Sitting of 24 March 1865

MINUTES.
SELECT COMMITTEE—On Taxation of Ireland Mr. Finlay added; Azeem Jah (Signatures to Petitions) nominated.
SUPPLY—considered in Committee—ARMY ESTIMATES.
PUBLIC BILLS—Ordered—Merchant Shipping Disputes *; Prisons Scotland Act Amendment*; Trusts Administration (Scotland).*
First Reading—Merchant Shipping Disputes [90]; Consolidated Fund (£15,000,000)*; Prisons (Scotland) Act Amendment* [91]; Trusts Administration (Scotland)* [92].
Second Reading—County Voters Registration (Ireland) [70] negatived.
Committee—Union Officers (Ireland) Superannuation [53].
Report—Union Officers (Ireland) Superannuation* [53].
Considered as amended—Herring Fisheries (Scotland)* [49].

LANARKSHIRE COUNTY PRISON BOARD BILL—(by Order)

  SECOND READING.
  Order for Second Reading read.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a second time."
  SIR EDWARD COLEBROOKEsaid, he contended that on public grounds this Bill ought not to be proceeded with. The object of the measure was to enable the Prison Board of Lanarkshire to enlarge the gaol at Glasgow, and to allow them to extend the cost of the undertaking over a number of years. They had not, however consulted upon that subject the Commissioners of Supply, or the other county authorities. It was not consistent with the practice of Parliament to carry out by a Private Bill any measure which could be effected by a general Act. By the 2 & 3 Vict. power was given to assess Scotland generally for the purpose of building prisons, and in addition there was a power which enabled the Local Boards to assess themselves further, and so liberally had that privilege been acted upon that £200,000 or £300,000 had been raised in different counties by the voluntary assessment of the Commissioners of Supply. He contended that the proper course to be taken was that full communication should be made to all parties concerned, and that nothing should be done without the consent of the Commissioners of Supply being previously obtained. This Bill was a proposal to place in the hands of the Prison Board the absolute power to make this assessment without the sanction of those parties, and he therefore opposed it. If this Bill were passed, though the assessment could not be made without the assent of the Commissioners of Supply, yet a Parliamentary sanction would be given to a particular proposal, which had never been fully discussed, and the House would throw upon the counties the odium of rejecting it without having had the opportunity of discussing any rival project. He objected to the Bill on principle, and hoped the House would reject it, and the more so because the Lord Advocate had a notice on the paper to bring in a Bill on the subject. He begged

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  to move that the Bill be read a second time that day six months.
  LORD ELCHOsaid, that he seconded the Amendment solely as a matter of principle. As a Scotch Member, and having a Prison Board in the county which he represented, which might, perhaps, at one time or another take it into its head to act as the Prison Board of Lanarkshire had thought fit to do, he was of opinion that it would he well to stop the practice in limine. The case lay in a nutshell. An Act of Parliament gave Prison Boards certain powers, but the Lanarkshire Board not being able to raise a particular sum for the enlargement of Glasgow prison, without the consent of the Secretary of State and the Commissioners of Supply, they had brought in a Private Bill to enable them to do what the public Act would not admit of.
  Amendment proposed, to leave out the word "now" and at the end of the Question to add the words "upon this day six months."—(Sir Edward Colebrooke.)
  Question proposed, "That the word 'now' stand part of the Question."
  MR. BAILLIE COCHRANEsaid, there was one monstrous injustice contemplated by the Bill. Lanarkshire was divided into three wards, and, though the district with which he was connected had not for a number of years sent a single prisoner to Glasgow, the Prison Board of that city, without consulting the proprietors of the county, took upon themselves to bring in a Private Bill in direct opposition to all the principles upon which such Bills ought to be founded.
  MR. DALGLISHsaid, the county of Lanark was divided into upper, middle, and lower wards, but it was not a Local Board, but the county Board, nominated by the Commissioners of Supply and the proper authorities in the county, which promoted this Bill. He could say that, as far as regarded the amount of assessment, the city of Glasgow was not adequately represented by the county Board. The county Board resolved that a certain addition to the prison should be made, but it was found that they had no power under the general Act. The county Board took the best advice they could, and this Bill was the result of their deliberations. The people of Glasgow had no desire to increase the prison, it was a matter of necessity, and this mode of doing it was considered the best. He hoped, then, the House would allow the Bill to be read a second time.
  MR. BLACKBURNsaid, he opposed the Bill on the ground that the Board had been elected to discharge certain duties, and that they were not entitled to go beyond them. He wanted to know if they were prepared to give power to the Prison Board to assess and do as they liked, without consulting the wishes of their constituents.
  MR. CRAUFURDsaid, he wished to ask would the House allow that to be done by a side wind which Parliament in its wisdom had not permitted under the sanction of the public Act? Ought they not rather to look at the question from a public point of view, and hear first what the Lord Advocate had to say when he should introduce his Bill for altering the very section out of which the present difficulty had arisen?
  THE LORD ADVOCATEsaid, the promoters of the Bill had agreed to make the exercise of their powers dependent on the Commissioners of Supply. He thought it would have been better if the Prison Board, before coming to Parliament, had communicated with the Commissioners of Supply. However he should not oppose the measure. He (the Lord Advocate) was about this evening to move for leave to bring in a Bill to amend the general law, and if that law was altered so as to allow the Prison Board to spread their assessment over a period of years and to borrow upon their security, there would not be any need of other legislation, as that would meet the difficulties which had arisen.
  Question put.
  The House divided:—Ayes 39; Noes 95: Majority 56.
  Words added. Main Question as amended, put, and agreed to.
  Bill put off for six months.

  COUNTY DOWN ASSIZES—CHIEF JUSTICE MONAHAN.—QUESTION.
  SIR THOMAS BATESONsaid, he wished to ask the Chief Secretary for Ireland, Whether he was aware that, in addition to the unwarrantable and censorial observations made by Chief Justice Monahan, reflecting on the character of gentlemen in the county of Down in their magisterial capacity, that Judge had in open court, when a Magistrate was endeavouring to explain the facts of the case, interrupted the Magistrate and refused to hear him, making use of these words, or words to the same effect, "G—d—it,

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  Sir, it's all stuff and nonsense." It was generally credited in the county of Down that those words were used, and a great sensation had been consequently caused?
  MR. COGANsaid, he rose to order. He wished to know, before the hon. Baronet proceeded further, whether he had given notice to Chief Justice Monahan of his intention to bring so serious a charge against him.
  MR. SPEAKER: Let the hon. Baronet ask his Question.
  SIR THOMAS BATESONsaid, that he had given notice to the right hon. Baronet the Chief Secretary for Ireland and had made him acquainted with the words which he believed could be proved to have been used. The people of the county of Down were primitive enough not to understand the use of such language from the Judicial Bench. He also wished to know whether Chief Justice Monahan had made to the Irish Government any explanation, justification, or retractation of the words censured by the right hon. Baronet the Chief Secretary, on a former occasion, in terms for which he (Sir Thomas Bateson) begged to thank him, and whether the Chief Secretary was aware that the Magistrates on the Rathfriland Bench, in the county of Down, were acting in the case of "The Queen v. O'Hare and others," under the advice and instructions of the Law Advisers for the Crown?
  MR. COGAN: I should wish to ask the right hon. Baronet, in addition, If Chief Justice Monahan has made any Report of this case to the Irish Government, and whether he has communicated with the right hon. Baronet with reference to the observations made by him on this affair, and if so, whether, in fairness to the Chief Justice, he will lay those communications on the table of the House, so that this House, which has heard the charges against this distinguished Judge, may hear the explanation of the circumstances connected with them?
  SIR ROBERT PEEL: I think it would have been infinitely better if, after the answer I gave the other night, this question had not been put. It is true that the Magistrates did consult the Law Officers of the Crown, and that they confirmed the judgment of the Magistrates in this matter. Chief Justice Monahan has written to me with respect to what an hon. and gallant Member of this House (Colonel Forde) said with reference to these re-
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  marks. Chief Justice Monahan states to me—
  "Colonel Forde mentioned to me that some people in the County Down were of opinion that I had accused the Magistrates there of administering justice partially. I have written to say that I do not remember exactly what observations I made, but certainly I had no intention of making any such charge."
  I am not aware what expressions were used by Chief Justice Monahan, and I am unable to say whether the charges are true or not, but I am only expressing the general opinion when I say that there is no more impartial or upright man upon the Irish Bench, and it was only yesterday that Lord Downshire came to me and said, "I do not know what the conduct of the Chief Justice may have been at Downpatrick, but I do not know any more just and upright man who goes circuit than Chief Justice Monahan." Those who know Chief Justice Monahan know that he is a little hasty and impetuous at times, but that he bears the character of an upright, frank, honest man. It is quite possible that in the heat of his observations he may have given way to some expressions which many might condemn, but I have no authority to state, without referring to him, that he did make use of the expressions attributed to him by the hon. Baronet.
  MR. COGAN: I beg to ask the right hon. Baronet the Chief Secretary for Ireland, whether Chief Justice Monahan has reported to the Irish Government with reference to this case; and secondly, whether such Report, if any, contains any reference to the epithets unjustifiably used by Chief Justice Monahan?
  SIR ROBERT PEEL: I beg again to state that what I said the other night was, that so far as my information went Chief Justice Monahan was not warranted in making the remarks he had made. The Chief Justice has written to me, and I think that if he had known all the circumstances which occurred at the sessions he would not have made use of the observations which fell from him on the occasion referred to.
  MR. COGAN: I must again appeal to the right hon. Baronet to give some reply to the two Questions I have put to him. Has Chief Justice Monahan reported upon the administration of justice in the county of Down? [Sir ROBERT PEEL: He has reported.] Will the right hon. Baronet lay that Report upon the table of the House?
  COLONEL FORDEsaid, that having the honour of representing the county of Down, he wished to make a few observations on that subject, and to place himself in order he would conclude by moving the adjournment of the House. He begged to tender his thanks to the Chief Secretary for Ireland for the prompt manner in which he had come forward to vindicate the magistrates of the county of Down; for there was no doubt that the words attributed to the Chief Justice in the local papers had been used by him. The expressions of Chief Justice Monahan in charging the petty jury in the case in question were—
  "Gentlemen, you have heard the whole of the evidence in this case; and I must say that I am very much disgusted with the way in which justice is administered in the county of Down."
  The learned Judge also added that the very idea of having peace in the county when matters were conducted in that way was utterly out of the question. Now, it was not for him to justify the magistrates of the county of Down in what they had done, for their conduct was above reproach, and no body of gentlemen could administer justice more impartially than they had done. The magistrates might have done wrong in taking action in the matter. They wrote to Lord Dufferin, who was in London attending to his official duties, but his Lordship had not answered their letter when the hon. Gentleman the Member for Devizes gave notice of his question. When the hon. Member for Devizes had given his notice relating to this matter lie himself wrote on behalf of the magistrates of the county of Down the following letter to Chief Justice Monahan, dated March 18:—
  "My Lord,—Having had an opportunity this day of conferring with some of the magistrates of the neighbourhood (whose names I annex) upon the subject of your Lordship's observations when charging the petty jury in the Rathfriland riot case, as reported in the Belfast News Letter of the 11th inst., a copy of which I send you, we beg respectfully to know if this is a correct report, as, if so, we conceive the magistrates of the county are accused of administering 'partial justice,' and that any reproach cast upon them is likely to act injuriously to the maintenance of peace. A reply, at your Lordship's earliest convenience, will greatly oblige."
  On the Tuesday morning, when he should have had an answer to that letter, he was returning here and he called on the Chief Justice at Belfast, and the learned Judge expressed himself as truly sorry that any observations which he had made should have been construed in any such way; and certainly, from what the learned Judge
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  said, he thought that perhaps his letter which followed might have been a more ample expression of his regret for what had happened than it was. He would now read to the House the letter he received from the Chief Justice—
  "Belfast, March 22.
  "My dear Colonel Forde,—I was detained so late in court last evening that I was unable to write to you by last night's mail, as I intended. As I stated when I had the pleasure of seeing you yesterday, I took no note of the observations made by me at the late trial at Down, nor can I recollect with accuracy what they were; but of this I am certain, that I had not any intention of stating that I considered the magistrates of the county capable of administering 'partial justice,' which you mention as the inference drawn by some from the report of the trial. Any observations I made had reference to the case then at trial, in which, from the evidence before me, I was of opinion that a serious mistake had been committed in sending for trial some of one party accused of riot, when from the evidence before me it appeared that the other party were, to say the least of it, equally culpable. It may be, as you stated yesterday, that if the facts appearing at petty sessions had been brought before me, my opinion would have been different.
  "My dear Colonel Forde, yours very truly,
  "JAMES H. MONAHAN,
  "Lieutenant Colonel Forde, M.P.,
  "Carlton Club, London."
  He thought it was only fair to the magistrates of Rathfriland that he should state very shortly the case as it came before them. The case, he would say, was brought before the Judge in a very had manner; the evidence was not properly placed before him. There happened to have been two riots on that occasion, and the Judge, unfortunately, mixed them both up together. The case was that of "The Queen v. Edward O'Hare and others," and the following was a statement of the proceedings upon it at Rathfriland Petty Sessions:—
  "On the 3rd of March, 1865, the adjourned case against Edward O'Hare, John Hillen, and John M'Evoy, for riot at Aughnavallog, on the 10th of February last, was proceeded with at Rathfriland Petty Sessions. For the prosecution it was proved that a riot had taken place at Aughnavallog, about one mile from Rathfriland, between half past five and six o'clock on that evening, and that O'Hare, Hillen, and M'Evoy were present, two of the accused being stripped to the shirt, and one of them using party expressions. That at same place, and about same time, a mob attacked and beat inoffensive individuals, some of whom were seriously injured. For the defence it was proved that previously to this, in the town of Rathfriland, a riot had taken place, in which were two party mobs throwing stones. No evidence was offered against any one of either party for the riot at Rathfriland, and the Justices of the Peace unanimously agreed to return to assizes informations against the three persons identified as being in a riotous mob at Aughnavallog that day."

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  He thought it would be seen that the Chief Justice had been misinformed in the matter, and he hoped that it might be a warning to Judges to be more careful in the observations they made at the different counties in their circuits. The advice tendered by The Times the other day to a young Lord who aspired to a seat in that House (Lord Amberley)—namely, to think twice before he spoke once—was, he believed, very applicable to the present case. The hon. and gallant Member concluded by moving the adjournment of the House.
  COLONEL GREVILLE: I rise to second the Motion for the adjournment of the House in order to ask the right hon. Baronet the Chief Secretary for Ireland if he will answer the question put to him by the hon. Gentleman the Member for Kildare (Mr. Cogan) namely—whether he will lay on the table the Report he has received from the learned Judge upon this subject. The right hon. Baronet has read a passage from a letter, but he has not stated to the House whether that letter is addressed to him personally, or whether it is the Report forwarded by the learned Judge to the Government.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."—(Colonel Forde.)
  SIR ROBERT PEEL: I read a passage from a private letter. I do not think it will be advisable to produce the Report.
  MR. HENNESSY: I think it is very advisable that we should have the Report. That report implicates not the magistrates of the county Down but the Law Officers of the Crown, and that is the reason why Her Majesty's Government will not produce it. The hon. and gallant Member, who has communicated with the learned Judge, has told us that he (the Chief Justice) had no fault to find with the magistrates. The fault rests with the Law Officers of the Crown. The informations were in their hands for several days, and they sent down two Queen's counsel and two junior counsel to prosecute the prisoners. It was a Crown prosecution, and not instituted at the instance of the magistrates, and consequently they were not to blame.
  SIR GEORGE GREYsaid, the proper course to take was, for the hon. Member (Mr. Hennessy) to give notice of moving for the production of the Report. Certainly it was very unusual to produce confidential Reports of the Judges. His right hon. Friend, when pressed for an
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  answer, properly said he would not undertake off hand to produce a document which according to general rule was not produced. An arrangement was made to enable Members to call attention to questions on the Motion to go into Supply on Friday evenings, and that was the second time in which Members, though possessed of the power to bring forward their questions on the Motion to go into supply, moved the adjournment of the House for the purpose of doing so. He considered that that was contrary to the Rules of the House, and he hoped the practice would not be continued.
  Motion, by leave, withdrawn.

  ARMY—THE WAR OFFICE.—QUESTION.
  SIR STAFFORD NORTHCOTEsaid, he wished to ask, Whether the Government, on resuming Supply on the Army Estimates, propose to take Vote 18 before the House has in its possession the Report of the Committee which has inquired into the War Office?
  THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTONsaid, in reply, that if it were the wish of the House that Vote 18 should not be taken till the Report of the Committee had been presented, he would not object to its postponement, although, of course, its postponement would be attended with some inconvenience.

  EASTER RECESS.—QUESTION.
  MR. ARTHUR MILLSsaid, he would beg to ask the noble Viscount at the head of the Government, When it is probable the adjournment will take place for the Easter Recess?
  VISCOUNT PALMERSTON: I think, Sir, if the state of public business admits of it, the best course will be to adjourn as of late years on the Friday before Good Friday.

  SUPPLY.
  Order for Committee read.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair."

  THE IONIAN ISLANDS—PENSIONS TO OFFICERS.—QUESTION.
  MR. BAILLIE COCHRANEsaid, he rose to put the Question of which he had given notice to the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Whether the Pensions assigned under Schedule B of the

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  Convention of the 29th March, 1864, between Her Majesty and the King of the Hellenes, have been paid in accordance with that Convention, and whether Her Majesty's Government intends to take any steps for the security of the recipients of these Pensions by placing those British subjects who served Her Majesty under the late Ionian Constitution on the same footing as Pensioners of the British Crown? The subject was one which claimed the attention of the House, not only because of the great injustice that had been done to a large class of gentlemen serving under the British Crown, but because it appeared by some recently published papers which had been placed in his hand that the conduct of the Government during the cession of the Ionian Islands had been of a somewhat extraordinary character. It was only now by means of papers which had recently arrived in this country that they had become fully acquainted with the whole of the negotiations which had been carried on at the time of the cession. The House would agree with him that it was of the utmost importance that good faith should he kept by Government with those officers who took service under them. Nothing surprised him more at the time than that so important a step as the cession of the Ionian Islands should have been taken without exciting more than one short debate. The details of that measure, all the circumstances connected with it, were not brought before the House. The papers were doled out to them, and they were never in a position to discuss the question. But that was at an end; the Ionian Islands, to their great misfortune, were ceded to Greece; and an hon. Member had informed him that when he asked a resident how soon the people there had begun to repent the change, the reply was, "One quarter of an hour after the British flag was pulled down." But what he wished to point out was that a great injustice had been done to a number of persons. The officers in the late Ionian service were divided into two classes, distinguished by Schedules A and B. Those included in Schedule A were gentlemen who had been employed for a number of years, some dating back as far as 1828, others to 1836. Many of them had been fifteen years in retirement, enjoying their pensions, not as servants of the Ionian Islands, but of the British Crown. They had been appointed by the British Crown, and were as much servants of the British Crown as the Lord High
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  Commissioner himself. These gentlemen had subscribed to the superannuation fund, which had amounted to £75,000, but which was taken possession of by the Government at a period of great distress in the islands. These gentlemen had not only a claim on the Government, but they were to be paid their pensions and guaranteed by the British Government. Schedule B comprised officers who served in the Ionian Islands at the time of the cession, and whom it was thought right to indemnify for the loss they sustained by being turned out of the position they held without any fault of their own. It did not appear that the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer had acted with perfect fairness towards these gentlemen. The officers who had pensions under the British Government previous to the cession of the Ionian Islands were permitted to hold any office in England under the Crown but not in Greece. When the question of cession was first mooted by the lamented Duke of Newcastle, he advised them to allow their pensions to be placed on the revenue of the Ionian Islands or Greece, because if so placed they would be enabled to hold office under the Crown. Two or three gentlemen, one a Consul at St. Petersburg, and another in Asia Minor, were then in the enjoyment of their pensions, and still employed under the Crown. There was a positive understanding between these gentlemen and the late Duke of Newcastle, and it was by the advice of the Chancellor of the Exchequer that this understanding was broken. [The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER: No!] The right hon. Gentleman said "no," but it appeared from the blue-book, published at Athens, containing the negotiation and correspondence respecting the cession, and which had only recently reached this country, that in an interview between Mr. Gladstone and the Greek Minister in London, the former declared—in reply to the application of the latter—that these sums should be charged on the British Exchequer—
  "That Parliament would not vote a credit for this purpose; but he was of opinion that the amount agreed on for this object might be reduced; that the payment of the compensation might cease on any one entitled accepting a salaried office under the British Government."
  And in accordance with this suggestion a proviso was inserted in the Convention of the 29th of March, 1864, and ratified in direct contravention of the promise made

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  by the Duke of Newcastle and of the Ionian Statute Law, and without any previous intimation to the recipients of such promise. Therefore he was justified in saying that it was by the advice of the right hon. Gentleman that this breach of faith had been committed. The statement he had made to the House was made upon the authority of the gentlemen interested. One gentleman who was pressed by the Crown to take office in the Ionian Islands accepted office there upon the distinct promise that his pension would be secured to him. Two other gentlemen, who were known to the hon. Gentleman opposite, the Under Secretary for Foreign Affairs, and who knew how much they had sacrificed in going to the Ionian Islands, had no idea at the time they accepted office there that the island would be ceded to Greece, and that thereby they would lose their pensions; but they went there with the positive understanding that they were in the service of this country. He could prove to the Hou3e that the Greek Government implored Her Majesty's Government not to press for these pensions being charged against them, for the simple reason that they were not in a position to pay them, their financial difficulties were so great. He thought the House would agree with him that that was an extraordinary fact. The justice of the claims of these officers had been fully admitted by Lord Russell. His Lordship said, "I must not leave these men unprotected. I must see that justice is done." On February 10, 1864, M. Tricoupi wrote to say that Lord Russell stated with regard to the Greek Government—
  "We showed but little gratitude to England for the great benefits she had conferred upon us in opposing a just indemnification to the English employés, who, without any fault on their part, lost a promising future by the cession of the Ionian Islands on the part of the British Government."
  It was astonishing that Lord Russell did not see the proper way of meeting the claim—namely, by putting the pensions on the English Government. The Minister of Foreign Affairs at Greece (Mr. Delyannis) wrote to this effect—
  "We cannot accept the proposal to indemnify individuals on account of loss of salary in consequence of the cession of the Ionian Islands, because such a principle is not based upon justice."
  Mr. Scarlett, the English Minister, also wrote to say that he could not strongly Support these clauses of the treaty, referring to the pension of these officers, but
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  expressed his opinion that it was not the interest of Greece to dispute them so pertinaciously. Then, Mr. Delyannis proposed, instead of a pension, we should fix a sum for an indemnity once for all. Why was that not accepted? The despatches which he had been referring to clearly proved that the difficulty had been pointed out to the Government from the first. When he gave notice of this question two months ago, the right hon. Gentleman the Under Secretary of State telegraphed to Greece and made every effort to obtain the payment of these pensions, and the pensions were then paid; but he (Mr. Baillie Cochrane) believed he was right in saying that these pensions would not be continued by the Government of Greece. Owing, he believed, to the mismanagement of Her Majesty's Government, Greece was on the eve of another convulsion. He never saw such a state of anarchy as prevailed there at present. Was he not justified in asking the right hon. Gentleman opposite whether, considering the importance of keeping good faith with the servants of the Government, they would not declare that in future the pensions of these officers, who had served them so well, and had given up professions and emoluments in this country to do so, should not be guaranteed by this country in the future?
  MR. LAYARDsaid, that the hon. Gentleman (Mr. Baillie Cochrane) had complained that the question of the cession of the Ionian Islands had not been fully discussed in that House; but, considering the interest the hon. Gentleman took in the question, it was strange that he did not bring some Motion forward on the subject and have it fully discussed. He would not follow the hon. Gentleman through the arguments he had adduced as to the policy of the cession of the Ionian Islands. He did not think the hon. Gentleman had made out his case—namely, that the Greek Government had justly protested against the payment of these pensions; or, at any rate, that it was a very great hardship to Greece, that upon the cession of the Ionian Islands, a most valuable territory, she should be saddled with the payment of pensions which had accrued to persons in the service of the Ionian Government and not in the service of the British Government. The hon. Gentleman wanted to know whether these pensions had hitherto been paid to the persons entitled to them. He could inform the hon. Gentleman that the pensions had been

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  paid, and if the hon. Gentleman had waited another day he would have learnt from the papers, which he (Mr. Layard) had just laid upon the table, the reasons of the delay which had taken place in the payment. It would be seen from the correspondence that the delay partly originated in the fact that the Minister at Athens (Mr. Erskine) had been under a misapprehension as to the course to be pursued with reference to the periodical presentation of the list of pensioners to the Greek Government. Shortly after the lists were presented the pensions were paid. The hon. Gentleman had complained that the Government had not got early information on the subject, but that was in consequence of an interruption in the telegraph to Athens, which was still interrupted, and it was ten or fifteen days before they could get an answer to the inquiries which we had made. He (Mr. Layard) thought it was not consistent with the respect due to a foreign Government that we should make the charge of insolvency against Greece, and anticipate that these pensions would not be properly paid. They had hitherto been paid, and he trusted the Greek Government would show their good faith in paying them regularly. If that House were to say that the English Government were prepared to pay these pensions, it would not be an encouragement to the Greek Government to pay them. The hon. Gentleman was no doubt prompted to bring this matter forward. Two gentlemen had not received their pensions at the time the money was paid over to the British Minister, but one of these, Sir Patrick Colquhoun, was determined to be a martyr. That gentleman would not go through the regular forms for the purpose of obtaining his pension. Sir Patrick Colquhoun was an old friend of his (Mr. Layard), and with every respect for him he must say that he was not justified in taking the course he had taken. He (Sir Patrick Colquhoun) had come to the Foreign Office and claimed not only his pension, but also the interest on money, which he might have received at once by writing to Athens. He (Mr. Layard) thought it was hard both upon the Greek and English Governments that they should be accused of breaking faith to Sir Patrick Colquhoun because he would not take the trouble of going through the form which the other officers went through in order to receive their money, that of appointing an agent at Athens to receive it.
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  The hon. Gentleman had alluded to the case of persons who, having earned their pensions previously to the cession of the Islands, had since taken service under the British Government, and were declared to have thus forfeited their right to receive their pensions. No doubt this was a case of hardship, but hitherto only two persons had been exposed to that hardship. Both had been submitted to the Greek Government, and they had very properly agreed to pay these gentlemen their pensions. He had every reason to believe that these pensions would be paid in future regularly by the Greek Government.
  MR. KINGLAKEsaid, the gentlemen to whom he was anxious that justice should be done were far distant from this country, and were not aware of any proceedings going on in that House with reference to them. He could not think the question raised by his hon. Friend (Mr. Baillie Cochrane) had been satisfactorily answered by the right hon. Gentleman the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. These officers had been invited by the Government in England to take service in the Ionian Islands, and it was a most miserable quibble to say that these officers were the servants of the Government of the Ionian Islands. They were employed by the Imperial Government, and when that Government thought right to bring to a close the period of service of these officers in the Ionian Islands, by withdrawing from the protectorate of those islands, the Government felt bound to give them a compensation, which had always been given in similar circumstances. The moral obligation was incurred not by the Government of the Ionian Islands, but by the Government of England. It was, he knew, perfectly competent for the Imperial Government to negotiate with the Ionian Islands and say when certain arrangements took place the English Government would be at a certain expense, and therefore the Government of the Ionian Islands should recoup the amount which the Imperial Government would have to pay by way of compensation to these officers. To hand the officers over to the Greek Government was to say, "We admit our moral liability, but will not give you our cheque, but that of a young friend of ours, and we hope it will be soon honoured." It turned out from the statement of his hon. Friend the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (Mr. Layard) that although the

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  money had been paid this year, it had not been paid at the right time, so that the future satisfaction of those just claims in reality depended upon the precarious income of Greece. It could not, however, be fairly urged that these gentlemen ought to depend for their compensation, on account of being withdrawn from other careers, upon a precarious income. He could quite understand that when the hon. Gentleman the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs answered for his Department, he felt himself bound to give that answer in a departmental sense, and he was not, therefore, astonished when his hon. Friend declined to give any guarantee to those gentlemen. He would, however, ask the noble Lord at the head of the Government whether he would allow a substantial claim of this kind to be defeated by handing over these gentlemen to a Government which might or which might not pay them, and whose finances, as we knew, were in a dubious state of solvency. He did hope that one way or another these gentlemen would receive an assurance that their claims would be provided for.
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERsaid, that the speech of his hon. Friend was not founded upon any hardship which had accrued to these gentlemen since the cession of the Ionian Islands. It was in reality an objection to the arrangement under which that cession had been originally made. The question as to the pensions or compensations of those gentlemen was fully settled and considered at the time, and he did not believe that the House would be very much disposed to re-open a matter upon an argument which in reality should have been urged at the time when the original measures were deliberately taken. On that occasion this question was raised by an hon. and gallant Gentleman opposite, whom he perceived in his place, and the intentions of the Government which were distinctly announced met, as he regarded it, with the approbation of the House. At all events the House so far sanctioned the policy of the Government that Her Majesty's Ministers had no occasion to come to the House for a Vote of money after the decision at which the House had arrived. The time did arrive when the course of Government should have been challenged if that course were objected to, but that challenge was not made. His hon. Friend (Mr. Baillie Cochrane) had said that he wondered
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  that the cession of the Ionian Islands had not occasioned more discussion in the House; but his hon. Friend should remember that the cession of those islands was not made in secret. The intentions of Her Majesty's Ministers were announced to the House at a very early date, and attracted a good deal of attention. If that cession, however, attracted less attention than it deserved, his hon. Friend, among others, was to blame, because it was competent for him to have expressed his disapproval of the conduct of the Government, especially as the matter was debated at considerable length. His hon. Friend who spoke last said that he felt convinced the noble Lord at the head of the Government would guarantee the payment of the pensions to these gentlemen when he perceived the justice of the case. That guarantee, however, it was not in the power of his noble Friend to give. A Bill could be introduced by the Government into the House with a view of effecting the object desired by the hon. Gentleman, and that would no doubt be done if the Government could see that such a course was necessary to procure justice to these gentlemen. But that was just what they were unable to see. No stratagem was more convenient in Parliamentary oratory than the introduction of a parenthesis of this kind into a sentence, because it enabled the speaker to elude the point upon which the whole thing depended. It was just that moral obligation, alluded to by the hon. Member, which had always been denied—or at least had never been admitted—by Her Majesty's Government. The argument of his hon. Friend really amounted to this, that this country, with her multifarious colonial relations, was bound to compensate every man who was appointed to an office in the colonies—in other words, that Lord Monck in Canada, or the Governor of any other of our colonies, had a claim upon the Consolidated Fund of this country if the colony which was indebted to him refused to perform its obligations in paying the salaries and allowances of these officers. That doctrine was an entirely new one. It had never been suggested to the House as an abstract proposition, and it would, he believed, be unwise to lay it down as such. He was not there to say what would be the decision of Parliament when any case of personal hardship was made out, but to grant the principle that a British subject appointed to an office abroad, dependent upon a Treasury different from our own, was to have a guaran-

  211
  tee from our Government, could not, he believed, be claimed with any degree of justice by the person himself, and would certainly be incompatible with what was due to our own taxpayers. His hon. Friend opposite (Mr. Baillie Cochrane) had brought a serious charge against the late Duke of Newcastle and himself, no doubt unintentionally, which would have had a considerable sting in it but for the kind and mild manner in which he had always introduced his views to the House. It would be inferred from his remarks that the Secretary for the Colonies of the time entered into a private engagement that compensation should he guaranteed to those officers on certain terms, and afterwards that he (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) caused those terms to be overruled. For his own part he did not know that any such agreement had ever been entered into by the Duke of Newcastle, nor had his right hon. Friend the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies, by his side, ever been made acquainted with it. He must say that he possessed so much confidence in the honour of the late Duke of Newcastle that he felt convinced that no such agreement ever existed. Knowing, as he did, that no man of higher or purer honour ever took service under the Crown, he could not help saying that it was perfectly incredible that that nobleman should have receded from any engagement of this kind.
  MR. BAILLIE COCHRANEsaid, that he did not allege that the Duke of Newcastle had receded from his engagement. The change was made while the Duke was out of office by his successor, and the engagement to which he referred was overset, he repeated, on the advice of his right hon. Friend himself.
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERsaid, that he had not described the words that had fallen from the lips of his hon. Friend. He had simply shown him what was the nature of the charges which he had made. His hon. Friend, however, was in error, because it was not true that the Duke of Newcastle was out of office when the change was made. The matter was completed during the administration of the noble Duke. If the Duke made any engagement of this kind it was his duty to have carried it out, and the statement of his hon. Friend, therefore, amounted to a charge that the Duke had receded from his engagement. He was quite sure that the hon. Gentleman never intended to make a charge against the Duke of New-
  212
  castle, and he was simply pointing out how, no doubt unintentionally, the hon. Gentleman's observations had that effect.
  MR. BAILLIE COCHRANEsaid, that he had never intended to imply anything of the kind.
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERsaid, his hon. Friend had not laid before the House the grounds upon which he asserted that the engagement he stated had been made. What the Government had done was this:—They had insisted that the Greek Government should grant to certain gentlemen pensions or compensation for loss of office, upon a scale which was totally unknown according to the habits, usages, or institutions of any country but our own. In fact, it was only England which showed such liberality. While enforcing the necessity of performing these engagements upon the Greek Government, the English Government thought it but fair that they should have such abatement as was provided by the law of this country in case of the resumption of office by these gentlemen under the Crown. They felt it was only right that they should insist on the rule which had prevailed in this country, that officers accepting offices in other Departments should only receive so much pension as was in excess of their salaries. That arrangement he believed to be a perfectly just one. Her Majesty's Government, therefore, not only did not admit the moral obligation which his hon. Friend had urged so strongly, but they were persuaded that the course which they had pursued was founded alike upon policy and principle, and any hon. Member who disapproved their conduct could avail himself of his privileges and challenge that conduct in the House.
  COLONEL DUNNEsaid, he denied that the great number of these employés in the Ionian Islands were employés of the Greek Government at all. They were, in fact, employés of the English Government, as much so as any right hon. or hon. Gentleman in that House. They were taken from employments in England and placed in office in the Ionian Islands. The British authorities there did not require the consent of the Ionian Government in any manner whatever to their appointment, and, what was more, they were put under the regulations which prevailed in this country with regard to deductions from their salaries. A deduction was made from their salaries for the express purpose of furnishing retiring pen-

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  sions. True it was that that fund had been taken possession of, not by the Greek Government, but by the Government of England. Most surprised, then, was he to hear the Chancellor of the Exchequer of this country repudiate the obligation on the part of England to pay these pensions. If there ever was a moral obligation to pay a retiring pension that obligation rested in this case on the English Government. It was the British Government that took possession of the fund formed from deductions from the salaries, and used it for their own benefit; and that was his answer to the right hon. Gentleman who now repudiated this moral obligation. He only hoped the Greek Government would fulfil its obligations. He was happy to hear that the pensions had hitherto been paid, and he trusted that the payments would continue to be made. As for the islands themselves, from his heart he pitied them. The anarchy existing there had been the result of the abandonment of our protectorate. Last year, at the end of the debate on this subject, he received an assurance, as far as any Government could give it, that if the Greek Government did not pay the pensions the English Government would, to some extent, recognize the claims. He had no doubt that this would be found in Hansard, and how the Chancellor of the Exchequer could now repudiate the moral obligation to pay went beyond his comprehension.
  SIR JAMES FERGUSSONsaid, that in the debate of last year it was made abundantly clear that the conduct of Her Majesty's Government in this matter was much looser than that of the Government of a great country like this ought to be. His hon. Friend (Mr. Baillie Cochrane) never intended to charge the Duke of Newcastle with having departed from any pledge which he had entered into; but there was reason to fear that the Members of the present Government were not so liberal as the Duke of Newcastle. The hon. Gentleman the Under Secretary knew perfectly well that there was a document at our Foreign Office which asserted in a manner which would hardly admit of contradiction that such a pledge had been given. He believed it would not be denied that a statement, made on the 18th of April, 1864, from which the following was an extract, was in the hands of the Foreign Office. [Mr. LAYARD: By whom?] The hon. Gentleman had better hear it read. This was the extract—
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  "When——saw the Duke of Newcastle on the subject of the pensions and compensations to be granted to British subjects, either as pensions acquired by them under the Ionian law, or as compensations for loss of office, or both conjointly, his Grace declared on more than one occasion, not only that the British Government would undertake to see these pensions paid, but pointed out the superior advantage of a Greek over a British pension, because it would be in addition to and tenable with any future employment under the British Crown, and he added that he would place his opinion in record on this point, in such a manner as should bind his successors."
  The hon. Gentleman could easily ascertain who the person that made the statement was, for he (Sir James Fergusson) was not sure that he was at liberty to mention his name. The hon. Gentleman had twitted his hon. Friend with not having brought on the subject at the time of the cession of the Islands. But the reason was because the facts were not known to Parliament. It was only within a short time that the papers containing the correspondence of the British Government upon these points had been laid before the Greek Parliament, and the Greek Government maintained that to throw the burden upon them was in the first place unjust, and in the second place more than they were able to bear. Over and over again the Greek Government declared that they could not undertake to indemnify our officials. On the 31st of January, on the 1st of February, and again in March they refused to accept the obligation. And when at length they did decide on accepting the extraordinary expenditure, of the legality of which they said they were not convinced, they were unable to meet punctually the demands of the pensioners, or if they did meet them it was with great difficulty. Was it too much to say that, surrounded with difficulties as the Greek Government was, they would not for the future be able to meet the claims of those gentlemen? Were they, therefore, to be utterly thrown adrift and never to receive the payment which they had a right to expect? How could it be said that they had no claims upon us when there was in the Foreign Office a statement which distinctly showed that a pledge had been given to them?
  MR. CAVENDISH BENTINCKsaid, he had heard the Under Secretary of State for the Foreign Department with great astonishment, because the hon. Gentleman made no reference to the original appointments. Sir Patrick Colquhoun, Sir Charles

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  Serjeant, and one or two others, were most certainly officials of the protecting Power, their appointments being made under the Constitutional Charter of 1817. By Articles 4 and 5 of that Charter, the justices of the Supreme Court were to be appointed by the protecting Power, and paid, not by the Ionian Government, but out of a sum of money, amounting to £13,000 per annum, which was set apart out of the revenues of the Ionian Islands, and was paid to the protecting Power, not to the Ionian Government. These officers were appointed and dismissed by the Colonial Office of the protecting Power, and the Ionian Government had no power to interfere. These officials, were therefore not the officers of the Local Government; they were not appointed by the Local Government; their salaries were to be paid by the protecting Power, and to that Power, therefore, they ought to look for their pensions. Neither the Ionian Government nor the Greek Government, to which the powers of the Ionian Government had been transferred, were liable for the payment of the retiring allowances. He said, then, that there was not only a moral obligation on England to see these pensions paid, but a legal obligation also. Did the right hon. Gentleman mean to say that those gentlemen would have taken office had they known that in a short time the Islands would have been ceded to Greece, and they themselves left to the tender mercies of the Government of a bankrupt kingdom? Of the right hon. Gentleman's comparison of these appointments with colonial appointments in general he would only say it was a quibble. There was no independent Member who did not admit the claims of these officers. He hoped that Her Majesty's Government would take them into consideration, and that justice would be effectually done.

DIGEST OF PARLIAMENTARY PAPERS.

  MOTION FOR A SELECT COMMITTEE.
  MR. W. EWART,in moving for a Select Committee on this subject, said, that hon. Members might well be forgiven for feeling a good deal of dread of blue-books, because of late years it had rained blue-books—Pelion had been piled on Ossa, and Ossa on Olympus. It had been sarcastically remarked that if you wanted to hide a question the best plan was to bury it in a blue-book—you might then defy anybody to excavate it. And
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  if you were praised in a blue-book your fate was certain—
  "Cum scriptore meo capsâ porrectus apertâ,
  Deferar in vicum vendentem thus et odores,
  Et piper, et quidquid chartis amicitur ineptis."
  The subject had been repeatedly considered, not only by Committees of the House but by the House itself, and the desirability of such an arrangement as he was about to suggest had been universally admitted. In submitting the Motion on the paper he had in view two objects—one being the convenience of Members, and the other the diffusion among the people of sound information on political questions. The difficulty consisted in having two sets of blue-books, the one containing the original documents in extenso, and the other simply the substance of the information contained in them carefully abridged and condensed. There was at present an immense waste of public money in printing blue-books, which were for all practical purposes wholly useless—the public never looked into them, and their end was to find their way to the waste-paper dealers. One suggestion for preventing the useless accumulation of these blue-books was, that they should be stopped in initio, and abridged before they were printed. No doubt it was important to abridge as much as possible in this stage, but it was also important that too much should not be cut away. He believed that their librarian, Mr. Vardon, to whom hon. Gentlemen were so much indebted, did curtail these voluminous publications, to which Commissions of Inquiry seemed to contribute very largely. He believed that one of those Commissions had given in 39,000 questions, and on being expostulated with had said they had intended to have sent 80,000. Mr. Hume had devoted himself to the Printing Committee of the House of Commons, and Mr. Tufnell moved for a Committee with a view to circulate these blue-books among mechanics' and other institutions. Little, however, had been done, and indeed you could hardly expect that the members of these institutions should read with attention such ponderous volumes. On the other hand, efforts had been made by private individuals to provide condensed abstracts of these papers, somewhat similar to what he now asked for. He should much prefer, if possible, that it should remain a matter of open competition; but these abridgments, though executed by men of great talent, had not been successful in a pecuniary point of

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  view. There was an able publication called The Parliamentary Record, by Mr. Charles Boss, which was exceedingly well arranged, and as well digested as a book could possibly be. He did not know whether the book was still issued, but while it was issued The Parliamentary Record was a very valuable publication. Mr. Toulmin Smith also issued a valuable publication, The Parliamentary Remembrancer, which gave much information as to current political literature; and Messrs. Smith and Elder published a third book, called The Annals of Legislation, which was edited by Mr. Leone Levi, was much consulted by foreigners, and was a most useful publication. Although, however, these gentlemen had devoted their time and talent to the work, he understood that, owing to their peculiar nature, they had not been successful in a pecuniary point of view. Mr. Hansard came under a different denomination. A certain number of copies were taken from him by the Government and distributed among the public offices, and this support, along with that of private purchases, enabled him to carry on his undertaking. Now he (Mr.Ewart) did not know for what use we had a statistical department of the Board of Trade if it was not to render service in such matters as this. This department issued yearly a valuable paper called the Statistical Abstract, which was known to and highly valued by foreigners as well as Englishmen; and if they were able to furnish so good an artiticle in respect of figures, he thought they might furnish an equally good article in respect of facts. It was the opinion of the late Prince Consort that the statistics issuing from the various Departments should be combined and issued in a condensed form, avoiding the repetitions which now frequently occurred owing to their issue from different departments. He thought that the convenience of the Members of the Legislature would be greatly consulted by the issue of such digests as he proposed; and he thought also that if the English people were really to be worthy of the political franchise, they ought to be supplied with the means of political education, and with information which was now often unavailable in blue-books. He trusted that some assurance would he given that the Board of Trade was not so inert as people supposed, and would employ itself in the useful work he had suggested.
  MR. KINNAIRD,in seconding the
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  Amendment, reminded the House that two Sessions ago a Committee was appointed to consider the expediency of providing a compendious Record of Parliamentary Proceedings for the use of Members. The Home Secretary, Mr. Massey, the hon. Member for Kilmarnock (Mr. Bouverie), and other Gentlemen of experience served upon that Committee, and after evidence had been taken a unanimous opinion was expressed as to the extreme inconvenience of the system under which these blue-books were now piled upon the House. Certain practical suggestions were then made—as, for example, that this House should procure the Journals of the Lords, which were now generally one or two years in arrear. An amazing amount of useless literature was at present forthcoming; but I what was really wanted was some guide to current political literature, an alphabetical register of the publications and the business of the Session, giving the dates of each proceeding. The Report contained some very useful suggestions on this and other points; but nothing was done, and he hoped the attention of the Government would now be turned to the subject, and that the result would be some practical measure.
  Amendment proposed,
  To leave out from the word "That" to the end of the Question, in order to add the words "it is expedient that a digest or abridgment of Parliamentary Papers and Blue Books be provided from time to time, and consolidated into one or more volumes at the close of each Session, under the authority of the Statistical Department of the Board of Trade, for the convenience of Members and for the diffusion of information among the public at large,"—(Mr. William Ewart,)
  —instead thereof.
  Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
  MR. J. R. YORKE,as a young Member of the House, thought that nothing was more depressing to the spirits and trying to the temper than the attempt to extract a few simple facts out of the mass of documents which now encumbered one's rooms. Last year he found that nearly 1,000 of these Parliamentary Papers were issued, containing upwards of 50,000 pages, at a cost of £67,000. It was lamentable to reflect what a large proportion of this expenditure might be said to be entirely thrown away, for the great mass of these volumes found their way to the waste-paper dealers. He would suggest that the large number of copies now printed in extenso

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  were not necessary, and that if a small number were printed and deposited in the British Museum, the public libraries, and other places, so as to be readily accessible for reference, that would be quite sufficient for all public purposes. If a digest giving something like a history of the various matters to which the documents referred were provided, it would greatly further the convenience of Members, and would also effect a considerable saving of public money. If such a plan could be adopted, there arose the further question—by whom was it to be carried out? Supposing that the Government were to undertake the duty, he believed that in practice the fairness of the extracts given would be called in question. The undertaking would offer few temptations to private enterprise, as unfortunately but little public interest was exhibited in respect of public documents to hold out the prospect of a profitable return. For that distaste on the part of the public, the House probably had itself to blame for presenting facts in so repulsive a form as at present. Another suggestion was that the Speaker should be intrusted with the superintendence of the work; but he doubted whether the right hon. Gentleman in the Chair would be willing to add to his already arduous duties such a novel responsibility. The only practical plan appeared to be for the Government to follow the example of Hansard's Debates, and to guarantee to the publisher the sale of a certain number of copies, which would encourage private enterprise to undertake the task. It would, of course, be necessary that the work should be intrusted to competent hands, and if any particular person could be indicated, as well qualified for the duty, he might mention the name of Mr. Leone Levi, who for the last seven years had been conducting the Annals of British Legislation, a very valuable work. He thought the Motion was a very useful one, and he hoped the Government would give it their support.
  MR. PEELsaid, that as his right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade wished to reserve himself for a question that was to come on later in the evening, he would say a few words upon the Motion. There was no doubt that, under certain circumstances, a work of the nature indicated by the hon. Member, well executed, and brought out promptly, would be an advantage, inasmuch as they would have presented in a portable shape the information now spread through voluminous Re-
  220
  turns, but it could not effect any saving in the expense of Parliamentary printing. The hon. Gentleman desired to have an abridgment of Parliamentary papers; but that pre-supposed that the Parliamentary Papers were first printed. Even if the abridgment were to precede the printing, he should doubt whether it would prevent the necessity of printing in extenso all the documents that were called for by Parliament, or were presented by command. No abridgment could be made so authoritative as to dispense with the papers in full. It was possible that such a work as that proposed might have the effect of reducing the number of copies of documents that were printed; but that at present the Printing Committee of either House considered themselves at liberty in the case of subjects of minor and local importance to reduce the number of copies of papers to be printed. But had the hon. Gentleman considered how small a proportion of Parliamentary papers were of more than ephemeral interest, and were worth the labour of being abstracted? The House would remember that in respect of a considerable number of Parliamentary Papers—those relating to commerce—a most valuable abstract was already to be found in the Statistical Abstracts of the Board of Trade. There were also the copious Indices to Hansard, which were very well prepared. So that the Motion of the hon. Gentleman would apply principally to Foreign Office papers, of which it would be difficult to prepare a satisfactory digest. Then, supposing that such a digest was desirable, there came the question, by whom should it be prepared? It might be done under the authority of the House, by a Department of the Government, and reference had been made to the recommendation of a Committee which sat in 1862 upon the subject of another work, which was a digest of Parliamentary Proceedings. But there was a great difference between a digest of the Proceedings of Parliament and a work which professed to be an abstract of all the papers presented to Parliament, which was a far more difficult work. The Committee referred to recommended that the assistance given should be limited to a certain subsidy in aid of private efforts. The work of Mr. Leone Levi which had been mentioned was, no doubt, a valuable work, but it had not been a profitable undertaking in a pecuniary sense. An abridgment of Parliamentary Papers was also to be found in the Annual Register. All

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  those works were, no doubt, deserving of public favour, but it would be a disagreeable task to select one to be supported by a public grant. As the hon. Gentleman's proposal now made varied from the Notice on the paper, he trusted that there was no intention to press it, but that the hon. Gentleman would be satisfied with the discussion which he had originated.
  MR. ARTHUR MILLSsuggested that the Government had the power of limiting the number of papers that were presented, and thereby of reducing the expenditure under that head. He especially referred to the class of "unopposed Returns," which were moved for and granted without attracting any notice, which cost sometimes large sums of money and great expenditure of time to prepare, and which, after all, were never read by anybody. An hon. Member might move at a late hour of the night for an unopposed Return, it was put and carried, and the whole proceeding occupying about half a minute; but the printing of the Return might cost £1,000. It was no argument against a digest of valuable papers to say that a vast number of the papers that were laid upon the table were useless.
  MR. THOMSON HANKEYthought the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of the Treasury had rather overrated the difficulty of complying with the suggestion of the hon. Member for Dumfries (Mr. Ewart). At present they had annual Reports on the Post Office, Inland Revenue, Customs, Board of Health, and Poor Law Board, and these were most satisfactorily abstracted in Mr. Leone Levi's publication. What was really wanted was something like the abstract information comprised in Mr. Leone Levi's valuable work. Hansard, useful as it was, could not be carried on without a subsidy in the shape of a subscription for copies. Something of this sort might be done with regard to the suggested abstracts—at any rate, it was worth consideration.
  MR. HENLEYsaid, the question seemed to be taking two forms. It was said that a great many Parliamentary Papers were printed that were useless; and then, on the other hand, it was proposed that somebody should have something for printing digests of these useless papers. But Parliamentary Papers, to be really useful, must be full. Suppose they had set a wise man to digest the Danish Papers. What would he have had to do? Would he have had to come to a conclusion upon
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  them? In that caseins digest might have hanged the Government or exonerated them. Again, when a Committee presented its Report, it recorded its conclusions, and perhaps they were arrived at by a very narrow majority, after numerous divisions. Then immediately hon. Gentlemen turned to the evidence to test the value of those conclusions. But were they to set some one to digest that evidence over again, perhaps bringing out a Report directly opposed to that of the fifteen gentlemen who had sat on the Committee? Unless they proceeded carefully they might get into a great deal of useless expense; they would be saddled with the same material twice over—once in extenso, and again in little. In talking about printing useless Parliamentary Papers, hon. Gentlemen forgot the multiplicity of subjects which engaged the attention of Parliament. The House of Commons was like a pack of hounds—one hunted one thing, and another hunted another; and they were not like a good pack either, for they would never go off together on one scent. Directly one took up a subject somebody else took up the other side; then they wanted all sorts of information, that they might pick out their points and battle over them, and by this means the truth was got at. No doubt the Statistical Abstract was a very valuable document, and it was prepared very much from Parliamentary Papers; but the principle of that Abstract would not apply to the Reports of Committees and Commissions, the printing of which was the chief expense. These abstracts might do for people who merely took a cursory view of things, hut they would not be used as authorities, nor could they be put into anybody's hands to make them authorities. However well the digest might be made, whoever wanted an authority must go direct to the fountain head. He would give no opinion as to taking a number of copies of a publication, in order to assist private undertakings of works of this nature, but he hoped the House would not be deprived of the means of obtaining the information they now got from the blue-book.
  MR. POLLARD-URQUHARThoped that the Secretary of the Treasury would endeavour to carry out the idea of the hon. Member for Dumfries, which he thought was exceedingly useful and would be the means of diffusing a great deal of valuable information throughout the country. He would suggest that means might be found

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  by restricting the number of blue-books and Parliamentary Papers now printed to what might absolutely be required.
  MR. BUTLER-JOHNSTONEsaid, he had found Mr. Levi's publication of great use to him in following out the course of legisislation, and he had no doubt that a digest of Parliamentary information would be of great utility; but he doubted whether a grant of public money ought to be made for preparing it. In 1854 a Committee had recommended that selections from the Parliamentary Papers should be presented to mechanics' and other institutions in the country; but it had been found impossible to make these selections on account of the voluminous nature of the papers. The House was bound to carry out the suggestions of the Committee. He thought this was a public view of the matter which the House might consider. The expense would be small, and the value immense. No one who had read the digest which had been referred to could say that there was any party spirit running through it. It was a wise way of giving the public the knowledge of the general course of legislation which Parliament was pursuing. If it was found that there was any party spirit pervading this selection of papers it would be open to the House to stop the small subsidy, and throw the matter into the market for others to undertake. He was sure this would be of great value, and he trusted the Government would not refuse it.
  MR. W. EWARTsaid, he would withdraw the Motion.
  Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

THE THAMES AND ISIS NAVIGATION.

  OBSERVATIONS.
  MR. MALINSsaid, he rose to call the attention of the House to the Petitions of the General Committee of the Thames and Isis Navigation, and the Mayor and Corporation of the Borough of Wallingford, presented to this House on the 7th of March; and to put a question to the President of the Board of Trade relating thereto. He said the object of these petitions was to point out the present state of the navigation of the upper portion of the river Thames above Staines, and to show that the locks and weirs had fallen into a state of decay; and unless something was done the navigation of that great river would become a thing of the past. Since the establishment of railways the traffic of the
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  Thames above Staines had decreased; and of course the revenue had decreased. In the petition of the Commissioners it was pointed out that in 1845 their revenue was £14,000. In 1846 it fell to £11,000; and it had gone on diminishing year by year until in 1864 it only amounted to the insignificant sum of £3,097. The consequence of this was that it became absolutely impossible for the Commissioners to discharge the duties imposed upon them by keeping up the navigation of the river. He ought to explain that the part of the navigation of the Thames of which he spoke was not under the Thames Conservancy, whose powers stopped at the City stone, above the bridge at Staines. At that point commenced the control of these Commissioners, and it extended to Cricklade or to Lechlade, beyond which the river was not properly navigable. Along this line, between Staines and Lechlade, there were thirty-five locks, and of course weirs and other works, to be maintained, which were maintained by means of the revenue raised from tolls. The Commissioners had been empowered by various Acts to borrow to the extent of £100,000. Their present debt was £88,000. That originally carried interest at the rate of 5 per cent. They were obliged gradually to lower the interest, and now the interest had ceased altogether to be paid. The consequence was that the creditors who had lent this money were dissatisfied. Some of them wished to take possession of the navigation, and would, if anything could be made of it. But so far was it from being possible to make anything of it that the Commissioners in consequence of want of money, had been compelled to discharge all their workmen, and the river was unproductive. There were 170 miles from Staines to Lechlade in this state of decay, the locks and weirs from non-repair being almost useless. It was, therefore, to be apprehended that the water would no longer be kept within its proper channel, and that by floods and otherwise the river would be diverted from its present course and become a succession of deep pools and shallows. It was not only with reference to the navigation he was speaking, but with reference to the supply of water for the various purposes of life to which this river was applicable; and this being the river which communicated with London, the great metropolis of England, the question was whether the Government could acquiesce in the present state of things. He contended it would be a dis-

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  grace to England if they allowed this magnificent river and important water highway to fall into decay. He and many of the hon. Members present, including the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and the hon. Members for the City of London, although he might not be aware of the fact, were ex officio Commissioners; and he thought they ought to sympathize with the acting Commissioners in their difficulties. But he was afraid none of the ex officio members of the Board had done their duty. The petition stated that the Commissioners were ready to do everything they could, but they could not find the funds. The question which he wished to put to the President of the Board of Trade was, whether he was prepared, on the part of the Government, to recommend the appointment of a Royal Commission, or a Committee, or to take any other step, with a view of remedying this lamentable state of things? Either private or public money must be found for the purpose. The Chancellor of the Exchequer shook his head at the suggestion of public money being found; but were the Government to see this great highway in a state of ruin for the want of a few thousand pounds? Mr. Leech, the Surveyor of the Thames Conservancy, in his Report stated that all the locks and weirs were falling into decay. A deputation which he had the honour to introduce to the President of the Board of Trade last summer stated that at that time £20,000 would be sufficient to put the whole in a complete state of repair, and that if an arrangement could be made with the old lockowners for a uniform rate of toll the revenue might be raised to such an extent as to be sufficient to pay the Government interest at the rate of 3½ per cent, also to pay the creditors and the expense of keeping the navigation in repair. The Commissioners had a difficulty to contend with owing to there being certain private lock-owners, who, though their locks were not used, under an Act of George III. were still allowed to charge the same tolls as they were entitled to receive when the traffic passed through their locks. The Commissioners had for several years past been trying to induce the old lockowners to reduce their tolls, and in June last they made another attempt at an arrangement based on a system of payment in one sum for all through traffic at greatly reduced rates. They obtained the assent of a majority of the owners, but the arrangement fell through because a small minority stood
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  out. The revenue of the river had dwindled from £14,000 a year in 1845 to £3,000 in 1864, and in the present year it would probably be still less. The banks were rapidly falling into decay; and he wished to know whether the Government were prepared to take any steps to prevent the navigation from continuing in a state which was a reproach to the nation?
  COLONEL KNOXsaid, that the locks in certain parts of the river were entirely gone, and if any serious flood took place it was impossible to tell what damage might not be caused to the various properties on its banks. A large portion of the water supply of London came from the works at Teddington, and they were now constantly precluded from working the mills on the banks of the Thames by the want of water. A great waste of water arose from the locks being out of repair and not performing the functions for which they were intended. That great water highway ought no more to be suffered to go into decay than any highway in the country. He made a suggestion last year which he thought worthy the attention of the Government and the House. The locks might easily be kept in good repair by means of a very infinitesimal rate, the fractional part of a penny in the pound, upon the property in the counties through which the river passed; and if the Government would bring in a Bill with that object he was sure it would meet with the approbation of all those counties, for it was essential to the water carriage of their coal, timber, and other materials that the navigation should be maintained. He trusted that if the Government would not take the matter into their own hands they would at least allow a Committee to be appointed to inquire into the subject.
  MR. MILNER GIBSONsaid, that a deputation who had waited upon him at the Board of Trade had stated very much what his hon. and learned Friend had done, and they had informed him that the upper navigation of the Thames from Staines to Lechlade was almost in a hopeless condition, and that it would probably be destroyed unless something was done. He certainly thought that the navigation of the Thames was a very important matter, and that if it were possible it ought to be maintained, but it ought to be maintained like other navigations—namely, by the proceeds from the traffic. His hon. and learned Friend had stated that the railways had interfered with the traffic on

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  the river, and that, in consequence, the income of the Commissioners had been brought down to virtually nothing, and that they were now unable to pay the interest on the money borrowed. But he would ask whether any steps had been taken for the purpose of enabling the river navigation competing with the railways? He believed that nothing had been done. The tolls now charged were of the same amount as of old, tolls too high to allow the traffic to increase and give a chance to a canal or river to compete with a railway. He believed that on the lower part of the river—from Staines to London—which was under the control of the Thames Conservancy Board—a very material reduction in the tolls had been made, and that the consequence was an increase in the tonnage over that carried before the construction of the railway. The Commissioners, in their petition, stated that if the works necessary were executed, the tolls which would be received would be amply sufficient to maintain the works and leave a surplus. No doubt the situation of the Commissioners was a very difficult one, and they could do nothing without the assistance of Parliament. They must come to terms with the old lock-owners, and they must make better arrangements in the management of the river. The Government would agree to the appointment of a Committee, who should inquire into the condition of the navigation of the river, and see whether any measures could be devised by Parliament to enable the navigation to be self-supporting. Nobody could tell what the produce of the tolls would be when some new system were adopted. He could not say that this Committee was to have the power of recommending that the navigation should be maintained at the public expense; but if it could be shown that there would be a fair and proper security for advancing money in a mode similar to that adopted in connection with public works, why of course that would be a different matter. He wished it to be distinctly understood that the Government would not consent to the appointment of the Committee with any understanding that there might be a recommendation that the river should be a public burden. He was sorry to say that he had been informed by competent engineers that the original construction of the locks was defective. They were so shallow that they would not admit barges
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  passing through drawing a sufficient depth, that was, barges suited to carry cargo sufficient to be profitable. That was an unfortunate state of things. It was something beyond the mere question of keeping the locks in repair. However, as he had said before, the Government had no objection to the appointment of a Committee of Inquiry.
  MR. HENLEYsaid, he was glad to hear that the Government were willing to accede to an inquiry, but thought it would be better that it should be conducted by a small Commission instead of by a Committee of that House. Such a Commission, with proper scientific aid, would obtain for them more valuable information than they could hope to get by a Committee, before which, he feared, they would only have persons bringing up a crowd of witnesses from Reading, Oxford, Wallingford, Merton, and other places on the river, all intent on establishing a case for their own particular localities. Full information on the whole subject was indispensable before they could have any sound legislation on that matter. A Commission would also be less expensive than a Committee. When they looked at the Thames in its course from Lechlade to the Thames Conservancy it would be seen that there were parts of the river which might be maintained as a navigation, and other parts which ought to be given up. Then there were conflicting interests, such as the old locks, the Commissioners locks, and the mills, to be considered. He believed that a Royal Commission, small in number, containing a due scientific element, would obtain a mass of information which would enable the House and the Government to come to a sounder conclusion than a Committee of that House, which must call before it a crowd of witnesses from the respective localities. He agreed with the President of the Board of Trade that the present was not a case for aid by public money. The navigation ought either to be self-supporting or ought to be abandoned, but if these interests were not to be kept up it became a question how they were to be let down. These works were maintained under Parliamentary sanction. All the magistrates of all the counties through which the river ran were, he believed, Commissioners, and they formed together a body as numerous, he supposed, as that House itself. The river was divided into districts, and now that the Commissioners had got no money the works were going to wreck and ruin.

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  Something must be done, and the Government might fairly be called upon to ascertain the facts by inquiry. If they would see the way to a remedy they would not only confer a great benefit on the public, but obtain a great deal of credit for themselves. He must, however, protest against the suggestion thrown out by an hon. Member of levying a penny in the pound on the counties for the maintenance of the navigation. The only effect would be to give a bonus to canal navigation against the railways. He believed that the transit from Oxford to London by this navigation occupied some six weeks, and even more, in the summer months, and that the cost was two or three times as much as was charged by the railways, which did the work in twenty-four hours. There were, however, parts of the Thames not near to railways where there was a heavy timber and coal traffic, and here the river navigation might be profitably kept up. If a Select Committee were appointed they must summon witnesses before them, and the expense of these witnesses would be paid by the public. The Commissioners, on the other hand, would go into the various localities, and would obtain the necessary information a great deal better and more cheaply.
  MR. LOCKEsaid, that as one of the Commissioners, he concurred in the opinion that a Royal Commission was far preferable to a Select Committee, because it would be absolutely necessary to go into the districts and to see the locks and weirs in order to enable them to give an opinion that might be relied upon. He was told that the navigation from the Severn to the Thames was in such a state that the tolls alone between Bristol and London amounted to more money than the whole charge for the same goods by railway. If so, it was by no means extraordinary that the goods traffic on the Thames should be so much diminished. If locks fit for these barges were made, it would be still doubtful whether the river navigation could compete with the railways. If they could not, who was to pay for the works, and would it not be necessary that the counties should have a rate levied upon them? They were all agreed upon one thing, that the river must remain navigable and that the banks must be kept up. The question of the pollution of the river deserved attention in connection with this subject. If a Board composed of a smaller number were to be set up in the place of the present 800 Com-
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  missioners, its duty might be more clearly defined, and some regulations must be laid down for preventing the discharge of the sewage of towns into the river. That was as important a matter as the repair of the weirs. The whole question ought to be referred to the Commissioners, who should inquire and report the names of the towns and places the sewage of which now polluted the stream above Staines. The Thames Conservancy had recently been most advantageously remodelled upon the recommendation of a Committee of that House. They obtained an injunction to prevent the discharge of the sewage of the town of Kingston into the Thames. The sewage works were consequently stopped, and the question would shortly be argued before Vice Chancellor Sir Page Wood. If the learned Judge should declare the emptying of the sewage of Kingston into the Thames to be illegal, a first and important step would be taken for the purification of the river.
  MR. NEATEsaid, he was very glad to hear that the Government recognized the great importance of this subject. It was, indeed, a branch of one of the most important questions that could be brought under their consideration. The Thames Commissioners were not a trading body, but they had discharged the duty cast on them, so long as they had the means, to the best of their power. When their revenue was taken from them, they were wholly unable to discharge that duty. Their revenue had been taken by the effect of past legislation. There ought to be an inquiry either by a Committee or a Commission. He did not think they would be able to dispose of the whole question without a Commission; but it might be very desirable to begin with a Committee, as the House already possessed a considerable amount of information on the subject. The most important and pressing point was to vote some money. They could very soon come to a Resolution on that subject. They wanted a considerable sum, and the body had undoubted claims on the public. They wanted an advance of money, not as a gift but by way of loan, and they would be able to offer for it very reasonable security. He thought the appointment of a Committee would be the best mode of dealing with the subject in the first instance.
  MR. SHAW LEFEVREsaid, that as representing one of the towns (Reading) immediately interested in this question, he

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  wished to say a very few words upon it. The case, he thought, was very analogous to that of bankrupt turnpike trusts, which often came before the House. No doubt it involved a great many important questions. It was not only a question of traffic, but of the health of many of the towns on the banks of the Thames. He believed the traffic would be found to pay if the tolls were diminished. He had been informed that a part of the town of Reading was likely to be flooded if the locks were suffered to pass into decay. He trusted something would be done in this matter even during the present Session.
  MR. WALPOLEsaid, he was not connected with any of the towns on the banks of the Thames, but as a member of the great community here, he could not but feel a deep interest in this question. It was, as stated by the hon. Member for Oxford (Mr. Neate), a branch of the greatest question that could occupy the attention of the House in a social point of view. He could not compare it to the case of a bankrupt turnpike trust, because the burden of maintaining the highways had been thrown on parishes. He agreed with his right hon. Friend (Mr. Henley) that it would be hardly, just to throw on the county rate the duty of keeping up the highway of the Thames. It was not the inhabitants of the county that benefited. The whole of the inhabitants of England benefited by the keeping up the highway of the Thames. The navigation of the Thames was only one part of the question. It was a very important part; but so long as there were railways it would be found impossible to compete with the quicker mode of transit, except for heavy goods. What had been stated by the hon. and learned Member for Southwark (Mr. Locke) was very important—what was to be done with the drainage which ran into the Thames above the metropolis? Even that was not the only question. He earnestly entreated the Government to consider the necessity of keeping the fullest supply of water they could in great navigable rivers for the use of the community. If they established water companies to supply London and the suburbs, they drew so much water away from the Thames, and were thus constantly diminishing the volume of water. He believed it would be found on inquiry that the effect thus produced on the river within the last twenty-five years had been very material, and if the volume of water was diminished they could not have that re-
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  serve of supply they required for the growing wants of the community. It became, then, a very grave question how the metropolis was to be supplied with water. He thought nothing but a Commission could properly deal with this question. The Commission should be small, consisting of scientific and skilful persons, well acquainted with the subject, who could inquire into the effect of the different works going on, draining, and the abstraction of water, the failure to keep up the weirs and locks; and when that information had been got they would be able to determine what was best to be done.
  MR. AYRTONsaid, he thought the question was one very easy of solution. In former times the conservancy of the Thames had been intrusted to the Justices of the Peace for the county in Quarter Sessions, but below Staines that duty was intrusted to the City of London. But when the trade and commerce of the City increased to a vast extent, the duty was vested in a Board, which was empowered to keep the river in order from its mouth to Staines. What was required, then, was to make the Board more efficient as regarded that part of the river above Staines. If the Thames Commissioners could not perform their duty the matter should be put into the hands of the justices of the counties through which the river flowed, and they could appoint committees of conservancy to take care of the river, and among other things to see that it was not polluted by sewage from the towns on its banks. Unfortunately, the present Board, in consequence of a decision of the other House last year, had not all the powers with which the House had desired to invest it. The heavy tolls paid on the rivers led to the traffic being transferred to the railways as soon as these were established; but now that the rivers had lost their value for purposes of navigation it was clearly according to the principles of the Constitution to put them back into the hands of the local magistrates, who would form admirable Boards of Conservancy in their several districts. Having the whole of the county funds at their disposal, they could be at no loss for means, while the tolls which were obtained from the river would, of course, be applied in diminution of taxation. There was no great need for inquiry; some practical proposition of the nature he had suggested could easily be worked out, the local magistrates having the example of the metropolis before their eyes, and if ener-

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  getic measures were taken in this direction, the river would soon be in the condition which everybody desired to see. He did not think the view taken by the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Walpole) was quite accurate. Instead of having drank the Thames dry, the fact that it was lower at some seasons than it used to be was, he believed, attributable to the system of thorough drainage. Instead of rain being absorbed in the soil, and gradually filtering back into the river, it now passed off very rapidly, and there was no longer the same storage of water in the ground to maintain the supply which there used to be in old and exploded systems of farming. Some misapprehension, he thought, existed as to the actual state of the Thames. Some time ago he was talking to a farmer living on the banks of the river, who maintained that the water was not so good for agricultural purposes, and did not fertilize so much as it used to do. His reason was that the moisture, instead of soaking downwards, and carrying with it dust and soil to the river, passed straight down to the drains, and no longer carried with it the same amount of nourishment. The argument might be worth much or little, but anyone looking at the Thames could judge for himself as to the cleanness of the water. He had often been along its banks, and he knew that it was one of the finest and purest rivers flowing in the world. River water had the power of purifying itself to a very great degree, but alarm was created by people calling themselves chymists who got water and kept it in a bottle till it began to smell disagreeably, pursuing with regard to it a course exactly opposed to that of the Thames itself, the waters of which were always running. More mischief was done by a few stagnant ponds here and there along the Thames than by the whole volume of water in the river itself from end to end of its course. It was important to bear these facts in mind, because a great deal of feeling had been excited by the Report of the Royal Commission appointed by the Government. Royal Commissions always started a theory and endeavoured to get up a cry with the object of persuading the country that the Commission ought to be permanent and every one of the Commissioners in receipt of good salaries. Some Royal Commissions had been guilty of most extraordinary proceedings. One which took up the subject of experimental farming, when questioned as to the operations undertaken,
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  admitted that they had been pursued regardless of expense; and he believed the Commissioners were now being sued by the landlords for spoiling the land which they professed to farm. These results were achieved, of course, with the object of instructing the country. The recent outcry about the state of the Thames he believed to be perfectly unfounded, but it was very desirable at the same time that the management of the river should be in good hands.
  SIR HARRY VERNEYsaid, he must protest against the doctrine laid down by the last speaker that the management and conservancy of the Thames ought to be paid for out of the county funds. There were some counties of which the river only touched the border, and in which the ratepayers consequently could have little interest in the solution of this question compared with residents in the metropolis. He believed that there was no more important question for consideration than the drainage of river basins; and his conviction was that if such basins were properly drained they would be much more fruitful, and that the public health would be promoted. The cost of such works, however, should not fall upon the county rate, but upon the inhabitants of the district drained.

  CANADIAN RAILWAYS.—QUESTION.
  MR. AYTOUNsaid, he would beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Colonies, Whether it is the intention of the Government to ask the sanction of Parliament, during the present Session, for a guarantee of a sum of money required to complete the railway from Halifax to Quebec. Even if the Government had no such present intention, he should like to know the reasons which were considered to justify such a guarantee at this or at any other time. He was induced to ask the question because he was informed only a few months ago that surveys for the purposes of the proposed line were going forward. In order to complete the line from Halifax to Quebec, he believed that 400 miles of railway must be carried through a most difficult country, in which the hills were composed of rocks, and, the rivers being numerous, engineering difficulties of magnitude presented themselves. It being tolerably evident that the works never could prove remunerative, it became important to ascertain on what grounds the Government imagined that a guarantee

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  might be granted hereafter. Two reasons had been given for the guarantee in the correspondence—one that it would be useful for commercial purposes, and the other that it would be useful for military purposes, by carrying troops on their way from this country to Canada. The line, however, passed through a strip of the country between the St. Lawrence and the United States sixty miles long and thirty-five broad, so that the railway would be within two days' easy march of the American frontier; and therefore he could not understand how the line could be useful for military purposes. For commercial purposes it would be useless for six months in the year, because it could not compete with the St. Lawrence when that river was open to navigation; and he had been informed by an engineer who knew the country that such a line could not pay its working expenses. Why should we guarantee money to make a line to carry our goods to Canadian Custom Houses, where they would be more heavily taxed than they would be on entering France. It was only by asking questions upon isolated subjects like this that the House was able to ascertain in what direction the policy of the Government was tending. He asked the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether it was the intention of the Government to ask the sanction of Parliament during the present Session for a guarantee of a sum of money required to complete the railway from Halifax to Quebec, or whether the idea was abandoned, and upon what ground, and if hopes were still held out to the colonies that ever such a guarantee could be recommended by the Government of this country? He hoped the right hon. Gentleman would also state upon what grounds he thought such a guarantee could be defended.
  MR. CARDWELLsaid, the whole of the information upon this subject was already on the table. It must be perfectly well known to his hon. Friend that the greatest interest was felt in the North American Colonies in the completion of the communication by railway between Halifax and Quebec. He must know, also, that proposals had been made by the different Colonies, and the Duke of Newcastle, in the name of Her Majesty's Government, entered into certain engagements which were to be carried out upon certain conditions being fulfilled by the colonies. The whole of the corre-
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  spondence referring to these proposals was upon the table. If, within a period of about two years, according to the terms of this correspondence, the colonies should come forward and fulfil their conditions, he (Mr. Cardwell) should feel it his duty, on the part of Her Majesty's Government, to fulfil the obligations which Her Majesty's Government had contracted, and make a proposal to the House, and he hoped his hon. Friend (Mr. Aytoun) would think that the proper time for stating to the House the reasons for that proposal would be when the period arrived for making it. As at present advised, he (Mr. Cardwell) had no intention to make any such proposal in the present Session of Parliament. At the same time, he must guard himself to this extent. His hon. Friend knew that when the conference at Quebec proposed to adopt that most desirable scheme, the union of the provinces of British North America, one of the conditions which were kept in view was the completion of the intercolonial railway. Her Majesty's Government, in giving their cordial approval of the scheme of the confederation, had given also their cordial approval to the Resolution with regard to the railway. If the colonies put themselves into a position to complete the railway the time would come when Her Majesty's Government would be called upon to fulfil their engagements. When the time arrived, however, he should be perfectly ready to state his reasons to the House for the proposal.

LABOUR ORDINANCE FOR INDIA.

  QUESTION.
  MR. HENRY SEYMOURsaid, he would beg to ask the Secretary of State for India, If he will promote a Labour Ordinance for India, or certain parts of India, similar to that now in force in Ceylon; and if he will cause to be remedied the great want of roads in the important district of Wynaad? The tea and coffee plantations in India had become a most important branch of industry, and an increasing amount of revenue was being obtained from them to this country. The planters in India, however, experienced a difficulty which was not felt in other of Her Majesty's colonies. There was no proper law existing between master and servant in that country, and the planters had no power to compel labourers to keep their contracts. When the planter in Ceylon

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  brought his Coolies from India, as he constantly did, he knew exactly what his expenditure would be, and he could compel the labourers to perform their contracts; but, strange to say that in India, where there were millions of acres of magnificent land lying waste, with her population going east and west to cultivate land in other countries, there was no labour ordinance to give security to the capitalist. When an Englishman went out to India and bought an estate for the purpose of cultivating it, he found, after going to the expense of gathering labourers from various places on that vast continent, that upon any day they might all leave him bodily, and there was no law to protect him. A meeting of the planters of the southern districts of India had been recently held upon this subject of labour ordinance, and they were unanimously of opinion that the labour ordinance which existed in Ceylon, and which had worked so well for the last twenty years, ought to be extended to India. When a gentleman in India invited a guest to dinner, the butler came in—not to announce that the dinner was ready, but that the cook had resigned. This was a very serious question. A planter might have 200 or 300 labourers, and he would find some morning that they had been bribed, and had gone to gather in some other person's crop. There were 1,000,000 acres in the south of India upon which tea and coffee might be grown; each acre would cost £100 to bring it into a proper state of cultivation, so that £100,000,000 of capital might be well employed in that part of India alone. The profits of the planters in the southern districts were represented at about 50 per cent, and as there was a deficit in the exchequer of India, he thought it would be a matter of interest to the Secretary of State for that country to encourage as far as possible the expenditure of capital in India. English capital and English energy were bid for in every part of the world, and they were taken to America, Australia, and every other part of the civilized and uncivilized world except India. Considering that the right hon. Baronet (Sir Charles Wood) would have in the course of a month or two to announce a deficit in the Indian budget, it would surely be worth his while to compete a little for that English energy and capital which went everywhere except to India. It was surprising that a labour ordinance had not been introduced into India long ago. In many parts of the country the planters were
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  leaving for want of that support which the Government had it in their power to give them. The local governors in India dismissed all complaints in a very summary manner, as they knew their superior would not find fault with them, and that the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State was many thousands of miles off. Nor was he particularly well disposed in favour of a European population in India, and the consequence was that the revenues of the country had not been so productive as they ought to have been, and the land remained to a considerable extent untilled. The meeting of planters to which he had referred was also unanimous as to the want of roads in the district, This had been a want felt for the last ten or twelve years, and they had always been assured by the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for India that roads were being made. Roads were always being made, but, somehow or other, not a single road had been completed. He could not understand how it was that such a want of energy should be displayed by the authorities in India, or why they should so neglect those sources of wealth which were open to them. It could not be because they had an overflowing treasury, for when his right hon. Friend paid off somewhat too prematurely two millions of Indian debt he little, in all probability, anticipated that he would have to come down to the House of Commons and announce a deficit in the course of the present Session. He might, however, have paid off that debt to the extent which he had done, had he only availed himself of the inexhaustible resources which India offered. He seemed to think, however, that there was some undefinable danger in expending British capital in India, and the result was that India remained unexplored, and the Indian Exchequer un-replenished to the extent which otherwise might be expected. A deficit existed in the Indian revenue. He believed that deficit would be diminished by the construction of reproductive works such as those which he then recommended. There were men who spent forty years of their lives in India, and who returned from it quite fresh, and he therefore saw no reason why the district to which he referred should not be colonized by Europeans, if the matter was only taken up by the Government in a proper manner. Such colonization had answered perfectly well in Ceylon, but, be that as it might, the waste lands which his right hon. Friend had promised should

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  be sold had been for some inexplicable cause left unbought. He should like to know what stood in the way of the sale, for it appeared that in Assam a considerable portion of land had been purchased. Those were all matters which deserved the most serious consideration of the Government, and he hoped they would receive their deliberate attention.
  SIR CHARLES WOODsaid, his hon. Friend urged him to incur a very considerable expenditure with a view to increasing the Indian surplus or diminishing the deficit. He could not, however, see how that object was to be attained by heavy expense for the construction of the roads which he advocated. He (Sir Charles Wood) admitted that the execution of the roads referred to was most desirable and necessary, and regretted that they were not more rapidly made. He believed that the roads had been made piecemeal, and he feared they were not well done—but orders had been given which he trusted would remedy that evil. He so far concurred with his hon. Friend that after the Report of Sir W. Denison, who had gone out to India last autumn, he had given instructions that roads, which he quite granted were very much needed, should be proceeded with in a more systematic way, and should be completed within a certain time. With respect to the coffee and tea districts, he found that there was an increase of about 2,000 tons a year in the production of coffee, and that the Assam tea, the production of which also was, he believed, on the increase, commanded a very good price in the London markets. His hon. Friend, however, adverting to another subject, complained that there was no law in India placing on a proper footing the relations between master and servant; but the fact was, that the question having been considered by the Law Commission in this country it had been placed upon that footing which the most able jurists deemed to be the best. Beyond that, the question of importing labour from one part of the country to another had been carefully considered with reference to the tea districts of Assam, for the introduction of labour into which a sepcial Act had been passed two years ago. He regretted, however, to say that the result had not realized the expectations which had been formed, owing to circumstances over which legislation had no control. It should, in dealing with the subject, be borne in mind that the introduction of labour into small islands like the West Indies or
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  Ceylon, and the control of the arrangements for the Coolies, was a comparatively easy matter; but that when labourers were brought into a vast and perfectly wild country, to the sort of life prevailing in which they were unaccustomed, these regulations were attended with considerable difficulty. In the former case the labourers were easily placed under a system of supervision which in the latter they naturally became much less manageable. Into the particular district of Wynaad almost all the labourers came from Mysore; and, as they generally went there only for two or three months, that permanent sort of contract to which his hon. Friend alluded could not well be established. They regarded their new employment only as a temporary matter, from which they returned to their own homes as soon as the coffee harvest was completed.
  MR. HENRY SEYMOURobserved, that all he said was that a law ought to be passed under the operation of which a servant could not, as at present, leave his master the very next morning after he had engaged to enter his employment. He would have a servant, if he failed to keep his contract with his master in India, punished by imprisonment in the same way as in Ceylon and other colonies of the British Empire.
  SIR CHARLES WOODsaid, he understood his hon. Friend to have cited the case of Wynaad, and to have contended that a law with regard to labour similar to that which prevailed in Ceylon should be introduced there with the view of producing similar results. The circumstances under which labour was obtained both in Ceylon and the West India Islands was altogether different. The experiment had been tried in Assam, where a special law had been passed authorizing a system of Coolie labour precisely analagous to that which existed in Ceylon, and entire failure had been the consequence. Indeed, the operation of the law, so great were the cruelties practised under it, amounted almost to enforced labour. In reference to the deception practised on Coolies, he would read the following extract from a letter of the Commissioner of the Decca division to the Secretary to the Government of Bengal:—
  "The deception lies in this, that a Coolie from the upper part of India has no idea of the country to which he is going when he enters into his contract in Calcutta, and the utter wretchedness of life in a plantation only opens to him when he reaches his destination. He naturally tries to

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  escape, and the planter in his duty to himself and his employers of course tries to prevent him, and as the planter has a contract into which the Coolie is supposed to have entered voluntarily he is not likely to listen to the Coolie's plea of ignorance."
  If these poor fellows complained to the magistrates they were treated as if they had absconded. The existing state of things was thus described by Deputy Commissioner Cachar's assistant—
  "But in too many gardens the labourers are flogged with frightful brutality, and for offences of the most trifling description."
  He would not now go into details as to what took place under the management of these people. He would simply read the following extract from a communication made by a magistrate of great experience:—
  "The magistrate was opposed to the maintenance of the Act, on the ground that the power given by it was liable to be much abused, so as to become a powerful engine for enforcing slavery."
  The object of all this was to introduce a modified system of what, to use the mildest terms, might be called forced labour. The people of America, in going into the backwoods, had no necessity for legislation to enforce labour, as they were able to hold out sufficient inducement to procure the services of people willing to work for them. He believed it would be found that kind treatment and good wages would be far more effectual in keeping the labourers on the estates than the enforcement of any system of pains and penalties which could be suggested.

ARMY—DEPOT BATTALIONS.

  EXPLANATION.
  THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTONsaid, before you leave the Chair, Sir, I wish to Bay a word or two in explanation of something I stated a few nights since in reference to the subject of Depot Battalions, because I regret that what I then said should have occasioned some misapprehension in the minds of the Inspector General of Infantry and of some of the officers in command of these battalions. I said on that occasion that I believed that officers in command of regiments generally preferred that young officers and recruits should join the head-quarters of their regiments at once, instead of going first of all to the depôt battalions, because, when they joined their regiments, they had frequently to spend some little time in unlearning what they had previously
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  acquired at the depôt. Now, I did not in the least mean to say that recruits or young officers usually learnt anything at the depots which was in any way injurious or contrary to the principles of the drill to which they would afterwards be subjected. All I meant was that regimental officers generally had their own system, and that they liked their recruits to fall into that system as soon as possible. If an absolute uniformity of drill and discipline prevailed in the British army, then the depot battalions or some such system would be necessary, but in the ordinary relations of our army such absolute uniformity does not exist. Therefore, without in the least degree discrediting the exertions of the Inspector General of Infantry and the officers in command of the depots, I think that the efficiency of the British army will not be injured by the abolition of the depôt system. I only wish to state now that nothing could be further from my intentions, and from the opinions of the Secretary of State and the Commander-in-Chief, than to impute the slightest fault to the Inspector General of Infantry or to the officers in command of depot battalions, because I believe that they are not only most excellent officers but that they admirably discharge the duties of their office.

CANADA—DEFENCES OF QUEBEC.

  OBSERVATIONS.
  LORD ELCHOsaid, that he had given notice of a Motion in Committee of Supply to call attention to what was reported to have been said in the Canadian Parliament relative to the Vote for the defences of Quebec. He had been told as a matter of form he could not bring on the Motion in Committee of Supply, and that it would be convenient for him to do so on the Motion for going into Committee. It had been suggested to him that as it was an important subject, bearing, as it did, upon the whole question of our defences, the opportunity for bringing it before the House would be on the bringing up of the Report on the Votes which they were to consider that evening. As he understood that there was no objection to this course, he should call the attention of the House to the subject on Monday evening next, if the Report were brought up at an hour sufficiently early to enable him to raise a discussion on the subject. If the Report, however, were not brought up until late,

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  he should give notice the first night on going into Committee of Supply.
  Main Question, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair," put, and agreed to.

  SUPPLY—ARMY ESTIMATES.
  SUPPLY considered in Committee:—ARMY ESTIMATES.
  (In the Committee.)
  (1.) Original Question again proposed,
  "That a sum, not exceeding £811,400, be granted to Her Majesty to defray the Charge of the Superintending Establishment of, and Expenditure for, Works, Buildings, and Repairs at Home and Abroad, which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March 1866, inclusive."
  SIR FREDERIC SMITHsaid, he wished to learn from the noble Marquess the reasons which induced the Government to increase their barrack accommodation while they contemplated a reduction in the number of our troops. He perceived that there was an Estimate for the purchase of Warley barracks. Those barracks were sold to the East India Company, and he wished to know whether they were to be purchased back from the Company, and, if so, whether at the same or at an increased price. There was also an item for the purchase of land and additions to the infantry barracks at Windsor upon which he should like to receive some information. Those barracks were only required for the accommodation of Her Majesty's Guards. But as there was to be a reduction in the number of men in the battalions of the Guards, and as the barracks were considered large enough for that portion of our army when they were maintained at their full strength, he wished to know why additional accommodation was now required for them. There was an item, too, for the conversion of Haslar barracks into a hospital. He never knew any barrack that was more unfit for conversion into a hospital than Haslar Barracks. The expense would be £7,500, and he saw no necessity whatever for this step. Under the head of Woolwich a sum of £26,000 was taken "for erecting stabling for the military train and for converting the garrison hospital into a barrack." He should like to know what would be the cost of each of these operations, and what troops the hospital, when converted, was to receive. He regretted that Parliament had given its assent to the erection of a new hospital at Woolwich because the old hospital had been considered to afford ample accommodation for the sick of the
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  garrison, even in times when the amount of sickness was above the present average. Then as to items abroad. Under the head of Bermuda there was a sum for the defences of the dockyard and for the naval anchorage. He remembered the importance of that item being pressed on the House, and no one who knew the importance of these defences could doubt the advisability of granting the money now asked for readily. He found that £35,000 was to be voted in the present year, and a much larger sum hereafter; but if there was a pressing urgency for the completion of the defences of Canada it was still more necessary that Bermuda should be put in a good state of defence, so as to he able to receive and protect our vessels in case of damage. He thought it behoved the Government to press these works forward with as much zeal as the works in Canada. Then there was a sum of £10,300 for officers' quarters at Gibraltar. They ought to know for what these quarters were required. Then there was a Vote for officers' quarters at Fort Ricasoli, at Malta, and some explanation ought to be given of that Vote. For the defences of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, the total Estimate was £190,000, of which £45,000 had been expended, and £35,000 was to be taken for the ensuing year, leaving £110,000 to be hereafter voted. These were works of vital importance, and ought to be pressed forward with all possible speed. Would the expenditure of £35,000 render these colonies defensible, or would it only go towards making the defences complete at some future day? The mere collection of stones and other materials would do little or nothing for immediate defence. Money enough ought to be taken to enable those materials to be applied to defensive purposes at the earliest period. The Government ought to take as much money as could be rendered available for the progress of the fortifications between this time and the corresponding period of next year. It had been said that there was a scarcity of skilled labour; let that be supplied by sending out some companies of engineer soldiers which are composed almost exclusively of artificers. The defences of Mauritius were so nearly completed that it would have been as well to have taken this year the £19,000 which was needed to finish them, as the £10,000 which the House was asked to vote. Upon the defence of commercial harbours we have already expended £154,000, leaving

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  with the £10,000 asked for this year £280,000 to be spent. The House ought to know whether the Government intended to lay out the whole of that sum upon the works originally contemplated; and especially what they intended to do at such harbours as Newhaven—which the Duke of Wellington described as one of the most important points along our coast as a harbour for gunboats, occupying as it does so important a position immediately opposite the coast of France. As to the Clyde and the Tyne, he regretted that they should be left so defenceless, for in case of war, if our fleet were worsted, there would not be room to refit them in the Government basins and docks of the Channel, but they would have to be taken into the commercial rivers or into the Medway. He should be glad to hear something from the noble Marquess as to the intention of Government with respect to these rivers.
  SIR HARRY VERNEYsaid, that in referring to the item of £10,000 for stabling of a more permanent character than that at present existing in camp at Aldershot, he wished to know whether Government intended to make any change with regard to that military station. Nothing could be more useful than to have a camp of instruction during the summer. But it was the universal feeling among the officers of the army that a sufficient amount of training for the troops might be obtained by placing them under canvas during the summer months, without compelling them to undergo the inconvenience and discomfort of living in huts during the winter, especially considering the short period the troops had to remain in England. The hardships undergone by the soldiers at Aldershot were regarded as one of the greatest objections to a military life; and, therefore, he was desirous of knowing whether it was the intention of Government to perpetuate the occupation of Aldershot, as would appear to be the case by their proposal to erect permanent stables there. He further asked to be informed why the general commanding the forces at Aldershot was obliged to rent a house two or three miles away from the camp, while there were three empty huts in its proximity suitable for his accommodation, reserved for the use of high official personages. He thought it a pity that the commander should not live on the spot, for, to compare the practice here with that of France, he (Sir Harry Verney) had visited
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  the camp at Chalons, and not only did the general live within the camp, but the Emperor stayed there when he paid the army a visit. He could not agree with the hon. Gentleman who had objected to the erection of the Military Hospital at Woolwich, as he regarded that building as being one of the greatest boons to the army. So far from its being unnecessary it was a fact, that at the time when it was decided to build that hospital, the invalids were living in tents around the other hospital, from want of accommodation. The sanitary condition of the army was now so very much improved that there was reason to expect that in future the average would only be 4 per cent of sick in hospital. It was now between 3 and 4 per cent, whereas it used to be between 6 and 7 per cent, and at that time the authorities required provision to be made at the rate of 10 per cent. The Herbert Hospital at Woolwich, together with Netley, would go far towards perfecting the general hospital system, and he was happy to find that it was intended to erect a third at Devonport. With regard to the defences of Canada, he should like to know whether Colonel Jervois's plan had received the approval of that able officer Sir John Burgoyne. The army felt that any system of defence which met with Sir John Burgoyne's approval must be one of the greatest value and importance.
  COLONEL DUNNEsaid, that he objected to the system adopted by the War Department of increasing the amounts originally voted by the House for specific works by certain additional sums which, as no notice was given of them, might be passed over without due inquiry. He also objected to the throwing away £3,000 for improving the defences of the Tower of London, which could be riddled through and through by guns from batteries placed above them, say at the Trinity House, which were exposed to musketry fire from every store, and St. Katharine's Docks, and which could not exist an hour if attacked by modern artillery. He had himself some years since, when Clerk of the Ordnance, with the assistance of the Secretary at War, put a stop to these ridiculous works. He did not know whether barracks were wanted there, but he was glad to see expenses were to be incurred for drainage and other works at Gibraltar, which he trusted would include the supply of water to Point Europa, where some years since the soldiers were compelled to buy it.

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  He also called attention to the insufficient hospital accommodation at Bermuda, where in 1853 great mortality had been caused by the yellow fever. Although the attention of Government was then called to this fact—by a special Report forwarded to the War Department condemning the hospital and suggesting various sanitary improvements—no steps had been taken to alter the state of things, and the result was that the disease had again broken out a short time since, when no less than 100 men were lost out of the regiment stationed there. Out of a total expenditure of £800,000 for the defences of the Empire, only £37,000 was devoted to the defence of Ireland; and yet Ireland was called on to pay more than her proportion of the £5,000,000 raised for fortifications. Would it be asserted that in case of war Ireland was not to be defended, or that Ireland was indefensible, were America to attack us? Was it to be doubted that Ireland was the point where she would attempt invasion? In the French war Ireland had been attempted at more than one point. At Bantry Bay the army of Hocke had only not succeeded, and yet all the fortifications for its defence were mouldering or in ruins, while sums were thrown away in erecting useless batteries merely for Volunteers to practice gunnery. He might ask, was Ireland to be considered a part of the Empire, or to be delivered to an enemy in time of war? In that country they would not trust the militia with the custody of arms, nor were Volunteers to be enlisted—yet he well knew, and the Government could not deny, the most distinguished officers commanding in Ireland had made Reports to the Government of the necessity for better defences in that part of the Empire. He hoped the noble Marquess would direct the attention of the Secretary for War to this among other points that had been mentioned in the course of the discussion on the Army Estimates.
  COLONEL DICKSONsaid, that he concurred in the remarks which had been made as to the enormous sums spent at Alder-shot. There had never been any system more mismanaged than our camp system, and for our army it was one of the greatest curses that had ever existed. There was one point which particularly struck him in the Army Estimates year after year, and that was the increase in the establishments. Great credit had been taken for reductions, but the reduction in the Army Estimates for the year had not been caused by any
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  economy in the Departments, but simply by a reduction in the number of men, because he believed we could not get them. In the present Estimates there were items that did not appear last year. The charges for the allowances to three officers of the Royal Engineers, temporary draughtsmen, &c., and the establishment of clerks at the War Office, exceeded by nearly £2,000 the charge of last year.
  SIR JOHN PAKINGTON: Before the noble Lord answers the various inquiries that have been put to him, I wish to ask him a question with reference to the items charged in the Estimates for the defences of Bermuda and Halifax. I find both in the Army and Navy Estimates an unusual number of Votes of the greatest possible importance to the defences both at home and abroad. The Estimates, on account of which these Votes are to be taken, include in the aggregate a very large sum of money, especially for our home defences; but I find that in almost every case insignificant sums only, comparatively speaking, are taken for the present year. And I cannot help regarding with some suspicion the motives of the Government in asking this year for portions of those Votes, so entirely insignificant both with regard to the magnitude of the objects in view and with the total sum to be expended. A worse or more unworthy policy I can hardly imagine than that when a Government has decided that a large sum ought to he expended in constructing important works for the defence of the country—and they have no reason to suppose that Parliament will take exception to them—they should be spreading the Votes over a great number of years; and I can suppose no other reason for anything so unprecedented of itself than timidity of swelling the Estimates for the current year. It is both unwise and impolitic, and there can be no doubt that a desire to keep down the expenditure is the reason for proposing so small a Vote for the defences of Canada. I now find there is a Vote of £35,000 for Bermuda, and also a Vote of £35,000 for Halifax, and what I wish to ask the noble Marquess is, whether or not he is prepared to state upon his official responsibility that these two sums are as much as can be properly expended in the current year? If he is not prepared. to do that, I think the Government are failing in their duty in not asking for a larger sum. I will accept the noble Marquess's assurance in the face of Parliament on his official responsibility that more than

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  is asked for cannot be expended in the current year, but if he cannot give that assurance, why then I say that the Government are failing in their duty in not asking for a larger sum.
  MR. AYRTONthought that the Government was to be commended for not making a larger demand for those works. It appeared to him that the course they had taken was a very natural one, especially in the last Session of a Parliament. The Government would shortly have to account to the constituencies, and therefore it was natural that at the present moment they should be more than usually mindful of the public interest. The Government were not to be blamed for not proposing to expend more on these very unsatisfactory establishments abroad, in order to gratify hon. Gentlemen opposite.
  THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTONsaid, that with reference to the "allowance to those officers of Royal Engineers especially employed," increased from £766 last year to £1,150, it had been caused by the fact that this year we had undertaken new works at Bermuda, in Canada and at Halifax. For the same reason there was a charge for additional draughtsmen who must be employed at the commencement of those works to prepare the plans necessary for the contractors. It did not follow that they would be employed during the whole progress of the works. The increase in the Vote for clerks at the War Office was occasioned by the transfer of those charges from Vote 18 to this Vote. Objection had been taken to the Vote of £60,000 towards the purchase money of Warley Barracks, which formerly belonged to the Indian Government. It was resolved at the amalgamation of the Indian and Imperial armies to take those barracks for the Crown. He could not give the former history of these barracks, or answer the question whether they had been originally built by the Indian Government, but the price paid was arrived at by a proper valuation made by competent persons. Some remarks had been made upon the item for the reform of the eastern defences, Tower of London; but, as the Vote was only £2,000—the residue of £11,500—to complete the work, it was hardly worth while to criticize it. It was not pretended that the work ever would be of the least use for defence against an enemy; but, as all the ancient fortifications of the Tower of London were falling into decay, if it were wished to preserve
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  the character of the building, it was necessary to expend some money upon repairs. The next item which he had to notice was the Vote of £5,500 for converting barracks into an hospital at Haslar. The hon. and gallant Member opposite said that Haslar Barracks were wholly unsuited for an hospital, but that opinion was not shared by the Barrack and Hospital Committee, who had reported that those barracks were peculiarly fitted for the purposes of an hospital. The reason why those barracks had become available was that a considerable amount of barrack accommodation had been provided in the new works at Gosport, but no additional hospital accommodation had been provided for the garrison of those works. With respect to the item—£26,000—for erecting stabling for the Military Train, and converting the garrison hospital at Woolwich into barracks, he might observe that hitherto no barrack accommodation had been provided for the Military Train, who had been quartered in huts for the whole year at Aldershot and at Woolwich, which the House would agree was rather hard upon them. The hon. Baronet (Sir Harry Verney) had explained the reasons which induced the late Lord Herbert to embark in the expenditure upon the hospital at Woolwich. Many statements had been made concerning that hospital, which were devoid of foundation. It had been stated that the building was not adapted for the purposes of an hospital, and also that there were very serious faults in its construction. The truth was that that hospital had been constructed upon the plan of the best modern hospitals in London and in Continental towns, upon plans recommended by a Committee which was appointed to inquire into the subject of hospitals, and upon the plans more directly sanctioned by the Barrack and Hospital Committee in 1858. He believed that the medical profession generally agreed that the hospital was constructed upon the best principles. As to the alleged faults of construction, although it was true there had been a slight slip of earth where a portion of one of the pavilions was built and a small crack had appeared in one of the walls, yet the damage done was very slight, and the foundations had been examined by competent persons, who reported that there was no danger of further accident. The next item to which his attention had been called was that for the defences of the dockyard and anchorage at Bermuda, in connection with which he

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  would take the item for defences at Halifax. Colonel Jervois, who was sent to report upon the defences of Canada, was also instructed to inspect the defences of the harbours of Halifax, and Burmuda. Considerable works had been going on for some time at Halifax, but hitherto none of any importance had been undertaken at Bermuda. Colonel Jervois recommended additional works at Halifax and that they should be proceeded with more rapidly. That officer also made several recommendations with regard to Bermuda, and accordingly an item had been placed upon the Estimates for defensive works at that island. In reply to the question of the right hon. Baronet (Sir John Pakington), he could not say that it would be impossible to spend more money than the Government proposed to spend this year upon those works; but he was prepared to state that in framing the Estimate the Secretary for War had consulted Colonel Jervois as to what sums of money could be properly expended this year at Bermuda and Halifax, keeping in view considerations of economy and completeness. The amount which Colonel Jervois mentioned as required for Halifax had been placed upon the Estimates. Although it would not be impossible to proceed at a faster rate with those works, yet if they did so the cost would he very much increased, as labour could not be obtained in very great abundance on the spot. With respect to the amount asked for Bermuda, it was true there was a slight decrease of the amount recommended by Colonel Jervois. That decrease was very slight, and it was made because, upon further consideration, it appeared that a larger sum could not be usefully expended this year. It was impossible to calculate upon obtaining a sufficient supply of labour on the island. The black population was not very disposed to work, and the white population was well employed in other ways. If labour was imported from this country, unless very high rates of wages were given, the vicinity of the United States would offer a great inducement to cross to that country. If the works were to be carried on at a very rapid rate it could only be done by military or by convict labour. The garrison at Bermuda was at present small, and there was not accommodation for any very large increase of force. It was proposed to carry on the works with convict labour, but there were objections to the employment of convicts upon works of that kind, and the authorities at the Home Office had not yet
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  decided whether they would allow a body of convicts to be sent to Bermuda. In any case, much time would be required to construct huts and to make other arrangements for the reception of the convicts, so that it was not probable that a larger sum than that placed upon the Estimates could be usefully expended this year. With respect to Halifax, it must be recollected that the working season there was short, and, consequently, a smaller sum could be expended in the year than in places where work could be carried on throughout the year. The sum taken for Halifax this year was larger than had ever been taken before, and although it would not complete the works, yet it would be sufficient, added to former expenditure, to place the works in a condition to resist an enemy's fleet. The money taken this year would be expended in preparing the existing works to receive heavier guns, and in providing accommodation for the repair of iron steamers. With regard to the hut barracks at Gibraltar, the site originally fixed was near some officers' quarters; but the site had been changed since the Vote was taken, and it was necessary now to provide officers' quarters. As to the officers' quarters at Malta, they were said to be almost the worst in existence. There had been a great deal of sickness among the officers quartered in them, attributed to their character, and this work was considered one of a pressing nature. The works at Harwich were nearly complete, and the contract for the works at Newhaven had been let. With regard to the Vote for the fortification of commercial harbours, part of that would be devoted to works on the Severn; and it was also proposed to commence a work at Liverpool, on the Mersey, the appropriation for the erection of which would be augmented by a contribution from local funds to be supplied by the corporation of that place. As to the small amount said to be devoted to Ireland, it must be remembered that the sum taken this year in the Estimates for fortifications in the United Kingdom was not large. The expenses of fortifications at home was almost entirely defrayed from the loans. The hon. and gallant Gentleman (Colonel Dunne) was aware that works were going on in Ireland at places recommended by the Commission, and the Committee would hardly think it right that they should begin erecting works in other parts which had not been recommended by any military authority. The decrease in the barrack expenditure in Ire-

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  land was owing to the fact that the concentration of troops in camps at the Curragh and Aldershot had led to a great many small barracks being given up.
  SIR FREDERIC SMITHsaid, that the noble Lord had said nothing about the Windsor Barracks.
  THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTONsaid, this Vote was owing to the fact that the infantry barracks at Windsor were extremely confined, and not sufficient for the accommodation of troops according to the modern notions of accommodation. They might be made much superior to what they were now, but the greatest fault was their confined space, which rendered it necessary to purchase additional land to expand them.
  SIR JOHN PAKINGTONsaid, he must acknowledge that the noble Marquess had answered his questions in a manner which showed that he was thoroughly conversant with the complicated details of these Estimates. Still, the answer he had given to one or two of his questions rendered it necessary to ask him one or two more. He could assure the hon. Member for the Tower Hamlets (Mr. Ayrton) that Gentlemen on that side of the House had not urged the Government to expenditure on these matters; all they had done was, when the Government had stated on their responsibility that such expenditure was necessary for the interests of the country, to suggest that it should not be spread over a period of time thereby causing unnecessary delay. The noble Marquess said that Colonel Jervois had recommended the expenditure of £35,000 at Halifax, but that he had recommended at Bermuda a larger sum than was asked for. What was the difference between the sum actually taken and that recommended? He also wished to know whether the Government had come to any decision as to the employment of convict labour on these works at Bermuda.
  SIR FREDERIC SMITHsaid, he wished to ask why the labour of soldiers—engineers—which was known to be so much cheaper in the erection of such works, was not employed. He believed they could easily be spared.
  THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTONsaid, he thought he had a right, before answering the right hon. Baronet's question, to protest against its nature, though he did not object to answer it. The Committee could not expect that any one representing a Department in that House
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  should be called on to state the precise nature of the confidential recommendations of the officers of the Department in reference to any work of this kind.
  SIR JOHN PAKINGTONsaid, the question was founded on the information given by the noble Lord himself to the House.
  THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTONsaid, he had stated that Colonel Jervois had been sent to Canada to inspect the works there, but did not imagine that the Committee would require the precise nature of his recommendations. As regarded the works at Quebec, Halifax, and Bermuda, Lord De Grey represented to Colonel Jervois that it was desirable no unnecessary delay should occur in their construction, and therefore asked him what amount of money could be expended during this year. £35,000 was mentioned for Halifax, £40,000 for Bermuda, and £50,000 for Quebec. But it was thought by the Government that £35,000 was as much as could be usefully spent in Bermuda this year. The Government were much obliged to the hon. Member for the Tower Hamlets (Mr. Ayrton) for defending them, but they had thought it right to take in every case the largest sum which they thought could be spent in the year.
  SIR JOHN PAKINGTON: What about convict labour?
  THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTONsaid, that question was still under discussion. It had been thought right to refer it to a Committee, which, if it had not met already, would meet in a day or two.
  COLONEL DICKSONsaid, the Government had initiated whatever irregularity there was by publishing Colonel Jervois's Report, and he was surprised they should now object to give information. But why had Colonel Jervois been sent out there at all? We had in Canada the flower of our army, comprising several distinguished engineer officers, and why were not they consulted? Colonel Jervois was one of our most distinguished officers, but then he had seen no service, and had been Secretary of that Defence Commission which had entailed upon us that extraordinary expenditure for fortifications which had made us the laughing stock of the whole world. Just as the currier thought there was nothing like leather, so with Colonel Jervois, there was nothing like fortifications.
  THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTONsaid, he did not in the least object to any questions which hon. Gentlemen might like

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  to put as to the nature of the recommendations of Colonel Jervois. What he objected to was being compelled to answer questions with regard to confidential communications which might have passed between Colonel Jervois and the Secretary of State, on the subject of those works. The hon. and; gallant Gentleman was, no doubt, right in I saying there were officers in Canada who would be quite competent to make recommendations upon the subject of its defences, but Colonel Jervois had had very great experience, if not in active service, in the construction of works of military fortification. He quite admitted that Colonel Jervois had been Secretary to that Commission whose recommendations had, in the hon. and gallant Gentleman's opinion, been the laughing-stock of the world; but that was not the opinion of the House. The Government, however, were not proceeding upon the unsupported recommendations of Colonel Jervois. His plans had been submitted to General Williams, in Canada, to the Governor-General there, to the Commander-in-Chief in this country, and the principal officers who advised him, and had obtained their entire concurrence. He might say that they had also met with the entire approval of Sir John Burgoyne. The Government, therefore, were not acting on the unsupported recommendations of Colonel Jervois, but upon the best military opinions within their reach.
  LORD NAASwas quite aware of the great advantage of employing convicts upon public works wherever it was possible, but he had on a former occasion brought the full question of the Bermuda establishment before the House, and the evils which had been shown to exist were so great that the Government resolved to discontinue the establishment as soon as possible, and they had since done so. If it were intended to send convicts there now, it would be necessary to go to the great expense of providing gaols and establishments for their use, for that House would never sanction a return to the horrors of the hulk system as practised at Bermuda some years ago. He hoped, therefore, whatever Department of the Government had this proposal under consideration would take full time before coming to a conclusion. He believed the expense they would have to go to if they were to send convicts there would be far greater than any possible advantage which could accrue to the public service.
  Vote agreed to.
  (2.) £163,500, Military Education.
  MR. AYRTONsaid, he was glad to see that the expenditure upon this department had somewhat diminished, and hoped it would still further decrease. The Council of Military Education cost £8,300 a year, He wanted to know whether the 200 cadets whose charge for messing was upon the Estimates formed the whole number at Woolwich. He had taken the trouble of adding up the number of persons who ministered to the education of these 200 gentlemen, and he found that they amounted to 147 in all. That was a very large and expensive establishment for 200 cadets. He did not think the double staff at all necessary. It appeared extraordinary to require a large military staff, who wore red coats, for purposes of discipline, who did nothing, and then a large educational staff, who taught the cadets something. If private persons were to establish a proprietary school they would not think of having a double establishment. It was rather an extravagant educational system when 200 cadets cost the sum of £36,000. There were also about 200 cadets at the Military College, costing for their education about the same sum. He thought the Government might find a more economical mode of doing the business.
  COLONEL DUNNEsaid, that of the £36.000 for the Royal Military Academy at Woolwich the cadets themselves paid £30,960, so that the country only lost between £5,000 and £6,000. The Sand-hurst College was not so self-supporting, for it cost the country about £20,000. With regard to the establishment at Chelsea, the schoolmasters which it furnished were the most insubordinate set of men that could be found anywhere, and the consequence was that the officers did not take the same interest in regimental schools that they did formerly. Of the entire Vote of £163,500 the sum of £60,000 was repaid.
  MR. KINGLAKEsaid, with regard to the double staff to which his hon. Friend (Mr. Ayrton)had called attention, it seemed rather strange that when it was thought necessary to effect some retrenchment, instead of reducing the military staff, which was the ornamental portion of the establishment at Woolwich, the reduction was made in the number of teachers. He thought this a most injurious course to take. Nothing could be more satisfactory than the condition of the pupils so far as concerned education, and the teachers had had nothing to do with the difficulties

  257
  which had occurred with regard to the military branch.
  MR. MAGUIREsaid, that he had to repeat the complaint which he had made on several previous occasions with respect to the state of the Military Hibernian School at Dublin, which was destined for the education and nurture of the children of soldiers in Ireland. The number in the school was about 400. About two-thirds of these were Protestants, and one-third Catholics. There were seventy officials in the establishment, but not a single person of rank or influence was of the Roman Catholic faith. The whole atmosphere of the place was Protestant. There were eight teachers, not one of whom was a Roman Catholic. This system had been attended with serious practical injury, for on several occasions owing to the influences which surrounded them, Roman Catholic boys had embraced the Protestant faith, and he would mention one or two cases to show how this influence had been exerted. In the year 1861 two Members of the Government stated that when a vacancy secured on the staff a certain number of Catholic teachers or officers should be appointed. A vacancy did occur soon afterwards, and it was filled up in defiance of the expressed opinion of the House of Commons. He had omitted to mention that a Roman Catholic boy, who had changed his faith, was sent to another institution and brought back as a Protestant teacher. This was a strong inducement to others to change their faith. Other vacancies occurred in November and in January, neither of which had been filled up by Roman Catholics, Nothing could be more injurious in Ireland than to allow even the suspicion of proselytism to attach to any institution under the control of the Government, and supported by Parliament. Great discouragement was given to the introduction of Catholic children, one instance of which he would mention. Colour-serjeant O'Callaghan, who fought in the Crimea and died at Corfu, left two children, one of whom was now serving Her Majesty as a soldier, and the other a boy of tender years. The father was born, bred, lived, and died a Catholic; the widow, who was a Protestant at the time of her marriage afterwards became a Catholic. She was still a Catholic, and applied to have her child admitted into the institution, but the application was refused. Admission was afterwards obtained for the
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  boy as a Protestant, and the Roman Catholic clergyman was refused access to the register in which the child's name was inserted. What would be said in England if the case were reversed? If such a state of things existed lie would be one of the first, in defiance of priest, bishop, or Pope, to raise his voice in protest against it. In this college, while a Protestant chaplain was in receipt of £300 a year, the official Roman Catholic clergyman received only £80, and all applications for increase had been refused. An orderly serjeant in the institution changed his faith, and the Roman Catholic clergyman was kept out of his room one hour and a quarter while the man was dying, and was only admitted when the man had breathed his last. In this case a rebuke was administered by the Lord Lieutenant. These things showed the bias of the institution; and he had no confidence that the authorities of the school would give proper protection to Roman Catholic children. On the last occasion when he brought this subject before the noble Lord, in the true spirit of an Englishman, declared that he would not defend the Vote this year if there was not some change. There had been no change. He asked for that change; and he appealed to the noble Lord to urge upon the Lord Lieutenant, as president of the institution, to interfere in the matter and see that justice was done, for the Catholic soldier behaved in the charge, breach, and deadly conflict as gallantly as any one serving in the ranks of Her Majesty's army.
  THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTONsaid, in reply, to the observations of the hon. Member (Mr. Ayrton), that the duties of the Council of Military Education were not confined to the examination of officers for commissions; but included the whole administration of the military colleges, and of the regimental and garrison schools and libraries; and it would be seen by reference to the Return on the table that the gentlemen composing that commission were as fully occupied as any one employed in a public office. As to the Military Academy and Military College, it had been said that what was called the double staff was unnecessary. It was a misapprehension to say that what was designated in the Estimates the military branch was composed of officers employed solely in looking after the discipline of the military cadets. In the military branch of the Royal Academy at Woolwich were included the lieutenant-

  259
  governor, the commandant, the inspector of studies, the assistant-inspector, and the chaplain—offices which would be necessary in any large educational establishment, and would have to be filled, if not by military men, by civilians. In the educational branch were included the professors only. The only officers employed on purely military duties were the captains, lieutenants, paymasters, and adjutants of the cadet companies; and the salaries of these officers constituted only a very small portion of the expense of the college. No reduction had been made in the military staff; but some reduction had taken place in the teachers, and there had been a consequent reduction in the expense. In reply to the observations of the hon. Member (Mr. Kinglake), he must say that the college had never contained the number of cadets on which the estimate of the number of teachers was originally based. During the last year or two a larger number of cadets had been sent from the military academy than commissions could be given to; and instead of 300 cadets, the number intended originally to be educated at Woolwich, it was found unnecessary for the service to educate more than 200, and therefore the number of professors had been diminished. A like observation would apply to the Military College at Sandhurst. Passing to the question raised by the hon. Member for Dungarvan (Mr. Maguire), he said it was true that last year the statement which the hon. Member brought before the House with regard to proselytising in the education given at the Royal Hibernian Schools attracted the attention of the Secretary for War, and the noble Earl had brought certain points connected with the management of that school under the notice of Sir George Brown and the Governors of the institution. The hon. Member last year gave him notice of the points to which he wished to call attention, and as far as any intention to proselytise on the part of any one connected with the education at the Hibernian School was concerned, he had shown that there was no real ground for the accusation; or, at all events, that if any indication of an attempt to proselytise the Roman Catholic children had ever been made, it had been checked and rebuked by the Governors of the institution. But he had been compelled to admit that in the educational staff of the college almost the whole—[Mr. MAGUIRE: Entire.]—perhaps the whole of the staff were of the Protestant religion. The Governors, however, assured them that
  260
  in the selection of the teachers they were not prompted by any religious feeling, and that their invariable practice had been to select those candidates who appeared to them to be most fitted for the posts. He had stated last year that the Government did not consider that that was entirely a satisfactory state of things. They thought that that principle ought not to be strictly adhered to; and Earl De Grey was of opinion that, considering the different religions of the children, the candidates for teacherships should, to a certain extent, irrespective of their other qualifications, be Roman Catholics. That opinion of Earl De Grey was communicated to Sir George Brown and the Governors of the institution, who immediately held a meeting and passed a resolution that in future appointments the religion of the candidates should be considered, and that it should be a rule that a certain proportion of Roman Catholics should be appointed. He made inquiries the other day as to what had been the result of that decision, and the information that he received was that the only vacancies which had since occurred to which Roman Catholics could be appointed were—for one pioneer corporal and three women servants. For these, Roman Catholics had been selected. Also two monitor-ships, since the 1st February last, had been held open, in hope that the Board of National Education would recommend candidates qualified for the appointment. He was sure that the Committee would agree that, after the declaration of the Governors, no further assurance could be needed that the promise would be carried out. He had no knowledge of the individual cases brought forward by the hon. Member, but he understood that no cases of proselytising had taken place since the last debate. Certainly, if any instances of proselytism had since occurred it was contrary to the spirit of the correspondence between Lord De Grey and Sir George Brown, and without further information and inquiry he could not believe that any such attempt had been made. The hon. Member had referred to the case of a refusal to admit a Roman Catholic child, who was afterwards admitted as a Protestant. Of course, having had no prievous notice of the case, he should offer no explanation with regard to it. The facts might be as the hon. Gentleman had stated them, but he did not think the inference that had been drawn from those facts was the correct one. If the child had been refused

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  admission, as stated, he should be inclined to believe it was not because the child was a Roman Catholic, but because there was no vacancy at the time, and that it was the occurrence of a vacancy, not the change of faith, which procured the subsequent admission.
  MR. BRADYwas glad to have this assurance from the noble Marquess, but when he looked at the largeness of this Vote, extending to £10,000 or £20,000, and that of the officers of the institution not one in the higher positions was a Roman Catholic, he must enter his protest. The institution was entirely a Protestant one in its character. The noble Marquess said there were no attempts at proselytism in that establishment. This assertion might be correct in the sense in which the noble Lord meant to apply it—namely, that no direct influence was brought to bear OH the children there to induce them to change their religion; but when the Committee saw that children of tender years were associated in the Royal Military School with persons of a different religion who had an influence over them, it was a natural consequence that those children would receive impressions which would weigh upon their minds. It was a well known fact that no Protestant parent believing in the doctrines of his Church would place his children under a Catholic teacher any more than he would place them under one of the Jewish persuasion, and it would be well that in this institution the Catholic children had not any inducement to become Protestants. The school was established as a boon to the people of Ireland at the time of the Union. It was intended as a boon, and might yet be made a boon if it were conducted aright. But the reverse of this had been the case, and it had provoked irritation in the minds of the Catholics. It ought not to be the policy of the Government further to attempt to estrange the feelings of the people of Ireland from this country. The Government had the opportunity to make amends for the past, and by seeing that this would be conducted in a fair spirit to the people of Ireland, it would tend to diminish that feeling of hostility which the Irishmen who had left for America had entertained, and which arose from the notion that justice had not been done to them at home.
  MR. MAGUIREexpressed his acknowledgments to the noble Marquess for the assurance which he had given. He (Mr. Maguire) should be sorry to make a state-
  262
  ment which he did not believe, and as an act of justice to himself and the noble Marquess, who had nothing to conceal, he would ask him to grant as unopposed the Returns he had moved for. They might render unnecessary any further appeals to the House on the subject.
  THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTONsaid, he had no objection to give those Returns.
  MR. WATKINcalled attention to the allowance for the messes of the cadets, and said as there were only 200 cadets, each of them must cost the country £180. This must be an expensive mode of education.
  Vote agreed to.
  (3.) £88,345, Surveys, &c.
  (4.) £107,700, Miscellaneous Services.
  MR. AYRTONsaid, he wished to call attention to an item of £5,000 for expenses attending the carrying out of the Act 27 & 28 Vict. c. 85, for the prevention of contagious diseases at certain naval and military stations. It was, he thought, remarkable, after all that was said and done in connection with the moral and intellectual improvement of soldiers, that it should be deemed necessary to propose a Vote of £5,000 for the purpose of ministering to their vices and tempting them into immorality. The proposed expenditure was of an entirely novel character, and he should be glad to know how the money was to be appropriated and what towns were to have the disgrace of participating in its distribution. A more discreditable proposal was never brought under the notice of the House.
  MR. LOCKEsaid, that as a Member of the Committee who sat upon the Bill which had now become law, and on which this Vote was based, he must protest against the extraordinary description which the lion. Member for the Tower Hamlets had given of the measure. It was wholly incorrect to talk of that £5,000 as being intended for the purpose of catering to the vices of the soldiers. It was simply intended for their protection; and if a similar measure could be carried out throughout the whole country it would be a very great advantage. The object of the Act was that where a woman was proved to be a common prostitute—a term well known to the law of England—she should be taken care of, and not allowed to be the source of mischief to other people. It was an

  263
  Act for the protection of the health of soldiers. A kinder or more benevolent Act he could not conceive. The hon. Member (Mr. Ayrton) had objected to it in the Committee because it was not sufficiently extensive, and seemed to think that they ought not to attempt to mitigate the evil because they could not entirely extirpate it. His hon. Friend (Mr. Ayrton) absented himself from the Committee, except on one day, when he expressed his entire dissent from the Bill. The Committee thought they did good service. They were unanimous. They were satisfied with themselves, and they were equally satisfied with his hon. Friend because he stayed away.
  THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTONsaid, that the proportion of teachers to students at the Ecole Polytechnique at Paris was much greater than at the Military College. The hon. Member (Mr. Ayrton) was correct in saying that there were only 200 cadets at Woolwich, but the charge for education was fair and reasonable. With regard to the item of £5,000, it was proposed to extend it in the hire of certain Lock wards in different places; and, although it was not quite decided, yet it was contemplated to commence a hospital in one or two places where no such wards could be procured. The proportion of the grant to Aldershot would be expended either there or in London, to which those persons would be removed. It was the general opinion of persons competent to judge that the Bill would be of great use.
  MR. BRADYsaid, that there was no city of Europe in which public hospitals were not open to this class of patients. They ought to be more general in this country.
  MR. AYRTONsaid, he had attended the meeting of the Committee one day, when he proposed that the law of the land should be put in force for the protection of the soldier.
  Vote agreed to.
  THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTONsaid, he did not propose to move the next Vote for the administration of the army until the Report of the Committee was received.
  (5.) £26,100, Rewards for Military Service.
  (6.) £74,200, Pay of General Officers.
  (7.) Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That a sum, not exceeding £455,000, be granted to Her Majesty, to defray the Charge of
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  the Pay of Reduced and Retired Officers, which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March 1866, inclusive:"—
  Whereupon Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Chairman do report Progress, and ask leave to sit again."—(Mr. Torrens.)
  Motion, by leave, withdrawn.
  Original Question put, and agreed to.
  (8.) £162,100, Widows' Pensions and Compassionate Allowances.
  (9.) £28,200, Pensions and Allowances to Wounded Officers.
  Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That a sum, not exceeding £33,200, be granted to Her Majesty, to defray the Charge of Chelsea and Kilmainham Hospitals, and the In-Pension thereof, which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March 1866, inclusive."
  COLONEL DICKSON COLONEL DICKSON moved that the Chairman report Progress.
  MR. HENNESSYsaid, he wished to have some information on this Vote. It appeared that only £15 a year was allowed to maintain soldiers' widows, and he wished to know how many widows had applied. Surely that was not the whole sum allotted to this purpose?
  COLONEL DICKSONsaid, that he hoped the hon. Member would not persevere in asking information then, as Progress had been made, and he was only marring the attempt to postpone the consideration of the Vote.
  THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTONsaid, that usually this Vote passed without discussion. He could see no objection to proceeding with it.
  COLONEL DUNNEsaid, that considerable discussion would arise upon the Vote.
  MR. WATKINsaid, he hoped the Committee would act like an assembly of business men. This was a Vote which everybody approved, and he appealed to the gallant Member not to obstruct business by this mode of objection.
  COLONEL DUNNEsaid, these discussions always arose upon the Estimates, as the hon. Member would have known if he had been as long in the House as he (Colonel Dunne) had. It was the hon. Member's inexperience which led him to make that suggestion.
  THE CHAIRMANproceeded to put the Vote.
  COLONEL DICKSON: I thought I had moved that Progress be reported. Really it seems as if the Government are trying to get these Estimates in an unfair manner.
  VISCOUNT PALMERSTONregarded the proposal as unreasonable, but as they had got already many Votes the Government would give way.
  Whereupon Motion made, and Question, That the Chairman do report Progress, and ask leave to sit again,"—(Colonel Dickson,)—put, and agreed to.
  House resumed.
  Resolutions to be reported on Monday next.
  Committee report Progress; to sit again on Monday next.

COUNTY VOTERS REGISTRATION (IRELAND) BILL— [BILL 70.]

  SECOND READING.
  Order for Second Reading read.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a second time."—(Sir Robert Peel.)
  COLONEL DUNNEasked for an explanation of its object.
  SIR ROBERT PEELsaid, that in 1862 a Bill was introduced for the purpose of limiting the polling in counties to one day, instead of two. It became law. In 1864 a Bill was introduced authorizing the Lord President in Council to make additional polling places by the division of baronies, attaching them to new polling-places. When that Act was passed an omission was made with reference to the preparation of the lists for those new polling places, in consequence of which the Act would not work. Representations had been made by Magistrates of Queen's county and Wexford of the inconvenience there, and it was to remedy the omission in the Act of last Session that this Bill was brought in,
  MR. AGAR-ELLISsaid, that the Bill would be totally unworkable. The Act of last year did not require amendment.
  COLONEL DICKSONsaid, his suspicion with regard to the Bill was as to the period at which it was introduced. Who were the Magistrates of Queen's County and Wexford who had made representations? It looked very much like a party move?
  SIR ROBERT PEELsaid, the Bill was introduced with no such object.
  SIR COLMAN O'LOGHLENsaid, the real object of the Bill was to supply the omission in the Bill of last Session. It had nothing to do with registration, but was merely for the convenience of voters.
  MR. BAGWELLbelieved that the inconvenience arising from the Bill would be greater than the convenience. He should move that the Bill be read a second time that day six months.
  Amendment proposed, to leave out the word "now," and at the end of the Question to add the words "upon this day six months,"—(Mr. Bagwell.)
  Question proposed, "That the word 'now' stand part of the Question."
  MR. LONGFIELDcontended that the operation of the Bill would entail a new revision in the districts to which it applied, by means of which not only would expenditure be incurred, but efforts to oust particular persons would be encouraged.
  SIR CHARLES WOODsaid, that the measure would not have any such effect. Its intention simply was to provide increased facilities for polling. There would be no new registration or revision of voters, and the sole object of the Bill was to provide for the division of the voters into polling districts.
  Question put.
  The House divided:—Ayes 30; Noes 32: Majority 2.
  Words added. Main Question, as amended, put, and agreed to.
  Bill put off for six months.

UNION OFFICERS (IRELAND) SUPERANNUATION BILL.— [BILL 53.]

  COMMITTEE.
  Bill considered in Committee.
  (In the Committee.)
  Clause 1.
  LORD JOHN BROWNE LORD JOHN BROWNE moved an Amendment to include clerks of Unions among the officers who might be superannuated.
  LORD NAASsaid, he was in favour of the principle of the Bill, but he doubted the prudence of the Amendment, as he thought that the only officers of unions

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  who should be superannuated were those who devoted their whole time to union affairs.
  COLONEL DICKSONsaid, he agreed with the Amendment, adding that he had, in fact, himself given notice of an Amendment of a similar nature, but somewhat wider in its operation, as it included among officers to be superannuated the union doctors, who were a most meritorious class of men.
  SIR EDWARD GROGANhoped the Government would adhere to the clause as it stood, and thus show a due regard for the rights of the ratepayers.
  SIR ROBERT PEELsaid, that the interests of the ratepayer must be considered. The effect of the hon. and gallant Member's proposal would be to give superannuation to the poor rate collector, and the chaplain, as well as the doctor and the clerk. He thought the principle of the Bill ought to be adhered to, as stated by the noble Lord opposite.
  Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
  MR. HENNESSY MR. HENNESSY moved an Amendment, including the medical officers and the clerks of the unions in the list of those to whom the benefits of the Bill should be extended.
  Amendment proposed, in line 11, after the word "officers," to insert the words "including the medical officers and the clerks of unions."—(Mr. Hennessy.)
  Question proposed, "That those words be there inserted."
  SIR ROBERT PEELsaid, that he could not conscientiously proceed with the Bill if the Amendment of the hon. Member for the King's County were carried, because he never would be a party to to the imposition upon the ratepayers of Ireland of the taxation which it would render necessary. He hoped the Bill would be passed in its present shape.
  Question put.
  The Committee divided:—Ayes 11; Noes 42: Majority 31.
  Clause, as amended, agreed to. Clause 2 agreed to. Clause 3.
  COLONEL DICKSON COLONEL DICKSON moved an Amendment to the effect that superannuation should be ruled by time of service and not the age of the applicant.
  SIR COLMAN O'LOGHLENsaid, the clause, as it stood, was identical with the English law, and therefere those Irish Members who generally expressed so strong a disapprobation of different legislation for the two countries ought to support the clause.
  Clause agreed to.
  Remaining Clauses agreed to.
  House resumed.
  Bill reported; as amended, to be considered on Tuesday next.

MERCHANT SHIPPING DISPUTES BILL.

  BILL ORDERED. FIRST READING. [BILL 90.]
  MR. DENMANobtained leave to bring in a Bill "to improve and facilitate the trial of disputes relating to the merchant shipping." He said that it was a measure drawn under the direction of the Chamber of Commerce, and was intended to give a cheaper, more expeditious, and better qualified tribunal to settle disputes than now existed.
  Motion agreed to.
  Bill to improve and facilitate the trial of Disputes relating to Merchant Shipping, ordered to be brought in by Mr. DENMAN and Mr. CLAY.
  Bill presented, and read 1°. [Bill 90.]
  House adjourned at half after One o'clock, till Monday next.

MINUTES.
PUBLIC BILLS—First Reading District Church Tithes* (45) [H.L.]; Qualification for Offices Abolition.* (46).
Committee—Perth Provisional Order Confirmation* (38); Bankruptcy and Insolvency (Ireland) Act Amendment* (20).
Report—Affirmations (Scotland)* (37); Perth Provisional Order Confirmation* (38).
Third Reading—Felony and Misdemeanor Evidence and Practice* (22); Consolidated Fund (£175,650)*; Election Petitions Act (1848) Amendment* (35); Dublin International Exhibition (1865)* (13) and passed.

DETENTION OF MR. DOCKRALL.

  QUESTION. MOTION FOR PAPERS.
  THE EARL OF MALMESBURYsaid, that in consequence of information he had received, he thought it his duty, as a Member of Parliament, to ask Her Majesty's Goverment for further information with respect to a case of great hardship and injustice arising from the illegal detention of a person named Dockrall in the Lunatic Asylum at Sedgefield, in Durham. The statement he was about to make to their Lordships was based on information which he believed to be derived from trustworthy sources, and had been corroborated by his own inquiries. It appeared that a most respectable man, named Dockrall, a bookseller, residing at Chester-le-street, Durham, aged thirty-six, was, by the order of Colonel Johnson, a local magistrate, taken from his house and confined in a lunatic asylum, where he remained five days. Colonel Johnson, it was clear, had acted illegally—in the first place, by consulting only one medical man as to the state of mind of the alleged lunatic, while the Act of Parliament requires two; and secondly, in his written order he stated that he had personally examined Mr. Dockrall, whereas he had not seen him at all. After Mr. Dockrall had been confined five days, it became evident to the medical man in charge of that asylum, that he was perfectly sane. This

  189
  was represented to two magistrates, who went to Sedgefield Asylum, and after an examination which lasted two hours, being convinced that he was perfectly sane, restored him to liberty. Mr. Dockrall was a poor man, but this act of the magistrates created a great deal of stir in the neighbourhood. Mr. Reade, an author of whom their Lordships had, no doubt, heard, sent him to consult his (Mr. Reade's) solicitors, Messrs. Bellfrage and Middleton, a highly respectable firm. These gentlemen advised Mr. Dockrall to take means to obtain redress by bringing an action at law; also by an application to the Court of Queen's Bench, the order for Mr. Dockrall's confinement in the asylum was quashed. He then brought an action against Colonel Johnson for wrongful imprisonment, laying the damages at £5,000. The case was set down for trial at the Summer Assizes in 1864 (the imprisonment having taken place in October, 1863), but the pressure of business was such that the Lord Chief Justice, although most anxious to try the case, was obliged to leave for another assize town before it could be heard. Under these circumstances, the unfortunate man, naturally of an excitable temper, and having undergone great afflictions in the loss of his children, and through domestic differences with his wife, was so overcome by this disappointment, following on his incarceration in the lunatic asylum, and on his unsuccessful applications for redress to the Home Office, that he committed suicide in October last. In order that their Lordships might understand the cruelty of the case, and the grounds on which he believed there was a primâ facie case against the Home Office of neglect of duty, he must trouble the House with some documentary testimony. His Lordship then read a letter from the father of the deceased, who said—
  "That his unfortunate son had been seventeen years a clerk in the Customs and was in the receipt of a small pension. He had three sons of the respective ages of four, seven, and nine, hut that just previous to this transaction they were attacked by typhus fever and two of them died. This grieved him very much and made him very sad, which was natural, as he was fondly attached to them. He accused his wife, who was a very bad woman, of being in a conspiracy with the magistrate to get him placed in a lunatic asylum, and he was dragged in a most brutal manner from his house to the asylum, where he was confined among the really mad people for five days. His son had applied to the Home Office for redress, and prayed that at least the magistrate should be suspended until a full inquiry was made, but that
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  Sir George Grey and Mr. Waddington took no notice of this very reasonable and moderate request. Seeing that no justice could be obtained by means of the Government he took prussic acid and died."
  The father's letter also made the imputation—
  "That his bad wife was in a conspiracy with the magistrate to get him detained in a lunatic asylum."
  Into that question, however, he would not enter. When he (the Earl of Malmesbury) received that letter he wrote to a noble Lord now present (the Earl of Shaftesbury), who had passed his life in resisting oppression and in assisting those who were suffering. He was one of the Commissioners in Lunacy, and he sent to him (the Earl of Malmesbury) a report of the case as it appeared at the time, which corresponded with the facts he had already stated. He was also in possession of a letter from Mr. Spring Rice, the Secretary of the Commissioners in Lunacy, to Mr. Dockrall, in which that gentleman stated that the matter was one which came more properly within the province of the Home Office, but that the only legal remedy Mr. Dockrall had was by an action at law. The Lunacy Commissioners had very restricted powers, and he (the Earl of Malmesbury) did not think them to blame in the matter. He would not trouble their Lordships with reading all the affidavits before the Court of Queen's Bench, but he begged to call attention to this point—that Colonel Johnson, being in the commission of the peace, and in the exorcise of his functions as a magistrate, had, in dealing with a case brought before him, signed his name to a statement which was not true—namely, he had signed his name to a statement that he had personally seen and examined the alleged lunatic—which was contrary to the fact. It was impossible that the Home Office should have been ignorant of what had occurred in this case. There was no doubt that the unfortunate man was sane when he was sent to the asylum. He quite admitted that a magistrate might, by mistake, act illegally, and if there had been nothing more in this case than that Colonel Johnson acted upon the certificate of one medical man instead of two lie should have said nothing on the subject; but he could not understand how a magistrate, when discharging one of the most important functions committed to him, could by mistake sign a certificate stating that he had personally examined an alleged

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  lunatic when such was really not the case. The case itself was one of immense importance, and he thought he had stated sufficient to show that it required the fullest investigation. The noble Earl concluded by moving an Address for—
  "Copies of all Correspondence and Information in Possession of the Secretary of State for the Home Department with respect to the Detention of the late Mr. Dockrall in the Lunatic Asylum at Sedgefield."
  EARL GRANVILLEadmitted that the noble Earl was quite right in calling their Lordships' attention to the subject, for no one could deny that it was most undesirable that any person should be confined in a lunatic asylum on the ground of insanity who was not really insane. He could only say, on the part of the Government, that they had no objection that the case should be investigated; while as to the conduct of the Home Office he did not see how the authorities there could have taken any other steps than they had done with respect to it.
  THE EARL OF SHAFTESBURYsaid, that the conduct of Colonel Johnson was altogether without excuse, and unwarrantable. No man had a right to sign his name to a document declaring that he had done in accordance with the statute law that which in reality he had not done. He was called upon by law to declare that he had himself personally seen and examined the person whom he was about to commit to a lunatic asylum. Now, in this case it was not true that the magistrate had personally seen and examined the alleged lunatic.
  EARL GRANVILLEasked how that appeared.
  THE EARL OF SHAFTESBURYsaid, the order for committal had been brought before the Court of Queen's Bench, and quashed as invalid on that ground. If matters of this kind were to be overlooked, it was to no purpose that Commissioners were appointed, Inspectors sent out, and laws passed for the protection of these unhappy persons. If the law was to be boldly and impudently evaded, as it had been in this instance, things had come to a position in which Commissioners and Inspectors might as well resign their offices, and the Legislature repeal all the Acts of Parliament upon the subject. The Commissioners of Lunacy were in no way chargeable with blame in this matter. Their jurisdiction over county asylums was very slight indeed—amounting only
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  to power to make an annual visitation and report what they saw. Notice was sent to them of the admission of patients; but in this case it happened that the notices of admission and of discharge arrived at the same time, and therefore there was nothing to call for their intervention. After the patient had been liberated, he called upon them to complain of his treatment; but the only answer which they could make was, that the matter was totally beyond their jurisdiction, and that if he had any grievance, as he seemed to have, he had better apply to the Secretary of State for the Home Department. After that time they heard nothing more of the case. He must again press upon the House the absolute necessity that some opinion should be pronounced upon this great abuse of magisterial functions. Many of the magistrates in England were most admirable men, and rendered the Lunacy Commissioners very great assistance in the administration of the law; but there were a great many who rendered no assistance, and in some measure offered obstructions to its enforcement. In this especial county of Durham the Commissioners had more trouble in getting an effective visitation of the asylums than in any other in the kingdom. Some of the magistrates did their duty well, but others did none at all. When they discovered a case in which a magistrate sent a man to a lunatic asylum, declaring that he had personally seen and examined him, when, in fact, he had done no such thing, it was time that that House should express a feeling that the law ought to be placed upon a better footing for the defence and protection of lunatics throughout Her Majesty's dominions.
  THE EARL OF DERBYwished to know whether, when the reference was made to this magistrate, he was asked to reply to the two allegations—one that he had committed this man to a lunatic asylum upon the certificate of only one medical man, and the other that he had made a declaration that he had personally visited him and satisfied himself with regard to his insanity, the fact being that he had not seen him at all; and, if not, why the Home Office had abstained from making such a requisition.
  EARL RUSSELLsaid, that being imperfectly informed of the facts, he could not give the noble Earl the information which he desired. The regular course, certainly, appeared to be that

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  the Home Secretary should have asked the magistrate for an explanation of the circumstances; and if the magistrate was unable to deny that he had acted upon one medical certificate instead of two, and that he had not seen the alleged lunatic, the Home Secretary should have represented the matter to the Lord Chancellor.
  THE EARL OF MALMESBURY,in reply, said, that he would accept the papers which had been offered to him by the Lord President; but he should expect to be told exactly what took place between the Home Office and Colonel Johnson, and in what position Colonel Johnson now stood—whether he had been rebuked or not. The impossibility of learning anything from the Government at present was another illustration of the inconvenience which their Lordships suffered from the distribution of offices in the present Administration, in consequence of which all the information which they received from certain Departments, such as the Home Office, the Board of Trade, and the Poor Law Board, came to them second-hand. Had the noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack any information on this subject?
  THE LORD CHANCELLORsaid, that he knew nothing about this case; but if the noble Earl would send him the papers the subject should receive his attention.
  Motion agreed to.
  House adjourned at a quarter past Six o'clock, till Monday next, Eleven o'clock.