Sitting of 27 March 1873

MINUTES.
PUBLIC BILLS—Resolution in Committee—Ordered—First Reading—Australasian Colonies (Customs Duties)* [106].
Ordered—First Reading—Conveyancing (Scotland)* [108]; Metropolitan Commons Supplemental* [107].
First Reading—Marine Mutiny*.
Second Reading—Income Tax Assessment* [98].
Committee—Report—(£9,317,346 19 s. 9d.) Consolidated Fund*; Register for Parliamentary and Municipal Electors* [66–105]; Mutiny*; Turks and Caicos Islands* [87]; Endowed Schools Address* [94].
Considered as amended—Public Worship Facilities* [100].

SPAIN.—QUESTION.
MR. P. A. TAYLORasked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, If he will state the precise grounds on which Her Majesty's Government declined to recognize the Spanish Republic as established by the vote of the Cortes?
VISCOUNT ENFIELD: Sir, Her Majesty's Government cannot recognize the present Government in Spain as otherwise than provisional. A Constituent Cortes will, however, be convoked to pronounce upon the form of Government to be adopted. Pending the deliberations and decisions of the Assembly, Her Majesty's Government will simply follow the precedent that was followed in the case of the Governments that provisionally succeeded the ex-Queen Isabella, the late ex-King Louis Philippe, and the ex-Emperor Louis Napoleon. Even had it been decided to precipitate the recognition of the present Government, it does not appear to whom Her Majesty's Minister at Madrid should be properly accredited, or from whom he could receive his credentials.

THE SANDWICH ISLANDS.

  QUESTION.
  MR. SALTasked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Whether information has been received that the United States are about to obtain an important harbour and coaling station in the Sandwich Islands; and, whether any efforts are being made to secure similar advantages for this Country?
  VISCOUNT ENFIELD: Sir, it appear- from the reports received from the acts ing Commissioner at Honolulu that there is a party in the Sandwich Islands favourable to the cession of Pearl River to the United States in exchange for the concession of certain commercial advantages. This party consists of members of the mercantile community. The King is stated to be favourable to granting a lease of the harbour, but nothing definite has as yet been done on this
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  subject. I do not believe Her Majesty's Government contemplate taking any similar steps.

TRADES' UNIONS—THE AMALGAMATED SOCIETY OF ENGINEERS.

  QUESTION.
  MR. HEADLAMasked Mr. Attorney General, Whether his attention has been directed to a case recently decided by the County Court Judge at Newcastle upon Tyne, where the plaintiff, a working engineer, brought an action against the Amalgamated Society of Engineers, alleging that after subscribing for twenty-one years, according to the rules of the Society, he was denied the privileges to which by the same rules he was entitled in respect of his subscription; whereupon the counsel for the Amalgamated Engineers' Society, having met the case by a statement that the Society was not registered, and that in consequence there was no remedy whatever at law for such a grievance, the plaintiff was non-suited; and, whether, assuming that the case was rightly decided, he will be prepared to introduce a Bill to render such Societies as the Amalgamated Society of Engineers liable at law for the non-fulfilment of their engagements?
  THE ATTORNEY GENERAL: Sir, my right hon. Friend will not feel offended at me if I say it is rather a bad precedent to ask the Attorney General for an opinion on a question arising in a private law suit. It is my duty to advise the Government, and also the House of Commons on any matter which may arise before them, and upon which my opinion may be required; but it is not my duty to give opinions upon matters between parties, and especially when the question involves my giving an opinion whether a Judge has or has not decided according to law. Now, if I were disposed to give an opinion on this case, the materials supplied would not enable me to do so. Assuming the Judge decided rightly, I am asked whether I am prepared to propose an alteration of the law of partnership. I am certainly not. The Judge decided, rightly or wrongly, that the association in question was a partnership, and he decided that on a most elementary principle. These associations may be registered as friendly societies, benefit societies, or as Trades' Unions under three

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  separate Acts of Parliament, and it could be easily ascertained whether they were registered or not, and if they are so registered those who contribute to them have abundant protection. If, however, societies choose for their own purposes not to register, and if persons choose to join unregistered societies, they do so at their peril. I am certainly not prepared to propose an alteration of the law of partnership in favour of persons who join unregistered societies with their eyes open.

METROPOLIS—THE PRICE OF GAS.

  QUESTION.
  SIR CHARLES W. DILKEasked the President of the Board of Trade, Whether, looking to the excitement which at present prevails in the Metropolis on the subject of the price of Gas, there is any objection to printing the accounts of the Metropolitan Gas Companies for the year 1872 at once instead of at the end of the Session of Parliament?
  MR. CHICHESTER FORTESCUE: I am not able, Sir, at once to have the accounts of the Metropolitan Gas Companies printed, because they have not yet been received, the meetings of the companies not having been held; but I believe they will soon be presented, and that I shall be able to lay the Return before Parliament at an earlier period than usual.

  ARMY—CHELSEA HOSPITAL PENSIONERS.—QUESTION.
  SIR LAWRENCE PALKasked the Secretary of State for War, If he would state to the House why no steps have been taken since the Royal Commission of 1870 to ascertain the wishes of the pensioners of Chelsea Hospital to remain or to leave; whether it is true that a pensioner of the name of Kirk, belonging to the left wing of the hospital, has been sent for seven days to confinement for sharing his regulation loaf with his wife, aged seventy-two; and, whether there is any sergeant in Chelsea Hospital who had been removed from Millbank for too great severity to the prisoners under his charge there?
  MR. CARDWELL: Sir, the inquiry of 1870 was conducted, not by a Royal Commission, but by a Departmental Committee. It did not recommend, as the hon. Baronet seemed to suppose,
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  that any steps should be taken to ascertain the wishes of the pensioners to remain or to leave. No married or in-pensioner is required to remain in the institution. Resumption of out-pension at any time is freely allowed. The pensioners are fully aware of this privilege, and a few avail themselves of it every year. I am informed that no pensioner named Kirk has been punished for sharing his regulation loaf with his wife. But a pensioner of that name was confined to the Hospital for seven days for attempting to take away fuel, the property of the Hospital, and to take his food outside at a forbidden hour. Though he had stated on admission that he had no relative dependent on him, he was afterwards allowed a pass to take his food to his wife at the proper hour. No sergeant or other person removed from Millbank for too great severity to prisoners is employed at Chelsea Hospital. The Sergeant of Police was formerly employed at Millbank, but he voluntarily resigned the employment, and left it with a good character.

SPAIN—SALE AND PURCHASE OF ARMS.

  QUESTION.
  CAPTAIN DAWSON-DAMERasked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Whether the attention of the Government has been drawn to the article in the "Mémorial Diplomatique" as to the purchase of arms by Carlist agents; and, whether they will be prepared to follow the course taken by the French Government, prohibiting the exportation of arms to the Carlist party?
  VISCOUNT ENFIELD: I am not aware, Sir, whether any Members of Her Majesty's Government have or have not read the article in The Mémorial Diplomatique. I may say for myself that I have not seen it; but I need scarcely remind my hon. and gallant Friend that the sale and purchase of arms in this country cannot be considered as an illegal act, and Her Majesty's Government cannot proceed exceptionally in the present instance.

  INDIA—BANDA AND KIRWEE PRIZE MONEY.—QUESTION.
  LORD ELCHOasked the Under Secretary of State for India, Whether any sum is now available for distribution on account of the Banda and Kirwee

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  Booty; and, if so, what is its amount, and when will it be paid; what amount of Treasure was taken in the Begum Kotee (or "Ladies' Palace") at Luck-now, shortly after the capture of that city by Lord Clyde, and what became of it; and whether there is any objection to produce the Official Correspondence which took place in India on the subject of this Booty?
  MR. GRANT DUFF: In reply, Sir, to the noble Lord's first Question, I have to say that no sum is now available for distribution on account of the Banda and Kirwee Booty, but it is possible that when the final account, which the Government of India has been instructed to prepare, is sent in, a small sum may be found available for a last distribution. In reply to his second Question, I have to say that the amount of the treasure found in the Ladies' Palace at Lucknow was £14,000; that treasure having been found after the cessation of hostilities was "treasure trove," not prize, and as such the property of the Government, which, however, gave a quarter of it as a reward to the finders. In reply to his third Question, I have to say that there is no objection to produce the Correspondence if the noble Lord likes to move for it.

MERCANTILE MARINE—THE "DRUID."

  QUESTION.
  MR. HAMBROasked the President of the Board of Trade, If he will state whether he proposes to act on the recommendation of the coroner's jury and the Board of Trade Court of Inquiry, in the case of the "Druid" exploding, whereby two lives were lost, and five seamen dangerously scalded; and if he will bring in a Bill to extend to all steamers the statutory provisions as to surveys now applicable only to passenger steamers; and, whether he proposes to take any steps against the owners, under section 11 of the Merchant Shipping Act of 1871, for not keeping that ship seaworthy?
  MR. CHICHESTER FORTESCUEin reply, said, that the case of the Druid was a very bad one. The Board of Trade inquiry decided that the explosion was the result of culpable negligence on the part of the owner, but whether the negligence brought him within the Merchant Shipping Act of 1871 he was unable on his
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  own authority to say. He had, however, referred the question to the Home Office to ascertain whether a prosecution would he against the owners or others under that section of the Act, or in any other way. The question whether all steamers should be surveyed compulsorily as if they were passenger ships was part of a much larger question—namely, whether all ships should be so surveyed, and upon this question he could not be expected to give an answer especially as it was one of the first questions which should be considered by the Royal Commission. To-morrow probably he would be able to communicate the names of the Royal Commissioners and the exact terms of the reference.

  SCOTLAND—DUMFRIES—THE ESTATE OF HANNAHFIELD—GRANT BY THE CROWN.—QUESTION.
  LORD CLAUD JOHN HAMILTONasked the First Lord of the Treasury, Whether the presentation of the estate of Hannahfield by the Lords of the Treasury to the Magistrates and Sheriffs of Dumfries for the benefit of the inhabitants of that town, as reported in the "Times" of the 24th instant, is substantially correct; and, if so, whether he has any objection to lay the Treasury Minute on the subject upon the Table?
  MR. BAXTER: Sir, the statement regarding the gift of the Hannahfield property to the town of Dumfries which appeared in The Times of the 24th instant, copied from The Scotsman, is substantially correct. The last paragraph of that statement, however, is not sufficiently precise, and might convey an erroneous impression. It is as follows:—
  "The intention of the husband of the late proprietor is said to have been to leave the estate for educational purposes, but he died suddenly before his will was completed."
  The fact is that a draft deed which he had caused to be prepared in 1838, about three years before his death, bearing pencil corrections by himself, has been produced. Its main object is, after providing certain legacies to relations and others, to found an educational institution in Dumfries for the benefit of the neighbourhood. The Treasury decision merely gives effect to his expressed intentions. That decision was conveyed in a Treasury letter dated the 18th instant, to the Queen's and Lord Treasurer's

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  Remembrancer in Scotland, which the noble Lord may have if he chooses to move for it.

  MERCANTILE MARINE—THE "KNIGHT TEMPLAR."—EXPLANATION.
  In reply to Mr. RATHBONE,
  MR. CHICHESTER FORTESCUEsaid, he had learnt since he spoke the other evening that an incorrect piece of information had reached him about this vessel. It appeared that she was not registered in the Liverpool Underwriters' Association, but was registered in the London Lloyd's.

  PARLIAMENT—ORDER OF BUSINESS—NAVY ESTIMATES.—QUESTION.
  LORD HENRY LENNOXsaid, he wished to ask the First Lord of the Admiralty a Question with respect to the Navy Estimates. He had privately informed the right hon. Gentleman that, in consequence of an impression that these Estimates would not be brought on until this day week, he had made for to-night an engagement of a public character which the right hon. Gentleman himself admitted it was almost impossible for him to forego. He quite expected from what the right hon. Gentleman said the other night that he would not enter upon any important Votes that evening. Would the right hon. Gentleman give an assurance that none of the important Votes would be brought before the House that night?
  MR. GOSCHENsaid, that the noble Lord was totally in error. The point was this: The noble Lord had got a Notice on the Paper with regard to the Devastation, and there were two other Gentlemen who had Motions on going into Committee of Supply. They were kind enough not to bring those Motions forward on condition that they should have an equally good opportunity of doing so, and, therefore, it was said that on this day week the Navy Estimates should be placed first, when the Motions might come on, but he had no intention not to take any important Votes before Thursday next. The question, therefore, arose whether important Votes were to be postponed because the noble Lord had got an engagement for that evening? He was willing to put off Vote 3, but he could not engage to defer the others.
  MR. GLADSTONEmoved that the Orders of the Day be postponed until after the first seven Notices of Motion.
  LORD HENRY LENNOXinquired after what hour the right hon. Gentleman would not go on with the Votes that night.
  MR. GOSCHEN: Not after 11 o'clock.
  SIR LAWRENCE PALKsaid, it certainly appeared to him the other night that the First Lord of the Admiralty did give the House to understand that the Navy Estimates would not be taken that night, but on next Thursday. ["Order."] The right hon. Gentleman himself must be aware that his (Sir Lawrence Palk's) noble Friend had given up his right to speak in order to suit the convenience of the right hon. Gentleman, and though it might not be right that the convenience of the House should be sacrificed to that of an hon. Member, still both sides of the House were deeply concerned in this—that faith should be kept.
  MR. GOSCHENsaid, the hon. Baronet had misunderstood him, and he would see that the object of the understanding that the Navy Estimates should be taken on Thursday next was that hon. Members who had postponed their Motions should have an opportunity of bringing them forward on that night.
  MR. G. BENTINCKsaid, there appeared to be a series of misunderstandings. He would like, at all events, to be quite clear on one point. He distinctly understood the other night the right hon. Gentleman to say that when he next brought on the Navy Estimates the Committee should be at liberty to enter on the general discussion, in return for having relinquished it at the time to suit the convenience of the Government. He hoped there was no misunderstanding on that point.
  MR. GLADSTONEsaid, that the Government had no power whatever to modify the rules under which discussions in Committee were conducted. The general discussion was certainly waived the other night for the convenience of the Government, and it was understood to be the desire of hon. Members that there should be given an opportunity of resuming the discussion with regard to the general scale on which the Estimates were proposed. The Government were under the belief that the discussion could be raised on the Votes in question,

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  and he trusted that would satisfy the hon. Gentleman.
  SIR JOHN HAYsaid, that what had fallen from the Prime Minister fully bore out the statements of his noble Friend (Lord Henry Lennox) as to what occurred the other night. They understood that the necessities of the public service required that the Vote for men should be taken before the end of the month, and they at once acceded to this proposal. But this showed that the Government did not then anticipate that they would have another day at their disposal before the end of March for further discussion of the Navy Estimates. It was in consequence of that, that Vote 1 was agreed to, on the understanding that the general discussion on the Navy Estimates should be continued on Vote 2, a course justified by former precedents. As the month of April had not yet arrived, he trusted the other Votes would not be taken before then.
  MR. GOSCHENsaid, that whether Supply could be brought on to-night would depend upon the length of the discussion which would previously take place.
  Motion agreed to.

PARLIAMENT—BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.

  MOTION FOR A SELECT COMMITTEE.
  MR. NEWDEGATE: Sir, the Motion which I now venture to make is for the appointment of a Committee to consider certain points connected with the procedure of this House. It will be in the recollection of the right hon. Gentleman the First Lord of the Treasury, and of the House, that I moved this same notice by way of amendment to the Resolution proposed by the hon. Member for Walsall (Mr. C. Forster) on the 25th of February, whereby, had that Resolution been adopted, Parliament would have been convened in November and sat on to Christmas each year. The right hon. Gentleman the First Lord of the Treasury, then accused me of great ingenuity; an accusation which I felt conveyed a high compliment, coming as it did from that right hon. Gentleman. The right hon. Gentleman said that I had managed to put two speeches into one; a speech against the motion of the right hon. Gentleman for Walsall, and a
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  speech in support of my own amendment. I do not see myself how otherwise I could have spoken on that occasion; but the right hon. Gentleman suggested that it would be better if a Committee of the House were moved for on the whole question of Public Business, probably not being aware, or not remembering, that, by the decision of the House against the Amendment made by the hon. Baronet the Member for Essex (Sir Henry Selwin-Ibbetson), at an earlier period of the Session, when the hon. Baronet moved for a Committee on the Despatch of Business, as an Amendment to the Resolution proposed by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, it was not competent to me to raise that question in its fulness again, either by an Amendment or as a substantive Motion. Such, Sir, is the position which I had to meet. The right hon. Gentleman the leader of the House suggested that a Committee should be appointed, and the Notice which I have given goes as far in that direction as I understood from you, Sir, when I privately consulted you, that it is competent to me to move. I therefore ask the House to adopt this Resolution as the only means by which the desire, expressed by many hon. Members of this House, can be accomplished; that desire being that a Committee should be appointed to consider the subjects connected with the procedure of this House, which have on various occasions recently been agitated. On the part of the non-official Members of the House there is a distinct feeling of uneasiness with regard to the position in which they are now placed; and I think that a glance at the Order Book of the House must satisfy every hon. Member that the state of Business is such as must inevitably lead to a dead lock, and that the result of a dead lock can only be the sacrifice of an enormous number of the Bills which have been introduced by hon. Members, and that without, by far the greater part of these Bills, having been considered by the House. But, Sir, the mischief does not stop there. Undoubtedly, among the Bills which have been brought in by hon. Members not connected with the Government, there are some which the House would be very glad to consider; but the state of facts is this. Before I gave this Notice on the 11th of March, I had examined the Order Book, and I found that every Wednesday, the day

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  specially appointed for the consideration and decision of the Orders introduced by non-official Members, was filled by Notices of one or more Orders up to the 16th of July. When I came to inquire at the Public Bill Office on that day, I found that, of the Bills for which leave had been given by the House to nonofficial Members, not less than 16 were unprinted. Several of those which were not printed at that time have since been printed and delivered to hon. Members; but what is the result? As long as the number of notices of Bills stand on the Book for Wednesdays, there is no probability of any decent number of the Bills introduced by non-official Members going through their subsequent stages. Among the many questions which are involved in the consideration of the present position of the Business of the House, this is one. Ought it to be competent to any hon. Member of the House on the 1st of March to put a Notice down for the 10th or 16th of July? Because if this practice is to prevail, it will become—indeed it is already—perfectly possible so to fill the Notice Paper that the Bills which stand for second reading early in the Session cannot be carried through their subsequent stages, owing to the manner in which every Wednesday is occupied up to the close of the Session. This, then, was the immediate cause of my giving this Notice. The House is aware of the rule with respect to Notices of Motion; no hon. Member can give a Notice of Motion beyond a month from the day on which the Notice is given; this arrangement keeps the Business, so far as notices of Motion are concerned, something within compass; but, with respect to Orders—that is, the notices of Bills—no such rule prevails; and this is one subject which I think a Committee of the House might well inquire into; because, before touching upon any further points connected with the conduct of Business by the Government, I wish the House to consider this, that the opportunities for transacting business which remain to the non-official Members—that is, the great body of the House—have been very greatly contracted. Ever since the Report of the Committee of 1861 was received, and to a considerable extent adopted by the House, step by step the opportunities for the transaction of their legislative business by the great body of the House—
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  that is, by the non-official Members—have been greatly diminished, until, as I think I can show the House, we are approaching a point when the legislative functions of the House will be absolutely delegated to Her Majesty's Ministers for the time being. Such a consummation, Sir, would be totally at variance with the original Constitution of this House; and I am anxious that a Committee should be appointed for the purpose of considering how we, the non-official Members, the great body of the Members of the House, can, by the aid of some regulations adopted by the House, adapt our business to our present straitened position; or to use a familiar phrase, cut our coat according to our very much diminished cloth—that is, how we can get on with the business which, after consultation in a Committee—for arrangement among ourselves seems impossible—may be deemed essential. In other words, how we can fit that business into the restricted hours which remain to us each week. The matter is the more urgent because we are approaching the period when we may expect the right hon. Gentleman at the head of the Government to evoke the Resolutions of 1869, and propose morning sittings; and when once the House has adopted these Resolutions, so that it will meet at 2 o'clock instead of at a quarter to 4, thus beginning sitting in the mornings on other days than Wednesdays; when I say this arrangement has been adopted, the effect of this, taken in conjunction with the rule against proceeding with opposed Business after half-past 12 at night, upon the position of the non-official Members comes to this, that they will only have Tuesday evening from 9 till half-past 12, and a short six hours' sitting on Wednesday, for the purpose of advancing through their several stages, whatever Bills they may have in their charge. In other words, while the House will be sitting fully 60 hours a week, the nonofficial Members will literally have but 92 hours for the transaction of the whole of their legislative business. I do not wish, Sir, to make any unreasonable complaints; I make no suggestion of my own; but what I ask is this—that inasmuch as we, the non-official Members of this House, are divided by party, or separated by the floor of this House; and inasmuch as we have not the power

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  of appointing a Committee among ourselves, that this House should itself appoint a Committee, before and in which we may consider these difficulties in which we find ourselves placed, and which may consider any means by which the time remaining to us may be best appropriated. With your permission, Sir, I will advert for a moment to some statistics relating to last Session, in illustration of what I have said. What was the state of things, then, last Session? I find that the total number of Bills introduced into the House of Commons, including Bills brought from the Lords, during the Session of 1872, was 240, of which number 120 were introduced by or on the part of the Government, and 120, the like number, by nonofficial Members of the House. Of the Bills introduced by Her Majesty's Government, 92 were passed into law, 27 were withdrawn or discharged, and only one rejected on a Division. Therefore, of the Bills introduced by the Government, three-fourths were passed, one-fourth, or nearly one-fourth of these Bills were withdrawn, and only one rejected. Of the 120 Bills introduced by non-official Members of the House only 30 were passed, 47 were withdrawn or discharged, 24 were dropped; that is, in all, 72 were abandoned; 18 were rejected on Divisions, and one was laid aside. Thus, while three-fourths of the Bills introduced by the Government were passed into law, the total number of their Bills being 120, not one-fourth of the 120 Bills introduced by the non-official Members of the House passed into law, and out of the 120 three-fourths were practically laid aside. I do not wish to be in the least unjust to the right hon. Gentleman the leader of this House. I do not blame him for the Government he leads in the least, because the House has placed in the hands of the Government so enormous a proportion of its legislative work, has virtually to this great extent abandoned its legislative duties to the Administration. Lord Palmerston, when he was recommending the House to adopt a Resolution of the Committee on Public Business in 1861, emphatically declared that the legislative functions of this House constituted its primary duty, and that for the discharge of that function, for the due performance of this duty beyond all others, this House was responsible to the country. He (Lord
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  Palmerston) then proceeded to touch upon the importance of the financial duties of this House, and afterwards dwelt with considerable emphasis upon the other functions of the House, to act as the great inquest of the nation, in hearing and seeking to remedy and demanding an account for any grievance that may be felt in any part of the country; but he treated the financial function of the House, and its function with respect to grievances, as subordinate and secondary to its great function, the function of legislation. Well, Sir, it appears to me that no Government ought to desire a monopoly of the legislative power of the House; but suppose it is to be granted further than it has been already granted, what will be the result? Her Majesty's Ministers are not, as the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer yesterday—at the Mansion House Banquet—said, they do not constitute merely a Committee of this House. They represent another power. They represent the Executive power of the Crown and of the nation. I should deeply lament if Her Majesty's Ministers came to be considered a mere Committee of this House. I should deprecate any evasion of, or any forfeiture of the peculiar prerogatives and functions of the Crown; but take the case, as I suppose it may become, for the sake of argument that the whole legislative power of this House were in addition to their other functions vested in the Government of the day. By the constitution of the country, the Government of the day must possess the confidence of a majority of this House, and it is therefore inevitable that they must be in this House the representatives of a party. What then would result of their monopolizing the legislative power of this House? The legislation approved by one party would, during the administration or tenure of office of that party be predominant. Then would come reaction, and when that administration leaves office their successors would be found to be their political opponents, and the legislation of this House would be forced into a direction altogether opposite to its former course; thus we should get into that seesaw, which has been found to work so much mischief in the United States of America. It might come to this, that the official Members of the House would be held to be a separate class apart from

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  the other Members of this House; that they were not merely the organs of this House, but they formed an administration, in fact, superior to and therefore irresponsible to Parliament. I think it evident, from the expressions used by the right hon. Gentleman the Chancellor of the Exchequer, upon a recent occasion, that he sees this danger and feels this difficulty; that the leader of the House is practically the organ of a party in this House; that if he became invested with the whole legislative power of this House, he could carry legislation only in one direction, and that thus we should have legislation all in one direction, as emanating from one party during their tenure of office, and that by reaction we should have legislation swaying back again in an opposite direction. I beg pardon of the House for having touched upon this subject, which is a somewhat grave one; at the same time I would that the House should consider that, in watching the progress of changes in the practice and organization of this House, we are watching a great legislative machine, which, now that the House of Lords has practically yielded its independent judgment so often to this House, does in itself possess a supreme legislative power, in other words, has become the supreme legislative power of the State. I cannot see any disorder in this House of which I have been so long a Member, without feeling deep regret. Humble Member as I am, I have never, during the 30 years I have been here, sought any object more anxious than to uphold the credit and character of the House of Commons. I have laboured to this end. I have made sacrifices for it; and I liked not the disorder which characterised the conclusion of the last Session; and it shall not be my fault if, for want of suggestions at all events, however humble may be their source, the House fails to consider its proceedings, with a view to their better regulation. I am unwilling to detain the House, but there are one or two other observations that I wish to make. What is the number of Bills which have been introduced into this House by non-official Members in the present Session? I am afraid it is almost as large as the number introduced last Session. Now the objection to this is that by the introduction of such an enormous number of Bills the non-official Members of this House obstruct each
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  other. In short it becomes a game, not of legislation but of obstruction, and nothing can be more unwholesome than this. It wastes both the time and the energies of the House. I have observed that, since the adoption of the restrictions which recent standing orders have placed on the opportunities for moving Amendments in Supply, the tendency of hon. Members has been to multiply the number of Bills before the House; and I feel convinced, when I see a notice for the second reading of some Bills given at the end of February for the 16th of July following, that that Bill stands there without any hope whatever, on the part of the hon. Member who introduced it, that it can pass into law, but that he merely means to treat it as a kind of Notice of Motion, as a kind of peg upon which to hang a statement or declamation. The more this practice prevails, the more our proceedings must be crippled, and the less capable must the House become of acting, to any degree, independently of the administration of the day in the discharge of its first function, that of legislation. During the last Session there were certain occasions on which the energy of the leader of this House prompted him on Friday night to convene the House unexpectedly to sit on Saturday, and this without notice, save that given the night before. One of the subjects which a Committee might consider is what notice should be given of any proposal to change the hour appointed for the meeting of the House, and what notice should be given of any alteration in the order of business appointed for each day. The object of Committee would be to make suggestions that may be worthy of the consideration of the House, for regulating its Business, and for so economising the time allotted to the great body of this House, the non-official Members, that we may be able to transact the business committed to us in a more orderly, a more expeditious, and a more efficient manner than last Session; for the House should not forget that some of Her Majesty's Judges have expressed many strong opinions with regard to the slovenly manner in which statutes, sent down to them for their guidance, have been passed through Parliament. I trust that I shall be excused for having enlarged upon this subject. I will conclude by expressing a hope that the right hon. Gentleman the

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  head of the Government and leader of the House, will carry out the expectation which I, not without reason, have hopefully entertained, by sanctioning this proposal for the appointment of a Committee of this House to consider those points in the procedure of this House, which are comprised in the Resolution.
  SIR HENRY SELWIN-IBBETSON,in seconding the Motion, said, he believed that the general sense of the House was very much in accord with the views of the hon. Member for North Warwickshire (Mr. Newdegate) who had brought forward this Motion. For his own part he agreed in the main with what his hon. Friend had said respecting the limitation during the last two years of the right of private Members to bring forward their Bills. He perhaps did not attach so much importance as the hon. Member to measures initiated by private Members. He was of opinion that the usefulness of private Members depended more on their action in bringing forward Motions on subjects in which their constituents were interested—bringing these Motions forward not, perhaps, with the hope of their resulting in immediate legislation, but with the view of giving a spur to the Government and the House by showing them what the feelings of the constituencies were upon various subjects, and thus paving the way for legislation. But it could not be denied that private Members were very much limited as to their opportunities for action even in that respect, and he quite agreed that it was desirable that something should be done to improve their position. The Business of the House increased from year to year. Tuesday morning sittings were becoming more frequent; the Tuesday night sittings were practically the only times private Members had of bringing forward their Motions; and on Tuesday nights private Members were often counted out. If the power of private Members to raise discussions were a valuable one, the curtailment of it ought to be carefully guarded. He did not think the Motion of the hon. Member for North Warwickshire was sufficient to meet the necessities of the case, for in any change in the mode of conducting the Business of the House, it should be dealt with as a whole and on the broadest possible basis. He was afraid that the terms of the Motion might, unless some facility were
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  given to hon. Members for moving instructions to the Committee, very much limit the scope of the inquiry. He should, therefore, like the inquiry to be enlarged, and certain points which had only been hinted at thoroughly thrashed out. Among these were the appointment of Grand Committees for certain Bills, the alteration of Notices of Motion with private Members' Bills on Wednesdays, which would obviate the temptation to talk out private Members' Bills on that day, and, the securing of Fridays to private Members. He thought that the best mode of dealing with the whole Question was to refer it to a Committee, and he trusted the instruction to the Committee would be enlarged so as to secure the consideration of these points.
  Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That a Select Committee be appointed to consider the time of the day at which the House should assemble, the hours during which the House can most conveniently sit for the transaction of Public Business, when the Business introduced by Her Majesty's Ministers should have precedence, and what Notice should be given of any proposal to alter the time at which the House will assemble, or the distribution of Business."—(Mr. Newdegate.)
  MR. DODSONsaid, he quite agreed with the hon. Member for North Warwickshire that it was most desirable that the Government should not monopolize too much of the time of the House, whilst he also agreed that it was most desirable that Motions brought forward by private Members should have ample opportunity of being discussed. Discussions of this kind were exceedingly useful. They expressed public opinion from different parts of the country, and discussions in the House helped to form a sound public opinion out-of-doors. It was also desirable that there should be sufficient time for the consideration of the principal Bills of private Members when introduced. He could not, however, agree with the hon. Member in thinking it desirable that the Bills introduced by private Members should be greatly multiplied.
  MR. NEWDEGATE: The right hon. Gentleman has quite misunderstood me. I deprecated the number being increased.
  MR. DODSONwas glad to hear the hon. Member say so. But the hon. Member, while deprecating the lack of time for the due consideration of the

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  Bills of private Members, used a curious illustration, for he referred to the comments of Judges on the vagueness of certain Acts which he complained had been hurried through the House, and it so happened that they were Government and not private Members' measures. A Notice which had been put on the Paper by the right hon. Member for Northamptonshire (Mr. Hunt) seemed to offer a short cut to the end the hon. Member for North Warwickshire desired to obtain. The effect of it would be to give Fridays to private Members; and if they had Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Fridays—three days out of five—it would be as much as could possibly be accorded them. The House would dispose of that Motion after discussion, and without the intervention of a Committee, and the new rule could come into effect during the present Session. He (Mr. Dodson) had before suggested that the Business of Tuesdays and Wednesdays should be transposed; that Orders of the Day should stand first on Tuesdays, and Motions on Wednesdays. Private Members' Bills would not then be exposed to their present risk on Wednesdays of being "talked out;" but they would run the risk of their Bills on Tuesdays being counted out. If a Bill attracted so little interest that 40 Members would not be found willing to come down to support it, the probability was that it had better be counted out. This arrangement and the making Friday a Motion night would give more time to private Members, and might facilitate the passing of their Bills, and both these were among the objects which the hon. Member had in view. Neither of them, however, would come within the terms of reference of the hon. Gentleman's Motion, which applied only to hours, and not to the nature of Business. As far as he was concerned he had very little hope of any good resulting from the appointment of another Committee. A great number of Committees had already sat, and if the hon. Gentleman wanted the recommendation of a Committee there were numberless recommendations lying in the library which he might take up. He believed that the Committee now proposed would be of less use than any of them, and he thought the object of the hon. Member for North Warwickshire would be better attained by the proposition of
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  the right hon. Member for Northamptonshire (Mr. Hunt).
  MR. BAILLIE COCHRANEsaid that the great loss of time occurred through the House being counted out on Tuesdays. He was very nearly being a sufferer himself last Tuesday, when the Prime Minister suggested that he should go on with his motion on the Suez Canal. He, however, felt certain that the House would be counted, which happened as soon as an hon. Member opposite (Mr. Chadwick) rose to bring forward a Motion on the Income Tax. Between 8 and 10 o'clock on Tuesdays the House was almost always counted. If, however, the Government would put down Supply or some other Government business on the Paper, the House would then be safe to be kept. As the right hon. Gentleman had been so kind in advising him to go on last Tuesday, perhaps he would give him the assurance that he would be in his place next Tuesday and keep a House for him.
  MR. COLLINSthought that if a question brought forward by any hon. Member would not attract forty Members, its fate could hardly be deplored; and he thought it would be well to lay down the rule that if an hon. Member were once counted out he should not be allowed to bring on the same Motion during that Session. It was no offence to the Colonies when an hon. Gentleman opposite was counted out, but only an intimation that the House did not think any good object could be gained by the discussion of the subject. When, however, that hon. Member was counted out, a great injury was inflicted upon the next hon. Member, who might have a sensible Motion on the paper, because the first Motion not only stopped the way, but emptied the House. The other night the hon. Member (Mr. Chadwick) was counted out in moving for a Committee on the Income Tax. The House knew very well that the tax could not be modified, but that it must either be got rid of or retained, and, therefore, the House knew it was only a waste of time to go on. He thought the House showed great good sense in refusing to entertain Motions of this kind. Out of the three recommendations of the Committee of last Session two had been adopted to the satisfaction of the House—one that Mondays should be given to the Government, and another that no opposed business

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  should be taken after midnight. The third—that a quarter of an hour's grace should be allowed before the Speaker counted, when the House resumed at 9 after a morning sitting—had not yet been adopted.
  MR. GLADSTONEsaid, the subject was now being discussed, partly on the Motion of the hon. Member for North Warwickshire (Mr. Newdegate) and partly upon a suggestion made by his right hon. Friend the Member for East Sussex (Mr. Dodson) for improving the conduct of the Business of the House. It was difficult to deal satisfactorily in debate with these proposals, and it was hardly possible to bring them to a state of maturity until after they had passed through the ordeal of a Select Committee. These matters required to be looked at on different sides, and it was conversation rather than speeches which enabled them to undergo the thorough sifting which they required before they were adopted. The right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Dodson) had made a suggestion which had been received with more than common favour, that there should be an exchange of the Business of Tuesdays and Wednesdays. A great deal might be said in favour of that Motion, but he doubted whether it would be safe to adopt it without carefully examining it from every side, because it clearly involved casting a weight in the scale in favour of Notices of Motion as compared with the legislation undertaken by private Members. It gave to Members who moved Notices of Motion six hours of an absolutely certain House. [Mr. HUNT dissented.] Yes, practically it did, because from 12 to 4 the House could not be counted. [Mr. HUNT: But will you make a House?] Sometimes there might be half an hour lost before a House was made, and there was that deduction between the hours from 12 to 4, but when London was full there was no difficulty whatever in keeping a House between 4 and 6 o'clock. That would give, practically, five or six hours certain to those who had Notices of Motion. The right hon. Gentleman proposed to repay the promoters of private Bills by giving them Tuesdays—which would be subject to risks. That was a change of great importance which required to be carefully weighed because the interest of these two classes was very distinct one from the other. He thought
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  it would not be imprudent to say that the whole of these suggestions required to be turned over and examined on every side. It had been charged upon the Government of the day that it had of late years made encroachments upon private Members. He questioned the truth of this assertion. If hon. Members went back 20 or 30 years, he was ready to affirm that, apart from morning sittings, the Government 20 or 30 years ago had a much larger proportion of the aggregate number of hours than at present, and that the encroachment had not been by, but upon the Government. In 1867 or 1868, when the rule was made for morning sittings, the inequality was so far removed as to bring matters back to the state in which they formerly were. While private Members squabbled with the Government and the Government with private Members, the cardinal difficulty lay in the quantity of business and the fixed quantity of time to do it in, and it was to the economical distribution of that time to which the House would have to look, rather than from any great advantage to be gained by private Members at the expense of the Government. He thought it would be worth while to appoint a Committee of the House to consider the subject anew, but there was no use in raising the question if hours were to be spent in debating it and in withdrawing the attention of the House from other business. He thought there would be no advantage in agreeing to this motion, and that for two reasons. In the first place, as had been said by the hon. Baronet (Sir Henry Selwin-Ibbetson) it would be impossible to limit the Committee in the manner proposed by this Motion. It had been suggested that, not by one but by a series of instructions, the scope of the Committee should be made wider. But that showed that the form of the Motion was a wrong one, and if a Committee were appointed, it ought to be appointed with much greater confidence in its discretion than the Motion showed. In the next place, he ventured to say that this was not a time of the Session at which such a Committee could be appointed with any advantage. A Committee on the Business of the House ought only to be appointed at a period of the Session when hon. Members of the House were so free from engagements that the members of the Committee could be chosen unrestrictedly

  241
  from the Members of the House. It ought to have the power of bringing together all those hon. Members who had been most responsible for the conduct of the Business of the House, and who had had the longest experience. If a Committee were appointed after Easter when a large majority of hon. Members whose assistance was most desirable were already so occupied with previous engagements, they would not be able to do justice to the inquiry. His hon. Friend the Member for the Isle of Wight (Mr. B. Cochrane) had complained of the request which was made to him to proceed with his Motion about the Isthmus of Suez on Tuesday night, but he (Mr. Gladstone) believed that if his hon. Friend had stood in the breach he would have kept a House. The hon. Member had also suggested a change by which the Government Orders should have precedence on Tuesday nights. [Mr. BAILLIE COCHRANE: Should not have precedence.] The hon. Member's proposition amounted to this—that the Government, without any hope of bringing on their Business, should place it on the Paper, in the hope that official Members would would be bound to keep a House. The hon. Member for Boston (Mr. Collins) had proposed that they should make a slight change with respect to the Rule that was to be enforced when the House recommenced its sittings at 9 o'clock, and stated that a quarter of an hour's grace should be given. He (Mr. Gladstone) did not know whether it was wise to have a Rule that on such occasions no Motions should be made to count out the House before half-past 9, instead of a Rule permitting the making of a Motion to count-out at a quarter-past 9; but the House had experienced the advantage of requiring a pause before a Motion for a count-out could be made on such occasions. As to the general subject, he hoped the hon. Member for North Warwickshire would not ask the House to Divide on his Motion.
  MR. R. N. FOWLERsaid, he was doubtful whether it would be desirable to transfer to Wednesday the business now transacted on Tuesday evening. If that had been done before last Tuesday, the consequence would have been that the hon. Member for the City of London (Mr. Crawford), and other mercantile Members, would not have been able to be present at the important dis-
  242
  cussion on the currency question. He thought it deserved consideration whether the present system was not better than the one now suggested. One of the results of the deliberations of the last Committee was the adoption of the half-past 12 o'clock rule, which stood in the way of private Members, and seemed to him a change of very doubtful advantage. Another change recommended by the Committee was that at the evening sitting the House should not be counted out before a quarter-past or—as subsequently suggested by the Government—half-past 9, and of that proposal he approved. With regard to the Motion of the hon. Member for North Warwickshire (Mr. Newdegate), he trusted that it would not be pressed to a division.
  COLONEL BARTTELOTasked the hon. Member for North Warwickshire not to divide on the question. He agreed with the right hon. Gentleman at the head of the Government that it would be much better to have an inquiry at the commencement of a Session, when the whole subject could be gone into. As to the suggestion of the hon. Member for Boston (Mr. Collins), he thought that at 9 o'clock a quarter of an hour's grace might be fairly allowed; but he should object to any extension of that time.
  COLONEL WILSON-PATTENsaid, he was afraid they were attempting an impossibility. Looking at the number of Bills before the House, he did not think that any Committee or any change of system would facilitate legislation to the extent imagined by some hon. Members. The other day he counted the number of Bills awaiting discussion which had been brought in by hon. Members. He found there were no fewer than 66 Bills on the Order Book. Each of those Bills would be discussed three times, and upwards of 190 days would be required for that work. He had not counted the Notices of Motion, but they were very numerous. It was clearly impossible that all of them could be considered and passed through their various stages in the time at the disposal of the House. The truth was, that the measures introduced by private Members impeded each other, and would continue to do so under any system that had been suggested. The only thing that would facilitate the passage of a

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  portion of them would be the withdrawal of the rest. He did not think that a Committee could, with advantage, be appointed at the present period of the Session, nor did he think that it would be desirable to appoint a Committee at all until they had before them some more definite proposition than they had at present. No hon. Member had made a better suggestion on this subject than the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Sussex (Mr. Dodson). He concurred with the Prime Minister in thinking that a House would have been kept on Tuesday if the hon. Member for the Isle of Wight (Mr. Baillie Cochrane) had proceeded with his Motion. The reason why the House was counted out was that nobody took an interest in the Motion of the hon. Member for Macclesfield (Mr. Chadwick). He did not see any use in the Committee proposed by the hon. Member for North Warwickshire. Numbers of hon. Members would be deprived of the opportunity of taking part in discussions if Wednesday were made the day for Motions. If, however, a substantive proposal were made to that effect, it might be discussed and decided by the House without the intervention of a Committee, as to the undesirability of appointing which, he agreed with the Prime Minister. Business had so increased that its discharge was almost impossible under any rules unless, as he had stated, hon. Members, whose Bills had no chance of passing, would at once withdraw them—a course, however, which it was hopeless to expect, every hon. Member naturally thinking his own Bill an important one.
  MR. CHADWICKtrusted the hon. Member for North Warwickshire would not withdraw his Motion, and urged that the main point should be to check the gross waste of time occasioned by the hon. Member for Boston and others, who appeared to think the House was burning to learn their sentiments on every subject. The Committee should be instructed to consider some mode of limiting the speeches of hon. Members to subjects which they understood, or could give some information upon. With regard to the count-out on Tuesday night, the income tax was a subject which he had studied for years, and he had intended to combat the heresies of the Prime Minister and the Chancellor of the Exchequer respect-
  244
  ing it. There was scarcely any subject which they could not count-out between the hours of 8 and 10. He could himself have counted out the House 20 times during the past Session when important questions were under consideration. When it was considered that they printed and published the names of hon. Members who voted for or against any Motion, he saw no reason why they should not print and publish the names, not only of those who were present when the House was counted, but of those hon. Members who moved a count. Why should they conceal the name of any hon. Member who thought the exigencies of the public service required a count? He trusted the Committee would be appointed, and that the main question for their consideration would be how they could restrict the large amount of useless talk which was at present indulged in by hon. Members.
  MR. SCOURFIELDthought that, unless the Committee had particular instructions as to the object with which they had to deal, they might meet 20 times without being able to form any definite plan. He was afraid that if they were required to solve the problem of how the Public Business could be best despatched, and, at the same time, secure unlimited liberty of debate for hon. Members, they would be placed in great difficulty.
  MR. CRAWFORDpointed out that Friday nights would be more available to private Members but for the rule against more than one division on the Motion for going into Committee of Supply. He thought that a good deal of the inconvenience which now existed would be removed if the House fell back on the old rule of moving that the House, at its rising, should adjourn until Monday. With regard to the project for bringing forward Motions on Wednesdays instead of Tuesdays, he wished to remind the House that it was quite impossible for those hon. Members who were engaged in the City or professionally occupied to come down to the morning sittings.
  MR. MONTAGU CHAMBERSsaid, he was not in favour of the form of Motion now brought forward, because he thought they were too much in the habit of submitting matters to Select Committees which ought to be taken into

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  consideration by the House itself. He could not avoid saying, however, that there were a vast number of Resolutions brought forward unnecessarily, and simply for the purpose of airing eccentricities, or with the intention of showing persons outside that their authors were attempting to do something. If hon. Gentlemen would read through the lists from time to time of the Resolutions to be proposed, they would not say they were nonsense, because that would be un parliamentary language; but some censorious person would say that the House of Commons, which ought to be engaged in most important business, was occupied too frequently in discussing that which might be occasionally instructive, sometimes extremely amusing, but which almost always ended in nothing. If hon. Gentlemen—acting upon the suggestion of the hon. and gallant Member for Lancashire (Colonel Wilson-Patten)—would be considerate enough, when there was Public Business to be done, to withdraw the advocacy of their conundrums, the House would be able to make progress with and to facilitate real business. He had frequently heard the expression "free discussion" used, but he thought the liberty of free discussion might be carried a little too far when important Public Business was waiting to be transacted. Perhaps it was complimentary, or perhaps it was not complimentary to that House, but he was of opinion that kindly forbearance on its part with reference to the agitation of unimportant questions was a little too indulgent. Some time ago a novel was published bearing the title of Thinks I to Myself, thinks I, and very often in the course of a debate he had said—"Thinks I to myself, thinks I, what a pity it is that the time of the House is wasted in this manner." There were many hon. Members who were in love with their own ideas, and who insisted on inculcating them in the House of Commons, and the consequence was that at the end of the Session but little real business had been transacted. He had made these observations in the hope of "showing ourselves up to ourselves," and he trusted that hon. Members would take them to heart. He wished to hold up the mirror to those hon. Gentlemen who were the habitués of the House of Commons, and knew what the Rules were. The proceedings at a count-out could not be de-
  246
  scribed as "disgraceful," because that also was not a Parliamentary expression. He was in the House the other evening when he was informed there would be a count-out on Mr. A, B, C, or D's Motion, and upon asking why, he got no answer. He however saw the exhibition. One hon. Gentleman rose up and observed that there were not 40 Members present. What did the hon. Gentleman then do? Why, he walked out at the door, and a number of other hon. Gentlemen trooped after him, and through that glass door were certain eyes peeping, all anxious that the count-out should be successful. It struck him as a most extraordinary proceeding that the very man who said there were not 40 Members present should be the first to run out of the House. That sort of thing was not only known out-of-doors, but it was ridiculed and condemned, and it was condemned with perfect propriety. It was very desirable, in his opinion, that a Rule should be made to the effect that after an hon. Member rose to draw attention to the fact that there were not 40 Members present, no hon. Gentleman should be allowed to leave the House until after the count had taken place.
  SIR STAFFORD NORTHCOTEagreed that the question of counting-out the House had attracted the attention of the public, but he thought it was not desirable that an impression should go abroad which should make hon. Gentlemen appear worse than they were. The speech of the hon. Member for Macclesfield (Mr. Chadwick) was calculated to produce a false impression, because the hon. Gentleman had put it forward broadly that there was no business, however important, upon which the House could not be counted-out between the hours of 8 and 10 on any evening. Undoubtedly it sometimes happened that on Government nights there were not at a certain hour of the evening 40 Members in the House; but if an attempt were made to count-out it would be found that there were plenty of Members within the walls of the building, and who would come in and make a House to prevent such an attempt being successful. It must be understood that Government business ran no risk of being got rid of by a count-out. The Government always could and always did keep a House for really important business; and if the business

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  brought forward by private Members sometimes suffered from a "count," it was generally because there was not a sufficient number of hon. Members interested in it to keep a House together, though sometimes the result, as was the case the other night, was due to accident.
  MR. NEWDEGATE,in reply, said: Sir, there is a modern invention connected with railways, the application of which has conduced much to secure the public safety, and it is known as the "block signal." And to day, I think I have at all events shown the House a block signal with respect to its own proceedings and business. I regret that it does not appear to be the inclination of the House, by a majority, to adopt the Resolution which I have proposed with a view to considering how the Public Business may be liberated. I feel the truth of what has been so ably stated by the right hon. Gentleman the First Lord of the Treasury, that whatever may be the value of any suggestion made for the improvement of the proceedings of this House, unless it has first been sifted by a Committee, it will not ultimately be adopted by the House. For years past no suggestion has been adopted by the House with reference to its procedure that has not been first recommended by a Committee; for this reason I acted upon the suggestion of the right hon. Gentleman by proposing the appointment of a Committee. But, as he conceives that the terms of the Motion, limited as they are by the circumstances of the case; by the fact that the proposal for the appointment of a Committee on the whole subject of the Business of the House, has already this Session been negatived, and that I am precluded by the Rules of the House from renewing that Motion, I suggested the proposal which is now before the House, fully convinced that, unless the discussion which has taken place has some influence upon hon. Members, the "block" in the business of the non-official Members of the House, which I have endeavoured to describe, must continue, and many of the Bills they have introduced, probably some of those most worthy of consideration, must lapse for this Session, because their course is obstructed by other measures that have far less claim upon the attention of the House. I will not risk again, and more finally, precluding the House
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  from entertaining the propriety of appointing a Committee to consider the state of its business, and the necessity for effecting some alteration in its proceedings, by taking a Division. With respect to an observation which has fallen from the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Sussex (Mr. Dodson), I would say that I hope he will not make his suggestion for an improvement in the proceedings of this House, without submitting it to a Committee, unless he is very confident that he has secured a majority in his favour beforehand. Few Members are more competent to deal with this subject than that right hon. Gentleman; but great as his authority may be, and however valuable may be his suggestions, I fear that, unless it be backed by the recommendation of a Committee, he is not likely to attain his object. I will no longer detain the House than to ask its leave to withdraw the Motion, lest, by its rejection on a Division, the House should find itself obstructed in consideration of the question hereafter, as it becomes more pressing with the advance of the Session, and I believe that it will become more pressing as the Session advances.
  Motion, by leave, withdrawn.

  MERCHANT SHIPPING ACT—RULES OF THE ROAD AT SEA.—RESOLUTION.
  MR. G. BENTINCK,in rising to call the attention of the House to the present inefficient state of the 'rules of the road at sea,' as regards the common practice of propelling steam vessels at a high rate of speed at night and in thick weather; and to move—
  "That, in the opinion of this House, other regulations are required, with a view to the better avoidance of the annual great loss of life and of property which is caused by the want of more stringent regulations on the subject,"
  said, the object he had was to obtain legislation the effect of which would be a considerable saving of life. If he could show that the want of certain rules and regulations, or Acts of Parliament—whichever might be required for the purpose—was the cause of an annual loss of human life, he thought it would be the duty of the Government to deal with the question. He wished to call the attention of the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Trade to what occurred last year when

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  this question was brought forward by the hon. and gallant Member for Stamford (Sir John Hay). The right hon. Gentleman opposed that Motion upon the ground that great inconvenience, possibly great risk, might arise if any attempt were made to change what were termed the 'rules of the road at sea,' after their being adopted by all the principal countries of Europe. In the present Motion he (Mr. Bentinck) did not ask for any alteration of the existing rule of the road,' but simply that a slight addition should be made to those rules, and if his suggestion should be adopted by the Government of this country, it could be made applicable to their own coasts, where it was chiefly required. If it should be adopted by other nations so much the better, but if not their rules would remain as they were. At any rate there would be greater security on their own coasts. The facts of the case were clear and simple, and they did not require the slightest knowledge of nautical matters upon the part of hon. Members to understand them. The practice on their own coasts where steamers abounded was to drive those steamers day and night and in thick and dark weather at the highest possible rate of speed, in order to curtail the time occupied in their voyages as much as possible. Now it was clear that the practice which he complained of must end in a great annual sacrifice of human life. He would not trouble the House with figures, but the Returns of the Board of Trade upon the subject showed that the practice led to many fatal consequences. What he complained of was that there was no law against the practice, the result of which in some cases might come under the head of misdemeanour, and there ought to be a law by which persons could be punished for the consequences of their acts. The present was a state of things which ought not to exist in a civilized country, for it led to a wanton sacrifice of human life. It was true there were stringent regulations in existence as to keeping a good lookout on board ships, but if steamers were driven in thick weather and in crowded waters, at a great rate of speed, those regulations were practically useless. Ought the present state of things to be allowed to continue? The secretary of Lloyd's stated, and the statement was quoted in the House last year by his
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  hon. and gallant Friend (Sir John Hay), that whilst the number of sailing vessels had increased 9 per cent, and the collisions had increased by 7 per cent, the number of steamers had increased 39 per cent, and the number of collisions by 39½ per cent. That showed that the collisions were mainly attributable to the number of steamers running on our own coast, and if that was the case, was there any possible ground upon which the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. C. Fortescue) could refuse to deal with the subject, and to take such steps as would prevent that great annual sacrifice of human life which, according to the Returns in the right hon. Gentleman's own possession, undoubtedly resulted from the practice to which he was referring. He might be asked why steamers ran the risk they necessarily did in steaming up and down our coast at such excessive speed in all weathers and under all circumstances that it was a mere matter of chance whether or not a collision would occur? The simple reason was that, in regard to the voyages of those steamers, as in all other commercial operations, time was money; and every half hour that was lost on their passage was so much out of the owner's pocket. He assumed that right hon. Gentlemen would not deny the facts which he had stated. There was no difficulty in dealing with the subject, because it was not necessary to alter the 'rules of the road,' but only to make an addition to those rules, which he could confine solely to our own coasts, where the grievance complained of principally existed. He maintained that it was the bounden duty of the Government to deal with the subject, and if they failed to do so they would be virtually responsible hereafter for every life lost on our coast by the practice to which he had referred. The hon. Member concluded by moving the Resolution of which he had given Notice.
  Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That in the opinion of this House other regulations are required, with a view to the better avoidance of the annual great loss of life and of property which is caused by the want of more stringent regulations on the subject."—(Mr. Bentinck.)
  SIR JOHN HAYsaid, his hon. Friend the Member for Norfolk (Mr. Bentinck) had brought that subject forward with the weight and ability which belonged

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  to him, and also with the great experience of the sea which that eminently English sport, yachting, of which he was so great a master, had conferred upon him. That question was not one that required any great discussion. The House had already been put in possession of the facts of the great loss of life caused by the imperfect regulations for navigation which now exist. He had himself had the honour of suggesting in the papers of the House certain changes in the wording of the present 'rules of the road at sea,' but he was by no means wedded to the particular changes he had submitted. Last year, when he introduced that subject, every hon. Member of the House who had served in the Navy, with a single exception, was of opinion that a Committee should be appointed. It was said that a Committee of that House was, perhaps, not the best tribunal to decide such a question, and there was some force in that observation; but it was true that there was some great objection in the Department to making or considering the changes which were requisite. In former years it had been opposed by the right hon. Member for Birmingham (Mr. Bright), when President of the Board of Trade, and also by the right hon. Gentleman opposite (Mr. Fortescue), upon information given by that Department. But last year his Motion for an inquiry was supported by two former Presidents of the Board of Trade, the right hon. Baronet the Member for Devonshire (Sir Stafford North-cote), and the right hon. Member for Shoreham (Mr. Cave), who both, with their knowledge of that Department, thought there was an opportunity for further investigation so as to save life and property at sea. The principal argument put forward by the Department was that those rules, whether perfect or imperfect, having been adopted by all nations, there would be very great inconvenience in making any change without the sanction of all nations who were parties to the agreement. But two of the principal nations who were parties to the agreement had themselves suggested that the present rules were imperfect. It was true that after making changes France and the United States of America gave way to the urgency of our Board of Trade; and, looking to this country as possessing the greatest mercantile marine, said that as great
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  inconvenience would arise at sea from any change made by themselves, they would not force them on the world without the sanction of England. The correspondence on the subject showed that the United States had withdrawn the alterations, which they thought necessary, not because they believed they would not conduce to the safety of shipping, but out of deference to our Board of Trade. Again, in the opinion of France, two of the rules now in force were a source of considerable danger. When two considerable Maritime Powers like the United States and Franco pointed out changes which they thought necessary for the safety of shipping, and only withdrew their endeavours to effect them owing to the numerical superiority of our mercantile marine, and their belief that these things must be carefully weighed by us, with the disposition to make prudent changes when they were shown to be necessary, surely it was time for the Board of Trade to cause inquiries to be made as to whether they were necessary or not? He had already quoted in the House many naval officers of eminence, to whose opinions weight and authority attached, who said that the rules now existing were the source of danger, and that change was necessary. He might allude to Admiral Sir Alexander Milne, the present First Sea Lord, an officer of the highest character and the greatest experience, to Commodore de Horsey, to Captain Colomb, than whom no one's opinion was more entitled to consideration, and Admiral Randolph. All these officers thought some change was necessary, though he was bound to admit they did not fully concur in the amendment he proposed. He must also allude to another sea-officer, Mr. Stirling Jason, who had put himself in communication with the naval authorities and the representatives of the commercial marines of six or seven of the principal Maritime Powers of Europe, and they all concurred in saying that change was necessary for the safety of life and property at sea. We knew that in 10 years 1,000 lives had been lost through collisions alone, which was at the rate of 100 a year; and surely such a sacrifice of life deserved the attention of Parliament? A suggestion he would offer was that the Royal Commission which it was understood was about to inquire into the safety of life

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  and property at sea should have this cognate subject referred to it. The decisions of such a commission would carry great weight, and he was sure they would be accepted not only by the shipowners and masters of England, but by the mercantile marine of the United States and France, and indeed by the navies of the world.
  MR. SAMUDAsaid, he recognized the importance of the subject, and concurred in the belief that the number of collisions was on the increase; but he was not certain whether the real defect in the rules, which was the cause of many collisions, was correctly apprehended. The rules directed that when steamers were meeting each other, each should port its helm—that is, move away to the right. That, he admitted, would secure safety when they saw each other's green and red lights, or each other's red lights only, but when they saw each other's green light—that is, the light on the right, then porting the helm in nine cases out of ten brought them into collision. It was important to consider whether this rule should not be varied, and whether steamers, under these circumstances, should not be directed to stand still. It would not be wise for Parliament to interfere with the discretion of captains as to the speed with which their steamers made their trips; but, as non-observance of the rule now involved liability for payment of damages, and observance of the rule caused collisions, we ought to consider whether some change could not be made in it.
  MR. T. E. SMITHthought that the Motion of the hon. Member for Norfolk (Mr. Bentinck), in the form in which he had put it before the House, must receive support from all hon. Members, and even be accepted by the President of the Board of Trade. Whether collisions occurred from errors in the regulation or not, it was known that a large number of collisions were due to too rapid steaming in thick weather. He had crossed the Atlantic with a captain who rather boasted that in one trip in a fog he had run a ship down, and in 22 minutes after the collision was steaming away with every member of the shipwrecked crew on his steamer—an incident which he spoke of simply as a clever feat. It was no secret that ships sometimes steamed at full speed through fog all the way from Liverpool to New
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  York. He had heard it said that it was a common practice among captains on our eastern coast to keep driving up and down during the prevalence of fogs. If the Board of Trade were to visit with condign punishment every breach of the rules which resulted in collisions, he felt convinced the number of lives lost at sea would be considerably diminished. As for the proposal of the hon. and gallant Baronet (Sir John Hay), from inquiries he had made he found that it met with little approval from the Mercantile Marine. It was highly important to have a uniform rule, universally accepted by all maritime nations, and one that should be strenuously acted upon.
  MR. LIDDELLsaid, he understood that the fact of a steamer not having a look-out did not constitute a positive offence against the law. If the information he had received were correct, the crews of large steamers running coastwise were very often in such a condition that they were unable to keep a look out. Their physical condition, arising from fatigue and sometimes from drink, incapacitated them from doing so. In these days steamers made rapid voyages, and were speedily reladen, so that the crews often left port in a weary and worn-out condition. Indeed, he had seen it stated that, soon after a ship left a port, it frequently happened that not a single man on board was awake with the exception of the steerer. Such being the case, it was no wonder that collisions constantly occurred. Moreover, it had been stated that none but passenger and mail steamers kept a look-out, as a rule, when at sea. Surely a stringent law ought to be laid down to compel every ship to keep a look-out? Again, it was an almost incomprehensible thing that in a maritime country like ours there should be no distinction between the danger signal and the signal for a pilot. This was one of the causes which contributed to the fearful calamity to the Northfleet off Dungeness, which was so fresh in their recollection. Several vessels were in the neighbourhood of that ill-fated ship, and might have rendered assistance to her, but it was thought the signals she made were merely for a pilot. Surely this was a matter which might be easily remedied, and that in concert with other maritime nations, and he trusted it would receive serious attention from the Board of Trade.
  MR. CHICHESTER FORTESCUEsaid, no one could be more anxious than he was to take every means within the power or the invention of the Government in order to diminish the loss of life and property at sea, but the practical question was how far these matters were within the power of legislation and Parliament. The matter was not so easy of practical solution as some people in their ardour imagined; but that was no reason why the best efforts of the Government should not be directed to that end, and so far as he was concerned, they should be so directed. The general question of the 'rules of the road at sea,' though not included in the terms of the Motion, had been raised by the hon. and gallant Baronet opposite (Sir John Hay), but he regretted that he was not able to take the view that had been propounded. Without going into the question, he would rest the opposition which he deemed it his bounden duty to give to any re-opening of our present system as to those 'rules of the road at sea,' on the ground so well put by the hon. Member for Tynemouth (Mr. Smith). As far as he was concerned this was necessarily a question of authority and of agreement between the maritime nations of the world. Now, the vast preponderance of authority, both theoretical and practical, was much more in favour of the rules as they stood than of those which the hon. and gallant Baronet wished to substitute for them. The present rules were settled, after a great amount of care and consideration, by agreement with the other Maritime Powers, chiefly in consequence of the exertions of one of his prececessors in the Presidency of the Board of Trade—Mr. Milner Gibson. It was under that gentleman's personal direction that the Code was brought to its present state and received the sanction of all the maritime nations of the world. Certainly, he could not consent to reopen the question now by any expression of opinion in favour of a change, or by referring the rules to a Royal Commission, which would have plenty of other matters to consider. The real object of the hon. Member for Norfolk (Mr. Bentinck) was the attainment of some change in the law, though what that change should be was not clearly expressed, but it seemed to refer to some increased stringency in the regulations,
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  with a view to diminish the number of collisions by checking the practice of driving steamers at a high speed. There was nothing in the hon. Member's motion to prepare him for any particular kind of legislation, and he could hardly be expected to give positive advice to the House on a proposition he had never heard before. As he understood the proposal, it was that every breach of the rules forbidding a high rate of speed should be made a criminal offence. The hon. Member omitted, however, to state that a penalty was inflicted now for a breach of the regulations. One of these regulations was to the effect that ships under steam were to slacken speed when approaching another vessel, and, if necessary, stop and reverse; that in a fog they should go at a moderate speed. Surely this rule was clear and intelligible enough? As to the observance of the rules, the Merchant Shipping Act provided that captains who did not obey them should be deemed guilty of misdemeanour, and their ships should be adjudged in default. He admitted that prosecutions for misdemeanour in those cases were difficult, and the difficulty was increased by the absence of a public prosecutor in this country. But, independently of the proof of misdemeanour, proof of the breach of these rules was attended with important consequences to the ship, and secured her condemnation, which in itself was a serious penalty. As to the suggestion of further legislation for the purpose of preventing collisions, he had in preparation a Bill which, without pledging himself as to the particular mode of meeting the question which had been raised by the hon. Gentleman opposite, contained what he hoped would prove acceptable provisions on this subject. One of those provisions would for the first time render it a criminal offence on the part of the master of any ship to act in the disgraceful way in which the master of the ship—whoever he might be—that ran down the Northfleet conducted himself. An attempt was once made by the late Lord Kingsdown to render that conduct criminal, but it was resisted by other legal authorities in the other House. However, he (Mr. Chichester Fortescue) was now in consultation with the Law Officers of the Crown upon it, and felt confident they would be able to propose a change in the law which

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  would for the future render such acts criminal.
  Notice taken, that 40 Members were not present; House counted, and 40 Members being found present,
  MR. CHICHESTER FORTESCUEresuming, said, the Bill now being prepared also contained clauses for providing an improved system of danger signals. It was not so easy as some persons might imagine to devise danger signals which should be of a thoroughly simple and practical kind, as they must be, and yet not capable of being confounded with ordinary signals for pilots. It was necessary to consult with parties having special knowledge on the subject, but after a great deal of time had been thus necessarily occupied, a large amount of agreement had been secured as to the simple form of signals which would be proposed in the Bill. These signals had been laid before foreign maritime countries through the Foreign Office, and had been assented to by Holland, Italy, France, Greece, and the United States. They would not consist of a coloured light as suggested. The adoption of a system of coloured lights would be dangerous, as there never could be any certainty that a vessel in danger would have a store of that particular kind of light; and if the means of making a danger signal could not be relied on for all conceivable occasions the danger was increased instead of diminished. He could not venture off-hand upon an opinion respecting the particular addition to the 'rules of the road' in respect of collisions, of which he had heard for the first time to-night. The subject, however, should have his best attention, and he should be glad if he could see his way to any increased stringency of rule. His opposition to change in the general 'rule of the road at sea' was founded upon a concurrence of authority against it; and he could not undertake to re-open the question by referring it to the Royal Commission. He had a recent conversation with a gentleman cognisant of this matter who said that in an interview with the late Dr. Lushington, that distinguished jurist said not long before his death—"Never allow the rule of the road at sea' to be altered;" and as far as the experience of the Court of Admiralty went, he had never been able to hear of vessels lost through the observance
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  of the rule; they were lost, if not by accident, then through the violation of the rule.
  MR. MONTAGU CHAMBERSthought that this was a question upon which the House wanted practical information, and as a practising Barrister he had had much to do with these rules. From the experience he had thus acquired in collision cases, he had found that the rules were most embarrassing, and he had also found that, besides their being embarrassing, if they were regularly and invariably adopted, the two vessels which were meeting were certain to come into collision. If the order to port the helm was obeyed in certain cases a collision wes a dead certainty. His experience had convinced him that the Rules should be revolutionized, and he adopted that term advisedly. Seeing that a Royal Commission had been authorized for the purpose of inquiring into loss of life in consequence of the un seaworthiness of vessels, was anything more reasonable than that this question of the loss of life by collisions, which was a cognate subject, and involved in the other, should be inquired into at the same time? He ventured to say that if they looked to the archives of the Admiralty Court and to the decisions of Dr. Lushington or other Judges' they would find that these very rules of the road' had received different interpretations and that they had embarrassed the Judges in that Court and Judges and juries in the Courts of Common Law. He agreed with the hon. Member for the Tower Hamlets (Mr. Samuda) in thinking that it would be impolitic to regulate the rates of speed by Act of Parliament, and it would not be for the interest of a commercial community like ours to endeavour to control it in too precise and dogmatic a manner, as that would only tend to obstruct private enterprise.
  MR. BATESwished to say a few words in reference to a statement of the hon. Member for Northumberland (Mr. Liddell) that it was only on board large steamers that a look-out was kept at sea. This statement was by no means correct. He (Mr. Bates) had been round the Cape more than once during the last 40 years both in sailing ships and steamers, and he had never been on board any vessel on which a look-out was not kept at night. No doubt it was true, as stated

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  by the hon. Member for Tynemouth (Mr. T. E. Smith), that the Atlantic steamers crossed generally at full speed; but he would remind the hon. Member that those steamers would bear favourable comparison with other steamers which left our coast.
  MR. G. BENTINCK,in reply, said that he had listened attentively to all that had fallen from both sides of the House with reference to the Motion he had brought forward, and he was bound to say that he had heard nothing which answered any statement he had made, nor had he heard any valid reason given for not complying with the suggestion that he had offered. What he had complained of was the driving of steamers at a high rate of speed in thick weather and at night, and in that way causing collisions and loss of life. He could not admit, as the President of the Board of Trade had said, that the question was one not easy of solution. The question could easily be solved if the right hon. Gentleman had the courage and energy to enter upon it. [Mr. CHICHESTER FORTESCUE said, that it was under consideration.] He hoped that the right hon. Gentleman would arrive at a different conclusion from that which he had understood him to express that night. Those acquainted with the details of the subject could understand how easy the solution of it would be. He did not propose to alter the 'rules of the road at sea.' All he asked was the making of an additional rule to deal with a particular case. The right hon. Gentleman complained that he had not explained the change which he (Mr. Bentinck) wanted made. It was true he did not state the precise penalties which he would attach, but what he wanted to convey was that at present the penalties were insufficient for the purpose. He asked the right hon. Gentleman to make the penalties sufficient to have a deterrent action upon the wrong-doers, who were drowning people day after day in order to put money into their own pockets, or into those of the owners. He wanted penalties not upon the owners but upon the actual perpetrators of the offence. The owner might be mulcted by the Admiralty Court in the event of a collision, but it was the master whom he wished to reach. Nobody could deny that collisions involving considerable loss annually occurred through the practice
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  of driving steamers at great speed in thick weather, especially in the Channel. The right hon. Gentleman held out the hope that he would introduce a Bill, but it did not seem that that Bill would deal with this particular subject. The question of signals would arise only after the collision had happened, whilst what he (Mr. Bentinck) wanted was to prevent the collision. In not dealing with the precise question he had brought forward, the right hon. Gentleman was assuming a grave responsibility, and he (Mr. Bentinck) must tell him that in so acting he would himself become virtually responsible for the loss of life at sea which was caused by a state of circumstances that might be very easily remedied by him.
  MR. CHICHESTER FORTESCUEsaid, he hoped that he might be allowed to explain, as the hon. Gentleman sought to make him personally responsible for loss of life because he had not acceded to his Motion. What he had said was this, that he had no means of judging from the form of the Motion what was meant—what addition it was desired to make to these rules; and this being so, he thought it was unreaaonable that he should commit himself off-hand to any pledge as to the extent to which legislation could be carried in this matter. He also said that it should have his best attention, to see if the regulations as to excessive speed could be rendered more effectual.
  MR. G. BENTINCKadded that he had distinctly stated that what he wanted was more stringent penalties; and if the right hon. Gentleman would say that he would enact the penalties which he (Mr. Bentinck) would point out, he would be perfectly satisfied.
  Question put, and negatived.

  PARKS REGULATION ACT—MEETINGS IN THE PARKS.—OBSERVATIONS.
  MR. J. LOWTHER,in rising to call the attention of the House to the various Rules and Regulations which had been from time to time issued under the provisions of the Parks Regulations Act, 1872; and to move—
  "That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, praying that She will be graciously pleased to direct that rules be drawn up for the more effectual protection of Her Majesty's subjects while availing themselves of the privilege accorded them of using the Royal Parks for purposes of recreation by prohibiting the delivery of public addresses in such Parks,"

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  said, that the subject with which his Notice dealt was one that had occupied a prominent place in the public mind, but had never been fairly discussed. In the early part of the Session there was an irregular discussion introduced somewhat unexpectedly by the Home Secretary upon a limited branch of this subject; but it very soon degenerated into a personal contest, though it was a contest of no ordinary magnitude, and by no means deficient in interest. It was, in fact, a contest of giants. There was the First Commissioner of Works, no mean antagonist for any man, not even for the hon. and learned Member for Oxford (Mr. Harcourt), who somehow or other did not now "come up to time," though perhaps at a more fashionable hour he would be there. In introducing the subject, which had been again forced upon the public attention by the events of Sunday week, he did not mean to make it the subject of any Vote of Censure upon the Administration, and still less of an attack upon any individual Minister. As regarded the Minister whose Department was specially charged with the preservation of the privileges accorded to the public in the Royal Parks, he believed that their opinions were not widely apart upon the subject. They were now in a better position than they were formerly for discussing the subject. Formerly there were conflicting opinions upon the state of the law, but now the law had been clearly defined by the highest tribunal in the Realm, and it was no longer competent for anybody to talk of the rights of the people to the Parks, or any of those platitudes that they had previously heard both inside and outside the House. They knew now how far the public authorities might go, and how far licence might go with impunity. Under the provisions of the Act the authorities were empowered to issue special Rules; and saying this brought him to the first set of Rules of the 11th July, 1872. He would not refer to those Rules which dealt with sheep, pigs, cattle, soap, fish, and such things, because he believed that there was no reason on earth for introducing a Bill in order to make regulations upon such subjects. When the Bill was first introduced it did not deal with the monster nuisance, the holding of meetings in the Parks, but the Select Committee intro-
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  duced that matter into it. The Rules of the 11th July he looked in vain for among his Parliamentary Papers, and he believed that there were only two hon. Members who got them—the hon. and learned Member for Oxford (Mr. Harcourt) and the hon. Member for Warrington (Mr. Rylands) who were favoured with "presentation copies." After he had tried in vain to get a copy himself, he remembered that there was "another place," and having gone there he had occasion to join in the popular cry, which was becoming more popular still, of "Thank God, we have a House of Lords." He found that in that House a similar practice as to withholding copies had not prevailed. Although those Rules had been amended and removed from the Table of the House of Lords and were to be considered as withdrawn, he should like to read them, because they were actually issued by those responsible for the government of the Parks. Rule 1 stated that no public address might be delivered except within 20 yards of the boundary stone, marked "Place for Public Addresses;" secondly, that no public address should be delivered on a Sunday—a most salutary regulation and one which would commend itself most heartily, not only to hon. Members, but to the great mass of the community. The next Rule stated that no public address of an unlawful character should be delivered—which was a truism he should have hardly thought it necessary to put the country to the expense of printing. But the most remarkable Rule was that no public address might be delivered unless a written notice to deliver the same, signed with the names and addresses of two householders residing in the metropolis, had been left at the First Commissioner's Office at least two clear days before the intended delivery. Such notice must state the name of the speaker, the subject of the intended address, and the day and hour when it was intended to be delivered. And after such notice had been received no other notice for the purpose of delivering any other address on the same day would be valid. What, he asked, could have been the object for issuing such a regulation as that? Was it done for the mere purpose of vexatiously annoying persons who intended to take part in public demostrations in the Park, or for the practical object of

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  guarding against serious danger to order and tranquillity and public convenience. It must be patent to those who knew anything of public meetings, that the authors of these Regulations—he presumed the First Commissioner of Works and those who assisted him in the construction of the Rules—must have had at the time a vivid recollection of the discreditable scene that occurred in the Park when the demonstration was made against Lord Robert Grosvenor's Beer Bill, and the Garibaldi meeting when numbers were taken to the hospitals. He presumed that the right hon. Gentleman wished to guard against the repetition of such scenes, and therefore he proposed this Regulation in order that rival meetings for the discussion of controversial topics should not be held at the same time and place; but if the reasons existed on the 11th of July they were equally as cogent now, if they did not exist in a greater degree. The next edition of the Rules appeared on the 26th July, which stated that the Parks might be enjoyed and used in the same manner so far as consistent with statutory regulations as was enjoyed before the passing of the Act. That was not much; but he now came to the edition of the 1st of October, 1872. The first Rule enlarged the area from 20 to 40 yards, and the wonderful notice stone was converted into a board—for the purpose, probably, of economy. Then there was a repetition of the old truism as to the prohibition of unlawful addresses, without any definition of what was unlawful; and next followed a Rule as to the giving of two clear days' notice to the First Commissioner, signed by two householders, the same as he had read, with this exception, that it did not require the subject of addresses or the names of the speakers to be stated. He purposely avoided going into the circumstances attending the withdrawal of those sets of Rules and the motives for the framing of fresh ones. The dates spoke for themselves. Until the 10th of February last the last named Rules remained in force, and on that day the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary, to the intense astonishment of the House—and he thought of the right hon. Gentleman himself when the further revised Rules were placed in his hands—proposed a fourth edition of the Park Regulations. That addition practically
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  placed the entire Park at the disposal of those who formed those demonstrations. Certain bounds were placed within which the addresses must be delivered, and in this Regulation a very useful edifice, the powder-magazine, played an important and significant part. But what were those bounds? Why, the entire Park was practically handed over to the roughs who collected together upon these occasions, with the solitary exception of one spot—which, by the way, was the portion of the Park in the centre of which the great bulk of the community would be most anxious to see the promoters of these troublesome assemblages immersed—namely, the Serpentine. However, as he had seen signs of works going on in the neighbourhood, perhaps the right hon. Gentleman the First Commissioner contemplated erecting a platform there to enable the speakers the better to address their admirers. He confessed that for his part he had not the slightest objection to public meetings. He had taken part at many meetings at which resolutions, which he had moved or supported, denouncing the Executive Government pretty freely had been adopted, and he hoped to live to do so again more than once, and the right which he claimed for himself in that respect he did not grudge to his fellow-men. But while he did not wish to prevent those persons at proper times and places airing their eloquence so long as they kept within the bounds of law and public decency, he desired to see others protected in the enjoyment of their privileges. What was the nature of those gatherings, of what elements were they composed, and who were the persons interested in the demonstrations being kept within reasonable limits? His hon. and learned Friend the Member for Oxford (Mr. Harcourt) was very fond of talking of carriage company and of the fashionable classes as if the upper ten thousand were specially interested in the limiting of the demonstrations. They were not. It was well known to hon. Members that on Sundays—the day usually selected for the meetings—the Park was not the haunt of what were called the upper classes. It was notorious that at any rate by the Gentile portion—he did not mean the genteel, though the term might be applicable—of the fashionable world the Park was not

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  frequented to any extent upon Sundays; he might say that it was used almost exclusively on that day by the artizan, who had worked during the other days of the week, and by his wife and children. He hoped, therefore, they would not have a repetition of the fallacy that it was the selfishness of the upper classes, who wished to keep the Park to themselves. But what was the nature of these gatherings? Were they in reality what were known as public meetings? They had been told that their forefathers had contended for the right of public meeting. But what resemblance was there between the meetings in question and those for which their forefathers had contended? None whatever. They were far more like those specimens of rowdyism which were so great a curse and discredit to the other side of the Atlantic. They were mere displays of physical force in in order to tyrannize rather than for calm discussion and argument. Those who had witnessed them would bear him out when he said that discussion was the furthest thing from their ideas; the speeches could rarely be heard except by a few, and the elements of which the gatherings were composed had no connection truly with the working man. They had only to glance at the names of those who took part in them to find that the élite of the working classes were absent. So far from their attending them they found in the chair some dismissed Revising Barrister, or some embryo County Court Judge, or perhaps for a little change they would find an ex-colonel, and on some occasions the ex-treasurer of a mess fund. Sometimes they were persons who might pass for workmen, but who no more represented that class than gingerbread without ginger—working men who never worked, glass-blowers who never blew a bottle, or cobblers who never mended a shoe, yet who pretended to represent the working men on these occasions in the eyes of the British public. Perhaps it was some person who was engaged in a ribald travesty of a Court of Justice, and who had been rewarded for his act of wanton violence in breaking into the Home Office by a grateful reception from a distinguished leader of a great political party. With these exceptions he could find no one who could bonâ fide claim to be a working man taking part in these
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  gatherings. At these meetings they also found that what were called mock litanies were very much in vogue. He would not insult the sense of the House by reading the details of these performances, but many persons were drawn to them from the spot where the stalest sedition was being spouted from the so-called chair; and these songs and tracts, which, with strange and perverse ingenuity, contrived to be at once disloyal, blasphemous, and obscene, found nevertheless a ready sale. He wished the House to reflect upon the contempt for authority engendered by these scenes. They found a person, he was going to say rewarded, who was connected with the discreditable scenes of 1866, when the Park railings were pulled down. That individual was, however, it was only fair to add, speedily brought into a Court of Justice by the present Government; but to the astonishment of the public, he was placed not in the dock, but on the bench. He did not say this with a view of casting a stone at the learned gentleman, but as a reflection upon those who had placed him in that position. As to the learned gentleman himself, he never mentioned his name without feeling the deepest gratitude to him, because it was to him they were indebted for the greatest metropolitan improvement of modern times—the widening of Park Lane and for the new palings. There were circumstances attending the last demonstration in Hyde Park on Sunday week which he specially desired to bring under the notice of the House. That was not a hole-and-corner affair got up in one of the "pot-houses" referred to by the Chief Commissioner, without notice and by obscure persons, but was resolved upon at a densely crowded meeting of delegates somewhere at Bow, at which it was agreed that "in the interests of order and decorum," notice of the intended procession should be sent to his Royal Highness the Duke of Cambridge, as Chief Ranger of Hyde Park, and to the Chief Commissioner of Works. The drift of their communication was a request that the gardeners and Park keepers should be directed to prevent boys from climbing the trees, and injuring the plants and shrubs, because "in a large concourse of persons (they added) there would always be unruly persons whose acts brought discredit"—not upon the

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  public but—"upon the meeting." This statement on the part of the promoters of the demonstrations was a confession that they had the effect of collecting a crowd of persons whose mischievous tendencies they too shrewdly suspected. The account wound up with the remarkable resolution—"That the procession should not be broken on its route, except by a funeral or a fire engine." Never in the course of his life had he heard of anything approaching such a point of audacity as this, that the persons promoting these meetings in Hyde Park arrogated to themselves the right of stopping the traffic of the metropolis for at least 25 minutes—the time which it took the procession to pass a given point, according to his own observation. They not only undertook to stop the traffic, but the police were charged with carrying their imperial behests into effect. Did the authorities meet such notices by telling these persons that they would endeavour to protect them as long as they conformed to the law of the country? Far from it. He went to the rendezvous in Trafalgar Square, whence the procession started. He saw them again in another part of the route, and lastly in the Park, and he felt bound to say in the whole of St. James's Street the most minute observation on his own part, and on that of friends who were with him, failed to detect a single guardian of the peace, and for 25 minutes one of the main arteries of the metropolis was handed over to the tender mercies of a body of roughs. There were the usual bands and banners and emblems, more or less seditious, in the procession; but the House would hardly believe him when he said that at different stages of the route persons stepped forward to turn away the cabs and private carriages, and prevent them from breaking the line of the procession. He watched one person in a cab with a portmanteau upon it who was kept waiting for 15 minutes, while his train was probably gliding away from the station. He was informed on reliable authority that a noble Lord who occupied a high position in the Councils of the Sovereign, and who at that very moment was designed by public rumour for a position still higher, was stopped by this procession. His noble Friend the Member for Marlborough (Lord Ernest Bruce) was, he had heard,
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  also stopped. One of the Park Rules said that there must be no unauthorized playing of any music in the Parks. If an organ-grinder had attempted to play the "Old Hundredth" he would soon have been taken to prison. There were bands however—one playing the "Marseillaise" and another the "Wearing of the Green"—under the protection of the guardians of public order. The Park was a perfect fair. There were people selling oranges, buns, cocoa-nuts, and other nuts, with the usual cry of "Crack 'em and try 'em before you buy 'em." At one time he thought that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich, finding his engagements too numerous to enable him to visit his constituents, was reduced to the extremity of reviving the old Conservative institution of Greenwich fair, and had invited them into the Park. The Park Regulations said that "no person should sell or let any commodity." Now, if the Chief Commissioner had been there—[Mr. AYRTON: I was there]. If so, why did not the right hon. Gentleman see that his Rules were enforced? Perhaps he was of opinion that it was the duty of the right hon. Gentleman on his right (the Home Secretary) to enforce these Rules. He should like to hear from the Home Secretary whether he had communicated to the Chief Commissioner of Police that the Rules of the Park were to be duly and efficiently carried out. The police were fully justified in not carrying out the ordinary Rules of the Park, because the feelings of common humanity would have been outraged at the spectacle of two full-grown constables dragging an orange girl to gaol, while the most flagrant violation, not only of the Rules of the Park, but of common decency and decorum, was elsewhere permitted. The litany men were present, but perhaps thinking some respect was due to the season of Lent, they did not appear in canonicals. A journal called The Republican was on sale, directed against "Kings, Queens, Princes, Priests, and Policemen," and the scene he then witnessed led him to think now of less-favoured regions—say Sloane Square. We lived in a Happy Land, in which any amount of blasphemy, sedition, and obscenity was not only pardoned, but promoted and encouraged by the authorities—["No, no!"]—because it was carried on under the eyes of the

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  police without their moving a finger to stop it—provided no sentence was interpolated which would provoke a smile at the expense of any Minister of the Crown. He believed the Rules, especially those issued by the Government on July 11, were framed to meet a danger known to exist—namely, that rival meetings might be got up on the same day, that sentiments inimical to those expressed by the promoters might be denunciated by others, and that a row might ensue. But had those dangers ceased to exist? Was there no danger of an Orange demonstration, which might, perhaps, end very much as did certain gatherings at Reading and Windsor, where certain fundamental and organic changes in the constitution of this country were openly handled? No, those dangers had not ceased. The English people, though law-abiding to a degree, were not disposed to brook these insults against institutions under which the country had so long prospered; and, in the absence of other protectors of decency, they had not abandoned their right of appeal to a Judge whose mandamus could override even that of a County Court Judge—he meant Judge Lynch. He had no wish to advocate a resort to the arbitrament of this personage, but the danger was not one to be lost sight of. In many parts of the country People's Parks had been given by philanthropic gentlemen like the late Sir Francis Crossley, and his hon. Friend the Member for Middlesborough (Mr. Bolckow), and rules had been framed under the direction of those benefactors, and with the full consent of the people for whose interest they were prepared, specially prohibiting all political and other meetings there. He was only asking the House to frame in the case of the Royal Parks the same regulations as had been adopted in almost every provincial Park under public control. The hon. Gentleman concluded by moving the Resolution of which he had given Notice.
  MR. BAILLIE COCHRANE,in seconding the Motion of his hon. Friend (Mr. Lowther), said, the last Sunday demonstration in Hyde Park seemed to have been—he presumed by the authority of the right hon. Gentleman—placed under the special protection of the police; for a Mr. Mooney stated that, on the part of the people who were to take part in it,
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  he had had an interview with Colonel Henderson, who received him most kindly, and promised that the police would protect the procession in its progress through London. He was glad the subject had been brought before the House. The supporters of this Motion were speaking, not against the liberties of the people, but for the liberties of the people; they were speaking against the tyranny of a set of roughs, and against the tyranny of mobs, which was of all tyrannies the worst. He himself saw carriages detained at Hyde Park Corner for 25 minutes while these roughs, accompanied by women of the lowest class, and displaying flags and banners, were allowed to pass by. The working men of London had little to do with such demonstrations; it was the roughs of London who chose to collect together and block the streets of London in this way on a Sunday. He had an important document to read to the House in support of his hon. Friend's description of the people who went with these processions. It referred to the Amnesty Meeting of November, 1872, but he was assured that the handbill announcing the last meeting was exactly similar. The handbill said—
  "To the Working Classes of London—Monster Amnesty Meeting in Hyde Park on Sunday, November 3, 1872.—A grand demonstration, similar to that which took place in October, 1869, will be held in Hyde Park, to demand the unconditional release of the Fenian prisoners, and to protest against their infamous treatment and the Algerine acts now in force in Ireland. Trusted representatives of the Proletarians, of all countries" (this was the International Society) "will take part in the proceedings. The people will meet in their respective districts, and under the direction of local committees proceed in military order four deep towards Trafalgar Square, which will be the central point of rendezvous for the entire procession. The International sections, Republican clubs, trades and other associations, will assemble in places appointed by their officers, from whence they will proceed to Trafalgar Square. Proletarians of all countries—Mr. Gladstone, the Bomba of Ireland, has again refused to release the 42 Irish political prisoners from the gaols of England, in which they are subjected to the most cruel treatment. Assemble in your tens of thousands to demand their release in the name of outraged humanity. English working men, arise from your apathy, and show the world that you sympathize with your Irish brothers, and that they are detained in cruel confinement against your will. Speak out boldly now, and at the next elections kick out the brutal gaolers who misrepresent you in the British House of Commons."

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  That document almost seemed a burlesque. It seemed as if the whole of this procession was intended as a joke. But it was not intended as a joke, and when a procession was summoned by that kind of language, and passed through the streets of London on a Sunday under the protection of the police, he did not hesitate to say that it was a disgrace to the civilization of this City, and, he must add, it was almost a disgrace to the House of Commons and to the Government that such a thing should be permitted. He knew that it was not the working men but the roughs of London who collected on these occasions and blocked the streets, and he regretted that the capital of England should be disgraced by such exhibitions. In conclusion he wished to know from the right hon. Gentleman whether it was true that, at an interview with the Chief Commissioner of Metropolitan Police, Colonel Henderson really promised that the police should protect this procession.
  Motion made, and Question proposed,
  "That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, praying that She will be graciously pleased to direct that rules be drawn up for the more effectual protection of Her Majesty's subjects while availing themselves of the privilege accorded them of using the Royal Parks for purposes of recreation by prohibiting the delivery of public addresses in such parks."—(Mr. James Lowther.)
  MR. AUBERON HERBERT,in rising to move as an Amendment—
  "That this House approves of the Rules lately issued by Her Majesty's Government for the Regulation of the Royal Parks, and is of opinion that no alteration affecting the existing rights of public meeting therein should be made unless previously approved by Parliament,"
  said he believed it was an object of hon. Members who sat below the gangway on both sides of the House to watch over the consistency, the straightforwardness, and the many other virtues of the right hon. Gentlemen who sat above them, and his hon. Friend (Mr. Lowther) opposite hoped by his Motion to commit some right hon. Gentlemen who he observed had taken great care not to be there that night to some plain statements which he had submitted. However much he admired the straightforwardness and plainness of speech of his hon. Friend, he could not but feel that the advice he had offered was rash and extreme. It was advice which ought not to be followed, and which was besides impracticable.
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  The object which he (Mr. A. Herbert) had in moving the Amendment of which he had given Notice was much humbler than that of his hon. Friend. He only wished to put temptation out of the reach of hon. Gentlemen on whichever side they sat. He did not think this was a matter to which they could look back with satisfaction on either side of the House. But a satisfactory solution of the difficulties had been arrived at. He would not criticize the conduct of the Government in this matter, because they were sinners who had repented. The Government were now acting on sound principles, and he would venture to say to them in the words of the proverb, that "Catch Hold was a good dog, but Keep Hold was a better," and to hope that they would persevere in the path on which they had entered. There were a great many different kinds of recreation, especially in the Parks, with none of which they desired to interfere. And why should the hon. Members opposite desire to interfere? Some people found recreation in walking, some in riding, some in sitting on chairs—for the use of which they paid 2d.—and smoking cigars, some in riding thoroughbred hacks. There was another class who found recreation in being drawn in carriages in an endless circle, and who reminded one of unhappy spirits in a region described by Dante. He did not quarrel with these kinds of recreation, but if it was a recreation to some of the public to meet in a Park on any day to express their opinions on public affairs and criticize what had passed, why should they not have the same freedom of enjoying their recreation as was accorded to the other classes he had mentioned? The real grievance of his hon. Friend was that these meetings slightly delayed the carriages of noble Lords and hon. Gentlemen. The only people that seemed to find favour with his hon. Friend were the orange women. He was kind enough to say he did not complain of them. But if a man attempted to sell a penny paper in one of the Parks, in the opinion of his hon. Friend, he ought to be dealt with by the Metropolitan Police. His hon. Friend said he watched for 25 minutes the meeting that was held a few days ago in Hyde Park, and there was not one policeman to be seen. Was not that testimony to the good conduct of the meeting? The truth was that since the

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  Government had allowed these meetings to be held a great change of temper had occurred, and those who convened these meetings took every step in their power to make them thoroughly orderly and respectable. His hon. Friend had talked about crowds in New York. He (Mr. A. Herbert) had seen meetings in the squares of New York comprising many thousands of people, all of whom had conducted themselves in a perfectly peaceable and orderly manner. What was the reason of that? Simply because the Government was wise enough not to attempt to offer the slightest opposition to those meetings. He believed we had learnt one thing, namely, that the greatest safety lay in a perfectly free and open discussion of everything. He knew there were the elements of danger and revolution in this country as in every other country. Through the neglect and unjust character of much of our past legislation some bad temper had been excited among a portion of the people of this country, but he frankly owned that he did not sympathize with that temper. If it were desired to give the dangers that now existed an explosive force which at present they did not possess, it was only necessary to attempt to restrain and restrict the right of open and free discussion. In this country we, doubtless, had to contend with some disadvantages, but we had not to contend against secret societies. Whatever was felt came freely to the surface and was openly expressed, and thus our safety was ensured. Should the time ever arrive, as he believed it might, when we in this country might make grievous mistakes in the way of rash experiments, our only safety would he in our perfect freedom of discussion, which would enable us to recover ourselves and to rectify our mistake without vital injury to the nation. The hon. Gentleman concluded by moving the Amendment of which he had given Notice.
  MR. RYLANDS,in seconding the Amendment, said, he felt bound to defend the action of the Government, who, however they might have erred originally in the matter, had at length fully repented of their error, and had done their best to rectify it. The hon. Member for York (Mr. Lowther) had referred to the clauses which authorized the right hon. Gentleman the First Commissioner of Works to frame Rules for the government of the Parks, but he had not stated
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  how it was that that clause came to be inserted in the Bill. The hon. Member who doubtless possessed great ability ["Hear, hear!"], great ability for mischief, had himself proposed the insertion of that clause in the Bill, when it was under the consideration of the Select Committee some two years ago, and he succeeded in carrying his proposal, by a majority of 1, in the absence of two hon. Members who supported the views of the Government on the Committee. But when the Bill came back to that House thus amended, the right hon. Gentleman at the head of the Board of Works declined the responsibility of the measure. He (Mr. Rylands) had complained on a former occasion that the right hon. Gentleman the First Commissioner of Works had for some unknown reason introduced that clause into his Bill in 1872, although he had withdrawn the measure he had brought forward in 1871, because a Motion for inserting a similar clause into it had been carried. Fortunately, however, Her Majesty's Government, after making one or two false moves in connection with this subject, had framed Rules under that clause for the government of the Parks, which were perfectly unobjectionable. The hon. Member for York was dissatisfied, because Her Majesty's Government had shown a disposition to make a concession to public opinion, and in favour of public rights, and acting no doubt consistently with the opinions he entertained on the subject in 1871, now asked the House to agree to an address to Her Majesty praying that she would prevent public addresses being delivered in the Parks, which would effect the same object which he had sought for by his Amendment in the previous Bill. But where were now those right hon. Gentlemen who had in 1871 supported the views of the hon. Member for York? Circumstances had since then greatly changed. That the hon. Member would not obtain universal support on this question from even his own side of the House was evident by the state of the Opposition from benches. The unoccupied condition of those benches was an eloquent expression of opinion on the part of the hon. Member's political leader. ["No, no!"] The hon. Member might dispute the fact as much as he liked, but there could be no doubt that the right hon. Member

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  for Buckinghamshire was his political leader. The reason why those benches were so deserted on this occasion was because the time had arrived when the Conservative leaders felt themselves on the threshold of office. Did the hon. Member for York think that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Cambridge University (Mr. Walpole) were he again Home Secretary would support his proposition and attempt to prevent public meetings being held in the Parks? Did he imagine that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Oxford University (Mr. G. Hardy), if again in office, would countenance such a measure as the hon. Gentleman now advocated? He admitted that on the fringe of great public assemblies something improper and objectionable might occur, and he fully endorsed the opinion of the hon. Member that the mock litanies which were performed on such occasions were most disgraceful. That fact, however, furnished no reason why the people should be prohibited from expressing their opinions in the Royal Parks or other public places. By adopting the advice of the hon. Member for York on this subject they would take a course like that of a man who sat upon the safety valve whilst the steam was rising in the boiler, and thus occasioned an explosion which spread death and destruction around. It was true that munificent gentlemen who gave parks to towns in the country usually made it a condition that political meetings should not be held in them; but the Royal Parks occupied a different position altogether, inasmuch as they were not the gifts of any individuals—they were the property of the people. ["No, no!"] He said "Yes." The people had bought them over and over again, and had given for them a great deal more than they were worth. The property belonged to the people, and it had been paid for out of the public taxation. The grants made by Parliament to the Crown in successive reigns amounted to more than the value of the Parks, and though, no doubt, they might produce a large sum if cut up for building purposes, those grants were made in times gone by, when no such sum could have been realized. The hon. Member for York might have refrained from any allusion to a learned gentleman whose name was associated with this question. He would only say
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  that that learned gentleman's conduct in the assertion of a public right was no disqualification for the position to which the Government had appointed him, and which his professional standing entitled him to fill.
  Amendment proposed,
  To leave out from the word "That" to the end of the Question, in order to add the words "this House approves of the Rules lately issued by Her Majesty's Government for the Regulation of the Royal Parks, and is of opinion that no alteration affecting the existing rights of public meeting therein should be made unless previously approved by Parliament,"—(Mr. Auberon Herbert,)
  —instead thereof.
  Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
  MR. STRAIGHTsaid, he could not quite agree with the hon. Member for York (Mr. Lowther), because he should be the last to put a stop to fair and free public discussion on public matters; but, at the same time, he contended that there was a middle course between unduly checking free discussion, and an indiscriminate permission to hold gatherings which were a nuisance to the general public. He believed the Prime Minister was out of town on the Sunday which had been referred to. Had he seen the gathering permitted to form a procession, he would have felt that such proceedings ought not to be countenanced. Long processions in the public thoroughfares were not essential to public meetings, but were clearly a nuisance. He could not help recollecting a discussion which took place in 1871 when the subject was the Phœnix Park Riots, and a Motion was brought forward by the hon. Member for Kilkenny (Sir John Gray), which censured the Government for dispersing a meeting in the Phénix Park, Dublin, respecting the release of the Fenian prisoners, a subject which the Prime Minister then declared to be one on which such a gathering could not be permitted. It was strange, therefore, that a public discussion of the same subject should be allowed in Hyde Park. The Executive Government should have the discretionary power of confining these meetings within reasonable limits, for the licence advocated by the hon. Member for Nottingham. (Mr. A. Herbert) might lead to the public discussion of questionable subjects prejudicial to the

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  morals of nursemaids and the Life Guards accompanying them. Hon. Members who did not reside in London ought to have a little consideration in that matter for those who were compelled to do so, and who were subjected to the great inconvenience and annoyance caused by those processions. The hon. Member for York had referred to the fact that a Cabinet Minister was stopped on his way through the streets by the mob and delayed on a Sunday; but with the extreme gallantry which belonged to him that right hon. Gentleman cut his way through the advancing hosts, and found himself on the other side of Piccadilly. Without wishing any harm to any right hon. Gentleman, he feared that until some catastrophe happened to a Cabinet Minister through these processions in these great thoroughfares, the public would obtain no relief from so serious a nuisance.
  MR. AYRTONsaid, that the propositions had been brought under the consideration of the House at some length by two hon. Gentlemen who, after the very prolonged discussions on the Royal Parks Bill last Session, both found themselves under the painful necessity of expressing their objection to the passing of that measure when all the rest of the House were satisfied that it ought to become law. How was it that those hon. Gentlemen were so restless? He believed it arose from the fact that they entertained most extreme opinions. The hon. Member for York (Mr. Lowther) was extremely Conservative, and yet he objected that under his own provision it was possible for any body of the people to express their opinions in any of the Royal Parks; while the hon. Member for Nottingham (Mr. Herbert) was equally dissatisfied because it might be impossible for some of the people to express their opinions in the developement of Republican principles, which he thought ought to be advanced by peaceful means and not by violence. That was a question which the House by its unanimity last year showed ought to be approached with reason and moderation; and it was rather remarkable that the hon. Gentlemen who had been most eminent in that House in discussing that subject had never had imposed on them by their constituents the duty of watching over the interests of the metropolis. He thought the Members for the Metropolis
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  were always quite competent and sufficiently active to bring forward any grievance under which their constituents laboured; yet, strange to say, the voice of none of those hon. Gentlemen had been raised in complaint against the manner in which the Parks Act had been carried out. The discussions which had arisen appeared to proceed from the excessive spirit of contention by which some hon. Gentlemen were animated in favour of their own peculiar views. He was surprised to find so distinguished a Conservative as the hon. Member for York objecting to the holding of public meetings in London. Did the hon. Member forget that processions and gatherings of the people were among the most ancient and most Conservative institutions in the world, and were universal in England until they were superseded by the modern invention of printing, which enabled people to communicate their ideas by other means; and the practice of holding popular gatherings was falling into disuse, in proportion as printing, writing, and reading increased. Therefore instead of coming there to object, the hon. Member ought rather to have come to complain that an ancient institution was decaying away. Now, representations had been made to him that there were occasions when people in the metropolis desired to meet for discussion at less expense than if they had to hire halls for the purpose; therefore he had undertaken to make such arrangements as would give them as much facility for expressing their opinions to the assemblies which they wished to convene in the Park as they would have enjoyed if they met in a hall. The first set of Park Rules was made in fulfilment of that pledge. It would have been a breach of faith towards the House and towards those who had made those representations if the Rules had not been as precise as they were, in order not only to confer that particular privilege, but to secure its enjoyment without interruption. It turned out, however, that the first set of Rules did not satisfy everybody, and that some people were determined to assert a right to set at defiance any Rules or restrictions which might be laid down. When that line was adopted there was but one course to pursue in regard to it—namely, to assert the rights of the Crown and the authority of Par-

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  liament by prosecuting those who so acted. The prosecution showed that those parties were entirely in the wrong. The Rules had all been framed for the same purpose—namely, to regulate the enjoyment of the Parks so far as to prevent abuse. The last Rules like the first provided that persons going into the Parks to deliver addresses should not destroy the general enjoyment of the Parks. They also provided that the delivery of the addresses should be subordinate to the authorities and to all those rights which were reserved to Her Majesty; and if they were rather less precise than those that went before they still left the question as a whole very much as it stood under the first arrangement, and the matter might now very well have been allowed to rest. He had been asked by the hon. Member who seconded the motion (Mr. B. Cochrane) whether he had sent for the Chief Commissioner of Police, and directed him to allow the meeting held a few days ago to be carried on without interruption. That question arose from a misapprehension of the First Commissioner's duty. The general use of the Park was entirely under the control of the Ranger, and the police were placed in the Park to uphold the Ranger's authority in the discharge of his duty. The First Commissioner of Works had no power to send for the Chief Commissioner of Police or to give him any directions in regard to any meeting held in the Park. He hoped the hon. Member for York (Mr. Lowther) would see that under the circumstances it was inopportune to press his Resolution on the notice of the House. If that motion was inopportune the Amendment of the hon. Member for Nottingham (Mr. Herbert) was one which could not be entertained. It stated that no alteration affecting the "existing rights" of public meeting therein should be made unless previously approved by Parliament. Now there were no "existing rights," and it would be impossible to agree to these words. A misapprehension existed that the Crown had given up its rights. Now the Crown had never surrendered its rights to the public. What the Sovereign did on Her accession to the Throne was to surrender the property of the Crown lands as part of the public revenue, but the Parks, not being kept for the purposes of profit, were not at all surren-
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  dered, and remained in the Sovereign precisely in the same way as Her Palaces. It would, therefore, be quite wrong to pass a Resolution in the terms proposed by his hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham. He hoped, therefore, he would be satisfied with having used it as a text for promulgating his views on the subject, and that he and the hon. Member for York would pair their opinions one against the other.
  MR. CAVENDISH BENTINCKsaid, he had listened with some curiosity to the speeches which had been made to see whether any answer would be given to the statements of his hon. Friend the Member for York (Mr. Lowther), but, not having heard any, he must again call the attention of the House to the main points which he had raised. Though he was prepared to vote for the Motion of his hon. Friend, he was afraid it would not be carried, for the occupants of the two from benches were both tarred in this matter with the same brush. The hon. Member for Warrington (Mr. Rylands) who addressed the House very frequently and with great ability, seemed to be so much engrossed with his own speeches that he had not time to attend to the facts of the case, otherwise he would have a more accurate knowledge of what had actually occurred. At the time when the Rules were framed there were two courses open to the Government, either to throw open the Parks to the lawless individuals who were patronized by the hon. Gentleman the Member for Warrington and by the hon. Member for Nottingham (Mr. Herbert), or to pass the Parks Bill and to frame regulations in accordance with the measure. The latter was the course which they took, but owing to their vacillation, they had brought the law into the utmost discredit. They had passed he did not know how many sets of Rules within the last three months for the purpose of regulating the meetings in the Parks, but he could not believe it possible that there could have been, notwithstanding, any such systematic violation of the law as had occurred on the 3rd of November. The police were, in the first place, entirely withdrawn from the Parks, and the speakers at the meeting—who, as usual, played but a small part in the proceedings, were stationed beyond the legal distance from the post which had been set up by the Chief Commissioner. A

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  body composed of at least 50 or 60 persons ascended the trees, and he himself saw at least one branch of a tree broken off in the most deliberate manner, which must have measured 25 feet. [An hon. MEMBER: The "Upas tree."] That was not all gone; there was one branch standing yet. There were, besides, persons offering for sale scurrilous verses on Her Majesty, a blasphemous litany, and other articles acceptable to a mob; and why had not such a state of things been put a stop to by the Secretary of State for the Home Department? Did the right hon. Gentleman think such exhibitions as those were proper on a Sunday afternoon? He happened on the evening of the day in question to meet a London stipendiary magistrate of great experience, to whom he had put the question whether, if he were to walk down Rotten Row on any afternoon in the week, and to offer for sale sticks or gingerbread nuts, he would do anything to him if he were brought before him? The answer was that he would be sent to prison for a month. Yet a Liberal Government allowed men to talk sedition and treason in the Park on Sunday afternoon with impunity. But that was not all; the trees having been broken down, the wood was openly stolen and taken out of the Park. He saw a policeman standing at Albert Gate when a person was coming out with an armful of sticks, and when he asked him why he did not interfere, the policeman merely shrugged his shoulders, saying that he had orders not to meddle in the matter. Where, he should like to know, was the justice of permitting treason to be rampant when offences much less heinous were punished by having the names of those who committed them placarded? He did not see the meeting in the Park last Sunday week, but he had heard that what had occurred there was but a repetition of the scene of the 3rd of November, and he should like to ask the hon. Member for Nottingham, who said no act of violence had been committed, what he thought of the destruction of national property and the forcible stopping of hackney carriages? But besides the Park Act there was the Metropolitan Police Act, which rendered it a punishable offence to obstruct the streets, to sell or exhibit indecent or scandalous publications, or to destroy trees. The
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  provisions of that Act had therefore been broken with impunity. Why, he asked, had they not been enforced? The right hon. Gentleman the First Commissioner of Works said he was not responsible. It was quite true that he did not control the police, nor did the Ranger of the Park, but the Home Secretary was answerable for the offences that had been committed, and to him the public had a right to look to see that the law was enforced and breaches of the law punished. Why was it, he asked, that while the leaders of these demonstrations were allowed to set the law at defiance, lesser offenders, who were not guilty of sedition, were apprehended and punished? He ventured to say that the great majority of the ratepayers were opposed to such demonstrations. The Government had talked a great deal about a policy of equality, but if they meant anything by that, why did they allow Mr. Odger and others to break the law? Ruffianism was tolerated, while respectability was oppressed. The fact was, what in the ruffian was a choleric word, that in the respectable was rank blasphemy. An hon. Member opposite had proposed to stop the delivery of letters on a Sunday, but did he not think that he might effect some good by helping to stop displays of this kind on that day? He hoped Her Majesty's Government would not only be able to offer a satisfactory explanation to the House for their supineness, but also to give some guarantee to the inhabitants of the metropolis that the law—so far as they could secure that end—would be observed in the future.
  MR. BRUCEsaid, he rose with pleasure to answer the question of his hon. Friend (Mr. Bentinck), and, in doing so, would endeavour to keep separate, issues which had by his hon. Friend and others been treated as one. The first was, whether the Parks should be used for public meetings; and the next whether, if so, they should be used in a decent, orderly manner, in accordance with the law. The first point he must decline to argue, assuming—and he thought the House would agree with him—that it had been already settled in the long discussions on the Parks Bill last Session. But, with respect to the second, his hon. Friend had raised a very fair question, and was entitled to an answer. His hon. Friend complained that scenes of

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  disorder had occurred in the Parks which had not been punished, and that, in the case of obstructions in the streets, the Police Acts had not been enforced. With respect to what happened in November last, his hon. Friend had forgotten to inform the House that no fewer than 12 persons had been summoned—[Mr. BENTINCK: For addresses]—before the magistrates for violation of the law. He was not there to defend any such violation of the law, or any address delivered, or act committed contrary to law, and he quite agreed with his hon. Friend that if the police had witnessed the destruction of trees, it was their duty to have taken the offender into custody. There had been a breach of the law by the delivery of addresses contrary to the Rules, and with that offence the parties committing it were charged. Subsequently, other meetings were held, and applications were made to the magistrates to issue summonses, but they declined, on the ground that it was not their practice to do so when a case had been granted which raised the question whether the proceedings were or were not legal. In fact, the legality of the Rules was the question to be decided under the case which was submitted for the decision of the Superior Court. With respect to what happened on last Sunday week, he had listened attentively to the statement of his hon. Friend (Mr. Lowther) who had moved the Resolution with so much ability; but he found that the whole of his speech was taken up with what had occurred as to the obstruction of the streets. His hon. Friend had mentioned one act of violence—namely, an assault on the soldier who had been so seriously injured. It was his (Mr. Bruce's) duty to inquire into that case, and he had done so. He sent an inspector of police to visit the poor man, and he assured the inspector that what had happened was entirely by accident—that he was in a great hurry to get away, but had not been pushed, struck, or assaulted. He was bound to say that the reports he had read in all the newspapers confirmed the reports from other sources, and bore testimony to the order and good conduct of the persons attending the meeting. They consisted of a number of Irishmen celebrating by anticipation their national festival, and discharging at the same time what they considered to be a duty of patriotism.
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  He did not agree with them, but he was bound to say he had heard of no instance of violence or of improper conduct on the part of those men, or of injury to the trees of the Park. With respect to the obstruction in the streets, it was impossible that meetings could be held in the Parks without a procession being formed in the streets. When large numbers of persons converged towards the Park some obstruction must necessarily be caused, and a certain amount of latitude should be allowed. Undoubtedly, it was the duty of the police to see that that obstruction was reduced to a minimum, and that free transit was allowed to all persons in pursuing their ordinary business. His hon. Friend would remember that a Question was put to him by the hon. Member for the Isle of Wight (Mr. Baillie Cochrane) with respect to the instructions he had given to the Chief Commissioner of Police, and he replied to the effect he had just mentioned. The principal promoter of the meeting called on the Chief Commissioner of Police to make inquiry on the subject, and he had no doubt the Chief Commissioner informed him he had given instructions to take on that occasion, as on all others, all necessary measures for the preservation of order. There would, he thought, be no disagreement on either side of the House as to that part of the question. His hon. Friend opposite the Member for Whitehaven (Mr. Bentinck) had stated cases of offence against the law which he had seen committed. If they were committed in the presence of the police, it was a very gross breach of duty on their part not to have acted strenuously and promptly. He only wished his hon. Friend had communicated with him, and he should at once have endeavoured, not only to punish the offenders, but also those who had allowed the offence to be committed without arresting the guilty persons. It was not his intention to enter into the question of the general policy of the Rules. With respect to that, he was well content to rest his position on the arguments of his right hon. Friend the Chief Commissioner of Works. He rose simply to answer the challenge of his hon. Friend opposite, and he hoped he had done so satisfactorily.
  MR. OTWAYsaid, that after they had arrived at a satisfactory settlement of this irritating question, it was a matter

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  of regret that it should have again been raised. He rose to enter his protest against the impression which the First Commissioner of Works had endeavoured to convey, that the Parks Bill of last year had been passed with unanimity. On the contrary, he and his hon. Friends near him had protested night after night against the mischievous, irritating, and foolish legislation which the First Commissioner had introduced. He told the right hon. Gentleman that some of the Regulations he proposed were mischievous and absurd; that they must inevitably be defeated; and the right hon. Gentleman, receiving his remarks with the urbanity and courtesy which distinguished him, replied that these were just the Regulations which he thought most necessary. They only allowed the Bill to pass on the promise of the right hon. Gentleman that the use of the Parks by the public was to continue as heretofore; but no sooner did the Bill become law than it was found, as he and others predicted, that these annoying and useless Regulations could not possibly be maintained; and these Regulations, which one would have supposed could only have emanated from King Theodore, of Abyssinia, had now been prudently withdrawn by the Government. He regretted that so irritating a subject should now be revived, and wondered that the hon. Member opposite (Mr. Lowther) should seek to identify his party with what appeared to be restrictions upon popular rights. He reminded the hon. Member that the most Conservative leader of the Conservative party, the late Lord Derby, was of opinion that some place of public resort in the metropolis should be given to the people for out-door meetings. Working men had not the means of acquiring music-halls or other places in-doors, and even if they had it was desirable, always providing that order was maintained, that they should be able to meet in open spaces. In his opinion Hyde Park was not the best place for holding public meetings; but, at the same time, having witnessed many demonstrations there, he was bound to say he had never seen any inconvenience arising from them. The meetings were held in a part of the Park which was not frequented by fashionable people. It seemed to him most unwise to raise that question again, and, under all the circumstances, he
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  trusted that the hon. Gentleman would not press the Motion to a division.
  MR. J. G. TALBOTsaid, he would support the Resolution as a protest against the favourite doctrine of the present day, that the noisy portion of the community represented the people. He believed that the mass of English people, strictly so called, were a most eminently order-loving and law-abiding people, and that they entirely objected to the use of the Parks which was now so much in vogue. The Home Secretary said that they had now made certain Rules, and that they might trust to the good sense of the people. The answer to that was that they knew those Rules by their fruits. They saw what those Rules had produced, and they were not satisfied with the result. This was not a question of the fashionable part of the community against the poorer portion. He believed that if the people who availed themselves of the public Parks on Sundays were asked their opinion, they would say that the public demonstrations interfered with the peaceable and orderly enjoyment of the Parks. A letter describing one of these meetings in November had been sent to the newspapers by a Liberal M.P. [An Hon. MEMBER: It was anonymous.] It might be true and yet anonymous; and if it were not true, let the hon. Member who wrote it rise and say so. The writer said that there were the same disgraceful proceedings, the same blasphemous litanies, and the same obscene rubbish that had marked previous meeting. The letter went on to say that the most shocking things were said of the Queen, and further, that litanies of the most blasphemous and obscene character were read and sold. Now, whatever might be the sentiments of hon. Members of this House on matters of religion, he was sure they would one and all, repudiate the travestying, blaspheming, or ridiculing, of any of the sacred doctrines of Christianity. He went one step further, and said that if religion was to be dealt with in the Parks, at all events there ought to be fair play. If anyone unwisely tried to preach upon religious subjects to a miscellaneous audience in the Parks, he would soon be put down by authority; but those persons, who travestied religion, blasphemed its doctrines, mocked its ceremonies, and insulted its professors, were allowed to

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  pursue their calling unchecked. Such a state of things was not only unworthy of a Christian nation, but it was repugnant to common justice, and if the House could not put an end to the inconsistency in the name of common Christianity, let it condemn it in the name of common justice.
  MR. TIPPINGsaid, he wished to point out that the meetings held in the Parks were utterly un-English and were merely an imitation of those French meetings which were always held prior to revolutionary attempts. As their only object was to overawe, alarm, intimidate, and annoy, no legitimate excuse could be set up for them, and to put them down altogether would be no real interference with free speech or the right of public meeting. Whenever a demonstration of this kind occurred in the Park, it must necessarily interfere with the pleasure of those who usually walked there, and although the roughs might not be afraid of the dowagers to whom allusion had been made, the dowagers might very well be excused if they were afraid of the roughs. He felt bound to vote with the hon. Member for York in the interest of liberty and the rights of the masses.
  MR. SCOURFIELDremarked that if the majesty of the law were obscured by the assembling of thousands in the Parks on a Sunday, it was some consolation to know that it would be vindicated the next day probably by a policeman ordering a little boy looking into a fruit shop to "move on."
  MR. C. E. LEWISsaid, that he could not vote for the Motion of the hon. Member for York (Mr. Lowther) because he believed that if it were carried it would only aggravate the evils complained of. He advised therefore that the Motion should be withdrawn.
  MR. J. LOWTHERin reply, said, the hon. Gentleman who had just sat down was connected with a constituency who were exceedingly fond of processions, and his views on the subject might therefore be peculiar. He (Mr. Lowther) must insist on taking the sense of the House upon his Motion.
  MR. GLADSTONEsaid, it was not possible for the Government to support the Amendment, on account of the words with which it closed, and they would therefore vote against both the Amendment and the original Motion.
  Question put.
  The House divided:—Ayes 142; Noes 46: Majority 96.
  MR. W. H. SMITHrose to entreat his hon. Friend the Member for York to withdraw his Motion. A statement had been made to the effect that during the debate which took place last year no hon. Member representing the metropolis had spoken on the Motion before the House. ["No, no!"] He understood the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary to give an assurance on the part of the Government that the Act of Parliament which had been passed on the subject of the Parks, and the Rules which had the force of law and had obtained the sanction of Government, would be observed so far as the police and the Government were concerned. The responsibility for the observance of the Rules practically rested with the Government, and he desired that that responsibility should be left with them. He understood that the right hon. Gentleman had practically given an undertaking that decent and orderly people who desired to use the Park for purposes of recreation would not be disturbed in that use, that the trees would be preserved from destruction, that open robbery and insult would not be permitted in the Park—in other words, that the police would do their duty. Respecting that assurance, and believing that it would be thoroughly respected by the Government, he thought it was desirable that the hon. Member for York should withdraw his Motion.
  MR. J. LOWTHERsaid, that the position which his hon. Friend occupied in the House and in the metropolis caused him to be listened to with respect, especially by one sitting on the same side of the House, and under the circumstances he felt it was only due to him to listen to his suggestion. The Motion was in the hands of the House, but it was not his wish to press it ["Divide!"].
  MR. SPEAKER: Does the hon. Member wish to withdraw his Motion. ["No, no!"] Does the House wish the Motion to be withdrawn? ["No!"]
  Main Question put, and negatived.

ARMY.—EASTER MONDAY REVIEWS.

  QUESTIONS.
  LORD ELCHOwished to put a Question to his right hon Friend the Secretary of State for War in order to ascertain his opinions with respect to those Easter Monday Reviews. The Reviews in question were spontaneous on the part of the Metropolitan Volunteers, who were not compelled to take part in them; they were originated by Lord Ranelagh about four years ago, they had met with great success, and become very popular. The opinion of General Ellice last year was favourable to these reviews. It was said to their disparagement that the Volunteers were only anxious to show themselves, that the Reviews did not contribute to efficiency, and that they ought to be discouraged. Sir Hope Grant was the first to issue a Report that was unfavourable, and a letter was in consequence addressed to the Secretary of State asking whether he would give them his sanction. A reply was received from Lord Northbrook last year on the part of the Secretary of State, to the effect that the Field Marshal Commanding-in-Chief did not think these Reviews contributed to efficiency, but that if the Volunteers wished, permission would be accorded to hold them. They held their Review last Easter Monday, and the Report of the Quartermaster General was favourable. Subsequently a new regulation came out from the War Office, which stated that those large Reviews should not be counted towards efficiency. The impression produced was that the Secretary of State wished to discourage them. The Metropolitan commanding officers met to consider what they should do on Easter Monday, and they came to the conclusion to ask the Secretary of State whether he thought it was desirable that these Reviews should be held. The answer they received was not a direct answer, but merely stated that in the event of the commanding officers thinking it desirable that such Reviews should be held, he would not object to it. They were however already aware that there was no objection on their part, but they had hoped to learn whether in the opinion of the Secretary of State they were or were not desirable. The Metropolitan commanding officers felt it would be indecorous
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  in them to enter into any correspondence on the subject, and resolved that, in the absence of any expression of opinion that these Reviews were conducive to the good of the force, it was not desirable that they should go out this year. The hon. Member for Cheltenham (Mr. H. B. Samuelson) had asked the Question whether any objection was raised on the part of the Secretary of State to these Reviews, but the question which ought to have been put was whether the right hon. Gentleman considered these Reviews were or were not beneficial to the force. That was the Question he wished now to put, in no hostile spirit, but in the interest of the force, which he knew the right hon. Gentleman had at heart.
  MR. CHARLEYremarked that the Metropolitan Volunteers were strongly in favour of the Easter Monday Reviews, as much advantage accrued to them from parading with the regular forces. He wished to ask whether the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Cardwell) had any objection to a Review of the Guards and of the Volunteers of London taking place on Easter Monday; and if not, whether he would give orders that it should take place?
  MR. CARDWELLin reply, said, that in reference to the last question, if it was desired to have an answer from him upon a military arrangement he should have had notice to enable him to consult the military authorities upon the subject. With regard to the Questions of his noble Friend (Lord Elcho), he would say, in the first place, that he had always considered that the main reason for not holding the Easter Monday Review this year was one which had reference to railway fares. [Lord ELCHO: That was one element.] He understood it was no inconsiderable element. Two years ago Sir Hope Grant, who commanded at Aldershott, reviewed the Volunteers at Brighton, and his opinion was unfavourable to holding these Reviews at all in the manner in which they were held. His Royal Highness the Commander-in-Chief expressed his concurrence in the opinion so expressed. That was made known to the Volunteer officers, who expressed their willingness to accommodate themselves to any new arrangements that might be suggested. The War Office was, therefore, willing to facilitate the holding of these Reviews under new arrangements, and the

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  of the Quartermaster-General was much more favourable than that of Sir Hope Grant. Then came the question whether there should be a Review this year, and he (Mr. Cardwell) was asked to express an opinion whether it was desirable it should be held. This divided itself into two parts, and so far as the military question was concerned he could not hold a different opinion from that expressed by the Commander-in-Chief and other military authorities; but as these Reviews were exceedingly popular, and were supposed to tend to encourage the force, as a sincere friend to the Volunteer cause, and wishing that their numbers and efficiency should he kept up, he had no hesitation in expressing his wish to encourage them on that ground. With regard to the military grounds, the War Office stood simply upon the Reports of Sir Hope Grant and General Ellice. If the Volunteer officers made an application for an Easter Review to the Government, he should be prepared to give to it his cordial concurrence; and he thought he could promise that the military authorities would do all they could to make such arrangements as were calculated to produce the effects mentioned in General Ellice's letter. He repeated he should give his cordial support to every measure tending to make the force a popular and useful one, and he was confident that His Royal Highness the Commander-in-Chief and those immediately under him, would most willingly co-operate with him in that object. The Report of the Royal Commissioners was against attendance at Easter Monday Reviews counting towards efficiency.
  LORD ELCHOasked whether the officers of the force might come to the conclusion that the Reviews, as they had been conducted since the Report of Sir Hope Grant, were viewed with favour by the right hon. Gentleman?
  MR. CARDWELLhad already stated that he would stand by the Report of General Ellice.
  MR. CHARLEYgave notice that he would repeat his Question to the right hon. Gentleman to-morrow.
  MR. CARDWELLsaid, the initiative rested with the commanding officers of the Volunteer force, and if they should hold a meeting and address a letter conveying the result to him, he would give it every consideration.

  REGISTER FOR PARLIAMENTARY AND MUNICIPAL ELECTORS BILL.
  (Mr. Attorney General and Mr. Hibbert.)

  [BILL 66.] COMMITTEE.
  Order for Committee read.
  Motion made, and Question proposed, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair."
  MR. PELLmoved that the Bill be referred to a Select Committee, on the ground that the Schedules contained certain serious errors, both as regarded dates and references to Acts of Parliament.
  Amendment proposed, to leave out from the word "That" to the end of the Question, in order to add the words "the Bill be committed to a Select Committee,"—(Mr. Pell,)—instead thereof.
  Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
  THE ATTORNEY GENERALhoped that the House would not adopt the proposition, as it was necessary—if the Bill were to be put in force this year—that it should pass as speedily as possible. The hon. Gentleman (Mr. Pell) could only discover three alleged errors as to dates, but those could be easily rectified in a Committee of the Whole House.
  MR. HUNTsaid, it was unreasonable to expect the House to proceed with the Bill, when important changes had been introduced into it, only with two days' notice. Little delay would ensue from referring the Bill to a Select Committee; but if that course were not adopted, at any rate time should be given to examine the scheme as now proposed.
  MR. COLLINSsuggested that the Bill should be passed through Committee pro formâ, in order that it might be reprinted with the Amendments of the Attorney General, which would make it practically a new measure.
  MR. HIBBERTsaid, the Government would be satisfied with simply going into Committee, and having taken that stage Progress would at once be reported and further consideration of the Bill postponed until to-morrow.
  MR. WHARTONdrew attention to the circumstance that the Bill would injuriously affect the Revising Barristers.
  MR. ASSHETON CROSSwas astonished at the immense mass of Amendments proposed by Government, and thought the best plan would be to go into Committee pro formâ.
  Motion made, and Question put, "That the Debate be now adjourned."—(Colonel Barttelot.)
  The House divided:—Ayes 45; Noes 64: Majority 19.
  Original Question again proposed.
  MR. C. LEWISsupported the Amendment for referring the Bill to a Select Committee.
  THE ATTORNEY GENERALassented to the Motion for going into Committee pro formâ on the hon. Member for Leicester (Mr. Pell) withdrawing his Motion for a Select Committee.
  Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
  Main Question, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair," put, and agreed to.
  Bill considered in Committee, and reported; to be printed, as amended [Bill 105]; re-committed for Monday next.

  AUSTRALASIAN COLONIES (CUSTOMS DUTIES) BILL.
  Considered in Committee.
  (In the Committee.)
  Resolved, That the Chairman be directed to move the House, that leave be given to bring in a Bill to amend the Law with respect to Customs Duties in the Australasian Colonies.
  Resolution reported:—Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. KNATCHBULL-HUGESSEN and Mr. Secretary BRUCE.
  Bill presented, and read the first time. [Bill 106.]

  CONVEYANCING (SCOTLAND) BILL.
  On Motion of Mr. Secretary BRUCE, Bill to amend the Law relating to Land Rights and Conveyancing, and to facilitate the Transfer of Land in Scotland, ordered to be brought in by Mr. Secretary BRUCE, The LORD ADVOCATE, and Mr. WINTERBOTHAM.
  Bill presented, and read the first time. [Bill 108.]

  METROPOLITAN COMMONS SUPPLEMENTAL BILL.
  On Motion of Mr. WINTERBOTHAM, Bill to confirm a scheme under "The Metropolitan Commons Act, 1866," relating to Tooting Beck Common, ordered to be brought in by Mr. WINTERBOTHAM and Mr. Secretary BRUCE.
  Bill presented, and read the first time. [Bill 107.]
  House adjourned at Two o'clock.

MINUTES.
PUBLIC BILLS—First Reading—Registration of Births and Deaths* (49).
Committee—Report—Bastardy Laws Amendment (on re-comm.)* (44–50).
Report—Poor Allotments Management* (43).
Third Reading—Victoria Embankment (Somerset House)* (28); Epping Forest* (19), and passed.
Their Lordships met;—

REGISTRATION OF BIRTHS AND DEATHS BILL [H.L.]
A Bill to amend the Acts relating to the Registration of Births and Deaths in England, and to consolidate the law respecting the Registration of Births and Deaths at Sea—Was presented by The Earl of MORLEY; read 1a. (No. 49.)
House adjourned at half past Five o'clock, till To-morrow, half past Ten o'clock.