SALMON FISHERY ACT (1861) AMENDMENT BILL—(No. 199.)

  COMMITTEE.
  Order of the Day for the House to be put into a Committee read.
  THE EARL OF MALMESBURYsaid, that though he had several Amendments to propose on this Bill, he had no wish to oppose its passing. He was desirous that the salmon fisheries should be protected and improved, but not at the expense of private rights, and he hoped that in revising the Bill their Lordships would remember that two years ago they had rather hastily taken upon themselves to decide several points in opposition to the opinion of the Lord Chancellor, three ex-Chancellors, another noble and learned Lord, and the two noble Earls who led the two sides of the House. The consequence was that a noble Lord who had been very zealous for the Bill came down the other night conscience-stricken and admitted that the Bill had been a failure; that it had committed great injustice, and that it must be remedied, if justice was to be expected from that House. He hoped that their Lordships in considering the Bill would not be carried away by a salmomania.
  House in Committee (according to Order).
  Clauses 1 to 13, inclusive, agreed to.
  Clause 14 (Ex-officio Members of Board).
  THE EARL OF MALMESBURYproposed an Amendment, providing that no person should be a conservator who was not the owner or occupier of fifty acres of land abutting on the stream within the limits of the fishery district.
  LORD STANLEY OF ALDERLEYobjected to restricting the discretion of the magistrates in the selection of these officers.
  Amendment negatived.
  Clause agreed to.
  Clauses 15 to 30, inclusive, agreed to.
  Clause 31 (Order for Entry of Water-Bailiff on Land).
  THE EARL OF MALMESBURYobjected to the extraordinary powers conferred upon watchers to enter upon premises and to remain there for three days and nights, and therefore moved the omission of the clause.
  LORD STANLEY OF ALDERLEYsaid, the clause was only an extension of a clause in the Irish Salmon Fishery Act.
  LORD CHELMSFORDsuggested that the clause should apply to premises not being a dwelling-house or garden.
  LORD STANLEY OF ALDERLEYagreed to the Amendment.
  Clause amended, and agreed to.
  Clauses 32 to 39, inclusive, agreed to.
  Clause 40 (Commissioners to inquire as to fixed Engines).
  LORD CHELMSFORDsaid, that the clause gave to the Commissioners unusual and arbitrary powers, and moved that it be omitted from the Bill.
  On Question, that the said Clause stand Part of the Bill? their Lordships divided:—Contents 13; Not-Contents 7: Majority 6.
  Amendments made; The Report thereof to be received on Thursday next; and Bill to be printed, as amended. (No. 229.)

  CONTENTS.

  Westbury, L. (L. Chancellor.)

  Abinger, L.

  Clandeboye, L. (L. Dufferin and Claneboye.)

  Somerset, D.

  Llanover, L.

  Lovat, L.

  Clarendon, E.

  Stanley of Alderley, L. [Teller.]

  De Grey, E. [Teller.]

  Granville, E.

  Sundridge, L. (D. Argyll.)

  Saint Germans, E.

  Gloucester and Bristol, Bp.

  859

  NOT-CONTENTS.

  Malmesbury, E. [Teller.]

  Denman, L.

  Monteagle of Brandon L

  Redesdale, L.

  Chelmsford, L. [Teller.]

  Somerhill, L (M. Clanricarde.)

  Cranworth, L.

ROMAN CATHOLIC SCHOOLS.

  QUESTION.
  THE MARQUESS OF WESTMEATHasked the Lord President of the Council, If his Lordship is aware that Mr. J. D. Morell, late one of Her Majesty's Inspectors of Roman Catholic schools, who was dismissed from that Office on the 4th day of March, 1864, has been appointed as Inspector of Roman Catholic schools by the Royal Commissioners of the Patriotic Fund with the sanction of the Committee of the Council of Education?
  EARL GRANVILLEsaid, that he had made inquiries on the subject, and it appeared that Mr. Morell was appointed by the Commissioners of the Royal Patriotic Fund previous to his dismissal from his office of Inspector of Roman Catholic Schools.
  THE MARQUESS OF WESTMEATHwished to know whether the noble Earl thought that the appointment should be sanctioned by the Government?
  EARL GRANVILLEsaid, that the Government had no voice in the matter.

LIVERPOOL BOROUGH PRISON.

  QUESTION.
  THE MARQUESS OF WESTMEATHasked Her Majesty's Government, Whether it has authorized a Curtain to be drawn over the Ten Commandments in the Chapel of the Liverpool Borough Prison, so as completely to obscure them from Observation while the Romish so-called Altar is therein displayed and the Roman Priest performs his services therein?
  EARL GRANVILLEsaid, that this was a matter for the justices of Liverpool to decide. No authority had been asked for and none had been given by the Home Office in the matter.

HYMN BOOK FOR THE ARMY AND NAVY.

  QUESTION.
  THE MARQUESS OF WESTMEATHinquired, Whether the Hymn Book entitled, Hymns Ancient and Modern, for use in the Services of the Church, has been adopted as the authorized Hymn Book for Her Majesty's Army and Navy? He understood that the Hymn Book in question had been
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  issued to the army and navy, with orders that no other work of the kind should be used for the service, and that it was bound up with the Prayer Books furnished to our soldiers. The noble Marquess quoted various passages from the hymns to show that they were either derived from or founded upon the Roman Catholic breviaries and missals, and maintained that their language was inconsistent with the principles of the Church of England, and countenanced doctrines which the Articles of that Church expressly denounced as "blasphemous fables and dangerous deceits." He complained of the insidious manner in which these doctrines were being introduced into the army and navy, and asked whether it was true that that Hymn Book had been inflicted on our soldiers and sailors.
  EARL DE GREY AND RIPONsaid, the noble Marquess was correct in supposing that a selection of hymns from the book called Hymns Ancient and Modern, had been made for the use of the army, and had been bound up with the Prayer Book as he had stated. These Hymns had also been issued to the navy. With respect to the book itself, he had not been able to follow the noble Marquess in the extracts he had read, and was therefore unable to say whether or not those particular hymns were included in the selection; neither could he enter upon any theological discussion of the subject; but the admitted fact that these hymns had been recommended by the dignitaries of the Church, and were used in a thousand parishes in this country, was the best guarantee they could have that they contained nothing inconsistent with the received doctrines of the Church of England. The old hymns of Tate and Brady had become distasteful to the soldiers and sailors, and it was thought desirable to provide some new ones. These had been adopted with the approval of the Chaplain General of the Army and of a Committee of naval chaplains and officers. The noble Marquess complained that portions of these hymns were taken from the Roman Catholic books of worship; but he surely was aware that large portions of the Book of Common Prayer was taken from the ancient Liturgies, and that the Te Deum, for instance, was similarly derived. That there was nothing in this Hymn Book contrary to the doctrines of the Church of England, the character of the noble Duke at the head of the Admi-

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  ralty (the Duke of Somerset) was a guarantee. He would not enter into a theological discussion with the noble Marquess, but he was content to rest his defence of the course taken in regard to this question upon the approval of a body of men who understood such subjects better than he or the noble Marquess—namely, the great dignitaries of the Church and the clergymen of a thousand parishes.
  THE MARQUESS OF WESTMEATHsaid, he was much obliged to the noble Earl for his candour, but must say that, while certain parts of our Prayer Book were no doubt taken from the Church of Rome, as, for example, the Te Deum—than which nothing could be more magnificent—yet nothing had been borrowed from that source which the Church of England expressly declared to be incompatible with her own principles.
  House adjourned at a quarter past Nine o'clock, till To-morrow, One o'clock.