Sitting of 17 July 1866

MINUTES.
NEW MEMBERS SWORN—Right hon. Lord John Manners, for Leicester County (Northern Division); Right hon. Sir Stafford Henry Northcote, baronet, for Devon County (Northern Division).
SELECT COMMITTEE—On Expiring Laws appointed.
SUPPLY—considered in Committee—Resolutions [July 16] reported.
PUBLIC BILLS—Resolutions in Committee—Public Works, Harbours, &c. [Advances].
Ordered—Overseer of the Poor (Small Parishes)*; Coinage*; Drainage and Improvement of Lands Acts (Ireland) Provisional Order*; Courts of Justice*; Public Works, Harbours, &c. [Advances].*
First Reading * Overseer of the Poor (Small Parishes)* [214]; Coinage * [215]; Drainage and Improvement of Lands Act (Ireland) Provisional Order * [216]; Courts of Justice * [217]; Public Works and Fisheries * [218]; Public Works Loans (Ireland)* [219]; Railway Companies (Ireland)* [220].
Second Reading—Militia Pay.*
Report of Select Committee—Tramways (Ireland) Acts Amendment [418 & 213].
Committee — Thames Navigation (re-comm.) [205] [R.P.]; Straits Settlements* [176]; Hundred Bridges* [178]; British Columbia* [186]; Charitable Trusts Deeds Enrolment* [199] [Lords].
Report—Straits Settlements* [176]; Hundred Bridges* [178]; British Columbia* [186]; Charitable Trusts Deeds Enrolment* [199] [Lords.]
Considered as amended—Rochdale Vicarage* [196]; Oyster Bed Licences (Ireland)* [175].
Third Reading — Local Government Supplemental (No. 2)* [198]; Local Government Supplemental (No. 3)* [191]; New Forest Poor Relief* [193], and passed.
Withdrawn—Execution of Deeds * [122].

THAMES NAVIGATION (re-committed) BILL.
(Mr. Milner Gibson, Mr. Monsell.)
[BILL 205.] COMMITTEE.
Leave to the Committee to sit till Four of the Clock, and report at Six of the Clock.
Bill considered in Committee.
(In the Committee.)
Clause 6 (One of the Five Conservators to be appointed by the Board of Trade.)
COLONEL WILLIAMSsaid, he wished to call attention to the fact that no compensation was provided under the Bill for certain persons who had property on the Thames which would be largely affected, and in some cases confiscated, if the provisions of the measure were carried out. He therefore trusted some means would be taken to remedy the defect to which he alluded. He also thought that this being a hybrid Bill, the petitioners against it had been put to an unfair expense.
THE CHAIRMANsaid, that the Bill was a Public Bill, and having passed through a Select Committee upstairs, it was now going through a Committee of the Whole House in the ordinary way. The question at present before the Committee was that Clause 6, which provided for the appointment of a Conservator by the Board of Trade, should stand part of the Bill.
MR. AYRTONsaid, it was important that the inhabitants of the metropolis should in some way or other be represented on the Board, in order that their interests might be protected. He therefore proposed to leave out all the words after "appointed," and insert—
"By the Metropolitan Board of Works, who shall be at liberty from time to time to revoke any appointments made by them and to appoint another Conservator instead, when and as they may think St."
The Metropolitan Board of Works represented the ratepayers, and he thought they were more entitled to a voice in the matter than the Board of Trade, who were empowered by the Bill in its present form to appoint five Conservators.
MR. CAVEsaid, he regretted the necessary absence of the President of the Board of Trade. He did not think that the inhabitants of the metropolis had much to complain of in this matter as the expenses were defrayed out of the tolls of the upper navigation, and the London Water Companies had agreed to contribute £5,000 a year towards the expenses. The Government were of opinion that the clause should stand as it was, inasmuch as the Select Committee, who had carefully considered this subject, had come to the conclusion that there was no reason why the Metropolitan Board of Works should be represented on the Board.
MR. MILNER GIBSONsaid, that the Bill simply transferred to the Thames Conservancy Board the jurisdiction over the Upper Thames from Staines to Oxford. The Metropolitan Board had no authority over the navigation of the Lower Thames, and it would, therefore, be anomalous to connect them with the Conservancy Board, and give them a jurisdiction over the Upper Thames. There was no more reason why the Metropolitan Board of Works should be represented on the Conservancy Board, than there was that the Conservancy Board should have a seat on the Board of Works. The navigation of the Thames was a public right, and was best placed in the hands of the Board of Trade, which had a general superintendence over the navigation of the Thames as had been suggested by the Select Committee.
MR. HENLEYsaid, the Metropolitan Board of Works might be an excellent body, but he objected to appointments of this kind being made by public bodies, as in case of bad appointments it was difficult to put the finger on those who had made an injudicious selection.
MR. AYRTONsaid, that the ratepayers of the metropolis had to sustain the expense of the upper navigation, and ought therefore to be represented. But as the Government opposed the Amendment, he had no alternative but to allow it to be negatived.
MR. THOMSON HANKEYthought the appointments should rest with the Board of Trade. The ratepayers of the metropolis merely sustained a share of the general burden.
SIR GEORGE BOWYERsaid, the Select Committee had carefully considered this subject, and they had come to the conclusion that the Metropolitan Board of

935
Works had no valid claim to be represented on the Conservancy Board.
Amendment negatived.
Clause agreed to.
Clauses 7 to 14, inclusive, agreed to.
Clause 15 (Votes for the election of Conservators should be given either personally or by proxy.)
MR. HENLEYsaid, that considering the scattered nature of the constituency, he thought it would be better that the election of Conservators should be by voting papers instead of by proxies.
MR. MILNER GIBSONsaid, that the proposal was a good one.
MR. CAVEsaid, he would move that the clause be struck out with the view of framing a new clause on the Report in conformity with the suggestion of his right hon. Friend the Member for Oxfordshire.
Clause struck out.
Clauses 16 to 42, inclusive, agreed to.
Clause 43 (Conservators to repair Dams, &c., in lieu of Millowners, &c.)
MR. GOLDNEYmoved an Amendment in order to prevent persons being compelled to repair certain locks, dams, and weirs after they had no longer become of use for navigable purposes.
MR. MILNER GIBSONsaid, he would support the clause in its present form, inasmuch as it merely enacted that no locks, dams, and weirs should be removed unless by lawful authority.
MR. CAVEsaid, that he would consent to consider the subject of giving power to the Conservators to remove the weirs, because under the clause as it at present stood no such power existed, and so long as the wiers were not removed, the persons using them were bound to keep them in repair.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause agreed to.
Clauses 44 to 57, inclusive, agreed to.
Clause 58 (Contributions of £1,000 a year by each of the five Water Companies of London.)
MR. AYRTONsaid, that this clause would never have been introduced if the late President of the Board of Trade had acted with a due regard to the rights of the public. He did not see why the metropolis should be taxed to provide the funds necessary for this Act.
MR. CLAYsaid, that the Water Companies were quite willing to pay the sum in question, for they would derive the greatest benefit from the purification of the river effected by means of the Bill. The hon. Member for the Tower Hamlets spoke of the metropolis being taxed as if the Water Companies intended to raise their rates in order to defray this sum. He could speak with authority, however, for two of these Companies—the Grand Junction and the Lambeth Water Companies —and he believed he might speak with equal certainty of the other Companies, that they had never thought of raising their rates for this purpose. The inhabitants of London would not be required to pay a farthing more for their water, although they might expect it to be of purer quality.
MR. A. PEELsaid, that the Metropolitan Water Companies had a direct interest in the purity of the stream from which they drew their supplies, because it relieved them from the danger of possible competition. He feared that the Thames would be in danger of becoming an open sewer unless this Bill passed.
MR. HENLEYobserved, that the Bill enacted that no new drains were to be opened into the Thames, and it would preserve the water at least as pure as it was now.
MR. MILNER GIBSON: It does more than that.
Clause agreed to.
Clauses 59 to 61, inclusive, agreed to.
Clause 62 (Provision for Compensation to Robert Danbe.)
SIR WILLIAM HEATHCOTEsaid, that the Select Committee had recognized the claim of Mr. Danbe alone to compensation, although a claim was set up on behalf of Lincoln College, Oxford, which appeared to be equally worthy of consideration. He moved to leave out the words "Robert Danbe," in order to insert the words "any person or persons." This would enable the claims of other parties to be determined by the arbitrator.
SIR GEORGE BOWYERsaid, that all the owners of tolls upon the upper navigation agreed to give up their claims except Mr. Danbe, Lincoln College, and Captain Phillimore. The latter claim was made too late before the Committee, but it would be heard before a Committee of the House of Lords. The Committee were

937
averse from making any exception, but after hearing counsel they were of opinion that there were reasons for making an exception in Mr. Danbe's favour, which, however, did not apply to Lincoln College.
MR. GATHORNE HARDYsaid, that Mr. Danbe and Lincoln College claimed the tolls in question by an ancient title prior to any Act of Parliament on the subject, but confirmed by Acts of Parliament. They were entitled to these tolls between Oxford and Abingdon in equal moieties, and those tolls were increasing with the increase of population. It seemed very extraordinary that, although they were joint owners, full compensation was to be given to Mr. Danbe, while Lincoln College was left out of the clause.
SIR GEORGE BOWYERsaid, the Committee was informed that Lincoln College, being the owners of a mill, had certain obligations in regard to conserving the river which they would now be relieved from. Mr. Danbe, on the contrary, received his tolls as private property, without any corresponding duty being imposed upon him, so that the two cases were not identical.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause agreed to.
House resumed.
Committee report Progress; to sit again this day.

METROPOLIS—BATHING IN THE THAMES.—QUESTION.
MR. GOLDNEYsaid, he would beg to ask the First Commissioner of Works, Whether he is prepared to make or recommend some temporary arrangement, with a view to a permanent arrangement, for affording facilities for public bathing in the River Thames, at spots and places to be determined on.
LORD JOHN MANNERS,in reply, said, he thought that the Thames was not yet in a state that would fit it for bathing, but if the hon. Member would call upon him at his office he should be happy to confer with him upon the subject.

IRELAND—THE CONSTABULARY.

  QUESTION.
  MR. O'BEIRNEsaid, he rose to ask the Chief Secretary for Ireland, Whether he intends to introduce a measure during the present Session of Parliament to carry
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  out the recommendations of the Commission upon the Irish Constabulary?
  LORD NAASsaid, in reply, that notice had already been given of a Bill for that purpose, and the Secretary to the Treasury would ask leave to introduce it that night.

NAVY—MEDICAL OFFICERS.

  QUESTION.
  MR. DYCE NICOLsaid, he would beg to ask the First Lord of the Admiralty, Whether he has any objection to lay before the House the Report and Evidence of the Commission on the position of the Medical Officers of the Army and Navy, presided over by Vice Admiral Sir Alexander Milne, of which a summary has appeared in the public papers, and whether it is intended to adopt the recommendations of the Commission in favour of the Medical Officers of the Royal Navy?
  SIR JOHN PAKINGTONsaid, in reply, that, so far as the navy was concerned—though he did not know what his right hon. Friend (General Peel) might be disposed to do with regard to the army— he had no objection to lay on the table the Report of the Royal Commission. It was his intention to adopt their recommendations, and he had that evening laid upon the table a 'Supplemental Estimate with a view of carrying them into effect.

  ARMY—BREECH LOADING AND REPEATING CARBINES.—QUESTION.
  MR. OLIPHANTsaid, he would beg to ask the Secretary of State for War, If it be the case that 20,000 breech loading carbines on the Westley Richards system which use the percussion cap are being made at Enfield; and if the attention of the Government has been called either to the Smith or Spencer repeating carbine now used by the United States Cavalry?
  GENERAL PEELsaid, in reply, that 19,000 Westley Richards carbines had been ordered in the course of last year. A portion of them had been delivered in store, and the remainder were in such a state of forwardness that it was not thought advisable to put a stop to their manufacture. There would not be the slightest difficulty in disposing of them without any loss to the Government. With regard to the other portion of the Question, he might state that the Spencer breech-loading repeating carbine had been brought before

  939
  the Department in the years 1864 and 1865, and was reported on by the Ordnance Select Committee as ingenious, but liable to be damaged by exposure to weather. The Committee reported against repeating rifles generally at that time; but it had since been found expedient to change that opinion, and a supply of six repeating arms of different patterns had been ordered, and they would be tried as soon as possible.

THE POOR LAW BOARD AND THE METROPOLITAN WORKHOUSES.

  QUESTION.
  MR. FAWCETTsaid, he wished to ask the President of the Poor Law Board, Whether it is the intention of Her Majesty's Government to introduce during the present Session any measure for improving the sick wards in the Metropolitan workhouses; and further, how it has happened that Mr. Farnall and others whose duty it has been to inspect these workhouses have not made known the lamentable condition of these sick wards until attention was directed to the subject by non-official persons?
  MR. GATHORNE HARDY: In reply, Sir, to the questions of the hon. Gentleman I beg to state, in the first place, that Her Majesty's Government do not intend to propose during the present Session any legislative measure on the subject. I should think I was extremely rash if, during the very short time that I have had access to the official information of the Poor Law Board, I should undertake to introduce a measure of such importance at a time when the House could not possibly give it sufficient attention. I quite admit the present evil condition of these workhouse infirmaries throughout London, and of course the subject will receive my earliest attention. But if I had taken steps to introduce any great measure on the subject it could not have dealt with the present evils. With these evils I propose, in the first instance, to deal under the powers, which I believe sufficient in the main, now possessed by the Poor Law Board, but which I believe have not always been, from the difficulties connected with them, enforced. I trust with the assistance of the Boards of Guardians and the medical officers we shall not be obliged to ask the Legislature to confer powers which have not hitherto been demanded, and that it will not be necessary
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  to exercise the existing powers under seal to compel the Guardians to the proper discharge of their duties. It may be necessary that I should ask the House to give me one power intended to be conferred by the original Poor Law Act, and which was included in a Bill prepared by my predecessor. The 25th clause of that Act was framed with a view to compel the alteration and enlargement of workhouses when required, but it was never once put into force in consequence of a proviso at the end of the clause to the effect that no parish should be charged with a larger sum than £50. Consequently, where several parishes were combined, one parish was enabled to put an end to the proposed alteration. To correct that defect I will ask the House to enable me to go to a certain extent of the annual amount of the rates of the union, with the view of enforcing such alterations as may be necessary. As to the powers at present possessed by the Poor Law Board, it has the right to require sufficient accommodation for the poor, to regulate the numbers to be accommodated in the workhouses, to prescribe how many beds should be in a room, and what amount of space should be afforded for each bed. If the asylums of the poor should be filled up to the highest point, it is then necessary for the Guardians to find additional accommodation elsewhere or to give relief to the persons for whom they have not accommodation out of doors upon a scale appropriate to the sufferings of these poor people. It is in the power of the Poor Law Board to take care that there is efficient and sufficient medical superintendence, and that the salaries of the medical officers should be fixed at a proper sum. It is also in the power of the Poor Law Board to secure that there is sufficient nursing by providing that there should be a suitable number of nurses, and also that proper salaries should be given to them. I say I think these powers have not been put in full force, and I think I ought not to ask the House to legislate for temporary remedies until I have tried them. I trust that the House will allow me a little time, now that I am wading through a vast mass of information, for I can assure hon. Gentlemen that I am as desirous as the hon. Member for Brighton (Mr. Fawcett) or any other man to apply a speedy remedy. I came to this office without anything in the past to fetter my conduct. I do not wish to make any reflection on the past. I look forward simply to the

  941
  future, and my endeavour shall be to bring the sick wards in the metropolitan workhouses into a proper condition. In the next Session of Parliament, I shall be prepared to state what course I may think proper to recommend with respect to any new legislation on the whole subject. The other question of the hon. Member relates to what is past. I thought it right when the hon. Member wrote to me to lay the question which he put, and which at that time referred to Mr. Farnall alone, but now takes in others also, before Mr. Farnall, and he has sent me a paper which, with the permission of the House, I will read. The paper is as follows:—
  "As regards the proceedings of Mr. Farnall in reference to the metropolitan workhouses he desires to refer to the many reports which he has made from time to time to the Poor Law Board and to the entries in the visitors' books of those places which will be fully laid before the House if the Motion of Sir John Simeon be assented to."
  This refers to a notice of Motion by the hon. Member for the Isle of Wight, and, if the Motion be assented to, it will then be seen how far Mr. Farnall has discharged his duties as official inspector. The paper goes on to say—
  "His observations, recommendations, and advice will then appear, and it will be seen how far be has discharged his duty as the Metropolitan Inspector. In that Return will appear what steps have been taken by other Poor Law Inspectors who had temporary charge of the district (while Mr. Farnall was in Lancashire), as well as by the Lunacy Commissioners, who are required by law to inspect and report upon the state of the pauper lunatics in workhouses."
  I think I have now answered the questions which the hon. Member has asked me. I can only add that my desire is, for the sake of the House and the public, that every information with respect to the abuses which have occurred should be laid before the House and the country; and I trust that for the future the House will extend to me its confidence, which I hope to deserve by endeavouring at least to remedy these evils.

  HANOVER AND PRUSSIA.—QUESTION.
  MR. GRENFELLsaid, he would beg to ask the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, If there is any truth in the statement made in the Berlin Borsen Zeitung, to the effect that "the English Cabinet have given it to be understood that England will not allow any part of Hanover to be handed over to Prussia, it being the
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  interest of Great Britain to see the integrity of Hanover maintained on account of certain eventual hereditary claims?"
  LORD STANLEY: Sir, I have not seen the statement to which the hon. Member's Question refers; but wherever that statement has appeared, or upon whatever supposed authority it has been made, I beg to assure the House that it is absolutely without foundation.

  IRELAND—FISHERIES.—QUESTION.
  GENERAL DUNNEsaid, he rose to ask the Secretary to the Treasury, Whether he will lay upon the table of the House the opinion of the Law Officers of the Crown as to the grant of £5,000 for Irish Fisheries, as his predecessor promised?
  MR. HUNT,in reply, said, it was not a usual thing in such a case to lay the opinion of the Law Officers upon the table; but if his hon. and gallant Friend would call at the Treasury, the Papers would be shown him.

  PRIVILEGES OF THE HOUSE—RETURN OF WRITS.
  SIR STAFFORD NORTHCOTE: I wish, Sir, to say a word upon a question which affects the privileges of Members of this House, and also to give some explanation to hon. Gentlemen who came down to-day at the morning sitting of the cause of my absence when a Bill connected with my Department was down for discussion. The circumstances were these:—The election for North Devon took place on Saturday last; I was declared duly elected, and, as I understand, the Under Sheriff sent up by post the Writ containing the notice of my return to an agent in London. The agent was not aware of the necessity for rapidity in his proceedings, and instead of bringing or sending down the Writ here yesterday, or even at an early hour to-day, he did not bring it until after the proceedings of the morning sitting had commenced. It was not brought here until about one o'clock to-day, although it arrived in London yesterday morning. I do not wish to make any complaint. I have reason to believe that the matter was an oversight arising from ignorance on the part of the agent, and that there was no intention of delaying the business of this House. But it is obvious that some inconvenience was occasioned. The circumstances might have been such as to make it a very serious matter that a delay should take place to

  943
  the return of a Writ. I have made inquiry, and am informed that Writs are very often sent in this manner instead of being sent, as I think they ought always to be, by post to the Clerk of the Crown, and I am bound to say it would be very convenient if a Standing Order should be made, or some other method should be taken, for insuring the rapid transmission of Writs to the House. I do not intend to make any Motion; but I thought it my duty to call the attention of the House, and yours. Sir, to the circumstance, and also to offer an explanation for not being in my place this morning.

HARES AND RABBITS BILL (SCOTLAND).

  QUESTION.
  MR. DYCE NICOLsaid, he would beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether it is his intention to proceed with the Hares and Rabbits Bill for Scotland?
  MR. WALPOLEsaid, that the Bill alluded to was not a Government measure.
  SIR WILLIAM STIRLING - MAXWELLsaid, that he intended to proceed with the second reading of the Bill in question on Friday.

MERCANTILE MARINE.

  MOTION FOR A ROYAL COMMISSION.
  MR. GRAVESsaid, he rose to move—
  "That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, praying that She will be graciously pleased to issue a Royal Commission to inquire into the present condition of the Seamen of the Mercantile Marine, with the view of ascertaining whether, within the last twenty years, the supply of British Seamen has or has not fallen off either in point of numbers or of efficiency; and, if in either a continuous decline should be apparent, then to ascertain further what are the causes which have led to such decline, and whether any remedy can be suggested."
  He begged the indulgence of the House, while he endeavoured to bring before it, as briefly as he could, a matter of no small importance. He wished to ascertain whether there was really any foundation for the opinion which prevailed generally throughout the country that there was a growing deterioration of its seamen. If the inquiry for which he asked should be granted, and the result should confirm the opinion to which he referred, it would behove the Government to legislate upon the subject as soon as possible, with the view of applying a remedy to the evil. The records of that House abundantly proved that whenever any question was raised
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  involving the welfare of our seamen it was discussed with the greatest earnestness and attention. His own experience in that House, short as it was, proved to him that whenever any question connected with the interests of the lower classes was introduced it always received the best attention of hon. Members. It was impossible for him to deal as he could wish with the national bearings of the subject, and yet that was the point of view from which he desired hon. Members might regard the question. There was no doubt whatever but that the seamen of our mercantile marine were our real reserves, and should it happen at any moment that our outer line of defences were unhappily broken through, it was obvious that we should be compelled to rely upon our merchant seamen to man the inner line. Seeing, then, the inseparable connection which existed between our national defences and the seamen of our mercantile marine, it was plainly a matter of no small importance that that marine should be placed upon the most efficient and reliable footing. He need not point to the past heroism and gallantry of our navy, or to their pluck and seamanship; but in the present day, when science had contributed so largely to the improvement of modern warfare, it was of the highest importance that in addition to the national characteristics of our seamen, we should have men of superior intelligence, judgment, and skill engaged in the naval service of the country. The question to which he desired to call the attention of the House divided itself into two branches. The one related to the apparent declension of the numbers of our able-bodied seamen as compared with the increase of our tonnage, and the other to the supposed deterioration of those seamen in quality. Unfortunately, until 1858 we had no record kept of the precise divisions of the classes composing our mercantile seamen. It appeared, however, that in 1850 the gross tonnage of the country was 3,032,000 tons, and the number of our seamen 151,000. In 1865 the tonnage amounted to 5,500,000 tons, and the total number of seamen to 197,000, showing an increase of 78 per cent in the amount of tonnage, and an increase of only 30 per cent in the number of seamen. This great difference might, however, be partially accounted for by the application of steam, the great competition of trade, the increased tonnage of our vessels, the improvements of steam winches to sailing vessels, and the adoption of many other

  945
  modern appliances. Those circumstances enabled us to employ a proportionably smaller number of seamen for the service of our marine than were deemed necessary in former years. In the gross numbers which he had given were comprised every class connected with our mercantile marine, including engineers and firemen, foreigners, stewards, and other persons; but the Return to which he would next refer showed the able-bodied division of our marine, and he would for the moment exclude from view the other portions of the service. In the year 1858, being the first year in which a record was kept of the various classes in the service of our marine, our tonnage amounted to 4,325,000, whilst our able-bodied seamen numbered about 66,000, and the number of foreign seamen was 11,458. In 1865 our tonnage was 5,480,000; our own able-bodied seamen had increased to 72,000, and the foreign seamen to 20,000. In other words, our tonnage had increased 25 per cent within that short period; our British able-bodied seamen had increased only 9 per cent, whilst our foreign able-bodied seamen had increased 76 per cent. If they compared the relative numbers of the British and foreign element in our service in 1851, which was the earliest year for which he could obtain an accurate record, with those of the last year to which he had alluded, they would find that whilst the gross number of able-bodied seamen in the service bad increased by 30 per cent the foreign element had actually quadrupled itself. If that disproportion between the increase of our own seamen and our foreign seamen had been merely accidental, arising from any peculiar circumstances of particular years, he should not have viewed it with the same alarm; but when he saw year after year, on the one hand, the steady diminution of the British element, and, on the other, the steady increase of the foreign element, it appeared to him that the time had come when it behoved the Government and the Legislature to look more narrowly into this question, with a view to a remedy for a very dangerous state of things, if it was within the power of legislation to provide one. As nearly as he could estimate the fact from the most reliable Returns he could procure, the drain on our service was 15 per cent per annum. That drain might be said to arise from deaths, desertions, age, resignations, and a variety of other circumstances. If they included petty officers, ordinary seamen,
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  and apprentices in the Estimate, the absolute drain on our service was something like 21,000 annually. Taking the boys and ordinaries as the source of supply, and assuming that it required four years to make a skilled seaman, we had 40,000 whom he would call recruits in our service, which would give us 10,000 a year to supply the drain of 21,000; the difference being, as he believed, largely made up from the foreign element to which he had referred. Until the year 1850 there existed in this country a system of compulsory enlistment of apprentices, under which system we had in the United Kingdom and our colonies 36,000 apprentices trained to the profession of the sea, of whom 31,000 belonged to the United Kingdom. Had that system been continued up to the present time we should have now more than 50,000 youths in training for our mercantile marine. He was unable to give precisely the number of apprentices as distinguished from the boys, who were classed together in the Records; but he found that the total of both in 1858 had fallen to 24,495, and that the total last year was reduced to 20,063. There were other causes at work independent of any which he had named for the diminution which had taken place in the number of our seamen, and that was the application of steam to maritime purposes. He had the curiosity to see what had been the effect of its operation in Liverpool, and he found that there had been last year entered in the sailing tonnage out of that port, which amounted to 1,236,000 tons, 849 boys and 578 apprentices. The steam tonnage at the same time amounted to 844,000 tons, and he found that the number of boys which it employed was only 173, and of apprentices only 90. Those figures proved that the steam trade as at present organized could not be looked upon as a nursery for our seamen, and if hon. Members would only reflect on the probable substitution, at no distant day, of steam for sails in all branches of our carrying trade, they will appreciate the full bearing of these figures in their future as well as present application to the maintenance of our seamen. He was desirous of ascertaining how far the mercantile marine had derived assistance by an overflow from the system pursued in the Royal Navy, and he had in the early part of the Session moved for Returns which gave him the information he sought. The conclusion at which

  947
  he had in consequence of these Returns arrived was that so far from the mercantile marine receiving any assistance from the system at work in the Royal Navy, the supply of men in that service was utterly inadequate to its own wants, and he could not let the present opportunity pass without endeavouring to impress on those who were charged with our naval administration that the state of things which had been revealed was such as to demand their immediate attention. On the 1st of April, 1861, there were 30,507 men in that service, whilst on the 1st of April, 1865, there were only 21,509, showing a diminution of 9,400 men. During these years 36,845 able-bodied men had left the service, of whom 19,415 were from deaths, discharges, purchases, pensions, desertions, and other causes, and the larger proportion of whom never returned to the service. He believed it would be found that 12,500 out of this 36,000 men had never returned to the service. The number of boys entered during the same time was 13,475. There were only 26,000 then introduced to fill up the drain caused by the 36,000 who had left the service, the waste in the service being thus absolutely greater than the nominal reduction which had from year to year been effected in it by that House. With a view to arrest that drain he would earnestly recommend to the Admiralty to take into their consideration the expediency of doubling the number of our training ships for the use of the navy as quickly as possible. Returning, however, to the mercantile marine, he would, with the permission of the House, advert for a few moments to the mode at present adopted for recruiting our merchant service. It was accomplished by the introduction of apprentices, ordinaries, and foreigners. The Registrar General had very kindly worked out for him a calculation as to the number of apprentices in our foreign sea-going trade, and lie found that it amounted only to 4,900, while the number of boys was 9,600, a discrepancy, as compared with the Parliamentary Return, difficult to account for. In the selection of those boys, he must observe, very little care appeared to be taken. They were lads who were, generally speaking, unable to obtain employment on shore, who were for the most part entirely devoid of education, the only qualification apparently which it was required they should possess being the power to go through
  948
  a large amount of physical work. He learnt from his experience it not unfrequently happened that these, after a voyage or so, called themselves ordinaries, and very soon after offered themselves as able seamen. Now, that was a state of things which was very much to be regretted, because the result was a master of a ship often went to sea under the impression that he had a crew of able-bodied men, but when an emergency arose he found that he had been labouring under a delusion. Then came the ordinaries, who were still more objectionable and who were, generally speaking, young men of eighteen, nineteen, or twenty, who had failed to earn a livelihood on shore, and were beyond the age for settling down to the discipline of sea life. They designated themselves ordinaries, and the consequence was that a very dissolute and unsuitable class was in that way introduced into the service. But in his mind the most dangerous element of all was that which was obtained by the system of foreign recruiting. Taking the Returns from the port of London for one month in the year 1852 in the foreign trade alone he found that there were 910 British seamen and 144 foreigners shipped through three shipping offices, while for the same month in 1866 the numbers were 1,125 British seamen and 543 foreigners, or nearly one-half of the latter. In such men there was no feeling of patriotism towards this country —they were aliens in language and in thought, and if it should happen that they were called upon to fight, they would probably be found fighting against the very flag under which they had for years obtained their livelihood. He did not know that he need trouble the House with any further figures to prove that while the trade of the country had increased our able-bodied seamen had only held their own, and that, so far from recruiting, as we ought to do, from our own population, we were having recourse almost entirely to the foreign element. He would now turn to the other branch of the question, which he ventured to call the deterioration of our seamen. In speaking upon this branch of the subject he regretted he should be compelled, in proving his case, to depend very much upon the opinions of others; but he had faithfully endeavoured to obtain opinions which deserved the confidence of the House. That would be his justification for reading the sentiments of gentlemen who were re-

  949
  garded as authorities upon this question in confirmation of what he asserted. The first he would quote, of many which he had received from gentlemen connected with the Royal Navy, was from one who was well known to many hon. Members of that House, and who stood deservedly high in the estimation of his profession—Captain Cooper Key. In his letter that gentleman referred to the great importance of the question, both with respect to our prosperity and our existence as a first-rate Power, and expressed a hope that he (Mr. Graves) would press the matter by all means in his power on the attention of the Government, in order to prevent the increase of this crying evil. No man became a seaman who took to it after eighteen years of age, and very few after sixteen. It was therefore, he said, imperatively necessary that some steps should be taken to remedy the evil effects resulting in some respects from the repeal of the Navigation Laws. There was much also to fear with regard to the Royal Navy, and Captain Cooper Key expressed a hope that the number of boys for the Royal Navy would be largely increased. He had received communications from various Government officials and superintendents of shipping offices at the various ports throughout the country. The first extract he would read was from Mr. Brown, Registrar of the Royal Naval Reserve, &c. That gentleman spoke of the deterioration of the British seamen connected with the mercantile marine, and said that there was great difficulty in finding properly qualified men to fill the ranks of the Naval Reserve. The number, he said, had not reached two-thirds of that sanctioned by Parliament; and, although 22,000 had been officially announced as having made application, 19,000 only had been enrolled, but he (Mr. Graves) had notice that lately they had fallen to 17,000. Nearly 30,000 men had made application, but not possessing the required qualifications they had not been enrolled. The superintendent of the shipping offices at Liverpool attributed the deterioration to the want of a proper recruiting service, and to the discovery of gold in America and Australia, the latter circumstance having caused many an able-bodied sailor to leave this country for those regions. The superintendent at Glasgow said there was a great deficiency of men, and that there were great complaints with regard to the deterioration and efficiency of such as were
  950
  obtained, and with regard also to the introduction of foreigners into the service. The superintendent at Bristol said they wanted training ships for boys at all the large ports in the kingdom; and, although Her Majesty's Government had kindly promised to furnish a ship for Bristol, they were obliged to abandon the undertaking from want of funds. The superintendent at Sunderland said the number of British sailors had decreased, and their deficiency had to be compensated by the employment of foreigners. The superintendent at North Shields said the employment of foreign sailors was large, and they had a demoralizing effect on the British sailor. One of the Inspectors of the Board of Trade (Mr. Hughes), who went to Cardiff to inquire into the desertions and crimping going on there, stated that British seamen were becoming more scarce daily. The stipendiary magistrate of Liverpool, at a public meeting, referred to the number of men that were brought before him for acts of insubordination, and stated that he was struck with the deterioration in the appearance of the men. It was, he said, something remarkable the number of men who did not belong to this country, and he had often thought and said he should not like to go to sea with such cut-throat looking fellows as many of them were who were brought before him on charges of insubordination; and in these views he (Mr. Graves) thought he would be borne out by many that were connected with the mercantile marine of the country. He had also received a large number of communications from shipowners and shipmasters, and others, all tending in the same direction, which more than strengthened the documents he had already quoted. Looking to the facts and evidence he had already produced from impartial and official witnesses, he felt he had said sufficient to satisfy the House on that point, and therefore he would read only one more extract from a document he had received from the seamen themselves. A Mr. Perry, at a meeting held for the purpose of forming a protection society, said it was not fair to the able-bodied seamen that men should be shipped who knew nothing of navigation. Such a practice was very common, and Mr. Perry said he knew a boarding-house master who had a wheel in his house with two spokes in it, and he was in the habit of making shoemakers become seamen by teaching them "hard a-starboard" and "hard a-port;" and as soon as they had learnt that they were

  951
  shipped as able-bodied seamen. The seamen of Liverpool, when they heard he had taken up the subject, asked him to receive a deputation from their body; but not being able to comply with their request, they, at his suggestion, had forwarded to him their views upon the subject in writing. They stated that the causes of the deterioration of the British seamen were almost too numerous to mention in detail in a letter. The reasons why the seamen were incompetent now to perform their duties were obvious—because they were not compelled to serve a reasonable apprenticeship. In many instances, they said, men went to sea on a short voyage, and they obtained their discharge in the form authorized by the Board of Trade, which stated their capacity as that of able seamen. These men suggested the propriety of again establishing the apprenticeship system, which had acted so beneficially. Another cause of deterioration they stated to be the wholesale introduction of foreigners; and it was a very common thing to find Portuguese, Spanish, and French, men with questionable morals, on board British ships. The consequences of such a heterogeneous mass were, they said, daily acts of insubordination and mutiny. Most of these foreigners were without the slightest spark of honour or principle. They were men driven from their homes for crime, and they came here to compete with honourable men. Instead, therefore, of the sea being made the heritage of the poor, it had become the last resort of vagabonds, and British seamen sought other employment rather than be mixed up with such a motley crew. The advance-note system, these men also stated, had greatly interfered with the morals of the seamen, and they suggested its discontinuance, because, even in times of sickness and shipwreck, their necessities would be met without it. They also stated that they thought great things might be accomplished for the benefit of the sailor if these matters were properly investigated. In speaking of foreigners as he had done he hoped it would not be supposed he was drawing invidious national comparisons, nothing was further from his thoughts, he spoke of foreign seamen only, and there were many exceptions, the seamen of the Scandinavian nations; putting aside national questions, were introduced into our mercantile marine with advantage. Unfortunately, however, we did not get many seamen from those countries, as they had sufficient employment at home;
  952
  but only the refuse of southern climes, men of bad habits and vicious conduct, without rectitude or principle, and who exercised a most injurious influence on our own men. He felt satisfied that he had shown to the satisfaction of the House that deterioration in the character of our seamen had taken place, and if unchecked would in time sap the foundation of our maritime supremacy. And now, with the sanction of the House, he would point out to them what, in the event of a Royal Commission being appointed, he thought might be a partial remedy for the evils complained of, for the House would probably expect him to show that these evils were within the control of the Legislature. Various suggestions had been made and pressed upon his attention; many persons had urged a return to the compulsory apprenticeship system; but he was afraid that those who remembered anything of the working of that system would come to the conclusion that that was not an altogether satisfactory system, and, further, that it would be most strenuously opposed as being contrary to the free policy of the country. The compulsory system, therefore, he thought, could not be considered for one moment. Others had suggested a modification of the system by making its adoption voluntary on the part of the shipowner, and that those who adopted it should receive certain bonuses for the lads they brought up to the sea. That suggestion he regarded as theoretical and impracticable, and he was not satisfied that even if adopted it would arrest the deterioration that was now going on. Others, again, had suggested that there should be no Government interference, as such was likely to destroy the responsibility of seamen; and this might be a proper matter for inquiry. The seamen had themselves suggested remedies, but he regarded them as scarcely touching the real evil. He was inclined to believe, after careful and long consideration, that the best solution of the difficulty which was in the power of this House to apply would be found in the promotion of a better system for supplying the service with the raw material — to begin, in fact, at the beginning and offer facilities, which do not now exist, to the well-conducted youth of the country to become sailors, by the establishment of training ships round the shores of our country, in which they could learn the discipline and theory of seamanship, and from which they could after a couple of

  953
  years be drafted into our naval or marine services to learn practical seamanship. The suggestion was not a new one, and he could not say it was his, but in 1859 he pressed it on the attention of the Duke of Somerset as First Lord of the Admiralty, and received a reply from his Grace that the suggestion should receive his attentive consideration, and indeed that the establishment of training ships at the different ports was then under the consideration of the Admiralty. The Commission on the Manning of the Navy strongly recommended this as one of the chief remedies for resuscitating the mercantile marine, and the noble Lord the late Secretary of the Admiralty (Lord Clarence Paget), who took a deep interest in the question, induced the Admiralty to introduce training ships for the Royal Navy, observing in one of the last speeches that he made in that House, that he knew of no measure more advantageous to the country than the establishment of such ships at all the great mercantile ports of the kingdom, and hoped that the example set by the Royal Navy might be imitated with advantage by the mercantile marine. In 1861 the proposed system was considered at a public meeting at Liverpool, and resolutions were passed in its favour. The resolutions were forwarded to Lord Palmerston, and his Lordship promised that the matter should be fully considered. The Board of Trade had considered the matter, and some two or three years ago they prepared a well-devised scheme, but from some cause or other— whether from motives of economy, or to enable us to make reductions in the duties on some trifling article of import, or from the feeling that the country was not warranted in paying £50,000 a year for the purpose of maintaining our maritime supremacy he could not tell, but the scheme was never brought forward, and so far as he knew it remained in the office of the Board of Trade to that day. It has been suggested that this is simply a shipowners' question. He denied it most emphatically. The shipping interest would take care of itself, and would man its ships with the best material obtainable, be it English or foreign. It was in the interest of the country he brought it forward. The State had a large interest in maintaining well-disciplined, well-trained, loyal seamen— our reserves rest entirely on them. 20,000 of the seamen of the marine at this moment hold the retaining fee of the State, obliging them to leave our service when
  954
  called on; the interest is a joint one, and the sooner it is recognized the better. It had also been said that this was a question of private effort and philanthropy; and if he thought it was, and that it was likely to succeed, he certainly would not have taken the trouble to bring it under the consideration of the House. Certainly, on the subject of training ships, Liverpool had not shown any want of public spirit. First of all, there was the Conway training ship for the higher ranks of the service; then there were two ships for reformatory purposes, and a fourth was established last year for the well-conducted youth of the town. The Admiralty had lent a 40-gun ship for the purpose, and one gentleman had given no less than £5,000 to fit it up; but, notwithstanding this help, and subscriptions amounting to £1,764, and other sources of income, he did not think private efforts in such a case would succeed, for at that moment the committee could only maintain fifty boys from want of funds. In Bristol similar efforts had been made, but not with more marked success. A well-organized system of training ships, into which diligent and respectable youths might be received from the various schools throughout the kingdom, would be of immense advantage, not only to the young population, but also to both services of the country, into which they could overflow to learn practical seamanship according to their wants and the wishes of the boys. As to the expense, he was satisfied that it would be too great for private persons, and that it must fall mainly on the public purse. Shipowners should also contribute, and in return for their share of the expense, would receive well-trained, respectable, and steady lads into their service. A portion of the Mercantile Marine Fund might well be appropriated in aid of the establishment of such training ships at the different ports. Englishmen instead of foreigners would thus fill up the ranks of the marine, and the country would have the satisfaction of feeling that in the merchant service they had a body of men ready and willing whenever an emergency arose to come forward in defence of the English flag, as the men of the Royal Naval Reserve so nobly did in the case of the Trent. He would ask the House, if satisfied he had proved his case, and without further inquiry, to consent to establish those institutions which had long been required, and which he had that night so feebly advocated.
  MR. LIDDELLsaid, he wished to make

  955
  only a few remarks in seconding the Motion. He thought that instead of his hon. Friend being under an obligation to the House, the House were greatly indebted to him for having so ably brought forward a question in which every Englishman ought to feel interested. For his own part, he had listened to many of the details related by his hon. Friend with a feeling of humbled national pride, for to know that of 60,000 seamen in our foreign trade, 20,000 foreign seamen should be engaged in carrying on our commerce was a very humiliating fact. This had arisen from our national policy, for although free trade had so greatly benefited the country it could not be denied that we had paid dearly for those advantages in some respects, and particularly in this matter. Some concessions, indeed, had been made to shipowners in consideration of the repeal of the Navigation Laws, but they were still very disadvantageously situated. The hon. Member for Liverpool had that night completely corroborated the evidence given before the Committee which sat on the subject six years ago. It was high time that this drain of seamen should be remedied, and although he had no desire to embarrass the Government when they were warm in their place, he thought they were bound to institute an inquiry. The remedy pointed out by his hon. Friend was one which had met the approval of the late Sir James Graham, one of the ablest administrators who had ever presided at the Admiralty. At that moment it was true that they had enrolled 60,000 seamen with an efficient body of officers in the naval reserve, but it was not advisable to rely upon that alone and neglect the natural mode of manning the navy by a system of training ships. He thought such vessels might advantageously be placed in connection with the industrial and ragged schools and other valuable institutions to which Lord Shaftesbury had devoted so much attention, thus opening an honourable career to the unfortunate youths who had till lately wandered about our streets. The navy and the merchant service might also with advantage be brought into closer relationship, and a better provision might to be made for merchant seamen in their old age, for if no provision were made for them in that respect the service would never be popular. He would beg the attention of the right hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. Milner Gibson) and also of his successor (Sir Stafford Northcote) to this question, for the Board of Trade were charged with the
  956
  supervision of the mercantile marine, though he was afraid its interests were not very safe in the hands of that Department. As an instance of this, he would refer to the scurvy treatment which an excellent institution called the Seamen's Hospital had received, a very large portion of its revenues having been docked off through the non-fufilment of arrangements entered into by that Board. At the present moment the Exchequer was a gainer to the amount of £8,000 a year by the surplus arising from the confiscation of the wages and effects of deceased seamen; although it had been contemplated that the whole of those funds should be paid into the hospital. That certainly was the intention of those connected with the Merchant Seaman's Act. When the House heard of deterioration and diminution in the number of their sailors it might be worth while to try what would be the effect of a little more care of our seamen by maintaining institutions of this kind on a scale worthy of the country. That might go a long way in encouraging men to enter the service. But he earnestly hoped that Her Majesty's Government would attend to the matter with the view of introducing some general scheme.
  Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, praying that She will be graciously pleased to issue a Royal Commission to inquire into the present condition of the Seamen of the Mercantile Marine, with the view of ascertaining whether, within the last twenty years, the supply of British Seamen has or has not fallen off either in point of numbers or of efficiency; and, if in either a continuous decline should be apparent, then to ascertain further what are the causes which have led to such decline, and whether any remedy can be suggested."—(Mr. Graves.)
  MR. HENLEYsaid, he thought that his hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool had no need to apologize for bringing the question before the House. He (Mr. Henley) had to apologize to the right hon. Gentleman (Sir Stafford Northcote) for taking precedence of him in the debate; but as he differed in some things from the hon. Member for Liverpool, it might be as well that the right hon. Gentleman should hear what he had to say before addressing the House on the subject. In his opinion the importance of the subject was not diminished, but ten thousand times increased by the remedy which the hon. Member for Liverpool had suggested, because it was clear that the hon. Member in his own mind relied on Government action instead of on that individual action on which they had

  957
  hitherto relied. That course involved, in his opinion, a consequence of greater importance than the subject itself. Being old, he perhaps looked on Government interference with a greater jealousy than others did. He doubted very much whether Government interference would bring about the end which the hon. Member had in view. In the strongest manner the hon. Gentleman said that he did not want any bonus, yet the training of these youths would be a continual bonus. It was said that the cost of training a youth would be £20 a year, so that if only half the number of 10,000 were trained in these ships that would be £100,000 a year. He had to go a little farther back than the hon. Gentleman had done in his remarks. It was in 1833 or 1834 that Government interference first took place between masters and men in the merchant service. He asked any man who heard him how long they supposed they could have good carpenters, good shoemakers, good ploughmen, good jockeys, or good anything else which they used if they could not hire them without going to a Government office? He put that question boldly. Men had lived through the ten or twelve years of dissatisfaction and discontent and grumbling which this state of things had brought about, just as they had lived through a Liberal Administration. They could not tell how. They lived through because they could not help it. The system was a great convenience to shipowners, but what happened? The shipowner knew nothing of the men whom he got. He went to an office, and there he found them. It relieved him of a good deal of trouble. It had also got rid to a considerable extent, though not entirely, of that abominable set of men called "crimps." It had put a spoke in their wheel; but it was in evidence that some of the Liverpool people employed crimps to bring men out of the shipping office, because that was the only way they could ascertain whether the persons whom they wished to hire were seamen or not. Whether that evidence was true he did not know. The main cause of the deterioration of their seamen, in his opinion, was the commencement of the system of short apprenticeships begun in 1823 and re-enacted in 1835. Two of the strongest motives in human nature were duty and interest. Each of those springs of human action worked in a different way; but if you got them to combine you were much more certain of the result than when you took them
  958
  singly. How did that bear on the system of short apprenticeship? Any man who knew mnch of these matters would tell you that of the masters of ships some were not seamen, while some who were seamen had no sympathy with boys, and were unable to teach them. All of us had had experience of schoolmasters who had a good deal of teaching power but who taught nothing. Well, supposing that under the system of short apprenticeship the master of a ship got a boy of about the age of fourteen, what interest had he in teaching such a boy, when he knew that the lad would be out of his apprenticeship by the time he was sixteen or seventeen years of age? But if he was to have the lad till he was twenty-one, he would get three years of his time after he had become a useful seaman; and if he did not teach him of his own accord, the owners would not be worth their salt if they did not see that he did so. What had been the working of the short apprenticeship system? In 1836, the first year of the operation of the renewal of the Act, 7,223 boys were bound, of which number 3,648 were bound for a period not exceeding four years, and 3,575 for a period of over four years, or until they were of age; so that the number bound for the long period amounted to about 49 per cent of the whole. If they took the first five years, from 1836 to 1840, they would find that 43 per cent were bound for the longer period; but when they came to the last five years included in the Returns—the period ending in 1860—they would find that the number bound for the longer period had dwindled down to 32 per cent, and of 5,616 boys apprenticed in 1860, only 1,827 were bound for any longer period than four years. This showed how the system, like a social cancer, effected a deterioration in the supply of good men for the service. Seamen were skilled workmen of the highest character, and they could not become such without special training. He might be wrong, but he did not believe that seamen could be made in training ships any more than a person learning to swim could be taught upon dining tables. If the country was to have good seamen, they must be trained upon the sea. He would not trouble the House with a multitude of figures, for he believed it would not be disputed that our seamen had greatly deteriorated. Every inquiry during the last seven or eight years — not made for this purpose—had drawn out incidentally, and, therefore, more credibly, that the men were deteriorating. Both

  959
  Admiral Denman and Admiral Elliot, who gave evidence before a Committee of which he was a Member, stated that the seamen were not what they used to be, and had become greatly deteriorated. But there was another test. Nothing could better prove the quality of masters and men than their success in sailing their ships. But on going into the Returns which had been laid before the House—it was not a pleasant matter—he found that in the year 1852 in every 209 voyages one vessel came to grief either by collision, wreck, or stranding. The last Return appeared in the year 1862. He had many times sought later Returns from his right hon. Friend opposite (Mr. Milner Gibson), but had never been able to get them. In 1862, one vessel in every 138 voyages came to grief which showed a gradual and steady scale of increasing disaster. He held that the opinions of gentlemen who had examined these matters were of great value; but when they were corroborated by such facts as these he could have no doubt on the subject. Great improvements had been made in shipbuilding, in cables, and other matters connected with vessels, all tending to diminish danger rather than increase it, and yet there was the discouraging result he had stated. It was the same with coaches as with ships. If you had a coachman who turned you over you would say he was not up to his work. And though he might say it was a bad shy, you would be inclined to think he was a bad driver; but if in addition to the driver being bad the men under him were bad, it would be much worse. Then the opportunities of teaching seamen were much less. The system of employing gangs of riggers was detrimental to the interests of the boys; and the employment of steam tugs prevented their being taught an important part of the work of a sailor. When getting in and out of port an opportunity for teaching the boys many things connected with their profession was formerly afforded which could not now be obtained in a voyage to India and back. But this was the natural course of trade, and they must take it for better for Worse. There was another thing to which he wished to advert. When he was at the Board of Trade some years back, he heard expressions fall from hon. Gentlemen similar to those spoken by the hon. Member for Liverpool to-night. One Gentleman told him that shipowners did not like the trouble of teaching boys; but if the mas-
  960
  ters would not undertake the trouble of teaching there would be no good servants. No Government school could, in his opinion, supply the place of the masters in teaching the boys. The whole thing seemed to be arranged to enable persons to place capital in shipping without any knowledge of its management. The Government found the masters and mates, and the masters provided the men, and so there was a most distinct line drawn between the employers and the employed. This was not the case twenty-five years ago, and tended to produce the deterioration of the men. It was quite clear from what his hon. Friend had stated that shipowners did not now care to take boys into their service, though there was nothing to hinder them from taking boys as aforetime, and binding them for seven years. Too much trouble was involved in this training, and much of the work they formerly did was now executed by gangs of riggers. But what was the inducement to the friends of boys to send them to sea. Having given some consideration to the subject, he was compelled to say that no honest man aware of the whole circumstances of the case would send a boy to sea. He was sorry to make this statement, but he did so with the firm belief that it was true. What was a boy's life at sea? Why, compared with the ordinary life of a boy on land from fourteen to nineteen years of age, it was a thousand times as hard. Then, when he became a man, as a seaman his earnings were low in comparison with those of the skilled artizan on land. The seaman must undergo great hardship, acquire a certain amount of knowledge and skill, and pass his life amid such danger and toil as was unknown to the bricklayer, carpenter, or blacksmith, for wages much lower than theirs. Then, again, owing to the increasing size of the ships, and the higher scale of education required from masters and mates, the difficulty of seamen being able to attain the position of a master or mate was becoming greater every day. Everybody would admit this statement to be true. He did not say that the masters and mates should not possess this scientific knowledge; but this circumstance put seamanship at a discount. He did not wish to disparage the examinations, but he believed that a man could pass a good examination and be no better a seaman than himself. In fact, they could not test, in this way, the backbone of seamanship. During inquiries into

  961
  the wrecks which occurred from time to time it was found, not that scientific knowledge was at fault, but that a large portion of them were owing to the neglect of ordinary duties. And what was the condition of a seaman at the age of forty or fifty? Thirty years ago the mastership was not shut against the man who entered before the mast, but this is now generally the case owing to the increased size of merchant ships. Thus the poor sailor had not half the chances of advancement which were formerly open to him. And after fifty years of age a seaman could not work. In fact, he was worked out; formerly he went on shore and turned rigger, but now the rigger's son succeeded to his father's business, and there was no room in the trade for the old sailor. One plan for his employment formerly was that at every port except London the shore boats were manned by old seamen, but the steamers had closed that trade against them. Again, the wages of seamen, as compared with mechanics, were very low. The wages for the foreign trade were £3 10 s. per month, and it might be taken that he would be eleven months at sea and one on shore. And in this he was at a disadvantage, for the skilled mechanic had fifty-two Sundays to himself, and poor Jack when at sea must work Sunday and week day. In his eleven months he would earn £38 10 s., and if to this was added the price of his food— £17 or £18—he would draw as wages less than the mechanic. It followed that the condition of the men must be improved, and that it was not by training ships that men were to be got, but by giving these men such wages and prospects for their old age as would induce them to learn their business. In his opinion, the desired result could be secured better without connection with the Government than with it. The remedy was to be found in improving the relationship between master and man. Unless the throat of the present system was cut, the French system would grow up among us, and we should have as bad seamen as that system now produced. This country had already had some experience in that matter. Towards the close of the last and the commencement of the present century our seamen fought and conquered, and swept the seas under Rodney, and Howe, and Parker and Duncan, and Jervis, and Nelson, with odds as great against them as any to which their successors of the present day would be exposed. And how were
  962
  those men trained? They were not raised in school-ships, nor made perfect by a few summers' trainings, and then as a gallant admiral had said before the Committee he had spoken of, became disgusted when taken out for a winter's cruise. Those brave men had been from early childhood put face to face with difficulty, danger, and death, so that all the soft ones among them—and there were soft and hard ones in every class — got squeezed out. They found the life of a seaman a hard one; they did not like it, and they returned ashore; and those who remained were as hard as nails. Those latter men learnt that great lesson which nothing but stern experience teaches—that the only way to escape death was boldly to face every danger, and with God's help, to grapple with and overcome every difficulty. That was the way those men were trained. History had recorded what they had done; he would be very glad if those who were raised in a different school would equal them; he felt perfectly sure they would not surpass them. Before he sat down he wished to ask his hon. Friend one question. He wished to know whether his hon. Friend believed that the general class of shipowners, when they wanted a crew, would take them from those training ships, where they never learned what a day's work was, and had never met with danger or difficulty? He doubted it; masters who wanted boys to do their work well would, he believed, go to some other place for them than training schools. He might be wrong in his conclusions, but he believed that legislation upon the subject would only aggravate the mischief by separating master and man. He hoped his right hon. Friend would assent to the proposition for the inquiry. The subject was one of the utmost importance, because the safety of this country depended upon its navy. They had heard the other night from the late Chancellor of the Exchequer a sad prophecy, and one which he (Mr. Henley) should never forget. The right hon. Gentleman told them that, in his opinion, this country could not hope to maintain the mastery of the sea as she had done during the great French war. He (Mr. Henley) thought that a faint-hearted declaration, and was quite sure that if England strove for her old mastery with the foregone conclusion that she would not maintain it, the battle would be half lost before it was begun. He believed that whether in steamers or in sailing ships,

  963
  when the day of trial came, victory would accompany those men who were the best trained, and who afforded the best materials for training. He hoped they should be enabled to discover by means of the proposed inquiry the most effective mode of securing that training and those materials; and perhaps one of its results would be to lead the employers of labour in that case to put their shoulders to the wheel, to bring up for themselves the best class of seamen, and to hold out, by means of good wages, an inducement to that class to enter their service.
  SIR STAFFORD NORTHCOTE: Sir, I have listened, in common, I am sure, with every Member of the House, with great interest to the speech of my right hon. Friend who has just resumed his seat, as well as to the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, who called our attention to the subject in a manner well worthy of its importance, and of the great constituency which he represents. My right hon. Friend and my hon. Friends who brought forward and seconded the Motion, agreed on this point, that there is evidence before us to show that there has been of late years a falling off to some extent in the numbers and in the efficiency of our seamen. My hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool moved for a Commission to inquire into the subject; and his Motion naturally divides itself into two distinct parts. In the first place, he wishes for an inquiry into the facts of the case; and secondly, if those facts should be found to be such as he believes them to be, he wishes for an inquiry into the causes of the alleged deficiency, and of the best mode of remedying the evil. Now, if there was any doubt about the facts, and if our attention were at present for the first time called to their existence, it is impossible to deny that it would be the duty of Her Majesty's Government to appoint a Commission, or to take such other steps as they might think desirable for the purpose of inquiring into allegations of so serious a character. But those Members who have already addressed the House appealed not to facts within their personal knowledge but to information which is public property, to documents which have for some time been lying upon the table of the House; and I, for one, am not at all prepared, on the part of the Government, to dispute the accuracy of the statements which they have made with regard to the present condition of the mercantile marine
  964
  of this country. I do not, therefore, think, it is at all necessary to appoint a Royal Commission for the purpose of inquiring into the facts of this case. My hon. Friend says that in the mercantile marine our seamen are falling off in numbers and in efficiency. Now, it is perfectly clear that the supply of British seamen has, in point of numbers—I will not say fallen off absolutely, but fallen off relatively to the amount of tonnage employed, within the last twenty years, and still more within the last seven or eight years; and, as a matter of course, as there has been a falling off in the number of men there must also be to some extent a falling off in their quality, because, as seamen must be had to meet the great increase of trade and tonnage, employers are of necessity compelled to draw upon an inferior stratum for their supply. But, at the same time, I am bound to say from all the information we have received, that although that may be the case to a certain extent, the mercantile marine of this country does not deserve the sweeping condemnation which is sometimes passed upon it. There is among our merchant seamen a large body of thoroughly efficient men, and I believe you would find among them many who are fully equal to those engaged in our merchant service at any former period. In proof of this I would appeal to my hon. and gallant Friend near me (Sir John Hay) and to those who have administered the naval affairs of this country. What is the quality of the merchant seamen who form that valuable force, the Naval Reserve. We know upon the highest authority, that we have now in our Naval Reserve 17,000 men of the best possible character, and of the most complete efficiency, and the records of the Board of Trade also show those men displaying a prudence and a self-control such as the members of their class never before exhibited. Sailors used to be proverbially reckless and improvident, but they now avail themselves largely of the facilities which our new system of savings banks and of Post Office Orders affords them for saving money for themselves in their old age or sickness, or for transmitting it to their families. I see that the number of money orders issued to our seamen has increased from 12,000 in the year 1856 to upwards of 45,000 in the year 1865, while during the same period the amount remitted by them has increased from less than £140,000 to more than £260,000. The returns relating to their savings banks are equally satisfactory. So much for

  965
  their prudence. As regards their intelligence I may refer to what we have just heard. The paper brought before the House by the hon. Member for Liverpool, and the temperate, intelligent manner in which the sailors there urge their grievances, and explain what they believe to be the causes of their distress, and the remedies they suggest, show that they are a body of men to whose opinions very considerable weight should be attached. I mention these facts in order that it may be understood that, while we admit the existence to a certain extent of a deterioration in our seamen, we are also persuaded that we have a number of men who have given proofs that they possess every quality which it is possible to desire. I believe, too, with my right hon. Friend (Mr. Henley) that a large portion of our present difficulty in this case is owing to causes entirely beyond the control of legislation. It must be remembered that this country has, of late years, increased in wealth and in general commercial activity in a far greater ratio than in mere population; and the result is, that in every branch of business efficient men have become more and more in demand. This has been felt in our supply of clergymen and in every other profession, and the same cause has naturally produced the same effect in our mercantile marine. There are greater attractions than there used to be for those who might otherwise have thrown themselves into a particular branch of industry. The same result affects various occupations and professions. For instance, the competition of other employments draws away those who would otherwise become clergymen. It is precisely the same with regard to seamen. So many lucrative employments are now open to men who formerly were in the habit of going to sea, that the merchant service is no longer so attractive as it formerly was. That service, as my right hon. Friend said, requires men to pass a life not only of hardship but of danger, and at present affords a very moderate amount of remuneration. The true remedy, my right hon. Friend seems to say, is in the hands of the shipowners themselves, who might get better men by paying better wages. No doubt that is the true and simple remedy. But the shipowner is bound to look after his own interest; and if he can get men who would answer his purpose at a low rate, we have no right to require him to employ a better class at an increased cost to him-
  966
  self. It so happens that among foreigners and in other directions he is able to find men who, though not of the highest class, are efficient enough to serve his turn. That being so, it is idle to expect that the shipowner will give higher wages than those for which he can get the services of such men. Therefore, although I agree with my right hon. Friend that the true remedy is to be found in the exertions of the shipowners, yet I think we must pay attention, if we consider it an important object to supply our merchant navy with a proportion of good British seamen, to any measures which can be devised to render it easier for the shipowners to get seamen of this character. My right hon. Friend seems to have one or two remedies of his own to which he points. In the first place, he would get rid of some of those provisions which have been introduced for the protection of the sailor. and which he says are in the nature of an interference between master and man. If I understand him rightly he objects to, or at all events does not like, the system of shipping offices and the whole of the machinery provided for securing to the seaman the power of making proper bargains with his employers. Upon that point I feel very little inclined to agree with him, because I do not understand, if I rightly conceive the spirit of those provisions to which he refers, that there is anything in them in the nature of such an interference between master and man as would be equivalent to saying to the master, "You are not to get your men in the open market where you please, but you must come to us to procure them for you." I understand the spirit of those provisions to be rather of this nature, that, inasmuch as the contract to be made between master and man is one in which it is often found that the seaman is overreached and defrauded, it was therefore desirable to institute tribunals—for these shipping offices are in the nature of tribunals—which should see that the seaman had fair play. Of course, if this were not the case, and these offices were likely in any way to interfere with a fair bargain in the open market, and to affect the power of the master to get his seamen where he might find them best, I should say by all means let us eradicate the faults of that system. With regard, however, to giving the seaman protection, and not allowing him to be overreached and ill-treated through the agency of men commonly known as

  967
  "crimps," I think there is no part of mercantile marine legislation to which we can look back with greater satisfaction than to the institution of these shipping offices, and I, for one, should be sorry to see anything done to destroy that humane and perfectly legitimate and reasonable provision. Then my right hon. Friend points to another matter in which I think he will find himself in some difficulty. He complains of the present apprenticeship system, but if you are to make laws to compel men to take apprentices, and to make a restriction as to the length of time during which they are to be bound, you will certainly interfere very materially with the principles of open supply and demand. The difficulties in the way are very considerable. The immense number of steam ships which we have now is very unfavourable to the apprenticeship system, because as a rule they train no apprentices, while on the other hand they require the services of trained sailors. There is always a demand for sailors at good wages, but there is not a corresponding supply, and you can hardly expect the master of a sailing vessel to undertake all the labour of training apprentices, when, as soon as he has trained them properly, the steamship owners go to them and, by the offer of a higher rate of wages, induce them to leave the service in which they have been trained and carry them off to a service which trains no apprentices. As a matter of fact, the system of compulsory apprenticeships to which allusion has been made was even under the old Navigation Laws open to great fraud, and was continually breaking down. The evidence of Mr. Lamport, of Liverpool, given before a Select Committee of this House in 1860, describes the way in which the apprenticeship system was entirely evaded under the old Navigation Laws, and now, with our enormous increase of seamen, and with the facilities which are given for obtaining foreign seamen, looking also to the demand for sailors in foreign services, it would be almost impossible to prevent the desertion of apprentices as soon as they became valuable, and almost impossible to prevent those frauds by which the apprenticeship system was made to look well, even while it was not accomplishing the objects which it had in view. The position which we are in is this—we are asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool to issue a Royal Commission to inquire into the condition of the mercantile marine,
  968
  with regard to which we say that we are able to ascertain by inquiries, which the Government will feel it their duty to institute, all that a Royal Commission could learn. We are also asked to inquire into the causes of the existing state of affairs, and to suggest the remedies for them. I think the House will agree with me that the appointment of a Royal Commission for this purpose is a step that is by no means free from objection, because, in the first place, though a Royal Commission might be excellent for the purpose of collecting information, it by no means follows that it is the best body for suggesting remedies, because it is not responsible for the legislation which would be required to give effect to its own recommendations. A Royal Commission consists of a certain number of gentlemen cognizant of the subject-matter to be inquired into, but with no knowledge usually of the feelings and temper of Parliament, and fettered by no consideration of expense. They make inquiries, which are very valuable no doubt, occupying a considerable length of time, and they then present a Report, which in all probability contains recommendations which are more or less at variance with the feelings of Parliament. The Government of the day looks at the Report, and finds the measures proposed are measures which Parliament would probably object to pass, and they may say, "We have done enough in getting the matter investigated. There is the Report, and no doubt something must be done at some future time." But there is no legislation upon it, and in that way the matter may be allowed to go to sleep. It would be more satisfactory if inquiries of this kind into the causes of certain evils and the remedies for them were to be conducted by the responsible Government of the country, because the Government would then not only inquire into the remedies which might be necessary, but would also at the same time propose their adoption. It is easy to propose remedies in the Report of a Royal Commission, in a form looking very well, but when you come to put those recommendations into the form of a Bill to be brought before Parliament, it is found that there are immense difficulties in the way of their adoption. On the other hand, general Reports do comparatively little good. The inquiries of a Government, however, must necessarily lead to the suggestion of remedies in a form proposed to be submitted in a measure. The Government will ex-

  969
  amine them with care and minuteness, and will then put them before Parliament in such a form as they think best calculated to secure attention and a favourable reception at the hands of the House. I think that is by far the best course of proceeding, and that it is much more likely to lead to beneficial results than the mere Report of a Royal Commission. I say this not merely from a consideration of general principles, but in consequence of what we have known of a Royal Commission on this subject before. There was a Royal Commission appointed by the last Government of Lord Derby, at the instigation of my right hon. Friend the First Lord of the Admiralty, and upon which my right hon. Friend the Member for the city of Oxford, the late Secretary for the Colonies (Mr. Cardwell), served and took a very active part. That Commission was appointed to inquire into the whole subject of the manning of the navy, and it made some most valuable suggestions, some of which, relating to the Naval Reserve, have been adopted. But one of the recommendations of the Commission, which appeared to be extremely good, has not yet been carried into effect, and that was the suggestion to which my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool has referred with regard to the establishment of training ships. It appears to me, without pledging the Government to the adoption of any particular course, that it is our first duty to take up that recommendation of the Commission of 1859 and to see whether anything can be done in order to give effect to it. It may appear, should we come to put that recommendation into the form of a Bill, that there are difficulties in the way which we do not now perceive, but I think it will be far better to attempt to deal with that first, rather than to send the whole subject to be considered by a Royal Commission, the possible result of which might be suggestions made without being carried into effect, as has been the case with the recommendation of the Commission of 1859. I entirely agree with my right hon. Friend that if you undertake out of the Exchequer of the country to provide trained sailors for the mercantile service you are in effect giving them a bonus; and it is a very doubtful question whether you ought to give a bonus of that kind, and if so, what amount of bonus you ought to give out of the public funds to any particular trade. As a general principle, my right hon. Friend is right when he says you do not train carpenters
  970
  and cotton spinners; but, with regard to seamen, I think other considerations may apply, and it may be right that the National Treasury should be asked to bear some portion of the expense. Certainly, however, the National Treasury could not be called upon to bear the whole of the expense, because the shipowners will benefit most by the undertaking; and it would be only reasonable and fair to call upon them for some contribution towards the expense incurred. I merely throw out these suggestions, however, as considerations which the Government might have to weigh. I cannot assent to the very severe strictures which my right hon. Friend passed upon training ships, for I believe that if you adopt them they will be the means of effecting considerable benefit. Of course, if you could get a sufficient number of men who had served under Rodney and Nelson, they, having gone through the rough and effectual training of actual service, would, no doubt, be superior to an equal number of those trained on board the training ships; but, as you have no compulsory apprenticeship, and as boys must be trained to the service, I believe the training ships are very valuable, and that so far as experience goes they have answered very well. They provide a set of men, at all events, equal if not superior to the set provided in the open market. The subject, therefore, is one not to be set aside slightingly, by references to learning to swim on a dining-room table; and I feel sure the training ships may be made to render most valuable assistance in providing us with sailors. All that I can promise on the subject is, that Her Majesty's Government will give it their most careful consideration; and I think I should be wrong if I gave a more definite promise, considering the short time I have had in which to take the matter into consideration. It may be necessary that we should enter upon the consideration of some other points. Nothing can be more important than that the comfort and the proper treatment of the seamen should in every possible way be provided for, but it would be undesirable to take out of the hands of the men the duty of looking out for themselves. All we ought to do is to give them the means of making their own bargain completely and fairly for themselves—to put them on a fair and equal footing with the shipowners, and then let them make their own bargains, and to adopt means to remove unfair and inconvenient restrictions. We thank the hon.

  971
  Member for Liverpool for bringing this matter forward. I have no doubt this discussion will do a great deal of good, and that the tone and temper which have been exhibited will show that there is every disposition on the part of Government to do what they can on the subject. I hope the hon. Member for Liverpool will be content with having brought the matter forward, and with the pledge I am willing to give him that we will take it into our most careful consideration. If we find it necessary in the course of our inquiries to issue a Royal Commission, of course we shall do so, and with that assurance I hope the hon. Member will not press his Motion, because I feel it would be inconvenient to tie the hands of the Government with any address to the Crown.
  MR. GRAVESsaid, he wished to explain that he had no desire to impose the whole of the expense with reference to the establishment of training ships upon the country. The shipowners ought to bear their share, and they were perfectly willing to do so. He did not expect to receive such a satisfactory assurance as had been given by the right hon. Baronet that the matter would be taken up. He considered that the mode of inquiry which the right hon. Gentleman had suggested was better and more valuable than his own, and he therefore asked permission to withdraw the Motion.
  Motion, by leave, withdrawn.

  THE BALLOT.—RESOLUTION.
  MR. H. BERKELEYsaid, that in bringing forward a Resolution upon the subject of the ballot he was afraid he must not expect any great favour from the present House of Commons, which had steadily opposed Reform, and had shown itself hostile to extending the privileges of the working classes. During the twenty-nine years over which his Parliamentary services had extended he had been painfully impressed with the evils which had crept into the electoral system of the country, and which, since the commencement of Her Majesty's reign, had been steadily on the increase. No doubt, the electoral system of England was one which, in its original state, was worthy of all praise, and was fully adapted to give the people that voice in the election of their representatives which free institutions demand. Of the electoral system in its original state the country had a right to be proud, but of the electoral system under its present state of abominable demoraliza-
  972
  tion the nation might well feel ashamed. Whatever might have been the practice of candidates seeking to enter those walls— some of them doubtless objectionable enough—there was not one hon. Member of that House who would dare to gainsay the great constitutional maxim that each elector ought to vote freely and indifferently — without fear of punishment and without hope of reward. He trusted that the House would excuse him for calling their attention to the strong opinions entertained upon this subject by a few great authorities who regarded with deep respect the functions of electors, and thought it of the first importance that care should be taken to preserve those functions unimpaired. Lord Russell, speaking of our electoral system, said that all our most ancient statutes, all our greatest constitutional lawyers, had established the maxim, and laid down the principle that the people of England ought to elect their representatives freely and indifferently. No doubt, the noble Lord referred to the opinion of Walpole, who spoke in eulogistic terms of the privilege of electing Members to serve in Parliament. He might also refer to the opinion of Burke and the language which that great man used touching the electoral franchise — when he said "his unbiased opinion, his mature judgment, his enlightened conscience, the elector ought to sacrifice for no man living." Again, Lord Chief Justice Holt said that it was a great privilege to vote for those who make the laws which govern life and property — a privilege which should not be deputed to another. But if it was too delicate to be deputed to another, what could be said of the present state of things when this privilege was wrested from the rightful owner and used by those who had not the slightest possible claim to it, more especially by the noble class of non-electors, who were forbidden by the Standing Orders of the House to interfere in the election of Members of Parliament. The miserable state into which the electoral system of the country was plunged was admitted by all the world. For twenty years Parliament had been tinkering at the electoral laws until a state of things had been produced which rendered this country the laughing-stock of Europe. He now asked the House, since they could find no remedy for bribery, to try that which had been advocated by the most enlightened writers from Daniel Defoe down to Jeremy Bentham and James Mill. Those writers insisted that the ballot was the only

  973
  thing likely to secure purity at elections, and in fact its principle had been adopted by England's greatest Parliament in 1628 under the advocacy of Hampden, Pym, Elliot, and the other great men of that day. A Bill for the introduction of the ballot at elections passed the House of Commons in 1710, but was rejected by the House of Lords in consequence of the opposition of Lord Godolphin. During the present century it had had the brilliant advocacy of Grote, Macaulay, Durham, Sheil, Cobden, Molesworth, Bethell, and many others. Under these circumstances, he was justified in believing that he had some little sanction for pressing the matter forward, and he trusted that in asking the House to make this experiment, no young Member would imagine he was asking it to adopt a crotchet of his own. He wished to advert very briefly to some of the arguments against the ballot. In the first place, it was said that the ballot was unmanly; secondly, that it was un-English; thirdly, that it was not successful where it had been tried; and fourthly, that it was wrong in principle, because the franchise was a trust held for the advantage of the non-electors, and consequently, must be exercised openly, and the electors must bear the responsibility of the publicity with which they gave their votes. No doubt hon. Gentlemen opposite recognized the old and stale arguments, but they did not bear in mind the various answers that had been given to them. Now, the first objection to the ballot, on the ground of its being unmanly, was set aside by the fact that it was the mode of voting in our clubs in almost all their elections, more particularly in the mode of voting in our military clubs. Our military and naval men were not supposed to be very unmanly, and yet every year an Act of Parliament was passed to enable members of courts martial to vote in secret, and consequently he need not waste time in arguing that it was not unmanly. Then it was said that the ballot was un-English. That was complete nonsense, for nineteen out of twenty of our elections were carried on by ballot. The only answer needed to that argument was a simple contradiction. The next objection that the ballot was not successful where it had been practised was equally erroneous. The conditions of the ballot were different in different countries, but as a rule it might be assumed that wherever secresy of voting was compulsory, there the ballot was most successful. In the first place let him cite America. ["Hear, hear!" from the
  974
  Ministerial side.] He had felt sure that he should elicit that ironical cheer from hon. Gentlemen opposite. He had never held up America as possessing a mode of voting which this country ought to imitate, but as possessing, on the contrary, a mode of voting which they ought to shun. In America a man might stick his voting paper in his hat if he pleased—or he might go to the electoral urn with his voting paper open in his hand and declare his vote. He had seen thousands do that. Other men might fold up their papers, and vote with perfect secresy and security. Yet the disadvantage of the open ballot had been experienced in America; for in the Northern States, where there was a great accumulation of poor voters, from the existence of large corporate bodies and other causes, corruption had begun to creep in, and both bribery and intimidation began to be practised. The consequence was that in Massachusetts an attempt was made to have the ballot absolutely secret, but it was defeated by a small majority. He knew not whether that attempt had been again made there since then; but of this they might be assured—that no man in America would think those persons otherwise than madmen who should propose open voting to him in preference to ballot. The ballot protected from consequences all who did not choose to declare how they voted; it was a protection from violence, lynch law, bullying, drunken men, and demoralization, and so the Americans adopted it. An interesting circumstance was related by an able correspondent of The Times in his admirable chronicle of the tour of the Prince of Wales in America. His Royal Highness visited Philadelphia at the time when a fierce election contest was going on. People were seen at the corners of the streets talking in knots, but there was no more disorder than there was to be found in an English town on a market day. There were no drunkards, no roughs, "no lambs," and "no men from the moon." Let his Royal Highness compare his recollection of that election at Philadelphia with a recent proceeding at Nottingham, and who could venture to doubt which of the two elections the Prince would pronounce was most worthy of a civilized country? On a former occasion he had quoted the case of Belgium to the House, consequently he should not repeat his statement. There were certain gentlemen from that country now being entertained by our own Volunteers who

  975
  would, no doubt, be able to give hon. Members every information on that subject if they chose to inquire; but he felt sure there was not a man among those visitors who would not prefer the ballot to open voting. In France the ballot gave perfect content. ["Hear, hear!" and a laugh.] If hon. Gentlemen doubted that fact, he trusted they would answer him by argument by-and-bye. The frequent election of Deputies in Paris and throughout the provinces in the very teeth of the Government proved that no great coercion took place in France. A letter addressed by his friend Sir John Bowring, to the editor of The Examiner was worthy the attention of Gentlemen who derided the idea of the ballot being successful in France. Sir John Bowring said that the arts of corruption, bribery, and the menaces of power all failed in presence of that protection which secret voting gave to every man, and that he had personally witnessed a remarkable instance of that while in Paris during a late election. Sir John Bowring visited the Imprimerie Imperiale, where a large body of workmen had been solicited to vote for the Imperial candidates. Most of the group declared that they meant to vote against the Government, and when asked whether they would not be punished for disregarding the wishes of their employers, they said, "What care we? Our votes are our own, and the right to vote as we please is ours; the law protects us, and our masters know that although they might exact a promise they could not secure a vote." He would now turn to the case of our Australian Colonies. In 1862 certain distinguished gentlemen came from those colonies to this country as Commissioners for the great International Exhibition. To those gentlemen the Ballot Society, to which he then belonged, proposed certain questions which had previously been propounded by The Times newspaper. The Times, it should be stated, had likewise demanded that an example should be found of some country in which the English language was spoken and English manners prevailed. One of The Times questions was, "Does the ballot prevent a man's vote from being known?" The Commissioner from Queensland replied that the ballot made voting secret; the Commissioner from South Australia reported that it was utterly impossible a man's vote could become known unless he himself chose to say which way he voted; and the answer of the Tasmanian Commissioner was to the
  976
  like effect. Another of The Times' questions was—"Does the Ballot put a stop to drunkenness and disorder at elections; does it shield a man from bribery, persecution, and other abnormal practices?" The South Australian Commissioner answered, when open voting existed in his colony drunkenness, disorderly mobs, violence, treating, and complaints from tradesmen of the loss of custom on account of their votes prevailed at elections, but that the ballot put an end to those evils. The Tasmanian Commissioner bore exactly similar testimony. The third question put by The Times was "Does the ballot diminish the expense of elections?" On that point the Commissioner from the first colony reported that vote by ballot had, beyond all doubt, the effect of considerably reducing the expense of elections. His fellow Commissioner from South Australia said that the ballot had most decidedly diminished such expense; and another authority in a different colony, the Sydney Morning Herald, declared the success of the ballot, and stated that it gave every freedom to the electors. The Times had always coupled manhood suffrage and the ballot together, but the two things were quite distinct The Melbourne correspondent of The Times, a very able gentleman, whose communications always commanded a column or more in its pages, took The Times to task upon the question, for he stated in one of his letters that the ballot was valued by the Conservatives in Australia for the quiet decorum at elections which it produced, while it was valued by the lower orders because they believed it enabled a man to give his vote free from dictation. There was besides the authority of another gentleman who was well acquainted with the operation of the ballot in the colony of Victoria, and in answer to questions which were put to him, he said that since the introduction of the ballot into the colony not a single petition against the return of a Member had, within his knowledge, been presented, and that it was regarded in the other colonies with great favour. Such being the results which were produced under the influence of the ballot in Australia and elsewhere, what were the objections to its adoption in this country? He now came to the fourth objection, which was more of an ad captandum vulgus character, and which was more pompous and at the same time more unsound than any other. It was said that the franchise was a trust held by the

  977
  elector for the benefit of the non-electors, and that it ought to be exercised openly, in order that the non-electors might know how the trust was discharged. Now, he had no objection to call the elective franchise a trust, but then it was a trust under certain limits and with its functions clearly defined. That function consisted in the elector voting freely and indifferently, without fear of punishment or hope of reward; but it was true beyond the possibility of a doubt that if the elector voted openly he was very often unable properly to comply with those conditions. Why, then, should he not be allowed to give his vote in secret? That was a question which, so far as he was aware, had never received a satisfactory answer. The argument to which he had been just adverting was one which was used by a number of gentlemen who seemed to have imagined it in Utopia, and who sought to apply it to the case of England. They appeared to forget that in this country the electors were divided into different factions—Whigs, Tories, and Radicals—and the consequence of an elector voting openly was that if he voted for a Whig the Tory held him to be a faithless trustee; if he voted for a Tory the Whig entertained a similar opinion of him; and if he voted for Whig or Tory the Radical considered him a man unworthy to be intrusted with the franchise. The free exercise of the franchise by the poor voter involved in many cases financial ruin, personal violence, and notices to quit house and home. The man who had been evicted in consequence of his vote might fairly say—
  "You take my life, When you do take the means by which I live."
  Now, the responsibility of incurring such penalties was one to which he maintained the elector ought not to be exposed. He would also invite the attention of hon. Members to the fact that the House of Commons had, on the let of May, 1628, passed the following Resolution:—
  "That the elective right is not a franchise in the nature of a possession or a privilege, but of a service pro bona publico."
  That wise Parliament, therefore, ordained that the electors might vote secretly, in order that they might perform that which they regarded as a service for the public good, in accordance with the dictates of their consciences. He wished, in the next place, briefly to advert to the demoralization which was produced by the existing system, but before he did so he should like to say
  978
  a word with respect to an election which had very recently taken place; he alluded to the late election for Guildford. He found that the successful candidate at that election was Mr. Bovill, Her Majesty's Solicitor General—and he was sure every one who heard him would agree with him in the opinion that the appointment of the hon. and learned Gentleman to that office was an act as graceful on the part of the Government as it was likely to be productive of advantage to the country. But when the hon. and learned Gentleman presented himself the other day to his constituents, whether owing to the excitement of the occasion or to the blushing honours which were showered upon him, he made some extraordinary remarks. He was about to quote from the account of the proceedings which was given in The Times, which he had no doubt was correct, but for the accuracy of which, of course, he could not be responsible. It appeared that some person upon the hustings asked the hon. and learned Gentleman some question about the ballot, to which he answered that the representation of the people was a great trust, adding, "What would you think of your representatives voting by ballot?" What would they think, indeed! He had heard of a man who, when asked whether he could speak the German language, replied that he did not know that he could, but that he had a brother who played divinely on the German flute. Now there was, in his opinion, quite as great an analogy between the German language and the German flute as between the functions of the elector and those of his representative in Parliament. The elector was answerable to no one for his vote. In voting freely and indifferently he discharged all the duties imposed on him by the law. He was neither to accept reward, nor suffer punishment for his vote. The case was altogether different with the Member of Parliament. He was answerable to his constituents for the fulfilment of his pledges. He might be rewarded or punished. He might be re-elected or rejected, according as his conduct might please or displease his constituents. He must consequently vote openly, or the representation of the people would be a mockery. But to return to the hon. and learned Gentleman the Solicitor General. It appeared he said that he hoped the time would never come when an honest Englishman would be afraid of recording his vote. Why the time had already come when thousands of English-

  979
  men were afraid to do so. It was all very well for a man occupying a high position like the Solicitor General, who probably had, by his great talents in his profession, realized a large property, to speak after that fashion. But take the case of a Mr. Bovill, a poor tallow-chandler, dependent on his customers, or a poor tenant dependent for his bread on his landlord, was such a person to be met by the taunt that it was to be hoped that the time would never come when an honest Englishman would be afraid to record his vote? There were too many of such cases; there were thousands and thousands of them, not confined to the working and trading classes, but extending to the educated classes. He would quote as an example the case of the medical profession. What young rising medical practitioner dared to record his vote? By birth and education, members of this profession were assuredly well qualified to exercise the franchise; but if they were to search the directory and find out the names of the medical men in any neighbourhood, and were then to turn to the register, and afterwards to the poll book, they would be able to estimate in some degree the need that existed for some efficient protection for electors. They would find that this and other classes of persons eminently fit for the exercise of the franchise were virtually excluded from it. It was all very well to say that an Englishman ought never to be ashamed to record his vote openly, but the plain, unanswerable facts of the case could not be gainsaid, that in too many cases Englishmen voted against their conscience to escape ruin. Was no intimidation ever exercised now? Was none put in force at Guildford? Was there no interference on that occasion by persons of high station with the freedom of voting? He held in his hand a letter from Lord Percy's steward, dated Albury Park, July 10, and it was in the following terms:—"Please make up my bill, as I may probably desire to close the account on Saturday next." He had another case, in which he could not give the name. It was that of a tradesman of Guildford who attended at Albury Park in consequence of receiving a message that a certain person in the establishment—he could not say whom, but it was one who certainly had the right to command—wished to see him. This person asked him how he intended to vote. He said that he had not made up his mind. An intimation was thereupon immediately conveyed to him that unless he voted for
  980
  the Solicitor General he would never do any more work in that house; and he was told likewise, that it was the intention of Lord Percy to send for the poll book, and he intended never more to employ those who voted against the Solicitor General. These statements, he was informed, could be fully borne out, and therefore he might fairly assert that the Solicitor General was a little too hasty in saying that an honest Englishman ought never to be afraid of voting openly. After the Reform Act of 1832, and when it was in full play, Mr. Grote, Mr. Macaulay, and others, came to the conclusion that the fatal defects of that measure were, that it left in existence close or nomination boroughs, and neglected to give to the electors the protection of the ballot. When Mr. Grote, brought the question before Parliament and obtained a Committee of Inquiry, the result was the production of a voluminous blue book, so interesting that extracts from it were published in every newspaper of importance throughout the kingdom. Every word that Mr. Grote had stated about the demoralization at elections was thoroughly proved; but things went on from that time growing worse and worse until the formation of Lord Aberdeen's Administration, and that nobleman, although he was certainly more than half a Tory, admitted that there were grave abuses in our electoral system which required amendment. A Committee was accordingly appointed, on which were an immense number of lawyers, who recommended the introduction of a Bill on the subject. Accordingly, a Bill was brought in; but the evident intention of that measure was to protect delinquent candidates, and the punishment which it proposed to inflict upon the voter was rendered nugatory because juries could never be found willing to convict. This Act Lord Derby described as being of no more use than waste paper. So here they now were, after the septennial saturnalia, smarting from their orgies, thoroughly helpless and hopeless, with that Act of Parliament alone for a guide, but which Act, instead of being a measure for the prevention of corrupt practices, was a measure for their encouragement, and was so viewed by the country. The investigations before the last Election Committees did not disclose a tithe part of the dreadful malady which was fast destroying the electoral system. If they doubted his word he would read an extract from the leading

  981
  Tory paper—unless, as he supposed, The Times was now to be looked upon in that light. It was stated by The Morning Herald that—
  "Public morality forbids such a speedy recurrence of the disgraceful scenes of last summer, the fearfully demoralizing effects of unlimited beer and uncounted bank notes."
  That was pretty well for a Tory newspaper, and he would now quote from the speech of a Tory candidate. Sir George Jenkinson, who this year stood for Nottingham, declared in his farewell address that—
  "He was told at two o'clock that he had the election in his own hands, and that he could win it by certain means not detailed, but which suggestion he refused to entertain, and the result was that he had lost the election, but had saved his honour. He thought, after the experience of the few hours before the final close of the poll, no one would question the truth of the remarks made by Mr. Osborne as to bribery, and he hoped that Gentleman would use his talents and his voice in Parliament to prevent such wholesale purchase of votes as took place between two and four o'clock. If the ballot would effect that end, he, for one, would vote for that measure, for no evil could equal the one of wholesale and open venality."
  He would now beg leave to quote the opinion of the late Chancellor of the Exchequer. Mr. Gladstone stated—
  "There is no reason to believe that the present provisions of the laws as to corrupt practices at elections have been efficient for the purpose intended; the amendment of such laws is very urgent. It is the conviction of Her Majesty's Government that it is their duty to endeavour to frame a measure for that purpose."
  He wished it was in his power to read some address from the present Chancellor of the Exchequer to his constituents admitting that he recognized the evils of the present system, and stating that the Government would frame a measure to prevent them, but he had looked in vain for any reference to the subject in the speech either of the right hon. Gentleman or of Lord Derby. Therefore he said that they were now left helpless and hopeless, and that it was useless to ask the House to adopt the remedy recommended in so many quarters. He must now say a word to his hon. Friend the Member for Westminster. He was proud of both his Members, for he spoke as one of their constituents; but he now particularly referred to the senior Member, formerly a strong supporter of the ballot, but who had committed a little backsliding in that character. Still, he was encouraged to hope, from the strong evidence he had produced
  982
  of what occurred at some of the recent elections and—perhaps it might be vanity on his part to say so—from a few of the statements he had detailed, that his hon. Friend would support the Motion. There was this passage in a speech his hon. Friend lately made—
  "If I thought that the electors of this country were in such a state of hopeless and slavish dependence on particular landlords, employers, and customers, I should be as I once was a supporter of the ballot."
  Now, could his hon. Friend continue to doubt this? Could he close his eyes to the state of the country, and did he believe that the upper class had become more virtuous, or that the lower and middle classes had become more independent, or would the hon. Gentleman at the eleventh hour state that his opinion was erroneous, and as he (Mr. Berkeley) hoped, give him his vote that night? In order that he might give the hon. Gentleman a little more evidence, he would state two or three events that had occurred. He would just give him two or three more facts to show how erroneous was such an opinion. There was a virtuous borough which was now the subject of inquiry by an appointed Commission, and which was under the political tuition and morality of the Duke of Somerset—he meant the borough of Totnes. He found in the columns of the local newspapers a charge made against the Duke of Somerset of having evicted his tenants without any other pretence than that they voted against him, and that none but those who voted for him should live in his houses. He hardly dare to trust himself in reading it, but it was so. [Cries of "Read, read!"] Well besides that, there was a statement in a newspaper that the Marquess of Bath had evicted twelve of his tenants at Frome without any other reason being assigned than that they had all voted for the Liberal candidate. These were statements publicly made, and he did not think that any man, however exalted his station, was too high to give a contradiction to them if they were untrue. At all events, if the aristocracy of England allowed such accusations to go forth without proof they did themselves a great injustice in not contradicting them. He had likewise the statement of a Mr. Whatmore, at one time mayor of Bridgnorth, but as he had presented a petition that night, and had it read at the table referring to the case of Whatmore and others, he would not further dilate on it except to

  983
  state that that gentleman was turned out of his house avowedly on account of the manner in which he voted. With these facts before him, he trusted he might be successful in his appeal to the hon. Gentleman; although he was afraid that with these philosophical characters when once they assumed a point it was difficult to make them let it go. If Mr. James Stuart Mill could have been present he would have advised the hon. Member differently, and have said, "My son, stick to the ballot and let the women alone." In conclusion, he would urge the House to dismiss all their unworthy fears of the people. The people were loyal and honest, and would repay the trust reposed in them. They were entitled to the protection of the ballot while discharging their political duty, but the Legislature was slow to give them that protection, because it was protection from themselves. That he had good reason to know was the feeling of the people. The ballot must come. Justice could not be denied for ever. It was better to give this boon graciously and at once, without waiting till it would be taken ungraciously. Let not their fears deny that which at no distant period their fears would compel them to grant. He had a firm conviction that the words of Bentham were true, that "secresy of suffrage is the Pole Star of Reform." He concluded by moving—
  "That, having regard to the failure of all direct legislation against corrupt practices at Parliamentary Elections, it is expedient to make experiment of the system of taking the votes at such Elections anonymously, according to the Laws now in force in other parts of Her Majesty's Dominions."—(Mr. H. Berkeley.)
  MR. MOWBRAYsaid, in rising to offer a few observations in opposition to the Motion, he considered he had a right on the part of the House to complain of the attack with which the hon. Member for Bristol commenced his speech in describing that as a hostile House of Commons. He thought the House was not fairly liable to such a charge, and the hon. Member for Bristol was the last person who should have made it. [Mr. H. BERKELEY: I said hostile to Reform.] An Instruction had been passed by the House on the 28th of May last, before going into Committee on the Reform Bill, in the most general terms possible that the Committee should have power to make better provision for the prevention of bribery and corruption—not specifying any plan and not excluding the particular crotchet of the hon. Member for Bristol; but
  984
  against that general provision he found the vote recorded of the hon. Member for Bristol himself. Well, then, he thought he had a right to say that this House of Commons, whether he took its general feeling as expressed in that resolution, or its conduct as evinced by the inquiries which had taken place before Election Committees and the Commission issued for inquiry into boroughs where corrupt practices had been reported, had not shown itself hostile or indifferent to any measure for the prevention of bribery and corruption. The hon. Gentleman had taken them over very extended periods of history; he had carried them as far back as 240 years, and over every quarter of the globe; but he owned when he recollected the freshness of the illustrations with which the hon. Gentleman had been in the habit of pourtraying the orgies of these septennial saturnalias that he had not entertained the House with such amusing illustration with reference to the demoralization and bribery which prevailed on those occasions as he had been accustomed to do. The hon. Gentleman had detailed the arguments with which he said this Motion had hitherto been encountered, and with which he expected it might be encountered again. It was, no doubt, the difficulty which attended any hon. Gentleman who attempted to meet the arguments of the hon. Member for Bristol that while one drew his illustration from recent facts the other had to go back and bring down his weapons from the old armoury; but, nevertheless, they were found to answer, and he was quite sure they would answer on the present occasion. The hon. Member for Bristol had divided the argument into four classes, and the first argument against the ballot was that it was unmanly; in answer to which the hon. Gentleman said it was adopted in all their clubs, and especially in their military clubs. He must, however, remind the hon. Gentleman that there was no analogy at all to be drawn between voting at the election of a member for a club and voting for a Member of Parliament. The one was political, the other was social. When voting for a Member of Parliament the electors voted on public grounds, and with reference to the qualification of individuals to discharge a public duty; but with respect to club elections they were entitled to indulge any caprice or fancy they pleased, and say for any reason, or for no reason, that they did not choose to associate with a certain individual in a particular club. He thought, when the hon. Gentleman touched upon the

  985
  subject of clubs, that he was going to enlighten the House with respect to a club with the arcana of which he was acquainted —and to tell them what was the position of the Reform Club at the present moment with regard to the ballot. Three years since it was stated by the noble Lord (Viscount Palmerston), who was then at the head of the Government, and the statement was unchallenged and uncontradicted, that, upon the Motion of the hon. Member for Birmingham, the ballot had been abolished in that club. ["No, no!" from several hon. Members.] Hon. Gentlemen opposite might say "No!" but on reference to Hansard it would be found stated by the noble Lord that in the Reform Club, on the Motion of the hon. Member for Birmingham, the election by ballot by the general members of the club had been abolished, and that the election had been referred, he believed, to a committee, but, at all events, to a limited number of members of the club. An hon. Member informed him that the ballot now prevailed there, but he was not sure, judging from recent occurrences, that it operated altogether satisfactorily to certain Gentlemen who might be adherents of the great Liberal party, but who had not been successful in getting admission into that club. The hon. Member for Bristol, proceeding next to deal with the argument that the ballot was un-English, met that point by simply remarking, "I say it is not so."
  MR. H. BERKELEY: I said that nineteen out of twenty people were elected to offices by the ballot, and that therefore the practice must be English.
  MR. MOWBRAYsaid, he was merely taking the hon. Gentleman's speech and not anything that he might have thought of since. The hon. Gentleman's words were, "The second argument against the ballot is that it is un-English; and I meet that by saying it is not so." It was sufficient, however, to remark that the hon. Gentleman, in endeavouring to introduce a practice which was at variance with the feelings and habits of Englishmen, himself admitted the ballot to be un-English, for it certainly did not prevail here at the present moment. Moreover, it was un-English, as being opposed to the general public opinion of the country; and when the hon. Gentleman spoke of a hostile House of Commons, he was not speaking of the particular assembly he was addressing, but was thinking of the twenty-nine years during which he had been associated with the Liberal party; but he
  986
  must be well aware that during that time public opinion had been steadily and unequivocally pronouncing in favour of the old, open, and Constitutional mode of voting, and against the secret mode which he sought to introduce. No one knew better than the hon. Gentleman himself that he could no longer muster as numerous a band of adherents as that which was marshalled thirty years ago under the leadership of Mr. Grote. The next argument which the hon. Gentleman discussed was that the ballot was not successful. Well, he himself admitted that in America, except in the State of Massachusetts, the voting was by ticket, the ticket being exhibited in the hat, and that certainly was not secret voting. The example of America used to be stock argument in favour of the ballot, but this was now altogether exploded. The hon. Gentleman next instanced Belgium, and referred them to the gentlemen now on a visit from that country to the Volunteers at Wimbledon, but he gave no particulars as to the operation of the ballot in that country. He then took them to France; but what was his argument with reference to France? Why, he proved, by the statement which he read from a French elector, the very objection which the opponents of the ballot were in the habit of propounding in that House. Their argument was that the ballot would encourage fraud, dissimulation, treachery, and lying, and the hon. Gentleman quoted a French elector, who said, "They can enforce the promise, but they cannot secure the vote." This was exactly what the opponents of the ballot maintained, that men would tell a lie and promise their votes, and then would vote the other way. The hon. Gentleman afterwards came to what had prevailed in the Australian colonies for the last half-dozen years, and really if those colonies had not adopted the ballot and furnished a peg for the hon. Gentleman and his supporters, it was impossible to say where they could have gone for an argument, for America had failed them, Belgium had been merely mentioned without any illustration, and France had completely proved the case against them. The hon. Gentleman was therefore driven, as a last resource, to the experience of the last few years in the Australian colonies, and he put this forward as a reason why the ballot should be introduced into this country. He had, however, completely failed to prove that the ballot had been so successful even in

  987
  Australia as to warrant its adoption in a country like this. The hon. Gentleman then came to the argument that the franchise was a trust, and that argument he always had an evident difficulty in encountering, because while the advocates of the ballot were obliged to admit that the franchise was a trust, they tried to define the trust in their own way. The hon. Gentleman contended that it was a trust which the voter was to execute freely and indifferently, but he then went on to read the Resolution of the Parliament of 1628, which stated that the service was to be rendered pro bono publico. Now, that was the very nature of the trust—namely, that the franchise conferred upon the elector should be exercised by him for the benefit of the whole community, both of those who had votes and those who had not, and of all who would be affected by taxation or legislation. It was for that purpose that the trust was confided to the voter, and he was bound to exercise it with all the responsibility that attached to an act openly done and amenable to public opinion. It was a trust, and not a property, for the hon. Gentleman surely would not contend that any one was entitled to sell his vote; and yet, if it was not a trust, there was no reason why he should not do so. The unanswerable argument which had been over and over again stated in that House, and which he shrank from repeating because he had heard it put with so much force by the noble Lord the late Leader of the House, was that the franchise was a sacred trust to be exercised publicly under the responsibility of public opinion, and that consequently persons should not be allowed to shelter themselves under secret voting. The hon. Gentleman ridiculed the analogy which was drawn by the Solicitor General in his Guildford speech between the position of the elector and that of the representative. His hon. and learned Friend, however, would no doubt have a word to say with respect to that election. What he contended was that publicity was the principle that pervaded all their transactions. Every public act which an Englishman had to discharge was performed publicly and in the face of day, and the solemn act of exercising the franchise in the election of a Member of Parliament should surely be discharged in the same manner. The proceedings of that House were public, the proceedings of the other House and of Parliamentary Committees, with very few exceptions, were public also.
  988
  Public opinion was brought to bear upon their debates and upon the speeches and actions of every individual Member. Publicity, moreover, attended the proceedings of our Courts of Justice, the debates in our municipal institutions, and even the details of every parish vestry. If they went from the highest tribunal in the land, from the House of Lords down to the smallest body, whether a municipal corporation, a parish vestry, a board of health, or whatever it might be, publicity they found to be the life and soul of all their proceedings. Everything in England was public. Well, then, if that was the case, he believed the House would agree with him that anything which would tend to destroy that publicity, and to substitute for it a system of secrecy, enabling men to skulk away and do something which they dared not avow and could not publicly justify—anything of that kind would be most unsatisfactory, and would, moreover, be altogether inoperative. He believed that the attempt to secure secrecy would be altogether futile. How could it be done? They must alter the whole course of an Englishman's life, all his thoughts and actions; they must not merely put down all election speeches, committees, and canvassing, and all the acts which proclaimed a man's opinions, but they must actually put a lock upon his tongue in the society of his friends and in the retirement of his own family circle. If, indeed, he might venture to trespass upon the House, he would quote a few words from the inimitable pamphlet of Sydney Smith. If this were not a new Parliament, and if he did not think there might be some younger Members to whom the passage was not so familiar, he would not trouble the House; but the argument was a most unanswerable one. Sydney Smith's words were as follows:—
  "He must talk with the wrong people, subscribe to the wrong club, huzza at the wrong dinner, break the wrong head, lead a long life of lies between every election, and he must do this, not only eundo in his calm and prudential state, but redeundo from the market, warmed with beer and expanded with alcohol; and he must not only carry on his seven years of dissimulation before the world, but in the very bosom of his family, or he must expose himself to the dangerous garrulity of wife, children, and servants."
  He did not believe such a state of things would be possible, for the feelings of Englishmen were entirely repugnant to such systematic dissimulation. The continuous growth of English freedom had

  989
  been won by the open expression of public opinion. It was not by any of the secret and underhand expedients which the hon. Gentleman suggested, but by the open expression of opinion on the hustings, and by suffering, if necessary, in the cause that Englishmen had at heart, that they had won their liberties for centuries past, and by that means alone they would preserve them. He did not wish to draw any contrast between the position of affairs in France and in England, but we possessed an amount of individual liberty which could not be found in some of the other countries that had been cited by the hon. Gentleman. He opposed the Motion, therefore, because he believed that the ballot would tend to destroy that public spirit, that manliness, that courage, which had been the characteristic of English life, because he believed it would tend to endanger those institutions which had given us greater freedom and greater stability than any other nation in the world had enjoyed, and because he believed it was opposed to the enlightened public opinion of the country.
  LORD HENRY PERCY: The hon. Member for Bristol has thought fit to bring three most unfounded charges against my brother. It is impossible for me to answer the last two, because this is the first time I have heard of them. My brother has, however, desired me to deny most fully and completely that he was guilty of any interference, through his steward, with the recent election at Guildford. This is a letter which my brother has received from his steward:—
  "Albury Park, Guildford. "My Lord,—Referring to the letter your Lordship received this morning from Mr. Bovill, I had no interference whatever in the late election at Guildford. Mr. Dowlin has a branch establishment here as harness maker, and as such I have employed him for some time for my farm horses. I had occasion about a month since to complain of his charges, and inquired for what he would contract to do a certain work. He mentioned a sum, and finding I could get it done for considerably less, I wrote him last Monday as follows:—
  "'Albury, July, 1866.
  "'Mr. Dowlin,—Will you please make up my bill to Saturday next, in case I desire to close the accounts?—I am, your obedient servant, "'G. W. How.'"
  My brother, Lord Percy, had nothing to do with his steward's farm horses; they did not belong to my brother, and they were employed upon the steward's farm. With regard to my brother sending for
  990
  the poll book and that backstairs statement about a certain person having told a tradesman that if he did not vote for the Solicitor General he would not be employed again, as I said before, this is the first time I have beard of these reports, and I can give no contradiction to them; but the hon. Member for Bristol may rely upon it that my brother will not allow them to pass uncontradicted, and will prove that the hon. Member has attempted to support the measure he proposes by unfounded statements picked up from the gossip of a country town.
  MR. ONSLOWsaid, he did not wish to enter into the general question, but to state to the House certain facts which had come to his knowledge within the last few days, and which had transpired in the borough which he had the honour to represent. If hon. Members would only state facts which came within their own knowledge of intimidation they would do more to carry the Motion of the hon. Member than all the convincing and able speeches of the hon. Member could do. At the same time, he admitted that Gentlemen on his side of the House were as guilty of those mal-practices as certain Gentlemen were on the other. The Liberals were, however, very clumsy imitators of those masters of the art, the Conservatives. The great landowners were bitter enemies of the ballot—and why? Because the last thing in the world they would give up was that political influence which they most unjustly and unfairly exercised over their dependents. There was an election at Guildford last week, when the Solicitor General was one of the candidates. The hon. and learned Member was opposed by a gentleman who came forward, not because he had any particular ambition to sit in Parliament—but because the occasion was the first and most fitting opportunity that was afforded of protesting against a Government which he with many other persons believed did not enjoy the full confidence of the country, and also of protesting against the unfair methods that had been adopted for the purpose of defeating the most modest proposal of Reform ever offered to the country. This gentleman accordingly came forward, and he (Mr. Onslow) did his best to help him. They, the Liberals, secured at least half the promises in the borough. There were 647 voters, and the Solicitor General polled 316, but the intimidation that was used was so extreme that it threatened to ruin the trade and prosperity of the borough,

  991
  and so the Liberals withdrew their man. They had a right to assume that those electors who had promised them their votes would have appeared at the poll if they had dared. For forty years the Liberals had always stood at the head of the poll in that borough; and why did they not on the late occasion? How was it that at this election the Solicitor General should have polled 316 votes, and the Liberals only twelve? Such a thing was unparalleled in the annals of Parliament. The fact was that if the Liberal party had persevered the town would have been half ruined: the tailors would have had to close their shops, the shoemakers would have made no shoes, the laundresses would have been unemployed, the butter would have been unchurned, and the whole borough would have been ruined. The noble Lord asserted that the letter which had been referred to had nothing whatever to do with the matter; but he (Mr. Onslow) had it in his hand. It was dated Albury Park, July 10, and it was written to the saddler—"Mr. Dowlin: Please make out your bill, as I may probably desire to close the account on Saturday next"—the day after the poll. He (Mr. Onslow) would make no comment on that letter. It was written by Mr. G. W. How, the steward of Lord Percy. He would mention another case. There was a tradesman in Guildford who went to Albury Park on the morning before the election. He was shown into the drawing room and was doing his business there, when the nearest relation of Lord Percy came into the room, and that party said, "Well, how are you going to vote?" The tradesman replied, "I have not made up my mind." The party then said, "If you vote against the Solicitor General, you must not come to this house again; it is the intention of Lord Percy to send for the poll book, and those who vote the wrong way shall no longer come near this house in the way of trade." He (Mr. Onslow) had the greatest possible faith in his information, and, if the noble Lord wished, he would give it to him in a private interview. He considered that the Liberals of Guildford had only polled so few votes at the late election in consequence of the bribery, corruption, and intimidation which were employed on the other side.
  THE SOLICITOR GENERALsaid, that he had not heard to-night for the first time of the letter to Mr. Dowlin, it was made to do duty in the most ample manner during the election at Guildford on the
  992
  strength of the representation that it proceeded from a Peer of the Realm, there being one nobleman to whom, from his connection with the borough, suspicion would naturally be attached; and the same representation appeared to have been made to the hon. Member for Bristol. His hon. Colleague now alluded to another nobleman not of the same politics as himself, and exerted himself to make the greatest use he could of the letter, which it seemed that he still believed, despite the assertion of the noble Lord, had some reference to the election and was intended to intimidate Mr. Dowlin. He hoped it would not be thought that any elector had hesitated to give his vote openly. He stated that on the hustings at Guildford, and he now repeated the statement, and he thought the best proof that could be given in favour of open voting was the conduct of this very Mr. Dowlin, to whom the letter in question was written, and also of Mr. How. That letter had no more reference to the election than any other letter which might be written on the subject of a disputed account. Mr. Dowlin was a saddler carrying on business at Guildford, but he also had a shop close to Albury Park. He was in the habit of repairing the harness belonging to the farmers there, and Mr. How had a trifling dispute with him. When Mr. Dowlin received this letter it happened to be at the time of the election, and he immediately put his own construction upon it and handed it over to the hon. Gentleman who last addressed the House. After all, what did this case of intimidation amount to? Why, from first to last he had been opposed by Mr. Dowlin, who throughout frankly avowed his intention of doing so. That was the way in which every Englishman ought to act. Even if the letter had been written with reference to the election, it would have had no effect on the tradesmen of Guildford, who like his opponent, Mr. Dowlin, were honourable and independent men. His Colleague (Mr. Onslow), however, said that somebody, whose name be declined to mention, went to Albury Park and was there told by somebody that he was not to go to the house again unless he voted for the Solicitor General. He had never heard of this before, and consequently could not say what really occurred, though he could easily understand that something of the kind might have taken place. He had been told, for instance, that one of his own housemaids, in his own house, had said to a working man, "If you do not vote for

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  Bovill, don't show your face here again." He had no doubt that a good many housemaids had made similar statements. In this case the housemaid was an old servant of his, and the man to whom she addressed the remark was a decided Radical, who had promised to vote against him. Of course, nothing that any servant might say would at all alter the opinions or the vote of that working man. For his own part he might remark that he had lived for a long time in the neighbourhood, and had associated with persons of all shades of opinion, but he had never heard that any members of his household, the housemaid included, had at any time endeavoured to deter any one from exercising his privilege of voting. He had also heard his hon. Colleague testify to the independent feeling of the electors of the borough of Guildford. That was at a time when he happened to be in the ascendancy at one election, and when certain persons had good reason, according to the argument of hon. Gentlemen opposite, to call for the protection of the ballot. But the Conservative electors of Guildford, and of many other boroughs in the kingdom, did not desire to be protected by the ballot. He ought, perhaps, to apologize to the House for having referred to the Guildford election. He should not have done so had it not been attempted to make political capital out of the letter which was written by the farmer who happened to be the steward of Lord Percy. That letter had been referred to in that House as furnishing an argument in favour of the ballot, but for his part he did not see that it proved anything except the extreme independence of the person to whom it was addressed. After the great pains which were taken to select a candidate to contest the borough of Guildford at the last election, it was somewhat strange to be now told that that candidate did not desire to have a seat in that House. He, at all events, should have been ashamed to resort to the means which that gentleman had adopted. On arriving in Guildford he found that his opponent had opened a number of public-houses. Was that done with a view to promote freedom of election and the independence of the voters? Public-houses had been engaged by a friend of his hon. Colleague, and he had been pressed to follow that example, but had naturally declined to do so. He believed that the contest had been got up solely for the purpose of putting
  994
  him to expense and trouble; but he should not trespass on the time of the House any further with reference to so merely personal an incident as his own election for the borough of Guildford. What took place then did not give the slightest ground for supporting the Motion of the hon. Member for Bristol, but only showed the independence and integrity of the electors, who had resisted, and would resist, all attempts to owerawe them.
  CAPTAIN VIVIANsaid, he should not refer to the Guildford election, nor descend to any personal attacks. He did not suppose that the hands of hon. Gentlemen on that side of the House were much cleaner than those of hon. Gentlemen on the other. He would remark with reference to the speech of the Judge Advocate General, that the right hon. Gentleman had acted as Chairman of the Great Yarmouth Election Committee, which reported that at the late election for that borough corrupt practices had prevailed, into which a Royal Commission had since been appointed to inquire. He could not understand why this had been made a party question, as it only referred to the manner in which votes should be recorded, and not to the votes themselves. With regard to a favourite argument against the ballot, he might point out that the decisions of jurymen were given in public, though the votes of individual jurymen remained a secret. In his opinion the only argument of any weight against the ballot was that made use of by Lord Palmerston—that the franchise was a trust to be exercised for the benefit of the non-electors. On the day of nomination the returning officer first put it to the crowd in front of the hustings to say who the candidate should be, and when the show of hands was taken at least three-fourths of the persons present were non-electors. He would suggest that power might be given to the returning officer to put it to the assembly at the hustings whether the polling should be taken by secret instead of public voting, and to declare the mode of election in conformity with that decision of the non-electors.
  MR. LOCKEsaid, the House had had a discussion not on the ballot, but on the Guildford election. His right hon. Friend opposite (Mr. Mowbray) made use of the reference which had been made by his hon. Friend (Mr. Berkeley) to the Frenchman, who told him that under the ballot he could make a promise, but that it could not be enforced as an argument against the ballot.

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  Now he (Mr. Locke) contended that that was a strong argument in favour of the ballot, because he denied the right of a man first to exact a promise, and then to enforce it. What right had any man to enforce that which they all admitted was a secret in the bosom of the person who had the right to exercise it? It was amusing to find how hon. Gentlemen on the Ministerial side of the House shielded themselves under the name of Lord Palmerston—the men who had traduced Lord Palmerston while he was living. He had never heard those hon. Members say anything in that noble Lord's favour while he was alive, except on the hustings when it suited their purpose. He agreed in what had been said by Lord Palmerston—that the franchise was a trust, and that the voter should have full opportunity of performing that trust, but under the present system you get a promise, which is used as a means of preventing the voter from performing that trust according to his conscience. The ballot was the only mode in which a voter could exercise his trust as an honest and conscientious man. In the Reform Club they had returned to the system of having the election of members by a general ballot. For some time that practice had been in suspense, and the election rested with a council of forty, who sometimes were called "the Forty Thieves." There was not, he believed, any particular reason for that appellation. He knew as a fact that they conducted their business very well, having had the honour himself to be one of them. But they had recently at a general meeting determined to return to their first-love, and now the old system of general voting was adopted. He sincerely hoped that hon. Members would vote that night, as if they were voting by ballot; and if they did they would carry the Motion of his hon. Friend.
  MR. H. BERKELEYsaid, he wished, in replying, to remove the impression from the minds of hon. Members that he had complained of the hostility of the House to his Motion, as on the contrary he felt he was under an obligation to hon. Members for the great kindness and patience which they had always accorded him, and he owed a debt of gratitude to the present Chancellor of the Exchequer, who on several occasions had kindly permitted him to bring forward his Motion from the Opposition side of the table.
  Motion made, and Question put,
  "That, having regard to the failure of all direct legislation against corrupt practices at Parliamentary Elections, it is expedient to make experiment of the system of taking the votes at such Elections anonymously, according to the Laws now in force in other parts of Her Majesty's Dominions."—(Mr. H. Berkeley.)
  The House divided:—Ayes 110; Noes 197: Majority 87.

ELECTORAL FRANCHISE.

  MOTION FOR A RETURN.
  MR. J. STUART MILL,in rising to move for an
  Address for "Return of the number of Freeholders, Householders, and others in England and Wales who, fulfilling the conditions of property or rental prescribed by Law as the qualification for the Electoral Franchise, are excluded from the Franchise by reason of their sex,"
  said: Sir, I rise to make the Motion of which I have given notice. After the petition which I had the honour of presenting a few weeks ago, the House would naturally expect that its attention would be called, however briefly, to the claim preferred in that document. The petition, and the circumstances attendant on its preparation, have, to say the least, greatly weakened the chief practical argument which we have been accustomed to hear against any proposal to admit women to the electoral franchise—namely, that few, if any, women desire it. Originating as that petition did entirely with ladies, without the instigation, and, to the best of my belief, without the participation of any person of the male sex in any stage of the proceedings, except the final one of its presentation to Parliament, the amount of response which became manifest, the number of signatures obtained in a very short space of time, not to mention the quality of many of those signatures, may not have been surprising to the ladies who promoted the petition, but was certainly quite unexpected by me. I recognize in it the accustomed sign that the time has arrived when a proposal of a public nature is ripe for being taken into serious consideration — namely, when a word spoken on the subject is found to have been the expression of a silent wish pervading a great number of minds, and a signal given in the hope of rallying a few supporters is unexpectedly answered by many. It is not necessary to offer any justification for the particular Motion which I am about to make. When the complaint is made that certain citizens of this nation,

  997
  fulfilling all the conditions and giving all the guarantees which the Constitution and the law require from those who are admitted to a voice in determining who shall be their rulers, are excluded from that privilege for what appears to them, and for what appears to me, an entirely irrelevant consideration, the least we can do is to ascertain what number of persons are affected by the grievance, and how great an addition would be made to the constituency if this disability were removed. I should not have attempted more than this in the present Session, even if the recent discussions in reference to Reform had not been brought to an abrupt close. Even if the late Government had succeeded in its honourable attempt to effect an amicable compromise of the Reform question, any understanding or any wish which might have existed as to the finality, for a certain period, of that compromise, could not have effected such a proposal as this, the adoption of which would not be, in any sense of the term, a lowering of the franchise, and is not intended to disturb in any degree the distribution of political power among the different classes of society. Indeed, hon. Gentlemen opposite seem to think, and I suppose they are the best judges, that this concession, assuming it to be made, if it had any effect on party politics at all, would be favourable to their side; and the right hon. Member for Dublin University, in his humorous manner, advised me on that ground to withdraw this article from my political programme; but I cannot, either in jest or in earnest, adopt his suggestion, for I am bound to consider the permanent benefit of the community before the temporary interest of a party; and I entertain the firmest conviction that whatever holds out an inducement to one-half of the community to exercise their minds on the great social and political questions which are discussed in Parliament, and whatever causes the great influence they already possess to be exerted under the guidance of greater knowledge, and under a sense of responsibility, cannot be ultimately advantageous to the Conservative or any other cause, except so far as that cause is a good one. And I rejoice in the knowledge that in the estimation of many hon. Gentlemen of the party opposite, the proposal made in the petition is, like many of the most valuable Reforms, as truly Conservative, as I am sure it is truly Liberal. I listened with pleasure and gratitude to the right hon. Gentleman who is now Chancellor of
  998
  the Exchequer, when in his speech on the second reading of the Reform Bill, he said he saw no reason why women of independent means should not possess the electoral franchise, in a country where they can preside in manorial courts and fill parish offices—to which let me add, and the Throne.
  MR. WALPOLEsaid, he would consent to the Motion, without however pledging himself to any future course on the question.
  Motion agreed to.
  Address for "Return of the number of Freeholders, Householders, and others in England and Wales who, fulfilling the conditions of property or rental prescribed by Law as the qualification for the Electoral Franchise, are excluded from the Franchise by reason of their sex."—(Mr. J. Stuart Mill.)

  VETERINARY SURGEONS BILL.
  (Mr. Holland, Mr. Newdegate.)
  [BILL 121.] COMMITTEE.
  Order for Committee read.
  MR. HOLLANDproposed to defer the Committee till Tuesday.
  MR. WALDEGRAVE - LESLIEsaid, that he would like some assurance from the hon. Member, as to whether or not he would adopt the Amendments proposed by the hon. Member for Edinburgh (Mr. M'Laren.) Very great injustice would be done to Scotland if these Amendments were not adopted. Were veterinary students to be expected to come up to London for some months in order to take out an English diploma? And was every one in Scotland without such an English diploma to be prohibited from practising in Scotland? Surely such an injustice could not be tolerated. If he did not receive the assurance that the Amendments of which the hon. Member for Edinburgh had given notice were to be adopted, he should, in the absence of the hon. and gallant Member for Fife (Sir Robert Anstruther), take up his Amendment—namely, that the House do, on this day three months, go into Committee on the said Bill.
  MR. M'LARENsaid, that he must endorse all that had been said by the hon. Member. If his Amendments were not adopted, and in the absence of so many of the Scotch Members who did not expect the Bill to be proceeded with, he should give the Bill his most determined opposition.
  MR. KINNAIRDsaid, that he must

  999
  appeal to his hon. Friend the Member for Evesham not to proceed with the Bill except on the understanding that full justice be done to the veterinary profession in Scotland.
  MR. HOLLANDsaid, he could not give the assurance asked for by his hon. Friend the Member for Hastings (Mr. Waldegrave-Leslie), but he would put off the Committee on the Bill till Tuesday the 24th.
  Committee deferred till Tuesday next.

  EXPIRING LAWS.
  Select Committee appointed, "to inquire what temporary Laws of a public and general nature are now in force, and what Laws of the like nature have expired, since the last Report upon the subject; and also what Laws of the like nature are about to expire at particular periods, or in consequence of any contingent public event; and to report the same, with their Observations there-upon, to the House:"—Mr. HUNT, Mr. DODSON, Sir STAFFORD NORTHCOTE, Mr. ATTORNEY GENERAL, Mr. SOLICITOR GENERAL, Mr. ADDERLEY, Mr. WILLIAM COWPER, Mr. CHILDERS, Colonel FRENCH, Mr. BARING, Colonel TAYLOR, Mr. DUNLOP, and Lord JOHN MANNERS:—Power to send for persons, papers, and records; Three to be the quorum.

  NAVY AND ARMY EXPENDITURE (1864–5.)
  Considered in Committee.
  (In the Committee.)
  1. Resolved, That the Expenditure incurred for certain Navy Services in the year ended the 31st day of March 1865 has fallen short of the sums appropriated to those Services by the sum of £305,038 10 s. 11 d.; and that the Expenditure which has been incurred for certain other Navy Services and not provided for in the sums appropriated to those Services for the same year has amounted to the sum of £266,404 15 s. ld.
  2. Resolved, That the said Expenditure for Navy Services unprovided for as aforesaid, amounting to £266,404 15 s. ld., has been temporarily defrayed, under the authority of the Commissioners of Her Majesty's Treasury, out of the Surpluses which have arisen, as aforesaid, upon other Votes for Navy Services, amounting to £305,038 10 s. 11 d.
  3. Resolved, That the application of so much of the said Surpluses be sanctioned.
  4. Resolved, That the Expenditure incurred for certain Army Services in the year ended the 31st day of March 1865 has fallen short of the sums appropriated to those Services by the sum of £418,628 4s. 4d., and that the Expenditure which has been incurred for certain other Army Services and not provided for in the sums appropriated to those Services for the same year, has amounted to the sum of £214,168 13 s. 6d.
  5. Resolved, That the said Expenditure for Army Services unprovided for, as aforesaid, amounting to £214,168 13 s. 6d., has been temporarily defrayed, under the authority of the Commissioners of Her Majesty's Treasury, out of the
  1000
  Surpluses which have arisen, as aforesaid, upon other Votes for Army Services, amounting to £418,628 4s. 4d.
  6. Resolved, That the application of so much of the said Surpluses be sanctioned.
  Resolutions to be reported To-morrow.

  OVERSEER OF THE POOR (SMALL PARISHES) BILL.
  On Motion of Mr. HOWES, Bill to authorize and provide for the appointment of one Overseer of the Poor in small parishes, ordered to be brought in by Mr. HOWES, Mr. BAGGE, and Mr. DE GREY.
  Bill presented, and read the first time. [Bill 214.]

  COINAGE BILL.
  On Motion of Mr. HUNT, Bill to enable Her Majesty to declare Gold Coins to be issued from Her Majesty's Colonial Branch Mints a legal tender for payments, ordered to be brought in by Mr. HUNT and Mr. ADDERLEY.
  Bill presented, and read the first time. [Bill 215.]

  DRAINAGE AND IMPROVEMENT OF LANDS ACT (IRELAND) PROVISIONAL ORDER BILL.
  On Motion of Mr. HUNT, Bill to confirm a Provisional Order under the Drainage and Improvement of Lands Act (Ireland) and the Acts amending the same, ordered to be brought in by Mr. HUNT and Lord NAAS.
  Bill presented, and read the first time. [Bill 216.]

  COURTS OF JUSTICE BILL.
  On Motion of Mr. HUNT, Bill to amend the Acts relating to the intended Courts of Justice, ordered to be brought in by Mr. HUNT and Lord JOHN MANNERS.
  Bill presented, and read the first time. [Bill 217.]

  PUBLIC WORKS, HARBOURS, &c. [ADVANCES] BILL.
  Resolution reported;
  "That it is expedient to authorize the Commissioners of Her Majesty's Treasury to make Advances or Loans out of the Consolidated Fund of the United Kingdom to an amount not exceeding £360,000 per annum, for carrying on Public Works and Fisheries, and the employment of the Poor; to an amount not exceeding £350,000 per annum for five years, for the purposes of 'The Harbours and Passing Tolls, &c. Act, 1861;' to an amount not exceeding £500,000 for the purposes of 'The Cattle Diseases Prevention Act, 1866;' to an amount not exceeding £250,000 for the purposes of the 'Labouring Classes' Dwellings Act, 1866;' and to an amount not exceeding £500,000 for enabling the Public Works Loan Commissioners to make temporary Loans to Railway Companies in Ireland."
  Resolution agreed to:—Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. DODSON, Mr. CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER, Lord NAAS, and Mr. HUNT.
  Bill presented, and read the first time. [Bill 218]

  PUBLIC WORKS LOANS (IRELAND) BILL.
  Bill "to authorize for a further period the application of Money for the purposes of Loans for carrying on Public Works in Ireland," presented, and read the first time. [Bill 219.]

  RAILWAY COMPANIES (IRELAND) BILL.
  Bill "to enable the Public Works Loan Commissioners to make temporary advances to Railway Companies in Ireland," presented, and read the first time. [Bill 220.]
  House adjourned at after half Twelve o'clock.

MINUTES.
PUBLIC BILLS—First Reading— Revising Barristers' Qualifications* (196).
Second Reading — Tenure (Ireland) (No. 2) (175); National Gallery Enlargement (171); Pier and Harbour Orders Confirmation* (185); Dean Forest (Walmore and the Bearce Commons)* (178).
Committee—Dogs [170], negatived.
Report—Glebe Lands (Scotland)* (194); Carriage and Deposit of Dangerous Goods* (159).

COLONIAL BISHOPRICS.

  QUESTION.
  LORD ST. LEONARDS,anticipating future legislation of some kind in reference to Colonial Bishoprics, desired to know, If the Government would deem it expedient to furnish the House with information as to their respective endowments, so that the House might be the better prepared for discussion?
  THE EARL OF DERBYreplied that the Colonial Secretary had already expressed his willingness to give the House all the information upon the subject that he possessed.
  LORD ST. LEONARDSsaid, that if
  918
  the endowments consisted of property in this country or abroad, the trustees of which were resident in this country, the English Courts of Law would have jurisdiction, and it might be left to them to determine to whom the property belonged. If, as in the case of New Zealand, the endowments were in the colonies, and the diversion of the endowment from its original purpose were sanctioned by the Colonial Legislature, there was no remedy for the donors except through the action of Parliament. He gave notice that, if any Bill shall be introduced into this House relating to the status of the Colonial Bishops who have surrendered or shall surrender their letters patent under the Crown, or shall no longer act under them, and which shall not provide for the return to the donors, after the deaths of the present Bishops, where such donors have not consented to the Bishops in succession enjoying the endowments although not acting under the authority of the Crown, he would move as Amendments to the Bill clauses for securing to the donors the return of their endowments upon the deaths of the present Bishops.
  THE BISHOP OF OXFORDsaid, that the money was paid to all the New Zealand Bishops by the Colonial Bishoprics' Council. The endowments of the Colonial Bishoprics were vested in the Colonial Bishoprics' Council at home, and the interest paid to the Bishops; but if the Bishops saw an opportunity of investing the money to better advantage in the colony they made application to the Council, and if the Council were satisfied with regard to the proposed investment they gave their sanction to it. In the case of the New Zealand group the money had been allowed to be invested in colonial instead of home property, and particular arrangements had been entered into with the Bishops and synods of the different dioceses. There was one point of which, he supposed, he should differ from his noble and learned Friend. He maintained that these Colonial Churches constituted the Church of England in the colonies, although they were not by law established and no peculiar advantages were conferred upon them. In every other respect they were the same body as the Church of England. Strictly speaking, therefore, they were the very body to which the money was originally given and no other. This being the case, there was no ground whatever for Bishop Selwyn or any of his brother Bishops bringing an accusation that the

  919
  Colonial Churches had received the money for one purpose and then tried to transfer it to another.

  TENURE (IRELAND) (No. 2) BILL.
  (The Marquess of Clanricarde.)
  (No. 175.) SECOND READING.
  Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
  THE MARQUESS OF CLANRICARDE,in moving the second reading of this Bill, said, he was taking what might, perhaps, be thought an unusual and unreasonable course. He was anxious that their Lordships should read the Bill a second time. It had been a long time before the House, and from the information which he had received from all parts of Ireland, and from communications which he had had with Members of the other House, he had reason to believe that the principle on which the Bill was based was generally approved. He was, of course, well aware that any attempt to pass this Bill, or any other measure of the sort in the present Session, would be absurd; but he was anxious that their Lordships should affirm its principle, although he should not attempt to proceed with it beyond the second reading. Their Lordships would recollect that the first Bill which he had had the honour to lay before them was introduced into that House as long ago as the 20th of March. Some time since he was desired by the late Government to let the Bill rest until the measure on the same subject which had been introduced into the House of Commons should he brought into that House, so that the two Bills might be considered together. He had learnt with satisfaction that the Government Bill would not be further proceeded with that Session; but he thought that, as this subject had given rise to much discussion in Parliament, and also out of Parliament, especially in Ireland, it was highly desirable that some sound principle of legislation with regard to it should be recognized at least by one House of Parliament. The present Bill, though not identical in all its provisions with, was substantially the same as, that which he introduced about three months ago. Some changes had been made in matters of detail, but the principle remained the same. The clauses, for instance, had been condensed, and this Bill thereby made considerably shorter than its predecessor. Another alteration of some importance was the withdrawal of the re-
  920
  trospective clause. The principle of the Bill was a system of voluntary contracts between landlords and their tenants. He thought the tenure of land in Ireland ought to be in principle the same as that which prevailed in England. At the same time, he did not object to the principle that the tenant was entitled to compensation in respect of labour and capital legitimately laid out by him in improving the land; but he was far from recognizing the proposition which had been advanced that a tenant might make any outlay, or might at any time say he had made an outlay, and might claim compensation for it, even though such expenditure might have been made without the knowledge or positively against the will of the landlord. He had not introduced a retrospective clause in the present measure, because though such a provision might in some cases possibly be just, the effect of it would be to open a door to all kinds of fraud and offer many inducements to perjury. The doctrines which had been disseminated in Ireland had been brought into notice more or less prominently by the Bill of the late Government. The three principal clauses of that Bill had been discussed all over Ireland; and really the principle affirmed by those clauses was almost sufficient to create a revolution in the country, because it was the principle invariably put forward by those who sought to make the people rise against the Imperial Government—namely, a division of the ownership of land. He felt quite convinced that there was no intention to put forward these doctrines, either by the Government or by his right hon. Friend who introduced the Bill. But those who asked Parliament to pass the Bill did not rest their case on the assertion that its enactments would be just. They simply argued that it was desirable to do away with the present state of what was called "landlordism" and to create a peasant proprietary in Ireland. He had a great respect for learning and for men who distinguished themselves by their writings; but he had come to the conclusion that practical men, even though they might be much less learned, were more fitted to deal with these questions than some of the writers to whom he alluded. It was new to him to learn that the whole rural economy of England was a vicious exception to the rules which prevailed among mankind generally, and that ours was an exceptional case. Our whole agricultural system, including all the improvement in agricultural implements, turns out, it is now said, to be a mistake and quite

  921
  unsound on economic principles. We ought to have no large proprietors, but only small ones; and this was the way things ought to be arranged in Ireland. We were told that the example of England ought to be avoided, and that of the Continent adopted. Now, he knew what the condition of small farmers in some other countries was; and he ventured to assert that the small farmers of Belgium and Germany were not in a better state than those of Ireland. He should like to know where good farming was to be found among small proprietary farmers? Certainly not in France, where the small proprietors of land were deeply in debt to the usurers in the neighbourhood. There was nothing new in the proposals of the Government, which were precisely those which were mentioned in the writings of Wolfe Tone—and just such a system of confiscation as was to have been introduced if the French had succeeded in their descent on Ireland. In Ireland there had been small proprietors on tenures similar to those of copyholders in this country; and those who knew anything of Ireland from personal experience, or who had read much about that country, knew what the effect of such fixity of tenure had been. The land had then been the property of middlemen; it was sublet again and again; and nominal proprietorship, with holdings insufficient for the support of the tenants, was the result. If Parliament did away with the large proprietors, the farms of Ireland would continue "to grow small by degrees and beautifully less." He objected to proposals of this kind being made, even supposing they were not carried into effect, because they kept the country in a ferment. There was as good agriculture in Ireland, on a small scale as well as a large, as in any other part of the United Kingdom. The agricultural improvements which had been adopted in this country were gradually finding their way into Ireland; but if one wanted to look for improved machinery and improved stock in Ireland he would not think of going among the peasant proprietary for that purpose — such things must be sought for on the lands of those who held at least tolerably large farms. It was untrue that the tenants of Ireland were all at variance with their landlords, and that the lowest class of the peasantry were the miserable beings which some persons represented them to be. On the contrary, the lowest class of the Irish peasantry were a great deal better off than the lowest class in Continental countries,
  922
  except where there were peculiar circumstances which told in favour of the latter, and as well off as the lowest class in this country. No doubt the present state of the law was not satisfactory, and he should wish to see their Lordships manifest a disposition to legislate on the subject. On a former occasion he mentioned an instance to show that legislation was required; and since then the case "Chute v. Busteed" had been heard. It was reported in the Irish Common Law Reports, and the facts were thus stated—
  "Appeal from the Court of Exchequer Chamber on the construction of the Landlord and Tenant Act of 1860. The Court of Exchequer had decided by three Judges to one that the 12th section was retrospective. The Court of Appeal, consisting of seven Judges, decided unanimously that it is not. The main question was whether the Act had completely abolished a feudal principle or not. Mr. Justice O'Hagan said— 'It is manifestly difficult to exaggerate the importance of the question to the proprietors of land in Ireland.' The minor points discussed were whether the Act was a consolidating or amending Act. The Court of Exchequer had held that it was the former, so had the Court of Common Pleas, by three Judges to one, in a late case of 'Bayly v. Lord Conyngham.' But now this is overruled. Mr. Justice Christian: 'It is not, I think, remarkable for skill in composition, for acquaintance with its subject, or for circumspection or foresight in anticipating or providing against questions, I will not say possible, but probable, and, like the present, even certain to arise.' All concurred in condemning the defects of the Act. Mr. Justice O'Hagan said—'It is a very ponderous piece of legislation, not quite homogeneous in all its parts, or easy of construction in all its provisions. Many of the sections are expressly prospective, many of them expressly retrospective, many of them in terms both prospective and retrospective, and many equivocal. … I shall not go through them in detail, but numerically. Six are in terms prospective and retrospective; twenty-four are in terms prospective; seventy-five have no terms making them expressly either retrospective or prospective. The 12th section properly ranges itself in the last class; its terms are equivocal.' Chief Justice Lefroy said—'Some of the views taken of the statute, and pressed upon us in the course of the argument, would upset the foundations of the laws of real property, and no new foundations were suggested.'"
  It was curious that the next two cases in the book were appeals on the same Act, which now regulates the tenure of land in Ireland. Many of the Judges had expressed themselves in strong terms upon the present state of the law, when cases arising out of its unsatisfactory condition had come before them. He was fully persuaded that Parliament was able by wise legislation to meet the wants of the country, and he held that he was quite justified in bringing the

  923
  present Bill forward. What he sought now was that their Lordships would read the Bill a second time, in order to affirm the principles it embodied. Ireland was in a very depressed condition, the effects of the financial crisis being felt through all classes of society; and were Parliament to show that it would set itself in earnest to deal with the subject great good would be done. Wise enactments regulating the relationship between landlord and tenant would do much to further the prosperity of agriculture.
  Moved, "That the Bill be now read 2a." —(The Marquess of Clanricarde.)
  THE EARL OF DERBY: I not think this Bill gives us a fair opportunity of discussing the very large and complicated questions relating to the landlord and tenant of Ireland. I am not about to follow the noble Marquess through the statement he has made and the principles he has laid down, though I entirely concur with him that our object should not be to subvert the arrangement now existing between landlord and tenant and introduce a class of peasant proprietors, but to simplify and improve the laws which regulate the matter. While I am desirous to uphold the rights of property, I would also remove all possibility of pressure or injustice being inflicted on the tenant farmer. My noble Friend, of course, has not proposed to do more than ask your Lordships to read the Bill a second time in order to affirm the principles which he has laid down without binding ourselves in the slightest degree to the details of the Bill. I cannot help saying that most of the principles are sound, just, and reasonable, and that the House and the country are under great obligations to my noble Friend for the great pains he has taken in examining this exceedingly complicated subject, and adopting a just and reasonable course between the some what conflicting interests of landlord and tenant. The principles of the Bill are— first, that all encouragement should be given to agreements in writing between landlord and tenant, which is a very important provision; and next, that great latitude should be given between landlord and tenant for entering into voluntary agreements for the management of the land. In order that this should be done, my noble Friend has introduced various forms of lease and various terms of agreement which may be adopted by the two parties. In this way a record would be
  924
  secured which could not be disputed. Then, again, the Bill contains provisions for facilitating an action for recovery on the part of the landlord or tenant, and thus by a simple and easy mode of procedure settling all difficulties. It further establishes a tribunal, cheap and easy, to which might be referred the interpretations of covenants; and lastly, it lays down rules by which the tenant at the expiration of a certain time may claim, according to the stipulated conditions, compensation for the improvements he has made in pursuance of the terms of his contract. These, my Lords, shortly stated, are the leading principles of the Bill, which I hold are fair and reasonable. I do not, however, in consenting to the second reading of it, bind myself in regard to the adoption of its details. It is a question which it will be the duty of the Government to take into consideration during the recess; and I can only say that my noble Friend by introducing the present Bill has given increased facilities to the Government in the further consideration of the subject. Without pledging myself to the details of the Bill, and without entering into the large question of landlord and tenant, I shall give my cheerful assent to the second reading of the Bill.
  EARL GRANVILLEsaid, he understood that in consenting to the second reading of the Bill their Lordships did not pledge themselves to the acceptance of its details, for there were various provisions requiring amendment. Under these circumstances, he would not oppose the Bill of the noble Marquess.
  Motion agreed to.
  Bill read 2a accordingly.

  NATIONAL GALLERY ENLARGEMENT BILL—(The Lord President.)
  (No. 171.) SECOND READING.
  Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
  THE DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM,in moving the second reading of this Bill, explained that its object was to authorize the purchase of a certain portion of land belonging to the parish of St. Martin, and gave permissive power to purchase the site of schools in the hands of the Charity Commissioners, called Archbishop Tenison's Schools. The land in question was little more than an acre in extent, and was situate at the back of the

  925
  National Gallery. It would further authorize the closing of the passage through the basement of the National Gallery, and also of the street behind that building. He did not think it was necessary to say anything further in explanation of the Bill as it had undergone discussion in the House of Commons, in which it had been introduced by the late Government. It was desirable that the Bill should be passed through the House without delay, as there was a private Bill depending upon it, introduced by the authorities of the parish of St. Martin, authorizing them to re-build their schools on other land. The expenditure which would be necessitated by the Bill was estimated at £120,000, which was held by the architect to be a fair and reasonable sum.
  Moved, "That the Bill be now read 2a." —(The Lord President.)
  VISCOUNT HARDINGEwished to ask the noble Duke whether he had any objection to postpone going into Committee on this Bill. The matter had been freely discussed in the House of Commons, and he understood that the whole question would shortly be raised in that House, and until then it was desirable that the further progress of the Bill should be delayed. The Burlington House scheme had been well considered by the late Government. There were various and weighty objections to the scheme of the present Bill, and, as it was a matter in which a large sum of money was involved, it would be more satisfactory if the whole question should be thoroughly sifted and discussed in the House of Commons.
  LORD HOUGHTONsaid, he trusted a final decision upon the question would not be come to by passing the second reading of the Bill. The questions relating to the National Gallery and the Royal Academy had been long mixed up with extraneous matter and regarded with an amount of prejudice which was truly amazing, and it had given rise to most violent and unseemly discussions in the House of Commons; but it seemed likely that the whole matter would now be considered in a fair and reasonable manner on the basis of a Motion soon to be brought before the House of Commons. The old objections to the propositions to remove the National Gallery and Royal Academy to Kensington were now completely met. The assertion that Kensington was too far distant from the rest of
  926
  the metropolis for the purpose of a National Gallery site could now no longer be made, seeing how largely metropolitan railway accommodation had been increased. There was no doubt that Trafalgar Square formed a very handsome site; but it was in the midst of a populous district, crowded by traffic, and by no means fitted for an exhibition which people visited with a view to continued study rather than cursory inspection. As to the proposition with regard to Burlington House, if acted upon, it would, in his opinion, be a wanton destruction of one of the few handsome buildings London possessed. It was certainly unadvisable that a final decision should be come to before the House of Commons had further considered the matter in the light of the Motion of which notice had been given; and he trusted that inquiries would be made of Members of the House of Commons as to their present opinion upon the matter. When that had been ascertained and the feeling of the country properly estimated the Government might during the recess give the matter their careful consideration, and come to a decision upon it satisfactory to Parliament and the country.
  THE EARL OF HARROWBYwas understood to support the request for postponement.
  THE EARL OF POWISasked for information with respect to the agreement come to between the Government and St. Martin's parish. As matters at present stood it appeared to him that if St. Martin's Workhouse were not taken before the 31st of December, 1869, the parochial authorities would not have compulsory powers to acquire land as a site for their buildings, as their powers lapsed at that date.
  THE EARL OF DERBY: I think it is hardly possible to accede to the proposition for delay. Without entering into the question whether the present is the best arrangement that could be made, I am quite certain that after the twelve or fourteen years this question has remained unsettled, the very worst arrangement that could be made would be better than nothing at all. During the whole time this matter has remained unsettled both the National Gallery and the Royal Academy have been cramped for room, and the greatest possible injury and inconvenience has arisen to the public in consequence. It is most important that no more time should be lost in coming to a decision upon the question. The noble Lord opposite

  927
  (Lord Houghton) says that the House of Commons should have an opportunity of expressing an opinion upon the subject, notwithstanding that the Bill we are now considering was framed in accordance with a vote of the House of Commons passed in 1864, that the Bill itself has passed through all its stages in that House, and that the money for the purpose of making the changes proposed by the Bill has been voted—and I know no better way in which the House of Commons can express its views than by passing the Bill and voting the money. When all this has been done, and contracts have been entered into in consequence, and only three weeks of the Session remain, we are asked to wait until we have ascertained whether the House of Commons will pass a Resolution in direct opposition to the principles of a Bill which it has read three times and sent up for your Lordships' endorsement. I cannot help regarding that as an unreasonable request. I have every possible respect for the opinion of the House of Commons, and if that House before the passing of the Bill through its various stages shows in an undoubted manner that it has changed its opinion with reference to the measure, I do not mean to say that that might not be sufficient ground to warrant your Lordships in considering whether it would be advisable to proceed with the Bill. But to ask me at this period of the Session, when the House of Commons has passed the Bill introduced by the Government, to postpone the measure for further consideration, appears to be only calculated to continue that uncertainty which has existed for so many years. I have not the slightest wish to hurry the Bill through its stages, but I am afraid that I cannot consent to the postponement which is, I think, unreasonably demanded.
  Motion agreed to; Bill read 2a accordingly, and committed for Thursday next.

  PUBLIC COMPANIES BILL—(No. 105.)
  (The Earl Nelson.)
  SECOND READING. ORDER DSICHARGED.
  Order of the Day for the Second Reading read.
  EARL NELSONsaid, he had been requested to take charge of this Bill which was one of those that had come up from the other House without any natural parent, and that when he did so he believed that the evil it sought to remedy was sufficient to justify his so doing. Their
  928
  Lordships might remember that the voting in public companies was carried on by means of proxies as well as by voting in person, and the object of the present measure was to permit the adoption of a third plan—that of using voting papers. The objection to the present mode of voting by proxy was that by the regulation providing that the proxies should be sent in to the Secretary forty-eight hours before the holding of the meeting, the Directors were enabled, knowing the number of proxies held by themselves and the number held by their opponents, to frame such a report as was likely to be carried. In 1864 it was stated by the Chairman of the Great Western Railway that the Directors held proxies representing nearly £8,000,000, before they drew up their report, for the consideration of which the meeting was called; and in 1865, in the case of the Great Eastern Railway, a great wrong would have been committed under the existing system. The Vice Chairman of that company had withdrawn from the direction, and brought some charges against the Directors, who refused the committee which was asked for. A poll was demanded and refused by the Directors, who would have succeeded but for some informality which was detected in some of the proxies. This vitiated the proceedings; the consequence was that as the matter came to be ventilated many of the proxies which the Directors possessed were not replaced by the shareholders, and the Directors were obliged to grant the Committee, and the charges were proved to be correct, involving the constitution of a new Board of Directors. The Bill, when first introduced, appeared to be calculated to remedy the evil complained of, but unfortunately in its progress through the House of Commons the clause permitting the voting by voting papers to be applied to the poll was struck out. He could not, therefore press the second reading, unless he proposed the restoration of that clause in Committee, and such a restoration it would scarcely be possible to carry at the present late period of the Session. He should, however, be glad if their Lordships would affirm the principle of the Bill by reading it a second time.
  LORD REDESDALEthought that if the objection to the present method was the fact that proxies must be lodged with the Secretary forty-eight hours before the holding of a meeting, the objection would be obviated by dispensing with the neces-

  929
  sity of sending in the proxies forty-eight hours before the holding of the meeting, and not by the establishing of a third system of voting.
  THE DUKE OF BUCKINGHAMsaid, that in its original form the Bill might perhaps have raised the question of voting by proxies fairly enough; but as it at present stood, he hoped the noble Earl would not press its second reading. He did not think it would act satisfactorily.
  EARL NELSONsaid, he had no wish to press the second reading, and would move that the Order be discharged.
  Order discharged.

  DOGS BILL.
  (The Marquess of Clanricarde.)
  (No. 170.) COMMITTEE.
  Order of the Day for the House to be put into Committee read.
  Moved, That the House do now resolve itself into a Committee on the said Bill.—(The Marquess of Clanricarde.)
  LORD CRANWORTHobjected to the Bill, on the ground that there was not the slightest necessity for the petty legislation it proposed to effect, as there were already three Acts of Parliament in force for the protection of sheep from dogs, and a man was punishable under the present law if he permitted a savage dog to be at large. He did not know at what point legislation on this subject was to stop. In the case of two dogs quarrelling, was it to be ascertained which was in fault; and if they fought and one was killed, was compensation to be made to its owner? If Parliament were to multiply Acts of this character, there would be no end to the litigation that would arise out of them.
  Amendment moved, to leave out ("now") and insert ("this Day Six Months.")— (The Lord Cranworth.)
  THE MARQUESS OF CLANRICARDEsaid, the noble and learned Lord would not think so lightly of this subject had a child of his been worried by a savage dog. Persons should be compelled to keep their dogs tied up. He should support the Bill which was useful in itself, and had received the assent of the House of Commons.
  On Question, that ("now") stand Part of the Motion? their Lordships divided: —Contents 14; Not Contents 37: Majority 23: Resolved in the Negative: and House to be in Committee on this Day Six Months.

  CONTENTS.

  Devon, E.

  Stratford de Redcliffe, V.

  Doncaster, E. (D.Buccleuch and Queensberry.)

  Ebury, L.

  Lonsdale, E.

  Inchiquin, L.

  Malmesbury, E.

  Polwarth, L.

  Romney, E.

  Ravensworth, L.

  Somerhill, L. (M. Clanricarde.) [Teller.]

  De Vesci, V.

  Templemore, L.

  NOT-CONTENTS.

  Chelmsford,L.(L. Chancellor.)

  Oxford, Bp.

  Ashburton, L.

  Buckingham&Chandos, D.

  Boyle, L. (E. Cork and Orrery.)

  Marlborough, D.

  Colville of Culross, L.

  Cranworth, L.

  Bristol, M.

  Dinevor, L.

  Bradford, E.

  Foley, L. [Teller.]

  Carnarvon, E.

  Hamilton, L. (L. Belhaven and Stenton.)

  Clarendon, E.

  De Grey, E. [Teller.]

  Lyveden, L.

  Derby, E.

  Ponsonby, L. (E. Bessborough.)

  Fortescue, E.

  Granville, E.

  Redesdale, L.

  Leven and Melville, E.

  Saye and Sele, L.

  Nelson, E.

  Seaton, L.

  Powis, E.

  Silchester, L.(E. Longford.)

  Shrewsbury, E.

  Stradbroke, E.

  Southampton, L.

  Wilton, E.

  Stanley of Alderley, L.

  Thurlow, L.

  Hawarden, V.

  Wrottesley, L.

  Sydney, V.

POLLUTION OF RIVERS, &c.

  PETITION.
  THE EARL OF SHREWSBURY,in presenting a Petition from Thomas Hawkesley, M D., and others, praying for an inquiry into the best means of Disinfecting Sewage and preventing the Pollution of Rivers, said, that the question to which the petition referred was a most important one, as our rivers were suffering very much from the increasing amount of sewage which was poured into them. The certificates of scientific persons attested the efficacy, importance, and practical value of Mr. Dover's system of filtering and deodorizing sewage. He could testify that the liquid which the process left, although it might not be particularly desirable to drink it, was yet clean and pure enough to be used for common washing purposes. At all events, it could not be at all injurious to rivers; and the adoption of the process along the banks of the Thames would produce the purification of that river. Those who had tested its results declared them to be important enough to justify an investigation at the public expense, and, as

  931
  the matter lay in a nutshell, an inquiry need not occupy more than two or three days.
  THE EARL OF DERBYsaid, that he was not quite clear whether his noble Friend meant merely to present the petition, or move for the appointment of a Committee on the subject. There was a considerable difference between the two; and if a Committee was to be moved for, though he did not see of what use it could be at the present state of the Session, his noble Friend had better give notice to that effect.
  THE EARL OF SHREWSBURYrepeated, that an inquiry need not occupy more than a few days, and gave notice that he would move for a Committee.
  EARL FORTESCUEsaid, that when he was Chairman of the Committee appointed some time ago to inquire into the subject of the Pollution of Rivers, Mr. Dover's invention was brought before it, and the results appeared to be as satisfactory as those of any process could well be expected to be. The liquid was perfectly free from smell and colour, and the extracted manure had been shown by experiment to possess practical value. But it was a question whether it would not be too expensive to adopt. Much good could hardly be expected from such an inquiry as could be made this Session. In regard to the purification of rivers and the utilization of sewage, he had arrived at the conclusion that we made a great mistake in allowing the rainfall to mix with the sewage of our towns. The sewage was a pretty constant quantity, and there was practically little difficulty in providing the means for dealing with it; but the uncertainty of the rainfall involved many difficulties. It was calculated that the average rainfall was about equal to the sewage of London for a year; but, whereas the sewage was equally distributed over the year, the rain fell within 140 or 150 days, and three-fourths of it in the course of from thirty to sixty days. He thought that if the more rational course were adopted in the metropolis and other towns of keeping separate what was originally separate—namely, the rainfall and the sewage—an inquiry into Mr. Dover's invention, and other kindred inventions, would have been of less importance; but, as things stood at present, it was highly desirable that such an inquiry should be instituted. From what he had seen of Mr. Dover's invention, he did not despair of its proving
  932
  workable, and he felt satisfied that it deserved to be carefully inquired into.
  LORD EBURYremarked, that the ease was very urgent, and if Mr. Dover's invention was such as the noble Earl had described, it would be productive of very great advantages, and would prove a boon to the country.
  Petition ordered to lie upon the table.

  PIER AND HARBOUR ORDERS CONFIRMATION BILL.
  Moved, That the Resolution of the 25th of June last, viz., "That no Bill confirming any Provisional Order made by the Board of Trade under the General Pier and Harbour Act, 1861, shall be read a Second Time after Friday, the 6th of July," in respect to, be dispensed with; agreed to: (The Earl of Belmore:) Then the said Bill was (according to Order) read 2a and committed to a Committee of the Whole House on Thursday next.
  House adjourned at Seven o'clock, to Thursday next, half past Ten o'clock.