Sitting of 31 July 1873

MINUTES.
PUBLIC BILLS—Ordered—First Reading—Law of Evidence* [274].
Second Reading—Duke of Edinburgh's Annuity [272]; Consolidated Fund (Appropriation); Militia Pay Acts Amendment* [273].
Committee—Four Courts Marshalsea (Dublin)* [265]—R.P.
Third Reading—Telegraphs* [262], and passed.
Withdrawn—Betting Houses (Scotland)* [185]; Stipendiary Magistrates (Scotland)* [129].

ELEMENTARY EDUCATION ACT—SCHOOL BOARD, HOLME ST. CUTHBERT'S.—QUESTION.
MR. F. S. POWELLasked the Vice President of the Committee of Council on Education, Whether his attention has been directed to a statement made by Mr. Parez, inspector of schools, in the Education Report, page 113—
"At Holme St. Cuthbert's the state of things seems hopeless; one member of the five having died, the four remaining members of the School Board are pitted two against two. The site once agreed to is now rejected by one party, consequently nothing can be done. The malcontent party have kept aloof, and not attended the meetings, so that a quorum cannot be made;"
and, whether the state of affairs so described still continues; and, if so, what steps have been taken, or are to be taken, in order to awaken the School Board of Holme St. Cuthbert's to a more active sense of their educational duties?
MR. W. E. FORSTER, in reply, said, that the dead-lock described by Mr. Pares had been removed since the Report was written; several members of the board had resigned, and orders had been issued by the Education Department for new elections, which he hoped would result in the school board work being discharged more satisfactorily in the future.

CRIMINAL LAW—FORGED TELEGRAMS.

  QUESTION.
  MR. PEEKasked Mr. Attorney General, Whether his attention has been called to the subject of forged telegrams; and, whether, during the Recess, he will consider the propriety of making the Law on the subject more stringent?
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL, in reply, said, his attention had been called to the subject, which was well worthy of attention. He had been in consultation with his right hon. Friend the Postmaster General on the matter. If there was an opportunity in the course of next Session he would endeavour to deal with the subject; but it was not an easy one to take up.

NAVY—THE ROYAL MARINES.

  QUESTION.
  MR. WATNEYasked the First Lord of the Admiralty, Whether the appointment in the Marine Artillery of "Lieutenant and Acting Adjutant for duties as Military Instructor," has been substituted for that of "Second Captain and Adjutant," thereby reducing the number of Captains by one; and, if so, by what authority?
  MR. GOSCHEN: Sir, in a scheme for the re-distribution of the Royal Marines, which is now awaiting an Order in. Council to give it effect, it is proposed to substitute a Military Instructor for one of the captains and adjutants, Royal Marine Artillery. This officer is to be a captain or lieutenant, to have passed the Staff College, and to be employed in instructing the officers in military law, field fortification, field sketching and reconnaissance, and military history and administration. This is considered a most desirable change, as the Staff captain and one adjutant are found sufficient for the military and office duties of the Royal Marino Artillery, and an instructor for officers is urgently required. By Board letter of the 7th of March, 1873, their Lordships appointed one of the captains and adjutants (Captain Suther) to be Instructor of Fortification at the Royal Naval College, Greenwich. Pending, therefore, the bringing out of the Order in Council, it was considered advisable to appoint a Staff College officer (Lieutenant Needham) as Acting Adjutant for duties as Military Instructor. As this officer happens to be a subaltern, and no captain is eligible for the appointment, it reduces the number of captains by one; but the change is a most desirable one. The vacancy will be regained on this officer's promotion.

  ARMY—THE COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF IN IRELAND.—QUESTIONS.
  MR. ANDERSONasked the Secretary of State for War, If the Correspondence as to the Accounts of the Commander in Chief of the Forces in Ireland is yet complete; if the "portions" of them that "objections have been raised to" by the Accountant General had been objected to by that officer previous to the 10th June, when the Question was first put on the paper; and, if he will state the nature of the "objections" that have been raised, and if they involve any censure to any one, or any repayment of money by the Commander in Chief in Ireland; and, if so, how much?
  MR. CARDWELL: Sir, the Correspondence has resulted in the objections raised by the Accountant General being sustained by me. The nature of them was that the periods during which the General was absent from Ireland in excess of the period for which pay during leave is allowed by the Royal Warrant had not been entered in the pay-lists as absent on leave or otherwise, the principal ground assigned being that such absence, which was in a considerable degree absence while attending Parliament, was understood by the General as not being required to be so entered, and as being permitted to carry Staff pay and allowances. The inquiry made in pursuance of the hon. Member's Question brought these circumstances to the knowledge of the Accountant General, and led to the objections which I have sustained. The amount retrenched is £753 11 s. The Accountant General, however, informs me that if the hon. Member's Question had not been put objections would have appeared on the face of the accounts now under examination, which would have led to the inquiry. The Correspondence and the pay-list will be laid on the Table without delay if my hon. Friend will move for them. I am glad of the opportunity of saying that the General observes upon the form of the pay-list as being deficient, of which those who see it will judge.
  MR. OTWAYasked, if he was to understand that the General commanding-in-chief had certified that he was in Ireland when in reality he was absent?
  MR. CARDWELLsaid, he had already stated the particulars.
  MR. ANDERSONasked, if the sum of £753 11 s. had been re-paid?
  COLONEL NORTHsaid, surely attendance in Parliament was a performance of duty, and did not involve stoppage of pay.
  MR. CARDWELLsaid, the regimental pay was not stopped, but Staff pay and Staff allowances were stopped. He was willing to lay the pay sheets and the Correspondence on the Table.

CRIMINAL LAW—THE WEAVERHAM COCK-FIGHTING CASE.

  QUESTION.
  MR. P. A. TAYLORasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether it is true that in the Weaverham cock-fighting case the magistrates have inflicted the modified penalty of £5 on the persons implicated, they being gentlemen of influence and position, and the fine therefore a nominal punishment; and he would take this opportunity of asking, whether it is true that a boy has recently been imprisoned for two months for ill-treating a cat?
  MR. BRUCE: I think, Sir, my hon. Friend's manner of putting Questions is very unfair to the Minister questioned and to the magistrates generally when he attempts to cover all magistrates with such blame as may arise from the misconduct or an error of judgment on the part of one. ["No, no!"] Some days ago my hon. Friend put to me, with reference to this case, on the authority of an unverified statement in a Manchester newspaper, a Question imputing gross partiality to the Weaverham Bench of Magistrates. I was then able to show that the imputation was undeserved, and, indeed, utterly unfounded. My hon. Friend now returns to the charge with the same imputation in another form. He asks me whether the magistrates have not inflicted a modified penalty of £5 on the persons implicated, they being gentlemen of influence and position, and the fine therefore a nominal punishment? Now, Sir, in the first place, the line is not a modified, but is a maximum, penalty under the Act. In the next place, although there were persons in the position of gentlemen among the defendants, there were also persons of a much humbler rank in life, and only one gentle-

  1325
  man was connected with the county (Cheshire) in which the offence was committed. My hon. Friend's complaint against the magistrates appears to be that they did not use the power given them by the 18th section of the Act to commit the offenders to prison without giving them the option of paying a fine. I am not prepared to find fault with the conduct of the magistrates in this respect. It would have been difficult for the magistrates where all parties were equally guilty, and where the only difference lay in their rank and wealth, to distinguish between them, and imprison some of them while they only fined others. It would have been impossible to draw the line. It should also be remembered that no long time has elapsed since these so-called sports, now justly deemed barbarous and disgraceful, were popular amusements, held to be innocent, if not manly. I am glad that the Law has given its sanction to the higher public morality and imposed punishments for such practices as these; but we must not forget that the chief object of punishment is to deter, and that to men of "influence and position" the heaviest part of the punishment is the shame which follows exposure and the conviction for having broken the Law.

  AGRICULTURAL LABOURERS MEETING—LEIGHTON BUZZARD—ALLEGED DISTURBANCES.
  MR. BRUCE: I may, Sir, perhaps, be permitted to refer to a Question put to me on Wednesday, the 23rd instant by my noble Friend the Member for Calne (Lord Edmond Fitzmaurice) with reference to the disturbance of a public meeting at Leighton Buzzard. My noble Friend placed his Question on the Paper on Tuesday. The House sat to a very late hour, and I only saw the Question a few minutes before entering the House on Wednesday, at 12 o'clock. I then stated that I had received no information on the subject. On Monday last, in answer to the hon. and gallant Member for Bedfordshire (Colonel Gilpin), the noble Lord stated that I was mistaken, for that I had received and answered a communication on the subject, and that he held my letter in his hand. I have inquired into the matter, and find that, while it was quite true that no
  1326
  memorial or communication specially referring to the Leighton Buzzard disturbance was received at the Home Office, a letter was received from Mr. Joseph Arch complaining of the conduct of the police at two public meetings at which he had not himself been present, one of which meetings was at Leighton Buzzard. Mr. Arch's question was—
  "Whether the police are justified in pandering to local farmers and others who, for a pint of beer, are made their dupes in order to put down free speech?"
  He was answered by the Under Secretary, in my name, that—
  "the Secretary of State has no control over county and borough police, and that any complaints respecting their conduct should, therefore, be addressed to the local authority."
  I made my answer in the firm conviction that no memorial emanating from persons actually aggrieved and stating facts within their knowledge would have been answered without being first submitted to me, and I am justified in that belief by the actual facts.

PARLIAMENT—THE NEW PALACE OF WESTMINSTER—THE FRESCOES.

  QUESTIONS.
  MR. BOWRINGasked the First Commissioner of Works, If it is true that symptoms of decay have recently manifested themselves in additional Frescoes in the Houses of Parliament, especially in those by Mr. Maclise and Mr. Herbert; and, if so, whether he proposes to take immediate steps with a view to arresting, if possible, the further progress of such decay?
  MR. AYRTON, in reply, said, it was undoubtedly true that for some time past the surface of these pictures had presented an appearance which greatly detracted from their effect; but what the exact cause of that appearance really was had not hitherto been clearly ascertained. There was a great difference of opinion on the subject. It was doubtful whether the appearance of one of the pictures arose from the natural decay of the picture itself, or from the efflorescence on the surface of some substance capable of being removed without injury to the picture. He had watched the picture with great interest, and had consulted several persons with regard to it. Recently he had the advantage of consulting Mr. Richmond, R.A., who had arrived

  1327
  at the conclusion that the appearance of the picture was owing to an efflorescence which might be removed from the surface, after which it would be nearly as good as ever. The subject, however, was one which required careful consideration. Dr. Percy, the eminent chemist attached to that House, was endeavouring to ascertain the nature of the substance on the pictures. He was also now making arrangements to secure the services of an eminent picture-cleaner, who had been recommended by Mr. Richmond as being best qualified for the purpose, and it was hoped that the result would be satisfactory.
  MR. BOWRINGasked whether the right hon. Gentleman's remarks applied to Mr. Maclise's picture of "The Death of Nelson?"
  MR. AYRTONwas understood to reply in the affirmative.

  FISHERY BOARD (SCOTLAND)—BRANDING FEES.—QUESTION.
  MR. MACFIEasked the Secretary to the Treasury, If he intends, or will consider whether he ought, to reduce the fee charged by the Fishery Board in Scotland for branding of herring barrels from the present rate of four pence per barrel, at which, according to the Brands recent Report, it yields much more than pays expenses, to such lower rate as, while leaving no demand to be made on the Exchequer to cover a deficiency, will be less oppressive to persons engaged in the fishery business?
  MR. BAXTER: It is not, Sir, intended at present to reduce the fee charged by the Fishery Board in Scotland for branding herring barrels, but I have no doubt the whole system of branding will eventually be abolished, as it is no part of the business of Government to affix an official stamp to any article of merchandize.

IRELAND—THE IRISH CONSTABULARY.

  QUESTION.
  SIR FREDERICK W. HEYGATEasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland, Whether, in any scheme to be considered by the Government for the contribution by Irish counties of a share in the cost of the Irish Constabulary, such charge will be proportioned to the relative number of Constabulary required and
  1328
  allotted to each county, and to the cost thereof?
  MR. BRUCE: I am requested, Sir, by my noble Friend the Chief Secretary for Ireland to give the following reply to the Question:—It is impossible at present to give the details of the scheme which will be proposed by the Government next Session; but the object will be to give to each county a substantial interest in the reduction of the number and cost of the constabulary force maintained in it. The difficulty lies in devising any plan which will secure this object without imposing on some counties an amount of taxation which might prove excessive.

IRELAND—LABOURERS' COTTAGES.

  QUESTION.
  SIR FREDERICK W. HEYGATEasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland, Whether he can give any assurance that he will, early next Session, promote a measure to give additional facilities for the erection of Labourers' Cottages in Ireland?
  MR. BRUCE(for the Marquess of HARTINGTON) said: I can only promise that the Reports from the Inspectors of the Local. Government Board which have been laid on the Table this year shall be carefully considered during the Recess with the view of an early introduction of a measure if we can see our way to making any satisfactory proposal.

  PATENT RIGHTS—INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE, VIENNA.—QUESTION.
  MR. MACFIEasked the Secretary to the Treasury, If Mr. Webster, Q.C., has been authorised to act or speak on behalf of the Vienna Exhibition Commission in the approaching Conference on Patents for inventions at Vienna; and, whether, if this eminent gentleman's opinions in favour of the policy of Patent Laws is not the opinion of Her Majesty's Government their want of assent thereto will be made known to the Conference?
  MR. BAXTER: Sir, Mr. Webster, Q.C., has been authorized by the Commissioners to attend the Conference simply for the purpose of making a Report. It is distinctly laid down that he is not to consider himself as in any respect representing Her Majesty's Government.

  POST OFFICE—REGISTRATION OF LETTERS.—QUESTION.
  MR. MACFIEasked the Postmaster General, If he will consider whether it is not expedient to encourage the registering of letters that contain stamps, notes, and jewellery by reducing the fee for registration to two pence?
  MR. MONSELL: It is very doubtful, Sir, whether a fee of 2d. for the registration of each letter would cover the expenses. Therefore, I can hold out to my hon. Friend no hope of the reduction of the fee.

METROPOLIS—KNIGHTSBRIDGE BARRACKS, MILLBANK, AND HYDE PARK.

  QUESTION.
  SIR THOMAS BATESONasked the Secretary of State for War, Whether the site at Millbank has been at any time reported on by a Board of Military Medical Officers, with a view to the location there of one of the Household Cavalry Regiments; and, if so, whether their report was favourable or otherwise; whether many tons of ammunition are not frequently stored in the magazine in Hyde Park, with only a. non-commissioned officer's guard in charge; and, whether on these grounds the late Duke of Wellington was not opposed to the removal of Knightsbridge Barracks?
  MR. CARDWELL: Sir, I have always understood that the Duke of Wellington was favourable to the continuance of Knightsbridge Barracks on their present site. If they shall at any time be removed, it will not be on military grounds, but for other and very different reasons. The fitness of the site at Millbank on sanitary grounds was much canvassed some years ago before the Embankment on the opposite side of the river was made. If at any time Parliament shall be asked to sanction the erection of a barrack on that site, full information of the state of the question as regards the sanitary considerations will no doubt be laid before it. In the meantime, I am informed by the Director of Convict Prisons that it is now a remarkably healthy place. Ammunition for the Guards and Volunteers is kept in the magazine under a sergeant's guard. The hon. Member is welcome to the Return on the subject of which he has given Notice.
  SIR THOMAS BATESONsaid, the right hon. Gentleman had not answered his Question in reference to the Board of Military Medical Officers.
  MR. CARDWELL: I will not enter into the details of this subject, because it has been much canvassed; and, in order that the House may be able to form a correct judgment respecting it, all the Papers ought to be on the Table. There was a Committee of Officers a long time ago, of which, I think, Sir Hope Grant was the President, and which condemned the site at Millbank on sanitary grounds. The matter was afterwards referred to the Army Sanitary Committee, and their Report was of a different character, being favourable to the site on the whole, provided certain objectionable buildings were removed on the opposite side of the river. The Embankment on the opposite side of the river has been made in the interval, and therefore the House will not be able to form a judgment without being in possession of the whole of the Papers. When a proposal is made on the subject, no doubt those Papers will be laid before the House.

  CHURCH OF ENGLAND—WEST INDIES CLERGY ACT—THE BISHOP OF KINGSTON.—QUESTION.
  SIR CHARLES ADDERLEYasked, the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies, Whether Bishop Courtenay of Kingston is not at least equitably entitled to £1,600 a-year from the Consolidated Fund, under the first section of the Act of 1868, for relieving the Consolidated Fund of salaries of West India Bishops and Clergy, which provides against any diminution of the salary of any Bishop which he may have been receiving at the passing of that Act; whether the Right Reverend Reginald Courtenay was not appointed Coadjutor Bishop of Kingston on the retirement of Bishop Spencer of Jamaica in 1856, by Letters Patent expressly providing that he should hold that office till a successor was appointed, and act for all purposes as Bishop of Jamaica; whether the £3,000 assigned out of the Consolidated Fund for that bishopric was not thus divided—£1,400 as retiring pension to Bishop Spencer, £1,600 to Bishop Courtenay; but an excuse for discontinuing the latter payment on the

  1331
  death of Bishop Spencer in 1872, has been found in the mere arrangement that the whole sum was made payable to the latter bishop on the understanding that he should pay over to the former his share; whether the subsequent disestablishment of the Jamaica Church has not precluded the Crown from the recommended appointment of Bishop Courtenay as Bishop Spencer's successor; and what steps Her Majesty's Government will take to protect Bishop Courtenay in his equitable claim, or to aid him in securing the position he has had so assured an expectation to hold in the new voluntary Church of Jamaica?
  MR. KNATCHBULL-HUGESSEN: It is difficult, Sir, to give a full answer to the five Questions of my right hon. Friend without making a longer statement than I should feel justified in doing. I will, however, state generally that his first Question turns upon the construction of an Act of Parliament, under which we do not consider that Bishop Courtenay has an equitable claim for £1,600 a-year from the Consolidated Fund. The arrangement by which Bishop Courtenay received a portion of Bishop Spencer's salary during the, life-time of the latter must be held to have been a private arrangement between the two Bishops, which terminated on the death of Bishop Spencer. It is true that Bishop Courtenay was appointed Coadjutor Bishop by Letters Patent, which provided that he should hold that office until a successor to Bishop Spencer was appointed; but this evidently referred to the interval which would in any case elapse between the death of Bishop Spencer and the appointment of a successor, if one were appointed. I do not know by whom or to whom Bishop Courtenay's appointment was "recommended;" no expectation was held out to him by authority; but any such appointment, with a salary from the Consolidated Fund, was prevented, not by the Jamaica Church Disestablishment Act, but by the Act passed by my right hon. Friend in 1868, removing these charges from the Consolidated Fund. I must remind the House that this matter has been already before the House of Commons, which decided against the Bishop's claim; and having gone most carefully into the case, with every disposition to do justice, my noble Friend at the head of the
  1332
  Colonial Department has come to the conclusion—in which I entirely concur—that there is no reason to reverse the decision of the House of Commons. As we consider that the Bishop has not established an "equitable claim," we cannot, of course, advise Her Majesty's Government to take steps to put him in a better position.

  HARBOURS, DOCKS, AND PIERS ACT, 1847.—QUESTION.
  MR. STEVENSONasked the President of the Board of Trade, If he will direct his attention to the 74th section of "The Harbours, Docks, and Piers Act, 1847," as recently interpreted by the Court of Queen's Bench, whereby a shipowner is declared liable for unavoidable accident caused by his ship to a pier, even when it is admitted that no blame attaches to the shipowner or master; and, if he will consider the propriety of amending the Law so that all shipowners in cases of inevitable accident may enjoy the same exemption from liability in such cases as is conferred by the section on shipowners employing a compulsory pilot, and the propriety in every case of a ship's collision with a pier of limiting the liability of the shipowner, as is done in the case of collision with another vessel.
  MR. CHICHESTER FORTESCUE, in reply, said, that where the collision was absolutely unavoidable, it was a most difficult question to say which of the two innocent parties was to suffer. It might indeed be said that the ship might easily be in fault, while the pier could not be in fault. He would promise to direct his attention to the subject; but he did not think it possible to deal with particular cases of this sort without raising other points in which harbour authorities were interested as against the shipowner.

  POST OFFICE (IRELAND)—SUB-POSTMASTERS.—QUESTION.
  MR. PLUNKET (for the Marquess of HAMILTON)asked the Postmaster General, Whether a memorial signed by 250 Sub-Postmasters in Ireland, asking for an increase in the scale of their pay and allowances, has been received by him; whether he will have any objection to lay a Copy of same, and of the answer thereto, if any, upon the Table of the

  1333
  House; and, whether it is the intention of the Postmaster General to refer the case of the Sub-Postmasters of Ireland to the Departmental Commission which is about to inquire as to other branches of the Irish Civil Service?
  MR. MONSELL, in reply, said, he had received the memorial to which his hon. and learned Friend referred, and in answer to that Question he had to state that there would be no objection to lay the memorial before the House with his reply to it. In answer to the third Question, he had to state that it was not intended to refer the case of the sub-postmasters of Ireland to the Departmental Commission to which he referred, because the sub-postmasters were appointed exactly in the same way as the sub-postmasters in England and Scotland. There were no fewer than 11,000 sub-postmasters in the United Kingdom, and as there was no difficulty in finding suitable persons who eagerly asked to be appointed, any increase of pay would involve a large additional expenditure, without any corresponding advantage to the public.

  EPPING FOREST—EXPENDITURE AND CHARGES.—QUESTION.
  MR. R. N. FOWLERasked the First Commissioner of Works, Why the Return "of the public expenditure and charges incurred but not paid under the Epping Forest Acts of 1871–2," ordered by the House on February 13th, has not been laid upon the Table?
  MR. AYRTON, in reply, said, the reason why the Return had not been laid on the Table was, that the officer on whom the duty of preparing the Return devolved had somewhat neglected his duty—that was to say, he fell sick; and though he recovered from his sickness he did not recover that particular attention to this Return which was due from him.

POST OFFICE—TELEGRAPH DEPARTMENT—HERRING'S TELEGRAPH PRINTING INSTRUMENT.

  QUESTION.
  MR. W. M. TORRENSasked the Postmaster General, Whether, in the trials about to be made of Mr. Herring's telegraph printing instrument at the Central Station, he will direct that one or more eminent telegraphists shall be
  1334
  present, to be named by the inventor, in addition to those representing the Department?
  MR. MONSELL: Sir, Mr. Herring's instrument has already been very fully tried and reported upon by two eminent telegraphists who are unconnected with the Department. At present no further trial appears to be required. If there should be a further trial, and Mr. Herring should wish any other telegraphists to witness it on his behalf, every facility will be afforded to them. But it must be on the distinct understanding that they are employed by Mr. Herring, and not by the Department.

SUPPLY—CIVIL SERVICE ESTIMATES—THE VOTE FOR DOVER HARBOUR.

  QUESTION.
  MR. RYLANDSasked the President of the Board of Trade, Whether, seeing that the Vote for Dover Harbour had been carried by a majority of only 1, he would undertake that no proceedings should be taken upon the Vote until after next Session?
  MR. CHICHESTER FORTESCUE, in reply, said, he was not aware that it was the duty of Her Majesty's Government to give any further opportunity to the House to exercise its judgment upon the matter. He would remind his hon. Friend that the Vote was a very small one, and that there was no serious opposition or difference of opinion between the House and the Government as to the merits of a completed harbour at Dover. The question was mainly one as to whether they should make any beginning during the present Session.

ARMY—7TH LANCASHIRE MILITIA.

  QUESTION.
  THE O'DONOGHUEasked the Secretary of State for War, If he has any objection to place upon the Table of the House the whole of the Papers connected with the removal of Lieutenant Langford Rae from the 7th Lancashire Militia?
  MR. CARDWELL, in reply, said, the case was one in which the Commander-in-Chief had, with his approval, removed the officer in question. It would not be right to lay upon the Table the Reports of the commanding and inspecting officers.

PARLIAMENT—PUBLIC BUSINESS.

  QUESTIONS.
  MR. BAILLIE COCHRANEsaid, with respect to the Business of the House, he understood the right hon. Gentleman at the head of the Government, that though there was no Supply down for tomorrow, the ordinary Motion for Adjournment would be made to-morrow, with the laudable object of allowing hon. Members, who had Notices on the Paper an opportunity of bringing them forward. He now heard that there was to be no adjournment to be moved tomorrow, but that the House would sit on Saturday. He wished to know, in that case, in what form he could bring before the House to-morrow the Question which stood in his name?
  MR. GLADSTONEsaid, his hon. Friend was quite right in saying that as it would be necessary for the House to sit on Saturday, it would not be possible to afford that opportunity for the Motions of hon. Members which they had anticipated by means of the Motion for the Adjournment. He was, however, going to propose that the House should meet to-morrow at 2, and re-assemble at 9, as usual on Fridays; and the Government would not put down any Order of the Day that would interfere with the Notices of Motion to which reference had been made by his hon. Friend; so that the list would be kept as open for them, he trusted, as it would have been had there been the ordinary opportunity for moving the adjournment. If further Orders should be put down of a nature to interpose a serious obstacle to the bringing forward of his hon. Friend's Motion, he thought it would be right to move that those Orders of the Day be postponed until after the Notices of Motion were taken.
  MR. BAILLIE COCHRANEsaid, in that case he should bring forward his Motion to-morrow.
  MR. NEWDEGATEexpressed a hope that the recommendations of the Committee of 1861, in reference to this subject, would be observed, and that the Prime Minister would allow the Adjournment of the House to be moved tomorrow, so that hon. Members might have the opportunity they desired of bringing forward their Motions.
  MR. GLADSTONEsaid, he had really no power to put down anything upon
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  the Paper on Supply, as Supply was closed on the introduction of the Appropriation Act.
  MR. BAILLIE COCHRANEpresumed there would be no such thing as a "Count-out" to-morrow night.
  MR. GLADSTONEsaid, the hon. Gentleman must exorcise his influence among his Friends.
  In reply to Lord ELCHO,
  MR. GLADSTONEsaid, that tomorrow he hoped to be able to inform the House with regard to the new constitution of the South Kensington Museum. With reference to the business for Friday, this was how the matter stood. To-night the First Orders were the Duke of Edinburgh's Annuity Bill and the Appropriation Bill. He did not anticipate that the first would tend to a prolonged debate; but on the Appropriation Bill a Notice had been given by the hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. Sclater-Booth) which would lead to some discussion. It was possible, therefore, that these two would make such a considerable aggression on the time for the Indian Budget as to make it difficult to finish that subject to-night. It would be recollected that the Government promised the hon. Member for Sheffield (Mr. Mundella) Wednesday for the debate on the Factory Acts Amendment Bill; but, unfortunately, he only obtained about an hour and a half of that day. He therefore felt that his hon. Friend had a first claim on the Government; and if he were disposed to make that claim—a point on which he had not had an opportunity of communicating with his hon. Friend—his Bill would be put down for 2 o'clock. In the event of his not making it, Friday would be available for the continuation of the debate on the Indian Budget, if it were not concluded to-night. Should the hon. Member for Sheffield go on with his Bill, there would be some hours available on Saturday. [A laugh.] The hon. Gentleman who laughed was jocose; but he (Mr. Gladstone) could not make time. He wished it were in his power to do so. It would save an infinity of trouble, and some needless interruptions, which might well be dispensed with. On Monday the right hon. Baronet opposite (Sir Charles Adderley) would have precedence.
  LORD ELCHOsaid, it was unusual to make such a concession as the right hon.

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  Gentleman proposed to make to the hon. Member for Sheffield, and he wished to know whether it was a personal favour to one Member, or whether the Government meant to support the Bill of the hon. Gentleman?
  MR. GLADSTONEsaid, the Government had formed no opinion as to the measure of the hon. Gentleman, nor was any personal favour intended, but only the fulfilment of a pledge which had not been fully redeemed by the partial debate of yesterday.
  MR. BOUVERIEreminded the Government that on Friday, Orders of the Day had precedence over Notices of Motions, so that the hon. Member for Sheffield, without any engagement on the part of the Government, might by the Rules of the House bring on his Bill to-morrow evening if he chose to do so. Remembering, however, that the Bill was now a debating club question, and not a practical question, he hoped the hon. Member would allow Motions to have precedence of it.
  MR. FAWCETTasked whether he was to understand that the Indian Budget would be divided into three ships, beginning to-night, continued tomorrow after the Bill of the hon. Member for Sheffield, and concluded on Saturday, and that the hon. Member for Sheffield, if he wished it, would have precedence of the Indian Budget to-morrow?
  MR. GLADSTONEanswered in the affirmative. He hoped that Parliament would be prorogued on Tuesday, and he wished to divide the interval in the manner most convenient to the House.
  MR. FAWCETTgave Notice that upon one of the stages of the Appropriation Bill he should call attention to the way in which the Government managed its Business.

  DUKE OF EDINBURGH'S ANNUITY BILL— [BILL 272.]
  (Mr. Bonham-Carter, Mr. Gladstone, Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer.)

  SECOND READING.
  Order for Second Reading read.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Bill be now read a second time."—(Mr. Gladstone.)
  MR. P. A. TAYLOR, in rising to move that the Bill be read on that day month, said: Mr. Speaker, if it were
  1338
  not the dream of an enthusiast to suppose that there is such a man as an English Republican, no one would feel more than such a man the respect and authority that attaches to the English Monarchy. I have no doubt there is no one in this House more entirely participates in this feeling than the right hon. Gentleman himself, yet it seems to me he is for ever bringing something before the House and the world which has a tendency to derogate from that respect. The Prime Minister brought a Message the other day to the House from Her Majesty, that she rejoiced in the approaching marriage of her second son, under circumstances most favourable to the happiness, and so forth. The people prepared to rejoice in the rejoicings of Her Majesty; but then the Prime Minister had his bitter potion to administer; the people must rejoice with tears, having to pay more taxes. Now, Sir, I have never been a professed enthusiast for Monarchy in the abstract; but I confess there is something to me repugnant and inappropriate in the fact that this ancient Monarchy is for ever being dragged before the already sufficiently oppressed taxpayers, in the character of the daughter of the horse-leech, for ever crying—"Give, give." And, Sir, in my opinion, this position of the right hon. Gentleman is entirely a mistaken one. There is no class in this country, I believe, who are desirous of dealing with the Crown in a niggardly or parsimonious spirit. I believe there is but one desire among all classes of the population, and that is that the Queen should be treated liberally in her Civil List. But what they do desire is, that this should be clone upon some intelligible principle, and that they should be able to understand to what extent it is to be carried out—how far that principle is to be made to extend. In a word, the people of this country do not like to be alternately goaded and cajoled, and in either case to be left in utter darkness. The Solicitor General, speaking the other day on the Crown Private Estates Bill, drew a distinction—and a very fine one—between concealment and non-disclosure. I will take either expression, and I will say either concealment or nondisclosure in regard to the accumulations of the Crown and its pecuniary relations with the people, if not a crime, is what is sometimes considered worse than a

  1339
  crime—a blunder. The right hon. Gentleman has been peculiarly unfortunate, for within the last fortnight he has brought into the House, and carried, the Crown Private Estates Act, upon which I must say a few words, as it has an apparent relation to the matter now in hand. That Bill was very tough reading for a layman. I found it more than ordinarily confused and difficult to comprehend, and I do not think the House understood it better, for we had one interpretration from the Prime Minister, and another from the Solicitor General, while the hon. and learned Member for Taunton (Mr. James) did not make it more intelligible and distinct. But it became sufficiently apparent that the idea and principle recognized there was, that the occupant of the Throne can hold and accumulate wealth, for himself or herself, and can give or bequeath it in the form of realty or personalty, just as though it were the property of an individual. We have passed that Act, and now the right hon. Gentleman comes to the House and asks for an allowance for one of the sons of the Queen, and bases the demand on the old principle and on the old form. I do not know whether the words used are the same now; but they used to be that the Crown asked Her faithful Commons for a provision for Her son, on the specific grounds that by law She is prevented from providing for him herself. Charles James Fox, on the debate on the Civil List of the Duke of York, in 1792, in which debate he took a warm interest and gave a hearty support to the Crown, laid down this principle—
  "With respect to provision for princes of the blood, the first question, when application was made to Parliament would naturally be—Is the Civil List inadequate to the purposes of fully maintaining and supporting them?"—[Parliamentary History, xxix. 1003.]
  Now, I think the right hon. Gentleman should let the House and the country distinctly understand what are his views on this matter. Does he hold with the old constitutional doctrine—that the Crown is not entitled to accumulate and bequeath—at any rate, landed possessions? The hon. and learned Member for Taunton (Mr. James) spoke of those who hold that opinion as antideluvian people—behind the spirit of the age. Yet, not so very long since, Sir George Lewis, a high constitutional authority, put this in as strong and powerful
  1340
  language as the English language is capable of. He said—
  "It has been deemed a matter of policy in this country to strip and denude the Sovereign of all hereditary property, and to render him during his life entirely dependent upon the bounty of Parliament."
  Does the right hon. Gentleman hold with that theory, or does he not? If he holds with the theory that the Crown can hold property, he is bound to show us the necessity of this grant he brings forward, and bound to lay before us an account of the property the Crown has to dispose of; but, if he does not hold with that principle, we want to understand what is the meaning of the Crown Estates Act which the right hon. Gentleman has just passed. The Solicitor General said the other day in relation to the Civil List—
  "Hon. Members said that if on a future occasion the House should be about to settle the Civil List, and the Crown should be in possession of large landed estates, it might affect the settlement. Certainly it might; but before the House of Commons settled the Civil List it would ask for a statement of what this property consisted of. Had the House never heard of such inquiry being made into the revenues derived from the Duchies of Cornwall and Lancaster?"
  This was the view put forward when the object was to find an argument for the Crown Estates Act; but as soon as we have to do with a grant such as is asked for to-day, the Government steadily refuse all information on the subject. In the same debate the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Gladstone) observed—
  "It was only during the present reign that they had learnt look with any feeling of kindness on the economy and good husbandry of the Civil List. … It was for the interest of the country in every sense that there should be thrift and good husbandry in the Civil List."
  No doubt, the people do desire economy and good husbandry in the management of the funds which they generously give for the benefit and the comfort of the Crown, and they do desire that they should not be spent lavishly. But what they object to is, the habit of concealment on all these matters. If there were frank openness and freedom as to what are the pecuniary relations between the Crown and the House, these difficulties would never arise. But it has been openly declared and hardly denied, while all inquiry has been steadfastly refused, that the grants in the Civil List for specific expenses based upon the actual expenditure of the last reign, amounting to upwards of £300,000 a-year, have

  1341
  been largely economized; that the money has not been expended; that the honour and dignity of the Crown did not therefore demand these large amounts; but that the savings are not applied in diminution of taxation—a species of thrift which would indeed be for the interest of the country—but that large sums are, by the connivance of the Treasury, systematically placed to the credit of the Privy Purse. I do not know whether it is true or not. I should like to believe that there is not a word of truth in it; but with this concealment is it wonderful that it should be believed that the result is an enormous aggregation of the Privy Purse? It must be common to most of us to hear it whispered, with every appearance of belief, that enormous accumulations have, in fact, been made by such savings from the Civil List. I mentioned, in giving Notice of opposition to this Vote on Tuesday, that this demand was absolutely unprecedented, and this I will now proceed to prove. My assertion is, that there is no instance,—take the last century—in which a demand for money has been made upon the marriage of any Royal Prince, apart from the question of its importance to the country in regard to the succession to the Throne. Now, I do not know whether it is necessary to enter into the question of the possible succession to the Throne in this case. But this point was only just alluded to, and had any importance attached to it, the House would hardly have been content with the off-handed way in which the Prime Minister answered the hon. Member for North Warwickshire (Mr. Newdegate) and the hon. Member for North-east Lancashire (Mr. Holt), as to the religion of the Bride that is to be. I should entirely agree that it was an impertinence to ask that question; but what reason could the right hon. Gentleman have for saying, that it was no use to ask it, unless he means to repeal the Act of Settlement. It is really just as easy to ask the Grand Duchess whether she is a member of the Greek Church, as to ask her whether she is a Papist. But there is not, in fact, any idea that this marriage affects the immediate succession to the Throne. As to another assertion which may be made—that it is distinctly for the political interests of this country that an alliance should be made between us and Russia—I will allude only very briefly. The
  1342
  time when political interests were supposed to be forwarded by marriage alliances has passed away. When I remember the time of the Crimean War, and the lame and impotent conclusions by which we gave up those things which we once thought worth fighting for, and which we believed we had justly obtained, I believe it is true that we lose more by diplomacy than we gain by force of arms. Without sinister vaticinations, I am not at all sure whether the interests of this country will be advanced by an alliance with the Colossus of the East. His aims and purposes are rather at variance, than in harmony with ours. I come now to one of the grounds on which I oppose this grant, and that is that it is unprecedented. The first instance to which I shall refer is in 1792, when provision was moved for the Duke of York, specifically on the ground that it was highly desirable that there should be a direct heir to the throne, and the heir had shown no apparent desire for marriage. The position of affairs is so well described in the words of Sir Matthew W. Ridley, in 1815, that with the permission of the House, I will quote them. He says, speaking on the question of the allowance to the Duke of Cumberland—
  "Nothing came near to this question as a precedent, except the marriage of the Duke of York, which only bore to it a very remote analogy. On making a provision for the Duke of York, a view was had to the probability of the succession of his marriage, as the Prince of Wales entertained at that time no idea of marrying. But a material change had since occurred." [In the birth of the Princess Charlotte.] "With respect, however, to the marriage of the Duke of Cumberland, it was not one which ought to be looked at in a national point of view, or which rendered it necessary on this ground for Parliament to step in to vote a grant for increasing the income of the parties."—[1 Hansard, xxxi. 1024.]
  That grant was refused. The whole case changed within the next few years. The whole nation mourned with an intensity—as I have been told by those who preceded me—before unheard of, the death of the Princess Charlotte. The position of affairs is described in Martineau's History of England during the 30 years' peace—
  "Some rather remarkable proceedings took place in the course of the Session in relation to the Royal Family, no fewer than four members of which were married in the early part of this year. 1st Elizabeth, 3rd danghter;—in this case the two Houses of Parliament were asked only to offer their congratulations to the Regent,

  1343
  the Queen, and the new-married couple. As the bride had completed her 48th year, her marriage could not be expected to contribute anything towards continuing the line of the old King, who now, notwithstanding his 15 sons and daughters, twelve of whom were still alive, was left without any descendant beyond the 1st generation."
  April 13th—a few days later—Messages were sent to both Houses from the Regent stating that treaties of marriage had been drawn up for the Duke of Clarence and Duke of Cambridge, and which went on to say that—
  "After the afflicting calamity which the Prince Regent and the nation have sustained in the loss of his Royal Highness's beloved and only child, the Princess Charlotte, his Royal Highness is fully persuaded that the House of Commons will feel how essential it is to the best interests of the country that his Royal Highness should be enabled to make a suitable provision for such of his royal brothers as shall have contracted marriage with the consent of the Crown."—[1 Hansard, xxxviii. 1.] [Asked £10,000 for Clarence, and £6,000 for Cumberland, Cambridge, and Kent if he should marry. The £10,000 was reduced to £6,000 with loud shouts of approbation; the £6,000 for Cambridge was carried by 177 against 95, and the Duke of Cumberland's negatived.]
  Of the proposed Vote of £6,000 a-year for the Duke of Kent the same historian says—
  "Of all these Royal marriages this was the one which the heart of the country went most along with; the Duke of Kent had attached himself to the popular party, and the relationship of the lady to Prince Leopold and the lamented Princess Charlotte, was of itself sufficient to awaken a strong interest in her favour. If the nation might have had its wish, it would have been from the first that that should happen which has actually fallen out, that to the issue of this marriage the inheritance of the Crown should descend. Yet even the grant of the additional £6,000 a-year to the Duke of Kent was stoutly opposed in the Commons; 51 Members, among whom were Lord Althorn Mr. Coke of Norfolk, Lord Folkston, Mr. Lambton, and Mr. Tierney voting against it."
  All these extracts bear upon the point that it was essential there should be Heirs to the Throne. I will further, with your permission, read a few extracts from the reports of that time, and I may say in reading over those reports that, although I have always been a zealous Parliamentary Reformer, yet I have felt a degree of shame that the debates of the unreformed Parliament showed a manly independence and absence of sycophancy and flattery which a reformed Parliament might do well to imitate—
  Lord CASTLEREAGH said—"Of the twelve children of his majesty, seven were sons, and five
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  daughters. But not one of them had a child to present a hope of direct inheritance of the throne…… To excite some of the members of the royal family to marriage, was now an object of much importance to the country. A single marriage would not satisfy the anxiety of the people."—[Ibid. 79–80.]
  "Mr. CANNING—With respect to his royal highness the duke of Clarence, he could assure the House that his royal highness would not have thought of contracting this marriage,…if it had not been pressed upon him as an act of public duty."—[Ibid. 107.]
  "Mr. BROUGHAM—He was justified in saying, that while the House would not hesitate to vote some allowance to those members of the royal family whom it was desirable to see married, and who would not be enabled otherwise to contract marriages, so they were bound by their duty to their constituents to refuse grants to those to whom they were not necessary.…… If the noble lord, therefore, could not assert that without this allowance his Royal Highness's private and public income would not enable him to marry, he should give the motion his negative altogether…… It was also understood that her majesty had very considerable property. … It seemed to be natural, that those who had large incomes, and property saved by a wise practice of economy, should furnish at least a part of the assistance wanted."—[Ibid. 122–3.]
  "Mr. TIERNEY: If the noble lord would say that the proposed marriage could not take place unless this grant were acceded to, he would immediately vote for it—if not, he felt that he must vote against it."—[Ibid. 136.]
  "Mr. PLUNKETT: The application of the noble lord rested on the abstract principle, independent of time or circumstances—that on the marriage of any individual connected with the Crown, his income should, of necessity, be increased. Where precedents were to be found for such a system, he knew not; and he was sure that nothing in reason or in justice could be discovered to sanction it."—[Ibid. 137.]
  Mr. Curwen (on Duke of Kent)—
  "He did not know that he had ever acceded to any pledge, by which he was bound, in all cases, to make a provision for every branch of the royal family, when a marriage was about to take place.… Had not the illustrious duke parents? Was not her majesty in possession of a very considerable sum, derived from the privy purse?"—[Ibid. 727–8.]
  Now, I say that the whole course of these debates proves the position which I have laid down—that there is no precedent in the last century for the grant upon marriage of an additional allowance to a Royal Prince, unless it could be shown to have some distinct relation to the interests of the people with regard to the succession to the Throne. I say upon this ground the grant to the Duke of Edinburgh fails altogether, for it is not on the ground of any particular advantage to the community that his mar-

  1345
  riage takes place. But suppose the marriage was an advantage to the country, he has £15,000 a-year already, and at any rate we are bound to know that an increase is necessary, and until the right hon. Gentleman gives us that assurance he is not entitled to ask for an increase of that amount. I say £15,000 a-year is, under any circumstances, in my opinion, ample allowance. At present this country is divided into two great classes, the veriest poor, and a small number of the very rich; putting on one side, for the moment, the middle class. Now, I look upon it as unconstitutional and dangerous for the Prime Minister to be continually intimating to us that the incomes of our Princes should be put on the level of the wealthiest classes in this country. But, Sir, this grant is not as Lord Brougham said, the question of amount—it is a question of principle. I shall not profess to speak for any number of persons outside the House—such assertions are easily made and equally easily denied—but I have some right to speak for 10,000 working men of Leicester, enfranchised by the last Reform Bill, who have sent me here to look after their interests. They are persons who, with the utmost industry and exertion, can do little more than exist, and who certainly do not enjoy many of the luxuries of life; and I am not here to give their sanction—however small the increase to their taxation—to an addition to a rent-roll which even as £15,000 a-year will appear to them something like the wealth of the cave of Aladdin. I do not know what the hon. Members for Scotland are going to do in this matter; but I would ask them whether, when one-third of their population live in houses of one room, this is a time for an increase to a Royal income, which already amounts to £15,000 a-year? But perhaps the most remarkable feature of this proposal is that it is made by an economical Government; by a Government which largely based its claims to the confidence of the people on the ground of their intended economy. I fear that their economy comes to an end when they have practised the principles of what they call political economy. This Government based its claims to the confidence of the people on the ground that they were to study economy. I fear they only study economy when they practise political economy upon some
  1346
  overworked Post Office official, or some underpaid Civil Service clerk; but when they come to a Zanzibar contract, or a Royal requisition, the lavish looseness of their economy was never exceeded. We get some insight into the elastic nature of the economical principles of the Government in a speech by the hon. Gentleman the Under Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Winterbotham) who at Colchester, the other evening, in the course of an admirable address, said—
  "The present quiet he disliked, and preferred a good hot contest. It was in these quiet times that measures of class and personal interests got the upper hand of Parliament. For instance, one strong point of the Liberal programme was the question of economy, and no doubt, great reductions had been made; but in this quiet time they found men representing small personal interests getting up, and through them resolutions were passed pledging men to expenditure which, in the earlier days of the Government, would have been impossible."
  There was published a few days ago a list of the pensions granted in the last year—a list of England's penurious liberality. Seventeen names! One only need glance at it to see that, they represent an amount of worth and useful work which a nation may well be proud of. Seventeen names, with an average of less than £75 each; such names as Somerville, Waghorn, and Livingstone. To those the right hon. Gentleman adds an eighteenth—H.R.H. the Duke of Edinburgh for condescending to marry the richest heiress in Europe, £25,000 a-year! In conclusion, I will venture to address one word to the independent Members of this House. Let them judge of the truth of what I have said upon its own merits; do not let them despise it because it comes from one of the humblest Members of this House—one of a small band of so-called extreme men. We are usually governed by party in this House, and in ease of any gross outrage—some enormous extravagance to be carried out—there will be lynx eyes ready to warn this House; but on questions connected with Royal dowries the independent Members are left to their own resources. There is a conspiracy of acquiescence between the two parties in the House. We are told in. the memoirs of Baron Stockmar, that ever since the unfortunate cutting-down of the allowance to the Prince Consort such matters have been arranged be-

  1347
  tween the two parties. The predecessors of Her Majesty were Tories, and did not profess to be anything else, the Tory party were known as the King's friends, and thus in those days it came to be the natural position, as well as the glory of the great Leaders of the Liberal party, to take their stand between the people and the Crown, and the Crown's claims. When Her present Majesty came to the Throne the state of affairs was altered, I may almost say reversed. Not being a Duke, I may hope to approach a delicate subject without offence. I may say, then, without hurting the feelings of anybody, that the condition of affairs was reversed, and the country saw with astonishment the Tory party, assisted by the Radicals, attacking the Government on the grant proposed for the Prince Consort, and while cutting down his allowance from £50,000 to £30,000, the Ministry did not dare to bring in the Bill—which was naturally graceful towards Her Majesty—for granting precedence to the King Consort. That was more equivocal loyalty than the part I am taking now. It is now acknowledged, to the honour of the Queen, by both parties, that she is of no party, and receives with equal readiness the right hon. Gentleman opposite and the right hon. Gentleman on this side. It is more constitutional, more convenient, and more safe. But it may be doubted whether—to reverse a well-known saying—it is a very good wind that blows no one any ill, and I sometimes think the people's interest in economy has suffered by the change. The right hon. Gentleman the Prime Minister and the right hon. Member for Buckinghamshire are sure to be in accord on this question, and when they do agree, their unanimity is wonderful. And when the latter Gentleman is absent, the right hon. Member for Northamptonshire (Mr. Hunt) gracefully intimates how much more the Tory party would have been ready to give had they been in power. Under such a condition, there is for the independent Member but one task—to protest and subside. In moving that this Bill be read a second time this day month, I make my protest against a measure which, in my opinion, is a discredit to the Government that brings it forward, to the House which sanctions it, and—well—no particular credit to His Royal Highness
  1348
  who accepts it. He begged to move the Amendment of which he had given Notice.
  MR. ANDERSONsaid, he begged to second the Amendment. The speech of his hon. Friend, however, had left very little for him to say. He looked upon that charge as entirely unprecedented; and for a House ruled as that House was by precedent, he thought they ought to be very cautious indeed that no act of theirs should constitute a precedent that did not exist before; but in that case he thought the right hon. Gentleman at the head of the Government had deliberately intended to constitute a now precedent; because it would be remembered that in the speech of the right hon. Gentleman, in making his proposal, almost the only argument which he adduced in its favour was that he himself led them to expect that. He told them that when he proposed a grant of £15,000 a-year for the Prince, that in the event of the Prince getting married, he should probably move for a further sum; but when some other Princes had had grants moved for them—take, for instance, that for Prince Arthur, the other day—the right hon. Gentleman was quite silent as to any further intention of increasing the provision for him. He had, therefore, led them to conclude, that if Prince Arthur got married tomorrow, there would not be any further provision proposed for him by the right hon. Gentleman; or the right hon. Gentleman intended in that case, to rely on the precedent he was now creating in the case before them. Now, they wore already giving in grants of one kind and another to maintain the members of the Royal Family somewhere about £130,000 or £140,000 in excess of the Civil List, and so long as they were left without any information whatever as to what the surplus was on the five heads of the Civil List, he thought he was entitled to assume that there were a great many abolished offices. They knew that there were some, and they were entitled to assume that there were many abolished offices from which there was an abundant saving made to provide such grants and payments as were asked for. Now, if that was not the fact, the right hon. Gentleman was himself to blame for any conclusion which they came to upon it. He ought not to have refused the information when it was asked for.

  1349
  If the information should be asked for again, he (Mr. Anderson) sincerely hoped that it would not be again refused. As to the matter of economy and the course pursued by their very economical Government, he should like to remind the House of an incident which occurred a few evenings ago. They had the Secretary of the Treasury attempting to defend an act of very gross injustice towards some of the very humble servants of the Crown, the out-port Customs' officers. The right hon. Gentleman pointed out that in the course of 15 years the outport Custom House clerks had had their salaries augmented by no less than 44½ per cent. The right hon. Gentleman was very precise in his figures, and he should be equally so. Here they were proposing in one year to augment the salary of H.R.H. the Duke of Edinburgh 66⅔ per cent. More than that, the right hon. Gentleman admitted that the outport clerks were doing more work, but His Royal Highness was to do very little more work except to get married. He had very little more to say, but he would like to allude to the details of the Bill, which appeared to him to be erroneous, even from the point of view of those hon. Gentlemen who differed from him on other points. One of those errors was that that grant; along with the former one, might be rescinded when the Royal Prince became naturally a foreign Prince. It was, however, only to be rescinded if Her Majesty wished to do so. It did appear to him that that was placing Her Majesty in a very false position; if she was to insist on its being done, it would be putting her in antagonism with her own son, and it would be far fairer to the country and to the Queen also, that that grant along with the previous one, should pro facto close on the Prince becoming a foreign Prince. He could see no ground for its being continued after that event; and if it were to be continued, it would only give rise to acrimonious debates in that House, which would be highly objectionable and distasteful to Her Majesty, and which he thought ought to be avoided. There was now only one other point. The 3rd clause dealt with the possible widowhood of Her Royal Highness, but the grant given to her of £6,000 in that event was subject to no such contingency as the grant of £10,000 in the
  1350
  2nd clause. Suppose the Royal Prince became a foreign Prince previous to his death. If, in consequence of that, his grant from that country ceased, his widow would then only be the widow of a foreign Prince; but under the clause, notwithstanding that state of circumstances, she would be entitled to the £6,000 a-year in perpetuity. He thought that the annuity under the 3rd clause should only be given in the event of His Royal Highness dying while he was still only an English Prince. He would not take up the time of the House further than by seconding the Amendment.
  Amendment proposed, to leave out the word "now," and at the end of the Question to add the words "upon this day month."—(Mr. P. A. Taylor.)
  COLONEL NORTHsaid, he was not at all surprised at the two speeches to which the House had just listened; but entirely denied that they would find any general response, either in that House or the country. On the contrary, the nation at large, he believed, took delight in any event which contributed to the happiness of Her Majesty or the other members of the Royal Family, and hailed with pleasure any such occasion as the present of testifying their affection towards them. If the hon. Member who moved the Amendment chose to declare on his own authority this illustrious Princess to be the wealthiest heiress of Europe, he ought to be certain that such was the case. The hon. Gentleman found fault with the Leaders on both sides such the House for acting in unison upon such occasions; but in doing so they represented not a mere fraction of the people but the hearty feeling of the country generally. He hoped the House would agree to the grant by a large majority.
  MR. BOUVERIE: I feel of course that in the case of the large mass of our labouring fellow countrymen such considerable sums as those which we are now asked to vote may appear unnecessarily great, and may be beyond their conception of what ought to be required even for a Prince. We must, however, look at the matter not merely from that point of view. My hon. Friend the Member for Leicester (Mr. Taylor) is, no doubt, entitled to entertain the opinion which he has expressed so very ably and temperately this evening; but

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  the great body of the House does not agree with him, and I am perfectly convinced that the great body of his fellow countrymen do not share his sentiments. He belongs to a very advanced party. He thinks there is a good time coming—Heaven forbid I should live to see it—when we shall have no Crown, no Peers, no parsons, no partridges, and even no Church. Such are, I believe, the aspirations of my hon. Friend; but such are, I think, not the feelings of the great bulk of Englishmen. They as well as I, I am sure, feel not only in reference to ourselves, but comparing our condition with that of neighbouring nations, that we ought to be very thankful we have a Royal Family, and that the race of that Family is likely to be continued. The very facts which have been brought forward by my hon. Friend indicate to what risks we might be reduced in that respect, for I believe it to be in the highest degree essential to the happiness and prosperity, and even the liberties of this country that we should always have a Constitutional Royal Family. The statesmen of the time to which my hon. Friend has referred contemplated—and must necessarily have contemplated—with alarm that the succession to the House of Brunswick might have failed altogether; and, looking upon the matter in the lowest and most utilitarian point of view—laying aside any question of sentiment, and that feeling of loyalty which, I believe, still burns in the hearts of the great majority of our countrymen—it would, in my opinion, be the greatest possible affliction to the material interests, to the commerce and progress of the nation, that questions of dispute as to the succession to the Throne of these realms should arise, and that we should be subjected to anything like that which we see on the other side of the Bay of Biscay in the Spanish Peninsula. But it is not upon this lower ground that I base my support of the present Bill. We have in this country a Royal Family who sympathize with us in our pursuits and feelings, who enter into our ordinary enjoyments, whom we see day by day, and who endeavour to play a useful part among their countrymen. The particular Prince, the grant to whom we are now discussing, takes his part like an Englishman in discharging the duties of his station. He belongs to a profession
  1352
  which is most popular among us, he has distinguished himself as an officer in that profession, and is supposed to be one of its ornaments. Are we, then, who represent the taxpayers of this country, to say that we shall debar him or the other Princes of the Royal Family from entering into domestic life? ["No, no!"] Yes, it really comes to that—the Royal Princes of a previous generation to whom my hon. Friend referred, appear to have considered themselves debarred, owing to the arrangements made in their case, from entering into domestic life. We regard that as the happiest side of English life; at least I do for one, so long as the ladies have not that preponderance in the state for which my hon. Friend wishes, but which I say Heaven forbid. But as long as the home and the fireside are the true objects and sources of happiness of English men and women, so long we ought, I think, to do all in our power, within reasonable and moderate bounds, to promote those objects in the case of a Royal Family, which for the best part of two centuries has contributed largely to the prosperity, welfare, happiness, and enjoyment of the people over whom they reign. I will only add that I give my most hearty support to the proposal of the Government.
  MR. GLADSTONE: I am extremely sorry that my hon. Friend (Mr. Taylor) has found it necessary to offer an opposition to this Bill, as it will entail upon me the necessity of detaining the House for a few minutes; because, as he has been compelled by his sense of duty to enter upon a discussion of the question, it would not be right that I should leave the points mentioned by him unnoticed, although I believe, so far as the general sentiments of the vast majority of the House are concerned, they have been expressed with perfect truth by the hon. and gallant Gentleman opposite (Colonel North) and my right hon. Friend who sits behind me. In the first place, as to the charges of the two hon. Gentlemen against the Government, I will dispose of them very briefly. My hon. Friend says I have maintained a habit of concealment as to the condition and circumstances of the Royal Family. He gave no particulars of that charge, and I affirm that I have maintained no such habit of concealment. I believe, myself, that, in a reasonable sense, the better the

  1353
  country understands the circumstances of the Royal Family the better it will be satisfied. But the hon. Gentleman says my doctrine is that the income of the Duke of Edinburgh ought to be raised to the level of that of the richest classes in the country. I appeal to the House whether I laid down any such doctrine. Nothing fell from me that could by any licence of exaggerated construction be twisted into such a doctrine. The hon. Gentleman must know perfectly well that the wealthiest classes in this country—the great manufacturers, merchants, and landowners—have incomes far exceeding that which we ask the House to vote on this occasion; and he must also know—or ought to know—that the incomes of members of the Royal Family are, to a considerable extent pledged, and, I may say, predestined to meet expenses in the nature of establishments, with regard to which the demands of society leave them no option whatever; whereas the wealthy merchant or manufacturer may spend his money exactly as he pleases. Therefore, nothing could be more unjust than the comparison the hon. Member has drawn in that respect. He also twits the Government as to its economy. I suppose he was not here during the discussions on the Supreme Court of Judicature Bill, or he would have known whether, as to the salaries of the Judges of the new Court, we were more yielding than we were in regard to the salaries of clerks. The hon. Gentleman says Mr. Fox asked in the last century, whether the Civil List was adequate for the maintenance of the Royal Princes? and he states that the Liberal leaders of the present day are making demands which would not have been made by Mr. Fox. I can give him a pretty good proof of the state of circumstances in which Mr. Fox spoke of the adequacy of the Civil List. The Civil List was, at that time, of an enormous amount, and was also charged with many public expenses with which it is not now charged, but it was computed to yield a larger sum to pay for the expenditure of the Court than the present Civil List. But what were the circumstances in which Parliament was placed in those golden days to which my hon. Friend referred? Why, Sir, they were these: that although George III. was proverbially economical, and although he was a most honourable and
  1354
  upright man, yet demands for the payment of his debts on the Civil List were made to Parliament and answered by Parliament in 1769, in 1777, in 1802, in 1804, in 1805, in 1815, and in 1816. The aggregate amount of those demands was £3,297,000. These were the circumstances of the time to which the speech of my hon. Friend, if his reference was worth anything, would tend to carry us back. Then he tells us that the late Sir George Lewis said the policy of this country was to strip the Crown of hereditary property. He did not give us the reference to the passage; but he knows perfectly well that when Sir George Lewis spoke of that he spoke of the Crown estates, and made no allusion to the few hundred acres of land that surround Osborne, or the few thousand acres of moor that surround Balmoral; and my hon. Friend's reference could only have the effect of bewildering the House if it were not too well informed for that to be possible. The hon. Member further says I gave the other clay an off-hand answer to the hon. Members for North-east Lancashire (Mr. Holt) and North Warwickshire (Mr. Newdegate). At any rate, I gave more of an answer than the House appeared to desire; and I had the most intelligible admonition from the House that it would be better pleased if I gave no answer at all. I gave that reply not because the House required it, but because, perhaps, some people out-of-doors who are not well informed on the subject—probably some of them may be in Leicester—might have misunderstood my silence on that occasion. It would be easy for me, if it were necessary, to give the assurance to the House, which, I think, is really quite needless, as to the intentions of the Crown, which could never be doubted in the case of a British Sovereign, and least of all in the case of Her present Majesty, to observe in letter and in spirit the ancient laws governing the succession to the Throne and the marriages of members of the Royal Family. And if the question had been asked of me, not in the manner in which it was asked, as to the personal habits which the illustrious Princess was to pursue, but with regard to that in which the country might naturally feel an interest—namely, the children with which I hope the union may be blessed—I should have had no

  1355
  hesitation in saying that the children will be brought up in the Protestant religion as professed by the Duke of Edinburgh. My hon. Friend went on to say it was requisite that the Civil List of this country should be founded on an intelligible principle. Well, I contend that it is founded on an intelligible principle. You must proceed in either of two ways—either you must give the Queen a Civil List with a very large margin, and then you may fairly expect that she will not come to Parliament to make provision for the Royal children; or, if you choose, you may give Her a Civil List carefully adapted to the probable expenditure of the Court, and then you may be prepared to face contingencies. Which of these courses is the most constitutional? I affirm that the course actually pursued is so. It maintains the control of Parliament; it enables Parliament to observe the conduct of the Royal Princes; to back up the parental authority of the Sovereign, and to form its own judgment from time to time as to the course it may be right to adopt. But the doctrine of the hon. Member, if it has any effect, comes practically to this—that we are at the commencement of every reign not merely to reckon the amount of the probable expenses of the Privy Purse, and have a Civil List proportioned to that amount, but that we should also throw in a large sum to enable the Sovereign to make provision for her younger children, and thus establish to a great extent the independence of the Crown of Parliament, instead of its dependence upon Parliament. If that dependence is to be established, as I hope it always will be, it requires the exercise of great wisdom and discretion on the part of Parliament to meet that state of things. It would be alike unwise and ungenerous for Parliament—for purposes such as seem to be contemplated by my hon. Friend—to take advantage of that arrangement which binds the Crown to come to Parliament to provide for these occasions when they arise. My hon. Friend has laid down in one part of his speech something like a proposition, with which it is practicable to grapple. He says there is no precedent for a grant on a Royal marriage except with reference to the succession to the Crown. That is in the first place not correct, and in the next place it is not relevant. As to
  1356
  the case of the Duke of Clarence, the third son of George III., the hon. Gentleman is aware that on that occasion, when he quoted the language of Mr. Canning, which did not fail to amuse the House, the House was willing to vote, and did vote, a sum to be offered on the marriage of the Duke of Clarence, although not so much as he expected; and that, acting ingenuously on the declaration which Mr. Canning made, he allowed the matter to go by. But there is another case—namely, that of the Duke of Cambridge, who was the youngest son of George III., and, in respect to that Prince, who had £21,000 a-year, an additional £6,000 was voted in 1820 on his marriage. Therefore, my hon. Friend is not accurate in stating that these steps have not been taken by Parliament otherwise than in reference to the succession to the Crown—unless, indeed, he deprives his own proposition of all meaning by saying that everything that is given on the marriage of a Royal Prince has reference to the succession to the Crown; and in that case we have a right to claim that our proposal should have the benefit of that principle. But my hon. Friend's proposition is irrelevant. The question is whether the aggregate allowance which is proposed is an unbecoming allowance; is it an extravagant allowance? My hon. Friend speaks of the 10,000 men of Leicester who would oppose the vote. I desire to say that I have more faith in them than he has; and I doubt whether he has correctly represented their opinions. What is the real state of things? £130,000 a-year is now the aggregate of the incomes granted from the taxes of the country to the Royal Family, together with £385,000 for the Civil List. These sums make a trifle more than £500,000 per annum; and I ask, whether, for a country with an annual income of at least £800,000,000, that is, after all, an extravagant sum. And not only that, but, looking at the number of men in the country who count their share of that vast revenue by tens, fifties, and some even by hundreds of thousands, we maintain that, under those circumstances, allowances of this kind must have some relation to the state of society, some reference to the expectations formed from those social relations and ties which it would be very difficult to break, and which it would be mischievous to break

  1357
  if the thing were possible. I was sorry to find my hon. Friend use against this proposal the argument that it was to be rejected because the Duke of Edinburgh was about to marry the wealthiest heiress of Europe. My hon. Friend was well told by the hon. and gallant Member opposite that if he chooses to declare on his own authority this illustrious Princess to be the wealthiest heiress of Europe, he ought to be certain that such is the case. Does he know it? He does not know it. He has taken up the idle rumours of the street—rumours doubling and trebling anything that we have the least reason to suppose will be possessed by the illustrious Princess. I rejoice to believe—although we are not in possession of accurate particulars—that this Princess is well endowed relatively to the usual rates of such jointures. But, I ask, are we really reduced so low that because a British Prince is going to marry a Princess abroad who has somewhat more than would, perhaps, be commonly found to be possessed in these cases, we are to go, cap in hand, to make that marriage, and to require and pray that there may be deducted from the allowance we are to vote as much as has been added on by the fact of her being a wealthy Princess? Does the hon. Gentleman think he could himself stand up in the face of that 10,000 men and make such a proposal? For my part I reject the idea altogether. I submit to the House that the real question is the reasonableness of this allowance. Is it to be a reasonable allowance in the aggregate? It is politic and it is wise that, with the sanction and approval of Her Majesty, instead of giving the full allowance to the young Princes while they were still bachelors, we should reserve a portion of it until they are married. I say that we are acting on a sound and wise principle. If, on the other hand, it be the judgment of this House, in the circumstances in which we are placed, that £25,000 a-year is an improper and extravagant sum for us to vote for the second son of the Queen of Great Britain and Ireland, in the century and the society in which we live, and with the expectations which are entertained by a person of that station, then let us vote with my hon. Friend. I believe, on the contrary, that the firm conviction of the House is exactly in the opposite direction; and I entreat hon.
  1358
  Members to vote by such a majority as will distinctly express the view of the entire Parliament of this country that they will grant to Her Majesty a sum, which we believe to be moderate and just, for I think that if we fell short of it we should fall short of the duty we owe to the Queen and the country.
  Question put, "That the word 'now' stand part of the Question."
  The House divided:—Ayes 162; Noes 18: Majority 144.
  Main Question put, and agreed to.
  Bill read a second time, and committed for To-morrow, at Two of the clock.

  NOES.

  Bright, J. (Manchester)

  Miller, J.

  Brown, A. H.

  Muutz, P. H.

  Buckley, N.

  Potter, T. B.

  Carter, R. M.

  Rylands, P.

  Dilke, Sir C. W.

  Shaw, R.

  Dixon, G.

  Wedderburn, Sir D.

  Ewing, H. E. Crum-

  White, J.

  Fawcett, H.

  Lawson, Sir W.

  TELLERS.

  M'Laren, D.

  Anderson, G.

  Mellor, T. W.

  Taylor, P. A.

  Bill read a second time, and committed for To-morrow, at Two of the clock.

  CONSOLIDATED FUND (APPROPRIATION) BILL.
  (Mr. Bonham-Carter, Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer, Mr. Baxter.)

  SECOND READING.
  Order for Second Heading read.
  MR. SCLATER-BOOTHsaid, he was sorry to stand between the House and the Appropriation Bill, the more so as he agreed with the First Lord of the Treasury that such a course should be reserved for occasions of importance. He conceived, however, that he had ample justification both by reports of recent Committees and by observations which had fallen from hon. Members in debate during the last few weeks, in drawing attention to the unsatisfactory relations at present existing between the Treasury and the other Departments of the State. If he required further justification it might be found in the fact that when the present Board of Treasury was first constituted it assumed a new and unprecedented shape, because a third Lord was added in the person of the right hon. Member for Halifax (Mr. Stansfeld), and a fourth in the person of a noble Marquess from "another place" (the Marquess of Lansdowne), who was kind enough to serve

  1359
  his apprenticeship in public business without salary. At the commencement of the Session of 1860, he drew the attention of the Chancellor of the Exchequer to these changes, and asked for an explanation, which was then given; but he still thought those changes were made in the wrong direction. What was required, in his opinion, was to strengthen not the political representation, but the permanent element of the Treasury. It would seem that the Government on reflection agreed in the justice of those criticisms, for when the then Secretary of the Treasury (Mr. Ayrton) was removed to the Office of Works, the Third Lord took his place, and the vacancy thus created was not filled up. In process of time the right hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. Baxter) succeeded to the Secretaryship of the Treasury, who, although he had left his mark at the Admiralty, had not, if he might be permitted to say so, taken that part in his present office to which by his talents and previous exertions he was entitled. With regard to matters arising out of the Committee of Public Accounts, that Committee made a Report in March suggesting that an inquiry should be made by the Treasury into the irregularities then existing in certain Departments. An inquiry was instituted, and the result had since been laid before the House; but it appeared that the inquiry took three mouths to report. He should have thought three weeks instead of three months would have sufficed for such a work. What had been the consequence? The debate on the subject was hurried over in four hours, while if it had taken place at an earlier period of the Session, it might advantageously have occupied two nights. It seemed that the regulations for the due disposal of the Savings Banks money had been set aside so long ago as 1868, and that fact must have been well known to the Treasury officials; and yet up to the present hour those regulations had never been insisted upon. When the Treasury Minute was produced, in consequence of the Commissioners' Report, he observed that this flagrant omission to comply with the terms of the Act of Parliament was not even alluded to. The Treasury Minute did indeed contain a clause to the effect that the Treasury would determine, after communication with the Post Office
  1360
  authorities, the form in which the different statements of accounts were to be rendered, and that it might be necessary to appoint a Committee on the subject; but this seemed to him a perfunctory way of dealing with what might easily have been dealt with on the spot. The other day the Chancellor of the Exchequer and his private Secretary, in their dealings with Mr. Scudamore, and in relation to the national business of the Post Office, really assumed functions which the Treasury Department ought, in his opinion, to undertake; and the Report of the Select Committee on the Cape of Good Hope and Zanzibar Contract confirmed the same view. In that case the transactions were sometimes conducted by the proper officers of the Treasury and the Postmaster General; but very frequently by the Chancellor of the Exchequer and his private Secretary behind the back of the Postmaster General. It was probable that if the Zanzibar Contract had gone through the usual process the case would have presented itself more clearly to the mind of the right hon. Gentleman. During the whole of the Summer of 1872 the Secretary to the Treasury took no part in the arrangement of the contracts, although he was an official who ought to have been consulted, because he had been the exponent of the policy of the present Government in those matters. Over and over again in the last Parliament that right hon. Gentleman brought forward the cases of the Cunard, the Peninsular and Oriental, and this very African contract, and he was supported in his views by the present President of the Poor Law Board and other Members now on the ministerial benches. The first thing the present Government did was to instruct the noble Marquess then at the head of the Post Office (the Marquess of Hartington) to lay on the Table a Motion altering the Standing Orders, and laying down the rule that no contract should be valid until it was approved by the vote of that House. The Chancellor of the Exchequer appeared the other day to complain of this rule; but as he was a Member of the Government who proposed it, he must be taken to have approved of it. He agreed with the right hon. Gentleman that the rule was sometimes inconvenient, although from what had occurred it was probable that postal con-

  1361
  tracts would not be so numerous in future as they had been in past times. This was, however, only another instance of the want of accord between the right hon. Gentleman and the other Members of the Government. It appeared that the Secretary to the Treasury signed some of these papers without having read them and without knowing what they contained. Being asked a question on this point by the Committee, he said that he had initialled these papers ministerially; whereas the Chancellor of the Exchequer said there was no such thing as initialling papers ministerially. The Chancellor of the Exchequer flatly contradicted the Secretary to the Treasury, and said that the latter was responsible, and that he (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) was not. He thought the House had cause to complain that the Treasury, as a Department, was not allowed to have its full share in making arrangements, before the Chancellor of the Exchequer came in to approve of or to alter them, and that they had no record in the Treasury of the detailed operations in connection with the subject, which he thought ought to have preceded the action of the right hon. Gentleman. The inquiries before the Civil Service Expenditure Committee disclosed a like unsatisfactory state of things. Their Report dealt mainly with the clerical establishment of the Departments, and with the question whether the Treasury exercised proper control in fixing these establishments and regulating the public expenditure. This Committee also regretted to find that more harmonious action did not prevail between the Treasury and the Departments. They especially referred to the controversy which had prevailed for a long time between the Treasury and the Board of Trade as to the establishment of the latter Department, and pointed out the absurd result of that controversy, which ended in the fixing of an establishment which was disapproved as excessive both by the Treasury and by the permanent head of the Board of Trade itself. With regard to the mode in which compensation was granted on the abolition of certain offices, the Act of Parliament required that under special circumstances a full salary should be granted; but it did not appear that the proper officers of the Treasury had ever made the
  1362
  necessary inquiry into special circumstances. He thought that the natural authority and responsibility of the officers of the Treasury should have been allowed to have full sway. It was the absence of that method of proceeding which seemed to him to demoralize the action of the Treasury, and to render its relations with the other public Departments far from satisfactory. With regard to the examination of clerks for the different Departments, the Orders in Council provided that the head of each Department should regulate the mode of examination for his Department in consultation with the Civil Service Commissioners; but the new system which had been introduced by the Chancellor of the Exchequer superseded the Orders in Council, and if it was intended to pervade the whole service, the public ought to be informed of the change. Another Report from a Select Committee, laid on the Table to-day, related to writers in the Civil Service. After repeated efforts by the hon. Member for Chatham (Mr. Otway), this Committee was appointed in order to "let down" the Government easily from the position they had taken up, and he believed the decision of the Committee upset the policy of the Government on this subject. It was a most extraordinary and unprecedented thing to see the House of Commons night after night and week after week taking up the cause of the servants of the Crown against the Treasury; but he feared the Government were in the habit of resisting the claims of public servants too long, and then they were obliged to yield to pressure in the House of Commons, perhaps twitting the House in the next Session for forcing expenditure upon the Government. Many instances of this kind must be in the recollection of the House of Commons, and he need not dwell upon them. The Supplementary Estimates also exhibited, in his opinion, an unsatisfactory state of things, showing that the Treasury did not make up its mind in due time upon the proposals which it desired to submit to Parliament. The greater part of these Supplementary Estimates might have been decided upon before the meeting of Parliament, or, if not, they might well have been left over till Parliament met again. He would not allude to the controversy respecting the embankment of land adjoining the Houses of Parlia-

  1363
  ment; but everyone must see here a want of harmonious action between the Treasury and the Department of Works as between the Treasury and the Board of Trade, which was much to be regretted, and which would, he hoped, be remedied before the next meeting of Parliament. The position of the Treasury, as the great controlling Department, quite irrespective of the Chancellor of the Exchequer for the time being, should be maintained and strengthened by every means this House could command. There was no security for public economy so great as the security afforded by the traditional habits and policy of the Treasury. The great abilities of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, however, should be reserved for great occasions, instead of being spent in doing the work of subordinate officers in his own Department. He thought it would be well if notice were given to the other Departments that the authority of the Treasury would be more strictly maintained than it formerly was. The subject was worth attention, for the public must feel that the existing state of things was unsatisfactory.
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUERexpressed his acknowledgments to the hon. Gentleman opposite for the very fair and temperate manner in which he had touched on topics which, no doubt, in other hands might have admitted of very different treatment. He also thanked the hon. Gentleman for the opportunity thus afforded him of giving explanations which it was desirable the House should receive and which he was very anxious to make. With his permission he would first touch on the last point noticed by the hon. Gentleman—namely, that relative to the embanking a portion of the Thames to the South of the House. He was not going into the controversy on this question, but wished to offer a personal explanation. He read this morning that there was one thing he could not deny—namely, that the Treasury had altered an Estimate of another Department, not only in its amount, but in its destination—by which, no doubt, was meant the purpose for which it was intended—without consulting the other Department. This statement was an entire mistake. He held in his hand a letter from the Board of Works, enclosing an Estimate which was divided into three parts—A, B, and
  1364
  C. A was for £1,000 to be employed in completing the purchase of land; B was for £7,500 for embanking; and C for erecting public buildings, no amount being stated for that object. Then there was a memorandum entering into details, setting forth that the £7,500 was part of £35,000 which would be ultimately required for the purpose of the Embankment, and as to C, the memorandum added—"The nature and extent of the public buildings not having been determined upon, no Estimate has yet been presented." The Treasury drew its pen through the part of the Estimate relating to the public buildings, with reference to which no amount was mentioned. That was all that was done, and no difference whatever was made in the amount or the purpose of the Estimate. In taking the course they had adopted the Treasury were not interfering in the business of another Department. They did no more than, as the Department responsible for submitting the Estimate to the House, they had a perfect right to do. The hon. Gentleman had spoken in terms not at all higher than they deserved of the gentlemen who joined the permanent department of the Treasury, and expressed an opinion that they were overworked and overtaxed. He (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) could not, certainly, say that they were under worked; but, while he should be most ready to recommend to Parliament an increase in their emoluments, should the occasion arise, he could not say that at present there was any case for such an increase. If new duties were imposed upon them a considerable increase should be given; but so long as matters remained as they now were, there was, as he had said, no case for such a proceeding. He was bound to say, too, that an honourable feeling prevailed among the gentlemen in question, that, as it was their duty to interfere with the expenditure of other Departments, they were bound to set an example of economy in their own. The hon. Gentleman spoke of the delay that existed in the furnishing of the Treasury Minute; but it was a matter in which, from its nature, greater promptitude could hardly be expected. There was not merely the ordinary writing of the Report, but it was a subject which involved much technical detail. The duty was a delicate and difficult one. The

  1365
  Treasury was a party implicated more or less, and therefore it required the utmost care to avoid appearing, in exculpating themselves, to inculpate any other Department. One cause of the delay was repeated requisitions from the Post Office—particularly from Mr. Scudamore—for more time to offer explanations. It would have been matter of grave animadversion if the Treasury had declined to give him ample time for that purpose. The transactions were exceedingly complicated, Mr. Scudamore had enormous difficulty in getting the facts together, and it would have been intolerable if the Treasury had not given him the full time he required for his defence. He could not therefore think—when it was remembered that the ordinary business of the Department had to be attended to as well—that the delay was greater than was justified by the circumstances of the case. Then with respect to the question of the regulations that were set aside by the Post Office, the hon. Gentleman assumed that the Treasury were aware of that fact; but they were not, and, indeed, did not know it until the investigation was made. They acted, he thought, discreetly, in not making any change until the entire matter was brought to a close. The Treasury were acting partly judicially, but they were also called upon to stand in the dock with the other persons accused. The Post Office was in fault; but if the Treasury had said so, they would have left themselves open to the observation that they were throwing dirt upon another Department in order to screen themselves. The thing had gone on so long that it was thought better to wait until the final decision of the matter had been arrived at, and then to adopt remedial measures. It was true that the Report was accompanied by recommendations; but it was thought better to keep back those recommendations until the tribunal which was ultimately to judge of the entire matter—the Committee of Public Accounts—had made its investigation. The Treasury were of opinion that when the Committee had come to a conclusion as to the relative amount of blame to be ascribed to the different parties it would be time enough to come forward with their recommendations. Had they done otherwise they would, probably, have left themselves open to the suggestion that they were
  1366
  endeavouring to shift blame from their own shoulders. It was quite true, as the hon. Gentleman said, that it was most desirable that order and regularity in the conduct of the business of the Treasury should be observed. No one was more sensible of that than he was. No one would more regret to see order or regularity put aside. The Treasury was a Department which could not always be managed in the same way. Sometimes business went solely through the hands of the Secretary to the Treasury. Sometimes a great portion of it went through the hands of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Sometimes it was equally divided between them. No rule could be laid down which would apply to all cases. He quite admitted it was desirable that at the Treasury all matters should go regularly through that Department, passing from the hands of the clerks up to the hands of the Financial Secretary, and from him, if it were of sufficient importance, to the Chancellor of the Exchequer. He could only give this assurance to the hon. Gentleman and the House—that both as regarded the internal administration of the Treasury and its relation to the other Departments of the State, the utmost care should be taken to maintain the relative position and rights of individual functionaries and public Departments. With respect to the Zanzibar Contract, the hon. Gentleman commented on the fact that a large portion of that business had been transacted by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The House would form their own opinion; but he did not think the course he had taken was wrong. It was unfortunate that the Report of a Committee was necessarily laid upon the Table a long time before the evidence taken before them. People were apt to make up their minds upon the Report and the subject had lost its interest before the evidence was before them. That was unfortunate for the defeated side. As a question of character and motives was involved in the case he hoped that hon. Members would do him the honour of reading the evidence he had given before the Committee before they formed a final judgment on the matter. The Government had been a party to the appointment of that Committee—the Committee had decided against the Government, and they had undertaken and

  1367
  would, with the utmost good faith, give effect to its recommendations. If they did not come to the conclusion that he was right, they would at least see that what had been done was done honestly with a view to the good of the public service and without the least wish to conceal anything from the House. He would explain how he thought that he was justified in keeping the matter in his own hands. From November, 1871, until August 1872, they did not seriously entertain the question of a contract. They were engaged in inquiries and in obtaining information in a variety of ways. No doubt mistakes were made, and there ought to have been a regular letter written from the Treasury to the Colonial Office, on which to found their letter to the Cape. But at that time he had the misfortune to lose the services of the gentleman who had for several years been his private Secretary, who was succeeded by a gentleman who, though well qualified for his duties, had not the same amount of knowledge and experience, and some matters wore omitted which ought not to have been omitted. Up to the 13th of August, 1872, they were not in a position to take any decision; but at that time the Government did come to a decision to go on with the contract, and from that moment everything had gone on with the most perfect regularity. It was only during the preliminary investigation that any mistake or omission had occurred. He certainly did not want to establish any new principle of action in the Treasury, or alter any general working of the Department. He repeated from the moment they did make up their minds to act they acted with the most perfect regularity. On the 13th of August, when this piece of business was taken up, they wrote to all the Departments concerned with the business, and regular action was taken till the whole matter was carried through in December, when the contract was signed. The hon. Gentleman referred to the case of the Secretary of the Treasury. As soon as the matter had assumed the form of action by the direction of the Cabinet the Secretary to the Treasury was a person to take part in it; but he happened to be out of town, and for some reason he had not discovered, the papers did not reach him. That certainly was owing to no direction on his
  1368
  part—nothing could be further from his intention than to give such a direction. It was said, Why did he not consult the Secretary to the Treasury? As regarded the Western contract—the proposal of the 29th of January—the Secretary to the Treasury had made a Minute on the Papers to the effect that he disapproved these proceedings altogether. After he had given so decided an opinion on the matter, he did not see any propriety in worrying him. So long as the matter was under deliberation in the Cabinet, he was not therefore consulted. He was not aware that there was anything further to notice with regard to the Zanzibar Contract. Then, with regard to the Report of the Committee on the question of the Civil Service expenses, the hon. Gentleman alluded to the dispute between the Treasury and the Board of Trade, and he seemed to be of opinion that there was some miscarriage in the matter on the part of the Treasury. The evidence before that Committee was not before the House; but those who would do him the favour to read his evidence would see what his opinion was. The Treasury was charged with the duty of bringing into effect the system of competition for clerkships. In order to do that it was necessary to regulate the system on which the office was to be organized. There was a long controversy with the Board of Trade, which insisted that the clerks ought to be paid according to the higher class, while the Treasury thought they should be on the second class. The Board of Trade also made demands for an increase of salaries to higher officers which the Treasury did not feel themselves at liberty to grant. The Board of Trade was an independent Department, and he had no power to coerce them. The Treasury were therefore driven to this dilemma—either the Board of Trade must be left without the proper complement of officers, or else a concession must be made which did not appear to be economical. Having exhausted all the means at their disposal, they had therefore thought it right to concede the wishes of the Board of Trade, instead of bringing the office to a dead lock. The Committee had reported that they were not satisfied with the grounds of action taken by the Treasury, and he was not prepared to say that the Committee were wrong. It

  1369
  was a very difficult matter to decide. He only hoped their Report would strengthen the hands of the Treasury, and that in any future organization they should not concede to the head of the Department more than was consistent with their own opinion of what was right. With regard to the case of the Bankruptcy pensions commented on by the Committee, the answer he had to give was very simple. The Treasury were not to blame. They deferred entirely to the views of the Lord Chancellor. He had the power of fixing the pensions by the Act, and the Treasury were required to assent to them. The matter came before the Government in a collective capacity. The Lord Chancellor stated that he was very much hampered by a promise which he had made in the House, and the Government came to their decision with regret, but felt that they had no alternative, having no power to coerce the Lord Chancellor. Though he (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) was no doubt responsible for what was done in that matter, he was responsible only in the same way as the other Members of the Government. He had now, as fairly and frankly as he could, answered the questions put to him by the hon. Gentleman. It was far from his intention to interfere beyond the strict letter of duty with any other Department, or to alter or diminish the position of any person within his own Department. All the Government Departments presided over by a Cabinet Minister were equal. As far as regarded salaries, the Treasury had power to object to their increase; they could not proprio vigore without the consent of the Government force Departments to reduce offices or salaries. The effect of that was this—they could not expect from the Treasury more than they could do. The danger was they might demand more from the Department than they were able to accomplish. All the Members of the Government being equal, if they attempted by an arbitrary regulation to raise one as a sort of ruler or judge over the other, re-action would probably leave the Department shorn of its legitimate powers. With these observations he had only to say that he should be exceedingly happy to find that they were received by the House in the same spirit in which they were submitted to them.
  MR. HUNTsaid, he thought his hon. Friend (Mr. Sclater-Booth) had done quite right in bringing the matter forward at this stage. Until two Sessions ago private Members had opportunities of raising discussions on the Motion for going into Committee of Supply; but the rule as to Mondays now left them little opportunity unless the Government chose to give them a day. This ought not to be the case when the conduct of the Government was in question, and it would have been well had questions which had recently excited attention been brought forward under the old plan. He himself wished to speak on the Post Office question; but the limited time available for the discussion disabled him from doing so, except by postponing the Division till the evening sitting, which would have been inconvenient to many Members. He rejoiced at the spirit in which the Chancellor of the Exchequer had met his hon. Friend, and especially at his assurance that the administration of the Treasury would be conducted on the old lines. He believed that the whole of the mistakes, misapprehensions, and bad feeling which had occurred, had arisen from the departure from the old practices. Almost all matters of importance came before the Treasury, and the wisdom of former generations had divided Treasury business between different Departments, each having an experienced permanent officer. Communications were distributed after registration among the Departments, and then brought before the Permanent Secretary and the Financial Secretary, being passed on, if necessary, to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and occasionally to the First Lord of the Treasury. He regretted that the highly competent Secretary to the Treasury had not shown himself more conversant with the financial business of the Government, and was surprised that in discussion on the Budget the Chancellor of the Exchequer had not invited him to take part. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, as he (Mr. Hunt) remarked two years ago, seemed to be Chancellor of the Exchequer and Secretary to the Treasury rolled into one. He feared that the Chancellor of the Exchequer's zeal and passion for work had led him to take things out of the hands of the permanent officers of the Treasury. The late Sir George Lewis, when asked whether he found time

  1371
  to work his Department, said, his duty was not to work his Department, but to see that his Department was worked. There was much sense in this, for heads of Departments should not do all the work, but should control their Departments, deciding all the more important matters themselves, but not taking everything out of the hands of the permanent officers. The right hon. Gentleman's great ability and quickness of apprehension and temperament had, perhaps, made him impatient of the delays involved in matters going through the Treasury mill. The Zanzibar Contract was evidently arranged in the right hon. Gentleman's room in Downing Street; for had it gone through the proper Department the offer of Mr. Monteith's company would have been duly registered and would not have been lost sight of. In the Post Office case, also, letters of the greatest consequence were mislaid. Delay might be caused by the regular routine of matters going through the Department; but the shortest cut was not always the best road, and he welcomed the Chancellor of the Exchequer's assurance that in future he would give all the functionaries of the Treasury their proper duties, and would make no short cuts to decisions on important matters. As to the Board of Trade, when at the Treasury he and his right hon. Friend (Mr. Cave), then Vice President, wore appointed a committee to inquire into the question of the staff and salaries, and they made a representation which was accepted by the heads of the Treasury and carried out. Had the same course been taken in the matter mentioned by the right hon. Gentleman there would have been harmonious action between the two Departments, and strife would have been avoided. [The CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER said, substantially the same course had been taken.] Then he could not understand how the question had been pending for three years. He also made a Report on the Poor Law Board, after personally obtaining sufficient information, and the President of that Board having also the opportunity of making a representation a decision was then arrived at. He regretted that the Chancellor of the Exchequer did not take a sufficiently high view of the power of the Treasury as to other Departments. The Office of Works and the Post Office were ex-
  1372
  pressly subordinate to the Treasury, and as to other Departments, the Treasury, through the First Lord and the Chancellor of the Exchequer, could urge on the Cabinet an opinion that the staff was too numerous or the expense too large, in which case the Government would order an inquiry through the agency of the Treasury. He could not conceive any inability on the part of the Treasury to carry out their views, if they were sound and recommended themselves to the Government of the day. The observations and assurances of the right hon. Gentleman must give the House great satisfaction, and it was to be hoped that we should not in any future Sessions have Report after Report of Committees commenting on the action of the Treasury in these matters.
  MR. GLADSTONEsaid, that nothing could be more fair than the manner in which this subject had been introduced by the hon. Gentleman (Mr. Sclater-Booth), or than the remarks which had been made by the right hon. Gentleman who had just spoken. He quite understood the observations with which the right hon. Gentleman commenced with respect to the new Rules of Supply; but he did not understand the connection which the right hon. Gentleman supposed to exist between those Rules and the somewhat rapid course of the debate of yesterday. He suspected that the evil lay deep in the overwork of the House of Commons, and not either in the Rules of the House or the disposition of the Government to make suitable arrangements for the Prorogation. The House felt, and must necessarily feel, fatigued at the termination of such a Session; but certainly the remarks of the right hon. Gentleman would have been most just if the Government had not given facilities for debate on serious matters connected with their own policy whore the subject was supposed to awaken a certain degree of public interest. In his opinion the regulations of Supply, although they were not free from inconvenience, were yet almost the only means by which the legislative business of the House could be prosecuted under the circumstances in which they now stood with anything like effect. He was very desirous of questioning in a certain degree what had been said by the right hon. Gentleman as to the power of the Treasury over other Departments. The

  1373
  matter, in his opinion, was stated with perfect precision by his right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer. In the first place, it was not accurate to say that the Office of Works and the Post Office were two Departments entirely subordinate to the Treasury. They were undoubtedly subordinate to the Treasury in their expenditure, and expenditure formed so large a portion of the business of those offices that they were brought into a position in which control could in most matters be largely exercised over them by the Treasury. But it would not be correct to state that in other respects the Treasury had a general power of interference with those particular Departments. With regard to the Revenue Departments, strictly so-called—namely, the Inland Revenue and the Customs—over these the Treasury was superior, and they must follow its directions. Of course, it was perfectly true that the Chancellor of the Exchequer could, in a case of necessity, call in the assistance of the First Lord of the Treasury. He recollected very well a case when first he was Chancellor of the Exchequer, in which a very serious difference arose between the Foreign Secretary of the day and himself as to the establishment of the Foreign Office, and the Foreign Secretary having, as he had himself, great confidence in the First Lord of the Treasury, Lord Aberdeen, they agreed to refer the matter to him, and Lord Aberdeen decided it in his (Mr. Gladstone's) favour. He remembered, too, feeling exceedingly grateful to the Foreign Secretary for acceding to the request that the matter should be referred to the First Lord of the Treasury. It was undoubtedly true that the Chancellor of the Exchequer could carry—as other Ministers could—any difference between himself and his Colleagues to the Cabinet for decision. He himself as Chancellor of the Exchequer had very frequently been defeated in the Cabinet, and he had seen other Chancellors of the Exchequer defeated too with regard to questions of expenditure. He heartily wished the right hon. Gentleman opposite good fortune in such cases, and that he might be able in every instance when on the part of the Treasury he raised the question of expenditure and carried it to the Cabinet to have his own way. He had no doubt it would be much better for the public that it should be
  1374
  so; but, nevertheless, the Treasury had to fight its battles in the Cabinet, and like other Departments take its chance, and though occasionally it might achieve victory it must sometimes resign itself to defeat. He wished to confirm in the strongest manner what had been said by the Chancellor of the Exchequer on the Bankruptcy Compensations. Much censure had for some time past been bestowed on him on account of those compensations, and it was only lately he had been able to refresh his memory as to the cause of the actual transactions, so as to be able to say that of special responsibility in that matter his right hon. Friend had none. He admitted that he did not think those compensations reasonable; and if asked why, then, was he a party to them, he could only justify himself by a reference to what occurred in the matter. They knew very well that on former occasions the compensation awarded to the profession in measures relating to what was called "Law Reform" had been perhaps almost scandalous, but certainly excessive and highly burdensome to the public. They also knew—and everyone who heard him knew—that the weight of the legal profession in the House upon questions of that kind was ordinarily irresistible. He did not mean to say that was the case when the public matters involved were of such interest and of so high an elevation that the entire House attended, and its deliberate judgment could be obtained. Then there was something like fair play for the public. But one of the difficulties inseparable from the constitution of the House was this—that the House consisted, as to its personal composition, not so much of one House as of a succession of Houses. For instance, when they were discussing questions of philanthropy affecting some distant island in the Pacific the benches were filled with philanthropists. On questions relating to Ireland, when that country was supposed to be injuriously affected, the benches were filled by Irish Members. And so it was all round. Well, when the House was discussing an Act like the Bankruptcy Act it was vain for the Government to try to assert itself against the authority of the legal profession in matters connected with the structure of the Courts. Under these circumstances, his right hon. Friend and himself—for

  1375
  he was quite as much concerned in it—were thankful to get what they could into the Act in the way of control for the purpose of mitigating the burden of those compensations. But they were not able to place the compensations in Bankruptcy under the Treasury in the same way as other compensations, and that the best arrangement they could come to was that they should be placed in the hands of the Lord Chancellor under the Treasury. Every Lord Chancellor was a faithful and loyal Member of the Government to which he belonged; but the associations of his profession were strong upon him. He was head of the Law first, and a Cabinet Minister afterwards. But whether that was so or not, when any question arose, the Lord Chancellor always alleged—and alleged truly—that the Government could never have got those provisions at all with regard to compensations if the Gentlemen of the legal profession had not agreed to the provisions of the Act, because of the power given to the Lord Chancellor by the terms of the Act. Therefore, though the Government could not justify the amount of the compensations, they had no other course than to accept them. He entirely agreed with his right hon. Friend near him as to the conduct of business; and he admitted that both the hon. Gentleman and the right hon. Gentleman opposite were quite justified in the very temperate remarks they had made on the subject.
  MR. LIDDELLsaid, he wished to render his tribute of thanks to his hon. Friend near him (Mr. Sclater-Booth), and also to the Prime Minister, for the admirable tone and temper which had marked the conduct of the discussion. His only desire was to make a few remarks upon the general topics which had been discussed. He had no intention to say more in reference to the irregularities in the Post Office, than that he regretted the House had not expressed itself much more strongly with regard to the question than it had seen fit to do. The House was mainly concerned in taking precautions in order to prevent the recurrence of similar irregularities. A great portion of the mischief had arisen from what the Postmaster General had described as the vortex of his own balances; but which, to use a more homely phrase, might he described as hodge-podge. He did not
  1376
  mean to say that a rigid adherence to the Treasury Minute of June 28th last, which provided for the more rapid handing over the balances to the National Debt Commissioners, would not succeed to a large extent in effecting the necessary reform, but he had a still more important recommendation to make. For instance, with regard to the Post Office, which was a large Revenue Department, at the present time the balances were paid into the Bank of England in such a way that it was utterly impossible to fix the Department to which they belonged, and he was convinced that no system of check could be perfect until means had been taken to ascertain the heads of service to which the balances belonged. While it was important that new regulations should be framed, it was of equal importance that they should be framed in the best possible manner; and this end would not be attained as long as the framing was left to each of the Departments affected. There was abundance of evidence now at the disposal of the Treasury to enable them to form, proprio motu, their own regulations, and he thought they should not be left to a departmental Committee, but that the head of the Department should be responsible for them. There was another point on which he wished to make a few remarks, in his individual character as a Member of the Committee which had inquired into the matter. No other Member of the Committee had alluded to the question, and therefore what he was about to say must be taken quantum valeat, as the expression of his own view. He alluded to the separation of the office of Receiver in the Post Office from that of Accountant General. In any case, the receiving and accounting department of a Government office ought, in his opinion, to be separated; but in the peculiar case of the Post Office, seen by the light of the Treasury Minute of last year, he thought this was of oven greater importance. The constitution of the Parliamentary officer at the head of the Department—the accounting officer of the Department—was an official fiction and a sham which ought at once to be put an end too. With regard to the office of Auditor General, too, he thought an alteration might be made with advantage. The Auditor General was not a Treasury officer, but an official responsible solely to Parliament; and there-

  1377
  fore he ought to be allowed to select his own subordinate officers, instead of being dependent upon the Treasury for them. An enormous amount and variety of extra work had of late years been thrown upon this Department, and no one could possibly be more competent than the Auditor General to select the persons best qualified, by special aptitude, to discharge the duties devolving upon the office. He wished to urge, in concluding, the importance of adopting the suggestion of the hon. Member (Mr. Sclater-Booth), that in future all loans contracted for departmental purposes should pass through the Exchequer, in accordance with the Controller and Auditor General's able memorandum upon the subject, appended to the Report of the Committee, and that they should be surrounded with all those constitutional safe-guards of which previous loans had been divested by a laxity of practice on the part of the House which it was not too late even now to amend.
  MR. WHITEsaid, he thought some expression of gratitude was due to the hon. Member for South Hants (Mr. Sclater-Booth) for having brought forward this question, and thus afforded an opportunity to the House for pronouncing an opinion upon what he must call a grave public scandal. He never recollected—and he doubted if even the oldest Member of that House recollected—such an event as four Select Committees, simultaneously sitting, having reported condemning the management of the Treasury by its ostensibly effective head, the Chancellor of the Exchequer. He had no desire to be unduly critical respecting the manner in which the subject had been treated by the hon. Member for South Hants—an ex-Secretary of the Treasury—although he could not help feeling that between those who were in office and those who had been in office there always existed that feeling which was said to make men wondrous kind. What was of more importance was that the independent Members should declare their opinion, and be hoped that they would now do so unreservedly. True, the Chancellor of the Exchequer had just read from the Table a profession of repentance for what was passed, and had promised good behaviour for the future, and had he done no more than made his recantation he (Mr. White) would have been satisfied.
  1378
  But when he proceeded to justify the course he had adopted with respect to the Cape and Zanzibar Mail Contracts, that was more than the most kindly intentioned man could put up with. He (Mr. White) bad read the evidence given by the Chancellor of the Exchequer before that Committee, and his opinion was that, judged by that evidence, the Report of the Committee was altogether too mild in its character and was not sufficiently strong in its condemnation. The right hon. Gentleman still contended that he was right and the Select Committee, the House of Commons—indeed, everybody else—were wrong, because he had such absolute confidence in his own superior wisdom, and such a cynical contempt for the crass ignorance of any person who did not see things exactly in his own light. He (Mr. White) believed that if the matter had been put to the test it would have been found that not only a majority of the House, but a large majority of his own Colleagues condemned the course taken by the right hon. Gentleman. The right hon. Gentleman had been a Member of the House even longer than he (Mr. White) had been, and he could not forget that there had been animated discussions, and many divisions in it, with reference to mail contracts, and he also knew that in times past Postal subsidies and contracts were used as the means of Parliamentary corruption, and that, in consequence thereof, the House very wisely determined that no contract for a mail service and no subsidy should be given without first being submitted to the House. That policy was recommended and further strengthened by the existing Liberal Government, and wholly accorded with the avowed principles of the present Prime Minister. By the old Standing Order, all mail contracts were submitted to the House, and if not approved of within one month became binding. The present Government, soon after its accession to office, on the Motion of the late Postmaster General (the Marquess of Hartington) passed without opposition the new Standing Order which enforced the absolute approval of the House before any such contract could take legal effect. The right hon. Gentleman (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) then, as now, held his important office in the Government which passed that Standing Order. And yet he still

  1379
  obstinately persisted in condemning such a wholesome proviso. The Chancellor of the Exchequer could not but know what a fertile source of Parliamentary corruption several subsidized mail contracts had often proved. It was notorious that by such corrupt influences the representation of some of our out-ports had been perniciously affected. Indeed, it was alleged, and he (Mr. White) believed truly, that at the last General Election the opportune grant—by the then Conservative Government—of the Cunard and Inman Mail Contracts secured a scat at Liverpool for one of its friends. He (Mr. White) could not refrain from expressing his deep regret that the Chancellor of the Exchequer had not that evening admitted that he had acted wrongly with regard to the Cape and Zanzibar Mail Contract; and if a Vote of Censure were moved on the right hon. Gentleman with reference to that transaction, he certainly would vote for it. At the same time, he believed that the right hon. Gentleman was thoroughly honest in conducting that arrangement. As long as the right hon. Gentleman acted the part of an obstinate impenitent heretic with reference to sound orthodox Parliamentary principles, one could not be surprised that, notwithstanding his distinguished talents and ability, he was so deservedly unpopular. Mr. Burke, when addressing the Speaker of the House of Commons on one occasion, said—
  "The House, like other collections of men, had a marked love of virtue and an abhorrence of vice, but that among vices there is none which the House of Commons abhors in the same degree as obstinacy." "Obstinacy," continued Burke, "is certainly a great vice and, in the changeful state of political affairs, is frequently, the cause of great mischief."
  He (Mr. White) would strongly commend those remarks of that illustrious statesman—Burke—to the serious consideration of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Special reference had been made to the Select Committee, on which he (Mr. White) had the honour to serve, with regard to the Expenditure of the Civil Service which had just reported. He would have been better pleased if his hon. Colleague on that Committee (Mr. Sclater-Booth), instead of bringing forward this Motion, had voted for the Amendment which he (Mr. White) moved to the Report of
  1380
  that Committee, because that would have brought the question of the present mal-administration of the Treasury Department formally before the House. That Amendment was to the effect that the Committee regretted that, owing to the limited powers exercised by the Treasury, its ostensibly effective head, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, should confess his inability to adequately control the Expenditure of the different branches of the public service, the details of which were annually submitted for his revision when the Estimates for the respective Departments were framed. For when examined before the Civil Services Expenditure Committee, the Chancellor of the Exchequer told them that it was a "delusion" to believe that the Treasury did now exercise a direct and effectual control over the expenditure of the country. He, moreover, added that as to Law Reform "no improvement could be effected without paying smart money for it." And that no re-organization of any Civil Department could be attempted without the heads of those departments "sticking in" a great many demands to which the Treasury had to accede rather than lot the public service stand still. The right hon. Gentleman cited the preliminary demand of Mr. Farrer (the permanent Secretary) of the Board of Trade, for an increase of £500 per annum, and also adduced the fact that both the Home and Foreign Departments had persistently refused compliance with the Orders in Council and Treasury Regulations for introducing open competition into the public service. Had his (Mr. White's) Amendment been agreed to, the Committee would have recommended that Parliament should devise an early and efficacious remedy for this glaring defect in the Executive Department of the State. That Amendment was negatived, although it had the support of hon. Gentlemen who did not agree with him in politics. He also moved another Amendment which was lost by the casting vote of the Chairman (Mr. Childers) to the effect that, having regard to the unanticipated magnitude of payments on the abolition of offices, and notably to the excessive compensations granted under the Bankruptcy Act of 1869, full salaries for life—namely, from £1,800 to £2,000 a-year having been awarded to everyone—young or

  1381
  old—of the ten Commissioners whose offices were then abolished, the Committee recommended that no Bill involving any public charge should be introduced into Parliament unless accompanied with an estimate or statement, signed by the Chancellor of the Exchequer or the Secretary to the Treasury, of the probable expense thereby entailed upon the country, and with the proviso that no disbursement in excess of such estimate or statement should be legal without the previous approval of Parliament. It was the duty of that House to strengthen and uphold the continuous supervision of the Comptroller of the Exchequer and of the Audit Department; besides it was owing to their sagacity and scrutiny that the misappropriations by the Post Office were originally brought to light.
  MR. PERCY WYNDHAMsaid, he was unable to say whether unanimity existed among the heads of the various Departments; but it was, at all events, agreeable to witness the amiable feeling that existed between those who sat on the two front benches. It was doubtful whether much good would result to the country from this most unsatisfactory debate on a serious and great question. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had been a little hard on Committees and their Reports, seeing that it was only through the painful interest which had been taken by the House in some of the transactions in his Department that formal Votes of Censure had been voted on two or three occasions this Session in the mild and indulgent form of referring the subjects brought under the notice of the House to Select Committees, whose labours should therefore have been alluded to by the right hon. Gentleman with gratitude if not with admiration. There was not much use in his going through all the points which had been raised in the course of this discussion; but he had risen with the object of obtaining from the Government an expression of opinion upon the question whether the conduct of the business in these great Departments should not be more in accordance with the ancient usage which prevailed before the present Government came into power, especially with respect to the manner in which communications were made between the different Departments. It was of the first importance that such
  1382
  communications should be made through the proper channels, and not by means of private secretaries behind the backs of the chiefs of Departments mostly interested. The other night when the Post Office scandal was under discussion, the Postmaster General, in the course of his defence, informed the House that the Correspondence on the subject, which was of such great importance, and which had led to such disastrous results, was carried on for months, not between the head of the Treasury and himself, but behind his back, and that it was altogether unknown to him that the letters were passing. To-night the Chancellor of the Exchequer had informed the House that, with regard to the very important subject of the Thames Embankment, the alteration made by the Treasury in the Estimate was a very nominal one. If that were so, how did he account for the manner in which it had been resented by the First Commissioner of Works? He should like to know if the alteration was made in a proper manner; and also he should like to receive some assurance from the Government that in future communications between Departments would be made in a proper manner. After reading this debate, the public would be of opinion that the time had arrived when not only the present Session, but the present Parliament should come to an end.
  MR. M'LARENsaid, that as a Member of the Select Committee upon Exchequer Expenditure, he wished to say a few words upon a point which had not been brought very clearly before the House. He had carefully attended to the evidence given before the Committee, and believed he fully understood the questions which had been raised; and he had listened to the explanation given by the Prime Minister respecting the allowance of full salaries for life to the Judges of the Court of Bankruptcy; and he thought that the right hon. Gentleman's explanation was not at all satisfactory. The charge which was made implied a censure upon the Government. The 131st clause of the Bankruptcy Bill provided that there should be two co-ordinate powers to deal with the question of the retiring allowances of the judges; one being the Lord Chancellor and the other the Treasury. The Act provided that the Lord Chancellor, under special circumstances, might recommend the full

  1383
  pay to be given to the Judges, but that he should do it with the consent of the Treasury. The Prime Minister, however, seemed to consider this to be a judicial discretion of the Lord Chancellor, controlled the Treasury, and deprived it of any independent judgment. He apprehended that that was quite a misconception of the intention of the Act of Parliament. The Treasury had a right to negative the proposition of the Lord Chancellor if they thought his proposition an unfit one. There was another point upon which he wished to say a word. The right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer had defended the delay in the appointment of the Commission to inquire into the Post Office accounts, by alleging the necessity of giving time to prepare the balances. He believed that no such time could be possibly required by any honest system of making out accounts, either for the Post Office or any other business in the world. If the Post Office accounts had been kept clearly and without intentional mystification, it was impossible that three months could be required for making things plain. In the largest businesses in the world, whether mercantile or banking, the books were kept in such a state, that instead of three months being required to ascertain how the balances stood, three days would not be necessary for making out a complete and exhaustive statement. The defence was really no defence at all, and it was impossible to condemn the Post Office officials in language too strong.
  GENERAL SIR GEORGE BALFOUR, referring to the alterations which had been introduced into the Estimate which had been submitted to the Treasury by the First Commissioner of Works with respect to the proposed embankment near the Victoria Tower, commented somewhat severely on the fact that those alterations had been made without consulting the right hon. Gentleman on the subject. He also dwelt on the want of united action between the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Secretary to the Treasury in the case of the Zanzibar Contract, observing that the opinions of the latter had been passed over because the former choose to think that he was prejudiced in the matter, and contending that, if there were any good grounds for such an insinuation, the proper course would have been to get
  1384
  rid of an officer who could not be trusted.
  THE CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER: What I said before the Committee was that my right hon. Friend had given a decided opinion on the matter, and that there was no use in troubling him.
  GENERAL SIR GEORGE BALFOURthought it was most undesirable that any officer in the Treasury, particularly one occupying the high position of the Parliamentary Secretary, should be considered incapable of carrying out the views of his superior, and he thought such a statement as that of the Chancellor of the Exchequer ought to be repudiated in the strongest terms. The right hon. Gentleman had no right to employ his private secretary in the business in the manner which he had done. The permanent secretaries, whether in Parliament or not, were those whose services should have been called into requisition. He did not mean, in making these observations, to impute the slightest shadow of wrong intention to the Chancellor of the Exchequer; but he must maintain, at the same time, that it was dangerous to any public office, to allow business to be transacted as he appeared to have done. Again, as to the case of the Postmaster General, he doubted very much whether the Secretary for War or the First Lord of the Admiralty would allow any such interference as had been shown to have existed in this Department. It was distinctly proved that the Chancellor of the Exchequer had been in close and frequent communication with officers subordinate to the Postmaster General, and any practice better calculated to destroy responsibility, could not have been taken. Perhaps the worst part of the case was that the Chancellor of the Exchequer had given no assurance that he would abstain from pursuing such a course in future. He made those remarks because he loved good administration, and because he thought such a line of conduct as that adopted by the right hon. Gentleman ought to be condemned by the House. The accounting officer and the receiving officer of the money receipts and expenses of the Post Office and Telegraph Departments ought to be distinct, and he would only strongly advise that the old practice of the War Office of "even and quits," should be introduced, and the

  1385
  balances ought to be delivered up at certain times. By that means the country would be freed from those scandals which resulted from the system on which the Chancellor of the Exchequer had acted. He (Sir George Balfour) added that he would now call attention to the sound suggestions of the hon. Member for Northumberland.
  SIR EDWARD COLEBROOKEthought the expressions used by the last speaker more severe than was warranted by anything which the Chancellor of the Exchequer had done in reference to more than one of the matters to which he had adverted. He (Sir Edward Colebrooke) was old enough to remember much more serious charges being brought against Government than unwillingness on the part of the Heads of Departments to take responsibility upon themselves. This charge was one which ought not to have the serious attention of the House.
  On Question, "That the Bill be read a second time,"

EAST INDIA REVENUE ACCOUNTS—THE FINANCIAL STATEMENT.

  QUESTION.
  MR. FAWCETTsaid, that before the Bill was read a second time, he wished to put a question to the Government with reference to the Indian Budget. In the early part of the evening he had found it impossible to extract a satisfactory answer from the Prime Minister as to the arrangement of Indian business. He understood that the present evening was, if possible, to be reserved for the discussion of the Indian Budget; but the Prime Minister stated that circumstances over which he had no control prevented him from giving up the whole of the evening for that purpose. Now, he admitted that the Public Business had been dislocated, owing to the unfortunate absence of the Prime Minister on Tuesday night. No one could, however, complain of his absence, for, as everyone knew, no Minister had ever worked more assiduously or zealously than he did. In consequence, however, of his absence, and owing to the circumstance that one of his Colleagues refused to say five courteous words, which would have been perfectly satisfactory to the House, the unusual course was adopted of moving the Adjournment of the House,
  1386
  and the Report of Supply was not, in consequence, agreed to. Had the Prime Minister been in the House he would have said those few conciliatory words which he spoke the next morning, and. the Business of the House would have been in a different position at the present moment. So far as that evening was concerned, he did not, therefore, blame the Prime Minister; but he could not understand whether to-morrow was or was not to be set apart for the discussion of the Indian Budget. That, it seemed, depended on whether a private Member was prepared to give it precedence or not. Unless, then, the Government gave him some assurance that time would be given for the due consideration of a subject which vitally affected our Indian Empire, he should deem it to be his duty to move a distinct Motion impugning their conduct as to the management of Indian affairs in that House before the Session should close.
  MR. GOSCHENsaid, that the hon. Gentleman (Mr. Mundella) would not bring on his Bill to-morrow, and the debate on the Indian Budget, if adjourned from to-night, would follow the Appropriation Bill and the Duke of Edinburgh's Annuity Bill to-morrow.

ARMY—ARTILLERY—THE 35-TON GUN.

  OBSERVATIONS.
  LORD ELCHOsaid, that as it appeared that the discussion on the Bill of the hon. Member for Sheffield (Mr. Mundella)—which under the circumstances of the Session was only worthy of a debating society—was to be postponed to another day, if the debate on the Indian Budget were not concluded to-night, he would ask the indulgence of the House while he called attention to a Vote in the Schedule of the Appropriation Bill affecting the Naval and Military Services—especially if it should turn out that the money had not been well expended. He understood that in the trials that had taken place on board the Devastation, the 35-ton gun, had not given satisfaction. He had been informed by an eyewitness that the brass studs of the bolts were shorn off before leaving the muzzle of the gun—the proof being that on the deck of the vessel in front of the turret there were several deep jagged cuts which could not have been the result of unexploded pebble powder as some sup-

  1387
  posed. The consequence of a stud being shorn off would be that the grooves of the gun would be injured and the gun become unserviceable. As a proof that something of this kind had happened to the guns of the Devastation, he was informed that a shot, which at the beginning of the trials, was easily rammed home by two men, required eight men after several rounds had been fired. If this was the case with respect to the grooving and studs, what was the effect on the flight of the projectiles? He was told that the missile, after going steadily through the air for 200 or 300 yards, was seen gradually to turn until its side was presented in the direction of the object at which it was aimed, and only after a considerable further flight recover itself and point straight to the object it was to strike. Now, if it should happen that the projectile should strike an enemy's iron-clad while in its sidelong flight, instead of penetrating, it would rebound, doing little injury. That, he believed, was not denied. [Mr. CARDWELL: It is denied altogether.] He had heard the same thing at Shoeburyness. It had certainly been admitted in the House that these guns were too short, and that in future they would be made longer. The general conviction was, that the system of rifling with studded shot—which was borrowed from the French—was not sound. His belief was that the smooth-bore Lancaster system had not had a fair trial, and he recommended that the question as between it and the Woolwich system should be settled at once by full tests, both as to range, accuracy of flight, and endurance. He believed the result would be greatly in favour of the Lancaster smooth-bore system. The cost would be small, and at any rate they would have an opportunity of judging which was the sounder system. He would suggest also, in order that the authorities might judge of the effect of firing on the 35-ton gun, that two "squeezes" should be taken—one from the gun as it was turned out perfect, and the other of the gun after it had been discharged—they would then be able to judge whether the present system was attended with the defects which were charged against it. The matter was of consequence. Enormous sums had been already spent, and much more was to be spent; for the War Office were now making a 35-ton gun which was to
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  throw a projectile of 700 lbs.—and he believed they were about to undertake a 70-ton gun which was to throw a projectile of 1,600 lbs. It was, therefore, of great importance to ascertain that we had got the best system of rifling.
  SIR HENRY STORKSsaid, he did not know that the noble Lord was about to raise this question or he would have been prepared with diagrams and the reports of the officers who were present to show how completely the noble Lord had been misinformed as to the result of the firing on board the Devastation. The deck in front of the turret was not ploughed up by studs shorn from the shots, but was scored to some extent by the pebble powder—some grains of which would always be blown from heavy guns in an unconsumed state. With regard to the unsteadiness of the flight of the projectile, and the statement that it had been seen to turn broadside in its flight towards the object aimed at, he defied anyone to see anything of the kind while the projectile was in its flight, and he had the authority of Captain Hood, the Director of Naval Ordnance, for stating that he had observed no unsteadiness in the flight of the shot; and that in firing two guns simultaneously at an elevation of 14 degrees, both projectiles struck the water at the full range of 6,900 yards, close together, and at the same instant—a pretty good proof of the accuracy of the guns. Five rounds were also fired at 1,000 yards, with 110 lbs of powder and a 700 lbs projectile, and at this range the guns would hit a man. The noble Lord said that, after a few rounds had been fired eight men were necessary for working one of these guns; but Captain Hood said that four were sufficient; and both he and Captain Boys of the Excellent agreed that the trials on board the Devastation were highly satisfactory. If the noble Lord would communicate to him privately the names of his informants he would communicate with them, and any representations they might make would receive every attention.
  MR. CRAWFORDsaid, that the noble Lord had remarked that the Bill of the hon. Member for Sheffield (Mr. Mundella) was better suited to a debating society than to that House; but he put it to the House whether the subject introduced by the noble Lord was not better suited to the United Service In-

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  stitution. He should not now further discuss the question of little bores or great bores, among whom he did not include his right hon. Friends below him. He hoped the Indian Financial Statement would not be further delayed.
  MR. R. N. FOWLERstrongly condemned the practice of deferring to the extreme end of the Session the discussion of the affairs of India, when there was barely time for the Under Secretary of State to make his statement to the House. He hoped the Government would take into consideration the Report of the East Indian Finance Committee, and that they should have a better opportunity of discussing the subject next Session.

EAST INDIA REVENUE ACCOUNTS.

  COMMITTEE.
  Order for Committee read.
  MR. GRANT DUFF: I rise, Sir, for the fifth time, to make the Indian Financial Statement, and am happy to state that that Statement will show a more prosperous condition of affairs in India than it has ever been my lot to describe in this House.
  I must, perforce, according to custom and the necessities of the case, divide my subject into three parts, and speak first of the year of Actuals—that is, the year which ended on the 31st of March, 1872; secondly, of the year of the Regular Estimate—that is, the year which ended on the 31st of March, 1873; and thirdly, of the year of the Budget Estimate—that is, the year which will end on the 31st of March, 1874; but I shall endeavour to give those who have hitherto censured me for being too long in my exposition, the contrasted, but doubtless equally keen, satisfaction of censuring me for being too short.
  In the year of Actuals—the year ending 31st of March, 1872—we received as income, £50,110,215, and we paid, on account of our Ordinary Expenditure, £46,986,038. Thus our surplus was no less than £3,124,177, the largest ever known in Indian annals since the abolition of the East India Company's monopoly of the China trade in 1834. For this great surplus we have to thank chiefly two things, one within, and one
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  not within our own control—economy and opium.
  I come now to the year ending 31st of March, 1873—that is, the year of the Regular Estimate, in which we expect to receive as income, £49,914,000, and to have to pay, on account of our Ordinary Expenditure, £48,422,000, which will leave a surplus of £1,492,000, thanks, again, partly to economy, partly, to a season favourable to the agriculturalist, partly to that mysterious but for the present, friendly opium. [An hon. MEMBER: And providence.] Under providence, no doubt. These expectations are founded, of course, on the approximate accounts for periods of the year ranging from nine to eleven months, on which the Regular Estimate which we submitted to Parliament in May is based; but our latest advices from India do not lead us to believe that they are too sanguine.
  I come now to the year passing over our heads, the year of the Budget Estimate. Sir Richard Temple expected, on the 27th of March last, to receive this year £48,286,000, and to have to pay £48,066,000. That is, he expected an equilibrium, supported, as he puts it, by a small surplus of £220,000. A smaller surplus, it must be admitted, than the Secretary of State leas, on various Occasions, pointed out as desirable, and even that surplus must be reduced by the sum of £80,000, omitted in India from the Transport Charges, and the estimated surplus is then £140,000 only. The cause of the smallness of the surplus is the abolition of the Income Tax, which, re-imposed by Lord Mayo in 1869, has, after various vicissitudes familiar to those who watch Indian affairs, been surrendered, at least for the present, by Lord Northbrook. The Income Tax of 1 per cent was expected to bring in £561,000 net in the year of the Regular Estimate, and, taking the same sum as its produce in 1873–4, would have given us a surplus of £692,000 for the year now in progress; just the sort of surplus for which successive Secretaries of State have wished the Government of India to budget. Nevertheless, it has been given up, and the Secretary of State in. Council has sanctioned the policy of the Viceroy. The hon. Member for Brighton (Mr. Fawcett), in replying to me last year, quoted a long chain of authorities against the Income Tax. Some hon.

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  Gentlemen will remember that I carefully guarded myself from saying one word in favour of the maintenance of the Income Tax, having, indeed, a shrewd suspicion that Lord Northbrook would not maintain it; but I disputed most strongly the statement contained in the hon. Member's Motion, that its unsuitability was admitted, and I said, that for every opinion he could cite against it, I could cite another just as good in favour of it. Let us see if that is so. Lord Mayo was sometimes in favour of, sometimes doubtful about, the Income Tax, so we will not count him as on either side; but against Lord Northbrook you may put Lord Lawrence; against Sir Charles Trevelyan you may put Sir Richard Temple; against the hon. Member for Orkney (Mr. Laing) you may put Sir Bartle Frere; against the right hon. Member for Tiverton (Mr. Massey) you may put Mr. Ellis; against Lord Hobart you may put Sir Philip Wodehouse; against Mr. Bayley you may put Lord Napier of Magdala or Sir John Strachey, and so I might go on almost ad infinitum. There is a habit of mind which is a most convenient one in considering financial, and, indeed, all other matters. The habit, I mean, of seeing facts exactly as one would like to see them. That habit is possessed to perfection by those who talk of the extraordinary consensus of opinion against the Income Tax. I can see no such consensus, and have rarely had to consider a question on which there was so much to be said on both sides. Not that I wish to doubt or dispute the wisdom of the course which has been pursued by Lord Northbrook. The line taken by a portion of the Anglo-Indian press, the dislike of many of our own officers to a tax which fell largely on themselves; the auger of the wealthy natives, who desired that the misera contribuens plebs, to use the famous old Hungarian phrase, should continue to be contribuens and misera; lastly, the course taken in this House on more than one occasion by the hon. Member for Brighton, have thrown a heavy weight into the scale against the Income Tax. In a country like India, political considerations—and these the political considerations not of the distant future, but of the passing hour—must often overpower the lessons of merely financial wisdom. Destiny may have in store for us in India a far more brilliant
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  financial future than I dare venture to anticipate; but unless she has, indeed, great surprises for us, I should be extremely sorry to guarantee that the Income Tax will not be re-imposed by some Viceroy or other within the next 10 years. For the moment, however, it has vanished from the number of controverted Indian questions—I wish I could say, abiit ad plures—and so I pass to the last item of information which it is necessary to set forth before the broad outlines of our actual pecuniary position are made apparent to hon. Members—the statement—namely, of the balances which India had at her bankers in England and in India on the 31st of March, 1873.
  India had at her bankers in England £2,998,444, or about her normal balance. In India she had 18 crores and 91 lacs of rupees, a sum which, if the rupee were worth 2s., as it used to be, would represent £18,910,000; but as the rupee is only worth 1s. 10½d. or thereabouts at present, does not, of course, represent nearly so much money. Still, it is a larger cash balance than we want, thanks chiefly to our great surpluses, and to our small expenditure on Public Works Extraordinary in the last two years of Actuals; so we propose to bring it down to normal proportions by paying out of it all the remunerative works of the current year to the amount of nearly £4,000,000. It results from what I have said that our pecuniary position for the moment is as follows:—We have a large surplus in the last year of Actuals; a good surplus in the year of the Regular Estimate; an equilibrium supported by a nominal surplus in the year now passing over us; and a large balance at our bankers. The fact of the matter is, that so far as money is concerned, the lines have fallen to us in pleasant places; and it is particularly amusing to observe, that the quasi-panic about the perilous state of Indian finance, of which the hon. Member for Brighton has made himself the mouthpiece, did not begin until after the measures were taken which have ended in sweeping away the deficit that had accumulated in the unlucky three years which ended with the spring of 1869, and originated that quasi-panic. In these three years the deficit on the actual accounts was no less than £6,299,216, while in the three years that followed them—namely, 1869–70,

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  1870–71, 1871–2, the surpluses on the actual accounts were no less than £4,725,836; so that the year ending 31st March, 1873, the year of the Regular Estimate, in which we expect a surplus of £1,492,038, will very nearly redress the balance, and sweep off the traces of the three years of deficit altogether. That is satisfactory, but there is better behind. If we take the whole series of Indian accounts from the time when Mr. Wilson first took the finances in hand—that is, from 1860 down to the end of the year of the Regular Estimate—we find a surplus of Income over Expenditure during the 13 years of £324,885.
  I showed last year, in some detail, that we have, out of income, since 1st May, 1861, expended something like £30,000,000 in roads, canals, harbours, civil buildings, military buildings, State railways, and other works of a permanent character absolutely necessary to India, if she is to rank as a civilized country; so that India's position is that of a landed proprietor who, looking back on the management of his estates for 13 years, finds that he has enormously improved those estates out of his ordinary income, and has also laid by a few thousand pounds in hard cash, a position which cannot be described as an unendurable one. Of course, the enemies of the Indian Government will immediately say—Oh, you are quite forgetting that you have appropriated and used as ordinary income a number of sums which you call windfalls, but which a mercantile concern, if managed according to proper mercantile principles, would have treated as capital, and not have used as income at all. To that I reply—Well, suppose I admit for the sake of argument that what you say is true, as to all these items to which you object, it is indisputable that we have charged against income sums to a very much greater amount than the amount of these disputed items, all of which sums a mercantile concern would have charged against capital and not against income; so that when I only claim to have a surplus of £324,000 on the finances of India, since Mr. Wilson took them in hand, I confess I wonder at my own moderation.
  Now, then, that we have a surplus, let us look around and see what there is to make us uneasy for the future, and
  1394
  what there is to re-assure us in the present state of Indian finance. And, first, I will take the dark side of our affairs, and begin with the Guaranteed Railways. The return from these has of late shown hardly any tendency to increase. The passenger traffic improves somewhat, but the goods traffic is nearly stationary, and the worst feature of the case is, that no one seems quite clear about the reason. The most plausible explanation that has come before me is this—that Indian exports consisting chiefly of heavy goods, the railways are not used except when time is an object, and time is only an object when the demand for Indian merchandize is unusually great. It is obvious, however, that this explanation will only apply to railways which have to compete with water carriage. I shall be glad if, in the discussion of to-night, the hon. Member for London (Mr. Crawford), or any other hon. Member, can throw some light on this matter. The heavy charge for Guaranteed Railway interest, estimated at nearly £1,800,000 for the year passing over our heads, is, to my mind, the least satisfactory clement in our financial affairs. But, after all, £1,800,000 is not an intolerable price to pay for the enormous advantages which both Natives and Europeans derive from the Indian railway system, even if the charge were certain to be permanent. Considering that till the other day the average return from the capital invested in English railways was only 4 per cent, a return of 3 per cent from Indian railways can hardly be called disastrous. It is easy to be wise after the event, and to wish that we had laid down all our Indian railways on a narrow gauge. But it is not fair to charge our predecessors with improvidence; because they made the arrangements which it was natural they should make in what may be called the infancy, or at least the youth, of railway enterprise.
  Next comes Opium, with regard to the return from which, although, as I have already said, the sales have been in recent years very favourable to us, I cannot rid myself of a certain vague feeling of apprehension. No doubt the analogy of the claret and champagne vineyards may hold good, but that remains to be proved, though certainly up to the present time the most sanguine anticipations have been those most jus-

  1395
  tified by events. On this subject, also, I trust any hon. Member who has special knowledge of the question from the Chinese side may say a word.
  Then there are the growing charges of Furloughs and of the Pension List, more especially in relation to uncovenanted civilians—necessary, no doubt, but not the less financially disagreeable. I do not add the prospective demands for military allowances, about which so much has been said; because, as I explained last week, I believe many of the assertions which pass current on this subject are founded on misapprehension, and if peace continues, I feel convinced that considerable though cautious reductions in our military expenditure will be not the least characteristic feature in the rule of Lord Northbrook. Sure I am that nothing can be stronger than the desire of my noble Friend the Secretary of State and of his Council to strengthen the Viceroy's hands on this vital matter. Reckless statements, not to use a stronger term, have been made to the contrary in India, under the veil of the anonymous; but nothing would be easier than to prove by a long catena of Despatches, that military reduction was one of the very first things to which the present Secretary of State called the attention of the Government of India, and that he has gone on pressing it on its attention.
  Then it is said that many of the irrigation works will not pay immediately. Of course they will not. No one over dreamt that some of them could pay immediately, unless the people who owned irrigable lands were forced to take the water. Lord Mayo and his Council thought that they should be forced to take the water. The Secretary of State in Council objected to this, thinking it a too despotic measure, and being convinced that it would be better to wait till experience and education had taught the people the value of an insurance against scarcity or famine. But in a country where the Governors are some hundred years at least in advance of the governed in intelligence, must we make no public works till the people can see their advantages and pay for them? That may be right policy; but if it is, nearly everything we have been doing for the last 30 years, with reference to public works, has been wrong. The talk about developing the resources of
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  India has been moonshine. This House has been hopelessly mistaken, and the most obstructive members of the most obstructive days of the old Court of Directors were utterly right. There is every reason to believe that our irrigation works, taken as a whole, will sooner or later, directly or indirectly, pay a handsome percentage on the money they have cost; but, whether they will or not, they must be made, for the very people who now shake their heads over the unprofitable expenditure would be the first to shriek and rage if a new famine caught us napping. Our position in India is an anomaly, and must have many anomalous results.
  I turn now to the brighter side of our affairs, and first I will take the elasticity of our Revenue. The hon. Member for Brighton does not agree with me in thinking that our Revenue is elastic; but what are the facts?
  The Land Revenue has increased since 1868–9 by £594,166; the Salt Revenue has increased by £378,355; the Opium Revenue has increased by £800,494; the Excise Revenue has increased by £85,373; and all this increase has been natural, not the result of new taxes, except in so far as the total is swelled by an increase under salt, the duty on which was, during the Viceroyalty of Lord Mayo, increased at Madras and Bombay by 5 annas a maund, say 7½d. on 82 lbs. That increase accounts for about £200,000. There is no important decrease of Revenue to be set against this increase of about £1,800,000 per annum, or £1,600,000, if we put out of sight that part of the increase under salt to which I have just alluded.
  So much for improved probabilities of receipt. Turning to the other side of the account, I am again so unfortunate as to take precisely the opposite view to that taken by the hon. Member for Brighton. That hon. Member informed the House last year that our expenditure is very elastic. I am happy to say that some of it is very elastic; because if we are not in India to civilize and raise India—things which cannot be done without spending a great deal of money—we had better leave it as soon as we can wind up our affairs. But is all our expenditure so very elastic in the sense of rising? If so, how comes it that we spent £52,036,721 in 1868–9, and only £46,986,038 in the last year

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  of Actuals. Partly, of course, because £700,000 of expenditure, which used to be paid out of the Imperial Exchequer, are now paid out of provincial Exchequers, which receive corresponding receipts. Still, when we have allowed for that fact, our expenditure in the last year of Actuals is less than the expenditure of 1868–9 by more than £4,250,000.
  Here are the figures for the last four years. In the year ending 31st March, 1869, there was spent £52,036,721; in the year ending 31st March, 1870, we spent £50,782,412; in the year ending 31st March, 1871, we spent £49,930,696; and in the year ending 31st March, 1872, we spent £46,986,038. So that the expenditure of India was less in the year ending 31st March, 1872, than it was in the year ending 31st March, 1869, by £5,050,683. Deduct from this the £700,000 for Provincial Services, and the result is a net decrease of £4,350,683. Look even at our Military expenditure—the most troublesome part of our expenditure. In the financial year ending 31st March, 1869, £16,269,581 were spent, but in the last year of Actuals only £15,678,112 were spent—that is to say, the expenditure was less by £591,469, or say £600,000, and the estimated decrease in the year of the Regular and Budget Estimate is even greater.
  Look now at our transactions with the Railways, as affected by the exchanges. I mentioned on the 3rd of August, 1869, that, whereas we had for many years been losing heavily in our transactions with the Guaranteed Railway Companies, by loss on exchange, our annually recurring drain on that account would ere long be replaced by an annual influx. And so it has turned out, for the very next year showed £40,000 to the good under this head. The next year showed £131,000, and the last year of Actuals £209,000, while the estimated gain in the year of the Regular Estimate is still higher.
  Take, then, the interest on the Debt. In 1871–2 it amounted to nearly £6,000,000, that is to say, to £5,966,299. In 1873–4 it is estimated at £5,770,000; and in 1874–5 an additional £450,000 will come off; so that it will be something like £5,320,000 for that year, or less than it was in 1867–8 by a good deal over £400,000.
  I have now put before the Committee our actual position at this moment, and
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  have selected, in rapid outline, what appear to me to be the least hopeful and what appear to me to be the most hopeful features in our Indian financial situation. I think that most persons will agree with me that the more hopeful features predominate. I know that. I have been accused of being unduly sanguine, and of taking a couleur de rose view of Indian finance. Nothing would be easier, if it were worth while, than to show, by reference to Hansard, that there is not a shadow of truth in such an accusation; but that, on the contrary, I have, on more than one occasion, protested in so many words against taking a couleur de rose view of Indian finance, and have dwelt upon the dangers likely to arise from doing so. In truth, one who holds the office that I hold has no temptation to do otherwise. The fact that Indian subjects are to most people so ghastlily dull has its advantages, in that the person who deals with them in this House on behalf of the Government is forced, by the very nature of things to pique himself upon being right, not upon being in accordance with those who imagine that they reflect public opinion in relation to Indian affairs. Imagine, I say, that they reflect it; for those do public opinion much wrong who confound it with the capricious ebb and flow of speculative exaggeration about India, with which we are familiar on platforms and in the Press. The truest gauge of public opinion about India is to be found, after all, in the state of the market for our securities, and that, I am happy to say, is all we could desire. We have the second host credit in the world—and that, considering what was the state of India before we went there, and at what rate the Company, in the old days, sometimes had to borrow, is surely something to be proud of.
  And, now, I will beg hon. Members to look at the, clock, and to bear me witness that I have not spoken three hours and a-half in making my Indian Financial Statement in 1873, as I was said, with equal correctness, to have done in 1872. For I have now finished the Indian Financial Statement properly so called, and what I shall add will refer to the Motion which the hon. Member for Brighton has put upon the Paper.
  Hon. Gentlemen will observe that the course which the hon. Member has taken this year, and took last, puts me in a

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  dilemma; for either I must allow our discussion to be taken without laying before the House the actual facts of the Indian financial situation, or I must combine my Financial Statement with observations upon the hon. Member's Motion. Again, if I follow the hon. Member, the necessities of debate would oblige me to put what I have to say about the existing financial situation in a different form from that which I deliberately believe to be the most proper form for submitting it the House, while if I precede the hon. Member I can only give a general answer to his speech. So true it is that the forms of this House, strange as they often appear to be, are usually the result of much thought and experience, and that any departure from our Parliamentary convenances, however convenient it may be to an individual, is hurtful to that transaction of Public Business which is the object of our coming together. Without further preface, then, I turn to the hon. Member's Motion, the words of which are as follows:—
  "That, in the opinion of this House, the present constitution of the Government of India fails to secure an efficient or economical management of its finances, and that this House views with apprehension the state of local taxation in that Country, and is of opinion that its financial condition must be regarded as unsatisfactory so long as the Income Tax forms its only financial reserve."
  First, then, as to the present constitution of the Government of India failing to secure an efficient or economical management of its finances. Now, that sweeping proposition must refer either to the Government of India in India, or to the Government of India at home, or to both of these bodies. I admit that with regard to the Government of India in India, the control of the Financial Member of Council over the other Departments is not so great as that of the Treasury in England; but the House must recollect that the Government of India, unlike the Government of England, is a personal Government, and that it pre-supposes that the power in the last resort to control all Departments must be in the hands of the Governor General. I do not say that that is an ideal Government for India or for any other country; but it is clearly the only possible Government for India at this moment. In the old days of the Company, finance was much the weakest
  1400
  part of our Indian affairs; but it has been steadily getting into better and better order, and I defy anyone to point to any moment in our history when it has been so well organized as it is now. The whole tendency of things in India is towards increased watchfulness over the finances and increased economy. The figures which I have laid before the House prove it to demonstration, and greater care is being constantly given not only to the larger questions of finance, but to the form of the accounts. I do not say that they have arrived at perfection even now. I think it is more than probable that some good suggestions will be made by, and some improved practices date from, the Committee which is now sitting; but I do say, that the progress from better to better has been steady, and during the last 13 years has been without a check. I confess that, looking at the working of the Indian Government in its relation to finance, I do not see any improvement that can be introduced which is not in the way of being introduced. I am not talking of the distant future, and in a country which is changing so rapidly as India, 10 years hence is the distant future; but for the present, for the next few years, I see nothing that is not in the way of being done with regard to our finance which it would be at once wise and possible to do. If the Committee now sitting, when it has taken all its evidence, has any suggestions to make, of course whatever Government is in power will give them most careful and respectful attention; but no new suggestions of any value have to the best of my knowledge and belief been made by witnesses who have come before the Committee; for those hon. Members who sit upon that Committee are aware that the improved form of the accounts laid before Parliament is due to the Committee itself, and, above all, to my right hon. Friend the Chairman (Mr. Dodson), who has, if I may venture to express an opinion, so admirably presided over our deliberations.
  Turning next to the allegation that the Government of India in England fails to secure an efficient or economical management of its finances—if that allegation is intended to be made, I entirely deny the truth of the proposition. I think the form of Government which was settled by Parliament in 1858 was

  1401
  in most respects a wise Government. In the constitution of that Government there was one very serious mistake, and that was that members of Council were appointed for life. Against that unfortunate provision of the Act of 1858, I divided, as a private Member at the time, and it was my agreeable duty eleven years afterwards to pass a Bill through this House which put it and some other matters on a better footing. Making allowance, however, for this one serious error, I should say that the Council had worked extremely well, and that it had exercised a very efficient supervision over the finances of India, except in the very few cases in which Parliament has stepped in and overruled it. Hon. Members should refer to the statements that were made upon this subject to the East India Finance Committee by Lord Lawrence, than whom no man had so good a right to express an opinion, because he spent five years as a Member of Council, and then spent five years as Governor General, so that he saw the working of the Council both from the inside and from the out. I will not, however, say anything more on this head. If anyone, after reading what Lord Lawrence told us on the subject, can attach any importance to the statements against which Lord Lawrence's remarks upon this head are principally directed, he will naturally not attach much importance to anything that I can advance. But the hon. Member goes on to say, that the House views with apprehension our local taxation. Well, all I can reply is, that if the House views with apprehension our Indian local taxation, it must be very easily frightened. Why, what does our local taxation in India amount to? What is the local taxation raised in that vast continent from a population which we are learning to believe, as the results of the recent Census come out, numbers something like 200,000,000 in British territory alone. Our local taxation amounts to only £2,500,000 per annum, including all our municipalities and all our Presidency towns, and our provincial taxation—that is, the taxation which was transferred by Lord Mayo from the Imperial to the Provincial Budgets—amounts to about £700,000. Can that seriously be said to be a heavy local and provincial taxation to be raised upon a country as large as Europe without
  1402
  Russia? Last year, to be quite safe, not having the exact figures, I said it was on an outside estimate, under £5,000,000; but it is really very much under £4,000,000.
  Have hon. Members ever read the Revenue Law of Menu, as quoted by Mr. Wilson in his great speech of the 18th of February, 1860?—
  "The revenue consists of a share of grain and of all other agricultural produce; taxes on commerce; a very small annual imposition on petty traders and shopkeepers; and a forced service of a day in each month by handicraftsmen. The merchants are to be taxed on a consideration of the prime cost of their commodities, the expense of travelling, and their net profits. On cattle, gems, gold, and silver, added each year to the capital, one fiftieth, which, in time of war or invasion, may be increased to one-twentieth. On grain, one-twelfth, one-eighth, one-sixth, according to the soil, and the labour necessary to cultivate it. This also may be raised in cases of emergency, even as far as one-fourth, and must always have been the most important item in public revenue. On the clear annual increase of trees, flesh meat, honey, perfumes, and several other natural productions and manufactures, one-sixth. The King is also entitled to 20 per cent on the profit of all sales. Escheats, for want of heirs, have been mentioned as being his, and so also is all property to which no owner appears within three years proclamation. Besides possessing mines of his own, he is entitled to half of the precious metals in the earth."
  After this, is it surprising that Mr. Wilson should add—
  "I should imagine the revenue laws of the ancient Hindoos must have been contributed to the sacred compiler by some very needy finance minister of the day."
  And yet we are accused of being unduly severe in our taxation, when from a country where a taxation like this is permitted in the books of the golden age, in a country where every financial device was adopted before our coming even by the most virtuous minister, we raise a taxation spent exclusively in increasing the prosperity of the country, of about 3s. 10½d. per head, even if you consider the rupee to be worth 2s., but at present, remember, it is only worth 1s. 10½d. That makes a difference of about 3d. Three shillings and sevenpence-halfpenny per head is the whole amount of the taxation raised in India by the British, inclusive of the land revenue. That is a fact which seems to me one of the most creditable that has ever been told of any nation. What we do in return for that taxation, the annual "Statement of Moral and Material Pro-

  1403
  gress" is there to show. Then the hon. Member proceeds to say that the financial condition of India must be regarded as unsatisfactory, so long as the Income Tax remains our only financial reserve. But in the first place, the Income Tax is not our only financial reserve; and in the next place, if it were, I do not for a moment admit that the Income Tax is a bad financial reserve. I have already said all I care on this occasion to say about the Income Tax; because the controversy having been settled for the time, I do not want to stir its embers. It is an open secret that the Governor General's Council was very much divided indeed upon the subject. But it will be time enough to defend the Income Tax when it is again introduced. For the present, I am quite willing to allow those who are opposed to it to seem to have the best of the argument. It must, however, be within the knowledge of the hon. Member, that some of the people who were most hostile to the Income Tax were strong partizans of other taxes by which they hoped to fill the deficit caused by the abolition of the Income Tax. Mr. Hunter, for example, a violent opponent of the Income Tax, has advocated a tax upon pân, the leaf which is chewed along with the betel nut. Others are in favour of a tobacco tax, and we have seen licence taxes and certificate taxes actually in force. Others, again, would raise the salt tax in Madras and Bombay, while succession duties, and a capitation tax, like that in Burmah, have all had their advocates. I have no hesitation in saying that I prefer the Income Tax to any of these; but then I am distinctly a friend to the Income Tax, and if the Governor General could have been guided by mere financial as distinguished from political considerations, I should like to have seen him abolish the inland duties on sugar, deal with the Salt Tax, thereby greatly curtailing the salt line, and perhaps even abolish the export duty on rice, before he had reduced the Income Tax below 2 per cent. Our information from India leads us to believe that it is the intention of Lord Northbrook to grapple with several of these questions during his term of office. For obvious reasons I will not say which; but I mention the fact, in order to show that neither he nor we share the hon. Member's alarm about the state of our finances. Now, as ever since I have been
  1404
  at the India Office, I have looked with great hope towards the possibility of further military reduction, and the latest news which we have about Opium gives us every reason to hope that that important resource will not fail us just at the moment when the sudden loss of the Income Tax makes us feel grave, though not uneasy.
  These are the general considerations which I have to offer to the House in reply to the hon. Member who is about to intervene in order to prevent us going into Committee. I have no doubt he will ransack the evidence that has been produced before the Finance Committee, to find what he supposes to be mistakes on the part of the Indian Government hero and in India during the last 15 years, and doubtless he will hit some blots. No one pretends that the Indian Government does not make mistakes; but I shall be surprised indeed if he can bring forward anything of sufficient importance to support the huge superstructure of the Resolution which he proposes to build up, and to build up while the Committee of which he is a Member is painfully engaged in collecting evidence through which it may arrive at some conclusion. For what possible object that Committee exists at all, if the hon. Member is to ask the House to take out of its hands the question which the House directed the said Committee to investigate is more than I can understand. That, however, the hon. Member should propose so strange a course to the House is a matter which the House and the Committee and the hon. Member must settle between them. It is no affair of mine, except in so far as I form a fractional part both of the House and of its much-enduring Committee. I move, Sir, that you do now leave the Chair.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair."—(Mr. Grant Duff.)
  MR. FAWCETTmoved the adjournment of the debate.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Debate be now adjourned."—(Mr. Fawcett.)
  MR. AYRTONurged that the discussion upon this most important subject ought not to be stopped at a quarter-past 11. He thought his hon. Friend might very well proceed to address the House at that period.
  MR. FAWCETTappealed to the Speaker whether he should lose his right of speaking on the main subject if he made one or two observations to explain why he moved the adjournment of the debate. He made that Motion simply to consult the convenience of the House.
  MR. SPEAKERsaid, the hon. Gentleman would be entitled to speak on the Motion he had made for the adjournment of the debate, but he could not speak again on that question. If the House allowed the hon. Gentleman to withdraw his Motion he might then speak on the Main Question.
  Motion, by leave, withdrawn.
  Question again proposed.
  MR. FAWCETTsaid, the reason why he wished for the adjournment of the debate was because he felt it impossible to confine his remarks within such a time as would suit the convenience of the House. He had a great deal to say upon India, and he felt it his duty to say it. Some 13 years ago the Queen, in the name of the English nation, laid down the principle that they were bound by the most sacred of all obligations to attend to the interests of her Indian subjects. The announcement of that principle was accepted with the greatest satisfaction from one end of India to the other. Had they acted on that principle? On the contrary, Indian affairs were treated with a contemptuous neglect which he ventured to say would not be shown towards the most insignificant question in that House. From a quarter past 10 o'clock in the fag-end of the Session, that being the only evening which was allotted to Indian affairs, was all that was vouchsafed by the Government of the time of the House for the consideration of this subject. The news would spread throughout the length and breadth of India, and the House might depend upon it that they had better postpone any subject of legislation than give the people of India the impression, which it would be very difficult to remove, that they did not give adequate consideration to their affairs. The Under Secretary had been kind enough to describe him as the spokesman of financial panics. He was not the spokesman of financial panics; but he would tell the Under Secretary what he meant to do in future as long as he was a Member of the
  1406
  House—he would do everything that an independent Member could do to arouse an adequate amount of interest in Indian affairs. They might depend upon it that if they went on in the future as they had done in the past, they would not be able to maintain their Empire in India, but would alienate the Indian people. Last year he promised that he would devote all the time at his disposal to Indian affairs, and the result had been that he could not now remain silent, although he was unwilling to trespass on the indulgence of the House. He would proceed in the course of these remarks to prove, in spite of what had been said by the Under Secretary, that the situation of the Government of India at the present time was such as to offer no adequate guarantee for efficiency and economy, and that extravagance ensued. He would also bring forward facts to show that the state of Local Taxation in India should excite their grave apprehension, and if he wanted a witness to that he could confidently appeal to the right hon. Gentleman who had presided over the East India (Finance) Committee (Mr. Ayrton) with so much courtesy, urbanity, and impartiality. Although that right hon. Gentleman had been the Chairman of another Committee, he, unlike the Under Secretary, had never been absent from the Finance Committee. Again, this other conclusion had been impressed upon his mind—that the financial position of India could not be regarded as satisfactory, the Income Tax being the only financial reserve. He (Mr. Fawcett) was not going to dispute the accuracy of the Under Secretary's figures; he would only say this much—that many different conclusions could be deduced from the same figures. He would begin with the subject of the Income Tax. If there was any truth in the doctrines which the Under Secretary laid clown last year with reference to the Income Tax, then the Government had been guilty of one of the grossest of financial blunders. Last year the Under Secretary said that the income Tax was the only means of taxing the rich, and now he said that he had given it up, not for financial, but for political reasons, in consequence of the abuses attending its collection, and in consequence of the discontent it produced. There could not be a grosser blunder than to assume that because a certain tax was suited to one

  1407
  country that therefore it was suited to another, and there was overwhelming evidence to prove that the Income Tax was entirely unsuited to India. If that tax were suitable to the country then the Government had been guilty of a gross blunder in repealing it. The Under Secretary had cited authorities of Indian Financiers in favour of the tax, and in reply he would cite the authority of three men who were successively Finance Ministers in India. The first abandoned an office, second only to that of the Governor General, rather than be a party to levying the Income Tax on the people of India; the next had stated that it was impossible to conceive a more obnoxious and objectionable tax; and his successor had declared that no power on earth would induce him to remain in office if he were compelled to impose the Income Tax as a permanent source of revenue. The Tinder Secretary had quoted the authority of Lord Lawrence in favour of the tax; but he had omitted to mention that Lord Lawrence had added, no other tax had produced more discontent in India. The Income Tax in the past had been constantly varying in India, and that accounted for the discontent of which Lord Lawrence spoke. The Indian people never knew from one year to another what Income Tax they would have to pay. The Under Secretary had said that in a few years it might be necessary to re-impose the tax; but he was prepared to show that if the present extravagance of financial administration continued, the re-imposition of that tax would be not merely possible but absolutely certain. The Under Secretary had taunted him that evening with being the spokesman of financial panic; and although he last year announced that what he should have to say upon the subject would not be of the slightest importance, this year he appeared to entertain a contrary opinion. About four years since he (Mr. Fawcett) attempted to arouse more interest in Indian affairs in that House than had previously existed, by the proposal to appoint a Select Committee, and from that time there had been a reduction of expenditure to the amount of £6,000,000 per annum, which was an inducement to him to persevere in the course he had marked out for himself. The Under Secretary had greatly overstated his ease in stating
  1408
  that the watchfulness of Parliament had led to the reduction, for he ventured to assert that the ablest financier in the country—not even the Prime Minister himself—could tell, if he devoted six months attention to Indian accounts, to what extent the expenditure of India had been reduced during the last three or four years. Indian finance had a confusion cast over it, owing to the unintelligible distinction that was made between Public Works Ordinary and Public Works Extraordinary, and to the appropriation of capital to income. Then, again, the fluctuations of cash balances to the extent of £16,000,000 within the same period of time, gave an unbounded field for exploits in financial ingenuity, and until they knew the nature of the cash balances it was impossible to place any confidence in the statements of expenditure and revenue. Nobody had been able to give an intelligible explanation of what the cash balances were—they were, in fact, a hotch-potch into which everything was thrown. Then the proceeds of the sale of Government land in India had been improperly transferred to the revenue account in defiance of the special Act which declared that under no circumstances should the proceeds of land be appropriated to income. That Act was disregarded, and it seemed to him that the appropriation of capital to income which, according to the evidence given before the Committee, was practised in India was not characteristic of the conduct of a prudent Government, but rather of the conduct of a spendthrift who grasped every farthing on which he could lay hand to meet his current expenditure. A great sensation had been created lately in this country by what was known as the Post Office scandal, which simply consisted of the transference of capital in one form to capital in another. Yet so serious was the appropriation considered to be that the Government expected a Vote of Censure upon it. Now, Governments had before to-day resigned on a less Vote of Censure, and if the present Government thought the proceeding to which he was referring so wrong that they submitted to be censured like lambs, what language, he should like to know, could properly characterize the far more grave proceedings which happened every year in India of appropriating capital to income? The Committee would now, he

  1409
  thought, understand why the subject had been passed by so lightly by the Under Secretary of State. But there was another reason why no confidence could be placed in the existence of a surplus in any particular year in India. Nobody, he believed, could tell to what an extent a comparatively favourable balance between expenditure and revenue was created by the suspension for a time of public works. No Department in India had been characterized by so much waste, mismanagement and extravagance as the Public Works Department, and nothing had contributed so much to that result as the impulsiveness with which public works had been undertaken, and the suddenness with which they had been abandoned in order to obtain a favourable balance of expenditure and revenue. The Under Secretary had stated that during the present year £4,500,000 out of the cash balances had been expended on Public Works Extraordinary. But the Government would not have that resource next year, and where then, he should like to know, was the money to be procured to continue those works unless it was by borrowing? The resource, in short, was simply temporary, and there would be a deficiency of £4,500,000 next year unless the system of borrowing were to be resorted to. The Under Secretary had, he might add, recommended to hon. Members a certain course of reading during the Recess. He had advised them to read the evidence of Lord Lawrence. That reading would, he hoped, be supplemented by an examination of the evidence of General Strachey. He could multiply instances out of number of the waste and mismanagement of the Department of Public Works, and he would give one short narrative, every fact of which was proved by official testimony. The Sanger Barracks were constructed by the Department. They cost £150,000, and it took four years and a half to complete them. When they were finished it was found out that they were so badly constructed that the Government found the best thing they could do was to pull them down. And what led to that inevitable result? Those works were watched over by an European Engineer officer with two European subordinates. Now, it appeared that not one of those persons had the slightest experience in masonry work, and it was for that reason, ap-
  1410
  parently, that they had been selected. The works were found to be so rotten that one could stick a walking-stick into them up to the arm, and the mortar dropped away like corn from a hopper. Indeed, the Committee could have no idea of the amount of officialism connected with the subject. Above the European Engineer there was a Superintendent Engineer, who visited the works only three times while they were being constructed, and who wrote only one report. He, again, was presided over by the local Engineer of the district, who never visited the works once, and who had not thought it worth while to write a report at all. Not a bit of the work, he might add, was undertaken by contract. It was all committed to the hands of the Public Works Department, to which it was now proposed to intrust the expenditure of £70,000,000 of the money of the people of India. But, leaving that point, he would direct his observations to some more general principles bearing upon the financial position of India. There was a broad distinction between the financial position of that country and that of England. In England the revenue went on increasing so rapidly that the income derived from the Income Tax was 100 per cent more than when the tax was originally imposed, while the tea, spirit, sugar, and tobacco duties brought in a greatly larger amount. The result was that the great expenditure of this country, as had frequently been pointed out by the Prime Minister—and no one could deal with the figures in a more masterly way—had been accompanied by a reduction of taxation. So that while we were spending £70,000,000 the country was, he believed, less heavily taxed to the extent of £40,000,000 than when we were spending only £50,000,000. That, however, was not the ease in India, although, no doubt, there was an increase in the land revenue. He would quote the words of one the loss of whom they all regretted, and who many of them knew intimately—Lord Mayo was no alarmist; he was a man of courage, and not the spokesman of a financial panic; but he declared that the increase of expenditure in India, unlike that of England, was producing a wide feeling of discontent from one end of the Empire to the other. That testimony had been supplemented by Lord Napier, who declared

  1411
  that in consequence of the increase of expenditure there was probably no time in the history of our dominion when we had so small a hold on the affections of the people. The military expenditure of India was to a great extent under the control of the War Office and the Horse Guards, and what might be an excusable piece of expenditure in a rich country like this would be a monstrous act of extravagance in the case of a poor country like India. Any day, from some emergency arising from war or unpropitious seasons, we might have to raise £5,000,000 of additional revenue in India. But suppose we had to raise such a sum in England, there were 20 different ways in which it might be done. A Minister who had the confidence of this country might, in case of a great emergency, raise £10,000,000, £15,000,000, or £20,000,000 additional revenue without for one moment affecting the stability of the Government. But how could they raise £5,000,000 of additional revenue in India? He had examined Lord Lawrence at length on this point, and what did he say? The land revenue was only susceptible of a very small increase. He next referred to the tax on opium; but Lord Lawrence said the opium revenue was much more likely to decrease than to increase. The Under Secretary had stated that in regard to opium we had Providence on our side; he (Mr. Fawcett) thought it was exactly the reverse. The Government of China, finding that their efforts to discourage the growth of opium were defeated by our persistent determination to force it on the people of that country, would sanction the growth of it in China itself. Then as to salt, could they get more revenue out of it? The Lieutenant Governor of Bengal said the other day that he would rather have his right hand cut off than be a party to increase the salt duty. Lord Hobart expressed a similar opinion. An increase of 18 per cent on salt only produced an increase of 12 per cent. The heavy duty on salt was checking consumption, and there was an extraordinary unanimity of opinion in India that owing to the heavy duty on salt there was great disease among the cattle of that country. The next item of revenue was the Customs, which only yielded £2,750,000, which to a great extent was paid by the European, not the native population. Lord
  1412
  Lawrence did not know a single Customs duty that could be increased. He asked Lord Lawrence whether he could suggest an existing tax in India that could be increased, and he could not; could he suggest the imposition of any new tax to raise additional revenue, and the reply was "No." Under those circumstances, he thought that he had proved his position—that if any additional income was required in India the only reserve from which it could be supplied was the Income Tax. Unanswerable arguments had been given against a tobacco tax, and lately the corn tax had been abandoned. He now came to the subject of Local Taxation—one which the Under Secretary had passed over I very glibly. In England, if it were proposed to increase local taxation, it could only be levied on land and houses. A man's income or his furniture could not be rated. That was not so in India. There local taxation was not only levied on land and houses, but upon everything a man possessed—the clothes he wore, his food, his furniture, his income, wore all liable. Would such a state of things be tolerated for a moment in England? But, said the Under Secretary, local taxation in India only produced £3,200,000. He forgot to remind the House of the extraordinary difference between the wealth of India and of England. Here an income tax of 2d. in the pound produced nearly £4,000,000; there it would produce only £500,000. The population of India was therefore eight times poorer than that of England. In other words, in a country seven times as great as England, a source of taxation only produced one-eighth what it would in England. Nothing could be more delusive than to make comparisons between the taxation of two countries unless the relative wealth of the two were taken into account. The highest authority on such a subject, Lord Lawrence, said that the mass of the people were so poor that they could barely obtain the means of a miserable existence. Not only did the Indian system of local taxation press with great cruelty upon the people, but it seemed to have been devised with a view to producing the maximum amount of torment and terror. Was the Under Secretary aware that in Bombay an Act existed—the Act was suspended merely, not repealed; it was held over the people's heads, and might be enforced any day—

  1413
  authorizing the imposition of an income tax on incomes of £5. In the history of the world was so monstrous a tax ever before devised by human perversity? While the extravagance to which he referred was being practised, the people of India, who found the money that was being squandered, were suffering under a taxation as grievous as any that human ingenuity had ever conceived. It might be asked how it was that local taxation had of late years occupied so permanent a position, and his answer was that the decentralization scheme of Lord Mayo was responsible for it all. The scheme involved the local authorities in an expenditure so vast they had been compelled to very considerably increase the local imposts in order to meet it. Decentralization was all very well in England, where to a great extent the prosperity and power of the country depended upon its local institutions; but it was altogether out of place in India, where the circumstances were altogether different. He might be asked to point out remedies for the state of things of which he complained, and he would endeavour to do so, but not until after he had pointed out the objectionable features of the case as they appeared to him. The most striking fact, as it appeared to him, was to be found in the mode in which the country was governed. The Secretary of State in England and his Under Secretary were at the head of affairs, although nominally the supreme control was in the hands of the Governor General; and therefore it would be seen that the destinies of India were in the hands of high officials who had not been nominated or appointed in any way by the population they ruled, but were Members of the Home Government, and might be removed, as they had been elected, by the will of the English people. There was nothing in the present administration of India to supply the place of that protection and watchfulness which India enjoyed under the East India Company. It might be said that no proofs could be adduced to show that the interests of India were sacrificed to those of England. One of the oldest Indian officials had, however, declared that under the present system he scarcely knew an instance in which the interests of India did not go to the wall when they conflicted with those of England. Sir Charles Trevelyan went out to India at
  1414
  the age of 17. When he returned to this country he became Permanent Secretary to the Treasury. He afterwards returned to India, and when he saw the system of government which had replaced that of the East India Company he averred that things were done now that could never have been done in the days of that Company, and that India was made to pay charges that would formerly have been out of the question. Formerly, under the Company, her finances were managed with remarkable frugality; now they were administered with reckless extravagance. Take the payments made by India for the Malta and Alexandria Telegraph, the payment by India of a portion of the expenses of the Abyssinian War, with which she had nothing to do, and other smaller charges of a like character. Why was India made to pay those charges? Because she was unrepresented. The Duke of Edinburgh not long since visited India, and India was made to pay the travelling expenses of his companions from England. It was no defence to say that the sum was small, for sometimes small impositions of this kind produced more discontent than larger grievances. India had suffered to the extent of millions of money because she had not been protected against certain commercial interests in this country. Scheme after scheme had been guaranteed and 5 per cent had been assured upon million after million upon contracts carelessly drawn. The Orissa Company had been bought at £450,000 more than its market value. The Madras Irrigation Company had a guarantee of 5 per cent upon £1,600,000, but had never returned 1s. of interest. About £8,000,000 had been expended upon the Scinde, Punjaub, and Delhi Railway, which returned 12 s. 6d. per cent upon the outlay. India bore the loss of these guarantees, and the £100 shares of these companies so disastrous to India figured in our Stock Exchange lists at from £4 to £7 premium. The Under Secretary stated that the Secretary of State for India was solicitous to reduce the military expenditure in India; but whenever he received from India a suggestion for its reduction he had to forward it to the War Office and the Horse Guards, and they invariably considered the question with reference to English and not to Indian interests. As a proof of the waste and

  1415
  extravagance of the military expenditure it was only necessary to state that during the last ten years, although the European forces had been decreased by 12,000 men and the Native troops by 16,000 men, yet the military expenditure was positively £1,500,000 more than before that reduction was made. To one enormity of Indian military expenditure he would call the attention of the House. In the Staff Corps an officer might enter after three years' active service, and he might rise to the rank of Major General and retire on a pension of £1,200 a year, without having ever done a day's work other than civilian. There was another point connected with military expenditure, which showed the unhappy position of India at the present time. India was charged by the War Office an extravagant price for recruits. She was made to pay at least one-third more than if she obtained them for herself. This had been protested against; but for six months no notice had been taken of the protest by the War Office. The Indian Council had disappointed the expectations of many of its friends. How was that to be remedied? Not by abolishing it, but by strengthening its hands. The proceedings of the Council should be published. If that were done it would form an intelligible basis on which to found our interference in Indian affairs. The whole future of our dominion in India simply depended on the extent to which the House in future was prepared to a greater extent to recognize its responsibility to India. There was no excuse, in his opinion, for continuing the Governorship of either Madras or Bombay. They should be governed as the Punjaub was, by Lieutenant Governors, with regard to whom he might observe that they were almost invariably appointed by the Governor General, and consequently were subordinate to the Viceroy; but the Governors of Madras and Bombay were appointed by the Secretary of State, and were therefore House of Commons' appointments, such Governors being appointed to serve party or political considerations. If it had not been for the extravagance of Bombay, many of the financial difficulties of India would have been avoided. He might mention, as an instance, that the Governor of Bombay pulled down his house, which was valued at £35,000, and when reproved by Lord Lawrence,
  1416
  the then Governor General, he said his intention was to build another house of equal value. The matter was then passed over by Lord Lawrence; but the Governor of Bombay incurred enormous expense at the cost of India in erecting another house. He had incurred a cost of £90,000 on the house. [An hon. MEMBER: Name, name!] Sir Bartle Frere. What sum did the House think was drawn from the people of India for the house? Not less than £160,000; and while that enormous sum was drawn from the finances of India to build a country house for the Governor, yet the Government of India could not or did not furnish the means to found 16 scholarships for deserving youths of the Presidency. Lord Lawrence again remonstrated with Sir Bartle Frere on the enormously extravagant sum drawn for the house, and Sir Bartle Frere thereupon wrote to the Home Government, and what did the House think was the result of his representation? Why, the Home Government actually gave him £20,000 to furnish his country House. Another reform which was absolutely required was to give the people of India a greater voice in the Government of the country. No native could even obtain employment in the Civil Service except he came to England to compete; neither could he become an engineer in his own country unless he appeared at the College at Cooper's Hill. India required what The Times recently called good State housewifery, because hitherto her affairs had been muddled, not managed. With those remarks of the leading journal, which well summarized his views on India, he would draw his remarks to a close. What was required for India was wise frugality, watchfulness of small details, and that careful attention, in short, which distinguished a well-managed household. They required above all to create greater bonds of sympathy between the rulers and the ruled. Scientific systems of jurisprudence, reforms in the law would do nothing unless the people were made to feel that they were to become greater sharers in the Government of their country. Unless England did that, she could not discharge the responsibility she had assumed in obtaining dominion unasked over 200,000,000 of people. The hon. Gentleman concluded by moving the Amendment of which he had given Notice.
  Amendment proposed,
  To leave out from the word "That" to the end of the Question, in order to add the words "in the opinion of this House, the present constitution of the Government of India fails to secure an efficient or economical management of its finances, and that this House views with apprehension the state of local taxation in that Country, and is of opinion that its financial condition must be regarded as unsatisfactory so long as the Income Tax forms its only financial reserve,"—(Mr. Fawcett,)
  —instead thereof.
  Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
  Debate adjourned till To-morrow, at Two of the clock.

  LAW OF EVIDENCE BILL.
  On Motion of Mr. ATTORNEY GENERAL, Bill to amend and consolidate the Law of Evidence, ordered to be brought in by Mr. ATTORNEY GENERAL and Mr. SOLICITOR GENERAL.
  Bill presented, and read the first time. [Bill 274.]
  House adjourned at a quarter before Two o'clock.

MINUTES.
PUBLIC BILLS—First Reading—Public Health Act (1872) Amendment* (257); Constabulary Force (Ireland)* (261); Expiring Laws Continuance* (258); Railway Regulations* (259); Royal Naval Artillery Volunteer Force* (260); Sanitary Act (1866) Amendment (Ireland)* (262).
Second Reading—Endowed Schools Act (1869) Amendment(253); Merchant Shipping Acts Amendment (254); Defence Acts Amendment* (255); Conspiracy Law Amendment (256).
Committee—Public Records (Ireland) Act (1867) Amendment* (209), discharged; Penalties (Ireland)* (242); Elementary Education Act (1870) Amendment, &c. (243–265); Langbaurgh Coroners* (248).
Third Reading—Salmon Fisheries, now Salmon Fishery* (249); Metropolitan Tramways Provisional Orders* (229), and passed.

SUPREME COURT OF JUDICATURE BILL.
Commons' Amendments &c. considered.
Commons' Amendment to Lords' Amendments to Commons' Amendments and Commons' consequential Amendments considered (according to Order).
LORD CAIRNSsaid, he was sorry to find that he had been misunderstood in the reference he made the other evening to the appointment of Mr. Mountague Bernard to the Privy Council. He was made to insinuate that Mr. Bernard was appointed to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council with the object of influencing the decision in the Bennett ease. He had never contemplated any such insinuation. What he did say was that a feeling existed out-of-doors that a Court might be constituted for particular cases, but that he knew that every effort was made to secure the best tribunal in every case.
THE MARQUESS OF RIPONwas glad that the noble and learned Lord had taken the earliest opportunity of removing a misapprehension which his remarks should not have occasioned, and which if allowed to continue might have produced evil consequences. For himself, he had not at all misapprehended the noble and learned Lord. He (the Marquess of Ripon) knew that the greatest possible care was always taken to have the best men sitting on the Judicial Committee. Mr. Bernard was summoned on quite different grounds from those suggested. Knowing the importance of the Bennett case, he (the Lord President) took the unusual course of inviting the attendance of every legal Member of' the Judicial Committee whom age or infirmity had not incapacitated.
THE LORD CHANCELLORwas also glad that the subject was introduced. He had enjoyed the friendship of Mr. Bernard for a great many years, and he knew that although the right hon. Gentleman had never the opportunity of enjoying considerable practice, yet he was not entirely without that kind of experience. In point of general ability and attainment, no man could possibly stand higher, and there were some branches of jurisprudence in which he had few equals and no superior, which might make his presence upon the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council
1308
not seldom eminently useful. With respect to the particular appeal, to which reference had been made, he had received a letter from Mr. Bernard; who stated that he had never been in the habit of speaking or writing on theological subjects; and that with respect to the particular questions involved in Mr. Bennett's case, he had never, to his knowledge, expressed any opinion before that appeal was heard.
Motion agreed to.
Commons' Amendments agreed to.

ELEMENTARY EDUCATION ACT (1870) AMENDMENT BILL—(No. 243.)
(The Lord President.)

COMMITTEE.
House in Committee (according to Order).
Clauses 1 and 2 agreed to.
Clause 3 (Repeal and substitution of other provisions for 18 & 19 Vict. c. 34 (Denison's Act).
THE MARQUESS OF RIPON moved, in page 2, line 5, to leave out
("a certificated child within the meaning of 'The Agricultural Children Act, 1873,' whose certificate is for the time being in force") and insert ("employed in pursuance of a certificate under 'The Agricultural Children Act, 1873,' and is not attending school.")—(The Lord President.)
Motion agreed to.
Amendment made.
Clause, as amended, agreed to.
Clauses 4 to 9, inclusive, agreed to.
Clause 10 (Amendment of 33 & 34 Vict. c. 75. s. 57. as to loans).
LORD CHELMSFORDmoved to add a proviso, that the consent of the Education Department to loans should be conditional on proof by the school board of the necessity of additional accommodation. This proviso was required to meet cases such as had already occurred where a narrow majority of a school board had attempted to saddle a parish with a loan for new schools where the existing accommodation was both efficient and sufficient. In this case, the Department, while refusing to recommend the application to the Public Works Loan Commissioners, declared its inability to prevent the borrowing of money in the open market, and this proviso would give them the required discretion.
Amendment moved, page 4, line 19, after ("fund") add—
"Provided, that no such consent of the Education Department shall be granted unless proof be given to their satisfaction that the additional school accommodation which it is proposed to provide and the works which it is proposed to execute are necessary in order to supply a sufficient amount of public school accommodation for the district."—(The Lord Chelmsford.)
THE MARQUESS OF RIPONobjected to the proposed proviso as imposing a needless obligation in cases where additional schools were obviously desirable. The distinct recommendation of the Department was essential to a loan by the Public Works Commissioners; in the eases of other loans it did not exercise so close a control, but accepted primâ facie evidence for the scheme, unless there was distinct proof to the contrary. In the case referred to, the school board had made a Return showing the need of further accommodation.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURYfeared the facility of borrowing would bring embarrassments on the ratepayers of the future. Both in education and other matters a check was required, and if a school board had evidence satisfactory to themselves, they could communicate it to the Department.
LORD STANLEY OF ALDERLEY and LORD LYTTELTONsupported the Amendment, as a safeguard in doubtful cases.
Amendment agreed to.
The Report of the Amendments to be received To-morrow; and Standing Orders No. 37. and 38. to be considered in order to their being dispensed with; Bill to be printed, as amended. (No. 265.)

ENDOWED SCHOOLS ACT (1869) AMENDMENT BILL—(No. 253.)
(The Lord President.)

SECOND READING.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading, read.
THE MARQUESS OF RIPON, in moving that the Bill be now read the second time, said, that the late introduction of the measure was due to a long inquiry by a Committee in the other House into the working of the principal Act. The principal alterations proposed by the Bill were these. The Endowed Schools Act 1869 was continued to the 31st De-
1310
cember, 1876: schools having endowments not exceeding £100 per annum are taken from under the operation of the Endowed Schools Acts and placed under the Elementary Education Act 1870. Under the 17th section of the principal Act clergymen were in certain cases ineligible as members of Governing Bodies. This provision had naturally given rise to much dissatisfaction, and it was now provided that where by the original instrument of foundation the holder of any particular office is a member of the Governing Body nothing in the section referred to shall prevent the holder of such office for the time being from being retained as a member. Another provision related to schools excepted from the provisions as to religion; and it is enacted that where by the original foundation of any school it is required that the Governing Body and officers shall be members of some particular denomination—such school shall be excepted from the provisions of the 19th section of the Act. The Bill further amended the Act of 1869 in respect to approval of schemes by the Committee of Council, and in respect of appeals to the Queen in Council; and provided that if, at the expiration of the time for a Petition to Her Majesty in Council against any scheme no such Petition has been presented, Her Majesty may by Order in Council declare her approbation of such scheme without the same being laid before Parliament. Lastly, it was provided that a graduate of any University of the United Kingdom, if otherwise fit, shall be held qualified, where the statutes of any school require the head master to be a graduate of Oxford or Cambridge. The subject had been already considered by several Committees, and had been introduced into the other House on the Report of the Endowed Schools Commissioners, and having been well considered by the other House, he trusted their Lordships would be willing to pass it.
Moved, "That the Bill be now read 2a."—(The Lord President.)
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURYsaid, that it was impossible that their Lordships could give sufficient consideration to this Bill at this period of the Session, when the Appropriation Bill had been brought in, and the Prorogation would probably take place three or four days

1311
hence. This amended Bill had been looked forward to by many oppressed interests for two years past. It was hoped that it would either entirely terminate the power of the Endowed Schools Commissioners, or else that Parliament would so restrict and modify those powers that the oppressive consequences which had previously occurred would never be brought into operation again. Certainly it was impossible for their Lordships now seriously to amend the Bill. Without entering into a discussion as to the true construction of the pledges given by the noble Marquess and by Mr. Forster in 1869, it was unquestionable that when the Endowed Schools Act was passed a general impression prevailed in both Houses of Parliament that it was a measure for enabling the Commissioners to deal compulsorily with endowed schools which were really and undoubtedly abused; but the result had shown that it enabled them to deal with all endowed schools whatever, without any restriction arising from the mode in which the trusts had been discharged. This result was attributable to the circumstance that the gentlemen who were selected to discharge the duties of Commissioners, though men of great purity of motive and of great business capacity, were of all people in the world the least fitted to administer a highly and widely discretionary Act, in which it was necessary to carry with them the opinions, feelings, prejudices, and traditions of a large number of people all over the country. The feelings of the Commissioners were hostile to the very idea of endowment, and they treated the notion of what was called the sacredness of trusts with something very like contempt. Knowing the opinions of those gentlemen, Parliament ought not to have sanctioned a Bill which contained their names. He regretted to say that further reflection and further appointments had not altered this peculiar feature of the Commission. Mr. Hobhouse, before leaving England, described the endowments of past ages as "no man's land," which anybody could claim. The noble Lord (Lord Lyttelton) expected posterity to think it a strange superstition that the directions of dying men should be adhered to for all time, unless they were palpably absurd or impossible, and that there should then be the minimum of varia-
1312
tion; while Mr. Roby deemed it the duty of the State to apply endowments to some other use, if under the circumstances it was more beneficial. Whether those views were correct or not was a question upon which he would not ask their Lordships to enter, but undoubtedly they were deeply opposed to the feelings of the local bodies who had the management and enjoyment of the endowments. Be those local bodies right or wrong, they held that a Founder's will, though made many years ago, ought to be a guide in disposing of the endowment, and that the State had no right to do what it willed with it. The consequence of this diversity of opinion between the butcher and the lamb as to the right of the butcher to use his weapon as he pleased was a great deal of turmoil and dissatisfaction. The noble Lord at the Table (Lord Lyttelton) and his Colleagues did not set to work in a spirit showing the greatest possible amount of conciliation, or with a desire to carry with them the largest possible amount of consent. They seemed rather to have proceeded in a despotic spirit, very much in the same way as the Emperor Nicholas was said to have made his railways—by taking a ruler and drawing, regardless of every other consideration, the shortest line from one point to another. The result was that a large amount of discontent had been called into existence. What he wished their Lordships to understand was that it was not the Act but the mode in which the Act was administered which had caused all the difficulties. No doubt power was given to the Commissioners to do what they pleased with the Governing Bodies, but they were not forced to treat those Bodies as they did. It was true the Governing Bodies had no vested rights; but they were persons of influence in their respective neighbourhoods, great sympathy was excited in their favour, and a great amount of antagonism aroused against the action of the Commissioners. Then, again, how had the Commissioners acted with regard to endowments for elementary education? To use the noble Lord's phrase, the middle classes came in for "the lion's share;" and the elementary schools were thrust out of the enjoyment of those endowments which had been left to them. One of two things was the necessary consequence. If the Elementary Education

1313
Act of 1870 became a failure, it followed that the poor were ousted out of that of which they ought never to have been deprived; and if the Act proved a success it followed that the ratepayers were saddled with expenses from which, by virtue of those endowments, they had a right to escape. But the greatest amount of opposition had been roused upon the religious question, and the noble Marquess (the Marquess of Ripon) was certainly right in saying that the peculiar interpretation of the 17th clause given by the Law Officers of the Crown, and subsequently by the Privy Council, had given rise to a great deal of discontent. When Parliament inserted that clause, it never dreamt that they were going to exclude rectors and vicars, deans and Bishops from the Governing Body, simply because they were rectors and vicars, deans and Bishops. He never heard any such suggestion made during the passage of the Bill through either House of Parliament, and his belief was that such an idea never entered into the minds even of those who represented the Dissenters. In foundation after foundation it was provided that spiritual persons, Bishops and Archbishops, should have the power of approving or disapproving the statutes made by the Governing Body of the school. That was a clear dedication to the Church of England, because there was no doubt in what direction those who possessed that power would exercise it. But in sweeping away the power of the Ordinary the Endowed Schools Commissioners acted entirely at their own discretion, for they did what they were not required by the Act to do. The 19th clause said nothing about the religious instruction to be given in the majority of the schools. The 17th clause had forbidden any test for the Governing Body, and the 16th had insisted upon a stringent conscience clause. The 19th clause said that where there was any express indication of the intention of the Founders that certain religious doctrines should be taught in the schools, these schools should remain denominational. But it did not say that there was to be no Church of England education in other schools. He did not in the least blame the Commissioners for refusing to impose a test on the Governing Body of the latter schools; but what he did complain of was that there was
1314
no provision whatever made by them for religious instruction according to the doctrines of the Church of England in schools in which that instruction may have been given for 100, 200, or 300 years. When Parliament abolished tests in the Universities it nevertheless enacted that religious instruction according to the doctrines of the Church of England should be provided for Church of England students. But all that the Commissioners had said was that religious instruction should be given; whether it was to be Church of England, Roman Catholic, Presbyterian, or Buddhist, they did not say. There were many ways of deciding what religious instruction should be given, but the very worst way was to leave it to be fought out by the ratepayers. If the ratepayers were to decide what doctrines were to be preached in the parish church it would be productive of nothing but confusion and dissension; and the result would be pretty much the same if the ratepayers were called upon to say what religious instruction should be given in the schools. He would like for a moment to refer to the special exemption which had been made in favour of the Moravians and Quakers. The Endowed Schools Commissioners had spared the Quaker and Moravian foundations, but had swept away the power of the Archbishops and Bishops. The question to be decided was as to the course to be taken in regard to the present Bill. He could not regard it as satisfactory, because in many points it took the Church of England at an unfair disadvantage. Disestablishment might or might not be wrong, but it could not be fair or just to attempt a bit of disestablishment by means of a Bill like the present. The course which the Endowed Schools Commissioners had taken would please neither of the parties who could be affected by the provisions of the Bill—the contrivance was, perhaps, the worst that could have been adopted; but it was impossible to do properly within three days of the prorogation of Parliament that which would require for its accomplishment long and anxious consideration in both Houses of Parliament. The only course which, under the circumstances, he saw to be open, and one which he believed would not be resisted, would be to provide that the operation of the Bill should be limited to one year

1315
from the date of its passing. The adoption of such a course would give security that there should be a discussion of all the important points involved in the course of the coming Session. He could not admit that the points to which he had adverted would be settled by the adoption of the course he suggested even for the limited period which would intervene between this and June of next year, and he therefore suggested further that the Amendments which were introduced in the other House of Parliament by Mr. Hardy and others who thought with him should be regarded as sub judice as far as their Lordships were concerned—as matters on which Parliament had not really decided. Some of these Amendments ignored in important respects the expressed intentions of the Founders; and if he proposed the rejection of future schemes of the Commissioners drawn on the principle of these Amendments their Lordships must not think him troublesome or importunate. If the Session could be prolonged for six weeks it would be possible to deal with the questions involved, but as that was out of the question, he hoped the course he suggested would be adopted. It had seriously weighed upon his mind and upon the mind of the noble Duke who was absent (the Duke of Richmond) whether they ought or ought not to move the rejection of the Bill upon the second reading. There were strong reasons in favour of that course, but against it there was the extreme inconvenience of breaking up a piece of administrative machinery which would occupy some time in the repairing; and, he might add, there was the fact that the Dissenters in the House of Commons were exceedingly anxious for that consummation. On the whole, therefore, he thought it would be best to amend the Bill, instead of rejecting it.
LORD LYTTELTONsaid, he must assume that the course suggested by the noble Marquess (the Marquess of Salisbury) would be adopted. The precarious position of the Commission would be inconvenient to some, and he hoped that if the need arose their interests would be duly remembered. He did not speak for himself when saying this, for he had found the Commission by no means a Garden of Eden, and the possibility of being again his own master was to him no matter of lamenta-
1316
tion. But for the Commission, as such, he thought the limitation very undesirable, because it would curb its freedom of action and prevent it from dealing with any except unimportant or unopposed schemes. Yet he could not but admit that there was some Parliamentary ground for the limitation proposed. It might be not unfairly said that they had reached the dregs of a Parliament which had continued for a long time—he would not say the dregs of the present Government, although since a remarkable event in the early part of the Session the Government, as had been observed in some newspaper, had been like a man who had suffered a paralytic stroke; it might continuo to live, but its movements, till a new Parliament, would be feeble and restricted. There had been, indeed, no delay in the consideration of the Bill. The Committee upon it was appointed at the very commencement of the Session, and no delay had occurred in its proceedings. But in the actual circumstances he did not complain, only he hoped it might be found possible to have no more of these short and inconvenient prolongations. At present there was an obvious and further reason why the noble Marquess had taken the course he had adopted. The noble Marquess and his Friends expected to come into power soon, and it was not unreasonable that they should say—"We shall not allow our political opponents to deal for the next three or four years with these important subjects which have so long been discussed, and many of which still remain undecided. We shall limit the operation of the Commission to one year, and then perhaps we may have our turn, and be able to give effect to some of our own opinions." In a party sense this was not unreasonable. He had no intention of extolling the merits of the Commission, but he hoped that before the question was finally settled, noble Lords would take the trouble carefully to read the evidence which had been given by the Commissioners before the Committee of the House of Commons. That evidence treated fully all the points that had been raised by the noble Marquess, and many more. What he ventured earnestly to impress on their Lordships was that when the time arrived for Parliament again to deal fully with the question as it had done in 1869, it should say what it meant and mean

1317
what it said. He hoped that Parliament would not intrust the Commissioners with the largest possible powers, and then turn round and call them to account for having acted upon them merely because of some vague reports of the opinions of individual Commissioners—some of them expressed before the Act was passed, or speeches of certain Ministers. The Commissioners were bound by the terms of the Preamble of the Act, by its general scope, spirit, and intention, and not by their own private opinions; and mainly by the 9th and 10th clauses as interpreted by the Preamble. He admitted, as had been done in their Report, that the country was not yet prepared for the Act being carried out with that stringency which the Act itself directed. Under the limitation now proposed they would probably have to proceed with "bated breath;" and indeed pending the more leisurely consideration of the whole subject, and having regard to local feelings and the sentiments of the people, he expected they would concede some points on which they had hitherto insisted. There were two points, and two only, which he considered to be vital, and unless they were maintained he would have nothing to do with the further administration of the Act. One was that special rewards and gratuitous or cheap education should be given solely for merit, properly understood. He differed from the noble Marquess, who had said that the giving of prizes for merit was part of the jargon of the day, and could mean nothing but competitive examination. Prizes might be given as the reward of industry and exertion, and not necessarily of superior talent. The other was that Parliament should not in the slightest degree fetter the Commissioners in dealing with Governing Bodies, especially in regard to the infusion of the popular element, which had in their judgment much to do with securing the prosperity of schools and the continuance of their usefulness. As to the question of religion, his own opinion was that it was better to leave that matter, except with regard to a few schools, to be decided by the Governors of the schools. If Parliament should choose to lay down anything intelligible and specific, for the purpose of defining what schools were Church schools, for the guidance of the Commissioners, he
1318
believed they would have no objection to act on it, but without some such further definition he did not know what a Church school was. With regard to elementary education, it was so difficult for them to deal with that matter that if Parliament should think fit to take all elementary schools out of the jurisdiction of the Commissioners, to himself it would give much satisfaction. He had been incorrectly supposed to object to endowments generally; for he held that endowments might be made of the greatest value, and he had no wish to discourage them. On the contrary, in the evidence he gave before the Committee of the House of Commons he said he did not believe that a power given to proper tribunals to deal within certain limits and after a certain time with endowments would discourage them.
Motion agreed to; Bill read 2a accordingly, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House To-morrow.

MERCHANT SHIPPING ACTS AMENDMENT BILL.—(No. 254).
(The Earl Cowper.)
Order of the Day for the Second reading, read.
EARL COWPER, in moving that the Bill be now read the second time said, that it did not deal with the points that were now under the consideration of the Commission which was sitting to inquire into the subject. This measure was little more than an expansion of the Act of 1871, and was intended to fill up the gaps in that statute. The Bill embraced a number of small details with which it would not be worth while to occupy the attention of the House at the present moment.
Moved, "That the Bill be now read.2a."—(The Earl Cowper.)
LORD CAIRNShoped that by the time the Bill reached its next stage certain of the clauses would be considerably modified.
Motion agreed to; Bill read 2a accordingly and committed to a Committee of the Whole House To-morrow.

CONSPIRACY LAW AMENDMENT BILL.—(No. 256.)
(The Earl of Kimberley.)

SECOND READING.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading, read.
THE EARL OF KIMBERLEY, in moving that the Bill be now read the second time, said, that the Bill, as originally framed, was introduced by Mr. Vernon Harcourt in the other House of Parliament, and applied to conspiracies which were connected with combinations concerning trade. The Government, however, did not deem it desirable to deal with the law of conspiracy on only a single point, and were of opinion that any Bill on the subject should be extended to the law of conspiracy generally. The occasion which gave rise to the consideration of the question was that of the strike of the gas stokers. It would be remembered that several of these persons were sentenced, for conspiracy to commit an offence, to much severer punishment than were others who had actually committed the offence itself. Now, the general effect of the present Bill would be that it would remove altogether from our law punishment for conspiracy to effect any object by a mere breach of contract, which would hereafter be left to be dealt with under the Criminal Law Amendment Act and the Masters and Servant Act; while in such grave eases as a charge of conspiracy for the purpose of extortion, to defeat the course of justice, or to murder, the sentences which might be pronounced were left subject to the existing law. The first clause, therefore, provided that no person should be liable to any greater punishment for a conspiracy to be carried out by a breach of contract than he would be liable to for a breach of the contract itself; and no person would hereafter be liable to punishment for conspiracy by reason only of his being a member of a trade combination. The clause defined "trade combination" as
"a combination between masters or workmen or other persons for regulating or altering the relations between any persons being masters or workmen or the conduct of any master or workman in or in respect of his business or employment or contract of employment or service."
He was aware that the Bill came up to their Lordships' House rather late in the Session, relating as it did to a question of great importance; but it had
1320
been carefully examined by the Law Officers of the Crown, and they had endeavoured to make it as complete as possible. He hoped, therefore, their Lordships would pass it, for it was not desirable that a penalty should continue to hang over the working classes of this country which Parliament, he believed, never intended should be imposed for the particular offence with which the Bill dealt.
Moved, "That the Bill be now read 2a."—(The Earl of Kimberley.)
LORD CAIRNSsaid, he had not the slightest objection to have the question fully considered how far it was desirable to treat the offence to which the Bill related as a criminal act. The matter was one which was, in his opinion, well worthy the attention of Parliament, and the law on the subject might stand in need of revision, more especially when a breach of contract of the kind under discussion was carried out by what was termed a conspiracy, but which would more properly be called a combination. He must add, however, that the Bill filled him with considerable apprehension. It proposed a great change in the criminal law; it had not been introduced as a Government Bill, but was proposed in the other House by a private Member, and it came before their Lordships at a very late period of the Session. It was desirable to have the opinions and the advice of the learned Judges on the matter before such an alteration of the law was made; but, in the present case, that assistance could not well be obtained, as the Judges were on their circuits. It appeared to him to be a very serious and somewhat dangerous thing at that period of the Session, for the purpose of effecting the object sought by that Bill, to alter the whole law in regard to conspiracy. He would now make no objection to the second reading of the measure, it being understood, however, that he would to-morrow, at its next stage, call their Lordships' attention to the points to which he had briefly referred, and ask their earnest consideration as to what course ought to be taken under the circumstances.
Motion agreed to; Bill read 2a accordingly, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House To-morrow.
House adjourned at a quarter before Eight o'clock, till To-morrow half past Ten o'clock.